Film Festivals

Documenta Madrid Unveils First Titles of 2013 Festival incl Oscar Nominated “The Gatekeepers”

[caption id="attachment_3605" align="alignnone" width="550"]The Gatekeepers[/caption]

The 10th International Festival of Documentary Cinema DOCUMENTA MADRID unveiled the first titles of the Official Selections for 2013, and will open May 5, 2013. with the controversial Oscar nominated documentary “The Gatekeepers”, featuring the Shin Bet, the Israeli domestic secret service agency. Directed by Dror Moreh, the film shows for the first time the inside operations of the agency, through the testimonies of six of its former directors.

The festival contest will have an Official Selection with 15 films, fourteen within the competitive section and a last film, out of contest, which will screen at the closing ceremony. The festival revealed the first selections in the competitive section, including “Winters Nomads” directed by Manuel Von Struler, described as a beautifully filmed documentary which tells the everyday life of the last Swiss shepherds. The film has won, amongst many others, the 2012 Best Documentary Film European Award.

“The Act of Killing” is the documentary film winner of the Panorama Berlin 2013, and of the First Prize at the CPH 2012 (Copenhagen´s Documentary Cinema Festival) and shall be another of the competitive section selection. The film was directed by Joshua Oppenheimer together with Christine Cynn and an anonymous co-director, and tells the story of the atrocities committed by the sinister paramilitary groups in Indonesia during the 1960s, which ended up with the extermination of more than a million people. The film´s originality is that the story is told by the assassins themselves, who appear in it as if they were cinema starlets.

The festival will also screen the 2001 Oscar winner Jean-Xavier de Lestrade latest film: “The Staircase 2. The Last Chance”. The film is the follow-up of the enthralling documentary series THE STAIRCASE which feature the trial of the writer Michael Peterson, charged with killing his wife, a case which was never solved. This new documentary film gives a turn to the story, reconsidering the basis of the approved sentence.

THE GATEKEEPERS – Belgium/Germany/Israel/France. 2012. 96 min. – OPENING
Director: Dror Moreh

[caption id="attachment_3606" align="alignnone" width="550"]The Gatekeepers[/caption]

For the first time ever, six former heads of Israel’s domestic secret service agency, the Shin Bet, share their insights and reflect publicly on their actions and decisions.

Since the Six Day War in 1967, Israel has failed to transform its crushing military victory into a lasting peace. Throughout that entire period, these heads of the Shin Bet stood at the center of Israel´s decision-making process in all matters pertaining to security. They worked closely with every Israeli prime minister, and their assessments and insights had –and continue to have- a profound impact on Israeli policy.

“The gatekeepers” offers an exclusive account of the sum of their successes and failures. In the process it sheds light on the controversy surrounding the Occupation in the aftermath of the Six Day War.

WINTER NOMADS – Switzerland. 2012. 90 min.
Director: Manuel von Stürler

[caption id="attachment_2894" align="alignnone" width="550"]Winter Nomads[/caption]

Pascal, 53, and Carole, 28, are shepherds. In the month of November 2010, they embark on their long winter transhumance: four months during which they will have to cover 600 km in the Swiss-French region, accompanied by three donkeys, four dogs and a eight hundred sheep.

An exceptional adventure is about to begin: they brave the cold and the bad weather day in day out, with a canvas cover and animal skins as their only shelter at night. This saga reveals a tough and exacting profession requiring constant improvisation and unflinching attention to nature, the animals and the cosmos.

An odyssey through a region undergoing profound changes that render this kind of expedition more difficult every year, particularly when the grass for the sheep has to be found between villas, railroad tracks and industrial areas. An eventful journey with surprise encounters, moving reunions with farmer friends, nostalgic figures of country life that is shrinking away fast.

A film dominated by the strong personalities of Pascal and Carole, whose relationship and joie de vivre transform this transhumance into a magnificent hymn to freedom, at opposite extremes of our comfortable reality.

Winter Nomads is an adventure film, a contemporary road movie, a reflection of our current world, which takes us back to our roots and our inner questions.

