Gaspar Noé Presents at FACT

Tom Grieve, Cinema Editor

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Gaspar Noé Presents

FACT, City Centre
16 May-13 June 2022

Always double check opening hours with the venue before making a special visit.

FACT
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To mark the release of Vortex, the new feature by France-based Argentine provocateur Gaspar Noé, Picturehouse at FACT have invited the director to programme a brand new film season. Gaspar Noé Presents is a personally curated selection of films, each relating to the narrative, formal and collaborative elements of Vortex.

Noé is known for his brand of challenging, extreme cinema, with films such as Irreversible, Enter the Void and Climax combining disturbing moments of sex and violence with phantomasgraphic, hallucinatory imagery. His latest stars master Italian director Dario Argento (in his first starring role) alongside Françoise Lebrun as an elderly couple beset by the terrors of dementia, disease, and the prospect of death.

It’s been touted as something of a departure for Noé, a sobering kind of horror dedicated “to all those whose brains will decompose before their hearts”. As such, the selection of films chosen for the film season at FACT is perhaps more varied than long time fans of the director might expect.

Amour

Gaspar Noé Presents starts on Monday 16 May with Dario Argento’s 1970 debut film, The Bird with the Crystal Plumage – a lurid serial killer flick which would help define the Italian giallo. Staying in Italy, Argento’s film is followed by Vittorio De Sica’s 1952 neorealist masterpiece Umberto D. (Mon 23 May), in which an elderly pensioner, alone except for his dog, strives to make ends meet during the post-war economic recovery of the 1940s.

The remaining films continue to focus on the theme of ageing. Yasujiro Ozu’s iconic 1953 Tokyo Story (Mon 30 May) is a nuanced portrait of an elderly couple ignored by their children, but embraced by their widowed daughter-in-law. While Michael Haneke’s 2012 Cannes Palme d’Or winner, Amour (Mon 6 June), takes a bleaker look at a retired couple’s battle with illness.

Noé’s season concludes with one of Hollywood’s most recognisable portraits of ageing, Billy Wilder’s suffocating 1950 Tinseltown noir, Sunset Boulevard on Monday 13 June. Starring Gloria Swanson as former silent cinema siren Norma Desmond, Wilder’s film delves into darkness and decrepitude, for a tragic tale of a forgotten star.

Where to go near Gaspar Noé Presents at FACT

City Centre
Café or Coffee Shop
Garden Cafe FACT

FACT Liverpool gets back to its coffee-with-creativity roots thanks to a foliage-full new café.

Liverpool
Restaurant
Next to Nowhere Café

Food From Nowhere is a weekly vegan cafe held in the basement space of much-loved radical bookshop News From Nowhere. It’s open every Saturday from midday to 5pm.

library
City Centre
Shop
News from Nowhere

News from Nowhere is a radical community bookshop selling texts on important current issues as well as leading social justice initiatives.

food and drink
City Centre
Restaurant
BAM BOO

BAM BOO delivers a slice of paradise right in Liverpool city centre, with indulgent meals and delicious cocktails.

City Centre
Café or Coffee Shop
Bold Street Coffee

A super cool cafe at the top of Bold Street, Bold Street Coffee in Liverpool serves a range of specialist coffee, cakes and sandwiches.

Liverpool
Restaurant
Maray

Much-loved Liverpool restaurant, specialising in forward-thinking small plate dishes.

City Centre
Café or Coffee Shop
LEAF on Bold Street

Keeping Bold Street a hub of creativity, LEAF is more than a tearoom, it’s also a bar and thriving event space with a packed schedule of upcoming happenings.

City Centre
Music venue
Arts Club Liverpool

Based in Liverpool’s old Royal Institute of Arts and Science building, Liverpool Arts Club is a great spot to catch small touring acts.

food and drink
City Centre
Bar or Pub
Cafe Tabac

Cafe Tabac is the longest running café bar in Liverpool, serving food and drinks to arty locals and curious newcomers.

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