War, Marriage, & More at New York Baltic Film Festival

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Tuesday, 01 November 2022 14:14

Written by Brad Balfour

Mariupolis 2

Now in it’s fifth year. the New York Baltic Film Festival (NYBFF), presented by Scandinavia House: The Nordic Center in America, will be running November 2-13, 2022 as a hybrid festival featuring Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian cinema. The in-person portion of the fest takes place at New York’s Scandinavia House (58 Park Ave, New York, NY) from November 2nd to the 6th and virtually November 4th to the 13th.

The theme for this year’s festival is  Past or Present, inspired by the intense emotional response felt in the Baltic countries following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Jūle Rozīte, the festival's Head of Programs, states: “When the war started, Eastern Europeans and many of us globally experienced the dissonance of seeing both past and present play out simultaneously. Suddenly, family traumas and collective memories were forced to the surface, as the inherited stories of occupation we have grown up hearing were playing out in real-time in Ukraine. Cinema from the Baltics can remind us of what was, act as a warning, elicit communal resistance and instill hope for a better tomorrow.”

The festival opens on Wednesday, November 2 with  the animated feature My Love Affair With Marriage, directed by Latvian-born and Brooklyn-based Signe Baumane.The film is a wild semi-autobiographical musical journey, exploring the notions of love, sex, and romance through the lens of neurochemistry. Baumane’s fiercely original and visually arresting work was recognized with the Jury Distinction for Feature Film at the Annecy International Animated Film Festival this year.

The documentary Mariupolis 2 is a harrowing look at Russia’s brutal siege of Mariupol in Ukraine this year. The director, Mantas Kvedaravičius, was tragically killed during filming. Mariupolis 2 was recognized with a Golden Eye Special Mention at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. The festival will also screen the film’s predecessor, Mariupolis, in which Kvedaravičius documented the lives of people during Russia’s attacks on Mariupol back in 2014.

Burial, directed by Emilija Škarnulytė, is a hypnotizing meditation on the power and danger of nuclear energy, presenting the paradox of scientific advancement coupled with environmental destruction with a meticulously crafted, eerie soundscape. Škarnulytė will be joined for a discussion with MoMA curator Sophie Cavoulacos following the screening.

To learn more, go to: https://www.scandinaviahouse.org/

New York Baltic Film Festival
November 2 - 13, 2022

Scandinavia House
58 Park Ave
New York, NY 10016

10th Annual Nyack Film Festival Features Works From Around the World

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

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Published on Wednesday, 10 August 2022 21:07

Written by Brad balfour

Now in its tenth year, the Nyack Film Festival returns with five nights of cinematic goodness August 14th to the 18th. Held at Hotel Nyack the festival features 64 films from artists around the world. Films include This Too Shall Pass, a short contemplating the fraught emotions and isolation caused by the pandemic. Inspired by true events, The Recess explores gender oppression in Iranian society as a young girl is caught trying to disguise herself as a man in order to see a soccer game. The Brink Of is a musical romance film about an indie pop duo, navigating their tumultuous relationship as partners on the brink of mainstream success. Glooscap And Noogami  is an animated short loosely based on the Wabanaki creation story. Marijuana Minutes follows an unambitious stoner as she finds her easy-going life turned upside down thanks to a vape pen that allows her to travel through time.

After the festival closes there will be a free outdoor film screening of VIRGIN BLACKTOP: A New York Skate Odyssey in Nyack Memorial Park, next to the river and under the stars, on Friday, August 19, starting at 8pm.

To learn more, go to: https://nyackfilmfestival.com/

10th Annual Nyack Film Festival 2022
August 14 - 18, 2022

Hotel Nyack JdV by Hyatt
400 High Ave
Nyack, NY 10960

See It Big: 70MM!: Cinema Classics Larger Than Life

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Wednesday, 27 July 2022 16:22

Written by Brad Balfour

Brainstorm

Movies feel truly larger than life on the big screen, and in 70mm they feel even bigger. The Museum of the Moving Image (36-01 35th Ave, Queens, NY) presents See It Big: 70MM, a special series of classic and contemporary films. The films will be shown at MoMI’s Sumner M. Redstone Theater from August 5 to September 4th.

Among the highlights this year are two titles from Disney long unavailable in 70mm: Sleeping Beauty (1959), the first feature animation to be released in the Super Technirama 70 format, and Tron (1982), the groundbreaking sci-fi thriller featuring innovative early CGI, which celebrates its 40th anniversary this year. The series also includes Paul Thomas Anderson’s Licorice Pizza (2021) and Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood (2019)—two retro Hollywood works by filmmakers who continue to shoot on celluloid. The series opens with Brainstorm (1983), one of only two films directed by the brilliant visual-effects master Douglas Trumbull, who died earlier this year, and closes with Top Gun (1986).

The Saturday, August 20 screening of Sleeping Beauty will be introduced by John Canemaker, the Academy Award–, Emmy Award–, and Peabody Award–winning animation filmmaker, historian, and NYU professor. He has authored twelve books on film animation history—with subjects including Winsor McCay, Felix the Cat, Tex Avery, and numerous Disney artists. He is professor emeritus of Animation Studies at New York University Tisch School of the Arts, where he headed the animation program from 1988–2022.

To learn more, go to: https://movingimage.us/series/see-it-big-70mm-6/

See It Big: 70MM!
August 5–September 4, 2022

Museum of the Moving Image
36-01 35th Ave
Queens, NY 11106