Liberation's Forge: A tense moment from STONEWALL UPRISING.

And so now we catch up on a couple of very good films that opened last week, but — because there’s only so much podcasting I can do before my ears start to bleed — had to wait a week to be covered. In the case of the film featured in this episode, STONEWALL UPRISING, the delay turns out not to be too bad: We’re still in the midst of  Pride Week, after all, so this documentary remains relevant.

This is from Kate Davis and David Heilbroner, whom we met earlier this year with the release of their black metal documentary WAITING FOR ARMAGEDDON. There are fewer church burnings in STONEWALL, but that doesn’t mean the event depicted — a 1969, NYC riot sparked when the police raided a gay bar called the Stonewall Inn and the patrons decided they’d had their fill of harassment — didn’t stoke its own kind of fire, specifically the birth of the gay rights movement. Davis and Heilbroner rally some great, eyewitness interviews — including the vice cop who led the raid — and manage to put the story in context with considerable footage from news shows and “educational” films showing how, even in the mid- to late-sixties, attitudes towards homosexuality had barely advanced beyond the let’s-burn-’em-at-the-stake stage. If you paired this up with another great doc released last week — 8: THE MORMON PROPOSITION, about the Mormon church’s concerted efforts to have their institutionalized homophobia turned into law — you’d get a good view of how far gay rights have come, and how far they still need to go.

Click on the player to hear the show.

This Episode is Brought to You by:
THE COLLECTOR
Play the Game!

===========================

STONEWALL UPRISING
Trailer

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

www.firstrunfeatures.com/stonewalluprising.html

IMDB Listing

Subscribe to MMP on iTunes

Sign Up for E-Mail Updates

Your email:

 

A Worthy Complement.

The gang has its typical falling-out in TOY STORY 3.

This week, the podcast review of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror takes you from the sublime to the ridiculous, as Dan Persons, Lawrence French, and Steve Biodrowski review TOY STORY 3 and JONAH HEX. Does TOY STORY 3 live up to its predecessors? Is JONAH HEX the biggest bomb of the summer or simply two films in one? Also on the menu, a round up of recent news, a calendar of upcoming events, and a preview of the week’s home video releases.

First up is an interview with Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam, the married directors of THE SUN BEHIND THE CLOUDS, a documentary about Tibet’s struggle for independence. A few years back, there were a handful of docs released on this topic. Most seemed to want to garner audience sympathy through scenic views of Buddhist temples and extended footage of prayer services — not really the most compelling argument for this viewer. Sarin and Sonam take a less romantic approach, focusing on the protests that rose up both within and without the country in 2008, while simultaneously following the Dalai Lama on his mission to gain international support for his controversial “Middle Way Approach,” wherein the struggle for independence would be ceded in return for more autonomy and religious freedom. That the filmmakers chose to present real world politics — including divisions within the movement itself — rather than trying to seduce people with pretty images goes a long way towards making this film a valuable and comprehensive evaluation of one country’s ongoing fight for liberty.

And while we’re talking about seduction, we follow up with a conversation with Nash Edgerton, the Australian stuntman-turned-director whose debut feature is the wicked noir thriller, THE SQUARE. I’d seen this film at a screening almost a year ago, and ever since have been champing at the bit for its long-delayed release. The film definitely traces its roots to the likes of BLOOD SIMPLE and RED ROCK WEST, but with a sense of brutal irony and a gratifyingly twisty interlacing of schemes and deceptions that makes it stand out on its own (and pretty much distinguish itself as uniquely Australian). It’s a good, dark ride; however long it took to finally hit the screens, it’s well worth the wait.

Pretty nice way to get back into production, methinks. Click the player to hear the show.

This Episode is Brought to You by
THE INFIDEL

THE SUN BEHIND THE CLOUDS

Trailer

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

www.thesunbehindtheclouds.com

IMDB Listing

THE SQUARE

Trailer

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

www.squarethemovie.com

IMDB Listing

Subscribe to MMP on iTunes

Sign Up for E-Mail Updates

Your email:

 

How Could We Not Recommend the Coens?

