The Edinburgh International Film Festival announces its full programme later this month (23rd May) with around 650 public, media, and industry screenings expected over the fortnight film binge.
We already know what some of those films will be in this the 72nd iteration of the festival. The EIFF has announced that the festival will open on 20 June with Puzzle starring Kelly Macdonald and it closes on 1 July with feel-good comedy Swimming with Men, about an an all-male group of synchronised swimmers.
In Puzzle, Kelly Macdonald plays a fortysomething woman who finds release from her tight-knit immigrant community and constraining family life with competitive puzzling.
Kelly Macdonald and the film’s director Marc Turtletaub are expected to attend the Festival.
Swimming With Men is directed by Oliver Parker (Dorian Gray, An Ideal Husband) and stars Rob Brydon, Adeel Akhtar, Jim Carter, Rupert Graves, Daniel Mays, Charlotte Riley, Thomas Turgoose with Jane Horrocks and Nathaniel Parker. The film is out on general release on 6th July, 2018.
Tickets have also been selling fast for the Family Gala screening at the Festival Theatre of The Incredibles 2, sequel to The Incredibles which is out in cinemas on July 13. EIFF and Disney.Pixar have a longstanding relationship with WALL•E, Toy Story 3, Inside Out and Finding Dory all having gala screenings at the EIFF in recent years.
EIFF Retrospective Strands
A big part of the EIFF programme is always its Retrospective strands. This year’s EIFF retrospective is inspired by current affairs in Trump-era America, with three strands of U.S. cinema from the 1980s under the umbrella “Time of the Signs: Chasing the American Zeitgeist”.
In "American Woman: Female Directors in American Cinema" - work by ground-breaking female filmmakers is in the spotlight. Titles include: The Decline of Western Civilization (Penelope Spheeris, 1981), Fast Times at Ridgemont High (Amy Heckerling, 1982), Testament (Lynne Littman, 1983), Smithereens (Susan Seidelman, 1985), Smooth Talk (Joyce Chopra, 1985), Desert Hearts (Donna Deitch, 1985), Working Girls (Lizzie Borden, 1986), Ornette: Made in America (Shirley Clarke, 1986), Near Dark (Kathryn Bigelow, 1987), and Paris is Burning (Jennie Livingston, 1991).
Additionally, a series of Academy Award® winning and nominated short films will screen as part of the programme including Women - For America, For the World (Vivienne Verdon-Roe, 1986), The Masters of Disaster (Sonya Friedman, 1986), Young at Heart (Pamela Conn, Sue Marx, 1987) and Frances Steloff: Memoirs of a Bookseller (Deborah Dickson, 1987).
Faith Hubley’s animated The Cosmic Eye, nominated for Grand Jury Prize at Sundance in 1986, will also screen alongside a programme of director Barbara Hammer’s short film work from the 1970s and 80s.
The second strand of the Retrospective, “American Exposé: The Media in Mainstream American Cinema 1975-1990” features Sidney Lumet’s multi-award-winning Network (1976), The China Syndrome (James Bridges, 1979), Being There (Hal Ashby, 1979), a tribute to Jerry Lewis with The King of Comedy (Martin Scorsese, 1982), Absence of Malice (Sydney Pollack, 1981) and Broadcast News (James L Brooks, 1987).
“Focusing on subjects such as freedom of speech, fake news, the cult of celebrity and the power of investigative journalism, these classic films are as compelling and relevant now as they were in the 1980s,” says Senior Programmer, Niall Greig Fulton.
In the final strand, "The American Nightmare: Horror in Mainstream American Cinema 1980-1985", horror fans can catch classics such as The Fog (John Carpenter, 1980), The Howling (Joe Dante, 1981), Poltergeist (Tobe Hooper, 1982), Day of the Dead (1985), and Nightmare on Elm Street (Wes Craven, 1984).
“It's an exciting late night strand, providing a rare opportunity for all the cult cinema fans in our audience to catch these dark gems in their full glory on the big screen," says Fulton.
Not be forgotten is a special Retrospective LIVE! screening of the rarely-seen concert film, Monterey Pop, which will feature as part of Summerhall’s Southern Exposure Festival. DA Pennebaker’s classic document of the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival features performances from Simon & Garfunkel, Jefferson Airplane, The Who, Otis Redding, Jimi Hendrix and The Mamas & the Papas and will be played as if it were a real, live gig, transporting the audience back to the golden vibe of the 1960s, with full festival lighting and sound.
The EIFF also announced, today, the 15 classic and big-budget films that will screen at its free outdoor Film Fest in the City.
The full Edinburgh International Film Festival programme will be announced by EIFF Artistic Director Mark Adams on Wednesday 23 May.
Tickets go on sale to Filmhouse members on Wednesday 23 May at 12noon and on sale to the public on Friday 25 May at 10am.