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OIFF Virtual Cinema - What's On This Week

Opening today, we offer actress turned director Romola Garai’s Chilling Directorial Debut,


AMULET

 UK  | 2020 | 99 min | Horror, Female Director
 

Things get dark when an ex-soldier dealing with PTSD moves into a decaying house to care for a woman and her dying mother, in Romola Garai’s chilling directorial feature debut.

“[The final act] goes full-throttle Dario Argento, mixing digital and hand-made effects in a sea of garish reds and bizarre pagan visions.” —David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter

Amulet is simply gorgeous to look at.” —Toussaint Egan, The A.V. Club



Have a great weekend and enjoy the films!



 
CLICK HERE TO SEE ALL FILMS PLAYING NOW

NOW PLAYING

"AMULET"
 UK  | 2020 | 99 min 

In this inventive gothic horror — the feature directorial debut from British actor-turned-filmmaker Romola Garai — the life of a traumatized ex-soldier (Alec Secareanu) takes a turn for the darker when he finds new employment and love. Tomaz, living homeless in London and recovering from an injury sustained at a construction site, is assisted by a kindly nun, Sister Claire (Imelda Staunton), who sets him up with shelter and a job, albeit a strange one: as live-in help in a decaying house, looking after a troubled young woman, Magda (Carla Juri) and her mysterious, ailing mother. As Tomaz starts to fall for Magda, he cannot ignore his suspicion that something sinister is going on — while, in a shifting timeline, the story unearths different demons from his past.
"The Audition"
 Germany | 2020 | 99min

Anna Bronsky is a violin teacher at a music-focused high school. Despite the opposition of all other teachers, Anna drives through the admission of a student, Alexander, in whom she detects a remarkable talent. Committed, she prepares him for the intermediate exam and neglects her family – her son Jonas, whom she brings into competition with her new student, and her husband Philippe. Her colleague Christian, with whom she has an affair, persuades her to join a quintet. When she fails during their joint concert, the pressure mounts and she focuses all her attention on her student Alexander. Come the day of the exam, events take a tragic turn.

 

"THE TOBACCONIST"
 Germany | 2019 | 113min 

Seventeen-year-old Franz journeys to Vienna to apprentice at a tobacco shop. There he meets Sigmund Freud (Bruno Ganz), a regular customer, and over time the two very different men form a singular friendship. When Franz falls desperately in love with the music-hall dancer Anezka, he seeks advice from the renowned psychoanalyst, who admits that the female sex is as big a mystery to him as it is to Franz. As political and social conditions in Austria dramatically worsen with the Nazis' arrival in Vienna, Franz, Freud, and Anezka are swept into the maelstrom of events. Each has a big decision to make: to stay or to flee?
"Miss Juneteeth"
 USA | 2020 | 99min

The debut feature from Channing Godfrey Peoples explores how black women and girls support each other in a world that often fails them. Miss Juneteenth is a very sweet and touching coming-of-age drama about a former Miss Juneteenth pageant winner and her daughter living in Texas. Turquoise Jones is a single mom who holds down a household, a rebellious teenager, and pretty much everything that goes down at Wayman’s BBQ & Lounge. Turquoise is also a bona fide beauty queen–she was once crowned Miss Juneteenth, a title commemorating the day slaves in Texas were freed–two years after the Emancipation Proclamation. Life didn’t turn out as beautifully as the title promised, but Turquoise, determined to right her wrongs, is cultivating her daughter, Kai, to become Miss Juneteenth, even if Kai wants something else.

"JOHN LEWIS"
 USA | 2020 | 96min  

Using interviews and rare archival footage, John Lewis: Good Trouble chronicles Lewis’ 60-plus years of social activism and legislative action on civil rights, voting rights, gun control, health-care reform and immigration. Using present-day interviews with Lewis, now 80 years old, Porter explores his childhood experiences, his inspiring family and his fateful meeting with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1957. In addition to her interviews with Lewis and his family, Porter’s primarily cinéma verité film also includes interviews with political leaders, Congressional colleagues, and other people who figure prominently in his life. Exclusive to our virtual screening the film will include a new interview between Congressman Lewis and Oprah that will play after every virtual cinema screening. 
 