]]> http://mightymoviepodcast.com/blog/2010/04/10/the-square-and-the-sun-behind-the-clouds/feed/ 0 Activism,Controversy,Death,Debut Feature,Drama,Emotion,Gritty,Indie,Justice,Murder,Off Beat,Racism So what have we been doing for the past couple of weeks? Pulling our hair out, what's left of it. Making repeated calls to Verizon. Hosting a visit from their friendly and professional service person (really, no sarcasm there, the guy was good). So what have we been doing for the past couple of weeks? Pulling our hair out, what's left of it. Making repeated calls to Verizon. Hosting a visit from their friendly and professional service person (really, no sarcasm there, the guy was good). Being granted the privilege of shelling out for a replacement modem and still not having all of our problems resolved. But we're at least back more or less to where we were before our internet went south on us, so we're going to catch up on the outage by covering two films -- both very good -- this ep. No Clear Solutions: Exiled Tibetans protest in THE SUN BEHIND THE CLOUDS First up is an interview with Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam, the married directors of THE SUN BEHIND THE CLOUDS, a documentary about Tibet's struggle for independence. A few years back, there were a handful of docs released on this topic. Most seemed to want to garner audience sympathy through scenic views of Buddhist temples and extended footage of prayer services -- not really the most compelling argument for this viewer. Sarin and Sonam take a less romantic approach, focusing on the protests that rose up both within and without the country in 2008, while simultaneously following the Dalai Lama on his mission to gain international support for his controversial "Middle Way Approach," wherein the struggle for independence would be ceded in return for more autonomy and religious freedom. That the filmmakers chose to present real world politics -- including divisions within the movement itself -- rather than trying to seduce people with pretty images goes a long way towards making this film a valuable and comprehensive evaluation of one country's ongoing fight for liberty. A Fool to Do Her Dirty Work: Ray (David Roberts) digs himself in deeper in THE SQUARE And while we're talking about seduction, we follow up with a conversation with Nash Edgerton, the Australian stuntman-turned-director whose debut feature is the wicked noir thriller, THE SQUARE. I'd seen this film at a screening almost a year ago, and ever since have been champing at the bit for its long-delayed release. The film definitely traces its roots to the likes of BLOOD SIMPLE and RED ROCK WEST, but with a sense of brutal irony and a gratifyingly twisty interlacing of schemes and deceptions that makes it stand out on its own (and pretty much distinguish itself as uniquely Australian). It's a good, dark ride; however long it took to finally hit the screens, it's well worth the wait. Pretty nice way to get back into production, methinks. Click the player to hear the show. This Episode is Brought to You by THE INFIDEL THE SUN BEHIND THE CLOUDS Trailer [youtube 34cLHNfFiZg nolink] www.thesunbehindtheclouds.com IMDB Listing THE SQUARE Trailer [youtube 49bD6LAKCN0 nolink] www.squarethemovie.com IMDB Listing Subscribe to MMP on iTunes Sign Up for E-Mail Updates [amazonify]B001B1UO7G[/amazonify] How Could We Not Recommend the Coens? Dan Persons no 35:18 http://mightymoviepodcast.com/blog/2010/04/09/attention-listeners-in-great-britain-help-send-mmp-to-camp/ http://mightymoviepodcast.com/blog/2010/04/09/attention-listeners-in-great-britain-help-send-mmp-to-camp/#comments Fri, 09 Apr 2010 17:33:39 +0000 Dan Persons http://mightymoviepodcast.com/blog/?p=1714 Okay, let’s be blunt about this: I know nothing about comic actor Omid Djalili or screenplay writer David Baddiel, or their new film, THE INFIDEL, which is currently running in Great Britain. But the plot — about a British Muslim who discovers he was actually born Jewish — has potential and, more to the point, if MIGHTY MOVIE PODCAST listeners in GB click on the video, it’ll cover our hosting fee for a few months.

The trailer is less than half a minute long, so checking it out won’t put too much of a time-sink on your day and will really help us out. Just to whet your appetite further, here’s the synopsis that was supplied to us:

In Cinemas Now! Written by David Baddiel and starring Omid Djalili, UK’s premiere comic talents!

