There’s what goes on in the film biz and then there’s what really goes on in Tinseltown. That’s what documentary filmmaker Marina Zenovich (director of last year’s “Lance,” about disgraced biker Lance Armstrong) was seeking to get at with her new film, “What Happens in Hollywood.” The documentary, which is now available on Roku, shows women, and some men, speaking candidly about the sexism and ... more >
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BENTONVILLE FILM FESTIVAL : “Waikiki,” “A Fire Within,” “The First Step,” “The High Life” and “Workhorse Queen”
BENTONVILLE, Ark.—Among Geena Davis’s goals for the Bentonville Film Festival is the inclusion of lesser-heard voices. The films at this year’s iteration of the festival here in northwest Arkansas certainly align with that dictum. Among the films I watched l this week was “Waikiki,” a drama about a native Hawaiian woman’s struggles with employment, her boyfriend and family. Writer-director ... more >
CANNES FESTIVAL : Cinefondation filmmaker AUDEN LINCOLN-VOGEL | INTERVIEW
Filmmaker Auden Lincoln-Vogel was in Cannes this year in support of “Bill and Joe go Duck Hunting,” which he's written and directed. In “Bill and Joe Go Duck Hunting,” a slow and contemplative film that was a part of the Cinefondation program, two friends go on a duck hunting expedition and much vexation ensues, the great outdoors the setting for an oppressive “huit-clos” film that's punctuated ... more >
CANNES FESTIVAL – “Titane,” machine-friendly gender-bending allegory, wins the Palme D’Or
Cinema is now synonymous with these two words: Julia Ducournau. She is the director of "Titane," a film, all savagery and tenderness, that won the Palme D'Or last night at the Cannes Festival here in France. Why these two words? Because contemporary cinema takes risks and it's prothean and it's in step with the times and it pays tribute to its past and I can't think of a better incarnation for it ... more >
CANNES FESTIVAL – Asghar Farhadi’s “A HERO”
This film is competing for the Palme D'Or
CANNES, France - Ethics and civility are not synonymous with honor but it’s generally understood, by most, that if you adhere to an ethical and civil conduct in life, honor will naturally flow from it. The idea of honor endures more or less overtly in Iranian society, and Asghar Farhadi’s new film “A Hero” thrives on it as leitmotif. The honor of one man, a painter calligrapher, crushed by debt ... more >
DIRECTORS’ FORTNIGHT: Panah Panahi carves himself a place in world cinema with quirky road movie “Hit the Road”
Directors' Fornight (quinzaine des realisateurs) is one of the parallel programs coinciding with the Cannes Festival every year
Pantea Panahiha, Hassan Madjooni and Rayan Sarlak
Directed by Panah Panahi
CANNES, France - A passing of the torch, of sorts, happened this year in Cannes, quietly: Jafar Panahi, high priest of Iranian cinema, bestowed the title upon his son (figuratively, of course). The Panahi name also became synonymous with a film dynasty, the counterweight, if one were to unseriously look at world cinema as a congeries of fiefdoms, to the House of Makhmalbaf. Panahi, whose films ... more >
CANNES FESTIVAL: Schlomi and Ronit Elkabetz explore the past and the present to confront an unavoidable future in “LES CAHIERS NOIRS”
Israël | 2021 | 209 minutes
CANNES, France - Filmmaker Schlomi Elkabetz made a documentary “Les Cahiers Noirs,” ("Machbarot Shchorot" in the original Hebrew) about his recently-departed sister (she died of cancer on April 19th, 2016), the actress and filmmaker Ronit Elkabetz. The project is over a decade in the making. Elkabetz sent a filmed love letter to his sister. Fusing hand-held camera footage with scenes from some of ... more >
