26 films will comprise the Main Slate official selection of the 53rd New York Film Festival (NYFF) taking place September 25 to October 11. The 2015 Main Slate will host four World Premieres: Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies (pictured above), starring Tom Hanks and Mark Rylance in the Cold War story of the 1962 exchange of a U-2 pilot for a Soviet agent; Laura Israel’s Don’t Blink: Robert Frank, a documentary portrait of the great photographer and filmmaker; as well as the previously announced Opening Night selection The Walk and Closing Night selection Miles Ahead.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-2x3r1m2I4
Award-winning films from Cannes will be presented to New York audiences for the first time, including Best Director Hou Hsiao-hsien’s The Assassin; Todd Haynes’s Carol, starring Best Actress winner Rooney Mara; Stéphane Brizé’s The Measure of a Man, starring Best Actor winner Vincent Lindon; Jury Prize winner The Lobster; Un Certain Regard Best Director Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Journey to the Shore; and Un Certain Talent Prize winner Corneliu Porumboiu’s The Treasure.
Other notables among the many filmmakers returning to NYFF with new works include Michael Moore with Where To Invade Next, which takes a hard and surprising look at the state of our nation from a fresh perspective; NYFF mainstay Hong Sangsoo, who will present his latest masterwork, Right Now, Wrong Then, about the relationship between a middle-aged art-film director and a fledgling artist; and French director Arnaud Desplechin, who is back with the funny and heartrending story of young love My Golden Days, starring Mathieu Amalric and newcomers Quentin Dolmaire and Lou Roy-Lecollinet.
Two filmmakers in this year’s lineup make their directorial debuts: Don Cheadle with Miles Ahead, a remarkable portrait of the artist Miles Davis (played by the Cheadle), during his crazy days in New York in the late-70s, and Thomas Bidegain withLes Cowboys, a film reminiscent of John Ford’s The Searchers, in which a father searches for his missing daughter across a two-decade timespan—pre- to post-9/11—from Europe to Afghanistan and back.
Several titles also add a comedic layer to this year’s lineup, including Rebecca Miller’s Maggie’s Plan, a New York romantic comedy starring Greta Gerwig, Ethan Hawke, Julianne Moore, Bill Hader, and Maya Rudolph; the moving and hilarious Mia Madre from Nanni Moretti, starring John Turturro; Michel Gondry’s Microbe & Gasoline, a new handmade-SFX comedy that follows two adolescent misfits who build a house on wheels and travel across France; and Corneliu Porumboiu’s The Treasure, a modern-day fable in which two men look for buried treasure in their backyard.
Opening Night
The Walk
Robert Zemeckis, USA, 2015, 3-D DCP, 100m
Robert Zemeckis’s magical and enthralling new film, the story of Philippe Petit (winningly played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and his walk between the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers, plays like a heist movie in the grand tradition of Rififi and Bob le flambeur. Zemeckis takes us through every detail—the stakeouts, the acquisition of equipment, the elaborate planning and rehearsing that it took to get Petit, his crew of raucous cohorts, and hundreds of pounds of rigging to the top of what was then the world’s tallest building. When Petit steps out on his wire, The Walk, a technical marvel and perfect 3-D re-creation of Lower Manhattan in the 1970s, shifts into another heart-stopping gear, and Zemeckis and his hero transport us into pure sublimity. With Ben Kingsley as Petit’s mentor. A Sony Pictures release. World Premiere
Centerpiece
Steve Jobs
Danny Boyle, USA, 2015, DCP, TBC
Anyone going to this provocative and wildly entertaining film expecting a straight biopic of Steve Jobs is in for a shock. Working from Walter Isaacson’s biography, writer Aaron Sorkin (The Social Network, Charlie Wilson’s War) and director Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire, 127 Hours) joined forces to create this dynamically character-driven portrait of the brilliant man at the epicenter of the digital revolution, weaving the multiple threads of their protagonist’s life into three daringly extended backstage scenes, as he prepares to launch the first Macintosh, the NeXT work station and the iMac. We get a dazzlingly executed cross-hatched portrait of a complex and contradictory man, set against the changing fortunes and circumstances of the home-computer industry and the ascendancy of branding, of products, and of oneself. The stellar cast includes Michael Fassbender in the title role, Kate Winslet as Joanna Hoffman, Seth Rogen as Steve Wozniak, Jeff Daniels as John Sculley, Katherine Waterston as Chrisann Brennan and Michael Stuhlbarg as Andy Hertzfeld. A Universal Pictures release.
Closing Night
Miles Ahead
Don Cheadle, USA, 2015, DCP, 100m
Miles Davis was one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. And how do you make a movie about him? You get to know the man inside and out and then you reveal him in full, which is exactly what Don Cheadle does as a director, a writer, and an actor with this remarkable portrait of Davis, refracted through his crazy days in the late-70s. Holed up in his Manhattan apartment, wracked with pain from a variety of ailments and sweating for the next check from his record company, dodging sycophants and industry executives, he is haunted by memories of old glories and humiliations and of his years with his great love Frances Taylor (Emayatzy Corinealdi). Every second of Cheadle’s cinematic mosaic is passionately engaged with its subject: this is, truly, one of the finest films ever made about the life of an artist. With Ewan McGregor as Dave Brill, the “reporter” who cons his way into Miles’ apartment. A Sony Pictures Classics release. World Premiere
Arabian Nights: Volume 1, The Restless One
Miguel Gomes, Portugal/France/Germany/Switzerland, 2015, DCP, 125m
Portuguese with English subtitles
An up-to-the minute rethinking of what it means to make a political film today, Miguel Gomes’s shape-shifting paean to the art of storytelling strives for what its opening titles call “a fictional form from facts.” Working for a full year with a team of journalists who sent dispatches from all over the country during Portugal’s recent plunge into austerity, Gomes (Tabu, NYFF50) turns actual events into the stuff of fable, and channels it all through the mellifluous voice of Scheherazade (Crista Alfaiate), the mythic queen of the classic folktale. Volume 1 alone tries on more narrative devices than most filmmakers attempt in a lifetime, mingling documentary material about unemployment and local elections with visions of exploding whales and talking cockerels. It is hard to imagine a more generous or radical approach to these troubled times, one that honors its fantasy life as fully as its hard realities. A Kino Lorber release. U.S. Premiere
Arabian Nights: Volume 2, The Desolate One
Miguel Gomes, Portugal/France/Germany/Switzerland, 2015, DCP, 131m
Portuguese with English subtitles
In keeping with its subtitle, the middle section of Miguel Gomes’s monumental yet light-footed magnum opus shifts into a more subdued and melancholic register. But within each of these three tales, framed as the wild imaginings of the Arabian queen Scheherazade and adapted from recent real-life events in Portugal, there are surprises and digressions aplenty. In the first, a deadpan neo-Western of sorts, an escaped murderer becomes a local hero for dodging the authorities. The second deals with the theft of 13 cows, as told through a Brechtian open-air courtroom drama in which the testimonies become increasingly absurd. Finally, a Maltese poodle shuttles between various owners in a tear-jerking collective portrait of a tower block’s morose residents. Attesting to the power of fiction to generate its own reality, the film treats its fantasy dimension as a license for directness, a path to a more meaningful truth. A Kino Lorber release. U.S. Premiere
Arabian Nights: Volume 3, The Enchanted One
Miguel Gomes, Portugal/France/Germany/Switzerland, 2015, DCP, 125m
Portuguese with English subtitles
Miguel Gomes’s sui generis epic concludes with arguably its most eccentric—and most enthralling—installment. Scheherazade escapes the king for an interlude of freedom in Old Baghdad, envisioned here as a sunny Mediterranean archipelago complete with hippies and break-dancers. After her eventual return to her palatial confines comes the most lovingly protracted of all the stories in Arabian Nights, a documentary chronicle of Lisbon-area bird trappers preparing their prized finches for birdsong competitions. Right to the end, Gomes’s film balances the leisurely art of the tall tale with a sense of deadline urgency—a reminder that for Scheherazade, and perhaps for us all, stories can be a matter of life and death. A Kino Lorber release. U.S. Premiere
The Assassin
Hou Hsiao-hsien, Taiwan/China/Hong Kong, 2015, DCP, 105m
Mandarin with English subtitles
A wuxia like no other, The Assassin is set in the waning years of the Tang Dynasty when provincial rulers are challenging the power of royal court. Nie Yinniang (Shu Qi), who was exiled as a child so that her betrothed could make a more politically advantageous match, has been trained as an assassin for hire. Her mission is to destroy her former financé (Chang Chen). But worry not about the plot, which is as old as the jagged mountains and deep forests that bear witness to the cycles of power and as elusive as the mists that surround them. Hou’s art is in the telling. The film is immersive and ephemeral, sensuous and spare, and as gloriously beautiful in its candle-lit sumptuous red and gold decor as Hou’s 1998 masterpiece, Flowers of Shanghai. As for the fight scenes, they’re over almost before you realize they’ve happened, but they will stay in your mind’s eye forever. A Well Go USA release. U.S. Premiere
Bridge of Spies
Steven Spielberg, USA, 2015, DCP, 135m
The “bridge of spies” of the title refers to Glienicke Bridge, which crosses what was once the borderline between the Federal Republic of Germany and the GDR. In the time from the building of the Berlin Wall to its destruction in 1989, there were three prisoner exchanges between East and West. The first and most famous spy swap occurred on February 10, 1962, when Soviet agent Rudolph Abel was traded for American pilot Francis Gary Powers, captured by the Soviets when his U-2 reconnaissance plane was shot down over Sverdlovsk. The exchange was negotiated by Abel’s lawyer, James B. Donovan, who also arranged for the simultaneous release of American student Frederic Pryor at Checkpoint Charlie. Working from a script by Matt Charman and Joel and Ethan Coen, Steven Spielberg has brought every strange turn in this complex Cold War story to vividly tactile life. With a brilliant cast, headed by Tom Hanks as Donovan and Mark Rylance as Abel—two men who strike up an improbable friendship based on a shared belief in public service. A Touchstone Pictures release. World Premiere
Brooklyn
John Crowley, UK/Ireland/Canada, 2015, 35mm/DCP, 112m
In the middle of the last century, Eilis (Saoirse Ronan) takes the boat from Ireland to America in search of a better life. She endures the loneliness of the exile, boarding with an insular and catty collection of Irish girls in Brooklyn. Gradually, her American dream materializes: she studies bookkeeping and meets a handsome, sweet Italian boy (Emory Cohen). But then bad news brings her back home, where she finds a good job and another handsome boy (Domhnall Gleeson), this time from a prosperous family. On which side of the Atlantic does Eilis’s future live, and with whom? Director John Crowley (Boy A) and writer Nick Hornby haven’t just fashioned a great adaptation of Colm Tóibín’s novel, but a beautiful movie, a sensitively textured re-creation of the look and emotional climate of mid-century America and Ireland, with Ronan, as quietly and vibrantly alive as a silent-screen heroine, at its heart. A Fox Searchlight Pictures release.
