Edinburgh Film News May 2006

Edinburgh's reputation as a bohemian home of the bizarre has evidently spread south, as the capital was this month announced as one of only two venues outside London to host a new film event set to wow audiences. At the left field of film exhibition, Future Cinema will take local venue Ego and transform it into a Transylvanian palace, replete with a gothic cinema, ballroom and a variety of crazed film-themed entertainment.

The big brother of Future Shorts, which runs monthly at local venue The Left Bank, it has only previously been seen in London. Its first appearance in Scotland is being run to coincide with the Film Festival and promises to be an extravagant spectacle for lovers of cinema. Quite aside from a rare screening of Murnau's 'Nosferatu' with a new score by Serafin front man Darren Harkness, there's the chance to see some great shorts by renowned filmmakers such as Spike Jonze and Mike Leigh. Throw into the mix a combination of trapeze artists, burlesque performers and roving musicians and it's easy to see why this event caused such a stir during its first performance in the big smoke. Future Cinema is scheduled at Ego for the 23rd August and tickets will sell out fast when they go on sale later this month.

May also offers the chance to catch two diverse works by cinematic greats at the Filmhouse. The first is Pier Paolo Pasolini's 'The Gospel According to St Matthew', certainly the most 'realistic' and possibly the most powerful film interpretation of the life of Jesus Christ. It's a surprisingly sympathetic portrayal of Christ given that Pasolini was an atheist, Marxist homosexual who incurred the wrath of the church for the content of many of his films. It makes something of a mockery of the various Hollywood versions with Pasolini's use of unprofessional actors who look as worn and rugged as the roughly shot environment. Equally don't miss a one-off chance to see the great Buster Keaton in 'Our Hospitality'. Buster was the original Hollywood daredevil with a penchant for stunts (or 'trajectories' as he called them) that made him uninsurable. This is one of his few full length features with plenty of laughs and a breathtaking sequence with Buster being thrown along a flooded river, bouncing along rocks and down a waterfall. Top that Mr. Cruise!