Black Mary Film Zine

2012-01-13T09:05:00.000-08:00

“The Interrupters” Wins Big at Cinema Eye Honors

Melissa Silvestri | January 12, 2012 | 0 Comments

Steve James and Alex Kotlowitz's "The Interrupters"

The 5^th Annual Cinema Eye Honors, a celebration of the best in documentary film, was held last night at the Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Queens. The ceremony was relaxed and fun, more a coming together of great artists in the documentary field than a narrow competition for awards. Hosted by filmmakers A.J. Schnack (“Kurt Cobain About a Son”) and Esther Robinson (“A Walk Into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory”), the ceremony handed out awards but also paid tribute to landmark filmmakers such as Frederick Wiseman, for his 1967 film “Titicut Follies,” and the duo of Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, for their “Paradise Lost” trilogy and the landmark efforts in justice that it helped to bring about.

Both of the top prizes, Outstanding Achievement in Direction and Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Feature Filmmaking, went to Steve James and Alex Kotlowitz’s “The Interrupters.” A film that has appeared on many film critics’ “best of 2011″ lists, it is a gripping look at three community activists known as Violence Interrupters who work to end street violence in their Chicago neighborhoods.

The first ever Hell Yeah award was given to Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, most notably because the human rights advocacy sparked by their “Paradise Lost” films led to three innocent men–the West Memphis Three–being released after serving years in prison for the deaths of three children. The surprise presenter was one of those men, Jason Baldwin, who had a casual warmth and a relaxed, open smile. For somebody who had spent many years behind bars for a crime that he did not commit, he did not show any resentment, just a desire to enjoy life and see the world. Baldwin made a poignant statement that when he was released from prison, he enjoyed getting to know Berlinger and Sinofsky as real people, meeting their families, no longer being filmmaker and subject, but now equal friends. “The Paradise Lost” films were noted by the filmmakers as an example of documentary filmmaking making a real difference.

Some winners were predictable in an understandable way. For Nonfiction Short Filmmaking, the award went to Tim Hetherington’s “Diary.” A noted photojournalist, Hetherington was killed in the Libyan conflict in April. His mother accepted on his behalf.

Mike Mills’s “Beginners” won for the Heterodox Award, which recognizes a narrative film that is influenced by documentary filmmaking styles. Of the five nominees, it was the only relatively mainstream film, compared to smaller films like “My Joy” and “The Mill and the Cross.”

Frederick Wiseman's "Titicut Follies," 1967

Frederick Wiseman was presented with the Legacy Award for “Titicut Follies,” a look at the harsh life inside a state prison in Massachusetts. Wiseman’s film oeuvre has spanned the range from ballet to boxing to the Air Force to state politics. The award was created to honor past documentaries that were landmark influences for many future filmmakers, fulfilling an achievement in artistry and nonfiction storytelling. Wiseman spoke eloquently, stating that “Making these movies is a great adventure. I’m extremely pleased and proud to have this award for this first film I did.”

A small moment that was a personal standout occurred when Cindy Meehl and her crew won the Audience Choice Prize for “Buck,” a documentary about a cowboy and his deep relationship with horses. “It takes a lot of women to make a film about a cowboy,” commented one of the filmmakers.

The other winners were as follows:

Outstanding Achievement in Production:

Gian-Piero Ringel and Wim Wenders, “Pina”

Outstanding Achievement in Editing

Gregers Sall and Chris King, “Senna”

Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography

Danfung Dennis, “Hell and Back Again”

Spotlight Award

Tatiana Huezo Sánchez, “The Tiniest Place”

Outstanding Achievement in an Original Music Score

John Kusiak, “Tabloid”

Outstanding Achievement in Graphic Design and Animation

Rob Feng and Jeremy Landman, “Tabloid”

Outstanding Achievement in a Debut Feature Film

Clio Barnard, “The Arbor”

This coverage was originally posted on Cinespect.

Highlights from DOC NYC

2011-11-02T09:54:00.000-07:00

“Girl with Black Balloons” – (Corinne van der Borch; U.S.A. and The Netherlands)

(screened with the short film ‘The Party in Taylor Mead’s Kitchen’)

“Girl with Black Balloons” bears some similarity to a documentary that showed at DOC NYC last year called “Lost Bohemia,” about the renovations to Carnegie Hall that involved kicking out residents in apartments and studios, mainly of whom were artists in their sixties and above. The artists were elderly, had dedicated their lives to the arts, and had great stories to tell, yet were absolutely destitute without anywhere else to go. “Girl with Black Balloons” tells the story of an artist named Bettina, a resident of the Chelsea Hotel since the 1960s. She has spent her life dedicated to her artwork, anonymous save for one public showing in 1980, and knows that the drive to create is unstoppable. Unfortunately, the Chelsea Hotel is being closed for renovation, and evicting many residents, much like Carnegie Hall did. Filmmaker Corinne van der Borch brings Bettina’s story to the screen, painting her with a warm and touching sensitivity to an unknown and semi-reclusive artist.

Van der Borch met Bettina by chance in the hotel, being invited into her apartment, which was barely livable. Bettina’s myriad of artwork was packed into boxes, but crowded all over the apartment, leaving only narrow walkways and spare room for guests. Bettina, from the outside would appear as an eccentric bag lady, an elderly woman with overdone makeup, a cobalt-blue wig, and getting around Manhattan on a scooter with a few black balloons tied to it. But behind her unusual appearance is a very intelligent, funny, and astute woman, devoid of any pretension. Bettina had been a very mysterious beauty in her youth, valuing her independence in traveling the world and being an artist, either by photographing people, painting Rorschach-like figures, or creating posters listing words that sound similar, like “constitution, retribution, institution, convolution,” etc. Bettina had given up a lot for her solitary life as an artist, with very little contact with friends and family, but still maintained that her work is her life.

Slowly gaining trust with van der Borch, Bettina lets her guard down, showing more of her art and smiling at ease, letting the outside world into her home. She expresses some regret over losing relationships over favoring her work, but knew that she was never cut out for a domestic way of life. She states that she never wanted children, and never married because the men would then expect a child. There is curiosity about her family, who Bettina is estranged from, and who obviously did not participate in the documentary.

While people may romanticize about brilliant artists who had mental illnesses or debilitating social phobia, Bettina does not strike as being neither mentally ill nor socially incapable of making friends. She had invited van der Borch into her life with a camera, and is not only friends with her, but is friends with a filmmaker/artist named Sam, who is her neighbor in the hotel. He is currently making his own film about her, and is inspired by her as a muse.

While watching the film, there was some concern that Sam and van der Borch were using Bettina for their own creative gain. An eccentric elderly woman who lived as a recluse with no close family or friends, who looked odd on the outside, and spoke with frankness and honesty. It seemed as if she was ripe for a filmmaker’s documentary, as if she was something of fascination for artists to make money off of. But as the film progressed, those notions went away, as both Sam and van der Borch were truly involved in Bettina’s life and well-being. In a scene where Sam and his friends are cleaning up Bettina’s apartment to make it more livable, Sam is clearly annoyed at van der Borch’s filming of the clean-up, essentially telling her that this was not a show, and if she wasn’t going to help clean up, she had to leave. Van der Borch gets the message, and leaves her camera rolling in a stationery spot as she pitches in. It quickly showed how special Bettina was, and how filming her was not for exploitation or amusement.

Van der Borch spent two years with Bettina, filming her life, and Bettina is a dazzling star of the film, with her high cheekbones, deep eyes, and knowing looks. The final scenes of the film, showing Bettina using a handheld camera to film passing ships at a harbor, reveals a once isolated woman opening herself up to the world beyond the four walls of her studio, accepting relationships without a fear that her independence will be taken away.

“The Island President” – (Jon Shenk; U.S.A.)

Whenever the world has heard about the threats of climate change, and seen the effects of it with this year’s cataclysmic earthquakes, hurricanes, tsunamis, and floods, it is often written off as just nature, to assuage people’s fears of rising sea levels that would swallow up land. But climate change is not happening in the future, it is happening right now, as evidence of the Maldives islands in danger of becoming a real-life Atlantis. In “The Island President,” documentary filmmaker Jon Shenk (“Lost Boys of Sudan”) profiles the charismatic and courageous president of the lowest-lying country in the world, President Mohamed Nasheed. In a lifetime spent fighting the oppression of the dictatorial president Maumoon Abdul Gayoom through protests and imprisonment, he faces a greater challenge than ever before – the sea levels of the Indian Ocean rising and submerging all 1200 islands of the Maldives.

The Maldives, to the world’s view, is seen as a tropical paradise, where British rock stars go to hang back on beaches shaded by palm trees, where divers go deep amongst brightly colored fish traveling in schools, and where life is at a peaceful standstill. The overhead shots captured by Shenk show the country as a gorgeous series of islands, surrounded by rich blue/green coral reefs, a stunningly beautiful arrangement of an island dream.

But that tourist fantasy masks the reality of the turmoil and hell that the country went through for thirty years. The country had liberated themselves from British rule in 1965. Their first president, Ibrahim Nasir, served from 1968-1978, and is credited with making the country viable for tourism, improving the economy, and modernizing the fishing industry, which provides a major source of income for the Maldives today. President Gayoom instilled a regime that eliminated all history of previous rule, insisting that schools only teach about him and nobody else. His administration imposed terror against anyone who disagreed with his rule, throwing people in prison or having them die of “natural causes” while their bodies show severe beatings. Nasheed was one of these prisoners, held in solitary confinement once for 18 months, surviving through his sheer willpower.

After thirty years of this hell, and the public made aware of the fatal beatings, a democracy movement was formed, with Nasheed at the head of it. Nasheed, despite all of the torture and pain he has gone through and witnessed, appears as a very likable and optimistic man, somebody who truly believes in his people and will not stop to bring them justice. Successfully, Nasheed won the people’s vote and became president in 2008. But while that ended Gayoom’s reign of terror, the difficulties in Nasheed’s term had only just begun.

The symptoms of climate change plays out like an omen of things to come. Fishing has been extremely low, fishermen only bringing in less than a quarter of their usual catch. Deep erosion has wiped away shorelines, revealing rocks that would normally lie beneath the surface. In one scene, Nasheed’s deputy undersecretary, Aminath Shauna, is telling her family about work, and they are light with her, asking her to “save them” so they don’t get “swallowed up.” They are both joking and serious, and it is a strange feeling to have, watching people who know that they may lose their lives to the ocean, but are trying to maintain a sense of humor about it to deal with the inevitability.

“The Island President” follows Nasheed through his first year in office, trying desperately to grab the world’s attention about the threat to his country while knowing that he is up against superpowers like India, China, and the U.S., who have their own interests at hand. Shenk’s crew have unfiltered access, sitting in on private meetings that would normally be classified, showing that behind his genial charm, Nasheed is very shrewd and dead-set on getting media attention, by any means necessary. He even stages a media stunt of an underwater cabinet meeting to make his point. The film culminates with the Copenhagen Climate Summit, where Nasheed and his dedicated staff hope to gain support from major developed countries to reverse these changes to save the world. Nasheed speaks with the kind of honesty and candor that many politicians would shy away from, like “”It won’t be any good to have a democracy if we don’t have a country.”

What is sad is that climate change is very real, and that in time, rising sea levels will not only engulf The Maldives, but will submerge coastal cities and lead to catastrophic terror and untold deaths of millions. It is a slow-moving threat, and even if it has already been noted in extreme weather, if these forces of nature happen far away, people assume that it can’t happen to them, that they are safe or protected by a rich government. Nobody is immune from these global changes.

“The Children Were Watching” & “The Chair” – (Richard Leacock; U.S.A.)

DOC NYC is celebrating the career of documentary filmmaker Richard Leacock (1921-2011), a filmmaker whose documentaries were a call for social activism in the name of human rights. His films, often so stark and revealing in people’s prejudices, ambiguities, and brutal honesty, would be prevented from being aired on television, too controversial at the time. Along with filmmakers D.A. Pennebaker and Robert Drew, they made films like”Primary,” about the 1960 Wisconsin Primary election between John F. Kennedy, Jr. and Hubert Humphrey for the Democratic Party’s nomination for President. Getting unprecedented access, using light cameras, and filming a la cinema verite, it was a breakthrough and innovation in the world of documentary filmmaking. Leacock’s career paved the way for many documentary filmmakers to film subjects with private access, capture candid moments, make social statements, and open audience’s eyes to worlds they never knew about before.

Two of his films that demonstrate that kind of candidness and brutal honesty were “The Chair” (1962), a feature about lawyer Louis Nizer’s fight to save his client Paul Crump from the electric chair, and “The Children Were Watching” (1960), a made-for-ABC-TV short about school integration in New Orleans. “The Chair” is gripping with courtroom drama and a sense of dread, while “The Children Were Watching” shakes audiences to the bones with the absolute hatred and steadfast prejudice spewed out of ordinary people due to social changes.

“The Children Were Watching” is right in the midst of the controversies that surrounded school integration at the time. In New Orleans, history is made when Ruby Bridges, a six-year-old girl, became the first African-American child to attend an all-white elementary school in the South. Mobs of white people who were pro-segregation gathered on her daily walks to and from school, yelling hateful epithets and threatening violence against this child, escorted by U.S. Marshalls to ensure her safety. The vitriol that came out of people’s mouths regarding African-Americans was absolutely horrendous. Talk of “these people,” that “they are trying to be white, and they’re not white,” and that they “have it good” only kept their perspectives narrow and close-minded. The sound quality of the 1960s audio made it a little difficult to understand people’s deafening yells, but the message was clear.

In retaliation, white parents pulled their children out of schools that supported integration, sending them to all-white schools that they had to be bussed into practically the next district. The narration was clearly in favor of integration, pointing out the benefits of integration would have children learn together as equals, and that the attitudes of these parents seeped into the minds of their children, infecting them with racism that they would carry on into adulthood. One man even stated that he thought school integration was a Communist plot, like an infection of American values of capitalism and freedom.

The mobs’ racism was not reserved only for African-Americans, but for white parents who supported integration and sent their children to schools with black students. The film focused particularly on the Gabriel family, a middle-class white family with six kids. Mrs. Gabriel escorted her daughter to and from school, nearly losing in amidst the mob that practically wanted to swallow them both up. But even when they got home safely, it wasn’t over. The mob continued yelling outside of her house, their roars nearly shaking the glass. The children inside, both watching from the window and being distracted with toys by their mother, were trapped, as if there were riots or a war going on outside. The mob was unrelenting, and their influence was close to destroying the lives of the family through social pressure and the high status that race plays in society.

The Chair was unusual in that it was not the case of an innocent man being on death row, as one might surmise from the description of a lawyer saving his client from the death penalty. Paul Crump was on death row for killing a security guard during an armed robbery of a meatpacking plant in 1953. Over the past several years, his lawyer, the famed Louis Nizer (clients included celebrities and journalists) gathered evidence that, while Crump was guilty, he showed that he could be rehabilitated into a civil, individual who showed contrition for his crime, and that killing him would only stop progress of successfully rehabilitating other prisoners to become law-abiding citizens. The film is a stirring drama of the uphill battle to convince a court that an admitted murderer can be reformed, especially playing into any racial politics at hand (Crump was African-American).

The film was a collaboration between Leacock, Drew, Pennebaker, and filmmaker Gregory Shuker, and their work as a team showed magnificently. Leacock’s depth of perspective was evident as he followed the prison warden through the long, winding hallways to the death chamber, where the electric chair waited for its next victim. The chair had a medieval appearance to it, with straps for the ankles, chest, and lap, and a screwed-on headpiece, as a true torture device for those both guilty and possibly innocent.

The hearing itself, while it mostly advocated for Crump to not receive the death penalty (with one or two prosecutors questioning if Crump was truly remorseful for his crime), brought the audience along with its suspense, dependent on the governor’s decision the day of Crump’s execution to save him or not. Even throughout the majority of the film, Crump is not seen, only spoken of by his defenders and reading a statement he made declaring that he has reformed for the greater good of humanity, while accepting whatever fate is bestowed upon him. Without knowing the ending, there is a fear that somebody would be executed, and Nizer would be shown sweating bullets in his office, staring at the telephone as if willing it for good news. The friendly and jovial relationship shown between him and his amiable secretary, who often eased his anxieties with good humor, were light and likable moments in the film.

Both films were landmark documentaries for their time, about the need for change in social issues regarding integration and the death penalty, and Leacock is to be remembered for his pioneer work not only as a documentary filmmaker, but as an advocate for social reform and positive change in the world.

“First Position” – (Bess Kargman; U.S.A.)

“First Position” takes the audience into the nerve-wracking world of ballet competitions, where a performance can make or break the path of a young dancer’s career. At the Youth America Grand Prix, ballet dancers aged 9-19, from all over the world, compete not only for medals, but for chances to be accepted at the world’s top ballet schools and companies. These dancers have been training their own lives, only focused on making a career as a successful dancer with an elite company. “First Position,” directed by Bess Kargman, centers on five young dancers, each with their own path and story of what dance means to them.

The children featured have very unique and interesting backgrounds. 11-yr old Aran, raised in a military family, continued his studies of ballet while living outside a U.S. military base in Naples. Michaela, 14, was an orphan from Sierra Leone who was adopted by an American couple, finding her talent in ballet. Rebecca, 17, is a bubbly teen girl who may come off as an average cheerleader type on the outside, but possesses unusual flexibility and a refreshing sense of humor about herself. Miko, 12, and Jules, 10, are brother and sister of mixed British/Japanese heritage, and Miko is even home-schooled so she can devote more time to her ballet training. And Joan Sebastian, 16, is a teenage boy from Colombia who is determined to make it big as a dancer so he can send money home to his family. All of these dancers possess both budding and extraordinary talent, with a preternatural maturity that is preparing them for careers as young adults in the unpredictable world of dance in a shaky economy.

One of the standouts was an 11-yr old Israeli girl named Gaya, who competes alongside Aran in the European finals of the Grand Prix. Her performance drew out a very dangerous and captivating energy, performed in a very mature and adult manner for a very young girl. This is not to say it was too mature for her; on the contrary, it showcased the intelligence and awareness that she possessed to be challenged by difficult material.

Of the dancers, Joan Sebastian was the most mature, simply because he was practically living on his own, far from his family. He left his small town in Colombia to pursue his ballet studies in NYC, living with his ballet instructor. At 16 years old, he is more of a man than a boy. He purchases calling cards to speak to his mother, who hopes that he isn’t eating too much fried food in America, and, while he is in a tough situation, doesn’t cry or get overwhelmed, composing himself with the kind of self-confidence that will serve him well in his career.

Ballet is a very expensive undertaking, and the families ranged from being well-off (enough to afford $80 pointe shoes or hand-made tutus) to very poor, relying on their child to find success in dance. For the mother of Miko and Jules, there was a sense that she had wanted to be a dancer herself or had been, and while Miko possessed the talent and drive, when Jules expresses doubts over dance, his mother is visibly upset, as if it was her dream to have successful ballet dancer children. The expenses are extremely great, and if the dancers don’t become successful, if it doesn’t “pay off,” then all the money would seem for nothing. Hence, the importance of gaining a scholarship to an elite school or a job with a respected ballet company.

Even when the stresses and difficulties of ballet are shown – Michaela’s tendonitis threatening her Grand Prix performance; the presence of injuries from overworking the body to do unnatural moves like overextending; and the sacrifices made to keep the ballet dream going– the subjects chosen are still healthy children graced with charm and poise who have important goals set ahead of them, while also still having fun with friends or other activities, not growing up too fast. The documentary leaves the audience wanting these children to succeed, and understanding the hard work and dedication that it takes to make these dreams come true.

This post originally appeared in Cinespect

A Selection of a Few Gems at Latin Beat in August

2011-11-02T09:52:00.000-07:00

Latin Beat, the annual showcase of the most diverse range of films from Latin American countries, is in its twelfth year at The Film Society of Lincoln Center. This festival features films that challenge audience expectations and give examples of slice of life storytelling that make the festival a stylish and fresh addition to the many summer festivals offered in NYC.

Of the films offered at the festival, there are a few with significant buzz and critical acclaim that should be noted. The Chilean film “The Life of Fish,” directed by Matias Bise, is a sad and poignant drama centering on the handsome vagabond Andres (Santiago Cabrera), who has been out of the country for a decade covering the world’s cities and landmarks as a travel writer sent on location. He is preparing for another business trip, and spends one last night in Chile, revisiting past friends at a birthday party.

What was remarkable about the film was how much is revealed in such natural ease. The dialogue doesn’t hit audiences like clunky exposition, but rather unfolds slowly, be it with Andres’ friends’ jealousy over his glamorous life, the adolescent crush had on him by the sister of an old friend, the fascination by two young boys over his experience in drugs and sex, and finally, the painful revelations revealed by his former lover, Bea (Blanca Lewin), now in a domestic and stable life from when he knew her. The film has minimal music, and an atmospheric blue lighting that gives the film a feeling like wading through water, slow and steady and controlled.

“No Return,” an Argentine psychological thriller by Miguel Cohan, is tightly paced, but is frustrating due to the selfish actions of its teenage protagonist, Matias (Martin Stipak), and the consequences of his parents’ actions to protect him. Matias is introduced as an ordinary teen boy driving with his friend from a party, while Federico (Leonardo Sbaraglia), a roguishly handsome ventriloquist, is driving home to his wife and daughter. A double tragedy occurs that evening when a young male cyclist is run over twice by both men in the same night. Federico merely hits his bike and leaves after arguing with the cyclist, who is then immediately hit by Matias. Matias, in a panic, leaves the cyclist for dead and rushes home, telling his father a bogus story to avoid the reality of the hit and run. The cyclist dies, and, with Matias being protected by his parents, refuses to own up to the reality, leaving Federico to be wrongfully imprisoned.

The sight of seeing a sniveling teenage boy being coddled by his parents over fear of going to prison was absolutely disgusting, and the story in the second act follows the retribution planned by Federico upon his release from prison. The film takes on a more dangerous atmosphere, as the warm and safe personality Federico had had has given away to a cold and calculating presence, a la a hardened criminal despite not having done anything to deserve that life.

“Long Distance,” a Cuban film directed by Esteban Insausti, is a drama centering on politics and fractured relationships. In 1994, Cuba experienced a mass exodus as Castro declared that the government would not stand in the way of those wanting to flee the island during their economic crisis. More than 35,000 people went to the United States in hopes of a better life, leaving friends and family behind. This film focuses on a young woman, who, on her 35th birthday, is struck with the emptiness that many of her friends are gone. She reminisces about her past friends, picturing them as attending a dinner party in her home, and the film tells their individual stories of pain and struggle, and it also uses documentary-like interviews with those who fled the country years before to escape poverty. The cinematography is stark and cold, reflected in the woman’s large apartment with minimalist art and spotlessly clean kitchen counters. The apartment is beautiful, but it feels like a tomb rather than a warm home.

“The Death of Pinochet,” directed by Bettina Perut & Ivan Osnovikoff, had the potential to be a thoughtful and objective documentary about the reactions to the death of the Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet in 2006, such as the supporters who argued that he brought economic stability and prosperity to their country, or the protestors who said he only brought death and destruction for over thirty years. But while the documentary did capture the explosive energy in the streets following his death, and gave both sides equal attention, the choice to film the interviewees with close-ups of their mouths as they spoke was jarring and irritating to watch. It was difficult to stay interested with their mouths filling up the whole screen, instead of pulling back to film their faces in an ordinary way. The choice was garish and over the top, and was bothersome to watch while staying informed about the impact Pinochet’s death had on Chile and their future.

The festival has many more selections and offers, which runs through the 24^th at the Walter Reade Theater at The Film Society of Lincoln Center. To see Latin American films from a wide range of countries and experiences, the festival is highly recommended to be seen.

This story originally appeared on Cinespect

2011-07-12T19:47:00.000-07:00

Guest Post: Interview with Sophia Takal - Writer/Director of Green by Melissa Silvestri

Actress/writer Sophia Takal’s directorial debut, Green, is a film that is both dark in its themes of jealousy, yet shines with a natural ease depicting the burgeoning friendship of two very different women. Green focuses on a young Brooklyn couple, Sebastian (Laurence Michael Levine) and Genevieve (Kate Lyn Sheil) who come out to a cabin in the woods where Sebastian is going to cover gardening and country life for his hipster blog, a city mouse meets the country sort of feel. Genevieve puts up with Sebastian’s pretentiousness because she doesn’t have a secure identity of her own, and it takes the friendship of Robin (Takal), a local woman, to bring out her confidence. But though Genevieve and Robin share an ease with one another, it slowly twists into a dark path in Genevieve’s mind, when she concocts cheating fantasy scenarios between Sebastian and Robin that threaten to destroy her relationships.

Green is slow-moving, and despite its dark moments, has a light and lush beauty to it, thanks to the gorgeous cinematography and long takes captured in wide camera angles, that really give the audience a chance to walk with the characters and understand them from the inside out. I spoke with Takal via phone, after Green had played at BAM’s BAMCinemaFest.

