Cloud Atlas (Rhoades)

“Cloud Atlas” Spans Time

In Its Meditation on Karma

Reviewed by Shirrel Rhoades

A cloud atlas is a pictorial guide to the nomenclature of clouds. You know, cirrus clouds, cumulonimbus clouds, altocumulus stratiformis perlucidus undulates, etc. Cloud atlases used to be an important tool in training meteorologists.

In 2004 British author David Mitchell wrote a sprawling 500-page science fiction novel titled “Cloud Atlas,” six intertwined stories that carry you back and forth in time – from a South Pacific island in the 19^th Century to a bleak dystopian future and back again. Sort of a “what goes around comes around” mystical theme.

Andy and Lana (né Larry) Wachowski, those ex-comic book writers who gave you the “Matrix” movies, have teamed up with German director Tom Tykwer to bring the book to the screen. An ambitious project with a $100 million budget, “Cloud Atlas” goes time traveling with a stellar cast that includes Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent, Hugo Weaving, Susan Sarandon, and Hugh Grant – all playing multiple roles.

For example, depending on the time period, Tom Hanks might be Dr. Henry Goose or Isaac Sachs or Dermot Hoggins or Zachry Bailey.

You almost need a scorecard to keep up with the characters. Or a cloud atlas.

This multi-leveled epic is about the meaning of life. It posits that the consequences of our lives impact one another throughout the past, present, and future. That a soul moves from person to person, reacting to simple acts of kindness and random cruelties to shape existence throughout time.

“Cloud Atlas” is every bit as much of a head-trip as “The Matrix,” the film that made the Wachowskis famous 13 years ago. “The philosophies in the book are so, you know, important,” says Andy Wachowski. “You know, just about humanity.”

At 163 minutes, it’s a long movie, but we’re talking about crossing epochs of time. Variety called it “an intense three-hour mental workout rewarded with a big emotional payoff.”

“Cloud Atlas” is currently warping time at the Tropic Cinema.

The Wachowskis got the idea of doing the movie while on the set of “V for Vendetta.” As Lana tells it, “I saw Natalie Portman reading ‘Cloud Atlas’ on the set. She said you will love this book. I read it that weekend and then I gave it to Andy. Then we gave it to Tom Tykwer and he read it because we had been looking for a project to work on together.”

Even the book’s author thought it was unadaptable. But the Wachowskis and Tykwer got excited about the challenge. The threesome worked together on the script for two and a half years, dissecting the six separate storylines and rearranging them on index cards. Like a time puzzle. Tykwer had played with time sequences before, in his classic “Run Lola Run.”

Then they phoned Tom Hanks. “I wasn’t familiar with the book, and it’s an impossible screenplay to describe,” laughs Hanks, a two-time Oscar-winner. “They talked about the multiple times and the multiple characters, and would I just entertain it?”

“It doesn’t feel as if it’s a conventional Tom Hanks movie,” admits Lana. “He’s playing these characters that are unlike his typical persona, and he’s also playing characters that are sometimes a part of the background.”

“It’s a difficult, complicated blueprint,” agrees Hanks. Nonetheless he said, “I’m in. Let’s go.”

Halle Berry came onboard next. “I thought it was going to be a nightmare,” she says. “Three directors? I’m gonna feel schizophrenic. Who am I gonna listen to? Is this gonna work the way I like to work? But it was just seamless.”

Lana smiles at the comment. “People sometimes say, ‘Well, how do you direct together?’  But writing is really the intimate process.  Directing is a social art form.  It’s about collaboration.  Really, the trick is writing together.” 

The trio divvied up the duties. The Wachowskis directed the nineteenth-century story and the two set in the future, while Tykwer directed the stories set in the thirties, the seventies, and the present day.

It worked. “Cloud Atlas” received a ten-minute standing ovation when it premiered at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival. At the screening author David Mitchell turned to Lana Wachowski, saying, “Oh, my God, that was amazing! That was – oh, that’s so clever! You clever monkey!”

