Hypnotic odd-couple story of a teenager struggling with her mental health and a carer exploring their gender
At times it feels like Canadian director Ashley McKenzie is setting a challenge with this: are you arthouse enough? Have you got the cinematic endurance? Her film is the story of a friendship between a neurodivergent teenager called Star struggling with her mental health, and a hospital volunteer newly immigrated from China. You could imagine it being turned into a quirky-cute odd-couple indie comedy with a superficial take on neurodivergence. Instead, McKenzie pulls us into Star’s reality, how she experiences the world. It’s a disorientating, unrelaxing two-hour experience, but rewarding.
It is set in the middle of winter in Nova Scotia, with snow up to the height of car roofs. Star (brilliantly played by Sarah Walker) has been admitted to hospital after drinking poison – not her first suicide attempt. A doctor...
At times it feels like Canadian director Ashley McKenzie is setting a challenge with this: are you arthouse enough? Have you got the cinematic endurance? Her film is the story of a friendship between a neurodivergent teenager called Star struggling with her mental health, and a hospital volunteer newly immigrated from China. You could imagine it being turned into a quirky-cute odd-couple indie comedy with a superficial take on neurodivergence. Instead, McKenzie pulls us into Star’s reality, how she experiences the world. It’s a disorientating, unrelaxing two-hour experience, but rewarding.
It is set in the middle of winter in Nova Scotia, with snow up to the height of car roofs. Star (brilliantly played by Sarah Walker) has been admitted to hospital after drinking poison – not her first suicide attempt. A doctor...
- 11/14/2023
- by Cath Clarke
- The Guardian - Film News
Mubi has unveiled their November 2023 lineup, featuring notable new releases such as Ashley McKenzie’s Queens of the Qing Dynasty and Alain Gomis’ Thelonious Monk documentary Rewind & Play. Also in the lineup is three stellar earlier films from Christian Petzold––Yella, Jerichow, and The State I Am In––along with John Cassavetes’ Husbands and Gloria, a Hayao Miyazaki short, and a retrospective dedicated to Argentinian-born, French-educated filmmaker and theorist Nelly Kaplan.
Check out the lineup below and get 30 days free here.
November 1
A Very Curious Girl, directed by Nelly Kaplan | A Mischievous Rebellion: Films by Nelly Kaplan
The Pleasure of Love, directed by Nelly Kaplan | A Mischievous Rebellion: Films by Nelly Kaplan
Charles and Lucie, directed by Nelly Kaplan | A Mischievous Rebellion: Films by Nelly Kaplan
Papa the Little Boats, directed by Nelly Kaplan | A Mischievous Rebellion: Films by Nelly Kaplan
Yella, directed by Christian Petzold | Phantoms Among Us: The Films of Christian Petzold
Jerichow,...
Check out the lineup below and get 30 days free here.
November 1
A Very Curious Girl, directed by Nelly Kaplan | A Mischievous Rebellion: Films by Nelly Kaplan
The Pleasure of Love, directed by Nelly Kaplan | A Mischievous Rebellion: Films by Nelly Kaplan
Charles and Lucie, directed by Nelly Kaplan | A Mischievous Rebellion: Films by Nelly Kaplan
Papa the Little Boats, directed by Nelly Kaplan | A Mischievous Rebellion: Films by Nelly Kaplan
Yella, directed by Christian Petzold | Phantoms Among Us: The Films of Christian Petzold
Jerichow,...
- 10/25/2023
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Canadian director Ashley McKenzie’s two features pivot around people caught up in traps. She’s a regional filmmaker, making work based in the communities of Nova Scotia’s Cape Breton island, which is home to 132,000 people. Her 2016 debut, Werewolf, followed a couple of opioid addicts struggling to live on methadone maintenance. Her long-awaited follow-up Queens of the Qing Dynasty, opening this Friday at NYC’s Metrograph, begins with a suicide attempt by an 18-year-old girl, Star (Sarah Walker). Although she’s just begun life as an adult, she will likely require a lifetime of institutionalization, as the state has determined that it’s too dangerous for her to live on her own. She befriends hospital volunteer An (Ziyin Zheng), a genderqueer college student from Shanghai.
Most of Queens of the Qing Dynasty remains confined to the uninviting spaces of the hospital, but the final half-hour shows the possibilities of...
Most of Queens of the Qing Dynasty remains confined to the uninviting spaces of the hospital, but the final half-hour shows the possibilities of...
- 5/3/2023
- by Steve Erickson
- The Film Stage
The summer season is upon us and, per each year, we’ve dug beyond studio offerings (though a few potential highlights remain) to present an in-depth look at what should be on your radar. From festival winners of the past year to selections coming straight from Cannes to genre delights to, yes, a few blockbuster spectacles, there’s more than enough to anticipate.
Check out our picks below and return for monthly updates as more is sure to be added to the calendar.
Riceboy Sleeps (Anthony Shim; May 2)
So-Young (Choi Seung-yoon) didn’t want to leave South Korea. She had no choice. The father of her newborn son committed suicide and, as an orphan who was never adopted, she had no other family. So, with nowhere to turn and a boy who couldn’t legally become a citizen due to being born out of wedlock, she immigrated to Canada to start anew.
Check out our picks below and return for monthly updates as more is sure to be added to the calendar.
Riceboy Sleeps (Anthony Shim; May 2)
So-Young (Choi Seung-yoon) didn’t want to leave South Korea. She had no choice. The father of her newborn son committed suicide and, as an orphan who was never adopted, she had no other family. So, with nowhere to turn and a boy who couldn’t legally become a citizen due to being born out of wedlock, she immigrated to Canada to start anew.
- 4/25/2023
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
One of the films we hoped would get distribution at the start of the year was Ashley McKenzie’s Werewolf follow-up Queens of the Qing Dynasty, a selection at Berlinale, TIFF, and NYFF. Thankfully, Factory 25 has come to the rescue and will debut the queer coming-of-age drama starting on May 5 at NYC’s Metrograph. Ahead of the release the new trailer and poster have arrived.
Here’s the synopsis: “Following a failed suicide attempt, introverted smalltown teenager Star (Sarah Walker) is subjected to constant invasive monitoring that does little to help her—until her encounter with An (Ziyin Zheng), a similarly genderqueer international student from Shanghai who’s been assigned to watch her in hospital, offers an unexpected chance for connection. Their blossoming relationship—two kindred spirits meeting across spectrums of culture, queerness, and neurodiversity—unfolds with alchemic crackle, leading up to a deeply moving denouement.”
Jared Mobarak said in his review,...
Here’s the synopsis: “Following a failed suicide attempt, introverted smalltown teenager Star (Sarah Walker) is subjected to constant invasive monitoring that does little to help her—until her encounter with An (Ziyin Zheng), a similarly genderqueer international student from Shanghai who’s been assigned to watch her in hospital, offers an unexpected chance for connection. Their blossoming relationship—two kindred spirits meeting across spectrums of culture, queerness, and neurodiversity—unfolds with alchemic crackle, leading up to a deeply moving denouement.”
Jared Mobarak said in his review,...
- 4/18/2023
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
Canadian Screen Week is officially underway — it’s the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television’s annual week-long celebration of the best in Canadian film, TV and digital media. With in-person ceremonies returning for the first time since 2019, nominees across 145 categories are being honoured over four days of live award shows at Toronto’s Meridian Hall. It’s all leading up to a star-studded broadcast hosted by Samantha Bee on Sunday night, when the winner of the Cogeco Fund Audience Choice Award will be revealed.
The hour-long special, which airs at 8 p.m. Et on CBC and CBC Gem, will look back at the past year in Canadian film and TV. Also on tap? Interviews with this year’s slate of Special Award recipients — which includes Canadian icons like Catherine O’Hara, Ryan Reynolds and Simu Liu — along with special guests Amy Poehler, Lamar Johnson, “White Lotus” star Adam Dimarco and more.
