Tribeca: "Glass Chin," A Glossy Neo-Noir

Here's Diana with our final Tribeca Film Festival 2014 review

It’s a chilly, damp night in a small urban city. On a nightly jog, a sweatpant-outfitted man and his dog trudge and bound respectively through the empty streets, with rain-drizzled lampposts to light the way and Laura nyro’s “Gonna take a miracle” playing to set the mood (both diegetic and nondiegetic). The pair slow down at a red-lit alleyway and stop at a hole-in-the-wall bakery. After a breather on the song’s bridge “It’s gonna take a miracle, yes, it’s gonna take a miracle,” the man takes out his earbuds to order a pain au chocolat. The shop owner tells him it’s the last one on the house and the jogger assures him that he’ll pay up soon. He is a man on-the-outs, not truly desperate but not nearly satisfied with the cards he was dealt and picked up along the way.

Bud “The Saint” Gordon (Corey Stoll) is a former professional boxer, whose post-retirement restaurant flopped and who didn’t have a Plan C lined up. [More...]

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Tribeca: How To Recover From A Breakup, Indie Style

Diana reporting on a thematic trend at Tribeca

Relationships end. Goodbyes, no matter how “amiable,” are awkward and feelings are hurt or mangled. We have all been there and survived. Like the worst of hangovers, there are still no sure-fire recovery cures and you’re frequently left with a ringing noise in your ears, whether it’s nagging self-doubts or ongoing pangs of heartache. Some turn to binges and purges (booze, food, etc.), others break out the self-help books and get a new haircut, and a very small few release public statements involving a new buzz phrase (looking at you, Gwyneth). At this year’s Tribeca Film Festival, many films tackled the issue head-on and their protagonists dealt with heartbreak to varying degrees of success, involving alcohol, rebounds, and even some zombie beavers (and we’re not talking about undead sex lives).

four movies after the jump

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Tribeca: Do You Hear What You Hear

Here's Jason reporting on the Joss Whedon-scripted In Your Eyes out of Tribeca.

In 2007 when Radiohead released their album In Rainbows directly online for fans, asking them to pay whatever they wanted for it, it was kind of a big deal. Made some headlines. Yes smaller acts had done it before, but this was one of the biggest bands in the world (the biggest if you ask me, but I'm monstrously biased) tossing the old models right out the window. At this point six years later it's become pretty old hat for any sort of entertainment - movie-wise if it's not a movie that needs to be seen in IMAX there's a good chance I will end up watching it at home now, thanks to my amped-up home-theater system and an encroaching case of hermit-itis, but also the ease and speed with which these things become available now.

But I have to admit, even with as many movies as I've taken to downloading over the past couple of years, I still got that ol' In Rainbows thrill when I read the news about Joss Whedon releasing his latest movie (written, not directed, but that really didn't stop people from thinking of Cabin in the Woods as his either) this way. [More...]

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Tribeca: An Order of Schmaltz

It's our last day of Tribeca reviews. Here's Abstew on "Chef"

It is definitely a good time to be a foodie. We live in a golden age where an ingenious pastry chef can fuse together a croissant and a doughnut to create the wonder that is the Cronut. (And then make people wait hours in line for the possibility of a taste.) It's a time where celebrity chefs from shows on The Food Network and Cooking Channel are greeted with the same sort of adoration and enthusiasm once reserved for rock stars. Where food-based reality shows like Top Chef and Hell's Kitchen aren't just niche programming but hugely successful phenomenons. So it's surprising that film hasn't entirely caught up with the trend. But writer/director/and actor Jon Favreau aims to correct that with his culinary-set film, Chef. [more...]

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Tribeca: Bits and Pieces

Glenn wrapping up his Tribeca film coverage with five films including Elisabeth Moss, Roman Polanski, Emory Cohen, Melonie Diaz, and the memory of a fashion icon.

The One I Love

Catching up with this high-concept romance after having missed it at Sundance was a good idea. Taking a Twilight Zone-ish twist to the relationship dramedy we see so often at festivals and on the indie scene, Charlie McDowell’s feature debut is a visually playful metaphysical look at marriage and the memory of love that is ultimately rewarding and inventive. Elisabeth Moss continues to be on top form following Mad Men, Top of the Lake, and Listen Up Philip with her role here, while Mumblecore graduate Mark Duplass gives fine if less attention-grabbing work as her somewhat dull husband.

The story is too complex to get into here (and yet easy to follow so don’t worry about this just being a winsome Upstream Color), and it’s probably best audiences go in as blind as possible to the twists that it takes with the story of a crumbling marriage and the retreat they take to the country where, apparently, everybody comes back refreshed and more in love than ever. Filmed in warm, picturesque yellow tones and with refined, yet deliberately essential production design, The One I Love is a winner that will likely be wonderful to revisit. B+

Venus in Fur, Under the Harvest Sky, Dior and I and X/Y after the jump.

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