San Francisco International Film Festival

29% of Films at SF Film Festival Women-Directed; Mira Nair To Receive Prestigious Award at the Fest

Diana Martinez — Thu, 31 Mar 2016 17:00:00 GMT

About 29% of the films in the lineup for the 2016 San Francisco International Film Festival are directed by women. Of the 173 films showing at the festival, 50 are directed by women. As previously reported, 35% of the features competing for the festival's Golden Gate Awards are female-helmed.

The festival lineup includes Anna Fontaine's "The Innocents" as part of the Global Visions program, which features contemporary films from around the world. Marquee presentations include Rebecca Miller's screwball romantic comedy "Maggie's Plan," starring Greta Gerwig, and the world premiere of Susanna White's film adaptation of John le Carré's novel "Our Kind of Traitor."

The SF Film Festival is honoring director Mira Nair with the prestigious Irving M. Levin Directing Award. According to the San Francisco Film Society, which heads the festival, the award is given yearly to "one of the masters of world cinema" who demonstrate "exceptional versatility in film."

Nair's breakout film was the Oscar-nominated "Salaam Bombay!" (1988). Her prolific career includes "Mississippi Masala" (1991), "Monsoon Wedding" (2001), "The Namesake" (2006) and "Amelia" (2009). She recently received the 2016 Laura Ziskin Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2016 Athena Film Festival.

Nair will accept her award at the Film Society Awards Night on April 25. A public conversation with the Indian filmmaker will precede the awards ceremony. "Monsoon Wedding" will be screened at the event, titled An Afternoon with Nair. The comedy-drama follows five romantic stories as they crisscross and jeopardize a wedding. Mixing a Bollywood sensibility with nuanced character renderings, the film is a great example of what San Francisco Film Society's Executive Director Noah Cowan calls "a spirit of internationalism."

The presentation will also include an exclusive first look at Nair's next project, "Queen of Katwe." Attendees will be able to see special footage of the film, which stars Lupita Nyong'o ("12 Years a Slave").

For a complete line-up of films, visit the official website for the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival.

[via Press materials]

San Francisco International Film Festival Announces Full Lineup, Including 'High-Rise' and 'Maggie's Plan'

Kate Erbland — Tue, 29 Mar 2016 18:00:00 GMT

The San Francisco International Film Festival is putting the finishing touches on its annual lineup, today announcing a series of very exciting new events and initiatives. At the top of the list are a pair of events that cinephiles will not want to miss, including the presentation of the Irving M. Levin Directing Award to filmmaker Mira Nair and the always-invigoraiting State of Cinema Address, which will be delivered this year by Pulitzer-winning film and cultural critic Wesley Morris.

As part of her award, Nair will participate in an onstage discussion of her career, followed by a first look at footage from her upcoming project "Queen of Katwe" and a full screening of "Monsoon Wedding." Morris' address will reportedly tackle "the current climate of race in the movies through an analysis of the secret radicalization of Sidney Poitier."

This year's SFIFF lineup includes a record number of films that were supported by SFFS grants and residencies, including their flagship SFFS / KRF Filmmaking Grant, the Documentary Film Fund and their FilmHouse Residencies and more. Films that will screen at SFIFF that have received these grants include Maris Curran's "Five Nights in Maine," Amanda Micheli's "haveababy" and Mike Plunkett's "Salero," among others.
This festival will also feature a spotlight on animation, with eight programs of features and shorts exploring the imaginative use of animation in various contexts. As part of their "Animating the Image" section, SFIFF will show a variety of features, including "Life, Animated," "NUTS!" and "Granny's Dancing on the Table."

READ MORE: San Francisco Film Festival Kicks Off with Whit Stillman’s 'Love & Friendship'

Other highlights of the festival include premieres like Michael Almereyda's "Escapes," Susanna White's "Our Kind of Traitor," Moby Longinotto's "The Joneses," and Guetty Felin's "Ayiti Mon Amour."

The festival is also presenting a number of special interests categories, from African American (which boasts films like Chad Hartigan's "Morris From America" and Anna Rose Holmer's "The Fits") to Economic Issues (which includes Ben Wheatley's "High-Rise" and Ira Sachs' "Little Men") to Female Perspective (toplined by Anne Fontaine's "The Innocents" and Rebecca Miller's "Maggie's Plan").
The festival previously announced its opening night film, Whit Stillman's dizzyingly fun Jane Austen adaptation, "Love & Friendship."

READ MORE: San Francisco Film Festival Reveals Golden Gate Awards Competition

The Film Society has also announced the launch of a year-round Online Screening Room, available on both their website and through a brand new mobile app, so that Society members can stream select festival films, Filmmaker360-supported projects and any other films that catch the eye of the organization's programmers.

This year, the sprawling 15-day San Francisco Film Festival's 200 films and live events and awards shows are spreading out around the area for greater outreach via screenings at the Castro Theatre, the Alamo Drafthouse New Mission, the Roxie Theater and the Victoria Theatre in San Francisco and BAMPFA in Berkeley. The 2016 SFFF will take place from April 21-May 5.

You can check out the rest of the festival's lineup over at their official website.

San Francisco Film Festival Kicks Off with Whit Stillman’s 'Love & Friendship'

Anne Thompson — Tue, 22 Mar 2016 18:57:36 GMT

The two-week-long 59th San Francisco International Film Festival (April 21–May 5) launches Opening Night with Whit Stillman’s Jane Austen comedy of manners "Love & Friendship" (Amazon/Roadside Attractions, May 13), starring Kate Beckinsale and Chloe Sevigny. The movie debuted at Sundance, along with another literary adaptation, writer-producer-turned-director James Schamus's "Indignation" (Lionsgate/Roadside Attractions, 2016), a 50s coming-of-age story starring Logan Lerman and Sarah Gadon, which is based on a Philip Roth novel and will play April 30th in the festival's Centerpiece slot.

READ MORE: Whit Stillman Q & A

READ MORE: How James Schamus Made His Directing Debut with 'Indignation' (Exclusive Video)

The Festival will close on May 5th with Bay Area director Jesse Moss’ documentary "The Bandit," a look at how Burt Reynolds and stuntman-turned-director Hal Needham made the high-speed pursuit classic "Smokey and the Bandit."

Held each spring for 15 days, SFIFF showcases cinematic discovery and innovation via nearly 200 films and live events, 14 juried awards with nearly $40,000 in cash prizes and upwards of 100 participating filmmaker guests. This year Fest director Noah Cowan is opening up the screening venues to the entire Bay Area, to spread the Film Festival love, from the venerable Castro Theatre to the Alamo Drafthouse New Mission, the Roxie Theater and the Victoria Theatre in San Francisco and BAMPFA in Berkeley.

San Francisco Film Society Announces Films in Competition for Golden Gate Awards, 35% Female-Helmed

Casey Cipriani — Wed, 16 Mar 2016 17:00:00 GMT

The San Francisco Film Society has announced the films in competition for the Narrative Feature and Documentary Feature Golden Gate Awards, which will be presented at the San Francisco International Film Festival running from April 21-May 5.

Of the 20 films in competition, seven, or 35 percent, were directed by women.

The awards will distribute nearly $40,000 in total prizes this year. Films are selected with an emphasis on bringing attention to innovative and quality film making regardless of participation in other festivals.

Notable inclusions in the documentary competition are "Cameraperson," a documentary from "Citizenfour" cinematographer Kirsten Johnson, and Sonia Kennebeck's "National Bird," which was produced by Wim Wenders and Errol Morris. Two of the narrative features, "As I Open My Eyes" and "Mountain," appear to follow women facing challenges that come from restrictive societies.

The GGA New Directors Prize winner will receive a cash prize of $10,000, the GGA Documentary Feature winner will receive $10,000 and the GGA Bay Area Documentary Feature winner will receive $5,000. In addition to the narrative and documentary features in contention, the Golden Gate Awards will include competitors in six short film categories. These films will be announced at the Festival press conference on March 29. Independent juries will select the winners in all categories, which will be announced at the Golden Gate Awards May 4.

The films directed by women are listed below, with synopses provided by the festival.

NEW DIRECTORS PRIZE (NARRATIVE FEATURE) COMPETITION (33 Percent Female Directed)

“As I Open My Eyes,” Leyla Bouzid, Tunisia/France/Belgium
Her family assumes that Farah, a high-achieving student in Tunis, will continue her studies, but she just wants to sing. When her mom hears that she's performing politically provocative material with a group of male friends, a powerful story unfolds of female independence that stands in the face of conservative Muslim beliefs.

“Mountain,” Yaelle Kayam, Israel/Denmark
Yaelle Kayam's debut feature is strikingly shot against the tombstones of Jerusalem's Mount of Olives, where an Orthodox woman's longing for her husband's love sets in motion a transformational journey into a nocturnal world of pimps and prostitutes. A mesmerizing performance by Shani Klein keeps viewers riveted to a character study that is by turns tender and startling.

“Thirst,” Svetla Tsotsorkova, Bulgaria
When water becomes scarce due to drought, a laundress living in rural southwest Bulgaria with her husband and son invites a dowser and his spirited daughter onto their property to search for hidden springs. Wonderfully atmospheric, the film gracefully depicts how the teenage girl's combative nature and the oppressive heat surrounding them all upset the family's balance, for good and bad.

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE COMPETITION (36 Percent Female Directed)

“Cameraperson,” Kirsten Johnson, USA
Simultaneously an astute observation of nonfiction filmmaking's dilemmas, and a wonderfully creative autobiographical collage, Cameraperson is a must-see for all documentary enthusiasts. Acclaimed cinematographer Kirsten Johnson, who has lensed such acclaimed films as Citizenfour, Very Semi-Serious and Darfur Now, assembles moments from 25 years of location shoots -- including a birthing clinic in Nigeria, a Bosnian farm, a detention center in Yemen and a boxing ring in Brooklyn -- and stiches together an illuminating, emotional patchwork memoir.

“haveababy,” Amanda Micheli, USA
Amanda Micheli's stirring and suspenseful documentary follows several aspiring parents who desperately want to have a baby but are struggling with infertility and the high cost of treatments. They place themselves in the hands of Las Vegas doctor Gregory Sher and his annual contest offering a prize of a free round of in-vitro fertilization treatments -- with no guarantee of pregnancy. A rollercoaster of hope and despair awaits them all.

“National Bird,” Sonia Kennebeck, USA
Executive produced by Wim Wenders and Errol Morris, this elegant and chilling documentary provides a glimpse of what the US government doesn't want you to know about drone warfare by focusing on three veterans whose service experience caused them to question the usage of drones in overseas combat.

“The Return,” Kelly Duane de la Vega, Katie Galloway, USA
After California voters reversed the state's Three Strikes law, thousands of inmates became suddenly eligible for re-sentencing and release. This provocative and touching documentary chronicles what happened next. Filmmakers Kelly Duane De la Vega and Katie Galloway (Better this World, SFIFF 2011) focus on the journeys of the newly free and their families, as well as the Stanford-based lawyers working on behalf of nonviolent offenders, illuminating the multifaceted struggle behind every transition from incarceration to freedom.

[via Press materials]

San Francisco Film Festival Reveals Golden Gate Awards Competition

Anne Thompson — Thu, 10 Mar 2016 21:00:00 GMT

The San Francisco Film Society has revealed the films in competition for the Golden Gate Awards (GGA), which will distribute nearly $40,000 in total prizes this year in various narrative and documentary categories. SFFS is continuing its support for emerging global film artists in the United States via the Golden Gate Awards, which have been presented at the San Francisco International Film Festival (April 21–May 5) since its inaugural year in 1957.

Given their spot on the calendar, with Sundance, SXSW and Tribeca ahead of them, it makes sense for the SFIFF to champion innovative new movies even if they've been screened at other fests. LA's fall AFI Fest's New Auteurs competition offers some of the most exciting filmmakers at that festival.

“At the Film Society, we feel that an important part of our responsibility to contemporary cinema involves hitting the pause button on the industry mayhem around premieres and concentrate on championing films and filmmakers who need our support,” said SFFS Executive Director Noah Cowan. "With more than a thousand new films from around the world hitting the major festival circuit each year, inevitably some great films get overlooked and some important voices go unheard. The Golden Gate Awards are here to celebrate these artists and their work, providing an additional chance for international exposure and recognition.”

