NYFF 2004

[pmw]

Here is the lineup for the NY Film Festival, Oct 1 - Oct 17:


Opening Night:
LOOK AT ME, agnès Jaoui, France, 110m. 2004. Sony Pictures Classics.

Centerpiece:
BAD EDUCATION, Pedro Almodóvar, Spain, 110m. 2004. Sony Pictures Classics.

Closing Night:
SIDEWAYS, Alexander Payne, USA, 124m. 2004. Fox Searchlight.

Festival Body:
THE 10TH DISTRICT COURT: JUDICIAL HEARINGS, Raymond Depardon, France, 105m. 2004.

THE BIG RED ONE, Samuel Fuller, USA, 158m. 1980 (restored 2004). Warner Brothers.

CAFE LUMIERE, Hou Hsou-hsien, Japan/Taiwan, 104m. 2004.

THE GATE OF THE SUN, Yousry Nasrallah, France/Egypt, 278m. 2004.

THE HOLY GIRL, Lucrecia Martel, Argentina, 106m. 2004. HBO Films.

HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS, Zhang Yimou, China, 119m. 2004. Sony Pictures Classics.

IN THE BATTLEFIELDS, Danielle Arbid, Lebanon/France, 88m. 2004.

KEANE, Lodge Kerrigan, USA, 90m. 2004.

KINGS AND QUEEN, Arnaud Desplechin, France, 150m. 2004.

MOOLAADE, Ousmane Sembene, Senegal, 124m. 2004. New Yorker Films.

NOTRE MUSIQUE, Jean-Luc Godard, Switzerland/France, 80m. 2004. Wellspring.

OR (MY TREASURE), Keren Yedaya, Israel, 100m. 2004.

PALINDROMES, Todd Solondz, USA, 100m. 2004.

ROLLING FAMILY, Pablo Trapero, Argentina, 103m. 2004.

SARABAND, Ingmar Bergman, Sweden, 107m. 2004. Sony Pictures Classics.

TARNATION, Jonathan Caouette, USA, 88m. 2004. Wellspring.

TRIPLE AGENT, Eric Rohmer, France, 115m. 2004.

TROPICAL MALADY, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand, 118m. 2004. Strand Releasing.

UNDERTOW, David Gordon Green, USA, 107m. 2004. United Artists.

VERA DRAKE, Mike Leigh, UK, 125m. 2004. Fine Line Features.

WOMAN IS THE FUTURE OF MAN, Hong Sang-soo, South Korea/France, 88m. 2004.

THE WORLD, Jia Zhangke, China, 133m. 2004.


Special Screenings:
INFERNAL AFFAIRS TRILOGY, Andrew Lau and Alan Mak, Hong Kong. 2002-03. Running times: 1: 98m; 2: 119m; 3: 117m. Walter Reade Theater.

MACUNAIMA, Joaquim Pedro de Andrade, Brazil, 110m.1969 (restored 2004). Walter Reade Theater.

MILES ELECTRIC: A DIFFERENT KIND OF BLUE, murray Lerner, USA, 87m. 2004. Walter Reade Theater.

SELLING DEMOCRACY: FILMS OF THE MARSHALL PLAN, 1947-55, Walter Reade Theater and Alice Tully Hall.

ELEGANCE, PASSION, AND COLD HARD STEEL: A TRIBUTE TO SHAW BROTHERS STUDIOS, Walter Reade Theater. (Details in separate release.)

UNFORGIVABLE BLACKNESS: THE RISE AND FALL OF JACK JOHNSON,

Ken Burns, USA, 210m. 2004. Walter Reade Theater.

VIEWS FROM THE AVANT-GARDE. Experimental works by various filmmakers.

Special Tribute:
VIVA PEDRO! A screening of career highlights and one-on-one conversation with Pedro Almodóvar, with appearances by special guests. Alice Tully Hall.

There will be a short film program and some special discussions scheduled as well.