"AVIVA"
 USA | 2019 | 116min | Director Boaz Yakin

Cast entirely with dancers from Israeli Batsheva Dance Company, Boaz Yakin's (“Fresh,” “Remember the Titans,”) sexually frank romantic drama explores the male and female aspects of its central characters, each played by both a man and a woman. There are plenty of bodies in motion, clothed and not, in Aviva, a love story propelled by inventive dance sequences and uninhibited sex. Inspired in part by the double casting of the lead character in Buñuel's That Obscure Object of Desire, the writer-director uses a similar approach to trace the highs and lows of a relationship between a man, Eden (Tyler Phillips), and a woman, Aviva (Zina Zinchenko): They're played as well by another pair of performers, choreographers Bobbi Jene Smith (as the female aspect of Eden) and Or Schraiber (the male Aviva). This quartet of selves appear in varying configurations, making for tantalizing explorations of flesh and identity, complete with four-way living-room arguments and metaphorical bedroom threesomes. 
 

"CRESCENDO"
 Germany | 2019 | 102min.   Director Dror Zahavi

When a world-famous conductor (Peter Simonischek, Toni Erdmann) attempts to create an Israeli-Palestinian youth orchestra, it takes all his skill and resources to overcome the discord and inspire these young people to play in harmony. Loosely inspired by Daniel Barenboim’s actual West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Academy-Award nominated director Dror Zahavi (“Alexander Penn”, “Everything for my Father”) directs this gripping drama as a constantly growing ‘crescendo’, rising the tension and conflicts until the last frame. Lead actor Peter Simonischek (“Toni Erdmann”) stars next to a highly convincing selection of up-and-coming actors like Daniel Donskoy (“Victoria”) and Sabrina Amali (“4 Blocks”). A remarkable theatrical movie and contribution to the world-wide efforts towards understanding, humanity and peace.
 

 
"Fishermens' Friends"
 England | 2019 | 112min | Director Chris Foggin

Inspired by a true story, this warm-hearted tale of a singing group from Cornwall, England reels in the laughs! A fast-living, cynical London music executive (Daniel Mays) heads to a remote Cornish village on a stag weekend where he's pranked by his boss (Noel Clarke) into trying to sign a group of shanty singing fishermen (led by James Purefoy). He becomes the ultimate "fish out of water" as he struggles to gain the respect or enthusiasm of the unlikely boy band and their families (including Tuppence Middleton) who value friendship and community over fame and fortune. As he's drawn deeper into the traditional way of life he's forced to reevaluate his own integrity and ultimately question what success really means.

"In My Blood"
 Australia | 2019 | 84min.   Director Maya Newell

 

A quietly masterful portrait of growing up Indigenous in Australia's Northern Territory. Dujuan is a 10-year-old Arrernte and Garrwa boy from Mparntwe (Alice Springs) in Australia. Full of life and exuberance, he learns, with the support of his loving mother and grandmother, to hunt, speak two Indigenous languages and become a healer. Dujuan is politically astute and a leader in the making. But within the westernized school system, his strength and intellect go unnoticed and the colonial approaches to education threaten him with failing grades. At the time of filming, 100% of the youth in Alice Springs detention centers were Aboriginal, and throughout the film it becomes increasingly clear that the system is set up to work against young boys like Dujuan. This powerful film, made in collaboration with Dujuan's family, is an emotional journey through the fight to mend an educational schism between traditional culture and colonial ideas and solidify a future for the youth.


"Our Mothers"
 Guatemala | 2019 | 78min | Director Cesar Diaz
 

Winner of the Camera d'Or for Best First Film at the Cannes Film Festival. Guatemala, 2018. The whole country is immersed in the trial of the soldiers who sparked the civil war. Victim statements come one after another. Ernesto is a young anthropologist working for the Forensic Foundation; his job is to identify the missing. One day, while hearing the account of an old woman, he thinks he has found a lead that might guide him to his father, a guerrillero who went missing during the war. Against his mother’s wishes, he flings himself body and soul into the case, looking for truth and resilience. (Spanish with English subtitles)

 

"Mr. Jones"
 Poland | 2019 | 141min

Agnieszka Holland’s thriller, set on the eve of world WWII, sees Hitler’s rise to power and Stalin’s Soviet propaganda machine pushing their “utopia” to the Western world. Meanwhile an ambitious young journalist, Gareth Jones (Norton) travels to Moscow to uncover the truth behind the propaganda, but then gets a tip that could expose an international conspiracy, one that could cost him and his informant their lives. Jones goes on a life-or-death journey to uncover the truth behind the façade that would later inspire George Orwell’s seminal book Animal Farm.

