Film Fests Archive for May, 2011

SIFF Review: The Sound of Mumbai: A Musical

By Kim Voynar - Friday, May 27th, 2011

Last Sunday, I took my son Jaxon, aged 11, to see The Sound of Mumbai, which is screening at SIFF in their Films4Families section. Jaxon is on the Films4Families jury this year, which means that for the first time, he’s being asked to view movies as more than just pure entertainment. The Sound of Mumbai was his first real experience with a documentary (other than March of the Penguins, and I’m not sure how much he remembers of that), and I was curious to see how he’d respond to it.

“Is this a real story or a made up story?” he whispered about 20 minutes in, as on the screen we saw the deplorable conditions in which the cheerful main subject lives.
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At SIFF This Weekend — May 20-22

By Kim Voynar - Friday, May 20th, 2011

This weekend, the Seattle International Film Festival offers an array of interesting, good films to choose from, which you can view on the handy-dandy fest calendar. Not sure what to watch? You can try out The Siffter for suggestions!

If you’re looking for recommendations, my own picks for Friday would be Submarine (7PM, Egyptian) or 3 (7PM, Neptune), Takeshi Kitano’s Outrage (9:30PM, Egyptian), AND the midnight screening of Trollhunter (midnight, also at the Egyptian). For Saturday, consider checking out Nuummioq, the first feature film out Greenland, at 11AM. The afternoon offers How to Die in Oregon up against Silent Souls – either is recommended.

If you’re over in Renton, which is having its opening night tonight, you can catch SXSW standout Natural Selection and Touch, an terrific little film about the relationship between a manicurist and a mechanic. In some ways, it’s kind of a lighter, funnier version of The Off Hours. which screens later in the fest.

Tomorrow afternoon you could catch The Trip, the hilarious road trip film with Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, and then check out Miranda July’s excellent, trippy flick The Future. Later tomorrow night, you won’t go wrong with either Perfect Sense or Jess + Moss, and midnight brings another offering: John Carpenter’s The Ward. Bring a friend.

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SIFF 2011: The Preview

By Kim Voynar - Wednesday, May 18th, 2011

Thursday evening, the 37th edition of the Seattle International Film Festival will kick off with a Gala opening screening of The First Grader, followed by a sure-to-be-packed opening party. Justin Chadwick’s charming drama about an 84-year-old Kenyan freedom fighter who decides to take advantage of the government’s free education program by enrolling in his village’s school is an interesting choice for a festival opener: There are no big stars to parade down the red carpet — but then Seattle’s never really been the kind of festival locals flock to because of the stars. It’s a rather innocuous, crowd-pleasing choice, not likely to offend any festival donors — but then, rebellious Seattle isn’t exactly the kind of town where not offending is the first priority.
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“I’m in Locarno, my movie is premiering for 1,000 people, which is nuts. A huge-ass screening, second day of the festival, 7:30pm in the sidebar competition. It’s comparable to Un Certain Regard or Director’s Fortnight. Every movie I saw in that section was fun, brilliant movies from around the world. The main competition was like Aza Jacobs and Mia Hansen-Løve, people who have been around. And I was like, “This is crazy. What am I doing inside the bloodstream of this establishment? I’m 27. I don’t belong here.” Every person I talked to there couldn’t believe what the movie cost, and then couldn’t believe when I told them what other American movies cost. We were the cheapest movie there by 65%. The next cheapest movie cost I think three times as much as we did. And they were just like, “You can’t make movies for what you’re telling us your movie cost.” And I told them, “Well, I can, I’m here, I’m in the same section as you are, so you are wrong. People think I’m lying when I tell them my budget. And also everyone likes it. I’m having a great time and people are being very responsive. Maurice Pialat’s widow was like, “I heard your movie’s good, I want a copy of it.” I’m like, “Well this is f**kin’ crazy.” Pedro Costa saw it there and really liked it and I’m like, What am I doing? I had gone in two months from screening at BAM for a lot of friends to Pedro Costa? This is the exact sentence: “Pedro Costa saw your movie. He’s a huge Jerry Lewis fan. He wants to talk to you about your movie and also Jerry Lewis.” And I thought, “I’m out of my element. I cannot have that conversation because that’s ridiculous.” Because his retrospective was happening at Anthology when I worked at Kim’s, and his Criterion box set came out when I was working at Kim’s. He can’t want to talk to me. That’s not possible. That’s not allowed. There is no world where that makes any sense!”  Or like when you wrote me to say that David Gordon Green wrote you to say, “I’m watching The Color Wheel and then I’m going to see Tree of Life.” There is no world where this is allowed! Again, somebody whose DVDs I was putting on the shelf, as, like, a hero. And it’s just like, “Oh, I’ll watch this movie.” There’s just a very fuzzy area in the middle there and it happened very quickly and I don’t understand why.  I still have a voice-mail from Sean [Price Williams, cinematographer]. I wish he was here to talk about it, but the voice-mail is a long pause and he’s just like, “I don’t want to tell you this, because it’s gonna make you so insufferable. I hate having to tell you this, but Leos Carax watched your movie and he really loves it, and he wants to meet you when he comes to New York.” I can’t live in a world where Leos Carax knows who I am, watches my movie, likes it, and thinks, “I wanna meet that guy.”
~ It’s Alex Ross Perry’s World

“I don’t know. It’s been a lot harder than I thought it was going to be to make the films I really dream of making. I was in Italy a few years ago scouting for this very beautiful film I wanted to make with Richard Linklater. We worked really hard on the script for a couple of years and couldn’t get the money together. It was an expensive idea. It’s heartbreaking when that happens over and over again and then the movies that do get made are ones that have lots of women being beaten up or zombies being killed. It’s all fine, it’s all okay, but it’s hard. I remember when River Phoenix died, he was ahead of me on this curve. He kind of realized how hard it was to make serious movies. People like Sidney Lumet figured out how to walk that line, but it’s hard. And it requires patience. It’s a life’s work and I wonder if I’m up to the task.”
~ Weary, Wary Ethan Hawke

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