From today film lovers of Glasgow's South
Side have an all-too-infrequent opportunity to indulge their
cinematic hankerings without having to venture up to and across the
River Clyde.
This evening starts a weekend-long
silver-screen treat – the South Side Film Festival – set
up, at least in part, to compensate for the fact that Glasgow's once
legendary passion for the cinema has long-since died in the far South
of the Clyde, and there are no longer any operating cinemas in that
part of the city – South-siders having to rely on Pacific Quay and
the I-Max on the very banks of the river itself.
The Festival, although it is largely
run by volunteers and housed in all sorts of buildings from scout
huts to Govan's august Pearce Institute, shows a remarkable breadth
and variety, with feature films rubbing shoulders with animation
workshops, cinema talks and exhibitions and, of course the obligatory
pub quiz (tonight in the Bungo from 8.00pm), where self-styled
'experts' will no doubt indulge in some verbal debate over obscure
details!
To single out highlights would be
invidious, so I will. You have an opportunity to see again the unique
film Class Struggle – film from the Clyde shot by Cinema
Action – the only film crew allowed into the Clyde shipbuilding
yards during the UCS Work-In forty years ago. Fittingly enough, this
is being shown on Saturday at 3.00pm in the Pearce Institute in
Govan. There will be a Q&A after the film with veterans from the
work-in.
Elsewhere in the political scene, two
films about the Northern Irish troubles look to be worth seeing.
Leila Doolan's biographical documentary of fiery republican,
Bernadette Devlin McAliskey is on in the Shed (Langside Ave)
on Saturday and will be followed by A Million Bricks on the
building of Belfast's biggest 'peace line'.
Buster Keaton features in the closing
film, The General is in Pollockshaws Burgh Hall on Sunday with
live Wurlitzer Organ accompaniment, and the launch film at 8.00pm
Friday in The Shed is a much more up-to-date item – South-side
resident, Peter Mullan's NEDS.
If you want to your way round the sites
of all the long-lost cinemas on Glasgow's South Side, I suggest an
afternoon visit to Tusk on Sunday (2,00pm) where Gary Painter
of the website scottishcinemas.org will give an illustrated talk on
their sites or if they still exist in another guise (as does the
Waverley cinema in which you will be sitting!
The programme for the weekend is here
and tickets available from tickets
scotland, on the door or at Youngs
Interesting Books.
