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Jim Hemphill’s Home Video Recommendations: Explorers, Fool for Love, 12 Monkeys
One of director Joe Dante’s most interesting and underrated films gets the Blu-ray treatment it deserves with the Shout Factory release of Explorers, Dante’s 1985 follow-up to Gremlins that walks a similarly unconventional line between Spielbergian sentiment and Tashlinesque pop satire, with an undercurrent of unsettling melancholy thrown in for good measure. There’s genuine warmth and wonder to spare in the first half of the film as friends Ethan Hawke, River Phoenix, and Jason Presson build their own spaceship; when they actually manage to rendezvous with the aliens who have been communicating with them, the movie shifts gears to become […]
by Jim Hemphill on May 24, 2021 -
“A Dream of Education”: Reel Works Celebrates its 20th Anniversary
When Maya Velazquez’s teacher told her class about Reel Works, the ninth-grader at Park Slope Collegiate had no idea what story she wanted to tell, only that filmmaking was something she wanted to try. Cultivating that spark of interest is what Reel Works, a New York-based nonprofit organization that teaches filmmaking to students, has done for the past two decades. Reel Works now celebrates its 20th anniversary and will host a 20th Anniversary Gala on May 26. And while the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the global film business in 2020, Reel Works actually had its most successful year yet, serving an […]
by Dominique Castanheira on May 20, 2021 -
“On Every Movie I Do, I Try to Test Every Single Camera I Can Get My Hands On”: DP Pawel Pogorzelski on Nobody
In the middle-aged revenge fantasy movie, the protagonist’s onslaught of violence is a reluctant one. In your John Wicks or Takens, these are men forced back into action by a transgression so grievous it demands brutal retribution. They don’t want to, but they have to. As director Ilya Naishuller points out, Nobody is an inversion of that formula. When Bob Odenkirk’s retired assassin Hutch is jarred from suburban drudgery by a home break in, he loses only a few bucks, a kitty cat bracelet and some pride. Hardly a kidnapped daughter or a murdered puppy. Hutch doesn’t have to dust off […]
by Matt Mulcahey on May 20, 2021 -
Wagner Moments: DP Manuel Alberto Claro on Melancholia at Ten Years, Lars Von Trier and Depression
Melancholia premiered in Cannes ten years ago this month and was immediately overshadowed by the infamous press conference in which its provocative Danish director, Lars Von Trier, said “I am a Nazi.” Yet, as the film rolled out across the world, its visceral and moving portrayal of depression found its way into audiences’ hearts. It stands the test of time as a rare example of a beautiful film about mental illness. The equivocation of a realistic depiction of depression in Part One as it engulfs Justine (Kirsten Dunst) on her wedding day with the science-fiction concept of the world ending […]
by Sophie Monks Kaufman on May 20, 2021 -
“Our Aim Was to Document a Reconciliation Process Led by Kurdish Women”: Alba Sotorra on Human Rights Watch Film Festival Doc The Return: Life After ISIS
Terrorist or victim? That seems to be the animating question behind Alba Sotorra’s The Return: Life After ISIS. Premiering at SXSW, and selected for the Special Presentations section at this year’s virtual Hot Docs (April 29-May 9), the film is an up close and personal look at a group of Western women caught in nightmarish limbo in a detention camp in northern Syria. All left behind First World lives – in the US and Canada, the UK, Germany, and The Netherlands – with online propaganda-shaped dreams of rescuing fellow Muslims and finding shared community. And all ultimately became disillusioned and […]
by Lauren Wissot on May 20, 2021 -
“Before Directing, I Never Truly Understood Just How Exhausting and Taxing the Filmmaking Process Is”: David Weil on Solos
Showrunner David Weil’s Amazon series Hunters was one of the most audacious pieces of television I saw in 2020, a profound meditation on morality and history articulated with the exhilarating narrative rush of a great genre film. Epic in its sweep and ambition, the show made me eager to see what Weil would do next—where does a filmmaker go after such a bold swing for the fences? The answer turned out to be Weil’s new show (also for Amazon) Solos, which operates at the other end of the spectrum in terms of scale but is just as daring in its […]
by Jim Hemphill on May 19, 2021 -
“I Wondered if Metaphor and Allegory Weren’t a Way of Integrating Censorship and Accepting Oppression”: Mohammad Rasoulof on There Is No Evil
“Under conditions of terror most people will comply,” Hannah Arendt wrote from the trial of Adolf Eichmann, “but some will not.” This simple, almost simplistic sentiment permeates There Is No Evil, the new film from dissident Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rasoulof. The original Farsi title, Sheytan vojud nadarad, translates more directly to The Devil Doesn’t Exist, a phrase that may sound hopeful until you unpack its dark implications. Rasoulof is among that rarified latter group that does not comply. He has continued to live and make films in Iran despite severe restrictions and regular threats of imprisonment. Rather than retreat into […]
by Soheil Rezayazdi on May 19, 2021 -
First Titles Announces for the 2021 Fantasia Film Festival
The Fantasia Film Festival has just announced the first titles from its upcoming 25th anniversary edition, which will take place as a virtual event from August 5 – 21. Films will be accessible to Canadian audiences via a platform created by Festival Scope and Shift72. The festival organizers will be listening to the advice of local health authorities and may add a limited number of in-person events closer to the festival date. The titles and descriptions, from the fest’s high-spirited press release, are below. THE LAST THING MARY SAW. Brace yourself for THE LAST THING MARY SAW, a breathtaking period occult […]
by Scott Macaulay on May 19, 2021 -
Another Screen Launches Streaming Series “For a Free Palestine: Films by Palestinian Women”
Another Screen, the streaming arm of feminist film journal Another Gaze, launched today “For a Free Palestine: Films by Palestinian Women.” The films all stream for free worldwide, and donations are encouraged that will go towards “facilitating medical, legal, and infrastructure aid on the ground. Secondary donations go to as supporting filmmaking in Gaza; restoration projects of older Palestinian films; cultural centers for refugees in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and more.” Already on the site are films by Jumana Manna, Basma Alsharif, Rosalind Nashashibi, Razan AlSalah, Mahasen Nasser-Eldin, and Larissa Sansour, and to be posted in the next few days […]
by Scott Macaulay on May 18, 2021 -
Back to One, Episode 154: Dot-Marie Jones
Fifteen-time arm wrestling champion and three-time Emmy nominee Dot-Marie Jones inspired viewers with her moving portrayal of Coach Beiste on Glee, which was her third time in a Ryan Murphy universe, after Nip/Tuck and Pretty/Handsome. Last year she played “Little Helen” in Greener Grass, and now she’s “Big Sexy” in the hilarious and charming arm wresting comedy Golden Arm. On this episode she tells the story of how, as an athlete who knew nothing about acting, an opportunity propelled her into the business after hearing the words “cold read” and imagining some kind of weather endurance test. She talks about […]
by Peter Rinaldi on May 18, 2021
