The Saratoga Film Forum is a nonprofit arts organization dedicated to bringing a wide variety of quality films to downtown Saratoga Springs. Founded on principles of community involvement, the Film Forum pursues creative collaborations with other nonprofit and for-profit groups.
New volunteers, members and sponsors are always welcome.
For more information, go to www.saratogafilmforum.org.
Lore (with panel discussion on April 7)
Friday, April 5, 7:30 p.m.; Sunday, April 7, 3 p.m.
Directed by Cate Shortland; screenplay by Cate Shortland and Robin Mukherjee, based on a novel by Rachel Seifert; 109 min.; Germany|Australia|UK, 2012; not rated; in German with English subtitles.
“Lore,” based on “The Dark Room,” by Rachel Seifert, is told from the point of view of a German teen trying to make sense of the catastrophe of the Third Reich. Five German children are left to fend for themselves after their SS officer father and mother, staunch Nazis, are arrested by the Allies at the end of World War II. Led by the eldest, 14-year-old Lore (Saskia Rosendahl), the five destitute siblings must travel 900 kilometers to find their grandmother, across a devastated trail from southwestern Germany to Hamburg. Lore understands—or thinks she understands—what she’s up against, but she quickly realizes that other Germans aren’t going to cut her and her band any slack just because they’re kids. If anything, these youngsters are seen either as a burden or as potential prey. The journey exposes them to the truth and consequences of their parents’ beliefs, and is further shaped by the appearance of Thomas (Kai Malina), a mysterious, charismatic refugee just older than Lore, by his account a Jewish survivor of the German prison camps. For his own reasons, Thomas has decided to take the group of siblings under his wing. Overwhelmed with responsibility she hates for children she loves, Lore is forced to rely on the good graces, competency and motives of a person she has been taught to hate. Roiling beneath the surface of this war drama is the subtler story of Lore’s dark coming of age, facing emotional conflicts and awakening sexuality even as she works at protecting her younger siblings from starvation and illness. Brave, yet troubling, the film is also beautifully executed in lush settings. “Lore” is an unexpected, uncomfortable perspective on the Holocaust.
SPECIAL NOTE: After the Sunday, April 7, 3 p.m. screening of “Lore,” there will be a special Film Forum panel featuring Rabbi Linda Motzkin of Temple Sinai, Professor Matthew Hockenos of the Skidmore College history department and Dr. Robert Flynn, a psychiatrist.
Sound City
Thursday, April 11, 7:30 p.m.; Friday, April 12, 7:30 p.m.; Sunday, April 14, 3 p.m.
Directed by David Grohl, written by Mark Monroe, 106 min., USA, 2013, not rated.
What do Neil Young, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Slayer, Johnny Cash, Guns N’ Roses, Fear, Charles Manson, Barry Manilow, Trent Reznor, Carl Perkins, Foreigner, Queens of the Stone Age, the Grateful Dead, Metallica and Frank Black and the Catholics all have in common? They all laid down tracks at Sound City, a funky, nondescript, but fabled recording studio in the San Fernando Valley. The new documentary, “Sound City,” memorializes that former box factory and the performers who graced it. In those analog days, Sound City was renowned for the quality of its live, single-take recordings, made with as few overdubs and backing tracks as possible. However, at the height of Sound City’s glory days, the digital revolution was taking place. The audio recording and editing program Pro Tools eventually killed Sound City in the early 2000s. More music was being recorded on laptops than in pizza-box-and-beer-can-encrusted dens with gold records on the walls. Director Dave Grohl, Foo Fighters’ frontman, will always be remembered as the drummer for Nirvana, and now he’s produced a documentary about one of the music landscape’s most iconic fountains of creativity, one of the best-received films out of last year’s Sundance Film Festival.
In the Public Interest! Bill W. (with panel discussion)
Saturday, April 13, 7:30 pm
Directed by Kevin Hanlon and Dan Carracino, 104 min., USA, 2012.
William Wilson, a wry, self-deprecating Vermonter, had his first drink in 1917. In his early 20s, he felt his blues disperse at once—he’d never talked so freely, felt so bright before. Seventeen years and countless black-outs later, his job at risk, his friends estranged, Bill made a fateful choice. Instead of making for the cocktail lounge, he called another drunk. Not to drink. To talk. The conversation that begat the addiction recovery model called Alcoholics Anonymous now claims more than 100,000 groups and 2,000,000 members in 150 countries. Don’t know much about it? There’s a reason. AA wants no last names, no dues, no centralized administration. It’s grassroots, plain-jane, and it works—one day at a time. Dozens of other 12-step programs take their lead from it as well. But Wilson, who shunned fame or compensation, was not “saved” by his invention. All his life, depression dogged him. He played with drugs; in his last breath, he asked for whiskey. This documentary, as ungimmicky and direct as Bill W. himself, tells the story of one of the most enduring cultural influences of our age.
SPECIAL NOTE: After the screening, there will be a moderated discussion about addiction in Saratoga Springs. Panelists will be identified as they are confirmed at www.saratogafilmforum.org. In the Public Interest! is supported by a grant from the Adirondack Trust Company Community Fund.
