Kafka comes to Oxford
This October, the Ultimate Picture Palace cinema in Oxford has programmed a season of screenings and events linked with Oxford University’s city-wide project ‘Kafka’s Transformative Communities‘ marking the centenary of Franz Kafka’s death.
The cinema season includes a rare outing for Hidden director Michael Haneke’s adaptation of The Castle (featuring an introduction by Guardian chief film critic Peter Bradshaw), and a screening of Steven Soderbergh’s recently re-cut version of his 1991 Kafka biopic entitled Mr. Kneff, screening in the UK for the very first time.
Alongside these events is a season of classic films influenced by the works of Kafka.
Tickets now on sale: https://uppcinema.com/kafka-on-film/
“What does the term “Kafkaesque” mean? An experience marked out by a nightmarish, phantasmagorical quality, a fruitless grappling with arbitrary and immovable social forces … and waking up one morning to find that you’ve turned into a giant insect. Perhaps more than any other art forms, film has taken up and responded to Kafka’s visions – no doubt responding to the very concrete nature of Kafka’s visions, however outlandish their nature. If you believe the Internet Movie Database there have been over 160 screen adaptations of Kafka’s work since 1950, which if nothing else demonstrates that Kafka is catnip to film-makers and has become an inescapable influence on what we see.” Andrew Pulver, the Guardian
The season examines two different methods by which Kafkaesque film-making has manifested itself: adaptations of Kafka’s work, and films that show Kafka’s influence on their makers.
In the first category, the Ultimate Picture Palace screened Orson Welles’ celebrated adaptation of The Trial back in May, to coincide with the 100th anniversary of Kafka’s death in 1924. This October the cinema will show the rarely screened 1997 adaptation of The Castle directed by multiple Palme d’Or winner Michael Haneke and Steven Soderbergh’s celebrated 1991 biopic Kafka, starring Jeremy Irons. The Ultimate Picture Palace will also host the first ever UK screening of Soderbergh’s Mr Kneff, a re-edit and re-working of Kafka that Soderbergh presented at the Toronto film festival in 2021.
The influence of Kafka on auteur film-makers has always been evident. Contemporary reviews of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil (1985) immediately picked up on this, even if the film is equally indebted to George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four; the spectacle of Jonathan Pryce’s Sam Lowry battling the arcane bureaucracy of this future society as as Kafkaesque as they come. Martin Scorsese’s After Hours (also 1985) is a purer form of the Kafka nightmare, with protagonist Griffin Dunne unable to get himself out of the increasingly bizarre situation he finds himself in. David Cronenberg’s Naked Lunch (1991) and its bug powder addiction gave us the amazing concept of the “Kafka high”, while David Lynch’s Eraserhead (1977) is arguably the nakedest expression of Lynch’s admiration for the writer who he described as “the one artist that I feel could be my brother”.
The season also includes two short film adaptations of Kafka’s works, with screenings of After Hours preceded by a special presentation of Lorenza Mazzetti’s short film K (1953), and screenings of Naked Lunch featuring Kōji Yamamura’s anime Franz Kafka’s A Country Doctor (2007).
FULL PROGRAMME
Brazil
Friday 4th October 8.30pm
Monday 7th October 6pm
After Hours + K
Saturday 12th October 6.15pm
Monday 14th October 9pm
The Castle + intro by Peter Bradshaw
Wednesday 16th October 6.15pm
Mr Kneff
Friday 18th October 8.30pm
Naked Lunch + Franz Kafka’s A Country Doctor
Monday 21st October 6.15pm
Thursday 25th October 8.45pm
Kafka
Tuesday 22nd October 6.15pm
Eraserhead
Saturday 26th October 9pm
Monday 28th October 6.30pm
Thursday 31st October 8.45pm
