In a world where the single, solitary perspective of the blockbuster has planted its rotten roots, and the signature style of the modern filmmaker, though visually seductive, numbs an audience sedated by a slew of shapes and colours, there is no better time to be reminded of the radical chaos that the auteurs of the French New Wave unleashed on post-war French cinema, before taking on the world.

The University Of London (Screen Studies Group) and the University Of Southampton (AHRC-- funded French Cinema In Britain research project) bring to you a two-day conference entitled The Nouvelle Vague -- 50 years On. Uniting a distinguished panel of film connoisseurs and aesthetes (including Academy Award-nominated Stephen Frears), the conference will run alongside a season of screenings exploring exactly what modern-filmmakers, "from Britain to Brazil", owe to the rebels of the French New Wave. The conference promises an unbounded and vigorous analytical dialogue of the life and times of the Nouvelle Vague -- how post-war France's socio-economic climate provoked such a powerful reaction against the despotic mainstream storytelling of the time; how the movement's shoestring budget led to some of its greatest creative hallmarks and ultimately to international success; and, under a microscope, the works of Jean-Luc Godard, Agnes Varda and Chris Marker.

Cine lumiere's accompanying film programme delivers a blow-by-blow account of the movement -- from the seeds sewn by Jean Vigo's politically audacious A propos de Nice, to its late 20th century remnants in the first Dogme 95 film The Celebration by Thomas Vinterberg. Highlights include Bernadette Lafont, the crusade's poster girl, introducing two important Nouvelle Vague works that she starred in, Les mistons and Le beau Serge (14/03), and a brand new print of Francois Truffaut's The 400 Blows (13/03), an homage to the movement's existential antihero, which shows for an extended period in April.

NB: The Nouvelle Vague -- 50 years On symposium runs all day on both 13/03 and 14/03. The Nouvelle Vague film programme runs from 13/03 till 22/03 and from14/04 till 21/04. You can also catch a Nouvelle Vague season at the BFI Southbank from 09/04 till 30/04.

How do you negotiate our fine city? Walter Benjamin knew his by the walks he took to see his whores. Flash fave Iain Sinclair goes back a step with Thomas de Quincey's idea of strolling round, sans pattern, in a dream-like state; it's called psychogeography. What he practices as a writer and occasional filmmaker is similar. Not really a travel writer, he is a creator of atmospheres. And as you well know, what makes cities great, strange, creepy or "normal" is their atmosphere. A Hackney denizen since the '60s, his books be they fiction, non, or neither, are an important document of that place in these times. Hence a large part of our fine city's ever growing cultural history. Just as every place is a muse, every writer has his place; and certainly with Sinclair, Hackney has found its chronicler, its poet and critic. Danielle Arnaud is providing Sinclair with a forum for his latest, Hackney, That Rose-Red Empire, yet another complex document of the place. Included in the book are prints by Oona Grimes, which are on display at the gallery, together with work by artists including Brian Catling, Susanna Edwards, Stephen Gill, Jock McFadyen, Chris Petit, Emily Richardson and Sarah Simblet who have all been invited to respond to both Sinclair and his borough.

NB: catch Iain Sinclair and Brian Catling for a reading on 13/03 at 7pm (booking essential). Rose-Red Empire runs at Danielle Arnaud till 15/03.

If you've turned on the radio at any point in the last month or so, the chances are that you will have heard Emiliana Torrini's most recent single "Jungle Drum": it's the first really alternative airwaves-friendly unit shifter of 2009, surfing the fine line between pure pop and zeitgeisty scenester-ism. This is thanks in part to the Icelandic singer's cool, sexy image, her undeniable songwriting chops and vocal qualifications, and also due to the fact that in Dan Carey, aka Mr Dan, she has a collaborator and producer whose credits appeal to trainspotters (check out his early breakbeat/funk cuts as half of Danmass) and a fonder of tracks which generally make it to the upper reaches of the hit parade. This ULU gig is certainly the kind of concert you should only really go to if you're in the mood for a dance, but keep an open mind and you could quickly find yourself developing a bit of a crush on the Nordic songstress -- aurally, or otherwise.

