It’s been one week since wrapping the 46th Telluride Film Festival, which means it’s high time for reviews and fall previews. In the spirit of the festival, let’s kick things off by first looking back. Each year, TFF invites someone … Continue reading Sunday Streams — LATE AUTUMN
With the 46th annual Telluride Film Festival opening next weekend (Aug. 30–Sept. 2), now seems like a fine time to dig into TFF’s past and highlight a few recent masterpieces. Let’s start with 2017’s First Reformed, a movie whose righteous … Continue reading Sunday Streams — FIRST REFORMED
At the first bullfight I ever went to I expected to be horrified and perhaps sickened by what I had been told would happen to the horse.” That’s the line Ernest Hemingway chose to open his 1930 masterwork, Death in … Continue reading Sunday Streams — THE MOMENT OF TRUTH
On August 1, 2019, D(onn) A(lan) Pennebaker, Penny to most, died. He was 94. A true titan of cinema, Pennebaker leaves behind a plethora of work, almost all of it falling under the category of Direct Cinema. His purpose was … Continue reading Sunday Streams — D. A. Pennebaker
Cinematographer Jack Cardiff was born for Technicolor. One of the company’s first technicians, Cardiff mastered the three-strip process in the late-1930s with industrial and instructional films before getting a chance to work as a 2nd unit cameraman on Michael Powell … Continue reading Sunday Streams — 10 from Cardiff
History, by its very nature, is reductive. There’s simply too much to consider, too many players to figure, and too many stories to remember. To the victor go the spoils the saying goes. And when the history of cinema was … Continue reading Sunday Streams — BE NATURAL
Jonathan Gold was one of a kind. He was the “belly of Los Angeles,” LA Weekly‘s Pulitzer Prize-winning restaurant critic, a chronicler of culture, and one of the best writers and thinkers about the great city of Los Angeles. His book Counter Intelligence: Where to Eat in the Real Los Angeles, is a must, as were his weekly appearances on Evan Kleinman’s KCRW show, “Good Food on the Road.” Sadly, Gold died on July 21, 2019, from pancreatic cancer. He was 57. It was a loss, not just to the writing community, but also to those who refuse to think of … Continue reading Sunday Streams — CITY OF GOLD
KCET, an independent and non-commercial Los Angeles TV station, offers stellar programming. From old Huell Howser episodes to the award-winning Lost L.A., KCET does an excellent job of exploring how past fissures inform a fractured present. Their most recent production, Broken Bread, stars L.A. chef Roy Choi (above) in a six-part series that looks at how the people of L.A. are using food to affect social change, and how the city of L.A. is providing food to its citizens. As the title suggests, Broken Bread is not one of those typical documentaries about helping hands and successful models, the kind designed … Continue reading Sunday Streams — BROKEN BREAD
As the decade comes to a close, the mind turns to the best films of the 2010s, and 2013’s Inside Llewyn Davis easily makes the shortlist. A Sisyphean story of a struggling folk musician searching for authenticity in 1961 Greenwich Village would have been enough, but filmmakers Joel & Ethan Coen drag their titular character (played magnificently by Oscar Isaac) across America’s fracturing artistic scene, crossing paths with a bevy of historical figures and mid-century archetypes. The music is outstanding, the performances are pitch perfect, and the cinematography from Bruno Delbonnel is beyond reproach. It’s one for the ages, a … Continue reading Sunday Streams — INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS
I have Varda on the mind. And not just because she passed away earlier this year at the age of 90. Or that I just wrote about one of her best films, Vagabond. Or that the Alamo Drafthouse Sloans Lake’s Femme Club is dedicating their July screenings to the great filmmaker; I have Varda on the mind because few filmmakers have occupied my mental real estate quite like the diminutive Belgian. Her final film, Varda by Agnès, has yet to make it to U.S. theaters, but I still think of her 2106 documentary, Faces Places (Visages Villages) as the perfect swan song. … Continue reading Sunday Streams — FACES PLACES
