La Pistola

Procrastinating on Premieres – Let’s eat.

I’ve been writing and rewriting a piece on the issue of premieres and film festivals for a week or so now. To be honest, I’m not sure what to do with it. The more I find information on who stole what from who, which festival claimed a premiere that actually wasn’t, the sheer volume of first-time filmmakers that have been led this way and that by festivals and film societies that are, on the surface, created to showcase film not hinder where else it can be screened, the more depressed I become. I’ve tried to bring this issue up before with people—festival directors and programmers—and it usually doesn’t get very far.

I was happy to read in a recent Variety article the comments made by Rose Kuo, new Artistic Director at AFI Fest, surrounding the issue, as well as comments by Noah Cowan earlier in the year. Will it change anything? I hope so but I’m not holding my breath.

During this year’s Denver festival a film that was submitted, invited and confirmed for the 2007 program ended up getting pulled (or dropped, I suppose, depending on your point of view.) The filmmaker contacted me and said, “I was wondering if the film screening could be listed as a "Sneak Preview". We've been in talks with a couple of festivals that will only show the film if it hasn't "premiered" elsewhere...” We talked about it for a while and I explained that I couldn’t support that because I felt that was ignoring a problem I saw as becoming all too prevalent in the festival world and we decided to not screen the film as part of the Denver festival. Another festival that had already scheduled the same film did go ahead and agree to list it as a sneak, and so I’m sure I’ll see this title pop up sometime this spring at another festival, as a premiere, which, of course, it actually won’t be.

For the moment though, I’m taking a break on this issue, if for nothing else but my own peace of mind.

So, on another matter, I convinced a great girl with a great job as a freelance food writer in Boston to move in with me a few months ago and leave her work at places such as The Boston Phoenix, The Improper Bostonian, The Dig and as the editor of Boston’s Zagat guide. She just started her own blog on…well, food, and making her way through Denver's culinary scene. You can take a look here.

SDFF30 / It's Over

Oof.

It’s over. Close to 200 films and right around 150 filmmakers came through town during the past 11 days (and some very long nights) and I’m always a bit depressed when it is all over. I’m heading out of town tomorrow for a break and some rest but will be posting some of the happenings from SDFF30 over the next several days. For the moment, here are the award winners:

Juried Awards
Krzysztof Kieslowski Award for Best Feature Film – Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud’s Persepolis
Maysles Brothers Award for Best Documentary – Michael Chandler’s Knee Deep
Emerging Filmmaker Award – Stephane Gauger’s Owl and the Sparrow

Audience Awards
Feature-length Narrative – Patricia Riggen’s La Misma Luna
Documentary – Amy Bucher and Mary Olive Smith’s A Walk to Beautiful
Short - Nicholas Ozeki’s Mamitas

SDFF30 / Continental, a Film Without Guns

As a programmer for a festival that screens upwards of 175 films it’s difficult to see all of them before the festival begins. So, even though the programs have gone to the printer and tickets are on sale, I’m still watching films. I watched one this past weekend that is now one of my favorites in the festival: Continental, A Film Without Guns. It’s a Canadian film directed by Stéphane Lafleur and it reminded me a lot of Robert Altman or Paul Thomas Anderson films; several subtly intertwining stories, a touch of the surreal and a wonderful mix of deadpan humor and heartbreaking sadness.

From the festival catalog:

The episodic dominoes Continental, A Film Without Guns lines up are set in motion when an unnamed man awakens to find himself alone on a bus parked at the edge of a forest. Darkness surrounds him. He alights and vanishes into the woods.

His disappearance comes as a blow to his wife of 30 years, Lucette – likewise suddenly alone and utterly bewildered, not only as to her husband's whereabouts but as to her own future. Should she mourn his death? Curse his name? Take herself out dancing?

Then there's Louis, who has relocated to begin work at the very insurance company that hitherto employed our John Doe. With his wife and three daughters back home, he has settled temporarily into a hotel. Overhearing the amorous activities of the couple occupying the room next door, he experiences longing with a force that surprises him. Meanwhile, the awkward hotel receptionist, Chantal, uses her home answering machine as an audio journal and dreams of finding love. As for Marcel – once a dance-hall organist, now a bankrupt gambler – he is redoubling his efforts to devise a system for winning at video poker upon learning he needs costly dental surgery.

As startling as its title, Canadian filmmaker Stéphane Lafleur's remarkable dark comedy considers human vulnerability and the fragility of the links we forge between us from a fresh – if not downright skewed – new angle.

I highly encourage you to see this one...

SDFF30 / Full Schedule is Live

You can get a complete picture of the programs, films and events happening during the 11-days of the Denver festival now…everything is up on the denverfilm web site. I’ll still be talking more specifically about films I think are not to be missed, but tickets go on sale this week and a lot of films will be sold out before the end of the weekend, so I encourage you to peruse the schedule now.

SDFF30 / In Competition III

(Miss Universe 1929)

Here, finally, is the third of our three juried competitions; the Maysles Brothers Award for Best Documentary Film.

Knee Deep (USA)
Directed by Michael Chandler

Lynch (USA)
Directed by blackANDwhite

Milk in the Land, Ballad of an American Drink (USA)
Directed by Ariana Gerstein, Montieth McCollum

Miss Universe 1929 (Hungary)
Directed by Peter Forgacs 

Mystic Ball (Canada)
Directed by Greg Hamilton

Soldiers of Conscience (USA)
Directed by Gary Weimberg, Catherine Ryan

That’s all I can get around to today…more, hopefully, tomorrow.

