It's time for the French Film Festival!

As the 24th VCU French Film Festival gets underway, I thought you might want to know a bit about the history and impact it has had on the community and world stage.  What began as a labor of love by Drs. Peter and Francoise Kirkpatrick (who were rewarded for their efforts with the title “Chevaliers de L’ordre des Artes et des Lettres,” bestowed upon them by the French Ambassador here in 2004) has grown into the one of the most important film festivals in the world and is considered to be the largest French film festival in the United States, having welcomed over 400 directors, producers, actors, film scholars, critics, and French government officials to attend since its inception.

Though it began near VCU with a small selection of five films which all had U.S. releases, it quickly expanded and transferred to the Byrd, where it has been held since 1996.  The majority of subsequent programming has never been released stateside, so those lucky enough to attend are the only U.S. viewers, except for possibly attendees to other film festivals throughout the country.  This year’s program contains an astounding 15 features, 3 documentaries and 16 short films over the four- day period, including 3 restored silents by legendary directors Gaston Breteau and Georges Melias.  Four master classes will be given as well as a free lead-in to the Thursday start:  a rare showing of the landmark Out 1, a twelve-and-a-half hour film which will be shown over three nights beginning March 28^th at the Grace Street Theatre where it all started back in 1993.  

Other highlights include La Loi du Marche, which has won both Cannes and Cesar (French Oscar) awards for star Vincent Lindon, two films starring Josiane Balasko, a major French actor, director and writer (and mainstay of the Festival, having been represented by 13 of her films, beginning with the very first festival) and the latest installment of the Belle and Sebastian series (The Current Adventures), which features rising star Felix Bossuet and is based on characters created by the popular children’s author Cecile Aubrey.  The latter two actors will be attending the festival and doing question-and-answer sessions after their respective screenings.

Luckily for RPL patrons, there are several past Festival selections currently available in our DVD collection.  My favorite drama of all those I have seen is Claude Miller’s (the Honorary Godfather of the Festival who passed away in 2012) Un Secret /A Secret (2008) and my favorite comedy is Le Prenom/What’s in a Name? (2013), which was adapted from the successful Parisian stage comedy.  The co-writers (also co-directors of the film) were both in attendance and noted that the Richmond audience was the first to see it in the United States.  (It later received a limited release in New York and Los Angeles.)  Other notable selections include The Hedgehog, adapted from the Muriel Barbery novel The Elegance of the Hedgehog and starring Ms. Balasko, Gemma Bovery (a selection from last year’s festival), Pour une Femme (For a Woman), Renoir and the extraordinary documentary Oceans, the latter of which can be watched in an English-dubbed format narrated Pierce Brosnan!

Thanks to Robert for the post this week!

Director's Cut: 5 films to inspire you from the Filmmakers Collaborative

Recently I spoke with James Couche of the Richmond Filmmakers Collaborative, who hold their monthly meetings at the Main Library and recently showcased their films here during the First Friday Filmfest. If you missed the Filmfest definitely keep an eye out for the next one. We laughed, we cried, we learned about indie film making and we watched some terrific short films created by local talent. James has shared with us this list of inspiring books and films for movie lovers and would be film makers:

If you want to see what you can do with few resources, watch El Mariachi, and be sure to listen to the commentary. The director basically funded it by selling his body to science.

El Mariachi (1992) is Robert Rodriguez's first full-length film.
"He didn't come looking for trouble, but trouble came looking for him."

Rodriguez did raise $3000 of the film's total budget of $7000 by testing a cholestorol lowering drug for a pharmaceutical company. No official word on how his HDL is doing. He did however get a lot of writing done while serving as a test subject.

To see the realities of film making, and the dedication required for the craft James suggests American Movie.

American Movie (1999) is a documentary by Chris Smith about Mark Borchardt, an aspiring filmmaker struggling to find the money to finish a horror film he started years before.

To run away screaming from film making James recommends Hearts of Darkness.

Hearts of Darkness (1991) is a documentary about the nightmarish experience of making Francis Ford Coppola's celebrated 1979 film, Apocalypse Now.

