Miami International Film Festival
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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 […]
by Carlos Aguilar on May 14, 2019 -
Spring Festivals on the Sea: Borscht, Miami and Annapolis
Around the time Miami’s Borscht Diez went down in late February, Black Cinema seemed to take over the world for a second. That was cool; Get Out was all anyone wanted to talk about. The doldrums of the country’s greater ills lifted somewhat during that thriller of a week, in which the Oscar Best Picture winner and the number one movie in America were suddenly, and for the first time ever, directed by African-Americans. That the former had been incubated by the country’s most outlandish short filmmaking outfit, Borscht Corp.— which goes out of its way to produce work by people of […]
by Brandon Harris on Apr 20, 2017 -
Film as a “Spiritual Memory”: Writer/Director Monica Peña on Her Miami International Film Festival Premiere, Hearts of Palm
Writer/director Monica Peña obliterates the notion of sophomore slump with her second independently produced feature film, Hearts of Palm, which will have its world premiere at Miami Dade College’s Miami International Film Festival tonight. With this movie, the Miami-based Cuban-American filmmaker has only advanced her avant-garde exploration of film narrative, which she first introduced us to with Ectotherms in 2014. Whereas her first film examined the lives of four Miami youths trapped in suburban anomie, her latest takes on a more personal subject: love turned sour. Both films are strongly rooted in Miami. The first contains allusions to the plight […]
by Hans Morgenstern on Mar 9, 2016 -
Vice City: The 31st Miami International Film Festival
Like many so-called “regional” film festivals, the Miami International Film Festival might not be on the tip of every rising filmmaker’s tongue when figuring out where they ought to submit. Struggles to get attention from the film world at large aren’t new for festivals taking place in non-media hub cities that happen to be events where movies aren’t bought and sold, just shown. Regardless of whether they’re “regional” or not, such festivals often get stuck with that half derogatory term. Such is the case with Miami even though it’s in a major city, is over 30 years old and has improved […]
by Brandon Harris on Mar 25, 2014 -
At 30, Miami Film Festival Finds its Niche
The Miami International Film Festival wrapped its 30th edition this past weekend, unspooling 138 films across 10 days. The program was strong enough across its myriad sections that many longtime observers were calling it the best iteration of the festival in memory, with a smattering of noteworthy films pulled from the mega festivals sprinkled across a wide reaching selection of work new and old. While light on significant premieres, sandwiched as it is between True/False and SXSW, it is a well-oiled machine, organized and efficient, with well-attended screenings that start on time in multiplexes, microcinemas and beautiful movie palaces such […]
by Brandon Harris on Mar 11, 2013 -
THE MIAMI INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2011
I guess it should come as no surprise that my preference for film festivals tends to follow my sensibility when it comes to films themselves. If everyone in the blogosphere and beyond is talking about the upcoming Hollywood blockbuster or even the latest offering from the mumblecore crowd, I’ll want to review what’s coming out of Kazakhstan (The Gift to Stalin — three stars!) or rave about an undistributed doc that takes a refreshing look at a trio of grandma-age sex workers in Berlin (Saara Aila Waasner’s uplifting Frauenzimmer). I often feel like I’m out of the loop as the […]
by Lauren Wissot on Apr 1, 2011
