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4 years ago
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Zeitgeist Films
We may not be able to see movies in actual theaters these days and the release dates of many films have been pushed back, but some distributors are working around our current COVID-19 lockdown.
Arthouse and international film distributor Kino Lorber has recently expanded its virtual theatrical exhibition program Kino Marquee into 150 theaters nationwide. This streaming initiative enables local movie theaters shuttered by the coronavirus outbreak to continue serving their audiences while generating some revenue. Film lovers are able watch spring releases while supporting their favorite theater.
Opening on Friday through the websites of various theaters across the country is Beyond the Visible: Hilma af Klint, Halina Dyrschka’s documentary about the revolutionary Swedish artist. What a great time to immerse oneself in the fantastical world and stunning visuals of af Klint’s work. On the other hand, it’s unfortunate that the film isn’t get the big-screen release it deserves. (Hopefully in the future?)
Beyond the Visible is foremost a depiction of af Klint's unusual life, but it's framed by the bigger issue of her undervaluation and near-anonymity until recently. Though Vasily Kandinsky has generally been credited as the first abstract artist, the film makes clear that af Klint was creating abstract works years earlier. Yet, many in the U.S. had never heard of her until a retrospective was mounted in 2018 at the Guggenheim, an amazing show that [...]
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4 years ago
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Courtesy of Zeitgeist Films in Association with Kino Lorber
Ken Loach, Britain’s filmmaker laureate of socially conscious movies, often depicting working-class families, has created an emotionally wrenching, beautifully realized drama with Sorry We Missed You. What better times than this trying era for Loach, whose clear-eyed focus on the underclasses has driven his work since 1967’s Poor Cow.
He takes on the exploitation and false promises of the gig economy in his latest film, which opens with Ricky (Kris Hitchen), an unemployed father of two from Newcastle, interviewing for a van driver position with a company that's an unholy cross between Amazon and Uber. As a franchisee he’ll receive no wages, no contract, and no regular hours. “Like everything around here, it’s your choice,” says Ricky’s future boss, Maloney (Ross Brewster), regarding the decision to buy a van or rent one from the company. Ricky opts to own, even though he and his wife Abbie (Debbie Honeywood) are already in debt. There’s the dangling carrot of major money to be made, but we can already see that the couple are on a hellishly slippery slope, and not just because this is a Ken Loach movie.
Courtesy of Zeitgeist Films in Association with Kino Lorber
For her part, good-natured Abbie works tirelessly as a home health aide, visiting clients who need to be fed, cleaned and otherwise taken care of. Though the work can be frustrating, grueling and downright disgusting, Loach is careful to show t[...]
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4 years ago
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Kino Lorber
Beanpole, the second feature from acclaimed, young Russian director Kantemir Balagov, is incredibly intense and bleak, almost unbearably so at times. Though its painfully drawn out scenes are sometimes hard to watch, Beanpole is nevertheless a compelling and emotionally crushing film for most of its 130-minute runtime.
The film revisits a particularly rough time in Russian history—the immediate aftermath of World War II, when soldiers have returned from the front missing body parts and worse. Though this period has certainly been covered before, Balagov’s approach is novel, focusing on two young female machine gunners who became close during the war and reunite in Leningrad. Their fraught, almost animalistic relationship embodies the suffering each has been through; their peculiar bond is demonstrated in several scenes by long stretches in which they seem to communicate by staring wordlessly into each other’s eyes.
Iya (Viktoria Miroshnichenko), the tall, pale "beanpole" of the film's title, is first shown having a kind of seizure, during which she emits short gasps and seems paralyzed. This state is almost casually referred to as “frozen” by the people who work with her in a hospital tending to war injuries. She lives with her young son, Pashka, in a communal living space that is rundown and faded, but (thanks to cinematographer Ksenia Sereda) full of eye-catching bright greens and scarlets, colors that show up in worn but colorful clothes, in addi[...]
