Science Exchange present...

Café Scientifique
Chasing the Big Bang:
New Technologies for Age-old Questions

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN will shed new light on some of the fundamental questions about the origins of the Universe and the nature of matter. The construction of this remarkable machine has involved the development of cutting-edge technolo

Tickets: No Charge, thanks to support from a variety of organisations

The Sinodun Players present their annual Pantomime...

Puss in Boots

Puss in Boots promises to be an uproarious romp in the Wallingford tradition. There's a kitchen scene with flour, water and custard pies in abundance; a beautiful, magical underwater sequence, two "baddies" called Crunchbones and Gruesome, a beautiful Princess, TWO Pusses, a pair of knockabout characters, a dashing hero, a good fairy, chases round the auditorium, lots of local references, a Dame called Queen Fanny the Fifth and, of course, the ever popular "kiddies song".

There will be a "black tie" Gala Performance on Wednesday 21 January; the ticket price includes sparkling wine and canapes at the interval.

Box Office opens Friday 21 November

Tickets: Gala Performance (Wednesday 21 January): £15
otherwise Under 16s: £5
Adults: Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays £9
Fridays and Saturdays £10

Sunday 1 Feb 7.30pm
Monday 2 Feb 7.30pm

Duration: 97 minutes

A Bunch of Amateurs

Burt Reynolds leads the cast playing the insecure difficult and demanding Jefferson Steel. As an aging Hollywood action hero accustomed to the perks of the job, he' s desperate to reinvigorate his waning career and is therefore convinced by his agent to accept a prestigious invitation to star in the British theatre playing King Lear at Stratford.... Only the Stratford in question is Stratford St John, a sleepy Suffolk village. And the theatre is an old barn, which the villagers want to save from closure by putting on a star-led charity performance.

Resentment bubbles close to the surface in the form of the local solicitor (Sir Derek Jacobi), who's finding it desperately hard to come to terms with playing understudy to a ghastly Hollywood hotshot. A wealth of British heavyweights (Imelda Staunton, Samantha Bond) co-star in this funny, moving comedy that was selected at this year's Royal Film Performance and was attended by the Queen, no less.

Contains strong language

Tickets: Adults £6

Tuesday 3 Feb 7.30pm
Wednesday 4 Feb 7.30pm
Thursday 5 Feb 7.30pm

Duration: 114 minutes

La Bohème

Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazón, hailed as the "dream couple of the opera world", play the roles of Mimi and Rodolfo, a couple who are passionately in love with each other, but face the ultimate test of love in Mimi's tragic death from consumption.

Anna Netrebko, the leading lady of this film, is no stranger to the spotlight. In addition to performing in some of the world's most renowned venues-the Metropolitan Opera, the Royal Opera House and Carnegie Hall, to name a few-she has also achieved recognition in a broader sector. In 2007, she was on Time Magazine's "Time 100" list, has been coined as "a genuine superstar for the 21st century" by Musical America, and was given the prestigious acknowledgement of being made a People's Artist of Russia by President Vladimir Putin in 2008. As for being a performer that the camera will love, this is a given-Playboy Magazine voted her as "one of the sexiest babes in Classical music".

Also starring in the movie with Netrebko and Villazón are Nicole Cabell, George von Bergen, Adrian Eroed and Vitaly Kovalyov.

Contains mild language and sex references

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

Friday 6 Feb 7.30pm

Duration: 74 minutes

For one night only

A special BFI presentation of Terence Davies' highly acclaimed...

Of Time and the City

Contains one use of strong language

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

Television history now on film. Michael Sheen and Frank Angella in...

Frost/Nixon

Peter Morgan's electrifying depiction of the historic encounter between Richard Nixon, the disgraced President with a legacy to save, and David Frost, a jet-setting television personality with a name to make, began its hugely successful life as a hit on the London stage. Now award-winning director Ron Howard brings this remarkable story to the screen, not only recreating the on-air interview, but also showing the motivations of both men, and the around-the-world, behind the scenes maneuverings and machinations at play.