Karma. All of it coming together, to use Lana’s phrase, “very Cloud Atlas-y.”

srhoades@aol.com

Anna Karenina (Brockway)

 Anna Karenina

Joe Wright's "Anna Karenina" is sumptuously produced but its decadent attention to detail makes it a Vanity Fair photo spread rather than a nourishing  experience or even a postmodern exercise. Keira Knightley is gorgeous-- a vamp in black--but unless this is a fashion shoot, I found it all a bit too pretentious. 

When the story begins we see a toy stage that evolves into a carnival of sorts, there are all kinds of elegantly plumped ladies twirling about and men blowing on trumpets, there is a man on a unicycle and even (horror upon horror)  a mime. I get the idea. This is a conceptual interpretation of a literary classic, but there is so much surface and artifice that it all seems a déjà view of Baz Luhrmann without much impact. 

The novelty of a  toy train offers a thin Christmas gimmick---all window dressing without a purchase.  

We have Keira Knightley, as Karenina tied down to the stentorian Alexei (Jude Law). One grey day on a train, Karenina becomes thunderstruck by the effete Count Vronsky (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) Vronsky is quite a character. I want to believe in his charisma, but at least in this incarnation, he has all the magnetism of a paper doll. Like Dorian Gray, he is all surface and silk waistcoats, going from dark wooded room to dark wooded room. He doesn't say all that much ( no one does) but I will give him this: his sunflower-tinted  mustache is flawless. It's remarkable that his face loses none of its polish even when he's away in the army. Dirt and smudges never touch him. Vronsky's expression is fixed in adamantine splendor. It says "I'm Handsome!" Yet he has all the chemistry of a velvet pointed #2 pencil. 

Keira Knightley is a definite stunner but aside from looking terrific in wonderful costumes, there isn't much drama for her to execute. Her best scene ( and perhaps the film's singular interest) is a sexual one in which she screams out "Murderer, Murderer!" as she reaches climax. It is a good scene but too little, too late. Mostly the film has her looking wistfully into the camera, (or into a mirror) a veil arranged perfectly around her face like a halo of black moths. The camera loves Knightley and her face makes magic. But it only goes so far. Her character moves at one speed: a stalk. In one particular scene, she partially disrobes as she treads aggressively. The cinematography is almost a direct imitation of a Victoria's Secret commercial. Every interpretation of the past carries something of the present with it, but it is too obvious to make for a compelling show. 

This tissue thin Tolstoy left me craving more cinematic meat. For all the fade ins, fade outs and double exposures, I could guess what was coming.  When Anna looks in the mirror, it is shattered, her face is shown in multiples. But of course. This imagery is right out of a Joan Crawford nerve-shrieker or a Roman Polanski chiller. I even recall the Twilight Zone using a splintered  mirror trick. 

The camera motion is grand. The costumes are impeccable with Intelligent Design but there is only a moon's breath of acting here, and a lacquered fingernail's width of tension. The stage-proscenium expansion and contraction device grew tedious with me, (I did not find the horse leaping out across "a stage" as exciting as 'Warhorse') as did the manner in which characters appear and vanish without rhyme or reason at times. The cast of "Twilight" has more respect for the machinery of time and space.  

I'll admit that the last segment of the film piqued my interest a bit, it's amazing what a quick spyglass, a tense score and a bit of dialogue can do---shades of the excellent "Dangerous Liaisons"---and it was almost enough. Ah Close but no cigar!

"Anna Karenina" works quite well as a conceptual commercial: the shortening of time and space, the flashy ultra-stylized gold, the characters invariably lit with overexposed lighting, the swift camera tracks, but as a sustained film, there is little to hang one's topcoat on. Excluding a few well timed dashes of nerve and fever It is pointlessly in love with itself, over producing a visual cirque malaise. 

