Premiere Brazil 2012 at MoMA Brings New Brazilian Directors

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Wednesday, 18 July 2012 17:21

Written by Renzo Adler

Along with the Brasil Summerfest, MoMA will be holding its own celebration of Brazilian culture. No stranger to great screening great works of film, The Museum of Modern Art (11 West 53rd Street, NY, NY), in conjunction with the Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival, presents the 10th installment of the Premiere Brazil! film series July 12- 24, 2012.

As this is the tenth anniversary of the festival, many of the directors being featured have taken part in previous installments. This includes

• Eduardo Coutinho
• Beto Brant
• Selton Mello
• Breno Silveira
• Eryk Rocha

along with several newcomer directors such as Kiko Goifman and Claudia Priscilla.  Films being screened include

• Heleno
  Dir. José Henrique Fonseca
   
• As Canções / Songs
  Dir. Eduardo Coutinho
   
• À Beira do Caminho / Roadside
  Dir. Breno Silveira
   
• Os Últimos Cangaceiros / The Last Cangaceiros
  Dir. Wolney Oliveira
   
• O Palhaço / The Clown
  Dir. Selton Mello
   
• Transeunte / Passerby
  Dir. Eryk Rocha
   
• 5 x Pacificação / Peace in Rio
  Dir. Wagner Novais
   
• São Bernardo 
  Dir. Leon Hirszman
  (Special restored print)
   
• A Hora e a Vez de Augusto Matraga / Matraga
  Dir. Vinícius Coimbra
   
• Olhe pra Mim de Novo / Look at Me Again
  Dir. Kiko Goifman
   
• Corações Sujos / Dirty Hearts
  Dir. Vicente Amorim
   
• Eu Receberia as Piores Notícias dos seus Lindos Lábios / I’d Receive the Worst News from Your Beautiful Lips
  Dir. Beto Brant

• 5 x Favela: Now By Ourselves 
  Dir. Cacau Amaral, Rodrigo Felha, Luciano Vidigal, Cadu Barcellos, Luciana Bezerra, Manaíra Carneiro and Wagner Novais 

Premier Brazil offers a great selection of new and old Brazilian directors and continues the tradition of great film series at MoMA.

To learn more, go to http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/films/1283

Premiere Brazil
July 12-24

The Museum of Modern Art
11 West 53rd Street
New York, NY 10019

17th Annual GenArt Film Fest -- 7 Shorts/Features/Parties in 7 Days

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Monday, 09 July 2012 05:00

Written by Brad Balfour

Nearly 20 years ago GenArt was launched as an arts and entertainment organization dedicated to supporting emerging talent, especially of its founders' generation. To support that mission it founded the GenArt Film Festival (GAFF) which continues this month in its 17th edition.

GAFF has established itself as one of New York’s most celebrated film festivals showcasing emerging filmmakers and actors.

Running from August 8-14, 2012, the festival’s unique format premieres one feature film and one short for seven consecutive nights, each followed by a Q&A with the cast and after-party. GAFF uniquely allows film lovers to experience a movie premiere like a true insider.

The 14 selected films include performances from actors such as Bryan Greenberg, Laura Prepon, Kathy Bates, Dreama Walker, and Mickey Sumner, with directorial debuts from Ryan Eggold and Jaime King.

Opening the festival will be the comedy Missed Connections, directed by Martin Snyder and starring Jon Abrahams, Mickey Sumner, Julia Jones, and Malcolm Barrett. And closing this year’s festival will be the world premiere of The Kitchen, directed by Isai Shetton and starring Laura Prepon, Dreama Walker, and Bryan Greenberg.

Confirmed notable attendees include:

Bryan Greenberg
Laura Prepon
Mickey Sumner
Toby Hemingway
Julia Jones
Jon Abrahams
Waris Ahluwalia
Greta Gerwig
Chris Benz
Annabelle Dexter Jones
Martin Snyder (Missed Connections director)
John Shepard
Gina Busch
Nelson Cheng (The Magic Life director)
Michael Friedland
Megan Boone
Jennifer Clary (The Silent Thief director)
Josh Pence
Nathan and Marc Zellner
Tate Ellington
Pepper Binkley
Adam Chambers
Jillian Clare
Vito Cottone
Ishai Setton (The Kitchen director)
Ryan Eggold (Literally, Right Before Aaron director)
Adam Rose
members of the band MGMT
GenArt CEO Marc Lotenberg

Jury members include award-winning writer, director, and producer Jay Duplass; entertainment journalist Ben Lyons; Webby-Award winning critic and host Matt Singer; and ABC News Radio host David Blaustein.

Each night the fest follows a basic schedule of a cocktail reception at 6:30  and then, at 7:30 the screening begins followed by Q&A with cast and after-party.

