The Lorain County Community College (LCCC) Film Society presents
BEFORE THE RAINS
Saturday, October 11, 2008 at 7:30 pm at the Stocker Arts Center on the campus of LCCC
 
2008   98min (PG 13)   UK/USA some subtitles
Director: Santosh Sivan
Cast: Linus Roache, Rahul Bose, Nandita Das, Jennifer Ehle, John Standing
 
Forbidden romance, empire and culture clash all are at the heart of this drama.  The story is set in a beautiful and colorful world where indigenous people are having change forced down their throats. Linus Roache is a rancher building a road through mountainous rural India in 1937; this construction project, as it clears forests and scars the land, becomes a metaphor for the country’s occupation by the British. He appears a benevolent and even kind sahib to a native man servant, but he imposes his white man’s prerogative in ways both subtle and cutting. The most obvious example of his sense of entitlement is a clandestine love affair with a servant girl, whose consensual appearance is a tragic delusion. If class and cultural differences were not enough to impact their love, they are each married to others as well. And when their relationship is exposed, an escalating series of events is set in motion – some accidental, some calculating – that precipitate the deluge before the storm. Santosh Sivan directs this film that is presented by Merchant Ivory, the renowned team behind HOWARD’S END and THE REMAINS OF THE DAY.
 
“Fatal culture clash, imperialist entitlement, forbidden passion between master and servant: the ingredients of the Indian director Santosh Sivan’s period piece BEFORE THE RAINS may be awfully familiar, but the film lends them the force of tragedy.” – Stephen Holden, THE NEW YORK TIMES
 
“A lovely, lyrical film with perfect timing that is a welcome relief from BlackBerries, iPods, gas taxes, punk rock, the failing economy and the boredom of cutthroat election campaigns.” - Rex Reed, NEW YORK OBSERVER
 
“The film is well-acted, a broad colonial allegory, and again, visually gorgeous.”
– John Anderson, NEWSDAY
 
Film Admission
Patrons, except LCCC students/faculty/staff with valid ID, must purchase an annual membership in the LCCC Film Society for $3.00/each, which is good for the entire season (September through the end of the 2009 Winter/Spring film series season). The admission price for each film is $5.00/ticket with your membership card.

Stocker Arts Center is on the campus of Lorain County Community College, located at 1005 Abbe Road North in Elyria Ohio, and is easily accessible from major interstate highways I-90 and I-480, as well as from the Ohio Turnpike. For complete directions go to http://www.lorainccc.edu/Stocker+Arts+Center/Map.htm