HIFF Now Showing Series Screens ‘The Divine Order’ at Guild Hall
Curated by the Hamptons International Film Festival (HIFF) and presented at Guild Hall in East Hampton, the Now Showing series of movie screenings continues with The Divine Order this Saturday, January 27 at 6 p.m.
The series features first run, acclaimed art house, independent and world cinema currently in theaters, but not showing on the East End, on select Saturday nights at Guild Hall’s John Drew Theater.
Set in 1971, filmmaker Petra Volpe’s The Divine Order takes place in a quaint Swiss village, seemingly untouched by the cultural and social upheavals of the 1960s, as its people anticipate the vote for women’s suffrage. A shy and well-liked housewife named Nora Ruckstuhl (played by Marie Leuenberger) becomes the unexpected beacon of her village’s suffragette movement after she’s exposed to a women’s rights demonstration in the more culturally advanced city of Zurich. (Watch trailer below.)
Nora—who lives with her husband Hans, their two sons, Luki and Max, and her complaining, condescending father-in-law—is never one to step out of line, until the day she starts a fierce, public fight for women’s suffrage, which Swiss men are to vote on, on February 7, 1971.
The young woman’s need to join the fight for equality after her husband refuses to allow her to return to work. Meanwhile, her teenage niece Hanna is sent away to reform school and then a women’s prison because she did not conform to the small-town conventions of the village.
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With all of this building tension, Nora realizes she can no longer be silent in her support of the vote, and that women need to demand it, loud and clear.
Told with humor and sincerity, The Divine Order features a strong ensemble cast, led effortlessly by Leuenberger, and inspired writing and directing by Volpe who sends home a message of speaking truth to power and telling husbands to do their own damn laundry.
See The Divine Order at Guild Hall’s John Drew Theater in East Hampton (158 Main Street) this Saturday, January 27 at 6 p.m.
For tickets and info, visit hamptonsfilmfest.org.