The GGA New Directors Prize winner will receive a cash prize of $10,000, the GGA Documentary Feature winner will receive $10,000 and the GGA Bay Area Documentary Feature winner will receive $5,000. In addition to the narrative and documentary features in contention, the Golden Gate Awards will include competitors in six short film categories. These films will be announced at the Festival press conference on Tuesday, March 29. Independent juries will select the winners in all categories, which will be announced at the Golden Gate Awards, Wednesday, May 4.

2016 GGA NEW DIRECTORS PRIZE (NARRATIVE FEATURE) COMPETITION

"As I Open My Eyes," Leyla Bouzid, Tunisia/France/Belgium
Her family assumes that Farah, a high-achieving student in Tunis, will continue her studies, but she just wants to sing. When her mom hears that she’s performing politically provocative material with a group of male friends, a powerful story unfolds of female independence that stands in the face of conservative Muslim beliefs.

"The Demons," Philippe Lesage, Canada 
Documentary filmmaker Philippe Lesage’s narrative debut is an exquisitely observed portrait of a delicate 10-year-old Quebec boy grappling with the insecurities and confusion of impending adolescence. The fragility of innocence is foregrounded through minor humiliations and petty cruelties that unfold in pastel, sun-soaked locations. Infused with an unsettling air of ambiguity and dread that portends terrible crimes to follow, this restrained and coolly beautiful film is an unforgettable portrait a child forced to confront the dangers of growing up.

"From Afar," Lorenzo Vigas, Venezuela/Mexico
When a middle-aged single man, who cruises his Caracas neighborhood for rough trade, takes a tough young boy into his home, a gritty exploration ensues as these two angry men negotiate a relationship that resides somewhere between lover and friend and a paternal father/son dynamic. Winner of the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, Lorenzo Vigas’s debut feature is a tour-de-force exploration of a relationship's darker side.

"Home Care," Slávek Horák, Czech Republic/Slovakia
Dedicated home-care nurse Vlasta (Karlovy Vary winner Alena Mihulová) traipses around the south Moravia countryside on bus and foot tending to (and bantering with) patients too infirm or elderly to travel. When she herself is diagnosed with a serious illness, she turns to alternative therapies and the company of women healers. The Czech Republic’s Oscar submission for Best Foreign Language Film is a rueful, touching mix of realism, absurdity, irony and daring gallows humor.

"Mountain," Yaelle Kayam, Israel/Denmark
Yaelle Kayam’s debut feature is strikingly shot against the tombstones of Jerusalem’s Mount of Olives, where an Orthodox woman’s longing for her husband’s love sets in motion a transformational journey into a nocturnal world of pimps and prostitutes. A mesmerizing performance by Shani Klein keeps viewers riveted to a character study that is by turns tender and startling.Neither Heaven Nor Earth, Clément Cogitore, France/BelgiumIn this suspenseful war film that uses fear of the dark to great effect, a French army contingent operating in Afghanistan is beset by mysterious disappearances. While Captain Antarès (Jérémie Renier) initially and understandably blames local villagers for the loss of his men, the real cause could be something supernatural, a force that implies the profound wrongness of these men being on soil that doesn’t belong to them.

"Thirst," Svetla Tsotsorkova, Bulgaria 
When water becomes scarce due to drought, a laundress living in rural southwest Bulgaria with her husband and son invites a dowser and his spirited daughter onto their property to search for hidden springs. Wonderfully atmospheric, the film gracefully depicts how the teenaged girl’s combative nature and the oppressive heat surrounding them all upset the family’s balance, for good and bad.

"Thithi," Raam Reddy, India/USA
In a small South Indian village, a cantankerous centenarian keels over and dies, setting the stage for a capricious comedy of errors among three generations of dissimilar sons. Conflict, confusion, corruption and a series of ill-conceived actions all come to a head at the funeral celebration (the titular thithi). With its charming cast of non-professional actors—both human and ovine—director Raam Reddy’s feature film offers a playful portrait of intergenerational conflicts and differences.

"Very Big Shot," Mir-Jean Bou Chaaya, Lebanon/Qatar
Two brothers are bitten by the movie bug when they conceive an idea to smuggle drugs in empty film canisters in this often hilarious satire of politics and filmmaking. With an easily manipulated director on board, their controversial storyline involving forbidden love catches the eye of local authorities and their original plan takes a backseat to their cinematic ambitions.

2016 GOLDEN GATE AWARDS DOCUMENTARY FEATURE COMPETITION

"Cameraperson," Kirsten Johnson, USA
Simultaneously an astute observation of nonfiction filmmaking’s dilemmas, and a wonderfully creative autobiographical collage, Cameraperson is a must-see for all documentary enthusiasts. Acclaimed cinematographer Kirsten Johnson, who has lensed such acclaimed films as Citizenfour, Very Semi-Serious and Darfur Now, assembles moments from 25 years of location shoots—including a birthing clinic in Nigeria, a Bosnian farm, a detention center in Yemen and a boxing ring in Brooklyn—and stiches together an illuminating, emotional patchwork memoir.

"Dead Slow Ahead," Mauro Herce, Spain/France
We are embedded on a massive cargo freighter as it chugs slowly across the vast Atlantic ocean in this haunting, meditative and expansively ambient film. Humanized by the melancholy of a hard-working crew as they struggle against the elements, Mauro Herce's insightful and poetic cinematography emphasizes the smallness of human experience against the crushing and mighty mechanical grind of the ship, and the unknowable vastness of the open sea.

"haveababy," Amanda Micheli, USA
Amanda Micheli's stirring and suspenseful documentary follows several aspiring parents who desperately want to have a baby but are struggling with infertility and the high cost of treatments. They place themselves in the hands of Las Vegas doctor Gregory Sher and his annual contest offering a prize of a free round of in-vitro fertilization treatments—with no guarantee of pregnancy. A rollercoaster of hope and despair awaits them all.

"The Joneses," Moby Longinotto, USA/UK
Filmmaker Moby Longinotto's fascinating, thoroughly candid documentary invites audiences to pull up a chair at the never-dull family table in a Mississippi trailer park home. Everything is on the menu: dashed dreams, seething resentments, sexual awakenings and dollops of unconditional love. Overseeing all the tumult is unflappable, 73-year-old transgender matriarch Jheri Jones, whose dedicated ministrations keep her family going.National Bird, Sonia Kennebeck, USAExecutive produced by Wim Wenders and Errol Morris, this elegant and chilling documentary provides a glimpse of what the US government doesn’t want you to know about drone warfare by focusing on three veterans whose service experience caused them to question the usage of drones in overseas combat.

"Notes on Blindness," Peter Middleton, James Spinney, UK/France
A taped journal that theologian John Hull kept after the onset of blindness in 1980 forms the basis of this elegant and moving depiction of struggle and transcendence. Hull's own voice provides the audio, though an actor plays the deceased writer, as he learns to negotiate his condition and endures a crisis of faith. Sublime sound design further enhances this evocative documentary, making manifest Hull's discovery that the loss of one sense leads to the sharpening of others.

"NUTS! ," Penny Lane, USA
Penny Lane’s documentary—comprised of archival material, animated sequences and the occasional talking head—blooms into an incredible almanac of early 20th-century quackery and innovation as she focuses on JR Brinkley, an early broadcasting baron, direct-mail pioneer and an evangelical proponent of goat-testicle implants. An empire built on spurious claims and fear mongering seems unstoppable—until an obscure regional newspaper dares to question its foundations.

"The Return," Kelly Duane de la Vega, Katie Galloway, USA
After California voters reversed the state's Three Strikes law, thousands of inmates became suddenly eligible for resentencing and release. This provocative and touching documentary chronicles what happened next. Filmmakers Kelly Duane De la Vega and Katie Galloway (Better this World, SFIFF 2011) focus on the journeys of the newly free and their families, as well as the Stanford-based lawyers working on behalf of nonviolent offenders, illuminating the multifaceted struggle behind every transition from incarceration to freedom.

"Salero," Mike Plunkett, USA/Bolivia
Moises Chambi Yucra and his family stand at the crossroads of time. For generations, they have has made a humble living harvesting salt from Bolivia’s Salar de Uyuni, the world’s largest salt flat, but beneath Uyuni sit massive amounts of lithium, a mineral instrumental in powering smartphones and electric vehicles. With stunning cinematography that captures both the vibrancy and the solitude of the land and life, director Mike Plunkett captures the final days of an age-old way of life.

"Under the Sun," Vitaly Mansky, Russia/Latvia/Germany/Czech Republic/North Korea
Shot with the permission and supervision of North Korean authorities, Russian director Vitaly Mansky’s film turns a propaganda effort into a deep-cover documentary about life inside one of the world’s most repressive nations. Its subjects—a young girl in Pyongyang and her family—rigorously stick to the ideological script, but by keeping the camera rolling between takes of their carefully staged “real life,” Mansky reveals the grinding gears of the totalitarian message machine.

"A Young Patriot," Du Haibin, China/USA/France
Du Haibin’s insightful documentary captures five years in the life of a young Maoist zealot in northern China and provides an unforgettable portrait of China in transition. As the tumult of the country's recent history unfolds, cracks in the armor of Zhao's patriotism appear on multiple fronts. Communist Party corruption scandals, the rise of capitalism and the inhumane treatment of his family due to a reclamation project erode his bright optimism.

This year the sprawling 15-day San Francisco Film Festival's 200 films and live events and awards shows are spreading out around the area for greater outreach via screenings at the Castro Theatre, the Alamo Drafthouse New Mission, the Roxie Theater and the Victoria Theatre in San Francisco and BAMPFA in Berkeley.

Coen Brothers to Award Janus Films and Criterion Collection at San Francisco Film Festival (EXCLUSIVE)

Anne Thompson — Wed, 02 Mar 2016 17:46:05 GMT

The Coen brothers, who recently participated in a Berlin Film Festival tribute to their old friend Ben Barenholtz, who helped them start their long careers, will show on April 30 at the Castro Theatre a recent restoration of their first feature "Blood Simple" (1984) at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival (April 21-May 5). They will celebrate sibling international art-house cinema pioneers Janus Films and the Criterion Collection with an onstage conversation with partners Peter Becker and Jonathan Turell of Janus Films and the Criterion Collection.

Every self-respecting cinephile knows the Janus and Criterion logos. Founded in 1956 as a theatrical distribution company that brought the best of international art-house cinema to American audiences, Janus has presented seminal works by Antonioni, Eisenstein, Bergman, Fellini, Kurosawa, Truffaut and Ozu. Janus's sister company the Criterion Collection also stands for outstanding quality and curatorial expertise. Since 1984, Criterion has issued a continuing series of important films in editions boasting both high technical quality and award-winning accompanying supplements. They pioneered the letterboxing standard and the craft of audio commentary. To date, more than 150 filmmakers have contributed to Criterion's significant library archive of director-approved DVDs, Blu-ray discs and laserdiscs.

READ MORE: The Dramatic Story Behind Satyajit Ray's 50s Masterpiece 'The Apu Trilogy'

The SFIFF award, named for pioneering San Francisco art and repertory film exhibitor Mel Novikoff (1922-1987), "acknowledges an individual or institution whose work has enhanced the filmgoing public's knowledge and appreciation of world cinema." The Coens' dark Texas comedy "Blood Simple," which features Frances McDormand, has a special tie to the late Novikoff, who championed the film on release and screened it to enthusiastic audiences in his San Francisco cinemas. The Coens named a character in their recent film "Inside Llewyn Davis" (2013), the colorful owner of Davis's small record label, after him.

“By insisting on the highest quality for both theatrical and home exhibition, Janus Films and the Criterion Collection have gone beyond honoring great films and filmmakers-they're doing more than any other contemporary company to make cinephilia sexy again,” said Rachel Rosen, San Francisco Film Society's director of programming. “Their painstaking restoration of 'Blood Simple,' a film that Mel Novikoff also championed, is a great illustration of how deserving they are of this award.”

