BFS screens two international feature contenders for 2020 Oscar race
Bozeman Film Society continues its 41st season on Wednesday, January 8th with the Cannes Palme d’Or winner for 2019, Parasite. Bong Joon Ho (Snowpiercer, The Host) brings his singular mastery home to Korea in this pitch-black, genre-bending thriller of class proportions. The Ellen Theatre hosts this new year screening at 7pm.
Meet the Park Family: the picture of aspirational wealth. And the Kim Family, rich in street smarts but not much else. Be it chance or fate, these two houses are brought together and the Kims sense a golden opportunity. Masterminded by college-aged Ki-woo, the Kim children expediently install themselves as tutor and art therapist to the Parks. Soon, a symbiotic relationship forms between the two families. The Kims provide “indispensable” luxury services while the Parks obliviously bankroll their entire household. When a parasitic interloper threatens the Kims’ newfound comfort, a savage, underhanded battle for dominance breaks out, threatening to destroy the fragile ecosystem between the Kims and the Parks.
RogerEbert.com film critic Brian Tallericico raves, “Parasite is unquestionably one the best films of the year. Just trust me on this one.” By turns darkly hilarious and heart-wrenching, the film showcases a modern master at the top of his game. Rated R, Parasite runs 132 minutes. Presented in Korean with subtitles.
Pain & Glory, the 21st feature film by esteemed Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar, follows on Friday, January 17th. The autobiographical story of a director looking back on his life and career, the film stars Antonio Banderas (who won best actor at Cannes for his role) and Penélope Cruz. The Ellen screening begins at 7pm.
Pain & Glory tells of a series of reencounters experienced by Salvador Mallo, a film director in his physical decline. Some of them in the flesh, others remembered: his childhood in the 60s, when he emigrated with his parents to a village in Valencia in search of prosperity the first desire, his first adult love in the Madrid of the 80s, the pain of the breakup of that love while it was still alive and intense, writing as the only therapy to forget the unforgettable, the early discovery of cinema, and the void, the infinite void that creates the incapacity to keep on making films. Pain & Glory talks about creation, about the difficulty of separating it from one’s own life and about the passions that give it meaning and hope. In recovering his past, Salvador finds the urgent need to recount it, and in that need he also finds his salvation.
“Pain & Glory might see Almodóvar working in a minor key, but it is a major work, graced with career-best work from Antonio Banderas,” wrote a reviewer for Empire. Rated R, Pain & Glory runs 112 minutes. Presented in Spanish with subtitles.
Reserved seats for Parasite and Pain & Glory are $9.75 for adults or $9.25 for seniors and students. Advance tickets available at www.theellentheatre.org (plus service fees). The Ellen lobby opens one hour before the screening for refreshments.
Bozeman Film Society seeks out and presents independent films which engage, entertain, and foster an understanding of the world community around us. Visit www.bozemanfilmsociety.org for film previews and further information – and “Keep ‘Em Flickering!” •