Meet MAHMUD NASIR, loving husband, doting father and something of a “relaxed” Muslim.

He may not be the most observant, but in his heart he is as Muslim as it gets. But after his mother’s death a discovery turns Mahmud’s world upside down. He finds his birth certificate which reveals that not only was he adopted at birth…but he’s Jewish, and his real name is Solly Shimshillewitz!

Okay, not sure about that whole “Solly Shimshillewitz” thing, but get a look at the trailer and, who knows, maybe you’ve got your weekend entertainment all set up!

And coming up later today or on Saturday: My interviews with the directors of THE SUN BEHIND THE CLOUDS and THE SQUARE.

Veit Harlan (center) directs his wife, actress Kristina Soderbaum. From HARLAN - IN THE SHADOW OF JEW SUSS

It’s typical in these circumstances to say, “I don’t know what came over me.” But I do know what came over me: I was going to interview Felix Moeller about his new documentary, HARLAN – IN THE SHADOW OF JEW SUSS — the film about German director Veit Harlan, his infamous, anti-Semitic 1940 creation JEW SUSS, and the repercussions said film and the man himself had on his descendents — when I was informed that one of the film’s subjects, journalist, critic, and Harlan niece Jessica Jacoby, would also be available. I agreed to interview them both, but then ran into a brick wall in my planning: I wished to have a candid discussion with Moeller about how he confronted so difficult a subject, and the presence of Jacoby — a woman who, I figured, had undergone every form of questioning on the subject from polite discussion to accusatory interrogation — threw me a curve. I was left not sure how I could ask the questions I wanted about Harlan’s work, how Moeller got the family to open up about the impact of that legacy, and the restrictions Germany has placed on the public exhibition of the film, without making the woman feel that she had travelled down this road far too many times.

I never came up with a solution for my dilemma — in hindsight, the best approach probably would have been just to ask the frakkin’ questions and let the chips fall where they might — and it shows in my awkward approach to the interview. Nevertheless, Jacoby and Moeller were quite forthcoming in discussing how they tackled the story of one of the darkest chapters of film history, and provided good insight into the creation of a compelling, revelatory, and surprisingly beautiful documentary. Click on the player to hear the interview.

Trailer

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

www.zeitgeistfilms.com/harlan

IMDB Listing

Subscribe to MMP on iTunes

Sign Up for E-Mail Updates

Your email:

 

It is available in the U.S, though.

More Than the Sum of Her Accomplishments: Avery Klein-Cloud in OFF AND RUNNING.

Before we get to the topic at hand, lemme tell you about another screening I went to a last week. Not going to tell you which film that was, because I walked out in the middle — yes, it was that good — but the focus of that film was on this family that was straight out of the Twilight Zone, totally unreal. Honestly, these guys would’ve given Donna Reed the hives — the only time you usually see people this loving, nourishing, and supportive on the screen is when they’re trying lure gullible strangers down to the torture chamber in their basement. But there were no thumbscrews or branding irons for these guys; you were supposed to take them at face value. Nobody in his/her right mind could do that.

That, of course, is a worse-case scenario, but film, documentaries included, have a tendency of viewing the family as if there was some sort of ideal that could be attained through hard work and lots ‘n’ lots of love. It’s only natural — we all want to see people pulling together to solve their problems. But anyone who makes the regular pilgrimage home for holidays knows better — the interchanges within any family are seldom tidy, and the problems that arise there are rarely prone to stock solutions.

Travis and Tovah, the two Jewish lesbians who are the heads of the house in the new documentary OFF AND RUNNING, eventually find that out when they decide to adopt an African-American baby. The baby girl, Avery, grows up to be a loving daughter, a good student and a top-notch athlete. She even manages to open up a line of communication with her birth mother. Initially, this is a good thing, then not so good when the woman stops responding to Travis’s letters. As filmmaker Nicole Opper shows, that sudden silence becomes the catalyst for a drama that explores a young woman’s quest for identity and a family’s struggle to deal with issues not covered in 101 Handy Tips for Raising Your Adopted Teenager.

