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Film Festivals
True/False Film Fest: A New Breed of Film Festival
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- Parent Category: Film Festivals
- Category: Previews
- Published on Thursday, 08 March 2012 16:48
- Written by Renzo Adler
For its 9th installment, the True/False Film Festival (March 1-4, 2012) returns to Columbia, Missouri for a unique combination of film festival, carnival, summer camp and political discussion. True/False brings a unique blend of films,some discovered at Sundance or Toronto, others making their premiere, but all deeply engaging and provocative.
The theme of the festival deals with documentaries, but also films about discovery or unearthing the truth. Rather than just a few movies in a dark room with a bloated party and pedantic step-and-repeats, True/False is a festival with a sense of purpose along with a sense of humor.
To simply call True/False a film fest does not totally do it justice as it also has an extensive programing that includes over 30 bands that perform through the course of the festival, field trips, campfire stories (really!) with film makers, stand-up comedy, breakfast, parades, folk and outsider art exhibitions, and celebration of “Buskers” (antiquated colloquialism for street-performers).
True/False features a whopping 40 feature films covering everything from artistic expression in the face of political oppression (Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry), shocking horror (V/H/S), to charming looks into the psyches of nerds (Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope). Special free screenings happen outdoors at the Great Wall, a wall outside a Methodist Church, that offers a unique viewing experience. There are also 20 short films and panel discussions which are free and open to the public that cover politicals, film making, technology, and more.
True/False also created the True Life Fund. Fesitval organizers state that "The True Life Fund demonstrates that documentaries can create change by offering tangible assistance to the real-life subjects of a new non-fiction film. And it acknowledges that documentary filmmakers and festivals thrive because of the stories given to us by people often of limited means."
This year the True Life Fund focuses on Bully, which chronicles a year in the life of five kids and their families who courageously share their stories to inspire change in how society deals with bullying. To assist the True Life Fund is the True Life Run marathon, in which participators can win prizes from local businesses and passes to next year’s festival.
Never before has a film festival had such a varied and wild assortment of programming. True/False is a festival in the truest sense of the word. Combining film, documentary, arts, and performance, True/False dares to do more than simply pander to big studios or pigeonhole itself. True/False is a new breed of film festival that believes in re-invention.
To learn more, go to www.truefalse.org
True/False Film Festival
March 1-4, 2012
Columbia, Missouri
Brooklyn Film Fest Submission Deadline: March 7
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- Parent Category: Film Festivals
- Category: Previews
- Published on Friday, 02 March 2012 15:15
- Written by Renzo Adler
Entering its fifteenth year, the Brooklyn Film Festival (June 1-10 at indieScreen and Brooklyn Heights Cinema) is in its late submission rounds for accepting entries.
The deadline for late submissions is March 7, 2012 for entries submitted through Withoutabox or films can be sent in by mail until March 7. The Brooklyn Film Fest is a British Academy Awards (BAFTA) qualifying festival.
Past winning films include Battle for Brooklyn, A Morning Stroll, and Scrapper.
Brooklyn Film Fest spokespeople state that the “…BFF mission is to provide a public forum in Brooklyn in order to advance public interest in films and the independent production of films. To draw worldwide attention to Brooklyn as a center for cinema. To encourage the rights of all Brooklyn residents to access and experience the power of independent filmmaking, and to promote artistic excellence and the creative freedom of artists without censure. BFF, inc. is a not-for-profit organization.”
To learn more, go to http://www.brooklynfilmfestival.org/
The Brooklyn Film FestJune 1-10indieScreen285 Kent Avenue,Brooklyn, NY 11211
Brooklyn Heights Cinema70 Henry Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201
Rendez-vous 2012: The French Are Coming (Again)
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- Parent Category: Film Festivals
- Category: Previews
- Published on Friday, 02 March 2012 15:00
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Since 1996, Rendez-vous with French Cinema has introduced New Yorkers to the newest and -- sometimes, as last year with Bertrand Tavernier’s The Princess of Montpensier -- best films from France. Even though the 2012 edition is no different (25 new features and a handful of shorts are scheduled during its run at the Film Society, IFC Center and BAM), there’s a bonus: a sidebar of classic and contemporary films that, like the recent Film Comment Selects series, gives Rendez-vous greater breadth.
The Weird and the Wonderful of New Orleans at BAMcinématek
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- Parent Category: Film Festivals
- Category: Previews
- Published on Thursday, 01 March 2012 15:33
- Written by Renzo Adler
From March 28 to April 1 and on April 8, 2012, the BAMcinématek will present New Orleans on Film, featuring 10 films on the fabled city, leading up to New Orleans music legend Dr. John’s nine-night residency at BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House this spring.
The Jim Jarmusch film Down by Law features musician Tom Waits and John Lurie, as well as Roberto Benigni (yes, the same actor/director who made Life is Beautiful) as three wrongfully imprisoned convicts on the lamb. Down By Law portrays New Orleans as a nexus of constant duality. A place where someone can be mired in despair, and yet be able to meet a companion that is equally mired.
Down by Law is a film as much about the strangeness of Americana as it is about the strangeness of New Orleans.As eclectic and fascinating as the actual city of New Orleans is, so too is this festival.
Spanning almost every genre of film, the oldest film in the festival is the 1934 Mae West starrer, Belle of the Nineties, while the most recent are the 2009 Abel Ferrara's post-Katrina crime drama Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans and Disney’s return to traditional animation, The Princess and the Frog. This festival embraces New Orleans both as a place of strange possibility and as a place of seedy but beautiful despair.
Paul Schrader’s 1982 remake of Val Lewton’s Cat People is a smoldering film that eschews Lewton’s subtlety for acts of debauchery punctuated by bloodshed. Nastassja Kinski slinks across a New Orleans in which the humidity is almost palpable to the viewer. While it lays the stereotypes of voodoo and decadence a little thick, Cat People is still a cult classic.
On the other side of the coin is Disney’s Princess and the Frog, a film which began to pull Disney back to traditional animation after several clumsy attempts at making CGI films without Pixar holding their hand. While the Randy Newman score can be distracting at times, Princess has a wonderful aesthetic combining 1920’s art deco evocative of Disney animator Mary Blair (Sleeping Beauty), with excellent natural and urban landscapes brought to life with post-Lion King elasticity.
Often when we think of New Orleans on film, we go to either the vested but somewhat tired classics like A Streetcar Named Desire, or to the absurdly stereotyped "Big Easy" of films like Live and Let Die.
This festival creates a picture of New Orleans that feels more whole, a place that is simultaneously beautiful and terrible, an exotic and fragile world that is bound by the same burdens of humanity as anywhere else, but still maintaining and unmistakable charm.
To learn more go to: http://www.bam.org/BAMcinematek
New Orleans on Film
March 28 - April 1
BAMcinématek
30 Lafayette Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11217
