Earlier this year, writer-director Ira Sachs brought the terrific Little Men to IFFBoston. After a screening at the Coolidge Corner Theatre, one of our most eloquent filmmakers discussed his intimate approach to storytelling, an unused ending and the remarkable performances from young stars Theo Taplitz and Michael Barbieri. Here are some edited highlights from the Q&A:
“I like the idea that you can subvert that initial judgement and impression, and you can get to know people and fall in love with them and see their humanity. The idea I could do that with these three women in this film was exciting to me. The world is hungry for real women. Not movie women. We are complex people, and that needs to be shown.” – Boston Reel, 07/27/2016
Last week the good folks at IFFBoston’s Screening Series brought writer-director Jeremy Saulnier to the Coolidge Corner Theatre for an early peek at Green Room, his new white-knuckle thriller about a punk gig gone horrifically awry. After the show, the Blue Ruin filmmaker took questions from a rattled crowd. Here are some edited highlights of the conversation:
Legendary director Werner Herzog unveiled his latest documentary, Lo And Behold, Reveries Of The Connected World, at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. After an introduction explaining that he didn’t make his first phone call until the age of seventeen, the filmmaker returned for a wide-ranging and often hilarious Q&A. Here are some edited highlights:
“When we were young we had a place called The Blue Mouse. That’s where we saw Harold And Maude and The Tin Drum. I don’t know how they even got The Tin Drum into Utah in the first place. I mean, at least here you can watch things like that at The Brattle surrounded by like-minded people. But imagine being in Salt Lake? Heads were exploding!” – WBUR’s The ARTery, 11/12/2015
“When we review films, it’s very easy to subscribe to the auteur theory. But what you find is that there are hundreds of decisions that go into making a film. If you’re lucky, there are also hundreds of people making a film. To attribute the cause and effect to any single human being now strikes me as inaccurate at best, misleading at worst.” – Movie Mezzanine, 04/20/2015
Legendary director William Friedkin spent last weekend at the Harvard Film Archive.
“It’s about this very abusive character, and I think people just felt abused at the end. They felt yelled at and made fun of, and people around the movie had a hard time separating the fiction and the character in the movie from reality. So it all got mixed up, and in some ways that was the film’s greatest achievement.” – The Improper Bostonian, 04/24/2013
“We didn’t have a script. We didn’t know what it was. You don’t know where you fit into this. And it was about learning to let go. You know what I mean? For better or for worse, you throw out everything you know and just jump off the thing and see what happens. There are things I love about the movie, and there are things I still don’t understand.” – BOFCA, 04/09/2013
SPLICED PERSONALITY 