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WELCOME TO OUR NEXT SCREENING
Patrice Chéreau's
QUEEN MARGOT
(La reine Margot)
In co-operation with the Institut Français and the Embassy of France
(France/Germany/Italy | 1994 | 161 mins | R16 violence & sex scenes)
Wednesday 6 May at 7.00pm
(Note Early Start) – Open To The Public
University of Otago’s Colquhoun Lecture Theatre**
Young Queen Margot finds herself trapped in an arranged marriage amidst a religious war between Catholics and Protestants – from the 1845 novel by Alexandre Dumas.
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“Chéreau’s highest-profile film was also his biggest departure: a lavish, blood-spattered, gold-spangled costume drama starring a trio of French superstars (Isabelle Adjani, Daniel Auteuil, and Vincent Perez). In the heat of the 17th-century Wars of Religion, the ruthless French queen Catherine de Medici (Virna Lisi) gives up her daughter Margot (Adjani) in marriage to the prominent Huguenot Henri of Navarre (Auteuil) as a peace offering – while secretly arranging for the mass slaughter of thousands of Protestants.
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Margot soon falls for a dashing Protestant soldier (Perez); bodice-ripping love scenes, court intrigue, poisonings and beheadings ensue. Chéreau captures it all with gleeful, operatic bravado, setting the movie at a pitch delirious enough to elevate it far beyond traditional period-piece territory. This is a “restored and enriched” version of the film, which debuted [2013] at Cannes in the festival’s Classics section.”
– Film Society Lincoln Center
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FURTHER REVIEW
Just six days after Margot and Henri marry, the St Bartholomew's Day Massacre is unleashed on the Huguenots in Paris. During the fighting, La Môle [Perez] is multiply wounded by marauding Catholics. He staggers into Margot's bedroom and collapses... "I screamed aloud, and he cried out likewise," she admitted in her memoirs, "for our fright was mutual." When they both calmed down, she saved his life... [Then], plotting to poison Henri of Navarre, Catherine de'Medici infuses a book with arsenic and leaves it for him.
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Instead, her own son Charles IX picks it up. The king endures a slow and disgusting death, convulsing and literally sweating blood... Pity anyone who turned up to La Reine Margot expecting heartwarming romance and instead got two hours of stabbing, shooting, goring, poisoning, incest, beheading and defenestration, ending with the king of France turning into a human blood fountain. La Reine Margot is a spirited adaptation of Alexandre Dumas's novel. Both novel and movie, though, are rambunctiously fictional versions of history.
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ABOUT THE DUNEDIN FILM SOCIETY
ADMISSION
Free to members.
TO JOIN
To purchase a Full/Half Season membership:
- complete a membership form from our website and pay by online bank transfer (06-0942-0696013-00);
- or join at the door before any screening (cash only).
- you can also join at the OUSA office reception at the University of Otago (cash only).
Alternatively, you can purchase a Three-Film sampler ($25), which can be also be shared to bring two friends to one screening. The sampler does not expire and can be used over multiple years.
Membership includes generous discounts at Rialto Cinemas (from Monday to Friday) and the 2026 Dunedin Whānau Marama New Zealand International Film Festival; and FREE entry to the 2026 screenings of all other affiliated New Zealand Film Societies. Each member is entitled to ONE FREE GUEST ADMISSION to a single screening.
**To get to the Colquhoun Theatre: The Colquhoun is located on the first floor of the current Dunedin Public Hospital, above the chapel and squash courts. Stairs and lift access are from the main Hospital entrance on Great King Street.
WE WELCOME YOUR FEEDBACK!... on this screening, or any other Dunedin Film Society showing, on dunedinfi...@gmail.com
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Dunedin Film Society
C/- 1 Crewe Street Maryhill Dunedin, Otago 9011 New Zealand |
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