Episode #109 - Terri Francis (Losing Ground)

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"An archive is more than a collection of stuff...when a person passes through your life, they leave an impression, maybe an emptiness that's there. Part of what archives do is they make sense of that impression, of what's left behind."

So often when it comes to cinema we can make easy assumptions, but the questions underneath them are brimming to push boundaries. What exactly should film archives contain and what are their social responsibilities? Could an independent cinema exist under state sponsorship? Why is the goal of scholarship a book or article? What if instead you made films in caves, or highlighted contributions to our history through gravestones? Through her unique career, Terri Francis has brought some of these questions to light in a different way that makes the work of academia feel not just groundbreaking but emotionally powerful. In this long-ranging conversation, the Indiana University professor and director of the Black Film Center/Archive explores a range of topics related to Josephine Baker, Jamaica Film, and understanding and expanding black identity and cinephilia in a time where the very nature of the premise is changing. Finally, Terri and Peter discuss Losing Ground, a pioneering and celebratory melodrama from indie filmmaker Kathleen Collins—Terri tells the story of how the film went from obscurity to the stunning restoration that's made it part of the new canon.

0:00-3:46  Opening
4:29-11:11 Establishing Shots — New Streaming Platforms, New Avenues
11:57-1:09:32 Deep Focus — Terri Francis
1:10:30-1:14:16  Sponsorship Section
1:15:36-1:38:44 Double Exposure — Losing Ground (Kathleen Collins)

1:38:49-1:40:33 Close / Outtake 

Boundaries of Reality: New Non-Fiction With Agnès Varda, JR, and Theo Anthony

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"An image is just a point to explore reality and memory."

As this podcast has explored, the limits of non-fiction have been continually pushed and pulled by daring filmmakers who refuse to understand the limits of what they can do. This week looks at two new releases from three creators asking questions of space, memory, history, and often themselves. First of all, Peter sits down with legendary French New Wave filmmaker Agnès Varda to discuss her new film, Visage Villages (in English, Faces Places), alongside her co-conspirator, the elusive street artist known as JR. They discuss the ins and outs of collaboration when their work ethics seemingly clash, the personalities they present on screen, and the "work" of their images. Then, Peter meets up with Baltimore filmmaker Theo Anthony to dissect his bold directorial debut, Rat Film. They discuss the alien style of the film and its interest in both the collection of data and the relation of its human subjects, all while asking how a film can provoke emotion and ideas in a diversity of ways without ever posing obvious solutions.

0:00-5:07 Opening
6:05-29:58 Agnès Varda and JR (Visage Villages)
30:43-35:22 Sponsorship Section
36:22-1:00:56 Theo Anthony (Rat Film)

1:01:02-1:02:46 Close / Outtake

Episode #96 - Laura Major (Heaven Can Wait)

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"Our aim for a lot of preservation—the standard goal—is to make it look

how it was seen before."

If more and more people are interested in shooting on film and projecting on film, there's one crucial step in between: how does film get from camera to screen? Through a lab obviously. But what does the lab do? Laura Major has been a staple at the Maryland based Colorlab for a number of years, helping the studio produce new 35mm negatives and positives of documentaries, experimental films, archival orphans, and more. Today, she sits down with Peter to trace out her own history from South Carolina to experimental film lover to a technician. They discuss the ins and outs of film processing and how Colorlab has integrated itself as a critical player in the future of celluloid. Finally, they dive into the Warren Beatty directed, Elaine May co-written Heaven Can Wait, a comedy built around a number of great performances and the strange odyssey that is the (now once again) Los Angeles Rams.