Women and Hollywood: : The title of the film has a double meaning, to both indicate nature and jealousy. How did you develop the story?

Sophia Takal: The story came up in an outline one night. I knew that I wanted to shoot with the other two actors (Sheil and Levine), and I had that house for location because it was my dad’s house. I wanted to explore jealousy, and the emotions that I’ve been going through my whole life, really intensely in the year before shooting Green. And the last movie I made, Gabi on the Roof in July, was all in New York City. I wanted to get out of New York and into nature; I thought that would be really nice. The plot itself just came out of nowhere. It was based on some themes that I had been sort of playing around with.

WaH: The cinematography was absolutely lush and gorgeous. How did you and Nandan Rao get together to collaborate?

ST: He had shot another film called Bummer Summer. Both Bummer Summer and Gabi on the Roof in July premiered at a festival in California called Cinequest, and we became friendly and stayed in touch. I love the way that it was shot. He’s really talented. And [I was using] the Canon 5D, and a lot of people said that it was hard to focus with. But I knew that Nandon knew the camera really well. But mainly he’s really talented, and more than being just a D.P. He was really patient with me because it was my first time directing, and he always knew what questions to ask to help me figure out what I was trying to get at. It was really helpful, because I don’t know if I’m the most articulate person, so anyone that can help me to get what I want, I really want around.

WaH: There were interesting camera perspectives where, during conversations between the two women, the camera was placed far back and stationary, and it was like listening in on private conversations. What was the thought behind that kind of staging?

ST: I really wanted to do as much in one shot of each scene as possible. I really didn’t want to cut a lot during the scenes. As they’re getting to know each other, the camera gets a little wider. But there’s a scene on the swings where Genevieve is upset, and they’re having their first real heart-to-heart, and the camera is closer in. But I feel like whenever there’s a cut in a movie, it gives the audience a millisecond to re-set and re-focus. I just wanted the audience to sit and have to watch everything as it was unfolding.

WaH: You reference back to older films where scenes were shot with fewer cuts and it allows the audience to take the film in more rather than be interrupted by jump cuts or stylish editing.

ST: I wanted the movie to be slow and meditative. I was really influenced by the Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu. He did a lot of static shots, where everything unfolds, and it’s all really naturalistic. Imagine mundane conversations, but there’s a lot going on underneath. I wanted to mirror that feeling.
Despite that there is a thread of jealousy in the film, the film’s strength comes from the relationship between Genevieve and Robin. Genevieve sees Robin as strange, but her lack of pretension is refreshing. The dialogue flows very naturally between them, that it almost felt improvised. What was it like developing those scenes?
Well, Kate and I are actually best friends in real life, so it was really easy to pretend to act like friends. We became friends while shooting Gabi. For me, I thought the most important relationship was the one between the women. Something about the supportiveness of females and friendship, and that Robin is giving Genevieve an opportunity to become more fully realized, not only defining herself by her man. It’s really important to me, because in my own experiences with women, I have a harder time trusting women and feeling comfortable, but I find that when I finally do break through, I can get a lot closer than I could with a man. So I wanted to look at that, I thought that was really important.

So even though there’s jealousy and the love triangle, the tragedy for me is the non-supportive nature of the two women. Genevieve turns so quickly against Robin, even though Robin hasn’t done anything, it’s all in [Genevieve’s] mind. But if women were more supportive of each other instead of viewing others as threats, maybe we could all feel stronger and undefeatable.

WaH: Genevieve really goes through an evolution in the film, as if nature is bringing out her primal side. How did you develop that character?

ST: I really wanted to start off with a character who doesn’t feel safe to show who she really is. And I feel like it’s rare to have a female protagonist whose identity is so unclear and unformed. But that was intentional, because I feel that Genevieve had defined herself by outside expectations. And that’s something that I’ve struggled with. Like, “who am I?” in relation to this person, vs. “who am I?” on my own. So I wanted to show her progress, and with the female friendship, show a potential way she could be. Like being comfortable in her own skin, comfortable to say what she does and doesn’t want, and comfortable in saying no to her boyfriend without being afraid that he’s going to leave her. That’s a really scary thing, I think. Forming an identity, and being comfortable enough to acknowledge who you really are, and get rid of all these poses of what you think you should be. So I think that she has the opportunity to grow, but because she’s not being supported [by Sebastian], she shrinks back to the way she was before. So that was the arc that I wanted to see with her character.

WaH: The music was very sparse, yet during Genevieve’s fantasy/jealousy scenes, it reminded me of 1970s horror films, most notably Carrie, due to Genevieve’s appearance. What kind of music was developed for those scenes?

ST: Ernesto Carcamo, who did the music score, is really talented. It sort of sounds like found objects, and he turns them into music. He can take the sound of a car driving and manipulate it to make it into a tone. Or people having sex, he can make it sound like a weird, ethereal instrument. He did a lot of stuff like that. I also wanted it also to be rooted in nature, like wind chimes and Native American instruments. He made it very other-worldly.

I wanted it to have the tone of a horror movie, because in those scenes Genevieve is becoming a monster, but I didn’t want it to be a horror movie. So I tried to have the music translate into what would sound like a horror movie. The horror of everyday, and the way that people are against each other, with psychological manipulations.
This post originally appeared in Women & Hollywood

2011-04-17T21:05:00.001-07:00

Interview: Goran Hugo Olsson (The Black Power Mixtape: 1967-1975)

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Apr 06, 2011
Source: IONCINEMA.com Exclusive

The Black Power Mixtape: 1967-1975 is a fine example of a documentary that blends the past and present, using the visual medium of film as a “mixtape” to collect images of the Black Power movement of the 1960s and 1970s while being entirely narrated from new and archived interviews with activists such as Angela Davis, Stokely Carmichael, and Kathleen Cleaver, and musicians such as Erykah Badu, Talib Kweli, and Questlove. The film’s footage was filmed by Swedish filmmakers who made documentary segments for Swedish television of the black power movement, and chronicling how a cycle of poverty, structural racism, and the need for equality using intellectual thought was pertinent during these years. These issues were spearheaded by the Black Panthers who, contrary to popular belief, were not advocating for violence but for education and reform in the black community.

The film was directed by Göran Hugo Olsson, who had previously directed Am I Black Enough For You (2009), about the life of Billy Paul, the sound of Philadelphia soul music, and the relationship between Paul and his wife, Blanche. The Black Power Mixtape was at Sundance in the World Cinema Documentary Competition category, and just played at New Directors/New Films. I spoke with Olsson this March in NYC.

Melissa Silvestri: How did you get involved with putting together this film and its footage?
Göran Hugo Olsson: I was doing research for another film. I decided that film should take place only in nighttime, so I wanted to have night shots of America from the 60’s and 70’s, and in the archive, I started looking for those images, and I also found this, the material that makes up the mixtape. It was only broadcast once in primetime, and never again. So as a filmmaker, you’re looking for topics and subjects that you think would be a good film, but also a topic that you are engaged in, so you can dedicate two or three years of your life to it. So when I discovered this much material, I realized this is a good film, this is something I want to do. So was my duty to take these images from the basement to a wider audience.

Silvestri: Were the subjects interviewed particularly for this film or were their interviews taken from other sources?
Olsson: Archived films, they can get claustrophobic, in a sense, because however good the images are or how interesting, you’re confined in the space of the archives. So I wanted to add voices from today, more oxygen into it. I needed voices and information that put the images in context. Also, I was inspired by commentary tracks on DVDs, where you can put on commentary. And sometimes that makes the film even better, where you can see Taxi Driver with Martin Scorcese talking over it. Maybe Taxi Driver is not better that way, but I enjoy that very much, so that’s what I wanted to do.

Silvestri: What was it like meeting and speaking with some of your subjects? Did you interview them yourself?
Olsson: I screened the material, made it five minutes, then I asked them to comment on the images. So it was like interviews, but they also comment on what they just have seen.

Silvestri: The Swedish filmmakers captured a side of America that was ignored or downplayed by the American media. Was it because they were outsiders that they were able to be more objective, or because their work had more freedom to be shown on Swedish television rather than American television? And how did they gain more trust, being not only white but foreigners?
Olsson: That was a lot of different questions. (laughs). The mainstream media just had shows and entertainment and news. Black people only appeared on the news when they were connected to crime or court cases. And I think they (the Swedish filmmakers) got access that no American could get that easily. They just knocked on the door and were like, “Hello, we’re from Sweden.” And it’s obvious even for me that when I’m meeting the voices of today that they understand that I can’t understand the whole history. I don’t have the whole history. But they’re very generous and try to explain things. I think it would be very hard for an American to do this film. With the original material, they had access to this environment that I know that when the Black Panthers had this big conference in San Francisco, they allowed no white people in, but there was a Swedish team, and it was like, “OK, you’re from Sweden, you can be in for ten minutes, that’s OK.” And also, there were very strong ties between the civil rights movement and Sweden. It started with Dr. King receiving the Nobel Prize in ’64. It grew from there.

Silvestri: That’s interesting, I didn’t know about that.
Olsson: He came to Sweden, and all of these people came to Sweden to lecture in universities .

Silvestri: So by Dr. King winning the Nobel Prize, more Swedish people would be aware of the civil rights movement in America?
Olsson: Very much so. And connecting the civil rights movement to the establishment in Sweden, and the mainstream people of Sweden were aware of this. And it meant a lot to Dr. King, and Sweden followed Dr. King very carefully after receiving the Nobel Prize.

Silvestri: I feel like a film of this magnitude should be shown in high school classes on the civil rights movement, that it presents a much wider sprectum of civil rights activists and intellectuals, combined with soul music that speaks with social commentary, than any watered-down program would. I was surprised by Questlove’s assertion that Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination was possibly a conspiracy because he was getting to be too radical, and it did make sense. What do you think this film could teach students about America’s history with racial politics?
Olsson: That I can’t answer because I don’t know that, but what I do know is that when I saw this material, my goal is to reach the libraries of schools and universities [everywhere]. In order to reach out to the libraries, and make the people who make the decision to buy them to the libraries, you have to package it. Editing the film, adding voices and music, be in film festivals and be in theaters to make it more attractive. Because if you just have the DVD where it says “for educational purposes” on it, it’s not so easy for people to find it. But if you have more [the contemporary artists], it’s more attractive in the light. And the goal is that the film can be on the shelf in the library besides books. And if you’re interested in that, you can see the film as a complement to the books.

Silvestri: I felt that the film would be beneficial in education because while young students may not know Angela Davis or Stokely Carmichael, they know Erykah Badu and Talib Kweli and The Roots. So having contemporary artists there could tie between the present and past to make it more relatable.
Olsson: That’s exactly the purpose. Those people could be the bridge between the film and younger people. They are not young anymore, but they talk to a younger audience. Maybe even the teachers at the school, they listen to The Roots.

Silvestri: How did Cory Smyth, the music producer, get involved in the film?
Olsson: He is a key figure, thank you for asking that. He did Dave Chappelle’s Block Party, he put that together musically. My co-producers in America, Josyln Barnes and Danny Glover, they worked with him before, so they put us together. I did the exact same thing, I showed some material to Cory, and we talked and came up with different names and recorded them, and so on.

Silvestri: What is sad is that the film is so honest about governments introducing drugs and encouraging gang violence in ghetto neighborhoods to keep black people in poverty, yet many people would blame black people for those things. Gang violence was stopped or shut down because it posed no threat to the white patriarchy, yet the Black Panthers were portrayed as boogeymen or dangerous figures because they were intellectuals and eloquent. What are your thoughts on that?
Olsson: I think it’s obvious. It’s not a conspiracy or anything. When hard drugs hit the inner cities of America, in connection to the Vietnam War, there is no way that that could happen without the knowledge of the C.I.A. or the army. There was no private plane carrying heroin from Southeast Asia to America. And I think the situation is very much the same. I’ve been to Mexico, and of course, (it’s the same). I don’t think that anyone is saying that the C.I.A. did this, but they didn’t do anything to prevent it from happening.

Silvestri: They would say that it’s a problem, but blame it more on the black working-class residents than looking outside of the neighborhood or a higher power.
Olsson: And it’s so connected with the Vietnam War as well, because people got hooked in Vietnam. It’s just sad, it’s just sad that it happened.

Silvestri: The film’s subjects and its times are very relevant today, due to a poor economy, wars, cutdown on education, and structural racism. How do you feel the events in your film relate to today’s world?
Olsson: Several ways. I think, first of all, you have to remember, Angela Davis, Stokely Carmichael, and the Panthers, they came not of rage or aggression or something like that. They came out from university, they were well-educated. They used education as a tool to see these mechanisms in society. All of them, they came out of Berkeley. And the only important thing is to have an education system that is equal to everyone. In education, as in sports, it’s important to cultivate any individual as much as possible. So equal opportunities in education is the only thing that matters.

The other thing is when we started this film, friends of mine said that revolutions and demonstrations, that’s history, that’s something that happened before and will never happen again. But as we’ve seen in the last couple of months (in the Middle East), there has been mass demonstrations that led to revolution. On my television screen, I’ve seen revolution in Tunisia, in Egypt, etc. So those mechanisms have been in human society since the days in Egypt five thousand years ago, and it will always be there. Like Dr. King said, “No lives lost forever.” Because when the ruling circus ignored younger people for too long, they will have to eat it up.

http://www.ioncinema.com/news/id/6271/interview-goran-hugo-olsson-the-black-power-mixtape-1967-1975

2011-04-17T21:03:00.000-07:00

Zeina Durra and Elodie Bouchez The Imperalists Are Still Alive! By Melissa Silvestri

From the opening shot of artist Asya (Elodie Bouchez) naked save for a machine gun and a hijab on her head, one can tell that The Imperialists Are Still Alive!, written and directed by Zeina Durra, is looking to flip the victim image of Muslim women on its head with a subtle sense of humor and observation. The Imperialists Are Still Alive! tracks moments in the life of Asya, an artist of mixed Middle Eastern background who lives a rock’n’roll lifestyle in NYC with a hip crowd while keeping tabs on the missing whereabouts of her friend in Lebanon. She lives her life day to day, and Durra keeps the films fresh and fun by never making Asya a self-pitying martyr, nor making light of life post 9/11 for people of Middle Eastern descent in NYC. Elodie Bouchez (of Alias and The Dreamlife of Angels) plays Asya with a keen awareness of her surroundings and a deep inner life that isn’t always obvious on the outside.

I spoke with Durra and Bouchez last week in NYC.

What was the genesis of this project, how did you get started?

Durra: Basically, I went to film school because I knew I wanted to make films. I knew I had a lot to say, and I was really working out what was I about, what did I want to do, what did I want to make films about. And that’s how this film came about. It took me ten years. It’s much more a meditation, rather than it being a story, about how one navigates one’s world with this kind of crazy political backdrop. And if you take that to wider themes, it’s about how we basically live. In every moment there are sort of very big things and very trivial things. So how do we digest that in our brains as we’re walking around?

Elodie, what attracted you to this film?

Bouchez: First of all, what really matters to me is the quality of the script, because I’m very sensitive. I really loved the script when I read it and I totally got her vibe even though I didn’t know her yet. And I enjoyed the quality of the writing itself. And that was funny because right at the same time, I was deciding whether to do this big French comedy that I wasn’t so sure to be part of. [But] I really loved it [Durra’s script], and the two movies were going to happen at the same time, and I thought “That’s the kind of movie I really want to do.” Then I met her and knew that we could get along.

How was it learning Arabic for the role? Was it difficult or with relative ease?

Bouchez: Arabic is not an easy language, especially for the accent. But we worked really hard on it.

Durra: People think her Arabic is so convincing because of her body language. Because often when you speak a language, you don’t have the body language that goes with it, so it seems forced. People don’t understand – cinema’s all about body language. When you edit the finest details of body language, that’s what really gives away an actor’s performance. Because film has that magnified. So what’s really interesting about this is when Elodie would say something and we would all laugh, we’d say “Just open your wrist a bit more.” She would do it, and then it would look so much more real. That was really interesting for me as well, discovering how to teach her how to speak Arabic.

I enjoyed the multi-lingual vibe of the film, and how characters moved smoothly between languages very often as if it was nothing.

Durra: People who speak more than one language are often immigrants or super-educated. But what’s interesting in the film is that rather than focusing on the privilege that lots of languages can give you, nowadays, the world is so globalized that wherever you go, people really do flip between languages. And no one just speaks one language anymore, people just throw in different bits of other languages. And I’m really interested in how that’s evolving. I’ve seen it a lot in cinema. I’ve got my ears to the ground like “Oh, are they doing this too?” And in the last five years, a lot of films have been throwing in a bit more languages here and there.

I appreciated the relationship between Asya and Javier, and how they really understood one another, and being in America where their ethnicities may be marginalized by threats of terrorism or immigration fears. They seemed to find a bond together.

Durra: There’s definitely a true bond, and it’s enhanced by the fact that when you are living in the States, and you don’t have people around that can have that cultural understanding. Latin America, for example, is a perfect place to choose, because both Latin Americans and Middle Easterners suffer from similar prejudices. I had a friend, who was a lawyer, and people were like “Oh, you speak English really well for a Mexican.” He had a law degree! And we were at a really nice dinner party. And it’s like “Who are you, where did you come from?” Meanwhile, he and his friends have PhDs and have been studying law at Yale. That’s the kind of things that really kill me, and when you’re living away from home, it’s really nice to be around people that get that.

Is this film based on events in your life, or is it all fictional?

Durra: These are themes that I’ve been aware of or that I’ve been interested in or things that I’ve experienced. Luckily I haven’t had a friend abducted, but most things are worries that I have had, that something has gone missing.

Aysa’s life is split between two different existences, but at the same time, it’s one world.

Durra: That’s the thing, If I did a Danny Boyle split-screen, you’d have her brain split in two with one of her running around and one of her always concerned about her family and politics. But the challenge was to weave in my ideas about these themes, which were that you continue living, while you have all this stuff going on. Just because you live your life, doesn’t mean you’re not concerned. It’s unrealistic to portray someone living abroad who’s from a war torn country just sitting at home thinking of where they’re from. They get up, they have an interaction with someone while they’re grocery shopping. Whatever level you play it at, Asya has a ridiculous, rock’n’ roll downtown life, but you deal with the fact that you have to get up in the morning, you take a shower, you have lunch. And that’s how we live.
And often, a lot of white male directors do the “poor victim” thing, which is a minefield. I’ve often found that Western films dealing with ethnic minorities going through a struggle are often handled in a patronizing way. And it’s always the same story being told. It was very hard for me to have this cool, feminist girl who wasn’t having problems covering up or with a religious father—people just didn’t get it. It was hard to make, because we weren’t doing the classic “Do I go to college or do I help my father make kebabs?” People just didn’t understand.

The Imperialists Are Still Alive! is now playing at the IFC Center in NYC.

http://blogs.indiewire.com/womenandhollywood/archives/guest_post_zeina_durra_and_elodie_bouchez_for_the_imperalists/

2011-03-19T21:42:00.000-07:00

Guest Post: Desert Flower Review by Melissa Silvestri

Desert Flower is a deeply emotional drama (with light comedic moments) that tells the true story of Waris Dirie, a Somali woman who had undergone female genital mutilation at 3 years old, escaped her rural home village before an arranged marriage at 13, became an indentured servant to the Somali ambassador in London, and then, by chance, was discovered and became a supermodel. But despite her fairy tale rags to riches story, Dirie was still haunted by her past, and all the celebrity brought on by her looks couldn’t deny that what happened to her as a child was an unnecessary act of violence, so she used her position and fame to raise awareness about the issue and became a UN spokeswoman against female genital mutilation (FGM).

Director Sherry Hormann (Father’s Day) tells Dirie’s remarkable story, and supermodel Liya Kebede stars as Dirie, in a performance that was deeply honest in portraying a complex woman. Dirie is introduced as being homeless on the streets of London, speaking limited English and dressed in fine scarves and wraps. Through a chance encounter, she befriends aspiring dancer Marylin (Sally Hawkins), who initially treats Waris like a lost puppy, but comes to find her as a caring and sensitive friend.

The scene where Waris slowly begins to understand that FGM is not the usual practice for all women, via speaking to Marylin about sex, is an incredibly sad and painful scene. Kebede plays this scene as if Waris has just been punched in the stomach, horrified that she is denied the pleasure which Marylin can take for granted. And Hawkins, up until this point, has played Marylin as a bit self-absorbed and flighty, more of a girly-girl friend who is unaware of her new friend’s cultural background and history. In this scene, she is just as shocked as Waris at this injustice that has been forced upon her due to traditional ideas about women and their sexuality being controlled by others. From this moment, Waris and Marylin’s friendship grows deeper, and with a richer meaning than just being friendly girlfriends.

The second half of the film focuses on Dirie’s modeling career, after she is discovered by photographer Terence Donovan (Timothy Spall), while working mopping floors and cleaning up trash at a London McDonald’s. She is completely clueless to the superficial world of fashion and marketed beauty, but Donovan’s trust in her gives her more confidence and freedom in the world. The fashion world scenes are more comedic, poking fun at the superficiality of the fashion industry, as exemplified by Waris’ agent Lucinda (Juliet Stevenson.) But, even with more mobility and success in the world, it doesn’t erase the pain that Waris feels at being an anomaly in more ways than one.

Waris’ courage in speaking openly about a deeply painful subject is commendable and truly brave, and her advocacy to end FGM for all women is a step forward in taking back control due to sexist ideas about women and their sexuality. Desert Flower portrays Waris Dirie as a strong woman who, through challenges and adversities, became a hero for many women around the world. Kebede plays her as a touching, compassionate human being, and her story leaves an indelible mark on the viewer afterwards.

Desert Flower opens in NY and LA on March 18.

http://blogs.indiewire.com/womenandhollywood/archives/guest_post_desert_flower_review_by_melissa_silvestri/

2011-03-19T21:41:00.000-07:00

Cinespect Presents: Impressions of the Korean American Film Festival New York Pt. 2

Melissa Silvestri | Mar 18, 2011 | Comments 0

Editor’s Note:

Cinespect is proud to bring you coverage of some of the highlights from this year’s 5th edition of the Korean American Film Festival New York (KAFFNY), which runs from March 17-20. The festival promises many more films than the amount that will be covered here on the site but it is our hope that you’ll find yourself curious and eager to explore beyond what is reviewed here. This year’s edition offers more than 14 features and 25 shorts to choose from, which range from early Korean cinema up to the most current Korean American films.

For this second part of the coverage we have contributor Melissa Silvestri reviewing “The House of Suh,” which screens this Saturday, March 19. For tickets and information be sure to visit: KAFFNY – “The House of Suh”

Enjoy the festival.

Review of “The House of Suh”

“The House of Suh,” a documentary by Iris K. Shim, revisits the murderous brother and sister pair of Catherine and Andrew Suh, who collaborated to kill Catherine’s allegedly abusive fiancé Robert O’Dubaine in 1993. While 19-year old Andrew was the one who fired two shots into O’Dubaine, Catherine orchestrated the murder, and, going into their family history, had always had a strong sense of control over her younger brother, who always valued family loyalty. “The House of Suh” is less a murder story than a family drama of the Suhs, a Korean-American family in Chicago who held strained relationships with one another, and both siblings suffered tragedy early on.

Growing up in Chicago, the Suh parents were Korean immigrants, and had two very different children. Andrew was the reliable one, the one used to be the English interpreter for his parents during transactions, doctor’s appointments, and work-related tasks. He obeyed his father without question, an old-school father whose attitude was “My house, my rules, my way.” Andrew was also favored because he was the boy, whereas Catherine was not only the girl, but much more rebellious and questioning of authority. She always questioned why something was the way it was, and was at contentious odds with her father, at one point even battling to the brink of death with him. Catherine left home as a teenager, while Andrew, 11, was a child who attended to taking care of his father as he was succumbing to cancer in 1985.

Two years later, Andrew’s world was shattered when his beloved mother was murdered in a still-unsolved case, leaving Andrew an orphan and in the care of his sister and her new boyfriend, Robert O’Dubaine. Andrew lived a double life from then on. At home he was closely guarded by the couple, groomed to obey them and know that they were his only family, O’Dubaine being the big brother he never had. At school, to hide his family problems, overcompensated by being incredibly popular and well-liked, a charismatic football player, and a fun-loving guy. These two worlds played side by side for years, until, due to familial pressures, he could no longer keep up the façade, seeing himself as the “lonely popular kid with nobody to talk to.”

The film succeeds with its candid interview with Andrew, who is currently serving a 100-year sentence in prison. He is open and funny and talkative, while well aware that he is marked as a murderer for a crime that he was pressured to do. He doesn’t so much express remorse as rather saying that he was a very young man back then, and may have not been thinking rationally in the name of protecting his sister from O’Dubaine’s abuse. While there is a glaring omission in the film of Catherine Suh’s presence (who did not respond to the filmmaker’s request for an interview), she isn’t really missed, as the film takes Andrew’s POV as the pawn in Catherine’s scheme to kill her fiancé. But as it is known, revenge for abuse never brings the closure or peace that one hopes for. Andrew states that he had “tried to destroy the monster, but in turn would become the monster.”

