Our annual engagement with the esteemed Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra celebrates Clara Bow, flapper superstar of the jazz age, in the 1927 romcom It - the film that designated her the original “It Girl”. This jazz-age classic from English writer Elinor Glyn and US director Clarence Badger will be brought to life at the mighty Civic with live music from Carl Davis, conducted by Marc Taddei.

“Clara Bow is at her free-spirited peak, an assured archetype of the early 20th Century modern woman. Bow’s cheeky vitality is ageless, an early echo of the quicksilver Hollywood allure that Marilyn Monroe would bring to screens decades later,” says NZIFF Director Bill Gosden. 

Marc Taddei conducts Carl Davis’ score. Marc is currently Music Director of Orchestra Wellington and the Vallejo Symphony in California. His many Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra Live Cinema engagements have included an exhilarating The Wind in 2006, an eerily romantic Nosferatu in 2011 and Carl Davis’ score for Safety Last! in 2016.

Music for this Live Cinema event has been commissioned by Photoplay Productions for Thames Television and Channel 4. Music is performed by arrangement with Faber Music Ltd, London. 

Music for silent films has been an enduring strand of the prolific Carl Davis’ activities. His 1980 score for Abel Gance’s Napoleon triggered an extraordinary revival of interest in silent film, and his oeuvre of more than 50 scores for this medium, including Flesh and the Devil, Ben-Hur, The Thief of Baghdad, Greed, Intolerance and The General, has brought him international acclaim.

Tickets for this Live Cinema event will be on presale from Monday 19 June - Saturday 24 June. The full NZIFF programme will be available online from Monday 26 June 7pm, and on the streets from Tuesday 27 June for Auckland. NZIFF starts in Auckland on 20 July 2017.