2011 Philadelphia Film Festival

Greetings Soldiers and Cinephiles,

It is October in Philadelphia and that means it is time once again for the latest installment of the Philadelphia Film Festival. Shooting Wall has a press pass for this year's festival, and we plan on some pretty extensive coverage this year. Our coverage will consist of reviews of films, but we are also going to be going a little be further by covering the festival itself. This means we are going to be writing pieces about how well these screenings are organized, projection (quality, digital or film, etc), Q&A, short films programmed with features, prices, and film selections. Our aim here is to offer, as Shooting Wall often does, an in-depth analysis of the industry of film festivals, which we already wrote about on the blog during last year's festival and in Issue #2 of our zine. I recommend all our readers look back over the article The Failures of American Film Festivals as an introduction to Shooting Wall's feelings on the subject.

I want to use this opportunity for a brief overview of the 2011 Philadelphia Film Festival and the films Shooting Wall is recommending people actually go see. To start, I offer the same criticism of the festival as last year, which is that is is too expensive. $12 a ticket and no student discount seems incredibly steep, and it shows who the audience for this festival is. Not many people can afford to fork over $12 a ticket to see a lot of films; many people don't have the finances for that. There are some ticket deals, such as 6 tickets for $60, which is an okay deal, but not a great deal especially considering if you buy this package you are required to go to the main festival box office to pick up this pass and then obtain your tickets in person, which isn't all that convenient really. Certainly you could spend $350 for an unlimited pass, but should cinema really cost this much money? Shooting Wall thinks that it shouldn't. The second and probably most significant gripe I have with the festival and with the majority of festivals the size and scope of the Philadelphia Film Festival is their lack of original programming. The majority of the films being shown this (and most) years are films that have been making the festival rounds for the last year or so; a good percentage, in fact, just premiered at the New York Film Festival. Not only that, there are so many films premiering that will be opening in Philadelphia almost immediately after the festival ends. Melancholia, Le Havre, and A Dangerous Method, to name three, already have release dates for Philadelphia. Why then should I waste $12 on seeing this films when if I wait a week or two I can see them more cheaply at the Ritz? It doesn't really make sense to me. The main films of this year's festival fall into this category; Shame, Kid with a Bike, Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life, Jeff, Who Lives at Home, Martha Marcy May Marlene, Le Havre, A Dangerous Method, Melancholia, My Week with Marilyn, will all play in Philadelphia. The Philadelphia Film Festival obviously assumes people don't go to film festival to see the most original, interesting, and cutting edge films which they cannot see elsewhere, but merely go see films they have already heard of a week or two before their friends. This, I do not believe, is the purpose of a film festival, at least not a festival like this one. And I am not saying I don't recommend some, if not all, of the above films that I have mentioned as many of them are probably going to be quite good, however, I just don't understand why I need to spend more money to see them a week before everyone else. My contention is that what makes a festival interesting is the diversity and originality of their programming. I want to find the films that won't make it to the theater in my city. I want the most difficult, original, and cutting edge films which can only find an audience among dedicated cinephiles at film festivals. I do not think there are very many of these film festivals in the United States anymore.

With all that out of the way, this year's festival line-up is decent, despite the originality, there are some films that probably won't make it to Philadelphia and not because they are too difficult or too esoteric to find an audience here, but because there seems to be a quota of goods films that are allowed to come to Philadelphia each year, which is sometimes not very high. I also want to mention that I think the relatively strong schedule of this year's festival compared to last year's has little to do with the festival programmers, but more to do with the fact that this year happens to be one in which a lot of the best filmmakers have films coming out. I believe this to be the case because even in the worst possible year for film, really creative and committed programmers could create a great film festival, but the Philadelphia Film Festival is not such a festival and if there aren't a lot of great films by well-known filmmakers out, then the festival won't be good.

I also have to say that the American films and the local Philadelphia films playing this year look pretty atrocious. Are these supposed to be indicative of what is happening in cinema in America and in Philadelphia? If so, we are in a lot more trouble than I ever imagined.

Below are the films Shooting Wall recommends for people to see at the film festival. These are films which we think either will not be released in Philadelphia or have very little chance of being released here. As far as the ones mentioned above, save your $12 and go see them in November and December at the Ritz for less money (almost half the price on Wednesdays).

