Glasgow Film Festival announces winner of first-ever Audience Award, closing dates and 2015 admissions

As the 2015 Glasgow Film Festival comes to a close with the UK premiere of  Force Majeure, the organisers are delighted to announce the winner of their inaugural Audience Award, as well as 2015 admissions numbers, and the dates for 2016’s event. The directors of the festival paid tribute to the 2015 audience and described this year as their ‘best ever’.


AUDIENCE AWARD

The winner of GFF’s first-ever Audience Award was Radiator, a beautiful and moving low-budget British film created by writer/ first-time feature director Tom Browne, and shot in the Cumbrian house of his deceased parents. 

Radiator features a pair of astonishing, career-best performances from veteran British actors Richard Johnson and Gemma Jones as elderly hoarders Leonard and Maria. Johnson and Jones, with Browne, were among the visitors to the festival this year. 

The Audience Award was voted on by the GFF audience from a selection of ten films made by first or second-time directors. Over 1100 votes were cast. The Audience Award runner up was the documentary Tender, directed by Lynette Wallworth. Both Radiator and Tender are currently seeking distribution.

Radiator writer/director Tom Browne said:
‘Receiving the Audience Award has made us all terrifically happy - thank you! Radiator has an unfashionable theme and was made on a tiny budget. Unsurprisingly it is taking a while for the film to find a place within the film industry so to receive this award is very significant for Radiator's future. Richard, Gemma and I had a great time in Glasgow - we were treated so kindly and were touched by the engagement of the audiences evident in the Q and A sessions.’


Glasgow Film Festival Co-Director Allan Hunter said:

‘We've always known that our audience has the best taste and now they have proved that all over again. The GFF audience has

enthusiastically embraced the responsibility of picking their favourite film from a list of ten contenders and deciding the winner of the festival's first Audience Award. They couldn't have picked a more worthwhile winner than Radiator.

Tom Browne's deeply autobiographical film resonates across the generations as it deals with the dynamics of family relationships and the challenges we will all face in our final years. It is funny, touching and told with a fearless truth and beautifully judged performances from Gemma Jones, Daniel Cerquiera and the magnificent Richard Johnson. I only hope distributors will take encouragement from the public passion for Radiator and the Audience Award and bring the film to the wider audience it clearly deserves.’



AUDIENCE NUMBERS
Despite fielding 23 fewer events this year due to unavailability at long-term venue partner Cineworld, the festival has still managed to reach over 40,000 admissions for the second year in a row at time of going to press.  45% of the events in the programme sold out completely; 61% of screenings sold 75% of their tickets.


Glasgow Film Festival Co-Director Allison Gardner said:
‘This year might just have been the best Glasgow Film Festival ever. It’s certainly been the most fun I've ever had. From ballroom dancing to roller-skating, from coming together in rapt appreciation at classic festival films like Wild Tales or

Mommy, giving a standing ovation to legendary Scottish writer William McIlvanney, or queuing for tickets for the Internet Cat Video Festival, our audiences have been generous, committed, passionate and open-minded. 

And they’ve all got fabulous taste in fancy dress costumes, which we have asked them to wear in some form almost every night. We’re also absolutely delighted that we've broken 40,000 admissions for a second year running, despite working with a smaller programme. Thanks so much to our wonderful audience: you make all the hard work worth it.’









2016 DATES
Glasgow Film Festival 2016 will run from 17-28 February.

The Citizens gets a spring in its step...

The Critics greet the news of the new season

Oi oi, Mad Cyril ere. Ready for the latest news from the Citz? Thought so.

Appy Birfday to the ol' fella in the Gorbals - 70 years young taday. An they've sent us all a press release. Let's ave a peek at wat they are up ta. 

· A new production of classic twentieth-century Scottish favourite

ga-ken wan

The Slab Boys, written and designed by John Byrne and directed by and featuring David Hayman in the cast.

Ayman's alright by Cyril. Did a tasty piece - two ov em - in the Fringe and as a passion fer the polemical art. Ee did Lear with Dom Ill a bit back, and ee's got those sweet actin chops. Byrne's shown is moves wiv a couple of translations of Chekhov in the past year. Nice. 

