Reviews

A very cold Friday night saw us at the Century Theatre, Coalville to see John Le Carre's classic cold war espionage thriller 'Tinker ,Tailor, Soldier .Spy' with Gary Oldman taking the main part as George Smiley. The supporting film was about Coalville Town Twinning Association visit to Roman-sur-Isere in 2011. The main film had mixed reaction from our group - some enjoyed it and some didn't.

We started our New Year film visits by going to the Century Theatre, Coalville to see 'Jane Eyre'. It was a remake film featuring Judi Dench and Mia Wasikowska who gave very good performances. It turned out to be quite an eventful evening - about 5minutes after the start of the supporting film 'A Farmer Moves South' the projector broke down - it was soon corrected and the film continued.We had just settled into watching 'Jane Eyre' when the fire alarm sounded - outside we all went for about 5 minutes. Once again settled back into our seats we were told that it had been a practice run. The film continued with just a few hic-cups but at the end we all decided that we had enjoyed the film.

For our December film we visited the home of one of our group to watch a DVD. We took a variety of DVDs between us and then decided which we wanted to see - 'Boys don't cry' was 'the one' - Hilary Swank played ther lead role of Brandon - it was based on the true story of Teena Brandon. It was about a girl whon didn't feel comfortable with being herself and portrayed her ventures into the world as a youth - unfortunately resulting in her death. We all felt it had been quite a film to watch on a Friday afternoon and not what we were expecting. Over a cup of coffee and biscuit, we had quite a discussion about what we thought of it and also what films we would like to see in the future. Our special Thanks to Lynne for her hospitality.

The Century Theatre was our venue for a wet November evening out to see the film 'The Way' - it was about an American father ( Martin Sheen) who decided to take his son's place and walk the El Camino de Santiago Trail. His son had unfortunatley died in a storm in the Pyrenees on his first day. Yes - there were some sad moments as you would expect (I don't think I was the only one with a tear in my eye) - but there were also some very amusing moments supplied by the various companions he met along the way - James Nesbitt being one of them. The overall de3cision was that we had enjoyed it.

We had a night of double entertainment on our October visit to the Century Theatre - not only did we see the film 'Water for Elephants' but also 60s singer Bobby Brown performing live on stage. He sang a selection of songs including a touch of Neil Diamond - his performance was in aid of 'Help the Heroes' - not a bad night for £3.50.
The film title gave no indication of the interesting and emotional film we saw. It was a romantic drama set in a travelling circus during the depression years. Robert Pattinson, Reece Witherspoon and Christoph Waltz gave very believable performances. As the film finished, the audience applauded and the last time I heard appreciation being shown was after the ' King's Speech' film.

The September film was "Oranges and Sunshine" at the Century Theatre. A very thought provoking film which was acted with great feeling. We were all shocked as the story revealed the horrific treatment of children shipped to Australia, for an alleged new and better life.

For our August film we went to the Century Theatre to see 'You will meet a tall dark stranger' - we all decided that it was a typical Woody Allen romance / comedy film. Anthony Hopkins and Gemma Jones gave very good performances as did the supporting cast.

We were joined by 2 members from the Charnwood U3A for our July visit to see 'Brighton Rock' at the Century Theatre, Coalville. The film was a re-make with Helen Mirren and made in black and white. Some of us came away feeling it was a bit 'dark' for our tastes, but never the less were pleased to have seen it.

Our group increased by three people for our visit to see the film 'West Is West' at the Century Thyeatre, Coalville on Friday 10th June - it was the sequel to 'East is East'. During our chat after the film we found we had all enjoyed it - not only for the humour but also the serious side. We also experienced 'a visit back to our younger days' when the film had to be changed due to a fault.

The Film Group had it's first cinema visit to the Century Theatre, Coalville on Friday 27th May - we went to see the 'Black Swan' . I think we were curious to see if it lived upto the media hype, As the evening only cost us £3.50 we decided we had had our monies worth.