Welcome to Close-Up!
Close-Up makes film culture and history accessible through its film programmes and mediatheque.
Located in the heart of Shoreditch, Close-Up is the ideal venue for all your screening needs, whether you wish to host a press screening, corporate event, presentation, conference, Christmas or birthday party. Our adjoined cafe and bar is fully licensed and offers a convivial atmosphere for drinks receptions, networking or informal post-screening discussion.
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Showing This Weekend
Sunday 26 May: The Leopard
The Leopard is not an “objective” account of the Risorgimento; instead, it tells the story of Italy’s unification as seen by the putrefying aristocracy it rendered irrelevant. Visconti harnesses all his familiarity with the sentiments, architectures and experiences of Italian aristocracy to create a period piece that is cosmic in scale and damning to the last shot.
Showing Next Week
Monday 27 May: Stalker
Arguably Tarkovsky’s purest articulation of the film as spiritual quest, Stalker develops a radically different attitude to time than the jigsaw of his previous film, Mirror. "A perverse replay of Solaris’s cosmic voyage, a remake of Rublev in a secular world of postapocalyptic misery, a premonition of Chernobyl and Soviet disintegration." – J. Hoberman
Monday 27 May: Chinese Roulette
Forever experimenting with form and tone, Fassbinder ventures into Edward-Albee-meets-Gothic-thriller territory with this account of the Christs (Alexander Allerson and Margit Carstensen), an affluent Munich couple whose polio-stricken daughter, Angela (Andrea Schober), brings them together at a country house with their respective lovers. Brilliantly shot by Michael Ballhaus with a constantly roving camera, the film keeps shifting the POV to establish the subjectivity of experience.
Tuesday 28 May: Drifting Clouds
One of Kaurismäki’s most acclaimed but least seen works, Drifting Clouds is an intimate portrait of a couple facing the emotionally enervating consequences of economic dislocation.
Wednesday 29 May: Mirror
While Mirror, like all Tarkovsky’s films, pays homage to painting, music, and poetry, it also makes plain that the Russian director understood Mnemosyne to be the mother of the muses. Being a poet, he sought not only to retrieve the past but to reveal its essence – and in so doing to redeem an inherently flawed present.
Wednesday 29 May: Not Reconciled
Not Reconciled is based on a novel by Heinrich Böll, Billiards at Half Past Nine, that chronicles three generations of a bourgeois German family of architects from the 1910s through the Nazi era to the economic "miracle" of postwar Germany. The filmmakers treat Böll’s narrative as a document, stripping it of any anecdotal or psychological elements.
Friday 31 May: Vox Lux
Glitter-spritzed spectacle and 21st-century trauma collide in this audacious art pop musical. Built around an electrifying performance from Natalie Portman, Vox Lux traces the meteoric rise of Celeste who, after she survives a school shooting, becomes a teenage pop superstar and emblem of national healing. Interweaving original songs by Sia with a score by Scott Walker, the sophomore feature from Brady Corbet (The Childhood of a Leader) is both a provocative dissection of celebrity culture and a delirious sensory explosion.
Saturday 1 June: The Boys from Fengkuei
Among Hou’s strongest early films, The Boys from Fengkuei offers a portrait of aimless youth as an emblem of eighties Taiwan in transition and moving rapidly towards an uncertain future. The film remains a milestone for giving first expression to the elliptical episodic narrative so central to Hou’s mature cinema.
Saturday 1 June: That Day on the Beach
Edward Yang’s first theatrical feature film is an intriguing blend of melodrama and social critique that occasionally recalls Fassbinder’s cool theatricality. The contrasting stories told by two reunited friends crystallize different facets of a changing Taiwan. The film also marks the debut of celebrated and influential cinematographer Christopher Doyle.
Sunday 2 June: A Brighter Summer Day
Among the most praised and sought-after titles in all contemporary film, A Brighter Summer Day is based on the true story of a crime that rocked Taiwan in the 1960s. A film of both sprawling scope and tender intimacy, this novelistic, patiently observed epic centres on the gradual, inexorable fall of a young teenager from innocence to juvenile delinquency.
