The island setting’s tangible existentialism made it a key figure for the burgeoning art cinema movement of the early 1960s: Through a Glass Darkly (1961), the first of many Ingmar Bergman films set on Fårö; Naked Island (1960), Kaneto Shindô’s lyrical depiction of a farming family’s hardships; Peter Brook’s adaptation of Lord of the Flies (1963); and Michelangelo Antonioni’s L’avventura (1960). Contra Rossellini, these are all films that marshal considerable aesthetic resources to suggest man’s estrangement from God. Most influentially, Antonioni allows his narrative to unspool when a society woman disappears during a pleasure cruise through the same rocky Aeolian Islands.>> - Max Goldberg...
- 11/18/2014
- Keyframe
The island setting’s tangible existentialism made it a key figure for the burgeoning art cinema movement of the early 1960s: Through a Glass Darkly (1961), the first of many Ingmar Bergman films set on Fårö; Naked Island (1960), Kaneto Shindô’s lyrical depiction of a farming family’s hardships; Peter Brook’s adaptation of Lord of the Flies (1963); and Michelangelo Antonioni’s L’avventura (1960). Contra Rossellini, these are all films that marshal considerable aesthetic resources to suggest man’s estrangement from God. Most influentially, Antonioni allows his narrative to unspool when a society woman disappears during a pleasure cruise through the same rocky Aeolian Islands.>> - Max Goldberg...
- 11/18/2014
- Fandor: Keyframe
In 2012, documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras went public with her Homeland Security troubles. The director of two highly regarded documentaries concerning the War on Terror, one focusing on an Iraqi doctor (2006’s My Country, My Country) and the other on two former Al-Qaeda functionaries (2010’s The Oath), Poitras apparently worried the American government enough to be detained at airports on several dozen occasions. Wary of jeopardizing the integrity of her subjects and footage, Poitras relocated to Berlin. Even knowing this, it was still a little jolting to see her name attached to the video interview with Edward Snowden that surfaced a few days after journalist Glen Greenwald began reporting stories based on the former Nsa contractor’s incendiary leak. After years exploring the consequences of America’s drive for “national security,” here Poitras was at the very heart of revelations about the fate of civil liberties after 9/11. She had initially planned...
- 10/20/2014
- Fandor: Keyframe
In 2012, documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras went public with her Homeland Security troubles. The director of two highly regarded documentaries concerning the War on Terror, one focusing on an Iraqi doctor (2006’s My Country, My Country) and the other on two former Al-Qaeda functionaries (2010’s The Oath), Poitras apparently worried the American government enough to be detained at airports on several dozen occasions. Wary of jeopardizing the integrity of her subjects and footage, Poitras relocated to Berlin. Even knowing this, it was still a little jolting to see her name attached to the video interview with Edward Snowden that surfaced a few days after journalist Glen Greenwald began reporting stories based on the former Nsa contractor’s incendiary leak. After years exploring the consequences of America’s drive for “national security,” here Poitras was at the very heart of revelations about the fate of civil liberties after 9/11. She had initially planned...
- 10/20/2014
- Keyframe
News.
As reported yesterday, the Toronto International Film Festival has begun unveiling its 2013 lineup, beginning with Gala and Special Presentations. An exciting heads-up and major opportunity for young filmmakers: Tribeca Film Festival is collaborating with the Imagination Series: Film Competition for a filmmaking contest in which screenwriters and directors pitch their conceptual take on a short script by Geoffrey Fletcher (Precious). Five ideas will be produced, and the resulting films will be shown at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival. With a chance to write and direct an instant-entry at Tribeca, the contest catch phrase makes it sound almost too easy: "No experience required. Just imagination." Lumière is soon to be releasing their 6th issue in print (check the Table of Contents here). Online you can find a piece on Gregory J. Markopoulos by our own David Phelps, as well as a conversation with Nathaniel Dorsky conducted by Francisco Algarín Navarro and...
