SFIFF51—Michael Hawley Previews The Lineup
Posted by Michael Guillen at 10:02am.
Posted in Film News , Documentary, Comedy, Drama, Horror, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Middle East, Africa, Mexico & South America, Asia, Continental Europe & Russia, USA & Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia & New Zealand, Random Festival News.
Citing last year’s 50th anniversary festival as a “fantastic benchmark” and “a gateway to a brighter future,” SF Film Society Executive Director Graham Legatt and his programming team revealed this year’s equally impressive line-up at a press conference last week. In a recent Evening Class write-up, I summarized all the special events that had been announced prior to the press conference, to which we can now add the following:
* Errol Morris will receive this year’s Persistence of Vision Award, with an on-stage interview and a screening of his latest work, Standard Operating Procedure.
* The Maurice Kanbar Award for screenwriting will go to Robert Towne, who will be interviewed on stage by Eddie Muller prior to a screening of Shampoo.
* This year’s State of Cinema Address will be given by Kevin Kelly, founding executive editor of Wired magazine and former editor/publisher of the Whole Earth Catalog.
* Rose McGowen and Jason Lee are to be the recipients of this year’s (2nd annual) Midnight Awards, presented to an actor and actress “entering the prime of their careers.”
That same pre-press conference write-up contained the Cinema by the Bay and Castro Theater roster of films. We now know what the other 80-plus programs worth of narrative and documentary features will be, and it’s quite something—full of movies I’d been hoping the festival would bring our way. I’ve had a week to digest the line-up and now offer this overview of what I personally find exciting about SFIFF51.
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In her first feature film
Launched in 2006 and supported by the European Union, the Caravan of Euro-Arab Cinema sponsored a series of cinematic events (aptly named “Caravan Nights") in various European and Mediterranean cities earlier this year. Focusing on Lebanese cinema, Caravan Nights presented 11 films produced between 2000 and 2006, representing established directors with unique approaches and up-and-coming directors making their feature-film debut. The screened films reflected the uniqueness of Lebanese film production less concerned with traditional issues and heavily influenced by the diaspora from Lebanon. During May and June, the Caravan traveled through the Netherlands where it attracted 4,500 filmgoers and screened Arab films in Amsterdam, Rotterdam and other Dutch cities. It also participated with 11 films in all four competitive categories of June’s 7th Arab Film Festival in Rotterdam. In July the Caravan was represented at the 5th Paris Cinema Festival at the Arab World Institute, where it then moved on to the Toulouse Cinématheque.
Lotfi Abdelli is a charismatic, handsome young Tunisian who carries himself confidently. His left eyebrow is accented by a diagonal scar. The award-winning actor for the Arab Film Festival’s opening night feature
If Lotfi Abdelli’s award-winning turn as Bahta in Nouri Bouzid’s Making Of wins you over to his promising talent, you might want to check out as well his brief appearance in the U.S. premiere of Lotfi Achour’s debut short film
At the 2006 Carthage Film Festival—the biannual October film festival hosted by the government of Tunisia—Nouri Bouzid’s
Michael Hawley is a contributing writer at The Evening Class and has offered up a preview sampling of this year’s Arab Film Festival for Twitch readers.