Given that Bizet's Carmen was based on a novella influenced by Pushkin's poem The Gypsies, the decision to set this music to flamenco -- the sensuous dance form from Andalusia, with strong gypsy roots -- is certainly appropriate. Telling a tragic-comic tale of the doomed love between a gypsy girl and a soldier, Bizet's music is passionate, fiery and full of rhythmic-like motifs -- perfect for dance, the very essence of passionate expression. If there is one musical narrative that could work with, and be enhanced by flamenco, it is undoubtedly Carmen. Originally made as a film, this version, choreographed by the great, late Antonio Gades and performed by his renowned dance company, is currently celebrating its 25th anniversary. It is bound to be a highlight of the eagerly anticipated, annual Flamenco Festival at Sadler's (19/03 till 22/03). Other performers include Estrella Morente (14/03) -- who can be heard on the soundtrack to Almodovar's Volver; Rocio Molina (17/03); Eva Yerbabuena (23/03 to 25/03); and the Spanish National Ballet -- also founded by Gades (27/03 to 29/03).

NB: runs till 29/03.

Come forth to Dalston this Saturday evening young urban dweller and join in the celebrations and commiserations at Club Motherfucker. Celebrate as it is the 6th Anniversary of this chaotic asylum of fun curated by the delectable Daughters Of The Kaos. Commiserate as the aforementioned Daughters have deemed this the last ever Club Motherfucker. Everybody's favourite basement club under a furniture shop in Dalston just won't be the same. Sad Face. Not wishing to motherfuck with the motherfucking formula, a headline act of some repute is nestled betwixt acts bubbling under nicely. Rex The Dog takes centre stage, his reputation untarnished by a shady pop house past and a recent underwhelming album. Rex's pulsating electro thump and throbbing synths are for the dancefloor not them ears, which is just as well really! Of the supporting pack the Hercules And Love Affair-esque operatic disco pop of ColourinIN provide perhaps the most intrigue and excitement. Still with us? Good, cos ex Durrr resident The Lovely Jonjo is on hand to play some lovely music for your lovely feet to dance to.

Nevereverland has a pretty colossal standing in Modular's homeland, after getting that pyramid down under for a four-night stand at the back end of 2007, and the moniker is slowly building itself up over here with a succession of kitchen sink line-ups. This episode is no different, although the real sting is quinqgenarian hip-hop pioneer Afrika Bambaataa, who apart from having helped build an entire genre, was also sleazing up Kraftwerk samples before most of Modular's roster were even born. And for those youngsters who believe electronic music was invented with Homework, it's probably about time they found out what electro used to mean. We'd imagine you wouldn't catch out Alexis Taylor (of Hot Chip) in a battle of genre definition snobbery such is his fierce but brilliant geekery, and he's flanked on the decks by DFA up an comers Holy Ghost, among others, who are certainly making handclaps interesting again. Plus no night built for the trend-conscious would be complete these days without a slice of psych-rock -- provided here by Aussies Tame Impala -- and something utterly oddball, in this case Taylor's protege from the Greco Roman parties, Drums Of Death.

Tenacious, energetic, ingenious and a ferocious believer in the power of ordinary people, documentary maker Franny Armstrong is back kicking up a fuss on cinema screens. Best known for her 2005 film McLibel, where she documented ordinary people taking on a multinational corporation, her highly topical new film The Age Of Stupid tackles our headlong rush towards a climatic disaster scenario. Not one to shy away from difficult subjects, her hard-hitting cinematic message is pitched from the future, as the narrator (Pete Postlethwaite) looks back in sombre hindsight at the (highly possible) disaster we are currently heading towards. Made almost entirely with a combination of willpower and volunteers, and bankrolled by a cunning system of "crowd-funding", the film has been the successful testing ground for a new way of communal filmmaking. This ethos is being extended to the marketing and distribution of the film as well, with a spirited viral campaign and unique launch. The film is aiming to hold the world's largest ever film premiere -- simultaneously at 64 cinemas across the UK (including the hotly sought-after and swiftly sold out Solar-Powered Cinema Tent in Leicester Square) this Sunday. Come and help make (and be inspired to help change) history.

