Plymouth Arts Cinema is the city's independent cinema for everyone. Check out what's on in January 2024, from critically acclaimed dramas and thought-provoking documentaries to enchanting animations and gripping thrillers, the programme offers something for everyone. 

   

Where to find Plymouth Arts Cinema

You can find Plymouth Arts Cinema inside Arts University Plymouth’s main campus at Tavistock Place. Go through Arts University Plymouth’s main entrance and turn right, you will face their Box Office and Café-Bar.

  

Opening times and how to book

The Box Office and Café-bar open Tuesday, Thursday and Friday: 5-8.30pm; Wednesday: 1-8.30pm; Saturday: 1-8pm). You can call Box Office during these times: 01752 206114.

Christmas and New Year; The cinema, Box Office and Café will be closed from Friday 22 December and will reopen on Tuesday 2 January at 5pm.

Standard £9.00 | Matinees £7.00 | Bringing in Baby £4 | Over 60s £7.75 | 25 & Under, Students, AUP Staff, Budget - Unwaged and low income £4 | Friends 10% discount and £6 on Tuesdays. Please bring relevant ID if you are eligible for a discount.

www.plymouthartscinema.org | 01752 206114 | info@plymouthartscinema.org

   

Eileen (15)

Tuesday 2 – Thursday 4 January

• Tue 2, 6pm
• Wed 3, 2.30pm & 8.30pm
• Thu 4, 6pm

Dir. William Oldroyd, US, 2023, 98 mins. Cast. Thomasin McKenzie, Anne Hathaway, Shea Whigham.

Based on the book of the same name by literary powerhouse Ottessa Moshfegh, Eileen follows a peculiar young woman whose dreary life stretches on toward unending misery. In frigid 1960s Boston, Eileen shuffles between her father’s dingy, emotionally haunted home and the prison where she works alongside colleagues who have ostracized her. When an intoxicating woman joins the prison staff, Eileen is immediately taken with her. Just when the possibility of a friendship (or maybe more) takes hold and forms a singular glimmer in Eileen’s darkness, her newfound confidant entangles her in a shocking crime that alters everything.

   

Tótem (12A)

F-Rated

Tuesday 2 – Thursday 4 January

• Tue 2, 8.30pm
• Wed 3, 6pm
• Thu 4, 8.30pm

Dir. Lila Avilés, Mexico, 2023, 95 mins, subtitled. Cast. Naíma Sentíes, Montserrat Marañon, Marisol Gasé

Director Lila Avilés explores the connection between relationships and interior spaces in her second film. This time, the setting is a large house where, over the course of a long day, family and friends meet for a dual ritual. It's the birthday of young father and painter Tona but, as it will likely be his last, it is also a farewell ceremony.

To begin with, Tona’s weakened body remains unseen. He remains in a room where he tries to summon up the strength required for a humanist ceremony. He will then be showered with all the love and affection needed to face his final journey.

Avilés takes meticulous care in observing her subjects. Her film bends trajectories and feelings, pruning all frills and excess away to reveal the spiritual dimension of human life.

   

Next Goal Wins (12A)

Friday 5 – Thursday 11 January

• Fri 5, 6pm
• Sat 6, 5.30pm
• Tue 9, 6pm
• Wed 10, 2.30pm & 8.30pm
• Thu 11, 11am (Bringing in Baby) & 6pm

Dir. Taika Waititi, UK/US, 2023, 104 mins. Cast. Michael Fassbender, Oscar Kightley, Kaimana.

Based on a true story, Next Goal Wins follows the American Samoa soccer team, infamously known for their brutal 31-0 loss in 2001. With the World Cup Qualifiers approaching, the team hires down-on-his-luck, maverick coach Thomas Rongen hoping he will turn the world’s worst soccer team around in this heartfelt underdog comedy.

   

Monica (15)

Friday 5 – Thursday 11 January

• Fri 5, 8.30pm
• Sat 6, 2.30pm & 8pm
• Tue 9, 8.30pm
• Wed 10, 6pm
• Thu 11, 8.30pm

Dir. Andrea Pallaoro, Italy, 2023, 113 mins. Cast. Trace Lysette, Patricia Clarkson, Emily Browning.

Monica is an intimate portrait of a woman who returns home after a long absence to confront the wounds of her past. Since leaving as a teenager, Monica reconnects with her mother and the rest of her family, finally allowing her to embark on a path of healing and acceptance. The film delves into her internal world and state of mind. It explores her pain and fears, her needs and her desires. And it ultimately explores universal themes of abandonment and forgiveness.