Previous recipients of the Mel Novikoff Award: Lenny Borger (2015), David Thomson (2014), Peter von Bagh (2013), Pierre Rissient (2012), Serge Bromberg (2011), Roger Ebert (2010), Bruce Goldstein (2009), Jim Hoberman (2008), Kevin Brownlow (2007), Anita Monga (2005), Paolo Cherchi Usai (2004), Manny Farber (2003), David Francis (2002), Cahiers du Cinéma (2001), San Francisco Cinematheque (2001), Donald Krim (2000), David Shepard (2000), Enno Patalas (1999), Adrienne Mancia (1998), Judy Stone (1997), Film Arts Foundation (1997), David Robinson (1996), Institut Lumière (1995), Naum Kleiman (1994), Andrew Sarris (1993), Jonas Mekas (1992), Pauline Kael (1991), Donald Richie (1990), USSR Filmmakers Association (1989) and Dan Talbot (1988).

The Mel Novikoff Award Committee members are Francis J. Rigney (chairman), Rachel Rosen (ex officio), Helena R. Foster, Maurice Kanbar, Philip Kaufman, Tom Luddy, Gary Meyer, Anita Monga, Janis Plotkin and Peter Scarlet.

Ian McKellen Will Please Sherlock Fans as 'Mr. Holmes'

Meredith Brody — Tue, 14 Jul 2015 17:31:00 GMT

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created an inexhaustible source for filmmakers with his seminal character Sherlock Holmes. The cool, cerebral detective appeared in only four novels and 56 short stories, but IMDb shows 267 movie and TV adaptations, and the Guiness Book of World Records has listed Holmes as the "most portrayed movie character," starting with a 1900 Mutoscope film. Two television shows are currently running, both set in contemporary times: "Sherlock," starring Benedict Cumberbatch in the title role and Martin Freeman as his friend and chronicler Dr. John Watson, which began in 2010 and arguably initiated Cumberbatch's stardom; and "Elementary," created in 2012 and set in New York, with Jonny Lee Miller as the sleuth and Lucy Liu as Dr. Joan Watson.

The latest entrant in the crowded field is "Mr. Holmes," based on the 2005 novel "A Slight Trick of the Mind," by Mitch Cullin, which finds Holmes in his retirement and expands upon the thin hints left by Conan Doyle: that Holmes moved to a farm upon the South Downs of Sussex and kept bees, writing a book called "Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, with Some Observations upon the Segregation of the Queen."

The always-interesting Sir Ian McKellen plays Holmes in 1947 at 93, experiencing the forgetfulness of senility, and also in flashbacks to his 60s, when a final case led, it seems, to his abrupt retirement as a consulting detective. He's heavily made-up in both incarnations, with a W.H. Auden-like mask of wrinkles as the elderly Holmes, and a curiously long nose. (But no deerstalker hat or calabash pipe, made sport of, once again, as the inventions of illustrators. In this version, however, the storied 221-B Baker Street is revealed to be a fake address, to throw off the scent of his admirers -- especially the Americans.) Holmes lives with a cranky, distrustful housekeeper (a decidedly de-glamorized, brunette Laura Linney) and her son, Roger (Milo Parker, who looks like the young Freddie Highmore), who lost their husband and father in WW II.

For the Anglophile and those fond of Masterpiece Theater, there are the considerable pleasures of the glorious settings -- the picturesque farm, windswept downs, period London and post-World War II Japan, where Holmes travels on a mysterious errand involving prickly ash -- and costumes. There's a wonderful used bookstore with secret passages, Holmes' study and chemist's lab, and, of course, the Diogenes Club, where brother Mycroft is briefly glimpsed. (Watson, who parted ways with Holmes when he married, is seen only as a pair of hands in a flashback.) Such British acting stalwarts as Frances de la Tour (as an instructor of the mysterious glass harmonica), Phil Davis (as a police inspector), and Roger Allam (as Holmes' doctor) are also briefly employed.

Holmes is troubled by his fading memory and failing health, and uses a concoction of prickly ash to forestall his forgetfulness, replacing the royal jelly from his bee hives that he also used. He's writing a reminiscence of his last case, in order to intrigue the young Roger, and bribe him into helping Holmes tend his bees.

Watching the growing friendship of Holmes and Roger proves more rewarding than the eventual working-out of why a seemingly routine case -- a young husband anxious about the mental health of his wife -- should have caused Holmes to abandon his career. And the denouement also seems like an afterthought.
But the plot is not the point. There's real pleasure in watching the assured work of director Bill Condon and McKellen, who last worked together in 1998's "Gods and Monsters," also based on a novel, in which McKellen incarnated the aged version of a character, the real-life director of Frankenstein, James Whale. Mr. Holmes will please both the Holmes aficionados and those new to the seemingly inexhaustible study of Holmesiana.

SF Film Fest: 'Western,' 'Of Men and War' Among Golden Gate Winners

Ryan Lattanzio — Thu, 07 May 2015 15:45:17 GMT

This year the Festival awarded nearly $40,000 in prizes to emerging and established filmmakers.

GOLDEN GATE NEW DIRECTORS PRIZE
The Golden Gate Awards New Directors jury was composed of producer and BFI Senior Production Executive Lizzie Franke, writer and filmmaker Ryan Fleck and producer Laura Wagner.

Winner: "Sworn Virgin," Laura Bispuri (Italy/Switzerland/Germany/Albania/Kosovo)

GOLDEN GATE AWARDS FOR DOCUMENTARY FEATURES
The GGA Documentary feature competitions jury was comprised of filmmakers Kristine Samuelson and Robert Greene, and journalist Susan Gerhard.

Documentary Feature Winner: "Western," Bill Ross IV, Turner Ross (USA)

Special Jury recognition: "Of Men and War," Laurent Bécue-Renard (France/Switzerland)

Bay Area Documentary Winner: "Very Semi-Serious," Leah Wolchok (USA) • Receives $5,000 cash prize

Special Jury recognition: "T-Rex," Drea Cooper, Zackary Canepari (USA)

READ MORE: San Francisco Film Fest Highlights

GOLDEN GATE AWARDS FOR SHORT FILMS
The GGA Short Film jury consisted of filmmakers Grace Lee and Jonathan Duffy and curator Liz Keim.

Narrative Short Winner: "The Chicken," Una Gunjak (Germany/Croatia) • Receives $2,000 cash prize

Documentary Short Winner: "Cailleach," Rosie Reed Hillman (Scotland)

Animated Short Winner: "A Single Life," Marieke Blaauw, Joris Oprins, Job Roggeveen (Netherlands)

New Visions Short Winner: "Discussion Questions," Jonn Herschend (USA)

Bay Area Short First Prize Winner: "The Box," Michael I Schiller (USA)

Bay Area Short Second Prize Winner: "Time Quest," John Dilley (USA)

GOLDEN GATE AWARD FOR FAMILY FILM
The Family Film jury consisted of Arts Education consultant Amy Balsbaugh, third grade teacher at Grattan School Susan DesBaillets and Head of Education and Community Programs at The Walt Disney Family Museum Hillary Lyden.

Winner: "The Story of Percival Pilts," Janette Goodey, John Lewis (Australia/New Zealand)

Honorable Mentions: "Lava," James Ford Murphy (USA) and "One, Two, Tree," Yulia Aronova

GOLDEN GATE AWARD FOR YOUTH WORK
The Youth Works jury was comprised of local high school students Diana Garcia, Ramses Mosley-Wise and Sean Rossiter, with adult supervisor Lisa Landi, producer of Film School Shorts at KQED.

Winner: "Two and a Quarter Minutes," Joshua Ovalle (USA)

Honorable Mention: "The Off / Season," Lance Oppenheim (USA)

Guillermo del Toro Feted at San Francisco Film Fest: "I saw my first corpse at age 4" (Video)

Meredith Brody — Fri, 01 May 2015 18:37:00 GMT

One of the pleasures of daily immersion in a film festival is appreciating the wildly different audiences you can be part of during a day. A couple of hours after watching "Wanda," made by Barbara Loden in 1970, introduced by local novelist Rachel Kushner, as one of a serious group of cinephiles that didn't exactly fill the 1,400-seat Castro Theatre, I returned that evening to be part of a capacity crowd of fun-loving fanboys and fangirls of Guillermo del Toro whose excitement and enthusiasm was so palpable as to be contagious. That's when a festival is festive indeed.

The witty and fast-moving clip reel reminded me that I haven't seen everything. And, of course, the way I'd like to see what I've missed, and re-see what I've seen, is just like this: beautifully projected on a huge screen. (Note: one plus of the digital revolution is that clip reels are now things of beauty indeed, crisp and bright and seductive. Farewell to the shabby prints of yesteryear. But one negative of the short-attention-span crowd: faster is not necessarily better.)

Noah Cowan, executive director of the San Francisco Film Society, made a superb interlocutor, given his history as programmer of the Toronto International Film Festival's revered and influential Midnight Madness program. He reminded us that del Toro is one of the great imaginative thinkers of cinema, as well as being able to scare the crap out of you. Del Toro arrived to tumultuous applause (the theater seemed close to levitating), and lowered his alarming, Wellesian bulk (like later-day Welles, he's dressed all in black) into a vast leather armchair.

He told us that he remembers seeing monsters in his crib -- "I saw my first corpse, like a good Mexican, at age four: a guy without a head at the side of the road" -- and he finds monsters endearing. His house in Los Angeles, which has secret rooms and passages, is "devoted to the history of crap" -- it sounds like Forrest Ackerman's (the publisher of Famous Monsters) famed Ackermansion. "I'm like the least focussed ten-year-old you know." But he said his influences came not from films, but painters, illustrators, and comic book artists.

Another great influence was the 1998 kidnapping of his father, which lasted 72 days -- unimaginable for most of us, but a part of life for many wealthy or influential Mexicans. Del Toro says that, with the exception of "Blade II," he's only made movies that wouldn't have been made without him. It seems that Mimic, his second feature, made for the Weinsteins, and not the movie he hoped to make, is still a sore point with him. But Pedro Almodovar, who produced "The Devil's Backbone," "taught me everything I know about producing," and "I've done it -- I've paid it forward."

When asked if he "lifts anything" from other movies, he says "Not anymore!…for me, it starts with the image…in 'Pacific Rim,' it was the little girl with red shoes." He cites the "awful horrible fucking images" (del Toro is nothing if not profane, delighting the fanboys) of Bosch and Goya. "It's almost like puking, and then you organize what comes out. It has to come from inside! All the movies I've done are for me." And now, like the Jimmy Durante song that goes "Did you ever have the feeling that you wanted to go, and then you have the feeling that you wanted to stay?," I have to leave before the special reel of del Toro's upcoming "Crimson Peak," and the screening of "The Devil's Backbone," in order to rush across town and catch the only Festival showing of another unique auteur's work: Guy Maddin's "The Forbidden Room."

And that night they both haunt my dreams.

An Evening with Guillermo del Toro from San Francisco Film Society on Vimeo.

Exclusive: 3 Documentaries Win San Francisco Film Society Grants

Ryan Lattanzio — Thu, 30 Apr 2015 19:42:45 GMT

This year's SFFS Documentary Film Fund awards total $75,000 to support feature-length docs in postproduction. Esteemed past winners include Zachary Heinzerling's 2014 Oscar-nominated "Cutie and the Boxer," Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson’s 2013 Sundance winner "American Promise" and Jason Zeldes' "Romeo Is Bleeding," which just premiered at the SF International Film Festival. The Fund has distributed over $450,000 to national filmmakers since 2011.

The panelists who reviewed the 11 finalists’ submissions are Jennifer Battat, founder of the Jenerosity Foundation; Noah Cowan, executive director of the San Francisco Film Society; Lisa Kleiner-Chanoff, cofounder of Catapult Film Fund; filmmaker Dan Krauss; and Michele Turnure-Salleo, director of the Film Society’s Filmmaker360 program.

WATCH: Homegrown Bay Area Doc "Romeo Is Bleeding" Hits SF Film Fest (Exclusive Clip)

2015 Documentary Film Fund Winners:

"The Island and the Whales" – Mike Day, director – $35,000
The pilot whale hunters of the Nordic Faroe Islands believe that hunting is vital to their way of life, but when a local doctor makes a grim discovery about the effects of marine pollution, environmental changes threaten to end the controversial tradition and change the community forever.

