Witness (Weir, 1985): BFI Southbank, NFT2, 8.40pm
This film, which also screens on March 31st, April 5th and April 22nd, is part of the Peter Weir season at BFI Southbank. You can find all the details here. Tonight's screening is introduced by season curator Elena Lazic.
Time Out review:
Peter Weir's first film set in America explores a theme familiar from his
earlier work: the discovery of an all but forgotten culture in modern
society: in this case the Amish, a puritanical sect whose life in
Pennsylvania has remained unchanged since the 18th century. Threat
explodes into this community when an Amish boy witnesses a murder; cop
Harrison Ford investigates the case and, finding his own life endangered, is
forced to hot-foot it back to the Amish ranch with the bad guys in
pursuit. The film also allows Ford to fall in love with the boy's mother
(Kelly McGillis), and comments on the distance between the messy world Ford
leaves behind and the cloistered one in which he takes refuge. Powerful,
assured, full of beautiful imagery and thankfully devoid of easy
moralising, it also offers a performance of surprising skill and
sensitivity from Ford.
Richard Rayner
Here (and above) is the trailer.
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