Early August is usually a transitional moment, when the summer movie season winds down to set the stage for the fall, and most moviegoers are catching up on highlights from the last few weeks. But for a few thousand people attending the Locarno Film Festival, a whole new set of discoveries await.
The Swiss festival is one of the major European film events of the summer, offering a range of new titles that encompass multiple genres and national cinemas, many of which will go on to play at other big festivals later this year. Here’s a look at some of the most promising films in this year’s lineup; expect to hear more about them in the near future. (Stay tuned for more essays on this year’s lineup from participants in the 2017 Locarno Critics Academy.)
Read MoreLocarno Film Festival 2017: Enter to Win Free Online Festival Pass to...
The Swiss festival is one of the major European film events of the summer, offering a range of new titles that encompass multiple genres and national cinemas, many of which will go on to play at other big festivals later this year. Here’s a look at some of the most promising films in this year’s lineup; expect to hear more about them in the near future. (Stay tuned for more essays on this year’s lineup from participants in the 2017 Locarno Critics Academy.)
Read MoreLocarno Film Festival 2017: Enter to Win Free Online Festival Pass to...
- 8/2/2017
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
One of the common threads in the last decade or so of experimental film has been the coincidence of folklore and film grain, as the filmmakers who have the clearest heads for anthropology and myth—whether they are established names like Ben Rivers (Two Years At Sea) and Ben Russell (Let Each One Go Where He May, the Rivers collaboration A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness) or newcomers like the duo of Samuel M. Delgado and Helena Girón—also share an interest in the properties of celluloid. Perhaps it’s part of a wider search for all things primeval: the rugged landscape, the oral tradition, the photochemical process, each promising to lead the artist back to something like the raw material of their origins. This is partly what the Morocco-based Franco-Spanish filmmaker Oliver Laxe is going for with Mimosas, his primitivist, shot-on-16mm fairy tale about a ragtag group...
- 4/12/2017
- by Ignatiy Vishnevetsky
- avclub.com
This article was originally published in print in Fireflies Issue #4: Pedro Costa / Ben Rivers (purchase here), and has been posted here with the generosity of the magazine's editors.Origin of the SpeciesAs the titles of This Is My Land (2006) appear on the black screen, we hear Jake Williams’ voice: a song hum-mumbled that reminds me of my father ironing. I like him instantly. When we eventually see Williams, two leaves obscure his forehead and mouth as if to say, this is as close as you’re going to get, or maybe, aren’t these leaves nice, shouldn’t we all spend more time in the woods, playing with leaves? He holds the pose as though instructed. After a few minutes, we get Williams’ first words as he stands in front of his house in the forest: “If you want to make a hedge but you’re not in a big hurry,...
- 11/8/2016
- MUBI
Jonas Mekas has been at the forefront of avant-garde cinema for more than half a decade, and in that time has accrued a wealth of knowledge that few could match. The 93-year-old luminary has condensed some of his insights into 13 precepts for aspiring experimental filmmakers to follow in “Akademie X,” a new book featuring lessons from 36 “tutors” offering advice in their respective fields.
Read More: Werner Herzog To Teach Online Filmmaking Class This Summer
Number four seems one of the most pertinent. “I believe that the two best ways to begin the journey are: one, to work with another filmmaker whose work you admire, and learn the art and craft the way the old Renaissance artists did or two, by acquiring a camera, any camera, and beginning to film/tape as a daily practice.” As with Werner Herzog and countless other filmmakers, Mekas also insists upon the importance of reading — and being discerning about it.
Read More: Werner Herzog To Teach Online Filmmaking Class This Summer
Number four seems one of the most pertinent. “I believe that the two best ways to begin the journey are: one, to work with another filmmaker whose work you admire, and learn the art and craft the way the old Renaissance artists did or two, by acquiring a camera, any camera, and beginning to film/tape as a daily practice.” As with Werner Herzog and countless other filmmakers, Mekas also insists upon the importance of reading — and being discerning about it.
- 7/10/2016
- by Michael Nordine
- Indiewire
British director wins $35,000 prize to help fund next feature.
Ben Rivers has been named as the second winner of the Eye Art & Film Prize at a ceremony in Amsterdam’s Eye Filmmuseum
The London-based artist and filmmaker, whose work includes A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness, received the $35,000 (£25,000) prize to fund the making of new work.
In 2018, Eye will present an exhibition of the first three prize winners’ work in Amsterdam.
The prize, created by the Dutch film museum Eye and the Paddy & Joan Leigh Fermor Arts Fund, aims to support and promote an artist or filmmaker whose work has contributed to the developments in the field between art and film in a remarkable manner.
Rivers was chosen from a shortlist presented to the jury by an international advisory board and the selection was made on the basis of the recipient’s body of work.
The British filmmaker has become known for treading a line between...
Ben Rivers has been named as the second winner of the Eye Art & Film Prize at a ceremony in Amsterdam’s Eye Filmmuseum
The London-based artist and filmmaker, whose work includes A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness, received the $35,000 (£25,000) prize to fund the making of new work.
In 2018, Eye will present an exhibition of the first three prize winners’ work in Amsterdam.
