In cult UK comedy treasure Alice Lowe’s second feature, a woman’s misguided fatal attraction to the same pretty bad-boy has lasted six centuries … so far.

Agnes is wildly in love with Alex. She won’t listen to her sensible advisor Scipio, hasn’t even noticed that her best friend Meg is equally in love with her, and doesn’t clock that the thuggish George wants her for himself. Agnes simply must have the brooding, edgy outsider, even at the cost of her own life. And, indeed, that’s the violent price Agnes pays – in 1688, 1793, 1847, 1940, 1980 and 2117. Will a prison of passion entrap all these poor souls forever?

After co-writing and starring in Ben Wheatley’s Sightseers (MIFF 2012), Lowe annihilated cosy stereotypes of expectant motherhood in her gory 2016 longform debut Prevenge. Now, she’s back to murder amour fou with raucous humour – and an eager ensemble cast including Hot Fuzz’s Nick Frost, Sex Education’s Tanya Reynolds, Interview With the Vampire’s Jacob Anderson and period-drama darling Aneurin Barnard as eternal f**kboy Alex. Timestalker dismantles the glamour of romantic obsession, revealing it as grimy, exploitative and tedious. Desire could be revolutionary and liberating – if only humans didn’t continually pine for undeserving fools!

“A triumph of imagination, soul-searching and a refined comic instinct … Can aptly be described as Alain Resnais does Blackadder.” – Little White Lies

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Producer Natan Stoessel is a guest of the festival and will be in attendance at the Friday 16 August session.