Mackay Library Society Films

Admission:

Members: $5.00
Non Members: $9.00

Enquiries: 4940 7536

Email: CQUniversity Library Mackay

Film Suggestions:

We value suggestions for new films from our members. Our policy is that we only screen arthouse/non-commercial films which aren't to be screened locally at the theatres. For any suggestions, please email the Library.

Seducing Doctor Lewis (M)

This delightful French-Canadian film is set on the imaginary island of St. Marie-La-Mauderne, where a tiny fishing village is suffering acutely from the decline in the fishing industry. All the men are on welfare and the whole island is depressed for want of a reason to go on. For eight years the locals have stood in line for dole checks every week, reminiscing about the good old days when the fishermen were proud, and life was worth living. A chance at salvation arrives in the form of a company looking to build a plastic container factory on the island for the tax-breaks, but their insurance requires a full-time doctor to live in St. Marie, which is three hours by boat from the nearest hospital

The situation seems hopeless until a young doctor in Montreal has a run-in with a traffic cop who just happens to be the town's former mayor, and finds himself on a boat to the faraway island for a month of community service. The problem the villagers have now is how to convince handsome, young, city-loving, cricket fanatic Dr. Lewis to stay in this tiny little village for 5 years

(Review by Jenny Fallon - ABC)

Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont (PG)

Starring: Joan Plowright, Rupert Friend, Anna Massey, Zoe Tapper, Georgina Hale
Directed by: Dan Ireland

Sarah Palfrey, (JOAN PLOWRIGHT), who has been recently widowed, has moved from Scotland into a residential London hotel expecting it to be somewhat more upmarket than it actually is.

She tries to contact her London-based grandson who never returns her calls, and as fate would have it, brings her together with a young writer, Ludovic Meyer, (RUPERT FRIEND), after she has an accident outside his basement flat.

The film was adapted from a 1970's novel by Elizabeth Taylor, a British writer, and balancing Plowright, Rupert Friend makes a very impressive debut as the movie was made before he appeared in Pride and Prejudice and The Libertine.

(Review Margaret Pomeranz - ABC )

The Valet (M)

Starring: Gad Elmaleh, Alice Taglioni, Daniel Auteuil, Kristin Scott Thomas, Richard Berry, Virginie Ledoven, Dany Boon, Michel Jonasz, Michele Garcia, Karl Lagerfeld
Director: Francis Veber

A wealth businessman pays his supermodel mistress to pretend to be dating someone else in order to quell his wife's suspicions. Daniel Auteuil, as the rich man, and the leggy blond model Alice Taglioni are a very far-fetched couple but Kristin Scott Thomas as Auteuil's suspecting wife is great; she's not as dumb as he thinks of course and is on to him.

The film belongs to Gad Elmaleh, though, as the man hired to be the boyfriend - a droopy-faced, slightly hunched guy who works as a valet and whose friends see as a bit of a loser with women. It's sweet revenge for him, though, and he even manages to attract the eye of a girl who never gave him the time of day.

(Reviewed by Jason Di Rosso - Movie Time)

As It Is In Heaven (M)

Language: Swedish (English subtitles)

A successful international conductor, Daniel Dareus (Michael Nyqvist) has a breakdown and suddenly interrupts his career and returns alone to his childhood village Norrland, in the far north of Sweden. It doesn't take long before he is asked to come and listen to the fragment of a church choir, which practices every Thursday in the parish hall. He can't say no, and from that moment, nothing in the village is the same again. The choir develops and grows, he makes both friends and enemies, and he finds love.

This was director, Kay Pollak's first film in 18 years and was a box office success in Sweden.
Although there are some dark moments, it is ‘surprisingly light-hearted, even joyous."

(Review: Evan Williams: The Weekend Australian)

Orchestra Seats (M)

Subtitled: French
Starring: Valerie Lemercier, Albert Dupontel, Claude Brasseur, Dani and Christopher Thompson
Directed by: Daniele Thompson

Orchestra Seats stars a delightfully bubbly Cécile De France in the role of Jessica, a naïve young woman who arrives in Paris and finds a job waitressing at the old-fashioned Brasserie des Arts, next to a theatre and close to an upscale Parisian neighbourhood.