Mike Day was previously a writer and photographer in Jerusalem and Cairo before becoming a lawyer in London and the Middle East. He retrained as a filmmaker and founded Intrepid Cinema in 2009 and was commissioned by the BBC to make "The Guga Hunters of Ness" to critical acclaim. Day is now a Sundance fellow, was listed as one of “10 filmmakers to watch in 2012” by Filmmaker Magazine and was one of the European Documentary Network’s “12 for the Future.”

"Learning to Forget" – Kaspar Astrup Schröder, director; Katherine Sahlstrom, producer – $15,000
In China, more people are on death row than in the rest of the world combined. The children of the convicts are most often left alone, stigmatized and living in the streets. Some of these abandoned kids are picked up by an orphanage founded by a former prison guard; here they learn to live a life without parents and prepare for a world outside where they have to prove wrong the many misconceptions about them.

Kaspar Astrup Schröder is an award-winning director based in Copenhagen, Denmark. He is self taught and started his career in editing fictional films. With a strong sense for narrative storytelling he thrives to make dramatic documentaries with a strong narrative arc. Previous films include "The Invention of Dr. Nakamats," "My Playground" and "Rent a Family Inc." His films have been nominated at many major international film festivals. "Rent a Family Inc." recently won the Golden Eye Award at Zürich International Film Festival.

"The Oakland Police Project" – Peter Nicks, director – $25,000
The Oakland Police Project is a film about police power and restraint, unfolding deep inside the famously troubled Oakland Police Department. The film presents in intimate detail the rare perspective of beleaguered officers who are often viewed as oppressors in the community they serve, even as they and their young chief struggle to rebuild trust in the face of mass protests, budget cuts and more violent crimes per officer than any city in America.

Director/producer/cinematographer Peter Nicks’ feature documentary "The Waiting Room" was released in 2012 to critical acclaim, named by the San Francisco Film Critics Circle as the best documentary of the year and shortlisted for an Academy Award. His other film and television credits include "Blame Somebody Else," for which he earned an Emmy; "The Wolf," executive produced by Jon Else; "Islam In America," "America’s Sheriff" and "Out Of Control: AIDS In Black America." Nicks was recently awarded a SFFS / KRF screenwriting grant for his first narrative feature "Escaping Morgantown," loosely based on the year he spent in federal prison in the early 90s.

San Francisco Film Fest Highlights, From Alex Gibney's Selfie to Korean BBQ with Guy Maddin

Meredith Brody — Wed, 29 Apr 2015 15:28:12 GMT

The Opening Night of the San Francisco International Film Festival featured a highly-anticipated film by Oscar-winner Alex Gibney, "Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine," about the famed founder of Apple, with obvious appeal to the local crowd. Executive Director of the San Francisco Film Society Noah Cowan, introducing the first festival produced under his leadership — he joined the organization just before last year's event — seemed especially ebullient as he introduced the evening at the historic and still-dazzling 1922-vintage Castro Theatre.

In a world of seemingly endless film festivals, both local and international, Cowan emphasized what sets San Francisco apart and draws attention from the world: the special qualities of the Bay Area, its innovation and curiosity. He also touted the year-round activities of the Society in education and filmmaking support as well as exhibition: six films directly supported by the Film Society are in the program this year, and others are appearing on the international film festival circuit.

It was surprising that, in his pitch for new membership, he didn't mention the most exciting and innovative new Film Society perk: access, after the Festival, to online streaming of 14 feature films and 11 shorts, starting the day of their final Festival screening and available until May 31. Film Society members can access all films; anybody who has purchased a ticket to a screening can access one feature and one short. With ticket prices at $15 and $13, and entry-level membership at $50, a membership can pay for itself after viewing three or four movies online.

READ MORE: Alex Gibney Doesn't Pander to Steve Jobs in His Unsparing New Doc

Gibney said that he was inspired to make "Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine" after witnessing the international outpouring of grief that greeted Jobs' untimely death at the age of 56 in 2011. The resulting 127-minute film seemed like the work of a biographer increasingly disenchanted with his subject. The relentless, driven visionary who profoundly changed communication was also revealed to be unpleasant in many of his dealings with humanity, from being dismissive and rude to collaborators as well as underlings to denying the fathering of his first child until a paternity test forced him to acknowledge her and accede to a $500 monthly support payment. Among many other revelations: when Jobs returned to Apple -- the most highly valued company in the world -- after a ten-year interregnum, he canceled its charitable programs.

Gibney's initial calls were to Jobs' widow, Laurene, who never met with him, and to Apple, who amusingly replied that they did not have the resources to comply with his requests.

The location of the opening night party, the kitschy Madame Tussauds, was a hit, as amused sophisticates took selfies with an array of simulacra, from the sublime to the ridiculous -- from ET to Barack Obama, with pauses in between for everybody from Steven Spielberg to One Direction (fetchingly arrayed on bleacher seats). Steve Jobs proved irresistible to everyone including Alex Gibney.

Luckily I only had to arrive at the first movie of the first full day of the Festival in Japantown's Kabuki complex at the crack of 2 pm: the documentary "Iris" about the fashion-world favorite, 93-year-old Iris Apfel, who never met an accessory she didn't like. (The SFIFF audience was also remarkable well-accessorised; my own seven bangles and two rings seemed timid in such company.) The film is the last full feature shot by the famed filmmaker Albert Maysles, who died on March 15 of this year, aged 88.

READ MORE: Noah Cowan Talks Leaving Toronto to Join San Francisco Film Society

The second program I chose was a master class, Cinema Visionaries, with director Alex Gibney, in spirited and enthralling conversation with Noah Cowan and filmmaker Rob Epstein, co-chair of the film program at California College of the Arts. The increasingly prolific Gibney, whose Scientology film, "Going Clear," and four-hour Sinatra documentary, "All of Nothing at All," premiered on HBO earlier this year, talked about his strengths as a conceptualizer and structurer of his works.

Afterwards I raced from the Kabuki across town to the Castro to see Liz Garbus's documentary, "What Happened, Miss Simone?" A long line wended down the block, which didn't stop me from missing the beginning of this compelling film, a Netflix production, about the unique entertainer Nina Simone and her tortured life, which received a standing ovation from its sold-out crowd.

Next up at the Castro, an unusual reboot: the director's cut of the film maudit "54," 17 years after its debut. This version took out 40 minutes of the original release and replaced it with half-an-hour of grittier footage, including a kiss between Ryan Phillippe and Breckin Meyer. Afterwards there was a Q&A with director Mark Christopher and cast members Phillippe and Meyer (who revealed that it was his first-ever onscreen kiss) before the delighted (young and disco-attired) Castro crowd. "San Francisco audiences do not disappoint," the happy Christopher said.

READ MORE: "54: The Director's Cut" Arrives in All Its Hedonistic Glory

The next day began with Bill Condon's examination of the elderly Sherlock Holmes, "Mr. Holmes," with Sir Ian McKellen incarnating the great man's beginnings of senility. The screening survived an unpleasant interruption: a fire alarm (blessedly false) necessitating a grumpy exit to the street and a fairly swift return.

READ MORE: San Francisco Film Fest: Bill Condon and Ian McKellen Reunite on "Mr. Holmes" (Review)

Another dash across town to the Castro, to see the co-presentation with the Telluride Film Festival of actress Barbara Loden's sole directing effort, "Wanda," introduced by this year's Telluride Guest Director, novelist Rachel Kushner. Kushner's introduction included the surprising quote from Kazan that he'd separated from Loden after she'd made the movie because she neglected her role as homemaker during its production: "I'm an old-fashioned man."

Afterward, I ran into a previous Telluride guest director, Alexander Payne, whom I tried to tell how the movie had stayed the same since I'd first seen it when it discomfited me with its story and displeased me with its filmmaking, but I had changed, and was now more accepting of it. He was more interested in sharing with me his own aperçu, that he preferred Fellini's (masterpiece) "The Nights of Cabiria": "Another movie about a pinhead who gets into trouble and ends up surrounded by musicians."

I stuck around at the Castro for the opening salvos of its Irving M. Levin Directing Award, a sublime and profane conversation between eager fanboy Noah Cowan and his old friend Guillermo del Toro, appearing Wellesian both in his black-clad bulk and his obvious joy in indulging in what Orson Welles called "the biggest electric train set any boy ever had": making movies.

READ MORE: Guillermo Del Toro Teases "Crimson Peak" Starring Jessica Chastain and Tom Hiddleston

At the Kabuki I caught the sole Festival screening of Guy Maddin's new "The Forbidden Room," an homage to lost films of the past. It's a sort of Russian Doll of narratives nestled within narratives, cobbled together from dozens of short films Maddin shot with an eclectic array of actors -- Udo Kier, Matthieu Amalric, Charlotte Rampling, Geraldine Chaplin -- in his first full foray into color and digital filmmaking.

Afterwards Maddin and the San Francisco Silent Film Festival's Anita Monga and Peter Moore and I went out on the mean windy deserted Post street in search of a drink. A couple of false starts led us up the stairs of a smoky Korean barbecue place (from the in-table grills, I hasten to point out, not cigarettes). We discussed Maddin's recent shoots in Jordan and Cuba, as well as his upcoming teaching stint at Harvard, while Korean girls danced and sang (inaudibly) on a big screen behind him -- which seemed appropriate.

At the Clay Theater was a moving documentary, "All of Me," about impoverished Mexican women who somehow cook daily meals for people illegally migrating northwards on freight trains, which they hurl at them as the train moves through. I remained there for "Best of Enemies," the witty examination by Oscar-winning director Morgan Neville and his colleague Robert Gordon of the ABC television debates between William Buckley Jr. and Gore Vidal during the 1968 Republican and Democratic conventions. Pure pleasure.

Would that the marquee event, the awarding of the Peter J. Owens acting award to Richard Gere, had been as delightful. Gere was generous and thoughtful in his conversation with journalist David D'Arcy, but his new movie "Time Out of Mind," though sincere in its attempt to look at homelessness in New York, felt tedious despite its innovative long-lens filmmaking (by interesting lenser Bobby Bukowski) and layered, purposely unsettling soundtrack.

Still I felt I'd had a perfect Festival opening weekend: documentaries, feature films, experimental movies, tributes. And there were eleven days yet to come.

'54: The Director's Cut' Comes to Digital HD in All Its Hedonistic Glory

Ryan Lattanzio — Tue, 28 Apr 2015 17:48:36 GMT

After hotly anticipated and successful premieres in Berlin and San Francisco, "54: The Director's Cut" will hit Digital HD on June 2 from Miramax and Lionsgate.

Dubbed the "ultimate party movie," this freewheeling dive into the debauchery days of New York's Studio 54 has been resurrected with 44 minutes of never-before-seen material. Sexy Ryan Phillippe stars as a Jersey boy who gets sucked into this world of sex and drugs alongside Salma Haye, Breckin Meyer, Sherry Stringfield, Neve Campbell and, of course, Mike Myers as the disco mecca's icky co-owner. (In the clip below, Phillippe gets his first taste of the sweet life.)

Miramax and Harvey Weinstein demanded reshoots before slashing the film down to a lean, sanitized and altogether messy 100 minutes in 1998. But the new version, which includes a key bisexual subplot left on the cutting room floor, won heaps of praise on the festival circuit this year. (Vulture has a great story on the history of the film here.)

Variety:

The love triangle is back in the movie, including a scene in which Phillippe comes on to Meyer in the club’s basement, shortly after having sex with his wife. Where “55” had featured Shane sleeping with a montage of sexual partners, all of them female, he now alternates between men and women. Here, it’s Shane who steals the money that gets Rubell’s longtime accountant fired, and it’s that accountant who ultimately turns him in to the authorities, who swoop in and arrest Rubell — all of it capped, a bit inexplicably, by Ultra Nate and Amber’s hit disco-style cover of “If You Could Read My Mind.”

The Guardian:

A handful of shots rescued from videotape have a degraded texture, but even that only enhances the air of melancholy. The subject matter of 54 was always bound to make it feel bittersweet. Now its own beleaguered history has fed back into that. It’s hard not to wonder how many other near-successes were killed in their cribs by callous producers. For now, "54: The Director’s Cut" represents an act of jubilant resurrection. It will finally get its day in the spotlight, or beneath the glitterball.

