By Janine Gericke. I’ve been going to the San Francisco Silent Film Festival (SFSFF) for ten years. My first introduction to the festival and the Castro Theatre was Buster Keaton’s 1923 film Our Hospitality. It was the first time I had ever seen a silent film with live musical accompaniment. […]
Observation and Immersion: 2018 AFI Docs
By Gary M. Kramer. The 2018 AFI Docs Film Festival screened over 90 features and shorts in Washington, DC and Silver Spring, MD. The films tackled topical issues such as the plight of refugees to more comical themes, such as the increasing popularity of “industrial musicals.” Many films took an […]
Nightmares from LA and von Trier: 2018 Cannes, Week Two
By Ali Moosavi. It is very unusual for Cannes, or indeed any film festival that I care to remember, to provide a warning in the festival program for a particular film. In Cannes this year this honour was bestowed upon Lars von Trier’s The House that Jack Built, shown out […]
“Sickie” Docs and Features: The 20th Maryland Film Festival
May 24, 2018
By Gary M. Kramer. The 20th Maryland Film Festival, held at the Parkway Theater and various additional venues in Baltimore, took place May 2-6. The program included more than 100 features, documentaries, and shorts. Here are some highlights and lowlights from this year’s festival. Anahí Berneri’ gritty character study, Alanis, introduces […]
At War with Trump, Etc: 2018 Cannes, Week One
By Ali Moosavi. The honor of opening the 71st Cannes Film Festival went to the Iranian director, and multi Oscar winner, Asghar Farhadi’s new film Everybody Knows. This thriller stars the real-life couple Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz, plus the always impressive Argentinian actor Ricardo Darin. In the press interview following […]
37th Istanbul Film Festival: Colours of the World on the Silver Screen
By N. Buket Cengiz. The Istanbul Film Festival, organised by Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (IKSV) for the 37th time on 6-17 April 2018, was introduced back in February with a poster in miniature style with characters from cult films such as A Clockwork Orange (Stanley Kubrick, 1971), Arabesque (Arabesk, […]
Faces and Things: 2018 Miami Festival Shorts Program
March 5, 2018
By Gary M. Kramer. On March 10, the Miami Film Festival will premiere ten short films in two consecutive programs screening at the Tower Theater. The first program, The Things They Left Behind and More Short Films, features three live-action shorts, reviewed below, and one animated short, (Fool Time) Job. […]
Northern Lights: The 14th Reykjavík International Film Festival
By Randy Malamud. I didn’t see the Aurora Borealis during my October visit to the Reykjavík International Film Festival, probably because I spent every night at the movies, but I did have some spectacular views of them on screen. “The energy of the planet comes from the north,” says a […]
New York, International: NYFF Shorts 2017
October 2, 2017
By Gary M. Kramer. The shorts programs at the 55th New York Film Festival are divided into three narrative sections: Narrative, Genre Stories, New York Stories, and there are some real gems among the fiction entries. There is also a Documentary program, but the non-fiction shorts were not previewed. The […]
Highlights from the 2017 TCM Classic Film Festival
August 22, 2017
By Jordan R. Young. To vintage film enthusiasts–more than 28,000 last year–April means it’s time for the TCM Classic Film Festival. The eighth annual event took place over three days and four nights in Hollywood this past April, where attendees feasted on a staggering number of films and an impressive […]