Aspen, CO
December 21, 2008 - January 3, 2009
Overview
As the Oscar ™ race heats up, December is now synonymous with the release of the
year’s most critically acclaimed, most eagerly anticipated movies. Since 1992
Aspen Film has been adding celluloid excitement to Aspen’s winter holidays with
a slate of the hottest films headlined by top directors and stars. Open to everyone,
this two-week extravaganza offers a sneak peek at some of the films everyone will
be talking about come the Academy Awards®.
Venue
All films screen at Harris Concert Hall (located adjacent to the Benedict Music Tent) or at the Wheeler Opera House (located in downtown Aspen). Doors open 30 minutes before show time
More information on Aspen Film Academy Screenings
Ticket Information
| Rate: |
General Admission $12
Members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences should contact 970.925.6882 x 101 |
| When on Sale: |
On Sale Now |
| Phone Orders: |
970.920.5770 |
| On-line Orders: |
www.wheeleroperahouse.com |
| Advanced Walk-in Orders: |
Wheeler Box Office 320 East Hyman or at
the Harris Concert Hall 960 N 3rd St. |
| Business Hours: |
10:00 am - 6:00 pm |
Tickets available at the door, subject to availability. If advance tickets sellout, a waitlist begins 30 minutes before
show time.
Transportation & Parking
Free parking available at North Third & Gillespie St. There is also a Free RFTA Cross Town Shuttle.
Please call 970.925.8484 for bus information.
Schedule of Films
December, 21st |
December, 22nd |
December, 23rd |
December, 24th |
December, 25th |
December, 26th |
December, 27th |
December, 28th |
December, 29th |
December, 30th |
December, 31st |
January, 1st |
January, 2nd |
January, 3rd
| 5:30 pm |
118 minutes |
Happy-Go-Lucky |
| 5:30 pm |
110 minutes |
The Secret Life of Bees |
| 8:00 pm |
141 minutes |
Changeling |
| 5:15 pm |
130minutes |
Everlasting Moments |
| 8:00 pm |
125 minutes |
Milk |
| 5:30 pm |
TBD |
Revolutionary |
| 8:15 pm |
129 minutes |
Defiance |
| 5:30 pm |
117 minutes |
I've Loved You So Long |
| 8:15 pm |
87minutes |
Waltz with Bashir |
| 5:15 pm |
130 minutes |
The Class |
| 8:15 pm |
116 minutes |
Gran Torino |
| 5:30 pm |
80 minutes |
Wendy and Lucy |
| 8:00 pm |
135 minutes |
Gomorrah |
| 5:30pm |
122 minutes |
Frost/Nixon |
| 3:00 pm |
104 minutes |
Doubt |
| 5:30 pm |
92 minutes |
Last Chance Harvey |
| 8:00 pm |
131 minutes |
Che Part 1 |
| 5:15 pm |
132 minutes |
Che Part 2 |
| 8:15 pm |
140 minutes |
The Reader |
| 5:30 pm |
105 minutes |
The Duchess |
| 8:00 pm |
105minutes |
The Wrestler |
Film Description
-
Happy-Go-Lucky
- Just how hard is it to be happy? In Mike Leigh’s (Topsy-Turvy, Secrets & Lies) new comedy, Sally Hawkins stars as Poppy, an irrepressibly free-spirited schoolteacher who brings an unsinkable sense of optimism to every situation. Poppy’s ability to maintain a buoyant perspective is tested early on when her bike is stolen. Along the way, her positive state of mind encounters even more challenges, including a cynical driving instructor (Eddie Marsan), a fiery flamenco instructor, her bitter pregnant sister, a troubled homeless man, and a bullying student, not to mention she has also thrown out her back. Leigh offers a touching, truthful, and life-affirming exploration of one of the most mysterious, and often the most elusive, of all human qualities: happiness. (UK, 118 min. R. Print courtesy of Miramax Films.)