THE ACT OF KILLING – Denmark. 2012. 115 min.
Director: Joshua Oppenheimer, codirected by Christine Cynn & anonymous associate

[caption id="attachment_3607" align="alignnone" width="550"]THE ACT OF KILLING[/caption]

When the government of Indonesia was overthrown by the military in 1965, more than one million people were killed in less than a year. Anwar and his friends were promoted from ticket scalpers to death squad leaders, and Anwar killed hundreds of people with his own hands. In The Act of Killing, Anwar and his friends agree to tell us the story of the killings. But their idea of being in a movie is not to provide testimony for a documentary: they want to be stars in their favourite film genres – gangster, western, musical. They write the scripts. They play themselves. And they play their victims. The Act of Killing is a nightmarish vision – a journey into the memories and imaginations of the unrepentant perpetrators and the shockingly banal regime of corruption and impunity they inhabit.

THE STAIRCASE 2. THE LAST CHANCE – France, 2012, color, 130 min. –CLAUSURA – FUERA DE COMPETICIÓN
Director: Jean-Xavier de Lestrade

[caption id="attachment_3608" align="alignnone" width="550"]THE STAIRCASE 2. THE LAST CHANCE[/caption]
‘This is the sequel to the documentary thriller The Staircase, an eight-part miniseries from 2004 that meticulously reported events inside and outside the courtroom following the mysterious death of Kathleen Peterson. Were her injuries caused by falling down the stairs, as her husband Michael claimed, or was there foul play involved? The six-hour miniseries ended with the sentencing of Michael Peterson to life imprisonment for premeditated murder. In this sequel, the makers pick up the thread when Peterson files his appeal, after doubts have been raised about the reliability of expert witness testimony. Eight years after his conviction, there is a glimmer of hope that Michael Peterson will be released. But while his sons and adopted daughters remain as loyal to him as ever, his stepdaughter Caitlin has lost faith in his innocence. In addition to showing the ups and downs within the family, the film provides insight into the U.S. justice system, where often self-proclaimed “experts” play a crucial role in the interpretation of evidence. The Staircase 2 adds a new and revealing chapter to this thrilling epic.

Read more
Maryland Film Festival Adds 12 More Films to 2013 Lineup incl. Here Comes The Devil, 16 Acres

Maryland Film Festival taking place May 8-12, 2013, in downtown Baltimore added twelve more films to their 2013 film lineup, bringing the total number of feature films revealed so far to 36.

The films announced today includes work from Finland, Mexico, Austria, and Israel, and such titles as Zach Clark’s holiday-themed, darkly comic White Reindeer;Alex Winter’s riveting look at the rise and fall of Napster, Downloaded; Jessica Oreck’s experiential documentary about a family of reindeer herders, Aatsinki; and Calvin Reeder’s surreal, horror-tinged mindbender about a mysterious loner, The Rambler.

Today’s announced features for Maryland Film Festival 2013 are:

16 ACRES (Richard Hankin)

From the editor and co-producer of Capturing the Friedmans comes this riveting and nuanced documentary look at the rebuilding of Ground Zero-one of the most architecturally, politically, and emotionally complex urban renewal projects in history.

AATSINKI: THE STORY OF ARCTIC COWBOYS (Jessica Oreck)

One year in the life of a family of reindeer herders in Finnish Lapland yields an immersive study of hard work, hard earned leisure, and an intricate bond between man and nature. From the director ofBeetle Queen Conquers Tokyo.

BEFORE YOU KNOW IT (PJ Raval)

This observational documentary raises the curtain on a profoundly neglected segment of the LGBT community, its senior population, as three gay men residing in very different regions of the U.S. face new life challenges.

BLUEBIRD (Lance Edmands)

In the frozen woods of an isolated Maine logging town, one woman’s tragic mistake shatters the balance of the community, resulting in profound and unexpected consequences.

DOWNLOADED (Alex Winter)

With remarkable insight and access, this documentary tells the story of the rise and fall of Napster, taking a close look at the internet mavericks and musicians involved and the lasting global impact of peer-to-peer file sharing.

HERE COMES THE DEVIL (Adrián García Bogliano)

From Mexico comes this horror film concerning disappeared children and panicked parents, offering ever-escalating thrills as it heads to increasingly bloody, diabolical, and even psychedelic territory.

FILL THE VOID (Rama Burshtein)

This drama set in Tel Aviv’s Orthodox community centers around 18-year-old Shira, who faces unexpected life challenges when her older sister dies.

GOOD OL’ FREDA (Ryan White)

Freda Kelly was just a shy Liverpudlian teenager when she was asked to work for a local band hoping to make it big. That band was The Beatles, and Freda was their devoted secretary and friend for 11 years; this documentary tells her story-and the story of the world’s most famous band through her eyes.