   

One Life

Friday 12 – Thursday 18 January

• Fri 12, 6pm
• Sat 13, 8pm
• Tue 16, 6pm
• Wed 17, 2.30pm & 8.30pm
• Thu 18, 6pm

Dir. James Hawes, UK, 2023, 110 mins. Cast. Anthony Hopkins, Helena Bonham Carter, Romola Garai.

One Life tells the true story of Sir Nicholas ‘Nicky’ Winton, a young London broker, who, along with Trevor Chadwick and Doreen Warinner of the British Committee for Refugees in Czechoslovakia, rescued 669 children from the Nazis in the months leading up to World War II. Nicky visited Prague in December 1938 and found families who had fled the rise of the Nazis in Germany and Austria living in desperate conditions with little or no shelter and food, and under threat of Nazi invasion. He immediately realised it was a race against time. How many children could he and the team rescue before the borders closed? Fifty years later, it’s 1988 and Nicky lives haunted by the fate of the children he wasn’t able to bring to safety in England; always blaming himself for not doing more. It’s not until a live BBC television show, ‘That’s Life!’, surprises him by introducing him to some surviving children – now adults – that he finally begins to come to terms with the guilt and grief he had carried for five decades.

   

Earth Mama (15)

Programmer’s Pick | F-Rated | Reclaim the Frame

Friday 12 – Thursday 18 January

• Fri 12, 8.30pm
• Sat 13, 5.30pm
• Tue 16, 8.30pm (Captioned+ Recorded Q&A)
• Thu 18, 8.30pm   

Dir. Savannah Leaf, US, 2023, 97 mins. Cast. Tia Nomore, Erika Alexander, Doechii.

Nominated for three BIFA awards, including Best Debut Director, Savanah Leaf's Earth Mama is a heartwarming story that explores the complexities of motherhood, the foster care system and the power of unity. “I don’t need a gold star to tell me I’m a good mom!” Heavily pregnant, and a recovering addict, Gia is a single mother who, with two children in foster care, embraces her Bay Area community as she fights to reclaim her family. Without preaching or editorialising, Savanah Leaf’s compassionate, poetic debut depicts a care system that’s stacked against poor American single mothers.

   

Anselm (PG)

Saturday 13 – Wednesday 17 January

1. Sat 13, 3pm
2. Wed 17, 6pm

Dir. Wim Wenders, Germany, 2023, 93 mins, subtitled. With. Anselm Kiefer, Daniel Kiefer, Anton Wenders.

Renowned director Wim Wenders creates an expressive portrait of one of the world’s most prominent artists Anselm Kiefer. For over two years, Wenders traced Kiefer’s path from his native Germany to his current home in France, connecting the stages of his life to the essential places throughout his phenomenal career that spans more than five decades. Wenders takes you on an expansive and experiential voyage of discovery of the artist's work.

   

The Boy and the Heron (12A)

Friday 19 – Thursday 25 January

• Fri 19, 5.45pm (English)
• Sat 20, 2pm (English)
• Tue 23, 8.15pm (Japanese)
• Thursday 25, 5.45pm (Japanese)

Dir. Hayao Miyazaki, Japan, 2023, 124 mins, subtitled/dubbed. Cast. Luca Padovan, Robert Pattinson, Christian Bale.

The latest animated masterpiece from Studio Ghibli visionary Hayao Miyazaki follows the transformative journey of a young, bereaved boy as he is magically transported to a dreamlike realm by a spirited talking heron. 1943. 12-year-old Mahito suffers the devastating loss of his beloved mother. In the aftermath, he is begrudgingly forced to relocate to a grand, blissful country estate, following his father’s marriage to his Aunt Natsuko.

This enchanting, semi-autobiographical animated odyssey from legendary filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki is pure Studio Ghibli magic – a thought-provoking, endlessly imaginative coming-of-age tale, which whisks us away on a deeply moving ethereal adventure.

We will be showing both the Japanese language version of the film (with English subtitles) and the English language version. See the list of showtimes for details of which version is showing when.

  

Priscilla (15)

F-Rated

Friday 19 – Thursday 25 January

• Fri 19, 8.30pm
• Sat 20, 8pm
• Tue 23, 5.45pm
• Wed 24, 2.30pm & 6pm
• Thu 25, 8.30pm

Dir. Sofia Coppola, US, 2023, 113 mins. Cast. Cailee Spaeny, Jacob Elordi, Ari Cohen.

When teenage Priscilla Beaulieu meets Elvis Presley at a party, the man who is already a meteoric rock-and-roll superstar becomes someone entirely unexpected in private moments: a thrilling crush, an ally in loneliness, a vulnerable best friend. Through Priscilla’s eyes, Sofia Coppola tells the unseen side of a great American myth in Elvis and Priscilla’s long courtship and turbulent marriage, from a German army base to his dream-world estate at Graceland, in this deeply felt and ravishingly detailed portrait of love, fantasy, and fame.