Carol
Todd Haynes, USA, 2015, DCP, 118m
Todd Haynes’s adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s debut novel stars Cate Blanchett as the titular Carol, a wealthy suburban wife and mother, and Rooney Mara as an aspiring photographer who meet by chance, fall in love almost at first sight, and defy the closet of the early 1950s to be together. Working with his longtime cinematographer Ed Lachman and shooting on the Super-16 film he favors for the way it echoes the movie history of 20th-century America, Haynes charts subtle shifts of power and desire in images that are alternately luminous and oppressive. Blanchett and Mara are both splendid; the erotic connection between their characters is palpable from beginning to end, as much in its repression as in eagerly claimed moments of expressive freedom. Originally published under a pseudonym, Carol is Highsmith’s most affirmative work; Haynes has more than done justice to the multilayered emotions evoked by it source material. A Weinstein Company release.
Cemetery of Splendour
Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand/UK/France/Germany/Malaysia, 2015, DCP, 122m
Thai with English subtitles
The wondrous new film by Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul (whose last feature, Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, was a Palme d’Or winner and a NYFF48 selection) is set in and around a hospital ward full of comatose soldiers. Attached to glowing dream machines, and tended to by a kindly volunteer (Jenjira Pongpas Widner) and a young clairvoyant (Jarinpattra Rueangram), the men are said to be waging war in their sleep on behalf of long-dead feuding kings, and their mysterious slumber provides the rich central metaphor: sleep as safe haven, as escape mechanism, as ignorance, as bliss. To slyer and sharper effect than ever, Apichatpong merges supernatural phenomena with Thailand’s historical phantoms and national traumas. Even more seamlessly than his previous films, this sun-dappled reverie induces a sensation of lucid dreaming, conjuring a haunted world where memory and myth intrude on physical space. A Strand Releasing release. U.S. Premiere
Les Cowboys
Thomas Bidegain, 2015, France, DCP, 114m
French and English with English subtitles
Country and Western enthusiast Alain (François Damiens) is enjoying an outdoor gathering of fellow devotees with his wife and teenage children when his daughter abruptly vanishes. Learning that she’s eloped with her Muslim boyfriend, he embarks on increasingly obsessive quest to track her down. As the years pass and the trail grows cold, Alain sacrifices everything, while drafting his son into his efforts. The echoes of The Searchers are unmistakable, but the story departs from John Ford’s film in unexpected ways, escaping its confining European milieu as the pursuit assumes near-epic proportions in post-9/11 Afghanistan. This muscular debut, worthy of director Thomas Bidegain’s screenwriting collaborations with Jacques Audiard, yields a sweeping vision of a world in which the codes of the Old West no longer seem to hold. A Cohen Media Group release. U.S. Premiere
Don’t Blink: Robert Frank
Laura Israel, USA/Canada, 2015, DCP, 82m
The life and work of Robert Frank—as a photographer and a filmmaker—are so intertwined that they’re one in the same, and the vast amount of territory he’s covered, from The Americans in 1958 up to the present, is intimately registered in his now-formidable body of artistic gestures. From the early ’90s on, Frank has been making his films and videos with the brilliant editor Laura Israel, who has helped him to keep things homemade and preserve the illuminating spark of first contact between camera and people/places. Don’t Blink is Israel’s like-minded portrait of her friend and collaborator, a lively rummage sale of images and sounds and recollected passages and unfathomable losses and friendships that leaves us a fast and fleeting imprint of the life of the Swiss-born man who reinvented himself the American way, and is still standing on ground of his own making at the age of 90. World Premiere
Experimenter
Michael Almereyda, USA, 2014, DCP, 94m
Michael Almereyda’s brilliant portrait of Stanley Milgram, the social scientist whose 1961, Yale-based “obedience study” reflected back on the Holocaust and anticipated Abu Ghraib and other atrocities carried out by ordinary people who were just following orders, places its subject in an appropriately experimental cinema framework. The proverbial elephant in the room materializes on screen; Milgram (Peter Sarsgaard) sometimes addresses the camera directly as if to implicate us in his studies and the unpleasant truths they reveal. Remarkably, the film evokes great compassion for this uncompromising, difficult man, in part because we often see him through the eyes of his wife (Winona Ryder, in a wonderfully grounded performance), who fully believed in his work and its profoundly moral purpose. Almereyda creates the bohemian-tinged academic world of the 1960s through the 1980s with an economy that Stanley Kubrick might have envied. A Magnolia Pictures release.
The Forbidden Room
Guy Maddin & Evan Johnson, Canada, 2015, DCP, 120m
The four-man crew of a submarine are trapped underwater, running out of air. A classic scenario of claustrophobic suspense—at least until a hatch opens and out steps… a lumberjack? As this newcomer’s backstory unfolds (and unfolds and unfolds in over a dozen outlandish tales), Guy Maddin, cinema’s reigning master of feverish filmic fetishism, embarks on a phantasmagoric narrative adventure of stories within stories within dreams within flashbacks in a delirious globe-trotting mise en abyme the equals of any by the late Raúl Ruiz. Collaborating with poet John Ashbery and featuring sublime contributions from the likes of Jacques Nolot, Charlotte Rampling, Mathieu Amalric, legendary cult electro-pop duo Sparks, and not forgetting muses Louis Negin and Udo Kier, Maddin dives deeper than ever: only the lovechild of Josef von Sternberg and Jack Smith could be responsible for this insane magnum opus. A Kino Lorber release.