The prize, created by the Dutch film museum Eye and the Paddy & Joan Leigh Fermor Arts Fund, aims to support and promote an artist or filmmaker whose work has contributed to the developments in the field between art and film in a remarkable manner.
Rivers was chosen from a shortlist presented to the jury by an international advisory board and the selection was made on the basis of the recipient’s body of work.
The British filmmaker has become known for treading a line between...
- 4/8/2016
- by michael.rosser@screendaily.com (Michael Rosser)
- ScreenDaily
A total of 25 films selected for competitive programme.
The Berlinale (Feb 11-21) has unveiled the 25 short films from 21 countries that will compete for the Golden and Silver Bear, a nomination for the European Film Awards and, for the second consecutive year, the Audi Short Film Award worth € 20,000.
The short film jury is comprised of the curator and director of the Sharjah Biennial in the UAE, Sheikha Hoor Al-Qasimi; Greek curator and writer Katerina Gregos; and Israeli filmmaker Avi Mograbi.
Among others, the competition will include films from Gabriel Abrantes, Pimpaka Towira, Réka Bucsi, Christoph Girardet and Matthias Müller, and Siegfried A. Fruhauf.
Ben Russell, who won plaudits at festivals around the world with A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness, will present He Who Eats Children, described as “a speculative portrait of a Dutchman living in the Surinamese jungle fixing canoe motors, accused of eating the locals’ children”.
Also among the line-up is a new documentary by [link...
The Berlinale (Feb 11-21) has unveiled the 25 short films from 21 countries that will compete for the Golden and Silver Bear, a nomination for the European Film Awards and, for the second consecutive year, the Audi Short Film Award worth € 20,000.
The short film jury is comprised of the curator and director of the Sharjah Biennial in the UAE, Sheikha Hoor Al-Qasimi; Greek curator and writer Katerina Gregos; and Israeli filmmaker Avi Mograbi.
Among others, the competition will include films from Gabriel Abrantes, Pimpaka Towira, Réka Bucsi, Christoph Girardet and Matthias Müller, and Siegfried A. Fruhauf.
Ben Russell, who won plaudits at festivals around the world with A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness, will present He Who Eats Children, described as “a speculative portrait of a Dutchman living in the Surinamese jungle fixing canoe motors, accused of eating the locals’ children”.
Also among the line-up is a new documentary by [link...
- 1/12/2016
- by michael.rosser@screendaily.com (Michael Rosser)
- ScreenDaily
Going UNDERGROUNDEverybody and their dog, it seems, feels this off imperative to try to identify common themes in the handful of festival films they (we) (I) see in a given year. It's the Ghost of Hegel, I suppose, demanding that we make sense of our times by referring to some Zeitgeist. (Zeitgeist? Isn't this just as likely to Strand the FilmsWeLike in some oh-so-precious Music Box, to be unearthed years later by members of some as-yet-unassembled Cinema Guild? But I digress.) There may or may not be tendencies running through this year's feature selections, and if there are, that could have as much to do with the people who selected them than with any global mood. But there does seem to be a generalized turning-inward, with filmmakers making works about themselves and their immediate lives, the cinematic process, and the very complexities of communicating with other human beings. There are...
- 9/17/2015
- by Michael Sicinski
- MUBI
Exclusive: Docu-drama selected for BFI London Film Festival.
Artscope has taken on international sales of UK artist and experimental director Ben Rivers’ Morocco-set The Sky Trembles And The Earth Is Afraid And The Two Eyes Are Not Brothers, a picture which explores the act of film-making.
Shot against the backdrop of the Atlas Mountains and the Moroccan Desert, the multi-layered film combines an adaptation of the late Tangiers-based, Us writer Peter Bowles’s 1947 short story A Distant Episode with footage of contemporary films sets.
“Part documentary, part fiction, we believe the film will not only speak to audiences familiar with Ben’s work as an artist but also to cinephiles and festival-goers eager to be shaken by different forms of expression,” said Sata Cissokho, head of Artscope, the specialist art film label of Paris-based Memento Films International.
The BFI London Film Festival (Lff) announced on Tuesday that the film would screen in its line-up in October. The feature...
Artscope has taken on international sales of UK artist and experimental director Ben Rivers’ Morocco-set The Sky Trembles And The Earth Is Afraid And The Two Eyes Are Not Brothers, a picture which explores the act of film-making.
Shot against the backdrop of the Atlas Mountains and the Moroccan Desert, the multi-layered film combines an adaptation of the late Tangiers-based, Us writer Peter Bowles’s 1947 short story A Distant Episode with footage of contemporary films sets.
“Part documentary, part fiction, we believe the film will not only speak to audiences familiar with Ben’s work as an artist but also to cinephiles and festival-goers eager to be shaken by different forms of expression,” said Sata Cissokho, head of Artscope, the specialist art film label of Paris-based Memento Films International.
The BFI London Film Festival (Lff) announced on Tuesday that the film would screen in its line-up in October. The feature...
- 9/1/2015
- ScreenDaily
One of the key aspects of the Toronto International Film Festival is the City to City Programme, which takes a look at a specific city every year, screening films that focus on the events of that specific city, as well as showcasing the latest projects by filmmakers from the city. The 2015 incarnation of the festival will focus on London, England, with eight films in the Tiff programme this year.
