Director Brett Haley on His Compelling Adaptation of All the Bright Places
Although he has just a handful of feature-length films to his credit, Brett Haley has become a master in creating character-driven worlds that resonate with audiences. The stories he tells are simple on the surface, but ultimately layered — from the septuagenarian romance in I’ll See You in My Dreams, to the legacy of an aging actor in The Hero, to the father-daughter bond in Hearts Beat Loud.
Simon Frederick on the History of Black Cinema in his Doc They’ve Gotta Have Us
In They’ve Gotta Have Us now streaming on Netflix, British photographer-turned filmmaker Simon Frederick chronicles the history of Black Cinema by sitting down with some of the people who made that history. Produced by BBC Two and Ava DuVernay‘s ARRAY company, the three-part documentary series blends archival footage with dozens of interviews to survey eight decades of American filmmaking.
“I wanted to hear about the struggles and the successes,
Writer/Director Rashaad Ernesto Green on his Bracing Love Story Premature
When Rashaad Ernesto Green and Zora Howard sat down to write a feature that Howard would star in and Green would direct, the pair already knew it would be a love story. No, Howard and Green are not a couple; they worked together on Green’s debut feature Gun Hill Road (2011) and on his 2008 short Premature. The two artists simply wanted to create “what we felt was missing in the current cinematic climate especially with relation to black stories,” says Green.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire Writer/Director Celine Sciamma on her Masterpiece
French writer-director Céline Sciamma, whose first three features, Water Lilies (2007), Tomboy (2011) and Girlhood (2014), established her unique voice with visually compelling depictions of coming of age, gender identity and the intimacy of girls’ relationships, has created a masterpiece with her fourth film, Portrait of a Lady on Fire. A sumptuous lesbian romance set in France in 1760, Portrait of a Lady on Fire won the best screenplay award and the Queer Palm at this year’s Cannes Film Festival and a host of year-end critics’ accolades.
Writer/Director Brenda Chapman on her Beguiling new Feature Come Away
Oscar-winning animation artist, writer, and director Brenda Chapman had never considered doing live-action before she read the script for Come Away, which came from first-time screenwriter Marissa Kate Goodhill. She was taken by the story, which is a “what if” tale, suggesting the origins for both Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland come from Victorian brother and sister Peter and Alice (Jordan Nash and Keira Chansa) who use their imaginations,
The Photograph Writer/Director Stella Meghie on Making Movies About Black Love
Director Stella Meghie has been on an accelerated rise in just these past few years. After an impressive feature debut with her 2016 indie comedy-drama Jean of the Joneses, the filmmaker followed up the next year with a studio picture, the YA adaptation Everything, Everything. After a return to indie filmmaking with 2018’s The Weekend, Meghie is once again working in the studio sphere—The Photograph is a Universal release (it premieres on February 14,
Directors Veronika Franz & Severin Fiala on Their Chilling New Film The Lodge
The Austrian aunt and nephew directorial duo Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala shocked even the most audacious horror buffs with their 2015 debut feature, Goodnight Mommy, which was chillingly austere before it ramped up to an unforgettably gruesome twist. Their follow-up, The Lodge (it premiered this past February 7), stays unsettling for its entire runtime; here, the two bring the European sensibility that marked their first film to a bigger American cast.
How Sundance Award-Winning Feature I Carry You With Me Came Together
The film I Carry You With Me (Te Lloevo Conmigo) landed in the NEXT category at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival with buzz about its great potential, as it was the first narrative directed and co-written by documentarian and Academy-Award nominee Heidi Ewing. It found an audience and great success in Park City. By the end of the fest, it had a distribution deal through Sony Pictures Classics in partnership with Stage 6,
Writer/Director/Star Numa Perrier on Her Autobiographical Sex Work Film Jezebel
Though filmmaker Numa Perrier only spent four years of her life in Las Vegas, those formative years being surrounded by adult vocations served as the backbone for her autobiographical ’90s-set film, Jezebel (now available on Netflix). Not only did Perrier write, direct, and produce, but she also stars as her older sister (executive producer Livia Perrier), who used to work as a phone sex operator and with whom Perrier shared cramped living quarters.
Director Destin Daniel Cretton on Adapting Bryan’s Stevenson’s Just Mercy
Destin Daniel Cretton remembers the exact moment back in 2015 when he first came to learn of Bryan Stevenson, the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative. The day didn’t seem out of the ordinary for the filmmaker. But looking back, it turned out to be a career-defining moment for Cretton.
“I was sitting in a coffee shop in LA called the Bourgeois Pig when I opened up a book called Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson,” says Cretton.
