I saw the last screening of the day on Oct. 28th. Film Forum was going to be closing early, in advance of the city-wide transit shut down. Superstorm Sandy was bearing down on the city. During the film my pocket was buzzing. “Are you evacuating?” I left the theater a few times to check messages …
I recently saw Les Bien-Amies and I’m trying to put my finger on it — what is so magical about the films of Christophe Honoré? His films are melancholy but not depressing and despite the darkness there is plenty of charm and compassion. Infidelity, premature death, incest, bisexuality, love, sex, unhappiness, obsession are among the …
It’s that time of year again to live the drama of the Tour de France. In honor of today’s rest day we watched Louis Malles’s 1962 short film Vive Le Tour. Absolutment wonderful! This brief film gives great insight into the race — the eccentricities (riders raiding roadside bars for beers and stuffing them into …
I saw this at BAM and it has now joined the list as one of the very best films I’ve ever seen. Right up there with Celine and Julie, with whom it shares some qualities. A surrealist, anarchic, hilarious romp of extremely bad behavior. Even after all these years, you can see how this …
In my opinion America’s great gift to cinema is Comedy and our snappy, spirited comediennes. The French basically invented cinema and their gifts are obvious, great and many. I never really considered comedy to be one of them. But up until yesterday I had never seen Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974, J.Rivette). The joyful …
I’m often asked what is “discobikini” The term is derived from this portion of my film Filmini Italiani. Made in 1998.
I saw the film Breathless at the impressionable age of 17 and fell instantly in love with jump cuts, billowing puffs of cigarette smoke and the movies. My career in pictures started with a stint as an intern on Dazed and Confused during a summer in Austin. From there I followed a unique path from …
Endless Love, 2005. A friend gave me a super-8 camera but wasn’t sure if it worked. So we stuck some film in it and filmed him and another pal pretending they were in a karaoke video. Turns out the camera worked and the film screened at the Bicycle Film Festival.
Trailer for ChandelAir Flight 69, 2005 The first (and only) installment of a soap opera set entirely on a luxury airliner. The idea was to pack as many outrageous plot lines as possible into the smallest amount of physical space. Shot in Brooklyn’s BCAT TV studios against a green screen with a cast of over …