AFS Selects "Le Havre"

AFS Selects is the name of a new partnership between the Austin Film Society and the Violet Crown Cinema.

Every month, a new film will be selected from the downtown theatre’s slate of independent, documentary, and international films, and for that film's entire run, $2 will be knocked off the price of admission for AFS members who show their membership cardsat the box office or while ordering advance tickets by phone or online. (General admission is $9 for matinees, $11 for weeknight screenings, and $13 for weekend evening shows. Ticket prices include four hours of free parking in the connected AMLI parking garage, which is entered from San Antonio between 2nd and 3rd Streets.)

It’s therefore so appropriate that the first film in this partnership is Le Havre, Aki Kaurismäki’s amusingly deadpan story about people who live in the margins of society. Kaurismäki is Finland’s best known director and Le Havre has been nominated as that country’s nominee for a Best Foreign Language Oscar, even though the film was made on location in France. In 2009, the AFS dedicated an entire Essential Cinema series, Aki Kaurismäki: The Chilly Humorist of Finland, to this director’s work; "The Mighty Finn" is my preview of the series. Now, AFS Programming Director Chale Nafus has written notes for Le Havre, and my review for the Chronicle is also here. Support of the AFS Selects partnership with the Violet Crown is one more way to ensure to the continued flow of original film programming in Austin.