Films with music as theme

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:  The Banner Film Society is here again, with a one-day film festival on Sunday. This time around, the theme of the fest is music. The curtains rise on Sunday morning at 9.30 am with a Turkish film, ‘International’, directed by Muharrem Gulmez and Sirri Sureyya Onder. It is about a group of local musicians preparing to play at a large military parade in a small town near Adana, Turkey. The film won awards at film festivals in Adana, Ankara, Istanbul and Thessalonika.An English film from Ireland, ‘Once’, directed by John Carney, will be the next to be screened at 11.30 am. The 85-minute film is about an unnamed, thirty-something man who sings and plays guitar on Grafton Street, a Dublin shopping district. He struggles with the trials of performing on the street, including chasing after a heroin addict (Darren Healy), who attempts to steal his earnings.Lured by his music, an unnamed young Czech immigrant flower seller girl approaches him and, despite his annoyance, persists in questioning him about his songs. Delighted to learn that he also repairs vacuum cleaners in his father’s shop, she insists that he fix her broken cleaner.‘August Rush’, directed by Kirsten Sheridan, is set in the year 1995. Lyla Novacek is a cellist in an orchestra under the strict rule of her father. Louis Connelly is the lead singer of The Connelly Brothers. Lyla and Louis have a chance meeting during a party and sleep together, while a man plays his harmonica down on the street. Lyla returns to her angered father and heads back to Chicago, finding that she is now pregnant with Louis’s son. After an argument with her father, she runs out into the street and is struck by a car. She gives birth prematurely and her father quickly puts her son up for adoption. Louis continues waiting for Lyla in New York and eventually gives up. The film will be screened at 2 pm.The last film to be screened on the day will be the 113-minute ‘Chicago’ directed by Rob Marshall. A rousing and energetic adaptation of the Broadway musical, ‘Chicago’ succeeds on the level of pure spectacle, but provides a surprising level of depth and humour as well. The film will be screened at 4.30 pm.