Authors — Scott Macaulay
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Trailer Watch: Brent Green and Sam Green, Live Cinema
What looks to be a stellar high-profile collaboration between two Filmmaker favorites is Brent Green and Sam Green: Love Cinema, running for four nights, December 7 – 10, as part of BAM’s Next Wave series. The two filmmakers aren’t related other than sharing a skill for charismatically fronting live performances blending their movies with live performance and narration. Brent first appeared in Filmmaker way back in 2005, when he led our 25 New Face list that year. We’ve assiduously covered his work since, as we have with Sam Green, whose works include the documentary, The Weather Underground, and then live […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 20, 2016 -
Recommended on a Friday: Manchester by the Sea, Uncle Howard, Off the Rails, Daughters of the Dust, J’Accuse, Pitch
Kenneth Lonergan’s masterful Manchester by the Sea is the high-profile opening of the week, and one strongly recommended by all of us at Filmmaker. The writer/director is our current print issue cover, with James Ponsoldt’s interview now online as well. In his intro, Ponsoldt wrote: Lonergan’s films all feature stand-out performances, and the constellation of actors in Manchester by the Sea — Kyle Chandler, Lucas Hedges, Michelle Williams, Gretchen Mol and Affleck — are beautifully cast. Their family could be your family. The Chandlers’ struggle to find a new normal in the wake of tragedy is surprisingly funny, human, messy […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 18, 2016 -
“Suddenly the World’s Wider, More Exciting, More Engaging”: Criterion’s Peter Becker on the New FilmStruck and Criterion Channel Streaming Service
For film lovers of all stripes, the launch this month of FilmStruck, a new streaming service partnership between Turner Classic Movies and the Criterion Channel, is nothing short of a major event. As Netflix tilts more and more towards television and original programming, and actual movies cycle on and off on-demand services at a dizzying pace, FilmStruck is poised to be a dependable and invigorating destination for anyone wanting to watch a simply great movie at any time of the day or night. FilmStruck will source films from indie distributors such as Janus Films, Zeitgeist, Film Movement, Oscilloscope Laboratories, as […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 15, 2016 -
Trailer Watch: Pablo Larrain’s Jackie
Pablo Larrain’s Jackie is one of my favorite films of the year. You can read my interview with the director in the current print edition of Filmmaker, and you can see more of the film in this new trailer, just out from Fox Searchlight. It’s more revealing than the earlier teaser trailer Stephen Garrett wrote about here, and, in some ways, quite different in tone, foregrounding the political mythmaking element of the story. Check it out above.
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 14, 2016 -
Trailer Watch: 95 and 6 To Go, Directed by Kimi Takesue
Screening yesterday at DOC NYC and now headed to RIDM is Kimi Takesue’s 95 and 6 To Go, both personal and metafictional in its story of a filmmaker, Takesue, and her recently widowed grandfather finding common ground within the director’s unproduced featured screenplay. Here’s the film’s synopsis: In 95 and 6 To Go, a resilient widower’s memories become intertwined with the fictional screenplay his granddaughter is writing, revealing the fine line between life and art, rumination and imagination. Filmmaker Kimi Takesue captures the cadence of daily life for Grandpa Tom, a retired postal worker born to Japanese immigrants to Hawai’i […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 13, 2016 -
DOC NYC: Five Questions for The Guys Next Door Directors Allie Humenuk and Amy Geller
Shot over three years, The Guys Next Door looks at what the filmmakers, Allie Humenuk (Shadow of the House) and Amy Geller (For the Love of Movies) dub “a real Modern Family” — a gay male couple parenting a child and forming an extended family with that child’s surrogate mother. Premiering today at DOC NYC, and co-presented by NewFest, the film catches its principal characters at a time when their commitments to each other are challenged by circumstance, geography and subtle changes in our society. Filmmaker: First, how did the two of you — Amy and Allie — wind up […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 13, 2016 -
DOC NYC: Five Questions for City of Joy Director Madeleine Gavin
World premiering last night at DOC NYC, City of Joy tells the story of a center for young women in the Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo dedicated to helping them overcome the aftermath of rape, abuse and traumatic violence. Directed by Madeleine Gavin, well known in the independent film world for editing films like Mean Creek, Meadowland and, most recently, Nerve, the film documents the relationship between the center’s three founders — Nobel Peace Prize nominee Dr. Denis Mukwege, a Congo doctor; The Vagina Monologues playwright and actress Eve Ensler; and Congolese human rights activist Christine Schuler-Deschryver — while also […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 12, 2016 -
Recommended on a Friday: National Bird, Uncle Kent 2, The Love Witch, DOC NYC, L.A. Rep Screenings and More
This week writing “Recommended on a Friday” is a way of tempering myself before tackling this week’s newsletter, which will be some form of screed about the election. Depending on your reaction to the surreal and seismic week, you may or may not be in the mood to go to the movies. If you are, however, there’s a lot in theaters we can recommend. I’ll start with 25 New Face Sonia Kennebeck’s National Bird, a provocative, thoughtful and cinematically ambitious documentary about the U.S. Air Force’s drone warfare program that focuses on the impact the program has had on the […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 11, 2016 -
Trailer Watch: The Prison in Twelve Landscapes
When it played Art of the Real last year, Astra Taylor singled out for Filmmaker the absolutely essential documentary, The Prison in Twelve Landscapes. She wrote: Story has crafted a profound and political film that, while not sensational, is quietly shocking — even if you are already steeped in the project’s central theme. By taking an innovative and unexpected approach to the subject of mass incarceration, Story reveals just how deeply entrenched the problem of over-policing is…. The Prison in Twelve Landscapes is an impressive, genre-subverting work, and one that deserves to be seen on the big screen. It is […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 4, 2016 -
Recommended on a Friday: Peter and the Farm, Robert Bresson, The Prison in Twelve Landscapes, The Chase
What’s happened to Filmmaker’s “Recommended on a Friday” series? Just three columns in and our mix of picks consists largely of repertory and home viewing choices. If you’re in New York, there are several series going on worth your attention, first and foremost BAM’s “Bresson on Cinema” series that features several Bresson titles — Pickpocket, Diary of a Country Priest and A Man Escaped, among them — alongside films that Bresson’s work was somehow in dialogue with. The latter includes a diverse group of classics including Bicycle Thieves and Battleship Potemkin. Bresson’s precise, ascetic style and his work’s near devotional […]
by Scott Macaulay on Nov 4, 2016