Write Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

Flight (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

Flight

Finally, here is a story that allows Denzel Washington the freedom to breathe, express and not be driven by an action film. "Flight" is the story of pilot Whip Whitaker (Washington) who always strives to do right even though he is beset by a few personal demons, namely those that are floating in vodka.When we first see him, the hot shot Whip is partying horizontally with a flight attendant, Katerina Marquez (Nadine Valazquez). Since he has a morning flight he decides to give himself a boost with a line of coke.It makes a strong cup of coffee.

Cue music by The Rolling Stones: a repeated auditory symbol of hedonism. Whip is dressed to kill in smooth dark shades, cocky in the cockpit. Bad weather? No problem. A storm? Please. Turbulence? Light stuff. Whip chooses to flirt with another attendant Margaret ( Tamara Tunie).

Then things get wild.

After some hair raising turbulence, Whip flies into tranquil air and proceeds to go into the plane for some easy banter with the queasy passengers. They applaud him and he goes for a covert screwdriver cocktail. Co-pilot Ken (Brian Geraghty) takes over. Under a snooze, our hot-wings flyer is jolted awake. There is severe turbulence and the instruments are not responding. Pandemonium ensues. What follows is some of the most stressful airplane chaos that I've ever seen but then again, I'm pathologically afraid of air-travel. The plane goes into a rapid downward plunge. Whip is the only person with a cool head.

There is some compelling surreal footage here as the plane plows into a Pentecostal Baptist ritual: crosses in flames while men in robes take flight, transforming into makeshift Emergency aides.

Our hero wakes up, bruised and battered in the hospital but as cocky as ever. After all, he saved lives by boldness. But part of this self importance is a mask to shade himself from the guilt of two flight attendants dying in air, one of them being Katerina. The question of Whip's responsibility is the dramatic thrust. Is Whip a good pilot despite his on the job drinking? Did he do all he could? Or was he set up by Fate (or God) to fail his passengers, his crew, and ultimately the inflated imperviousness  of himself?

Washington gives a solid turn here with the perfect blend of devil-pilot-rocker slyness  with a directness of logic and compassion. Whip is both fragile imp and arrogant hero. He is a skilled pilot and he knows it. Despite some obvious melodrama (the liquor, the ex-wife and son battle,the attraction to a troubled woman) Denzel makes it all very believable. We are moved just as much by his near demonic possession as we are by his yearning to comfort others.

There is one scene involving a hotel liquor cabinet and a tiny vodka bottle that is as jolting as "Jaws" albeit kitschy.

John Goodman steals the show as Whip's glib and fun-loving drug dispensing friend Harling Mays who gives some refreshing irreverence and has the film's best lines. He has no qualms asking for recreational addictions of all kinds. You will laugh out loud. Goodman alone is reason to see this film.

Don Cheadle also delivers a capable, if somewhat uninspired interpretation of a NTSB lawyer. Melissa Leo appears as a head investigator, all ice and nerves.

Some rightful wings are earned by Spielbergian director Robert Zemeckis (Castaway, Forrest Gump) who mixes his trademark Americana of The Everyman with enough tension to make it ultimately and intimately watchable, due in no small part to the skill of Denzel Washington.

In the end, we might have a bad dad  pilot, trying to make good with some predictable elements, but in Whip Whittaker there resides a Humanist unsentimentality that soars beyond any  traditional trail of tears.

Write Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters

I've often felt that it would be wonderful to record your dreams in a concrete and technologically accurate way like a TiVo device or DVR although this is impossible, at least right now. But there is one artist who is striving to document his own personal REM tableaux. His name is Gregory Crewdson and he is obsessed.

"Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters" is a new documentary about Crewdson's  large format photographs that spill on the eye like a painting by George Bellows or Edward Hopper if filmed by David Lynch.

Crewdson's immense works are painstakingly staged and posed before they are shot. His work which resembles film, is often shot on location in Mid-American towns and they have a definitive economically depressed tone. Shabby grey people often stare in doorways their mouths agape with eyes full of sleep. Often, an eerie supernatural light emanates from windows suggesting the arrival of aliens or possibly a noxious gas.