The hour-long special, which airs at 8 p.m. Et on CBC and CBC Gem, will look back at the past year in Canadian film and TV. Also on tap? Interviews with this year’s slate of Special Award recipients — which includes Canadian icons like Catherine O’Hara, Ryan Reynolds and Simu Liu — along with special guests Amy Poehler, Lamar Johnson, “White Lotus” star Adam Dimarco and more.
- 4/13/2023
- by Etcanadadigital
- ET Canada
Reality TV star Callum Izzard and Towie’s Ella Rae Wise rekindled their romance while competing on The Challenge: UK. Are they still dating?
Callum Izzard and Ella Rae Wise began dating after rekindling the romance in ‘The Challenge: UK’
Reality TV star Callum Izzard and The Only Way is Essex standout Ella Rae Wise connected in Dubai, but nothing happened due to the timing. They reconnected during The Challenge: UK, which was filmed around September 2022, and quickly formed a showmance.
Initially, Ella admitted to only using the romance to her advantage in the game. However, it became more to her, and she noted she would like to pursue a relationship after the show. The couple continued to date following filming but split a few months later, in November 2022.
Ella & Chloe come face to face and the beef is still strong ? #Towie pic.twitter.com/CMOhzaTS54
— Only Way is...
Callum Izzard and Ella Rae Wise began dating after rekindling the romance in ‘The Challenge: UK’
Reality TV star Callum Izzard and The Only Way is Essex standout Ella Rae Wise connected in Dubai, but nothing happened due to the timing. They reconnected during The Challenge: UK, which was filmed around September 2022, and quickly formed a showmance.
Initially, Ella admitted to only using the romance to her advantage in the game. However, it became more to her, and she noted she would like to pursue a relationship after the show. The couple continued to date following filming but split a few months later, in November 2022.
Ella & Chloe come face to face and the beef is still strong ? #Towie pic.twitter.com/CMOhzaTS54
— Only Way is...
- 3/13/2023
- by Tamara Grant
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
The Royal World alum and The Challenge: UK runner-up Zara Zoffany currently competes in The Challenge: World Championship. During the UK-based spinoff, she met Britain’s Got Talent star and Strictly Come Dancing professional Aj Pritchard, and the two hit it off, eventually making it to the finals together. However, it appeared the couple broke up a few months after filming. Is Zara currently single?
Zara Zoffany still appears to be dating ‘The Challenge: UK’ co-star Aj Pritchard
Britain’s Got Talent standout Aj Pritchard met The Royal World star Zara Zoffany while competing on The Challenge UK together around September 2022.
Recently single as he and dancer Abbie Quinnen called it quits after she reportedly caught him texting other women, Aj and Zara quickly hit it off in the Challenge house.
The Tension then was just… ??️ #TheRoyalWorld pic.twitter.com/WvI6fyhX3W
— The Royal World (@mtvroyalworld) December 5, 2018
They continued to...
Zara Zoffany still appears to be dating ‘The Challenge: UK’ co-star Aj Pritchard
Britain’s Got Talent standout Aj Pritchard met The Royal World star Zara Zoffany while competing on The Challenge UK together around September 2022.
Recently single as he and dancer Abbie Quinnen called it quits after she reportedly caught him texting other women, Aj and Zara quickly hit it off in the Challenge house.
The Tension then was just… ??️ #TheRoyalWorld pic.twitter.com/WvI6fyhX3W
— The Royal World (@mtvroyalworld) December 5, 2018
They continued to...
- 3/12/2023
- by Tamara Grant
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
The Challenge: UK ended with Love Island star Kaz Crossley and Made in Chelsea standout Tristan Phipps winning the title and £100,000. Here are three things to know about UK before watching World Championship.
Several showmances happened in ‘The Challenge UK’
The Only Way is Essex standout James Lock and Love Island star Arabella Chi hit it off on the first day of entering The Challenge: UK. However, after the first daily mission, he got upset with her because she didn’t pick him as a partner.
James confronted her about it, and Arabella pointed out that he also had the opportunity to team up with her. A flashback proved her right as they stood beside each other, but Tristan Phipps asked her to partner with him first. Regardless, James decided to cut things off with her before they began, noting he wanted to focus on the game. However, he went...
Several showmances happened in ‘The Challenge UK’
The Only Way is Essex standout James Lock and Love Island star Arabella Chi hit it off on the first day of entering The Challenge: UK. However, after the first daily mission, he got upset with her because she didn’t pick him as a partner.
James confronted her about it, and Arabella pointed out that he also had the opportunity to team up with her. A flashback proved her right as they stood beside each other, but Tristan Phipps asked her to partner with him first. Regardless, James decided to cut things off with her before they began, noting he wanted to focus on the game. However, he went...
- 3/12/2023
- by Tamara Grant
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
Geordie Shore standout Nathan Henry finished runner-up on The Challenge: UK and seemed poised to make a deep run in World Championship as a Global Mvp. However, he was quickly medically disqualified. The reality TV star has since spoken about his early exit, admitting he was “absolutely gutted” to find out he couldn’t participate in the Paramount+ competition series.
Nathan Henry on early disqualification from ‘The Challenge: World Championship’
Geordie Shore 10 star Nathan Henry competed on The Challenge: UK, where he finished runner-up and returned for The Challenge: World Championship as a Global Mvp.
They faced off in a qualifier that determined how the newcomers would draft Challenge legends, with the last-place finishers headed straight into elimination. Presumably at the opening challenge, Nathan apparently sustained an injury, resulting in his medical disqualification from the series. Due to his exit, only a female elimination took place.
The British are coming!
Nathan Henry on early disqualification from ‘The Challenge: World Championship’
Geordie Shore 10 star Nathan Henry competed on The Challenge: UK, where he finished runner-up and returned for The Challenge: World Championship as a Global Mvp.
They faced off in a qualifier that determined how the newcomers would draft Challenge legends, with the last-place finishers headed straight into elimination. Presumably at the opening challenge, Nathan apparently sustained an injury, resulting in his medical disqualification from the series. Due to his exit, only a female elimination took place.
The British are coming!
- 3/11/2023
- by Tamara Grant
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI, and sign up for our weekly email newsletter by clicking here.NEWSOn the Adamant.The Berlinale wrapped up over the weekend. The Golden Bear was awarded to Nicolas Philibert’s On the Adamant, while other major prizes went to Christian Petzold, Philippe Garrel, Angela Schanelec, and Dp Hélène Louvart. You can browse the full list of winners on Notebook, and keep your eyes peeled for our reports.In other festival news: Ruben Östlund will preside over this year’s Cannes jury, and the full lineup has been unveiled for Film at Lincoln Center and MoMA’s New Directors/New Films.The pioneering Senegalese filmmaker Safi Faye—the first African woman to make a commercially distributed feature film—died last week at the age of 80. Writer and programmer Yasmina Price recently surfaced a thread of archival material,...
- 2/28/2023
- MUBI
As various critics groups and awards bodies dole out their top films of the year, it can be hard to parse which ones are actually worth paying attention to. One such list has arrived today with Film Comment’s annual end-of-year survey. Revealed at a special live talk last night, in an unexpected but welcome surprise, David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future topped the list, which also included Jerzy Skolimowski’s Eo, Charlotte Wells’s Aftersun, two by Hong Sangsoo, and more. They also revealed their top undistributed films list, which included David Easteal’s The Plains, Bertrand Bonello’s Coma, and Laura Citarella’s Trenque Lauquen.
“That the winner of this year’s poll is a strange, gory, apocalyptic film about a future where art and humanity are both on the precipice of extinction is a striking reflection of what we’re seeking from cinema in 2022,” said Film...
“That the winner of this year’s poll is a strange, gory, apocalyptic film about a future where art and humanity are both on the precipice of extinction is a striking reflection of what we’re seeking from cinema in 2022,” said Film...
- 12/15/2022
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
There are chemicals mixed into the magical focal bond in "Queens of the Qing Dynasty." It's perhaps incomprehensible in normal terms but easier to feel in the visual textures of a film about two misfits.
