FRED Film Radio - English Channel

PODCAST | Christopher Makoto Yogi, director.

Christopher Makoto Yogi is a writer, director, and artist from Hawaii and living in NYC. His first feature film, August at Akiko’s, premiered at Rotterdam in 2018 and will be released theatrically in 2019. His second feature, I Was a Simple Man, is currently in development. His works can be seen at www.nahwave.com and at www.augustatakikos.com.

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>

The post Christopher Makoto Yogi – Berlinale Talents 2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Chiara Nicoletti interviews Florian Weghorn, programme manager of the Berlinale Talents.

The Berlinale Talents turns 17 and as for every teenager, it’s time to think about the future once the critical time of adolescence has passed. Florian Weghorn is back on FRED to talk about this year’s talent, taking place from February 9th to the 14th with its 250 up-and-coming film professionals from 77 countries. It’s not the first time that the number of women (141) overcomes the number of men and it’s a good sign that things will get better eventually in the whole gender quotes’ discussion surrounding festivals, film funds and awards. This year’s theme is “Mistakes” as the talents participating are navigating towards, through and beyond their errors, past and future failures to learn how to appreciate their mistakes and how to fail better in order to finally learn the filmmaking craft. A total of 20 renowned alumni are returning as guests, including the Golden Bear winner Adina Pintilie and the directors David Lowery, Guy Nattiv, Teona Strugar Mitevska, and many more. Among the “famous guests” meeting the talents: the recipient of this year’s Honorary Golden Bear, Charlotte Rampling, the Competition directors André Téchiné and Nadav Lapid and Roberto Saviano, whose novel was the basis of Claudio Giovannesi’s Competition entry La paranza dei bambini (Piranhas).

Berlinale Talents is an initiative of the Berlin International Film Festival, a business division of the Kulturveranstaltungen des Bundes in Berlin GmbH, funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, in cooperation with Creative Europe MEDIA, a programme of the European Union, the Robert Bosch Stiftung and Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg. It was initiated in 2003. In addition to the extensive summit programme of master classes and panel discussions with top-notch experts, Berlinale Talents offers a range of Project Labs in which you can further develop and present your own project. Berlinale Talents also provides Studio programmes and workshops for specific groups of film professionals. As an initiative of the Berlin International Film Festival, the entire event is closely linked with the programmes of the festival sections and the European Film Market. While the roots of Berlinale Talents are firmly planted in Berlin new shoots of the initiative have been sprouting internationally. These Talents International editions, Talents Beirut in Lebanon, Talents Buenos Aires in Argentina, Talents Guadalajara in Mexico, Talents Durban in South Africa, Talents Sarajevo in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Talents Tokyo in Japan have the familiar structure and purpose of their German counterpart; all the while retaining a regional perspective and finding support and the necessary amenities in a locally based international film festival. Talents initiatives are supported by local partners as well as by the Goethe-Institut.

To know more about Berlinale Talents, click here.

The post Florian Weghorn – Berlinale Talents #Berlinale2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST | Michael Curtis Johnson, writer and director.

Michael Curtis Johnson is one of the Talents of this year’s edition of Berlinale Talents. He shares with FRED’s listeners his background and experiences.

To discover more about his works, click here.

The post Michael Curtis Johnson – Berlinale Talents 2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews filmmaker Edgar Pera.

An interview with Portuguese filmmaker Edgar Pera from the 2019 International Film Festival Rotterdam. The festival had a retrospective of his film work, describing it on their official website as “an overdue tribute to one of world cinema’s most unpredictable voices.” In our interview we talk about many aspects of his work, beginning with the first moment he remembers picking up a camera and how that experience shaped the vast creative output that followed it. He also mentions that when he works, sound (or “the unseen,” as he calls it) comes before the vision, and discusses the way in which his use of technology has evolved over the years, as well as the many tools he has used and uses to this day, including his interest in 3D filmmaking and VR. Reflecting on his retrospective – or “retro-future-spective,” as he calls it – Pera also considers how other re-evaluate his work and how he himself re-evaluates it. Besides the retrospective, he also describes the live cinema, cine-concert project he also did this year in Rotterdam, and we end by asking him in what ways, if any, an audience may also disappoint him. “I don’t think filmmakers today are better or worse,” he says. “I think spectators are worse.”