MUSEUM HOURS (Jem Cohen)

From the director of Benjamin Smoke and Instrumentcomes this gentle and expertly crafted drama about a Vienna museum guard and the friendship he forms with a woman visiting town to care for a sick friend.

THE RAMBLER (Calvin Reeder)

Dermot Mulroney, Lindsay Pulsipher, and Natasha Lyonne star in the latest psychotronic vision from the director of The Oregonian, in which a mysterious loner, newly released from prison, sets out on a journey filled with bizarre characters and warped experiences.

WE ALWAYS LIE TO STRANGERS (AJ Schnack and David Wilson)

A documentary story of family, community, music and tradition, built over five years and set against the backdrop of Branson, Missouri, one of the biggest tourist destinations in America.

WHITE REINDEER (Zach Clark)

After an unexpected tragedy, Suzanne searches for the true meaning of Christmas during one sad, strange December in suburban Virginia. From the director of Vacation! and Modern Love Is Automatic.

Read more
Rooftop Films Returns for 2013, Kicks off with Short Films and “Frances Ha”

[caption id="attachment_3580" align="alignnone" width="550"]Frances Ha[/caption]

Rooftop Films is back for the 17th Annual Summer Series, with this year’s edition kicking off on Friday, May 10th with a screening of what the festival describes as “some of the greatest new short films from all around the world”. On Saturday, May 11th, Rooftop will present a special sneak preview screening of “Frances Ha,” directed by Noah Baumbach and starring Greta Gerwig,

Some highlights from this year’s Summer Series include New York premieres, sneak previews, and more:

Rooftop will host a sneak preview screening of “Crystal Fairy,” starring Michael Cera and Gaby Hoffmann, directed by Sebastián Silva (“Old Cats,” “The Maid”), winner of the Sundance Film Festival’s award for Best Director Award in World Cinema. The director and cast members will be in attendance.

On Saturday, July 13th, the documentary “Brasslands” will be presented with Arts Brookfield as part of the River To River Festival 2013 on the waterfront of Brookfield Place (formerly World Financial Center), with live performances by four Balkan brass bands, recreating the experience of the massive Serbian music festival that the film documents.

On Saturday, May 25th, Jordan Vogt-Roberts returns to Rooftop with his hilarious feature film debut, “The Kings of Summer” (formerly “Toy’s House”), starring Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally.

Continuing their partnership, Rooftop and BAMcinématek will host a party with a sneak preview of “Drinking Buddies,” directed by Rooftop alum Joe Swanberg and starring Anna Kendrick and Olivia Wilde, on Thursday, June 27th, outdoors across the street from BAM. The filmmaker will be in attendance for the event.

Rooftop will be screening many works by Rooftop Filmmakers’ Fund grantees in 2013, including two films that premiered at Sundance: the hit western “Ain’t Them Bodies Saints,” directed by David Lowery, and “Newlyweeds,” a stoner romantic comedy directed by Shaka King.

Rooftop Films 17th Annual Summer Series Opening Weekend

Friday, May 10, 2013
This is What We Mean by Short Films
Opening Night of Rooftop Films 17th Annual Summer Series will feature grand stories in little packages, with some of the greatest new short films from all around the world. Shorts will be announced soon.
Venue: Open Road Rooftop (350 Grand Street, LES)

Saturday, May 11, 2013
Frances Ha (Dir. Noah Baumbach) (see main image)
Frances wants so much more than she has, but lives her life with unaccountable joy and lightness. “Frances Ha” is a modern comic fable in which Noah Baumbach explores New York, friendship, class, ambition, failure, and redemption. Courtesy of IFC Films.
Venue: Open Road Rooftop (350 Grand Street, LES)

Rooftop Films 17th Annual Summer Series Highlights

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints (Dir. David Lowery)

[caption id="attachment_3581" align="alignnone" width="550"]Ain’t Them Bodies Saints[/caption]
“Ain’t Them Bodies Saints” tells the tale of an outlaw who escapes from prison and sets out across the Texas hills to reunite with his wife and the daughter he has never met.
Courtesy of IFC Films.

Brasslands (Dir. Meerkat Media Collective)

[caption id="attachment_3582" align="alignnone" width="550"]Brasslands[/caption]
Presented by Rooftop Films and Arts Brookfield
Devoted American musicians, Serbian brass heavyweights, and a Gypsy trumpet master collide at the world’s largest trumpet festival.