“The House of Suh” fascinates with its look inside the twisted binds of loyalty in family, and how control and manipulation can pull family members in deeper because of the idea that nobody else can love you as much as your family can.

http://cinespect.com/cinespect-presents-impressions-of-the-korean-american-film-festival-new-york-pt-2/

2011-03-19T21:40:00.000-07:00

Cinespect Presents: Impressions of the Korean American Film Festival New York Pt. 1

Melissa Silvestri | Mar 16, 2011 | Comments 0

Editor’s Note:

For this edition of our KAFFNY coverage we have contributor Melissa Silverstri reviewing three films by Dai Sil Kim-Gibson, who is being honored by KAFFNY this year with a retrospective that includes six films. The screenings of two of her films, “Sa-I-Gu” and “Wet Sand: Voices of L.A.,” will be followed by a talk between Dai Sil Kim-Gibson and Charles Burnett.

Enjoy the festival.

Dai Sil Kim-Gibson

Review of “Sai-I-Gu: From Korean Women’s Perspectives” and “Wet Sand: Voices from L.A.”

The L.A. riots in 1992 were a tragic moment in the history of L.A.’s race relations, not only between black citizens and corrupt officers in the LAPD, but between black people and Korean-American people co-existing together on the same streets, where many Korean shop owners had black customers. Years of hostility between Koreans and blacks due to misunderstandings blew up during the riots, when many stores owned by Koreans were destroyed and burned down, and lives were lost in the terror. In the 1993 documentary “Sai-I-Gu: From Korean Women’s Perspectives,” and its 2004 follow-up “Wet Sand: Voices from L.A.,” director Dai Sil Kim-Gibson records the stories of the Korean women who were devastated by the riots, and who lost husbands and sons amidst the chaos. The film explores race relations, poverty, and the immigrant experience of making it in America, and how decades of hard work were lost within one week due to the riots.

Sai-I-Gu is Korean for April 29^th, the day when the riots started. In L.A., many Koreans had come over and settled in an area known as Koreatown, where it was like their own country. No white people, no outside influences, their home culture within a new landscape. Many Koreans opened convenience stores, and the majority of their customers were black people. The local racism carried over into these stores, where black people viewed Koreans as being like white people, trying to assimilate by assuming the criminal worst about black people, and not treating them with respect. And Koreans would be seen as the foreigners, the ones who refuse to learn more English, the strange immigrants. Some of the women will admit to these perceptions of blacks by Koreans as having been carried out by others, and stating how if one is to have a store in a neighborhood, one should get to know their customers instead of openly disliking them or treating them like potential thieves. This would all come to tragic consequences during the riots, when stores were destroyed, particularly as revenge at Koreans who didn’t treat their black customers fairly.

More so, this film is about the disillusionment of the American dream. As stated by one of the women, “I thought America was perfect, since she helped others abroad. After the riots, I feel there is a huge hole in America.” When Koreans came to America, saving for years and packing up their families, instead of coming to the America as seen on TV, they came to the poverty-stricken neighborhoods of South Central L.A., where they had to struggle to survive all over again and work hard to ensure that their children would have a good future. When their stores were destroyed, anger was not at the black citizens who did it, but at the LAPD and state government who favored protecting the wealthy and middle-class but allowing the blacks and Koreans to “fight over crumbs,” because it didn’t affect white supremacy.

One of the saddest moments in the film is Mrs. Lee speaking of her son Edward Jae Song Lee, who was killed by a Korean who thought he was a looter. Her disbelief at her son’s death (and still in disbelief and grief a decade later) is palpable, and her realization that he died based on seeing his photo in a Korean-American newspaper is heartbreaking.

“Sa-I-Gu” is a raw and emotional film that can be hard to watch because it puts such innocent faces over a tragic event, but it is painstakingly honest in showing the cracks in a flawed society. Its follow-up “Wet Sand,” revisiting the events and tracking how race relations have gone in L.A. since then, doesn’t offer much hope. Despite the formation of activist groups like the Association of Korean-American Victims, the Korean-American and black citizens of L.A. deny that there is a problem between them, and that the media played up the supposed rivalry to avoid confronting white/black tensions. The lack of good public education in L.A. leads many young people to the streets to make quick money, and the money that would go to education would go instead to wealthy developers. There isn’t a happy ending to either of these films, but a wider awareness of the immigrant experience in America and the tragic consequences when race relations is escalated to deadly ends.

“Broken Silence: Korean Comfort Women”

Dai Sil Kim-Gibson’s 1999 documentary “Broken Silence: Korean Comfort Women” is a difficult documentary to watch, because the wounds that the elderly Korean women interviewed received as a result of being made into sex slaves by the Japanese army during WWII are still palpable. The Japanese military coerced or kidnapped Korean women and took them all over Southeast Asia to be sexual playthings for war-weary Japanese soldiers to use and abuse, raped over and over again. Yet decades after these violations of human rights, Korean comfort women are not recognized as victims of the war and not given public and legal reparations. It took a lot of bravery and honesty for these women to speak of these painful memories before the camera, capturing these stories before their ultimate passings (many of these interviews are from the 1990s and the women were quite elderly at the time).

These ranged in age from young adults to being as young as twelve years old, taken from their families and schools either by force or with the promise of job opportunities abroad. This is much like the human trafficking trade of today with Eastern European women in impoverished countries promised great jobs in Italy or Germany, but tricked into becoming sex slaves instead. In WWII, the military ships would pick up and drop off girls in foreign countries all along Southeast Asia, taking Korean girls as far as Thailand and Indonesia. Every girl was given a forced hysterectomy to ensure that there would be no pregnancies. They belonged to the government, and their bodies were to be taken advantage of until they were of no use to anybody. In a chilling recollection, a woman describes seeing half-dead girls being dragged out in front of new recruits, and the soldiers telling the new girls that if they don’t obey, this will happen to them, before shooting the wounded girls in the head. It is unbelievable how one can go through life having seen such horrible torture and death and not lose their mind, or not lose faith in humanity. When one woman states that she wishes that she could “have her youth back,” or another says that she would wish to be a man instead of a woman, it’s all one can do to not scream in agony at these horrible acts forced upon these women in the name of war and power.

The women weren’t just used for sex, but also used as expendable fighters, trained to kill Chinese civilians with bayonets, and forced to do it. Another woman remembers eating human flesh. Their dehumanization as comfort women broke their minds down to become mindless fighters and slaves, one woman even forgetting how to speak Korean and never re-gaining the ability, in regret as she lives on her death bed.

Japanese men appear throughout the film, mainly a teacher, a soldier, and scholars, in plain denial of what these women went through, or downplaying their stories as not being as bad as they say it was. It’s as if that if men say that women are crazy or exaggerating, then the patriarchy won’t take them seriously, and not see them as true victims of war.

Kim-Gibson’s film excels because she captures the stories of several women who are willing to speak on camera about such a horrific past, and ensure that they will be remembered and not forgotten after their passings for audiences today to be educated and aware. It is a stunning and unforgettable documentary, without any pomp or flash, just honest stories from women who could be your grandmothers.

http://cinespect.com/cinespect-presents-impressions-of-the-korean-american-film-festival-new-york-pt-1/

2011-02-28T19:13:00.000-08:00

Interview: Monia Chokri (Heartbeats)

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Feb 26, 2011
Source: IONCINEMA.com Exclusive

Heartbeats, directed by Xavier Dolan, is a romantic drama from Montreal that concerns the close-knit friendship of Marie (Monia Chokri) and Francis (Dolan), a straight woman and a gay man who create their own hipster enclave of Spanish-language pop songs and vintage 1960s bohemian flair. But when they both develop a crush on their mutual friend Nick (Niels Schneider), their competitiveness threatens to tear their friendship apart. The Cannes Un Certain Regard selected (here's our coverage of premiere night) film stands apart for its gorgeous slow-motion segments where music tells the story and the screen is filled with vibrant colors, a la Almodovar. The film has a marked influence of both Godard films starring Anna Karina as his hipster muse and Wong Kar-Wai films with Tony Leung mourning the loss of a lover, and is truly splendid yet opens up that uncomfortable feeling of when one has projected their own fantasies onto a crush then faces reality. Released by IFC Films theatrically yesterday in New York and March 4th in Los Angeles, I did a phoner interview with the French Canadian actress who is now preparing for Dolan's third film.

Melissa Silvestri: How did you and Xavier meet?
Monia Chokri: We met a few years ago by a common friend. The guy plays his boyfriend in I Killed My Mother, his first feature. His name is Francois Arnaud, who is an actor who is very talented.

Silvestri: What attracted you to this script?
Chokri: Well, it was not about attraction. I was at the beginning of the process, so I knew where I was going with it. And also, to work with my two good friends, Xavier and Niels [Schneider], so the basis of the project was working together, editing the script, and filming. It was a really interesting way of seeing love, or our idea of love.

Silvestri: The film has been compared to Truffaut's Jules et Jim, in terms of romantic love triangles between friends and having a mutual crush. Would you agree or disagree?
Chokri: Yes, I really love that movie, actually. It’s a movie that you see when you’re 17 years old, and it’s a normal way of seeing typical Francophone culture.

Silvestri: It had a way when watching that film that it felt very modern and fresh, not dated at all. I really enjoyed how in Heartbeats, the slow-motion musical moments were like music videos, and really brought a slow beauty to the film.
Chokri: We didn’t think of a music video when we were shooting the slow-motion musical segments. But we’ve grown up with videos, we’ve probably seen more videos. It’s something to see and affix to. For us, in my generation, it’s a way to think of editing in cinema right now. It’s such a natural way to film. So it’s a less stressing art for me, and it’s a big part of our narration, and a lot of great directors came out of music videos. You can see really great short movies in music videos too. When you think of Fever Ray, a band whose music is in the film – a big important aesthetic is the music video. So I think it’s a way that we see cinema now. It’s not a thing that we do on purpose, thinking in the music video way.

Silvestri: It was beautiful to watch, it expanded the film into a piece of art, between the first-person interviews about peoples’ failed relationships and the relationship between Marie and Francis as they both care for one another and compete over Nick. The music moments brought something colorful about the film.
Chokri: Yes. I believe that when you’re in love, or when you think you’re in love, there is this way of having this floating moment. Everything seems more beautiful and colorful and in slow-motion. Because we’ve grown up with those images of love, because of cinema. And I think it’s really important when you’re young. Most of the people who buy CDs or buy music are people from age 18 to 25, so music is a big part of youth. And every moment in your life, you can relate music to, to a relationship. And you can create this universe of color and music, and it’s part of love, too, in a way.

Silvestri: Was the character of Marie a collaborative process between you, Xavier, and the costume department, or was it singularly from Xavier’s script?
Chokri: It was in the script. I mean, with her dresses, Xavier really wanted something 1950s/1960s, because from that, he wanted to mix contemporary references. Because love has no age. Even as generations change, love is the same. It was a way to attribute to older generations who felt the same way about love. So it was in the script first, and then when we started with the dresses and everything, Marie appeared. I was thinking that if you dress like that, you have a way to see the world, and show yourself to people.

Silvestri: I’m reminded of the scene when Marie and Francis enter a party, dressed as James Dean and Audrey Hepburn, and the party is very much a contemporary scene, with House of Pain’s “Jump Around” playing, and they clearly stick out as vintage heads amongst the modern youth.
Chokri: I actually really love that scene, because we don’t see them a lot with people. We forget that they are really odd, or really awkward [laughs]. And when they enter that party, you realize that they’re really weird. I mean, they arrive with presents, even though it’s not the birthday of Nick. They are really like that, really weird.

Silvestri: There is this competitiveness over Nick between Marie and Francis, when they don’t really know him very well. Like in the scene when they’re talking about their presents for him, and one-upping each other. Why do you feel they become so competitive over him, and jeopardizing their friendship?
Chokri: It’s a game of the movie. And the thing is that there is no competition, because Nick is not into either of them.

Silvestri: Yes, because in the end, he has completely different ideas about each of them than they had thought.
Chokri: Yes, of course. It’s the idea of the movie. It’s not about love, it’s about the idea that you have of someone, and the projection you can have on someone, and thinking that you’re in love with that kind of person.

Silvestri: Exactly, that kind of projection messes up one’s own view of a person. My last question is, what are you working on now?
Chokri: I’m starting my third movie with Xavier, Laurence Anyways. We are in preparation right now.

IFC Films releases Heartbeats in New York on the 25th of February and March 4th in Los Angeles

2011-02-14T13:21:00.000-08:00

Interview: Iciar Bollain (Even the Rain)

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Feb 14, 2011
Source: IONCINEMA.com Exclusive

Actress and filmmaker Iciar Bollain has had a stellar career in her native Spain, directing powerful dramas such as Hi, are you alone? (1995) Flowers from Another World (1999), and her crowning opus, Te Doy Mis Ojos (2003), which won seven Goya awards including Best Picture.

She returns with Even the Rain, a drama about colonialism in both the past and present. Filmmakers (led by Gael Garcia Bernal and Luis Tosar) head with their crew to a small town in Bolivia to make a movie about the Spanish conquest of Americas. The indigenous townspeople are chosen as extras not only because they look right, but also because they can be used as cheap labor. While this unconscious brand of colonialism is taking place, protests based on the real-life Cochabamba protests in 2000, where the government privatized water, threaten to put the town and the filmmakers in serious danger, and the filmmakers question their own ethics of the story they’re trying to tell. The TIFF 2010 selected film is an emotionally wrought story with an uncomfortable truth, made the shortlist of this year’s Academy Awards as the Spanish entry for Best Foreign Language film, and was just nominated for a record 13 Goya awards. I spoke with Bollain in December.

Silvestri: How did you get the idea to blend the real-life Cochabamba protests with the story of the filmmaking crew?
Iciar Bollain: The idea comes from the script writer, Paul Laverty, who first wrote an entire period piece film. Then he decided to bring it to the present somehow, and update it, and he read about and researched this real struggle in Cochabamba in year 2000. To link such two distant events, he got the idea of a film crew, doing this period film in Cochabamba while the riots begun.

Silvestri: Sebastian (Bernal) maintains a sort of innocence as the director, believing that he is telling a great story, while his producer Costa (Tosar) has more of a cutthroat agenda. They both go through a deep evolution, learning more about humanity for Costa and reality for Sebastian. Tell me about those characters, and the character development that Paul Laverty, Bernal, and Tosar went through.
Bollain: I guess there is a cross journey, Costa goes in a direction and Sebastian in the opposite one. I found that very attractive about the script, the "moral" journeys of both and thought that was the spine that hold together those three stories the film unfold. I talked about it a lot with Tosar, because is his journey that actually carries us along the film, and we try to find the moments in which he does the changes, little moment of reflection, a look here, a silence there. With Bernal was finding the dramatic moments, like when he breaks down or making the decision of betraying Daniel. Spotting those actors the moments in which that journey was told and stress them.

Silvestri: Carlos Aduviri was very memorable as Daniel, a man who was a warrior in both the film within a film and the protests. Given that he only has two screen credits, I was wondering if he was a professional actor or found at an open call? He was found in an open call.
Bollain: There are not that many actors in Bolivia, and we couldn't find any with his profile, so we went on an open casting door by door... It was a long process, that took several months till finally Carlos happened to come. He did a number of auditions and we thought, as Gael in the film, he had an amazing face and presence. Working with him was basically helping him to go through the scenes, the lines, to communicate the character as written.

Silvestri: You had worked with Luis Tosar on your film Take My Eyes. He is probably Spain's most accomplished yet unknown actor. How did you perceive him prior to your first film with him, and has that perception changed?
Bollain: I met him even before Take My Eyes, he did his first film with me Flowers from Another World. He had just done television and it was his first film and he was already very deep, very profound and very true in his performance. Since then I have seen him gaining confidence and experience but never losing his truthfulness. I really believe Luis is the most extraordinary actor.

Silvestri: What was the financing like for this film? How were you able to get support to make the film?
Bollain: It was quite hard to find the finance. The budget is a bit bigger than what you can get within Spain, so producer Juan Gordon had to find it abroad, which with a Spanish-language film is never easy... I think the film looks more expensive than it really is!

Silvestri: Even the Rain had made the shortlist for Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars. Not only is that a great accolade in addition to Te Doy Mis Ojos' seven Goya awards, but you are noted as the first female Spanish film director to be submitted in that category. Is it notable for you, or do you prefer not to be singled out as a woman?
Bollain: I'm always happy to see a woman breaking through since there is so few of us directing. I would really would like to see the day in which it is not an exception or a first time anymore, I would like to see many more films directed, written and produced by women. I think film talks about how life is and how we see it, so it makes all the sense to have every version of it, not just half of it!

Silvestri: What are you working on next?
Bollain: I'm about to do a film in Nepal, about a Spanish teacher [Vicky Sherpa] who went over in the early nineties and tried to teach there and create her own community project. It is inspired by a real woman.

Vitagraph Films releases Even the Rain in theatres this Friday.

2011-02-09T12:26:00.000-08:00

Claude Bessy, Lignes d’Une Vie (Traces of a Life)

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Feb 09, 2011
Source: IONCINEMA.com Festival Coverage

This year marked the 39th anniversary of the Dance on Camera Film Festival, held in New York City's The Film Society of Lincoln Center with events spread out a little bit everywhere in the city.

Claude Bessy is considered one of France’s greatest ballerinas of the 20th century. With Bardot-like features and impossibly long legs, she brought a combination of sensuality and womanliness to the often strict world of classical ballet. But what made her an innovative artist was that she did not rest on her laurels with the Paris Opera Ballet, and expanded her repertoire, performing jazz pieces with Gene Kelly and experimenting in modern dance. She knew that versatility was of the utmost importance to a dancer, and in Claude Bessy, Lignes d’Une Vie (Traces of a Life), directed by dancer and choreographer Fabrice Herrault, her remarkable life from training as a child in ballet schools to mentoring future artists as director of the school is captured in beautiful archival footage.

Bessy, during the tumultuous years of WWII, studied diligently in the Paris Opera Ballet’s school, pushing her body and focus to one day became a danseuse etoile (prima ballerina). Ballet was all about perfection and repetition, yet she wouldn’t have wanted to be anywhere else. Bessy got her wish in 1956, when she was promoted to danseuse etoile after years in the company in the corps de ballet. She carried within herself a vibrant sensual grace, not so much a cold removed quality that can be found with many a ballerina. Besides her central work with the Paris Opera Ballet, she danced with the American Ballet Company as a guest performer, and developed a friendship with Gene Kelly, who was eager to introduce his Hollywood audience to the greatest ballet dancers around, featuring her in his 1956 film Invitation to a Dance. Their jazz duets were smolderingly cool, just hinting at a deep intimacy (albeit platonic) between the two artists.

Even when Bessy was sidelined by a serious car accident that fractured her leg, she was able to heal miraculously and return to the stage in eight months in a triumphant return in Ravel’s Bolero, dancing opposite her partner Maurice Bejart.

Bessy danced with the ballet until 1972, before she became ballet master and head of the Paris Opera Ballet School, nurturing such ballet stars of tomorrow as Sylvia Guillem and Laurent Hilaire. Her teaching was strict with the children, to prepare them for adult careers, yet encouraged them to pursue jazz and modern dance, to expand their repertoire and become versatile artists. Bessy retired from the school in 2004.

The film is a gorgeous celebration of a truly one-of-a-kind artist, and Bessy, interviewed amongst her old haunts in the studio and theater, lovingly reminisces about the joys she had being a dancer. As an elderly woman, she still shines with a beautiful youthful glow and a delightful sense of humor.

Included with the screening of Claude Bessy, Lignes d’Une Vie at the Dance on Camera film festival is an excerpt of a film by Nicholas Ribowski entitled Les reflets de la danse (Reflections of the Dance) from 1979, where students in the Paris Opera Ballet School, including Guillem, Hilaire, and Elisabeth Maurin, practice with militaristic-like repetition at the barre, moving in perfect unison. The film is all in French with no subtitles, but it is not necessary, as the majority of the French is ballet instructions, with voiceovers from the children expressing their dreams for a future in ballet. It is the kind of hard work that children go through in order to be the best in their craft, and is truly admirable to watch.

2011-01-19T13:59:00.000-08:00

2011 The Cinema Eye Honors: Gift Shop and Last Train Home Win Big

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Jan 19, 2011
Source: -

It was a wonderful night celebrating documentary filmmaking at the fourth annual Cinema Eye Honors, held in the beautifully renovated Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Queens, N.Y. on January 18th. Hosted by filmmakers AJ Schnack (Kurt Cobain About a Son) and Esther Robinson (A Walk Into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory), the nominees comprised of some of the best documentary films of 2010, truly a celebration of nonfiction filmmaking rather than a competition. David Schwartz, the chief curator of the Museum, relayed the thoughts of many filmgoers who say that “the best films at festivals are the documentaries.”

The night kicked off with musical accompaniment by the Quavers and an excerpt of Utopia in Four Movements, performed by Sam Green. His excerpt was at both funny and poignant, touching upon a mix of history and comedy, segueing between 1960s ideas of the future world to stark photographs of Cambodian prisoners before they were executed by the Khmer Rouge. While that sounds dark, it was more about the power of documenting the real yet uncomfortable pieces of life.

Lixin Fan’s Last Train Home was the major winner of the night, taking home three awards for Production, Cinematography, and International Film, sharing the award with co-producers Mila Aung-Thwin and Daniel Cross. Last Train Home is a remarkable debut about the life of migrant workers in China trying to get an elusive train ticket to visit family during the New Year.

Exit Through the Gift Shop took the top award for Nonfiction Feature Filmmaking, as well as winning for Outstanding Achievement in Editing. Unsurprisingly, director Banksy was not there to accept his award. Schnack joked about the controversy surrounding the film, as to whether it is fictional or truth, alluding to the film before playfully pointing fingers at Laura Poitras’ The Oath, which ended up winning for Outstanding Achievement in Direction. For Outstanding Achievement in Debut Feature, Jeff Malmberg’s Marwencol, about a man who recreates a WWII-era miniature town to cope with a life-changing accident, won the award to much applause.

Other winners included Juan Cardarelli and Alex Tyson for their graphic design and animation in Gasland; Norbert Moslang’s music score for The Sound of Insects – Record of a Mummy; the inaugural Heterodox Award, sponsored by Filmmaker Magazine, which celebrates artists who blur the line between fiction and nonfiction, went to Matt Porterfield for Putty Hill; the Spotlight Award went to Andrei Ujica for The Autobiography of Nicholas Ceausescu; Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Short Filmmaking went to Vance Malone for The Poodle Trainer; and Ricki Stern and Annie Sundberg won the Audience Choice Prize for Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work.

The presenters included James Marsh (Man on Wire), Louie Psihoyos (The Cove), actor/filmmaker Harry Shearer, They Might Be Giants musician John Flansburgh, and Margaret Brown (The Order of Myths).

The night held two loving tributes for two filmmakers who passed away this last year. Morgan Spurlock spoke warmly of director George Hickenlooper, who directed Mayor of the Sunset Strip and Hearts of Darkness and was greatly funny and modest about his own talents as a pioneering filmmaker, speaking that he made films for the story, not the money. And editor Karen Schmeer was given a special tribute by her friends, filmmakers Liz Garbus (Bobby Fischer Against the World), Greg Barker (Sergio), and Lucia Small (My Father, the Genius), who truly brought her quiet yet headstrong personality to life onstage, speaking on how she completely immersed herself into editing, would identify so strongly with the subjects that she would adapt their personalities to the film, and yet maintained a lot of friendships by multitasking between emailing friends while editing films.

The Legacy Award was awarded to the Maysles brothers for their decades of excellent documentary filmmaking, especially highlighting Salesman and Grey Gardens. Their work exemplified true honesty and a deep respect for their subjects, celebrating the Beale family as unique and wonderful women in Grey Gardens. Albert Maysles, accompanied by his co-director Muffie Meyer, quoted Alfred Hitchcock in saying “In a non-fiction film, God is the director.” The award was presented to them by Lixin Fan, Jeff Malmberg, and Laura Poitras, all whom were deeply honored and touched to be celebrating these filmmakers.

The Cinema Eye Honors was a wonderful celebration of the best in documentary filmmaking, where the audience felt like they had all contributed, whether as filmmakers, press, or filmgoers. It truly felt like a big family there at the Museum of the Moving Image.

Favorite Films of 2010

2011-01-19T13:57:00.001-08:00

These movies are ones that came out this year, that have been personal favorites of mine. I'm just listing them, not giving a short review or anything like that.

