Has it Really Been 20 Years Since Toy Story?
Given the length of the lines (at least 100 people were turned away at the door) for South by Southwest’s, “Infinity & Beyond: Pixar & 20 Years Since Toy Story” panel, many of us have a friend and clearly miss our old Buzz Lightyear and Woody the cowboy toys. But this ‘behind the scenes’ look ...
SXSW 2015: A Q&A With the Director & Star of She’s The Best Thing In It
Films by women, about women, and in many ways, targeted to women were a huge part of this year’s South by Southwest festival. Women were tremendously prominent in the line-up, serving as two of the four SXSW film keynote speakers: Ava DuVernay, the noted director of Selma, and Christine Vachon, who has produced some of the ...
SXSW 2015: Sony’s Steve Mosko Talks TV
Sony Pictures Television’s president Steve Mosko recalled the reaction of some of his fellow executives when they were preparing to green light an oddball script some years ago. The story was about a high school chemistry teacher with terminal cancer turning to the production and distribution of crystal meth in order to support his family ...
SXSW 2015: Selma Director Ava DuVernay’s Moving Keynote Address
In her South by Southwest keynote address, director Ava DuVernay discussed taking on one of the greatest challenges for any filmmaker; the depiction of a historical event. For DuVernay, of course, it was the challenge of making Selma, the story of Martin Luther King Jr. leading the historic, dangerous march from Selma, Ala., to Montgomery in support of ...
SXSW 2015: Alison Bechdel, Joshua Openheimer & Maria Hinojosa talk Storytelling
Maria Hinojosa, the executive producer and anchor of Latino USA on NPR, led a discussion between two leading lights in their respective fields; graphic memoirist Alison Bechdel and documentarian Joshua Oppenheimer. Bechdel’s last two works, the groundbreaking “Fun Home,” about her childhood and, more specifically, her closeted father, and “Are You My Mother?” which explores ...
SXSW 2015: Honeytrap Writer/Director Rebecca Johnson
In America we call them projects, and they’ve been the locus of many crucial, incredible films, quiet a few from Spike Lee, including Do the Right Thing and Clockers. They’re called favelas in Brazil, the setting for the Fernando Meirelles and Kátia Lund’s explosive City of God, while in Britain they’re called estates. These are ...
SXSW 2015 Preview: Women to Watch
The programming at SXSW has become more robust each and every year. Part of the appeal of the festival's selections is the wide representation of female filmmakers, who have produced an especially rich mix of films for this year's slate.There are far too many filmmakers to chose from, so here's just a very quick peek ...
SXSW 2015 Preview: Hot Docs
We’re back in Austin for the SXSW film festival, and holy hell there’s a lot of stuff to see and do. The festival officially kicks off this Friday with the documentary Brand: A Second Coming, director Ondi Timoner’s profile of the comedian/author/activist Russell Brand’s evolution from hard charging bon vivant to political disruptor and revolutionary who has ...
