Category: The List

The List

Michael Lumpkin looks back

It’s perhaps not so shocking that the 2008 Frameline Award is going to the festival’s own Michael Lumpkin this year. Frameline’s retiring executive director, as well as sometime board member and festival co-director, started as a volunteer in 1979, then basically led the SF International LGBT Film Fest for 25 years (taking four out to co-produce The Celluloid Closet). No one is more deserving of in-house honors for not only developing a world-class festival, but charting an ever-more-community-inclusive path for (as the monicker labels it) international lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender cinema. Whatever he’s up to in the future, his departure from Frameline causes no small amount of sentimental ache.

In parting, he’s chosen a mini-retrospective of features over the last two-decades-plus that highlight some personal favorites that made waves at the festival (and sometimes in the larger cinematic world). They’re a terrific assortment you’d be well advised to check out, whether as a first-timer or nostalgic re-viewer.

topics: film festivals, gay lesbian cinema

The List

Travel guide through Another Hole in the Head Film Festival

It’s summer—not that that means much if you live in SF proper—so you might be contemplating vacation travel of one sort or another. Or if work commitments, poverty and/or gas prices are keeping you home for the season, maybe passive travel via the wonderful world of available local cinematic entertainment will have to suffice. That’s a pretty safe way to get around, but beware nonetheless: Even movie tourism can be dangerous to your health. Certainly if you’re a movie character, at least.

This year’s edition of SF Indiefest-presented Another Hole in the Head, the two-week horror, sci-fi and fantasy fest, offers a plethora of destinations it turns out were a very bad idea to visit. We can’t guarantee fate will deal you cards as grim as it does the cast in these representative ’08 HoleHead titles. But one can never be too cautious, right? So, for the time being one might want to avoid the following top ten locations for terror:

topics: bay area, genre films, horror, japanese cinema, sf indiefest

The List

Contemporary Jewish Museum's DAWN

Looking for something meaningful to do Sunday morning at 2 a.m.? SF360.org offers key notes of the all-night Dawn festival—art, film, ideas—at the Contemporary Jewish Museum’s new digs.

topics: art, dance, jewish cinema, music

The List

SF International Arts Festival

In addition to bringing a host of worldwide performers to the Bay Area for the first time, the San Francisco International Arts Festival (May 2-June 8), now in its fifth year, has become an indispensable showcase for collaborative work by leading Bay Area artists and their peers across all manner of geographical, cultural and disciplinary borders. The more than 40 performances in this year’s lineup, taking place at 14 separate venues across the city and in Berkeley, span the worlds of dance, music, opera, theater, visual arts and multidisciplinary work. The following four highlights are all hybrid productions with strong film and/or video components.

topics: exhibitions, experimental film, performance

The List

Seven from the Sonoma Valley Film Festival

There are few things in the Bay Area more adventurous and relaxing than being able to take off a day or two and head to Wine Country. The mere fact that driving less than 30 miles north of San Francisco and Alameda counties warrants taking off a “day or two” is testament both to spring fever and the siren song of Sonoma’s hospitality, the lure of the vineyards and riverbanks.

The Sonoma Valley Film Festival, which runs April 9-13, has gone to great lengths to enfold the event in its surroundings. Complimentary food tastings prepared with fresh, regional ingredients will be offered before every single screening. The festival sommelier has chosen over 30 locally produced wines to pair with each food selection. It’s no surprise that the opening night gala at Jacuzzi Winery is sponsored by Food & Wine magazine.

topics: bay area, directors, documentary, exhibitions, film festivals, sonoma

The List

The many faces of Faust

The Faust legend has resonated throughout cultures, genres and media for centuries—particularly in Germany, where it began. It was already popular in various literary and performance forms (notably Christopher Marlowe’s 1588 drama) long before Goethe wrote the most famous and influential of all interpretations, the two-part stage epic simply called Faust In honor of that work’s 200th anniversary, the Goethe-Institut is hosting a mini Faust-fest offering four memorable screen versions of the story.

topics: bay area, german cinema, silent film

The List

SFIAAFF's winners

Boys will be boys, or b-boys, if you look at the winners of the 2008 San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, announced last night, the final SF night for the annual SFIAAFF. Winners of the Narrative Feature Jury Prize (a tie with Santa Mesa), as well as Best Documentary, were b-boy movies, Always Be Boys and Planet B-Boy, respectively. While breakdancing in the U.S. has certainly seen better days (a U.S. team has not won the international “Battle of the Year” since 1998), the art has been taken up with a vengeance by Asians, with Korean teams a particularly dominant force. Last night, they came up on top again. The complete list of awardees, in case you missed it live, is here at SF360. The Festival moves to San Jose March 21-23.

topics: asian american cinema, asian cinema, awards, bay area, directors, documentary, pacific film archive, sundance kabuki

The List

Judy Stone's San Francisco Int'l Asian American Film Festival picks

A name familiar to longtime readers of the San Francisco Chronicle, where she once worked, Judy Stone came out with Not Quite a Memoir two years back, offering audiences conversations on film from around the world. This week, she offers SF360.org readers her top picks for the SFIAAFF’s collection of films from around the world—films screening at the Sundance Kabuki as you read this. Her work has also appeared in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Ramparts, for over 40 years, and Stone has two other books out as well, Eye on the World: Conversations with International Filmmakers and The Mystery of B. Traven.

topics: asian cinema, authors, critics, film festivals, filmmakers

The List

10 reasons to see "Cinema Piemonte"

This weekend the Associazone Piemontesi of Northern California, in association with the Italian Cultural Institute and Regione Piemonte, is presenting “Cinema Piemonte,” a brief survey of movies made in that beautiful area of the mother country. The four films run the gamut, from comedy to melodrama to spectacle to agitprop. They also span a whoppin’ nine decades of cinematic history. Admission is free to all programs. Beyond that obvious lure, here are further reasons to attend:

topics: directors, italian cinema, san francisco

The List

Bollywood by the Bay

Every morning I wake up with Bollywood movie tunes going through my head. Every. Single. Morning. Such is the life of a Bollywood fanatic who needs the addictive rhythms, blinding bling-covered costumes, sensational settings, and emotional outpourings of Hindi Cinema. To keep from getting the tremors, I require an injection several times a month. Happily the Bay Area is not stingy with its Indian film offerings. Listed below are some of the best places to get your fix.

The much anticipated Bollywood film “Jodhaa Akbar” opens at the Balboa Theater in San Francisco this Friday (the same day as the world-wide release). This movie has big-time creds featuring two of the hottest Bollywood stars, Ashwariya Rai Bachchan and Hrithik Roshan, scored by the prolific composer A.R. Rahman, and helmed by Ashutosh Gowariker, director of the Oscar nominated “Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India” (which featured a truly exciting hour-and-a-half cricket match).

topics: bollywood, lists