The films that will be part of the lineup have now been announced, alongside an additional set of films that will be part of the Tiff Wavelengths Programme, joining the previously announced entries in the programme. The complete list of films in both programmes, along with their official synopses, can be seen below.
City To City
Couple in a Hole, directed by Tom Geens, making its World Premiere
A middle class British couple end up living like feral creatures in a...
The films that will be part of the lineup have now been announced, alongside an additional set of films that will be part of the Tiff Wavelengths Programme, joining the previously announced entries in the programme. The complete list of films in both programmes, along with their official synopses, can be seen below.
City To City
Couple in a Hole, directed by Tom Geens, making its World Premiere
A middle class British couple end up living like feral creatures in a...
- 8/18/2015
- by Deepayan Sengupta
- SoundOnSight
The fall festival rush is upon us. Locarno is currently ramping up. Venice has released their line-up and Thom Powers and the Toronto International Film Festival team have dropped a bomb with a previously unannounced new feature from powerhouse docu-provocateur Michael Moore. It is truly a miracle that the production of a film such as Moore’s upcoming Where To Invade Next (see still above) managed to go completely undetected by the filmmaking community until it was literally announced to world premiere at one of the largest film festivals in the world. Programmed as a one of the key films in the Special Presentations section at Tiff, the film sees Moore telling “the Pentagon to ‘stand down’ — he will do the invading for America from now on.” Also announced to premiere at Tiff was Avi Lewis’ This Changes Everything, which has slowly been rising up this list, as well as...
- 8/7/2015
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
Rushes collects news, articles, images, videos and more for a weekly roundup of essential items from the world of film.Above: Nastassja Kinski & Jean-Pierre Léaud are on the poster for the 2015 Venice Film Festival.At the New York Times, A.O. Scott and Manohla Dargis are in dialogue reflecting on feminism and summer movies.There's a new festival in the works from producer/distributor Karin Chien, critic/curator Shelly Kraicer, and filmmaker/anthropologist J.P. Sniadecki: "Cinema on the Edge! Bestof the Beijing Indie Film Festival." With the 2014 Biff thwarted, these three are essentially transposing the festival and its films to New York this summer. They've launched a Kickstarter to support the venture.Above: Lauren Bacall in a 1943 issue of Harper's Bazaar. Via bettybecallbeauty.Film Comment's latest issue is out, and much of it is available to read online, including Kent Jones on Horse Money, reports from Cannes and Tribeca,...
- 7/8/2015
- by Notebook
- MUBI
It’s been a surprisingly interesting month of moving and shaking in terms of doc development. Just a month after making his first public funding pitch at Toronto’s Hot Docs Forum, legendary doc filmmaker Frederick Wiseman took to Kickstarter to help cover the remaining expenses for his 40th feature film In Jackson Heights (see the film’s first trailer below). Unrelentingly rigorous in his determination to capture the American institutional landscape on film, his latest continues down this thematic rabbit hole, taking on the immensely diverse New York City neighborhood of Jackson Heights as his latest subject. According to the Kickstarter page, Wiseman is currently editing the 120 hours of rushes he shot with hopes of having the film ready for a fall festival premiere (my guess would be Tiff, where both National Gallery and At Berkeley made their North American debut), though he’s currently quite a ways away from his $75,000 goal.
- 7/6/2015
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
They’re responsible for landing some of the best in unwanted, rejected yet critically acclaimed festival winning titles all during the eleventh hour. As was the case with Ramon Zürcher’s The Strange Little Cat, Denis Côté’s career best in Vic + Flo Saw a Bear and Ben Rivers & Ben Russell’s A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness, they’ve now saved a piece of Norwegian cinema from continually bumping into the wall. Winner of several awards including the Screenwriting Award for World Cinema at Sundance ’14, IndieWIRE reports that Eskil Vogt’s Blind has been picked up for release and will likely find a slot for sometime this year.
Gist: This focuses on Ellen (Ellen Dorrit Pettersen), a woman contending with the loss of vision. In trying to navigate a world without sight, she spends her days attempting to reconstruct the visual world as she once knew it. In...
Gist: This focuses on Ellen (Ellen Dorrit Pettersen), a woman contending with the loss of vision. In trying to navigate a world without sight, she spends her days attempting to reconstruct the visual world as she once knew it. In...
- 4/7/2015
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
The Cinema Eye Honors for Nonfiction Filmmaking have presented their first awards of 2015, with the group's Heterodox Award going to Richard Linklater's "Boyhood" and the Legacy Award presented to Jennie Livingston's 1990 classic "Paris is Burning." The Cinema Eye Heterodox Award, sponsored by Filmmaker Magazine, honors a fiction film that imaginatively incorporates nonfiction strategies, content and/or modes of production. In addition to "Boyhood," 2015 Nominees included: "Heaven Knows What" (Josh and Benny Safdie), "A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness" (Ben Rivers and Ben Russell), "Stop the Pounding Heart" (Roberto Minervini) and "Under the Skin" (Jonathan Glazer). This is the sixth year that Cinema Eye presented its Legacy Award, intended to honor classic films that inspire a new generation of filmmakers and embody the Cinema Eye mission: excellence in creative and artistic achievements in nonfiction films....
