Summer Festivals
Los Angeles is not known for its film festivals. There are no Golden Bears, Silver Lions or Palme D’ors awarded to obscure auteurs whose careers rise and fall on a handful of impossible-to-get-into screenings presided over by the cinematic elite. There are no A-List celebrities conducting full press Q&As.
Sacred Spaces – Film Theaters as Church and Commerce
Los Angeles is the film production capital of the world, but it’s also a great place to see those films. Just as the term “Hollywood movie” can contain an almost endless variety of meanings, the act of theater-going in the “film colony” can range from enlightening to exasperating. A repertory screening of the original 1972 “The Mechanic” and a multiplex engagement with its 2011, Jason Statham starring progeny, help illustrate this idea.
KABOOM, ENTER THE VOID Director’s Cut, VISIONS OF THE SOUTH, and the OSCAR Snorefest
So, the 83rd annual Academy Awards happened. I think. The effort to revitalize the franchise for the “young and hip” demographic failed miserably. Twitter was abuzz with grand pronouncements of “most boring Oscars ever.” The historically-inaccurate THE KING’S SPEECH robbed the historically-inaccurate THE SOCIAL NETWORK of all the highest honors. The most entertaining part of [...]
Youngblood on Film: Kurosawa Centennial at the Belcourt Part 2
The Kurosawa Centennial continues at the Belcourt Theatre in Nashville, Tennessee. Here’s the second part of my preview of the retrospective. (Part one here.)
Youngblood on Film: Interview with Belcourt Programming Director Toby Leonard
Nashville’s Belcourt Theatre has lived a long and fruitful life, first opening in 1925 as the silent movie house The Hillsboro Theatre. Since then, the Belcourt has housed the Grand Ole Opry, The Children’s Theatre of Nashville, the Nashville Community Playhouse, and the Belcourt Cinema. In 1999, the theatre was forced to close, and a [...]
Belcourt Screenwriter Membership Up for Grabs
If ya haven’t listened to this week’s podcast: TFT 104 – EVERYBODY’S FINE / PAPER HEART you may not know that the fine folks at that great repertory cinema The Belcourt Theatre here in Nashville, are offering an absurdly wonderful gift to a new ‘The Film Talk’ Member this week, (it could be you!). As [...]
Escapism Preview #2: Dr Strangelove, Superman, The Black Hole, Planet of the Apes
The Escapism Festival begins tonight and runs til late on Sunday evening – Jett and I are ensconced and ready for the show. One sentence previews follow: hope you’ll be with us in spirit if not body; and we’ll podcast next week about whether or not the experience renewed Jett’s love of the movies, or [...]
Tarkovsky: Maybe Our Favourite Director
Jett: ‘If there were one film to take to a desert island and the only one I could see for the rest of my life, it would be ‘Andrei Rublev’. It’s an astonishing, engrossing film that feels like it was shot in the time it was set. In the 14th century.’ Gareth: ‘I probably haven’t [...]
Cinematic Shrines: Queen's Film Theatre
You know, Dear Listener, that The Film Talk is striving for something rare: to be a truly international cinema podcast. Your genial co-hosts Jett & Gareth are men of the world, widely travelled, for whom it would not be an overstatement to assert the core truth of country music: wherever they lay their hats, that’s [...]
Google Street View, Visiting the Old UC Theatre in Berkeley
Google has unveiled a new feature called Street View, which lets you navigate the streets of a town via photographic interface. My first thought was to visit the UC Theatre in Berkeley, California. My love for movies was born at the UC. Every day – every single friggin day! – when I was was growing [...]