The sophomore feature of Canadian director Ashley McKenzie (the 2016 "Werewolf"), "Queens of the Qing Dynasty" expresses a fixation on particles: the freckles, the frost, and the fingernail dust. Twenty minutes into the film, we're privy to a medical appointment where a scope is lowered into an esophagus and slithers into slimy innards. An unorthodox rhythm is spun out of the mechanical wriggle of the tube and the dilated pupils of the patient, the wide-eyed Canadian teen Star (Sarah Walker). Such textures, visual and sound, define Star's existence as a neurodivergent teen.
Star speaks in her own terse vernaculars. Her perpetual facial placidness is not to be mistaken for stoicism, vacancy, or aloofness. She holds a...
The sophomore feature of Canadian director Ashley McKenzie (the 2016 "Werewolf"), "Queens of the Qing Dynasty" expresses a fixation on particles: the freckles, the frost, and the fingernail dust. Twenty minutes into the film, we're privy to a medical appointment where a scope is lowered into an esophagus and slithers into slimy innards. An unorthodox rhythm is spun out of the mechanical wriggle of the tube and the dilated pupils of the patient, the wide-eyed Canadian teen Star (Sarah Walker). Such textures, visual and sound, define Star's existence as a neurodivergent teen.
Star speaks in her own terse vernaculars. Her perpetual facial placidness is not to be mistaken for stoicism, vacancy, or aloofness. She holds a...
- 10/18/2022
- by Caroline Cao
- Slash Film
“Thank you for communicating and being like family. I love you for that,” Star (Sarah Walker) tells An (Ziyin Zheng) in the final moments of “Queens of the Qing Dynasty.” The moment feels like a closure point, as if the close friendship between the characters has run its course. But rather than a goodbye, it instead feels like the friendship is being put in a box, carefully placed in the back of a closet. The intensity of this moment for Star and An is over, but they are both forever changed simply by knowing each other. It’s like the parting of two lovers, connected by language instead of sex or even physical touch. Their relationship is personified perfectly on the poster, which displays two hands crossed at the wrist, occupying the same space without contact, close and distant at the same time.
With their first feature “Werewolf,” Canadian director...
With their first feature “Werewolf,” Canadian director...
- 10/15/2022
- by Jourdain Searles
- Indiewire
The 60th New York Film Festival kicks off on September 30th! Below you'll find all of Notebook's coverage of the films in the selection, gathered in one convenient place. As we cover more titles, this page will be updated with new essays and interviews, so check back frequently for updates.Main SLATEFilmmaker Interviews:De Humani Corporis Fabrica (Véréna Paravel and Lucien Castaing-Taylor)Pacifiction (Albert Serra)Trenque Lauquen (Laura Citarella)Showing Up (Kelly Reichardt)Dispatch Coverage:All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Laura Poitras)Armageddon Time (James Gray)Corsage (Marie Kreutzer)A Couple (Frederick Wiseman)Decision to Leave (Park Chan-wook)Enys Men (Mark Jenkin)Eo (Jerzy Skolimowski)The Eternal Daughter (Joanna Hogg)Master Gardener (Paul Schrader)No Bears (Jafar Panahi)The Novelist's Film (Hong Sang-soo)One Fine Morning (Mia Hansen-Løve)R.M.N. (Cristian Mungiu)Saint Omer (Alice Diop)Scarlet (Pietro Marcello)Showing Up (Kelly Reichardt)Stars at Noon (Claire Denis)TÁR...
- 10/11/2022
- MUBI
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSSacheen Littlefeather: Breaking the Silence.Sacheen Littlefeather, Native American actress and activist, has died at 75. At the 1973 Academy Awards, she declined Marlon Brando’s Oscar for The Godfather on his behalf to condemn the treatment of Native Americans by the film industry and bring attention to the Wounded Knee protests.After five years in charge of BFI Flare and the London Film Festival, Tricia Tuttle has stepped down from her role as Festivals Director at the British Film Institute.Feminist film journal Another Gaze has announced a publishing imprint. Another Gaze Editions launches in late 2022 with My Cinema, a collection of writings by and interviews with Marguerite Duras, and a new translation of The Sky Is Falling, Lorenza Mazzetti's first novel.Recommended VIEWINGHunt, the directorial debut from popular South Korean actor Lee Jung-jae (Squid Game), has a trailer.
- 10/4/2022
- MUBI
Queens of the Qing Dynasty, the second feature from Nova Scotia’s Ashley McKenzie, is a unique work of independently produced Canadian cinema. Both a stark about-face from the hardscrabble realism of her 2016 debut Werewolf—about a pair of strung-out young lovers living hand-to-mouth on the margins of Cape Breton—and a decisive break from the docufiction trends of art cinema at large, Queens is rigorously composed and austerely dramatized, an artful fable pitched somewhere between comedy and tragedy. Starring newcomer Sarah Walker as Star, a neurodivergent teen who develops a deep connection with her caregiver An (Ziyin Zheng, also making their […]
The post Crafting a Life as a Filmmaker: Ashley McKenzie on Queens of the Qing Dynasty first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post Crafting a Life as a Filmmaker: Ashley McKenzie on Queens of the Qing Dynasty first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 9/30/2022
- by Jordan Cronk
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Click here to read the full article.
Guillermo del Toro’s Nightmare Alley, David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future and Danis Goulet’s Night Raiders lead nominees for the upcoming Dgc Awards with three each.
The Directors of Guild of Canada unveiled nominations for its 21st Dgc Awards on Nov. 5 on Friday. Del Toro, who shot Nightmare Alley mostly in and around Toronto, did not receive a nomination for best feature film direction.
But del Toro’s tribute to the film noir genre, which starred Bradley Cooper and Cate Blanchett, did earn Oscar-nominated production designer Tamara Deverell a Dgc Awards nod in the same category, Cam McLauchlin a nomination for feature best picture editing, and best sound editing nominations for Nathan Robitaille, Jill Purdy, Dashen Naidoo, Josh Brown, Nelson Ferreira, Kayla Stewart, Craig MacLellan and Kevin Banks.
Cronenberg received a best film director nomination for Crimes of the Future,...
Guillermo del Toro’s Nightmare Alley, David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future and Danis Goulet’s Night Raiders lead nominees for the upcoming Dgc Awards with three each.
The Directors of Guild of Canada unveiled nominations for its 21st Dgc Awards on Nov. 5 on Friday. Del Toro, who shot Nightmare Alley mostly in and around Toronto, did not receive a nomination for best feature film direction.
But del Toro’s tribute to the film noir genre, which starred Bradley Cooper and Cate Blanchett, did earn Oscar-nominated production designer Tamara Deverell a Dgc Awards nod in the same category, Cam McLauchlin a nomination for feature best picture editing, and best sound editing nominations for Nathan Robitaille, Jill Purdy, Dashen Naidoo, Josh Brown, Nelson Ferreira, Kayla Stewart, Craig MacLellan and Kevin Banks.
Cronenberg received a best film director nomination for Crimes of the Future,...
- 9/23/2022
- by Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
While we’re in the middle of the fall festival season, with Telluride, Venice, and TIFF in the rearview, and NYFF, BFI London, and AFI Fest on the horizon, it’s time to round up some of our early favorites. We’ve polled our contributors from Venice and TIFF to share their top picks, which one can see below along with our ongoing coverage here.