Opper talked with me about what happens when one’s planned exploration of joyous, adoptive parenthood takes a sudden detour into unexplored territory, and what it’s like when your teen subjects are more and more accustomed to living the public life. Click on the player above to hear the interview.

Trailer

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

offandrunningthefilm.com

IMDB Listing

Subscribe to MMP on iTunes

Sign Up for E-Mail Updates

Your email:

 

More Athletic Dreams Deferred

]]> http://mightymoviepodcast.com/blog/2010/01/30/nicole-opper-on-off-and-running/feed/ 0 Activism,Controversy,Documentary,Drama,Emotion,Love,New York,Off Beat,Racism,Success Before we get to the topic at hand, lemme tell you about another screening I went to a last week. Not going to tell you which film that was, because I walked out in the middle -- yes, it was that good -- but the focus of that film was on this family ... Before we get to the topic at hand, lemme tell you about another screening I went to a last week. Not going to tell you which film that was, because I walked out in the middle -- yes, it was that good -- but the focus of that film was on this family that was straight out of the Twilight Zone, totally unreal. Honestly, these guys would've given Donna Reed the hives -- the only time you usually see people this loving, nourishing, and supportive on the screen is when they're trying lure gullible strangers down to the torture chamber in their basement. But there were no thumbscrews or branding irons for these guys; you were supposed to take them at face value. Nobody in his/her right mind could do that. That, of course, is a worse-case scenario, but film, documentaries included, have a tendency of viewing the family as if there was some sort of ideal that could be attained through hard work and lots 'n' lots of love. It's only natural -- we all want to see people pulling together to solve their problems. But anyone who makes the regular pilgrimage home for holidays knows better -- the interchanges within any family are seldom tidy, and the problems that arise there are rarely prone to stock solutions. Travis and Tovah, the two Jewish lesbians who are the heads of the house in the new documentary OFF AND RUNNING, eventually find that out when they decide to adopt an African-American baby. The baby girl, Avery, grows up to be a loving daughter, a good student and a top-notch athlete. She even manages to open up a line of communication with her birth mother. Initially, this is a good thing, then not so good when the woman stops responding to Travis's letters. As filmmaker Nicole Opper shows, that sudden silence becomes the catalyst for a drama that explores a young woman's quest for identity and a family's struggle to deal with issues not covered in 101 Handy Tips for Raising Your Adopted Teenager. Opper talked with me about what happens when one's planned exploration of joyous, adoptive parenthood takes a sudden detour into unexplored territory, and what it's like when your teen subjects are more and more accustomed to living the public life. Click on the player above to hear the interview. Trailer [youtube rIgzStLKbq0 nolink] offandrunningthefilm.com IMDB Listing Subscribe to MMP on iTunes Sign Up for E-Mail Updates [amazonify]B0007WFYBG[/amazonify] More Athletic Dreams Deferred Dan Persons no 19:46 http://mightymoviepodcast.com/blog/2009/10/29/anthony-fabian-on-skin/ http://mightymoviepodcast.com/blog/2009/10/29/anthony-fabian-on-skin/#comments Thu, 29 Oct 2009 22:15:56 +0000 Dan Persons http://mightymoviepodcast.com/blog/?p=1284

The Face Looking Back: Sophie Okonedo in SKIN

You could probably forge a good, absurdist, dark comedy out of a government where racial identity can be declared and reversed by official decree, and white parents whose child’s skin is, because of a genetic quirk, darker than theirs struggle to get their kid designated Caucasian. I can imagine Terry Gilliam going to town on something like that, or maybe even Kevin Smith in a more thoughtful mode. But this isn’t absurdist comedy, this was South Africa in the throes of apartheid, and the story told in Anthony Fabian’s debut feature, SKIN, turns out to have been all too real.

The actual person, Sandra Laing, suffered through a kind of industrial-strength crisis of identity, with her parents determined to ensure that her privileges be protected via that all-important white designation, and her own growing awareness that, whatever the government stamped on a piece of paper, she would have no shortage of difficulty in finding a place in so divided a society. Director Fabian shot the film in South Africa, and brought together a strong cast, including Sophie Okonedo as Sandra and Sam Neill and Alice Krige as her parents. The result is quite moving — a human and unusual perspective on the insanity of institutionalized racism.