 


"Shirley"
 USA | 2020 | 107min

Renowned horror writer Shirley Jackson is on the precipice of writing her masterpiece when the arrival of newlyweds upends her meticulous routine and heightens tensions in her already tempestuous relationship with her philandering husband. The middle-aged couple, prone to ruthless barbs and copious afternoon cocktails, begins to toy mercilessly with the naïve young couple at their door. 

 

 

"Diana Kennedy: Nothing Fancy"
 USA | 2020 | 82min


Featuring extensive interviews with Diana Kennedy and famed chefs José Andrés, Rick Bayless, Gabriela Camara and Alice Waters, Diana Kennedy provides an intimate look at the leading expert on Mexican cuisine. The author of nine acclaimed cookbooks and a two-time James Beard Award winner, Diana is called the “Julia Child of Mexico”, but the feisty cook prefers “The Mick Jagger of Mexican Cuisine”.  

 

 
 

"Papicha"
Algeria | 2019 | 108min


Official Academy Award Submission, Best International Film. Algeria, 1990s. Nedjma (Lyna Khoudri starring in Wes Anderson’s upcoming ‘The French Dispatch’), an 18 year-old student passionate about fashion design refuses to let the tragic events of the Algerian Civil War to keep her from experiencing a normal life and going out at night with her friend Wassila. As the social climate becomes more conservative, she rejects the new bans set by the radicals and decides to fight for her freedom and independence by putting on a fashion show.  

 


The Painter and The Thief"
Norway | 2020 | 102min

 
Desperate for answers about the theft of her 2 paintings, Czech artist Barbora Kysilkova seeks out and befriends the career criminal who stole them. Hoping to learn what happened, Barbora approaches one of the thieves, Karl-Bertil Nordland, at his criminal hearing. She asks if she can paint his portrait and, contrite, he agrees. What follows—over a series of portraits and many years—is an extraordinary story of human connection and friendship.  

 

 

Military Wives
USA | 2019 | Drama


Military Wives centers on a group of women from different backgrounds whose partners are away serving in Afghanistan. Faced with their loved ones’ absences, they come together to form the very first military wives choir, helping each other through some of life’s most difficult moments, and quickly find themselves on an international stage. Peter Cattaneo (THE FULL MONTY) directs Kristin Scott Thomas and Sharon Horgan in this feel-good crowd-pleaser inspired by true events.

 

 

Life In Syncro
USA | 2019 | 106min

If a single figure skater is a marvel, a team of figure skaters is practically a miracle. Welcome to the beautiful, cold, hard world of synchronized ice skating - the toughest sport you’ve never heard of. This one is truly family-friendly. 

BONUS! Join us and audiences from 34 other film festivals from around the country - for Film Festival Day:  a celebration of what makes the film festival experience so unique. Watch a virtual screening of LIFE IN SYNCHRO, and then join a Filmmaker Q&A.

 

 

Saint Frances
USA | 2019 | 106min

Flailing thirty-four-year-old Bridget (Kelly O’Sullivan) finally catches a break when she meets a nice guy and lands a much-needed job nannying six-year-old Frances (played by a scene-stealing Ramona Edith-Williams). But an unwanted pregnancy introduces an unexpected complication. To make matters worse, she clashes with the obstinate Frances and struggles to navigate a growing tension between Frances’s moms. Amidst her tempestuous personal relationships, a reluctant friendship with Frances emerges, and Bridget contends with the inevitable joys and shit-shows of becoming a part of someone else’s family.

 

 

 

Thousand Pieces of Gold
USA | 1990 | 105min

Set in a mining town in the 1880s, Thousand Pieces of Gold is based on the classic novel by Ruthanne Lum McCunn with a screenplay by award-winning filmmaker Anne Makepeace (Tribal Justice). Upon its release in 1990, the film won immediate acclaim for its portrayal of the real-life story of Lalu (Rosalind Chao), a young Chinese woman whose desperately poor parents sell her into slavery. She is trafficked to a nefarious saloonkeeper in Idaho's gold country. Eventually, Charlie (Chris Cooper), a man of different ilk, wins her in a poker game and slowly gains her trust. Way ahead of its time, the film resonates even more powerfully today in the era of #MeToo. Nancy Kelly became a victim of prejudice against women directors within the American film industry and was never offered another movie to direct in spite of extraordinary reviews from critics, some of whom compared her talent to that of John Ford.