Tickets: Adults £6

Friday 13 Feb 7.30pm

Duration: 124 minutes

Starring Kate Winslet and Ralph Fiennes and directed by Stephen Daldry...

The Reader

A boy becomes involved with a strange woman twice his age. She mysteriously disappears and he discovers her, eight years later, on trail for war crimes.

Contains strong sex

Tickets: Adults £6

The Pete Allen Jazz band presents...

Valentine Jazz

Tickets: £12.50

Sunday 15 Feb 7.30pm
Monday 16 Feb 7.30pm
Tuesday 17 Feb 7.30pm
Wednesday 18 Feb 7.30pm
Thursday 19 Feb 7.30pm

Duration: 124 minutes

Starring Kate Winslet and Ralph Fiennes and directed by Stephen Daldry...

The Reader

A boy becomes involved with a strange woman twice his age. She mysteriously disappears and he discovers her, eight years later, on trail for war crimes.

Contains strong sex

Tickets: Adults £6

Madagascar Escape 2 Africa

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

Monday 23 Feb 7.30pm
Tuesday 24 Feb 7.30pm
Wednesday 25 Feb 7.30pm
Thursday 26 Feb 7.30pm

Duration: 165 minutes

Starring Nicole Kidman...

Australia

Set in northern Australia before World War II, an English aristocrat who inherits a sprawling ranch reluctantly pacts with a stock-man in order to protect her new property from a takeover plot. As the pair drive 2,000 head of cattle over unforgiving landscape, they experience the bombing of Darwin, Australia, by Japanese forces firsthand.

Contains one use of strong language, moderate war violence and injury

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

Kate Hudson, Anne Hathaway and Kristen Johnston star in...

Bride Wars

A light-hearted Comedy in which two best friends become rivals when they schedule their weddings on the same day!

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

To celebrate ten years of the Wallingford Children's Choir...

The First Wallingford Choir Festival

This wonderful week of music will see choirs from Wallingford and surrounding villages taking to the Corn Exchange stage and performing a wide range of music, with something for every taste. The Wallingford Children' s Choir is now in its 10th year and this Festival will afford local choirs the opportunity, which the Children' s Choir has been lucky enough to have regularly, of performing at the Corn Exchange.

School Choirs that are so far booked to sing include those from Wallingford School (and their Fun Band), Cranford House School, Cranford Choral Society, Cholsey Primary, Crowmarsh Primary School, Moulsford School, St. John' s Primary and Fir Tree Primary, with other local schools expected to take part. Also involved are The Wallingford Singers, Wallingford Parish Church Choir and the Thames Consort.

In between the choir items there will be a chance for previous members of the Children' s Choir to return to the stage to show how their music making skills have matured over the last ten years.

The two matinées will be performances of "Alice" by the Children' s Choir, the first musical they performed. The current choir will be joined on the Sunday by original cast members revisiting their earlier roles.

The week will finish with a Gala Concert on the Saturday evening.

Proceeds from the week will be shared between Water Aid, and the Alzheimer' s Society.

Box Office opens Friday 2 January

Tickets: Adults £6 Under 16s £4

Sunday 8 Mar 7.30pm
Monday 9 Mar 7.30pm

Duration: 120 minutes

Slumdog Millionaire

Danny Boyle's well-earned reputation as one of Britain's most versatile directors will be further cemented by his latest feature which won three awards at the British Independent Film Awards and is nominated for a Golden Globe award.

A vibrant, modern love story set and shot in India. Jamal Malik, an 18-year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, is about to experience the biggest day of his life. With the whole nation watching, he is just one question away from winning a staggering 20 million rupees on India's Who Wants to be a Millionaire. But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating: how could a 'slumdog' know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life - tales of the Juhu slum where and his brother Salim grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika, the girl he loved and lost. Each picaresque episode holds the key to the answer of one of the game show's questions.

Contains strong language and violence

Tickets: Adults £6

The Sinodun Players' Wardrobe Department presents...