- 1/7/2015
- by Casey Cipriani
- Indiewire
#20. The Skeleton Twins
#19. Obvious Child
#18. A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness
#17. Wild
#16. 112 Weddings
#15. The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga
#14. Tales of the Grim Sleep
#13. The Boxtrolls
#12. Enemy
#11. The Guest
#10. The Lego Movie
Despite my love of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, nothing could prepare me for the sheer joy projecting from every pixel, effortless kineticism that carries the raucous narrative, nor the surprising intellectualism that serve as the building blocks of the entire film. Writer/directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller have performed a cinematic miracle in bringing a beloved inexpressive children’s toy to life with more vivacious wit than the vast majority of films release this year, animated or not.
#9. The Strange Little Cat
Ramon Zürcher’s student project turned festival darling debut is an odd, wholly original work that bears little resemblance to anything on this list. Essentially a non-narrative dinner party film about...
#19. Obvious Child
#18. A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness
#17. Wild
#16. 112 Weddings
#15. The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga
#14. Tales of the Grim Sleep
#13. The Boxtrolls
#12. Enemy
#11. The Guest
#10. The Lego Movie
Despite my love of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, nothing could prepare me for the sheer joy projecting from every pixel, effortless kineticism that carries the raucous narrative, nor the surprising intellectualism that serve as the building blocks of the entire film. Writer/directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller have performed a cinematic miracle in bringing a beloved inexpressive children’s toy to life with more vivacious wit than the vast majority of films release this year, animated or not.
#9. The Strange Little Cat
Ramon Zürcher’s student project turned festival darling debut is an odd, wholly original work that bears little resemblance to anything on this list. Essentially a non-narrative dinner party film about...
- 1/6/2015
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
It seems with each passing year the flood of year end lists are published earlier and earlier, assuring that at least a handful of films deserving a place on any given list are missed due to a lack of time and opportunity. Even here at Ioncinema.com, posting my list after the calender year has actually closed, it feels a little premature writing up a list, knowing there are plenty of films that I’ve yet to see due to a lack of screenings nearby – Mr. Turner, Foxcatcher, Leviathan, Winter Sleep and Selma just to name a few. I should note that it seems there is a lack of international releases on this list as well, but rest assured, of the many I saw this year, most won’t reach a domestic release until sometime in 2015, so films like Christian Petzold’s Phoenix, Tsai Ming-liang’s Journey to the West,...
- 1/5/2015
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
A Spell to Ward off the Darkness unites Ben Rivers and Ben Russell, two stars of contemporary avant-garde cinema, on a feature-length search for utopia in different corners of Northern Europe. While each director bears a distinct individual vision and approach to filmmaking, they share a common fascination with the possibility of attaining one's own paradise and transcendence, whether by one's self or among others, and especially as an alternative to the prescriptions of contemporary mainstream society. >> - Kevin B. Lee...
- 12/10/2014
- Fandor: Keyframe
A Spell to Ward off the Darkness unites Ben Rivers and Ben Russell, two stars of contemporary avant-garde cinema, on a feature-length search for utopia in different corners of Northern Europe. While each director bears a distinct individual vision and approach to filmmaking, they share a common fascination with the possibility of attaining one's own paradise and transcendence, whether by one's self or among others, and especially as an alternative to the prescriptions of contemporary mainstream society. >> - Kevin B. Lee...
- 12/10/2014
- Keyframe
Ben Russell and Ben Rivers take an academic approach to filmmaking, which makes their collaborative effort, "A Spell To Ward Off the Darkness," either one of the most intellectually engaging films of the year or an experience full of cramps, fidgeting, and eye-rolling, depending on who's talking. In any case, this is a film that should, at the very least, make one appreciate the all-encompassing breadth of cinema, and, at most, provoke deeper thought of transcendental existence in correlation with nature and The Idea of Man. If words like "sublime," "transcendence," and "ethnography" make you recoil in frustration, what Russell and Rivers are trying to get at here won't interest you in the slightest, and you'll be cramping, fidgeting, and rolling your eyes. But we're squarely camped on the other side of that fence. "A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness" doesn't only have the greatest title of any film this year,...
- 12/9/2014
- by Nikola Grozdanovic
- The Playlist
This year, Richard Linklater’s "Boyhood" played in the closing night slot of the True/False Film Fest, a festival dedicated to documentaries. The organizers explained the that, because of its documentary-like production schedule, the film represented something that only non-fiction is capable of. "For most casual filmgoers, the role of the producer may be mysterious, in part because their efforts are designed to be invisible onscreen. But a film like 'Boyhood,' seamless as a viewing experience, also demands that we acknowledge the epic care and attention to detail than went into its creation. What's more, Linklater's artistic process, by necessity, took into account the natural meanderings of his actor's lives, lending a verisimilitude to the action missing from many other fiction films." The folks behind the Cinema Eye awards clearly agree with True/False’s assessment and in the possibility that fiction can transcend its own narrative...