· A major new play by Douglas Maxwell, Fever Dream: Southside, a hallucinatory comic thriller set in Glasgow’s Southside.

Sarfside Massive shout out. Maxwell's got a free pass if ee's talkin baht my manor.

· Into That Darkness, an adaptation by former Citizens Theatre Artistic Director Robert David MacDonald of Gitta Sereny’s interviews with SS-Obersturmführer Franz Stangl.

Nice... here's one for Anselm Henrich off Glasgow Uni. Ardcore.

· Return visit by theatre company Headlong with The Absence of War, David Hare’s state of the nation play focusing on the Labour party.

Sweet, bit of a modern classic.

· A radical re-imagining of Macbeth by Filter.

It betta be very radical. Frickin Shakespeare. Still, Filter'll rip it like ya jaw on a sovreign. 

· Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2014 hit Lippy by young Irish theatre company Dead Centre.

· The Garden, an opera by Zinnie and John Harris and David Leddy’s Long Live the Little Knife in the theatre’s Circle Studio.

John Harris is sound. Zinnie is cool. Baht time they teamed up. 

· Top names on the UK comedy circuit including John Shuttleworth, Henning Wehn, Simon Amstell, Jon Ronson, Susan Calman and Des Clarke as part of the Glasgow International Comedy Festival.

A bunch of jokers, eh?



Announcing the new season Artistic Director Dominic Hill said

"This season honours the Citizens’ long-standing tradition of bold and daring work that speaks to Glasgow audiences. As well as welcoming back old friends and showcasing some exciting new talent, I'm particularly looking forward to directing Douglas Maxwell’s new work, set in the Southside of Glasgow and exploring universal themes of parenthood, community and belonging."


Aving all of it, big style...

Press Release: Crystal Palace Dance Sport Cup

Dudendance Theatre presents Borderlands

I don't get to the Borders often - that is, in any physical sense. I spend most of my time in the liminal spaces of consciousness and...

Dudendance, however, are taking the metaphor more literally. On tour in July, they have created a series of site-specific performances in the Abbeys of the Scottish Borders. Drawing on the 'the juxtaposition of spirituality and war in a meditative interpretation of invasion, conquest and contemplation,' (a liminal space itself bordering the highest aspirations and the lowest behaviour, perhaps), the company are exploring the potential of the holy house to illuminate a perennial problem.

The ruined Abbeys of the Scottish Borders are layered in history. Deeply rooted in medieval Christian mysticism and home to Premonstratesian, Tironensians, Cistercians and Augustinian orders, these great examples of medieval architecture became caught up in the anarchic struggles between Scotland and England and then were finally destroyed by the reformation.

Of course, I'd argue with the use of the word 'anarchic' to describe a battle between two nation states: brutal, violent, chaotic, vicious - but I bet there were plenty of leaders (archons, if you will) stomping about the battle-field.

Borderlands will be set within three prominent Abbey sites of Kelso, Jedburgh and Dryburgh along the Scottish Borders Abbey Way. Versions of the piece will performed at special events including celebrations for the Queen’s Baton Relay, Aberdeenshire’s Scottish Sculpture Workshop live sculpture

walk and a night-time version for Huntly Halloween. 

The piece is created with a large cast drawn from the local communities through a series of intensive workshops and rehearsals. The Borders cast consists of professionals, non-professionals, young people and international artists. In Huntly, Dudendance will be running both Summer and Autumn intensives for young people for an atmospheric night-time version at Huntly Castle.

Historically the Scottish Borders were one of the most turbulent and anarchic places in Britain with constant disputes during the Scottish Wars of Independence. 2014 will see the Scottish Referendum and the celebration of the 1st World War – Borderlands will be a poetic metaphor – a subtle evocation of what it means to be invaded.

Despite the repeated misuse of anarchy - unless there is another history buried beneath the invasions, in which the local people built local co-operatives and refused the hegemony of feudal and capitalist societies - this has got my attention. It is the mismatch of the content and the events: celebrating the Queen's Baton Relay (something to do with the Commonwealth Games?) and the Scottish Referendum sets monarchist and republican values against each other.

