ATLFF Filmmaker Nathalie Cools Tackles Our Mix-and-Match Questionnaire
"Trans: A Documentary About Transboys" Director Nathalie Cools tells us which films she thinks are underrated and her favorite way to eat potatoes.
Complete this sentence: "If you liked _________ or _________, you'll love my film."
"If you liked 'Her' or 'Unbroken', you'll like my film."
Is your film for cat people or dog people? Why?
Good question! I always wanted a dog as a kid, but I ended up with a cat... So I guess the movie is for both of them!
What's the most challenging part of making a film for you? Do you enjoy the challenge or is it something to be avoided?
I'm shy with the camera, while I often choose places and situations that are not easy to film. This part is hard, but once I install the camera and look at the frame, I can forget the uncomfortable feeling. I really like editing, and the better my images are, the better the editing goes.
Of the filmmakers working today, whose talent do you want to steal?
Recently I enjoyed the movies from François Ozon, Spike Jonze, Angelina Jolie, Richard Linklater and Jonathan Glazer. Last years some movies that really blew me were "We need to talk about Kevin" from Lynne Ramsay, "Elève libre" from Joachim Lafosse and "Tomboy" from Céline Sciamma. And I am also a real fan from Paul Verhoeven!
Name three films you consider unappreciated and explain their hidden genius.
Mmmm... Makes me think of some oldies... Like "Marnie" from Hitchcock - I've known this film since I was little, and when I later found out it flopped, I rewachted it... In some way the story is dated, but his attraction for her, her dislike for hem, and their struggling with responsibility... It intrigued me and still does. And two horror movies: "Prince of Darkness" from John Carpenter, that really scared me to death! I rememberd I paused the movie because I was too scared to look. As well as a Dutch movie "De lift" from 1983, which saddled me up with a phobia for elevators for years!
What are your three favorite ways to eat potatoes?
French fries, french fries, French fries!
Nathalie's film, "Trans: A Documentary About Transboys," screens TOMORROW, Saturday March 21st at 11:15am at The Plaza Theatre! Get tickets while you can!
Spotlight by Dean Treadway: 8 Must-See Narrative Features at the 2015 ATLFF
Special Contributor Dean Treadway highlights 8 feature films you must check out at #ATLFF '15!
Even though I've only caught a little over 50% of the forty narrative films selected to be part of this year's Atlanta Film Festival, at this halfway point I inevitably have to arrive at a list of favorites. If you consider yourself an adventurous moviegoer forever on a quest for the new and different, here are eight choices you can rely on to provide you with just those hard-won qualities:
A DESPEDIDA (FAREWELL) (Marcelo Galvao, Brazil, 90m) My favorite film thus far at this year's ATLFF is this heartbreaking but never overdone examination of one person's final crack at dignity. In a performance of supreme bravery and athleticism, Nelson Xavier plays the Admiral, a once vital man whose 92 years have finally caught up with him. Rising slowly on a particularly good morning, he dresses and cleans up with fierce and treacherous difficulty, resolving to have one last day all to himself minus the doting of worried kids and caretakers. Marcelo Galvao's assured direction keeps things tense in a fast-moving city bustle that blurs past the Admiral's achingly slow, score-settling trudge towards that one final liaison with his much younger "brown sugar" (a devastatingly lovely and caring Juliana Paes). Consistently engrossing despite its measured pace, and completely fearless as it portrays the inevitable decay of the human body and the occasionally resultant rise of the spirit, A Despedida is something of a miracle: rarely have I seen a movie that bares the humility and wisdom of old age as does this extremely bittersweet and honest painting. It's definitely one of the masterpieces at this year's festival. In Portuguese with subtitles. A Despedida (Farewell) plays at the Woodruff Arts Center's Rich Theater on Saturday, March 21 at 4 pm; tickets can be purchased online here.
WILDLIKE (Frank Hall Green, USA (Alaska), 104m) In another of my absolute favorites of this year's ATLFF crop, writer/director Frank Hall Green follows the nervous path walked by 14-year-old Mackenzie (Ella Purnell in a compelling debut performance) as she takes up residence with her suspicious uncle (Brian Geraghty) in his Juneau, Alaska home. Quickly finding he's not to be trusted, she ankles it into the chilly wilderness, searching for a connection to anybody with which she can feel a modicum of safety. This leads her to an older man, Rene Bartlett (played with quiet power by a superb Bruce Greenwood), whom she finds hiking the mountainous trails as he attempts to escape his own dark past. Shadowing his steps, she strikes up a cautious, needy friendship—one with irritations that Bartlett often wishes he wasn't being saddled with. Cinematographer Hillary Spera perfectly captures the snow-capped yet utterly green beauty of Alaska while she also contributes piercing close-ups of characters whose deep hurts are dramatically in need of some healing time. Meanwhile, composers Danny Bensi and Saunder Jurriaans provide the film with an alternately tense and tunefully evocative score. Still, it's the confident cast (which includes Ann Dowd, star of 2012 AFF entry Compliance), backed by Green's searing and always authentic screenplay, that one walks away remembering most thankfully. WildLike plays at the Plaza Theater's main auditorium on Saturday, March 21 at 5 pm; tickets can be purchased online here.