The film also screened at Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta Film Festivals as well as the BFI Flare: London LGBT Film Festival. 54: The Director’s Cut will continue to screen at festivals around the world.

Guillermo del Toro Reveals How He Got An R-Rating For 'Crimson Peak,' The Ending Of 'Pan's Labyrinth,' And Much More

Ryland Knight — Mon, 27 Apr 2015 15:04:00 GMT

This year’s Irving M. Levin Directing Award recipient at the San Francisco International Film Festival, Guillermo del Toro, may be most famous for his monster work in horror and comic book movies, but he should be famous for just how ingratiating a person he is in conversation. Executive Director Noah Cowan spent over an hour talking with del Toro on stage at the Castro Theatre, covering just about any topic he and del Toro and the crowd could think up, from monsters imagined to the 72-day kidnapping of his father in 1998. Profane, animated, self-described as “100% Mexican,” del Toro was a perfect guest and host. The crowd was more than happy to lap up his jokes, and his generosity with answering questions — stopping himself multiple times to ask if he’d satisfied the query’s curiosity — was a true act of love.

Cowan started the evening describing del Toro’s career up to now, how he’s only made 9 movies, but each rich with unique imagery, before a clip reel showed some “greatest hits” from across his filmography. I was reminded of the graceful camera work, evident from the start in "Chronos," and the often puerile but always sincere sense of humor that pervades his movies. In the talk that followed, it was del Toro’s sense of humor that won me over, as well as his evident passion for everything he does and touches.

“I’m the best funded 10 year old I know!”

“I was 70 when I was 7 and I’m 10 now that I’m 50.”

At heart, I think I agree with del Toro about a great many things, none more than his answer to a fan asking whether the ending of "Pan’s Labyrinth" is pessimistic or optimistic. His first reply, “Well, I think it says more about you than it does about me, how you asked the question,” got a huge laugh, but I know he meant it, even with his wicked smile. However, he proved his love for his fans by going further, vowing to give him an answer, and elucidating what motivated his storytelling, because he admitted he wants to know these things, too, as a fan of movies. (He also said he would do everything to dissect a film, shot by shot, to come up with his own answers, but that’s another matter.) In short, del Toro stated he is both a pessimist and optimist, that by saying "fuck you" to the fascists and saving her brother, Ofelia may have sealed her fate, dying in the real world, but her reign to come helped sprout a flower on the dead fig tree, a small thing he said, which are the only things we can truly do in the world.

When asked about his involvement in the "Silent Hill" video game series, del Toro sadly admitted it wasn’t going to happen, eliciting many groans. But he quickly followed up with, “I’m 50 now, and I told myself, all I’m going to do now is direct. Direct, direct, direct.” This of course got the crowd, and Cowan, excited. “Yeah! Make some more movies!” Cowan interjected.

When asked if he’d ever make a nominally straight film, without the special effects, del Toro said he could, that he has three scripts that may fit that bill. An acid western adaptation of "The Count of Monte Cristo" might come close, he said, before he remembered that the Count has a mechanical hand that allows him to be the fastest draw in the west, ever, of all time. He has a WWII story born from his voracious reading, too, but ultimately, he said, “we are like trees; we give the fruit we are meant to give. You don’t make grapefruits and then decided, oh, let me apple this grapefruit.” Further, he said, “There are so many people who do that so well, better than I could ever do it, and I do what I do, whatever it is I do, better than anybody else, but I also may be the only one doing it.”

Maybe. He admitted he thought “The Babadook” was a “masterpiece” and he spent a couple years “obsessed” with “I Saw the Devil,” another masterpiece in his eyes. So he knows there are other horror films out there ready to scare with jumps and design.

What surprised me most, maybe, was del Toro’s passion for literature, and reading. “What I love most is books,” he stumped, before an aside: “and movies.” His two favorites, he said, are Juan Rulfo and Jorge Luis Borges. Any fan of Borges knows this affinity to be true from the very title of "Pan’s Labyrinth," but this name dropping echoed an earlier statement in the talk, when del Toro talked about how most of his movies are set in a house, or some closed structure, that is meant to be an analogy for a brain, how it compartmentalizes things, how it isn’t linear, how it, too, is encased.

The film shown after the talk, "The Devil’s Backbone," bears more family resemblance to Rulfo’s work, though, del Toro said, in its tactility. He quoted a passage describing the air as thick with sand and nails that could scratch into your throat. He also said Pedro Almodóvar, who produced 'Backbone,' thought it was two movies at first, and asked how del Toro would pull them off at the same time. “Sheer will!” he exclaimed, which seems to carry over to the present day. Describing his upcoming "Crimson Peak," which he showed an extended preview for, a kind of exhibitor’s reel, he said he gave up all his back end, all his points, just to be able to make an R-rated horror movie. Even the trailer tells us the crimson is evident everywhere, most notably the snow drenched in blood surrounding waif Mia Wasikowska, alone in that dead space with only a knife and a nightgown.

READ MORE: Watch: 'Crimson Peak' Trailer Traps Mia Wasikowska in Guillermo Del Toro's Haunted House

But before the final clip reel and the intermission before 'Backbone,' del Toro returned to an important point echoing his "Pan’s Labyrinth" answer: “Do you think there is really a line between America and Mexico? It’s a story we agreed upon! … Hopefully, as the world grows beyond gender, we too will grow beyond borders and realize we are all in this together, we are the same country... The genocide and atrocities committed by the drug cartels and their reach into the government should not be ignored. Here, there. There are terrible things happening in my home and I urge you to speak out about them, forward messages, emails, whatever you young people do, tweet. I don’t even check my mail, so what do I know. Just tell people.” I may not be a fan of his art, but he won me over big time as a man.

READ MORE: The Films of Guillermo del Toro: From Worst to Best

How Silicon Valley Relates to the Film Industry

David D'Arcy — Wed, 22 Apr 2015 15:06:04 GMT

READ MORE: Alex Gibney Doesn't Pander to Steve Jobs in His Unsparing New Doc

"The film is about to begin, please turn off your iPhones and Apple watches." Where else but San Francisco might one hear those words?

Technology dominates the San Francisco International Film Festival, which opens April 23 with "Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine." In 58 years, Alex Gibney's portrait of the Apple founder is the first documentary to open the festival.

The biographical film, which premiered at SXSW, now goes to the belly of the beast: In San Francisco alone, more than 50,000 people work in the tech sector. (To get a sense of the economic effect of that number, try finding an affordable apartment there.)

"In San Francisco and the Bay Area, we live and breathe science and technology every day. No figure looms larger than Steve Jobs in setting the course for not just the tech sector here, but the whole innovation culture of the region," said Noah Cowan, now in his second year as SFIFF director. "Alex Gibney's film not only looks at Jobs himself, but looks at him in light of the inspirational quality that all of these new innovative technologies have brought to the world, and some of the difficulties as well."

The Jobs doc will not be alone in SFIFF's focus on tech in its mix of 100 features and 181 films. Also on the bill is "Deep Web," Alex Winter's documentary on the Silk Road internet crypto-currency black market, whose operator, Dread Pirate Roberts (Ross William Ulbricht), was arrested in 2013 at Glen Park Library in San Francisco. (SF-based Wired editor Andy Greenberg consulted on the film.) The VETERAN special effects pioneer and virtual reality tech proponent Douglas Trumbull will give the festival's State of Cinema talk. And VR reporter Nonny de la Pena will speak on technology and journalism.

Granted, technology isn’t the whole story here. SFIFF promises tributes to Richard Gere and Guillermo del Toro, and a screening of Stanley Nelson's Black Panther doc that could draw masses of radical alumni from across the bay in Oakland.

Still, the Jobs doc is leading the way — if not to a homecoming, to an arranged meeting. "These companies run or founded by utopian individuals – what does it mean when they start running up against the reality of being big businesses?" said Cowan. "Jobs is a fascinating harbinger of some of the internal debates that are taking place within companies that have now matched the size of Apple. A lot of young entrepreneurs are actually thinking through those challenges and trying to figure out a way to navigate success in a different way."

Is a venerable film festival driving a business debate in a much younger industry? "Jobs embodies this utopian entrepreneurial quality in American culture that is at the core of how this country identifies its own soul," noted Cowan, a Canadian. "Warts and all, he's still that guy."

The Shadow of Steve

In a region where technology is as central as entertainment is to Los Angeles, SFIFF probably doesn't need to worry about filling its screenings. But will Apple employees be there for the film that "very disappointed" Apple exec Eddy Cue tweet-dissed as "inaccurate and mean-spirited" at SXSW?

Cowan repeated what an unnamed tech source told him: "Noah, you'll have no problem getting the tech sector out. It just depends on whether they'll be wearing trench-coats or not." Is that the new business-casual?

READ MORE: How Can the Nation’s Oldest Film Festival Survive?

Word in Austin, where the Jobs doc premiered, was that the tech crowd skipped films in favor of the Interactive Conference and its many parties, but Alex Gibney said he was told that Apple employees packed into the film's premiere.

"It's not a slam," said Gibney, who hopes for greater numbers from the Apple ranks when the Jobs bio-doc opens SFIFF. "He was the one who told us to take it as writ that Apple represented a higher ideal. The film takes a look at that to see whether that's true."

If the film is about the paradox of Steve Jobs, the director said, it's also about the paradox of Silicon Valley. "We're not here to build a winner-take-all society, where a handful of entrepreneurs win and everybody else loses," he said. "Silicon Valley owes itself a moment to look in the mirror, and the rest of us owe ourselves a look at the culture that's coming from there – what's great about it, and what's problematic."

And Silicon Valley is more than a subject for films and a potential public at SFIFF. The tech sector, where philanthropy has been notoriously slow to expand, is viewed by Bay Area cultural institutions as a realm of untapped donors. Given Apple's reaction to the Gibney doc so far, SFIFF won't be holding its breath for a sponsorship deal from that firm.

Courting the Tech Sector

Partnering with the broader tech sector is a work in progress, but work is progressing, Cowan says.

"We've added a bunch of new board members, many of whom are intimately connected to the tech business community," said Cowan, who noted that tech CEOs, who rarely have time to sit on cultural boards, tend to try to completely reorganize the institutions that they support.

At least one guest at SFIFF will be there to enlist Silicon Valley's technology and capital to reorganize cinema as we know it: Douglas Trumbull, whose special effects credits range from "2001: A Space Odyssey" to "Blade Runner" and "The Tree of Life." Most recently, Trumbull has been refining virtual reality technology from his studio in western Massachusetts. Trumbull expects he’ll fit right in at the festival. "I'm very focused on Silicon Valley and tech sector, because I think it's more open to disruptive change than anything in Hollywood," he said.

"The movie business is so totally screwed up that I just don't have the energy to invest three or four years in a feature film," is a much-quoted Trumbull opinion.

Trumbull, 73, offered a capsule of what he'll be telling tech-savvy audiences in San Francisco. "The medium of movies at 24 frames a second is no longer adequate to carry the spectacle of what the studios are willing to pay for," he said. "One of the bottlenecks we have right now is that it's not that they're unwilling to spend $100,000,000 or $200,000,000 or $300,000,000 on a movie – it's that the movie itself is being bottlenecked by poor presentation in theaters, on screens that are too small, not bright enough, not big enough, not spectacular enough. And so the production value that they're paying for is not getting to the eyes and ears of the audience, because it's being throttled down by the medium itself."

Silicon Valley firms haven't engaged with cinema because movies haven't offered a technological challenge like immersive VR, Trumbull argues. "Because they're so sophisticated technologically, they probably look at movies as a technology and a process of the past," he said. "Movies on screens – big deal – they've seen it all their lives, it's been around for a hundred years."

Trumbull admits that tech investors have been a hard group to crack. His own research and his new demonstration film, UFOTOG, are self-financed – so far. And he'll show film clips at his SFIFF talk, because there's no available technology to present the actual film at the festival. "Wait a few months," he said.

A Future for Film and Tech

It could be a long wait for Trumbull or for SFIFF, but the tech sector, despite taking production (and lots of capital) abroad, is keeping most of its brains in the Bay Area. Like the Beats and the hippies, tech is part of the culture and healthier.