Crystal Fairy (Dir. Sebastián Silva)

[caption id="attachment_3583" align="alignnone" width="550"]Crystal Fairy[/caption]
A hilariously unpredictable comedy about a self-involved young American searching for a secret hallucinogenic cactus in the desert of Chile.
Courtesy of IFC Films.

Drinking Buddies (Dir. Joe Swanberg)

[caption id="attachment_3539" align="alignnone" width="550"]Drinking Buddies[/caption]
Presented by Rooftop Films and BAMcinématek
Luke and Kate are co-workers at a Chicago brewery where they spend their days drinking and flirting. They’re perfect for each other, except that they’re both in relationships. But you know what makes the line between “friends” and “more than friends” really blurry? Beer.
Courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.

Newlyweeds (Dir. Shaka King)

[caption id="attachment_3584" align="alignnone" width="550"]Newlyweeds [/caption]
Brooklyn residents Lyle and Nina blaze away the stress of living in New York City, but what should be a match made in stoner heaven turns into a love triangle gone awry.
Courtesy of Phase 4 Films.

The Kings of Summer (Dir. John Vogt-Roberts)

[caption id="attachment_3585" align="alignnone" width="550"]The Kings of Summer[/caption]
A unique coming-of-age comedy about three teenage friends who, in the ultimate act of independence, decide to spend their summer building a house in the woods and living off the land.
Courtesy of CBS.

Read more
5 Documentaries to Watch at 2013 Tribeca Film Festival

by Morgan Davies

The Tribeca Film Festival kicks off in downtown Manhattan this week, and while movies with big stars like The English Teacher (with Julianne Moore and Nathan Lane) and Almost Christmas (with Paul Giamatti and Paul Rudd) may get most of the attention from the press, many of the festival’s best films are likely to be less-seen documentaries. Here are five to look out for.

Mistaken for Strangers

Unlike previous festivals, which have opened with the likes of Spider-Man 3 and The Avengers, Tribeca will officially begin this year with Mistaken for Strangers (see main image), a documentary (or mock-documentary) by Tom Berninger, brother of Matt Berninger, the frontman of Brooklyn-based indie rock band The National. Described as “embodying the wherewithal of a Christopher Guest character” in the official description of the film, Tom went on tour with his brother’s band as a roadie-cum-documentarian, and what started out as a mockumentary project grew into something more. In a recent interview with Pitchfork, Matt said the film kept getting closer and closer to reality: “We crafted some of it to tell that story, and we’re not calling it a pure documentary, but it’s a very honest, personal narrative that we started chasing.”

http://youtu.be/FUjBue7XggQ

Bridegroom

With the Supreme Court set to make a ruling on the constitutionality on California’s Prop 8 this summer, same-sex marriage is on everybody’s mind these days. Bridegroom, the debut documentary feature by Linda Bloodworth Thomason, is right on the zeitgeist: it focuses on Tom, a young man who must “fac[e] the failure of same sex marriage protections that leave him completely shut out and ostracized” in the wake of his partner Shane’s untimely death.

Gasland Part II

Gasland, Josh Fox’s 2010 Oscar-nominated documentary, was instrumental in starting the national conversation about the effects of hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) on the land and the people living on it. In his follow-up, Fox once again “examines the long-run impact of the controversial process, including poisonous water, earthquakes and neurological damage, placing his focus on the people whose lives have been irreparably changed.” By looking at anti-fracking protesters and movements and the corporations on the other side of the battle, Gaslands Part II promises to expand and deepen the conversation even further.

Oxyana

Funded by Kickstarter, Oxyana is Sean Dunne’s debut documentary feature, focusing on the small town of Oceana, West Virginia, which has become plagued by rampant prescription drug addiction in the wake of the vanishing coal industry. With a score by alt-country band Deer Tick and beautiful photography as seen in the film’s haunting trailer, the film – described as “unflinchingly intimate” – promises to be something special.

Flex is Kings

All dance aficionados owe it to themselves to watch the captivating film above, which features footage of twenty-one “flex” dancers from East New York in Brooklyn. Flex is a rapidly-growing style of dance native to Brooklyn that is unlike anything you’ve ever seen. In this documentary, filmmakers Deirdre Schoo and Michael Beach Nichols combine “majestic choreographed set pieces” with a focus on three central characters: Reem, Flizzo, and Jay Donn. Billed as “a sparkling testament to the freeing power of art and a powerful visual celebration of the beauty born when raw energy is directed toward the creative process,” this isn’t one to miss.