[arsaib4]

Official schedule is now available:

http://www.filmlinc.com/nyff/nyfffilm2004.htm

[oscar jubis]

Strong lineup. I don't know about you but at festivals I concentrate on promising films that don't have distribution and the rare special screenings like the restored Sam Fuller.
The one to avoid seems to be Woman is the future of Man, early reviews indicate is inferior to the director's last, Turning Gate.

[arsaib4]

It's rare for a NYFF lineup to have so many films already distributed but it's a good sign (and no Miramax) so i won't bitch as much.

I talked about Woman is the Future of Man in the dvd section, certainly not one of the better efforts from Hang-soo. I have a feeling that strong reviews from both Kent Jones and the editor Gavin Smith in 'film comment' is part of reason that film is in the lineup. I'd be very surprised if gets picked up.

[Chris Knipp]

It certainly looks like they're showing a lot of good stuff. There seems to be little point in seeing something that you know will be distributed unless it will have only very limited distribution.

[Chris Knipp]

The Venice Film Festival is beginning. I'd appreciate any comments on the lineup of films, which you can find here:

Films in and out of competition:

http://www.repubblica.it/speciale/20...nconcorso.html

The schedule day by day:

http://www.repubblica.it/speciale/20...zia/0109.html.

[pmw]

Nice replies. I agree Oscar that Turning Gate was a disappointment. Here's hoping that the latest is better.

As for festivals and distributed/undistributed films, I will certainly make it a point to try and catch the unidistributed. I think as far as NY is concerned the purpose of the film festival is to bring together what the committee feels are among the strongest films of the year and offer them to the public. In other words, to build some visibility around a strong body of film (distributed or otherwise). In doing that, there is that line one needs to walk between putting out some crowd pleasers (to attract audiences) and ramming the tougher films down the audience's throats (the ones they wouldn't see if they had been able to get tickets to the crowd pleasers). It's a little bit of educational psychology at work, and last year's festival was not amazingly successful...

I am so looking forward to:
TROPICAL MALADY, TRIPLE AGENT, LOOK AT ME, THE WORLD and CAFE LUMIERE. Not to mention another cut of Sideways, which I think is one of the best two or three American films this year....

Cant wait!
P

PS anyone else thinking of attending ??

[oscar jubis]

Actually I liked Turning Gate and the bulk of the reviews conclude that the new film is inferior. I'd say if you didn't like Turning Gate, Woman is... may be one to avoid.

[arsaib4]

Originally posted by Chris Knipp
The Venice Film Festival is beginning.

Actually I posted the lineup not long ago in this forum, may be you wanna talk about it there.

http://www.filmwurld.com/forums/show...=&threadid=999

[Chris Knipp]

I thought you might like to comment on the general outlines of the Venice vs. others such as New York, the prestige and personality of the festival, the quality and personality of the programs. I was appealing to the expertise of others. I have no comments but would welcome yours, if you have any. Thanks.

[arsaib4]

oops, i thought you wanted to talk about the lineup itself.......

Anyways, i'm no expert on the history of these two even though i have attended both in the past. Venice is the oldest festival around (to the best of my knowledge), about 5 years older than Cannes. I started following the festivals a few years ago and Venice to me had taken a backseat to Toronto ever since Toronto has emerged as the 'the festival' later in the year, partly due to their vast lineup and easy accessibility. Toronto has also become the favorite destination of most stars. But in the last couple of years, as Cannes has slipped a bit (they have no one else to blame but themselves), Venice programmers have taken advantage of it by inviting the ignored filmmakers and going with a more challenging lineup as they are not obligated to have a certain amount of glitz in the competition. One distinct advantage Venice has over Toronto is their prestigious award (the Golden Lion) and unless Toronto (and NY) start main competitions, in the eyes of the programmers and filmmakers they will always be second best.

NY is very unique and as pmw pointed out earlier, it's basically a showcase, some years they do manage to walk the tightrope between the crowd pleasers and auteur driven films like they did in 2002.

[Chris Knipp]

oops, i thought you wanted to talk about the lineup itself.......