A Cavalcade of 20th Century Costume

A unique fashion show, a nostalgia trip and an educational experience all rolled into one!

For many years the people of Wallingford have donated wonderful costumes to the Sinodun Players' Wardrobe Department. Now you have the chance to see some of these outfits, never before seen on stage, in a unique fashion show which will span the whole of the 20th Century.

These are not costumes we have made for shows but the genuine article from the Flapper era, through "The Fifties" and "The Swinging Sixties", the era of "Power Dressing", and a selection of wedding dresses dating from 1911.

This one-night show will be a nostalgia trip for many, an educational experience for drama, art and design students and a memorable occasion for all.

Tickets: (on sale from Friday 9 January) £8.00

Starring Anne Hathaway...

Rachel Getting Married

Tickets: Adults £6

Friday 13 Mar 7.30pm
Saturday 14 Mar 7.30pm
Sunday 15 Mar 7.30pm
Monday 16 Mar 7.30pm
Tuesday 17 Mar 7.30pm
Wednesday 18 Mar 7.30pm
Thursday 19 Mar 7.30pm

Duration: 166 minutes

Starring Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

A man is born in his eighties and ages backwards!

Contains infrequent strong language and moderate violence

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

Friday 20 Mar 7.30pm

Duration: 126 minutes

Part 1 of the tale of idealism, tenacity and sacrifice, it illustrates why Che Guevara remains a potent symbol of idealism and heroism around the world.

Che!

Steven Soderbergh's acclaimed epic (showing in two parts on successive nights) about the revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara, is virile, muscular film-making, with an effortlessly charismatic performance by Benicio del Toro in the lead role. Big, bold, ambitious film-making: Che is never boring and often gripping.

Part 1 tells of the uprising in Cuba, tracking Che's rise from doctor to commander and revolutionary hero during the years 1956 to 1959. It shows how Castro, Che and their comrades, with their tiny army, fought its way to overthrow Batista's government.

Contains strong language and infrequent bloody war violence

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

Saturday 21 Mar 7.30pm

Duration: 126 minutes

Part 2 of the tale of idealism, tenacity and sacrifice, it illustrates why Che Guevara remains a potent symbol of idealism and heroism around the world.

Che!

Steven Soderbergh's acclaimed epic (showing in two parts on successive nights) about the revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara, is virile, muscular film-making, with an effortlessly charismatic performance by Benicio del Toro in the lead role. Big, bold, ambitious film-making: Che is never boring and often gripping.

Part 2 deals with Che' s involvement in the Bolivian campaign of 1966 to 1967 and the attempt to orchestrate the great Latin American revolution. Lacking popular support, and with the Bolivian army and its American advisors waging effective counterinsurgency, the failed revolt brought Che to his death.

Contains strong language and infrequent bloody war violence

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

The Sinodun Players Ray Cooney's...

Funny Money

Jean is preparing a birthday dinner for her mild-mannered accountant husband Henry. Good friends Betty and Vic are expected any minute, and Jean is frantic because Henry is late. When he eventually arrives, Jean finds him not quite the man he used to be. He wants to emigrate to Barcelona immediately, and with good reason: the briefcase he accidentally picked up on the Underground is stuffed with bundles of fifty pound notes amounting to millions of pounds. All seems perfectly logical - do a runner with the unmarked money and live happily ever after. Except for a few problems: two policemen, his confused friends and an increasingly tipsy Jean who refuses to go along with his plan. The friends have to assume all sorts of identities to keep the money and stay away from the police and "Mr Nasty". Will they succeed?

Tickets: First night £7 Other nights £8

Advance Notice

Featuring Emily Blunt as the young Queen Victoria & Rupert Friend as Prince Albert...

The Young Victoria

A dramatization of the turbulent first years of Queen Victoria's rule, and her enduring romance with Prince Albert.

Tickets: Adults £6 Under-15s £4

Friday 24 Apr 7.30pm

Duration: 96 minutes

Woody Allen's latest comedy drama marks both a return to form, and a return to the themes of impulsive romance at which he excels