Celebrate 60 years of Austrian film at Regent Street Cinema

The ACF London is celebrating their 60th birthday, by partnering with Regent Street Cinema, and hosting a special film season. The season showcases the journey of Austrian cinema throughout the last six decades.

Screenings to show at Regent Street Cinema include:

Female Experimenta
Thursday 12 May 2016, 7.00pm | Austrian Cultural Forum London
Austrian Film Season in partnership with Regent Street Cinema
Avant-garde filmmaking has played a vital role in establishing Austria as a film nation in its own rights and filmmakers have often interacted with artists from other fields. Most notably the link with Viennese Actionism explored new artistic and intellectual avenues, paving the way for new approaches and perspectives. This ACF Cineclub presents the experimental work of Maria Lassnig, Linda Christanell and VALIE EXPORT, three unconventional, pioneering and bold female filmmakers and artists.


Double Bill: The Counterfeiters & Breathing
Q & A with Karl Markovics
Wednesday 18 May 2016, 7.00pm | Regent Street Cinema
Austrian Film Season in partnership with Regent Street Cinema.
In The Counterfeiters, Karl Markovics stars as Salomon Sorowitsch, known as the ‘king of the counterfeiters’. Thanks to his pragmatism and inexhaustible creativity, he enjoys the sunny side of life until he is arrested and transported to Sachsenhausen in 1944, where he is coerced into assisting a secret Nazi-operation. Markovics’ directorial debut Breathing is an eloquent and affectionate portrayal of an incarcerated teenager attempting to win parole by working at a local morgue.

The Inheritors
Thursday 19 May 2016, 7.00pm | Austrian Cultural Forum London
Austrian Film Season in partnership with Regent Street Cinema

A village between the world wars: seven maids and farm hands inherit their dead master’s farm. While The Inheritors (Die Siebtelbauern, 1997) has all the hallmarks of a modern-day Heimatfilm – a genre which idealised the beauty of nature and served as post-war escapism – the film actually paints a much darker picture of Austrian rural realities at the time.


Gustav Deutsch's Film Ist
Sunday 29 May 2016, 4.00pm | Regent Street Cinema
Austrian Film Season in partnership with Regent Street Cinema
Gustav Deutsch, the maestro of found footage filmmaking, investigates the endless wealth of the medium in this triple bill. The first film (1998) is dedicated to the scientific laboratory as the first birth place of cinematography, while the second (2002) addresses questions of magic, the circus and the fantasy aspect of cinema traced back to Georges Méliès. The third chapter Film ist. a girl & a gun (2009) deals with the oldest themes of cinematography and humankind

Double Bill: The Locked Out & The Piano Teacher
Wednesday 1 June 2016, 7.00pm | Regent Street Cinema
Austrian Film Season in partnership with Regent Street Cinema
Elfriede Jelinek is Austria’s most celebrated female writer and feminist. The Nobel laureate’s multi-faceted and highly controversial work, along with her political activism, has provoked divergent and often heated reactions. This double bill features films based on her books. The Locked Out (Die Ausgesperrten, 1982) tells the true story of a high school student running amok, while Michael Haneke’s The Piano Teacher (Die Klavierspielerin, 2001) stars Isabelle Huppert in a stunning performance as Erica Kohut who is seduced by one of her students

Double Bill: Hotel & The Strange Case of Wilhelm Reich
Wednesday 8 June 2016, 7.00pm | Regent Street Cinema
Austrian Film Season in partnership with Regent Street Cinema
This double bill presents films by two of the founding members of Austrian arthouse production company coop99. In Jessica Hausner’s Hotel, a new receptionist discovers her predecessor has mysteriously vanished. She is met with indifference and hostility from the other employees. Antonin Svoboda’s The S