-
Secret Life of Bees
- JDakota Fanning leads a stellar ensemble cast in this evocative adaptation of Sue Monk Kidd’s bestselling novel chronicling a young Southern girl’s healing journey during a defining moment in American history. Escaping her lonely life and embittered father, 14-year-old Lily (Fanning) flees with Rosaleen (Jennifer Hudson), her caregiver and sole friend during the dawning of the Civil Rights era. Taken in by the intelligent and independent Boatwright sisters (played by Queen Latifah, Alicia Keys and Sophie Okonedo), Lily finds solace in their mesmerizing world of beekeeping and discovers a realm of kindness and redemption that has eluded her. Director Gina Prince-Bythewood artfully renders a story of adventure and self-discovery. (USA, 110 min. PG-13. Print courtesy of Fox Searchlight Pictures.)
-
Changeling
- Changeling begins on a deceptively personal scale when single working mother Christine Collins (wonderfully played by Angelina Jolie) returns home one day to discover that her son has disappeared. When the initially unresponsive Los Angeles Police Department launches a national manhunt and locates Walter, it’s not the end but merely the beginning of a stranger-than-fiction true crime tale. A thematic companion to Mystic River but more ambitious and far-reaching, Changeling is at once the harrowing story of a woman wronged and a serpentine portrait of city corruption and closely guarded disturbingly dark secrets. It is also Clint Eastwood’s most provocative inquiry yet into justice and that morally ambiguous grey area between good and evil. (USA, 141 min. R. Print courtesy of Universal Pictures.)
-
Curious Case of Benjamin Button
- In an unexpected departure, David Fincher (Se7en, Fight Club) directs Cate Blanchett and Brad Pitt in a romantic fantasy adapted from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s short story about two fate-crossed lovers. Benjamin Button (Pitt) is born at the end of World War I as an eighty-year-old infant who ages backwards. Moving forward through the 20th century, he meets the love of his life, Daisy (Blanchett). But a thwarting force slowly introduces subtle gravity into this seemingly fanciful adventure. Using ground breaking special effects and imagery, the film yields magical moments through the discovery of the people, places, love, and joy in Button’s bittersweet journey. (USA, 165 min. PG-13. Print courtesy of Paramount Pictures.)
-
Everlasting Moments
- One fine day in 1907, Maria Larsson wins a camera in a lottery. A young maid and mother with no artistic aspirations, she quickly blossoms under the tutelage of the kindly village photographer and is surprised to discover a passion. For the next ten years, as she struggles to keep her home and growing family together in the face of a workers’ strike, unemployment, the Great War, and a chronically philandering and abusive husband, Maria manages to record a gallery of “everlasting moments.” Based on the true story of his wife’s grandmother, celebrated Swedish director Jan Troell (The Emigrants) brings this family album to vibrant and affecting life. Winning audiences since its festival debut earlier this fall, Troell’s latest is one of his finest and Sweden’s official Oscar® submission. (Sweden, 130 min. PG. Print courtesy of IFC Films.)
-
Milk
- Harvey Milk, America’s first openly gay man to be voted into major public office, was more than a gay activist. Funny, courageous, outspoken, he forged coalitions across a wide spectrum at a time when prejudice against gays was the accepted norm. From Milk’s relocation to San Francisco in the early 70s to his political rise and then tragic death in 1978, Gus Van Sant (Good Will Hunting) adroitly and tenderly chronicles the Mayor of Castro Street’s personal and public life. Capturing the politician’s powerful effect on the people he served, Milk also recalls an exciting moment in American political life that has particular resonance thirty years later. Sean Penn leads a fantastic cast including Emile Hirsch, Josh Brolin, and James Franco. (USA, 125 min. R. Print courtesy of Focus Features.)
-
Revolutionary Road
- With Revolutionary Road, director Sam Mendes returns to the suburban milieu of quiet desperation that earned him an Oscar© for American Beauty. Based on Richard Yates’ acclaimed 1961 novel, the story centers on Frank Wheeler (Leonardo DiCaprio), an aspiring writer who sells out to Madison Avenue, and his restless wife April (Kate Winslet). As their conventional life in a mid-1950’s Connecticut suburb threatens to stifle their spirits and love, Frank and April dream of moving to France. Incisively translating Yates’ poetically insightful and brutally honest prose to the screen, Mendes subtly peels away the layers of a downward spiraling marriage, exposing two lives whose self-assured exteriors mask unsettling self-truths. (USA, 119 min. R. Print courtesy of Paramount Vantage.)