- 12/8/2014
- by Matt Patches
- Hitfix
When non-fiction and narrative film collide, how do we distinguish between the two? The Cinema Eye Honors’ answer to this is that they do….and they don’t. Easily my favorite award category of all the year-end shenanigans, the Heterodox Award is designed for the brazen filmmakers who allow docu-form to enhance the narrative experience — essentially service narrative form who boldly incorporate a docu aesthetic and this year’s batch of five noms do this serviceably in their own fashion. Announced by Filmmaker Magazine, here are the five films.
Boyhood directed by Richard Linklater
Heaven Knows What directed by Josh and Benny Safdie
A Spell to Ward off the Darkness directed by Ben Rivers and Ben Russell
Stop the Pounding Heart directed by Roberto Minervini
Under the Skin directed by Jonathan Glazer...
Boyhood directed by Richard Linklater
Heaven Knows What directed by Josh and Benny Safdie
A Spell to Ward off the Darkness directed by Ben Rivers and Ben Russell
Stop the Pounding Heart directed by Roberto Minervini
Under the Skin directed by Jonathan Glazer...
- 12/8/2014
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
The Cinema Eye Honors for Nonfiction Filmmaking today announced the five nominees for its annual Cinema Eye Heterodox Award, sponsored by Filmmaker Magazine, a publication of Ifp. The Cinema Eye Heterodox Award honors a narrative fiction film that imaginatively incorporates nonfiction strategies, content and/or modes of production. The five films nominated this year for the Cinema Eye Heterodox Award are: Boyhood directed by Richard Linklater Heaven Knows What directed by Josh and Benny Safdie A Spell to Ward off the Darkness directed by Ben Rivers and Ben Russell Stop the Pounding Heart directed by Roberto Minervini Under the Skin directed […]...
- 12/8/2014
- by Filmmaker Staff
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
The Cinema Eye Honors for Nonfiction Filmmaking today announced the five nominees for its annual Cinema Eye Heterodox Award, sponsored by Filmmaker Magazine, a publication of Ifp. The Cinema Eye Heterodox Award honors a narrative fiction film that imaginatively incorporates nonfiction strategies, content and/or modes of production. The five films nominated this year for the Cinema Eye Heterodox Award are: Boyhood directed by Richard Linklater Heaven Knows What directed by Josh and Benny Safdie A Spell to Ward off the Darkness directed by Ben Rivers and Ben Russell Stop the Pounding Heart directed by Roberto Minervini Under the Skin directed […]...
- 12/8/2014
- by Filmmaker Staff
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
There’s a scene early in Ben Rivers and Ben Russell’s A Spell To Ward Off the Darkness in which a young American woman, a member of a sort of hippie commune in Estonia, shares her vision for utopian architecture. She begins by describing a hypothetical building constructed as a spiral, one whose innermost circle, like the center of a vinyl record, would form “a locked groove that keeps going until infinity.”>> - Calum Marsh...
- 12/5/2014
- Fandor: Keyframe
There’s a scene early in Ben Rivers and Ben Russell’s A Spell To Ward Off the Darkness in which a young American woman, a member of a sort of hippie commune in Estonia, shares her vision for utopian architecture. She begins by describing a hypothetical building constructed as a spiral, one whose innermost circle, like the center of a vinyl record, would form “a locked groove that keeps going until infinity.”>> - Calum Marsh...
- 12/5/2014
- Keyframe
The Brothers Ben Find Supernal Solace On The Fringe
There are creative collaborations and there are perfect unions. The newly born cinematic relationship between experimental documentarians Ben Russell (Let Each One Go Where He May) and Ben Rivers (Two Years At Sea) seems to be the latter. Their first feature together, A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness, lets the inclinations of both artists meld into one pensively celebrative journey into the outskirts that sees the human spirit glow in the shadow of societal norms. Part reflexive documentary and part narrative fabrication, the film follows the existential exploration of a nameless journeyman (played by real-life musician Robert A.A. Lowe) in three parts – from an island-bound commune in Estonia, to the solitary seclusion of the Finnish backwoods, and finally to the dark depths of a rock club in Norway where he joins fellow black metal musicians on stage in a breathtaking...
There are creative collaborations and there are perfect unions. The newly born cinematic relationship between experimental documentarians Ben Russell (Let Each One Go Where He May) and Ben Rivers (Two Years At Sea) seems to be the latter. Their first feature together, A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness, lets the inclinations of both artists meld into one pensively celebrative journey into the outskirts that sees the human spirit glow in the shadow of societal norms. Part reflexive documentary and part narrative fabrication, the film follows the existential exploration of a nameless journeyman (played by real-life musician Robert A.A. Lowe) in three parts – from an island-bound commune in Estonia, to the solitary seclusion of the Finnish backwoods, and finally to the dark depths of a rock club in Norway where he joins fellow black metal musicians on stage in a breathtaking...
- 12/1/2014
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
★★★☆☆Narrative is not even a remote concern for Ben Rivers and Ben Russell, the co-directors of the experimental mixed-media art documentary, A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness (2014). Carved into three distinct acts, their film ostensibly follows the wanderings (or wonderings) of a man – musician and artist Robert A.A. Lowe – through an Estonian free-loving commune; an isolated stretch in a beautiful, desolate forest; and playing in a Norwegian metal band. Glacially paced with little incident, this is cinema as visual poetry, exploring our relationships what is around and within us. It is lyrical, oblique and completely bewitching even if it is never entirely satisfying.