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4 years ago
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Little Joe, Austrian director Jessica Hausner’s first English-language film, is as spare and deliberate as it is visually arresting. With its chilly tone and gorgeous, pastel-hued visuals, the sci-fi drama is both beautiful and creepy, despite a familiar plot.
The film opens with an overhead shot of row-upon-symmetrical-row of red-hued plants in a sterile, brightly lit lab, staffed by technicians in lab coats. New to Planthouse Biotechnologies, Alice (Emily Beecham, who won Best Actress award for the film at Cannes), is lead scientist on this particular project. She has succeeded in synthetically breeding plants that will emit a scent with antidepressant properties in exchange for an abundance of TLC, including temperature control and affectionate conversation. Alice and her associate Chris (a solid-as-always Ben Whishaw) discuss the plant's readiness for market, specifically the fast-approaching Plant Fair at which it will be unveiled. Already, we feel a sense of foreboding, as the scene is punctuated by Teiji Ito and Markus Binder’s spare, haunting score.
The divorced Alice lives with her son Joe, a young teen who believes that she and Chris would make a great couple, but she has no time for romance, what with the upcoming debut of “Little Joe” (the plant is named after her son). Alice discusses this with her therapist (Lindsay Duncan), along with foreshadowy concerns about her son and the frankenplant itself. (“You never know what might happen.”) She also goes agai[...]
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4 years ago
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The 10th Anniversary edition of DOC NYC – America’s largest documentary festival – takes place from November 6 through 15. Among the 300+ films and events are 28 World Premieres, 27 U.S. Premieres, and 59 NYC Premieres. More than 500 doc makers and special guests will be on hand to present their films or participate on panels. This year’s festival is dedicated to the memory of D.A. Pennebaker (Don’t Look Back, Monterrey Pop), a DOC NYC fixture who died this past summer.
As always, there is a multitude of worthy films from all over the world, in myriad styles, about almost every conceivable subject. Individual portraits include the founder of the World Toilet Organization (Lily Zepeda's Mr. Toilet: The World’s #2 Man); an innovative and iconic punk performer (Beth B's Lydia Lynch: The War Is Never Over), and a revered Abstract Expressionist painter (Dennis Scholl's Lifeline: Clyfford Still), plus many others.
Among this year's offerings are docs sure to make you seethe (Matthew O'Connor & Barnaby O’Connor’s The Pickup Game, about the billion-dollar industry fueling the "art" of picking up women, and Deia Schlossberg’s environmental expose The Story of Plastic); docs that will crack you up (Weijun Chen's comedic City Dream, about a Chinese street vendor who clashes with authorities); and docs that will make certain people wildly nostalgic (Scott Crawford's Boy Howdy! The Story of Creem Magazine).
Here are just a few more highlights:
About LoveArchana Atul [...]
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5 years ago
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Music Box Films
Known mainly for his psycho-sexual dramas (Under the Sand, Swimming Pool), François Ozon's new film, By the Grace of God, is a surprisingly straightforward and relatively fast-paced crime drama based on recent news events that still dominate headlines in France. The film details the efforts of three men from Lyon to seek justice, having been sexually abused as children by the same priest . Well-acted, rock-solid and even suspenseful, the movie is reminiscent of 2015’s Oscar-winning Spotlight, about reporters from the Boston Globe investigating a similar cover-up by the Archdiocese of Boston. In By the Grace of God, it’s the victims themselves who initiate and carry out much of the detective work, at the same time confronting their own religious beliefs (or lack of), and residual trauma. It’s a powerful and poignant movie highlighting the struggle of sexual-abuse victims in a country where the Catholic Church is a hugely dominant institution.
We first meet Alexandre (Melvil Poupaud), a successful, religious father of five, as he learns that Father Bernard Preynat, the local priest who abused him years ago, is still working with children. Through a series of letters (voice-overs convey the copious correspondence that set events into motion), he arranges a meeting with the now elderly Preynat (Bernard Verley). The priest doesn’t deny the allegations and admits that there were many other victims, defending himself by asserting that he ha[...]