KRISHA (Trey Edward Shults, USA (Texas), 82m) Both monstrous and pathetic, with a mesmerizing command of the camera, Krisha Fairchild delivers a blistering performance as "heartbreak incarnate" in writer/director Shults' feature-length adaptation of his acclaimed short film. In it, the 60-ish Krisha is returning home after being estranged from her family for decades. It is Thanksgiving, and as the typical family mainstays are staged--the frantic cooking, the overly-competitive games, the ardent arguing and soul-baring--Krisha past misdoings come slowly back to haunt both her and her family. Shults films this disaster in a dynamic slow-burn fashion, with a constantly moving camera shuttling between vividly lit tableaus, making this one of the most striking visual experiences of the festival. Highly emotional and even at times stunningly harsh, and with a terrific ensemble cast that's perfectly game, Krisha is a movie that staunchly rattles us with more than a few unsettling conclusions. Krisha plays at the Plaza Theater's upstairs auditorium on Saturday, March 28 at 4:45 pm; tickets can be purchased online here.
GOD BLESS THE CHILD (Robert Machoian and Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck, USA, 92m) Deftly walking the tightrope between documentary and narrative filmmaking, this challenging work very simply chronicles one day in the life of the Graham family. In it, we follow an often overwhelmed teenager (Harper Graham) as she tends to the needs of her four younger brothers, all of whom spend the day battling each other in games of strength and burgeoning masculinity. All the while, Harper is searching and waiting impatiently for the parent who is missing in action. Superbly shot in low light and long takes that keenly place us in this poverty-stricken world, God Bless the Child gives us an often uncomfortably real sense of the joys, and the burdens, of raising a family with little support financially or emotionally. It's a plotless movie that some might find difficult, yet I felt it was constantly engaging and even sometimes wondrous in its daring, transporting abilities. God Bless the Child plays at the Plaza Theater's upstairs auditorium on Wednesday, March 25 at 7:15 pm; tickets can be purchased online here.
CHRISTMAS, AGAIN (Charles Poekel, USA (Brooklyn NY), 84m) Kentucker Audley delivers a superbly low-key performance in writer/director Poekel's wonderfully well-observed narrative filmmaking debut. In it, Audley plays Noel, the depressed night man at a Brooklyn Christmas tree lot whose drab routine is goosed up after he rescues a young girl (Hannah Gross) he finds passed out on a freezing park bench. Scored with a lively source music soundtrack and filled with the sort of alternately annoying and benign characters anyone who's worked retail could easily recognize, Poekel's film successfully transmits both a sense of the Christmas blahs and of holiday hope without ever obscuring the story's humanity with maudlin sentimentality. Christmas, Again plays at the Plaza Theater's upstairs auditorium on Sunday, March 22 at 6:30 pm; tickets can be purchased online here.
L'ANNEE PROCHAINE (NEXT YEAR) (Vania Leturcq, Belgium/France, 103m) Clotilde and Aude are high school best friends who make plans to enroll at the Sorbonne in Paris the following year. Writer/director Leturcq, in her first feature, follows these young women as they each struggle to discover their unique voice in their chosen fields, while also stumbling their way through romantic entanglements and family obligations. Along the way, the women find their search for knowledge is uncovering an ever-widening rift in their relationship—one that may be irreparable. Anchored surely by precocious lead performances from Constance Rousseau and Jenna Thiam, NEXT YEAR, while examining a friendship undone by competition and suspicion, confidently portrays those tentative steps taken when first venturing out into adulthood. In French with subtitles. L'annee Prochaine (Next Year) plays at the Plaza Theater's upstairs auditorium on Saturday, March 28 at 2:15 pm; tickets can be purchased online here.
POS ESO (POSSESSED) (Sam, Spain, 81m) Even as it ticks off homages to a litany of popular genre movies, I can say--without fear of reproach--that I've never seen anything like Spanish director Sam's expertly crafted stop-motion animated horror story. Watching it is like seeing Wallace and Gromit being split open and gutted before our terrified yet somehow bemused eyes. The film follows a faith-challenged priest and his inevitable clash with Damien, the devil-possessed child of Spain's most famous bullfighter and his Flamenco-dancing superstar wife. Genre fans will have fun spotting the references, most obviously to William Friedkin's The Exorcist, but also to films like Raiders of the Lost Ark, Gremlins, The Evil Dead, Alien, and even well-loved horror obscurities like The Beast Within and The Gate. Though this is definitely not a film for kids, with its nudity and shocking plasticine gore, Possessed smartly navigates the rarely tread line between the animation and horror genres. For fans of both, this one's not to be missed. In Spanish with subtitles. Pos Eso (Possessed) plays at the Plaza Theater's upstairs auditorium on Friday, March 20 at 9:45 pm; tickets can be purchased online here.