- 12/1/2014
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
A new issue of Film Comment is out and a generous slice of it is online. Amy Taubin talks with David Fincher about Gone Girl, Quintín considers the work of Lisandro Alonso and Robert Horton previews the New York Film Festival's Joseph L. Mankiewicz retrospective. Plus reviews of David Cronenberg's Maps to the Stars, Alex Ross Perry's Listen Up Philip and more. Also in today's roundup: Jonathan Rosenbaum on Béla Tarr, an excerpt from an unrealized screenplay by Pier Paolo Pasolini, Sophia Nguyen on Scarlett Johansson, essays on Federico Fellini's Il Bidone, Ben Rivers and Ben Russell’s A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness and more. » - David Hudson...
- 9/15/2014
- Keyframe
A new issue of Film Comment is out and a generous slice of it is online. Amy Taubin talks with David Fincher about Gone Girl, Quintín considers the work of Lisandro Alonso and Robert Horton previews the New York Film Festival's Joseph L. Mankiewicz retrospective. Plus reviews of David Cronenberg's Maps to the Stars, Alex Ross Perry's Listen Up Philip and more. Also in today's roundup: Jonathan Rosenbaum on Béla Tarr, an excerpt from an unrealized screenplay by Pier Paolo Pasolini, Sophia Nguyen on Scarlett Johansson, essays on Federico Fellini's Il Bidone, Ben Rivers and Ben Russell’s A Spell to Ward Off the Darkness and more. » - David Hudson...
- 9/15/2014
- Fandor: Keyframe
★★★★☆A collaborative journey across the spiritual plains of Northern Europe, Ben Rivers and Ben Russell's A Spell to Ward off the Darkness is arthouse cinema at is most challenging, pushing ethnographic fetishism and self-reflective analyses to the nadir of its cerebral appeal. Although divided into three distinct segments, this philosophical voyage remains relatively amorphous. The first fragment presents an English-speaking commune in a quaint Estonian idyll where the free spirits of the sixties never dissipated - with anecdotes about fingers in bums a commonplace attitude towards psychoanalysis. The second section sees us transported to the Finnish wilderness in what feels like a version of Thoreau's Walden.
- 9/11/2014
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
Thanks to the increase in access to small scale non-fiction films through the barrage of streaming services viewers now have access to – Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon Prime, Mubi, Vudu, etc – people are watching more documentaries than ever before. You can literally turn on any web ready device of your choosing and be watching any number of top quality docs within a number of seconds. It’s nothing short of incredible. But, with ease of access comes an over saturation of content used to fill in the curatorial gaps. For every Marwencol, Senna, Gimme Shelter or The Act of Killing, there are heaps of ordures cinéma clogging up precious bandwidth. And let’s not forget, cinemas themselves are enjoying a renewed trust in the non-fiction form, exhibiting over 100 documentaries on the silver screen last year and banking over $50 Million at the box office in the process, not including the hundreds of...
- 7/28/2014
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
The Film Society Of Lincoln Center and The Museum Of Modern Art have announced seven official selections for the 2014 New Directors/New Films Festival, set to run from March 19–30.
The 2014 edition marks the 43rd year of the festival dedicated to the discovery of new works by emerging and dynamic filmmaking talent.
The initial seven selections represent 11 countries and are:
Richard Ayoade’s The Double (UK):
Benedikt Erlingsson’s Of Horses And Men (pictured, Iceland);
Abdellah Taïa’s Salvation Army (L’Armée du Salut) (France-Morocco-Switzerland);
Ben Rivers and Ben Russell’s A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness (Estonia-France);
Roberto Minervini’s Stop The Pounding Heart (Belgium-Italy-us);
Albert Serra’s Story Of My Death (Història De La Meva Mort) (Spain-France); and
Vivian Qu’s Trap Street (Shuiyin Jie) (China).
The 2014 edition marks the 43rd year of the festival dedicated to the discovery of new works by emerging and dynamic filmmaking talent.
The initial seven selections represent 11 countries and are:
Richard Ayoade’s The Double (UK):
Benedikt Erlingsson’s Of Horses And Men (pictured, Iceland);
Abdellah Taïa’s Salvation Army (L’Armée du Salut) (France-Morocco-Switzerland);
Ben Rivers and Ben Russell’s A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness (Estonia-France);
Roberto Minervini’s Stop The Pounding Heart (Belgium-Italy-us);
Albert Serra’s Story Of My Death (Història De La Meva Mort) (Spain-France); and
Vivian Qu’s Trap Street (Shuiyin Jie) (China).
- 1/14/2014
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
AFI Fest 2013 presented by Audi top brass unveiled the New Auteurs and shorts sections that will screen at the festival, set to take place from November 7-14 in Hollywood.
The New Auteurs section highlights first and second-time feature film directors from around the world.
Entries include: Yeon Sang-ho’s The Fake (South Korea), Emir Baigazin’s Harmony Lessons (Kazakhstan, Germany, France), Nana Ekvtimishvili and Simon Gross’ In Bloom (Georgia, Germany, France); Mira Fornay’s My Dog Killer (Slovakia, Czech Republic); and Katrin Gebbe’s Nothing Bad Can Happen (Germany).