Crewdon's mastery is unmatched ; he manipulates huge machinery, people and lights, often  building entire sets to produce his imagery.

But for me, at least from the point of view of a documentary, Crewdson himself seems more compelling than his work. Throughout the film he tells of his father, a psychoanalyst in New York. He admits to wanting to eavesdrop on psychiatric sessions, of having dyslexia, of making art during his divorce (which were dioramas of birds and suburban houses clearly inspired by the film Blue Velvet) and one wishes for more details.

Crewdson is clearly a charismatic person but the documentary reveals little of his personal life. What about his divorce? And who was she? Crewdson also mentions a sensation of dislocation, yet we are given very little as to how he really feels about himself, his loves or his parents. Given the obvious otherworldly and personal nature of his work, I was left craving a bit more.

The documentary, which contains many striking on-location scenes of Crewdson at work, as he poses his cast, nervously walking and talking, is so step by step that it seemed I was watching an art history piece more than a feature documentary. The residents all seem to respect him as he closes down entire streets of a Massachusetts town and that's all well and good, but given that the work is existential and haunting it seemed to be missing some dramatic discontent.  What about his enemies? I'm sure the artist has some critics.

Despite its want of private information however, "Gregory Crewdson: Brief Encounters" makes a good introduction to an artist who works with his own insular visions. Excluding any intimacies of the artist, the photographs are majestic alone, lighted with minute detail and birthing new suburban offspring to the painters John William Waterhouse and Millais.

Write Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

The Big Picture (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

The Big Picture

Voila! At last, here is a film reminiscent of Rene Clement's "Plein Soleil" (Purple Noon). Clement's film was based on Patricia Highsmith's masterfully detached novel The Talented Mr. Ripley. In Clement's narrative , we saw a smooth and dashing sociopath, Tom Ripley, driven by ego and loathing to achieve an elitist lifestyle. Tom was played by the inimitable Alain Delon and in this latest outing, we have something of Delon here.

Eric Lartigau's "The Big Picture" stars Romain Duris as Paul Exben, a scruffy postmodern yuppie, a defeated photographer who is now a partner in a law film. He wakes every morning in a haze, his toddler wailing incessantly. At the breakfast table his wife is abstract and distant. Paul becomes obsessed with the idea of his wife's possible infidelity, all the while being mocked in his past artistic pursuits. At the mall, Paul meets a self assured and confident acquaintance Gregoire Kremer (Eric Ruf). Paul is eaten up by Kremer's easy nonchalance. During a party, he happens to see Kremer touching his wife's bottom.

Then he knows.

Paul is not a complete snowman like Ripley, ( Tom murders without a blink)  but the two characters share a kindred pathological bent. "The Big Picture" is less about a bloody crime and more about forgery, guilt, and the process of becoming someone else. The forgery of a life is not a final, punishable plight but a spring to artistic fruition. Yet where, Tom is as smooth as ice, Paul is wretched and scruffy, sweating in screams, horrified to leave his children. Both "The Big Picture" and "Purple Noon" portray two characters who stop at nothing to attain status (albeit with different goals) when the earth spins on with an unfailing neutrality.

Romain Duris is full of sneering ridicule at one moment only to be prostrate with suffering the next, but as an actor he makes both conditions thrilling. Duris puts a wonderful dark silhouette upon Alain Delon's iconic role. The thrill is not whether Paul will get away with his crime, but rather how far he will go. And it is not the natural world, but the randomness of chance that propels Paul forward. As luck would have it, a single blue duffle bag can either be an impartial sack or a midnight flag of sin and danger.

Catherine Deneuve gives a nice turn here as Paul's associate, as does the recognizable Niels Arestrup (Sarah's Key) who plays a maudlin but suspicious-seeming photographer who may or may not know more than he lets on.