David Katz (@davidfabiankatz)
1. Saint Omer (Alice Diop)
2. Trenque Lauquen (Laura Citarella)
3. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Laura Poitras)
4. Master Gardener (Paul Schrader)
5. The Whale (Darren Aronofsky)
6. Love Life (Kôji Fukada)
7. Blonde (Andrew Dominik)
8. A Couple (Frederick Wiseman)
9. In Viaggio (Gianfranco Rosi)
10. The Eternal Daughter (Joanna Hogg)
Luke Hicks (@lou_kicks)
1. Bones and All (Luca Guadagnino)
2. Other People’s Children (Rebecca Zlotowski)
3. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Laura Poitras)
4. The Eternal Daughter (Joanna Hogg)
5. Athena (Romain Gavras)
6. White Noise (Noah Baumbach)
7. The Banshees of Inisherin...
David Katz (@davidfabiankatz)
1. Saint Omer (Alice Diop)
2. Trenque Lauquen (Laura Citarella)
3. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Laura Poitras)
4. Master Gardener (Paul Schrader)
5. The Whale (Darren Aronofsky)
6. Love Life (Kôji Fukada)
7. Blonde (Andrew Dominik)
8. A Couple (Frederick Wiseman)
9. In Viaggio (Gianfranco Rosi)
10. The Eternal Daughter (Joanna Hogg)
Luke Hicks (@lou_kicks)
1. Bones and All (Luca Guadagnino)
2. Other People’s Children (Rebecca Zlotowski)
3. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (Laura Poitras)
4. The Eternal Daughter (Joanna Hogg)
5. Athena (Romain Gavras)
6. White Noise (Noah Baumbach)
7. The Banshees of Inisherin...
- 9/21/2022
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
Concrete Valley.Hopefully you’ve been following along, but over the last decade there’s been a wonderful surge of young Canadian directors making exceptional short- and feature-length movies, all on a small, independent scale that should be invigorating to makers and audiences alike. While no one would (nor should) ascribe any kind of movement label to them, being eclectic in origins and approaches, it has been notable how many of the films hinge upon explorations of mental health, the search for well-being, and the weaknesses and strengths of community. Films as disparate as the substance abuse and social work documentary The Stairs (2016), the immersive impressionism of mental anguish of Anne at 13,000 Ft. (2019), and this year's Queens of the Qing Dynasty (2022), a striking story of social difference, hospitalization, and friendship filmed in Cape Breton, are among these adroit new Canadian films fueled by human inquiry and empathy.This note is...
- 9/17/2022
- MUBI
Ashley McKenzie, the Nova Scotia-based director of the elliptical and scarifyingly intimate methadone-addiction drama “Werewolf,” returns with another tale of codependence and the Canadian welfare state. Talking to Film Comment in 2018, McKenzie copped to a desire “to have more extensive scenes and more elaborate choreography and staging” in future projects and hinted at her then-gestating second feature. “The elevator pitch would probably say ‘Certain Women’ meets Alan Clarke BBC portrait dramas,” she said.
And so it is: “Queens of the Qing Dynasty,” about a neurodivergent teenager hospitalized following a(nother) suicide attempt, and the genderqueer Chinese-immigrant advocate she bonds with during her recovery, is at once rigorously intimate and richly symbolic.
Continue reading ‘Queens of the Qing Dynasty’ Review: Ashley McKenzie Crafts An Intimate And Rich Story of Friendship [TIFF] at The Playlist.
And so it is: “Queens of the Qing Dynasty,” about a neurodivergent teenager hospitalized following a(nother) suicide attempt, and the genderqueer Chinese-immigrant advocate she bonds with during her recovery, is at once rigorously intimate and richly symbolic.
Continue reading ‘Queens of the Qing Dynasty’ Review: Ashley McKenzie Crafts An Intimate And Rich Story of Friendship [TIFF] at The Playlist.
- 9/10/2022
- by Mark Asch
- The Playlist
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSWill-o'-the-Wisp.The New York Film Festival has revealed the lineup for their Currents section, dedicated to films "testing and stretching the possibilities of the medium." The program includes new films from João Pedro Rodrígues, Ashley McKenzie, Bertrand Bonello, Helena Wittmann, and more. This year's crop of Revivals was also unveiled, featuring the highly anticipated restoration of Jean Eustache's The Mother and the Whore.61 films will be preserved through funding from The National Film Preservation Foundation. Grant recipients include the 1921 mystery-western Trailin’—starring Tom Mix, considered the first on-screen cowboy—and The Cruz Brothers and Miss Malloy (1980), one of two feature films Kathleen Collins completed before her premature death.Cinema company Cineworld, owner of the Picturehouse chain in the UK and Regal Cinemas in the US, could be facing imminent bankruptcy, per recent reports.
- 8/23/2022
- MUBI
Following the Main Slate and Spotlight announcements, the 60th New York Film Festival has unveiled its Currents section. The slate of boundary-pushing work features Bertrand Bonello’s Coma, João Pedro Rodrigues’ Will-o’-the-Wisp, Helena Wittmann’s Human Flowers of Flesh, Alessandro Comodin’s The Adventures of Gigi the Law, Joana Pimenta and Adirley Queirós’s Dry Ground Burning, Ruth Beckermann’s Mutzenbacher, and Ashley McKenzie’s Queens of the Qing Dynasty, plus new shorts by Bi Gan, Mark Jenkin, Simón Velez, Nicolás Pereda, Courtney Stephens, Ben Russell, and more.
“Each Currents lineup is an attempt to distill the spirit of innovation and playfulness in contemporary cinema, and this is, by design, the most expansive section of the festival,” said Dennis Lim, artistic director, New York Film Festival. “There are familiar names here—including multiple filmmakers who will be known to NYFF and Flc audiences—as well as some electrifying new talents,...
“Each Currents lineup is an attempt to distill the spirit of innovation and playfulness in contemporary cinema, and this is, by design, the most expansive section of the festival,” said Dennis Lim, artistic director, New York Film Festival. “There are familiar names here—including multiple filmmakers who will be known to NYFF and Flc audiences—as well as some electrifying new talents,...
- 8/18/2022
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
The WhaleWAVELENGTHS - FEATURESConcrete Valley (Antoine Bourges)De Humani Corporis Fabrica (Véréna Paravel, Lucien Castaing-Taylor)Dry Ground BurningHorse Opera (Moyra Davey)Pacifiction (Albert Serra)Queens of the Qing Dynasty (Ashley McKenzie)Unrest (Cyril Schäublin)Will-o’-the-Wisp (João Pedro Rodrigues)Wavelenghths - SHORTSAfter Work (Céline Condorelli, Ben Rivers)Bigger on the Inside (Angelo Madsen Minax)Eventide (Sharon Lockhart)F1ghting Looks Different 2 Me Now (Fox Maxy)Fata Morgana (Tacita Dean)Hors-titre (Wiame Haddad)I Thought the World of You (Kurt Walker)Moonrise (Vincent Grenier)The Newest Olds (Pablo Mazzolo)Puerta a Puerta (Jessica Sarah Rinland, Luis Arnías )The Time That Separates Us (Parastoo Anoushahpour)What Rules the Invisible (Tiffany Sia)Gala PRESENTATIONSAlice, Darling (Mary Nighy)Black Ice (Hubert Davis)The Greatest Beer Run Ever (Peter Farrelly)Butcher’s Crossing (Gabe Polsky)The Hummingbird (Francesca Archibugi)Hunt (Jung-jae Lee)A Jazzman’s Blues (Tyler Perry)Kacchey Limbu (Shubham Yogi)Moving On (Paul Weitz)Paris Memories...
- 8/4/2022
- MUBI
The Toronto International Film Festival lineup continues to unfold, with TIFF announcing the programs for its Midnight Madness, Discovery, and Wavelengths programs on Thursday. The festival runs September 8 through 18.
“For TIFF audiences in the know, the Discovery, Midnight Madness and Wavelengths programmes are where you’re rewarded for taking risks and being adventurous,” offered Anita Lee, TIFF’s chief programming officer. “Whether it’s the discovery of an audacious new auteur, a brilliant visionary work that reimagines storytelling or the most wicked cinematic experience you will ever have, this is where you will find it.”
Discovery
“TIFF’s Discovery program is a showcase of cinema and talent from around the world — a place to unearth work that is bold, distinctive, and, above all, passionate,” said Dorota Lech, Discovery lead and international programmer, TIFF. “This year’s robust program offers 24 films that shook us to the core, filled us with joy,...
