FSLC ANNOUNCES ANA VAZ AS THE 2015 KAZUKO TRUST AWARD RECIPIENT

Vaz’s film Occidente is a selection of the Projections section in the 53rd New York Film Festival

The Film Society of Lincoln Center announces Ana Vaz as the 2015 Kazuko Trust Award Recipient. The grant is presented by the Kazuko Trust and the Film Society, in recognition of the  excellence and innovation of an artist’s moving-image work. Vaz’s latest short film, Occidente, will premiere on Friday, October 2 and Saturday, October 3 in Program 3 of this year’s Projections section, running October 2-4 and sponsored by MUBI. Visit filmlinc.org/nyff for more information. 

The Kazuko Trust was established upon the death of Kazuko Oshima, a Patron of the Film Society who loved film, and experimental film most of all. It was her wish to contribute to this area of the film world after her passing, by awarding the Film Society with a $50K grant for the purpose of creating a scholarship fund for worthy experimental filmmakers featured in NYFF's Projections. In addition, a seat in the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center was named in her honor.

In 2012, Laida Lertxundi and Michael Robinson each received $5,000 grants during the Trust’s inaugural year, and in 2013, the committee awarded Dani Leventhal with a $10,000 grant. Last year, Jean-Paul Kelly was given a $10,000 grant. The 2015 committee includes Projections curators Dennis Lim (Director of Programming, Film Society of Lincoln Center), Aily Nash (independent curator), and Gavin Smith (Senior Programmer, FSLC and Editor-in-Chief, Film Comment); Rachael Rakes (Programmer at Large, Film Society of Lincoln Center); and Christopher Stults (Associate Curator, Film/Video, Wexner Center for the Arts). 

Rakes says: “Brazilian artist and filmmaker Ana Vaz combines film and video, ethnography and speculation, precise photography and found footage in her series of short, carefully crafted works. Vaz’s pieces often explore the meeting points between personal and geographic history in the post-colonial sphere, documenting place without the signals of exact physical orientation, but with a heightened sense of memory and time. Her latest work, Occidente, presents a mesmerizing cycle of establishing moments: the outside spaces of sea life, plants, and monuments, and variations on the domestic space of the table—all of which give over to a sense of locality that is at once subjectively knowing and voyeuristic, visually transmitting the scars of the past in the surfaces of the present."

Reflecting on her practice, Vaz says: “The work in itself does not exist, there is no whole or wholesomeness, what exists is a series of gestures, a multiplicity of perspectives, a savage mode of thinking, a history that is not his and that incarnates itself into a patchwork of materials and resources—moving or still, phrased or shot, imprinted or traveling. I want to disorganize, to dissociate through association—to bring things together in order to undo their normative state. A multiple becoming through film or otherwise, an untying of historical thinking and monolithic prose, a becoming that renders narration an art of trickery, of cheating and betraying both sight or sound only to permanently decolonize our modes of thinking.”

Ana Vaz was born in Brazil in 1986. A graduate of the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology and Le Fresnoy - Studio National des Arts Contemporains, she was also a member of SPEAP (an experimental Art and Politics research group), a project conceived and directed by Bruno Latour. Her films have screened at a number of international film festivals including the New York Film Festival (as part of Views from the Avant-Garde, Toronto (Wavelengths), Visions du Réel, Media City, Ann Arbor, Images, Videobrasil, Buenos Aires Biennial of Moving Image, Premiers Plans, Melbourne International Film Festival, as well as solo and group shows at Rosa Brux (Brussels), Museum of the Republic (Brazil), Museum of Contemporary Photography (Chicago), Jeune Création (Paris), and Temporary Gallery (Cologne). In 2015, she was awarded the Grand Prize for the international competition at Media City Film Festival as well as the Main Prize at Fronteira International Documentary & Experimental Film Festival for Occidente. Ana currently lives in Paris where she is developing a medium-length film with the aid of the CNAP (Centre National des Arts Plastiques) and will be a resident at Triangle Association (NYC) in Spring 2016. Her films are distributed by Light Cone.

