“Strangerland” will be shown at the Mostly British Film Festival.
San Francisco’s Mostly British Film Festival proudly lacks one staple of international film festivals — subtitles. That’s because its foreign fare comes from English-speaking places like Britain, Australia and Ireland.
It’s also an international festival with a cozy neighborhood feel, with virtually all screenings taking place in the friendly confines of the Vogue Theatre, a singlescreen jewel in Laurel Heights.
For Anglophiles, as well as the city’s considerable Irish community, the festival offers chances to see films from their home turf that otherwise wouldn’t play in the Bay Area. Yet any film lover will find appealing things in this lineup of welltold, entertaining stories.
This year’s festival, which runs from Thursday, Feb. 18, through Feb. 25, includes the American premiere of “The Dressmaker,” starring Kate Winslet as a fashion designer whose work divides a conservative Australian town. Other offerings include:
One Million Dubliners: This superb documentary not only showcases Dublin’s beautiful Glasnevin Cemetery — the final resting spot of 1.5 million people — but also provides a soulful meditation on life, death and beyond. Serving as our tour guide is the affable historian Shane MacThomais, who with humor and grace shares insights about Irish culture and history. The final frames of this gem will take your breath away. 4:30 p.m. Feb. 21, Vogue; Ireland, 80 minutes. Strangerland: Nicole Kidman is a sexually frustrated housewife whose dull life gets an unwelcome jolt when her two unhappy teenagers run away and go missing in the Australian Outback. This is hardly your typical kidsin-peril family drama, and Kidman courageously takes us to some unexpectedly dark places. The forsaken but beautiful desert landscape is an important character in this film, which keeps you guessing to the end. 9 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 20, Vogue; Australia, 112 minutes. The Lost Aviator: British pilot Bill Lancaster is at the center of this formidable documentary, which chronicles a true story that has everything: a dashing aviator, a love triangle, a murder, a show trial for the ages and one final flight for redemption. Lancaster’s great nephew, Andrew, directs the wellmade film, getting reticent family members to open up and showing no fear about delving into the mythical allure of Lancaster, who made the record books with a flight from England to Australia in the 1920s. 9 p.m. Feb. 22, Vogue; Australia, 90 minutes. A Nightingale Falling: An act of mercy turns into a tragedy of errors when an Irish woman finds a wounded British captain on her property and secretly takes care of him — a move that imperils both her and her younger sister in war-torn Ireland during the early 1920s. This compelling period piece explores themes of sibling rivalry, love gone wrong, and decisions that have irrevocable consequences. Expect plenty of twists in the third act. 11:45 a.m. Feb. 21, Vogue; Ireland, 110 minutes. You’re Ugly Too: Aidan Gillen (“Game of Thrones”) portrays Will, a guarded Irish man who has been granted early release from prison to take care of his orphaned and outspoken 11-year-old niece, Stacey (Lauren Kinsella). They develop a dysfunctional rapport that is both amusing and poignant, thanks to the excellent chemistry between Gillen and Kinsella and to Mark Noonan’s careful direction. When Will reveals why he’s in prison, the engaging film takes a riveting turn. 6:15 p.m. Feb. 21,Vogue; Ireland, 80 minutes.