“For TIFF audiences in the know, the Discovery, Midnight Madness and Wavelengths programmes are where you’re rewarded for taking risks and being adventurous,” offered Anita Lee, TIFF’s chief programming officer. “Whether it’s the discovery of an audacious new auteur, a brilliant visionary work that reimagines storytelling or the most wicked cinematic experience you will ever have, this is where you will find it.”
Discovery
“TIFF’s Discovery program is a showcase of cinema and talent from around the world — a place to unearth work that is bold, distinctive, and, above all, passionate,” said Dorota Lech, Discovery lead and international programmer, TIFF. “This year’s robust program offers 24 films that shook us to the core, filled us with joy,...
- 8/4/2022
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
“Weird: The Weird Al Yankovic Story” will make its world premiere at TIFF, leading the Midnight Madness program’s 10-film lineup.
Starring Daniel Radcliffe as “Weird Al” Yankovic, the film chronicles the career of the music and comedy icon. Directed by Eric Appel, who co-wrote with Yankovic himself, the cast of the Roku biopic also includes Evan Rachel Wood, Quinta Brunson and Rainn Wilson.
As Midnight Madness’ opening night film, “Weird: The Weird Al Yankovic Story” will premiere on Sept. 8 at 11:59 Est.
Also Read:
Daniel Radcliffe Was Cast as Weird Al Thanks to a Graham Norton Appearance (Video)
“For TIFF audiences in the know, the Discovery, Midnight Madness and Wavelengths programmes are where you’re rewarded for taking risks and being adventurous,” offered Anita Lee, Chief Programming Officer, TIFF. “Whether it’s the discovery of an audacious new auteur, a brilliant visionary work that reimagines storytelling or the most...
Starring Daniel Radcliffe as “Weird Al” Yankovic, the film chronicles the career of the music and comedy icon. Directed by Eric Appel, who co-wrote with Yankovic himself, the cast of the Roku biopic also includes Evan Rachel Wood, Quinta Brunson and Rainn Wilson.
As Midnight Madness’ opening night film, “Weird: The Weird Al Yankovic Story” will premiere on Sept. 8 at 11:59 Est.
Also Read:
Daniel Radcliffe Was Cast as Weird Al Thanks to a Graham Norton Appearance (Video)
“For TIFF audiences in the know, the Discovery, Midnight Madness and Wavelengths programmes are where you’re rewarded for taking risks and being adventurous,” offered Anita Lee, Chief Programming Officer, TIFF. “Whether it’s the discovery of an audacious new auteur, a brilliant visionary work that reimagines storytelling or the most...
- 8/4/2022
- by Harper Lambert
- The Wrap
Click here to read the full article.
The Toronto Film Festival’s Midnight Madness sidebar will open with Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, with Daniel Radcliffe playing the prolific musician behind humorous songs like “Eat It” and “Amish Paradise.”
Eric Appel directs the biopic for The Roku Channel that also stars Evan Rachel Wood and will have a world premiere Sept. 8 at TIFF at the Royal Alexandra Theater.
“I couldn’t have hoped for a more appropriate opening night film than Weird: The Al Yankovic Story — a beautifully deranged biopic made in the great Midnight movie tradition of challenging conventions and forging one’s own path, no matter how weird,” Midnight Madness curator Peter Kuplowsky said in a statement Thursday.
The latest additions to the Toronto Film Festival also include the lineups for the Discovery and Wavelengths programs unveiled Thursday.
The gore-filled Midnight Madness program has world bows for Tim Story...
The Toronto Film Festival’s Midnight Madness sidebar will open with Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, with Daniel Radcliffe playing the prolific musician behind humorous songs like “Eat It” and “Amish Paradise.”
Eric Appel directs the biopic for The Roku Channel that also stars Evan Rachel Wood and will have a world premiere Sept. 8 at TIFF at the Royal Alexandra Theater.
“I couldn’t have hoped for a more appropriate opening night film than Weird: The Al Yankovic Story — a beautifully deranged biopic made in the great Midnight movie tradition of challenging conventions and forging one’s own path, no matter how weird,” Midnight Madness curator Peter Kuplowsky said in a statement Thursday.
The latest additions to the Toronto Film Festival also include the lineups for the Discovery and Wavelengths programs unveiled Thursday.
The gore-filled Midnight Madness program has world bows for Tim Story...
- 8/4/2022
- by Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSThe official poster for the the 54th Directors' Fortnight is by multidisciplinary artist Cecilia Paredes. In a statement, the festival points out that Paredes' photo-performance is "both visible and invisible, the artist blends into the image she creates, much like filmmakers do in their films." Following the release of Joel Coen's The Tragedy of Macbeth, Ethan Coen is setting out to make his own solo directorial debut with a still-untitled "lesbian road trip project that Coen and [his wife, Tricia Cooke] initially wrote in the mid-2000s." Gus Van Sant is set to direct the second season of Ryan Murphy's anthology series Feud, which will be based on Laurence Leamer's book Capote’s Women: A True Story of Love, Betrayal, and a Swan Song for an Era. Playing one such woman will be Naomi Watts,...
- 4/6/2022
- MUBI
My favorite film of the Berlinale was Queens of the Qing Dynasty, Ashley McKenzie’s ambitious and otherworldly fantasia about a “queer friendship romance” between a suicidal young woman and a Chinese immigrant she meets while hospitalized. Inspired by two teenagers she befriended during the casting of her previous feature, Werewolf (2016), McKenzie first sketched out the central character, Star (Sarah Walker), whose everyday life is mediated by endless negotiations with social workers, doctors, guardians, landlords and the various bureaucracies that employ them. Star is aging out of child protective services and has been deemed unfit to live independently, so as […]
The post Berlinale 2022 Critic’s Notebook: Queens of the Qing Dynasty, Dry Ground Burning, Rewind and Play, Camouflage, Happer’s Comet, The Middle Ages first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post Berlinale 2022 Critic’s Notebook: Queens of the Qing Dynasty, Dry Ground Burning, Rewind and Play, Camouflage, Happer’s Comet, The Middle Ages first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 3/22/2022
- by Darren Hughes
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
My favorite film of the Berlinale was Queens of the Qing Dynasty, Ashley McKenzie’s ambitious and otherworldly fantasia about a “queer friendship romance” between a suicidal young woman and a Chinese immigrant she meets while hospitalized. Inspired by two teenagers she befriended during the casting of her previous feature, Werewolf (2016), McKenzie first sketched out the central character, Star (Sarah Walker), whose everyday life is mediated by endless negotiations with social workers, doctors, guardians, landlords and the various bureaucracies that employ them. Star is aging out of child protective services and has been deemed unfit to live independently, so as […]
The post Berlinale 2022 Critic’s Notebook: Queens of the Qing Dynasty, Dry Ground Burning, Rewind and Play, Camouflage, Happer’s Comet, The Middle Ages first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post Berlinale 2022 Critic’s Notebook: Queens of the Qing Dynasty, Dry Ground Burning, Rewind and Play, Camouflage, Happer’s Comet, The Middle Ages first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 3/22/2022
- by Darren Hughes
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
Queens of the Qing Dynasty is writer-director Ashley McKenzie’s long-awaited follow-up to Werewolf (2016), her auspicious first feature, and one of the most acclaimed Canadian debuts of recent years. Like Werewolf, Queens is set on McKenzie’s native Cape Breton Island, off the East Coast of Nova Scotia. And like that film, it is essentially a two-hander, following a pair of entwined lives with an at times disconcerting intimacy. When first introduced, 18-year-old Star (Sarah Walker) has been admitted to a hospital for ingesting poison, though we quickly surmise that she has been in and out of hospitals and social welfare institutions for much of her life. Meanwhile, An (Ziyin Zheng), a Chinese expatriate volunteering at a local hospital to accrue immigration points, has been assigned to her case. The strange, symbiotic relationship that soon develops between the two provides the film with its unpredictable, live-wire energy.In its approach to psychology and character subjectivity,...
