rural cinema

All is True review: A boldly fanciful but nuanced portrait of Shakespeare’s final years

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There is a knowing irony in calling a film as fanciful as this latter life Shakespeare biopic All is True. Written by Ben Elton and directed by its star Kenneth Branagh, the film plays so fast and loose with the playwright’s final years that they needn’t have bothered fitting Branagh with a prosthetic nose – accuracy is clearly not the priority here.

There is a succinct emotional truth, though, to All is True, whose name comes from the alternative title to Shakespeare’s final play, Henry VIII. It was during a performance of that play that a rogue cannon burnt the Globe Theatre to the ground in 1613 – and it is in the aftermath of that disaster that the film begins. Shakespeare, vowing that he is “done with stories”, returns home to his family in Stratford to live out the rest of his days. But he has been absent for so long that his arrival disrupts their life more than completes it.

UK cinemas see wet weather boom

This article which tells us:

“Indoor attractions are benefiting from the rain. The BFI’s IMAX cinema, where people usually book in advance, has noticed a huge jump in passing trade. Odeon, which sells one in three of the UK’s cinema tickets, says cinemas have been busier overall, and the opening weekend of Ice Age 4 smashed through expectations.

Advance bookings are also strong and the The Dark Knight Rises has taken more than £1m before opening, though whether that is down to in-your-face marketing or the expectation of more rain is hard to say.

Festivals, meanwhile, have been blighted by the weather, with the Isle of Wight the most high-profile washout. On a smaller scale, Wayne and Gerardine Hemingway have merged their Vintage Festival with the Wilderness Festival in Oxfordshire, blaming poor ticket sales and the weather.”

The article got me thinking about the importance of rural cinema and a number of examples of brilliant innovation in that context. I can supply more information if you ask along with information about a September based conference in Cambridge on the challenges and opportunities of rural cinema.