After befriending a celebrated pianist experiencing a mid-life crisis, a famous television star, a great art collector and the theatre's concierge, Jessica starts to have her own dreams of fame. Filmed under a beautiful Parisian sky with wonderful views of the city, each character in the movie has something we can relate to.

With a stellar cast, this superbly written and directed romantic comedy is a charmer.

**Academy Award Nominee for Best Foreign Language Film 2007**

Copying Beethoven (PG)

Film and Arts, Mackay Inc. & Conservatorium Friends, Mackay Inc. present A Banquet of Beethoven.

After the film patrons can enjoy a themed supper. Proceeds go to the purchase of music for the Library collection & other activities.

Adults $15, Concession/Child $12, Con Friends, CQUniversity Mackay Library Society members, Friends of the the Theatre (MEC) $10
Phone 4940 7800 for bookings

Starring: Ed Harris, Diane Kruger, Matthew Goode
Director: Agnieszka Holland

COPYING BEETHOVEN is a fictional account of the last years of the life of the great composer. It stars ED HARRIS as the irascible genius and DIANE KRUGER as Anna, the young woman who is sent as a copyist to help prepare the 9th Symphony for its premiere.

Anna has ambitions of her own as a composer but this is at a time when such a career for a woman is unthinkable.

COPYING BEETHOVEN is the work of director Agnieska Holland and in lesser hands it might have been an hysterical disaster but with two fine performers at its core it explores the world of this agonised man, who was becoming profoundly deaf, in a dignified and very moving way.

(Review Margaret David

The Lives of Others (MA)

Starring: Martin Gedeck, Ulrich Muhe, Sebastian Koch

East Berlin, November 1984. Five years before its downfall, the former East-German government ensured its claim to power with a ruthless system of control and surveillance. Party-loyalist Captain Gerd Wiesler hopes to boost his career when given the job of collecting evidence against the playwright Georg Dreyman and his girlfriend, the celebrated theater actress Christa-Maria Sieland. The "operation" is backed by the highest political circles. What he doesn't anticipate, however, is that submerging oneself into the world of the target also changes the surveillance agent. The immersion in the lives of others--in love, literature, free thinking and speech--makes Wiesler acutely aware of the emptiness of his own existence. But the system, once started, cannot be stopped. A dangerous game has begun...

Oscar Winner 2007 - Best Foreign Film

Prairie Home Companion (PG)

Starring: Meryl Streep, Lily Tomlin, Kevin Kline, Woody Harrelson, Tommy Lee Jones, Garrison Keillor, Lindsay Lohan, Birginia Madsen, John C. Reilly and Maya Rudolph
Directed by: Robert Altman

For 32 years, Garrison Keillor, or GK, has been hosting a radio programme called A Prairie Home Companion out of St. Paul, Minnesota. The show consists of country and western songs and very laid-back chit-chat. Among the stars of the show are the Johnson Sisters, Yolanda, (MERYL STREEP) and Rhonda, (LILY TOMLIN). There's also singing cowboys Dusty, (WOODY HARRELSON), and Lefty, (JOHN C. REILLY).

Altman' means ‘old man', and Robert Altman was in his 80s, so it's no wonder that his marvellous new film is a relaxed contemplation on old age and the proximity of death. A Prairie Home Companion is a serene and lovely film and Altman's last and one of the best.

(Review by Margaret: David: )

Paris Je T'aime (R)

Starring: starring an ensemble cast of American, British and French movie actors
Directors: many

"Paris, Je t'aime is the brain child of French TV director Tristan Carne.
Give eighteen international directors a Paris neighbourhood and tell them to produce a 5 minute film about love. The subjects they chose ranged from infidelity, grief, the Ugly American, public displays of affection to why Muslim women wear headscarves. Among the actors appearing in the segments are some well known names including Gerard Depardieu, Willem Dafoe , Miranda Richardson and Bob Hoskins. Each director's film was then taken and weaved into a single narrative about Paris, The City of Love. The result is a film that has something for everyone.