Directors
Interviews - Directors
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“That’s What Public Art is All About…Everyone is Invited”: Andrey M Paounov on his Christo doc Walking on Water
Andrey M Paounov’s Walking on Water centers on the legendary environmental artist Christo and the realization of his most recent project (his second since the 2009 death of his beloved partner in life and art Jeanne-Claude). 2016’s The Floating Piers was a two-mile-long walkway of monk-yellow fabric that allowed over a million visitors to “float” on foot across Italy’s Lake Iseo. What Walking on Water is not, thankfully, is your standard celebratory portrait of an unconventional maestro (though Christo, who brings to mind a Bulgarian version of Bernie Sanders, is certainly that). Indeed, what makes Paounov’s Locarno-premiering film so refreshingly […]
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“Everything We Could Embrace about Motherhood Happened Through the Making of this Movie”: Director Ash Mayfair on Her Vietnam-Set Debut, The Third Wife
The Third Wife marks the ambitious debut of Vietnamese director Ash Mayfair, who gained her MFA from NYU. Set in the late 19th century, her film tracks the fortunes of 14-year-old Mây (Nguyễn Phương Trà My), who is selected as the third wife of a much older man, who expects her to bear him a son. Her life in rural Vietnam becomes further complicated as she begins to develop feelings for the second wife Xuân (Mai Thu Hường) and as pressure builds in the family. Shot by Chananun Chotrungroj (Pop Aye, Hotel Mist), the film largely uses natural light and […]
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“Shows of Women Who Eat Bananas Seductively are Banned”: Shengze Zhu on Present.Perfect
Before authorities cracked down in June, 2017, over 400 million customers watched live streaming in China, primarily on three internet sites: douyu.com; huya.com; and panda.tv. (According to Variety, panda.tv closed in March, 2019.) Live streaming in China resembles amateur YouTube broadcasts here, with a slightly different vocabulary. In China “anchors” host “showrooms,” or channels, and transmit “bullets” to their followers. Documentary filmmaker Shengze Zhu (Another Year, 2016) screened hundreds of hours of footage for Present.Perfect. What starts as a survey of live streaming narrows down to focus on a handful of anchors, including a seamstress assembling underwear in a clothing […]
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“We Don’t Do Pickups, It’s Not Fair to the Actors”: Ritesh Batra on Photograph
Two strangers from different classes meet in Mumbai by accident in Photograph, an Amazon Studios release opening theatrically May 17. Rafi (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) scrapes along by selling snapshots of tourists. The middle-class Miloni (Sanya Malhotra) has her life planned for her: a course in accounting, followed by an arranged marriage. Through a familiar screwball-comedy twist, she agrees to pose as Rafi’s betrothed when his grandmother Didi (Farrukh Jaffar) visits. Photograph is not strictly a comedy, but more a study of two deeply unhappy people taking tentative steps out of isolation. Writer and director Ritesh Batra explores his characters with an […]
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“Arrogance and Confidence Comes with Film School and That Age”: Joanna Hogg on The Souvenir, Shooting 16mm and Film School
There are many movies about making movies, far fewer about film school. Joanna Hogg’s The Souvenir (the first in a diptych—part two is supposed to shoot this summer) grounds itself in the early ’80s at the UK’s National Film and Television School (NFTS), where Hogg herself went to school. It was there that she experienced a tumultuous relationship, dramatized here as the story of clean-living Julie (Honor Swinton Byrne), a student who falls for Anthony (Tom Burke) after they meet at a party. All well and good, but what Julie doesn’t clock is that Anthony is a heroin addict. A real-life […]
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Streaming, Theatrical and Film School: Barry Jenkins, Boots Riley and Aaron Stewart-Ahn at the Miami International Film Festival
Three of current American independent cinema’s most prominent filmmakers recently came together at the Miami International Film Festival to impart some of the hard-earned knowledge they’ve acquired. Barry Jenkins (Moonlight, If Beale Street Could Talk), musician, activist, and storyteller Boots Riley (Sorry to Bother You), and journalist-turned-screenwriter Aaron Stewart-Ahn (Mandy) were honored at the festival as the first trio of guests to be part of the inaugural Knight Heroes masterclass and symposium. Ahead of their presentations in front of a crowded Olympia Theater in Downtown Miami, the three creators sat down with Filmmaker to discuss a wide range of topics: the […]
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“Light a Candle for My Guardian Angel So Nothing Bad Happens”: Theodore Collatos and Carolina Monnerat on Their Portrait of Trans Lives in Struggle, Queen of Lapa
With nearly 20 credits as a director and as many as an editor, Theodore Collatos has been quietly making documentaries and narratives to critical acclaim for the last decade, often collaborating with his wife, former professional dancer Carolina Monnerat, as producer and actor. For Collatos’ sixth feature, and first with Monnerat as co-director, they returned to Monnerat’s native city of Rio for an intimate and revealing look at an underground cultural icon. Queen of Lapa, named for a district renowned for its sex trade, devotes its focus to the late Luana Muniz, a trans-rights advocate, founder of Luana’s House (a […]
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“Those Two Characters are There, Forever Young”: Wong Kar-wai on Chungking Express
The night before my interview with him, Wong Kar-wai addressed a sold-out crowd assembled for a screening of one of his greatest films, 1994’s Chungking Express. Hawaii International Film Festival’s longtime director of programming, Anderson Le, affably overcame some introductory ribbing by Wong (“Anderson, why do you ask me that question! It was 25 years ago, and after 25 years, it’s still that same question!” he jokingly responded to the first, somewhat innocuous query), and coaxed out some remarkable storytelling and reminiscences from the director. “Every film [has] their luck,” Wong began. “Certain films, the process is really difficult: the […]
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Wong Kar-wai on Screenwriting, Patience and His Next Feature, Blossoms
A debate over power napping (“Hong Kong people have never even heard of that!”) proved least of the memorable things covered by Wong Kar-wai during his appearances at this past winter’s Hawaii International Film Festiva Taking time off from introducing films, appearing at the festival’s gala, and touring the island with his wife (and celebrating her birthday), Wong was kind enough to sit down with Filmmaker one leisurely Friday afternoon, amidst the becalmed tropical surroundings of Waikiki’s Halekulani Hotel. Born in 1958 in Shanghai, Wong “was born in a generation where watching films was the main entertainment for kids. You could […]
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“This Movie’s Explicitly Nonvisual”: Olivier Assayas on Non-Fiction
Writers and publishers, politicians and performers deal with a changing cultural landscape in Non-Fiction, the latest feature from writer and director Olivier Assayas. A snapshot of Parisian society about to succumb to the digital generation, it’s also a surprisingly supple romantic comedy in which couples form and dissolve with distinctively French sangfroid. Alain (Guillaume Canet), a publisher of “quality” literature, is facing the takeover of his house by a digital entrepreneur. His assistant Laure (Christa Théret) argues that books are obsolete anyway. Alain’s wife Selena (Juliette Binoche) feels trapped in her role as a “crisis management expert” (read: “cop”) in […]