In the meantime, Cowan has another tech film up his sleeve. SFIFF closes with the stylish "Experimenter" by Michael Almereyda, which revisits the obedience studies of Stanley Milgram from the 1960's in which subjects obey commands to administer what they think are painful electric shocks.

"It's a film about the limits we like to impose on scientific inquiry, and when that runs up against extending the base of human knowledge. Where we go with that is a really thorny question," said Cowan. "It so clearly tracks to now, in that it's really about the limits of data collection, and how we're going to think about the ethics of data collection as we move forward as a society. It may even be more relevant than the Jobs film to the Bay Area and what we're debating out here."

Do all these debates lead back to Steve Jobs? At a time when the consensus is that post-Jobs Silicon Valley is driven by Wall Street to maximize profit above all else -- as Alex Gibney’s doc suggests -- partnerships with cinema might reveal a softer side of that industry. And it’s not all about altruism. Let’s not forget the promise of profit from tech-driven entertainment ventures.

The best evidence of that opportunity is Pixar, in Emeryville across the bay from San Francisco, a successful marriage of creativity and technology – thanks largely to the support of none other than Steve Jobs, who made Apple its owner and principal investor. Apple sold Pixar to Disney in 2007 for some $7.4 billion.

Not all those signs are encouraging. Lucasfilm, acquired by Disney (like PIXAR), seems to be going Hollywood, and may be heading for a tent-pole future that looks back rather than forward.

For film – and for film festivals, always in need of support – the obvious incentive is the promise of tech funds, a drop in the bucket for heavily-capitalized Silicon Valley industries. There’s also the prospect of closer ties to the designers and the makers of the machines that will make the films of the future. Some of those machines, said Douglas Trumbull, looking over the horizon, will be high-tech and down-market -- that is, more sophisticated and democratizing consumer versions of the Go Pro camera. They might be as personal as an iPhone, and maybe cheaper.

Is another Steve Jobs required for a novel tech/film collaboration to bring us the next Pixar or VR revolution? Probably not, since that commingling is inevitable, although not at Apple-level. After all, to borrow a term from an earlier scientific upheaval, the critical mass is in the Bay Area.

READ MORE: San Francisco Film Fest Highlights, From Isabella Rossellini to '54: The Director's Cut'

Watch: Homegrown Bay Area Doc 'Romeo Is Bleeding' Hits SF Film Fest (Exclusive)

Ryan Lattanzio — Tue, 14 Apr 2015 19:28:38 GMT

An editor on Oscar winner "20 Feet from Stardom," rookie director Jason Zeldes' debut doc "Romeo Is Bleeding" shadows Richmond-based poet and activist Donté Clark as he fights to heal a community ravaged by violence. Here's the synopsis:

With the help of teacher/mentor Molly Raynor, Clark collaborates with youth at RAW (Richmond Artists With) Talent to adapt Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet to modern-day Richmond, CA. Instead of Verona and Mantua, Te’s Harmony unfolds in Central and North Richmond and tells a tale of love, revenge and murder amid poverty and family disintegration, with the lines delivered in slang-filled iambic pentameter and hip-hop metaphors. Occasionally, the new script incorporates Shakespeare’s words, adding an extra layer of meaning.

The film features interviews with the budding writers of RAW Talent and residents of Richmond, which isn't far from where BART passenger Oscar Grant was shot by a police officer on New Year's Day, 2009, to the outrage of the entire Bay Area.

Check out an exclusive clip from the film below. A recipient of the SF Film Society's 2014 Documentary Film Fund, "Romeo Is Bleeding" world-premieres during SFIFF at El Cerrito High School on April 29.

Paul Schrader Gets San Francisco Film Fest Award and Tribute (Exclusive)

Ryan Lattanzio — Fri, 10 Apr 2015 19:58:14 GMT

Veteran director and screenwriter Paul Schrader will receive the San Francisco International Film Festival's Kanbar Award for storytelling. He will be honored alongside fellow SFIFF awardees Richard Gere and Guillermo del Toro on Film Society Awards Night, which goes down Monday, April 27 at The Armony on Mission Street.

Schrader's long and storied career began with writing Sidney Pollack's 1974 "The Yakuza" before Martin Scorsese's Palme d'Or winner "Taxi Driver." As a director his films have included "American Gigolo," "Affliction," "Auto Focus, "Light of Day" and more recently "The Canyons," written by Bret Easton Ellis and starring Lindsay Lohan, and "The Dying of the Light," which the director washed his hands of after losing final cut.

READ MORE: Warning: "Dying of the Light" Is Not a Paul Schrader Movie

Paul Schrader will also be honored at An Evening with Paul Schrader at the Sundance Kabuki Cinemas, Tuesday April 28, 6:30 pm. An onstage interview and a selection of clips from his notable screenwriting and directing career will be followed by a screening of his epic portrait of the Japanese author "Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters" (1985).

Previous Kanbar recipients incude Stephen Gaghan (2014), Eric Roth (2013), David Webb Peoples (2012), Frank Pierson (2011), James Schamus (2010), James Toback (2009), Robert Towne (2008), Peter Morgan (2007), Jean-Claude Carrière (2006) and Paul Haggis (2005).

READ MORE: San Francisco Film Fest Highlights

15 Bay Area Projects Up for SF Film Society Grants

Ryan Lattanzio — Thu, 09 Apr 2015 20:24:14 GMT

15 finalists are up for San Francisco Film Society/Kenneth Rainin Foundation grants. Up to $300,000 will be awarded to one or more narrative feature films now in various stages of production. These grants are given out twice annually, and the spring 2015 recipients will be announced in May.

These are promising projects to watch for. Past films have enjoyed indie success on the festival circuit and theatrically, including Ira Sachs' "Love Is Strange," Destin Cretton's "Short Term 12," Ryan Coogler's "Fruitvale Station," which went all the way to win a Cannes prize, and Benh Zeitlin's Best Picture-nominated "Beasts of the Southern Wild."

There are a few familiar names on this list with their next projects, like documentary filmmaker Jesse Moss ("The Overnighters"), Ian Olds ("The Fixer," starring James Franco), Travis Mathews, who co-directed "Interior Leather Bar" with Franco, and Boots Riley, the frontman of hip hop group The Coup.

READ MORE: 2015 San Francisco Film Festival Highlights

Blustar
Stella Kyriakopoulos, cowriter/director and Margaret Shin, cowriter -- screenwriting
Two lovelorn cleaning ladies become friends and find hope while working on the Blue Star Ithaki, one of the fleet of ferries that shuttle myth-seeking tourists to the Greek islands. When the friends learn their Blue Star will be sold to Canada, they are forced to confront their own myths about Greece and each other.

Chickenshit
Jessica dela Merced, writer/director -- screenwriting
11-year-old Phoe enlists the help of a group of neighborhood boys to track down the culprits behind a recent string of fires in Detroit, including the one that claimed her father's life. jessdelamerced.com

The Fixer
Ian Olds, writer/director and Caroline von Kuhn, producer -- production
An Afghan journalist is exiled from his war-torn country to a small bohemian community in Northern California. When he attempts to turn his menial job on the local police blotter into "Afghan-style" coverage of local crime he gets drawn into the backwoods of this small town-a shadow Northern California where sex is casual, true friendship is hard to come by, and an unfamiliar form of violence burbles up all around him.

Freeland
Mario Furloni and Kate McLean, co-writer/directors -- screenwriting
In the last season of black market marijuana growing before legalization, a mother and a daughter must reconcile their differences in order to survive in an increasingly inhospitable world.

Jones
Sally El Hosaini, writer/director -- screenwriting
When his father abandons him deep in the Guyanese jungle, the rebellious son of a narcissistic church leader discovers a new life of freedom. His utopia is soon shattered when "Dad" arrives with hundreds of followers. Driven by the universal need for a father's love he becomes complicit in the depravity he previously rejected. Based on Stephan Jones's true-life story.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco
Joseph Talbot, writer/director and Rolla Selbak, producer -- preproduction
Jimmie Fails is a young African American who dreams of buying back the Victorian home his grandfather built in the heart of San Francisco. Now living in the city's last, dwindling black neighborhood with his oddball best friend, Prentice, they search for belonging in the rapidly changing city that seems to have left them behind. vimeo.com/97971791

The Last Prairie
Chloé Zhao, writer/director -- screenwriting
A young ecologist moves to the Sandhills of Nebraska trying to stop the building of the Keystone Pipeline XL and soon finds herself caught between a small town's fight for survival and the debate over the future habitability of our planet.

Mustang
Laure de Clermont Tonnerre, writer/director -- screenwriting
Roman Coleman is halfway through serving an 11-year sentence for attempted murder when he is offered the chance to participate in an ongoing rehabilitation therapy program involving the training of recently captured wild mustangs. Through his struggle to communicate with the animals, trainers, and other inmates he is forced to face his past and must learn confront his inner demons.

Oscillate Wildly
Travis Mathews, writer/director -- production
When a first love challenges his guarded sense of what's possible, a hot-headed young gay man with mild cerebral palsy is forced to confront the disability he's let consume and define him. travisdmathews.com

Patti Cake$
Geremy Jasper, writer/director and Michael Gottwald, producer -- preproduction
Patti Dombrowski, a heavy-set white girl, struggles to break out of her blue collar New Jersey town and become a legitimate rap superstar, all on her own terms. welcometolegs.com

Reza and the Refugee
Aaron Douglas Johnston, writer/director -- screenwriting
A ragtag team of Middle Eastern political refugees in Holland enters the Eurovision song contest in an effort to save their friend from deportation and certain death.

Sorry To Bother You
Boots Riley, writer/director and George Rush, producer -- screenwriting
A Black telemarketer discovers a magical way to make his voice overdubbed by a White actor, propelling him into the upper echelon of a macabre universe where he is selected to lead a species of genetically manipulated horse-people, called the Equisapiens. thisisthecoup.com

Staring at the Sun
Ryan Piers Williams, writer/director -- screenwriting
After a massive solar event knocks out the world's technological infrastructure, healthcare becomes a vital commodity. An elite group of United Nations aid workers given access to the best healthcare are tasked to isolate the sick from the healthy and privileged. When a young aid worker finds himself in a forbidden love, he must choose between a life of solitude or an uncertain fate with the woman he loves.

Untitled Whaling Project
Jesse Moss, writer/director -- screenwriting
A feature-length fiction film, based on a true story, about America's last commercial whaling vessel and its final, fateful voyage in 1971.

What Waits For Them In Darkness
Stephen Dunn, writer/director -- screenwriting
11-year-old Skipper gets separated from her family during the Newfoundland resettlement and stranded alone in her floating house on the high seas of the Atlantic where reality mixes with the rich folklore of Newfoundland for a dark fantasy adventure.

San Francisco Film Fest Highlights, From Isabella Rossellini to '54: The Director's Cut'

Ryan Lattanzio — Tue, 31 Mar 2015 18:00:00 GMT

From April 23 to May 7, SF International suffuses the Bay Area with world and North American premieres, titles hot off the fest circuit and a surfeit of tributes, guest programming and many-faceted sidebars.

This looks to be among the fest's juiciest slates yet. As previously announced, Alex Gibney's unsparing documentary "Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine" will open SFIFF, with buzzy Sundance premieres "The End of the Tour" and "Experimenter" rounding out the Centerpiece and Closing Night slots, respectively. Also already announced are tributes to Guillermo del Toro and Richard Gere, a new performance piece by Miranda July and more (below).

READ MORE: SF Film Fest Gets 3 Films from Sundance and SXSW

SFIFF has also generously programmed films from last year's Cannes and Fall festivals, and more from this year's Sundance and SXSW. On the narrative side, we'll see: mumblecore granddaddy Andrew Bujalski's "Results," brazen dark road comedy "Entertainment" (Rick Alverson), Bill Pohlad's poignant Brian Wilson biopic "Love and Mercy," Guy Maddin's rebellious avant-garde outing "The Forbidden Room," Mia Hansen-Love's house music coming-of-ager "Eden," the US premiere of "Mr. Holmes," Bertrand Bonello's unsung French Oscar submission "Saint Laurent," Lisandro Alonso's polarizing tone poem "Jauja," Rania Attieh and Daniel Garcia's eerie Independent Spirit winner "H." and much more.