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5 years ago
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In the Family LLC
Writer/director Patrick Wang’s A Bread Factory, available in two parts via VOD this Tuesday, is a sprawling, quirk-filled ensemble film that attains a kind of greatness by its conclusion. With its many interlocking characters and plot threads, lengthy monologues, and a generous dash of absurdity (especially in Part 2), the film can sometimes feel a little unwieldy. However, A Bread Factory (the title refers to a fictional small-town arts space) is full of droll wit and affection for both its characters and for theater in general, resulting in a highly watchable four hours. Filmed like a play, with static camera angles and no soundtrack, the film is as visually simple as it is narratively complex.
At the heart of the A Bread Factory are Dorothea (Tyne Daly) and Greta (Elizabeth Henry), a older couple who have devoted their lives to running Checkford’s humble arts space, housed in, yes, a former bread factory. The women and town are shaken and stirred by the recent arrival of May Ray, a ridiculously over-the-top performance-art couple (Janet Hsieh and George Young) who have opened their own slick space, Forum for the Exercise of Experience and Living (FEEL). Some townspeople are intrigued by May Ray's otherworldly, highly synchronized performances, while others are scornful. At stake is the arts budget allocation of the local school board, without which the Bread Factory could not operate.
In the Family LLC
Part 1: For th[...]
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5 years ago
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Courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics
Though the phrase “cinematic experience” is somewhat overused and should generally be met with suspicion, Victor Kossakovsky’s Aquarela can hardly be called anything else. This startling documentary about the earth's most versatile element, water, is a mind- and eye-boggling trip, evoking both sadness and exhilaration, among other strong emotions. Shot at 96 frames per second, as opposed to the usual 24 (though theaters are only equipped to show it at 48 fps, at most), its rich visuals are so smooth they sometimes seem like CGI, but there is nothing artificial about this film.
Filmed in seven different countries, Aquarela opens on frozen Lake Baikal in Siberia, where several men are attempting to retrieve something from under the surface. Amid amplified sounds of cracking, groaning ice, it soon becomes apparent that a car has fallen into the lake. As dramatic as this seems, it’s not the last time it happens. We see two more cars speeding along the river as voices yell out “Stop, stop!” to no avail. Turns out that the lake is thawing early this year. This is our introduction to one of the film’s main themes, climate change, though it’s never discussed or openly addressed. It’s also the only scene in the movie with actual dialogue. Human beings, clearly at the mercy of the film’s subject, are not the main focus here. Adding to the strangeness of the scene is a wildly incongruous element of slapstick, as people keep falling thr[...]
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5 years ago
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Big World Pictures
“I Do Not Care if We Go Down in History as Barbarians.” So said Romanian military dictator Marshal Ion Antonescu to the Council of Ministers in 1941, in an infamous speech that kicked off a program of ethnic cleansing on the Eastern Front.
Romania’s role in the WWII holocaust is one that is often conveniently forgotten (or outright denied), but director Radu Jude wants to make sure that we remember, as does the main character in his audacious new film—which is titled “I Do Not Care if We Go Down in History as Barbarians,” complete with quotes.
The movie’s fictional stage director Mariana Marin (an electric and believable Ioana Iacob) is mounting a spectacular re-enactment of the 1941 Odessa massacre, in which Romanian soldiers allied with the Nazis to kill tens of thousands of Jews. She encounters resistance from a variety of people, including cast members, government officials, and her own boyfriend, many of whom think it’s either a bad idea to bring up old memories or simply anti-Romanian. She also has increasingly frustrating personal issues with her already-married partner. None of it stops her.
Big World Pictures
Because this is Radu Jude, however, the film’s themes are couched in scenes that are as playful and audacious as they are dark and disturbing. (The jokey tone is similar to his equally singular 2015 film Aferim!, about another shameful period in Romanian history.)