As reported yesterday, the Toronto International Film Festival has begun unveiling its 2013 lineup, beginning with Gala and Special Presentations. An exciting heads-up and major opportunity for young filmmakers: Tribeca Film Festival is collaborating with the Imagination Series: Film Competition for a filmmaking contest in which screenwriters and directors pitch their conceptual take on a short script by Geoffrey Fletcher (Precious). Five ideas will be produced, and the resulting films will be shown at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival. With a chance to write and direct an instant-entry at Tribeca, the contest catch phrase makes it sound almost too easy: "No experience required. Just imagination." Lumière is soon to be releasing their 6th issue in print (check the Table of Contents here). Online you can find a piece on Gregory J. Markopoulos by our own David Phelps, as well as a conversation with Nathaniel Dorsky conducted by Francisco Algarín Navarro and...
- 8/5/2013
- by Adam Cook
- MUBI
News.
Above: Filmmaker Andrei Ujică in conversation with Dennis Lim.
Dennis Lim is the new year-round Cinematheque programmer for the Film Society at Lincoln Center. Not too long ago we reported Robert Koehler had taken the position, but due to family health issues, he has stepped down. We congratulate Dennis Lim and our thoughts are with Robert Koehler. He may not be a household name, but he meant a lot to those who knew him: Ric Menello passed away at the age of 60 last week. Menello is known for co-writing Two Lovers and Lowlife with James Gray, and for directing this. Take a look at the Ditmas Park Corner blog's remembrance of Menello.
Editor of The Chiseler and Notebook contributor Daniel Riccuito has a new book coming out, and it's a humdinger: The Depression Alphabet Primer, with illustrations by Tony Millionaire. You can find a sample of the delights...
Above: Filmmaker Andrei Ujică in conversation with Dennis Lim.
Dennis Lim is the new year-round Cinematheque programmer for the Film Society at Lincoln Center. Not too long ago we reported Robert Koehler had taken the position, but due to family health issues, he has stepped down. We congratulate Dennis Lim and our thoughts are with Robert Koehler. He may not be a household name, but he meant a lot to those who knew him: Ric Menello passed away at the age of 60 last week. Menello is known for co-writing Two Lovers and Lowlife with James Gray, and for directing this. Take a look at the Ditmas Park Corner blog's remembrance of Menello.
Editor of The Chiseler and Notebook contributor Daniel Riccuito has a new book coming out, and it's a humdinger: The Depression Alphabet Primer, with illustrations by Tony Millionaire. You can find a sample of the delights...
- 3/6/2013
- by Adam Cook
- MUBI
Looking back at 2012 on what films moved and impressed us, it is clear that watching old films is a crucial part of making new films meaningful. Thus, the annual tradition of our end of year poll, which calls upon our writers to pick both a new and an old film: they were challenged to choose a new film they saw in 2012—in theaters or at a festival—and creatively pair it with an old film they also saw in 2012 to create a unique double feature.
All the contributors were asked to write a paragraph explaining their 2012 fantasy double feature. What's more, each writer was given the option to list more pairings, with or without explanation, as further imaginative film programming we'd be lucky to catch in that perfect world we know doesn't exist but can keep dreaming of every time we go to the movies.
How would you program some...
All the contributors were asked to write a paragraph explaining their 2012 fantasy double feature. What's more, each writer was given the option to list more pairings, with or without explanation, as further imaginative film programming we'd be lucky to catch in that perfect world we know doesn't exist but can keep dreaming of every time we go to the movies.
How would you program some...
- 1/9/2013
- by Daniel Kasman
- MUBI
My apologies to everyone who’s missed these links posts that I’ve been slacking off on recently, which is the result of a combination of things — being out of town, being busy and being brain-fried again. Mostly the last option, though, in all honesty.
If you love classic ’70s movie posters, then you absolutely have to read Temple of Schlock’s interview with Mort Künstler who painted posters for The Poseidon Adventure, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and more. Plus, Joshua and the Blob?The Austin Statesman interviewed filmmaker Don Swaynos about his directorial debut, Pictures of Superheroes. Most interestingly, why did Don, an awesome professional film editor, direct a feature film? Well, out of a fear of going blind! That’s motivation for you! P.S. Pictures of Superheroes is an amazing comedy — To be reviewed on Bad Lit soon!The One+One Filmmakers Journal takes...
If you love classic ’70s movie posters, then you absolutely have to read Temple of Schlock’s interview with Mort Künstler who painted posters for The Poseidon Adventure, The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and more. Plus, Joshua and the Blob?The Austin Statesman interviewed filmmaker Don Swaynos about his directorial debut, Pictures of Superheroes. Most interestingly, why did Don, an awesome professional film editor, direct a feature film? Well, out of a fear of going blind! That’s motivation for you! P.S. Pictures of Superheroes is an amazing comedy — To be reviewed on Bad Lit soon!The One+One Filmmakers Journal takes...
