Interview: Chris Butler on creative freedom, animation's future, and "Missing Link"

by Nathaniel R

Chris Butler (Paranorman, Missing Link)

When I met the talented Chris Butler earlier this year for the release of his second film Missing Link (2019), I was buzzing while he was crashing. I was thrilled that he’d just proved his Oscar nominated horror-tinged comedy ParaNorman (2012) was no fluke with his sophomore effort, a hilarious adventure comedy which wore its Victorian literature and adventure film influences all over its fussy colorful sleeves. He was suffering from a cold and ready for a much needed vacation after wrapping his second feature and hitting the publicity grind immediately thereafter. 

As writer and director, he plays two very different roles on each film, one a solitary pleasure, but in the other surrounded by hundreds of people daily. He jokingly feared that he’d become misanthropic. “I need some space! ‘Chrisanthropic’ -- that’s what they call me!”

I flashed back to that interview recently given that year end awards and “best of” lists are upon us. If there’s any justice, Missing Link is being rediscovered right now on FYC screeners and Butler will be surrounded by hundreds of people again on red carpets. Here’s hoping that well-earned vacation was rejuvenating!

[The following interview has been condensed for clarity]

NATHANIEL: Audiences rarely think of animated films in terms of directors but studios… but your films originate with you. 

CHRIS: Our process is probably different from the biggest studios. You know, I originally went to Laika to work for six months and that was 13 years ago!  So yeah, clearly there was an opportunity there that was worth pursuing. What it was was absolute creative freedom...

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Interview: Nadav Lapid on 'Synonyms' and who gets to tell which stories

by Murtada Elfadl

Using his own experiences as a blueprint Nadav Lapid (The Kindergarten Teacher) made a furious, kinetic and altogether astounding film about being disaffected and seeking a new life, ideals and country. In Synonyms (opening today in limited release) Tom Mercier plays Yoav, a young Israeli who flees Tel Aviv for Paris and tries to completely erase his former identity. The movie is not easy to describe, it’s better to dive in and enjoy the experience. It won numerous accolades around the world this year starting with the Golden Bear at the Berlinale. While in New York to present his film in the main slate of the New York Film Festival, we got the chance to talk to Lapid about his film, his powerful lead actor and who owns the rights to tell which stories. The interview has been edited and condensed for clarity

Murtada Elfadl: Can you talk about the beginning of the film. The first 10, 15 minutes are hypnotic, confusing, and disorienting, throwing the audience into the story with no introduction.

NADAV LAPID: I felt that the movie should start with a vibration, with movement. In a way the biggest challenge of the filmmaking was to create this movie that doesn't have a clear narrative line. I didn't want the film to become a series of anecdotes. We had to have something attached to that feeling, that vibration. It's a movie that's based on compulsion, on an urge. You cannot imagine an introduction to such a movie...

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Interview: Ira Sachs on "Frankie"

by Chris Feil

Frankie is the latest film from director Ira Sachs, one that transplants his trademark humane examination of family dynamics to a beautiful town in Portugal. Isabelle Huppert plays the titular actress, who has insisted on a vacation with family and friends after receiving a fatal diagnosis. The film - also starring Marisa Tomei, Brendan Gleeson, Jérémire Renier, and Greg Kinnear - is Sachs’ most sprawling ensemble yet. In the span of the day, there are reconciliations and aired heartbreaks shared between lovers, step-siblings, and most importantly parents and children - all set against the revealing truth of nature and the landscape. When I sat down to talk with Sachs about the film and his point of view as a storyteller, he was every bit as warm and thoughtful and introspective as his films...

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That time when one of the great cinematographers hooked up with Jake Gyllenhaal...

by Nathaniel R

Here's a little teaser for a forthcoming interview with Rodrigo Prieto, the two-time Oscar nominated DP whose latest film is Martin Scorsese's The Irishman. The famed Mexican cinematographer turns 54 next month. We'd always seem him in photos, handsome, crouched down behind cameras with tightly cropped hair. In person he's a tall silver fox and he's let his hair grow out. He could have been in front of cameras but instead got behind them from an early age. And what a career he's had. Standing majestically amongst his classics is Brokeback Mountain (2005) so during a lengthy sit down we had at the Middleburg Film Festival this past weekend, we asked him how he ended up with his only onscreen role.

We don't know if you knew this but he plays the Mexican hustler who Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal) picks up during a quick trip south of the border. That's the trip that Ennis and Jack fight about, later in the movie, lighting a bonfire of scorched feeling in that famous 'I wish I knew how to quit you' scene...

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Interview: Waad Al-Kateab and Edward Watts on 'For Sama'

by Murtada Elfadl

For Sama, the new documentary in theaters that chronicles the five years of the Syrian uprising in Aleppo, is presented as a document from a mother trying to explain what happened to her newborn daughter. Yet what filmmaker Waad Al-Kateab shows through capturing the minutiae of everyday life in a city under siege and continuous bombardment, is a love letter to people committed to building a better society even as the situation around them becomes dangerous. Al-Kateab, a journalist, and her husband Hamza, a doctor, make the choice several times to stay in Aleppo and continue their work while starting a family, building a life, helping their community, hoping they can sustain despite the circumstances. The film presents a narrative rarely seen on screen, intimately documenting life from inside a city ravaged by war, as its people are just trying to live through the days. We recently spoke to Al-Kateab and her British co-director Edward Watts in New York. (This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.)

Murtada Elfadl: How did you come to work together?

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