AFI Fest Highlights

Following are capsule reviews of today’s screenings in the American Film Institute Los Angeles International Film Festival at the Cineplex Odeon Century Plaza Cinemas: ‘On the Black Hill’

Great Britain, 1988, 116 minutes 8:45 p.m. Andrew Grieve’s stately, beautiful film from Bruce Chatwin’s novel exemplifies the traditional screen narrative at its most satisfying. Set in the border country between England and Wales, it tells of the lives of twins (Mike and Robert Gwilym) born at the turn of the century to a fiery Welsh farmer (Bob Peck) and an Englishwoman (Gemma Jones) of greater status and education. Grieve illuminates the psychic, often anguished bond between the brothers against the stormy background of their parents’ marriage and the chronic, enraging condescension and exploitation of the Welsh by the English. RECOMMENDED