Welcome to the Purbeck Film Festival

16th Purbeck Film Festival

The Purbeck Film Festival 2012 is now in its 16^th Year and STILL the longest running rural film festival!

This quirky, brilliant and popular event takes place from Friday October 12th to Saturday October 27th - two weeks of fantastic films in over 20 stunning rural locations. The festival is so popular that it has spread its magic into the urban swathes of Poole (The Lighthouse) and Bournemouth in collaboration with ‘Bournemouth Arts By the Sea Festival’.

The festival’s theme this year is movie comedy - and the screen icon is the late, fabulous Elizabeth Taylor; showing some of her inspirational and varied movies.

The central buzz of the film festival is the Rex in Wareham - showing films since 1918 – the Rex may have a small auditorium but it is a power-house of movie energy. Screenings are an eclectic, heady mixture of silent, classic, art-house and foreign films including:

Gala Opening film: The acclaimed The Welldigger's Daughter

The Short Film Festival Competition now in its 3rd year and gaining international prestige; entries are coming in thick and fast. Prizes to be won. Closing date is Friday 31^st August

Screenbites: A chance to taste Purbeck Produce and watch the academy nominated Israeli film The Lemon Tree

Festival Closing Film: The award winning Danish Film A Royal Affair

Apart from screening films in village halls, pubs, shops, private homes, the festival is back this year to the thrilling, cliff-top location of the newly restored DURLSTON CASTLE; not only will there be evening films but during the day there will be an exciting exhibition of the early history of movies, the story of the film festival itself and the inspirational Rex Cinema in Wareham. One of the evening highlights at the Castle will be a talk, Magic Lanterns, by Robert MacDonald who has researched and lectures on the early visual entertainments and this will be a rare chance to see some of these optical wonders. Another evening at Durlston is dedicated to the ground-breaking BBC producer David Rose (A Purbeck man) who tells his own story in My Journey Together.

At Corfe Castle, David will also give an introduction to the BBC cult-comedy Nuts In May and maybe bring a member of the cast along with him. Bring it on Keith! Another exciting prospect is Trishna at Langton Matravers where Phil Hunt, one of the producers, will come along to speak about the making of this extraordinary film. At Bloxworth, Anwar Brett, BFI member, journalist and author will present Far From The Madding Crowd filmed just up the road from the village hall.

Meanwhile, back in the conurbation of Bournemouth, The Winchester Bar is the perfect, spooky venue for an evening of Gothic Horror.

No festival would be complete without the enthusiastic volunteers and the Purbeck Film Festival is no different – there are people happy to put on black polo shirts and lug equipment over the countryside, putting up large screens and stretching tape over cables on dusty floors. Extraordinary.

There is something for everyone here - for sure. Festival programmes are now available, so grab one and spool on to this unique homage to cinema.

Celebrate the magic of the movies in one of the most beautiful places in the world – the Isle of Purbeck

Last Updated on Saturday, 01 September 2012 14:51

CREATING THE SPECTACLE

Underwater Life Events
The Purbeck Film Festival is delighted to be supporting this groundbreaking series of works by Sue Austin in her self-propelled underwater wheelchair. The swimming pool is transformed into a sub-aquatic arena as the dramatic, magical event is watched by underwater and poolside audiences.

The events have been a logistical and physical challenge to the festival technicians, more used to setting up in village halls, pubs, beaches and castle ruins than swimming pools. How do you project from an underwater camera to a large screen on the poolside without compromising Health & Safety issues? How do you provide a sound system without the harsh distorted echo that booms through confined watery spaces? Let us just say it was done – and the diving board played its part

The Purbeck Film Festival endeavours to be self-financing and because we like to keep our ticket price to a minimum (audience before profit!) we do rely on funding from donations, grants and awards. It was a privilege and very moving to work with mermaid Sue Austin and to pass on the generosity of our patrons by providing the festival equipment and expertise.

Last Updated on Friday, 31 August 2012 11:10

Festival Theme - COMEDY

*Dinner for One* is a relatively obscure short English film which is screened every Christmas in Germany. Show the film to an English audience and you are likely to illicit an occasional bemused smile, show it in Germany and they laugh out loud. Humour is personal, regional, cultural. It’s based on education, intelligence and maturity. In short having it as one of this year’s festival themes is perhaps asking for trouble. However film comedy is the oldest of film genres springing as it does from the slapstick of the silent era. It is to humour that we often turn to smooth over our discord, cut through complexity and lighten the burdens of life’s routines. Humour is healthy. Time and again it is used as therapy and as an aid in teaching. Whether it’s the extreme body comedy of Chaplin’s The Circus or the satirical bleakness of Dr. Strangelove we love to laugh and cut through the seriousness of life. Humour can be very clever, it can be very surreal, it can be as light as a feather and as black as coal. Even when we crave truth and certainty its contradictions, paradoxes and ambiguities always seem to comfort us.
Last Updated on Thursday, 31 May 2012 10:39
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Festival Theme - ELIZABETH TAYLOR

The second of our themes is the phenomenal career of Elizabeth Taylor. Reading the reviews and obituaries of her life is rather sobering. Married 8 times, twice to Richard Burton, is only a small part of it. A very good actress, a fabulous star, a sex icon, a courageous survivor—she nearly died on 4 separate occasions and a charity campaigner—$270 million at the last count. She had a truly democratic soul and would treat film personnel and royalty with the same open nature, self-deprecating humour and steely honesty.

Born in Hampstead in north London to an art dealer father and a thespian mother she had a very privileged up-bringing which was relocated to L.A. in 1939.

11 - 26 October 2013

Film Diary 2012

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