Sweetly off-kilter comedy about a socially awkward young man who buys a silicone doll which he treats as his real girlfriend. Surprisingly, given the subject matter, this is a touching, life-affirming film as his family and community respond with compassion and understanding.

Ryan Gosling’s performance as the lonely misfit who finds acceptance is outstanding

Linda Cracknell reads from her long-awaited new collection ‘The Searching Glance’ and Sara Maitland reads from her new collection ‘True North and other Dark tales’ featuring ‘True North’, now a film starring Sean Bean, to be released later this year.

Followed by a discussion on short stories.

Tickets for this event available from DGAA: 01387 253383 or jean@ dgaa.net

Based on the play ‘La Duchesse de Langeais’ by Honore de Balzac and set in the aristocratic salons of 1820s Paris, the story recounts the emotional wrangling between Napoleonic general Armand de Montriveau and society coquette Antoinette de Langeais.

The couple’s romantic fencing achieves the grandeur of classical tragedy.

Hertfordshire 1982. 10 year old Will Proudfoot is forbidden to watch television by his Plymouth Brethren mother. At school he gets involved with troublemaker Lee Carter who inducts Will into the world of Sylvester Stallone’s ‘First Blood’. The boys decide to make their own version.

Warmly nostalgic, beautifully observed; sharp and wry in equal amounts.

Jared and his family move into an old house where they discover a book containing spells and information about other worldly creatures. Are the children strong enough to hold their own in a goblin battle or are they destined to fail in their mission to restore normality to their world?

Fantasy adventure from the beloved best-selling book series.

Two unique TV documentaries made in the late 1960s examining the work of two key British artists who lived in St Ives, internationally acclaimed abstract sculptor Barbara Hepworth and founding father of studio pottery Bernard Leach. Both films include extensive and rare interviews with the artists themselves.

Footage supplied by South West Film and Television Archive.

Freelance curator, writer and artists’ agent and former director of Tate St Ives Susan Daniel-McElroy will give a talk after the screening.

Rare opportunity to see critically acclaimed documentary of Pablo Picasso at work. The film used the technique of filming Picasso painting on a semi-transparent canvas with ink, causing the image to show through clearly on the other side. This process was filmed by Claude Renoir (a nephew of the filmmaker Jean Renoir and the grandson of the painter Auguste), the entire shoot taking three months, after which Picasso destroyed all the pictures, making the film itself the art.

The film was declared a national treasure by the French government in 1984.

Artist Jackson Pollock revolutionized American painting in the 1940s with his exciting abstract canvases that used dripped and splattered paint in a manner at once excitingly physical and structurally intelligent.

While Pollock became a heroic figure in the art world, his private life was nothing to envy, and this biography looks at both his professional triumphs and personal tragedies.

Deliciously funny and warm character study starring Sally Hawkins as the effervescent Poppy, a 30-year-old north Londoner with an irrepressibly bright outlook on life. She loves her job as a teacher, her friends and her freedom, and her cheer is irresistible to those around her, from her controlling younger sister to her grumpy driving instructor.

This is joyful and life-affirming film and proud of it. A good blast of fresh air that sweeps you off your feet.

www.happygoluckymovie.co.uk

Bring a Baby : Wednesday 28 May at 1pm / Coffee Club: Thursday 29 May

One of the most potent tearjerkers from Hollywood’s Golden Age, ‘Dark Victory’ features a stunning Bette Davis performance that transforms saccharine clichés into heartrending tragedy.

Davis is a wealthy hedonistic heiress stricken with a brain tumour that is destined to render her blind before her inevitable death. Her victory over the dark comes with romance, friendship, an acceptance of her fate and a glorious score from Max Steiner. No wonder this has been called the Rolls Royce of weepies.

Screening celebrates the hundredth birthday of Bette Davis, one of Hollywood’s greatest ever stars, who was born on 5 April 1908.

4pm: Robert Burns’ Concert
[duration: 1hr, tickets: £8.50/ £7.50 conc]

• Violinist Hector Scott and pianist Julia Lynch will perform virtuoso music inspired by Robert Burns’ poems, including arrangements by Beethoven, Kozeluch, Haydn and William Mackenzie Murdoch.
• Full details of the music to be played available as a PDF download [76kb]
• Muscians Biographies as a PDF download [58kb]

5-7pm: Buffet Supper at Hullabaloo
[£11.95 per person]

• Scottish-themed buffet supper in between the concerts upstairs at Hullabaloo.

7pm: Archive film screening with live musical accompaniment
[Each concert lasts 1 hour, tickets: £8.50/ £7.50 conc]

• Screening of three archive films about traditional Scottish life, with a live accompaniment of virtuoso medleys of Scottish folk tunes performed by violinist Hector Scott and pianist Julia Lynch.
  
  The screening will include “Eriskay - A Poem of Remote Lives” a magnificent record of life on Eriskay in 1934 by eminent ethnologist Werner Kissling, a former émigré from Prussia who spent the last years of his life in Dumfries.
  
  
• Full details of the archive screening available as a PDF download [69kb]
• Muscians Biographies as a PDF download [58kb]

All tickets (including buffet supper) now available to buy from the Robert Burns Centre Film Theatre. Due to limited capacity, tickets will be sold separately for each event.

Werner Kissling - A Retrospective
In partnership with Dumfries Museum the RBC exhibits a remarkable collection of photographic images by the ethnologist Dr Werner Kissling.

• Details of the Werner Kissling Retrospective available as a PDF download [12kb]