- Defiance
- Based on an extraordinary true story, this epic WWII tale of family, honor, vengeance, and salvation unfolds in the Belarussian woods where three Polish Jews (Daniel Craig, Liev Schreiber, and Jamie Bell) take refuge from the Nazis. What begins as a primitive struggle to survive becomes something far more consequential – a way for them to avenge the deaths of their loved ones by saving thousands of others. Whispers of the brothers’ daring efforts spread, attracting others – men and women, young and old – willing to risk everything for the hope of freedom. As winter descends, they work to create a community, and to keep faith alive when all humanity appears to be lost. Edward Zwick (Blood Diamond, Glory) directs. (USA, 129 min. R. Print courtesy of Paramount Vantage.)
-
I've Loved You So Long
-
French novelist and screenwriter Philippe Claudel brings intelligence and compassion to his debut feature about two sisters, divided long ago by a shocking tragedy, who are searching to find closure on the past and forge a new life together. Kristin Scott Thomas gives a sensational performance as the mysterious Juliette, whose move into sister Léa’s house in their French hometown sets off a journey toward redemption. Though Léa (Elsa Zylberstein), her husband and friends hesitate, Léa’s two adopted daughters take an immediate liking to their newfound aunt. As secrets are revealed, the two sisters slowly rebuild a bond of trust. A critical and box office hit in France, I’ve Loved You So Long explores the terrain of forgiveness to utterly engrossing effect. (France/Germany, 117 min. PG-13. Print courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics.)
-
Waltz with Bashir
-
Haunted by a past he can’t recall – his military service in the 1982 Lebanese war – Israeli documentary filmmaker Ari Folman embarks on a quest to reconstruct his wartime experiences. Interviewing old friends and comrades, Folman depicts their stories through animation, painting a vivid picture of what it was like to be young, Israeli, and conscripted in the early ’80s. As Folman delves deeper into his past, his recollections begin to bubble up in surreal images, conveying the feverish atmosphere of warfare, where fear, horror — and, later, guilt — distort perception and memory. Folman’s film both illustrates and transforms the events to which he bears witness. Winner of worldwide accolades including Best Picture at the Israeli Academy Awards, Waltz with Bashir is Israel’s Oscar® submission for Foreign Language Film. (Israel/France/Germany, 87 min. R. Courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics.)
-
The Class
- Take a classroom full of outspoken, multi-ethnic teens from a tough Parisian junior high, none of them professional actors, add a real-life teacher trying to make a difference, and you've got Laurent Cantet's engrossing portrait of the new France. It's a new school year and the French teacher strives to make literature relevant to his feisty polyglot charges, which constantly test the boundary between respect and anarchy. Based on his autobiographical bestseller, François Bégaudeau plays himself in this refreshingly unsentimental addition to the canon of classroom movies. Using a gripping documentary style, director Cantet tracks the complex dynamics and fluid emotions of this social "laboratory" to captivating effect. Winner of the Cannes Film Festival's Palme d'Or, this is France's Oscar® submission for Foreign Language Feature. (France, 130 min. PG-13. Print courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics.)
-
Gran Torino
- Clint Eastwood (Million Dollar Baby) directs and stars in his latest feature, a drama about a man, his car, and the changing world around him. Walt Kowalski (Eastwood), an iron-willed, disgruntled Korean War vet and bigot, lives in a racially mixed Detroit neighborhood menaced by local gangs. His prized possession, a 1972 Gran Torino, catches the eye of his troubled next-door neighbor, a boy from a Vietnamese immigrant family. When the teenager is caught trying to steal the car, Kowalski sets out to reform his young neighbor. With unflinching honesty and bold action, Gran Torino forces Kowalski to confront his long-held prejudices, and Eastwood once again delivers the kind of intense, suspenseful, yet thought-provoking drama only he can create. (USA, 116 min. R. Print courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures.)
