The trailer for Ari Aster’s highly-anticipated new film, Beau Is Afraid (formerly titled Disappointment Blvd), has arrived. The writer-director, whose previous films Hereditary and Midsommar have been widely lauded, appears to be continuing his work in the horror genre, though the trailer contains a distinct comedic streak. The film stars Joaquin Phoenix as an emotionally stunted man who embarks on a strange, arduous journey to get home to his mother. Also starring are Nathan Lane, Amy Ryan, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Hayley Squires, Denis Ménochet, Kylie Rogers, Armen Nahapetian, Zoe Lister-Jones, Parker Posey, and Patti LuPone. Beau Is Afraid will hit […]
Indiewire’s chief film critic David Ehrlich returns with his annual video countdown of the year’s best films, selecting 25 titles to highlight via clever editing choices and, most distinctly, various needle drops culled from a wide range of 2022 releases, from The Batman to Bones and All. In what’s also become a recent tradition, Ehrlich continues to have the director behind the top-ranked film choose a charity for viewers to donate to, as a way to “help justify the (truly humiliating) amount of time it takes me to make them.” This year, Filmmaker is proud to say that Charlotte Wells, […]
Steve James’s A Compassionate Spy is an unexpectedly charitable portrait of a man who betrayed his country for a higher cause. Specifically in the case of physicist Ted Hall—still a teenage undergrad at Harvard when, in 1944, he was tasked to help develop the atomic bomb—the greater cause of world peace. But unlike far more famous contemporaneous “traitors” Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, executed in 1953, Hall managed to do something even more remarkable than simply smuggle secrets to the Soviets—he escaped accountability for his actions. FBI surveillance aside, he went on to enjoy a surprisingly normal life with his adoring […]
The Sundance Institute announces today the lineup for the Beyond Film conversations at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival, which will all be open to the public. The slate is comprised of three separate series—Power of Story, Cinema Café and The Big Conversation—and will feature filmmaker panels, audience discourses and broader artistic conversations. Beyond Film will be hosted in-person at the festival from January 19-23, with several conversations accessible virtually for nationwide audiences through the Festival’s online platform beginning on January 24. Also announced today are conversations hosted by Sundance Collab and several of the Festival’s partners, which are similarly available […]
In The Menu, entitled dinner guests get more than they bargained for when they travel to a remote island to feast upon the culinary delights of a disillusioned celebrity chef (Ralph Fiennes). Despite being surrounded by exquisite works of gastronomical artistry during the shoot, cinematographer Peter Deming did not partake. “I didn’t taste any of it. I’m not a big food person,” said Deming. “I’ve actually talked to a number of people who said the first thing they did after seeing the movie was go have a cheeseburger.” While Deming may not have an appetite for ornate cuisine, the cinematographer certainly knows […]
Sara Newens and Mina T. Son’s provocatively titled Racist Trees begins as an innocent investigation into the root (no pun intended) of a half-century dispute over a line of 60-foot tamarisks separating a historically Black section of Palm Springs from its historically white (and now overwhelmingly gay cisgender male) neighbors on the other side of a city-owned golf course. The film morphs into something much more shocking than merely another example of systemic inequality and the longstanding “polite” racism of white liberals who prefer gaslighting to admissions of culpability. Indeed, in the slyest and boldest of moves, the white and […]
An Olivier Award-winning success in the West End and a Tony Award-winning one on Broadway, the musical adaptation of Roald Dahl’s Matilda now arrives as a toe-tapping motion picture, with addictive song-and-dance numbers meant to be streamed over and over again. The key plot details from Dahl’s book (and Danny Devito’s 1996 crack at the material) and characters remain: the title character (Alisha Weir) is a charming young girl with a great imagination and special powers, something that comes in handy once she’s sent to a grade school run like a military bootcamp by the demonic Miss Trunchbull (Emma Thompson). Disavowed […]
Watch the trailer for Pacifiction, the latest from Spanish filmmaker Albert Serra. It premiered at Cannes last year before screening at TIFF, NYFF, BFI London Film Festival and AFI Fest. The film stars Benoît Magimel, Marc Susini, Alexandre Melo, Pahoa Mahagafanau, Matahi Pambrun, Sergi López and Montse Triola. Pacifiction‘s official synopsis reads: “On the French Polynesian island of Tahiti, the High Commissioner of the Republic and French government official De Roller (Magimel) is a calculating man with flawless manners. His somewhat broad perception of his role brings him to navigate the high end ‘establishment’ as well as shady venues where […]
A hybrid collaboration between writer/director Alex Harvey (Walden Life in the Woods, The Last Ecstatic Days, I Am A Seagull) and the theater collective, Banana Bag & Bodice (aka Jason Craig and Jessica Jelliffe), Space//Space screens this weekend in New York City at Anthology Film Archives. Harvey has sent the teaser trailer, posted above, as well as the following notes about the film. It’s been ten years since Banana Bag & Bodice’s beloved experimental production, Space//Space made waves in the New York theater scene (“Waiting for Godot in space” raved the New York Times). Now the married performance artist duo who […]
Filmmaker‘s most recent print issue features our annual selection of below-the-line artists whose work has excited us through this Fall’s awards season. Linked below are profiles by A.E. Hunt, Vikram Murthi, Matt Mulcahey, Isaac Feldberg and Abbey Bender on the most impressive technical aspects of six recent films, which we highly recommend viewing. Editing: Everything Everywhere All At Once‘s Paul Rogers, by A.E. Hunt Production Design: The Fabelmans‘ Rick Carter, by Vikram Murthi Cinematography: Bardo‘s Darius Khondji, by Matt Mulcahey Original Score: Women Talking‘s Hildur Guðnadóttir, by Isaac Feldberg Costume Design: The Banshees of Inisherin‘s Eimer Ní Mhaoldomhnaigh, by Abbey […]