0:00-3:07 Opening
4:12-12:24 Establish Shots — Frederick Wiseman's Ex Libris
13:10-48:50 Deep Focus — Laua Major
50:34-53:18 Sponsorship Section
54:48-1:10:57 Double Exposure — Heaven Can Wait (Warren Beatty)

1:11:20-1:14:09 Close / Outtake

This American Life — Remembering Jonathan Demme

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Jonathan Demme began his film career 50 years ago while working for Joseph Levine's production company in 1967, carving a path that resembled no other director in American film. His narrative films ranged from the grindhouse to Oscar prestige pictures to indies and more. Beyond fiction, he made documentaries about musicians and politics, music videos for the coolest bands, and a number of television episodes that gave life to the so-called writer's medium. While the word humanist gets thrown around carelessly, Demme deserved that term for the worlds his films enveloped and the generosity he showed each and every character while often creating an implied utopian vision of diversity. This special episode mourns the death of one of the great directors, as Peter invites on Jake Mulligan and Willow Maclay to discuss the multifaceted career of a director destined to cement a place in the canon. Plus, we revisit that oft-discussed director with three Double Exposure discussions with former guests. 

0:00-4:12 Opening 

4:12-43:27 Discussion with Jake Mulligan and Willow Maclay

44:34-47:26 Sponsorship Section
48:41-1:04:20 Beloved with Stephen Cone
1:05:21-1:28:18 The Truth About Charlie with Keith Uhlich
1:29:27-1:52:13 Stop Making Sense with Tim Grierson
1:52:40-1:22:02 Close

A Halloween Horrorthon!

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In a podcast first, the conversations of the past return...from the dead! To celebrate the end of Shocktober alongside Halloween, Peter returns to five different conversations exploring the horror genre in some way. First, Michael Koresky talks about the fear-inducing but plainly stylized The Seventh Victim, which turns classical continuity into a source of horror.  Then, Kim Morgan explores trauma in the highly underrated rape drama Something Wild with Carroll Baker. Then it's back to Classical Hollywood with Farran Smith-Nehme's choice of Three Strangers, a supernatural film noir where a promise from a Chinese goddess only leads to doom for Geraldine Fitzgerald, Sydney Greetstreet, and poor Peter Lorre. Then the line between horror, comedy, documentary, and general "WTF" is truly bent with Matt Singer's choice of The Buried Secret of M. Night Shaymalan, which (inadvertently?) explores the limits and literalism of auteurism. Finally, we go to the purest horror film of all time with Angela Catalano's choice of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, a film that knows no boundaries when it comes to showing unadulterated malice. It's time to revisit our most frightening conversations!

0:00-3:52 Opening

5:16-19:03 The Seventh Victim with Michael Koresky

20:45-34:50 Something Wild with Kim Morgan

36:48-55:08 Three Strangers with Farran Smith-Nehme

56:11-59:13 Sponsorship Section
1:00:59-1:20:45 The Buried Secret of M. Night Shaymalan with Matt Singer
1:21:52-1:38:48 The Texas Chain Saw Massacre with Angela Catalano
1:38:53-1:40:48 Close 

Episode #86 - Gordon Quinn (One Way Or Another)

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"You're not just like your subjects. You're a filmmaker. You need to acknowledge who you are."

If cinema can achieve more than simply be art but a form of action, how does one negotiate the role that the camera plays in reality. Celebrating its 50th Year, Kartemquin Films has used cinema as a tool for addressing social, political, and economic inequality through the documentary from, spearheaded by its co-founder Gordon Quinn. In this wide ranging interview, Gordon reflects on the early days of the collective—from films about retirement homes and the general state of happiness to more direct political engagement through filming labor strikes. He talks with Peter about negotiating the role of the subject, the role of his own identity in filming the stories of others, the importance of character, and the fickle nature between making a statement and making a dollar. Finally, the two discuss a film that shows all of the work in action: Sara Gomez's landmark documentary One Way Or Another, which stages fabricated drama in the midst of real turmoil in 1970s Cuba to a powerful effect.