La Mission

Night Catches Us

Children of Invention

Winter's Bone

A Prophet

Mother

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Never Let Me Go

The Secret in Their Eyes

Easy A

Restrepo

Cairo Time

Last Train Home

127 Hours

NY Export: Opus Jazz

White Lines & the Fever: The Death of DJ Junebug

The Fighter

2011-01-19T13:55:00.000-08:00

All Good Things

Relationship Therapy: Jarecki Leaves Viewers Hanging with Haunting Mystery that Lingers

Distributor(s): Magnolia Pictures
Film Genre(s): Thriller, Romantic Mystery
Country: United States
Director(s): Andrew Jarecki
Actor(s): Kirsten Dunst, Ryan Gosling, Frank Langella, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Kristen Wiig

Andrew Jarecki made his mark on the documentary scene with his 2003 film Capturing the Friedmans, an uncomfortable look at a suburban Long Island family in the 1980s, where the father and son were on trial for child molestation. The film was made up of many home videos, both happy family videos and recording their tribulations during the trial. For such a normal-seeming family, it seemed a mystery as to whether these two men could commit these horrible crimes, and these accusations tore the family apart.

Jarecki, himself having grown up in a patriarchal family of privilege with expectations of maintaining that class, continues on this theme of family dysfunction with his narrative feature debut, All Good Things, based on the on the life of Robert Durst, a real estate heir who has been the main suspect in the disappearance of his wife, Kathleen McCormack, since 1982. Their marriage was a meeting of old money and middle-class suburbia, but Durst’s growing hatred of being guilted into the family business, along with his alienation from his career-minded wife, led to tragedy and a fractured existence. The film even opens with a series of 1950s home videos portraying the seemingly happy life of young Durst (fictionalized as David Marks here), frolicking around with his mother before she later commits suicide in front of him.

David Marks (Ryan Gosling) meets his future wife Katie McCarthy (Kirsten Dunst) by chance when he is sent over to fix her sink in the early 1970s. They’re an amiable couple, but David’s father, real estate scion Sanford Marks (Frank Langella) personally lets him know that Katie will “never be one of them.” Katie comes from a happy suburban family in Long Island, where everyone jokes around and displays love and affection. David has grown up in a family of locked-away secrets, fake happy faces, and a reticence of true emotion. Katie’s joie de vivre allows him to shed his family’s conservativeness, and to break away from the pack to start a new life with her.

But, despite a brief life running a health food store together in Vermont, the security and safety of Marks’ wealthy family proves too good to give up. It also seemed positive for Katie, because his wealth would open more opportunities for her in Manhattan, than had she stayed home in Long Island. They were attracted to each other’s differences, but the marriage would only turn volatile and uneasy to escape.

The events of the film are shot with a soft-focus lens by D.P. Michael Seresin, not only mimicking the washed-out look of 1970s films, but also firmly keeping the events in the past, like bad memories. The film looks like privileged glamour with a rotten core at its center. It was a time where, given that there was less surveillance and certain issues were not spoken of (mainly abuse, eating disorders, depression, abortion),the beauty of the upper-class set only looks more like a prison, from which if you wrong the family, any chance of you developing an independent life is thwarted by their patriarchal control.

David is a danger to himself, because of his family history, yet he cannot push himself to change his future for the better. He has been raised to not talk about certain things, especially speaking to an “outsider.” Even Katie doesn’t know all about his family’s personal life, she only finds out things by accident. As David works more for his father, his once loving heart is replaced with a cold stone, and, he takes his frustration out on Katie. Katie uses her societal advantages to pursue a medical career, but David can’t stand her having kind of independence, and continually thwarts her chances.

Jarecki’s film accurately displays how an emotionally abusive marriage is not easy to break away from, and how it can be even worse if the victim tries to escape, only enraging their abuser even more. There is a sequence in the film where David forces Katie to make a critical decision that she doesn’t agree with, but, because her body is as much David’s as it is hers, she has no choice in the matter. David is to support her at the moment when this decision is made, but at the last minute bails, leaving her to face this agonizing choice alone. It’s a chilling and heartbreaking scene of control and emotional manipulation, and Dunst, breaking away from the young girl roles she has played well into her twenties, delivers this scene with anguish and a deep hatred of her husband. All Good Things details the downward spiral of a person’s dreams shattering, giving up their dreams in exchange for the safety net of money, only to resent themselves and take it out on the world. It’s a dangerous trap, and what happens when power is put in place of love. Gosling delivers a chilling performance as David Marks, a shell of a man whose emotions are kept locked inside of him, his humanity drained out of him until there is nothing left. Dunst finds a mixture of vulnerability and strength in Katie, maintaining to stay alive in an unstable marriage. Jarecki’s intimate focus truly makes All Good Things one of the more realistic depictions of domestic abuse and the corruption of power and money.

Reviewed by Melissa Silvestri
Date Posted: 2010-12-03

2011-01-19T13:51:00.001-08:00

Interview: Lena Dunham (Tiny Furniture)

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 08, 2010
Source: IONCINEMA.com Exclusive

Ever since Lena Dunham’s feature debut Creative Nonfiction won for Best Narrative at SXSW ’09, her career has rapidly ascended in the indiewood ranks with her break-thru year being topped by her sophomore year and comedy-drama about the pitfalls of post-graduation life. Recently nominated for a pair of Gotham Awards (Breakthrough Director and Best Ensemble Performance), Tiny Furniture went under the knife in November of 2009, and was conceived at the same Austin-set festival where she once again walked away with top honors.

Tiny Furniture tracks the misadventures of Aura (Dunham) as she comes home after graduation and is trying to figure out what to do with her life. Hanging with old friends, enduring family conflicts, working a low-paying job, trying to get her art/film career off the ground, and having trysts with the wrong kind of guys, Aura is at both sympathetic in her relatability and frustratingly self-centered and immature. It’s an introspective kind of film, with embarrassing moments as well as a darkly comic sensibility, and a blending of truth and fiction, as Dunham cast her family and friends to play their own roles.

Since Tiny Furniture, Dunham has spent a portion of her summer with Ry Russo-Young hitting the Screenwriters Lab in Sundance for Nobody Walks (Russo-Young will direct next year), inked an HBO deal with Judd Apatow, and was just named as helmer for the Scott Rudin produced Dash and Lily's Book of Dares. I sat down with the very busy Dunham this month in New York City, a week before Tiny Furniture receives it's theatrical release at the IFC Center.

Melissa Silvestri: Audiences can relate to the depiction of post-college life, coming back home and not immediately starting on their dream career, and still being financially dependent on parents, hanging out with high school friends, and working low-paying jobs while figuring out their next step. Have you found this to be a major theme with college grads?
Lena Dunham: Well, that’s certainly what I did, and it still feels really surreal for me, doing the thing that I want to be doing with my life right now, because when I first got out of college, I worked in a restaurant, I was a babysitter, and I worked in a clothing store. I had all these educational experiences, but they all felt empty to me in the world that I wanted to be inhabiting. So I think especially now, graduating in the recession era, it’s more likely that you’re not going to be doing a job that’s not necessarily in the world that you dreamed of.

Silvestri: It’s difficult when you’re trying to get into your career post-college, and your degree isn’t enough to get you in, or that your career doesn’t immediately start as a full-time, well-paying position...
Dunham: No, no, I think that’s a really crazy reality that you face when you get out of college. Like “Hey, I’ve been thinking professionally for four years, I’m perfectly up for any job,” and then you quickly realize that it’s not the case. I think for me, the film was about the disappointments of life as you imagined it versus life as it actually is.

Silvestri: How did you decide to both be a filmmaker and the lead in your films?
Dunham: For me, it’s funny. I don’t consider myself an actor, but there keep being roles that are appealing to me, so I keep constantly end up inhabiting. Like this character, she’s like me, in an inappropriate way, so I’ll just inhabit it. I kind of use that as an excuse, like “Oh, there aren’t any other actors to play!” But I’ve only recently felt that I do enjoy the acting part of it, there’s an immediacy to it that doesn’t exist as a director or writer. It just brings me a distinct kind of pleasure. So it’s been this sort of natural urge for me, like directing the same things that I write and act in, wanting to own every part of the process. But the other thing that I love about making movies is that it’s so collaborative. The other actors direct you in a certain way, you’re directed by the on-set experience, so once you’re on set, a certain amount of that responsibility is yours, and a certain amount of it suddenly becomes this amazing group thing, and I think that tells you what to do with it.

Silvestri: Speaking of collaborators, I was really impressed by the cinematography work by Jody Lee Lipes, having seen his gorgeous work on NY Export: Opus Jazz, bare minimalist wide-screen shots that captured so much with a lot of simplicity.
Dunham: He’s amazing. I love the way he works because his camera work is so gorgeous, but so unobtrusive, so it really lets the characters live and breathe. But it’s also incredibly sensitively done; it keeps you feeling close to people’s experiences, but also gives them enough space to do what they need to do. So I found working with Jody, who I still work with to this day, to be a total revelatory experience.

Silvestri: What was it like having your mother [artist Laurie Simmons] and sister [Grace Dunham] play your mother and sister in the film? Were there conflicts of interest or requests for line changes?
Dunham: They were really open and game. They were really conscious of playing developing characters, which was amazing to me, because I just pulled them in to say “Do what you do when I see you around the house,” to keep it feeling natural, and they gave it this actorly consideration that was so awesome and surprising. They didn’t really request line changes in the way like a mom and sister would, like “Oh, I would never say that, that’s not me.” They only really did it the way an actor would, like “This line feels a little unnatural to me, can we work with it a little bit.” So their openness to the process is something that I’m forever grateful for.

Silvestri: Tiny Furniture can be uncomfortable to watch, as Aura can be quite self-centered and embarrass herself, such as at her sister’s party or trying to get Keith, her co-worker, to like her. Those moments are very emotionally raw, was it difficult to shoot those scenes?
Dunham: It’s not difficult to act out. As an actress you would just do what the script requires, try to make it feel honest, or just live it honestly and see what happens. As a writer and director, and in the editing room later, it’s just a high-wire act of making sure that you don’t lose people in your depiction of yourself, and you make sure that your character is sympathetic enough that they can sustain an audience. At the same time, it’s funny, I never critique films in terms of “I liked this person” or “I didn’t like this person,” I tend to think, “Did their journey feel truthful to me?” That’s the base that I judge films on, I know not everyone feels that way.

Silvestri: The character, even if they are unlikable, have to have something redeemable or interesting about them...
Dunham: If you don’t feel any connection to them, or you don’t feel any hope that they’re ever going to change or become better, then there’s a way that their story doesn’t mean anything to you, so you sort of have to become invested in the journey of someone who you think is capable coming out the other side.

Silvestri: Have you had difficulty with basing characters on real-life people or as composites of people?
Dunham: Not in difficulty writing, and even in casting, you can have this really fun cast counter to what you saw in your head or make interesting choices. You really want to make sure that you’re being sensitive in your depiction, because it’s my right to reveal myself in my films, but it’s not my right to reveal the lives of other people. But at the same time, my life intersects with that other person, so for me, I take from life, but I also do a lot of composite characters and creating characters who are amalgamations of many people who I’ve known, and people I haven’t known. But yes, there have been moments where I’ve wondered, “Is this thing I’m writing over the line in some way?” not sensitive to the feelings of somebody who I am close with or have been close with. You really have to ask yourself every time you do that, “Is this worth it, am I making something that is putting ‘good energy’ into the world versus bad energy?” So I definitely think about all of those things.

Silvestri: Ever since Creative Nonfiction won at SXSW, you have gone so far in such a short time span. Magazine features, The New York Times, HBO, and IFC... What has it been like for you?
Dunham: It’s been amazing. Tiny Furniture’s coming out in theaters and On Demand literally a year after we started shooting it. It’s been one of the most unbelievable roller coasters. I think the most incredible thing, besides getting positive attention from many people I admire, [has been] making it easier for me to do my work, which is all I ever really wanted and what the film is about in the first place. So it’s this amazing, beautiful irony that making a movie about that time of my life is sort of what got me out of that time of my life, in a certain way. Of course, I’m still 24, with bumblings and worries and all of the classic anxieties that accompany that age. But I’m getting to do something I really love on a day-to-day basis, and I think that’s the most amazing thing that this year has given me.

Silvestri: What are you working on now?
Dunham: Well, I’m a week and a half away from shooting a pilot for HBO, so that’s a big thing in my life right now. And aside from that, I am readying another script that I am adapting called Dash and Lilly’s Book of Dares, which is a young adult novel that I really adore. And working on taking my baby Tiny Furniture and sending it off to college [laughs]. It does feel like I’ve raised a child for a year and now it’s going off to live its independent life. So that’s what I’m doing, and just continuing to work, which is what I enjoy most.

IFC Films releases Tiny Furniture at the IFC Center this Friday, November 12th. It receives a limited release in more locations in the weeks to come.

2011-01-19T13:49:00.001-08:00

2010 DOC NYC: Josh Freed's Five Weddings and a Felony

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 05, 2010
Source: IONCINEMA.com Festival Coverage

Josh Freed is a piece of work. The first-time filmmaker ends up making his first film a documentary where he is the unlikable star. In it, he continually dicks around women for his own selfish reasons, while thinking of himself as both the unlikely “player,” and the sweet, modest type. He freely admits to always having had issues with relationships and dangerous patterns, yet it only makes his film, Five Weddings and a Felony, frustrating to watch. His immaturity and disregard for others’ feelings is really disgusting, and it’s unclear whether his honesty about his insecurities makes it any better to take.

Freed is at both a hopeless romantic and a commitment-phobe. He has had the same pattern with romantic relationships since he was 12: he likes a girl, she doesn’t want to date him, so he dates a female friend, drawing her in and making her think he really cares for her, then he ends it abruptly by saying that he doesn’t want to be serious with her. Yet he is jealous if she goes and dates another guy. His friend Liliana, whose sister Paulina he jerks around, gives the honest truth: he doesn’t want to be with her sister, but doesn’t want her to be with anyone else. After his casual girlfriend Katja says she doesn’t want to be exclusive, Josh falls for Paulina’s beauty and sweet charm, but while he doesn’t want to be serious with her, he still keeps up correspondence and messing with her mind.

Freed’s film is an extension of his passion for filmmaking, and he freely says that he was jealous of Katja because she was having a successful screenwriting career while he couldn’t get a film started. So Paulina, being a schoolteacher and more vulnerable, is like his own revenge. What is awful is that Freed keeps a front as being shy and modest and cute, drawing in girls by being artistic and self-effacing, when in fact he is narcissistic, self-absorbed, shallow, and still playing mind games with women like when he was a kid. He is personally jealous of his friends who are getting married, yet can’t find it in himself to maintain a healthy relationship with a woman.

Five Weddings and a Felony has been called a “compelling portrait of modern love,” but it isn’t. It’s one man’s selfish intentions towards romantic relationships, where he wants to be adored and fawned over, yet cannot bring himself to get past the puppy love stage and deal with the everyday truth of maintaining a relationship like a grown man. Freed is fully aware of his habits, yet doesn’t seem able to really change them. Talk is cheap, and actions are the true test of whether one is able to grow up or not.

2011-01-19T13:48:00.001-08:00

2010 DOC NYC: Robert Greene's Kati with an I

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 05, 2010
Source: IONCINEMA.com Festival Coverage

Kati with an I, directed by Robert Greene, is an introspective documentary about an Alabama teenage girl named Kati who is two days away from graduating high school and engaged to her high school boyfriend. Her parents live in North Carolina for work reasons, and her graduation spells the end for her years of adolescence, getting ready to enter adulthood. Kati, who is Greene’s half-sister, is a bright and lovely young woman; however, the film’s slow and meandering pace does not provide enough interest in what is a rather dull story.

Kati spends her last days before graduation living it up with her friends: having a pool party, taking long drives, and getting dressed up for a party. It’s as if they’re trying to hold onto their sisterhood before they inevitably part, possibly drifting apart while they attend college. Their sisterhood is beautifully captured by cinematographer Sean Williams (Beetle Queen of Tokyo), and despite being on the brink of 18, they seem more like cherubic young girls.

Kati’s relationship with her fiancé is fraught. James, while he wants to be a meteorologist, is still very childish and apathetic at his age. He is watched over closely by his mother, and doesn’t seem like an intellectual equal for Kati, who speaks with an astute awareness of the world around her. He hesitates to follow her to North Carolina to spend the summer with her and her parents, and for all of their talk of “I love yous,” it never rings as particularly genuine, more of what a teenage couple says to each other out of infatuation or puppy love. James doesn’t seem quite all there, and when the end of the film reveals their future, it looks like a hard road ahead of them.

Kati with an I attempts to document the coming-of-age of a young woman growing into adulthood (and even interjects scenes with home video footage of a child Kati talking about her life and emotions) and shedding her teenage skin. But it plays like a home movie mixed with a teen drama, and isn’t compelling enough of a watch. Greene obviously has personal attachment to Kati, through blood and her experience in front of his camera as well as his ex-girlfriend’s photo work. But it rambles along, and by the end of the film, there isn’t a solid, much-needed resolution.

2011-01-19T13:47:00.001-08:00

2010 DOC NYC: Ryan Kerrison's MindFLUX

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 04, 2010
Source: IONCINEMA.com Festival Coverage

His name may not be as well-known as Stephen Sondheim, but Richard Foreman is a legendary freak of a genius. A playwright whose abstract plays defy definition, his shows of absolute madness and confusion have both turned on and weirded out audiences since the 1960s. Ryan Kerrison’s documentary mindFLUX examines the life of this strange and unusual artist, who has touched the lives of many of the most celebrated theater artists in New York City.

Richard Foreman debuted his theater the Ontological-Hysteric Theater in 1968, a venue where he could give a stage to the out-there performers who didn’t belong anywhere near Broadway. Ontology is the study of the nature of being, and Foreman’s theater is dedicated to balance the primitive with the absolute mad, taking the perplexity of life and throwing it onstage for extensional understanding. Foreman’s work is anti-commercial, hilarious in a sick way, and is not performed to please the audience, but rather to challenge them.

Foreman’s work has touched the lives of many theater professionals who have either worked with him or been influenced by his eccentricity. Amongst the interview subjects are James Cromwell, Willem Dafoe, Lili Taylor, Suzan-Lori Parks, Yoko Ono, Lou Reed, and Eric Bogosian. As actor T. Ryder Smith tells a long and strange tale of his audition for Foreman, his story is presented in an animated sequence, turning Foreman into a grizzly ogre and his apartment building a dank and smelly fortress, heightening the auditioner’s sense of insecurity and hesitation over giving themselves up for critique by this enigmatic individual.

Foreman’s work stayed underground for years, until he gets the opportunity to stage Bertolt Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera at Lincoln Center in 1976, starring Raul Julia, a gifted Shakespearean actor who got Foreman’s macabre side to deliver a stunning performance as Macheath. While Foreman himself is not an accessibly likable character, and his shows that are abstract for the sake of being that way can be frustrating to watch and verge on pretentiousness, his willingness to forgo mainstream acceptance is to be admired. Foreman himself would say of aspiring artists that he is “hungry for your uniqueness.” Anybody who shakes up audience’s expectations and opens their minds to the reawakening of life is to be commended.

2011-01-19T13:46:00.000-08:00

2010 DOC NYC: Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 03, 2010
Source: IONCINEMA.com Festival Coverage

It's business as usual for legendary Werner Herzog -- the prolific documentary and narrative filmmaker (My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done, The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call - New Orleans) utilizes a technology that we would normally associate with fiction films, and applies it to the soulful and mesmerizing 3-D documentary. With the help of archeologists in the south of France, Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams visits the Chauvet Cave, which is populated with not only a damp and quiet eeriness, but cave drawings of long-extinct animals and pictorial depictions of ancient mankind.

Herzog’s camera combined with stunning 3-D technology truly draws the audience into the cave, listening to the dripping off of stalagmites and practically touching the etchings of human figures and wild animals, including extinct creatures like the cave lion and the cave bear. Aside from Herzog’s narration, the film is dominated by the archaeologists’ insightful commentary on the way that man once lived, and the stories that they told through their drawings. The cave’s ground is so fragile that the people can only walk on a two-foot wide walkway, and at times, cannot get close enough to the walls to truly observe the drawings.

Herzog allows the audience to see the drawings for themselves, sans commentary or interviews, in a quiet segment near the end of the film, where the camera just pans over intricately detailed drawings like two large beasts locked in horns, their legs braced for action, or the multiple legs of a man meant to portray him walking, as if he was being animated via flipbook. The peace of the cave combined with the visual effects brings serenity into the theater, a hushed silence, as if the audience is all on this rare journey together.

Cave of Forgotten Dreams is a breathtaking film to highlight the wonders of this cave, which, due to toxic levels of radon and carbon dioxide as well as fragile ground, is not open to the general public. Herzog does a great service in bringing this natural beauty to the big screen.

NYC DOC screening times.

2011-01-19T13:44:00.000-08:00

2010 DOC NYC: Josef Birdman Astor's Lost Bohemia

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 04, 2010
Source: IONCINEMA.com Festival Coverage

Carnegie Hall has not only been the place where great classical music is performed. It has housed 165 studios above the theaters since 1895, where artists live and work to create dance, music, art, photography, and act. The artists who live there taught students in these very studios, and many 20th century luminaries graced these illustrious halls, including Isadora Duncan, George Balanchine, Elia Kazan, Marlon Brando, and Martha Graham. But in the past few years, Carnegie Hall has decided to tear down the studios to replace them with offices and music studios, leaving many of its elderly residents out in the cold, many who were instrumental in the mid 20th century art scenes of New York City. With studios full of fifty years’ worth of their life’s work, it seems hypocritical that an institution devoted to the arts would throw out many of the people who are living works of art. Lost Bohemia, directed by photographer and longtime resident Josef “Birdman” Astor, pays tribute to these singular individuals losing their livelihood to big business.

Lost Bohemia takes the audience on a trip through time, exploring the vast studios of a select group of individuals who have been living in the studios for decades, their lives intertwined with their immense contributions to the cultural arts of New York City. Many of these people were instrumental in saving Carnegie Hall in 1960 when it was in danger of demolition. A pianist who has been recording since the 1950s is at home at his large piano. A dancer in her eighties, named Star, still stretches diligently with remarkable flexibility in the stairwells. Robert Modica, an acting teacher, has taught at the studio for nearly 50 years. Editta Sherman, at age 98, has been the public face of the fight to save the studios, a former model and muse for many designers and artists. Her home, like the others, is furnished with grand photographs of past stars like Grace Kelly and Leonard Bernstein, with an innumerable amount of books, music, and irreplaceable historical memorabilia.

When watching Lost Bohemia, you might feel like you're in mid-20th-century New York City, when artists lived on the cheap, roomed with one another, ate at local delis, and the work they put their sweat into revitalized the local arts scenes with thought-provoking youthful energy. Be it Kazan and Tennessee Williams collaborating to bring uncomfortable truths to the theater, Jerome Robbins developing the street ballet of West Side Story, or the indie film actors of the 1980s honing their craft with Modica, the Carnegie Hall studios provided an exceptional channel for the greatest artists of the 20th century.

The artists did not win their battle, but their stories and contributions to the arts of New York City will never be forgotten or be unappreciated.

2011-01-19T13:43:00.001-08:00

2010 DOC NYC: Paul Clarke's Mother of Rock: Lillian Roxon

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 05, 2010
Source: IONCINEMA.com Festival Coverage

Lillian Roxon was a pioneering music journalist in the hedonistic rock ‘n’ roll world of the 1960s. A transplant from Australia, she made her mark in the boho scene of Manhattan, hanging out with the likes of Bob Dylan, The Velvet Underground, and Andy Warhol. She had a sixth sense for predicting who was going to be culturally significant, and her charm and enthusiasm was infectious. Paul Clarke profiles her brief but incredible story in Mother of Rock: Lillian Roxon.

Roxon was raised in Australia after her family emigrated from Italy in the 1930s to escape fascism. She was a free spirit who preferred to live as a single and adventurous woman in 1950s Sydney rather than wait at home to be married. Wherever there was a party, she was there. Getting started in tabloid journalism, she moved to NYC in 1959 and became the correspondent for several Australian women’s magazines. There, she served as ambassador for other Australian visitors, soaked up the nightlife, and was drawn like a magnet to the electrifying world of rock ‘n’ roll.

Roxon stood out as a freak, both as a foreigner and as a female writer in the burgeoning world of rock journalism. Iggy Pop, whose punk rock stage antics Roxon was blown away by, pointed out that she was attracted to the reckless dark side of rock ‘n’ roll, knowing everyone at Max’s Kansas City. She was a singular force who was an early promoter of punk rock before it had a name, the glam rock scene, and anything that was wild and weird and unusual. Her life burned out at age 41 due to an asthmatic condition, but while she was here, the world was a little brighter with her in it.

Lillian Roxon paved the way for seminal female rock music journalists like Ann Powers and Jancee Dunn. No inhibitions, no regrets, just a woman who, with the power of her pen, brought the freak side of New York City’s rock scene to many rock music fans and lonely outcasts, detailing the underground scene of music, art, sex, and theater that was just exploding with raw and vibrant power.