- 10/28/2012
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
News.
You're probably already aware, but there turned out to be some controversy over the awarding of the Golden Lion in Venice last week. Apparently the jury had decided to give it, in addition to the Silver Lion and Best Actor prize, to Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master, but were told they could not give a single film three awards, resulting in their choice—arrived at through heated debate from the sound of it—to instead give it to Kim Ki-duk's Pieta. Tiff is roughly at the halfway mark and David Hudson has an index of coverage for those eager to catch-up and/or follow along. The full line-up for this year's Vancouver International Film Festival has been unveiled, and it's massive: chock-full of the best films on the festival circuit as well as the impressive offering of East Asian films that characterizes the 2nd biggest fest in North America.
You're probably already aware, but there turned out to be some controversy over the awarding of the Golden Lion in Venice last week. Apparently the jury had decided to give it, in addition to the Silver Lion and Best Actor prize, to Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master, but were told they could not give a single film three awards, resulting in their choice—arrived at through heated debate from the sound of it—to instead give it to Kim Ki-duk's Pieta. Tiff is roughly at the halfway mark and David Hudson has an index of coverage for those eager to catch-up and/or follow along. The full line-up for this year's Vancouver International Film Festival has been unveiled, and it's massive: chock-full of the best films on the festival circuit as well as the impressive offering of East Asian films that characterizes the 2nd biggest fest in North America.
- 9/12/2012
- MUBI
The 55th San Francisco International Film Festival (site), opening tomorrow and running through May 3, "will seem comfortingly the same" to many in the Bay Area, writes G Allen Johnson in the Chronicle:
[A] lavish opening-night film and party, a rocking closing-night film and, in the two weeks between, 172 more films from 45 countries and tributes to distinguished celebrities... But behind the scenes, it's been the most challenging year in the festival's history. Two executive directors of the San Francisco Film Society have died — Graham Leggat, who lost a battle to cancer in August at 51; and his replacement, independent film maestro Bingham Ray, who had two strokes and died at 57 while attending the Sundance Film Festival in January. He had been on the job only 10 weeks.
"It sounds like a line, but it's actually true that for me personally it was a relief that I had something I could throw myself into that...
[A] lavish opening-night film and party, a rocking closing-night film and, in the two weeks between, 172 more films from 45 countries and tributes to distinguished celebrities... But behind the scenes, it's been the most challenging year in the festival's history. Two executive directors of the San Francisco Film Society have died — Graham Leggat, who lost a battle to cancer in August at 51; and his replacement, independent film maestro Bingham Ray, who had two strokes and died at 57 while attending the Sundance Film Festival in January. He had been on the job only 10 weeks.
"It sounds like a line, but it's actually true that for me personally it was a relief that I had something I could throw myself into that...
- 4/18/2012
- MUBI
The Believer's 2012 Film Issue is out and you can sample every essay, interview and list that's in it, though only a handful of texts are online in full. Joshua Jelly-Schapiro, for example, talks with Peter Doig, "a figurative painter whose lush dreamscapes at once evoke his medium's past and suggest the feel of photos and films," who also co-runs the StudioFilmClub in Trinidad: "In an airy old rum factory with a digital projector on one wall, a large screen on another, and a homey bar stocked with coconut water and local Stag beer, he hosts free screenings. Each Thursday night, FilmClub's patrons thrill to independent and art-house films ranging from Killer of Sheep and Klute to — on the night of my first visit a couple years ago — Nagisa Oshima's 1976 classic of sensual obsession, In the Realm of the Senses." You can see more of the flyers Doig's painted for the FilmClub here.