 

 

 


On A Magical Night
France | 2019 | Romantic Comedy | 86min
 

In this fantastical comedy about middle-age love and regret from writer-director Christophe Honoré, we meet Maria (Chiara Mastroianni), a woman with a wandering eye. After a heated argument with her husband of 20 years, she spends the night in room 212 of the hotel across the street from their home. There, she has a bird’s eye view of her apartment, her husband, and her marriage. In this comic romp, she confronts her past lovers and relationships on one magical night, fantasizing about the lives she could’ve lived and wondering if she’s made the right decisions.

 

 

Someone, Somewhere
France | 2019 | Romantic Comedy | 110min

In this modern twist on the classic romantic comedy genre, warehouse employee Rémy (François Civil) and research assistant Mélanie (Ana Girardot) have never met, but they live parallel lives: they reside in neighboring apartment buildings, ride the same subway route, and are troubled by bouts of insomnia and depression. As they stumble through psychotherapy, dating apps, fainting spells, and family visits, the seemingly star-crossed duo orbit around each other but remain just out of reach. Director Cedric Klapisch spins a delicate “what-if” exploration of modern relationships that is funny and moving.
 

The Booksellers
USA | 2019 Documentary | 95min

Antiquarian booksellers are part scholar, part detective, and part businessperson, and their personalities and knowledge are as broad as the material they handle. They also play an underappreciated yet essential role in preserving history. THE BOOKSELLERS takes viewers inside their small but fascinating world, populated by an assortment of obsessives, intellects, eccentrics and dreamers.
 
Beyond the Invisible: Hilma AF Klint 

Germany | 2019 Documentary, Biography | 93min

The art world is confronted with a sensational discovery -- a hundred years too late! How could it happen, that an artist who discovered abstract painting at the beginning of the 20th century remained largely unnoticed? Hilma af Klint's first abstract painting is dated 1906, four years before that of Vassily Kandinsky. Why was she ignored? This is the first film about her life and work. It investigates the role accorded to women in art history and asks why Hilma af Klint was scandalously denied the status of a pioneer of modern art. And how this recognition is now finally taking place. Today her exhibitions are attracting millions of people worldwide. The cinematic approach of her paintings reveals an artist who is seeking for meaning in life beyond the visible. Hilma af Klint's clairvoyant work developed a unique visual world and more than 25.000 pages of notes reveal a boundless thinking that led into an outstanding oeuvre. Her timeless paintings cross all conventional borders and resonate with our innermost feelings today.




Balloon
Germany | 2019 Thriller | 125min 
 

A thriller-like true story of one of the most spectacular escapes of the 20th Century. BALLOON is based on the true events of one of the most daring escapes of the Cold War in which two families living in Communist East Germany sailed over the heavily fortified border in a homemade hot-air balloon.

 



The Perfect Nanny
France | 2019 Thriller | 99min


Adapted from the eponymous novel by Leïla Slimani and based on a true story that took place in Manhattan, this psychological thriller stars the luminous actress Karin Viard as the seemingly perfect Mary Poppins nanny. She is an instant hit with both the kids and the parents... but appearances can be deceiving and even dangerous as her perfection gradually cracks into something much more disturbing.

 




The Etruscan Smile
USA | 2019 Dramedy | 105min 
 
In this heartfelt and uplifting dramedy based on the best selling novel by José Luis Sampedro, Brian Cox (HBO’s SUCCESSION) delivers a career-defining performance as Rory MacNeil, a rugged old Scotsman who reluctantly leaves his beloved isolated Hebridean island and travels to San Francisco to seek medical treatment. Moving in with his estranged son, Rory’s life will be transformed, just when he least expects it, through a newly found love for his baby grandson. Also starring JJ Feild, Thora Birch, Peter Coyote and Rosanna Arquette.