The Rabbi Report and SDFF30 / Films in Competition II

(Owl and the Sparrow)

First things first: a thanks to Mark Rabinowitz over at The Rabbi Report for his more-than-kind words about this here site. His is a great blog to follow all the daily (or nightly) happenings once the festival gets under way…keep an eye on it.

Also, a word of gratitude to Screen International, who presents the Krzysztof Kieslowski Award for Best Feature Film… I should have mentioned them yesterday and really am so grateful to everyone there for their support…and to Mike Goodridge specifically.

SDFF30 / In Competition II

The second of our three juried competitions is the Emerging Filmmaker Award, this one presented by Denver’s Fox 31 News. Sometimes a bit of a misnomer, but it’s for a first or second time filmmaker who, according to the Denver programming collective, are doing something interesting and innovative. The 2007 finalists:

American Fork
Directed by Chris Bowman

Frownland
Directed by Ronald Bronstein

Loren Cass
Directed by Chris Fuller

The Memory Thief
Directed by Gil Kofman

Owl and the Sparrow
Directed by Stephane Gauger

SDFF30 / In Competition I

(My Brother is an Only Child)

There are three juried competitions in the Denver Festival in addition to the audience awards; The Krzysztof Kieslowski Award for Best Feature Film, the Maysles Brothers Award for Best Documentary and the Emerging Filmmaker Award for a first or second time director. It’s never easy narrowing down a huge list of films to a tiny sampling of six to present to a jury—but it’s done, and for better or worse, here are the finalists for the Krzysztof Kieslowski Award for Best Feature:

Continental, A Film Without Guns (Canada)
Directed by Stephane Lafleur

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (France)
Directed by Julian Schnabel

I Served the King of England (Czech Republic)
Directed by Jiri Menzel

The Last Mistress (France)
Directed by Catherine Breillat

My Brother is an Only Child (Italy)
Directed by Daniele Luchetti

Persepolis (France)
Directed by Marjane Satrapi, Vincent Paronnaud

SDFF30 / Persepolis

Back in May, after returning home from the Cannes Film Festival, I wrote a bit about some of my favorite films I saw there. One of them, which is still one of my favorite films of the year, Persepolis, will be screening as a Special Presentation in this year’s festival. The film, based on the graphic novels of the same name by Marjane Satrapi, is, simply put, a stunning piece of work. From the festival catalog:

Persepolis recounts the difficult journey of a young Iranian girl from childhood through her teens and into her 20s. Marjane's story begins in Tehran under the reign of the Shah; but when Islamic fundamentalists seize power and the devastating war with Iraq begins, her parents, fearing for her life, send her to Vienna. Growing up in exile there, and later in Paris, she weathers the vagaries of adolescence without parental guidance. Upon finally going back to Iran, she enters promptly into an unhappy first marriage. All the while, expressive shifts in tone and perspective make for a daringly honest, truly magical cinematic experience: Persepolis is agonizing as our heroine watches her family adjust to political repression; satirical as she tries to fit in with her European friends; poignant as she returns home to reclaim her identity.

A prize-winner at this year's Cannes Film Festival and a likely nominee for Best Foreign Language Film at the 2008 Oscars, Persepolis not only marks a paradigm shift in our understanding of animation's radical potential but also offers an unforgettable reminder that the personal is always political.

The entire schedule for the festival will be posted on our web site this coming Monday, the 22nd of October and tickets go on sale the 26th.

SDFF30 / Prague

There is something about the Danish sensibility that I just love. For a country of just over five million people the list of ground-breaking and accomplished filmmakers that come from there is impressive. Danish films seem to have a sort of lyricism—visually as much as written and the films are often full of intense emotion and subtle dark humor filmed in cool blues and grays.

Consider the filmmakers churning out stuff today: Thomas Vinterberg (Dear Wendy, It’s All About Love, The Celebration); Billie August (Goodbye Bafana, Smila’s Sense of Snow); Lars von Trier (Breaking the Waves, Dancer in the Dark, Dogville); Anders Thomas Jensen (Flickering Lights, Adam’s Apples, writer of Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself); Jorgen Leth.

In this year’s festival is the new film by Ole Christian Madsen (Kira’s Reason) called Prague. It’s a heartbreaking film about the disintegration of a marriage, the death of a father, infidelity and the inability to connect with one another. What’s amazing about it, is that right before it gets to be too much, the film infuses some small moment of humor and let’s you breathe and connect with the characters again, almost bond in their misery and feel, just perhaps, that everything is going to be okay. Of course not everything does end up for the best, but enough does, and sometimes that's all you can hope for. I think it’s wonderful film and highly recommend it.

SDFF30 / Animation

I’ve always been a big fan of animation; Japanese anime, Don Hertzfeld’s amazing short films, the mixed-media stuff that Slinky Pictures in the UK produces, Bill Plympton, the Brothers Quay…but I’ve always found some of the most amazing animation to be from the Czech Republic—Jan Svankmajer and the short puppet films produced by Kratky Film Praha.

In this year’s festival there is a feature length Czech animated film called One Night in the City directed by Jan Balej. It’s a truly surreal mix of stories that happen in and around an apartment complex over the course of one evening. There’s a great sequence where a fish and a tree, neighbors in the building, head out to the corner bar for a drink and a story where a man sews an ear he finds on the ground onto his own head and subsequently finds he is able to paint like van Gogh. It’s an incredible piece of work.

And, in case you’ve got little ones (because One Night in the City is definitely not for the kiddies) we’ve also got the Animation Station running during the first weekend of the festival, There will be three workshops for three different age groups—children and adults—where you can come down and make your own animated film which we’ll then screen the second weekend of the festival.