- 3/5/2012
- MUBI
The Miners' Hymns (2011) is "an elegant, elegiac found-footage work from Bill Morrison, best known for his silent-film reverie Decasia," writes Manohla Dargis in the New York Times. "A miner himself of a type, Mr Morrison has dug into the archives of the likes of the British Film Institute to cull primarily black-and-white images so rich, so alive with dirty faces, shadows and the occasional pit pony that they resurrect a world that for many has long been lost to history." It screens from today through Tuesday at Film Forum with three of Morrison's shorts, previewed by Cinespect's Ryan Wells. Release (2010) "uses found footage of the 1930 release of Al Capone from Philadelphia's Eastern State Penitentiary," while Outerborough (2005) "gorgeously catches a ride on a trolley making its voyage across the Brooklyn Bridge from Manhattan. Morrison gives us a split screen with two perspectives: a camera facing Brooklyn, another looking back at Manhattan.
- 2/9/2012
- MUBI
Looking back at 2011 on what films moved and impressed us it becomes more and more clear—to me at least—that watching old films is a crucial part of making new films meaningful. Thus, our end of year poll, now an annual tradition, which calls upon our writers to pick both a new and an old film: they were challenged to choose a new film they saw in 2011—in theaters or at a festival—and creatively pair it with an old film they also saw in 2011 to create a unique double feature. Many contributors chose their favorites of 2011, some picked out-of-the-way gems, others made some pretty strange connections—and some frankly just want to create a kerfuffle. All the contributors were asked to write a paragraph explaining their 2011 fantasy double feature. What's more, each writer was given the option to list more pairings, with or without explanation, as further imaginative...
- 1/5/2012
- MUBI
Fake Fruit Factory from Guergana Tzatchkov on Vimeo.
"Every year, Librarian of Congress James H Billington personally selects which films will be added to the National Film Registry, working from a list of suggestions from the library’s National Film Preservation Board and the general public," reports Ann Hornaday for the Washington Post. This year's list of 25 films slated for preservation:
Allures (Jordan Belson, 1961) Bambi (Walt Disney, 1942) The Big Heat (Fritz Lang, 1953) A Computer Animated Hand (Pixar, 1972) Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment (Robert Drew, 1963) The Cry of the Children (George Nichols, 1912) A Cure for Pokeritis (Laurence Trimble, 1912) El Mariachi (Robert Rodriguez, 1992) Faces (John Cassavetes, 1968) Fake Fruit Factory (Chick Strand, 1986) Forrest Gump (Robert Zemeckis, 1994) Growing Up Female (Jim Klein and Julia Reichert, 1971) Hester Street (Joan Micklin Silver, 1975) I, an Actress (George Kuchar, 1977) The Iron Horse (John Ford, 1924) The Kid (Charlie Chaplin, 1921) The Lost Weekend (Billy Wilder, 1945) The Negro Soldier (Stuart Heisler,...
"Every year, Librarian of Congress James H Billington personally selects which films will be added to the National Film Registry, working from a list of suggestions from the library’s National Film Preservation Board and the general public," reports Ann Hornaday for the Washington Post. This year's list of 25 films slated for preservation:
Allures (Jordan Belson, 1961) Bambi (Walt Disney, 1942) The Big Heat (Fritz Lang, 1953) A Computer Animated Hand (Pixar, 1972) Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment (Robert Drew, 1963) The Cry of the Children (George Nichols, 1912) A Cure for Pokeritis (Laurence Trimble, 1912) El Mariachi (Robert Rodriguez, 1992) Faces (John Cassavetes, 1968) Fake Fruit Factory (Chick Strand, 1986) Forrest Gump (Robert Zemeckis, 1994) Growing Up Female (Jim Klein and Julia Reichert, 1971) Hester Street (Joan Micklin Silver, 1975) I, an Actress (George Kuchar, 1977) The Iron Horse (John Ford, 1924) The Kid (Charlie Chaplin, 1921) The Lost Weekend (Billy Wilder, 1945) The Negro Soldier (Stuart Heisler,...
- 12/30/2011
- MUBI
"To follow news of the Mexican cartel wars is to perpetually learn anew of the worst thing you have ever heard of," writes Nick Pinkerton in the Voice: "the village-size mass graves, the revenge-killings on entire families. This is the silent wreckage; El Sicario, Room 164 introduces us to the personnel…. The film's sparse, almost banal presentation is a virtue, for to boldface the horrors under discussion would only trivialize or sensationalize them, as the Mexican murder magazines do."
As Max Goldberg wrote here in the Notebook back in February, in the documentary beginning its one-week run at New York's Film Forum today, "a former assassin describes his experiences working and killing for the Mexican narco-state in a bland motel room on the Us side of the border — bland except for the extraordinary charge that comes of the sicario's claim that he once tortured a man in this very same room.
