New Seats Just Released! Celebrate the return of the Brisbane International Film Festival with one of the most biting, contemporary, social commentary films of the year! Our opening night gala feature film is the darkly funny, wildly entertaining Swedish satire The Square, fresh from taking out the prestigious Palme d’Or at this year’s 70th anniversary Cannes Film Festival. Written and directed by one of cinema’s contemporary masters Ruben Östlund – this scathing black comedy – based loosely on some of his own chequered experiences with art installations – takes aim at the self-obsessed and decadent art world, with its hunger for publicity and pretensions towards smug altruism. Beloved by the critics and featuring a talented cast including Claes Bang, Elisabeth Moss and Dominic West, this film is a must-see: by turns hilarious and horrifying, clever and surreal. Opening Night is sure to be fun with a drink on arrival, film, after party and entertainment. It’s hip to be square! “Thrillingly weird…it sets out to make your jaw drop. And it succeeds…This is high wire cinema!” — The Guardian Christian (Claes Bang) likes to think he’s a good and ethical person. He’s a devoted dad-of-two, a dyed-in-the-wool liberal, a charitable giver, and he even drives an electric car. And as curator of Stockholm’s palatial art museum, his next show is The Square, a wonderfully positive installation that invites passers-by to do good deeds, reminding them of their interconnectedness, their social conscience, their very humanity. But some days, it’s hard to live up to your own ideals. After stepping in to help a stranger, Christian finds he’s been mugged, his wallet and phone have been stolen – and his calm and considered altruism is gone in an instant, replaced by a raging need to track down the thief at all costs. Meanwhile, at the museum, a ruthlessly gung-ho public relations agency has gone a little too far to build some buzz for The Square, sparking a public outcry and adding to Christian’s woes. Writer/director Ruben Östlund mercilessly takes a sledgehammer to the stuffy, bourgeois, self-absorbed art world in this weird and darkly funny Palme d’Or–winning satire, which also stars Elisabeth Moss and Dominic West. WINNER OF THE PALME D’OR 70TH CANNES FILM FESTIVAL, 2017 | UNCLASSIFIED 15+ | 2017 | SWEDEN | 142 MINS | PROD ERIK HEMMENDORF | ENGLISH, SWEDISH

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