Sundance: Choose Your Own Interpretation of "Luce"
Wednesday, January 30, 2019 at 10:01PM Abe Fried Tanzer reporting from Sundance
People walk through this world with different levels of privilege. It’s a concept that’s become more widely understood of late, and certainly featured prominently in numerous films in recent years. In fact, 24 year-old actor Kelvin Harrison Jr. has starred in a handful that have played at Sundance, including both Monster and Monsters and Men just last year. This year, he stars opposite Naomi Watts in two films. One is The Wolf Hour, a dreary tale of agoraphobia in 1970s New York City that mildly touches on race and class. The other, which tackles the notion of privilege and prejudice, is Luce.
Harrison Jr. stars as the title character, who was adopted from Eritrea at age 7 by Amy (Watts) and Peter (Tim Roth), and, with the help of considerable therapy to overcome his violent childhood, has excelled incredibly and become the class valedictorian...
All 95 Foreign Film Nominees This Century. Oscar & Box Office Trivia!
Wednesday, January 30, 2019 at 6:00PM by Nathaniel R
Roma's great competition: Shoplifters, Never Look Away, Cold War, and Capernaum
Dear readers, I've been filled with existential despair this week. I'm not sure how to continue covering the Oscars next year if the Oscars are going to drain all the art out of it by denying all the categories that make cinema, cinema, and announcing them off air. I haven't quite formed my thoughts on this (I expect this upcoming Oscar night to be disastrous) for a complete post but while we still have the more movie-fan friendly categories to look forward to let's continue to talk about them! We've done some research on how the foreign film category tends to fare in the US marketplace that we wanted to share. In addition to being a super high quality roster, this year's Foreign Film list has done well with audiences, too.
Both Poland's Cold War and Japan's Shoplifters have become genuine hits and will certainly outgross the long runs of the last few years worth of most talked about foreign flicks whether or not they were Oscar nominated like The Square, A Fantastic Woman , Elle, The Salesman, and The Handmaiden. In fact, in any year without Roma or each other in it, wouldn't Cold War or Shoplifters be winning this category with ease ?!?
After the jump, let's take a look back at all 95 nominees this century and how well they fared at the box office. Plus lots of trivia just because trivia is fun and will ward off the despair...
Sundance: "The Last Black Man in San Francisco"
Wednesday, January 30, 2019 at 2:15PM Murtada Elfadl reporting from Sundance
While watching The Last Black Man in San Francisco - a gorgeous, specific, and fantastical fable of a film with a decidedly assured tone - I kept thinking of Oprah Winfrey’s introduction of Precious star Gabourey Sidibe at the Oscars. “Where did that come from?”, “Where did you learn how to do that?” I was asking these questions of writer/director Joe Talbot and writer/actor Jimmie Fails. They had collaborated on a short film before, but this is their feature debut. How did they spring out of the gate so exceptionally?
Sundance Short Film Winners - clues to *next" year's Oscar list?
Wednesday, January 30, 2019 at 12:15PM by Nathaniel R
Sheila Vand at SundanceWe hope you've been enjoying our coverage of Sundance this year. Our two men on the ground (Murtada and Abe) have already reviewed 10 films. Sundance wraps up next Sunday, February 3rd but we've already got our first bit of award news. A three person jury comprised of Iranian-American actress Sheila Vand (We the Animals, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night), Obie award-winning playwright/filmmaker Young Jean Lee, and filmmaker Carter Smith (who won at Sundance 12 years ago for his gay short Bugcrush), have picked the winning shorts of the festival. Six of the seven films honored were by people of color, five were from women, and two from filmmakers who identify as LGBTQ. (Yes, Sundance has made huge diversity efforts these past few years... and they've put their money where their mouth is, both in their film selections and in press badges, even subsidizing minority journalists to combat the inequities in entertainment journalism).
Sundance is an Oscar-qualifying festival which means you might hear about a few of these shorts next year about this time if they're very lucky...