  

Tish (15) + Fotonow Event

Programmer’s Pick

Saturday 20 – Wednesday 24 January

• Sat 20, 5.30pm
• Wed 24, 8.30pm

Dir. Paul Sng, UK, 2023, 90 mins. With: Tish Murtha, Ella Murtha. Narrated by Maxine Peake

On Saturday 20^th January, Emma Booth from Fotonow will give an introduction to the film and talk about Fotonow’s socially engaged approach to photography.

Tish Murtha was a visionary photographer committed to documenting the struggle and inequality of the working-class communities that framed her upbringing. Her archive of work from Northeast England and London’s Soho of people on the margins of society in Thatcher’s Britain challenged inequality, yet she was unable to escape the poverty she documented and died aged 56, her work relatively unknown. Tish’s brilliant eye, her unswerving ethics and constant empathy are present in her images, yet little is known of the artist herself. In this feature documentary we follow Tish’s daughter, Ella, as she opens up her mother’s archive for the first time on screen to reveal a treasure trove of unseen images, artefacts, letters and diaries.

   

The Holdovers (15)

Friday 26 January – Thursday 1 February

• Fri 26, 5.45pm
• Sat 27, 8pm
• Tue 30, 5.30pm
• Wed 31, 2.30pm & 8.15pm
• Thu 1, 5.30pm

Dir. Alexander Payne, US, 2023, 133 mins. Cast. Paul Giamatti, Dominic Sessa, Da'Vine Joy Randolph.

As the students of New England prep school Barton Academy excitedly depart for the winter holidays, a ragtag bunch with nowhere to go are forced to stay behind. Making things worse, their appointed ‘babysitter’ is the cantankerous Professor Hunham. But as the days pass, the grumpy professor forms an unexpected bond with smart-but-troubled student Angus, and Mary, the school’s cook, who is grieving the loss of her son. Alexander Payne reunites with his Sideways star Paul Giamatti in a film that strikes the perfect balance between pathos and playfulness. The Holdovers is just the kind of warm-hearted and thoughtful work we have come to expect from one of contemporary cinema’s great humanist filmmakers.

  

Poor Things

Programmer’s Pick

Friday 26 January – Thursday 1 February

• Fri 26, 8.30pm
• Sat 27, 2pm & 5pm
• Tue 30, 8.15pm
• Wed 31, 5.30pm
• Thu 1, 8.15pm

Dir. Yorgos Lanthimos, UK, 2023, 141 mins.  Cast. Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe.

The incredible tale and fantastical evolution of Bella Baxter, a young woman brought back to life by the brilliant and unorthodox scientist Dr. Godwin Baxter. Under Baxter’s protection, Bella is eager to learn. Hungry for the worldliness she is lacking, Bella runs off with Duncan Wedderburn, a slick and debauched lawyer, on a whirlwind adventure across the continents. Free from the prejudices of her times, Bella grows steadfast in her purpose to stand for equality and liberation.

'A coming-of-age story, monster movie and bawdy, foul-mouthed sex romp that the Greek alchemist (Lanthimos) has somehow forged into a masterpiece.' - Time Out

  

All of Us Strangers (15)

Dir. Andrew Haigh, UK, 2023, 105 mins. Cast. Andrew Scott, Paul Mescal, Jamie Bell, Claire Foy.

Adam is a screenwriter living in London. He strikes up an uneasy acquaintance with his mysterious neighbour Harry, which edges towards something more intimate. At the same time, on visiting his old family home, he discovers something quite strange and beautiful, which keeps him returning time and again. But as the days continue, Adam begins to question the turn his life has taken and whether it is to his detriment. Andrew Scott’s central performance once again shows why he is regarded as one of our finest actors. Paul Mescal is sublime as Harry, while Jamie Bell and Claire Foy’s performances elicit some of the film’s most striking emotional notes.

Andrew Haigh’s script sprinkles a sense of foreboding lightly over the proceedings, while his searching portrait of relationships is everything we have come to expect from the exceptional writer-director of Weekend and 45 Years.

  

The End We Start From (15)

Dir. Mahalia Belo, UK, 2023, 102 mins. Cast. Jodie Comer, Joel Fry, Katherine Waterson.

Mahalia Belo’s confident feature debut brings Megan Hunter’s acclaimed 2017 dystopian novel to the screen as a disaster movie with immense power deriving from the intimacy of its performances.

An excellent Jodie Comer, playing the young mother, is joined by a uniformly superb cast, including Joel Fry and Katherine Waterson, who convey the emotional gravity of this poignant and unsettlingly prophetic tale of survival against the odds, which has echoes of The Road and Children of Men.