In the Shadow of Women / L’Ombre des femmes
Philippe Garrel, France, 2015, DCP, 73m
French with English subtitles
The new film by the great Philippe Garrel (previously seen at the NYFF with Regular Lovers in 2005 and Jealousy in 2013) is a close look at infidelity—not merely the fact of it, but the particular, divergent ways in which it’s experienced and understood by men and women. Stanislas Merhar and Clotilde Courau are Pierre and Manon, a married couple working in fragile harmony on Pierre’s documentary film projects, the latest of which is a portrait of a resistance fighter (Jean Pommier). When Pierre takes a lover (Lena Paugam), he feels entitled to do so, and he treats both wife and mistress with disengagement bordering on disdain; when Manon catches Pierre in the act, her immediate response is to find common ground with her husband. Garrel is an artist of intimacies and emotional ecologies, and with In the Shadow of Women he has added narrative intricacy and intrigue to his toolbox. The result is an exquisite jewel of a film. U.S. Premiere
Journey to the Shore / Kishibe no tabi
Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Japan/France, 2015, DCP, 127m
Japanese with English subtitles
Based on Kazumi Yumoto’s 2010 novel, Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s latest film begins with a young widow named Mizuki (Eri Fukatsu), who has been emotionally flattened and muted by the disappearance of her husband Yusuke (Tadanobu Asano). One day, from out of the blue or the black, Yusuke’s ghost drops in, more like an exhausted and unexpected guest than a wandering spirit. And then Journey to the Shore becomes a road movie: Mizuki and Yusuke pack their bags, leave Tokyo, and travel by train through parts of Japan that we rarely see in movies, acclimating themselves to their new circumstances and stopping for extended stays with friends and fellow pilgrims that Yusuke has met on his way through the afterworld, some living and some dead. The particular beauty of Journey to the Shore lies in its flowing sense of life as balance between work and love, existence and nonexistence, you and me. U.S. Premiere
The Lobster
Yorgos Lanthimos, France/Netherlands/Greece/UK, 2015, DCP, 118m
In the very near future, society demands that we live as couples. Single people are rounded up and sent to a seaside compound—part resort and part minimum-security prison—where they are given a finite number of days to find a match. If they don’t succeed, they will be “altered” and turned into an animal. The recently divorced David (Colin Farrell) arrives at The Hotel with his brother, now a dog; in the event of failure, David has chosen to become a lobster… because they live so long. When David falls in love, he’s up against a new set of rules established by another, rebellious order: for romantics, there’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. Welcome to the latest dark, dark comedy from Yorgos Lanthimos (Dogtooth), creator of absurdist societies not so very different from our own. With Léa Seydoux as the leader of the Loners, Rachel Weisz as David’s true love, John C. Reilly, and Ben Whishaw. An Alchemy release.
Maggie’s Plan
Rebecca Miller, USA, 2015, DCP, 92m
Rebecca Miller’s new film is as wise, funny, and suspenseful as a Jane Austen novel. Greta Gerwig shines brightly in the role of Maggie, a New School administrator on the verge of completing her life plan with a donor-fathered baby when she meets John (Ethan Hawke), a soulful but unfulfilled adjunct professor. John is unhappily married to a Columbia-tenured academic superstar wound tighter than a coiled spring (Julianne Moore). Maggie and the professor commiserate, share confidences, and fall in love. And where most contemporary romantic comedies end, Miller’s film is just getting started. In the tradition of Woody Allen and Paul Mazursky, Miller approaches the genre of the New York romantic comedy with relish and loving energy. With Bill Hader and Maya Rudolph as Maggie’s married-with-children friends, drawn to defensive sarcasm like moths to a flame, and Travis Fimmel as Maggie’s donor-in-waiting. U.S. Premiere
The Measure of a Man / La Loi du marché
Stéphane Brizé, France, 2015, DCP, 93m
French with English subtitles
Vincent Lindon gives his finest performance to date as unemployed everyman Thierry, who must submit to a series of quietly humiliating ordeals in his search for work. Futile retraining courses that lead to dead ends, interviews via Skype, an interview-coaching workshop critique of his self-presentation by fellow jobseekers—all are mechanisms that seek to break him down and strip him of identity and self-respect in the name of reengineering of a workforce fit for an neoliberal technocratic system. Nothing if not determinist, Stéphane Brizé’s film dispassionately monitors the progress of its stoic protagonist until at last he lands a job on the front line in the surveillance and control of his fellow man—and finally faces one too many moral dilemmas. A powerful and deeply troubling vision of the realities of our new economic order. A Kino Lorber release. North American Premiere
Mia Madre
Nanni Moretti, Italy/France, 2015, DCP, 106m
Italian and English with English subtitles
Margherita (Margherita Buy) is a middle-aged filmmaker contending with shooting an international co-production with a mercurial American actor (John Turturro) and with the fact that her beloved mother (Giulia Lazzarini) is mortally ill. Underrated as an actor, director Nanni Moretti, offers a fascinating portrayal as Margherita’s brother, a quietly abrasive, intelligent man with a wonderfully tamped-down generosity and warmth. The construction of the film is as simple as it is beautiful: the chaos of the movie within the movie merges with the fear of disorder and feelings of pain and loss brought about by impending death. Mia Madre is a sharp and continually surprising work about the fragility of existence that is by turns moving, hilarious, and subtly disquieting. An Alchemy release. U.S. Premiere
Microbe & Gasoline / Microbe et Gasoil
Michel Gondry, France, 2015, DCP, 103m
French with English subtitles
The new handmade-SFX comedy from Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Be Kind Rewind) is set in an autobiographical key. Teenage misfits Microbe (Ange Dargent) and Gasoline (Théophile Baquet), one nicknamed for his size and the other for his love of all things mechanical and fuel-powered, become fast friends. Unloved in school and misunderstood at home—Microbe is overprotected, Gasoline is by turns ignored and abused—they decide to build a house on wheels (complete with a collapsible flower window box) and sputter, push, and coast their way to the camp where Gasoline went as a child, with a stop along the way to visit Microbe’s crush (Diane Besnier). Gondry’s visual imagination is prodigious, and so is his cultivation of spontaneously generated fun and off-angled lyricism, his absolute irreverence, and his emotional frankness. This is one of his freshest and loveliest films. With Audrey Tatou as Microbe’s mom. U.S. Premiere
Mountains May Depart
Jia Zhangke, China/France/Japan, 2015, DCP, 131m
Mandarin and English with English subtitles
The plot of Jia Zhangke’s new film is simplicity itself. Fenyang 1999, on the cusp of the capitalist explosion in China. Shen Tao (Zhao Tao) has two suitors—Zhang (Zhang Yi), an entrepreneur-to-be, and his best friend Liangzi (Liang Jin Dong), who makes his living in the local coal mine. Shen Tao decides, with a note of regret, to marry Zhang, a man with a future. Flash-forward 15 years: the couple’s son Dollar is paying a visit to his now-estranged mother, and everyone and everything seems to have grown more distant in time and space… and then further ahead in time, to even greater distances. Jia is modern cinema’s greatest poet of drift and the uncanny, slow-motion feeling of massive and inexorable change. Like his 2013 A Touch of Sin, Mountains May Depart is an epically scaled canvas. But where the former was angry and quietly terrifying, the latter is a heartbreaking prayer for the restoration of what has been lost in the name of progress. A Kino Lorber release. U.S. Premiere
My Golden Days / Trois Souvenirs de ma jeunesse
Arnaud Desplechin, France, 2015, DCP, 123m
French with English subtitles
Arnaud Desplechin’s alternately hilarious and heartrending latest work is intimate yet expansive, a true autobiographical epic. Mathieu Amalric—Jean-Pierre Léaud to Desplechin’s François Truffaut—reprises the character of Paul Dédalus from the director’s groundbreaking My Sex Life… or How I Got Into an Argument (NYFF, 1996), now looking back on the mystery of his own identity from the lofty vantage point of middle age. Desplechin visits three varied but interlocking episodes in his hero’s life, each more surprising and richly textured than the next, and at the core of his film is the romance between the adolescent Paul (Quentin Dolmaire) and Esther (Lou Roy-Lecollinet). Most directors trivialize young love by slotting it into a clichéd category, but here it is ennobled and alive in all of its heartbreak, terror, and beauty. Le Monde recently referred to Desplechin as “the most Shakespearean of filmmakers,” and boy, did they ever get that right. My Golden Days is a wonder to behold. A Magnolia Pictures release. North American Premiere
No Home Movie
Chantal Akerman, Belgium/France, 2015, DCP, 115m
French and English with English subtitles
At the center of Chantal Akerman’s enormous body of work is her mother, a Holocaust survivor who married and raised a family in Brussels. In recent years, the filmmaker has explicitly depicted, in videos, books, and installation works, her mother’s life and her own intense connection to her mother, and in turn her mother’s connection to her mother. No Home Movie is a portrait by Akerman, the daughter, of Akerman, the mother, in the last years of her life. It is an extremely intimate film but also one of great formal precision and beauty, one of the rare works of art that is both personal and universal, and as much a masterpiece as her 1975 career-defining Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles. U.S. Premiere
Right Now, Wrong Then
Hong Sangsoo, South Korea, 2015, DCP, 121m
Korean with English subtitles
Ham Chunsu (Jung Jaeyoung) is an art-film director who has come to Suwon for a screening of one of his movies. He meets Yoon Heejung (Kim Minhee), a fledgling artist. She’s never seen any of his films but knows he’s famous; he’d like to see her paintings and then go for sushi and soju. Every word, every pause, every facial expression and every movement, is a negotiation between revelation and concealment: too far over the line for Chunsu and he’s suddenly a middle-aged man on the prowl who uses insights as tools of seduction; too far for Heejung and she’s suddenly acquiescing to a man who’s leaving the next day. So they walk the fine line all the way to a tough and mordantly funny end point, at which time… we begin again, but now with different emotional dynamics. Hong Sangsoo, represented many times in the NYFF, achieves a maximum of layered nuance with a minimum of people, places, and incidents. He is, truly, a master. U.S. Premiere
The Treasure / Comoara
Corneliu Porumboiu, Romania, 2015, DCP, 89m
Romanian with English subtitles
Costi (Cuzin Toma) leads a fairly quiet, unremarkable life with his wife and son. He’s a good provider, but he struggles to make ends meet. One evening there’s a knock at the door. It’s a stranger, a neighbor named Adrian (Adrian Purcarescu), with a business proposal: lend him some money to find a buried treasure in his grandparents’ backyard and they’ll split the proceeds. Is it a scam or a real treasure hunt? Corneliu Porumboiu’s (When Evening Falls on Bucharest or Metabolism, NYFF 2013) modern-day fable starts like an old Honeymooners episode with a get-rich-quick premise, gradually develops into a shaggy slapstick comedy, shifts gears into a hilariously dry delineation of the multiple layers of pure bureaucracy and paperwork drudgery, and ends in a new and altogether surprising key. Porumboiu is one of the subtlest artists in movies, and this is one of his wryest films, and his most magical.
