(Chatham, NY—October 13, 2022)—FilmColumbia, the county’s premier cultural event held annually at the Crandell Theatre, will kick off its opening weekend on Friday, October 21, with several very special events. The festival continues through Sunday, October 30, with a highly curated lineup of Hollywood, independent and international films. Tickets and full festival passes will go on sale to the general public on Saturday, October 15.
FilmColumbia 2022’s opening day, Friday, October 21, will feature a special screening at 4:30 pm of Ang Lee’s award-winning classic Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. After the show, the festival will celebrate Sony Pictures Classics’ 30th anniversary with a free Q+A featuring co-founder and co-president Tom Bernard. He’ll be joined on stage by triple-threat writer, producer and director James Schamus, a long-time Lee collaborator and the film’s Oscar-nominated screenwriter. In its three decades as a distributor of art cinema, Sony Pictures Classics has released more documentary and foreign film Oscar winners than any other distribution company in history. Schamus and Bernard will look back on those highlights and discuss the current state of films.
The following night, on Saturday, October 22, the festival will feature a late-night 10 pm screening of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead 3D. We’ll start things off at 9 pm at Chatham’s The People’s Pub for a lively pre-show gathering of libations and film talk (cash bar). The film’s producer, Richard P. Rubinstein, will be on hand for the screening to delve deep into the screen zombie multiverse.
There’s still time to sign up for the festival’s popular Screenwriting Workshop on Saturday, October 29, which has returned after a brief hiatus. Moderated by actor/producer Scott Cohen (Gilmore Girls, The 10th Kingdom, The Americans, South Mountain) and writer/director Anastasia Traina (Horton Bliss, Street Time, Sullivan and String), the workshop lets participants hear their screenplays–in–progress read by professional actors and discussed by Cohen and Traina to help bring their ideas to the next level.
Several of the international films screening at FilmColumbia 2022 are already their country of origin’s selection in the 2023 Academy Awards foreign film competition. Well ahead of its official release in December, the historical film Corsage, Austria’s entry to the Oscars, is gaining attention for Vicky Krieps’ luminous performance and for the frustrated royal she portrays. Krieps won best actress for her star turn at Cannes this year.
The Israeli film Karaoke is a bittersweet comedy about aging empty nesters who become fascinated by their neighbor, a bachelor agent for fashion models, living a few floors above them in a Tel Aviv suburb. The film won the Audience Award at the Jerusalem Film Festival and was a favorite at the Tribeca Film Festival.
This year’s selection of international films features several directorial debuts, including Aftersun, the first dramatic feature from Scottish filmmaker Charlotte Wells, and Rodeo, from French director Lola Quivoron. Winner of two major awards at the Venice Film Festival, and featured in both Toronto and New York, Saint Omer is the stunning debut feature film from the noted French documentarian Alice Diop. Based on the real-life trial of a Senegalese mother who abandoned her infant daughter during a high tide on a beach in Northern France, the film is France’s official entry to the Oscars.
Curated by co-executive and co-artistic directors Peter Biskind and Laurence Kardish, the 2022 festival lineup also includes EO, a slice-of-life Polish movie told through the eyes of a donkey that won the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes, and the regional theatrical premiere of the Indian film RRR, a firecracker of an epic made to be seen, and enjoyed, on the big screen.
FilmColumbia 2022 tickets and passes are now available online to members of the Crandell Theatre. Tickets and passes for the general public will go on sale online starting this Saturday, October 15, at 9:00 am, and at the Crandell Theatre box office, 48 Main Street, in Chatham, NY. Both members and the general public can purchase tickets in person from 9:30 am to 12:30 pm on October 15. To learn more about becoming a member of the Crandell Theatre, visit here.