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| Everyone is gone and the last few people are straggling away from Alice Tully Hall |
As this posts the New York Film Festival is done and it’s time to relax and chill out. All of the mad dashing up to Lincoln Center is all over (for now).
I’m not going to do any sort of reflection on the festival. I just don’t have the words. I realized there was going to be a problem when I was talking to one of the Film Society patrons at the Personal Shopper press screening. He had been coming to the festival since it started and attended every year for the last 50 years. To him this year’s festival was the least exciting. There was of course some great films but there was no excitement because for the most part there wasn’t any big deal movies after 13TH screened.
I kind of agree with his assessment with even the public Q&A’s not generating any heat- though Debbie Reynolds call in for BRIGHT LIGHTS was of the highlights.
Actually the festival is probably going down as one with some really weird moments such as the most over hyped introduction ever with Dennis Lim's intro and the festival staff wildly over selling TONI ERDMANN (it seemed to liken it to seeing god) and the complete confusion as to what MY ENTIRE HIGH SCHOOL... was doing on the main slate (though many people I know will argue it shouldn't have been at the festival)
Despite the lack of excitement the festival did have some of the best films of the year. Here are my best of the fest films in no particular order
UNCLE HOWARD
CINEMA TRAVELERS
PATERSON
MOONLIGHT
HISSEIN HABRE
DAWSON CITY
JACKIE
and I'm including PERSONAL SHOPPER because while not perfect it is truly scary
I also have to mention Adriana Barraza in EVERYTHING ELSE because acting never gets better than that.
And of course there was the phone call by Debbie Reynolds which charmed everyone in attendance at the BRIGHT LIGHTS screenings- that's now on the list of truly great NYFF moments ever.
I am going to be posting Nate Hood's NYFF best of list separately. His wrap up piece is too good to be linked to my nonsense. I also want to thank Nate for helping out with reviews and with acting as my frequent wing man at NYFF screenings and events. As always it's been a pleasure my friend.
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The other day a friend said she had just seen THE HOST for the first time. With the NYFF winding down I was reminded of the story of the film playing the New York Film Festival back in 2006. It was amusing as hell to see the film playing at Alice Tully Hall with an audience of upscale film lovers unfamiliar with Korean horror films. (remember this was before New York Asian changed the film landscape in New York) Watching the audience get more and more freaked out as the moster ate people was great fun. It was clear that many people didn’t expect the fear nor did they expect to be literally jumping out of their seats in mid-belly laugh. While there was no post film Q&A the post film talk among the audience was largely centered on what the hell was that and why hadn’t they seen anything like that before. It was for many a game changer
(perhaps it's time to shake up the programmers and get back to screening films that change the way New York and the world sees film)
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A quick note or two on BILLY LYNN'S LONG HALF TIME WALK which world premiered at the New York Film Festival.
While as many of you know the word on the film is mixed, the real talk is about the high frame rate projection. The projection is supposed to render the images as if you are looking out a window. It is supposed to amazing and eerie.
I was talking to some people who are involved in the festival and was told a couple of things-
First there will only be two theaters to show it in the new format one in New York and One in LA. It will most certainly never be shown in that way ever again after the the theatrical run because the cost of the projectors are north of a million dollars. They are so costly that the theaters are only borrowing them for the screenings.
Next the technology is such that no other film is planning to shoot using it, which effectively means that in the current for them format is dead, or if not dead a prototype of a years in the future technology.
Lastly the frame rate isn't always 120 frames per second. The war scenes are at that rate. All the other scenes have different rates depending upon the mood that they want to create.
The people I spoke with said that if you're going to see the film and can see it in the high frame format do so. If not you need not rush out to see the film.
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With the end of the NYFF Unseen (reviews will finish up Wednesday) is going back into cruising mode. As things stand now things are programmed into January. I’m going to go back and circle my wagons in my personal life and try to sort a few things out. There are things that have to be done and Unseen can take care of itself.
There is going to be lots of older films in the next few weeks. Any new films are going to be things I want to cover. I suspect that in the next few weeks I’ll be doing DOC NYC, SAIFF and a couple other film festivals that have peaked my interest.
Despite the preprogramming stay with us because who knows what is going to pop up.
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Producer Ben Umstead has an Indegogo up for the post production on TORMENTING THE HEN. This is definitely a film you want to back. I've seen the films Ben has produced and they are awesome. Help get another one made.
The info can be found here
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And now Randi's Links
A new Russian film propagates an old Soviet myth and reveals Putin's move to control history
The TAKEN speech
Syria's Banksy
Russian MST3K
KITT from Knightrider saves Christmas
HOLOGRAM FOR THE KING extended dream sequence
On Disney's Robin Hood or people with no joy should not review films
Broadway shows that shut down to revamp
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| So long until next year |
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