Where To Invade Next
Michael Moore, USA, 2015, DCP, 110m
Where are we, as Americans? Where are we going as a country? And is it where we want to go, or where we think we have to go? Since Roger & Me in 1989, Michael Moore has been examining these questions and coming up with answers that are several worlds away from the ones we are used to seeing and hearing and reading in mainstream media, or from our elected officials. In his previous films, Moore has taken on one issue at a time, from the hemorrhaging of American jobs to the response to 9/11 to the precariousness of our healthcare system. In his new film, he shifts his focus to the whole shebang and ponders the current state of the nation from a very different perspective: that is, from the outside looking in. Where To Invade Next is provocative, very funny, and impassioned—just like all of Moore’s work. But it’s also pretty surprising. U.S. Premiere
Read more
The 40th Toronto International Film Festival revealed the inaugural lineup for Platform, the new juried program that champions director’s cinema from around the world.
“We created this new program as a way to sharpen our focus on artistically ambitious cinema in our 40th year and we are thrilled to be able to put the spotlight on these 12 brilliant filmmakers this September,” said Piers Handling, Director and CEO of TIFF. “They are major creative forces: the next generation of masters whose personal vision will captivate audiences, industry members and media from around the world.”
“Each of the filmmakers in the program fearlessly transforms a wide range of compelling realities through their unique visual and narrative styles, and they do so with incredible command and precision,” said Cameron Bailey, Artistic Director of the Toronto International Film Festival. “From a stark coming-of-age story, a retro-futuristic science-fiction and a lyrical post-western to an abduction thriller, a raw documentary and hard-hitting and topical dramas, this lineup reflects the diversity of international directors’ cinema today.”
Platform films will screen from Thursday, September 10 to Thursday, September 17. Each film will have its first screening for public, press and industry at the Visa Screening Room at the Elgin Theatre.
An international jury composed of acclaimed filmmakers Jia Zhang-ke, Claire Denis and Agnieszka Holland will award the Toronto Platform Prize ($25,000 CAD) to the best film in the program, which will be announced at the Awards Ceremony on September 20, 2015.
Bang Gang (A Modern Love Story)
Eva Husson, France
World Premiere
Biarritz. Sixteen-year-old George, a beautiful high-school student, falls in love with Alex. To get his attention, she initiates a group game with Alex, Nikita, Laetitia and Gabriel during which they will discover, test, and push the limits of their sexuality. Through scandals, love and the breakdown of their value systems, each of them manages this intense period in radically different ways. Starring Daisy Broom, Fred Hotier, Lorenzo Lefebvre, Marilyn Lima, and Finnegan Oldfield.
The Clan (El Clan)
Pablo Trapero, Argentina/Spain
North American Premiere
Within a typical family home in the traditional neighborhood of San Isidro, a sinister clan makes its living off kidnapping and murder. Arquímedes, the patriarch, heads and plans the operations. Alejandro, his eldest son, is a star rugby player who gives into his father’s will and identifies possible candidates for kidnapping. To a greater or lesser extent, the members of the family are accomplices in this dreadful venture as they live off the benefits yielded by the large ransoms paid by the families of their victims. Based on the true story of the Puccio family, this film full of suspense and intrigue takes place in the context of the final years of the Argentine military dictatorship and incipient return to democracy. Starring Guillermo Francella and Peter Lanzani.
French Blood (Un Français)
Diastème, France
International Premiere
This is the story of a Frenchman, born in 1965 on the outskirts of Paris. The story of a skinhead, who hates Arabs, Jews, blacks, communists and gays. An anger that will take 30 years to die out. A bastard, who will take 30 years to become someone else. And he will never forgive himself for it. Starring Alban Lenoir, Paul Hamy, Samuel Jouy and Patrick Pineau.
Full Contact
David Verbeek, Netherlands/Croatia
World Premiere
A contemporary tale of a man who accidentally bombed a school through a remotely operated drone plane. Modern warfare keeps Ivan safe and disconnected from his prey. But after this incident, this disconnectedness starts to apply to everything in his life. He is unable to process his overwhelming feelings of guilt, but needs to open up to his new love Cindy. Only by facing his victims can he rediscover his humanity and find a new purpose in life. Starring Grégoire Colin, Lizzie Brocheré and Slimane Dazi.
High-Rise
Ben Wheatley, United Kingdom
World Premiere
1975. Two miles west of London, Dr. Laing moves into his new apartment seeking soulless anonymity, only to find that the building’s residents have no intention of leaving him alone. Resigned to the complex social dynamics unfolding around him, Laing bites the bullet and becomes neighborly. As he struggles to establish his position, Laing’s good manners and sanity disintegrate along with the building. The lights go out and the elevators fail but the party goes on. People are the problem. Booze is the currency. Sex is the panacea. Starring Tom Hiddleston, Jeremy Irons, Sienna Miller, Luke Evans and Elisabeth Moss.
HURT
Alan Zweig, Canada
World Premiere
Steve Fonyo is a one-legged cancer survivor who completed a cross-Canada run raising $13 million in 1985. The next 30 years were straight downhill: petty theft, larceny and drug addiction. The run has nothing to do with the life of this one-time hero, and everything to do with it. Starring Steve Fonyo.
Land of Mine (Under Sandet / Unter dem Sand)
Martin Zandvliet, Denmark/Germany
World Premiere
A story never told before. WWII has ended. A group of German POWs captured by the Danish army, boys rather than men, are forced into a new kind of service under the command of a brusque Danish Sergeant. Risking life and limbs, the boys discover that the war is far from over. Starring Roland Møller, Louis Hofmann, Joel Basman, Emil Buschow, Oskar Buschow and Mikkel Boe Følsgaard.
Looking for Grace
Sue Brooks, Australia
North American Premiere
Grace, 16, runs away from home. Her parents, Dan and Denise, head off on the road across the Western Australian wheat belt with a retired detective, Norris, to try and get her back. But life unravels faster than they can put it back together. Grace, Dan and Denise learn that life is confusing and arbitrary, but wonderful. Starring Richard Roxburgh, Radha Mitchell, Odessa Young and Terry Norris.
Neon Bull (Boi Neon) (pictured above)
Gabriel Mascaro, Brazil/Uruguay/Netherlands
North American Premiere
Iremar and his makeshift family travel through Northeast Brazil taking care of bulls at the Vaquejadas, a Brazilian rodeo. But the region’s booming clothing industry has stirred new ambitions and filled Iremar’s mind with dreams of pattern-cutting and exquisite fabrics. Starring Juliano Cazarré, Aline Santana, Carlos Pessoa and Maeve Jinkings.