Read more
USA Film Festival Unveils 2013 Lineup, incl The Way, Way Back, Manhunt

The USA Film Festival released the schedule of events for the 43rd Annual USA Film Festival, April 24 – 28, 2013 to be held at the Angelika Film Center, in Dallas, Texas.

This year’s program include a salute to veteran indie distributor Jeff Lipsky, Academy Award®-winning filmmakers Nat Faxon and Jim Rash present The Way, Way Back (main image), veteran documentary filmmaker Greg Barker presents Manhunt (pictured above) and Linda Bloodworth-Thomason’s documentary Bridegroom.

Other highlights include actress/writer Abby Miller presents Congratulations, director Susan Seidelman presents The Hot Flashes, Caesar Must Die from Paolo and Vittorio Taviani, and Kevin Connolly’s documentary Big Shot (pictured above).

The festival will also screen new films from femme filmmakers, Sarah Polley’s Stories We Tell and Lynn Shelton’s Touchy Feely (pictured above), Japanese anime feature The Princess and the Pilot, feature documentaries Blackfish (dir. Gabriela Cowperthwaite), Free the Mind (dir. Phie Ambo) and More Than Honey (dir. Markus Imhoof).

Films from hometown – Texas – talent include writer/director David Gordon Green with his new feature Prince Avalanche (pictured above), Actress Amy Acker presents Joss Whedon’s Much Ado About Nothing, Writer Joey O’Bryan’s Hong Kong thriller, Motorway, gets the big screen treatment, writer Brad Hennig presents The Hot Flashes (a feature film created to support awareness for cancer screenings), and Dallas filmmakers Drew Rist and Don Merritt present their documentary Bottled Up, the Dublin Dr Pepper story.

Read more
Kinky Lesbians and U-Locks in “Sweet Ride” at 2013 Filmed by Bike

The short film “Sweet Ride” directed by Ilima Considine, singer of The Sexbots, will show during Filmed by Bike, a film festival of the best bike themed movies from around the world, April 20-23, 2013 at the Clinton Street Theater, 2522 SE Clinton Street in Portland, Oregon.

The film features a lesbian love nest with a Sprockette and a greasy bike mechanic, kinky sex involving a bike helmet, someone gets beaten into a coma with a U-lock and what the filmmaker best describes as “or, as my Asian mom said, “I can’t watch this.”

Considine’s debut short in 2011’s Filmed by Bike was about a pair of friends who shared a fetish for bike mechanics, just like the director. She has claimed that this 4-minute short was a thinly veiled excuse to make out with a Sprockette and beat someone with a bike lock.

Read more
Pasadena Starring Peter Bogdanovich, Cheryl Hines to World Premiere at 2013 Sarasota Film Festival

PASADENA, the new independent ‘dramedy’ starring Peter Bogdanovich, Cheryl Hines, Alicia Witt, Sonya Walger and Ashton Holmes will have its World Premiere today, Saturday April 13, 2013, in Sarasota, Florida, at the 2013 Sarasota International Film Festival.

PASADENA was written and directed by Will Slocombe. Set in present-day Pasadena and constructed around a series of meals, PASADENA is about what happens when you set a match to a powder keg. It’s about honesty. It’s about love. It’s about trying your best. Ultimately, it’s about the kind of emotional terrorism that only families can inflict upon one another.

Thanksgiving get-together for the eccentric Turner clan, presided over by eminent scholar and patriarch, POPPY (Peter Bogdanovich), turns into a disastrous holiday weekend when black sheep daughter NINA (Alicia Witt) pays her first visit home in 15 years. Nina immediately clashes with stepmother, DEBORAH (Cheryl Hines), and competes with her siblings (Ashton Holmes and Sonya Walger) for Poppy’s affection – and money. Over three days, the family gradually disintegrates over who will get Poppy’s money – only to discover Poppy has his own bad news to share…

Read more
Maryland Film Festival Adds Twelve More Films to 2013 Lineup

Maryland Film Festival unveiled twelve more feature films in the festival’s 2013 lineup. The list includes two highly anticipated documentaries with Baltimore subjects, Jeffrey Schwarz’s loving and definitive portrait I Am Divine (photo above), and Joe Tropea and Skizz Cyzyk’s Catonsville Nine documentary Hit & Stay.