2011-01-19T13:32:00.000-08:00

Interview: David Soll (Puppet)

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 05, 2010
Source: IONCINEMA.com Festival Coverage

When we think of puppets, a few things come to mind. Jim Henson. Ventriloquism. Sock puppets. Puppet takes the chance to challenge the misconception of what is normally perceived as merely children’s entertainment. Puppetry has been a creative art of storytelling for centuries, to tell many stories through lifelike figures. Director David Soll intertwines the history of puppetry with the staging of the show Disfarmer, by puppeteer Dan Hurlin, about the nearly-obscure Depression-era portrait photographer Mike Disfarmer. Puppet captures a uncanny parallel between the photographer whose work was nearly forgotten and the puppeteer who struggles to make a show that resonates with audiences and shines a spotlight on the ingenious craft of puppetry. I spoke to David Soll via phone.

Melissa Silvestri: How did you get involved in Puppet?
David Soll: Pretty simply actually. I saw the show. I read David Rakoff’s article in the New York Times previewing Hiroshima Maiden [Dan Hurlin’s previous show]. I went to see that show, not knowing what to expect. It had never occurred to me that puppetry could be for adults. My only reference point was The Muppets and Sesame Street. I had no idea that in every other country in the world, puppetry was either high art or religion or folk craft, and it was only in America that this had been marginalized as children’s theatre. So this was completely new to me. And [it was] the unexpectedness of seeing such a moving piece, done with subtly and nuance as a puppet piece, combined with Dan’s exquisite aesthetic. [It] just really inspired me and thrilled me. And I didn’t do anything about it, until I met Dan by chance. And I told him how much I loved Hiroshima Maiden. And he told me about his upcoming piece, Disfarmer. And he told me the story of Disfarmer, and I said to him, “It seems to me that there should be a much larger audience for this work than there is,” and I would come up to his church where he was having his first rehearsal residency. He would bring these puppeteers up from New York City to work with him in this church. And once I saw them operating the puppet, looking at it through the camera, I couldn’t really resist. It was such a compelling image to see a close-up of the puppet being operated by these three extremely talented puppeteers.

Silvestri: There is a way that these puppeteers bring life to these creations that make the puppets very lifelike and emotions are projected onto them, despite their fixed expressions.
Soll: That’s absolutely right. I’ve spoken to the puppeteers, [and] they describe their role as facilitating a connection between the audience and the puppet. So while they are performers, and they recognize that they are performers, there’s a certain immediate connection that people have with the inanimate object, that once it has just the slightest amount of life breathed into it, [it] captivates, and really inspires an audience to connect, and bring all of their own emotions into the scene. So the puppeteers just see themselves as really enabling that primordial connection.

Silvestri: Audiences may be turned off to puppetry because of a fear of puppets, of something inanimate being given human emotions and feelings, and almost coming to life.
Soll: There are definitely people who find puppets creepy. But I think it’s the robotics theory, from the late 70s, [that] has become really popular, as with 3-D animation, the uncanny valley, this notion that a human simulacra, [like] an animated figure or a puppet, as it approaches lifelike, it reaches a point where it’s almost human, but not quite, and it goes from being amusing and engaging to uncanny and terrifying. And that was the theory behind why The Polar Express as a film did really badly at the box office, because they were too lifelike but not quite lifelike enough. As something gets too close to being lifelike, the audience starts to focus on the ways that it’s not alive, and get revolted, rather on the ways that it is alive, and be delighted. So I think puppets, when they’re done well, exist right on the edge of the uncanny valley where they’re completely compelling, but not quite uncanny.

Silvestri: The slow acceptance of a puppet as an lifelike creature reminds me of Todd Haynes’ Superstar, which allows the audience to initially get past the absurdity of Barbie and Ken dolls acting out a story and feel emotions for the story via the voice acting and music, projecting their own emotional responses onto the plastic faces.
Soll: I think that’s right. It’s really a tricky line between being boring, because they’re just dolls, and being completely captivating, and being revolting. The difference between those three categories is really pretty subtle, I think. And you’re not really sure how or why that line gets crossed.

Silvestri: I had seen an exhibit of Disfarmer’s work at a Manhattan gallery [Steven Kasher Gallery], I was curious to know if Dan related to Disfarmer in being a misunderstood artist?
Soll: I don’t think Dan was entirely sure why he wanted to make a piece about Disfarmer at the beginning. He thought he was fascinating, but I don’t think he started out seeing himself in this puppet. That’s something that evolved for him over time. And I don’t think it’s necessarily about feeling unappreciated it was more about connecting to someone for whom issues of legacy and mortality were really salient. So for Dan, it’s more like the life in his show. He spent three years making this project with collaborators, investing with enormous personal, emotional and creative resources into it, and when it’s over, it’s just gone forever. And that to me, just in terms of any performance art or theater, is really terrifying. As a filmmaker, I want to make things that will last. That’s just something that I’m attached to, and I don’t know how people like Dan Hurlin do it, and invest so much time and energy into something that when it’s over, it’s really gone. So the least that he’s hoping for is a really significant run where he gets to feel like a lot of people saw it, that it made its mark on theater, that it did something. That it had a life in the world.

So he chose as his project this story about a man who had done incredible work, completely outside the New York art world, completely unknown to the art world, and then passed away completely in obscurity. And only thirty years later did his work find its own new life, completely separate from him as a human being. There was something about that overlap and intention.

Silvestri: Disfarmer’s photographs show people who have strong, stoic expressions, and whose backgrounds are completely mysteries, that you can project whatever kind of background you want onto them.
Soll: Absolutely, and that was Dan’s first epiphany when making his piece, that was he was drawn to these photographs the same reason that he was drawn to these puppets, and the same reason that he was drawn to Disfarmer, that they all invite that kind of interpretation. And they also feel like they just barely exist. They’re there enough to captivate your imagination, but you don’t know anything about them. We don’t know anything about Disfarmer. We just know that he was an eccentric guy who took amazing photographs, so he’s just there enough to inspire an evening performance, but not enough to tell you the whole story. The Wikipedia entry on Disfarmer’s life is pretty short [laughs]. There’s just not much there.

Silvestri: The documentary gives audiences a wider view of the art of puppetry, beyond children’s theater or hand puppets. The puppetry in work like The Lion King expands an awareness that puppetry can be more alive and one with the performer or work as a support to an artist rather than being the star itself. And that puppetry is more respected in other countries as a legitimate art form rather than the U.S., where it is demoted to only being for children, and not high art enough for adults.
Soll: I’m glad to hear that that comes across. And what I was hoping to do was not just make it a lot of context for this guy [Hurlin], but have Mike Disfarmer, Dan Hurlin, and the form of puppetry as three intertwining threads, which have these overlapping themes of disappearance and revival. All three experience issues of disappearance and legacy and marginalization, and I was hoping to find a way to put those three in dialogue with each other.

Click here for festival dates for David Soll's Puppet.

Review of Errol Morris' Tabloid

2010-11-03T08:07:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared on IONCinema.

2010 DOC NYC: Errol Morris' Tabloid

Posted by Melissa Silvestri on Nov 02, 2010

Prominently featured in the inaugural edition of the DOC NYC Film Festival, documentarian Errol Morris brings his TIFF-premiered title that reminds us of the filmmaker's curiosity for the fringe characters that populate this world. Joyce McKinney is better known in England as a 1970s tabloid fixture for her bizarre involvement in kidnapping her fiancé from Mormon missionaries, and tying him to her bed to have a “proper” honeymoon. Her mixture of naiveté with a sordid past made her a juicy target for religious zealots to use her as the “devil” woman that tempts man with sin. In Tabloid, Morris looks at the strange and absurd tale of a former beauty pageant winner who broke the law all in the name of love.

Joyce McKinney had been Miss Wyoming in the 1970s, moved to Utah, and became engaged to a pleasant young man named Kirk Anderson, who was a young Mormon planning on becoming a missionary. He disappeared without a trace in 1977, and McKinney, with the help of a private detective, found out he was in England completing the orientation of his faith into missionary work. McKinney, convinced the church was brainwashing him, set up a crack team of herself, a pilot, her friend Keith May, and bodyguards to rescue Anderson. The plan was falling apart, so McKinney resorted to May kidnapping Anderson at the church, holding him against his will in Devon, and convincing herself that she was “saving” him. Anderson escaped, and McKinney and May were arrested on kidnapping charges.

McKinney is a strange and captivating individual. On one hand, she seems completely delusional that what she did was a savior gesture, and that she and Anderson had a “romantic” weekend together while he was held against his will. She doesn’t seem completely in touch with reality, and her life afterwards was hindered by agoraphobia and an inability to have a romantic relationship with someone else after Anderson. But, she is still visibly hurt by the tabloid accusations of her being called “crazy” or demeaned for her sexy appearance, and is an intelligent woman who is vulnerable to being mocked or misunderstood. She can be unintentionally funny, referring to Morris as “Mr. Filmmaker” with a sweet charm.

The title perfectly captures the chopped-up editing of the film. Names are displayed in large, L.A. Confidential-style captions, the subjects are interviewed against blank gray walls, and news clips puncture the film constantly, giving Tabloid a speedy pace of breaking news. Tabloid never demeans its subject to the point of humiliation. Rather, it gives McKinney proper respect, while remaining objective in its view of her. Whether she can be seen as an innocent victim who thought she was saving her fiancé, or a sexpot who flouted the law in pursuit of her own delusions, remains up to the audience to decide.

Halloween Shorts Special from iTunes and Shorts International

2010-10-19T17:53:00.000-07:00

This was originally published on Film Monthly.com.

Halloween Shorts Special from iTunes and Shorts International

by Melissa Silvestri

iTunes is offering a special collection of Halloween Shorts, courtesy of Shorts International, available October 19th in the US, Canada, UK, and Germany. Over 25 shorts are packed with stars like Emily Blunt, Jane Lynch, Eric Roberts, and John Simm. The films are available for $1.99 each, and as a bonus, Roar, a subversive thriller starring Russell Tovey (Doctor Who) and Jodie Whittaker (St. Trinian’s), will be made free for a limited time.

Daniel Persitz’s Alex’s Halloween, starring Jane Lynch, is a playful romp in the Halloween adventure of an imaginative little boy named Alex (Robert Ochoa) who pictures himself as whatever fantasy figure he likes, be it a knight, a wizard, or a superhero. It’s reminiscent of the 90’s cartoon Bobby’s World, where a child’s imagination can conflict with real life. Lynch appears briefly as Alex’s mother, who pressures her teenage son Matt (Connor Gramme) to take Alex trick-or-treating, to his sullen displeasure. All Alex wants is to hang out with his cool older brother, who reluctantly accepts when Matt figures they can sneak candy past their mother’s health-food regime. But when Matt’s plans change otherwise, Alex’s world is shattered. The short isn’t so much about Halloween, but the relationship between brothers, and bridging the age gap. It’s a delightful short and enjoyable to watch.

Toby Spanton’s directorial debut Curiosity, on the other hand, is a terrifying nightmare. The film stars Emily Blunt (who starred in The Wolfman for which Spanton was a assistant director) and Tom Riley as a young couple who suspect that a murderer may be on the loose. Their strange suspicions prove accurate when the murderer begins to terrorize them. In just nine minutes, an ordinary couple goes from tucking-in for the night to fighting for their lives against a killer, a radical change of pace from the previous film. Curiosity paces itself with an ominous, haunting feeling, and the final tight POV shot on Blunt’s face is surely to stick in the brain.

John Simm (Life on Mars) stars in Devilwood, written and directed by Sacha Bennett, about a mysterious stranger in 1700s England, by the name of Dante (Dylan Brown). He enters a small town looking for “papers” from a local gentleman. At the same time, a beautiful young woman also arrives, named Rossetti (Kate Magowan), in search of Dante. Neither are really who they say they are, and their presence in the eyes of Gabriel (Simm) signals an arrival of the Devil. This evocative thriller won several awards, including Best Horror at the California Independent Film Festival.

Shorts International is a major short entertainment movie company, holding the largest collection of short films in the world. They also run their programs on several channels, including ShortsHD on Dish Network, ShortsTV UK, ShortsTV France, and on TTNET in Turkey. More information can be found at www.shortsinternational.com.

Interview with Anna Farrell, director of Twelve Ways to Sunday

2010-09-22T15:13:00.000-07:00

“TWELVE WAYS TO SUNDAY” COMES TO ROOFTOP FILMS

By Melissa Silvestri

Wednesday, September 22nd, 2010

In this time of economic peril, many Americans have begun to shed frivolous spending for small but rich pleasures. With less nights of take-out or cineplex movies, they’ve learned that it’s the homemade things that count in this world. Filmmaker Anna Farrell portrays a tight-knit community in her documentary Twelve Ways to Sunday, one that always knew about the basic and organic things in life. Fixing up motorcycles, dishing up meals at the local diner, and canning fruit preserves, the people of Allegany County, New York, have always sustained through the good and bad times. Playing this Wednesday at Rooftop Films as part of their extended 2010 Summer Series in NYC (in part with IFP‘s Independent Film Week), Twelve Ways to Sunday shows that in the leanest years, people in rural America have always known how to persevere with strength and know-how, and that a different kind of wealth can be appreciated: self-sustainability, good conversation, rich stories, and getting to know your neighbors.

The beauty in Twelve Ways to Sunday is the unique and interesting cast that Farrell and co. have assembled for this film. A pastor who enjoys making peanut brittle that is hard and mixed with chocolate; Fred, a grizzled rough-talking old man who hangs out at the local diner and is friends with the co-owner, a hearty and witty young woman; an elderly couple who ride motorcycles and have tattoos, and a young woman who is an avid hunter, yet appreciates the beauty of the woods and its inhabitants.

Farrell had previously been a 2009 IFP Documentary Lab Fellow with Twelve Ways to Sunday, showcasing her film at last year’s Rooftop Films / IFP Lab Selections screening last year. She was co-director of the accompanying documentary with Opus Jazz: N.Y. Export, and has recently worked on both Tiny Furniture and Twilight.

I spoke with Farrell via email this month, in preparation for the screening.

Twelve Ways to Sunday features many memorable characters who instantly become endearing and interesting to an audience, and with a wide diversity. How did you develop the film project?

TWTS developed out of a desire to create a multi-character portrait piece about life in rural New York. My brother [Samuel Farrell, assistant producer] and I grew up in a relatively small town upstate, but I wanted to go further out in the state to find “our town” for the film. Allegany County stood out because of its poverty levels (one of the poorest in the state) and its deer harvesting statistics (one of the highest in the state). Self-reliance is one of the defining characteristics of all of my subjects. We basically started driving west and when we found this small town, Bolivar, NY, it really felt right, and people seemed willing to give us a chance. We ended up filming in a few adjacent small towns: Bolivar, Richburg, Friendship, Cuba, Scio. The “story” then became about the people we found there.

The townspeople are very emotionally open and blunt in front of the camera, telling their stories. How did you find your subjects, and how did they come to trusting the film crew and telling their stories?

We worked hard early on to make ourselves very visible in the community—we ate at the diners, went to the harvest festivals, went to church on Sunday, went to the football games. We followed up with everyone. Most of the time we were with our subjects we were not filming—instead we were helping cook dinner, cut firewood, hiking in the woods, sharing our stories too. I think being brother and sister made us immediately accessible, people trust and understand family dynamics and we were allowed to be ourselves. In the end, the tone of the film is very intimate and very honest because the subjects were talking to someone they knew on the other side of the camera. I am really proud that we were able to maintain that trust throughout the entire process and that it reads to the audience as well.

What was the financing like for the project?

Financing this project was rather tricky. When we began fundraising, I was a 20-year-old first-time director writing and budgeting a documentary that wasn’t a social issue film, so it was difficult to attract grant money. Most of the financing came either in the form of out-of-pocket expenditures or individual and in-kind donations. IFP supported the project early on through fiscal sponsorship, which encouraged giving on many levels. NW Documentary, a non-profit in Portland, Oregon offered me an artist-in-residence position during post-production, and having an edit station, office space, and other creative minds with whom to share the process was invaluable; however, without formal funding, we had to constantly find creative ways to keep our costs low and remain patient. It was a healthy challenge.

In some filmmakers’ hands, they would present the people of Allegany County as either folky simpletons, or backwards country folk, or even look on them pitying for being working-class. Twelve Ways to Sunday does not take that pretense at all, celebrating the characters and uniqueness that the people are, and how gorgeous their home is (which is shot in wide panoramic shots). What do you think it is about the county that brings out the strength and humility in its people?

When we began filming, I was expecting to tell a story about a disappearing community. The Americana story that examines poverty and hardship and perhaps is full of romantic idealism for rural life. However, good documentary filmmaking is less about hunting down the story you have from the start and more about gathering the story as it unfolds before you. It requires patience and the ability to be surprised. What I found in Allegany County was an overwhelming sense of life, humility and self-reliance. Despite the economic depression in the area, I was met with a generosity that I had never before encountered. In the end, TWTS is more of a celebration film than anything else. I think that if you spent time in any small town you would find people that amazed you, inspired you, people that saw life if a poetic way, it’s just a matter of taking the time to get to know those folks.

Rooftop Films in NYC has been such a great showcase for independent films for the last 14 years. How did you become involved with them? Was it through IFP’s 2009 Documentary Filmmaker Lab, or did they contact you separately?

I met Mark Rosenberg, Artistic Director of Rooftop Films, last year during Independent Film Week. Rooftop hosts a preview screening of clips from that year’s Filmmaker Labs, and my trailer screened underneath the Brooklyn Bridge during that showcase. I actually gave Mark Rosenberg a jar of homemade jam (my budget marketing campaign!) that evening. I was already a big fan of what Rooftop is able to accomplish and I thought my film would find a welcome home with their programming. He checked out our rough cut through the DVD library at Independent Film Week and jumped on as an early supporter of the doc. We couldn’t be more ecstatic to be premiering with them.

On your blog, you mentioned that you became inspired by Mary to be more self-sufficient, and canned your first jar of preserves. What else did you take away from the filming, and what do you hope audiences will learn as well?

I drew much inspiration from the Foxfire book series, an anthology of oral histories that “promotes a sense of place and appreciation of local people, community, and culture as essential educational tools.” (The Foxfire Fund, Inc. Mission Statement, http://www.foxfire.org) I am hoping that the finished film will encourage and inspire discussions about rural America as well as celebrate living people as sources of disappearing knowledge.

What projects are you currently working on now?

I am currently developing a feature documentary examining the physical and physiological effects of shift work on body and mind. It is a character-driven film that follows the life of a nurse who frequently rotates between night and day shifts. I’m also working on a script for a narrative feature. It is about a young Chinese woman who has the opportunity to immigrate to the U.S. after her sister passes away during childbirth. She moves in with her sister’s widower to help raise her newborn niece. They live in a fairly small town in (surprise) upstate New York. The film is about being a novice, new life to the world, new immigrant to a country, and new outsider in a small town. I’m really excited by both non-fiction and fiction formats, and it seems organic to want to direct in both genres.

Interview with Kings of Pastry directors D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus

2010-09-15T11:01:00.000-07:00

This story originally appeared in Filmmaker Magazine.

D.A. PENNEBAKER & CHRIS HEGEDUS, “KINGS OF PASTRY”

By Melissa Silvestri

Wednesday, September 15th, 2010

D.A. Pennebaker is a legend in the world of documentary filmmaking. A pioneer in the art of cinema verite, he first made his mark with the 1967 classic Don’t Look Back, chronicling Bob Dylan’s final acoustic tour in the U.K. He met his partner (in directing and matrimony) Chris Hegedus in the 1970s, and they have co-directed nearly 30 films together since 1977, including the Oscar-nominated The War Room and the Sundance entry Startup.com. Their latest collaboration is Kings of Pastry, a whirlwind peek into the M.O.F. competition, a French pastry chef contest in which 16 of the world’s best pastry chefs compete by making nearly 40 different kinds of pastries, including elaborate and often fragile sugar sculptures, all to be named the Meilleur Ouvrier de France, or the Best Craftsman of France. Kings of Pastry tracks the journey of French pastry chef Jacquy Pfeiffer, a world-renowned chef who runs the French Pastry School in Chicago, and dreams of joining the ranks of his elite mentors.

But Kings of Pastry is far from a Top Chef competition, where amateurs bicker and fight with one another only to create sub-par meals and win celebrity attention. These chefs are the best and know it too. They share a sense of camaraderie and respect with each other. The way that Pennebaker and Hegedus capture this collegiality is so palpable — whenever a delicate sugar sculpture is in danger of crumbling, or a judge shoots a critical glance, tension fills the screen.

Filmmaker spoke with Pennebaker and Hegedus in their New York office earlier this month. Kings of Pastry opens at the Film Forum in New York City today.

Chris Hegedus & D.A. Pennebaker. Photo by Kit Pennebaker

Filmmaker: What was the genesis of this project?

Hegedus: Well, this project really came about because a friend of mine (Flora Lazar, co-producer) decided to move to Chicago. She went to the French Pastry School and really wanted to be a pastry chef. She told me about Jacquy Pfeiffer deciding to compete in this famous M.O.F. competition, and how his partner at the school, Sebastien [Canonne], had already competed [and won], and it just really sounded intriguing. So we flew out and met them. We met Jacquy and Sebastien. Once we heard about the competition, and the extreme nature of it, [we were] fascinated.

Pennebaker: [Jacquy] was sort of older, and he kind of had to do it. I liked him right away, and I thought, “This is the kind of person I’d like to film doing this.” So we just went to France with him and from then it was just hanging on and trying to figure out what we were doing.

Filmmaker: Was it difficult to obtain rights to film the M.O.F. competition?

Pennebaker: Well, in France, in August, nobody answers the phone. So no matter what you have in mind, you could call the police and get no answer! [laughs].

Hegedus: It was really through Sebastien, since he was already a M.O.F. and knew the organization, and had contacts there, and Jacquy knew them as well. But it was through his encouragement that we were able to contact the head people. And basically, we just had to convince them that we weren’t going to interfere, which is why at the end of each day, they would have to re-convene to see if we’d be allowed to shoot the next day [laughs]. It was a very risky situation, but they liked us.

Filmmaker: From the outside, the film seems like it would just be about a baking competition, but it really is about artisanship in general.

Hegedus: Yes, that’s basically what it is — an artisan field to an extreme degree. There are aspects in the pastry field where people start doing this elaborate artisan ornamentation to embellish their art form. And the chefs that they want at this level have to be able to do both, to cook perfectly, to be artistic to the degree of making sculptures, and make things that taste delicious, which is kind of an odd combination. Most people that work as glass sculptors don’t have to make something that tastes good [laughs].

Pennebaker: The competition between chefs here [in the U.S.] is quite different. It has to do with speed, and a certain kind of aspect of food, which is what you see on television. But at the M.O.F.s, it was like a club that you wanted to get into. You didn’t just win. A number of people got selected based on their abilities, and the rest would have to come back another time.

Filmmaker: The film keeps the audience in suspense, from the judges’ intense scrutiny to the precariousness of the fragile sugar sculptures. Was that kind of tension there while filmmaking?

Hegedus: Well, we really didn’t have any budget on this project because our access was at the last-minute. It was at a very low level, and because no one had ever been allowed permission to even look at it or film it, they were very nervous that we would do something that would cause something to break in any way. So we couldn’t use any booms or radio mikes. We basically had our cameras, no lights or anything. It was restricted filming, and by the third day, when everyone was going to be carrying their beautiful displays, they drew little boxes around each of the tables and the kitchens, and that’s where you could stand.

Pennebaker: Our camera equipment is like any home movie camera. In the competition, we didn’t do any sound, because wireless microphones would distort the readings on their little scales, which is very crucial to them. But it was a very simple kind of filming. I don’t think anybody really noticed us after the first ten minutes.

Filmmaker: Chris, you grew up with a baking legacy, between your grandfather’s tea rooms in the 1920s and making chocolates and ice creams, while your great-grandfather was a highly respected chef and cooked for the Roosevelts. Did you find a kinship with the chefs?

Hegedus: It was interesting to me because my grandfather, who came from Europe, apprenticed to a baker, and then came to the United States and created these pastry confectionary stores. But I think my real connection to the chefs is less from my grandfather, because he died before I knew him, but from my Hungarian grandmother, who was just such an exquisite chef. For me, that was interesting, because at a time when I grew up in the ’50s, cooking in America had turned away from the cooking roots of people’s families. It was the blossoming of all TV dinners and fast food. We almost lost the idea of cooking. [laughs] I did have this side of my family that was involved in this really exquisite cooking, where I would get these elaborate cakes. I never saw them anywhere else.

Filmmaker: How do you get subjects to be natural and comfortable in front of the camera?

Hegedus: I think for both people [famous and non-famous], it’s a matter of getting them to trust you. And if they see that you’re genuinely interested in what they do, that you take the time to really find out about what they do, they’ll slowly let you into their lives. But it’s a privilege, it’s not something that is given. And definitely, when things are going well, and however they envision the movie of their life, they’re happy to have you there. But when things aren’t going as planned, then it’s not the happiest moment to have you around. And I think in those moments, it’s very nice to have a partner. You feel very un-loved, you don’t know what to do, and it’s nice to have someone when you’re making a film at this point. It’s an adventure and a risk on both of our parts. I think that kind of bonds you in a certain way.

