Category Archives: FILM

BELA TARR’S DAMNATION

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In all our movies, the location has a face. It looks like an actor… In the beginning, we were just talking about social conflicts, and then we were opening, opening, opening. Now we had to show the landscape and the time… When we did location scouting [for DAMNATION] we kept seeing the cable cars. It was awful weather, we were very poor and just trying to do something, but one thing was sure—the cable cars kept going. The most important part of these movies is mostly the location—you have to go and find the visual elements, something which is real. — Béla Tarr

DAMNATION—starring Vali Kerekes as a married but very independent nightclub singer and Miklós B. Székely as a philosophical barfly obsessed with her—features Tarr’s signature characters and landscapes in various states of abjection and decay rendered through spellbinding cinematography and poetic resignation.

Tarr’s first collaboration with writer László Krasznahorkai, DAMNATION has been restored in 4K from the original 35mm camera negative by the Hungarian National Film Institute–Film Archive under the supervision of the director.

The film will stream online over the next several days, presented by the UCLA Film & Television Archive. See link below for details.

DAMNATION

UCLA Film & Television Archive

Through Thursday, November 5.

Béla Tarr, Damnation (1988), with Vali Kerekes and Miklós B. Székely (second from top and below). Images courtesy and © the filmmaker and Arbelos Films.

CÉCILE B. EVANS — GISELLE

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Cécile B. Evans presents her “experimental ecofeminist thriller” A Screen Test for an Adaptation of Giselle and a related performance work—Notations for an Adaptation of Giselle (welcome to whatever forever)—in Paris, through the first week of November. The works are part of the Move 2020 festival at Centre Pompidou.

Both A Screen Test—which combines digital footage, 16mm, VHS recordings, animation and AI—and the live Notations performances feature Alexandrina Hemsley as Giselle, Rebecca Root as Bertie, and Lily McMenamy as Leonida.

See link below for schedule.

CÉCILE B. EVANS—INSTALLATION AND PERFORMANCES

Through November 7.

Centre Pompidou

Place Georges-Pompidou.

Temporary entrance on rue Beaubourg and rue Saint-Merri, 4th, Paris.

Cécile B. Evans, A Screen Test for an Adaptation of Giselle (2019). Images © Cécile B. Evans, courtesy of the artist, Galerie Emanuel Layr, Vienna, and Château Shatto, Los Angeles.

NEWFEST 2020 — CICADA AT THE DRIVE-IN

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Ben (Matthew Fifer) meets Sam (Sheldon D. Brown) browsing-cruising the Strand bookstore bargain bin in CICADA, a collaboration between the film’s co-stars. The actors brought their own histories of trauma to the screenplay, which Ben powers through with a steady flow of wisecracks and Sam negotiates with caution. Shot through what seems like an endless golden hour, CICADA is also a love letter to New York, celebrating the kind of freedom and spontaneity that has largely gone missing over the last seven months.

As part of Newfest 2020, CICADA—directed by Fifer and Kieran Mulcare—screens this weekend at the Brooklyn Drive-In, preceded by a Brooklyn Boys program of short films. A post-screening Q & A with the filmmakers is also scheduled. See link below for details.

CICADA

Newfest 2020

Saturday, October 24.

Brooklyn Boys shorts program at 7:30 pm.

Cicada at 8:15 pm

Q & A at 9:45 pm.

Brooklyn Drive-In

Brooklyn Army Terminal

80 58th Street, Sunset Park, Brooklyn.

Matthew Fifer and Kieran Mulcare, Cicada (2020), from top: Sheldon D. Brown (left) and Matthew Fifer; Cobie Smulders and Fifer; Brown; Brown and Fifer (2). Images courtesy and © the filmmakers and the actors.

AFI FEST 2020 — SHE PARADISE

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I’m inspired by the women in my life and telling stories that prominently feature women making decisions, being active and at the forefront of the narrative… I simply knew I wanted to explore sisterhood and tap into some of my experiences as a teenager living in Trinidad. I then started interviewing dancers and the story for the film became clearer from those interviews. I was lucky enough to get women to open up to me about their personal stories. Those interviews helped affirm that there was an important story to tell. — Maya Cozier

SHE PARADISE—directed by Cozier, and co-written by the filmmaker and Melina Brown—started out as a feature-length script. Cozier then devised a short version as a festival calling card before developing her story of a work hard/play hard Trinidadian dance troupe, negotiating gigs—video shoots and party appearances—and demanding their due. Sisterhood above all is an inviolable precept, and it is a pleasure to watch Sparkle (Onessa Nestor), Diamond (Kimberly Crichton), Mica (Chelsey Rampersad), and Shan (Denisia Latchman) build a life through exhilarating movement and hustle.

This world premiere engagement is now streaming at AFI Fest 2020. See link below for details.

SHE PARADISE

AFI Fest Presented by Audi.

Streaming through October 22.

Following the film, AFI FEST Senior Programmer Claudia Puig leads a conversation between Maya Cozier, Melina Brown, and Onessa Nestor.

Maya Cozier, She Paradise (2020), from top: Onessa Nestor; She Paradise; Chelsey Rampersad; She Paradise; Nestor. Images courtesy and © the filmmaker, the actors, and She Paradise Instagram.

AFI FEST 2020 — SOUND OF METAL

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SOUND OF METAL—the story of a heavy metal drummer whose sense of hearing suddenly disappears, and one of the highlights of this year’s AFI Fest—is distinguished by writer-director Darius Marder‘s deep affection for his characters and the sensitivity with which these characters are brought to life.

Riz Ahmed stars as Ruben, the drummer for a band fronted by his partner, singer-guitarist Lou (played by Olivia Cooke). Paul Raci co-stars as the director of a sober living house for the deaf.

The film was co-written by Abraham Marder, from a story by Derek Cianfrance. See link below for streaming details.

SOUND OF METAL

AFI Fest Presented by Audi.

Streaming through October 22.

Following the film, Variety’s editor Clayton Davis leads a conversation with filmmaker Darius Marder, Riz Ahmed, Paul Raci, Chelsea Lee, and Shaheem Sanchez.

Darius Marder, Sound of Metal (2019), from top: Riz Ahmed; Ahmed at post-streaming Q & A; film cast, director, and interpreters at post-streaming Q & A; Ahmed in film. Images courtesy and © the filmmaker, the actors and interpreters, AFI Fest, and Amazon.