Meet Me in Montenegro is a romantic comedy about two lovers, a Norwegian dancer and an American filmmaker, who meet by chance during a visit to Berlin. The film is based on the real-life romance between co-writers, producers, and editors Linnea Saasen and Alex Holdridge, who both also star in the film as the fictional portrayals of their real-life characters. On the eve of the German premiere in Munich, I sat down with Saasen, her co-producer Ineke Hagedorn, and co-actress Jenny Ulrich. The Orchard has recently released the film in the U.S. and Canada, and it’s also available on digital […]

I’m sitting in a small cinema in Berlin watching Mad Max: Fury Road, thrilled by the action and by the fight for freedom. Less thrilling is the guilty reminder of today’s massacres in Syria or human trafficking epidemic. I feel a similar pang of conscience while re-reading passages from Medea during real-life Greek tragedy, while the potential Grexit compromises the entire economic stability of the Eurozone. I’m torn between bearing the responsibility of world strife personally, as a passive consumer, and indirectly, as a helpless Samaritan. I can sometimes evade my guilty conscience by damning society. But even then, I’m […]

Following up her debut feature, A Teacher, Hannah Fidell premiered 6 Years at SXSW before traveling with it last month to the Champs-Élysées Film Festival. A relationship tale about two twenty-somethings navigating the complications of post-collegiate life, the film stars Taissa Farming and Ben Rosenfield. Filmmaker caught up with Fidell in Paris to learn about working without a script, returning to Austin for production and how film theory has affected her filmmaking. 6 Years will be released later this year by Netflix. Filmmaker: 6 Years is the second film in your Texas trilogy. Because the movie was improvised, did you ever […]

Recently released by WellGo USA, The Road Within is the directorial debut of screenwriter and actress Gren Wells (A Little Bit of Heaven). Starring Robert Sheehan, Dev Patel and Zoe Kravitz, the film tells the story of three escapees from a psych ward (Tourette Syndrome, OCD and anorexia sufferers, respectively) on a transformative road trip. It won the Audience Award at the Champs-Élysées and is currently available in the States on digital platforms. Filmmaker: How do you think your next film will be different than your first? Wells: I think you start to define who you are with the second […]

Audiences respond to movies at the Munich International Film Festival much like the way popcorn is served — sweet or salty. It’s a relatively peaceful festival, with neither chaotic ticket lines nor crowded after-parties. But pouring out from small dark cinemas into the summer sun, attendees quickly share ruthless but straightforward critiques, a la Roger Ebert thumbs-up or down. This definitive sweet or salty response to a film feels standard among the German crowds. It’s certainly an effective method for rating movies. But when I need some time to marinate after watching Uisenma Borchu’s world premiere of Don’t Look At […]

Filmmaker‘s Taylor Hess recently attended and reported on the U.S. in Progress series at the Champs-Élysées Film Festival. While there, she spoke to a number of female directors, producers, actresses and, below, an editor. Here is her conversation with Sofia Subercaseaux, who edited Sebastian Silva’s Nasty Baby. Filmmaker: How did you start working in film? Subercaseaux: I went to film school in Chile. It was a random decision because I had no idea what I wanted to do, but the course description just seemed right. Afterwards, I worked in production. It was really fun and I learned a lot, but […]

Filmmaker‘s Taylor Hess recently attended and reported on the U.S. in Progress series at the Champs-Élysées Film Festival. While there, she spoke to a number of female directors, producers and actresses. Below, her conversation with Hannah Gross and Deragh Campbell, who both appear in Nathan Silver’s Stinking Heaven. Filmmaker: I Used To be Darker was your first film together, and Deragh, your first time acting? Campbell: Right, I’m not trained. My college degree is in writing and my background is publishing and writing. In a lot of ways I look at acting as another way of interacting with material and […]

Filmmaker‘s Taylor Hess recently attended and reported on the U.S. in Progress series at the Champs-Élysées Film Festival. While there, she spoke to a number of female directors and producers. Below, her conversation with Applesauce producer Melodie Sisk. Filmmaker: What was your timeline on Applesauce? Sisk: Applesauce moved so fast! We essentially had no real pre-production and had to jump right in. This made our schedule erratic, we’d shoot a few days at a time, jumping around between holidays, and then, just like that, we premiered at Tribeca exactly five months to the date of our first day of shooting. It […]

Bonjouring my way down the Champs-Élysées, I arrive at Ladurée, a Parisian bakery nearly as iconic as the Arc de Triomphe. I sit among film distributors and we are presented with food almost too pretty to eat. We are in Paris for U.S. in Progress, a joint program between Black Rabbit Film and the Champs-Élysées Film Festival. The purpose is to expose U.S. indie films in post-production to European buyers and distributors and introduce the American filmmakers to the European market. The three-day event is organized bi-annually, first during the Champs-Élysées Film Festival and again during the American Film Festival […]

When Miles Davis moved to the Upper West Side in 1958, backyard jams with visiting musicians transformed the small block. His residency lasted about 25 years, so he was long gone by the time I moved in to the building next door. But I was there for the block party last year when the street was renamed in his honor. In spite of the loudspeaker recordings, I got to hear the street on jazz. And immersed in the throngs of his friends and relatives, I felt transported. The next day, walking past a new 24hr CVS on the nearby corner, […]