The Woman Who Loves Giraffes
Canada | 2019 Documentary | 150min

In 1956, four years before Jane Goodall ventured into the world of chimpanzees and seven years before Dian Fossey left to work with mountain gorillas, 23-year-old biologist Anne Innis Dagg made an unprecedented solo journey to South Africa to study giraffes in the wild. In The Woman Who Loves Giraffes Anne (now 86) retraces her steps, and with letters and stunning, original 16mm film footage offers an intimate window into her life as a young woman, juxtaposed with a first-hand look at the devastating reality that giraffes are facing today. Both the world’s first “giraffologist,” whose research findings ultimately became the foundation for many scientists following in her footsteps, and the species she loves have each experienced triumphs as well as setbacks. The Woman Who Loves Giraffes gives us a moving perspective on both.



The Best of Cat Video Fest 2020
USA | 2020 Comedy | 45min

For the first time ever, CatVideoFest is available to screen virtually outside of theaters! Long time CatVideoFest curator extraordinaire Will Braden has crafted a 40-min “treat” of a reel specifically designed for home-viewing, which includes the very best videos from CVF’s illustrious history. The Best of CatVideoFest is being offered on a sliding scale with 75% of the proceeds going to support The Sea View Theatre. The suggested ticket price is $7.50 BUT you can pay as little as .99 cents or as much as $100 or even more to support The Sea View.
 


Straight Up
USA | 2019 Comedy/Romance | 95min

Todd is a hyper-articulate, obsessive-compulsive gay twentysomething whose fear of dying alone leads him to a baffling conclusion: he might not be gay after all. When he meets Rory, a whip-smart struggling actress with her own set of insecurities, the two forge a relationship that’s all talk and no sex. Writer-Director-Star James Sweeney delivers a razor-sharp rom-com that’s equal parts Classical Hollywood and distinctly 21st century, exploring just how elastic our definitions of love and sexuality can get.

 

 

And Then We Danced
Sweden | 2019 Drama | 113 min

 

Orcas Island Film Festival 2019 Vanguard Award Winner. A passionate coming-of age tale set amidst the conservative confines of modern Tbilisi, Georgia, AND THEN WE DANCED follows Merab, a competitive dancer who is thrown off balance by the arrival of Irakli, a fellow male dancer with a rebellious streak. Official Academy Award Subission for Best International Film, Sweden. 

BeanPole
Russia | 2019 Drama | 130min

Set in the aftermath of World War II, this dazzling, richly burnished and harrowing film centers on two women who are each scarred by war trauma. As the film begins, Iya works as a nurse in a shell-shocked hospital. A shocking accident brings the two women closer and also seals their fates. Russian director Kantemir Balagov won the Best Director prize at the Cannes Film Festival's Un Certain Regard Section. Official Academy Award Submission from Russia for Best International Film. 

 


Mephisto
Hungary | 1981 Drama  | 146mim

The 1981 Academy Award-winning Best Foreign Language Film MEPHISTO, by Hungarian master István Szabó, concerns a passionate but struggling actor (Klaus Maria Brandauer) who remains in Germany during the Nazi regime and reaps the rewards of this Faustian pact by finally achieving the stardom he has long craved. Sparkling new 4K restoration.
 

 

Sorry We Missed You
United Kingdom | 2019 | 101min

 

The British working class is once again the empathetic subject of renowned filmmaker Ken Loach’s SORRY WE MISSED YOU, an absorbing, intimate family drama that exposes the dark side of the so-called “gig economy”.

 

CLICK HERE TO SEE ALL FILMS PLAYING NOW


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**Technical Support:  Every film released in our virtual cinema is available through the individual distributor’s websites and streaming services. You will be able to easily watch the film at any time within the stated period on any of the following platforms:

1. SMART TV   (by using the browser, also on your Apple TV, Android TV, Fire TV,
    Roku or Chromecast)
2. MOBILE DEVICE   (iPhone, iPad, Android)
3. COMPUTER   (by clicking on the link in your email receipt)
 
The link to rent and view the film will take you to their website to sign on.  A portion of your virtual rental will help support the Sea View Theatre during this challenging time when their doors must remail closed to protect the community.   If you are having technical issues, please read the FAQ or help tab on the distributor's website when you buy a ticket. 


 


Thank you for Your Support and
Enjoy the Movies!

 
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