Country: UK
Year: 2010
Duration: 90'
the arbor The short life of Andrea Dunbar, the author of Rita, Sue and Bob Too, as told through various points of view and reminiscences. The film alternates a representation of The Arbor, which she wrote when she was only fifteen years old and living in Brafferton Arbor, which inspired the title, with interviews with friends and acquaintances. The film shows the complex personality of Dunbar and her difficult relationship with her daughter Lorraine, who is now in prison for having caused the death of her son. Lorraine’s recent reconciliation with the figure of her mother adds power to the author’s human drama. “I want people to think about the fact that the film has been shaped and edited by the filmmakers, but to acknowledge that the interviewees have differing ways of telling the same story so that the experience of watching can move away from the factual and become a narrative, but I don’t want to take people out of engaging emotionally. I want to make an audience aware that they are watching the retelling of a true story. And this becomes all the more important when the story is such an emotive one.”
Biography
film director
Clio Barnard
Clio Barnard (UK) is an artist who has been involved in audio-visual works for years. Her works have participated at various international festivals; they have been exhibited in galleries like the Tate Modern and the Tate Britain in London and MoMA in New York, and have been broadcast by the most important English channels, including Channel 4. In 2005 she won the prize created by England’s Paul Hamlyn Foundation for emerging artists. The Arbor, her debut feature film, was selected at the Torino Film Festival, in Onde section. She then directed The Selfish Giant (2013), which premiered at the Director’s Fortnight in Cannes and then won the Label Europa Cinemas Award.
FILMOGRAFIA
Dirt and Science (cm, 1988), Lambeth Mash (cm, doc., 2000), Random Acts of Intimacy (cm, 2002), Flood (cm, 2003), Dark Glass (cm, 2006), The Arbor (doc., 2010), The Selfish Giant (2013), Dark River (2017).
Cast
& Credits
regia, sceneggiatura/director, screenplay
Clio Barnard
soggetto/story
dall’omonima pièce teatrale di/from the play of the same title by Andrea Dunbar
fotografia/cinematography
Ole Birkeland
montaggio/film editing
Nick Fenton, Daniel Goddard
scenografia/production design
Matthew Button
costumi/costume design
Matt Price
musica/music
Molly Nyman, Harry Escott
suono/sound
Tim Barker
interpreti e personaggi/cast and characters
Manjinder Virk (Lorraine), Christine Bottomley (Lisa), Monica Dolan (Ann), Neil Dudgeon (Steve), Danny Webb (Max, il padre/Father), George Costigan (Jimmy), Natalie Gavin (la ragazza/Girl), Kathryn Pogson (Pamela)
produttore/producer
Tracy O’Riordan
produzione/production
Artangel, UK Film Council Production
vendita all’estero/world sales
Wavelength Pictures