0:00-3:29 Opening

4:19-10:04 Establishing Shots — Kelly Reichardt's Certain Women

10:49-1:20:13 Deep Focus — Gordon Quinn

1:20:56-51:51 Sponsorship Section

1:24:33-1:42:01 Double Exposure — One Way or Another (Sara Gomez)

1:42:05-1:43:44 Close

Life and Something More: Abbas Kiarostami Remembered

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Abbas Kiarostami, born in 1940 in Tehran, turned to filmmaking in 1970 when he helped set up the Institute for Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults. He had made a half dozen shorts and one feature, The Report in 1977, before the Iranian Revolution changed the public face of his country. While many filmmakers moved away in search of more creative freedom, Kiarostami continued to direct. Around the early 1990s, his films suddenly found an international foothold at festivals via the Koker trilogy and his most famous work, Close-Up. In 1997, he won a Palm D’Or for Taste of Cherry, helping paint the way for Iranian filmmakers to find an audience abroad. His filmmaking only became more cryptic and complex, especially with his early adoption of digital cinema with Ten and the self-reflexive documentary, Ten on Ten. His final films, Certified Copy and Like Someone In Love, were his only made outside his native Iran. Kiarostami passed away on July 4, 2016. In this special episode of the podcast, Amir Soltani, Tina Hassania, and Carson Lund join the podcast to celebrate the life and work of one of the legendary filmmakers to emerge on the world cinema stage.

0:00-2:49 Opening
2:49-46:18 Abbas Kiarostami — Part 1

47:16-52:02 Sponsorship Section

52:48-1:32:07 Abbas Kiarostami — Part 2

1:32:10-1:33:22 Close 

Episode #77 - Eric Hynes (Quick Change)

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"Documentaries are where the most exciting stuff in film is happening. Inevitably that's what I'm going to write about and push for."

Eric Hynes may not want to be boxed in for his work on documentaries, but it seems more and more to be where his interests as a writer for Reverse Shot and Film Comment alongside programming duties at the Museum of the Moving Image have taken him. But Eric is so much more, and has become one of the most valued writers of criticism and beyond—someone who shows passion and acute judgement within his sentences without ever condescending nor falling into cliché. In his interview with Peter, Eric traces his way into writing through music criticism and books, his decade-long tenure at one of the most important institutions in online film writing, and a continuing love of Star Wars. Then, the two turn to a truly forgotten gem of 90s cinema: Bill Murray and Howard Franklin's Quick Change, perhaps the last film to show New York City when it was truly the worst, in the best way possible.

0:00-3:37 Opening
4:22-54:46 Deep Focus — Eric Hynes

55:52-1:00:23 Sponsorship Section
1:02:08-1:21:46 Double Exposure — Quick Change (Billy Murray and Howard Franklin)

1:21:51-1:23:30 Close

Read Eric Hynes at Film Comment, Reverse Shot, Rolling Stone, Slate, and Cinema-Scope. Read his 2013 Neither/Noir monograph for True/False, and follow him on Twitter.
Check out Quick Change here.

Episode #76 - David Wilson (Gummo)

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"That's the heart of independent film...

Figuring out your limitations and then turning them into strengths."

David Wilson had a vision for his dream film festival—and now he has it. The co-founder of Columbia, Missouri's RagTag cinema and now one of the creative heads behind the True/False Film Festival, David has succeeded in transforming the way people can think, imagine, and design a film festival without the prohibitive nature of bending to the economic whims of Hollywood, while also engaging with the most aesthetically groundbreaking cinema without alienating audiences. Peter was lucky to catch David right in the middle of the flurry, and talk to him about his interest in coming back to the Midwest, his own documentary work, and why True/False captures the heart of so many filmgoers, whether they would call themselves cinephiles or not. Finally, the two discuss Harmony Korine's Gummo, a film that David hated so much because of its fictional representation, until it began to appear more and more like a documentary.

0:00-3:10 Opening
4:03-10:30 Establishing Shots — Desperately Seeking Susan and Lá-Bas

11:15-39:50 Deep Focus — David Wilson

40:37-44:10 Sponsorship Section
45:38-1:01:54 Double Exposure — Gummo (Harmony Korine)

1:01:57-1:03:35 Close

Read more about True/False at their website, learn about Ragtag Cinema here, and follow David Wilson on Twitter.
Check out We Always Lie to Strangers here and Big Birding Day here.

