Boulder Int'l Film Festival Is High on the Fest Circuit

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Parent Category: Film Festivals
Category: Previews
Published on Thursday, 11 February 2010 08:57
Written by L E Shannon

The Boulder International Film Festival (BIFF) is being held February 11-14, 2010 in scenic Boulder, Colorado, featuring award-winning films and filmmakers from all over the world. Screenings are at the Boulder Theater, Boulder Public Library, and First United Methodist Church ("The Church"). 

The Opening Night Red-Carpet Gala includes the screening of The Lightkeepers, directed by Daniel Adams and starring Richard Dreyfuss, Blythe Danner, Bruce Dern, Tom Wisdom and Mamie Gummer. The film is about the lightkeeper for a lighthouse on a deserted Cape Cod beach in 1912. A mysterious man takes the position of assistant lightkeeper, and the two men swear an oath to never get involved with women. However, they soon find themselves contending with two female summer visitors. Following the screening, Ms. Danner, the director, and producer Straw Weisman will be on hand for a Q&A.

BIFF’s Closing Night Awards Ceremony will feature a tribute to Emmy Award-winning actor Alec Baldwin, who will be honored with an Award of Excellence in Acting. Included is a film retrospective of his work, followed by a Q&A hosted by BIFF executive producer Ron Bostwick.

Film highlights from the festival include:

I Am Love, directed by Luca Guadagnino, was a winner at the Venice Film Festival. Starring Tilda Swinton, this drama portrays the irresistible heat of forbidden passion within the constrained upper-class mores of an Italian family.

Last Train Home, directed by Lixin Fan. The world’s largest human migration takes place each year in China as 130 million factory workers fight for space on overcrowded trains to return home for the Spring Festival. This beautiful film captures two years in the life of the Zhangs, who left the poverty of the countryside and their children behind with their extended family.

Mugabe and the White African, directed by Lucy Bailey and Andrew Thompson, is the story of one of the few hundred white farmers left in Zimbabwe since President Robert Mugabe began his violent land seizure program in 2000. In 2008, Campbell took the unprecedented step of challenging Robert Mugabe before international court, charging him and his government with racial discrimination and violations of human rights.

Other BIFF films not to be missed:

Soundtrack for a Revolution, directed by Bill Guttentag and Dan Struman, depicts the American civil rights movement through the music that fortified protestors as they struggled for equality, with music by The Roots, Wyclef Jean, Joss Stone, Richie Havens and Harry Belafonte.

A Film with Me In It, directed by Ian Fitzgibbon, is a morbidly delightful account of a hapless out-of-work Dublin actor named Mark, who is struggling to make it through a day from hell. Together with his hilarious neighbor, Pierce, they hatch a desperate plan of treating their predicament like a film scenario and try to rewrite the day.

The Most Dangerous Man in America; Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, directed by Rick Goldsmith and Judith Ehrlich, depicts the high-level Pentagon official, former Marine and Vietnam War hawk who discovers top-secret reports detailing the lies the Pentagon had been telling the public about the war.

Wings of Silver: The Vi Cowden Story, directed by Mark and Christine Bonn. This remarkable documentary follows Vi Cowden’s journey from rural South Dakota, where she learned to fly biplanes, to her two years in the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs), for which she piloted 19 different types of fighter planes in the U.S. on enough trips to have circumnavigated the world 55 times. Healthy and lively, Vi last piloted a P-51 when she was 92.  In March the United States will award the Congressional Gold Medal to nearly 300 women, all over the age of 86, who flew fighter planes for the Army Air Corps in 1943-44. The directors will be present following the screening.

Waking Sleeping Beauty, directed by Don Hahn, is a juicy, scathing, behind-the-scenes tell-all about the turmoil at Walt Disney Studios released by, well, Walt Disney Studios. After a string of flops in the 1980s, movie animation was considered dead. Yet the ‘90s saw a staggering output of Disney hits—Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin and The Lion King. This incredibly well-crafted documentary from two-time Oscar nominee Don Hahn and then-animation-head Peter Schneider shows us a side of Disney we’ve never seen before, with feuds, ego battles, cost overruns, failed experiments—all the blood, sweat and carnage that went into the great Disney Renaissance. Magic, it seems, like sausage, is not always pretty to watch being made. This film is a must-see for all serious film heads who still believe in magic. The director will be present.

Mother, directed by Bong Joon-ho, is about a fiercely maternal single mother determined to protect her only child, a handsome but mentally challenged 27-year-old son, who was framed for a heinous murder. The small-town police and the town folk are already convinced of his guilt, while the mother ferociously goes on a hunt for the real killer herself. Bong Joon-ho, who wrote and directed the cult film The Host, has crafted a superb Hitchcockian murder mystery peppered with surprising twists coming thick and fast, which keep his audience guessing over who the real culprit is until the very end.

The Secret of Kells, directed by Tomm Moore, is an animated masterpiece that blends fantasy and Celtic mythology into a riot of color and detail. In this sweeping story about the Viking raids of Ireland, 12-year-old Brendan’s dangerous quest takes him, and the mysterious wolf-girl, Aisling, into the enchanted forest where mythical creatures hide. Director Moore scanned the stunningly beautiful illuminations of Ireland’s thousand-year-old Book of Kells into a computer program so that they would move. And then, using the same brilliant colors and flat medieval perspective, he produced a feature-length animated film that tells a hero-quest set in the time of the book.

Additionally, BIFF hosts:

The Digital Media Convergence Symposium (DiMe), a celebration of creativity, technology and those who innovate in these converging spheres. A panel of visionary leaders in the film, media and gaming industries will discuss commonalities and potential for collaboration, as well as the evolution and applications of new technology and distribution and how to engage in this profitable arena.

Call 2 Action, a program that offers concrete ways for filmgoers to translate the energy and passion that film evokes into action. Film has the unique and creative ability to educate, integrate and involve the entire community to teach us about our world.

For further information, visit www.biff1.com. 

Boulder International Film Festival (BIFF)
February 11-14, 2010

Boulder Theater, Boulder Public Library, and
First United Methodist Church ("The Church")
Boulder, Colorado