Events Calendar

The Petoskey Film Theater will be showing the film "Blue Valentine" (Rated R) on Wednesday and Friday, May 18 and 20, 7:30 pm at the Petoskey District Library, Carnegie Building (old library). Donations are appreciated. "Blue Valentine" stars Ryan Gosling and Michele Williams, who was nominated for an Academy Award (Best Actress).

Once crazy about each other, Cindy (Michelle Williams) and Dean (Ryan Gosling) have now grown apart. Cindy is bored and disenchanted with her life while Dean languishes in the emotional emptyness of their sexless, routine life in rural Pennyslvania. As they muddle through their marriage, they hearken back to the golden days when life was filled with possibility and romance.

Love blooms and dies at the same time in the delicate dance between Oscar nominees Ryan Gosling (Half Nelson) and Michelle Williams (Brokeback Mountain). Gosling's Dean, a high-school dropout, works for a New York moving company. While relocating a frail widower into a retirement home, he spots Cindy, a nursing student who's visiting her grandmother, but the film actually begins six years later. Married with a daughter, they live in rural Pennsylvania. Heavy drinker Dean's looks are fading, while Cindy still turns heads. In his elegantly constructed second feature, writer-director Derek Cianfrance pirouettes between past and present, with each scene commenting on the next. The Dean of the early years pursues Cindy, who resists at first, but a spontaneous date ends with her tap dancing (badly) and him singing (not so badly). She leaves her domineering boyfriend for this attentive stranger, leading to scenes of intimacy. Later, when the family dog goes missing, the cracks in their marriage intensify, so Dean arranges for a night of romance, which plays out like a negative image of their first date.

For more information on upcoming films call the PFT Movie Hotline at (231) 758-3108. To receive weekly email updates send an email to petoskey.film.theater2@gmail.com.

Programs are held on Fridays at noon in the Library Conference Room. Reservations are preferred. Call (231) 348-6600 or email cmacinnis@ncmich.edu to reserve your place at the table. Cost is $9 and includes lunch.

Down to the Bismarck - The most famous German warship of World War Two, the 50,000-ton Bismarck, was sunk on May 27, 1941, by Britain's Royal Navy to avenge the loss of the HMS Hood just three days earlier. In 2005, Bob Williams descended 15,300 feet below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean in a Russian Mir submersible to see the remains of the great ship. Bob will share photos of his adventure and his observations about "the absolute futility of war." Bob is the retired chairman of Genova Products, Inc, a master plumber and the holder of 11 patents for products and processes he developed in the plastics industry. He now devotes considerable time talking to school groups around the country about his undersea adventures that have included two trips to the wreckage of the Titanic.