[Psychomagic] is an art, not a science. I make all the art.” By Gary M. Kramer. Chilean cult filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky has always been a cine-magician. He made his feature debut with the surrealistic Fando and Lis (1968) and then achieved worldwide attention for his cult films, El Topo (1970) […]
Learning to Tell a Story: Scorsese Shorts (Criterion Collection)
By John Duncan Talbird. In 1974, soon after the splash of Mean Streets (1973), his first major directorial success, Martin Scorsese made a documentary about his parents, Italianamerican. Aside from still photos of the family and archival footage of Manhattan’s Little Italy neighborhood during the early 20th century, the film […]
On the Queen and Her People – Ella Fitzgerald: Just One of Those Things
By Ali Moosavi. She has been called The First Lady of Song and Queen of Jazz, titles which Ella Fitzgerald truly earned. In the documentary, Ella Fitzgerald: Just One of Those Things (2019), veteran British documentary filmmaker Leslie Woodhead charts Ella’s life from becoming a teenage orphan, running away from […]
Rocking (and Tripping) in the Desert: Stuart Swezey’s Desolation Center
By Thomas Puhr. Los Angeles probably isn’t the first city that comes to mind when one thinks of American punk rock, but Stuart Swezey’s Desolation Center (2018) successfully shines a light on one of the genre’s lesser-known cultural hubs. The titular organization, founded by Swezey himself, held a series of […]
DocuChronicles – Elsa Flores Almaraz on Carlos Almaraz: Playing With Fire
June 5, 2019
DocuChronicles is a blog dedicated to independent documentary cinema by filmmaker Marjorie Sturm. It includes a mix of reviews, interviews, and longer pieces. By Marjorie Sturm. The 2019 documentary Carlos Almaraz: Playing With Fire portrays the dramatic life of an artist. Co-directors/artists Elsa Flores Almaraz (whose late husband is the subject) and […]
Silverdocs Film Festival, 18 – 24 June, 2012
July 18, 2012
By Gary M. Kramer and Michael Miller. Silverdocs, the all-documentary film festival held at the AFI Theatre in Silver Spring, MD, celebrated its 10th anniversary this year. There were many memorable films on a wide variety of subjects from competitors vying for the coveted spot as the human specimen at […]
55th BFI London Film Festival 12-27 October, 2011
By Deborah Allison. One of the strengths of the BFI London Film Festival has always been its accessibility. Although press and industry passes are available, it is designed mainly to cater to the film-going public. This ideology is reflected in its varied but unpretentious programming, which features strands calculated to […]
Take One Action Film Festival (19 September–2 October 2011)
By Yun-hua Chen. The Scotland-based Take One Action Film Festival strikingly distinguishes itself from other film festivals in terms of its clear focus on “people and movies that are changing the world” and its strong emphasis on audience participation. Instead of film aesthetics, the festival foregrounds significant issues such as […]
FID-Marseille: Festival International du Cinema, 6 July–11 July, 2011
By Philip Cartelli. Near the end of Philippe Grandrieux’s hyperbolic It May Be That Beauty Has Reinforced Our Resolve – Masao Adachi (Il se peut que la beauté ait renforcé notre resolution – Masao Adachi, 2011), screened in the international competition at this year’s FID, director Masao Adachi looks into […]
Edinburgh Film Festival | 15-26 June, 2011
By Yun-hua Chen. This year’s EIFF feels very different in all aspects, not only led by the new producer Jimmy Mulligan but also affected by the general budget cut in the UK. It is thus an interesting occasion to observe how film festivals tackle restraining material resources. Instead of red […]