Pennebaker: The thing is, if people are uncomfortable in front of your camera, you better stop filming them. That’s why you don’t sit them down in a chair and ask them questions. It’s boring for everybody, so you try to avoid it. What you want to do is find out everything you want to know by seeing it happen. You don’t want to have them tell you about it, or have someone tell you about it. It’s kind of how documentaries began, because everybody couldn’t be there when the action took place. But if you work on it and think about it before you film, you sort of know how people are going to act, and that’s when you want to be filming. You want to be in the War Room when they win the election, not afterwards when they tell you about it.

Filmmaker: The chefs seem to hold more of a camaraderie with each other rather than a rivalry, and it was uplifting to watch. As well as the judging M.O.F.s who showed support to the contestants.

Pennebaker: Well, they all know each other. I mean, these are the best chefs in France, which is something. They were already working in restaurants that were heavy-duty, so it’s not like they’re trying to break into the [business]. They’re already there. It’s the kind of single effort on the part of a Frenchman to join a special group, like the Knights Templar. Anybody who was a Knights Templar was like the king, meaning he had access to the king. And this is back in the 1300s, and it’s prevailed, so it’s kind of like that.

Hegedus: It was incredibly supportive. I think they (the M.O.F.s) recognize that anybody who made it to that level of the competition, they’re all pretty good chefs. They know they should be part of their club, and it is an interesting club, these chefs who have the red, white, and blue collars. The idea of the M.O.F. was started 100 years ago to encourage excellence in the manual craft field, so a lot of it is about giving back. The chefs say that the hardest thing is that after you get the M.O.F., you have to be this role model for people and give back. I think that’s why the chefs came up to [the contestants] when they were having a hard time — that kind of mentoring and encouraging thing is part of what the M.O.F. is about, and I think that’s wonderful.

Filmmaker: Your documentaries have featured politics, music, and entertainment figures, like Carol Burnett, Al Franken, Bill Clinton, and Bob Dylan. Do you feel like you choose your subjects, or do they choose you?

Hegedus: I think most of our subjects come to us. Someone says, “I’d think it’d be good if you did a film about this, would you be interested?” If somebody has access, that’s the most important thing, but yes, people come to us, or hear about things that we’re interested in. When I did Startup.com, I was interested in the Internet, it seemed like this Wild West in front of us, and everybody wanted to be a part of it.

Filmmaker: Your films often have your subject in the middle of a project, be it a Broadway show, an election, a concert tour, or recording an album. Do you feel these situations reveal their personality more than an interview would?

Pennebaker: If you want to know what somebody’s like, if you want to get a sense of their character, you’ve got to get them when they’re going around a corner. In an election, that’s easy, because the corner is the election, but sometimes, it’s like with [the band] The National, they want to do a concert at BAM, which would go online. I thought it sounded like a marvelous idea — I’ve never done a live concert. So we all find out something, and it was a marvelous thing to do.

Filmmaker: How has finding funding changed over the years?

Hegedus: Funding was more difficult in the beginning because getting started on a major film was expensive. A roll of film had to be processed and a print made from it. A 10-minute roll cost two hundred and fifty dollars when you finally got it out of the lab. This meant that it was often necessary to try and sell the project before beginning it, which required a script or outline. It also meant that whoever put up “front” money really owned the film and could edit it as they saw fit. Not a good arrangement for filmmakers.

Most of our funding early on was borrowed, either from friends or relations, and of course they had to be paid back so it was almost obligatory that the project be salable not to TV that had little interest in independent filmmakers, but to theatrical distributors, or in most instances to theaters as a first run self-distributed film which was very hard to carry out. You certainly didn’t get rich. Don’t Look Back and Monterey Pop were examples of this, and while they were both extremely popular and each played theatrically for well over a year it was difficult to get the theaters to pay. The film of Steve Sondheim’s Company was never sold to a network but had to be parceled out to individual stations and paid for by piecework sales to sponsors. I don’t know if the producer made much money but we certainly didn’t.

Switch now to present: A serious project like The War Room or Kings of Pastry can be started with relatively little investment other than a small video camera and the time of the actual filmmakers. A simple video camera records high quality sound and picture and can be operated by a single person. Both of those films were shot without lights or an expensive crew. Filming over long periods of time, which is almost always required, is expensive but the film generally ends up belonging to the filmmakers, and much of the money to pay for it raised through funding organizations that give tax benefits to donors instead of promising profits from subsequent distribution.

Filmmaker: What are you working on next?

Hegedus: Next project, well, we’re never quite sure what’s next until we actually pick up a camera and start to shoot, but there is some talk about doing a film with Steve Sondheim, whom I have known for some time but not really well so it offers a chance to know him better and to do a musical film which of course we would really like to do. Ask us in a couple of months and let’s see what brews. We are also following the activities at CERN and the possibilities for a film coming out of there or connected to it.

Review of Lixin Fan's Last Train Home

2010-08-27T08:21:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared on IONCinema

Last Train Home, the directorial debut of documentary filmmaker Lixin Fan, has had an impressive streak at the past year's major film festivals. An official selection of Sundance Film Festival, and winner at several festivals including the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, San Francisco International Film Festival, and top tier docu festival IDFA (International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam), this chronicles two years in the lives of the Zhengs, a working-class Chinese family who are separated for economic reasons. The parents are two of the 130 million Chinese migrant workers who currently work in the factories of China's major cities, leaving the countryside for opportunity and economic growth. They are only allowed to go home once a year, and that is for Chinese New Year in February. But with that many workers, it is practically impossible that all will be guaranteed a train ticket home to see their families.

Fan uses a hand-held camera to capture intimate yet bleak panoramic shots of the mass hysteria that ensues when millions of people are struggling to gain a ticket, then trying to even find space on the overcrowded train. In each scene, everybody is worried that they won't be one of the lucky ones, that they will be left behind and miss the chance for a nice holiday. Spending their days and nights hunched over sewing machines in loud, congested factories, this is an escape into the comfort of home traditions. People being pushed and shoved, loaded down with luggage (often carrying quite heavy loads practically on their heads) presents a dystopian image of low-income workers in overpopulated cities with all the same dreams and hopes, but not everybody will be rewarded with a rags to riches life.

The elder Zhengs work down to their fingers sewing clothing to be sent to America. It's a sobering reality for Western audiences to see the faces behind the "Made in China" label, and how there are real people struggling to provide better lives for their children. Fan's narratives with the family members depicts a unit that is broken, emotions running high from immense guilt from the parents, to seething resentment from their teenage daughter, who lives out in the country with her grandmother and younger brother. The traditional rural life is abandoned by the young people, migrating to the cities, leaving the children and elderly folks to try to maintain farm life. City life is intensely competitive, and young adults starting at 15 quit school to assert their independence working in the factories. They're working long hours for low pay, but it's something they can call their own.

The Zheng family are split, not just by distance, but by familial strain. They are missing out on their children growing up, and their daughter is frustrated and angry at them for leaving her. She takes the risk in leaving school and going to work in the factories, despite her parents' protestations. Her stance is brave and strong, wanting to take control of her own life at 17. Tensions run high during a uncomfortably raw moment where father and daughter are at each other, hollering and snarling at one another. It not only rips through all the niceties that they've been giving each other (and the audience), but breaks the fourth wall, the threads of their family coming undone. It's a sad example of the circle of industrial life in the world, the parents who worked hard to provide a better life for their children only to see their children go the same route out of instant results instead of the long-term results of education.

Last Train Home shines a light on people who would normally not be seen in the media eye, anonymous workers who toil for hours creating clothing for consumers who don't question the distance that it traveled to their shops, and whose livelihood hangs on a factory's supply and demand. Already, these factories will have machines replace humans, increasing output, and leaving millions jobless and lost.

Zeitgeist Films releases Lixin Fan's Last Train Home on Friday, September 3rd.

Review of Emilia Menocal and Jauretsi Saizabitoria's East of Havana

2010-07-28T15:27:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

'East of Havana' review

This documentary offers a rare glance into the rap scene of a younger Cuban generation

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: February 28th, 2007 | 5:33pm

East of Havana is a fascinating documentary about contemporary rap music in Cuba. The film follows three local rappers: Magyori, Mikki, and Soandry, who are members of the rap collective El Cartel and rhapsodize about the fallen Cuban economy of the '90s and the anger it has fueled their generation (blackouts, no money, poor housing). The three are charismatic, intriguing individuals as they talk about what rap means to them and how they express their emotions and life stories in the strength and purity of their rap verse.

The three youths grew up in an impoverished part of Havana; Magyori sells her belongings and others' stuff for a daily profit, Mikki lives with his grandfather and does odd jobs, and Soandry is his parents' last remaining child; their older son left Cuba during the 1994 exodus when 33,000 Cubans fled the island to the United States, and he hasn't been able to return home since. A heartbreaking moment occurs when Soandry's older brother, living in Seattle, sees pictures of his parents and brother for the first time since he left, and the shock of seeing their aged faces breaks him down into tears.

The film was co-directed by native Cuban Jauretsi Saizabitoria, and co-produced by her longtime friend, actress Charlize Theron. The idea for the film came from a 2001 trip the two took to Cuba and a drive to show the island beyond images of Castro, Scarface, and 80-year old Buena Vista Social Club-type musicians. This film shows the inherent strength of the young generation, and their determination to change Cuba into a more economically diverse, rich nation. East of Havana is a small but unforgettable film that gives an American audience a rare eye into the everyday life of Cubans living under Castro's government.

Review of Craig Brewer's Black Snake Moan

2010-07-28T15:23:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

'Black Snake Moan' review

Christina Ricci shocks and shines in her return to the big screen

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: March 9th, 2007 | 9:12am

This March, one of the most controversial films of 2007 premiered, after being buzzed for months about its alleged misogyny and racism. Black Snake Moan, a parable starring Samuel L. Jackson and Christina Ricci, is a unique and individual film that, while weak in some parts, is a tour de force for Ricci';s performance as a sex-addicted Mississippi runt who is enslaved to transform under the watchful eye of Jackson'sbluesman-turned-farmer.

The selling point of the film has been the farmer's unethical way of taming the promiscuous girl of her "demons" (locking a 40-ft chain around her waist and keeping her housebound for days), but it is a drastic measure for a girl who has used sex to mask being sexually abused as a child, taking back power in an aggressive and emotionless manner. The girl, named Rae, frequently suffers fits and spells, mentally revisiting her past abuses with her current sexual situations of overtaking a man or letting a man have his way with her, practically using her as a toilet.

The film suffers by garnering a lot of unintentional laughs from the audience for what would be an intense story. The chain scenes are made to be hilarious instead of disturbing (as it would be for anyone in that situation), and Jackson's cult popularity for Pulp Fiction and Snakes on a Plane gives the audience a smug knowingness, laughing at the way he says "motherfucker"; or rolls his eyes in disbelief at another. In addition, the subplot of Rae's Iraq-bound boyfriend is unnecessary, a ploy to make Rae more sympathetic by showing her in loving coitus with her man and having him for stability in her turbulent life. The boyfriend is dead weight and Rae was enough of a fleshed-out character without him.

The glue of this film is Christina Ricci as Rae. Recovering from a career slump (her last critically-acclaimed role prior was in Monster, and in The Opposite of Sex five years before that), she reveals herself physically and emotionally naked, a feral animal ripping herself for the audience to gaze upon both in titillation and sympathy. A standout scene is her Pentecostal-like dance to the blues classic 'Stackolee,' releasing herself of her sexual demons and feeling free and exhilarated for the first time in years.

The film was directed by Craig Brewer, best known for the Oscar-winning Hustle & Flow. This continues the same style of using music to complement a Southern lifestyle, and it works superbly, enriching the film with the blues music of R.L. Burnside and Scott Bomar's raw instrumentals, and covers sung by Jackson himself, evoking the style if not the technical proficiency. The title is derived by Blind Lemon Jefferson’s 1920s number, and it evokes comparisons to PJ Harveys 'Long Snake Moan.'

Black Snake Moan is a flawed piece, but the blues-numbers scenes and Christina Ricci’s performance will rivet you and get under your skin.

Review of Craig Gillespie's Lars and the Real Girl

2010-07-28T15:22:00.001-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

Getting real

Ryan Gosling finds a lady friend in Lars and the Real Girl

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: October 21st, 2007

Just as the film Lars and the Real Girl was set to be released, a British documentary premiered this year. Love Me, Love My Doll chronicled the relationships that several men have had with their Real Dolls, an 21st century upgrade of the blow-up dolls of the past. The documentary starkly presents these men as lonely, socially awkward, sad people going into great detail about their "girlfriends" and all the relationship troubles they've faced, which would seem more genuine if the girlfriend wasn't made of plastic and rubber. It could be argued that the men preferred the dolls to real women because of their being sexually attractive yet not speaking or arguing with them.

Lars and the Real Girl dramatizes a typical life of one of these men. Lars Lindstrom (Ryan Gosling) is a reserved individual living in the garage of his brother, Gus (Paul Schneider). Gus' wife Karin (Emily Mortimer) tries to engage him in going out on excursions with them, having dinner with them, and trying to draw him out of his shell. His co-worker Margo (Kelli Garner) is interested in him, but he is merely polite to her. Lars seems like a giant man-child at 27, possibly autistic and sensitive to touch. It seems like there isn't any point to socialize Lars into the world, that he is content to live alone in his garage home and pay no mind to anybody.

Several weeks later, Lars introduces his girlfriend, Bianca, to Gus and Karin. Bianca is a Real Doll, resembling Angelina Jolie. Lars gives Bianca an entire backstory (she is a Brazilian wheelchair-bound woman who wants to work as a missionary). Though it seems like Lars has completely lost his mind, his devotion to Bianca as a real person (Karin even unconsciously sets a dinner plate for Bianca upon first meeting her) touches the rest of the town, and Bianca is accepted as a new member of the community, being spoken to and cared for as if she were real. Lars' relationship with her, where he is the only one who can hear her responses, brings up comparisons to Harvey, where Jimmy Stewart joyfully speaks to an invisible six-foot-tall rabbit and his family fears him being mentally ill. The psychologist (Patricia Clarkson), tries to give therapy sessions to Lars under the guise that she is "treating" Bianca, but he keeps his emotions locked up as to whether he believes that Bianca is real or that he knows that she's just a doll.

Lars is idealistic and a bit of a fantasy, but it is an interesting movie to see how a whole town will rally around one of their own and accept somebody's odd behavior - even learning something new about themselves along the way. The audience even starts to believe in Bianca's presence as much as the townspeople do, thanks to the convincing acting, led by Ryan Gosling's childlike performance, and the compelling script, written by Nancy Oliver.

Review of Michel Gondry's Be Kind Rewind

2010-07-28T15:18:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

Indie filmmaking in the extreme
Michel Gondry's Be Kind Rewind takes DIY directing to Hollywood

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: March 5th, 2008

Be Kind Rewind is the latest from music video auteur Michel Gondry, known for his childlike imagination and use of cardboard cutouts a la Where The Wild Things Are. Be Kind Rewind’s art imagery borrows from Gondry’s past videos for Björk and the Chemical Brothers, but has a DIY aesthetic that attracts the audience into the small world of Passaic, New Jersey. The audience reminisces back to the days before DVDs and Netflix, when the tattered format of VHS ruled.

The film follows Mike (Mos Def) and Jerry (Jack Black), two schmoes living day-to-day without a bright future. Jerry is an auto mechanic and lives in a trailer by the power plant. He’s the main customer at Be Kind Rewind - an old video store in a building that, though a place where Fats Waller once lived, is in danger of being demolished and replaced by a condominium, sending the video clerk Mike and his boss Fletcher (Danny Glover) into the projects.

While Fletcher is out of town, Jerry (having been electrocuted while trying to sabotage the power plant) becomes a “human magnetic field,” inadvertently erasing the films in the video store. As a last-ditch effort to appease the elderly and loyal Miss Falewicz (Mia Farrow) when she wants to rent Ghostbusters, Mike and Jerry decide to re-do the film as a 20-minute abbreviated version, shot in 2 ½ hours, using vacuum cleaners on their backs, a miniature Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man, and streamers to imitate the rays from the laser guns.

Their homemade recreation becomes a hit with her nephew and his friends, and they receive requests to re-do other pop-culture classics like Robocop, Driving Miss Daisy, and 2001, calling their style of film “Sweded.” For the female roles, they recruit Alma (Melonie Diaz), a bored dry-cleaning employee, who quickly grasps their enthusiasm and becomes a part of the local phenomenon.

The film drags when the video store is sued by the movie studios for copyright infringement (with Ghostbusters' Sigourney Weaver as the studios’ attorney), and the guys find themselves at a crossroads. It gets a little cheesy and Capra-esque at the end, but the majority of the film is pleasant and enjoyable.

Review of Ira Sach’s Married Life

2010-07-28T15:16:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

The nuclear family?
Married Life attempts to make a social commentary, but goes sour

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: April 2nd, 2008

Ira Sach’s Married Life suffers from clichés of cheating husbands, rejected wives, and young chippies as mistresses of the married man. There is no real message of the film (‘50s “perfect” families) that hasn’t been better expressed in Far From Heaven or Douglas Sirk films. The talented leading actors endure an uninspiring, dull script that wraps itself up with no real answer, other than “they all lived happily ever after.”

Married Life begins in 1949. Harry Allen (Chris Cooper) is an ordinary suit, dreadfully unhappy with his wife of 20 years, Pat (Patricia Clarkson), and is plotting his move to leave her to marry his young mistress Kay (Rachel McAdams), who is more romantic about love than Pat. Harry confides in his best friend Richard (Pierce Brosnan), who narrates the film and is uncomfortable with Harry’s choice, which devastates Pat when she figures out his intentions though a rhetorical question he asks her. Harry also brings up the idea that a wife is making her husband a better man through their marriage, and inadvertently presenting him to a younger woman awed by his intelligence and life wisdom.

Harry is filled with guilt about hurting his wife, yet wants to start over with Kay. So he gets the idea that he should poison Pat, to allow her to die in her sleep without pain instead of being marked as a divorced woman and feeling humiliated. Meanwhile, Richard has been taking Kay out on dates and impressing her with his quick wit and not having Harry’s emotional baggage. He sees the same innocence and sweetness in Kay as Harry does, as well as a levelheaded maturity that allows her to connect with men 30 years her senior.

The film suffers because the characters are cardboard cutouts - they are forgettable and boring. The clichés of repressed suburbia are old and well-mined, as is the notion that life was only dull and stifled back in the '50s and that everything is so much more liberal and better now. Sachs and his co-writer Oren Moverman could’ve written this script in a weekend, and the lack of heart and spirit shows. It is a waste that can only be explained by having to fulfill some studio obligation and cranking out something safe but regurgitated from better films.

Review of Saul Dibb's The Duchess

2010-07-28T15:13:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

The Duchess of yawn
This period drama is all corsets and no character

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: October 8th, 2008

The Duchess is a lackluster film that seems like a shell of its self. With empty characters and a cliché repressed wife making the choice between fulfilling her duties as the duchess and living independently with a young hot liberal, it’s similar in style and execution to Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette. Both films suffer from the same problem of pretty imagery but a weak storyline.

The Duchess follows the path of young Georgiana Cavendish (Keira Knightley), who is betrothed to the Duke of Devonshire (Ralph Fiennes) in 1774. At 17, she enters a life of grand privilege and charms a large circle of literary and political figures with her witty quips and comely looks. But what looks like an interesting life is all a façade: Georgiana is unable to conceive a surviving male heir, and her husband has many affairs unabashedly. After he unknowingly destroys the only truly happy part of her life, she chooses to have an affair with a young and handsome budding politician, and is given a sharp ultimatum by her husband when she reveals this affair.

The film suffers by making a potentially interesting story dull, reducing Georgiana to some heroine of a typical bodice-ripper who discovers her hidden sexuality through hot forbidden sex with an attractive man, while being imprisoned by a much older, cold husband. The casting of Knightley doesn’t help — her girl-of-the-21st-century appeal clashes with the gravitas and old-fashioned appeal required to play a 1780s character. While she fit as Elizabeth Bennett in Pride & Prejudice because of her modern feminist attitude, she looks out of place and overwhelmed by this film.

As for the other actors, Fiennes is good and delivers the material well, and Hayley Atwell stood out as Georgiana’s troubled best friend Lady Elizabeth, who betrays her in a soul-killing scene that nearly destroys Georgiana’s heart. Dominic Cooper as the lover (who becomes the future prime minister) doesn’t have much to do but look earnest and gaze at Georgiana, then make sweet love to her.

If you like period dramas and all that goes with powdered wigs, corsets, and repressed emotions, then this film is good to watch on a lazy Sunday afternoon. Otherwise, don’t expect much.

Review of Fernando Meirelles' Blindness

2010-07-28T15:11:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

Turning a blind eye
Blindness portrays hopelessness, but ends up just plain hopeless

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: October 21st, 2008 | 10:10pm

Blindness follows in the path of 28 Days Later and Children of Men, presenting a 2000's version of a dystopian society fallen apart in the din of madness and hopelessness. The film, based on the novel by José Saramago, begins on a strong premise: An epidemic of blindness affects the residents of an unnamed city, leading many to be quarantined and treated like lepers. Society completely falls apart.

The first victim of this epidemic is a Japanese man (Yusuke Iseya), who is struck blind while driving in traffic. He is assisted home by a wily young thief (Don McKellar), who also becomes blind. The blindness may or may not be infectious, since an eye doctor’s wife (Julianne Moore) is one of the few who does not become blind. She keeps her sight a secret, accompanying her husband (Mark Ruffalo) into a prison-turned-asylum for the newly blind, and being the den mother to all whom arrive, including a prostitute (Alice Braga), a child (Mitchell Nye), the Japanese man and his wife (Yoshino Kimura), the thief, and a myriad of other nameless characters. The film is intriguing as the doctor and his wife handle the new “patients,” giving people confidence and guidance in their strange new world of sightlessness.

The film takes a turn for the worse as more people are ushered in, leaving the prison a complete hellhole — the floor always wet, feces by the wall, random nudity and public copulating, and a stench that the audience can only imagine. A bartender (Gael García Bernal), frustrated by the doctor’s authoritarian stance over everybody, decides to take over in a radical new direction, withholding food until he can get what he wants out of people. The movie gets more depressing and dire in this second act, and is hard to sit through.

The third act seems as if the plot has lost its thread, and the characters are walking around aimlessly and confused, waiting to see if they regain their sight or not. The film could have been an interesting exercise in the epidemic of blindness affecting a whole city, but taking the “post-apocalyptic fall of society” theme and bringing the audience down in its muck is clichéd, boring, and doesn’t add anything new.

Review of Deirdree Timmons' A Wink and a Smile

2010-07-28T15:09:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared on Venus Zine.

Gender Bending Burlesque
A Wink and a Smile fails to live up to its burlesque tease

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: May 7th, 2009

A Wink and a Smile, currently making the rounds at US indie theaters, focuses on ten women in the Seattle area taking a six-week course in burlesque dance from professional dancer Miss Indigo Blue, culminating in a one-night-only performance. Directed by Deidree Timmons, the women’s journey is peppered by their lingering insecurities about their bodies and sexuality, and unfortunately, it's these redundant ruminations that drag the film down.

The burlesque dance classes are almost treated more as group therapy sessions, inviting the participants to reveal their self-doubts and confidence issues. After about nine out of ten women in a row speaking negatively about herself, it gets frustrating to listen to, boring, and takes the fun out of the documentary.

The highlights of the film are the performances from established stars subverting gender norms and social stereotypes, like The Shanghai Pearl twisting Asian exoticism, Waxie Moon, the sole male performer who is clearly influenced by ‘70s glam star Jobriath, Tamara the Trapeze Lady as the first to use trapeze in the burlesque scene, or one performer using herself as a canvas, being the artist, model, and audience all in one. These performers take the burlesque act and can use it to be male as female, female as male, female as male as female, or anything beyond just shaking tassels around.

A Wink and a Smile is a great effort to show how anybody with a passion and creative spirit can work within the burlesque world, but the focus on the women’s insecurities in comparison to the wildly diverse professionals exhibited makes it disjointed and split in half. The film would have benefited from editing down some of the women's segments – not necessarily to censor them, but not to keep making the same point of shyness, insecurity, or having issues with confidence or sexuality.

Review of Kathyrn Bigelow's The Hurt Locker

2010-07-28T15:08:00.001-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

Kathryn Bigelow brings the trenches to your cineplex in The Hurt Locker
A visceral film about the Iraq war that is not to be missed

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: July 8th, 2009

After a seven year hiatus from feature films, director Kathryn Bigelow (Near Dark, Point Break, Strange Days) is back, and The Hurt Locker is an explosive, gut-wrenchingly honest take on the current Iraq war, from the POV of three bomb techs finishing up a 38-day tour. The camera angles stay focused on their peripheral sightlines, allowing the audience to truly feel the anxiety and fear and quick action of the war scenes, as well as the brotherly intimacy between the three men.