-
Wendy and Lucy
- Actress Michelle Williams (Brokeback Mountain) delivers a critically acclaimed performance in this spare and uniquely offbeat road movie. Wendy (Williams) is headed to Alaska, hoping to find lucrative work and the start of a new life with her dog, Lucy. But when her car breaks down in Oregon, the thin fabric of Wendy’s precarious financial situation comes apart and she is faced with a series of increasingly dire decisions, with far-ranging repercussions for herself and Lucy. Based on the fine script she co-wrote with short story writer Jonathan Raymond, true-indie director Kelly Reichardt (Old Joy) explores sympathy and generosity at the edges of American life, revealing the limits and depths of people’s duty to each other in tough times. (USA, 80 min. R. Print courtesy of Oscilloscope Pictures.)
-
Gomorrah/dt>
- Roberto Saviano’s fictionalized exposé of the Camorra, Italy’s most powerful criminal organization, hit a nerve – the book topped Italian best-seller lists and its author made the Mafia’s hit list (he still travels with bodyguards). Writer-director Matteo Garrone has created an equal stir with his powerful screen adaptation. Winner of the Grand Prize at Cannes, and Italy’s Oscar® submission for Foreign Language Film, Gomorrah interweaves the stories of five separate sets of characters, following them through the scruffy byways of Naples’ working-class suburbs. From high fashion, toxic waste, shopkeepers, and pensioners, to teenage petty criminals and aging but still lethal mobsters, Garrone lays bare the pervasive, tentacle-like grip of organized crime on all reaches of southern Italian society. (Italy, 135 min. Not yet rated. Print courtesy of IFC Films.)
- Frost / Nixon
- Tony® Award-winning actor Frank Langella (Starting Out in the Evening) stars as Richard Nixon in this biographical drama based on the televised interviews Nixon granted David Frost in 1977. Adapted from his own play by writer Peter Morgan (The Queen, The Last King of Scotland) and directed by Oscar®-winner Ron Howard (The Da Vinci Code), Frost/Nixon creates an intimate and fierce battle of wits between devil-may-care young British talk show host Frost, (Michael Sheen, The Queen) and the brooding, fallen president. While Frost’s advisors are determined to give Nixon the trial he never had, Nixon is intent on outsmarting Frost and winning back the respect of the American people. Digging into their roles, Langella and Sheen vividly revive this tense and exciting match. (USA, 122 min. R. Print courtesy of Universal Pictures.)
-
Doubt
- The Bronx. 1964. Charismatic, forward-thinking Father Flynn (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is new to St. Nicholas and keen to introduce change. But his efforts quickly put him at odds with Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Meryl Streep), the school’s iron-gloved principal who rules by fear and discipline. When young Sister James (Amy Adams) shares her suspicions that the priest may be paying too much personal attention to St. Nicholas’ first black student, her zealous superior is galvanized to unearth the truth, setting in motion a confrontation that threatens devastating consequences. John Patrick Shanley brings his absorbing, intelligent Pulitzer Prize-winning play to the screen in a gripping drama about truth, the winds of change, and the danger of blind justice fueled by moral certainty. (USA, 104 min. PG-13. Print courtesy of Miramax Films.)
-
Last Chance Harvey
- Thompson and Dustin Hoffman reunite with tremendous on-screen chemistry in this engaging romantic dramedy written and directed by British filmmaker Joel Hopkins. When divorced, unsuccessful New York jingle-writer Harvey Shine (Hoffman) travels to London to attend his daughter’s wedding, a string of mishaps force him to face his crumbling personal and professional life. Retreating to an airport bar to drown his sorrows, he meets Kate (Thompson), a prickly, 40-something would-be writer, whose emotionally crimped life is limited to work and the occasional humiliating blind date. Their chance encounter transforms both. Thompson and Hoffman enrich their hapless characters with endearing charm, and Hopkins crafts a subtle and stylish tale of late-life romance that delights in simple pleasures. (USA, 92 min. PG-13. Print courtesy of Overture Films.)