The Promised Land (Hui Dao Bei Ai De Mei Yi Tian)
He Ping, China
World Premiere
Ai Ling, growing up in a small town, loses her fiancé Jiang He in Beijing. After returning to her hometown with a broken heart, she has to face all the complications life and love have in store for her. Starring Jiajia Wang, Yi Zhang, and Zhiwen Wang.
Sky
Fabienne Berthaud, France/Germany
World Premiere
Romy is on holiday in the USA with her French husband, but the journey quickly turns into a settling of old scores for this worn out couple. After a huge argument, Romy decides to break free. She cuts her ties to a stable and secure life that has become alienating and escapes to the unknown. Drifting through a noisy Las Vegas to the wondrous high desert, she goes on with her solitary journey, abandoning herself to her sole intuitions and making it up as she goes. Liberated, she will cross paths with a charismatic and solitary man, with whom she’ll share an inconceivable but pure love. Starring Diane Kruger, Norman Reedus, Gilles Lellouche, Lena Dunham and Q’orianka Kilcher.
The White Knights (Les Chevaliers Blancs)
Joachim Lafosse, France/Belgium
World Premiere
Critically acclaimed Joachim Lafosse brings to the screen the Zoe’s Ark controversy which made headlines in 2007: a story about the limits of the right of interference. Jacques Arnault, head of Sud Secours NGO, is planning a high impact operation: he and his team are going to exfiltrate 300 orphans, victims of Chadian civil war and bring them to French adoption applicants. Françoise Dubois, a journalist, is invited to come along with them and handle the media coverage for this operation. Completely immersed in the brutal reality of a country at war, the NGO members start losing their convictions and are faced with the limits of humanitarian intervention. Starring Vincent Lindon, Valérie Donzelli, Reda Kateb, Louise Bourgoin and Rougalta Bintou Saleh.
The 40th Toronto International Film Festival runs September 10 to 20, 2015.
Director Brian De Palma will receive the Jaeger-LeCoultre Glory to the Filmmaker 2015 Award, dedicated to personalities who have made particularly original contributions to contemporary cinema, at the upcoming Venice International Film Festival.
Regarding this award, the Director of the Festival Alberto Barbera declared, “The child of an artistic era (the ‘70s) full of innovative ferment, Brian De Palma has made a name for himself as one of the most skillful directors in constructing perfect narrative mechanics with great creative freedom, experimenting with new technical solutions, rejecting the classic rules of the language, abandoning himself to aesthetic virtuosity, and celebrating his favorite authors. When watching a movie by Brian De Palma, we revert to being basic spectators. Although our eyes are wide open to avoid falling into the trap, we know full well we’re bound to fall into it anyway. De Palma’s cinema is playful to the nth degree; it is a pleasure for the eyes and at the same time a game that tantalizes the cinéphile. He has never lost the curiosity of the experimenter as he reinvents the already-seen, and when it comes to constructing and manipulating images, this fundamental trait makes De Palma one of the greatest innovators who came of age in the shadow of the New Hollywood.”
“Jaeger-LeCoultre is proud to pay tribute to Brian De Palma with the Glory to the Filmmaker Award”, declared Daniel Riedo, CEO of Jaeger-LeCoultre. “For ten years, our company has supported the seventh art and the Venice International Film Festival through continuous promotion of cinema’s creativity and ingenuity. Precision watches and the maximum expression of the cinematographic art are fruit of the same passion. Both call for months and even years of concentration and patience, in order for the virtuosity of talented professionals to lead to the creation of masterpieces of aesthetic and technical perfection, destined to last forever.”
The award will be given to Brian De Palma on September 9th at 9.30 p.m. in the Sala Grande (Palazzo del Cinema) during the 72nd Venice International Film Festival (September 2-12, 2015), directed by Alberto Barbera and organized by the Biennale chaired by Paolo Baratta.
Following the award ceremony, the 72nd Film Festival will present the world premiere, Out of Competition, of the documentary De Palma (109’) by Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow. The film grew out of the two directors’ spending time with Brian De Palma for over ten years. It’s an intimate conversation between filmmakers, chronicling Brian’s six decade long career, his life, and his filmmaking process.
This major award consolidates the important bond between the Venice Film Festival and Brian De Palma, who has presented seven movies at the Lido, the first time forty years ago with Sisters in the section Proposte di nuovi film (1975). In 1981, De Palma screened Blow Out in the section Mezzogiorno/Mezzanotte; in 1987, The Untouchables, an out-of-competition Special Event; in 1992, Raising Cain, the closing film in competition; in 2006, The Black Dahlia, the opening film in competition; in 2007, Redacted, in competition and the winner of the Silver Lion; and in 2012, Passion, in competition.
Born in 1940, Brian De Palma studied film in New York. In 1963, he directed The Wedding Party, giving twenty-year-old Robert De Niro his first part. Carrie, a movie starring Sissy Spacek and based on the Stephen King novel, was his first big success. To date, De Palma has directed over 30 films, including The Untouchables (1987) with Robert De Niro, Kevin Costner and Sean Connery; Mission Impossible (1996) with Tom Cruise; and Scarface (1983) with Al Pacino. Over the years, De Palma has directed stars such as John Travolta, Melanie Griffith, Tom Hanks and Sean Penn. He is particularly famous for his psychological thrillers, which feature his personal style, unusual camera angles and elements that often recall works by the directors who have influenced him, in particular Alfred Hitchcock. Among the great actors Brian De Palma has directed, three have received Oscar nominations: Sissy Spacek (best actress, Carrie), Piper Laurie (best supporting actress, Carrie) and Sean Connery (best supporting actor, The Untouchables), who received the Oscar for his performance.
Jake Paltrow was born September 26, 1975 in Los Angeles, CA. His films are Young Ones (2014) and The Good Night (2007).
Noah Baumbach was born and raised in Brooklyn. His films include Kicking and Screaming (1995), The Squid and the Whale (2005), Margot at the Wedding (2007), Greenberg (2010), Frances Ha (2012), While We’re Young (2014), and Mistress America (2015).
Jaeger-LeCoultre has been a sponsor of the Venice International Film Festival for eleven years, and for nine years has sponsored the Glory to the Filmmaker Award. In the past years, the prize has been awarded to Takeshi Kitano (2007), Abbas Kiarostami (2008), Agnès Varda (2008), Sylvester Stallone (2009), Mani Ratnam (2010), Al Pacino (2011), Spike Lee (2012), Ettore Scola (2013) and James Franco (2014).
The 7th Annual Milwaukee Film Festival announced its critically acclaimed line-up for the Rated K: For Kids program. Rated K: For Kids offers a selection of award-winning features and shorts from around the world, ideal for ages 3 to 12 but equally enjoyable for all ages.
Five feature films and three shorts programs spanning live action, animation and even an anniversary classic comprise this year’s program. Milwaukee Film celebrates 20 years of Babe: The Gallant Pig with a screening of the 1995 classic. Co-written and produced by George Miller of the Mad Max series, Babe was nominated for 7 Academy Awards and won the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy in 1995. The first 200 people in line for this screening dressed in their finest farm attire will receive free popcorn.
Another highlight of this year’s program is the animated feature Song of the Sea. Fantastical Irish folklore and gorgeous animation make this film especially appealing to kids and adults alike.
“I am particularly excited to bring Song of the Sea to our audiences,” enthuses Milwaukee Film’s Education Director (and lead programmer of Rated K: For Kids), Cara Ogburn, “This 2014 Academy Award nominee never screened theatrically in Milwaukee. It is a lushly animated, beautifully mythic film from the team behind the Secret of Kells that is not to be missed on the big screen.”
The 2015 Milwaukee Film Festival runs 
The 
The Santa Barbara International Film Festival will honor actress Jane Fonda with the tenth annual Kirk Douglas Award for Excellence in Film. The award will be presented at a black-tie Gala dinner at Bacara Resort & Spa on Saturday, October 3rd, 2015.
“Jane Fonda obviously has the right genes. Her acting performances set a standard that’s hard to follow,” says original award recipient, Kirk Douglas.
Jane Fonda is a two-time Academy Award® winner, a three-time Golden Globe® winner, an Emmy Award winner, and was the 2014 recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award. She will next be seen in Fox Searchlight’s critically acclaimed feature, YOUTH, which debuted at the Cannes International Film Festival, and will be released in the United States on December 4th. Written and directed by Paolo Sorrentino (director and co-writer of Italy’s Academy Award® winning Best Foreign Language Film The Great Beauty), the film explores the lifelong bond between two friends vacationing in a luxury Swiss Alps lodge as they ponder retirement. In addition to Fonda, YOUTH stars Michael Caine, Harvey Keitel, Rachel Weisz and Paul Dano. Fonda also stars in Netflix’s GRACE AND FRANKIE, currently filming for its second season.
