Stars to shine bright at EIFF

Published on Friday 13 June 2008 08:54

THE name is Bond... Yes, Edinburgh's favourite son, Sean Connery, along with Hollywood beauties Keira Knightley, Sienna Miller and the acclaimed actress Tilda Swinton are just four of the celebrities adding a touch of red carpet glamour to the 62nd edition of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF).

Projectors roll in earnest next Wednesday and it's all change; for the first time in its 62-year history, the EIFF has swapped the mayhem and madness of Edinburgh's traditional festival month, August, for a hectic 12 days in June.

This year's event boasts 142 feature films from 29 countries, including 15 world premieres and is set to be a star-spotter's paradise, with a raft of famous names lined up to attend.

Artistic director Hannah McGill promises, "We have a terrifically exciting programme this year, which is the happy result of a very enthusiastic response from distributors and filmmakers. From powerful artistic and political statements to works of pure, escapist entertainment, I think this is a Festival that reflects an active, vibrant world film culture – and suits the diverse and daring tastes of our audience."

Highlights include the new Pixar animation WallE. Part silent comedy, part family adventure, it's the touching story of the last robot left alone on Earth; Shane Meadows' Somers Town reunites the director and star of This Is England in the tale of a run-away surviving on his wits in inner-city London; and the most eagerly awaited British debut of the year, Duane Hopkins' Better Things, a hard-hitting collection of fractured relationships exploring the way that love can transform and shape even the most humdrum of lives. Other films not to be missed include the UK premiere of Brad Anderson's Transsiberian, starring Woody Harelson, Emily Mortimer and Sir Ben Kingsley; Isabel Coixet's Elegy, which again features Kingsley while starring Dennis Hopper and Penelope Cruz; and a special preview of Terence Davies' Of Time and City, in which the British director presents a highly personal documentary recalling his early life in Liverpool, using archive and contemporary footage of the 2008 City of Culture to inform his journey.

Fittingly, as the EIFF began life as a documentary festival, Encounters at the End of the World by Werner Herzog continues that tradition, finding the great documentary maker interviewing the people who live and work in frozen Antarctica. The Document section is further bolstered by James Marsh's Man On Wire, which records one of most breath-taking stunts of all time, Philippe Petit's high wire walk between the Twin Towers of the World Trade Centre, and Errol Morris' investigation of the Abu Gharib scandal in Standard Operating Procedure.

Leading the British charge this year are Oliver Blackburn's Donkey Punch, which follows three glamorous British holiday-makers as their hedonistic holiday takes a grisly turn; Charles Martin Smith's Stone Of Destiny, which sees Robert Carlyle and Billy Boyd in a retelling of the 1950 theft of the Stone of Scone from Westminster Abbey; and Kenny Glenaan's Summer, which also stars Carlyle on top form in an emotional study of loyalty and loss.

Culture Minister Linda Fabiani says, "As the world's longest continuously running film festival, the Edinburgh International Film Festival holds a very special place in the hearts of film enthusiasts and professionals. The EIFF undoubtedly deserves its excellent reputation and I am sure they will build on this with the 2008 programme and their move to a new position in the calendar."

&#149 The 62nd Edinburgh International Film Festival runs from Wednesday to June 29, for full programme visit www.edfilmfest.org.uk

RED CARPET STAR SPOTTING

FRIDAY, JUNE 20

THE KREUTZER SONATA @ Cineworld, 7.30pm, Danny Huston SOMERS TOWN @ Cineworld, 5pm, Shane Meadows, Thomas Turgoose DONKEY PUNCH @ The Cameo, 9pm, Jaime Winston and her boyfriend Alfie Allen RED @ Filmhouse, 7.30pm, Brian Cox

SATURDAY, JUNE 21

STONE OF DESTINY @ Cineworld, tbc, Robert Carlyle, Billy Boyd, Charlie Cox, Tilda Swinton, Sir Sean Connery and Brian Cox

SUNDAY, JUNE 22

SUMMER @ Filmhouse, 7.35pm, Robert Carlyle

TUESDAY, JUNE 24

SLAPPER @ Filmhouse, 5.15pm, Chiwetel Ejiofor

THURSDAY, JUNE 26

A FILM WITH ME IN IT @ Cineworld, 5.15pm, Dylan Moran

FRIDAY, JUNE 27

TRANSSIBERIAN @ Cineworld, 7.15pm, Emily Mortimer BIGGA THAN BEN: A RUSSIAN'S GUIDE TO RIPPING OFF LONDON @ Filmhouse, 9pm, Ben Barnes (aka Prince Caspian)

SATURDAY JUNE 28

FAINTHEART, @ Cineworld, 6pm, Jessica Hynes, Ewan Bremner, Eddie Marsan

&149 Information subject to change

WORLD PREMIERE OPENING GALA:

THE EDGE OF LOVE

Starring Keira Knightley, Sienna Miller, Cillian Murphy and Matthew Rhys Written by Sharman Macdonald and directed by John Maybury LONDON 1941. Two feisty, free-spirited women are connected by a charismatic poet who loves them both.

The passion and pathos of poet Dylan Thomas is told through the lives of two women.

Vera Phillips and Dylan were childhood sweethearts; fast forward ten years and the two reconnect in war-time London. She's working as a singer while he's churning out propaganda scripts for government in aid of the war effort. The two feel the thunderbolt once more, but Thomas is now married to the adventurous Caitlin. Despite being love rivals, the women form a friendship; whilst Caitlin indulges in her own infidelities she knows her husband's connection with Vera is sojmething deeper.

In Vera's life the turmoil continues. She marries her devoted admirer William Killick, but when William is posted abroad on a dangerous assignment behind enemy lines Vera returns with her friends to Wales, where the battle between her heart and head becomes more intense.

William, scarred by war, comes back a changed man and finds Vera is no longer the carefree girl he married.

Neighbourhood gossip and Dylan's open mockery of soldier-heroes, fuels William's anger. Enraged, he stages a violent attack that forces Vera to choose between the men in her life and the friend that she loves.

&#149 Cineworld, Fountain Park, Wednesday, 9.30pm and 9.45pm, 11, 0131-623 8030

WORLD PREMIERE CLOSING GALA: FAINTHEART

Starring Ewen Bremner, Jessica Hynes, Eddie Marsan, Paul Nicholls and Tim Healy.

Written and directed by Vito Rocco.

Richard is a loveable nerd with a passion for Viking battle reenactments, but his wife Cath is quickly running out of indulgent affection for strange obsession.

As their marriage fragments, Richard must locate the hero within...! Assuming he's there.

Faintheart, a comedy set in the world of battle reenactments, won the MySpace Movie Mash Up competition, beating more than 1000 other contestants by being selected by a panel of experts and then voted the winning entry by the public.

&#149 Cineworld, Fountain Park, June 28, 9.30pm and 9.45pm, 11, 0131-623 8030

EDINBURGH ON SCREEN: DEATH DEFYING ACTS

Starring Catherine Zeta-Jones, Guy Pearce and Timothy Spall There's nothing quite like rediscovering the drama and beauty of the city of your birth through the eyes of a filmmaker seeing Edinburgh's elegant nobility for the first time.

In this period romance, set in the Capital, legendary escapologist Harry Houdini arrives in town offering a reward to anyone who can make contact with his dead mother – self-styled psychic Mary, played by Zeta-Jones spots an opportunity.

"Lavish and irresistible," according to the EIFF programme, Death Defying Acts promise to put the Edinburgh into the Edinburgh International Film Festival.

&#149 Cineworld, Fountain Park, June 24, 8pm and June 26, 5pm, 8, 0131-623 8030