Capital Celluloid 2025 — Day 331: Sat Nov 29

Madame X (Lowell Rich, 1966): BFI Southbank, NFT2, 8.40pm


This film, which also screens on November 23rd (introduced by season curator Ruby McGuigan) is part of the Melodrama season at BFI Southbank.

BFI introduction:
Alexandre Bisson’s 1908 play, with its tragic anti-heroine and tale of moral decline, has been revived and transformed across the decades. Holly is a working-class girl who marries into wealth, only to find her new surroundings isolated and suffocating. Her relationship with a local hedonist prompts a downward spiral, with Holly quickly ejected by those who never truly accepted her. For Lana Turner, it is the role she was born to play. As the bored housewife-turned-fugitive who loses everything, including her beloved son, she brings a fragility and tenacity that elevates the emotional avalanche of this Technicolor tragedy. Even Sirk must have been envious.

Here (and above) is the trailer.

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