Tickets for Projections are $15 for General Public; $10 for Members & Students, and a $99 Projections All Access Pass will also be available for purchase. Visit filmlinc.org/NYFF for more information. Additional NYFF special events, documentary section, and filmmaker conversations and panels will be announced in subsequent days and weeks.

The 17-day New York Film Festival highlights the best in world cinema, featuring top films from celebrated filmmakers as well as fresh new talent. The selection committee, chaired by Kent Jones, also includes Dennis Lim, FSLC Director of Programming; Marian Masone, FSLC Senior Programming Advisor; Gavin Smith, Editor-in-Chief, Film Comment; and Amy Taubin, Contributing Editor, Film Comment and Sight & Sound. 

Tickets for the 53rd New York Film Festival went on sale to Film Society patrons at the end of August, ahead of the general public. Learn more about the patron program at filmlinc.org/patrons. Becoming a Film Society Member offers the exclusive member ticket discount to the New York Film Festival and Film Society programming year-round plus other great benefits. Current members at the Film Buff Level or above enjoy early ticket access to NYFF screenings and events ahead of the general public. Learn more at filmlinc.org/membership.

For even more access, VIP Passes offer buyers the earliest opportunity to purchase tickets and secure seats at the festival’s biggest events including Opening, Centerpiece, and Closing Nights. VIP passes also provide access to many exciting events including the invitation-only Opening Night party, “ An Evening With…” Dinner, Filmmaker Brunch, and VIP Lounge. Benefits vary based on the pass type.

For more information about purchasing VIP Passes, go to filmlinc.org/NYFF or contact patrons@filmlinc.org.

For more information, visit: www.filmlinc.org

Elijah Wood Contaminates in “Cooties” (2/4)

If you've ever had a fear that one day all the little prepubescent children eating chicken nuggets during lunch would suddenly turn on you, then Cooties shows you all the best places to hide in order to survive. Elijah Wood, who stars and co-produces the movie, plays substitute teacher, Clint Hadson, who returns to his hometown of Port Chicken, a quaint suburb in Illinois to clear his mind in efforts of writing a novel. He chooses the wrong day to fill-in, because an odd virus hits the children and turns them into flesh-eating zombies. For the duration of the day, Mr. Hadson and the rest of the teachers spend their time trying to stay alive. Elijah Wood is backed by his quirky team of zombie-fighting teachers played by, Allison Pill, Rainn, Leigh Whannel, Wilson, Jack McBrayer, and Nasim Pedra.

It's no secret that one-liners saved the movie. With a film almost so outrageous, you almost get the sense that part of the comedy was to produce it as an extremely bad movie almost too painful to watch. This isn't to say there weren't parts that make you giggle, but confusion may be the underlying emotion when watching Cooties. Almost nothing made sense, but in a weird way, that's where most of the entertainment came in. There is no way that one could predict what would happen in even the next scene.

Elijah joins forces with Saw co-creator, Leigh Whannell, and Ian Brennan of Glee, to write a witty yet disordered film.

With gruesome fighting scenes and rather profane children that could constitute as delinquent,  Cooties, makes for a surprising and fun watch, but more so the movie you watch when you have nothing else to do.

Rating 2/4 stars

ACME FILMWORKS TO PRESENT “THE 17TH ANNUAL ANIMATION SHOW OF SHOWS” IN THEATERS This Sep!

http://blogs.indiewire.com/animationscoop/

• 11 Award-Winning Acclaimed Animated Shorts From Around the World Are Highlighted In Theatrical Showcase Nationally Beginning September 24, 2015!

• First-Ever Theatrical Release for the Annual Animation Show of Shows Curated and Produced by Ron Diamond

For 16 years, The Animation Show of Shows was created, curated and presented by veteran animation producer Ron Diamond (whose producing credits include The International Tournée of Animation) to introduce new and innovative short animation films exclusively to studios, societies, schools, and festivals around the world.  Over the years, 29 of the films showcased in previous Animation Show of Shows went on to receive Academy Award® nominations with nine winning the Oscar® for best Animated Short Film.

