It's The Big One - #Southend On Sea Film Festival 2012!
It's The Big One - Southend On Sea Film Festival 2012!
With any luck you’re aware of this, and you might even have already bought some tickets, but, just in case, it’s that time of year again, it’s the annual Southend-on-Sea Film Festival. Yes, Essex’s biggest and best film festival, organised by local company The White Bus, is heading your way over the May Bank Holiday.
This year we’ve crammed in over 50 films and events. The Festival Fringe, which runs a full two weeks from Friday 27th April to Saturday 12th May, starts things off with an exhibition of film posters at the Beecroft Art Gallery. Then the Main Festival starts with the Opening Gala presentation of new, gritty, thriller ‘Hard Boiled Sweets’ at the Odeon on Thursday 3rd May. Festival Patron Ray Winstone will be joining guests from the film and other celebrities for this star-studded, event. A limited number of public tickets were available, but many of you have clearly heard about the festival, as they have already sold out!
The Main Festival takes place at the Palace Theatre, on Friday and Saturday, 4th to 5th May, and the Park Inn Palace Hotel, on Sunday and Monday, 6th and 7th May. Two auditoriums in both venues will provide film entertainment from lunchtime to late in the evening.
The Closing Gala, at the Park Inn Palace Hotel on Monday 7th May, is the new drama ‘Lost in Italy’. It stars our Patron, and we hope Ray will pop back for this screening. Lots of other guests will be there. As with our Opening Gala, the public tickets are selling fast, so don't delay!
Apart from the Opening Gala, all tickets are just £4.
Highlights this year include:
- A special archive presentation by jazz legend Digby Fairweather
- British black and white thrillers from the 1950s
- Sing-a-long ‘Bugsy Malone’ (go on, you’ve always wanted to!!)
- Special presentations on Alfred Hitchcock and Terry-Thomas
- World Cinema: Films from France, China, Greece, Korea, Italy, Iran, Japan, Serbia - and Krygyzstan
- ‘Way of the Morris’, an affectionate look at this most English of dance traditions
- Children’s favourites: ‘Peter Pan’ and ‘Tintin’
- Classics from the 30s: Hitchcock’s ’39 Steps’, Fred and Ginger in ‘Swing Time’ and Bing Crosby in ‘Pennies from Heaven’
- A 50th anniversary screening of ‘Dr. No’
- New British features, including ‘Resistance’ and ‘Payback Season’
- ‘Casuals’, a documentary about the legendary terrace fashion (featured in the last issue) introduced by Cass Pennant
- ‘East End Babylon’, the powerful story of punk group The Cockney Rejects (with guitarist Mick Geggus introducing the film)
- ‘The Holding’, introduced by lovely Leigh based actress Kierston Wareing
- ‘Sound It Out’, bittersweet documentary about the last remaining vinyl record shop on Teesside
- For the petrol heads, ‘Senna’ and ‘Le Mans’
Full details of all the films and Fringe events, plus venue and ticket information, can be found on-line at www.southendfilmfestival.com and in the festival brochure, available from the Palace Theatre, Park Inn Palace Hotel, TAP Gallery, Pier Visitor Centre, Royals and Victoria Shopping Centres, Civic Centre, Central Library, HMV, DNA-Zone and the Railway Hotel.
To find out more about The White Bus please click here:
Festival Director Paul Cotgrove and the Festival Team look forward to your company.
