BritFest Films : <i> Following are capsule reviews of screenings in the American Film Institute’s BritFest during the UK/LA ’88 Festival. All screenings are in the Mark Goodson Theater on the AFI campus in Hollywood. : </i>
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‘THAMES FILM’ Goodson, 8:45 p . m.
No film could hope to convey the decline of the British Empire with more impact and poignancy than this 50-mile trip down the River Thames, which often produces vistas as beautiful and haunting as a Turner painting as it proceeds from London Bridge to the sea. The stark and impersonal skyscrapers of London give way to a seemingly endless slow pan of derelict wharves, docks and a few, mainly rusty, ships. Film maker William Raban then commences to interrupt this sad and placid journey with voices and images of the Thames’ proud, enormously productive and tumultuous past; it’s an inspired instance of the use of a technique that is as simple in itself as it is stunning in its effect. RECOMMENDED
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