Since 2006, the annual Kirk Douglas Award for Excellence in Film has been awarded to a lifelong contributor to cinema through their work in front of the camera, behind, or both. Past honorees include Jessica Lange, Forest Whitaker, Robert DeNiro, Michael Douglas, Harrison Ford, Quentin Tarantino, Ed Harris, and John Travolta
Funding from the Gala will go to support the many educational and community programs hosted by the Santa Barbara International Film Festival such as Mike’s Field Trip to the Movies, the 10-10-10 Mentorship program and competitions, the Film Studios Program, Apple Box Family Films and the festivals new initiative to be launched this summer, Film Camp. The 31st annual Santa Barbara International Film Festival will take place from Wednesday, February 3rd through Saturday, February 13th.
The Tribeca Film Festival (TFF) will hold its 15th edition on April 13 to April 24, 2016 in New York City, and today announced a call for submissions for narrative and documentary features, short films, and exhibits in interactive storytelling.
Returning for the second year is Tribeca Film Festival at Spring Studios, the Festival’s creative hub and destination for festivalgoers, industry and press where innovation events, select Tribeca Talks® panels, Awards night, parties, and more will take place.
TFF continues to encourage women filmmakers through The Nora Ephron Prize, sponsored by Coach. For the third year, the $25,000 award will recognize a female filmmaker whose work embodies the spirit and vision of the legendary filmmaker and writer Nora Ephron.
For the past 14 years, TFF has provided a platform for original storytelling, creative expression, and immersive entertainment. The Festival supports and celebrates both American independent voices and established directors from around the world, and hosts screenings of feature and short length films, curated conversations, and master classes for industry and the cultural community. The 2016 Festival will continue to explore the intersection of storytelling and technology with a variety of programming, including the fourth annual Storyscapes program — a juried showcase of interactive storytelling, VR showcases, TFI Interactive, and more.
Deadlines to submit U.S. and international films for the 
The 63rd San Sebastian Festival will offer, as part of its Pearls section, the Spanish premiere of some of the most important films presented during the year at different international festivals.
Among the films selected are the Golden Bear-winner at the Berlin Festival, Taxi Teheran by Jafar Pahani; Me and Earl and the Dying Girl, by Alfonso Gómez-Rejón, Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival; Nie yinniang / The Assassin, by Hou Hsiao-Hsien, the Jury Grand Prix-winner and Best Director Award at the Cannes Festival, Saul Fia / Son of Saul, by László Nemes. The section will similarly include works by directors such as Arnaud Desplechin, Jia Zhang-ke, Charlie Kaufman, Hirokazu Kore-eda, Nanni Moretti, Pablo Trapero and Denis Villeneuve.
Woody Allen’s new film, Irrational Man (pictured above), will also be screened out of competition in the section. The remaining Pearls will compete for the Audience Award, decided according to the votes cast by attendees of the first public screening of each film in the section. The Audience Award comes with two prizes: a First Prize for the Best Film, with €50,000, and a Second Prize for the Best European Film, with €20,000. The Audience Award goes to the distributor of the film in Spain.
ANOMALISA
CHARLIE KAUFMAN, DUKE JOHNSON (USA)
Charlie Kaufman and Duke Johnson tell the tale of a man who struggles with his inability to connect with other people. Spanish premiere following its screening at the Venice Festival.
BLACK MASS
SCOTT COOPER (USA)
Johnny Depp, Joel Edgerton and Benedict Cumberbatch star in this film presented out of competition at the Venice Festival. FBI Agent John Connolly persuades Irish mobster Jimmy Bulger to collaborate with the FBI and eliminate a common enemy: the Italian mob. This unholy alliance spirals out of control.
EL CLAN (THE CLAN)
PABLO TRAPERO (ARGENTINA – SPAIN)
Pablo Trapero’s new movie is a competitor at the Venice Festival. Argentina, in the early 80s. Behind the facade of a typical family from the upmarket San Isidro neighbourhood lurks a sinister clan that kidnaps and murders for a living.
HITCHCOCK / TRUFFAUT
KENT JONES (FRANCE – USA)
Fifty years after the publication of François Truffaut’s book “Cinema According to Hitchcock” filmmaker Kent Jones invites some of the best directors of our time (Martin Scorsese, David Fincher, Richard Linklater, Wes Anderson, James Gray, Olivier Assayas…) to share their thoughts on the master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock.
ME AND EARL AND THE DYING GIRL
ALFONSO GÓMEZ-REJÓN (USA)
The amusing and moving tale of Greg, a student in his last year of high school who navigates the minefield of adolescent social life by steering away from all close relations. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival.
MIA MADRE
NANNI MORETTI (ITALY – FRANCE – GERMANY)
Nanni Moretti competed at the Cannes Festival with this film about Margherita, a director shooting a film with a famous American actor, who is quite a character on set. Away from the shoot, Margherita tries to hold her life together while feeling powerless when facing her mother’s illness and her daughter’s adolescence.
NIE YINNIANG / THE ASSASSIN
HOU HSIAO-HSIEN (TAIWAN)
Hou Hsiao-Hsien won Best Director at the Cannes Festival with his latest work. China, 9th century. Nie Yinniang comes home after years in exile, now a trained vigilante. When her mistress orders her to kill her cousin, she will have to choose between the man she loves and her loyalty to the “order of the Assassins”.
SAUL FIA / SON OF SAUL
LÁSZLÓ NEMES (HUNGARY)
Winner of the Jury Grand Prix at the Cannes Festival, this debut by Hungarian moviemaker László Nemes is set in Auschwitz, 1944. Saul Auslander is a Hungarian prisoner assigned to one of the Auschwitz crematorium ovens. He tries to save the body of a young boy he believes to be his son from the flames.
SHAN HE GU REN / MOUNTAINS MAY DEPART
JIA ZHANG-KE (CHINA – FRANCE – JAPAN)
Spanish premiere of Jia Zhang-ke’s latest movie following its screening in the official competition at the Cannes Festival. China, 1999, two childhood friends court a young girl from Fenyang. One has his future mapped out for him, but not the other. The young girl’s heart is divided between the two, but she must take a decision that will mark her life, and that of her son.
SICARIO
DENIS VILLENEUVE (USA)
In the border area stretching between the U.S. and Mexico, an FBI agent is enlisted by an elite North American government task force official to aid in the escalating war against drugs. The new film by Denis Villeneuve competed in the Cannes Official Selection 2015.
TAXI TÉHÉRAN
JAFAR PANAHI (IRAN)
Golden Bear-winner at the last Berlin Festival. A yellow taxi drives through the hustling, bustling streets of Teheran. The taxi picks up all sorts of passengers, each one more colourful than the last. All talk frankly to the driver. What they don’t realise is that the person interviewing them is none other than the director Jafar Pahani, one of the biggest names in today’s Iranian cinema.
TROIS SOUVENIRS DE MA JEUNESSE / MY GOLDEN DAYS
ARNAUD DESPLECHIN (FRANCE)
Arnaud Desplechin revisits the rich emotional landscape of Comment je me suis disputé… (My Sex Life…) and Un conte de Noël (A Christmas Tale) with this film presented at the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight. Paul remembers his youth and his first, and only, true love…
UMIMACHI DIARY / OUR LITTLE SISTER
HIROKAZU KORE-EDA (JAPAN)
A film by Japanese moviemaker Hirokazu Kore-eda which competed in the Cannes Official Selection. Three sisters share a house in the city. They haven’t seen their father for 15 years. When he dies, the three travel to the countryside for his funeral. There they meet their shy teenage half-sister. It won’t be long before they grow fond of the girl.
Not in competition
IRRATIONAL MAN
WOODY ALLEN (USA)
Not in competition
Woody Allen’s new film, presented at the last Cannes Festival, is about a tormented philosophy professor who finds a will to live when he commits an existential act.
The Black Lens program returns for the second year to the 7th Milwaukee Film Festival, and will features 8 fiction and documentary films from both emerging and established African-American filmmakers
“The level of films we were able to incorporate into the program last year as well as the incredible response we received from the community really solidified Black Lens program as an essential part of the Milwaukee Film Festival,” explains Geraud Blanks, programmer of Black Lens, also a batterer’s intervention specialist for Sojourner Family Peace Center, music promoter, and former Milwaukee Journal Sentinel contributor.
