A window can often be distracting--especially for a comic book artist who has set up his work space in a position where he can see the entire apartment building across the street. But a voyeur may…
1997
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A window can often be distracting--especially for a comic book artist who has set up his work space in a position where he can see the entire apartment building across the street. But a voyeur may also find that he is not always the lone viewer and that others also like to look. Director Samuel Lee takes us on a mildly surreal journey into the world of a voyeuristic artist who becomes enamored with a video artist who is also finding interest in his building. Following her around the city, however, leads our hero into a world of deceit and murder.
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In the spirit of 19th century Gothic tales, reminiscent of Edgar Allan Poe, Morella takes bio-technology as its bogeyman and sets it in its own cold and drafty "haunted mansion"--a gene-splicing research lab. In an effort to survive her impending death from a rare form of multiple sclerosis, the beautiful and ruthless Dr. Morella (played by Angela Jones of the recent film Curdled) recruits a fellow researcher to help clone herself into a viable embryo. The enraptured Dr.
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Fred Frenger (Alec Baldwin) is a wanted ex-con whose devil-may-care attitude surprisingly hasn't yet led to his capture. Upon reaching Miami he meets up with Susie (a hooker played by Jennifer Jason Leigh) adopts her as his fiancee, and sets about supplementing their income with a string of petty thefts. Upon acquiring the cuffs, badge, and other accouterments of cop Sgt. Hoke Moseley (Fred Ward), he discovers that larceny has never been easier. This disarming black comedy stands out among others in the pack because its offbeat plot turns make for an intriguing, often unpredictable, pacing.
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For artists and poets, Mary Paradox and Grace describes one person's approach as an answer to those who need inspiration in the pursuit of a meaningful life. Very few films successfully blend art, philosophy, poetry and music, but to gain a full appreciation of an artist requires just such a blend. In Karen Watson's film, the life and thoughts of the artist Mary Holmes, a founding professor at U.C. Santa Cruz, are gracefully combined to produce a rounded picture of a woman who has devoted her long life to art without many of the compromises that are usually required along the way.
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Harry has been "cursed" with a large facial birthmark in the shape of the island of Madagascar. Fleeing the local gay scene, his feelings of loneliness are curbed with an unusual meeting between him and another societal outcast named Flint, a somewhat older and more bitter man. Illegally taking over an abandoned cottage, the two men begin to regain their lost trust in humankind. Although at first uneasy with Flint's easy-going and unscrupulous approach to life, Harry's instinctual need for physical contact unchains his mind allowing his attraction to the heterosexual Flint flourish.
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Luna di Capua and her shadow have a story to tell. It begins in Milan in 1955, as Luna spends her days, a dedicated teacher with a rigid agenda, not just for her students, but for herself. She doesn't even have time to notice Angelo, the school's janitor, who has been in love with Luna for years. But Luna's life is about to change. The Panforti Circus has come to town, and through a twist of fate, Luna comes into possession of Igor's magic lantern.
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One of the most powerful documentaries you'll see at this year's festival, Lost in Mississippi is Jim Chambers' haunting journey back to the south, trying to uncover whatever he can about reported prison suicides over the last five years. The "victims" were "mostly young, male `short-timers'" and "fully half of whom were African-American." Chambers talks with anyone who will talk with him, and what emerges is a collection of sometimes disturbing, sometimes sad, but always riveting stories.
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Twelve million people a year visit this holy place, some making pilgrimages lasting months. The destination, however, is not some exotic location like Mecca or a distant temple in Tibet. Instead, these devoted pilgrims march to the hill Tepeyac, in the heart of Mexico City. The reason for their pilgrimage and its importance to Mexican heritage are the driving forces behind Juan Francisco Urrusti's newest documentary. A Long Journey to Guadalupe introduces its viewer to the many individuals whose paths culminate at the shrine to the Virgin Guadalupe.
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"Love stories are about people who find love in happy times. Tragedies are about people who seek love in unhappy times." -- Roger Ebert, The Chicago Sun Times Brooklyn in the 1950s was a hellhole. And there was no way to get out, no way to escape the ensuing madness. The union official cannot admit to being left wing. The strike leader cannot reveal he is homosexual. The father cannot express his love for his child. The prostitute cannot accept her love for the sailor. The drag queen is not able to love himself.
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On the eve of the Velvet Revolution a mercenary, has-been musician unexpectedly finds he must finally grow up in Kolya, directed by Jan Sverak, the foremost member of Czech cinema's new wave. It's 1989 and Prague, occupied by the Russians, is on the brink of enormous political changes. For Frantisek Louka, however, concerns are a shade more mundane. Once a renowned cellist in the August Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Frantisek has been reduced to playing for funerals at the city crematorium and renovating tombstones in his spare time.