Please note this film will take place in the Green Room Bar.

The Eclectic Cinema Presents:

The Terence Davies Trilogy (15)

UK | 1983

Directed by: Terence Davies

Starring: Phillip Mawdsley | Terry O’Sullivan | Wilfrid Brambell | Valerie Lilley

We bid farewell to Terence Davies, gay British film director, who died in October 2023. This semi-autobiographical trilogy comprises three segments made at different times – Children (1976), Madonna and Child (1980) and Death and Transfiguration (1983). Together they portray the life of a gay man growing up in Liverpool from the 1950s onwards.

The depiction of life as a working-class homosexual man at this time is unrelentingly bleak and lonely. The epithet ‘gay’ seems entirely inappropriate. The protagonist’s Catholic upbringing only serves to amplify the extent of his guilt and shame. It is perhaps surprising, then, that Davies himself seemed much more upbeat in real life, with an obvious sense of humour. On the other hand, he preferred to remain alone, a single man, uninterested in the burgeoning gay scene.

The Trilogy has been screened at numerous film festivals to critical acclaim. His later films, often with autobiographical and/or gay themes are also admired, with awards going to Distant Voices, Still Lives (1988), The Long Day Closes (1992), The House of Mirth (2000) and A Quiet Passion (2016).

This screening will be in the intimate atmosphere of the Green Room Bar, and there will be a short break between each segment of the Trilogy.