Recommended Films:

Attenberg by Athina Rachel Tsangari
Bonsai by Cristián Jimenez
Collaborator by Martin Donovan
Corpo Celeste by Alice Rohrwacher
The Day He Arrives by Sang-soo Hong
The Fairy by Bruno Romy and Fiona Gordon
Habemus Papam by Nanni Moretti
House of Tolerance by Bertrand Bonello
Michael by Markus Schleinzer
Miss Bala by Gerardo Naranjo
Once Upon a Time in Anatolia by Nuri Bilge Ceylan
The Turin Horse by Béla Tarr and Ágnes Hranitzky

-JOSH

CITY HALL SCREENINGS + PODCAST

Our new podcast is now out, subscribe here. It has audio from our last Show & Tell event of Luc Moullet's Les Sieges de L'Alcazar, an interview with Doug Sakmann about the demise of the 941 cinema, and a very unique interview with local filmmaker Dante Aleman.

We are doing some screenings at City Hall on Tuesdays, you should definitely come out. Next Tues Oct 25th we're going to play Jacque Tati's Playtime.

Shooting Wall Zine, Issue #3

Here it is. Our hard work has paid off and we've put it up for your viewing. Containing 12 articles and 6 columns, it's our largest, most diverse and spectacular publication so far. Expect more content-driven stuff from us in the future, and feel free to think about contributing articles and art work to us for our next issue, which we will begin working on soon for it to arrive sometime around the New Year. For now, enjoy Issue #3!

Shooting Wall Issue 3

REMINDER: Saturday October 15th Shooting Wall Release Party

This is a reminder to everyone that our release party is happening tomorrow night (Saturday October 15th) at 6pm. This is going to be the film event of the year.



Oct 15th 6pm-8pm
Broad Street Ministry 315 S Broad St.

We will be releasing onto the world the epic 3rd issue of our cinema zine containing many unique pieces of film theory and criticism. Then, we'll screen our first omnibus film, This is Shooting Wall, in which 6 local filmmakers made short films inspired by the theme of 'Sacco and Vanzetti.' This event will be attended by some of the most mobilized members of Philly's film and art community.

Admission and light refreshments will be FREE.

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TOUT VA BIEN TONIGHT AT CITY HALL (POST-SCRIPT)

Here is a link to some more photos of the event. We successfully played a film that suggested that it is "more complicated" than we think to just occupy a place, work with the mainstream left, to be a woman worker, etc., right onto City Hall in a constructively critical fashion. Quite possibly the real way this film was supposed to be projected and seen. The film also, in terms of aesthetics, directly connected to the visuals going on at Occupy Philly. The banner you can see below in the flier existed also at City Hall. And our post-film discussion eluded to the film, but also interestingly broke out into wider Occupy Philly strategy, which was our intention with the film. We should be doing this every Tuesday at 9pm at the same spot, would appreciate to see some new faces to discuss the films and grow as revolutionary people through the power of the cinema.

Just to portray a unique moment before we played the film here. It was sometime after it was time to talk at their general assembly, but we were taking over the PA system that had the earlier assembly's mic to play Tout Va Bien. We then decided, after hearing what wanted to be said over the PA, to let them speak before we played the film. Two passionate speakers than went on for several minutes each in tirades against some new revelations from City Hall via a letter they just received in which they called for demands. A large crowd, some surely there prior to see the film, others running over to hear what the dissent from the mic was about, crowded around the speakers, and next to them a projector throwing a 60 foot paused Tout Va Bien on City Hall. The second and last speaker, a Cindy Milstein, ended her speech few minutes of political oration with "...and if they want to give us demands, we'll give them demands! And now a very important film about people taking power for themselves!" And as she walked off stage, we pressed play, and gave us one of the best introductions ever. 

To keep up with future stuff we'll do a City Hall and all our events which are the same as what we did last night, you can join our FB group, which is the best way to keep up with our events and get involved with our collective or you can bookmark our eventbrite page.

ORIGINAL POST 

Although Shooting Wall is not a political outfit, we believe in the creation of community and the liberation of art/film art. Currently we live in a time that doesn't foster the creation of either. We also just really love left radical cinema, even if some of us in our ranks are not politically active or are not left wing. That said, there is no better group in this city to play some revolutionary films. 

Going to be projecting around 9pm onto the front of City Hall on the 15th & Market side.