Arts & Events

Amour: A Film to Die For
Opens at the Albany Twin Theater on January 18

By Gar Smith
Friday January 18, 2013 - 01:21:00 PM
Director Haneke and stars Riva and Trintignant

Nominated for a Best Foreign Film Oscar, Austrian director Michael Haneke's Amour, features a trio of French acting royalty in a stunning, intimate portrayal of the grandeur (and drudgery) of devotion, when an aging couple is forced to square off with the demands of mortality. Jean Louis Trintignant, Emmanuelle Riva and Isabelle Huppert embody the close-knit and cultured octogenarian couple Georges, and Anne and their distant musician daughter. Trintignant (81) has acted in more than 100 films (including A Man and a Woman). Riva (85) has appeared in more than 40 movies (beginning with a starring role in Hiroshima Mon Amour). Huppert has more than 70 films to her credit. Together they represent nearly 150 years of cinematic chops. -more-


AROUND & ABOUT THEATER: Altarena Playhouse's 75th Anniversary and 'God of Carnage, directed by Sue Trigg

Thursday January 17, 2013 - 10:10:00 PM

Altarena Playhouse turns 75 this year, and to mark the event, there will be a reception after Friday's opening of 'Good of Carnage' by Yasmina Reza ('Art') for their new multimedia theater library and company history room, including materials from their run of more than 400 productions dating back to 1938. -more-


Best of the Berkeley Video & Film Festival (BVFF) 2012 This Friday-Saturday at East Bay Media Center's New Screening Room in Downtown Berkeley

By Ken Bullock
Thursday January 17, 2013 - 10:05:00 PM

The Berkeley Video & Film Festival, founded in 1990, will be screening its Best of 2012 program this Friday and Saturday nights at the East Bay Media Center's excellent new screening room in downtown Berkeley--and at a great price: $5 a night for a wide array of styles and subject matter from all over (including the vaunted University of Southern California's film program), including Andrea Heckman' and Rose Gordon's documentary about Bon, the pre-Buddhist rerligion of Tibet, and its preservation by Tibetan Buddhists, short fiction films, animation, television innovations ... A potpourri of unusual work. -more-