Also featured are a wide range of international films including Augustine (France), Berberian Sound Studio (UK), Post Tenebras Lux (Mexico), and Watchtower (Turkey); Sundance 2013 breakthrough dramas A Teacher and This Is Martin Bonner; and the latest from David Gordon Green, Prince Avalanche.

MFF 2013 will take place May 8-12 in downtown Baltimore.

The latest announced titles for MFF 2013 are:

Augustine (Alice Winocour) Set in Belle Epoque France, Alice Winocour’s provocative period piece chronicles the sexual awakening of a female patient in a mental hospital for women suffering from “hysteria.”

Berberian Sound Studio (Peter Strickland) In the 1970s, a gifted but reclusive British sound engineer begins having ever-escalating strange experiences the mirror that Italian horror film on which he’s working.

Drinking Buddies (Joe Swanberg) Kate and Luke form a close bond working together at a Chicago craft brewery-but as the line between friendship and romance gets blurry, cracks begin to show, both in the workplace and their personal lives. Starring Olivia Wilde, Anna Kendrick, Jake Johnson, and Ron Livingston.

Hit & Stay (Joe Tropea and Skizz Cyzyk) This Baltimore-made documentary tells the story of the radical priests, nuns, and everyday people who comprised the Baltimore Four and the Catonsville Nine, risking prison to challenge U.S. military involvement in Vietnam.

I Am Divine (Jeffrey Schwarz) From the director of Vito comes the definitive documentary look at actor, singer, and drag icon Harris Glenn Milstead, better known as Divine; featuring extensive interviews with John Waters and many others who knew, loved, and worked with Divine.

Leviathan (Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Véréna Paravel) Functioning as both an immersive experiential documentary about modern commercial fishing and a feature-length experimental film, Leviathan offers an explosive and chaotic sensory experience like no other.

Post Tenebras Lux (Carlos Reygadas) The director of challenging art-house favorites Battle in Heaven and Silent Light returns with his most personal and transgressive film yet, a masterful meditation on natural wonder, sudden violence, and the human condition.

Prince Avalanche (David Gordon Green) Paul Rudd and Emile Hirsch star as highway workers with a bumpy history paired for a project in a remote location in this charming blend of comedy and drama from the director of George Washington and Pineapple Express.

Swim Little Fish Swim (Lola Bessis and Ruben Amar) In this offbeat French/U.S. co-production with notes of deadpan comedy and romance, hardworking Mary’s frustration with her idealistic husband Leeward mounts when a vivacious young French woman enters their life.

A Teacher (Hannah Fidell) Diana, a young suburban high-school teacher, seems to be leading a pleasant, if placid, life-but behind closed doors, she’s risking it all for an affair with one of her students.

This Is Martin Bonner (Chad Hartigan) Fifty-something Martin Bonner looks for a new beginning in Reno, working with released prisoners for a faith-based organization. This subtle and moving character study won the Sundance 2013 Best of Next Audience Award.

Watchtower (Pelin Esmer) Plagued by tragedy and guilt, a man takes a job in a remote corner of Turkey-but the solitary new life he builds for himself is challenged by the arrival of a young woman, also running from her past.

Read more
Zulu Starring Forest Whitaker, Orlando Bloom to Close 2013 Cannes Film Festival

The 66th Festival de Cannes aka Cannes Film Festival, has chosen the thriller Zulu starring Forest Whitaker, Orlando Bloom and Tanya van Graan to close the festival on May 26, 2013. The film which shot entirely on location in South Africa by Jérôme Salle is adapted from the novel of the same name by Caryl Férey.

The action takes place in Cape Town, in a South Africa still overshadowed by apartheid, where destitute townships rubs shoulders with affluent neighborhoods Two cops on the beat, Orlando Bloom (Pirates of the Caribbean by Gore Verbinski, Lord of the Rings by Peter Jackson) and Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland by Kevin McDonald, Ghost Dog, La Voie du Samouraï by Jim Jarmush) are caught up in a suspenseful search which combines elements of political film noir and social study.

Interesting tid bit: In 1988, Forest Whitaker won Best Male Actor at Cannes for his role in Clint Eastwood’s Bird.

Read more
Opening Night Red Carpet Photos of 2013 Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles

The 11th Annual Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles kicked-off Tuesday, April 9, 2013 at Arclight Hollywood in Los Angeles with a red carpet and the Los Angeles premiere of Anurag Kashyap’s GANGS OF WASSEYPUR, followed by a gala.

Celebrities in attendance included Actress Freida Pinto and director Anurag Kashyap (pictured above).

