By Yun-hua Chen and Anne Küper. I like movies too much to just sit idly by, knowing that there are people in this industry who struggle with protecting both their work and themselves. My goal is to empower them to do just that, so they can focus on their art […]
Against Mechanization: Adam Elliot on Memoir of a Snail (CIFF 2024)
By Jonathan Monovich. It’s always tempting to speed up the process and save money by using CGI, but I think we’re at a period where we’re drowning in CGI. Now, with the advent of AI, I think stop motion has never been appreciated as much as it is now.” —Adam […]
Transport for Survival: Arash Rakhsha’s All the Mountains Give (DOC NYC)
By William Blick. A survivalist story and an unobtrusive, objective gaze into the bleak lives of dedicated, seemingly forgotten people….” In a time when the arts and culture are under assault from all angles, artists find a way to survive and thrive. Such is the case with Kurdish film director, […]
Schrader, Almodóvar, I’m Still Here: 72nd San Sebastian International Film Festival
By Ali Moosavi. At my age, receiving such an award may be a sign that you have reached the end of the line and this is an appreciation for going on this journey that I have travelled for 44 years. But I don’t see it that way. I can’t imagine […]
Made in Chicago: Andrew Davis on his Career and Disturbing the Bones (CIFF 2024)
By Jonathan Monovich. Born in Chicago’s South Side, Davis understands exactly where his characters should be, when they should be there, and why they should be there.” Throughout his career, Andrew Davis found a way to make Chicago the city of spectacle on the big screen. There have been plenty […]
Meanwhile on Earth: E.T. Phone Her(e)
By Elias Savada. For Elsa, her E.T. essence in her head never offers up an origin story or a political agenda, and this ambiguousness pushes the question – is this a cosmic lifeline or an invasion?” Leave it to the French (and writer-director Jérémy Clapin) to fashion this moody, low-budget, […]
Complicated Feelings – John Bleasdale on The Magic Hours: The Films and Hidden Life of Terrence Malick
By M. Sellers Johnson. A lot of the people who worked for Malick have a lot of affection for him and want to protect him. They have this complicated feeling that they’re really keen to tell stories but they don’t want to be seen to be spilling the beans. Having […]
Round Like a Circle in a Spiral: The Poster Art of Film Noir (Preview)
By Marlisa Santos. As the movie-viewing public was becoming more comfortable with these kinds of filmic depictions, poster art, never to shy away from marketing hooks, aimed to tantalize prospective audiences with images that promised entrance into a suspenseful world of increasingly commonplace criminality and subversion of systemic stability…. University […]
“Hitchcock is Grammar”: Mark Cousins on My Name Is Alfred Hitchcock
By Jonathan Monovich. A lot of people talk about the scary Hitchcock, the manipulative Hitchcock, or the anti-feminist Hitchcock, but in looking at his films I wanted to see what really were the themes and where the humanity was in his work.” Mark Cousins Mark Cousins has dedicated his life […]
The Phantom (1931): Hollywood’s First Independent Horror Movie
By Gary D. Rhodes. Even if it is not at the artistic level of many of those produced in the months, years, and decades that followed, The Phantom exemplifies ambition over vision. Its speed of production placed it in a pole position, independent of competition, let alone studios, a position […]