Helena Vesey loves her son with a passion verging on the demonic. When he announces his engagement to Angela, it’s clear that she’s not losing a son, only her sanity. She’s soon dusting off her books on lethal poisons and begins a ruthless killing spree, elegantly disposing of anyone she sees as opposition.Read More »
A Western couple (played by Melissa Leo and James Wilby) working in Pakistan visit an unconventional holy shrine to harness its spiritual powers to help them conceive a child. They are lavished with the attentions of the shrine’s leader (an exceptional performance from Zia Mohyeddin – Lawrence of Arabia, Khartoum) and her followers, but their methods and motives are not all that they seem, and the couple’s lives are plunged into darkness.
This ravishing, unsettling film from director Jamil Dehlavi (The Blood of Hussain, Born of Fire) is a deeply personal work which raises questions of cultural and sexual identity, religious fanaticism and the abuses of power. The brand-new 2K restoration from the original negative was supervised and approved by Dehlavi and cinematographer Nic Knowland.Read More »
Lady Chatterley is a 1993 BBC television serial starring Sean Bean and Joely Richardson. It is an adaptation of D. H. Lawrence’s novel Lady Chatterley’s Lover, first broadcast on BBC1 in four 55-minute episodes between 6 and 27 June 1993. A young woman’s husband returns wounded after the First World War. Facing a life with a husband now incapable of sexual activity she begins an affair with the groundskeeper. The film reflect’s Lawrence’s focus not only on casting away sexual taboos but also the examination of the class system prevalent in early 20th century Britain.Read More »
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Set against the stifling conformity of pre-World War I English society, E.M. Forster’s Maurice is a story of coming to terms with one’s sexuality and identity in the face of disapproval and misunderstanding. Maurice Hall (James Wilby) and Clive Durham (Hugh Grant) find themselves falling in love at Cambridge. In a time when homosexuality is punishable by imprisonment, the two must keep their feelings for one another a complete secret. After a friend is arrested and disgraced for “the unspeakable vice of the Greeks,” Clive abandons his forbidden love and marries a young woman. Read More »
Immaculate Conception is the story of a young western couple, Jewish-American Hannah and British Alistair who are living in Karachi and desperate for a child. They visit the eunuch shrine of Gulab Shah which has a reputation for curing infertility and, sure enough, Hannah conceives. Hannah decides to convert to Islam and coaxes Alistair to do the same.Read More »