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THE 17TH ANNUAL ANIMATION SHOW OF SHOWS -  is Diamond’s vision to heighten the exposure for this extraordinary art form and entertainment platform and to allow audiences to experience these in a theatrical environment with others that share the same passion for animation.

THE 17th ANNUAL ANIMATION SHOW OF SHOWS will be distributed theatrically this fall by the Animation Show of Shows (a non-profit group) across the US.  This extraordinary program of 11 films is created by animators from Australia, France, Ireland, the US, Russia, Switzerland, and Iran, including 7 women directors or co-directors, and many of which have garnered awards from distinguished festivals worldwide. Program highlights include Russian Animator Konstantin Bronzit’s  We Can’t Live Without the Cosmos, winner of 40 festival awards worldwide, including top prizes at Annecy and Animafest Zagreb.  Also included, is Academy Award® nominated director Don Hertzfeldt’s newest film, World of Tomorrow , which has garnered over 20 awards this year including grand jury prizes at Sundance and SXSW.  This will be the first theatrical release of this annual program, finally sharing these animation talents with a wider audience.

“It has been a personal goal of mine to bring these amazing films to a larger audience and in theaters,” said Diamond.  “ Normally, it’s just the animation studios, Academy members and a festival goers who get to experience these films on the big screen.  And through this showcase many more animation and short film lovers will be able to see these gems as they should be.  This is a very exciting time for animation film and technology, and this program features many different styles, animation techniques and stories. From LGBT themes to environmental tales to personal stories, this Show of Shows offers something for everyone.”

Acme Filmworks Presents THE 17TH ANNUAL ANIMATION SHOW OF SHOWS features the following films:

• THE STORY OF PERCIVAL PITS, created by Janette Goodey & John Lewis, Australia
• TANT DE FORETS, created by Geoffrey Godet & Burcu Sankur, France
• SNOWFALL, directed by Conor Whelan, Ireland
• BALLAD OF HOLLAND ISLAND HOUSE, created by Lynn Tomlinson, USA
• BEHIND THE TREES, created by Amanda Palmer and Avi Ofer, USA
• WE CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT THE COSMOS,  created by Konstantin Bronzit, Russia
• MESSAGES DANS L’AIR, created by Isabel Favez, France/Switzerland
• STRIPY, Written and directed by Babak Nekooei & Behnoud Nekooei, Iran
• ASCENSION written and directed by Thomas Bourdis, Martin de Coudenhove, Caroline Domergue, Colin Laubry, Florian Laubry, France
• IN THE TIME OF MARCH MADNESS,  directed by Melissa Johnson and Robertino Zambrano, USA
• WORLD OF TOMORROW, directed by Don Hertzfeldt, USA

For more information, please visit: www.animationshowofshows.com.

SPECIAL EVENT! OTTO PREMINGER’S New 4K Restoration Sunday, September 20

Otto Preminger’s BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING (1965), starring Carol Lynley, Keir Dullea, and British stage icons Laurence Olivier and Noël Coward, will be shown in a special screening at Film Forum on Sunday, September 20 at 5:30 pm. Co-star Keir Dullea will appear in person to introduce the film and for an after-movie audience Q&A, moderated by film historian Foster Hirsch, author of Otto Preminger: The Man Who Would Be King.

Carol Lynley’s suspenseful search for her missing daughter — but does she exist? — is aided by doubting brother Keir Dullea (2001: A Space Odyssey) and inspector Laurence Olivier. London location shooting and a memorable study-in-perversion cameo by Noël Coward — and The Zombies!

Mr. Hirsch has called BUNNY LAKE “a shimmering post-Noir Film Noir and the last fully assured work of Preminger’s career... a rare display indulging himself in rococo virtuosity.”

BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING will be shown in a stunning new 4K restoration, supervised by Sony Pictures’ Grover Crisp.

"The cast alone is worth the price of admission."
— Leslie Halliwell

Repertory calendar programmed by Bruce Goldstein 

For more information, links and showtimes, visit www.filmforum.org