The film centers around three bomb techs: the reckless Sgt. William James (Jeremy Renner), the levelheaded Sgt. JT Sanborn (Anthony Mackie), and the nerve-ridden Specialist Owen Eldridge (Brian Geraghty). James is brought as a replacement for a bomb squad leader who was killed, and is apathetic about his position, having a “if I die, I die” attitude. Sanborn’s patience is tested again and again as James risks the safety of his squad to disable bombs in unsafe areas of Baghdad, pushing to be the hero, even if he sacrifices himself. Eldridge is panicked about being in the war, knowing that his life is truly fragile and could be taken away from him at any moment. Together, these three men form a bond that is unstoppable, taking chances every day to fulfill their missions and disable bombs for the safety of the Iraqi civilians whom they are protecting.

What stands out about this film is that there is never a lull in the action, be it a war scene or chitchat amongst soldiers. The lead characters are charismatic and relatable, it is stripped of few clichés, has moments of humor and brevity in between the chaos, and presents, via journalist Mark Boal’s script based on his time amongst bomb squads in Iraq, an accurate portrayal of the day-to-day life of war. In one scene, James and Sanborn are positioned with their guns behind a sand hill, looking to shoot the enemy. They sit for what seems like hours at a time, not bothering to swat the flies crawling on their eyes and lips, the sand and dirt crusting on their faces, and withstanding the immense heat and boredom to take down a few men hiding in a nearby shack. It breaks the audience of their preconceived notions of combat as shooting from the trenches, and displays a scene of both tense action and drawn-out tediousness.

The Hurt Locker will stand as a classic in the war film genre, with an objective view of the war, focusing more on the soldiers’ day-to-day life than saying whether the war is right or not. The leads are phenomenal standouts, especially with Renner’s truly honest performance, and it is a treat to see Bigelow return to the big-screen with her intelligent and thought-provoking style of shooting action films with grit and substance.

Review of Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds

2010-07-28T15:06:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared in Venus Zine.

Bested by Basterds
Quentin Tarantino brings with to the multiplex with Inglourious Basterds

By Melissa Silvestri
Published: August 28th, 2009

Six years after his last major feature (Kill Bill) Quentin Tarantino returns with Inglourious Basterds, an anachronistic, wildly inaccurate re-telling of WWII history, where Jewish fighters take bloody revenge upon the Nazis who massacred their people. Don’t expect any sentimentality or bleeding-heart moments, this film will hold you in with this layered nuance in the powerful dialogue scenes and draw you deeper into the relations between the Germans occupying France and the French citizens just barely concealing their contempt.

Contrary to the film’s advertising, Brad Pitt is not the star, but rather the marquee name to bring audiences in. More suited as a supporting actor in unusually comic roles, he lightens up the otherwise dark film with quick wit and brevity, as the charismatic leader of a squad of Jewish-American soldiers turned rogue warriors, earning a reputation as the Inglourious Basterds, men who torture and bludgeon Nazis and German soldiers to a pulp, usually leaving one alive to tell the tale, but left with a lifelong mutilation to never allow anyone to forget what they represented.

The opening scene is a stunning and mesmerizing 20-minute dialogue between a French dairy farmer and a German Nazi named Colonel Landa, played with cool insouciance by Christoph Waltz. His play on words, feigning ignorance of French, and warm smile undercut with deadly threats keeps the audience both charmed and in fear of him. The Jewish family that the farmer was hiding is massacred by the SS, save for a teenage girl, Shoshanna (Melanie Laurent), who runs for her life, Landa deciding to let her escape, assuming she’ll be caught sometime.

Three years later, Shoshanna, now living under the name Emmanuelle Mimieux, runs a movie theater in Paris, hiding her Jewish ancestry under German rule. She is just trying to live her life in peace and not be discovered, when a young German soldier (Daniel Bruhl), celebrated for his heroics, courts her repeatedly, with no luck, as she despises him and his people for obvious reasons. To her dismay, he ends up getting her theater to host the premiere of a Nazi propaganda film called Nation’s Pride, where he plays himself fighting the Italians, a la Audie Murphy. With a packed theater full of Nazis, Shoshanna realizes she can kill them all at once by burning the theater down, exacting revenge in the name of her people. Laurent delivers this fire and passion beautifully, picturing her as a Resistance heroine nearly sacrificing herself to spare horrors put upon the Jewish race.

Inglourious Basterds is marked by some of Tarantino’s trademarks: drawn out dialogue scenes, film discussions, spurts of obscene violence, a beautiful woman’s foot. However, there is something intense and more effective about the film, especially in the scenes between the French and German people. Their conversations reveal so much hidden subtlety, no distracting background music, just slowly removing layers to get to the core of a situation and feeling the mounting fear as a French Jew risks being discovered or a German actress’s role as a spy for England is uncovered. Those scenes are really the highlights of the film, as the theater audience is so quiet and still, deeply taking in these highly tense exchanges undercut with cruel wit. There is a lot of ambiguity with the characters and their actions, and it takes a lot of little “aha” moments to realize their intentions or thoughts. This film is unconventional and takes chances with presenting an alternate history of WWII, yet will be memorable for the stunning performances given by Melanie Laurent and Christoph Waltz, and the talent that Tarantino has been crafting extensive dialogue scenes that don’t always say so much on top but reveal many entendres underneath.

Cine Institute in Haiti

2010-07-28T15:03:00.000-07:00

This piece originally appeared in Filmmaker Magazine.

Cine Institute in Haiti
by Melissa Silvestri

India has Bollywood, and Nigeria has Nollywood, two examples of international film industries that have thrived outside of Hollywood, and soon, perhaps, Haiti can be added to that list. In the port city of Jacmel, considered the cultural capital of Haiti and home to many writers, painters and poets, is the Ciné Institute, which is steadily instilling film schools in the country’s young film students.

The school had its origins as a film festival in 2004. The Festival Film Jacmel, founded by filmmaker David Belle and artist Patrick Boucard, showed international films annually for free to thousands of Haitians. After three years, the festival’s popularity spurred interest in further developing Haiti’s own film industry, and a school called the Ciné Institute was started, where young students could learn technical and creative skills involved in filmmaking, and then use these skills to earn a living, support their families, and drive local economic growth.

With a donation by Francis Ford Coppola and Paul Haggis on the advisory board, the school has imported many teachers, including screenwriter, director, journalist and editor Annie Nocenti, who teaches short filmmaking, to work with the students. After visiting Belle in Haiti, Nocenti was invited to the Cine Institute a year and a half ago. “He brought all these movies to Haiti, as many people would have only seen a few movies in their lifetime, and his dream was to put cameras in the hands of Haitians so they could tell the stories they want to tell,” she says. “People have this portrait of Haiti that it is all slums, and it's not true. I was one of the first teachers, in screenwriting, but I'm just one of many. David has been the driving force of the whole thing.”

In the past year, Nocenti’s students have completed six short films, premiered four this past June, and this September she will return to teach the current students feature screenwriting as well as short filmmaking to the 25 new fall arrivals. Of her experiences with her students, she says she tries to build trust with young people who may be naturally shy towards newcomers but enthusiastic about developing their filmmaking skills. If the Cine Institute’s project is a success, the future of Haitian film could be promising. Nocenti agrees: “Well my hope for it as a filmmaker and journalist is what looks to be a new birth of cinema, a new language.”

VIC SKOLNICK, R.I.P.

2010-07-28T15:00:00.000-07:00

This piece originally appeared in Filmmaker Magazine.

VIC SKOLNICK, R.I.P.
By Melissa Silvestri

I was saddened to hear of the death of Vic Skolnick, an influential co-founder of Long Island’s first major art house movie theater, The Cinema Arts Center, in Huntington, N.Y. Passing away at 81 on June 10th, Skolnick, along with his wife, Charlotte Sky, founded what was originally known as the New Community Cinema in 1973. Skolnick, a teacher for twenty years at N.Y. public schools, combined his passion for history with a lifelong love of films. His ambition was to show as many diverse films as possible and educate his loyal audience in innovative cinema. The cinema went through many transformations over the years, before settling at a former elementary school in Huntington.

Skolnick made himself accessible to the audiences by making impromptu introductions before the films, telling fascinating anecdotes about the directors. With Skolnick, there was always an underlying enthusiasm to share something with an audience of fresh eyes. His intros gave the cinema a personal feel, like the founder and the audience were one and the same, with the same love for great films.

Skolnick didn’t only just show films and talk about them. The CAC was instrumental in instilling a Film Arts in Education program for local schools, screening films like El Norte and Riding the Rails for field trips of their students.. Many film festivals have run at the CAC, ranging from African films, gay and lesbian films, and Asian-American films.

Thanks to the CAC’s wide influence, future film professionals, many from Long Island, would make it big, and come to the CAC to promote their films and engage in lively discussions with the audiences. Amongst the illustrious guests have been Hal Hartley, Steve Buscemi, Edie Falco, Isabella Rossellini, and Edward Burns. These guests developed long friendships with Skolnick and Sky, exchanging in a mutual appreciation of great films.

Having been a teenage volunteer at the CAC circa 2000, I felt lucky to be a small part of this theater, which gave me unlimited access to the best in independent and foreign film and an education in not only cinema the whole world beyond my suburban neighborhood. Skolnick was a true local legend, and his presence at the cinema will be surely missed, not only by his friends and family, but by the audiences who had come to regard him as a warm and benevolent presence.

THE ADRIENNE SHELLY MEMORIAL GARDEN OPENS IN THE WEST VILLAGE

2010-07-28T14:58:00.000-07:00

This piece originally appeared in Filmmaker Magazine.

THE ADRIENNE SHELLY MEMORIAL GARDEN OPENS IN THE WEST VILLAGE
By Melissa Silvestri

Nearly three years ago this November, actress/writer/director Adrienne Shelly's life was cut short by a brutal act of violence. Her unique and indelible spirit is sorely missed, as evidenced by her most recent film, Waitress, which she wrote, directed, and co-starred in as the shy but sweet waitress named Dawn, looking for love. Since then, her husband, Andrew Ostroy, has carried on his late wife's work, through founding the Adrienne Shelly Foundation, a non-profit organization that gives support to emerging women filmmakers, and produced her script Serious Moonlight, a film starring Meg Ryan, directed by her Waitress co-star Cheryl Hines, and will be released in December.

Thanks to the efforts of Ostroy and Shelly's friends, a memorial garden honoring Shelly was unveiled on Monday, August 3rd, in Abington Square Park in Greenwich Village, where Shelly lived and worked, creating her films and raising her daughter Sophie with Ostroy.

At 9:45 am, the park quickly filled with many of Shelly's family, friends, and colleagues, including film professionals Hal Hartley, Kevin Corrigan, and Paul Rudd. Even if one did not know Shelly, they could still feel touched and moved by the effect that she had on people. I myself was introduced to her via her 1990 film Trust, having found a video copy while working as a volunteer at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington, N.Y. in 1999. As the world-weary pregnant teenager Maria, Shelly projected this intriguing combination of innocence and street smarts, somebody who didn't trust the world yet still believed in love and kindness. That spirit of love, humor, and beauty made everybody want to know her, and she had an immeasureable effect on many lives.

At 10 am, Ostroy delivered a heartfelt speech honoring Shelly as a "loving daughter, sister, and a deeply devoted friend," with a "brilliant, unique voice that will live on." He continued to say that "what comes out of horror can come positive things," as the Adrienne Shelly Foundation was created with Shelly's intention to give women filmmakers the same advantages and opportunities that she worked for and enjoyed in life. Choosing the garden for her memorial was "quite fitting," as it was a place she admired, in her neighborhood home, and where she directed her film I'll Take You There in 1999.

Through her foundation, Shelly's influence and lifelong passion for films will give so much to aspiring filmmakers, a role model to be truly admired and respected. She was a truly beautiful human being, who was not only special to her friends and family, but influenced many who watched her films, knowing that she was an underrated and deeply talented artist, who understood the artistry of filmmaking and gave back to encourage other women to follow their dreams and passions in their life's work. Her spirit will live on through the foundation, her films, her loved ones, and in her young daughter, Sophie.

RUNNING OUT OF AIR: PENNING MIDNIGHT MOVIE “BURIED”

2010-07-28T14:56:00.000-07:00

This interview originally appeared in Filmmaker magazine.

RUNNING OUT OF AIR: PENNING MIDNIGHT MOVIE “BURIED”
By Melissa Silvestri

Hell can be many things — being buried alive in the Iraqi desert, for example, or perhaps just watching your screenplay slowly disintegrate on the shelf during never-ending studio “development.” The opposite of most screenwriters, Chris Sparling knows the former but not the latter. He went directly from struggling indie director to successful Hollywood scribe when the screenplay for his horror thriller Buried was picked up, cast with a major up-and-coming star, and thrown before the cameras in just six months. And now it’s receiving its U.S. premiere at the Sundance Film Festival.

Sparling made his debut feature, An Uzi at the Alamo, in 2005. He wrote, directed, acted and produced the low-budget comedy about a failed writer pledging to kill himself on his 25th birthday. The film received only minimal distribution and after making a short, Balance, Sparling decided to come up with a high-concept idea that could be shot cheaply and quickly. He remembered news reports about U.S. contractors working in Iraq and Afghanistan building bridges and houses. These aren’t the Blackwater types but “everyday folks, like truck drivers, carpenters, etc.,” Sparling says. “Over the years, many of them have been taken hostage and held for ransom. I considered the possibility of one of these individuals being buried alive and given only a very short amount of time to coordinate their own ransom. And if they’re not successful, they’re left to die right where they are.”

That ghoulish concept, echoing not only the popular Saw series but also George Sluizer’s classic psychological thriller The Vanishing, led to his script for Buried. Ryan Reynolds plays that American contractor working in Iraq and stuck in a coffin with only a cell phone and a lighter.

Although the film’s setting is a metaphorically rich one considering recent American foreign policy, Sparling says he was guided by more practical concerns. “Stealing a page from Hitchcock’s playbook,” he says, “I decided on writing a story that takes place entirely in one small location. In my case, this was inside an old, wooden coffin. From there, I needed a plausible reason why someone would be buried alive.”

To research his tale he interviewed actual contractors who worked in Iraq. “I didn’t want to tell a POV of their specific stories,” Sparlings says. “Rather, I wanted to get a sense of what it was really like over there for them. More than anything, I wanted to portray them, and the difficult job they did, accurately. I felt a certain responsibility to do this, probably the same way a documentary filmmaker would.”

After finishing the script, Sparling made a crucial decision: to step back from his previous role as a writer-director. “I decided to go out with the script as a spec,” he says. Buried was quickly picked up by producer Peter Safran, who attached Spanish director Rodrigo Cortés. “Rodrigo had an incredible vision for the film, and after watching [his Spanish film] The Contestant, I knew immediately that he was exactly the right person to direct the picture. And he was also the only director who wanted to shoot the film as it takes place in the script; that is, keeping the story inside the box for the duration of the film.”

A well-known actor had to be found to bring in investors and interest, and Ryan Reynolds (The Proposal) was quickly chosen as the hero stuck underground. “Ryan, Rodrigo and I are all repped by the same agency, so I imagine that made it a bit easier to get him the script,” says Sparling. Once he had the script, the movie happened the way movies are supposed to happen but rarely do. “We sat down at a restaurant one day in L.A. to discuss the project, and then literally, within weeks, the cameras were rolling.”

Buried was shot on a soundstage in Barcelona over a 21-day period last August. Sparling, who only knew his own no-budget productions, was surprised when he arrived in Spain to visit the shooting. “I was amazed at how big of a production it actually was in spite of the contained nature of the film,” he says. Buried’s charmed life continued when, barely four months after the start of principal photography, it was accepted to Sundance, where it will world premiere in the Midnight section.

Since Buried wrapped in September, Sparling’s been busy. He recently sold a script entitled Mercy to Gold Circle Films to be produced next year. He’ll reunite with Safran on an untitled thriller set to shoot next spring and is currently developing a script titled Falling Slowly, which will see his return to the director’s chair. And prepremiere, Buried saw its industry profile increase when its screenplay was selected in December for the prestigious “Black List” of Hollywood’s most-liked screenplays of 2009.

Of his whirlwind year, Sparling says, “I was really beginning to question if I’d ever catch my proverbial big break. I drifted away from film work and started applying for police jobs and even began the interview process with the A.T.F. It’s not that I intended on throwing in the towel, but I thought I was really going to have to restrategize my approach to… well, to life.” But Sparling is taking his current good fortune in stride. “All told, I guess I’m still waiting to see if this really is my big break,” he laughs. “But even if it turns out not to be, I’m very grateful to have a break of any kind, because, quite honestly, my hands were getting pretty damn tired from all that knocking.”

Tribeca 2010: Thorkell Hardarson and Orn Marino Adnarson's Feathered Cocaine

2010-07-28T14:54:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared on IONCinema.

Tribeca 2010: Thorkell Hardarson and Orn Marino Adnarson's Feathered Cocaine
by Melissa Silvestri

One of the most profitable and unusual illegal trades has been falconry. Throughout the Persian Gulf, falcons, sold for recreational hunting, can go from $25,000 to $1 million a bird, often traveling from Central Asia, and used as a status symbol for rich businessmen. Thorkell Hardarson and Orn Marino Adnarson, directors of Feathered Cocaine, center on a man who used to be in this underground trade, but now works to crack down on illegal falcon smugglers for the love of the birds.

Hari Har Singh Khalsa, born as an American named Alan Parrot, left home when he was 18 to Iran to work with falcons, eventually smuggling them and raising them for the royal court. But after many years in the trade, he sees the toll on the birds, the greed in his clients and companions, and the dirty connections between government officials and the falcon trade, and is desperately trying to eradicate this shady business.

The twist in the film is when Khalsa discovers that Osama Bin Laden is an aficionado of the birds, and decides to use that as a method of tracking down his whereabouts, but to little to no avail. That moment changes the course of the film from being about falcons to governments either supporting or being indifferent to illegal trades and terrorism, wondering just who is scratching whose back here.

Feathered Cocaine is more about politics and shady trades than it is about falcons, and it is a fascinating film about a little-known trade that works as a cover for the way business is done in the Middle East. Bold statements and harsh realities fly in the film, with the feeling that governments will always let something slide if there’s something to be gained in their favor.

Tribeca 2010: Documentary Short Film Highlights

2010-07-28T14:52:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared on IONCinema.

Tribeca 2010: Documentary Short Film Highlights
by Melissa Silvestri

This year at the Tribeca Film Festival showcases short films in six different "thematic" programs. Wishful Thinking is a package dominated by characters making hard decisions, while Between the Lines examines subject matter that isn’t always what it seems at first. The package Flashback, made up of six documentary shorts, explore politics, music, race, and popular culture, and give a fascinating diversity in telling these stories. I’ve selected the best in my opinion that you should look out for, should you ever come across the film or its directors.

James Cromwell is best known as an actor, particularly from Babe and The Green Mile, but he has been a lifelong activist for human rights. In the 1960s, he provided a safe house for affiliates with the Black Panthers, risking the ire of the police and his own social standing as a young white man in dangerous times. A .45 at 50th, co-directed by Joshua Bell and John Cromwell, combines Cromwell’s recollection of this tumultuous time with black & white re-enactments of his story. Cromwell had made the acquaintanceship with Elbert 'Big Man' Howard, a core member of the Black Panther Party. Cromwell worked with the Committee to Defend the Panthers, offering his parents’ apartment as a safe house while they were on vacation, and being both committed to the cause, and feeling way in over his head. The film is both sad for its subject matter, and funny in moments where Cromwell sticks out like a nerd against the militaristic black-leather clad coolness of the Panthers. His remarkable activism was very brave and admirable during a time when it was dangerous to be a civil rights supporter as a white man.

A similar hero, considered the Rosa Parks for Japanese-Americans, gets her due in Out of Infamy: Michi Nishiura Weglyn, co-directed by Sharon Yamato and Nancy Kapitanoff. Born to a Japanese-American farming family in California, Michi was a bright young woman whose family was interned in the U.S. concentration camps during WWII. After the war, she went to NYC and became a successful costume designer on "The Perry Como Show", working with the likes of Bob Hope and Lucille Ball. But she never forgot the pain and humiliation that the U.S. had inflicted onto her community. She met and married Walter Weglyn, a German Jew who survived the war via the kindertransport and hiding in Holland. The realization that Roosevelt at the time both neglected to save European Jews earlier and kept his own people in an concentration camp sparked her to write Years of Infamy, a book detailing the harsh reality of how the U.S. treated Japanese-Americans during WWII. Her book pushed the protests for reparations, which were finally given out in 1988. Michi Nishiura Neglyn was an unsung hero who combined class, brilliance, smarts, beauty, and an unforgettable character in the activism for civil rights. (See pic above).

New American Soldier, co-directed by Emma Cott and Anna Belle Peevey, looks at three of the more than 70,000 immigrant soldiers fighting today in the U.S. military. The three chronicled are a young woman from Latin America, a young man from Ghana, and a teenage boy from Mexico, all whom are trying to gain their citizenship while serving in the military. Their stories range from coming to America via a visa lottery, to crossing the border and working in the fields in Southern California. It’s a long and hard struggle, but incredibly worth it to be considered an American both for personal pride, and ensuring the economic and social safety of their families.

Hip-hop got its start in the economic warzone of the South Bronx in the 70’s and 80’s, where from absolutely nothing, a creative and vital musical source grew. White Lines & the Fever: The Death of DJ Junebug, directed by Travis Senger, is an incredible story not only about a forgotten musician who was taken too soon, but how hip-hop came from its roots to became a multi-million dollar industry. When life in the Bronx, marked by poverty and drugs and hell, was a warzone, young people would line up outside the club Disco Fever, a badass dance club where the hottest beats played and you could just forget everything outside. DJ Junebug, a young Puerto Rican kid with an insatiable love for music, provided that soundtrack for the neighborhood in the early 80’s. But Junebug’s temptation towards the easy money of selling drugs would get in the way of his DJ work, and lead to tragic consequences. This short film, in just 27 minutes, tracks the old-school world of hip-hop with the drug realities of the time, and the interviews with illustrious figures like Kurtis Blow, DJ Hollywood, and Sal Abbatiello chronicle an unforgettable time that blew up into an amazing art form.

Review of Ruba Nadda's Cairo Time

2010-07-28T14:50:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared on IONCinema.

Tribeca 2010: Ruba Nadda's Cairo Time
by Melissa Silvestri

Cairo Time is an unusual love story, where the main love interests maintain a platonic romance. Written and directed by Ruba Nadda, inspired by her time visiting Cairo, Cairo Time, starring Patricia Clarkson and Alexander Siddig, flips the expected notions of an affair and focuses it on a woman’s re-discovery of herself after many years of loneliness.

Juliette (Clarkson) is visiting her husband, a UN worker, abroad in Cairo, but his work keeps him too busy to spend time with her. So in his place, he sends his former colleague Tareq (Siddig) to show her around the city and be her guide to Egyptian culture. Their friendship slowly blossoms into sweet romance, but they both uphold a genteel restraint towards anything adulterous.

Clarkson and Siddig share a charming chemistry playing like-minded souls. They are both private and elegant people, who share a sense of chivalry and elegance that is truly a joy to watch. Clarkson has an extraordinary talent for finding the understated gestures of a touch or a look, saying more with a tilt of the chin or averted eyes than words ever could.

While Cairo Time at times runs the risk of being a movie about a white woman who discovers herself in an “ethnic” culture, it rarely feels as if Juliette’s story is the only focus, or that she is the center of everything. Siddig portrays Tareq as an old-fashioned gentleman in balance to Clarkson’s kind gracefulness as Juliette. The film is a love letter to the gorgeous architecture of the city of Cairo, and its diverse and interesting people who make the city what it is.

Review of Kim Chapiron's Dog Pound

2010-07-28T14:44:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared on IONCinema.

Tribeca 2010: Kim Chapiron's Dog Pound
by Melissa Silvestri

Kim Chapiron, who debuted at the Tribeca Film Festival with the dark and edgy Sheitan in ’05, returns to the Festival with Dog Pound, a brutal slice of post-adolescence male aggression, and the prison cycles that encourage it. Dog Pound is difficult to watch at times for its unrelenting violence of boys against boys, but it offers a sobering argument against juvenile detention centers that unwittingly create repeat offenders, and gives a glimpse into why adult criminals may be the way they are.

Dog Pound follows three teenage boys, in for petty crimes: Angel (car theft and assault); Davis (possession of narcotics with intent to resell); and Butch (assault on a correctional officer). They’re interned in a facility in Montana where there’s not only strict rules to enforce discipline, but a class system amongst the prisoners is maintained by the guards, which only encourages a sick abuse of privileges by the favored inmates.

