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HomeNewsArchivesThe Forum Film Festival Presents Three Choice Films

The Forum Film Festival Presents Three Choice Films

Oct. 24, 2005 – The Forum Film Festival will show three films on three consecutive Wednesday nights in November. The films are: "The Story of the Weeping Camel" an Oscar nominee; "Murderball," a Sundance Festival winner; and "Grizzly Man," a new film that has received many great reviews. Neil Prior, chairman of the Forum says, "Our film festival is always a sell-out event. These three films may well be the best three we've ever offered."
Tickets are $15 and are available at Reichhold Center, Modern Music (Nisky), Dockside Bookstore, Home Again and Interiors (Fort Mylner).

"The Story of the Weeping Camel" will play at Market Square East on Wednesday, Nov. 2, at 7 p.m.
Set amid the vast expanse of South Mongolia's Gobi Desert, this film follows the adventures of a family of camel herders who face a crisis when one mother camel rejects her newborn following a particularly difficult delivery. Invoking an ancient ritual, the family sends two of its young boys to the capital city to enlist the aid of a musician whom they believe will coax the mother camel into nursing her baby.
Wall Street Journal: "Please see this movie."
Washington Post: "The movie, a lyrical blend of documentary and fiction filmmaking techniques, offer a bold example of the rewards of crossing boundaries—stylistic, cultural, temporal and even commercial."
New York Daily News: "Even the hardest heart must melt in the face of 'The Story of the Weeping Camel.'"

"Murderball" will play at Market Square East on Wednesday, Nov. 9, at 7 p.m.
Featuring fierce rivalry, stopwatch suspense and larger than life personalities, "Murderball," winner of the Documentary Audience Award and a Special Jury Prize for Editing at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, is a film about tough, highly competitive rugby players: quadriplegic rugby players. Whether by car wreck, fistfight, gunshot, or rogue bacteria, these men have been forced to live life sitting down. In their own version of the full-contact sport, they battle each other in custom-made gladiator-like wheelchairs, pursuing gold medals and proving to themselves and to anyone who see them in action that there is life after disability.
From the gyms of Middle America to the Olympic arena in Athens, Greece, "Murderball" tells the story of a group of indomitable, world-class athletes unlike any ever shown on screen. It will smash every stereotype you have ever had about "gimps" and "cripples." It is a film about family, revenge, honor and the triumph of love over loss.
But most of all, it is a film about standing up, even after your spirit and your spine have been crushed.
New York Times: "This exciting, richly human documentary about wheelchair rugby as played by members of the United States Paralympic Team avoids the inspirational bromides of many movies about the disabled. Its disturbing observation that brutal, cutthroat athletic competition gives the players a reason to live can easily be extended to embrace our entire national sports mania."

"Grizzly Man" will play at Market Square East on Wednesday, Nov. 16, at 7 p.m.
"Grizzly Man" explores the life and gruesome death of amateur grizzly bear expert and wildlife preservationist Timothy Treadwell. The film is a powerful cautionary tale about modern man's relationship to wild nature as it follows Treadwell's journeys to Alaska where he lived among the grizzlies and grew to love them. Treadwell's crusade to defend the grizzlies tragically ended when he and his girlfriend were attacked and killed by a rogue grizzly in Oct. 2003.
New York Times: "' March of the Penguins' may be a good film but 'Grizzly Man' is a great one. At its center is a charismatic modern-day hippie who lived in Alaska on and off for 13 years. An initially appealing figure, Treadwell loses his glamour as he grows to imagine himself a kind of honorary grizzly; the man who gave cute pet names to the beasts in his wilderness neighborhood appears increasingly unhinged and messianic."
Variety: "Nothing short of extraordinary"
Roger Ebert.com: "An astonishing portrait…brilliant"
Hollywood Reporter: "One of the best nature films ever made."

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