- 2/27/2022
- MUBI
Our introductions to writer/director Ashley McKenzie’s leads in Queens of the Qing Dynasty are not to be forgotten. Whether Star’s (Sarah Walker) open-mouthed and fully dilated thousand-yard stare in a hospital bed after her latest suicide attempt (this time for drinking poison) or An’s (Ziyin Zheng) voice regaling the women nurses with a Chinese song while their supervisor drawls “Old Macdonald” in response, the notion that we’re dealing with two eccentrics in a world that may never understand them is abundantly clear. It’s therefore only right that they’d end up being put on a collision course ignited by duty (An’s hospital volunteer is assigned Star’s evening suicide watch) yet sustained by genuine intrigue. They share their deepest secrets without judgement, ultimately discovering things about themselves along the way.
It’s through these late-night sessions that they begin to question the roads...
It’s through these late-night sessions that they begin to question the roads...
- 2/24/2022
- by Jared Mobarak
- The Film Stage
Filmmaker Ashley McKenzie (“Werewolf”) returns to the Berlinale this year with her second feature, “Queens of the Qing Dynasty,” premiering in Encounters on Tuesday. The writer-director stands out as an emerging Canadian talent, backed by the Toronto Film Critics Assn., who awarded her debut film the $100,000 Rogers Best Canadian Film Award in 2017.
An impressive new offering, “Queens” showcases McKenzie’s flair for loose, floating narratives and complex characters hoping to break free from their ennui. Protagonist Star (Sarah Walker) navigates life after a suicide attempt with the help of a special kind of babysitter, hospital volunteer An (Ziyin Zheng). An idiosyncratic friendship blooms and Star finally begins to feel a sense of kinship in her life, supported by a vibrantly queer individual who stands apart from the beige monotony of her experiences in the outside world.
Where did this story originate for you?
I auditioned two teenagers for my last feature,...
An impressive new offering, “Queens” showcases McKenzie’s flair for loose, floating narratives and complex characters hoping to break free from their ennui. Protagonist Star (Sarah Walker) navigates life after a suicide attempt with the help of a special kind of babysitter, hospital volunteer An (Ziyin Zheng). An idiosyncratic friendship blooms and Star finally begins to feel a sense of kinship in her life, supported by a vibrantly queer individual who stands apart from the beige monotony of her experiences in the outside world.
Where did this story originate for you?
I auditioned two teenagers for my last feature,...
- 2/15/2022
- by Caitlin Quinlan
- Variety Film + TV
After launching last year’s edition as a two-pronged event held last March and June, this year’s Berlin Film Festival is attempting to return to (relative) normalcy, complete with an enviable lineup of new films. While the Berlinale’s European Film Market has moved online, this year’s Berlin Film Festival is sticking to an in-person event with limited capacity, mandatory vaccines, and no parties.
But although moviegoers might not be literally partying it up during the course of the 10-day festival, there will still be plenty to celebrate, including new films from beloved auteurs like Claire Denis, Dario Argento, Quentin Dupieux, Ursula Meier, and Peter Strickland, plus new works from rising stars on the international circuit like Kivu Ruhorahoza, Ashley McKenzie, and Li Ruijun. There are Covid-made features and murderous revenge thrillers, small-scale romances and real-life twins making their debut, and at least one film that just might...
But although moviegoers might not be literally partying it up during the course of the 10-day festival, there will still be plenty to celebrate, including new films from beloved auteurs like Claire Denis, Dario Argento, Quentin Dupieux, Ursula Meier, and Peter Strickland, plus new works from rising stars on the international circuit like Kivu Ruhorahoza, Ashley McKenzie, and Li Ruijun. There are Covid-made features and murderous revenge thrillers, small-scale romances and real-life twins making their debut, and at least one film that just might...
- 2/9/2022
- by Kate Erbland, David Ehrlich and Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
The November 2020 lineup for The Criterion Channel has been unveiled, toplined by a Claire Denis retrospective, including the brand-new restoration of Beau travail, along with Chocolat, No Fear, No Die, Nenette and Boni, Towards Mathilde, 35 Shots of Rum, and White Material.
There will also be a series celebrating 30 years of The Film Foundation, featuring a new interview with Martin Scorsese by Ari Aster, as well as a number of their most essential restorations, including films by Jia Zhangke, Ritwik Ghatak, Luchino Visconti, Shirley Clarke, Med Hondo, and more.
There’s also David Lynch’s new restoration of The Elephant Man, retrospectives dedicated to Ngozi Onwurah, Nadav Lapid, and Terence Nance, a new edition of the series Queersighted titled Queer Fear, featuring a new conversation between series programmer Michael Koresky and filmmaker and critic Farihah Zaman, and much more.
See the lineup below and learn more on the official site.
There will also be a series celebrating 30 years of The Film Foundation, featuring a new interview with Martin Scorsese by Ari Aster, as well as a number of their most essential restorations, including films by Jia Zhangke, Ritwik Ghatak, Luchino Visconti, Shirley Clarke, Med Hondo, and more.
There’s also David Lynch’s new restoration of The Elephant Man, retrospectives dedicated to Ngozi Onwurah, Nadav Lapid, and Terence Nance, a new edition of the series Queersighted titled Queer Fear, featuring a new conversation between series programmer Michael Koresky and filmmaker and critic Farihah Zaman, and much more.
See the lineup below and learn more on the official site.
- 10/27/2020
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
In 2018 we've published 70 interviews whose subjects have ranged from old masters to emerging new voices, and including some unexpected conversations, including those with curators (Dave Kehr of the Museum of Modern Art), as well as archival finds (a 1971 talk with Jerry Lewis).Below you will find an index of our conversations throughout the year, listed in order of publication date.Blake Williams (Prototype)Samira Elagoz (Craigslist Allstars)F.J. Ossang (9 Fingers)Jerry LewisAndré Gil Mata (The Tree)Christian Petzold (Transit)Raoul Peck (Young Karl Marx)Ashley McKenzie (Werewolf)Penelope SpheerisTed Fendt (Classical Period)Dominik Graf (The Red Shadow)Blake Williams ("Stereo Visions")Arnaud Desplechin (Ismael's Ghosts)Ruth Beckermann (The Waldheim Waltz)Nelson Carlos de los Santos Arias (Cocote)Esther GarrelPhilippe Garrel (Lover for a Day)Jonas MekasJohann Lurf (★)Karim Aïnouz (Central Airport Thf)Juliana Antunes (Baronesa)Cristina Gallego and Ciro Guerra (Birds of Passage)Wang Bing (Dead Souls)Donal Foreman...
- 12/27/2018
- MUBI
Winston DeGiobbi's Mass for Shut-Ins (2017) is exclusively showing August 23 – September 22, 2018 on Mubi in most countries in the world as part of the series Canada's Next Generation.Arriving with an unexpected boom of Nova Scotian inspiration alongside Ashley McKenzie’s Werewolf, Seth Smith’s The Crescent, Cory Bowles’ Black Cop, Winston DeGiobbi’s artisanal and anarchic debut feature is one of the most distinct visions to emerge in a larger movement of recent Canadian independent cinema. Easily likened to Harmony Korine for its on-the-ground in-the-thick of it poverty-grit setting and style, Mass for Shut-Ins, is, refreshingly, a film that seems born directly out its own milieu rather than out of any sort of reverential relationship to cinema. DeGiobbi possesses a sensitivity and skill in taking observations of his surroundings and channeling them into something just bent past realism into a discreet poetry where mundanity and strangeness blur as one. Aside...
- 8/26/2018
- MUBI
Ashley McKenzie's Werewolf (2016) is exclusively showing July 20 – August 19, 2018 on Mubi in most countries in the world as part of the series Canada's Next Generation.Werewolf is a summer movie. Not in the blockbuster sense. Not in the genre sense either, despite any lure offered by the title. The film is a relationship drama about a methadone-dependent couple who spend a summer dragging a rusty lawn mower door-to-door in their small town to make money.The film is set in the place where I live, Cape Breton Island. Summertime here is prime. There is a pressure to make the most of it, otherwise you blink and you’re shovelling snow again. You swim, hike, camp, sun, and socialize, if your life affords you the freedom to partake in such activities.It was this time six years ago that I started to write Werewolf, my first feature film. I moved back...