For something uplifting, James recommends Primer, the critically-acclaimed sci-fi thriller made for just $6,000.

Primer (2004) is about four engineers who build a time machine in their spare time.

For an example of success, James says to check out Following, Christopher Nolan's first film. (You may remember Christopher Nolan from such little known films as The Dark Knight, Inception, Interstellar, and The Prestige.)

Made for 6,000 pounds, the indie thriller Following was shot on the weekends to accommodate the cast and crew's full time jobs.

For a riveting read about working with difficult directors James recommends you check out The Disaster Artist by Greg Sestero, a tell-all by one of the stars of The Room", the "greatest bad movie ever made".

(Then go watch The Room. It's spectacularly awful and you won't regret it.)

How to Stay in Twin Peaks: Go to the Library

Last week, Natalie mentioned the "dreamlike, earnest young people" and "seemingly ordinary settings" in the work of filmmaker David Lynch, just in time for Richmond's very own Twin Peaks festival, The Great Southern. The festival, organized by Movie Club Richmond, the Video Fan, and Makeout Creek Books, celebrates David Lynch's first foray into television, Twin Peaks, a serial drama that burst into pop culture in 1990 and has only grown in popularity since, its mysteries deepening in the minds of fans new and old.

Set in a small town in Washington state, Twin Peaks centers ostensibly on the murder of teenage Laura Palmer but spirals out to explore teen-dom in general, Americana, the perks and perils of the unconscious, and the nature of evil. Beginning last night in Carytown and ending late Sunday, The Great Southern will move across seemingly ordinary Richmond with performances, visits from actors and authors, a midnight screening, a costume party, and more. If you find yourself still hankering for Twin Peaks after the festival, or just want to whet your appetite for the first time, simply walk into the library and have the reference librarian point you in the direction of these topics:

 

Peyton Place

First a novel, and then a film, and then even a few television series, Peyton Place aims, like Twin Peaks, to reveal the lives of those who live in small town U.S.A., up to and including the things that no one likes to talk about. Lynch screened the 1957 film Peyton Place for his co-creator Mark Frost in the early development of Twin Peaks. It is a natural touchstone for any piece of pop culture that deals with small town life, and informs the sense of Twin Peaks as soap opera. It also starred Russ Tamblyn, later featured in Twin Peaks.

 

 

Film Noir

Lynch and Frost did not look only at depictions of suburban America before making Twin Peaks. The ultra-urban aesthetic of film noir heavily influenced the show. In many ways Twin Peaks is a soap opera film noir, or a film noir soap opera, or both. Coined by French critics, "film noir" refers traditionally to Hollywood crime films made just before and after the second World War. The films, like Double Indemnity and The Maltese Falcon, portray a fatalistic, morally ambiguous reality. And as in Twin Peaks, little elements in the film--objects, types of characters--are repeated until they take on a meaning and a grammar all their own.

Surrealism and Dreams

Juxtaposing the tropes of urban film noir with suburban America would be a classically surrealist move, and Lynch is often referred to as a surrealist. In surrealist works of art, the rational mind is downplayed in favor or unexpected connections and bizarre twists. There is a logic to surrealist art, but it's a dream logic. In Twin Peaks, Special Agent Dale Cooper looks especially to dreams to help him solve his cases. Look for Andre Breton's Surrealist Manifesto for background and check out a few dream dictionaries to see if your unconscious has been planting clues.

Reading Lincoln

Richmond is excited about the November 16th opening of Stephen Spielberg’s biopic Lincoln, directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Daniel Day Lewis.  For 53 days last fall, Lincoln-sightings titillated Richmond and Petersburg, and the filming contributed millions to the local economy. For a lucky few, tonight’s two back-to-back invitation-only screenings at the Byrd Theatre in Carytown will bring some of Hollywood’s glamour to Richmond.  The movie’s wide release next week promises to nurture and renew our enthusiasm for its subject.