Throughout the film, Paul endures one apprehensive shock after the other with the stark shadows of sea and sun moving ahead of, or beyond consequence. Paul is not very likeable but  neither is anyone else and perversely, his pathos along with his offhand manner is infectious. You just might end up rooting for this intense sociopath with the laughing eyes. Paul clearly is as surprised as anyone else by his predicament and both fortune and demise are given equal measure.

Write Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

Key West Film Festival (Brockway)

Tropic Sprockets by Ian Brockway

The Key West Film Festival

The Key West Film Festival has arrived under The Tropic's famous Art Deco marquee with much anticipation. A local favorite with a strong Key West connection remains "Tiger Eyes" based on Judy Blume's controversial novel and directed by her son Lawrence. This film has sweeping locations in Atlantic City and New Mexico, combined with poignant performances by Willa Holland and the legendary Native American actor and activist Russell Means in his final role.

In the other films, outspoken or quirky characters seem to be the order of the day. There is  Brian Dannelly's "Struck by Lightning" about a precocious high schooler (Glee star Chris Colfer) who blackmails others in the cause to make his magazine a success. In "Any Day Now", the versatile Alan Cumming plays a drag performer, circa 1970, who fights for the custody of a neglected child with Down Syndrome. Vibrant and heartfelt, trading in his customary villainy for some organic Glam rock, Cumming has never been better.

Other standouts are "California Solo", a gritty existential tale of an almost famous Scottish rocker caught in the knotty dilemmas of America's immigration policy. Robert Carlyle is Lachlan. With his gaunt angular physique and emotional  face, a study in struggle,  Lachlan is the perfect shape  for a well meaning figure caught in Kafkaesque quicksand. Along the way, he also exemplifies a shaky rhythm and the joy of Rock and Roll.

The iconic Jane Fonda stars in "All Together" as Jeanne, a libidinous commune resident filled with five other friends all of them septuagenarian or octogenarian and too cute for words as each one dreams of caressing the other. Free love has never been so accepting of its wrinkles, but the acting is excellent.

In Gayby, a gay slacker (Matthew Wilkas) and a volatile  yoga instructor (Jenn Harris) are best friends that want  to have a baby. What at first glance is ho hum, is quickly lifted to ho-ha-hilarious with its rapid one liners and its no holds barred (with all things bare) irreverence. "Gayby" has a wonderful spirit helped in no small measure by the quirk in its characters.

Last but not least, there is Stephen Cone's "Wise Kids", a sociological tale of children deep in a matrix of Fundamentalist beliefs. By highlighting each character "Wise Kids" owes a debt to the work of Larry Clark, but its neutral tone gives the film a wistful edge.

Whether you have a craving for the comical to the quirky, or some edgy moral quandaries, The Key West Film Festival makes for some diverse cinematic flora. Here's to next year!

Write Ian at redtv_2005@yahoo.com

Tips for the Key West Film Festival Nov.29-Dec 2 (Mann)

Phil Mann’s Tips

For the 2012 Key West Film Festival 

The 2012 Key West Film Festival opens with a welcoming party at the Hemingway House on Thursday afternoon at 5:30pm (Tix at Keystix.com) followed by a screening of While We Were Here at the San Carlos that night. On Friday through Sunday more than 33 films will unspool at the Tropic (on all four screens) and at the San Carlos. For a grand finale, there'll be a free screening of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid on the beach in front of Salute.

 The full schedule and info is at KeyWestFilmFestival.com. Tickets can be bought there, or at the Tropic Box Office, for all films. To help you sort through them, here’s a quick summary.

ALL TOGETHER- Moving and comedic story of aging friends who decide to share a communal home, starring Jane Fonda and Geraldine Chaplin (in French w/subtitles).

ANY DAY NOW – In the 1970’s a gay couple fights the legal system to keep custody of an abandoned mentally handicapped teenager. Starring Alan Cumming, with locals including Randy Roberts, Randy Thompson and Annie O’Shea. “Laugh out loud funny and heartbreaking without resorting to neat Hollywood set-ups or resolutions.” Eye For Film

BETTIE PAGE REVEALS ALL – Bettie narrates the story of her life, with a light touch and humor.

