HOMEwarming Weekend, Manchester
Goodbye arthouse, hello art-home. The Cornerhouse was Manchester’s bastion of non-mainstream cinema for 30 years, but now it’s been replaced by HOME, a new £25m arts venue. To mark the occasion, and assuage beleaguered cinephiles, there’s an inaugural weekend of special film events. Hot tickets include the UK premieres of off-kilter western Slow West and Stanya Kahn’s new experimental feature Don’t Go Back To Sleep (both 23 May). Fittingly - the venue’s address is 2 Tony Wilson Place - there’ll also be a screening of 24 Hour Party People (25 May).
HOME, Thu to 25 May
Documenting Ukraine, London
Ukraine has become a very 21st-century type of conflict – one based on propaganda, denials and a lack of reliable information. As such, it’s an environment where documentary cinema comes into its own. This weekend of films, debates and discussions organised by Open City Docs provides not just credible information and authoritative viewpoints but also a chance to understand the country in a deeper context. On the latter front, that goes right back to Dziga Vertov’s 1928 propaganda film The Eleventh Year, which plays here with a new live score. For the bigger picture, there’s the UK premiere of 2011 film Ukraine: When The Countdown Began, about the country’s post-Soviet independence. More up-to-date films include a work-in-progress documentary on film-maker Oleg Sentsov, currently facing a 20-year prison sentence in Russia on terrorism charges.
Frontline Club, W2, Sat & Sun
Holmfirth Film Festival
It’s not exactly the most high-profile film festival in the land (they should hold it in nearby Netherthong if they really want people to remember the name), but this well-curated festival has a great spread of recent releases you might have missed (such as Inherent Vice, Sun), classics, cult obscurities, live events and a few oddities – including Ploughing And The Stars (Sun), a new film about competitive tractor ploughing (plus a Q&A with the three-time world champion). Oscar-winning Yorkshireman Simon Beaufoy (Slumdog Millionaire, The Full Monty) is here talking about his screenwriting career (Tue), Saint Etienne perform a live score to postwar London doc How We Used To Live (Wed), plus a sing-along Sound Of Music (Fri) and food-and-film nights to gastro-hits such as Chef (Tue).
Various venues, Sat to Fri
We Are Many, Nationwide
It is highly probable that had the US and British governments paid heed to the largest public demonstration in history, the world today would be a very different place. Filmed over nine years, this documentary tells the story of how the 2003 global protest against the Iraq war was co-ordinated, and tracks the repercussions of that moment of people power, talking to activists, politicians and artists. Mobilised for special previews and a satellite-linked discussion this week are the film’s director Amir Amirani, executive producer Omid Djalili and law professor Philippe Sands. Amirani also talks to the Guardian’s Seumas Milne and Stop The War’s John Rees at the Guardian Live event on Sunday (Rio, E8).
Various venues, Thu