I am not admitting that we are 'celebrating' WWI though, regardless of Michael Gove's opinion. I wouldn't want to celebrate the dissolution of the abbeys either - at its best, the monastic tradition has preserved the interior, meditative traditions of Christianity. Mind you, that tradition does include the Knights Templar, so it has not always been averse to a ruck.

The professional/non-professional cast is another liminal space. All of these conflicts are difficult - good and evil get muddled in conflicts pretty quickly, and the righteousness of a cause does not prevent unrighteous behaviour. Like, it's good to get more critics and not  privilege the authority of a critical caste: but ripping off people and printing their reviews without paying them is bad. Community-based performances occupy the same challenging territory.


Inspired by paintings of the Renaissance, the costumes by Canadian designer Heather MacCrimmon are stylistically a combination of ecclesiastical wear and armor designed for shape-shifting and movement flow. The slow meditative pace and sculptural quality of the performance unfolds like a dream around the audience who will discover different “views” of the performers through and into the ruins. Technical production will be minimal allowing the piece to become one with the space. The aim is to give the audience new perspectives of these historic places and to fully engage participants in a unique performing experience.

ANDATE Chamber Choir will accompany Borderlands in Dryburgh Abbey with a rendition of Tomas Luis de Victoria’s requiem mass and Argentine composer/musician Fabiana Galante will create a spoken and whispered soundscape with Huntly based Aurora choir.


ABBEY PERFORMANCES in JUNE 2014:


KELSO TOWN and ABBEY
June 14th at 2pm (starting point at the Market Square)

Admission Free

JEDBURGH ABBEY
June 22nd from 2pm (three performance cycles 2-5pm)

Historic Scotland site -admission charges apply.
DRYBURGH ABBEY
June 29th from 2pm (three performance cycles 2-5pm)
Historic Scotland site- admission charges apply.


18th June: Queen’s Baton Relay in the Borders 6pm
Admission free

16th August: Living Sculpture Walk at Scottish Sculpture Workshop 4pm
Admission free
Following on from a summer-school intensive with local young people *Borderlands will be a starting point to create a living sculpture promenade performance at the site of the former sculpture park in Lumsden Aberdeenshire. The performance will be followed by a BBQ at SSW.

HUNTLY HALLOWEEN at HUNTLY CASTLE
1st November 6pm
Admission free
Starting point at the Deveron River car park then promenade to the Huntly Castle. This night-time version of Borderlands is created with a group of young people from Huntly who have taken part in Dudendance’s summer and autumn school intensive training.
Argentine composer Fabiana Galante has been commissioned to work with local Aurora Choir on a spoken and whispered soundscape to accompany the live performance.



Fabiana Galante is considered to be Argentina’s foremost experimental pianist and composer. She has won critical acclaim for establishing the avant-garde music festival Experimenta and Instantes Sonoras and collaborated with high profile artists such as Kazuo Ohno. During her MA study in Scotland at the RSAMD she performed at the CCA, Tramway, Northern College in Aberdeen , Dundee and St. Andrew’s Universities and premiered work by Scottish composer Ross Campbell . She has worked with Dudendance since 2001 and also created experimental music for the Huntly Pipe Band, collaborated with violinist Paul Anderson and performed in the SOUND festival.

Clea Wallis and Paul Rous met at Camberwell Art School in 1984 and formed Dudendance with a group of seven performers and art students. Clea subsequently studied under expressionist choreographer Anna Sokolov in New York and Pina Bausch in Wuppertal Germany. Paul worked with Laurie Booth and Motionhouse, taught in prisons, formed his own company and performed for several companies including Dance Unlimited.

Dudendance have created over twenty works having been based in London, Glasgow, Aberdeenshire and working internationally in Germany, Canada, and South America. Recent site-specific productions include Into the Wild and This Side of Paradise made with young people in Huntly. A strong link to South America since 1992 has resulted in co-production, tours, film projects and interchange in Brazil and Argentina.