True/False 2016

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One might not expect much from a film festival right in the dead center of America's Heartland, but for thirteen years, True/False has been changing the way to think about the micro-film festival as well as the form of cinema in major ways. In this dispatch from Columbia, Missouri, Peter sits with critics Sam Adams, Tim Grierson, and (eventually) Scott Tobias to look at how the documentary-oriented festival puts aesthetics into the conversation while remaining politically engaged. While the subjects can be galvanizing—the US prison system, delinquent teenage girls in Tehran, Chinese miners, the fall of Iraq—the films continually break the mold for how one thinks about the format by exploring the relationship between the filmmaker and their subject. Plus, a discussion about Concerned Student 1950, a student-made documentary addressing the issues of the University of Missouri protests in 2015, and what its premiere could mean for the future of the festival.

0:00-2:50 Opening
2:50-8:00 Concerned Student 1950

8:00-49:35 True/False Favorites

50:47-54:16 Sponsorship Section
55:05-1:19:05 True/False Favorite Scenes

1:19:08-1:20:47 Close

Read more about True/False at their website.

Follow Our Guests on Twitter: Sam Adams, Tim Grierson, and Scott Tobias.

Episode #60 - Tim Grierson (Stop Making Sense)

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"This idea that has always stayed with me is that movies are an art form for everyone."

After first watching Spike Lee's Do The Right Thing, Peter went through a phase of going through the albums of Public Enemy. They were loud, rambunctious, and meant something in the same way the films he watched. But what happened to them after the summer of 1989? Tim Grierson's new biography of the group examines that question of perhaps the most important hip hop artists of all time, tracking both their meteoric rise and through their much-more-interesting-than-you've-been-told years that followed. Since Tim also works as a film critic, he sits down to trace his origins as a Midwestern boy coming to Los Angeles, his mindset for writing, and of course his book (along with his struggle with understanding a group so different from his own identity). The two then close out the conversation with another music-movie: Joanthan Demme's concert movie of the Talking Heads, Stop Making Sense, a film of ebullient surprise and joy, while also one of the most meticulously constructed documentaries ever put on screen.

0:00-2:44 Opening

3:02-10:03  Establishing Shots - Results and Pitch Perfect 2
10:48-1:30:04 Deep Focus - Tim Grierson

1:30:55-1:32:55 Mubi Sponsorship
1:33:50-1:58:10 Double Exposure - Stop Making Sense (Jonathan Demme)

1:58:14-1:59:57 Close / Outtake

Read Tim Grierson's Public Enemy: Inside The Terrordome, which available online and at most local retailers.
Read Tim's other writing at Deadspin, Rolling Stone, Paste Magazine, Vulture, and at his blog. Follow him on Twitter.
Stop Making Sense is available on Blu-Ray and multiple streaming platforms.

Episode #35 - Mark Harris (The Best Years of Our Lives)

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"I was interested in the story of these five men who were in Hollywood and established directors, then left, and then came back."

During World War II, five of Hollywood's star directors, whose names had been behind some of the biggest box office hits and Oscar winners, dropped their entire careers to go to war. Their goal was not to fight, but to document. Besides being the only Oscar columnist worth reading, Mark Harris is now the author or Five Came Back: A Story of Hollywood and the Second World War. In this podcast, Mark and Peter sit down to discuss this essential read, examining the relationship between Hollywood and the government, the problem of realism and re-creations, and the pains felt by men who returned to a system that seemed to have forgotten them. Finally, the two discuss William Wyler's The Best Years of Our Lives, a universal drama that has numerous touches of the director's own war experience.

0:00-1:35 Opening 

2:33-8:06 Establishing Shots - William Freidkin's Sorcerer

8:50-1:26:40 Deep Focus - Mark Harris

1:27:53-1:46:58 Double Exposure - The Best Years of Our Lives (William Wyler)

1:47:02-1:48:41 Close

Read Mark Harris on Grantland, New York Magazine, and Entertainment Weekly; purchase Pictures at a Revolution and Five Came Back.
Follow Mark on Twitter.