Movies

"On the Road" director Walter Salles talks about filming an "unfilmable" novel

By Jim Brunzell III, The Optimistic Pessimist

Since its release in 1957, Jack Kerouac’s “Beat Generation” semi-autobiographical novel On the Road has become an American literary classic. It is also one of those rare novels that seemed untouchable for years to turn into a feature film, documentary, mini-series, television series, or any medium where it could be viewed on either a big theater screen or a big-screen television.

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"Life of Pi" leaves you thinking

By Derek Anderson, Tuesday Movie Men

When you survive a shipwreck, your main concerns are most likely to be staying afloat, drinking clean water, and keeping your hunger at bay.

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Tuesday Movie Men

Walker Art Center pays homage to darkly funny auteur Noah Baumbach with a Regis Retrospective and Dialogue

By Jim Brunzell III, The Optimistic Pessimist

“Come on…be romantically self-destructive with me.”

This quote comes from Kicking and Screaming, Academy-Award-nominated writer/director Noah Baumbach’s 1995 debut feature about a group of college students facing life after graduation, dealing with ongoing and hazardous relationships, finding a purpose in the real world, and facing personal crises. This quote could also represent four other Baumbach films screening at the Walker Art Center, as part of the Regis Dialogue and Retrospective Noah Baumbach: Visibly Human. The retrospective kicks off with Kicking and Screaming, on Friday, March 15 and runs through Friday, April 5 with Baumbach and Village Voice chief film critic Scott Foundas, discussing Baumbach’s 18-year career as a screenwriter and director.

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Understanding Arab culture through film: Mizna Arab Film Festival runs March 13-17

By Ed Felien, Southside Pride

Films from Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Algeria, Morocco, and Palestine, among other countries, will make up the Eighth Annual Mizna Arab Film Festival. The Festival runs March 14-17, 2013 at the Heights Theatre at 3951 Central Ave. NE and opens at Walker Art Center, March 13 with “OK, Enough, Goodbye,” a film about a single man whose mother eventually moves out. Variety calls it “humorous, melancholy, sardonic and wistful.”

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2013 Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival announces a winning lineup

By Jim Brunzell III, The Optimistic Pessimist

The Angel's Share

This week The Film Society of Minneapolis/St. Paul made its first big announcement about the upcoming Minneapolis/St. Paul International Film Festival (MSPIFF), which opens Thursday, April 11 and runs through Sunday, April 28, 2013, at St. Anthony Main. One of the biggest cultural events in the Midwest, MSPIFF will screen over 200 international, American independent feature length and short films, narratives and documentaries representing over 60 countries.

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Native filmmaker Missy Whiteman takes spiritual message from Minnesota to SXSW

By Lu Lippold, TC Daily Planet

Courtesy Independent Indigenous Film & Media

If you watched the Academy Awards recently, you may think that pretty much all movies are made by white men. Not true. Movies are also made by non-white women, including one whose name is…Whiteman.

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My martenitza: A story of hope in Bulgaria

By Sarah Routman, TC Jewfolk

It’s March 1st today. Until 1998, when I made my first trip to Bulgaria, March 1st didn’t mean very much. Today, however, March 1st, 2013, some 15 year later, I will share my discovery of what March 1st means to me all over the University of Minnesota campus. I will do it with Hillel students as we give martenitzas to anyone who will take them.

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TC Jewfolk
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