Coming Soon
1 - 30 June 2019: Taipei Stories
Close-Up is pleased to present a programme of thirteen films, by three masters of Taiwanese New Cinema, set in and around Taipei throughout the 20th and 21st Century.
5 - 8 June 2019: Aperture: Asia & Pacific Film Festival
Aperture is dedicated to screening some of the boldest, most challenging and striking films from the Asian and Pacific regions, exploring issues around diversity and cultural identity, as well as the inherent links between and blurred boundaries within Asia and the Pacific. Presented by Day for Night in partnership with the Centre for Research and Education in Arts and Media (CREAM), University of Westminster.
7 June 2019: On the Various Nature of Things: Deborah Stratman
Close-Up is thrilled to welcome Deborah Stratman to present a programme centred around her 1995 short, On the Various Nature of Things – presented here in its original 16mm format. Deborah will be in conversation with scholar and critic Erika Balsom following the screening.
9 June 2019: Nick Macdonald: Anarchist Films
In the early to mid 1970s, Nick Macdonald made several political essay films in and around his New York apartment. Influenced by anarchism, the films are unique, personal projects that eschew traditional documentary footage in favour of a sort of bricolage technique. We're thrilled to welcome Nick to present and discuss a slection of his work.
22 June 2019: Kelly Gallagher, I am the mace
We're thrilled to present the first European solo screening for the US artist Kelly Gallagher, comprising ten years of her moving image work across animation, live action and avant-garde collage. These two programmes offer an overview of a brilliant young artist who has demonstrated a mastery of technique, matched with a strong historical and political consciousness. Kelly will be in conversation following the screenings.
Calendar
Mon 27 May 3:30pm
Stalker
Stalker
Mon 27 May 8:15pm
Chinese Roulette
Chinese Roulette
Tue 28 May 8:15pm
Drifting Clouds
Drifting Clouds
Wed 29 May 3:30pm
Mirror
Mirror
Wed 29 May 8:15pm
Not Reconciled
Not Reconciled
Fri 31 May 8:15pm
Vox Lux
Vox Lux
Sat 01 Jun 6:00pm
The Boys from Fengkuei
The Boys from Fengkuei
Sat 01 Jun 8:00pm
That Day on the Beach
That Day on the Beach
Sun 02 Jun 6:00pm
A Brighter Summer Day
A Brighter Summer Day
Mon 03 Jun 8:30pm
Rebels of the Neon God
Rebels of the Neon God
Wed 05 Jun 6:00pm
Poetic Voices: Taiwanese Avant-Garde of the 1960s
Poetic Voices: Taiwanese Avant-Garde of the 1960s
Wed 05 Jun 8:00pm
The End of the Track
The End of the Track
Thu 06 Jun 6:00pm
Renewal: Artists’ Moving Image from New Zealand
Renewal: Artists’ Moving Image from New Zealand
Thu 06 Jun 8:00pm
Kuldesak
Kuldesak
Fri 07 Jun 8:15pm
On the Various Nature of Things: Deborah Stratman
On the Various Nature of Things: Deborah Stratman
Sun 09 Jun 6:30pm
Nick Macdonald: Anarchist Films
Nick Macdonald: Anarchist Films
Sun 09 Jun 8:30pm
La Grande Illusion with Nick Macdonald
La Grande Illusion with Nick Macdonald
Mon 10 Jun 8:15pm
Eternity and a Day: A Tribute to Bruno Ganz
Eternity and a Day: A Tribute to Bruno Ganz
Thu 13 Jun 8:15pm
The Terrorizers
The Terrorizers
Fri 14 Jun 8:15pm
That Day on the Beach
That Day on the Beach
Sat 15 Jun 7:30pm
A City of Sadness
A City of Sadness
Sun 16 Jun 5:30pm
Taipei Story
Taipei Story
