"Wonderstruck" and "Mudbound"
Tuesday, October 24, 2017 at 9:00AM 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...