Documentaries include: Morgan Neville and Robert Gordon's charming Vidal vs. Buckley study "Best of Enemies," Laura Gabbert's gently touching portrait of LA Times food critic Jonathan Gold "City of Gold," Stevan Riley's Brando doc "Listen to Me Marlon," Liz Garbus' "What Happened, Miss Simone?," Albert Maysles' penultimate film "Iris" and more. SFIFF also hosts the world premiere of filmmaker Jody Shapiro's "Isabella Rossellini's Green Porno Live!" which follows the actress on the road with her traveling series imitating the mating habits of animals including whales, spiders and praying mantises. Sold.

READ MORE: Richard Gere Faces Good Year as "Time Out of Mind" Yields SF Film Fest Tribute

On the retrospective side, coming down the pike from Berlin is Mark Christopher's scandalous "54: The Director's Cut," the long lost, gritty, supposedly masterpiece version of the 1998 sex odyssey starring Ryan Philippe as a pretty boy pulled into the illicit nether regions of the titular Studio 54. Later, film programmer Rachel Krushner will present a 35mm restoration of Barbara Loden's verite working-class drama "Wanda" from 1970.

To celebrate Alamo Drafthouse's forthcoming, first-ever San Francisco location, SFIFF has invited Tim League to guest curate and co-host Dark Wave, the fest's new late-night genre sidebar. Films include the slow-burning torture thriller "Goodnight Mommy," which League called his favorite film out of Toronto 2014, giallo throwback "The Editor" and car-chase thriller "Cop Car."

Meanwhile, "2001: A Space Odyssey"'s VFX pioneer Douglas Trumbull has big shoes to fill when he delivers this year's State of Cinema Address during the festival's second weekend. Director Steven Soderbergh rocked the house back in 2013 when he gave his own industry analysis. Trumbull will speak about film technology and the future of the movie-viewing experience.

More of SF International Film Festival's previously announced programs, including the narrative and doc competition sections, below. Head over to the San Francisco Film Society website for the complete lineup.

READ MORE: "The Tribe," "Wolfpack" Among SF Film Fest's 19 Films in Competition

READ MORE: Guillermo del Toro Gets SF Film Fest Directing Award

READ MORE: Miranda July Will Debut New Work at SF Film Fest

SF Film Fest to Host US Premiere of 'Mr. Holmes,' Starring Ian McKellen (Trailer)

Ryan Lattanzio — Fri, 27 Mar 2015 17:37:07 GMT

Ian McKellen received glowing reviews out of the Berlinale for playing an aged, retiring Sherlock in writer/director Bill Condon's "Mr. Holmes." Ahead of its UK premiere in June and US opening from Roadside Attractions and the reawakening Miramax on July 17, 2015, the film will play the SF International Film Festival on Saturday, April 25 at the Sundance Kabuki Cinemas in Japantown as a Marquee Presentation.

This version of the story begins in 1947 when an aging Holmes (McKellen) returns from Japan, where he was seeking a restorative plant and witnessed the devastation of nuclear war. Settled at a remote seaside farm, Holmes tends to his bees in the company of his housekeeper (Laura Linney) and her young son (Milo Parker) with whom he becomes close--and who helps him revisit an unsolved case.

READ MORE: Ian McKellen Stars in Miramax's "Mr. Holmes"

Bill Condon previously directed Ian McKellen as "Frankenstein" director James Whale in the Oscar-winning 1998 film "Gods and Monsters." "Mr. Holmes" co-star Laura Linney starred in Condon's "Kinsey."

The full SFIFF lineup hits next Tuesday. Here are the films announced so far, including Sundance premieres "The End of the Tour" and "Experimenter," and SXSW premiere "Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine."

SF Film Fest Gets 3 Films from Sundance and SXSW

Ryan Lattanzio — Thu, 26 Mar 2015 00:18:50 GMT

Now in its 58th year, the San Francisco Film Society's two-week festival will kick off on April 23 with Alex Gibney's SXSW premiere "Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine," a probing documentary portrait of the Apple guru.

On May 2, the Centerpiece screening will be James Ponsoldt's acclaimed Sundance feature "The End of the Tour," starring Jason Segel as author David Foster Wallace opposite Jesse Eisenberg as the budding Rolling Stone journalist who follows him.

The fest closes on May 7 with Michael Almereyda's "Experimenter," also a Sundance premiere, starring Peter Sarsgaard as scientist Stanley Milgram opposite Winona Ryder. The full lineup lands next Tuesday, March 31.

READ MORE: Here Are the 19 Films in SF Film Fest Competition

SFIFF previously announced a special award tribute to Guillermo Del Toro, where we'll see footage from his fall tentpole "Crimson Peak," along with the 19 films in competition including Sundance premiere "The Wolfpack" and hot 2014 Cannes title "The Tribe."

READ MORE: Guillermo del Toro Gets Directing Award and Shows Upcoming Film Clips at San Francisco Fest

Guillermo del Toro Gets Directing Award and Shows Upcoming Film Clips at San Francisco Fest

Anne Thompson — Thu, 19 Mar 2015 19:17:15 GMT

The San Francisco Film Society will give Mexican filmmaker Guillermo del Toro its Irving M. Levin Directing Award at the 58th San Francisco International Film Festival (April 23–May 7) on Awards Night, Monday April 27 at The Armory, which will also honor actor Richard Gere, who is getting a head start on his "Time Out of Mind" awards campaign.

According to a SFIFF press reelase, the SFIFF tribute will celebrate del Toro’s "exceptional versatility in film and mastery of building fantastic yet familiar worlds, populating them with disorienting and heroic monsters, brings audiences deep inside the living, oozing heart of his rich world of ideas and images."

Del Toro will also be honored at "An Evening with Guillermo del Toro" at the Castro Theatre, Saturday April 25, 8:00 pm complete with onstage interview and clips from his directing career as well as a sneak peek at such projects as TV series "The Strain" and fall tentpole "Crimson Peak," followed by a screening of his chilling horror classic "The Devil’s Backbone" (2001), a political allegory set during the Spanish Civil War.

SFFS executive director Noah Cowan sees the spring and summer festivals outside the awards corridor as "championing

high quality cinema all year long." Last year, he points out, Oscar contenders "Grand Budapest Hotel" and "Boyhood" "used the spring zone successfully."

Cowan recognized Del Toro as an enthusiastic educator and speaker after bringing him to multiple appearances at the TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto. Coming up is another season of Del Toro's horror TV series "The Strain," on which he remains a creative force, as well as Legendary/Universal's big-budget extravaganza "Crimson Peak," which boasts spectacular VFX from the Bay Area's ILM, as did "Pacific Rim."

"He's done the most interesting trick in cinema these days," says Cowan, "directing both the highest grossing blockbusters of all time and great art films: only filmmakers like Spielberg have that ability." Cowan visited the set of "Crimson Peak" and believes this film could "bring together Del Toro's incredible ability to convey large-screen action and intimate horror inside politics in the way we loved so much in 'Pan’s Labyrinth.'"

Cowan is working on expanding ILM owner Lucasfilm's SFFS art and science series into a national program. "The Bay Area is really the stealth filmmaking capitol," he says. "All of this below-the-line technology here is instrumental to the idea of contemporary cinema."

Here's some biographical background on Del Toro from the SFIFF:

Del Toro burst onto the international scene with Cronos (1993), winner of nine Ariel Awards from the Mexican Academy of Film Arts and Sciences and the Cannes’ International Critics Week prize. The Devil’s Backbone solidified his reputation as a masterful storyteller, while Pan’s Labyrinth (2006) opened to worldwide acclaim, winning three Oscars and garnering Academy Award nominations for Best Original Screenplay and Best Foreign Language Film. Del Toro continued to develop his unique directorial style with fan favorites Blade II (2002), Hellboy (2004) and Pacific Rim (2013), which was one of the highest grossing live action films that year, topping $400 million at the box office worldwide. The Strain, his 2009 vampire novel co-authored with Chuck Hogan, was recently adapted for television and developed into an FX series, and audiences eagerly await his upcoming gothic thriller Crimson Peak, set to release in October 2015.

Del Toro is notable for multi-faceted projects and collaborations with the cinematographer Guillermo Navarro, actors Ron Perlman and Doug Jones, and for his influential friendships with fellow Mexican directors Alfonso Cuarón and Alejandro González Iñárritu. Beyond his contributions to directing, del Toro works as an activist, author and film historian, and has screenwriting and production credits on over thirty films. From the fairytale friendships of Pan’s Labyrinth to the haunting coastlines of Pacific Rim, he is responsible for numerous stories, characters and landscapes sparking the imagination of fresh and seasoned audiences alike.

The Irving M. Levin Directing Award is presented each year to a master of world cinema in memory of Irving M. Levin, founder of the San Francisco International Film Festival in 1957. It was first bestowed in 1986 on iconic filmmaker Akira Kurosawa. Previous recipients are:

Richard Linklater, USA; Philip Kaufman, USA; Kenneth Branagh, England; Oliver Stone, USA; Walter Salles, Brazil; Francis Ford Coppola, USA; Mike Leigh, England; Spike Lee, USA; Werner Herzog, Germany; Taylor Hackford, USA; Milos Forman, Czechoslovakia/USA; Robert Altman, USA; Warren Beatty, USA; Clint Eastwood, USA; Abbas Kiarostami, Iran; Arturo Ripstein, Mexico; Im Kwon-Taek, South Korea; Francesco Rosi, Italy; Arthur Penn, USA; Stanley Donen, USA; Manoel de Oliveira, Portugal; Ousmane Sembène, Senegal; Satyajit Ray, India; Marcel Carné, France; Jirí Menzel, Czechoslovakia; Joseph L. Mankiewicz, USA; Robert Bresson, France; Michael Powell, England; and Akira Kurosawa, Japan.

33% of Contenders for San Francisco Festival's Golden Gate Awards Directed by Women

Inkoo Kang — Wed, 18 Mar 2015 20:00:00 GMT

Six women-directed films -- three narrative, three nonfiction -- will compete for the San Francisco International Film Festival's Golden Gate Awards this year.

The total of 18 films (with nine finalists in each category) are in contention for nearly $40,000 in award money. The winners will be announced on May 6.

The films competing for the New Directors Prize (Narrative Feature) award directed by women are:

“Bota” — Iris Elezi, Thomas Logoreci, Albania/Italy/Kosovo

“Flapping in the Middle of Nowhere” — Diep Hoang Nguyen, Vietnam/France/Germany/Norway

“Sworn Virgin” — Laura Bispuri, Italy/Switzerland/Germany/Albania/Kosovo

The films competing for the Documentary Feature award directed by women are:

“Democrats” — Camilla Nielsson, Denmark

“Very Semi-Serious” — Leah Wolchok, USA

“The Wolfpack” — Crystal Moselle, USA

[via Variety]

Richard Gere Faces Good Year as Oscar-Worthy 'Time Out of Mind' Yields Tributes, Including SF Film Fest

Anne Thompson — Tue, 17 Mar 2015 19:58:44 GMT

Richard Gere is having a good year.

At the Toronto, New York, Rome and Hampton film festivals last fall, critics and audiences embraced Oren Moverman's cinema verite drama "Time Out of Mind," in which Gere gives a moving, nuanced Oscar-worthy performance as an aging man who is surviving on the streets of New York. He's also a welcome addition to the starry ensemble hit "The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel."

So accepting the Peter J. Owens Award for excellence in acting at the 58th San Francisco International Film Festival (April 27) is likely to be one of many such tributes over the course of the year. Gere will also be publicly honored at "An Evening with Richard Gere" at the Castro Theatre, Sunday April 26, 6:30 pm, via an onstage interview and a selection of clips from his career, followed by a screening of "Time Out of Mind," which is set to open this year via IFC Films.

The Film Society uses the Film Society Awards Night fundraiser to support its year-round exhibition, education and filmmaker services programs. The glam event will also honor the recipients of the Irving M. Levin Directing Award, the Kanbar Award for excellence in storytelling, and the George Gund III Craft of Cinema Award, who will be announced later on.

