Austin Film Festival Offers Visionary Filmmakers and Exceptional Films

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Tuesday, 24 September 2013 10:32

Written by Evan Pearson

For 20 years, the Austin Film Festival has provided world-class premieres, documentaries, and local films, and the 2013 AFF and Conference is no different. A uniquely pro-artist festival that focuses on the directors and creative minds behind some of the most contemporary, thought-provoking, and eclectic films that will come out all year, the films at this year's AFF are as eclectic as the diverse artists who the festival will honor. As Barbara Morgan, the AFF’s executive director, said of this iteration, “As the festival that honors the writer, we are thrilled to continue a program that boasts strong narrative work, eclectic world premieres, and retrospectives presented by some of the industry’s top filmmakers during this momentous 20^th Anniversary.” Looking at the roster of films set for the Conference and for the festival’s yearlong outreach - with more billed attractions added daily as the festival nears - it’s hard to disagree.

Beyond the world-class films, film and writing awards, workshops, and local nightlife events – all stellar reasons to attend the festival, as anyone who’s visited Austin and taken in it’s rich culture can attest to – the festival offers sit-downs with panelists who represent some of the more brilliant minds in film today with a focus on writers and directors and their creative processes. Notable attendants include the Academy Award-winning director Jonathan Demme, Vince Gilligan (creator of Breaking Bad), Jim Taylor (the writer of Sideways and About Schmidt), and Norman Steinberg, the co-writer of the classic Blazing Saddles.

This is just being the tip of the iceberg, as these 8 days promise to be revelatory for those interested in how the ideas and the inspiration for their projects come about. When coupled with the retrospective showings of works that inspired these panelists to create, these panels dive deep into the works of these creators and promise to be both highly educational and wildly entertaining.

In many cases, the films that will show at the 2013 Austin Film Festival are world premieres from local artists and state-of-the-art international directors and writers, with topic matters diverse and challenging enough to entice even the most jaded viewer. Some of the more interesting works include the black and white Nebraska directed by Alexander Payne and starring Will Forte as a long-suffering son on the way to claim his father’s sweepstakes winnings, the horror film Innocence produced by Christine Vachone (Boys Don’t Cry) and based on Jane Mendelsohn’s 2000 novel, and Siren, seasoned television writer Jesse Peyronel’s directorial debut starring Vinessa Shaw (3:10 to Yuma, The Hills Have Eyes). Buffeted with sneak peaks of works in progress and other exclusives by featured directors, AFF offerings are exceptional in quality and provide lasting value for aficionados and casual viewers alike, all centered around Austin’s prolific culture and the minds and work that brings these wonderful projects to light.

This 20^th Anniversary Austin Film Festival and Conference takes place from October 24^th-31^st, 2013 and is highly recommended for fans of film and film writing in general. Badges and Passes are available for purchase online 24 hours a day along with a constantly updating film and event schedule at www.austinfilmfestival.com.

Austin Film Festival and Conference
October 24^th-31^st, 2013
Paramount Theatre, Alamo Drafthouse Village, Long Center Rollins Theatre, Hideout Theater, and the Bob Bullock Texas State History Musuem IMAX Theater.
www.austinfilmfestival.com.

Bend Film Festival Announces Principal Lineup

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Monday, 23 September 2013 10:41

Written by Kyle Sittig

This year’s 10^th Anniversary Bend Film Festival, running from October 10^th -12^th, opens with Francesca Gregorini’s The Truth About Emanuel. The film stars Jessica Biel and Kaya Scodelario and centers around a girl’s strange obsession with a new neighbor. A House, A Home, the short film by Daniel Fickle will show before The Truth About Emanuel.

The BFF has also announced three other films that will join in the competition, including the West Coast premiere of Tom Gilroy’s The Cold Lands, a story about grief and reality in the wake of loss. Neil LaBute’s Some Velvet Morning, an intense two-person drama starring just Stanley Tucci and Alice Eve, about the reunion of ex-lovers, will follow.

Dave Carroll’s Bending Steel is among the BFF’s three featured documentaries. Carroll’s documentary follows Chris Schoeck, a man determined to overcome body and mind to revitalize the art of the olde-time strongman. Also in the documentary lineup, BFF has Nicholas D. Wrathall’s attack on the radical Right Wing of the United States, Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia. Hunter Week’s Walter will be the third of the festival’s core documentary lineup. The film follows Hunter Week and his wife, as they try to meet the world’s eldest people, many of which were born in the 1800’s.

The BFF is looking as strong as ever in its tenth year, refreshingly bringing some independent film love to the Pacific Northwest.

The 10^th Anniversary Bend Film Festival
October 10^th- 12^th, 2013

2013 NYFF Masterworks Sidebar Unearths Cinematic Glories

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Parent Category: Film Festivals

Category: Previews

Published on Friday, 20 September 2013 04:17

Written by Jack Angstreich

The Film Society of Lincoln Center has recast its New York Film Festival "Masterworks" sidebar under the new rubric, "Revivals", this year featuring a handful of outstanding classics in beautiful 35mm prints.

Arthur Ripley's underrated, experimental, early film noir, The Chase, about a down-on-his-luck ex-GI who tries to help the beautiful wife of a menacing gangster who employs him as a chauffeur, is being shown in the fine UCLA restoration print. The Chase boasts outstanding credits — a screenplay by Philip Yordan, adapted from one of Cornell Woolrich's "Black" series novels, and photographed by the great Franz Planer — but Ripley's demonstrates an authorial sensibility that can also be detected in his later Thunder Road. Some of the nightmarish elements and unorthodox structure must be owed to Woolrich but the elegance of the realization must largely be credited to Ripley's mise-en-scène. Robert Cummings is characteristically lackluster as the hero but Steve Cochran as the heavy provides the requisite menace while Michele Morgan — still alive at age 93! — as the wife radiates the necessary glamour; however, the film is stolen, unsurprisingly, by Peter Lorre as the gangster's henchman.

Screening with The Chase are two short, recent animated films directed by Mark Kausler and produced by Greg Ford, presented here in digital video: It's The Cat! (2004) and Some Other Cat (2012) — these successfully attempt to recapture the distinctive qualities of 1920s and 1930s Hollywood cartoons, replete with period music.

Nicholas Ray's first feature, the classic film noir They Live by Night, about a pair of young lovers on the run, is one of the most impressive debuts in the history of cinema. Based on a classic crime novel, Thieves Like Us by Edwin Anderson — and later filmed by Robert Altman in the early 1970s, this features the most memorable performances of Farley Granger and Cathy O'Donnell, as the doomed lovers. The film was screened in a handsome, restored print.

Another recent Ray restoration in a very fine print was also shown:  the wonderful The Lusty Men, about an ex-rodeo-performer — played with effortless aplomb by Robert Mitchum — who takes up with a younger ranch-hand (Arthur Kennedy, effectively cast) trying to earn big money on the circuit. The great cinematographer Lee Garmes achieves an evocative, lyrical naturalism while Susan Hayward shines as the ranch-hand's wife. Arthur Hunnicut as a voluble ex-rodeo-star steals every scene he is in.

The digital restoration of Martin Scorsese's magnificent Edith Wharton adaptation, The Age of Innocence, screened from a DCP, was deeply unsatisfactory with disastrous loss of detail, even at 4K, and range of contrast. Under such circumstances, one's attention is directed to the work of the actors and the film's score, both of which are stellar.

For more information, go to: www.filmlinc.com and follow @filmlinc on Twitter.

The 51st New York Film Festival
Septermber 27 - October 13, 2013