APARTMENT TROUBLES (Jess Weixler and Jennifer Prediger, USA (Brooklyn, NY and Los Angeles, CA), 77m) Frothy but with the sharp edge of desperation, Apartment Troubles is the impressive feature debut of writer/directors Weixler and Prediger who star as Olivia and Nicole, two struggling Brooklyn artists trying to keep up with the ever-escalating rent being imposed on them by their stern landlord (Jeffery Tambor). When the pressure becomes too much for them, they mount an escape to Los Angeles, where they take up with Nicole's rich and famous aunt (a lively Megan Mullally) and discover that their friendship is at a point where it could either be deepened or destroyed. With notable appearances by Will Forte, Christopher “Kid” Reid and Lance Bass, this breezy yet slyly emotional comedy provides a terrific platform for the talents of these newly-minted filmmakers. Apartment Troubles plays at the Plaza Theater's main auditorium on Sunday, March 29 at 2:15 pm; tickets can be purchased online here.
Atlanta native Dean Treadway is the Co-Host of Movie Geeks United, the internet's #1 weekly podcast devoted entirely to movies, with 750 industry guests and four million listeners worldwide. His blog, filmicability, has over 500 articles obsessing over films present and past and is approaching 1 million hits.
Spotlight by Dean Treadway: "Frances Ha" and Greta Gerwig
Dean Treadway shines a light on the final pre-festival screening in our Growing Up Baumbach retrospective, "Frances Ha." Get your tickets!
Among the finest features of the 2015 Atlanta Film Festival is Growing Up Baumbach, the retrospective of one of this year's honored filmmakers, Noah Baumbach, who's repped at the fest with one of his two new films, While We're Young (starring Naomi Watts and Greenberg collaborator Ben Stiller, playing Wednesday, March 25th, 7 pm at the Plaza Theater). The retrospective has already covered his 1995 debut, a look at post-collegiate aimlessness called Kicking and Screaming, and his Oscar-nominated 2005 film The Squid and the Whale, about a dissolving family of New York intellectuals. Yet I think they've possibly saved the best for last with Baumbach's 2012 teaming with star/co-writer Greta Gerwig, Frances Ha (playing Wednesday, March 18th at 7 pm at the Plaza Theater). I still think it's Baumbach's most visually resplendent movie, and as such, it's primed to be seen on the big screen where we can better enjoy its wily black-and-white gorgeousness.
Baumbach's second 2015 film, Mistress America, will be released later in the year, which is particularly exciting because it features his third collaboration with Gerwig (who broke through to widespread acclaim in 2010 with her superb supporting performance in Greenberg). From the look of things, their work together is shaping up to be among the most fruitful director/actor collaborations currently hitting screens, and certainly Frances Ha bears this out with its sympathetic, energetic peer into the life of a scrambled artist who's let her rambling youth intercede too far into her adulthood. Gerwig plays a dancer--one without particular talent or drive--who slowly sees the connections around her falling by the wayside. Her relationship with her boyfriend self-destructs in the very first scene, and things keep getting worse for Frances as the film moves on. Her once vital friendship with roommate Sophie (an excellent Mickey Sumner) hits a harsh roadblock, and this sends Frances spiraling into a frantic and hilarious search for her place in the world (literally). Instantly in the pantheon of great New York films (stylistically extremely indebted to Woody Allen's Manhattan, though transplanted to hipstery Brooklyn), Frances Ha is constantly funny, beautiful to behold (with cinematographer Sam Levy's amazing B&W images and a clever source music score featuring David Bowie and French New Wave composer Georges Delarue), and it's the utterly perfect vehicle for Gerwig who, with her articulate eyes and inquisitive mind, continues on her path to being among the most treasured actors on the indie scene.
I've been a fan of Gerwig's ever since being astonished by her work in both Greenberg and Nights and Weekends, her 2008 directorial debut with Joe Swanberg. As the co-host of Movie Geeks United, I had long been angling to get an interview with her for the show, and in 2012, I was successful in landing a 40-minute talk with her about her work on Frances Ha (she was extremely generous, as we had initially only been given 25 minutes together). So I thought I'd include that here as a special bonus. It's a captivating conversation, as I hope you will agree. See you at Frances Ha on Wednesday, March 18th at the Plaza Theater!
Atlanta native Dean Treadway is the Co-Host of Movie Geeks United, the internet's #1 weekly podcast devoted entirely to movies, with 750 industry guests and four million listeners worldwide. His blog, filmicability, has over 500 articles obsessing over films present and past and is approaching 1 million hits.
