Rick Ostermann’s Lysis — which had its world premiere at Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival last month — required the Krieg and Wolfskinder director to put even more faith in his actors than usual, as they were also their own directors of photography and, to an extent, their own scriptwriters. The story centers on a dad (Oliver Masucci), who takes his long-estranged teenage son (Louis Hofmann) on a white water rafting and camping trip, with the intention of filming their “adventure.” Once in the wilderness, however, his son proves less than willing to reconnect and an act of petulance soon […]

From her breakthrough in Kick-Ass through great roles in Let Me In, Hugo, and Carrie, Chloë Grace Moretz has become one of the hottest young actors in Hollywood. In this half hour, she talks about her recent decision to take time to “reassess who I am and find myself within my roles again,” which led to her brilliant performance in The Miseducation of Cameron Post, this year’s winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance (now streaming on demand). She also talks about avoiding what she calls “emotional cavities,” and how she craves to be taken off guard in her […]

With riveting performances in films such as Hell or High Water, The Messenger and 3:10 to Yuma, Ben Foster established himself as an intensely serious actor who goes all-in for a role. With this year’s Leave No Trace, Foster takes that same intensity and brilliantly turns it inward, portraying a laconic veteran who suffers from PTSD and survives in the woods of Oregon with his teenage daughter, played by Thomasin McKenzie. Foster talks about working with McKensie to establish the connection they needed, why he took performance enhancing drugs to play Lance Armstrong, and the “emotional erectile disfunction” of over-directing. […]

Elsie Fisher was not just some 13-year-old Bo Burnham plucked from Middle America to star in his debut feature Eighth Grade. She has been a working child actor in Hollywood since infancy. She did, however, just finish eighth grade in public school when filming began, and she managed to create a performance so vulnerable and true that the seams of the acting craft are invisible. In this half-hour, I attempt to get Fisher and Burnham to open up about the origins of this movie and how this young lady carried it so successfully that it just might be the performance […]

Wobble Palace is a reverse romantic comedy set in relationship hell tinged by the toxicity of Tinder hookups and Trump’s political rise. “One of the early ideas was to make a movie about a happy break up,” explains director Eugene Kotlyarenko. “The formula for a rom com is whatever happens for the first 90 minutes, by the end, the couple gets together.” Flipping this arc, the film climaxes (spoiler alert!) in the couple splitting up instead. “In a relationship that’s really toxic, staying together is really horrible and breaking up is really liberating,” Kotlyarenko continues. The film follows a millennial […]

Bradley Cooper’s directorial debut, A Star is Born, is the kind of movie that feels as though it contains decades’ worth of saved-up ideas and feelings, yet never strains under the weight of its ambition. It’s simultaneously sweeping in its scope and razor-sharp in its clarity, passionate and exuberant but restrained and confident. Although the tale has been told several times before, most memorably in George Cukor’s 1954 CinemaScope extravaganza, Cooper (who collaborated on the screenplay with Eric Roth and Will Fetters) makes it his own by using the basic premise as a springboard for a sophisticated meditation on fame […]

Film directors casting their significant others is a trend as old as film itself, but Colin Minihan and Brittany Allen are different. They met when he cast her in his 2014 alien invasion pic Extraterrestrial. Not only did they start dating, she started producing his films, in addition to being their star. There was the zombie-thonIt Stains the Sands Redin 2016. Now there’s What Keeps You Alive, a romantic cabin getaway that abruptly turns into a survive-the-night serial killer grinder. It’s not just about putting the one you love on screen; theirs is a true collaboration. Ever since his debut […]

John Cho is perhaps best known for playing Sulu in the Star Trek reboots and Harold in the Harold and Kumar films. His new movie Searching takes place entirely on computer screens. Cho’s performance is one of the reasons why it is a successful piece of true cinema and not a novelty. We discuss the unique challenges of performing alone in some scenes and trusting director Aneesh Chaganty to navigate him through the space. We also talk about one of my favorite recent indie films, Columbus, and the connection he felt with co-star Haley Lu Richardson that truly powers the […]

His portrayal of “Richie” on the HBO series Looking brought Raúl Castillo some serious recognition and started moving him into bigger and better parts. One such role is “Pops” in the astonishing queer coming-of-age film We The Animals (in theaters now) directed by Jeremiah Zagar from the Justin Torres best-seller. Castillo talks in depth about his process of bringing this complex character to life, and the importance of owning your space as an actor. Plus we do a deep-dive into the straight man’s approach to same-sex on-camera kissing. Back To One can be found wherever you get your podcasts, including […]

Seven seasons on the sitcom That ’70s Show led Topher Grace to roles in Steven Soderbergh’s Traffic, In Good Company, a not entirely successful turn as “Venom” in Spider Man 3, and lighter projects like Win A Date With Tad Hamilton and Valentine’s Day. He then decided to change the trajectory of his career. He told his agents he wanted to work exclusively with great film artists in environments that inspired him. Worthy projects like Interstellar, Truth and War Machine followed. And this year, Grace’s next chapter continues with David Robert Mitchell’s Under the Silver Lake and the challenging role […]