Rounding out the ten selections are: Agustín Toscano and Ezequiel Radusky’s The Owners (Argentina); Clio Barnard’s The Selfish Giant (UK); Ben Rivers and Ben Russell’s A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness (France, Estonia); Ramon Zürcher’s The Strange Little Cat (Germany); and Samuel Isamu Kishi Leopo’s We Are Mari Pepa (Mexico);
For the full list of shorts and jurors for both categories visit the...
The New Auteurs section highlights first and second-time feature film directors from around the world.
Entries include: Yeon Sang-ho’s The Fake (South Korea), Emir Baigazin’s Harmony Lessons (Kazakhstan, Germany, France), Nana Ekvtimishvili and Simon Gross’ In Bloom (Georgia, Germany, France); Mira Fornay’s My Dog Killer (Slovakia, Czech Republic); and Katrin Gebbe’s Nothing Bad Can Happen (Germany).
Rounding out the ten selections are: Agustín Toscano and Ezequiel Radusky’s The Owners (Argentina); Clio Barnard’s The Selfish Giant (UK); Ben Rivers and Ben Russell’s A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness (France, Estonia); Ramon Zürcher’s The Strange Little Cat (Germany); and Samuel Isamu Kishi Leopo’s We Are Mari Pepa (Mexico);
For the full list of shorts and jurors for both categories visit the...
- 10/15/2013
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
Fresh from triumph on the festival circuit, a host of exciting British films is set for release. We talk to the directors behind this sudden renaissance
At Cannes, in May, there was anxious talk. Of the 70-plus features showcased at the film festival only two of them were British. Did it signal a decline in the UK industry? By the end of 2013, would our film people be wringing their hands while cinemagoers queued up for American fare and the House of Lords unhappily convened a select committee?
Without a doubt, the pair of British films on show at Cannes were excellent – Clio Barnard's The Selfish Giant and Paul Wright's For Those in Peril – both bruising, powerful dramas. But French and American and Mexican and Chinese and Cambodian film-makers left Cannes with the top prizes; meanwhile fans and boosters of British cinema travelled back across the Channel in mild panic.
At Cannes, in May, there was anxious talk. Of the 70-plus features showcased at the film festival only two of them were British. Did it signal a decline in the UK industry? By the end of 2013, would our film people be wringing their hands while cinemagoers queued up for American fare and the House of Lords unhappily convened a select committee?
Without a doubt, the pair of British films on show at Cannes were excellent – Clio Barnard's The Selfish Giant and Paul Wright's For Those in Peril – both bruising, powerful dramas. But French and American and Mexican and Chinese and Cambodian film-makers left Cannes with the top prizes; meanwhile fans and boosters of British cinema travelled back across the Channel in mild panic.
- 9/15/2013
- by Tom Lamont
- The Guardian - Film News
The 57th BFI London Film Festival line-up has officially been revealed, and it is led by a slew of incredibly promising films, many of which have already been buzzing on the festival circuit, and a number of which will be making their debuts here in London.
As previously announced, Paul Greengrass’ Captain Phillips will open the festival next month, and John Lee Hancock’s Saving Mr. Banks will close it, book-ending the festival with Tom Hanks leading two highly prominent, Oscar-primed movies.
Stephen Frears’ Philomena was also previously announced as the Lff American Express Gala, with The Epic of Everest announced as the Lff Archive Gala.
And leading the line-up alongside them this year will be some of the most Oscar-buzzed movies of 2013, including Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave, Jason Reitman’s Labor Day, Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity (in 3D), Joel and Ethan Coen’s Inside Llewyn Davis, Terry Gilliam’s The Zero Theorem,...
As previously announced, Paul Greengrass’ Captain Phillips will open the festival next month, and John Lee Hancock’s Saving Mr. Banks will close it, book-ending the festival with Tom Hanks leading two highly prominent, Oscar-primed movies.
Stephen Frears’ Philomena was also previously announced as the Lff American Express Gala, with The Epic of Everest announced as the Lff Archive Gala.
And leading the line-up alongside them this year will be some of the most Oscar-buzzed movies of 2013, including Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave, Jason Reitman’s Labor Day, Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity (in 3D), Joel and Ethan Coen’s Inside Llewyn Davis, Terry Gilliam’s The Zero Theorem,...
- 9/4/2013
- by Kenji Lloyd
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Ben Rivers & Ben Russell – A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness
Section: Wavelengths
Times: Saturday 7th, Monday 9th, Sunday 15th
Buzz: It’s very possible you’ve never heard of either of the pair of outsider artists that helmed this genre blending docu-odyssey, but for those in the know, directors Ben Rivers and Ben Russell seem a match made in heaven. Both yearn for the alchemy of film as a developers medium. Both bend the non-fiction form into the free-wheeling realm of avant-garde as true Diy artists. Both find solace on the fringes, either filming a hermit in the backwoods of the Scottish Highlands, as in Rivers’ Two Years at Sea, or individuals on spiritual journeys the world over in Russell’s self-dubbed ‘psychedelic ethnography’ series, Trypps. Their collaboration looks to have melded their best qualities and strewn them across the Scandinavian periphery, from communes to black metal and back again.
