Interview

By Paul Risker. Within the ongoing story of film there are those filmmakers, actors and producers that cast long shadows, although there are the more personal and intimate shadows, such as the one Marc Abraham’s producing career has cast over his work as a director: Flash of Genius (2008) and I […]

By Paul Risker. Last year saw The Gdynia Film Festival celebrate its 40th edition, the history and lifespan of which greatly dwarfs the brief involvement of its current Artistic Director Michał Oleszczyk, who has just completed his second year in the prestigious role. When one contemplates film as a collaborative medium […]

By Gary M. Kramer. Paolo Genovese’s cheeky comedy-drama Perfect Strangers operates on the simplest—and perhaps riskiest—of principles: if our phones are all “black boxes of information” about us, is there anything in them that could possibly embarrass us in front of our spouses and dearest friends who know us so […]

By Paul Risker. “It would have definitely been another series had it come out before the financial crisis, or it would have had a different reception,” offers actress Natalie Madueño in reflection of the climate that has invariably impacted the new Danish Series Follow The Money (created by Jeppe Gjervig Gram, 2016). More […]

By Amir Ganjavie. One of the great entries at this year’s Berlinale, Ira Sachs’s Little Men centers on the coming-of-age story of two Brooklyn boys who test their friendship after a conflict between their parents. The challenge of this genre is to avoid the usual boy-meets-a-girl trap that often involves a routine portrayal of budding sexuality. Little […]

By Paul Risker. The question is an integral part of the interview, but equally it was a question that was the spark for Michal Kosakowski, Andreas Marschall and Jörg Buttgereit’s collaboration on the anthology film German Angst (2015). As Kosakowski explained: “Andreas told me about an idea that he’d had for […]

By Amir Ganjavie. The central questions in Western philosophy concern what is truth, reality, and right or wrong. Major sources of debate for Greek philosophers, these notions have become very problematic in our postmodern virtual world. As Jean Baudriallrd argues, it is no longer truth that shapes reality but rather reality which […]

By Paul Risker. The dark psychological drama The Passing (2016) is a moment in which the Welsh landscape is blighted by yet another brooding tale. Although just as characters of film are stalked by their dramatist creators who make them the prey of dramatic provocation, so too can the landscape be […]

By Gary M. Kramer. It’s Tribeca Film Festival time again, which means my annual conversation with Sharon Badal, curator of the festival’s shorts programs. This year’s fantastic line up offer some new programs: California Dreaming, which features stories from the other coast; Warped Speed, a first-ever Sci-Fi program (in honor […]

By Amir Ganjavie. Louder Than Bombs, Joachim Trier’s third feature, tells the story of an aging schoolteacher (Gabriel Byrne) who grapples with the recent death of his wife (Isabelle Huppert) and tries to find a way to reconcile with his two sons (Jesse Eisenberg and Devin Druid). Quite a bold entry […]