Spotlight by Dean Treadway: "Dante's Down the Hatch"
Special Contributor Dean Treadway shines a light on ATLFF '15 Official Selection "Dante's Down the Hatch" (March 29, 4:30 PM and 7:00 PM), with an interview with director Jef Bredemeier.
Any native Atlantan will be able to tell you about their first visit to Dante's Down The Hatch, once the city's most revered jazz club and fondue palace. With its warmly detailed nautical decor (complete with an alligator-filled moat), this magical spot ruled Atlanta nightlife for 43 years before being closed in July 2013. But, luckily, through Jef Bredemeier's bittersweet new documentary, we can revisit the hallowed decks of this Atlanta institution, even if we're also treated to the sad sight of its demolition as part of the bargain. Bredemeier, a longtime employee of The Hatch, gets unfettered access to the restaurant's busy final days, while drawing a candid portrait of its idiosyncratic mastermind Dante Stephensen (who cuts a memorable swath onscreen with his smoking pipe and his southern gentlemanly looks). The film finds time to ruminate on the restaurant's design and operation, as well as on the "straight ahead" jazz sounds heard wafting through the restaurant's air each night. Stepping into the establishment itself was like traveling back to a more hep era of craft and class, and so acts Dante's Down the Hatch in similar fashion: it's a genial time capsule of a recently passed era, and as such it's essential viewing for those interested in Atlanta's quickly evaporating history. It's also a road map for anyone seeking to learn how to run a business infused with heart, imagination and intelligence. Dante's Down the Hatch will premiere at the 2015 Atlanta Film Festival on the Plaza Theatre's main screen on Sunday, March 29th at 4:30 pm, with an encore showing at 7 pm.
We talked to director Jef Bredemeier about his experiences filming the final days of Dante's Down The Hatch:
I'm curious what your previous filmmaking experience is.
This is my first film and it's all basically very new to me. I had experimented somewhat with video work on a photo shoot out in LA. I did an interview and followed this musical duo around for a week and, when I came back to Atlanta, I had a friend help me edit a little short segment on them. Now when I decided to do the documentary on Dante's, there was a whole world I had to learn in order to pull it off. I opened up Premiere Pro account while filming and just started watching every tutorial I could get my hands on. If I needed to do something, I had to look it up or reach out to friends with questions. I wanted this film to look good--Dante's is a place that is over the top and mind-blowing and this would be the only memory left of it.
That seems like a tremendous responsibility to take on, especially given your debut status and the legions of fans of this establishment. But your love of The Hatch sings through in every moment of the film. When did you definitely decide that you needed to record these moments in time?
Dante pulled the team together one night in November and told us that we would be closing our doors forever. Every jaw was on the floor because we never thought he would do it. I had worked there for over 13 years at that point and that's longer than I had lived in any house growing up. That's when I thought someone should be filming this--this whole thing, everything. The place means a lot to the people who've dined there but that's nothing compared to the people who had lived there for ten, twenty, FORTY years. Over the years I can safely say that I got sick of waiting tables but I never got sick of The Hatch. I always loved the way everything looked and felt.
How long was your filming schedule, and did you run into any roadblocks along the way?
I started with New Year's Eve 2012 and continued filming into 2014 after the tear-down, doing interviews and follow ups with Dante. Other than that, there was no schedule. I was waiting tables five nights a week but I always had my camera rig hidden behind the bar so I could cover my tables and start recording. I came in on my days off or I came in early before my shift and stayed late. After waiting on 70 to 80 customers, I'd grab a beer and head up to the office where Dante and I would just sit and talk with the camera on a tripod. There were hundreds of old employees coming into town for one last meal so I was ready for anything. The difficulty was the amount of running around without a shot list or a script or even the experience of knowing what to do. It was months of chaos. Shooting in a jazz nightclub was also difficult because, if you caught something great while "Eleanor Rigby" was playing in the background, you might as well delete it because getting the rights is next to impossible.
Wow, I bet that WAS tough, dealing with all the music issues! As I'm sure you realize, your subject, Dante Stephensen, is a real treasure, and I sense he had a lot of respect for you as an employee and as a filmmaker. What is it that you think set him apart from other employers or restaurant owners?
Dante put his people first. He made sure that he had a crew that could work well together and had a personal investment in the place. This was his family and he wanted us to be happy so that we could give the people of Atlanta an amazing experience. The restaurants motto is "Where the employees give a damn" and you can ask anybody how hard it is to work for someone else after you've had the experience of working at Dante's Down the Hatch. It was a well-oiled machine. He gave yearly bonuses for good performance and he'd call meetings just to read a bunch of positive letters from customers. At many other restaurants sometimes the only exchange you'd ever have with the boss is when you're doing something wrong. That was NOT Dante. That style of managing people is driven out of fear that somewhere down the line it might be a problem and they end up throwing the baby out with the bathwater. My favorite part of making this film is the long talks we'd have about the industry as a whole and why we excelled in so many areas. This was how he and I always spoke to each other so as a boss he is very approachable and truly enjoys talking to people. That is the side of Dante that I really wanted to show in this film.