Grimly shot with teenage actors and in harsh lighting, the film is centered on the choices of violence and retaliation, and how easy it is, especially for teenagers who have little impulse control, to react by beating the hell out of each other in maintain power and respect. It only leads them further into the wrong decisions, being seen as “unstable” by the correctional facility, and being treated like wild dogs that need to be put down.

Dog Pound works because the dialogue is genuine, and the feeling of being cooped up and wanting to fight back is palpable for anybody. It ranks amongst Kids and Thirteen as portrayals of adolescence within a sick and messed-up society, and the audience should brace themselves for a intense powerhouse of a picture.

Interview with The Secret In Their Eyes director Juan Jose Campanella

2010-07-28T14:40:00.000-07:00

This interview originally appeared on IONCinema.

Interview: Juan Jose Campanella (The Secret In Their Eyes)
by Melissa Silvestri

The Secret in Their Eyes, from Argentinean director Juan Jose Campanella, is a riveting murder mystery that not only was one of the biggest cinematic successes in Argentina, but also won the Academy Award for this year’s Best Foreign Language Film beating out heavyweights The White Ribbon and A Prophet.

Based off of the novel La pregunta de sus ojos, by Eduardo Sacheri, this follows the past and present lives of Benjamin Esposito (re-teaming with Ricardo Darin) a retired federal justice agent, who is obsessed with a rape/murder case from 1974 that he investigated and closed, but still feels has unanswered questions. His obsession is not just about the case, but about his unrequited love for a fellow lawyer (Soledad Villamil) and his own years of loneliness and isolation years after the case. The story blends seamlessly between the times, using a color shading to highlight the bold memories of the past and the muted realities of the present.

There is some surprising humor in the film, mostly courtesy of famed Argentinean comedian Guillermo Francella. At times, the film is quite Fincher-esque with shades of such films as Seven and Zodiac. It shares that unrelenting search for a killer, the mental toll it takes on its investigators who can’t let it go, and the years of paperwork and files that don’t lead anywhere. The Secret in Their Eyes opens April 16th, and I spoke with the Oscar-winning director recently in NYC.

Melissa Silvestri: How was the five-minute one-shot tracking shot in the stadium done?

Juan Jose Campanella: The shooting was actually not that long, it was three days. A producer once told me I can do things well, cheap, and fast, and he gave me two. (laughs) Cheap is slow, because we didn’t really have much money to make it. We were about 15 people working on it for almost nine months. So obviously not one take, from the helicopter to the bleachers, you have to have a fusion there. But it’s really invisible; they worked very hard at it.

Silvestri: And that scene was not in the book?

Campanella: It was everything I was interested in adding into the movie, which was the passion thread. Everything in the movie was the crime. It’s more than just passion, it’s perverted passion. So that’s why I wanted to find the guy, not because he left any clues or any fingerprints or DNA. So we worked with that. {On} the decision of making it in one shot; I had very little time to make the audience feel the adrenaline of that chase. I started with that convention in mind, so we had the aerial shot. We also {knew} a convention of at a certain point, you cut to the audience. So when you’re not cutting, you follow {the main characters}, and you see the audiences lean forward in their seat. It’s really effective, being so into the pictures. You’re there with them, and you’re part of the chase. Then it becomes personal, and that makes it more exciting and riveting than if we just had guys running after each other.

Silvestri: Were you surprised to get an Oscar?

Campanella: I was very relaxed; I took the nomination as an honor. And that was fine, I never thought about it. Many blogs and magazines, like Entertainment Weekly, were talking and talking, and I became a nervous wreck and couldn’t sleep anymore. And I went there thinking we were in the running, actually. Of course, I was surprised, but it didn’t take me out of the room, because a lot of people were saying that we would win. There was that week of the love there, in Argentina. It was like defeating Brazil in football. But it was bigger than you would expect. It was 1:30 in the morning when they announced it in Buenos Aires. And you could hear the screaming from the apartment. This last week was quite crazy.

Silvestri: It was the only other Argentinean film to win the Oscar Best Foreign Language Film (other than The Official Story in 1985). How did you feel about that?

Campanella: I was nominated before in 2002 with Son of the Bride. I don’t know what happened with this movie. Maybe, like in soccer, when you like the team, you push more for it. And this movie was a huge hit in Argentina; it struck a chord with it. It was the most successful in 35 years. People were so ready for it, I don’t know what would’ve happened if we hadn’t won.

Silvestri: There was a mix of humor in with the murder mystery that made it interesting and funny to watch at times.

Campanella: I don’t know how it’s worked here, but in Argentina, people laughed a lot at the movie. And the actors never played it for laughs. But when the guy scares his friend {by sneaking up on him}, usually in a film you’d usually have the guy go “Huh?” But in real life, you would jump and hit the ceiling. So the truth of that moment, going “you goddamn . . .” When someone scares me, I insult them for ten minutes! So I told Ricardo {Darin}, you just keep telling him, “Fuck you, fuck you!” I think that people relate to the real reactions of characters to what’s happening. I think that’s the only secret in it.

Silvestri: How did you balance the cinematography of the present day scenes vs. the past scenes?

Campanella: The scenes in the past had very bold colors, and muted in the present. We wanted to work the past in like when you are remembering something, you forget details, and only the bold strokes stand out. The past scenes are all coming from this guy’s memory, so it’s a very dominant, strong color. In the present, memory has no part, everything is the same, muted and de-saturated, and without any charms, in a way.

Silvestri: What was Argentina’s political atmosphere like at the time of the film, and how does it relate to the film?

Campanella: In the novel, the past respects the real time, so the crime takes places in 1968, and he escapes in 1976, {and the present-day scenes.} We couldn’t afford having eight changes of fashions and looks; it would be reducing the tension. So we decided in these two years (1974-76), these years before. Because there was a perceived threat of terrorism in Argentina, they started taking liberties one by one, until they started with death squads to eliminate terrorists, and it took the people working in the Justice system by surprise. If we had started with that dictatorship that started in 1976, everybody would know exactly what the deal with. They wouldn’t go “How could you free that guy?” They were very domesticated at that time. So we chose to show the time of democracy, before the obliterating of personal liberties began. We also thought it was more relevant to what is happening today.

Interview with Untitled director Jonathan Parker

2010-07-28T14:36:00.000-07:00

This interview originally appeared on IONCinema.

Interview: Jonathan Parker (Untitled)
By Melissa Silvestri

Director Jonathan Parker (Bartleby, The Californians) returns with a film focused on the contemporary art and music scenes of New York City, and how artists maintain passion for a creation that may be more miss than hit. Inspired by his own experiences as a musician and art collector, (Untitled) stars Adam Goldberg as frustrated contemporary classical composer Adrian, whose shows are sparsely attended while his artist brother Josh (Eion Bailey) draws rave reviews for his gallery work. The bridge between them is Chelsea art gallerist Madeleine (Marley Shelton), who both supports Josh’s work and begins a love affair with Adrian out of a shared love for music and art. In it lies an intelligent humor that doesn’t make a joke out of its protagonists, but treats them with dignity and class in being thoughtful artists. It’s a broad look on how artists handle the unpredictable tastes of crowds and try to balance playing to their audience while staying true to their artistic passions.

I was plagued by tape recorder problems during my meet up with Parker in Manhattan, so here is a concise and to the point transcription of our conversation.

Melissa Silvestri: How did you and writer/producer Catherine di Napoli come up with the story?

Jonathan Parker: I was a musician for a long time, and always played in a variety of bands, and there were people with difficult personalities in music, so it was always in the back of my mind, and so we started with that, and then we created the antithesis, this guy with a sunny disposition and didn’t have any of these problems in the creative world, so after researching the art world and talking to a lot of art gallery people and artists, we came up with this character whose work is sold out of the back room, but who wants a show in the front room of the gallery, he doesn’t understand the distinction.

I’ve been involved in the art world through parents and kids and relatives, and do a little collecting myself, of kind of obscure work. I go to a lot of shows, and art markets and auctions, and it’s just interesting noticing the people who are buying art and collecting art, and their mixed motivations. It just seemed like a nice comic setup to have these two brothers, bringing together these two contemporary artists.

MS: Why did you choose to focus on a contemporary music composer?

JP: With classical music, and contemporary classical music, as opposed to all other forms of music, there’s a seriousness and a high-mindedness to that world that doesn’t exist in the rest of those music worlds, that I think sets up this comic dichotomy where you’re very serious about what you’re doing, but what you’re doing can often look kind of funny.

MS: What kind of research did you do to prepare a portrayal of the contemporary art scene, both music and in visual art?

JP: Well, in music, I have a lot of firsthand experience, but also I’ve attended a number of concerts, and had a long interview with the composer David Lang, who gave me a ton of background information, and he’s more than just the guy who wrote the score for the film, he became kind of a consultant, and the spirit behind the music side of the story. As for the art, I met with gallery owners and artists, and went on studio visits with the gallery owners. Also having collected some art myself, I had talked to auction house people as a collector, and they’re trying to sell you art, so you get a different perspective.

MS: Your family is very much involved in the art scene. How has there been a familial draw towards visual arts, and how has that influenced Untitled?

JP: I would say so. I grew up with that, my parents have an art collection, my mother has been an artist for a long time, and still is, to that extent, but when my son got interested in it, it was actually kind of in the beginning of writing this script because I started going to a lot of contemporary galleries with him, and he became very knowledgeable about it, so it kind of filled out that very contemporary side of it for me, and I just began to make friends with some gallery people and some artists, of various types, some conceptual artists, and some artists who are more like how the brother is in the movie, doing more decorative work.

MS: There is a theme of being really passionate about something, despite it seeming absurd to others, like Adrian with his music or Madeleine with the art she promotes. Do you identify personally with that?

JP: Oh sure, yeah. I think anybody who pursues a creative endeavor, when the product is idiosyncratic, then you’re always going to run into that basic dilemma that is in the bottom of the film story which is, “OK, I’m passionately pursuing this thing that nobody responds to.” Those who are committed don’t care what the response is, and those who are more uncertain about themselves are obviously much more swayed by response or lack of. But I think it’s a pretty classic dilemma that that has a really good comic setup, and I just think it’s something that a lot of people respond to, I think that no matter what you’re doing, that if there’s a creative side to it and people are always balancing what they have to do for a living with what they want to do as a true passion, it’s very rare when those two things sync up to the exact same activity.

MS: How did David Lang get involved?

JP: Well, I knew David from college, we went to Stanford together, I was a percussionist, and he was writing music back then, and I’d get called to play on his compositions. I just periodically had kept hearing about him over the years, he did work for the Santa Fe Opera, and my mother actually met David at a dinner there, so I kept hearing about him periodically over the years, and when it came to this story, I really loved his music, and I really wanted to have him be able to use some of his music in the movie, and as it developed, once he read the script and got into it a little more, he really wanted to do all of the music in the movie. So it made it a little bigger job that he actually thought it was going to be (laughs).

MS: Do you feel that he identified with Adrian a lot?

JP: Well, I think he identified with Adrian, and as I was getting background information from him – David’s a guy who knows a lot about music and his attitude about it is fresh, and I’m a big fan of his music, I just think he’s an amazing composer. I just thought it was nice that while he was working on the score he picked up the Pulitzer Prize (for The Little Match Stick Girl).

MS: Who did he spend a lot of time with to understand Adrian and the music?

JP: Initially what we did, I wanted the actors to know what it looked like to perform this music, so I had them come to the recording session that David was doing, which was just the music that was performed on camera by the actors, so that was the beginning of his involvement there, And after that, the composer’s not someone who’s gonna be on the set at all, but he worked with Lawson White, who played Seth, so he did the whole score basically.

Review of Frederick Wiseman's La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet

2010-07-28T14:33:00.000-07:00

This review originally appeared on IONCinema.

Wiseman's La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet

By Melissa Silvestri

The prolific documentary filmmaker Frederick Wiseman's new film, will have a two-week engagement at Film Forum in NYC, and it is a stunning display of some of the best dancers and choreographers in the world training at one of the world's greatest ballet companies. Wiseman's film career has spanned more than 40 years, and here he is returning to familiar territory, having done the 1995 documentary Ballet, a profile of the American Ballet Theatre's preparation for a European tour. In this film, Wiseman takes us inside the studios where dancers painstakingly take direction in great detail from choreographers while rehearsing seven ballets to perform for a major gala coming up. It's a wonder to watch masters undulate their bodies in controlled yet freeing ways, and adding contemporary influences to traditional classical ballet.

Wiseman chooses to both highlight the performers and the administration, and it colors the film, showing the business side of running such a seemingly glamorous organization. The artistic director, Brigitte Lefevre, a former principal dancer, devotes her life's work to representing the organization as one of the finest companies in the world, as well as watching out for her dancers; to a young ballerina wanting career advice, she simply tells her "One can gain a lot by studying the star dancers at rehearsal and in performance." Watching La Danse, you get the sense of how stressful it is to be a dancer, to constantly take criticism from choreographers and re-do the same moves until they are pleased. Or the precise work that goes into creating costumes by hand, sewing dresses or glueing gems on a jacket. Wiseman, without narration, allows the film to speak for itself as a beautiful tribute to the hard work and artistry of the ballet world, onstage and backstage.

The film begins with rehearsals for the ballets and ends with excerpts of their final performances, illuminated by lights and music and costumes. Two particular examples stick out: La Maison de Bernada, a ballet choreographed by Mats Ek based on a Lorca play where several women in black dresses move in syncopantic motions around a table and letting out occasional screams in pain for the death of their father or husband, and the absolutely gripping Le Songe de Medee, choreographed by Angelin Preljocaj, where Medea, portrayed by Emilie Cozette in a chilling display of human agony, practically rips herself apart as she murders her children, destroying them and herself in the process. These segments draw you into the brilliant power of ballet, more than just pas de bourrees and entrechats.

The film is a gorgeous masterpiece, albeit for two flaws. One, there should be captions identifying the dances and performers, which would allow the audience to better remember what exquisite pieces they just watched, instead of being at a blank and later forgetting. Also, it runs long at 158 minutes, and seemed to be fairly lengthy for a film about a ballet company. While there is so much great footage to be shown, it felt extraneous and long towards the last half hour. That being said, La Danse takes you into a rarefied and high-class world where some of the finest artists in the world train hard for their craft to present breathtakingly beautiful performances of unbelieveable proportions.

Interview with Prodigal Sons Director Kimberly Reed

2010-07-28T14:30:00.000-07:00

This interview originally appeared on Women and Hollywood.

Interview with Kimberly Reed, Director of Prodigal Sons by Melissa Silvestri

Kimberly Reed’s documentary, Prodigal Sons, has been a long time in the making. Growing up life seemed so perfect. She was born as Paul McKerrow, the high school quarterback, one of the most popular guys in school. But inside, Paul felt conflicted about his gender identity. So after high school, he moved to San Francisco and experimented with living as a woman, before making the full transition to life as a woman. This change served as a major aggravation to her brother Marc, who struggled for years as the adopted son. Marc’s resulting mental instability from a brain injury at 21 only exasperated his idealization of the past and Paul’s life from twenty-five years ago.

Living as a successful editor and filmmaker in S.F. and New York, she returned to her hometown of Helena, MT for her high school reunion, and a re-connection with Marc. The film is intense, raw, and gives the audience an open intimacy into the lives of Marc and Kimberly, and finding that they have more in common than they originally thought. Prodigal Sons opens Friday, February 26 in NYC.

How did you come to recording your journey and making a narrative comparing yours and your brother’s lives?

I had recently transitioned, this is probably about sixteen or seventeen years ago, I’m walking down the street in San Francisco, and I see somebody who I used to work with. And I went up and had that sort of shocking thing of like, “Hey, it’s me,” not wanting to be nosy. And it was a dear friend, his name was Bob Hawk, we worked at Film Arts Foundation in San Francisco, supporting independent film and artists. And we’ve been in touch ever since then; he’s an executive producer on the film. But a couple of weeks after that, he kept saying, “you have to make a film about this.” And at the time, I was like “No, no, I’m not going to talk about this, this is not going to happen.” But both of us knew there was going to be a time when it was going to happen. So fast-forward to 2005, when I finally get up the nerve to go to my high school reunion, he was the first person I called. So in a lot of ways, the journey to make this film goes back there. In other ways, the journey to make this film starts with that decision to go to the high school reunion, which I think triggered a lot of other things.

How did people in your family adapt to being filmed? Did they request that somethings not be filmed?

Well, first of all, my dad was always shooting, so I think everyone was already used to the camera. I took on that mantle, and I was always shooting family gatherings, which I think was my way of assessing a lot of that stuff. I was more comfortable behind the camera. But also I think it was just how I processed the world, when I would get upset or melancholy, I would go out and shoot films, that’s what I would always do. The family was always used to me running around with a camera so at the reunion when we were going to shoot it, it was like, “OK.” I never had to convince anyone. I’m really lucky that I have a family that’s very trusting. The D.P., John Keitel was good at sinking into the scene and disappearing, he’s a vérité shooter, and that really helped a lot.

I was really struck when you said that your brother wanted the identity that you were trying to be rid of. Do you think that his short-term memory loss emphasized the past much more?

I think so. He’s not building new memories, because he has short-term memory loss, so in a lot of ways, he’s much more comfortable holding onto the past. And of course, the irony is that it’s the past I want to get rid of.

Why do you think Marc kept bringing up your male past it seems as if he didn’t want to let you forget it?

There’s also this thing that, “If he idealizes this person that I used to be,” which I think a lot of people did, and then I turn on my back on that, saying “I don’t want to be any part of that, that’s not important to me,” people see that as an affront, or an insult. And if you’re aspiring to anything and what somebody says it’s not worth aspiring to, it messes with your head.

Were you and Marc able to find a parallel experience in both having mixed identities?

I think so. I think in a lot of ways – both Mark and I are kind of outcasts, me because of my gender and Marc because of his head injury and mental illness and being adopted. We’re both kind of outsiders, and I think we can relate to each other because of that. The reason that I hesitate to use that word is because if you watch the film, it’s not too long before you’re in a position when, instead of thinking, “Whoa, I’m seeing the point of view from this outsider,” you kind of forget about that, you’re kind of along for the ride. And it’s important for me to have audiences be in the position of the outsider, and then kind of forget that they’re the outsider. You can create a lot of compassion for people that you never imagined you would seeing the world through their eyes.

You had said that you had changed your social security number, driver’s license, and all government traces of being Paul. What was that experience like, of completing changing not only your personal identity but your government identity as well?

That stuff is such a drag. It’s hard enough to do it on a personal level, but to have this whole legal apparatus that you have to work through is just discouraging. And it doesn’t have to be as hard as it is. There’s a lot of situations with passports and I.D.s where it’s assumed that you’re going to be treated like a felon. On the other hand, it is very important, and it’s a symbolic transformation, you’re very excited when that first I.D. shows up in the mail, they got the name right, they got the gender right, all of that. It can be very exciting, too.

Your mother has this incredible strength that I truly admired. She’s accepted you as her daughter, she did not indulge Marc when he got angry, and recently she’s had to be the sole parent. Can you talk more about her?

She’s amazing. Sometimes people look at my transition and say, “wow, that was hard,” or “that took a lot of courage.” I think that having the example of my mother helped me through a lot of that. Just making this film was a really hard thing, putting that story out there. But my mom has been great and she’s been nothing but 100% supportive the entire time. I really felt with the film, it shows some really difficult moments with our family falling apart in some ways. It gets built back up but you just wonder, what is going to happen here? Of course as a filmmaker, as a family member, I was very concerned about if it was it okay for me to depict our family coming apart at the seams. The two things that really motivated me are, one, Marc wanted his story told. It’s part of him, it’s really difficult, he has a lot of challenges, but he wants that story told. The other thing is that I knew that if I could keep the camera rolling, that even if there were really difficult and challenging periods, that if we stuck with it, the love in my family would show. And not this sort of simple, Disney Hallmark love, but the love that is really hard. And that’s the love that really goes on with families. It’s really hard, but you have to go on and buck up and have a lot of faith in your family members. And I think my mom embodies that for me. And my dad was incredible in that respect as well.

Interview with Araya Director Margot Benacerraf

2010-07-28T14:25:00.000-07:00

This interview had been previously posted on Women & Hollywood and IONCinema, in different forms.

Interview with Araya Director Margot Benacerraf
by Melissa Silvestri

The Venezuelan director Margot Benacerraf may have only made two films, the 1950s documentaries Reveron and Araya, but her efforts in supporting great Latin American cinema over the past 45 years as the head of various film institutes and organizations have earned her the respect and honors as a pioneer female director in an era where there were few other female directors, save for Ida Lupino and Agnes Varda.

Largely forgotten due to lack of distribution, Araya was stunningly restored for its 50th anniversary, and re-released by Milestone films. It is running this month at the IFC Center in NYC. Joining the ranks of other lost documentary classics like I Am Cuba and Killer of Sheep, Araya is a hidden gem that was not only an early documentary, but subverted its format to be more of a narrative film and successfully blend reality and drama together. There is no doubt that it was a brilliantly innovative piece of work in 1959, since it shared the top prize with Alain Resnais’ Hiroshima, Mon Amour at that year’s Cannes Film Festival.

Araya, rather than being dry, follows the style of poetic realism, using a classic film score, staged scenes, established characters, and a direction to display the rare and beautiful world of Araya, a land on the cusp of industrialization, where families are connected through the many generations who have worked for over 450 years. Benacerraf displays a masterful eye for balancing truth with cinematic narrative. She gained the trust of the island’s families and was able to tell the story of a land hard and tough, yet with blinding white beauty in its salt pyramids. It showed the strength and grace the people’s work routines, and the love and respect shared amongst the families.

I got a chance to interview Benacerraf via email this week about her filming of Araya, her early years in Paris as a filmmaker, and the scene of female filmmakers in the 1950s.

Melissa Silvestri: Araya seems to be from another time and place altogether, pastoral communities separated from the mass market industry of the mainstream world, an environment that seems to be growing rarer due to increased industrialization and people moving into cities. I’m wondering what your thoughts are on that, if you believe such communities can still thrive without disappearing altogether due to pressures from the mainstream world.

Margot Benacerraf: There shouldn’t be many isolated communities left, and even if there are still any left, they would find it very difficult to resist the exterior pressures of the mainstream world. In any case, it is about, and it will always be about, asking to take into account the human problem before those very violent changes, with all that they bear. In the case of Araya, at the end of the film, I couldn’t give it a conclusion before the arrival of the machines because precisely as I was filming on a horse a world that was disappearing, another was beginning. I only had left raising a question with evident anguish because what I had observed nobody else considered to be a human problem. Unfortunately time would vindicate me. Not everything has been beneficial for the people of Araya.

MS: Was it difficult to gain the trust of the salt miners, or were they naturally at ease in front of a camera?

MB: No, because I went several times before shooting to share their lives, and become familiar to each other. So when I start shooting they didn’t run away and they accepted willingly and patiently the directions I gave them. They had never seen cameras around and they didn’t know exactly what it was all about. They just trust me. And think that every shot in the film is directed!

MS: Post WWII, there was a large boom in young filmmakers who came from all over the world, and creating these innovative films that gave a fresh modernity to filmmaking, whether making social or political statements, or bringing a poetic realism in with nonprofessional actors. You had studied in Paris, and I wanted to know what was it like to have been a part of that environment, and if you saw a great change from the previous generation.

MB: It was very significant to see how in the Cannes Festival of 1959 we matched up without knowing each other and without pre-established agreements with Truffaut and Alain Resnais. We were filmmakers eager to express ourselves differently so we were using new methods of production and looking for new forms to connect with the audience, and that’s why that Festival was so important. One can say that the eruption of the New Wave with all its investment and revolutionary marquee in that prestigious and classic Festival marked a before and after in filmmaking that without a doubt influenced the following generations.

MS: Were there other women directing at the time you made Araya?

MB: Very few. In the 50s, in France, there was Nicole Vedrés, Yannick Bellon, Agnes Varda, in the United States, there was Maya Deren and Shirley Clarke, and in Mexico, Matilde Landeta.

MS: What was it like to be a female director at a time where there were hardly any other women’s voices out there?

MB: I can’t say that being a woman has made my work difficult. I suffered the general conditions of a country where it was very difficult of make films. In the Venezuela of those times the filmmaking trade was practically unknown. In 1951, when I made my first film “Reverón” it was the only case of a female filmmaker. Later, 2 or 2 male filmmakers came more at the end of the 50s, but the difficulties were continuing to be the same for everyone.

MS:Since Latin American cinema is so broad and widespread across many different countries, is there a specific style or genre that you’re attracted to, either as a viewer or a supporter through your work in the cinema?

MB: What is known in literature as “the marvelous reality” or as “magical realism”, of those who Gabriel García Márquez and Alejo Carpentier are the most well-known exponents, and its parallelism in film especially attracts me. I recognize in that vision and in that form of expression one of the more interesting paths and big possibilities for the development of Latin American film.