Film festival proving a big hit (From Thurrock Gazette)

Film festival proving a big hit

7:30am Friday 29th June 2012 in News

THURROCK’s first ever International Festival kicked off with a glitzy launch party at the Park Inn Hotel in North Stifford.

The festival opened with a talk about the history of film making in Thurrock, from Jonathan Catton, Gazette columnist and curator of Thurrock Museum.

Then followed a documentary about the making of Ludd and Isis at the Royal Opera House’s Production Park in Purfleet, and the British premier of the docmentary The Good Life, which is about a mother and daughter, born into wealth in Portugal, forced to live on benefits after losing it all.

On Wednesday, students from Palmer’s College in Grays were due to show their entry for the Music Video and Experimental Category, followed by a screening of The Wizard of Oz, starring Judy Garland.

Yesterday (Thursday) was set to see talks by the BBFC on censorship and popular television film critic Barry Norman on his favourite films.

Today (Friday) sees the entries of the International and Foreign Language category battling it out from 2.30pm to 3.30pm at the Thameside Theatre in Grays, followed by entries for the student and under-16 category from 5pm to 7pm, at Palmer’s College in Grays.

There will be a screening of Singin’ in the Rain at the Thameside from 7pm to 8.40pm, followed by Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, for which a speedboat chase scene was filmed at Tilbury Docks, from 9pm to 11pm.

Tomorrow from noon to 2pm at the theatre there will be a showing of Spirited Away, the acclaimed animation from Studio Ghibli.

From 3pm to 5pm it’s the fiction category of the festival, followed by the awards ceremony from 7pm to 10pm.

Tickets are £3 per event, and can be booked by calling the Thameside box office on 0845 3005264.