“Downton Abbey” fans will always think of Joanne Froggatt fondly as the lady’s maid Anna, a role for which she received three Emmy nominations and won a Golden Globe. But Miss Froggatt has moved on with movie and TV roles displaying her versatility. In the series “Liar,” which will be back for a second season on SundanceTV, she plays a victim of date rape who can not convince authorities she is telling the truth. She appeared as Britain’s first female serial killer in Masterpiece’s “Dark Angel,” and in the tender “Starfish” she watches her husband succumb to a devastating infectious disease. The Mostly British Film Festival is lucky to be catching her just as her career has caught fire.

Miss Froggatt will be interviewed by Jonathan Moscone, director of civic engagement at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts and former artistic director of California Shakespeare Theater.

“A Crooked Somebody” – an American independent film Miss Froggatt chose to screen-shows another side of the multi-faceted actress. For one thing she plays an American. Rich Sommer (“Mad Men”) makes a very appealing psychic named Vaughn. Vaughn’s readings seem to make people feel better afterward by giving them a kind of closure. But he proves to be too successful when someone he comes across believes that Vaughn is the real deal and can assist him in connecting with the other side. This is more of a grift than Vaughn can handle as his friend and business partner played by Miss Froggatt tries to warn him. With Ed Harris as Vaughn’s father, a preacher disgusted by his son’s career path. USA 2017 (102 minutes)

Ticket includes:
7:30 pm Joanne Froggatt Tribute: Film clips from her career, onstage interview
8:40 pm Screening of “A Crooked Somebody”

This is the Irish movie that made Colin Farrell famous. He is part of a terrific ensemble including Shirley Henderson, Colm Meany, Cillian Murphy and Kelly Macdonald. Their characters’ lives are portrayed in a series of stories set in modern day Dublin as they search for love, show their anger and commit crimes that will never pay off. Directed by John Crowley who would go on to direct “Brooklyn.”

UK, 2003 (102 minutes)

The exquisite Indian desert and the village people come alive on the screen and draw you in from the first long shot of this drama about women attempting to escape their plight in a cruel, relentless patriarchy, Their sensual aspirations, feminine solidarity and joy in even small revenge are all vividly expressed, qualifying this as great cinema. The very same themes pervade urban India as well which makes the film topical as well. The screenplay is based on recorded conversations of Indian village women by director Leena Yadav. The enchanting lilt of their dialect comes through loud and clear.

India, 2015 (116 minutes)

An Australian teen goes missing, and a local investigator joins the search started by her anxious parents, played by Radha Mitchell (“Melinda and Melinda”) and Richard Roxbury (“Mission Impossible 2” and the TV series “Rake”). Grace’s absence is a catalyst for other discoveries – narratives of loss and uncertainty that are at the heart of this compelling family drama directed by Sue Brooks (“Japanese Story”). Location shooting in Western Australia.

Australia, 2015 (100 minutes)

A day in the life of a dusty old pawn shop in the Melbourne suburb of Footscray, 12 individuals’ stories unravel before the world-weary owner. The raw humanity of the characters comes alive through strangely moving vignettes – an odd street singer, a duo of homeless wackos, a couple working in the local bookshop – all enmesh in Paul Ireland’s directorial debut to produce a colorful, giddy ensemble piece. Great soundtrack and winning performances.

Australia, 2016 (89 minutes)

Director Anthony Asquith’s silent classic is a working class love story about an electrician and a porter who both fall in love with a shop girl they meet on the London Underground on the same day. Set in the subterranean entrails of the London Underground in the 1920s with iconic shots of Lots Road Power Station in Chelsea, gentle Bill and macho Bert charge through tunnels and across monumental buildings to fight it out. No one “minds the gap” and passengers smoke, nonchalantly dropping stubs on the wooden carriage floors. The 2009 restoration by the British Film Institute makes the film look fresh and new.

UK, 1928 (84 minutes)