SCHEDULE:

• Wednesday, August 8
  Feature: Missed Connections directed by Martin Snyder; starring Jon Abrahams, Mickey Sumner – Comedy; Short: “Old Man” directed by Leah Shore – Animated Documentary
• Thursday, August 9
  Feature: Privacy directed by Jorg Ihle; starring John Shepard, Gina Busch – Thriller
  Short: Rolling on the Floor Laughing directed by Russell Harbaugh– Drama
• Friday, August 10
  Feature: The Magic Life directed by Nelson Cheng – Documentary
  Short: Cadaver directed by Jonah Ansell; starring Christopher Lloyd, Kathy Bates, Tavi Gevinson – Animation 
• Saturday, August 11
  Feature: Leave Me Like You Found Me directed by Adele Romanski; starring Megan Boone, David Nordstrom – Drama
  Short: Latch Key directorial debut from Jaime King; starring Spencer Susser, Kyle Newman – Drama
• Sunday, August 12
  Feature: The Silent Thief directed by Jennifer Clary; starring Toby Hemingway, Cody Longo, Scout Taylor-Compton, Kurt Fuller, John Billingsley – Thriller
  Short: Reform directed by Jamal Caesar; starring Jake Hoffman – Drama
• Monday, August 13
  Feature: Kid-Thing, A Zellner Brothers film; starring Sydney Aguirre, David Wingo, Nathan, David Zellner – Drama
  Short: Carbon for Water directed by Evan Abramson and Carmen Lopez Abramson – Documentary
• Tuesday, August 14
  Feature: The Kitchen directed by Ishai Shetton; starring Laura Prepon, Dreama Walker, Bryan Greenberg – Comedy – *World Premiere
  Short: Literally, Right Before Aaron directorial debut from Ryan Eggold; starring Adam Rose, Lindsey Kraft – Comedy

The GenArt Film Festival’s week of premieres has spotlighted some of the talented emerging filmmakers in North America. GenArt’s roster of events and programs are tailored to give up-and-coming filmmakers a platform to propel them into the spotlight. GenArt has helped launch the careers of countless influential filmmakers including: 

• Brad Anderson
• Richard Shepard
• George Ratliff
• Jesse Peretz
• Adrienne Shelly
• Tim Blake Nelson,
• Cary Fukunaga
• Drake Doremus

Now noted actors who have all made debuts with GenArt as well include:

• Rooney Mara
• Malin Ackerman
• Krysten Ritter
• Adrien Grenier
• Josh Radnor
• Adrien Brody

For updates regarding the GenArt Film Festival follow on Twitter (@GenArt) and through the festival’s hashtag: #genartfilmfest or go to: www.genart.com

The 17^th Annual GenArt Film Festival
August 8 - 14, 2012

School of Visual Arts Theatre
333 West 23^rd Street
New York City

August 8-13 after-parties: 

Thompson LES
190 Allen St.
Lower East Side

Closing night party, August 14:  

Gallery Bar
120 Orchard St.
Lower East Side

Robot Film Festival Rises Up Again

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Saturday, 07 July 2012 17:55

Written by Laura Blum

“Why do robots always get a bad rep?” was the rhetorical quibble that prompted social robotist Heather Knight to found the Robot Film Festival last year. Now back for its second installment (July 14, 2012 at Manhattan's 3LD Art & Technology Center), the fest aims to burnish the image of artificially intelligent creatures, which Knight vindicates as "good guys if we design them right.”

As befits a celebration of automata, RFF is quick and efficient enough to achieve its task in one day. It's up and at it with mimosas, caffeine and a morning matinee screening of Jake Shreier's directorial debut, Robot & Frank.

The sci fi comedy follows retired cat burgler (Frank Langella), who persuades his humanoid robot caretaker (voice of Peter Sarsgaard) to assist on one last heist. It snagged an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation award at this year's Sundance Film Festival, and is RFF's designated feature to assay its 2012 theme evaluating the impact of emerging technologies: "Are Robots Man’s New Best Friend?"

"Robots are not merely a type of character, but rather a medium for character -- just as animation and puppets and costumes allow us to experiment with our conceptions of ourselves and others,” observes Festival co-producer Marek Michalowski of BeatBots.

Though RFF calls itself a film festival, live performances, art installations and robot demos render the algorithm intriguingly more complex. It's really more of a variety show spliced with a TED Conference and flowing with mood lubricants.

The day culminates with the 2nd annual Botsker Awards, where the verdicts of RFF's juried short film showcase will be revealed amid the robo-antics of emcee and comedian/musician Reggie Watts.

Botsker categories include:

• Best Robot Actor
• Best Human as Robot Actor
• Best Human-Robot Interaction
• Most Uncanny Interaction

Held in a venue evocative of Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, the ceremony will kick off with the descent of mini-humanoids across the red carpet and close with Josh Ventura and Data the Robot -- his sidekick programmed by Knight -- in a number billed as a "human-robot dance."

Also getting his groove on will be BeatBots’ Keepon robot. Attendees are invited to pose on the Step & Repeat with the human-sized robot Millennia, known for her flirty come ons and snide asides.

Knight's résumé is hardly the usual festival curator's. She runs Marilyn Monrobot, a robot theater company which creates socially intelligent robot performances and sensor-based electronic art.

Her background includes stints at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Syyn Labs (with whom she built the award-winning This Too Shall Pass music video for OK GO), Aldebaran Robotics and the Personal Robots Group at the MIT Media Lab. Knight graced the 2011 Forbes List for 30 under 30 in Science.

Whether festival-goers will be too distracted by their mobile devices to absorb the concepts and queries of the Robot Film Festival remains to be seen. “Are we also out-of-touch with human character?" wonders Knight.

This Bastille Day rise up and storm the Festival barracks to find out. For more info or tickets, go to: http://robotfilmfestival.com or @robotfilmfest

Robot Film Festival
Saturday, July 14, 2012
10:30 am - 10 pm

3LD Art and Technology Center
80 Greenwich St.
New York, NY 10006