Director Kate Woods on Faith and Belief in her Netflix Drama Messiah
Early on in the new Netflix drama Messiah, CIA agent Eva (Michelle Monaghan), paradigmatically dogged in her duties, informs a failed prospective job candidate, “the truth may look gray, but I assure you, it is not.” It’s easy to guess that Eva’s next assignment will have her rethinking the office hiring policy. After she becomes aware of a long-locked, proselytizing enigma first spotted preaching mid-sandstorm to a band of followers in Damascus,
Sam Mendes & Screenwriter Krysty Wilson-Cairns on Their Epic WWI Drama 1917
1917 is the story of an urgent message and the two WWI soldiers who have to deliver it to prevent hundreds of their fellow British troops from walking into a trap. We accompany them on an arduous, dangerous journey in what appears to be one long, breathtaking shot. In an interview with The Credits, director Sam Mendes and his co-screenwriter Krysty Wilson-Cairns talked about the research they did for the film and how they crafted this meticulously constructed,
Best of 2019: Writer/Director Noah Baumbach on his Devastating Marriage Story
*We’re reposting some of our favorite interviews of 2019. Happy Holidays!
Writer/director Noah Baumbach’s substantial body of work has often explored families in all their painful, darkly funny dysfunction, evolving from the perspective of an adolescent witness to the break-up of his parents in his 2005 second feature, the Oscar-nominated The Squid and the Whale, to the poignant, middle-aged observations of a son coming to terms with his estranged family and self-absorbed father in 2017’s The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected).
Writer/Director Noah Baumbach on his Devastating Marriage Story
Writer/director Noah Baumbach’s substantial body of work has often explored families in all their painful, darkly funny dysfunction, evolving from the perspective of an adolescent witness to the break-up of his parents in his 2005 second feature, the Oscar-nominated The Squid and the Whale, to the poignant, middle-aged observations of a son coming to terms with his estranged family and self-absorbed father in 2017’s The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected).
Waves Writer/Director Trey Edward Shults & Stars Kelvin Harrison & Taylor Russell on Their Powerful Drama
From the moment the new film Waves had its premiere at the Telluride Film Festival in August, it started getting awards mentions. Touted were the emotional intensity and authenticity of the script by writer/director Trey Edward Shults, and the powerhouse performances served up by an ensemble cast that included stars Kelvin Harrison, Taylor Russell, Lucas Hedges, and Sterling K. Brown. The story centers on the members of one South Floridian family, and how their personal challenges lead variously to trauma,
Writer/Director Rian Johnson on Going From Star Wars to Knives Out
Director Rian Johnson wanted to do something “completely different” from Star Wars with his new movie, Knives Out (released Nov. 27).
“It’s not a heavy movie, it’s not like an incredibly dark movie or anything, it’s kind of going for just giving you a blast of fun,” he told The Credits at the Denver Film Festival screening. “So that was kind of refreshing honestly,
Edward Norton on Redefining Heroism in Motherless Brooklyn
Edward Norton brought Motherless Brooklyn, his long-gestating passion project, to the Motion Picture Association’s brand new theater last night for a special screening and Q&A moderated by professor Yanick Lamb, Director of Media Studies at Howard University. Norton’s film, which explores institutional racism built into the very foundations of New York City, was inspired as much by Robert Caro’s Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of “master builder” Robert Moses, “The Power Broker,”
Writer/Director Jill Culton on her Animated Feature Abominable
At the beginning of the new animated feature Abominable, tomboy Yi (Chloe Bennett) is grieving for her dad, who has passed away. When she finds a wounded Yeti hiding on the roof of her apartment building, she names him Everest, after where he’s from, and determines he needs help getting back to the famed mountain. She and her friends Peng (Albert Tsai) and Jin (Tenzing Norgay Trainor), travel all the way across China to get him back home.
Downton Abbey Director Michael Engler on Bringing the Crawleys to the Big Screen
Downton Abbey is a haven. In this starchy refuge, worry whether Tom Branson (Allen Leech) will be able to keep his long out of sight Irish Republicanism in check in front of two guests who have invited themselves to stay the night, King George V (Simon Jones) and Queen Mary (Geraldine James), represents the height of concern. Coming in just behind on the worry scale is the question whether Mary (Michelle Dockery) will act on her impetus to give up on Downton,
The Creators of Netflix’s Unbelievable on Their Urgent New Series
Buzz for the new true-crime drama Unbelievable, which is now streaming on Netflix, is getting pretty intense, and for good reason. Inspired by real events covered in a Pulitzer Prize-winning article from The Marshall Project and ProPublica called, “An Unbelievable Story of Rape” and a This American Life episode called “Anatomy of Doubt,” it tells the story of a teen named Marie (Kaitlyn Dever) who reports a sexual assault,
