Interview: "Escape from Mogadishu" director on following "Parasite" towards the Oscars

by Nathaniel R

The "Korean Wave" has exploded in the last decade as more and more international audiences eagerly lap up South Korean music, television, and film. The roots of that cultural tidal wave go back to the 1990s and, in film, particularly the early Aughts when a group of young directors took the country by storm with exciting genre films. Some of them like Park Chan Wook and Bong Joon-Ho have gone on to become international superstars but they weren't alone. Ryoo Seung-wan, one of several others to make waves in the Aughts with hits like Die Bad and The Unjust is, in some ways still rising. He recently had the biggest hit of his career and awards nominations at home with the action drama Veteran and, now, a handful of years later, another huge hit and his first Oscar submission. Escape from Mogadishu is a tense action drama and true story. When the Somali Civil War broke out in the 1990s, the North and South Korean embassies were thrust together, against their natural impulses, in a desperate attempt to survive.

We recently had the chance to sit down with Ryoo Seung Wan in Los Angeles as his film was screening for Academy voters. He was in something like a state of joyful disbelief, laughing as he told me "my parents were actually married at a venue called 'The Academy'!". This interview was conducted through a translator and has been edited and condensed for clarity...

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Interview: Tatiana Huezo on Mexico's Oscar contender "Prayers for the Stolen" (now streaming)

by Nathaniel R

After several shorts and a few documentaries including the highly acclaimed Tempestad, which won her the Best Director Ariel back home in Mexico, filmmaker Tatiana Huezo didn't rest on her laurels. She wanted to take a risk. She set herself an "ambitious challenge" for her first narrative feature, adapting the award winning novel "Prayers for the Stolen" by Jennifer Clement about young girls living in the mountains who are in continual danger of abduction and worse from the cartels.

The risk paid off when her film debuted to immediate praise at Cannes where it won a Special Mention in Un Certain Regard. Prayers for the Stolen, now streaming on Netflix, was then selected as Mexico's Oscar submission for Best International Feature Film. We were privileged to sit down with the director recently to discuss her film and the Oscar race. This interview was conducted with a translator though Tatiana Huezo slipped into English once, with joyful laughter to say "Nooo, it's too much!" when the topic of Oscar submissions came up... 

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Quick Chat: Tom Mizer (Marvelous Mrs Maisel), Emmy Nominee!

by Nathaniel R

Moore (far left) and Mizer (far right) with cast members from The Marvelous Mrs Maisel

If you're a faithful reader of TFE you know that we're fans of the songwriting duo "Mizer & Moore" who wrote the songs for this season of Marvelous Mrs Maisel. Tom, the lyricist half of the duo, recently served on the panel of our Supporting Actress Smackdown of 1947 and then guest blogged for a day here at TFE to tell us about his Maisel experience and other movie musical interests. Naturally we were thrilled when he snagged his first Emmy nomination and called him right up...

NATHANIEL: Congratulations. I am doing a little happy dance for you in my chair as I type away about the Emmys. We've on this journey with you, at least in spirit (socially distanced!) for so long now. Are you shocked? thrilled? humbled? already exhausted by well wishers? 

TOM: Thank you so much! Sharing just a bit of this madness with you and your smart, supportive readers has been a thrill given I’ve been reading The Film Experience forever. It’s surreal to be on the “other side”...

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Chatting with Disney's vfx contenders

by Abe Fried-Tanzer

When the Oscar shortlists were announced in nine different categories a few weeks ago, the remaining films up for Best Visual Effects were halved from twenty to ten. It turns out that five of those films left are Disney productions, and so we had the chance to sit down with the team from each to learn a bit more about what went into creating everything you see on screen.

Team Endgame
Avengers: Endgame
Each member of this specific team was beyond excited to have worked on the epic blockbuster conclusion, which, to each of them, was a scope that they had never experienced before. They code-named their work “Mary Lou,” after the famous gymnast, to reference a need to “stick the landing”...

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Interview: 'Diamantino' directors on queer influences, genre twists, and Pekingese puppies

by Murtada Elfadl

The balancing of many different tones differentiates Diamantino, which just opened in theaters after a hit run at Cannes last year. It's a satire, an allegory, a rom-com and a fantasy -- all of those things in one yet it all jells. Co-directors Gabriel Abrantes and Daniel Schmidt kept all these different balls in the air. The story is absolutely bonkers. Let’s see if we can get it straight with the help of the official synopsis: 

Portuguese soccer hunk Diamantino (Carloto Cotta, Tabu) blows it in the World Cup finals, he goes from superstar to laughing stock overnight. His sheltered worldview is further shattered after learning about the European refugee crisis and he resolves to make amends by adopting an African refugee – only to find that his new “son” is actually an undercover lesbian tax auditor investigating him on the suspicion of corruption. From there, Diamantino gets swept up in a gonzo comic odyssey involving cigarette-smoking evil twins, Secret Service skullduggery, mad science genetic modification, and a right-wing anti-EU conspiracy.

This doesn’t even include the fluffy giant Pekingese puppies that make the best co-stars. Critics, including this writer, have been in love since the film premiered at Cannes last year winning the Critics' Week Grand Prize. We recently had the chance to speak to the co-directors in New York. The interview has been edited and condensed for clarity...

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