- 7/19/2018
- MUBI
Share her Journey to offer partial support for female selections.
Six women and six men have been unveiled as the 12 Canadian participants in this year’s Tiff Writers’ Studio as Tiff continues its commitment to gender parity across its talent development programmes.
The women will be supported in part by the organisation’s Share Her Journey campaign to champion women in front of and behind the camera.
The 2018–19 Tiff Writers’ Studio participants are: Danilo Baracho, Yung Chang, Martin Edralin, Sarah Goodman, Carinne Leduc, Jennifer Liao, Frieda Luk, Kaveh Nabatian, Celeste Parr, Kazik Radwanski, Lina Rodriguez, and Jorge Thielen-Armand.
Tiff Writers...
Six women and six men have been unveiled as the 12 Canadian participants in this year’s Tiff Writers’ Studio as Tiff continues its commitment to gender parity across its talent development programmes.
The women will be supported in part by the organisation’s Share Her Journey campaign to champion women in front of and behind the camera.
The 2018–19 Tiff Writers’ Studio participants are: Danilo Baracho, Yung Chang, Martin Edralin, Sarah Goodman, Carinne Leduc, Jennifer Liao, Frieda Luk, Kaveh Nabatian, Celeste Parr, Kazik Radwanski, Lina Rodriguez, and Jorge Thielen-Armand.
Tiff Writers...
- 6/7/2018
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
Share her Journey to offer partial support for female selections.
Six women and six men have been unveiled as the 12 Canadian participants in this year’s Tiff Writers’ Studio as Tiff continues its commitment to gender parity across its talent development programmes.
The women will be supported in part by the organisation’s Share Her Journey campaign to champion women in front of and behind the camera.
The 2018–19 Tiff Writers’ Studio participants are: Danilo Baracho, Yung Chang, Martin Edralin, Sarah Goodman, Carinne Leduc, Jennifer Liao, Frieda Luk, Kaveh Nabatian, Celeste Parr, Kazik Radwanski, Lina Rodriguez, and Jorge Thielen-Armand.
Tiff Writers...
Six women and six men have been unveiled as the 12 Canadian participants in this year’s Tiff Writers’ Studio as Tiff continues its commitment to gender parity across its talent development programmes.
The women will be supported in part by the organisation’s Share Her Journey campaign to champion women in front of and behind the camera.
The 2018–19 Tiff Writers’ Studio participants are: Danilo Baracho, Yung Chang, Martin Edralin, Sarah Goodman, Carinne Leduc, Jennifer Liao, Frieda Luk, Kaveh Nabatian, Celeste Parr, Kazik Radwanski, Lina Rodriguez, and Jorge Thielen-Armand.
Tiff Writers...
- 6/7/2018
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSAndré S. Labarthe, critic and producer of the long running Cinéastes de notre temps film series covering famed film directors, has died.In memory of André S. Labarthe, who, with Janine Bazin, created the TV series Cinéastes de notre temps, a historic, inexhaustible trove of filmed portraits of directors and interviews with them and associates (too often only seen as DVD-extra snippets): https://t.co/t7qm8AlT4b— Richard Brody (@tnyfrontrow) March 5, 2018Following a report earlier this year, award winning director Kim Ki-duk has been further accused of sexual abuse. The actresses making said claims remain anonymous in fear of being publicly shamed, Yahoo reports.Quentin Tarantino is making moves on his controversial new project, which appears in part to concern the Manson family murders. Variety reports that Brad Pitt has joined the project alongside Leonardo DiCaprio.
- 3/8/2018
- MUBI
wide
Red Sparrow [my review]
Jennifer Lawrence stars as a Russian spy who uses manipulation to get what she wants. (male writer and director)
limited
Werewolf [IMDb]
Ashley McKenzie writes and directs this drama about outcast drug addicts, costarring Bhreagh MacNeil.
Oh, Lucy! [IMDb]
Atsuko Hirayanagi cowrites and directs this dramedy about a lonely Tokyo woman, played by Shinobu Terajima.
Chasing Great [IMDb]
Michelle Walshe cowrites and codirects this documentary about a (male) rugby player.
Dance Academy: The Comeback [IMDb]
Samantha Strauss writes this drama following the continuing stories of the gender-balanced ensemble from an Australian television show.
Eat Me [IMDb]
Jacqueline Wright writes and costars in this thriller about a woman and the (male) home invader who saves her mid-suicide attempt. (male director)
The Lullaby [IMDb]
Tarryn-Tanille Prinsloo writes this horror movie about a woman, played by Reine Swart, who is having difficulty as a new mother.
Hondros [IMDb]
Jenny Golden cowrites this documentary about a (male) war photojournalist.
Red Sparrow [my review]
Jennifer Lawrence stars as a Russian spy who uses manipulation to get what she wants. (male writer and director)
limited
Werewolf [IMDb]
Ashley McKenzie writes and directs this drama about outcast drug addicts, costarring Bhreagh MacNeil.
Oh, Lucy! [IMDb]
Atsuko Hirayanagi cowrites and directs this dramedy about a lonely Tokyo woman, played by Shinobu Terajima.
Chasing Great [IMDb]
Michelle Walshe cowrites and codirects this documentary about a (male) rugby player.
Dance Academy: The Comeback [IMDb]
Samantha Strauss writes this drama following the continuing stories of the gender-balanced ensemble from an Australian television show.
Eat Me [IMDb]
Jacqueline Wright writes and costars in this thriller about a woman and the (male) home invader who saves her mid-suicide attempt. (male director)
The Lullaby [IMDb]
Tarryn-Tanille Prinsloo writes this horror movie about a woman, played by Reine Swart, who is having difficulty as a new mother.
Hondros [IMDb]
Jenny Golden cowrites this documentary about a (male) war photojournalist.
- 3/2/2018
- by MaryAnn Johanson
- www.flickfilosopher.com
Ashley McKenzie’s Werewolf is one of the most accomplished and acclaimed Canadian debut features in recent memory. Set on Cape Breton Island off the East Coast of Nova Scotia, the story follows a methadone addicted couple, Nessa (Bhreagh MacNeil) and Blaise (Andrew Gillis), who are struggling to survive. McKenzie looks at the cycles of dependency that trap these characters in an environment that offers them few escape routes. Living in the woods, waiting for housing support, getting daily methadone doses, and unsuccessfully trying to make ends meet by going door to door mowing people’s lawns, it becomes clear that their relationship is part of what perpetuates their situation. Slowly, Nessa tries to break free. McKenzie’s acute sense of the milieu of her native Cape Breton is reflected in both the authenticity of the performances and the film’s assured formal language that captures the marginal space—figurative...
- 3/1/2018
- MUBI
Every week, IndieWire asks a select handful of film critics two questions and publishes the results on Monday. (The answer to the second, “What is the best film in theaters right now?”, can be found at the end of this post.)
This week’s question: “Wonder Woman” and “Black Panther” have helped to reinvigorate the superhero genre as a social and creative force, and the success of those films can be at least partially attributed to their directors. With that in mind, which filmmaker would you most like to see direct a blockbuster superhero movie next, and why?
Max Weiss (@maxthegirl), Baltimore Magazine
I’m firmly in the camp of not wanting my favorite actors or directors to either star in or helm superhero films. (I audibly groaned yesterday when the news surfaced that Joaquin Phoenix was going to be playing The Joker.) Yes, Waititi, Coogler, Jenkins, et al managed...
This week’s question: “Wonder Woman” and “Black Panther” have helped to reinvigorate the superhero genre as a social and creative force, and the success of those films can be at least partially attributed to their directors. With that in mind, which filmmaker would you most like to see direct a blockbuster superhero movie next, and why?
Max Weiss (@maxthegirl), Baltimore Magazine
I’m firmly in the camp of not wanting my favorite actors or directors to either star in or helm superhero films. (I audibly groaned yesterday when the news surfaced that Joaquin Phoenix was going to be playing The Joker.) Yes, Waititi, Coogler, Jenkins, et al managed...