NB: The Age Of Stupid is released in London on 20/03. Also of note this week is the release of Wonderful Town and Bronson and, the French New Wave symposium and season at Cine Lumiere.

Two weeks after Ramadanman's house-fused headline set, FWD>> welcomes Hessle Audio's other key-player Pangaea for another Sunday night of quaking dubplates at Plastic People. Over the last two years the young Leeds-based collective have been blowing the competition out of the water, by combining the icy mechanics of Berlin dub-techno with the atmospheric sensibilities of deep house to create a steppier, more emotive vein of dubstep. With both the London and Bristol scene-leaders giving the output extensive play and the label promoting the cause via their weekly Ruffage Sessions show on Sub FM, it wasn't long before Hessle Audio were the new toast of the dubstep community. Carving out a sound reminiscent of drum and bass pioneer Photek, Pangaea (aka Kevin McAuley) has been a major factor in the label's rapid success, with two big releases in 2008 including the ethereal-epic "You & I". Hot on the heels of his latest 12-inch "Bear Witness" with Hotflush Recordings the youngster performs at a Sunday night institution, continuing to go from strength to strength with every week that passes.

As a film inspired by the southern Thai town of Takua Pa which was devastated by the 2004 Tsunami, Wonderful Town is not an explicit documentary of the wreckage left behind. A few years have passed and the area has physically recovered -- heartbreaking retellings of the event are few. The film is the story of Na, a socially-inhibited plain Jane, culturally colliding with Ta, an architect from Bangkok who comes to the town to oversee a building project. Despite the exotic backdrop, this is no mere two-hour billboard for Thai Tourism -- there are no hair-flowing moments, swirling camera movements, or waterfalls; the film is still as a photo, a breathtaking documentation of a town swallowed by nature, with the simple, tender experience between two people running alongside it. Wonderful Town says a lot without saying much at all -- on the surface it is a quiet film with the cheapening effects of orchestral strings thankfully absent -- but through his exhibition of moments director Aditya Assarat presents a complex cultural and personal dilemma framed by the day-to-day mundane difficulty of dealing with destruction no longer visible to the naked eye. Particularly interesting for those of us who take personal experiential freedom for granted.

NB: Wonderful Town is released in London on 13/03. Also of note this week is the special premiere of The Age Of Stupid, the release of Bronson and the French New Wave symposium and season at Cine Lumiere.

In truth, the braggadocio shenanigans of Charles Bronson, formerly known as Michael Gordon Peterson, got right on our wick. For a long time we were fed up of reading of this man kidnapping guards and committing random acts of violence for no apparent reason. But, after seeing his exploits in this film we have completely changed our minds. In 1994, while holding a guard hostage, he demanded an inflatable doll, a helicopter and a cup of tea as ransom. We rest our case. Directed by the great Danish director, Nicholas Winding Refn, who helmed the quite superb Pusher series (I,II and III), the picture tells of this man, who committed for a bungled minor armed robbery, just plain and simply refuses to accept any of the usual crap doled out by the prison services and revolts and revolts and revolts. Subsequently, he has spent some 34 years At Her Majesty's Pleasure and 30 of it in solitary. Of course this at times powerfully surreal movie is not just any old prison flick -- it delves into the very notion of incarceration, and Tom Hardy in the lead, who transformed himself entirely for the role, delivers a performance that is simply astonishing. Not for everyone but this film is destined to be a cult hit.

NB: Bronson is released in London on 13/03. Also of note this week is the release of Wonderful Town, the special premiere of The Age Of Stupid and the French New Wave symposium and season at Cine Lumiere.