Lincoln was based in part on Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. Goodwin’s book explored a facet of Lincoln’s presidency of particular relevance in the wake of 2012’s polarized election: how he was able to convince his three rivals for the Republican nomination -- Salmon Chase, William Seward, and Edward Bates --  to join his Cabinet and unite for a common cause.  In 1862, he appointed his former professional rival William Stanton as Secretary of War, who became perhaps his greatest admirer. Goodwin's focus on the relationships between the men and Lincoln’s deft and insightful management of a brilliant but fractious “team of rivals” attracted Spielberg’s cinematic attentions and formed the basis for his dramatic recreation of Lincoln’s last four months.


But let’s not forget the wealth of other Lincoln biographies available.  A partial list, compiled from various sources, appears below.

Best Books About Abraham Lincoln

* available @RPL

Selected by Michael Burlingame,  history professor at the University of Illinois-Springfield and the author of "Abraham Lincoln: A Life" and "The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln.
for the Wall Street Journal 2/13/10   http://online.wsj.com

* Douglas L. Wilson’s Honor's Voice (1998) a “comprehensive view of Lincoln's path to maturity”

* Kenneth J. Winkle’s The Young Eagle: The Rise of Abraham Lincoln (2001) “a strikingly original study that locates Lincoln in the context of his time and place”

* Joshua Wolf Shenk’s Lincoln's Melancholy (2005) “how Lincoln's tendency to depression helped shape his character”

*Jennifer Fleischner’s Mrs. Lincoln and Mrs. Keckly (2003) a dual biography of Mary Todd Lincoln and her dressmaker, a former slave

*William H. Herndon’s Lincoln (originally 1889) “classic work by Lincoln's law partner, . . . the most influential biography of Lincoln ever written”

Selected by Allen C. Guelzo, Lincoln scholar and the Henry R. Luce III Professor of the Civil War Era at Gettysburg College                   www.jackmillercenter.org

* Benjamin P. Thomas’s Abraham Lincoln (1952) “the best and most-readable of all single-volume Lincoln biographies”

Michael Burlingame’s The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln (1994) “for those who want to probe more deeply into the ‘private’ Lincoln”

Mark E. Steiner’s An Honest Calling: The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln (2007) “an easily-understood overview of the various facets of Lincoln’s law practice”

* Kenneth J. Winkle’s The Young Eagle: The Rise of Abraham Lincoln (2001). “. . . the ‘social history’ of Abraham Lincoln . . .[his] social milieu in Illinois, his friends, his associates . . . in the decades before the Civil War”

Harry V. Jaffa in Crisis of the House Divided: An Interpretation of the Issues in the Lincoln-Douglas Debates (1959). a “magisterial treatment of the great debates [that] shows Lincoln in his greatest moment”

Selected by the readers of GoodReads                                        www.GoodReads.com

*Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln (2005)

*David Herbert Donald’s Lincoln (1995)

*James L. Swanson’s Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer (2006)

*Carl Sandburg’s Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years & the War Years (originally 1954)

*Gore Vidal’s Lincoln (1984)

Pray the Devil Back to Hell

Please join us at 1 pm on Saturday, May 5th at the Main Library as Mothers' Awakening presents the film, Pray the Devil Back to Hell. This is a powerful story about courageous Liberian women who came together to end a bloody civil war and bring peace to their shattered country. This screening will be free and open to all.
Pray the Devil Back to Hell is part of a groundbreaking special series WOMEN, WAR & PEACE, which aired in 2011 on PBS in the US. Plans for a worldwide global outreach campaign is underway.

SCI-FI DOUBLE FEATURE

As part of the 19th James River Festival,  Mike Jones, a filmographer, will be bringing double feature films to the Main Library on Friday, April 13 at 12 pm.
The first film, Futuropolis is an outer space adventure that uses the animation process known as pixilation.

                                                            
The second film, Mark of the Damned is a sci-fi/horror film directed by Eric Miller.

This will be the opportunity for you to meet the actor of Futuropolis, Tom Campagnoli and the director of Mark of the Damned, Eric Miller. They will be available to answer questions.

If you like sci-fi films, this is for you!

The program is FREE and open to teens and adults. It will be held in basement auditorium at the Main Library.