The next film, Fish Tank, by the Williams Lake Film Club will be shown this coming Thursday, Jan. 27, at 7 p.m. at the Gibraltar Room.
Back doors open at 6:30 p.m. and admission is $9 regular, $8 for members and $6 for seniors and elders. Recommended for 16 and up.
This film comes from Britain and has won the BAFTA Award for Outstanding British Film and the Jury Price at Cannes 2010, not to mention numerous other awards.
Fish Tank is a great piece of modern British cinema, gritty, realistic, tough, and going right to your heart.
Mia, the 15-year-old protagonist, is played by newcomer Katie Jarvis who is not a trained actor. She was discovered by director Andrea Arnold on a train platform in the same area where this film’s story is set and filmed. This seems to be a new trend in alternative filmmaking and it certainly does add to the rawness and authentic feel, as we had just seen in Ajami.
We are quickly caught up in Mia’s pain, loneliness and isolation. She feels she is living in a Fish Tank, seen by everyone, but not touched by anyone, a feeling familiar to many of us. More importantly, we realize we really do care about Mia. She is vulnerable, at war with the world. She has been kicked out of school, spends her days drinking and dancing to hip-hop tunes in an abandoned apartment. She has her dreams, and we care. She goes home to fight with her foulmouthed little sister, who seems to constantly watch TV, to fight with her mother who loves to party, and we care.
Then the new boyfriend of her mother enters the film, a charming, kind-hearted Irish man. He takes a liking to the girls, especially to Mia, and we begin to wonder.
And in between there is the story of the horse, chained in an empty lot, destined to suffer. Mia wants to help this horse ... she wants to free it, like she herself would like to be free. And she encounters a very dangerous situation in this.
This film is all about relationships, Mia’s with her family and friends, with her mother’s boyfriend, and all of them are fraught with longing, with dangers and hopes, false and true.
Rarely has a film caught these basic feelings so true, so free of clichés. There are many twists and turns in the script, we really are kept on the edge of our seats many times. And that is really all I want to tell you. You just have to watch this film to get the complete story.
One more bit of exciting news — last Dec. 16 we were able to provide our second cheque of this season, again in the amount of $1,000, to the LDA, the Williams Lake Chapter of the Association for Students with Learning Disabilities. We wish to thank you all for your continued support, it is so important. And it is wonderful to see that at every screening club members will bring something for the food bank. I do know that the Salvation Army does thank you for that.
See you Thursday!