The post Edgar Pera #IFFR2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Itay Tal, director of the film God of the Piano.

An interview with director Itay Tal, whose film God of the Piano has its world premiere in the Voices strand of the 2019 International Film Festival Rotterdam. The film talks about a woman who programs her son to become the concert pianist she could, somehow, never become. In our chat, we discuss this theme but also the similarities Tal found between the world of classical music and the world of film. We also talk about the origins of creativity, whether it is generic or perhaps something else – something spiritual. Among the other topics discussed are his relationship with his actors, and we particularly focus on that with his lead actress Naama Preis, whose restrained performance counters, for example, the emotional Anna Magnani role in the similarly themes Luchino Visconti’s film, Bellissima.

God of the Piano: Concert pianist Anat’s waters break while she is playing. Devastatingly, her son proves deaf. The “Baby Mozart” CD her father gives her can go straight in the bin. However, Anat’s will to raise a piano genius who would befit her respected musical family only becomes stronger, and she takes drastic measures to make this happen. Composed as a moral parable with a touch of thriller, God of the Piano tells the story of a mother – played with great reserve by Naama Preis – whose obsessive behaviour and mile-high expectations threaten to crush her child, just as she was once crushed. While focusing on mother-son relations, the film also explores the uncertain nature of prodigy. Is talent inherited? Is there a secret tension or even an interplay between giftedness and averageness? And – most importantly – what price does a person, be it adult or child, pay for being labelled a genius?

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>

The post Itay Tal – God of the Piano #IFFR2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Frederikke Aspöck, director of the film Out of Tune.

An interview with director Frederikke Aspöck, whose third feature film Out of Tune had its world premiere at the 2019 International Film Festival Rotterdam. The film is a black comedy set in a prison, and its plot revolves around a white-collar criminal and his problematic, power-thirsty relationship with a prison choir. In this interview, Aspöck talks about the timeless elements of her movie and the ways in which she attempts to defy representations of masculinity and make a film that itself is out of tune, different from other prison movies.

Out of Tune: Suspected of large-scale investment fraud, multimillionaire Markus Føns is remanded in custody. Self-assured as he is, he assumes that his connections with the underworld will come in handy in the remand centre, but quite the contrary turns out to be true. After being beaten up by a prison gang, he allows himself to be persuaded to go into voluntary solitary confinement in a special department that offers protection to the most despised prisoners: the father killers, abusers of women and rapists of children. The arrogance of the white-collar criminal contrasts starkly in this prison comedy with the social stigma confronting the other prisoners. Solidarity in the prison wing is typified by the choir they sing in every week. It’s not long before the newcomer joins the rehearsals, but taking part isn’t enough for the Machiavellian Markus. As an experienced manipulator, he starts, step-by-step, undermining the position of choir leader Niels.

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>

The post Frederikke Aspöck – Out of Tune #IFFR2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Brunna Laboissière, director of the documentary Fabiana.

An interview with Brunna Laboissière, director of the documentary Fabiana, which had its international premiere in the Bright Future strand of the 2019 International Film Festival Rotterdam. For this film, she went on the road with the title transgender woman, a stigma-defying seasoned truck driver, on one of her last journeys. In this interview, she talks about meeting Fabiana and the challenges that came with working with her along the way, and whether she was ever aware of what would happen next.

Fabiana: Fabiana is a seasoned trucker who has crisscrossed and conquered the roads of Brazil for 30 years. The fact that she is transgender doesn’t seem to make any difference for her nomadic life. In many places, she can hook up with a variety of women and is in her element among the guys on the road. Now she is approaching retirement, Fabiana realizes her life will change drastically. Her house, where she lives with her girlfriend when not on the road, will become her new world. During her last journeys, documentary maker Brunna Laboissière hitches a ride. Laboissière records the endless routes through changing landscapes, films intimate phone calls Fabiana has with friends and lovers, and functions as a confidante for the tawny, self-assured Fabiana. The truck’s cabin is her home, her route is paved with adventure. How do you deal with a changing life if you’re happy with the way things are?

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>

The post Brunna Laboissière – Fabiana #IFFR2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Paul Duane, director of the documentary While You Live, Shine.