Section: Wavelengths
Times: Saturday 7th, Monday 9th, Sunday 15th
Buzz: It’s very possible you’ve never heard of either of the pair of outsider artists that helmed this genre blending docu-odyssey, but for those in the know, directors Ben Rivers and Ben Russell seem a match made in heaven. Both yearn for the alchemy of film as a developers medium. Both bend the non-fiction form into the free-wheeling realm of avant-garde as true Diy artists. Both find solace on the fringes, either filming a hermit in the backwoods of the Scottish Highlands, as in Rivers’ Two Years at Sea, or individuals on spiritual journeys the world over in Russell’s self-dubbed ‘psychedelic ethnography’ series, Trypps. Their collaboration looks to have melded their best qualities and strewn them across the Scandinavian periphery, from communes to black metal and back again.
- 9/2/2013
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
Programmer Andrea Picard can do no wrong. From the compiled short and medium film offerings (see listing below for huge sampling of renowned world auteurs) to the latest from Tsai Ming-liang, Ben Wheatley (Karlovy Vary winner A Field In England), Albert Serra (Locarno debuted Story Of My Death), Wang Bing and that Rotterdam offering that we never thought we’d have the chance to see from Cristi Puiu, the ’13 edition of the Wavelenths programme is for those who need a little spunk in their cinema.
Of the titles that additionally caught our attention we have the Locarno preemed A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness by Ben Rivers and Ben Russell, the world premiere of (see pic above) La ultíma película – by Raya Martin and Cinemascope/Locarno programmer Mark Peranson (making his feature debut), Into Great Silence docu-helmer Philip Gröning’s The Police Officer’s Wife and a title that...
Of the titles that additionally caught our attention we have the Locarno preemed A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness by Ben Rivers and Ben Russell, the world premiere of (see pic above) La ultíma película – by Raya Martin and Cinemascope/Locarno programmer Mark Peranson (making his feature debut), Into Great Silence docu-helmer Philip Gröning’s The Police Officer’s Wife and a title that...
- 8/13/2013
- by admin
- IONCINEMA.com
Rithy Panh’s Un Certain Regard winner takes its place alongside Ben Wheatley’s A Field In England and new films from Canada’s Stephen Broomer and Chris Kennedy in the Wavelengths section.
The selection of short, medium-length and feature work includes Caroline Strubbe’s I’m The Same, I’m An Other; Raya Martin and Mark Peranson’s La Ultima Pelicula; and Albert Serra’s Story Of My Death.
The Toronto International Film Festival is set to run from Sept 5-15.
Wp = World premiere
IP = International premiere
Np = North American premiere
Cp = Canadian premiere
Tp = Toronto premiere
Short Film PROGRAMMESWavelengths 1: Variations On…Variations On A Cellophane Wrapper David Rimmer (Restoration courtesy of Academy Film Archive) (Canada)Pop Takes Luther Price (Us)Airship Kenneth Anger (Us)El Adios Largos Andrew Lampert (Mexico-us)The Realist Scott Stark (Us)Wavelengths 2: Now & ThenInstants Hannes Schüpbach (Switzerland)Pepper’s Ghost Stephen Broomer (Canada)Man In Motion, 2012 (Homme En Mouvement...
The selection of short, medium-length and feature work includes Caroline Strubbe’s I’m The Same, I’m An Other; Raya Martin and Mark Peranson’s La Ultima Pelicula; and Albert Serra’s Story Of My Death.
The Toronto International Film Festival is set to run from Sept 5-15.
Wp = World premiere
IP = International premiere
Np = North American premiere
Cp = Canadian premiere
Tp = Toronto premiere
Short Film PROGRAMMESWavelengths 1: Variations On…Variations On A Cellophane Wrapper David Rimmer (Restoration courtesy of Academy Film Archive) (Canada)Pop Takes Luther Price (Us)Airship Kenneth Anger (Us)El Adios Largos Andrew Lampert (Mexico-us)The Realist Scott Stark (Us)Wavelengths 2: Now & ThenInstants Hannes Schüpbach (Switzerland)Pepper’s Ghost Stephen Broomer (Canada)Man In Motion, 2012 (Homme En Mouvement...
- 8/13/2013
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
Thanks to the inquisitive nature of one of our most unabashedly hardcore cinephile writers on the site (Blake you’re a hawk!), we’ve uncovered a slew of title offerings for this year’s Tiff (a little ahead of what should be the final announcement wave) and we’ve got a grab-bag of mention-worthy items from beloved auteurs. Among the titles (see list below – here’s our source) we find carry-over items from Cannes in Alain Guiraudie’s Stranger by the Lake, Rithy Panh’s The Missing Image, Guillaume Canet’s Blood Ties and Claire Denis’ Bastards (among one of our top films for 2013 – see pic above), while from Venice, we have the just-inserted Patrice Leconte title, A Promise and what will easily be among the most sought after Tiff 2013 coverage items in Catherine Breillat’s Abus de faiblesse. Here is the rest of the spoiler set:
Special Presentations
A Promise...
Special Presentations
A Promise...
- 8/10/2013
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
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