It's not a complete either/or, since the nature of a fest can be read in it's lineup, don't you think? and it's interesting to do that, but some of you know more of the directors represented or know the directors (like Claire Denis, say) in more depth than I do, to comment on how shrewd or fortunate a certain current choice might be -- such as Hang Soo the cirector of Turning Gate and Woman Is the Future of Man, of which I know nothing, though the former sounds like I might like it from a DVD site summary I read.

Thanks for these comments though.

This is very helpful. And wouldn't Venice relate to Cannes naturally because it comes after Cannes and is also in a glamorous touristic part of Europe? I get the picture that Toronto stands out, but New York also is of interest. There are lots more film fests than we've talked about, though, aren't there? Some of them are little and local, likd the Jewish Film Festival in the SF Bay Area, or the Marin Film Festival also in this area. And Sundance which you've not mentioned is both loved and hated by inde directors and critics. I've gotten some information about the fests from reading Jonathan Rosenbaum because he has attended them faithfully and been influenced by what he's seen there and written about that.

If anybody knows a website where there's a survey of all the international film festivals and a discussion of their different personalities and relative merits that would be very helpful.

[arsaib4]

Originally posted by Chris Knipp

I've gotten some information about the fests from reading Jonathan Rosenbaum because he has attended them faithfully and been influenced by what he's seen there and written about that.

Then maybe you need to tell us a few things.

[Chris Knipp]

I'm sure you know as much about Sundance and Miramax (which latter is a main focus of Rosenbaum's Movies as Poloitics) as I do--no, more than I do, from what I gather, and you've talked about Miramax elsewhere on this site. The main thing I was thinking of, I guess, was Rosenbaum's Movie Wars: How Hollywood and the Media Limit What Movies We Can See, "Chapter Nine: Trafficking in Movies (Festival-Hopping in the Nineties)". He isn't the only one to talk about the commercialization of Sundance--is that a fair term? and the dominance of Harvey and Bob. But Rosenbaum's only extensive discussion of the changes in the personality of a particular festival in Chapter Nine of Movie Wars is the "Cannes, 1995-95" section, and "Why I've Never Attended Sundance and Telluride." Rosenbaum lists the festivals he's been to and how many times he's been to each in the first page of the chapter. New York ("countless times") and Toronto (20 times) win, with Rotterdam (13) and Chicago (12) next. Frequency of visit constitutes a scoring system of a sort for Rosenbaum, though Chicago's "rating "close to Rotterdam may have something to do with his living there.

I was particularly interested in one paragraph which I can copy out for you in the section of Chapter Nine headed "Problems of Access: On the Trail of Some Festival Films and Filmmakers:"

"Festival film": a mainly pejorative term in the film business, especially in North America. It generally refers to a film destined to be seen by professionals, specialists, or cultists but not by the general public because some of these professionals decide it won't or can't be sufficiently profitable to warrant distribution. Whether these professonals are distributors, exhibitors, programmers, publicists, or critics is a secondary issue, particularly because these functions are increasingly viewed today as overlapping, and sometimes even as interchangeable.

The two types of critic one sees at festivals are those (the majority) who want to see the films that will soon be distributed in their own territories, and those who want to see the films that they'll otherwise never get to see. . . Btecause I gbelong to the second group I generally prefer as a filmgoer festivals such as Rotterdam and Vienna, where business is kept to a relative minimum, to festivals like Cannes and Berlin, where business of one kind or another becomes the main focus. In recent years, sad to say, Toronto has gradually become more like Cannes and Berlin and less like Rotterdam, and this year Rotterdam was threatening to become a little more like Toronto....

I'm pretty sure Rosenbaum also talks a bit about festivals in Movies as Politics, as well as elsewhere, but I don't have time to track down all the references and summarize them now, sorry. I was hoping anybody here would be willing to characterize specific festivals.

What about Moscow? Not mentioned in Movie Wars, apparently.

[arsaib4]

I agree with his assessment for the most part, Rotterdam is certainly a favorite among critics. From what i've read few others have acquired prestige as the quality of native films have improved, chief among them is Buenos Aires International Independent Film Festival (nicknamed BA FICI) along with Istanbul and Fajr (Tehran) film festivals.