BIG VISION EMPTY WALLET COMEDY SHORT FILMS- The best of the films submitted in this year’s shorts competition.

BORN AND RAISED - A coming-of-age drama about a teenager in the Florida panhandle who begins considering venturing out of his small town to escape his interpersonal conflicts. From Rome Film Festival.

CALIFORNIA SOLO – A British rocker faces deportation from the U.S., and confronts his past. “Robert Carlyle's layered performance as an embittered musician facing his demons gives this fragile drama some emotional heft.” Hollywood Reporter

CLOUDBURST- A Lesbian couple escapes from a nursing home and go on a road trip to Canada to get married, with Olympia Dukakis and Brenda Fricker. “This crowd-pleaser from writer-director Thom Fitzgerald brings campaign-season relevance, geriatric glamour and Oscar clout.” Memphis Commercial Appeal

COMING UP ROSES – Young Alice (Rachel Brosnahan) and her fading-actor mother, Diane (Bernadette Peters) desperately hold onto each other and the fantasy of a better life.

DEADFALL - Two siblings (Eric Bana and Olivia Wilde) on the run after a casino heist. “A highly satisfying Western-cum-noir in the old tradition.” Variety

EL MEDICO: THE CUBATON STORY - Like Buena Vista Social Club it combines the personal story of a Cuban musician with plenty of his music and dancing. Is he El Medico – the doctor his mother wants him to be, or Cubaton -- the reggae singer his Swedish music producer is trying to develop? “Takes us on a wonderful authentic trip into the heart of Cuba.” (Linda Sweatt, SBCC Film Reviews)

THE FALLEN FAITHFUL- Thriller about a religious man, searching for a profound and meaningful connection with God, who is also a man of violence, a hired killer.

GAYBY is one of several LBGT-themed films at the Festival. This one’s a comedy about a straight girl who wants to get pregnant, and her male gay best friend who helps her “the old fashioned way.” Sharp and witty, and set in Brooklyn, you’ll be reminded of Lena Dunham’s Girls, with cameos from her cast-mates Adam Driver and Alex Karpovsky. “Like Dunham's show, Gayby draws zeitgeist-y, situational laughs from the lives of people it seems to know, rather than straining to position itself as a hip authority…. If it's not the best comedy of the year, it's easily the best to transcend the comedy formula.” (R. Kurt Osenlund, Slant Magazine)

HEAD GAMES – A stark, unflinching examination of contact sports and the self-inflicted injuries the participants take as "part of the game." (Documentary)

HORS SATAN - Enigmatic drama about the relationship between a woman and a mysterious outsider on Northern France's Opal Coast. Is he the Second Coming, or the Devil? (in French w/subtitles)

IN ANOTHER COUNTRY presents us with three overlapping small love stories, all featuring the same cast headed by the well-known French star Isabelle Huppert. It’s directed by Sang-soo Hong (known as Korea’s Eric Rohmer) and set at a seaside town in his home country. “While it doesn’t shy away from telling moments of harshness, it’s for the most part bright and breezy viewing, matching its picturesque and sunny seaside scenery with mischievous insights.” (James Mudge, Beyond Hollywood. com) Nominated for the Palm d’Or at Cannes, this is a must for fans of French cinema. (Despite its foreign aspects, the movie’s language is English. How else can the French and Koreans communicate?)

JOURNEY TO PLANET X – Two young filmmakers make a movie about making a sci-fi movie… and having fun. From Tribeca Film Festival. Cast and crew will be there for a Q & A.