Celebrated documentary filmmaker, MacArthur Fellow, and National Humanities Medal winner Stanley Nelson Jr. will attend in person and receive a Tribute Award from the film festival prior to a screening of his latest film, Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution. Stanley Nelson’s films are very familiar to Milwaukee Film Festival audiences, as the 2014 festival featured Freedom Summer and the 2010 festival featured Freedom Riders. In addition to receiving the Tribute Award and presenting his latest film, Stanley Nelson will also conduct a Masterclass with local filmmakers.
Three of the program’s featured documentaries cover topics that have garnered national attention in the past year. “In fact, the storylines behind A Ballerina’s Tale, Cincinnati Goddamn and Little White Lie are so timely, it gives new meaning to the phrase ‘art imitates life,’” explains Blanks.
A Ballerina’s Tale profiles ballet dancer Misty Copeland who, in June, became the first African-American woman to be promoted to principal dancer in the American Ballet Theater’s 75-year history. Tackling issues of race and identity, Cincinnati Goddamn spotlights several police shootings of black men in Cincinnati over a 6 year period in the 1990s, while Little White Lie tells the story of a young African-American woman who passes for white as a child until a family secret forces her to question her identity.
A Ballerina’s Tale (pictured in main image)
(USA / 2015 / Director: Nelson George)
Misty Copeland, the first African-American female soloist at New York’s American Ballet Theatre, would be the first to tell you that, based on body type, pedigree and background, she shouldn’t be a part of one of the world’s most prestigious ballet companies. But her inspirational story of dogged determination (overcoming a debilitating shin injury, eating disorders and racial issues), filmed here in a raw, cinéma vérité documentary, will leave no doubt as to how this trailblazer shot her way up the ranks and overcame all obstacles to turn in breathtaking performances in Firebird and Swan Lake.
https://vimeo.com/124288652
Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution
(USA / 2015 / Director: Stanley Nelson Jr.)
Into today’s era still struggling with police brutality, racial discrimination and extreme poverty comes master documentarian Stanley Nelson’s stirring portrait of the Black Panther Party. Following the party from its inception in the early ’60s to its bitter dissolution a decade later, MFF alumnus Nelson captures the essential history of the movement, elegantly mixing archival footage alongside interviews with FBI informants, journalists, supporters, detractors and lower-level members of the party. This is a profoundly resonant portrait of a period of time when impatience bred revolution and a vibrant group rose up to bring civil rights issues to the forefront.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F56O3kZ9qr0
Cincinnati Goddamn
(USA / 2014 / Director: Paul Hill and April Martin)
Trailer:
It’s a story that has become all too familiar — young, unarmed black men killed by law enforcement agents who have sworn to protect them, followed by protests-turned-riots sparked by the men’s untimely demise. But before Michael Brown and Ferguson, there was Timothy Thomas, Roger Owensby and Cincinnati. A powerful examination of a moment preceding the #BlackLivesMatter movement, the documentary Cincinnati Goddamn presents a chilling and revealing look into what one academic calls “urban genocide” — a volatile cocktail of systemic racism, widespread poverty and unchecked police brutality — and the grassroots activism that took to the streets to challenge it.
https://vimeo.com/104340013
A Girl Like Grace
(USA / 2015 / Director: Ty Hodges)
Seventeen-year-old Haitian-American Grace (newcomer Ryan Destiny, in a spirited breakout performance) finds her dysfunctional existence thrown further into upheaval following the suicide of her best friend, Andrea. Grace is already a social pariah tormented by a clique of bullies (led by Raven-Symoné), and her desire to understand her friend’s decision leads to Andrea’s older sister Share (Meagan Good), who encourages Grace to embrace her sexuality, leading her down a rocky road of discovery. This sensitive coming-of-age story anchored by a stunning lead performance captures the social hardship inherent in a young woman coming to terms with herself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcmUzkC5WNI
Imperial Dreams
(USA / 2014 / Director: Malik Vitthal)
A redemption tale anchored by an amazing lead performance from John Boyega (star of the upcoming *Star Wars* film), *Imperial Dreams* is a family drama with an astonishingly realized father/son relationship at its core. Bambi (Boyega) is coming home to Watts; recently released from prison, he has designs on earning a living as a writer (having been published while incarcerated) to provide for his young son Day. But he quickly realizes the deck is stacked against him and it’s going to take everything he has to achieve his dreams in this stunning, multiple award-winning drama.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwuBl1Stum8
In A Perfect World
(USA / 2015 / Director: Daphne McWilliams)
Documentarian Daphne McWilliams was looking to craft a film about young men raised by single mothers, so she turned to the strongest source she knows — her son. This courageous examination into modern family life, with McWilliams grounding her sociological study through extraordinarily intimate interviews with her son, Chase, as well as other men raised without a father figure, is revelatory. A story of boys becoming men despite the absence of a male presence and the utterly unique relationships they forge with their mothers, In a Perfect World is stirring, relevant filmmaking.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NthftfkGsBs
Last Night
(USA / 2015 / Director: Harold Jackson III)
A whirlwind romantic encounter perfect for fans of the Before Sunrise trilogy, Last Night pairs its mismatched strangers on a night of soul-baring disclosures and verbal sparring on the streets of Washington, D.C. Gorgeous fashion model Sky is escorted on an unexpected evening-long adventure with impulsive businessman Jon — the only catch being that this is Sky’s final night in D.C. before moving to North Carolina to live with her boyfriend. The film is a warmly shot, exquisitely performed look at romantic longing between two people who realize they may only ever have this extended moment between one another.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8WOvlx9hKc
Little White Lie
(USA / 2014 / Directors: Lacey Schwartz and James Adolphus)
A documentary released at a perfect point in our culture when knotty intersections of race and identity are making headlines, Little White Lie tells one woman’s remarkably intimate story of a life spent between two worlds. Raised white with her dark skin color and curly hair explained away as an inheritance from her Sicilian grandfather, the director Lacey Schwartz can’t fight the nagging feeling that her upper-middle-class Jewish upbringing is hiding something, only to find she was the product of her mother’s affair with a black man. After her biological father’s passing, she cannot hold back this family secret any longer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nHq3DevkXqA
The 39th Montreal World Film Festival taking place from August 27th to September 7th 2015, announced the line-up of its World Competition as well as First Feature Competition. Members of both Juries are also public as of today. “Over the decades, the MWFF has achieved its cultural and an economic mission by offering audiences and professionals a multitude of films, of all genres and provenances,” stated Serge Losique who added “An institution recognized by cineastes the world over, this great cinematic institution has always worked hard to assure its perenniality. It has always been about bringing to Montreal screens the new and interesting films that constitute the best showcase of essential cinema culture.”
This year the number of entries to the MWFF sections has overtaken those of previous years : over 2000 feature and short films (in equal proportion) have been screened by the selection committee not mentioning the other films viewed during festivals abroad. The number of countries within the selection highlights this increase as 86 countries will be represented during the 39th edition of the Festival. There are 36 World Premieres in those competitions