An interview with Paul Duane, director of the documentary While You Live, Shine, from the 2019 International Film Festival Rotterdam. Here, Duane describes his film as being about “longing and finding something different than what you have”; in this case, it is about finding it through music and, specifically, it is about how American musicologist Chris King found it in his discovery of the music of Epirus in Northern Greece, one of the oldest forms of Western music. The film is an emotional journey, as Duane travels with King to find out more about this music and the culture that inspired it. In our chat, we talk about how Duane met King and how the Greek village reacted the making of the film, and more.

While You Live, Shine: This documentary takes us back to one of the oldest forms of Western music, using Chris King’s collection of 78 RPM LPs. King is an American music expert fascinated by early recordings of melancholy blues and folk from the start of the twentieth century. One of his favourites: the sad violin music of Greek Alexis Zoumbas, who emigrated to New York in 1910. It doesn’t get any better. “Everything recorded after 1949 is rubbish”, King opines. Duane’s title derives from the Seikilos song, the world’s oldest recorded piece of music, from Greece. The transcendental music carved into the stone remains alive in Epirus, where Greeks gather every summer to play, dance and sing. King travels there to experience the enchanting phenomenon that rekindles his love for this art form.

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>

The post Paul Duane – While You Live, Shine #IFFR2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Anna Eborn, director of the documentary Transnistra.

An interview with director Anna Eborn, whose film Transnistra had its world premiere at the 2019 International Film Festival Rotterdam. For a year, Eborn followed and filmed a group of young people in their late teens, living in the tiny, unrecognized state of Transnistra, which split from Moldova in 1992 (although it is still officially recognized by the UN as part of Moldova). The director tells us about the contrast of old and new in her film, of being fascinated about hearing of the place during the making of the previous film and then once she saw it with her own eyes, and of “street casting” her protagonists, being particularly taken by the energy of one of them, Tanya. We also discuss the power of 16mm and how the technique of filming on 16mm, as she says, “just suits her.”

Transnistra: Dreamy documentary about the inner lives of underprivileged teens in Transnistria, an area that unilaterally declared independence from Moldova after the collapse of the Soviet Union, but remains unrecognised. Although ostensibly this declaration was occasioned by unity between the inhabitants, there is little evidence of this. Swedish director Anna Eborn reveals the uncertainty among youngsters. Should they stay or leave? Do they even have the money to do so? Transnistra focuses on the daily lives of six teens. Tanya plays the field with her male friends while she has a boyfriend abroad. She takes the boys into nature or to dilapidated tower blocks for brief trysts or to have good company. Combined with sensual music, Eborn’s intimate shots suggest this idyll is fleeting. Life is extra evanescent in a non-existent country.

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>

The post Anna Eborn – Transnistra #IFFR2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.

PODCAST| Matt Micucci interviews Catherine Chagnon, producer of the film The Seven Last Words.

An interview with Catherine Chagnon, producer of The Seven Last Words, multidisciplinary film project based with seven different Canadian filmmakers interpreting Joseph Hayden’s oratorio The Seven Last Words of Our Saviour on the Cross from 1787. The film was presented at the 2019 International Film Festival Rotterdam, where the film was accompanied by a live performance of the music by the Callino String Quartet. Changon tells us about the genesis of the project (she was approached by filmmaker, musician and composer, Kaveh Nabatian with the idea), the process in which the different filmmakers made their parts of the movies and how they were each given their themes and parts of the music to visually interpret, and more.

The Seven Last Words: As a filmmaker, musician and composer, Kaveh Nabatian doesn’t want to choose between music and film. He’d rather combine both disciplines as far as possible. For instance in this multidisciplinary project, for which he cooperated with six other Canadian filmmakers and the British Callino String Quartet. It’s based on the commissioned composition The Seven Last Words of Our Saviour on the Cross (1787) by Joseph Haydn – a piece that is a special favourite around Easter and which grippingly expresses the state of the suffering Christ on the cross. Each of the directors in this omnibus film provides their own very personal view of the themes in Haydn’s piece: forgiveness, redemption, abandonment and reunion. Nabatian himself made the intriguing introduction and the concluding ‘earthquake’, which frame the seven short films. These films are very varied in genre and style: fiction, documentary, experimental, magic realist and sometimes also soberly filmed – intimate and personal.

<span data-mce-type="bookmark" style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>

The post Catherine Chagnon – The Seven Last Words #IFFR2019 appeared first on Fred Film Radio.