You get the feeling, as one interview subject says, that the flame of the restaurant was burning very brightly before it went out. Do you think all the activity before the restaurant's closing helped Dante and his employees keep their mind off the inevitable final day?
Honestly, I think it was a good and bad that we were so busy. The massive reaction of the city that came out for one last dinner with us was amazing and record-breaking. That crew worked themselves to the bone with three times the amount of business than they had ever seen. Those of us that stayed to the bitter end received a severance package from Dante on top of the great money they were making, so that helped a lot in the transition of losing our jobs. I will say that the only sad element was that a lot of us didn't have time to process what was going on, up until the very last day. We were all sort of speechless when we left that last night. You're standing in a parking lot with around fifty of your close friends that you won't be seeing on a daily basis anymore and you just went through what felt like war with these people. Dante's started with a bang and it finished with one as well and I don't think we'd have it any other way.
The auctioning of all the ephemera in this beautiful place and then the dismantling of the restaurant is some of the most powerful stuff in the film. Those must have been incredibly rough days to shoot, given your personal involvement in the place. What was your own emotional state during all of this?
It was hard for a lot of us to watch our home be picked to pieces and stripped to an empty shell. It's difficult to not compare it to vultures in the desert, but when you really stopped to think about it, the place was not going up in flames or being trashed. The people that were coming in to this place were gathering parts and pieces of Dante's that could live on somewhere else. As Richard Sorenson says in the movie "It''s like a 43-year-old dandelion that has cast its seeds to the wind." As the filmmaker I was listening to everyone's emotions not only over the course of the dismantle but during the year of editing as well, so at times it was very tough to keep reliving the experience. I think the hardest moment for me was filming Allen Murphy, who has past away since the closing, singing "Now that I know what loneliness is" on the very last day. That was the song for a lot of us that rang true to what we were feeling about starting a new life and moving on. As soon as he started singing I could feel my eyes filling up and the camera started to get blurry. I just held the frame and hoped he was still in it. It was difficult.
Allen's performance is definitely one of your movie's emotional highlights, so you're to be commended for keeping a few tears out of your eyes long enough to shoot it all. In the end, what did you take away from your experience first as an employee of Dante's and then as the maker of the documentary?
What I've learned now. over the past 15 years in service of this man. is to follow your gut--follow your dreams, even while walking around people that think you're crazy for doing it. He dug a hole out of the mud in Underground Atlanta to put in it a pirate ship with a jazz band, crocodiles and fondue. Everyone thought he was out of his mind. Working there taught me how to think for myself and spend less time trying to get away with stuff and more time not disappointing those around me. At the start of this project, I was a painter, primarily, and I had no business making a movie. But I had an amazing story to tell and I had to step up to the plate to tell it. I had a lot of doubts around me but nothing compared to the self-doubt that plagued me of messing up this important piece of history. I loved Dante's Down the Hatch and I loved creating the long goodbye that it deserves.
I think it's amazing that, despite your lack of experience, you just said "Screw it" and went on ahead. And you were right to do so, as you've provided people--particularly Atlanta natives, but also fans of the restaurant from around the world--a lasting document to this unusual labor of love that Dante Stephensen created so long ago. I should say, I love movies made by people who've never made movies before, and you've made a whopper of one here, one filled with heart and soul. Do you see anything now presently in Atlanta that approaches the experience of Dante's, or do you think that it's just an impossible thing to ever approach or recreate?
This type of place is a dying breed. Opening up a restaurant is a risky operation, even one without a 500 gallon moat of water in it. I'm sure in the future something will compare but it's hard to say. The timing of everything, even back in the 70's, fits into how this place came into existence. The appreciation of live jazz is even falling by the wayside. It's my hope that this film will teach people what is possible and if I was someone looking to open a restaurant on any scale, I'd want to get the advice of someone who did it well. I'd talk to Dante and the staff of amazing managers and really look at what's important when it comes to creating something for the long haul.
I think that's good advise--he's someone who obviously did it right, to the nth degree. Okay, so, finally, we come to my standard closing question, since I'm such a movie geek: name five movies you love, or that you think inform your filmmaking style?
I've always been in love with movies that move me. The first film that actually got me into painting on a serious level was Basquiat. The flow of that film just takes you through a whirlwind of that man's life. I was completely blown away by it and I choke up ever time it ends. For some of the same reasons I can't say enough about Dead Poet's Society. With living in the art world for so long you can't help but relate to the character of Neil. The antagonist is not necessarily Neil's father but the world that his father comes from, and that is sometimes the fiercest bad guy in an artists life, the fear of going against the grain. I love movies like Cast Away that stay with the character, and stay with the shot. There's a part in my documentary that focuses on Dante's face as he watches the last Fourth of July firework display and I want you to be there with him and feel what he's going through. Pride and Prejudice is, I think, an amazing display of human nature and all the grinding thoughts and assumptions that we have about the world that attempt to protect us but sometime are the things that cause us our own grief. She was a character born with a natural ability to speak her mind regardless of what the times told her she shouldn't be saying. Lastly, I'd have to say that a film like Inception would be an amazing example of creating a movie that was not based in "give them what they want" but more so in "give them something to reach for." It was a puzzle that was not afraid to be difficult to solve. It was a piece of artwork that really pushed you to understand it while being wildly entertaining and visually dynamic.