As Max Goldberg wrote here in the Notebook back in February, in the documentary beginning its one-week run at New York's Film Forum today, "a former assassin describes his experiences working and killing for the Mexican narco-state in a bland motel room on the Us side of the border — bland except for the extraordinary charge that comes of the sicario's claim that he once tortured a man in this very same room.
- 12/28/2011
- MUBI
Go ahead and tell us you click it for the articles, but there's no shame in admitting that what you're really after are the book reviews. And the new issue of Scope, the online journal of film and TV studies from the University of Nottingham, has ten new book reviews. Sampling from one of them, Daniele Rugo writes, "As the title provocatively announces Dudley Andrew's book What Cinema Is! engages in the complex task of responding to André Bazin's attempt to identify the core of the cinematographic creation…. Andrew develops an inspired and insightful, if perhaps nostalgic, roadmap delineating how cinema should proceed to remain faithful to its origins (or to Bazin's original ideas)." Let Catherine Grant be your guide to the full issue.
The November/December 2011 issue of Film Comment is up, with nearly as many online exclusives as samples from the print edition: Peter von Bagh's uncut interview with Aki Kaurismäki,...
The November/December 2011 issue of Film Comment is up, with nearly as many online exclusives as samples from the print edition: Peter von Bagh's uncut interview with Aki Kaurismäki,...
- 11/9/2011
- MUBI
"The San Francisco Film Society's annual French cinema roundup stretches its national mandate a bit this year," writes Max Goldberg in the Bay Guardian, noting the inclusion of The Kid with a Bike by Belgian brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, "one of the best films of the year regardless of country of origin," and Finnish director Aki Kaurismäki's Le Havre. "Also worth checking out is Pierre Schöller's fascinating train wreck of an information age political thriller, The Minister, starring longtime Dardennes player Olivier Gourmet as a compromised bureaucrat. The Long Falling [image above], Martin Provost's second match up with actress Yolanda Moreau after Séraphine (2008), purposefully shuttles from a hardened Belgian village to an unmoored Brussels and features Agnès Godard's characteristically probing camerawork, itself a pride of French cinema."
From the lineup of eleven films, the Chronicle's Mick Lasalle picks out six to highlight, including Katia Lewkowicz's Bachelor Days Are Over,...
From the lineup of eleven films, the Chronicle's Mick Lasalle picks out six to highlight, including Katia Lewkowicz's Bachelor Days Are Over,...
- 10/28/2011
- MUBI
"We All Are Captains…" reads the headline at the top of Andrew Schenker's entry at his Cine File today, followed by "…in the exciting world of film criticism, but some are more so, thanks to the weight of institutional authority. Such is the case with one of the most embarrassing movie reviews I've ever read, David DeWitt's inane take on Oliver Laxe's You All Are Captains for the New York Times, which, among its other sins, seems not to understand the work in question one jot." Others, evidently, would second that reading.
Andrew Schenker's own review appears in Slant: "Laxe goes full-on meta by casting himself in the role of a visiting moviemaker who travels to Morocco to shoot footage with disadvantaged children living in a shelter. Arrogant, unresponsive to the needs of the kids, 'Oliver' neglects his educational mission in favor of using the children for his own somewhat mysterious cinematic ends…...
Andrew Schenker's own review appears in Slant: "Laxe goes full-on meta by casting himself in the role of a visiting moviemaker who travels to Morocco to shoot footage with disadvantaged children living in a shelter. Arrogant, unresponsive to the needs of the kids, 'Oliver' neglects his educational mission in favor of using the children for his own somewhat mysterious cinematic ends…...
- 10/21/2011
- MUBI
François Ozon has completed shooting his 13th feature, reports Fabien Lemercier at Cineuropa. An adaptation of Juan Mayorga's play The Boy in the Last Row, Dans La Maison features Fabrice Luchini, Kristin Scott-Thomas, Emmanuelle Seigner and Denis Ménochet and is slated for a release in France next fall.
"As the repression of Iranian filmmakers and actors intensifies, a group of prominent Iranians — including artist Shirin Neshat, Mohsen Makhmalbaf and Oscar-nominated actress Shohreh Aghdashloo — have called on countries worldwide to boycott official Iranian film and TV organizations and sanction its members." Anthony Kaufman has the full statement.