-
Che Part I
- Perhaps more than any other individual, Ernesto “Che” Guevara personifies an era: The Sixties, a time when “Viva La Revolución!” was a serious call to action, not cool T-shirt art. Che’s allure is arguably as powerful now as it was when he was alive. Director Steven Soderbergh and actor Benicio Del Toro take on the daunting task of telling this legendary figure’s story. Part one of this fascinating epic, spans 1955 to 1962 and deals with the Cuban Revolution, portraying the grueling countryside campaign that Fidel and Che waged before triumphantly entering Havana on January 1, 1958. Soderbergh’s intimate yet complex portrait reveals a powerful and decisive figure who is also human, flawed, and at times painfully frail. (USA/France/Spain, 131 min., R. Print courtesy of IFC Films.)
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Che Part II
- The second half of Steven Soderbergh’s sweeping portrait of Che Guevara is set ten years after the Cuban Revolution, from 1966 until his death in 1967. Che Part 2 follows Che as he attempts to export the lessons of his successful Cuban grassroots campaign to Bolivia, galvanizing poor peasants and valiantly organizing them into a suitable military force able to take on trained professionals. This is guerilla warfare, and Soderbergh does a superb job capturing its scale and gritty reality. As Guevara, Benicio Del Toro, disappears into his role – the likeness is eerie and his performance towering. Inevitably, Che will provoke endless discussion about this most charismatic and elusive of men. (USA/France/Spain, 132 min. R. Print courtesy of IFC Films.)
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The Reader
-
Kate Winslet and Ralph Fiennes star in this beautifully-acted love story based on Bernhard Schlink’s best-selling novel of the same name. Directed by Stephen Daldry (The Hours, Billy Elliot), this drama recounts Michael’s (Fiennes) passionate affair with a mysterious older woman, Hanna (Winslet), in pre-WWII Germany. The romance left the young man heartbroken. Years later, when Michael is a law student observing the Nazi war trials, Hanna enters his life once again – this time as a defendant in the courtroom. As her past is revealed, Michael uncovers a secret that will impact both of their lives. The Reader is a haunting story about truth, reconciliation, and how one generation comes to terms with the crimes of another. (USA, 140 min. R. Print courtesy of The Weinstein Co.)
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The Dutchess
- Keira Knightley and Ralph Fiennes lead an outstanding cast in this lavishly produced biography of 18th-century English aristocrat – and celebrity of her day – Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire. Distinguished by her extravagant tastes, highflying friends, and provocative political views, the Duchess was a fascinating figure involved in national politics, a complicated marriage and romantic intrigues. Visualized through stunning locations, costumes, and cinematography, the film chronicles her social arc from 17-year old budding beauty to fully flowering “Empress of Fashion” and favorite Whig whip. Knightley’s passionate Duchess strikes fire against the flinty coldness of Fiennes’ Duke. Dominic Cooper (The History Boys) as her lover and Charlotte Rampling as her mother, among other supporting talent, bring this period drama to vibrant life. (UK/Germany, 105 min. PG-13. Print courtesy of Paramount Vantage.)
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The Wrestler
- In a tour-de-force performance, Mickey Rourke creates a fascinating, humorous, and surprisingly nuanced portrait of “The Ram,” a washed-up professional wrestler eking out a living while dreaming of trying to get back in the game. Outside the ring, all he has to show for his life is his estranged daughter (Evan Rachel Wood) and a tentative romance with a fading stripper (Marisa Tomei). When offered a rematch with a heyday rival, Ram rises to the bait, resulting in a climax that is exhilarating, brutal, funny, and moving. With the precision and simplicity of a great Hemingway story, director Darren Aronofsky’s latest film is astonishing from every angle, winning top honors at Venice this fall and showcasing an unbelievable performance by Rourke. (USA, 105 min. R. Print courtesy of Fox Searchlight Pictures.)
Package Information
For all-inclusive event packages, including lodging, airfare, rental cars, or
anything else you may require, call one of our local vacation experts at
888.649.5982
, or e-mail
info@stayaspensnowmass.com to have a customized quote sent to you via e-mail.