Author Dean Treadway is the Co-Host of Movie Geeks United, the internet's #1 weekly podcast devoted entirely to movies, with over 700 industry guests and four million listeners worldwide. His blog, filmicability, has over 500 articles obsessing over films present and past and is approaching 1 million hits.
Sunday, March 29, 2015 at 7:00 PM — The Plaza Theatre, Main Theatre
ATLFF '15: Nine Films Compose Pink Peach Lineup presented by Orbitz
Six feature films and three short films make up our Pink Peach lineup, presented by Orbitz. Get your tickets now!
Every year, the Atlanta Film Festival features a track of LGBT interest films. This year, we are pleased to showcase six feature films and three short films in our Pink Peach program, presented by Orbitz.
Narrative features "Drown" and "Helicopter Mom" will play at The Plaza Theatre alongside documentary feature "Before the Last Curtain Falls" and "Trans: A Documentary About Transboys." Two other documentary features, "Masculinity/Femininity" and "In the Turn," will play at 7 Stages.
Three short film blocks contain Pink Peach films. Better Left Unsaid, which plays at 7 Stages, contains the short film "Actresses." Love NC-17, which plays at The Plaza Theatre, contains the short film "Happy Endings." The New Mavericks shorts block contains the short film "Charlotte."
Check out each short block or feature below and get your tickets now!
Short Blocks:
Features:
WonderRoot's Local Film Series Will Kickoff ATLFF '15!
WonderRoot's Generally Local, Mostly Independent Film Series takes place on March 19th, the day before ATLFF Opening Night 2015! Special guest jurors Reel Georgia.
Original art by ATLFF's own Alex Watson
Voted Best Local Film Series by Creative Loafing Atlanta for three years running, WonderRoot's Generally Local, Mostly Independent Film Series is locked and ready! Thursday, March 19th at 8pm, join us at The Plaza Theatre for this quarter's installment of winning submissions. Enjoy nine featured shorts along with an ATLFF Official Selection and the Critics' Pick from the Creative Loafing Short Cuts Film Contest! Check out the agenda:
- "‘Short Little Summer Love Song’- Baby Baby" directed by Deon Kay
- "Wallace" directed by David Over
- "Blades of Grass" directed by Jason Fernandes
- "Nonut Donut" directed by Joshua Winters
- "God Fetish" directed by Alex Zhuravlov
- "+" directed by David Nobles
- "Postcard Boredom" directed by John Dierre
- "Silent Kid" directed by Nastasia Humphries
- "Prosopon" directed by Thomas Thoma
screens with "Ir/Reconcilable" directed by Gabrielle Fulton (ATLFF 2015 Official Selection)
screens with "Something Made" directed by Tahno DeBurr (CL Short Cuts Contest Critics' Pick)
Gear up for this veritable short film smorgasbord with a FREE Sponsor screening of "Altered" at 5pm at The Plaza before enjoying drinks and conversation with other industry enthusiasts at this month's Eat, Drink, B-Indie. Our Guest Jurors—the team behind homegrown #GAfilm resource Reel Georgia—will be happy to meet you as well!
Arguably the best part: tickets cost a paltry ten bucks! But if you're ready to take your filmlove to the next level, become a member and attend both this event and everything else on the ATLFF '15 schedule for FREE.
Spotlight by Dean Treadway: "Good Grief Suicide Hotline"
Special Contributor Dean Treadway shines a light on ATLFF '15 Official Selection "Good Grief Suicide Hotline" (March 23, 9:30 PM), with an interview with director Sam Carter.
Atlanta director Sam Carter and his co-screenwriter Evan Fowler ring up some pretty dark laughs, as one might expect, in their new comedy Good Grief Suicide Hotline. This raucous farce has Dane Davenport starring as innocent soul Mark Reynolds who guiltily offers his services to the titular hotline after a personal tragedy leaves him searching for answers. Immediately, though, he starts to regret this outreach, especially after meeting the very near suicidal nuts working at this drab, dreary outpost of humanity. Carter's film is consistently funny in its near offensiveness, and this is particularly due to its superb ensemble cast, including the hilarious George Faughnan as the hotline's feckless leader, Hannah Fierman (from former ATLFF fest entries V/H/S and The Unwanted) as a drug-addled pixie nightmare girl, Evan Fowler as the hotline's resident slimeball, Ben Owen as its stress-ball squeezing closer, and Theodore Abner as a high-strung co-conspirator named Clairmont. Good Grief Suicide Hotline has its premiere screening as part of the 2015 Atlanta Film Festival at the Plaza Theater on March 23rd at 9:30 pm.