KINDERBLOCK 66: RETURN TO BUCHENWALD - The story of four men who, as young boys, were imprisoned by the Nazis in the notorious Buchenwald concentration camp and who, sixty-five years later, return to commemorate the sixty-fifth anniversary of their liberation. (Documentary)

LET MY PEOPLE GO is another LBGT-themed comedy. Reuben is a French-Jewish gay working as a postman in Finland (after completing his degree in comparative sauna cultures). It’s “a hectic, colour-saturated Euro farce that sends up a multitude of stereotypes.” (Craig Takeuchi, Straight. com)

NOT WAVING BUT DROWNING- A chronological look at growing up, formed from two different stories. The two sets of friends represent the American dilemma between what you have known and what you hope to know; the split between longing for the past and the desire to explore.

THE PLAYROOM features another appearance for the versatile John Hawkes (Winter’s Bone, The Sessions) now as a parent carousing downstairs while his four children invent a game of their own in the attic playroom. “An emotionally rich drama set in suburbia in 1975. Gathered around a candle to simulate a campfire setting, they improvise a tale about four orphaned kids who escape from their lonely castle and set out for adventure.” (Eric Snider, Film. com)

QUARTET is Dustin Hoffman’s directorial debut. The foursome of the title are retired opera singers, Maggie Smith and Tom Courtenay among them, sharing digs at a retirement home and finding a way back to their glory days. “Quartet has a warmth and charm that'll likely make it a firm hit with the same crowd that turned out for The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.” (Simon Reynolds, Digital Spy)

THE SAPPHIRES follows an Aborigine girl band as they go on a tour of American troops in Vietnam. “A jewel-bright charmer about four spunky indigenous women whose powerhouse voices catapulted them onto the 60s-era world stage as Australia's answer to the Supremes.” Hollywood Reporter.

SHADOW DANCER is a spy thriller featuring Andrea Riseborough (Made in Dagenham) as an IRA turncoat double agent and Clive Owen as her MI5 handler. “A labyrinthine tale of cat and mouse, of deception and double cross, of betrayal and confused allegiances.” Observer (UK)

SOMEWHERE BETWEEN is a documentary about four international adoptees, “Chinese girls emotionally divided between the Asian country in which they were born and the America in which they were raised... you’d have to be a stone not to be moved.” Kenneth Turan, Los Angeles Times

STARLET- about the moral dilemmas raised when an aspiring and often stoned actress discovers a stash of cash in a Thermos she buys at a yard sale. The movie was featured at the SXSW Festival, and won the Breakthrough Performer Award for Dree Hemingway (granddaughter of Papa) at the Hamptons Film Festival.

STRUCK BY LIGHTNING – An outspoken gay teenager narrates his own funeral. Laugh aloud high school comedy with Allison Janney, Rebel Wilson & Allison Janney “The characters are likable, the jokes are spot on & it's an all-around good time.” Movies. com

TIGER EYES is the first-ever feature film adaptation of a Judy Blume novel, written by Judy with her son Lawrence, and directed by him. It’s the story of a teenager coming to terms with the sudden death of her father and an unwanted family relocation. “The rarest of family films, smart and nuanced, with an attention to detail in images that mirrors what is Ms. Blume’s strength with words.” Filmmaker Magazine. Judy will be there for a Q and A after the film.

TIME ZERO: THE LAST YEAR OF POLAROID FILM – Documentary that captures the passion of photographers who loved Polaroid film, and what they went through to save it.

UNFIT: WARD VS. WARD – Expose of bias against lesbian mothers via a documentary on case of convicted murder husband awarded custody. (Documentary)

VIOLETA WENT TO HEAVEN – A portrait of famed Chilean singer and folklorist Violeta Parra filled with her musical work, her memories, her loves and her hopes.

WHILE WE WERE HERE – A married American woman (Kate Bosworth) has an affair with a younger man on an Italian island. With Claire Bloom.

THE WISE KIDS – A low-key drama about questioning kids in a South Carolina Baptist church. “A guileless exploration of the growing pains of sheltered innocents whose reticence and sincerity evoke 1950s small-town values.” NY Times

YOSSI – “Yossi (Ohad Knoller) is a thirty something doctor in Tel Aviv who hides the fact he is gay from all around him…. a lovely story full of emotions that build to a crescendo.” Flickfeast