The film festival, which runs through April 14, is showcasing 30 plus narrative and documentary features and short films.

From left – Actress Freida Pinto, director Anurag Kashyap and Christina Marouda, Founder and Chair of the Board of the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA) on the Opening Night Red Carpet Tuesday, April 9, 2013 at Arclight Hollywood in Los Angeles. Kashyap’s film GANGS OF WASSEYPUR opened the film fest that runs through April 14.
Photo credit: Tiffany Rose

From left – Guneet Monga, CEO and Producer AKFPL and Sikhya Entertainment who is also an honoree of IFFLA’s Industry Leadership Award 2013, Christina Marouda, Founder and Chair of the Board of the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA), and director Vasan Bala whose film PEDDLERS is part of the film fest line-up on the Opening Night Red Carpet Tuesday, April 9, 2013 at Arclight Hollywood in Los Angeles. The film fest runs through April 14
Photo credit: Tiffany Rose

Actors Parvesh Cheena and Ben Rappaport with Christina Marouda, Founder and Chair of the Board of the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA) on the Opening Night Red Carpet of the film fest Tuesday, April 9, 2013 at Arclight Hollywood in Los Angeles.The film fest runs through April 14.
Photo credit: Tiffany Rose

Director Anurag Kasyap whose film GANGS OF WASSEYPUR opened the 11th Annual Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA) Tuesday, April 9, 2013 at Arclight Hollywood in Los Angeles addresses the audience prior to the screening while Christina Marouda, IFFLA Founder and Chair of the Board, looks on. The fest runs through April 14.
Photo credit: Tiffany Rose

Director Wendy J.N. Lee whose award-winning documentary PAD YATRA: A GREEN ODYSSEY is screening at the 11th Annual Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (IFFLA) poses on the film fest’s Opening Night Red Carpet Tuesday, April 9, 2013 at Arclight Hollywood in Los Angeles. The fest runs through April 14.
Photo credit: Tiffany Rose

Read more
Pedro Almodóvar’s Kinky Comedy Film I’m So Excited! to Open 2013 Los Angeles Film Festival

The North American Premiere of Pedro Almodóvar’s I’m So Excited! will double as the opening night film for the 2013 Los Angeles Film Festival on Thursday, June 13.

Starring Javier Cámara, Cecilia Roth, Lola Dueñas and Raúl Arévalo, and featuring cameos from Antonio Banderas and Penélope Cruz, I’m So Excited! follows a very mixed group of travelers in a life-threatening situation on board a plane flying to Mexico City. They let off steam, attempt to seduce and be seduced, lie to themselves and each other, and battle with fear, loneliness and the prospect of death.

The film’s release is set for June 28, 2013 from Sony Pictures Classics.

Now in its nineteenth year, the festival will return to downtown Los Angeles, with its central hub at L.A. LIVE, and will run from Thursday, June 13 to Sunday, June 23, 2013.

http://youtu.be/KAwsgR5MhjI

Read more
NOR’EASTER to Screen at the 2013 Sarasota International Film Festival

NOR’EASTER is screening this upcoming weekend at the 2013 Sarasota International Film Festival in Sarasota, Florida. NOR’EASTER was written and directed by Andrew Brotzman.

A young priest, Erik (David Call, TINY FURNITURE, Gossip Girl) serves as the lone Catholic authority on a small island off the coast of Maine. After a poorly attended mass, Erik is visited by Ellen Greene, the mother of Joshua, a child who has been missing for five years. Josh’s absence has pushed Ellen’s marriage to the breaking point, and though her husband strenuously objects, she and the priest decide to hold a symbolic funeral in an effort to move on.

When the family’s decision becomes public, Josh inexplicably returns to the island, alive and well. Now sixteen years old, Josh appears unharmed, but refuses to answer questions about where he has been.

Erik interprets Josh’s return as a divine event and involves himself in the family’s affairs in an effort to both help them and affirm his own faith. He proves to be the only one able to uncover Josh’s past whereabouts, but in doing so, causes more problems than he could have ever anticipated, threatening his relationship to the family, the church, and the law.

NOR’EASTER was written and directed by Andrew Brotzman. It has a running time of 85 minutes and is not yet rated by the MPAA.

The 2013 Sarasota International Film Festival runs April 5 – 14, 2013 in Sarasota, Florida.

Nor’easter Trailer from David Lowery on Vimeo.
Read more