We talked to director/co-writer Sam Carter about the process of making Good Grief Suicide Hotline in Atlanta:
I feel like the ensemble really performs well together in your film, so I'm curious about the casting process. Were the parts written with these actors in mind, or were there open auditions?
A bit of both, actually. Cooper was written for Evan and Adam was written for George. We knew we wanted Matt Pharr (Gary Spidoni) involved, but originally considered him for a different role. Other characters, like Doug (Ron Ogden), were written with a short list in mind. Spencer and Shirley were our biggest question marks, because though they are supporting characters, their roles play such a vital part to the comedy of the film. But, Ben Owen and Casey Holloway both just destroyed their auditions and made the selection process much easier.
Their rapport was so sharp, I'm also led to ask if there was a rehearsal period?
A little, but not as much as I would have liked. We did a couple of table reads with the cast, and Dane Davenport (Mark) and Hannah Fierman (Lizzy) and I set aside some time to work on their scenes, but really a lot of that was just naturally occurring or was manufactured in the editing room. I try to cultivate a very relaxed set to keep my actors comfortable. Comedy's tough enough without adding any additional stress on top of it.
The script you and Evan Fowler wrote, it's got a lot of risky laughs in it. Obviously, you're not worried about offending people, poking fun at such delicate subjects. We're all too offended these days anyway, wouldn't you agree?
Well, here's the funny thing about that. Believe it or not, we set out to make a dark, but not necessarily a controversial film. We wrote the script in 2011 and shot it in early 2012. You know what happened AFTER we shot it? The Aurora movie theater, Sandy Hook, Isla Villa, and a bunch of other mass shootings. The rate of mass shootings in the US has literally tripled since we shot the film. Beyond that, before such a beloved iconic figure as Robin Williams killed himself, suicide wasn't nearly as risqué a topic as it has since become. There was a suicidal character played for laughs on Scrubs--SCRUBS for god sakes! So, while I'm a firm believer that we should be able to make fun of anything because otherwise we give it far too much power, I've had to stand back during post and watch as my film has become increasingly offensive. At the end of the day, my movie isn't about making fun of depressed people or about the selfishness of suicide. Good Grief is about making fun of narcissistic people and the selfishness of doing good in the world for the sole purpose of being praised by others.
I think that definitely comes through in the film. You landed a lot of great locations for the shoot, including Atlanta institutions Star Bar and Java Monkey. How did the shooting go in these locations and what strings did you have to pull to land them? Any guerilla filmmaking on the streets here?
Good Grief has deep roots in the world of Atlanta stand up comedy. We got the Star Bar because we cast half of their Monday Night Comedy line up and because Rotknee Leete was able to pull some strings. The Java Monkey was a similar situation in that a couple of our crew members knew the owners. But yes, there's a ton of permitless guerrilla filmmaking throughout the movie.
You used narration in an unusual and creative fashion, too. Was it difficult striking a balance regarding this element of the movie?
I'm a huge fan of Arrested Development and always loved the function that Ron Howard's narration served on that show. There are so many moments throughout that series that would fall flat without the narration. There probably are moments in Good Grief in which we overuse the narration. But, by and large, I feel that its effectiveness benefits the film.
What do you find is the #1 benefit of filming features in Atlanta?
Atlanta has a wonderfully close knit indie film scene. There are a lot of very supportive and very talented people here. It's my hope that with all of the studio productions here in town, the opportunities afforded to the actors and crew will continue to grow. It's great when our people get camera assistant gigs, but it will be better when we start getting cinematographer gigs.
Finally, my standard closing question: Name five movies you love, or that you feel influence your own filmic style.
1) The Big Lebowski
2) Groundhog Day
3) A Face in the Crowd
4) The Adventures of Baron Munchausen
5) Shaun of the Dead
Author Dean Treadway is the Co-Host of Movie Geeks United, the internet's #1 weekly podcast devoted entirely to movies, with over 700 industry guests and four million listeners worldwide. His blog, filmicability, has over 500 articles obsessing over films present and past and is approaching 1 million hits.
So the Squid and the Whale Walk Into The Plaza...
It's not too late to become a part of Growing Up Baumbach! Join us in our second screening, "The Squid and the Whale," TOMORROW at 7pm!
Phase two of Growing Up Baumbach, a celebration of Noah Baumbach's twenty years in cinema, graces our screen tomorrow! This week, it's "The Squid and the Whale" (2005). Jeff Daniels, Laura Linney, and a young Jesse Eisenberg star in Baumbach's fourth feature film, a semi-autobiographical comedy-drama about his experience with his parents' divorce. Watch the trailer now:
This film is our second-to-last installment before Baumbach's latest release, "While We're Young," screens at the 39th annual Atlanta Film Festival. Report to The Plaza Theater by 7:00pm on Wednesday, March 11th to grow up with Baumbach!
