Slapstick - Bristol's Silent Comedy Festival

Bristol's Silent Comedy Festival returns this January for it's 10th anniversary and promises to be the biggest and funniest festival ever with an extraordinary list of guests.

Along with films from the never-to-be excelled classic era of silent comedy, this year we feature comedians who have shown that great visual comedy did not disappear with the coming of sound - from the incomparable Will Hay to Kenny Everett, Neil Innes and the Bonzos, and the Monty Python team.

Michael Palin himself - legendary traveller, author, actor and Python - launches Slapstick 2010 at Colston Hall with a unique programme of on-stage chat and classic comedy that concludes with one of the supreme achievements of the great era of comedy, Buster Keaton's THE NAVIGATOR.

Other comedy giants on show include W.C.Fields, Harold Lloyd and Laurel and Hardy in a selection of classics and rarities. Extending our international reach we have René Clair's AN ITALIAN STRAW HAT from France and THE HOUSE ON TRUBNAYA, a delightful and funny comedy from the unlikely source of revolutionary Russia.

We offer the world premiere of a recently rediscovered college film by Neil Innes, featuring the inimitable Vivian Stanshall, and featured in "The Bonzo Dog Scrapbook Show" (Arnolfini, Saturday). Jesters comedy store host the final night events, featuring, on stage, four national treasures of comedy art, Neil Innes, Barry Cryer, Tim Brooke-Taylor and Graeme Garden.

All in all an extravaganza four days packed with classic film comedy to leave you laughing, all brought to life by an unprecedented line-up of special guests.

A must for anyone who is passionate about Silent films!