"A pioneer of what film scholar Gene Youngblood called 'expanded cinema,' San Francisco artist Jordan Belson developed his majestic form of abstract cinema over six decades of work," writes Max Goldberg. "He died last month at 85, the same day as George Kuchar. Belson worked on a very different plane than Kuchar: his films were non-representational,...
"As the repression of Iranian filmmakers and actors intensifies, a group of prominent Iranians — including artist Shirin Neshat, Mohsen Makhmalbaf and Oscar-nominated actress Shohreh Aghdashloo — have called on countries worldwide to boycott official Iranian film and TV organizations and sanction its members." Anthony Kaufman has the full statement.
"A pioneer of what film scholar Gene Youngblood called 'expanded cinema,' San Francisco artist Jordan Belson developed his majestic form of abstract cinema over six decades of work," writes Max Goldberg. "He died last month at 85, the same day as George Kuchar. Belson worked on a very different plane than Kuchar: his films were non-representational,...
- 10/19/2011
- MUBI
"Although most film festivals are consecrated to glamorous premieres and the newsworthy new, [To Save and Project: The Ninth Moma International Festival of Film Preservation, opening tomorrow and running through November 19,] treasures the rediscovered and dusted-off," writes J Hoberman in the Voice. "Like browsing a used bookstore in an unfamiliar city — another endangered pleasure — parsing Tsap's lineup, you're never sure what will turn up. This year's attractions range from a restored color version of Georges Méliès's A Trip to the Moon (the Star Wars of 1902) and the first Soviet stereo-vision feature, Robinzon Kruso (1947), to new prints of Roger Corman's anti-segregationist screen-scorcher The Intruder (the most alarming B-movie of 1962), Louis Malle's 1969 doc Calcutta (showing with Iranian poet Forough Farrokhzad's lyrical portrait of a leper colony, The House Is Black), Alberto Lattuada's 1952 neorealist adaptation of Gogol's The Overcoat, and Elaine May's 1976 black comedy Mikey and Nicky (the best movie John Cassavetes never made), as well as the preserved work of the late downtown performance artist Stuart Sherman.
- 10/13/2011
- MUBI
"Leonard Retel Helmrich's Position Among the Stars should be essential viewing for anyone curious to know what the rapidly modernizing 'second world' actually looks like," writes Steve Macfarlane in the L: "motorcycles, bootlegged t-shirts, plastic Tupperware containers, cell phones, and scores of dead cockroaches. Indonesia — the fourth biggest country in the world, and the nation with the largest Muslim population — has been the topic of Helmrich's life work, a trilogy of docs culminating here."
This "third documentary about the same Indonesian family is a dazzler in at least a couple ways," adds Seth Colter Walls in the Voice. "First off, it's the rare final chapter in a decade-plus-long saga — a trilogy that also includes 2001's The Eye of the Day and 2004's Shape of the Moon — that you can slide right into without any prior knowledge. There's a brief 'previously in post-Suharto Indonesia' montage at the beginning that draws...
This "third documentary about the same Indonesian family is a dazzler in at least a couple ways," adds Seth Colter Walls in the Voice. "First off, it's the rare final chapter in a decade-plus-long saga — a trilogy that also includes 2001's The Eye of the Day and 2004's Shape of the Moon — that you can slide right into without any prior knowledge. There's a brief 'previously in post-Suharto Indonesia' montage at the beginning that draws...
- 9/15/2011
- MUBI
For Reverse Shot's 30th symposium (congrats!), contributors "consider at length the movie that they believe to be the worst in a single filmmaker's career." So far: Jeff Reichert on Woody Allen's Anything Else (2003), Leah Churner on Otto Preminger's Skidoo (1968) and Leo Goldsmith on Ingmar Bergman's The Touch (1971) … PopMatters wraps its "100 Essential Directors" series … Kristin Thompson on Dw Griffith's devices … Max Goldberg previews The Outsiders: New Hollywood Cinema in the Seventies, running at the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley through October 27; related reads: Andy McCarthy on Larry Cohen's The Private Files of J Edgar Hoover (1977), Sam Wasson (Paul on Mazursky) on three Mazurskys and Peter Tonguette (The Films of James Bridges) on The China Syndrome (1979).