"Richard Gere is one of cinema's few unmistakable icons, a powerful connection to the heart of Hollywood history," said SFFS Executive Director Noah Cowan. "But when we saw his extraordinary performance in 'Time Out of Mind,' we were instantly reminded of something else -- that he is an intoxicatingly gifted actor, capable of extraordinary depth and subtlety. We anticipate continuing acclaim for Gere now and through the awards season."

Richard Gere has won a Golden Globe for the musical "Chicago," which won the Best Picture Oscar, but surprisingly has never been nominated for an Oscar. Gere started his career on Broadway where he starred in "Bent"; he made his on-screen breakthrough in 1978 with Terrence Malick's Oscar-winning "Days of Heaven." His subsequent films include Paul Schrader's "American Gigolo" and Taylor Hackford's "An Officer and a Gentleman" as well as such hits as "Internal Affairs," "Pretty Woman," "Unfaithful" and "Arbitrage," which yielded Golden Globe and SAG nominations. He will next appear in "Franny," directed by Andrew Renzi, and "Oppenheimer Strategies," co-starring Dan Stevens, Michael Sheen, and Steve Buscemi.

'The Tribe,' 'Wolfpack' Among 19 Films in 2015 SF Film Fest Competition

Ryan Lattanzio — Wed, 11 Mar 2015 19:00:00 GMT

Each year, the San Francisco International Film Festival (running April 23 to May 7) awards nearly $40,000 in total prizes to narrative and documentary films, this year from 20 different countries.

Both the GGA New Directors and Documentary Feature prize winners will receive $10,000, and the GGA Bay Area Documentary Feature winner will receive $5,000. In addition to these 19 narrative and documentary features by emerging filmmakers, the Golden Gate Awards will include competitors in six short film categories. These films will be announced on Tuesday, March 31. Juries select winners, to be announced on Wednesday, May 6.

READ MORE: SF Film Society Names 11 Finalists for Documentary Film Fund

US and international highlights include 2014 Cannes premiere "The Tribe," the stunning Ukrainian film shot with an all-deaf cast of non-actors, Sundance-winning docs "The Wolfpack" and "Western," Afghanistan's 2015 Foreign Oscar submission "A Few Cubic Meters of Love" and more.

Here are the narrative and doc feature titles in competition, with synopses from SFIFF.

READ MORE: Magnolia Snatches Hot Sundance Doc "The Wolfpack"

2015 GGA NEW DIRECTORS PRIZE (NARRATIVE FEATURE) COMPETITION

Bota, Iris Elezi, Thomas Logoreci, Albania/Italy/Kosovo – North American Premiere

Populated by charming oddballs, quirky café/bar Bota (literally “the world” in Albanian) is a silent witness to the lives and secrets of people living in the shadow of the past. Long after the end of Albania’s harsh dictatorship, the locals’ lives have stagnated, most too poor to seize the opportunities liberty has offered them. But progress, in the form of a highway construction project, prompts change and new decisions for this very special café society.

El Cordero, Juan Francisco Olea, Chile

Domingo is a devoted family man and Christian missionary gliding through a dutifully modest if unexceptional life. He’d happily keep it that way, too, but for the fact that a fatal accident leaves him, disturbingly, without a sense of guilt. Shot through with a subtle, sardonic humor and beautifully acted, this exceptional feature debut is an engrossing dramatic thriller reverberating with deeper questions about our innermost natures and our ties to one another.

Court, Chaitanya Tamhane, India

Chaitanya Tamhane’s gorgeously recorded debut unfolds almost in slow motion. The film–a prizewinner at the Venice International Film Festival–concerns a criminal case in Mumbai’s lower court, tracing the private and professional lives of the lawyers, defendants and judges implicated in the proceedings. A patient examination of a less-than-functional and sometimes Kafkaesque justice system, Court succeeds as a human drama, raising questions about social structures while vividly painting the individuals who must navigate them.

A Few Cubic Meters of Love, Jamshid Mahmoudi, Iran/Afghanistan

An Afghan refugee and an Iranian metal-punch worker cultivate a clandestine relationship amid the corrugated-metal shacks of undocumented workers in an industrial suburb of Tehran. Like teenagers in love from time immemorial, they are convinced the world will bend to their dreams. A beautifully shot slice of contemporary neorealism, A Few Cubic Meters of Love was Afghanistan’s official submission for the Foreign Language Oscar.

Flapping in the Middle of Nowhere, Diep Hoang Nguyen, Vietnam/France/Germany/Norway

Vietnamese director Diep Hoang Nguyen’s debut feature is a sensuous and moody observation of a young student’s struggle to get an abortion in the tropical languor of the slums of Hanoi. Thuy Anh Nguyen finds the right balance of innocence and fortitude in the lead role, enduring prostitution, an immature boyfriend and the questionable wisdom of her roommate. While alluring and enchantingly unconventional, Nguyen’s film also tells some hard truths about coming of age in Vietnam.

Run, Philippe Lacôte, Ivory Coast/France

Masterfully blending enchanting magic realism with piercing sociological insights, Philippe Lacôte's fleetly paced drama charts the unusual circumstances that set the seemingly directionless Run (Abdoul Karim Konate) on the path to becoming an assassin. The rich folklore and fractious politics of the Ivory Coast factor heavily in this picaresque fable that surprises at every turn and has seen Lacôte rightfully hailed as one of the most exciting new talents in African cinema.

Sworn Virgin, Laura Bispuri, Italy/Switzerland/Germany/Albania/Kosovo

A young Albanian woman, chafing against her culture’s strictures on women’s behavior, makes the decision to follow the local tradition of living as a man and takes the name Mark. Years later, questioning her choice, she leaves her remote village to join her sister in Italy. Stunningly shot and acted, this moving debut film carefully and precisely delineates its protagonist’s determination to discover who she really is.

The Tribe, Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy, Ukraine

A tour de force of pure expressive, explosive cinema, Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy’s one-of-a-kind drama recasts Lord of the Flies in a Ukrainian school for the deaf where violence and unforgiving social Darwinism speak louder than words. Telling its story completely through non-subtitled sign language, The Tribe is a stunning directorial debut and a unique, disturbing cinematic vision.

READ MORE: 'The Tribe' Among 9 Must-Sees Headed for New Directors/New Films Series

Vincent, Thomas Salvador, France

In this charming slice of magic realism, a quiet drifter finds a construction job in a small town and meets a friendly woman living in the neighborhood. Finally feeling the urge to settle down, Vincent’s newfound life is thrown into jeopardy when his unique power is revealed.

Documentary features after the jump:

2015 GOLDEN GATE AWARDS DOCUMENTARY FEATURE COMPETITION

Beats of the Antonov, Hajooj Kuka, Sudan/South Africa – U.S. Premiere

Filmed in the civil war-ravaged region between South and North Sudan, Beats of the Antonov paints an inspiring portrait of the Blue Nile and Nuba Mountain refugee communities and their reliance on music making not only as a healing force in the face of devastating loss and displacement, but also as a vital instrument to keep their cultural heritage alive.

Democrats, Camilla Nielsson, Denmark

The Catch-22 of attempting a transition to democracy in Zimbabwe while its prior epoch's autocratic tyrant, Robert Mugabe, still rules makes for riveting, stranger-than-fiction drama in Camilla Nielsson’s documentary. She focuses on two leaders tasked with drafting a new constitution for the country, a process rendered surreal at times by the secret police, false arrests and other intimidation tactics still in place from President Mugabe’s decades-old regime.

A German Youth, Jean-Gabriel Périot, France/Germany/Switzerland – U.S. Premiere

In the ‘60s and ‘70s, political upheaval wracked West Germany. The legacy of Nazi Germany caused a fervent youth movement to question the legitimacy of the State. From this resistance, rose the movement’s most lethal offshoot, the Baader-Meinhof Gang, as the media called it. Using only found and archival footage, director Jean-Gabriel Périot reveals their increasingly radical statements and actions.

The Iron Ministry, J.P. Sniadecki, China/USA

A thrillingly expansive portrait of China as observed in the cramped compartments of its trains, J.P. Sniadecki’s The Iron Ministry is simultaneously a vivid social document and a bold aesthetic experiment. Shot over three years and dozens of rides, the film seamlessly unfolds as a single voyage, Sniadecki’s indefatigable camera instigating several conversations along the way that may surprise audiences for their political candor.

Of Men and War, Laurent Bécue-Renard, France/Switzerland

Winner of the 2014 IDFA award for Best Feature Documentary, Of Men and War is director Laurent Bécue-Renard's multiyear account of the residents of The Pathway Home, an innovative treatment center for PTSD and related war traumas in Yountville, California. This quietly intense film bears witness to Iraq and Afghanistan veterans as they revisit the brutalities of combat, process the traumatic memories that haunt them and search for meaning in the psychological wreckage of war.

Sunday Ball, Eryk Rocha, Brazil

This mesmerizing film captures the spirit of a championship soccer game between rival teams from Rio de Janeiro’s impoverished Sampaio neighborhood. More like a work of poetry than a traditional sports documentary, the film uses footage from various games to create an intimate portrait of favela football culture. Composed with luminous cinematography and exquisite sound design, the film takes us inside the match along with the players, and we experience something more like a deep spiritual quest than a game.

T-Rex, Drea Cooper, Zackary Canepari, USA

In the new Olympic sport of women’s boxing, 17-year-old Claressa Shields bursts out from the total obscurity of a small Flint, Michigan, gym to compete for a coveted gold medal. T-Rex beautifully captures her rapid ascent, her battle to overcome a damaged home life, the culturally ingrained bias against women's boxing, the spellbinding thrill of her bouts and the indomitable willpower that shows, in its purest and most powerful sense, the meaning of warrior spirit.

Very Semi-Serious, Leah Wolchok, USA

San Francisco-based filmmaker Leah Wolchok’s highly entertaining behind-the-scenes documentary look at the world of The New Yorker’s cartoons and cartoonists brings to vivid life a beloved part of the magazine. Featuring insightful interviews with many of its most popular contributors (including Roz Chast and Bruce Eric Kaplan) and the department’s sagacious editor Bob Mankoff, meditations on humor and life and many dozens of cartoons, it’s unmissable for fans of the magazine and its sophisticated irreverence.

Western, Turner Ross, Bill Ross IV, USA

This intimate, observational documentary portrait of the US-Mexico border focuses on two Eagle Pass, TX, residents—cattleman Martin Wall and Mayor Chad Foster—and follows the strains in the border town’s relationship to its sister city, Piedras Negras, Mexico. As drug cartel violence moves into the region and threatens to spin out of control, U.S. Federal policies made a thousand miles away shut down commerce and further test an already delicate balance.

The Wolfpack, Crystal Moselle, USA

This Sundance Documentary Grand Jury Prize winner intimately focuses on the charming and insightful Angulo brothers who range in age from 16 to 24. Kept isolated within their family’s apartment, homeschooling, DVDs and fear of the outside world—epitomized by their bizarre reenactments of famous films—inform the brothers’ reality. When one brother sneaks away from home and eventually convinces his siblings to join him, their shared truth is threatened with endlessly surprising results.

Miranda July Will Debut New Work at San Francisco Film Fest

Ryan Lattanzio — Tue, 03 Mar 2015 21:09:37 GMT

Miranda July sadly hasn't directed a feature since 2011's "The Future." But the talented multi-hyphenate will launch her latest interactive performance piece in a special two-night run during the San Francisco International Film Festival. This theater experiment first premiered on the east coast last year.

"New Society," set to premiere April 28 at the Brava Theater Center, investigates how groups form, change and disintegrate and will, according to the San Francisco Film Society, test the limits of what is possible in two hours with a roomful of strangers.

July won SFIFF's New Director prize for her 2005 Sundance debut "Me and You and Everyone We Know," a creepy, beautiful and button-smashing comedy that also entwined strangers of disparate ages in uncomfortable scenarios. In her just-published first novel "The First Bad Man" and tender 2005 short story collection "No One Belongs Here More Than You," July observes similar themes of alienation and social boundaries with in-your-face sexual frankness.

Though she has directed shorts, July has no new film on the horizon. So this will have to do.

WATCH: Miranda July's New 10-Minute Short Film "Somebody"

San Francisco Film Society (SFFS) and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) have teamed up to co-present this west coast premiere on Tuesday, April 28 and Wednesday, April 29 at the Brava Theater Center (2781 24th Street).