Tuesday Jan 19th 7.30 p.m.    35 Shots of Rum
Dir: Claire Denis   France 2008 100 mins Cert 12A
Cast: Alex Descas, Gregoire Colin, Mati Diop, Nicole Dogue

Lionel, a calm, dignified widower, works as train driver and lives in Paris with his daughter Jo. Their relationship is affectionate but sometimes emotionally fraught, partly because of the friends, neighbours and romantic interests that circle them. Denis explores this in a typically French way, with the kind of movie-language that is rich, quietly complex and subtle. The 35 shots of rum are considered to be the customary form of celebration for an outstanding event but Lionel does not let this happen until all tensions are resolved by the end.

Tuesday February 2nd 7.30 p.m.   Encounters at the End of the World
Dir: Werner Herzog   USA 2007 99 mins Cert U
Herzog spent five long months in Antarctica during its ‘Austral Summer’, from October to February, during which it never gets dark. He talks to the thoughtful, spiritual folk who run the various scientific projects and also shows us the beautiful, surreal landscape of the land itself. Herzog explores the lives of the pioneers who are seeking new horizons at the McMurdo Station, a thousand-person settlement populated by professional dreamers masquerading as scientists. An intelligent, tremendous-looking film which includes image after image of other-worldly beauty

Tuesday February 16th 7.30 p.m.   Broken Embraces
Dir: Pedro Almodovar   Spain 2009 127mins Cert 15
Cast: Penelope Cruz, Lluis Homar, Blanca Portillo, Jose Luis Gomez

Broken Embraces feels like Almodóvar’s take on noir dramas of the 40s and 50s. Set in Madrid, it concerns Mateo, a former film director, now blinded and turned screenwriter. He is trying to piece together a tragic episode in his past: his doomed love affair with Lena (Penelope Cruz), a would-be actress and the mistress of Martel, a domineering millionaire. While using flashbacks and a labyrinthine plot, it is the sheer, gorgeous style of Broken Embraces which is so seductive; Almodóvar conjures a vivid palette of colours which have the texture of something by Hitchcock, but his handling of the material is so confident and distinctive that it goes way beyond pastiche.

Tuesday March 2nd 7.30 p.m.   Fish Tank
Dir: Andrea Arnold    UK 2009 124 mins Cert 15
Cast: Katie Jarvis, Michael Fassbinder, Rebecca Griffiths

Mia is a troubled 15 year-old Essex girl at war with everything: her family, her school, the girls on her estate. Her one release is dancing, a passion that she practices in secret. To complicate matters, Mia is attracted to her mother’s new boyfriend, Connor. But whilst Mia has issues with the notion of family, Connor’s are more complex: his secrets are shabbier and more poisonous than Mia or her mother could have realised. What makes the relationship between Mia and Connor so transgressive is not their sexual attraction for each other but their delusional longing to be father and daughter. There are visually stunning views of the Essex countryside in what is eventually a film of tenderness and hope.

Tuesday March 16th 7.30 p.m.   Welcome
Dirs: Anees Bazmee, Philippe Lioret    France 2009 155 mins Cert 15
Cast: Firat Ayverdi, Vincent Lindon, Audrey Dana

A gripping French contribution to movies about exile and refugees, this centres on the friendship between a swimming instructor in Calais municipal baths and Bilal, a 17 year old Iraqi Kurd bent on swimming the Channel to be reunited with his girlfriend in London. Central to the story is the way in which both the illegal immigrants and the French citizens who run risks to help them are treated by French officialdom. Lioret said, "We decided to make the film when we heard that refugees really had tried to swim the Channel”. He chose to set the drama in Calais because it resembled "our version of the Mexican border".

Tuesday March 30th 7.30 p.m.   Fugitive Pieces
Dir: Jeremy Podeswa   Canada/Greece 2007 109 mins Cert 15
Cast: Stephen Dillane, Rade Serbedzija, Robbie Kay, Rosamund Pike

Stephen Dillane plays Jakob, a Canadian writer encouraged by his girlfriend Alex to explore his locked-away past. His family were murdered by the Nazis in wartime Poland and Jakob was rescued and taken to Greece by an archaeologist who found him hiding in the forest, close to death. The action cross-cuts between Jakob’s childhood and adulthood; as Jakob delves deeper into his memories, his present-day dysfunctions are healed. Anne Michael’s award-winning novel is adapted here into an affecting drama. Handsomely shot and thoughtfully acted, the film is a touching testimony to the power of remembrance and redemption.

Tuesday April 13th 7.30 p.m.   Séraphine
Dir: Martin Provost    France 2008 125 mins Cert PG
Cast: Ulrich Tukur, Yolande Moreau

This tells the extraordinary true story of French naïve painter Séraphine Louis, aka Séraphine de Senlis (1864-1942), a humble servant who became a gifted self-taught painter. Discovered by prominent critic and collector William Uhde, she came to prominence between the wars, grouped with other naïve painters like Henri Rousseau, only to descend into madness and obscurity with the onset of the Great Depression and World War II. Provost unearths this marginal figure to offer a poignant salute to a life on the fringes. The film raises highly topical questions about sudden fame and its effects.