To save paper, cut costs and give us flexibility in selecting films at short notice, we no longer produce printed programmes. All of our films are listed on the Buxton Opera House Cinema website as well as our own. If you’d like to receive a weekly alert for our Monday film please subscribe to our newsletter.
Here is our diary – we update it as soon as new films are confirmed. You won’t find a more varied and interesting programme anywhere!
| Monday 17/8/26 7.30pm | Nostalgia (15) | Andrei Tarkovsky is widely considered to be one of the greatest directors in cinema history and Curzon have just re-released his final two works. We’ve picked this unforgettably haunting film, his first to be made outside Russia. It explores the melancholy of the expatriate through the film’s protagonist, Gorchakov, a Russian poet researching in Italy. Arriving at a Tuscan village spa with Eugenia, his beautiful Italian interpreter, Gorchakov is visited by memories of Russia and of his wife and children, and he encounters the local mystic who sets him a challenging task. ‘Nostalgia’ is filled with a series of mysterious and extraordinary images, all of which coalesce into a miraculous whole in the film’s final shot. As in all Tarkovsky’s films, nature, the elements of fire and water, music, painting and poetry all play a major role. Whether you know of Tarkovsky’s work or not, this is not to be missed. It will stay with you… |
| Monday 31/8/26 7.30pm | Cactus Pears (15) | We loved this gentle and moving award-winning study of grief and love in rural India when we previewed it earlier in the year. After his father dies, 30-year-old Anand returns from Mumbai to his ancestral village for a 10-day mourning period. The intensity of these rituals and his well- meaning relatives’ pressure on him to marry leave him little room to grieve. But his rekindled friendship with childhood pal and local farmer Balya offers him a glimpse of freedom, and as the pair reconnect and explore their shared history, their companionship leads to deeper feelings. Against the backdrop of Western India’s vast, rugged landscapes, Kanawade’s understated, beautifully photographed modern romance won the World Cinema Grand Jury Prize at Sundance Film Festival 2025. |
| Monday 7/9/26 7.30pm | The Last Viking (15) | The sixth collaboration between director Anders Thomas Jensen (The Promised Land, Riders of Justice, Men & Chicken) and stars Mads Mikkelsen and Nikolaj Lie Kaas, this outrageous black comedy sees them lean further into the mayhem. Under the weight of a remarkably unflattering perm, Mikkelsen plays Manfred, a man who believes he’s John Lennon despite persuasive evidence to the contrary, Lie Kaas his brother Anker, who’s fresh out of jail after a 15-year stint for bank robbery. Manfred is the only one who knows where the loot is buried, but he’s forgotten. And so, the brothers must embark on a chaotic journey to locate it, at the same time uncovering more about who they are. Joined by performers including The Killing’s Sofie Gråbøl and Søren Malling, The Last Viking lines up a memorable gallery of equally ludicrous misfits and miscreants with their own foibles and fixations – but for all its outlandish, farcical and occasionally violent comedy, also lands deeper notes about identity, difference and tolerance. |
| Monday 14/9/26 7.30pm | The Summer Book (PG) | |
| Monday 21/9/26 7.30pm | EOS James McNeill Whistler | In an era of great change and great beauty emerged the character of James McNeill Whistler. Considered by some to be one of the great innovators of 19th century art, he was a contemporary of the Impressionists, much admired by Van Gogh and Manet. Boldly experimental and famously witty, Whistler disrupted the strict conventions of Victorian society in pursuit of a new cult of beauty, creating “art for art’s sake” and earning himself a place in the history of great art. He found a parallel between painting and music, and entitled many of his paintings "arrangements", "harmonies" and "nocturnes", emphasizing the importance of tonal harmony in his work. His most famous painting, Arrangement in Grey and Black No. 1 (1871), commonly known as Whistler's Mother, is a revered and often parodied portrait of motherhood. It is arguably one of the most famous paintings in history and this film will unveil the artist behind the art. Tate Britain is now holding the first major retrospective of Whistler in three decades. This blockbuster exhibition promises to reawaken the world to just how important Whistler is to art history, uniting world-famous masterpieces with rarely seen works. Exhibition on Screen will bring these stunning works and the incredible story behind them to cinemas around the world while the exhibition is still running, bringing this truly global artist to a global audience. This will be an unmissable chance to get to know this visually spectacular artist and the influence he has had on those who followed. |
| Monday 28/9/26 7.30pm | tbc | |
| Monday 5/10/26 | Bitter Christmas | The new Almodovar - more details soon |