The Village Screen’s Christmas Cinema at Victoria Baths
Tom Grieve, Cinema Editor
The Village Screen bring a yuletide twinkle to Victoria Baths this December as they pop-up a Christmas-themed weekend cinema showing everything from kids’ classics, to romantic winter warmers, and a certain Bruce Willis action extravaganza. Manchester’s Victorian Water Palace makes for a charming – if unlikely – cinema space; with a screen set up at one end of the drained pool and film fans sat in deckchairs along the bottom. Village Screen regulars know the drill, but as always the films will be accompanied by some of the North’s finest street food vendors, a fully stocked bar and a DJ loaded with festive tunes.
It all kicks off on Friday 7th December with John McTiernan’s classic of 80s cinema: Die Hard. Now widely accepted as a Christmas staple, Bruce Willis plays a New York cop who gets more than he bargains for when he travels to L.A. in a last ditch effort to win back his wife, and reunite his family. Saturday 8th is a more child-friendly affair, as Kermit, Miss Piggy and co. do Dickens in A Muppet Christmas Carol, before Macauley Culkin’s Kevin McCallister is left Home Alone to battle a pair of bungling burglars.
Sunday 9th brings with it a couple of recent entries into the Christmas-movie canon. In Elf, Will Ferrell stars as Buddy, a startlingly large member of Santa’s workshop team who travels to New York upon learning of his heritage. This classic fish-out-of-water tale quickly established itself as a festive fave due to Ferrell’s comedic chops and quotable dialogue. Last up, The Village Screen have lined up Richard Curtis’ ensemble romance, Love Actually. With a cast so starry it’d bewilder the wise men, Hugh Grant, Keira Knightley, Emma Thompson, Liam Neeson, Colin Firth and company make for a fitting finale to The Village Screen’s Christmas Cinema.