World Competition
26 Feature films will compete for the Grand Prize of the Americas.
2 Nights Till Morning by Mikko Kuparinen (Finland-Lithuania) 84 mins
A Havana Moment by Guillermo Ivàn Duenas (USA – Cuba – Mexico – Colombia)
A Matter of Courage by Roberto Gervitz (Brazil – Uruguay) 90 mins
Chucks by Sabine Hiebler, Gerhard Ertl (Austria) 93 mins
Demimonde by Attila Szàsz (Hungary) 88 mins
Gassoh by Tatsuo Kobayashi (Japan) 87 mins
Getaway of Love by Tonino Zangardi (Italy) 90 mins
Grey and Black by Luís Filipe Rocha (Portugal – Brazil)
Happy 140 by Gracia Querejeta (Spain) 98 mins
John Hron by Jon Pettersson (Sweden) 127 mins
L’Accabadora by Enrico Pau (Italy – Ireland) 97 mins
Mad Love by Philippe Ramos (France) 96 mins
Memories of the Wind by Özcan Alper (Turkey – Germany – France – Georgia) 140 mins
My Enemies by Stéphane Géhami (Canada) 106 mins
On the Road to Berlin by Sergei Popov (Russia) 82 mins
Outliving Emily by Eric Weber (USA) 88 mins
Rider Jack by This Lüscher (Switzerland) 90 mins
Secret by Selim Evci (Turkey) 102 mins
Seven Days by Xing Jian (China) 73 mins
Summer Solstice by Michal Rogalski (Poland – Germany) 95 mins
Taboo by Khosro Masoumi (Iran) 108 mins
The Invisible Artery by Pere Vilà Barcelo (Spain) 119 mins
The Midnight Orchestra by Jérôme Cohen Olivar (Morocco) 114 mins
The Petrov File by Georgi Balabanov (Bulgaria – Germany) 90 mins
The Soul of a Spy by Vladimir Bortko (Russia) 110 mins
The Visitor by Mehmet Erylimaz (Turkey) 127 mins
First Feature Competition
Beijing Carmen by Wang Fan (China) 95 mins
Closer by Mostafa Ahmadi (Iran) 90 mins
Crushed by Megan Riakos (Australia) 111 mins
Das Deckelbad by Kuno Bont (Switzerland) 97 mins
Dear Deer by Takeo Kikuchi (Japan) 107 mins
Fire Birds by Amir Wolf (Israel) 105 mins
Kagurame by Yassuo Okuaki (Japan) 112 mins
Legacy by Nemanja Cipranic (Serbia – Montenegro) 90 mins
Live by Vlad Paunescu (Romania) 107 mins
Lost and found by Show Yanagisawa (Japan) 111 mins
Maresia by Marcos Guttmann (Brazil) 90 mins
Neboke by Norihito Iki (Japan) 115 mins
Our Everyday Life by Ines Tanovic (Bosnia-Hezegovine – Slovenia – Croatia) (pictured above)
Rainbow Without Colours by Tuyen Quang Nguyen (Vietnam) 93 mins
Rosa Chumbe by Jonatan Relayze Chiang (Peru) 75 mins
Orage by Fabrice Camoin (France) 80 mins
Stubborn Boy by Moritz Kramer (Germany) 82 mins
The Funeral by Qi Wang (China) 115 mins
The Plastic Cardboard Sonata by Enrico Falcone, Piero Persello (Italy) 80 mins
The Sum of Histories by Lukas Bossuyt (Belgium – Netherlands) 85 mins
The Thin Yellow Line by Celso Garcia (Mexique) 95 mins
Three Days in September by Darijan Pejovski (Macedonia – Kosovo) 90 mins
Under Heaven by Dalmira Tilepbergen (Khirgizistan) 88 mins
Vals by Anita Lakenberger (Austria) 120 mins
The Toronto International Film Festival announces the lineup for its 2015 TIFF Cinematheque program, featuring both 35mm prints as well as new digital restorations of classic films from around the world including Marcel Ophüls’ The Memory of Justice, Luchino Visconti’s Rocco and His Brothers and Kelly Reichardt’s River of Grass.
“We believe that cinema has a rich heritage that must be protected, celebrated and preserved for current and future generations. This year’s TIFF Cinematheque lineup highlights our commitment to both preservation and restoration,” said TIFF programmer Brad Deane. “We’re thrilled to present some of the best new digital restorations along with some beautiful new 35mm prints, embracing both the future of the medium as well as the past.”
A new digital restoration of Julian Roffman’s The Mask (Eyes of Hell), the first feature-length Canadian horror film and first 3-D film made in Canada, makes its world premiere at the Festival. The digital restoration of The Mask (Eyes of Hell) was commissioned by TIFF using elements from the best remaining 35mm prints. One of Canadian cinema’s long buried treasures, The Mask (Eyes of Hell) creates an atmosphere of pervasive dread with its use of inventive visuals and prominent Toronto landmarks.
Other works include Harlan County, USA — the debut documentaries from Barbara Kopple which also screened at the very first Toronto International Film Festival in 1976 — and Frederick Wiseman’s searing Titicut Follies, which returns to the big screen with a newly restored 35mm print. Both Wiseman and Kopple have their latest films in the 2015 TIFF Docs program.
Also screening is another TIFF-commissioned 35mm print of Jacques Rozier’s Adieu Philippine, an oft-overlooked French New Wave gem; and a digital restoration of The Round-Up (Szegénylegények), a landmark of post-war cinema from Hungarian master Miklós Jancsó.
The lineup features selections by the TIFF Cinematheque programming team led by Brad Deane, Senior Manager of Film Programmes, and including James Quandt, Thom Powers and Jesse Wente. TIFF Cinematheque is now in its 25th year.
As part of TIFF’s ongoing commitment to accessible film education, tickets to all TIFF Cinematheque screenings during the Festival are free and will be distributed at the Steve & Rashmi Gupta Box Office at TIFF Bell Lightbox on a first-come, first-served basis two hours before each film screening.
Films screening as part of the TIFF Cinematheque program include:
Adieu Philippine
Jacques Rozier, France/Italy
Set under the looming shadow of the Algerian war, Adieu Philippine follows a young television cameraman who meets and attempts to seduce two beautiful, inseparable young women. The trio’s frolicking fun takes them from the streets of Paris to a Corsican holiday tinged with melancholy.
Harlan County, USA
Barbara Kopple, USA (pictured above)
Harlan County, USA chronicles a fiercely contested labour battle in Kentucky during the early 1970s. The strike began when the miners working for the Eastover Mining Co. joined the UMW, and its corporate parent, Duke Power, refused to sign the standard union contract. By living with the 180-odd families involved in the strike, Kopple shows the backbreaking burdens of the miners’ life in the best of times and the looming fear of destitution in the worst. While the film is unabashedly partisan, it’s worth remembering that the company’s refusal to sign a contract was condemned by the National Labor Relations Board and that the corporation agreed to sign only under heavy pressure from federal mediators.
The Mask (Eyes of Hell)
Julian Roffman, Canada
Newly restored by TIFF and the 3-D Film Archive, director Julian Roffman’s deliciously creepy tale about a haunted tribal mask was the first feature-length horror movie and first feature-length 3-D film produced in Canada. Using elements from the best remaining 35mm prints, TIFF and the 3-D Film Archive have digitally restored the film’s original cut in both anaglyph and polarized 2K 3D. The Mask was restored with the support of TIFF’s donors and members, who contributed to a crowd-sourced fundraising campaign to launch the project.
The Memory of Justice
Marcel Ophüls, United Kingdom/USA/Germany
This epic documentary by Marcel Ophüls (The Sorrow and the Pity) meditates on Western society’s concepts of justice through comparisons of war crimes in Vietnam, Algeria, and Nazi Germany.
Restoration by the Academy Film Archive in association with Paramount Pictures and The Film Foundation. Restoration funding provided by The Material World Charitable Foundation, Righteous Persons Foundation, and The Film Foundation.
River of Grass
Kelly Reichardt, USA
Shot on 16mm, the story follows the misadventures of disaffected housewife Cozy, played by Lisa Bowman, and the aimless layabout Lee, played by indie legend Larry Fessenden, who also acted as a producer and the film’s editor. Described by Reichardt as “a road movie without the road, a love story without the love, and a crime story without the crime,” River of Grass introduces viewers to a director already in command of her craft and defining her signature themes.
Preserved by UCLA Film & Television Archive in conjunction with Oscilloscope Laboratories and Sundance Institute. Preservation Funding provided by Oscilloscope Laboratories, Sundance Institute, TIFF, and a number of very generous Kickstarter backers.
Rocco and His Brothers (Rocco e i Suoi Fratelli)
Luchino Visconti, Italy
Luchino Visconti’s magisterial family saga — about an impoverished Sicilian clan who arrive in Milan in search of a better life — returns in this glorious new restoration, featuring two previously censored scenes.
Restored by Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory in association with Titanus, TF1 Droits Audiovisuels and The Film Foundation. Restoration funding provided by Gucci and The Film Foundation.
The Round-Up (Szegénylegények )
Miklós Jancsó, Hungary
The first of Hungarian master Miklós Jancsó’s historical epics is set in an isolated concentration camp in the 1860s, where imperial authorities use brutal methods to discover the nationalist rebels hiding within the ragtag group of prisoners.
A presentation of the Hungarian National Film Fund and the Hungarian National Digital Film Archive and Film Institute (MaNDA).
Restoration 2K image and sound by the Hungarian Filmlab from 35mm negative.
Titicut Follies
Frederick Wiseman, USA
Titicut Follies is a stark and graphic portrayal of the conditions that existed at the State Prison for the Criminally Insane at Bridgewater, Massachusetts. The film documents the various ways the inmates are treated by the guards, social workers and psychiatrists.
Preserved by Library of Congress National Audio Visual Conservation Center.
The 40th Toronto International Film Festival runs from September 10 to 20, 2015.