Image: Elliott Gould and Ingmar Bergman on the set of The Touch. For news and tips throughout the day every day, follow @thedailyMUBI on Twitter and/or the RSS feed....
Image: Elliott Gould and Ingmar Bergman on the set of The Touch. For news and tips throughout the day every day, follow @thedailyMUBI on Twitter and/or the RSS feed....
- 9/6/2011
- MUBI
Above: Publicity still from John Parker's Dementia (1955).
Rep houses in San Francisco, like those in most American cities, are struggling to stay open. But for something like thirty nights a year, the clouds lift and big crowds materialize for films of the past: call it the noir exception. To be sure, one needn’t actually attend the Film Noir Foundation’s annual Noir City festival at the Castro or Elliot Lavine’s grittier programs at the Roxie to know that the generic fantasy of film noir (style, sex and violence washed together) still holds powerful allure. You could hardly miss the bus stop advert for Rockstar Games’ latest blockbuster, L.A. Noire, outside the Roxie during Lavine’s latest marathon, “I Wake Up Dreaming: The Legendary and the Lost”. For those of us still invested in the non-interactive cinema experience, however, the popularity of these series is a remarkable if curious thing.
Rep houses in San Francisco, like those in most American cities, are struggling to stay open. But for something like thirty nights a year, the clouds lift and big crowds materialize for films of the past: call it the noir exception. To be sure, one needn’t actually attend the Film Noir Foundation’s annual Noir City festival at the Castro or Elliot Lavine’s grittier programs at the Roxie to know that the generic fantasy of film noir (style, sex and violence washed together) still holds powerful allure. You could hardly miss the bus stop advert for Rockstar Games’ latest blockbuster, L.A. Noire, outside the Roxie during Lavine’s latest marathon, “I Wake Up Dreaming: The Legendary and the Lost”. For those of us still invested in the non-interactive cinema experience, however, the popularity of these series is a remarkable if curious thing.
- 6/13/2011
- MUBI
I'll leave the commentary on poster design to the far more knowledgeable Adrian Curry, but in rounding up notes on events happening around the Us (outside of New York, which'll have its own roundup in a bit), a handful of posters caught my eye, starting with this one for Other Cinema's Fujiyama in Red, a live program aimed at raising funds for Japanese Tsunami Relief and named "after the 1990 Kurosawa movie that foresaw the catastrophe." Tomorrow night in San Francisco; scroll down for details.
Brian Darr: "It's hard to imagine a better time for a San Francisco movie lover to partake in the by-now almost subversive act of watching a great classic film in a cinema, than when our city's architectural pride and joy, the Castro Theatre, devotes its screen to a 70mm film series, as it will for eight days starting this Saturday night, when it plays West Side Story,...
Brian Darr: "It's hard to imagine a better time for a San Francisco movie lover to partake in the by-now almost subversive act of watching a great classic film in a cinema, than when our city's architectural pride and joy, the Castro Theatre, devotes its screen to a 70mm film series, as it will for eight days starting this Saturday night, when it plays West Side Story,...
- 6/3/2011
- MUBI
Time for a quick break from the news coming out of Cannes. With the emphasis on quick, here's a bit on what's going on elsewhere.
First, on the film journal front, Midnight Eye's posted three new reviews and a feature by Mark Player, "Post-Human Nightmares: The World of Japanese Cyberpunk Cinema." The new Offscreen features pieces on Luis Buñuel, Jesús Franco, Wristcutters: A Love Story, A Single Man and 3D. Word from Catherine Grant: "The second issue of the new Movie: A Journal of Film Criticism has just been posted online, with a wonderful looking Lang dossier, a fine tribute to the late Robin Wood, which takes the form of seven of his rarest pieces from the 1960s, 70s and 80s. And there's more besides on Susan Hayward and Vincente Minnelli." Speaking of Lang, you'll want to see David Bordwell's latest entry on how Lang shifts our alignment and...