There are not many designers out there who openly question briefs, challenge and confound expectations, and manage to infiltrate their client's work with their own personal and political agenda. Jan van Toorn happens to be one of the lucky few. Pivotal in the Dutch visual communications field since the '60s, Toorn's designs are very culturally and politically aware, reminiscent of the 1920s Dada photomontage boom. Think Hannah Hoch's optimistic pieces celebrating all things electric and technological, or John Heartfield's anti-Nazi posters. Like the Dada ancestors, Toorn's work is often described with such unreassuring concepts as "alienation", "incomprehensibility", "defamiliarisation", and "intrusion". Contradiction is his modus operandi. Interested in all forms of propaganda, Toorn uses the classic collage method of cut and paste to produce confrontational and highly idiosyncratic images attempting to bring to light the mechanics of manipulation. Here expression is favoured over composition and the viewer is invited to participate in the designer's activist appeals. In this talk, Toorn will be discussing his career, showing work and sharing current ideas. It's definitely more than just a pretty picture.

Is this an art gallery we see before us? Or a magician's workshop that has been taken over by experimental disco fiends? Definitely the latter. Fizzing, kicking, slapping and tapping is not what you should expect to find behind the blackout curtains at Rokeby at the moment. Stage Fright presents a large collaborative installation between Laura Buckley, David MacLean and Haroon Mirza, who have taken Buckley's sharply cut films of everyday objects creating sounds and rhythms as a starting point. These films swoop and slide around the room, bouncing off and refracting through geometric sculptural shapes of mirror and Perspex, reminiscent of conjurors' props. As you are guided around the space by the beats and flashes of the films, which have been built up into an electronic, orchestral sound, you might catch glimpses of magic built out of the quotidien. Downstairs is one of Doug Fishbone's oddly comic visual lectures, in which the artist charmingly explains, and then confuses, the power of visual symbols and their spell-like hold upon us. Shazam!

NB: runs till 21/03.

The undisputed highlight of this year's SPILL Festival is a trilogy of new work by the extraordinary Cesena-based troupe Societas Raffaello Sanzio, led by director Romeo Castellucci. Based on Dante's epic poem, the work is presented as two large-scale shows (Inferno and Purgatorio) as well as a smaller installation for ten people at a time (Paradiso). That Paradise is attainable by so few is surely no coincidence (you have to register your interest!) and is in line with Castellucci's fascination with the darker side of humanity, and the problem with its representation on stage. Inferno (which begins with the director himself being mauled by dogs) includes a cast of 50 local actors, a burning piano and Andy Warhol emerging from a car crash. It's one of those gigantic performance events which will likely be discussed for years, fuelled no doubt by its deeply troubling twin, Purgatorio, shocking from the outset if only for its starkly different, hyper-realist set design (a stylish, modern kitchen). Castellucci's work has always divided audiences, some finding it over-disciplined and unrelentingly grim, others celebrating an artist unafraid to play profoundly affecting semantic games with the "timeless themes": birth, death, violence, etc. Either way, his work is fascinating on a craft level, setting with every exquisite production new benchmarks concerning what can be done on a stage.

NB: Inferno is performed 02/04 and 03/04; Purgatorio on 08/04 and 09/09; and Paradiso on 02/04 till 09/04 (part of this year's SPILL Festival which runs from 02/04 till 26/04). Not many tickets remain for this trilogy of events so book quickly.

If you find that minimalism lacks soul, Tom Burr is your man. In his second Modern Art solo show, Head Ache, the American conceptual artist applies his strategy of appropriating the minimalist vernacular by adding the human touch. A bit like finding a Flavin and Judd side by side in your attic, with your old jeans on top. Made out raw untreated plywood, the geometric sculptures might look impersonal at first, but then you stroke one and it's covered with the finest cashmere. Warmer already. A pile of socks and a hanging jacket later and you begin to feel distinctly cosy, as glimpses of Burr's life begin to slip in; neon signs, empty record sleeves, vintage fashion magazines -- tell tale signs of New York's underground '80s scene. While the neatly organised Bulletin Boards convey a sense of order there is much more in Burr's boxes than initially meets the eye. See if you can spot the decapitation without the gallerist's help.

