FilmColumbia, Columbia County's premier annual cultural event, screens the very best upcoming American and international films for ten days in late October. Launched in 1999 as the Crandell Theatre's "little local festival that could," FilmColumbia is now an acclaimed, nationally recognized film event.
FilmColumbia was recently recognized by MovieMaker Magazine as one of the "25 Coolest Film Festivals in the World." Said Tim Molloy, MovieMaker's editor-in-chief, "Obviously a lot of New Yorkers are now discovering the beautiful small communities just a short drive from New York City, and we think they'll be delighted to learn more about FilmColumbia, a fest that blends a gorgeous location, local color (both people and leaves) and Oscar-caliber films, lovingly programmed by a revered team with exquisite taste."
Schedule of Events:
Union
1:00PM
100 min
Despite Amazon's best union-busting efforts, in 2022, the eight thousand workers at its JFK8 warehouse in Staten Island joined up, after a three-year struggle intimately recorded by Brett Story and Stephen Maing. Focusing on Chris Smalls, the union's founder, who was fired by Amazon for organizing, the film reveals the way Amazon sought to break the strike by means of mandatory "non-union training sessions." Although JFK8 was eventually unionized, Amazon refused to bargain with it. Winner of Sundance's Special Jury Award for the Art of Change.
Ama Gloria
Short: Janie's Life Changing Baked Goods
3:00pm
101 min
Cleo, a precocious bundle of energy, lives in Paris with her widowed dad. She is madly in love with her nanny Gloria who suddenly must return to Cape Verde to look after Caesar, her surly young son. Anxious about losing another "mother," Cleo successfully campaigns to spend the summer with Gloria, and discovers, much to her disappointment, she must share Gloria with Caesar. Cleo is played with astonishing brio and understanding by six-year old Louise Mauroy-Panzani. Marie Amachoukeli-Barsaca's debut film opened the Critics' Week at Cannes and went on to win best film at the Jerusalem International Festival.
All We Imagine as Light
5:00pm
110 min
In Mumbai, a city of contrast and change, two hospital nurses, one with an absent husband, and the other with a secret boyfriend from a different religion, share a flat. A third woman, a widow who cooks at the hospital, may soon be without a home. Out of commonplace problems, Payal Kapadia, a film artist with an eye for beauty and detail, makes a work of such sublimity that it won the Grand Prix at Cannes this year.
The Room Next Door
7:30pm
110 min
Once again, the great Pedro Almodóvar bravely plunges into a sea of estrogen in this, his first English-language movie. It stars Tilda Swinton as a war correspondent and deeply flawed mother, and Julianne Moore as her writer friend. The film touches on war, death, and waking up to birdsongs in upstate New York. The Room Next Door, won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and was the centerpiece of this year's New York Film Festival.