“I Do Not Care…” clocks in at a le[...]
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5 years ago
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Juno Films
An intriguing new entry in the still-alive zombie-apocalypse genre, the German-language Ever After (Endzeit), from Swedish director Carolina Hellsgård, goes deeper than most screen depictions of the undead. It's also gorgeous-looking, thanks to cinematographer Leah Striker, which adds to the film’s captivating quality.
A horror/road movie/eco-drama hybrid, Ever After focuses more on the relationship between its two main characters than on inventive portrayals of guts and decaying flesh, though there’s some of that too (but probably not enough to satisfy diehard gore fans).
At the heart of the film, which is based on the screenplay by Olivia Vieweg (who adapted it from her own graphic novel) is an unlikely alliance between two young women -- the fragile, weak-seeming Vivi (Gro Swantje Kohlhof) and badder-assed Eva (Maja Lehrer).
The setting is post-plague Germany, two years into the apocalypse, where there are human survivors in only two cities: Weimar, where the infected are killed immediately, and Jena, where people are researching a cure. Vivi and Eva meet as stowaways on a self-driving supply train from the former to the latter city. Though temperamentally and emotionally very different, they’re both searching for something lost in their former lives. It's a setup that could have led to a more conventional apocalypse survival story, but Ever After ultimately winds up veering into an entirely different direction.
Juno Films
Forced to ditc[...]
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5 years ago
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Mademoiselle Paradis
The 11th edition of the Panorama Europe film festival, co-presented by Museum of the Moving Image (MoMI) and the members of European Union National Institutes for Culture (EUNIC), will take place from Friday, May 3, through Sunday, May 19.
The 17 films screening this year, programmed by David Schwartz, MoMI curator-at-large, represent some of the continent’s most intriguing emerging directors, nine of them women. Included are both documentaries and fiction, many of them set in contemporary Europe, reflecting its current state of flux. Though the films tackle weighty subjects such as politics, history, labor, and feminism, their stories focus on the lives of individuals.
In addition to films from cinematically prolific countries such as Germany, Spain and France, there are entries from Malta, Slovakia, and Croatia, among other places that are not as widely represented on screen, providing welcome glimpses into those cultures.
Screenings will take place at the Museum of the Moving Image (36-01 35th Avenue, Astoria) and Bohemian National Hall (321 East 73rd Street, Manhattan).
The festival opens with the U.S. premiere of Mademoiselle Paradis, Barbara Albert’s excellent period drama, starring Romanian actress Maria Dragus as blind, 18th-century pianist Maria-Theresia Paradis. Though visually lush and authentic to its time, this mildly satirical film is also feminist in its depiction of a determined young [...]
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5 years ago
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Courtesy of IFC Films
Diane, the narrative debut by Kent Jones (director of the New York Film Festival) is a thoughtful, deeply affecting film, especially so for viewers who are middle-aged or older, or have recently been touched by death. (Though all but the most shallow of viewers will probably feel something.)
The film, which stars Mary Kay Place in one of the most intense and substantial roles of her career, is the portrait of a woman who busies herself caring for those around her while struggling with shame, loss and no less than the meaning of life itself.
In many ways she is like all of us, which is why the movie resonates. Ostensibly a simple story of an ordinary life in a New England town, Diane almost furtively tackles the Big Issues. The film starts off stylistically straightforward, with close-ups of mundane kitchen items and conventionally framed conversations, before becoming progressively more surreal, as if showing how we, like Diane, are part of a bigger picture that we can't really control, or even grasp at times.
Courtesy of IFC Films
We first see Diane asleep in a hospital room chair, as the room’s occupant, her cousin Donna (a sharp Deirdre O'Connell), asks if she's OK. Throughout the movie, various friends, relatives and acquaintances will inquire about Diane’s well-being, as she cares for them. A retired widow, she brings food to ailing neighbors and volunteers at a soup kitchen with her friend Bobbie (a sympathetic Andrea Martin). She a[...]
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