From dak at sarai.net Mon Apr 4 17:16:07 2005 From: dak at sarai.net (The Sarai Programme) Date: Mon, 4 Apr 2005 17:16:07 +0530 Subject: [Sarai Newsletter] APRIL 2005 Message-ID: <200504041716.07406.dak@sarai.net> CONTENTS: APRIL 2005 Film @ Sarai: Urban Amour/City Love 8th Wings of Desire, dir. Wim Wenders 15th Raghu Romeo, dir. Rajat Kapoor 29th In the Mood for Love, dir. Wong Kar Wai Please note: The Digital Video Image Masterclass is cancelled due to unavoidable circumstances. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FILM @ SARAI: Urban Amour/City Love Curated by Anand V. Taneja This month's curation at Sarai showcases three films which explore the quirks and mysteries of love. But these films also explore, and lovingly dwell on, the quirks and mysteries of the cities the love stories are set in. These are films about love, which could equally be said to be 'in love' with the cities they portray. Where the 'character' of the city plays an important part in the film. City Love. Love for Cities. A slightly indulgent take on Sarai's engagement with the Urban Experience, we are screening unforgettable portrayals of love in the city, love and the city, loving the city... from Berlin, Bombay and Hong Kong. Friday, April 8, 2005, 4:30 pm Wings of Desire (Himmel uber Berlin - The Skies over Berlin) Directed by Wim Wenders 1987, 128 minutes "Berlin is divided like our world, like our time, like men and women, young and old, rich and poor, like all our experience .... My story isn't about Berlin because it's set there, but because it couldn't be set anywhere else. The name of the film will be 'The Sky Over Berlin' because the sky is maybe the only thing that unites these two cities, apart from their past of course." - Wim Wenders. Set in pre-unification Berlin, with the Berlin Wall looming in the frame and the movie's consciousness, 'Wings of Desire' is a meditative, reflective philosophical film about what it means to be human. Ironically, the film is shot largely from the point of view of angels, who hover over the city, and listen in to human thoughts and conversation, and who give invisible comfort and succour to humans. Gentle, sad, and occasionally absurdly funny, 'Wings of Desire', as one reviewer puts it, is "underneath its melancholia and mind-boggling metaphysics, the simplest (well, almost) story ever told -- angel meets girl, angel gets girl." Friday, April 15, 2005, 4:30 pm Raghu Romeo Directed by Rajat Kapoor 2003, 99 minutes A waiter besotted with a television actress, a bar girl besotted with the waiter, a hitman besotted with the bar girl - 'Raghu Romeo' is an intensely funny, and moving set of intricately linked stories of unrequited love, everyday disappointments, unfulfilled hopes and dreams, and a great madcap joie de vivre that underlies it all. The film also revisits the now familiar terrain of 'gangster' Bombay and gives it a refreshingly different look. With spectacular performances by Vijay Raaz, Saurabh Shukla, Sadiya Siddiqui and Maria Goretti, theatre and screen actor Rajat Kapoor's first feature film as a director is a cinematic classic. Friday, April 29, 2005, 4:30 pm In the Mood for Love Directed by Wong Kar Wai 2000, 98 minutes Hong Kong, 1962: Chow Mo Wan and Su Li Zhen move into neighboring apartments on the same day. Their encounters are polite and formal -until a discovery about their respective spouses sparks an intimate bond. At once delicately mannered and visually stunning, Wong Kar Wai's 'In the Mood for Love' is a masterful evocation of romantic longing and fleeting moments in time. Christopher Doyle beautifully shoots the claustrophobia of their lives and work by intricately framing noodle stalls, back alleys, and cramped apartments. ... In the words of one reviewer, "Violins tactilely pull at your heartstrings and induce memories of all the unrequited love affairs or unhappy memories you ever had." All screenings are held in the Seminar Room, CSDS, 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi-54. Programme subject to last-minute changes. ------ Ranita Chatterjee Programme Coordinator The Sarai Programme Centre for the Study of Developing Societies 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi 110 054 Tel: (+91) 11 23960040 (+91) 11 23942199, ext 307 Fax: (+91) 11 23943450 www.sarai.net