London Film Festival: Roundup and Oscar Chances

Pivotally positioned in October, the BFI London Film Festival boasts the distinction of having some of the most feted films of the year, champions newcomers and not without its stalwart festival curiosities. On the ground this year was Film Experience contributor Seán McGovern who saw only a fraction of the films on offer, but nonetheless a taste of potential Oscar contenders.

Call Me By Your Name
Worried that I would be tranquillised by the hype, I nonetheless could not resist it. Yes, it's a film about gorgeous people of immense privilege, but who can dismiss how hard it is to successfully capture the furtive horniness and confused intensity of young love? Timothée Chalamet's Elio teeters between brazenness and vulnerability, and Armie Hammer captures a strange aloofness that is hard to do on screen. It actually made me want to have children - just so I could grow up and be Micheal Stuhlbarg.

Oscar chances: Director, Picture, Best Actor (Chalamet), Supporting Actor(s) (Hammer, Stuhlbarg), Adapted Screenplay, Cinematography, Original Score. Whether Academy voters embrace two LGBT films in a row is another thing.

 Six more films after the jump...

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TIFF & NYFF & Middleburg Wrap-Ups

Another autumn whizzes by and with it a look back on the festivals we've covered. Here's everything we reviewed from TIFF and NYFF and Middleburg this year in case you missed it. Reviews from Jason Adams, Manuel Betancourt, Nick Davis, Sean Donovan, Murtada Elfaldl, John Guerin, Chris Feil, and Nathaniel R

TIFF 2017

the films 
The Breadwinner •  Darkest Hour • 
Death of Stalin • Disaster • Downsizing • 
Euphoria • Film Stars Dont Die in Liverpool • 
First They Killed My Father • 
The Florida Project • Happy End • I, Tonya • 
The Killing of a Sacred Deer • Kings • 

Lady Bird • Lodgers • Mademoiselle Paradis • 
Mary Shelley • mother! • 
Never Steady Never Still • On Body and Soul • 
The Racer and the Jailbird • Revenge • 

The Seen and Unseen • The Shape of Water • 
Sheikh Jackson • Thelma • 
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing Missouri • 
Tigre • Western • The Wife • Zama

parties, events, randomness
greatest party photo ever • "I'm Armie" • 
Helena Bonham-Carter • mother! moods • 
portraits from the fest • PODCAST FINALE

NYFF 2017

the films 
Arthur Miller: Writer • BPM (Beats Per Minute) • Before We Vanish • 
Boom for Real: The Late Teenage Years of Jean-Michel Basquiat • 
Faces Places • Félicité • First Reformed • The Florida Project • 

Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold • Lady Bird • Let the Sunshine In • 
The Meyerowitz Stories • Mrs Hyde • Mudbound • The Rider • Spielberg •
Thelma

 parties, events, randomness 
red carpet prayer • PODCAST FINALE

MIDDLEBURG 2017

the films
Darkest Hour • A Fantastic Woman • Last Flag Flying • Mudbound •
Novitiate • Wonderstruck

parties, events, randomness
James Ivory talk • Nicholas Britell in concert

Middleburg Finale Pt 1: "Last Flag Flying"

Day 1 (Darkest Hour) and Day 2 (James Ivory, Mudbound, A Fantastic Woman) in case you missed them.

Saturday at Middleburg started really slow but then the tempo and key changed. And then it got chopped and screwed and tessellated... and became truly special. If you don't know what any of that means, it's okay; neither did I. I shall explain when we come to the topic of Oscar nominated film composer Nicholas Britell of Moonlight fame.

But first Last Flag Flying...

Richard Linklater is America's most distinguished auteur in the subgenre of movies in which a tight knit group of men just kind of hang out for two hours. He's back quickly after his delightful college baseball comedy Everybody Wants Some!! but this time he's trained his lens on three men his own age... 

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"Wonderstruck" and "Mudbound"

Lynn Lee continuing our Middleburg Film Festival adventure

Dee Rees and Mudbound cast earlier this year. © Daniel Bergeron

It’s always a little weird to attend a talk with a director before seeing the film they’re being interviewed about.  That’s what happened with Mudbound, which concluded a day that began with a very engaging conversation between director Dee Rees and Washington Post film critic Ann Hornaday and festival founder Sheila Johnson’s presentation of the 2017 “Visionary” award to Rees.  Rees was charming, articulate, and impressively self-possessed, and had many interesting comments on the directorial choices she made in Mudbound, which I wasn’t sure whether I should keep in mind or set aside while watching the film that night.  Rees made clear that she resists being pigeonholed as a director of color, female director, or female director of color, an aversion reflected in her somewhat bland mantra “let excellence be the standard.”  At the same time, she agreed that the current system is structurally biased against prioritizing excellence and needs to be opened up...

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Middleburg Day 1: Delightful Fest / Darkest Hour

by Nathaniel R

Thursday. Though a cab accident* and a missed flight threatened to derail day one, somehow The Film Experience's second annual trip to Middleburg, VA commenced just in time for the opening night festivities. The Middleburg Film Festival is now in its 5th year and growing each time.  It's still small enough, however, that it feels like a discovery.

This year's fest kicked off with Joe Wright's Darkest Hour which holds up incredibly well to a second viewing. It's both muscular and fabulous, so it feels like a blend of impulses that, say, Scorsese and Baz alike might thrill to. And in place of their shared muse Leo DiCaprio a fat-suited bejowled Gary Oldman...

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