First, on the film journal front, Midnight Eye's posted three new reviews and a feature by Mark Player, "Post-Human Nightmares: The World of Japanese Cyberpunk Cinema." The new Offscreen features pieces on Luis Buñuel, Jesús Franco, Wristcutters: A Love Story, A Single Man and 3D. Word from Catherine Grant: "The second issue of the new Movie: A Journal of Film Criticism has just been posted online, with a wonderful looking Lang dossier, a fine tribute to the late Robin Wood, which takes the form of seven of his rarest pieces from the 1960s, 70s and 80s. And there's more besides on Susan Hayward and Vincente Minnelli." Speaking of Lang, you'll want to see David Bordwell's latest entry on how Lang shifts our alignment and...
- 5/16/2011
- MUBI
"Fifty years ago this July," begins Michael Fox in the Sf Weekly, "Bruce Baillie and Chick Strand set up a sheet in their backyard in the California town of Canyon to project avant-garde films. This low-key, lo-fi setup, fortified with red wine, became a weekly bastion for filmmakers as well as their associates, friends, and lovers. Baillie and Strand went on (separately) to make landmark experimental films while shepherding their small artistic and social scene into incarnations that continue to thrive today: San Francisco Cinematheque (exhibition) and Canyon Cinema (distribution). The second annual Crossroads Festival launches tonight with Radical Light: Cinematheque at 50, part of a program honoring the Bay Area’s broad, important, and entertaining history of avant-garde filmmaking."
"Opening night includes at least one city symphony (Timoleon Wilkins' Chinatown Sketch), a form expanded upon in several subsequent Crossroads shows," notes Max Goldberg in the San Francisco Bay Guardian. "Jeanne...
"Opening night includes at least one city symphony (Timoleon Wilkins' Chinatown Sketch), a form expanded upon in several subsequent Crossroads shows," notes Max Goldberg in the San Francisco Bay Guardian. "Jeanne...
- 5/12/2011
- MUBI
Updated through 4/30.
The San Francisco International Film Festival (Sfiff), the longest one running in the Americas, opens tonight with Mike Mills's Beginners and closes on May 5 with Mathieu Amalric's On Tour. Among the 150 films screening in between, give or take, will be the centerpiece, Azazel Jacobs's Terri.
"In terms of artistic achievement, it's safe to say no producer has contributed to independent American cinema over the last two decades like Christine Vachon," writes Dennis Harvey, introducing his interview. Vachon will be delivering the State of Cinema address on Sunday evening (it's a busy time for her; she's also on Tribeca's Documentary and Student Short Film Competitions jury). Also at SF360, Michael Fox has cinema studies professor Bill Nichols give him a preview of the discussion he'll be leading on the Social Justice Documentary and talks with Bay Area filmmakers who have work in the lineup.
Max Goldberg...
The San Francisco International Film Festival (Sfiff), the longest one running in the Americas, opens tonight with Mike Mills's Beginners and closes on May 5 with Mathieu Amalric's On Tour. Among the 150 films screening in between, give or take, will be the centerpiece, Azazel Jacobs's Terri.
"In terms of artistic achievement, it's safe to say no producer has contributed to independent American cinema over the last two decades like Christine Vachon," writes Dennis Harvey, introducing his interview. Vachon will be delivering the State of Cinema address on Sunday evening (it's a busy time for her; she's also on Tribeca's Documentary and Student Short Film Competitions jury). Also at SF360, Michael Fox has cinema studies professor Bill Nichols give him a preview of the discussion he'll be leading on the Social Justice Documentary and talks with Bay Area filmmakers who have work in the lineup.
Max Goldberg...
- 4/30/2011
- MUBI
"For a biographical abstract of Christopher Maclaine, try the famous first lines of Allen Ginsberg's Howl," suggests Max Goldberg in the San Francisco Bay Guardian. "For greater precision, observe poet David Meltzer's letter to film historian P Adams Sitney (reproduced in Radical Light: Alternative Film and Video in the San Francisco Bay Area, 1945-2000): 'Poet, filmmaker, stand-up comic, bagpiper, chaser of mysteries.' Meltzer's letter continues, 'In the mid-60s sacrificed his nervous system to methedrine.' Stan Brakhage wrote of Maclaine, 'He courted madness and he finally got it.' Before he did, he completed four films, the first of which — his preemptive magnum opus, The End (1953) — flattened a very young Brakhage at its infamous Art in Cinema premiere. 67 years after the museum crowd balked at Maclaine's celluloid testament, the film is back at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art."...
- 3/31/2011
- MUBI
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