Anthony Fabian and I got a chance to talk about his motivation for taking on this project, and how the dictates of apartheid could twist the motives of even the best-intentioned of parents. Click on the player above to hear the interview.

Trailer

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

www.skinthemovie.net

IMDB Listing

Subscribe to MMP on iTunes

Visit the MMP Store

Sign Up for E-Mail Updates

Your email:

 

Truly Absurd Bureaucracy

Don't Worry, It's Not the Brown Acid: Demetri Martin (center) and Paul Dano (right) take a trip under Ang Lee's supervision.

If I was to be completely honest about it, I’d have to say that my disappointment at not being able to attend Woodstock had less to do with the possibility of experiencing the performances of Joplin, Hendrix, The Who, et al, than with my fourteen-year-old, hyper-hormonal self missing the opportunity to see a real, live nekkid hippie chick in the flesh.

Ang Lee’s TAKING WOODSTOCK isn’t anywhere near as adolescently single-minded in its obsessions, but in a similar way, music isn’t really an issue for the film. The main character, Elliot Tiber — played by Demetri Martin and based on the real-life guy who was instrumental in bringing the fest to Max Yasgur’s farm — never gets a chance to witness the fest, despite several abortive attempts. Instead, Woodstock is both a front-and-center catalyst for the film’s drama and tangental influence for changes the characters, Elliot prime amongst them, will go through. Director Lee latches onto the almost universally familiar iconography — mostly as was conveyed by Michael Wadleigh in WOODSTOCK — to give us an alt-view of events from the perspective of the locals, exploring how that chaos percolated down to affect small yet profound (Ang Lee, remember?) changes in those observers.

It’s broad in its way — there’s a theater group that sheds its clothing at the slightest provocation, and Liev Schreiber turns up as an ex-marine-turned-quite-burly-transvestite (interestingly, comic actor Eugene Levy delivers a shrewd, nuanced performance as Max Yasgur) — but it’s in the service of a sweet and somewhat yearning examination of a period when people could dream of the world being better, and could imagine the steps that might be taken to make it so.

Click on the player above to hear my interview with Ang Lee.

Trailer

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

www.filminfocus.com/focusfeatures/film/taking_woodstock

IMDB Listing

Subscribe to MMP on iTunes

Sign Up for E-Mail Updates

Here’s Where the Music Is

So, yeah, there’s FIFTY DEAD MEN WALKING, a dark and violent action drama — based in fact, directed by Kari Skogland and starring Ben Kingsley and Jim Sturgess — about a man who in the 80’s infiltrates the IRA for British intelligence. But then there’s also FIVE MINUTES OF HEAVEN (multiples of five… conspiracy!), a somewhat more intimate drama — directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel and also based on a true story — that starts out in the 70’s as a young, Catholic boy witnesses his brother being murdered by a member of the Protestant Ulster Volunteer Force, then flashes forward to a wholly fictional� present in which a TV news crew seeks to arrange a conciliatory meeting between murderer (Liam Neeson) and witness (James Nesbitt). This, you might suspect, isn’t necessarily a good idea.

Two films, and I am but one man. Plus, I already have one other, really cool episode set for this week (Spike Lee! Coming Thursday!). I decided to focus on FIVE MINUTES because of, amongst other things, the naturalistic, suspensful depiction of the murder that takes up the film’s first act; for Guy Hibbert’s literate script that manages to focus down on two men and distill great insights from their plights; and especially for James Nesbitt’s taut, vitriolic performance as the guilt- and rage-wracked survivor. Not to knock FIFTY DEAD MEN — some will favor that film, others, hopefully the majority, will find value in both — but FIVE MINUTES just stuck with me as the more compelling experience.

Click on the player above to hear my interview with Hirschbiegel.

Trailer
(Yes, it ends abruptly. IFC put it up that way.)

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

www.ifcfilms.com/films/five-minutes-of-heaven

IMDB Listing

Subscribe to MMP on iTunes

Sign Up for E-Mail Updates

Also Starring James Nesbitt