Agnieszka Holland Film Retrospective: U-M Center for Russian, East European, & Eurasian Studies.
A series of screenings in conjunction with the director's October 10 Copernicus Lecture.
Sept. 6: Fever (Agnieszka Holland, 1981). Set in 1905 Poland, a time of feverish revolutionary underground activity when Poland was partitioned between three neighboring countries, the film is the story of a bomb passing from anarchist to anarchist as several attempts are made on the life of the Tsarist governor general. Polish, subtitles.
Sept. 13: A Woman Alone (Agnieszka Holland, 1981). Story of a middle-aged woman trying vainly to make a life for herself and her 8-year old son living alone on the outskirts of Wroclaw, where she works as a mail carrier. Polish, subtitles.
Sept. 20: Europa Europa (Agnieszka Holland, 1990). Tragicomic film adaptation of the autobiography of a German Jewish boy who escaped the Holocaust by masquerading as an elite “Aryan” German. German & Russian, subtitles.
Sept. 27: The Secret Garden (Agnieszka Holland, 1993). Adaptation of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s well-loved 1909 children’s novel set in Victorian England. Sent to live in the cheerless house of her reclusive, widowed uncle and his invalid son, an orphaned girl discovers a hidden garden that reintroduces joy to her life and that of her relatives.
Oct. 4 (4448 East Hall, 530 Church): Washington Square (Agnieszka Holland, 1997). Splendid adaptation of Henry James’s novel about a young woman torn between love and duty. Jennifer Jason Leigh, Albert Finney.
Oct. 7 (4 p.m.): Total Eclipse (Agnieszka Holland, 1995). Adaptation of the 1967 Christopher Hampton play about the passionate and violent relationship between the 19th-century French poets Verlaine and Rimbaud. Leonard DiCaprio, David Thewlis.
Oct. 7: Copying Beethoven (Agnieszka Holland, 1997). Fictional version of the triumphs and heartaches of Beethoven’s last years. Ed Harris.
Oct. 10 (7 p.m.): In Darkness (Agnieszka Holland, 2011). Drama about a sewer worker in a Nazi-occupied Polish city who uses his knowledge of the city’s sewer system to shelter a group of Jews. Today's screening is preceded at 5 p.m. by a free lecture by director Holland on"A Filmmaker's Approach to Society's Most Vexing Concerns." Q&A.
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7:30 p.m., Michigan Theater (unless otherwise noted), Michigan Theater. Free. 663-0351. [map]
