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BIG SCREEN FILM EVENTS PLANNED FOR AUTUMN

The New Zealand International Film Festival will present a series of Autumn Events this April and May, including new digital restorations of Lawrence of Arabia, Guys and Dolls and Jean-Luc Godard’s Pierrot le fou.

NZ premiere screenings of Oscar-nominated Kon-Tiki and a selection of striking new documentaries and features will round out the events in Auckland and Wellington.

The Autumn Events will take place at The Civic, the newly refurbished Academy Cinemas and Rialto Cinemas in Auckland in late April and May. In Wellington NZIFF is planning to host Guys and Dolls and Lawrence of Arabia at the Embassy Theatre from 20 April. Further Autumn screenings will take place at the Paramount, Wellington.

“Two spectacular classics will launch our Autumn Event calendar on April 20: Lawrence of Arabia, in a new 50th anniversary 4K digital restoration acclaimed at Cannes last year; and Guys and Dolls, which sees the unfailingly charismatic Marlon Brando croon it up alongside Frank Sinatra,” says NZIFF Director Bill Gosden.

“NZIFF’s curatorial eye never rests. We never stop hearing about or seeing films that deserve a theatrical platform out of the annual midwinter programme. The opportunity to present some spectacular digital restorations on the giant Civic screen and at the Wellington Embassy was especially irresistible.”

The Autumn Events will screen at a time of year that previously would have seen NZIFF’s World Cinema Showcase screenings taking place in the four main centres.

“We saw that the original purpose of the Showcase was becoming harder to articulate to an audience confronted by a proliferation of smaller, more clearly defined festivals. The NZIFF in July is our flagship event. Rather than continue with a second festival, our newly styled NZIFF Autumn Events seem a more easily understood and seamless extension to the winter extravaganza,” says Gosden.

Christchurch and Dunedin NZIFF venues, which formerly hosted the Showcase, are not currently equipped to screen key Autumn Event films for 2013, but NZIFF is keen to retain an off-season presence in both cities in the future.

“We hope the Regent Dunedin will be funded to equip with DCP technology in time for the NZIFF in August. In Christchurch we hope negotiations will open the way for NZIFF to use the current venue’s DCP equipment for the Festival in August.”

The calendar of NZIFF Autumn Events will be online and tickets on-sale from Tuesday 12 March directly from the Civic. A free printed calendar will be available around Auckland and Wellington from the end of March.

The main Festival, NZIFF, will screen in Auckland from 18 July to 4 August and in Wellington from 26 July – 11 August. Full programme updates will be made in late June. For Festival updates visit www.nzff.co.nz and register to receive e-newsletters.

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For further information about the NZIFF Autumn Events or to arrange an interview with Director Bill Gosden please contact:

Rebecca McMillan, (04) 802 2575, 0274 555 061, rebecca@nzff.co.nz