See "The Squid and the Whale" for just $7, or become a member and enjoy this blast from the past—along with "Frances Ha" and "While We're Young"—for FREE!
ATLFF '15: THE SISTERHOOD OF NIGHT Slated to Bring Several Young Stars to Atlanta
Caryn Waechter is scheduled to attend the #NewMavericks screening of her directorial debut, "The Sisterhood of Night," along with two producers and four lead cast members, including Georgie Henley from "The Chronicles of Narnia" and Kara Hayward from "Moonrise Kingdom."
Willa Cuthrell, Olivia DeJonge, AND Georgie Henley in "The Sisterhood of Night"
Over 36 days in 2012, director Caryn Waechter and screenwriter Marilyn Fu completed Kickstarter's second most successful narrative campaign ever funded. Graduates of Columbia University's MFA film program, Waechter and Fu intrigued supporters with the following pledge:
"With your support, we'll have the $$ to start production on The Sisterhood of Night, a feature film and creative entry point into the world of the average (or not-so-average) teenager.
Sisterhood is a modern version of the Salem witch trials, adapted from a short story by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Steven Millhauser (Martin Dressler, "Eisenheim the Illusionist"). The heart of the story is about how teens connect with each other through art, friendship, and the power of secrets. We also promise to do what every movie should—entertain you and take you for a ride. Sisterhood is a provocative and inspiring story that builds a network of creativity for teens to share ideas and visions. You can be one of them."
Thanks to our festival's closing weekend, you can, too. Check out the official trailer:
On March 27th at 7:00pm in The Plaza's main theatre, The Sisterhood of Night will screen for a limited audience and a majority of the starring talent! Director Caryn Waechter, lead actresses Georgie Henley ("The Chronicles of Narnia" film trilogy), Kara Hayward ("Moonrise Kingdom"), and Willa Cuthrell ("Dan in Real Life," "Whatever Works"), actor Evan Kuzma, Exectutive Producer David Urritia, and Producer Elizabeth Cuttrell (both produced "Meek's Cutoff" and "Jesus' Son") are scheduled to attend.
Fortified with the winning submissions of a crew-hosted teen art contest, this fresh and frank star-studded drama (leads Kal Penn, Laura Fraser, and Jessica Hecht also star) is at once an homage to the history of small town uproar in the face of change, a dichotomy of Internet effects on teens and popular media, and a testament to courage and self-discovery.
Don't miss your chance to see this one-time festival screening! Get your tickets now, or become a member and see it for free!
"The Sisterhood of Night" is a standout feature film in ATLFF's third annual New Mavericks film program. A series showcasing films from female filmmakers with strong female leads, 2015 New Mavericks selections have expanded to include feature films for the first time. Follow along with #NewMavericks and check out our Filminism Creative Conference Panel—hosted just hours before "The Sisterhood of Night"—while you're at it!
Noah Baumbach Knows You.
Director Noah Baumbach's been making movies about you for 20 years. Check out his first feature Wednesday night at The Plaza at 7 PM.
“Movie time is like college time."
“Days are slow and months are fast?”
“If you had a test on Thursday, Friday felt so far away.”
--Noah Baumbach & Greta Gerwig in The New Yorker
Noah Baumbach's movies don't make much money. Adjusted for inflation, no feature film in his twenty year directorial catalogue has grossed more than $10 million.
His most recent projects might break this streak ("While We're Young," "Mistress America"), but they might not. And Baumbach is 100% okay with that. This fact is responsible for the air of autobiography in every film he writes; much like his witty, existentially concerned, perpetually adrift characters chug along in—admit it—relatable stagnance, Baumbach doesn't require box office chart fame, or any fame for that matter, to validate his continued exploration of what the heck he's doing here, anyway.
Sound familiar? More so than, say, any film he's released?
We're here to help.
For less than a third of what Criterion wants from you, our premiere venue will screen Baumbach's directorial debut, "Kicking and Screaming," as the first of three weekly installments in Growing Up Baumbach: a retrospective tribute to his twenty years in cinema. Released in 1995, Baumbach's timeless portrait of post-grad friends who struggle to find the Real World Freedom in what feels like Real World Quicksand will strike a chord that leaves you echoing one of their own. "I've begun reminiscing events before they even occur. I'm reminiscing this right now."
Don't miss out as we prepare you to find yourself once more in ATLFF Official Selection "While We're Young," which screens Wednesday, March 25th as part of our 39th Annual lineup months before its theatrical release. See one retrospective selection for $7, all three for $15, or all three PLUS his brand new film for free when you become a member!
"Kicking and Screaming" screens TOMORROW, March 4th, at The Plaza at 7pm. See you there!