Henry Fool
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“Just a Normal Guy with Completely Predictable Middle-Class Morality”: Hal Hartley on Ned Rifle
When Hal Hartley arrived on the American filmmaking scene in the late 80s and early 90s, “indie film” wasn’t yet hardened into a niche or a brand. Possibilities seemed endless. Hartley’s debut feature The Unbelievable Truth, starring the late Adrienne Shelly, filtered humor and attitude through an unexpected rigor and formal seriousness. Like other early nineties filmmakers who have remained significant over the subsequent quarter-century (Haynes, Van Sant, Solondz), Hartley’s cinema has balanced a sense of specificity of place – many of Hartley’s films are rooted in the five boroughs, Long Island in particular – with international film culture and […]
by Michael Sicinski on Mar 31, 2015 -
Watch: The First Trailer for Hal Hartley’s Ned Rifle
Here’s the first trailer for Ned Rifle, the third part of Hal Hartley’s “Henry Fool” trilogy, which began with the titular 1998 film and continued with 2007’s Fay Grim. The trailer’s wordless for a good chunk, but when we finally hear words, we know exactly what’s going on: Henry (Thomas Jay Ryan) and Fay (Parker Posey)’s son Ned (Liam Aiken) is going to find his dad and kill him. This capstone film — “probably” the final installment, the Kickstarter hedged its bets — was posted in advance of the film’s premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival later this year. […]
by Vadim Rizov on Jul 22, 2014 -
Hal Hartley, Fay Grim
PARKER POSEY IN HAL HARTLEY’S FAY GRIM. COURTESY MAGNOLIA PICTURES. For a period in the 1990s, Hal Hartley was one of a group of directors, along with Jim Jarmusch and John Sayles, who really defined what American indie filmmaking was all about. Hartley’s Trust (1990), Simple Men (1992) and Amateur (1994), set in the suburbs of Long Island but seen from Hartley’s unique perspective, were idiosyncratic, literate films which set the bar high for other writer-directors aiming to portray contemporary American life. Since the mid-90s, though, Hartley has broadened his focus, both thematically and geographically: Flirt (1995) told love stories […]
by Nick Dawson on May 18, 2007
