Authors — Erik Luers
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From AD to UT: Keith Maitland on Tower
Racking up three prizes upon its premiere at SXSW 2016 (Best Documentary Feature, the Louis Black “Lone Star” Award, and an audience award), Keith Maitland’s Tower debuted on home turf — which doesn’t mean that audiences knew the tragic details. A breathtaking retelling of the horrific 1966 University of Texas campus shooting that left 16 dead, Tower tirelessly recreates, through modern day interviews, archival footage, and meticulously crafted rotoscope animation, the life-or-death situation many found themselves unexpectedly thrust into. By having the viewer live through the experience while simultaneously listening to the stories of those affected by it, Maitland’s film emphasizes memory and shared experience. Impressively incorporating animation, Tower is […]
by Erik Luers on Oct 14, 2016 -
Racism in Baltimore via Pest Control: Theo Anthony on Rat Film
An ethnographic and sociological nonfiction horror film, Theo Anthony’s Rat Film is a free-form experience with topical relevance. Long burdened by a documented history of residential segregation, Baltimore, Maryland — Anthony’s current place of residence — has served as a recent political hotbed due to the unjustified death of African-American resident Freddie Gray while in police custody. Less than a month after a court ruling declared (in the midst of the strengthening Black Lives Matter movement) all tried police officers not guilty of any wrongdoing in the Gray homicide, Anthony’s challenging film debuted in Switzerland at the Locarno Film Festival to much […]
by Erik Luers on Aug 19, 2016 -
Deformed Creatures for Everyone: The 20th Fantasia International Film Festival
Independent of the intent of hardworking programmers and staff, a film festival can occur at an unexpectedly opportune time. That I attended the 20th edition of the Montreal-based Fantasia International Film Festival as many New York colleagues spent their evenings watching the genre-defying, quasi-patriotic spectacle known as the Republican National Convention only made my politically-removed self more grateful. Creating and celebrating horror within the confines of narrative and nonfiction cinema proved to be a more peaceful environment than gawking at the horrific notions of those in power. At the festival’s midway point, the Frontières International Co-Production Market — a four-day event where […]
by Erik Luers on Aug 1, 2016 -
Mary Lambert on Pet Sematary, Non-Linear Narratives and Child Actors
As haunting and macabre as when it was first released in the spring of 1989, Mary Lambert’s Pet Sematary is fondly remembered for being one of the more faithful and rich screen adaptations of a Stephen King novel. (A documentary on the film’s production, Unearthed & Untold: The Path to Pet Sematary, is to be released later this year.) The story of a nuclear family who move to small-town Maine and, through a series of unfortunate events (i.e. the death of a beloved feline), discover an ancient Indian burial ground that brings the dead back to life, Pet Sematary’s playfully dark twist stems from reincarnation […]
by Erik Luers on Jun 15, 2016 -
Private Discussions and Public Support: The 18th Maryland Film Festival
Although this may not sound as remarkable as it is, the Maryland Film Festival (MFF) thrives on being filmmaker-friendly. Encouraging attending filmmakers to participate in a closed-door, multi-hour group conference designed to serve as a safe space to voice their career concerns and hosting a rocking evening of karaoke performed on a stage at The Windup Space (which uncannily resembles the Black Lodge from Twin Peaks), MFF works hard to keep participating artists in dialogue with one another. In screening spaces as the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), the Walters Art Museum, and the intimate black-box Single Carrot Theater, it’s not uncommon […]
by Erik Luers on May 16, 2016 -
Tribeca 2016: Five Questions for Keep Quiet Directors Joseph Martin and Sam Blair
A role reversal so outrageous it could only be a work of nonfiction, the story of Csanad Szegedi, an infamous member of Hungary’s conservative Jobbik party, is as preposterously true as they come. A former Holocaust denier and anti-Semite, Szegedi now lives as a practicing Orthodox Jew determined to honor his familial past (his grandparents were Jewish). Fascinated by this turnaround, filmmakers Joseph Martin and Sam Blair created Keep Quiet, an in-depth study of the new life of Szegedi and co-lead Rabbi Boruch Oberlande, as a portrait of internal religious tension and the endless trying struggle to right one’s wrongs. As Keep […]
by Erik Luers on Apr 25, 2016 -
Tribeca 2016: Five Questions for Obit Director Vanessa Gould
While there have been several documentaries exploring the inner-workings of the Gray Lady, the life and challenges of a New York Times obituary writer is a profession that has yet to receive its due. Working on strict deadlines that arrive at a moment’s notice (such is life and, in effect, death), these obit writers have to be on call to craft a minimal but effective summation of character while working with limited time and limitless resources. A fascinating subject that immediately evokes a plethora of questions (what’s the criteria for determining who gets a Times obituary? How quick is a […]
by Erik Luers on Apr 22, 2016 -
Going Reverse Oedipal Outside the Margins: Eight Tribeca 2016 Short Films
The wide-ranging 15th edition of the Tribeca Film Festival feels more screen-agnostic than ever, with films, television, VR, and interactive projects expanding across two weeks of downtown-centric programming. While resisting the urge to identify an all-encompassing theme that sloppily groups all these works into a State of the Union address, the shorts I viewed provided an appropriately hefty sampling of independent cinema comfortably outside the margins. Famous faces, small budgets, issue-driven calls-to-action, oddball foreign comedies, intriguing student work, and throwbacks to pop cinema were all accounted for. Given the scope and depth of the films being offered then, take the following as […]
by Erik Luers on Apr 19, 2016 -
Cancer and Video Games: Malika Zouhali Worrall and David Osit on Thank You for Playing
A video gaming experience therapeutic for both players and its grief-stricken creator, That Dragon, Cancer can currently be purchased for use on your Mac/PC and other devices. Created by Colorado-based developer Ryan Green, the independent video game serves as a reflection of a tragedy he and his family recently experienced: the death of Green’s young son, Joel, who passed away after a sustained battle with cancer. Working on the project as Joel was receiving treatment, Ryan and his family incorporated very real moments of personal history into That Dragon, Cancer, even going as far as to sample Joel and his family’s actual voices […]
by Erik Luers on Mar 18, 2016 -
Five Questions for SXSW Feature Documentary Winner Tower Director Keith Maitland
One of the busiest filmmakers at this year’s SXSW, documentary filmmaker Keith Maitland has two films premiering at the festival, both with roots firmly in Texas. A Song For You: The Austin City Limits Story is a loving look back at the PBS program that featured some of the music industry’s most iconic talent like Ray Charles, Willie Nelson, and Stevie Ray Vaughn. Tower, a partially animated documentary that incorporates archival footage and first-person testimonials, reconstructs the University of Texas campus shooting that took the lives of sixteen people in the summer of 1966. The Grand Jury winner for Documentary Feature, Tower has been praised for […]
by Erik Luers on Mar 16, 2016
