The Fun Starts Here Who would have thought that the funniest moments at the Toronto International Film Festival would revolve around climate change and activism? Ten years ago, the message-delivering pranksters, the Yes Men, first spread their alarming messages in their eponymous documentary. Instead of staging street protests, they pull off media stunts to the […]
Directed by John Bruno, Andrew Wight, and Ray Quint Produced by Wight and Brett Popplewell Released by National Geographic Entertainment USA. 90 min. Rated PG People often grow up fantasizing about outer space and/or the Earth’s oceans, the two great canvasses available for boundless possibility and discovery. James Cameron is at the far end of the […]
Directed by Kelly Reichardt Produced by Neil Kopp, Anish Savjani, Chris Maybach, Saemi Kim, Rodrigo Teixeira Written by Jon Raymond & Kelly Reichardt Released by Cinedigm Entertainment USA. 112 min. Rated R With Jesse Eisenberg, Dakota Fanning, Peter Sarsgaard, Alia Shawkat, Logan Miller, Kai Lennox, Katherine Waterston, James Le Gros What’s to be done to […]
Written, Directed, & Produced by Atsushi Funahashi Produced by Yoshiko Funahashi & Hashimoto. Released by First Run Features Release Japanese with English subtitles Japan. 96 min. Not rated Films that focus on the aftermath of a catastrophic disaster, be it natural, man-made or otherwise, tend to follow similar structures in their narratives. Blame is widely […]
Director of Photography/Directed by Kalyanee Mam Produced by Mam & Ratanak Leng Released by Migrant Films Cambodia/USA. 83 min. Not rated Filmmaker Kalyanee Mam (director of photography for the Oscar-winning documentary Inside Job) returns to her native Cambodia for a story of globalization and its impact on people and nature. She introduces viewers to three […]
Directed by Gabriela Cowperwaithe Produced by Manuel V. Oteyza & Cowperwaithe Written by Cowperwaithe & Eli Despres Released by Magnolia Pictures USA. 83 min. Rated PG-13 Blackfish is most engrossing when it offers an alarming CSI-type forensic analysis into the 2010 death of whale trainer Dawn Brancheau at SeaWorld Orlando, by tracing the background of […]
Written & Directed by Markus Imhoof Produced by Thomas Kufus, Helmut Grasser, Pierre-Alan Meier & Imhoof Released by Kino Lorber Germany/Austria/Switzerland. 91 min. Not rated English, German, Swiss-German & Mandarin with English subtitles More Than Honey, a delectable nature documentary of the secret life of bees, is also a philosophical rumination on the past, present, […]
Some of Tribeca Film Festival’s lesser-known documentaries and fiction films were the strongest I’d seen in the program. There were certainly standouts, films that had what seemed like impossible footage of an event—Alias Ruby Blade shares secrets firsthand from within the heart of a country’s rebellion—or feature films that explore familiar territory with nuance and […]
Produced & Directed by Beth Gage & George Gage Written by Beth Gage Released by First Run Features USA. 73 min. Not rated Listening to the passionate and eloquent message of Tim DeChristopher, I was reminded of the famous Unitarian minister William Ellery Channing. A transcendentalist, Channing preached about man’s innate goodness and his ability to […]