- 2/12/2018
- by David Ehrlich
- Indiewire
Prototype (Blake Williams)The 36th Vancouver Film Festival recently wrapped, and with it, the second year of the Future//Present program, a selection of eight features (and a number of shorts) dedicated to emerging Canadian filmmakers. If the inaugural edition had the task of distinguishing itself from the rest of the festival's True North “stream,” this year's offered the opportunity to cement its relevancy and expand its vision. That's something for which the admirably varied program proved more or less able, albeit with higher highs and lower lows than in 2016, which speaks, at least, to chances being taken (something that can't necessarily be said of the festival's programming in general). Taken on the whole, there are—beyond the uniting sensibility of critic and programmer Adam Cook—filmmaking trends that one could identify, and patterns that one could connect, for better and for worse, to the larger contemporary arthouse scene. But the most successful selections,...
- 10/20/2017
- MUBI
Although there’s no shortage of regional film festivals throughout the year, few — if any — are better curated than the Maryland Film Festival. With a slate organized by Director of Programming Eric Allen Hatch, the downtown Baltimore festival, which takes place from May 3-7, offers the finest in independent and international cinema of the past year, as well as some of our most-anticipated world premieres.
Now in its 19th year, we’re pleased to debut the full line-up for the 6-screen festival, and can exclusively reveal that Brett Haley‘s The Hero (one of our favorite films from Sundance) will be the Closing Night film. World premiering at the festival is Stephen Cone‘s Princess Cyd, his follow-up to one of last year’s finest films, Henry Gamble’s Birthday Party, along with Josh Crockett‘s Dr. Brinks & Dr. Brinks.
We can also exclusively reveal the Opening Night Shorts — 5 short...
Now in its 19th year, we’re pleased to debut the full line-up for the 6-screen festival, and can exclusively reveal that Brett Haley‘s The Hero (one of our favorite films from Sundance) will be the Closing Night film. World premiering at the festival is Stephen Cone‘s Princess Cyd, his follow-up to one of last year’s finest films, Henry Gamble’s Birthday Party, along with Josh Crockett‘s Dr. Brinks & Dr. Brinks.
We can also exclusively reveal the Opening Night Shorts — 5 short...
- 4/21/2017
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
As Donald Trump and Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau met face-to-face at the White House on Monday, Canadian directors in Berlin sounded off on the new U.S. president.
Ashley McKenzie, director of Werewolf, a gritty look at opiod addicts in her native Cape Breton, said Trump was "delusional" after telling a recent roundtable of county sheriffs that building a wall on the Mexican border will end the opiod epidemic in the U.S.
McKenzie, whose film screened in Berlin over the weekend, said ending opiate misuse, overdoses and deaths — including in her hometown due to jobs lost...
Ashley McKenzie, director of Werewolf, a gritty look at opiod addicts in her native Cape Breton, said Trump was "delusional" after telling a recent roundtable of county sheriffs that building a wall on the Mexican border will end the opiod epidemic in the U.S.
McKenzie, whose film screened in Berlin over the weekend, said ending opiate misuse, overdoses and deaths — including in her hometown due to jobs lost...
- 2/13/2017
- by Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Those of us who see Canada as an ideal refuge for the problems currently plaguing America should check out Werewolf, a stark, disquieting portrait of a pair of recovering drug addicts trying to scrape by in the suburban wilderness of Cape Breton Island.
Marking the first feature effort of writer-director Ashley McKenzie, the film is reduced in scope and seems to skirt the line between documentary and fiction, making for a dark study of mutual dependence that’s more about observation than drama. After premiering in Tiff last year, this potent minimalist debut should continue its respectful festival run and find...
Marking the first feature effort of writer-director Ashley McKenzie, the film is reduced in scope and seems to skirt the line between documentary and fiction, making for a dark study of mutual dependence that’s more about observation than drama. After premiering in Tiff last year, this potent minimalist debut should continue its respectful festival run and find...
- 2/10/2017
- by Jordan Mintzer
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
World premieres include Barrage, starring Isabelle Huppert and her daughter Lolita Chammah.Scroll down for full list
This year’s Forum programme at the Berlin Film Festival (Feb 9-19), which highlights avant garde and experimental works, will feature 47 films, including 29 world premieres.
These include the premiere of Laura Schroeder’s Barrage, which stars Isabelle Huppert alongside her daughter Lolita Chammah in the story of a young woman who returns to Luxembourg after a 10-year absence to spend time with her estranged child. Huppert plays the grandmother, who has fostered the young girl during that absence.
Read: ‘Barrage’, starring Isabelle Huppert and daughter Lolita, finds sales home
Having its international premiere at Forum this year will be Golden Exits, the new feature from American filmmaker Alex Ross Perry. His previous credits include Queen Of Earth, which premiered at Berlin in 2015. His latest tells the story of a young Australian woman who comes to New York for a few months...
This year’s Forum programme at the Berlin Film Festival (Feb 9-19), which highlights avant garde and experimental works, will feature 47 films, including 29 world premieres.
These include the premiere of Laura Schroeder’s Barrage, which stars Isabelle Huppert alongside her daughter Lolita Chammah in the story of a young woman who returns to Luxembourg after a 10-year absence to spend time with her estranged child. Huppert plays the grandmother, who has fostered the young girl during that absence.
Read: ‘Barrage’, starring Isabelle Huppert and daughter Lolita, finds sales home
Having its international premiere at Forum this year will be Golden Exits, the new feature from American filmmaker Alex Ross Perry. His previous credits include Queen Of Earth, which premiered at Berlin in 2015. His latest tells the story of a young Australian woman who comes to New York for a few months...
- 1/19/2017
- by tom.grater@screendaily.com (Tom Grater)
- ScreenDaily
The 67th Berlin International Film Festival announced 43 additions to its 2017 roster today, including Alex Ross Perry’s “Golden Exits,” Joshua Z. Weinstein’s “Menashe,” and Amman Abbasi’s “Dayveon,” and rounding out much of the festival’s main line-up.
Read More: Berlinale 2017 Will Premiere ‘Logan,’ ‘Trainspotting: T2,’ and Hong Sangsoo’s Latest
Known for its robust variety of programming, the festival previously announced new films from Aki Kaurismaki, Oren Moverman, Sally Potter, Agnieszka Holland, and Sebastian Lelio. More commercial fare includes the international premiere of Danny Boyle’s “Trainspotting” sequel, and the world premiere of James Mangold’s addition to the Wolverine franchise, “Logan.”
Read More: 5 Exciting Films in the 2017 Berlin Film Festival Competition Lineup
The films of the 47th Forum are:
2 + 2 = 22 [The Alphabet] by Heinz Emigholz, Germany – Wp
Adiós entusiasmo (So Long Enthusiasm) of Vladimir Durán, Argentina / Colombia – Wp
At Elske Pia (Pia Loving) by Daniel Joseph Borgmann, Denmark – Wp...
Read More: Berlinale 2017 Will Premiere ‘Logan,’ ‘Trainspotting: T2,’ and Hong Sangsoo’s Latest
Known for its robust variety of programming, the festival previously announced new films from Aki Kaurismaki, Oren Moverman, Sally Potter, Agnieszka Holland, and Sebastian Lelio. More commercial fare includes the international premiere of Danny Boyle’s “Trainspotting” sequel, and the world premiere of James Mangold’s addition to the Wolverine franchise, “Logan.”
Read More: 5 Exciting Films in the 2017 Berlin Film Festival Competition Lineup
The films of the 47th Forum are:
2 + 2 = 22 [The Alphabet] by Heinz Emigholz, Germany – Wp
Adiós entusiasmo (So Long Enthusiasm) of Vladimir Durán, Argentina / Colombia – Wp
At Elske Pia (Pia Loving) by Daniel Joseph Borgmann, Denmark – Wp...
- 1/18/2017
- by Jude Dry
- Indiewire
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