NB: runs till 09/04.

Four photographers: two Americans, one Brit, and one Palestinian. The winner gets £30,000. What to expect? Almost anything really. The work spans romanticism, documentary, politics, and straight-up weirdness. Our money is on the Americans -- either Taryn Simon or Tod Papageorge. Simon's composed glossy still lives clearly demonstrate that she has a good nose for the bizarre hidden around the corner of American daily life. A snub-nosed genetic reject from a white tiger breeding programme glowers threateningly, even more disturbing when you realize its not photoshopped. Other oddities include a steaming pile of impounded food back stage at airport immigration and a folksy looking cryogenic unit in some crackpot's backyard. Papageorge is the granddaddy of the bunch, and has found Elysium in Central Park, New York City. His flawless black and white photos contain semi-nudes self-obsessing in the long grass. Paul Graham is less optimistic about urban life: his constellations of images tell banal film-like stories about life in the burbs. For a blast of political reality, Emily Jacir tells the forgotten story of a Palestinian intellectual killed by Israeli secret police. A mixed bag, but the classy new building on Ramillies Street gives space and calm to an interesting show.

NB: runs till 12/04. The winner of the prize is announced on 25/03. On 21/03 (7pm) catch Tod Papageorge at The Photographers' Gallery when he discusses his work with Aaron Schuman.

Lee Hall's play about the true story of miners who took up painting (to widespread critical acclaim) opened in 2007 in Newcastle before moving to the NT's intimate Cottesloe, and then to the roomier Lyttelton. Soon it's going on a national tour, so see it before it leaves the capital. It's the 1930s and in a spirit of self-improvement five miners take up art appreciation classes. The bourgeois university lecturer drafted in to teach them encourages his students to learn to paint so that they can understand more fully the drive behind art in order to appreciate it. Comical clashes of the classes make up much of the first half (a la Billy Elliot, also by Hall) as do a lack of understanding of accents, laughing at pompous middle class pretentiousness etc. The essence is that no one's ever seen working class art in Britain quite like this, and it becomes a sensation. The second half gets more meaty, dealing with individual moral struggles, media pressures, prejudices, loyalty and the impact of the war. It would be easy to label this play's intentions -- the awakening, broadening, emotionally empowering nature of art, or the class boundaries and prejudices inherent in the art world, but that would be annoyingly reductive. The main thing is it's great fun, genuinely humorous and it'll really make you think.

NB: runs till 14/04.

As part of what seems to be a new endeavour toward showing the less well-known oeuvre of major artistic figures, the National Portrait Gallery presents a concise collection of Gerhard Richter's portraits. Mostly comprised of images taken from snapshots rather than life, Richter again demonstrates the vast range of his capabilities in work such as the stunningly photo-realistic "verso" rendition of his daughter Betty, the almost neo-pop, soft photo-montage-esque Gilbert and George, the beautifully coloured early work Frau mi Schirm to Ella. The latter is an appropriate choice as the cover of the catalogue, considering how this particular portrait toes the line between his conspicuously vague and surreal take on the sitter's persona, interspersed with a skillfully blurred rendition of their physical attributes. Richter is not a traditional portraitist in that he does not make portraits to reflect the personality or inner nature of the sitter, a reality that he believes cannot be harnessed properly on canvas. Instead his portraits serve to capture a moment, a portrait of real time and experience enveloping the sitter as opposed to a window into an identity he prefers to leave obscured on canvas.

NB: runs till 31/05. On 24/04 (10:30am - 5pm) the National Portrait Gallery is hosting a Gerhard Richter Study Day (speakers include Paul Moorhouse, curator of Gerhard Richter Portraits; Alex Danchev, University Of Nottingham; Dr Wiebke Leister and Dr Craig Smith, London College Of Communication).

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