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 […]

Whenever directors watch their own films, they always do so with the knowledge that there are moments that occurred during their production — whether that’s in the financing and development or shooting or post — that required incredible ingenuity, skill, planning or just plain luck, but whose difficulty is invisible to most spectators. These are the moments directors are often the most proud of, and that pride comes with the knowledge that no one on the outside could ever properly appreciate what went into them. So, we ask: “What hidden part of your film are you most privately proud of […]

“It’d be nice if you could come up here, maybe distract me from my work,” H (Liam Gillick) tells his wife D (Viviane Albertine) at the start of Joanna Hogg’s surprising and stunning new film Exhibition. The two speak via intercom, from separate stories of their postmodern London behemoth, and Hogg’s film is as much about communication, or lack there of, as it is about staving off our most prized objectives. D and H — both artists, only one of whom is “successful” — have decided to sell their house after living there for nearly 20 years. That decision, or rather, acquiescence on D’s part, […]

The Locarno Film Festival opened Wednesday with a bang — or two, to be exact. There was the bombastic Opening Night selection in the Piazza Grande, which was the Mark Wahlberg/Denzel Washington vehicle 2 Guns — what one fellow critic called Lethal Weapon for 2013 (and seemingly a bizarre choice incongruous with the rest of the programming) — and there was the massive summer storm that stole the film’s thunder and literally dampened the affair. The Piazza, one of the largest outdoor screening venues in Europe, is where Locarno the town and Locarno the international festival literally come together — and […]