Green
Sophia Takal’s Green delves into the lives of a young urban intellectual couple from New York. Sebastian (Lawrence Michael Levine) and his girlfriend, Genevieve (Kate Lynn Sheil), retreat into the country, presumably somewhere down south, for an extended period. Sebastian is a writer, whose project is improbably about sustainable farming, while Genevieve has tagged along […]
Martha Marcy May Marlene
The fragility of the human psyche seems especially pertinent at this particular moment, as evidenced by recent zeitgeist films such as Jeff Nichols’s Take Shelter and Miranda July’s The Future. Sean Durkin suggests in an interview: “I guess I’m most afraid of conforming. Groups that conform in a blind way without understanding what’s happening to […]
Words & Images: Screenwriting Conference
For the past several years, I've presented papers at the annual conference of the International Screenwriting Network. It's an exciting event, and one I look forward to each year. Noted film scholar David Bordwell gave a keynote address at the recent conference in Brussels this past September, which also featured Jean-Claude Carrière. On his popular […]
The Future
The idea that things in the world are not quite right seems to be pervasive these days. Economic recessions and global crises will do that, but something much deeper appears to be at work. Jeff Nichols’s new film Take Shelter takes most people’s anxieties about health insurance, job loss, and climate change and turns them […]
Bad Fever
Dustin Guy Defa’s debut feature Bad Fever, set in the director’s home town of Salt Lake City, presents a fascinating study of contrasting characters: Eddie, a lonely misfit living under the thumb of his mother, and Irene (Eléanore Hendricks), a harsh street hustler, with whom he gets involved. Eddie is a wannabe stand-up comic, who’s […]
Putty Hill
After financing fell through on a scripted feature about teenage metal heads in Baltimore, entitled Metal Gods, Matthew Porterfield put together a five-page treatment based on people and locations he discovered while developing it. Shot guerrilla-style in 12 days, the result turned out to be Putty Hill. Porterfield’s semi-improvised second feature mixes a simple fictional […]
Beautiful Darling
[Photo by Anton Perich]Candy Darling (1944-1974) was a later Warhol superstar from the period after the Pop artist was shot by Valerie Solanas and became the producer of Paul Morrissey’s films. Born James L. Slattery, Candy appeared in Flesh (1968-69) and starred in Women in Revolt (1971), Morrissey’s satire of the women’s liberation movement – […]
Best Independent Films of 2010
I’ve posted my "best film" list for the past three years now in February rather than December like other critics and bloggers. The reason is simple. Because I’m based in the Midwest, I always want to be sure I’ve seen all the major indie films that might be worthy of consideration. As I keep complaining, […]