FRED Film Radio - English Channel

PODCAST | Nicolò Comotti interviews Nancy Buirski, director of the film The Rape of Recy Taylor.

Nancy Buirski presents her latest documentary The Rape of Recy Taylor, competing in Venice in the Orizzonti selection. The Rape of Recy Taylor tells Recy’s sad and yet incredbly brave story, who waged war against the entire American establishment, and spoke up to reclaim her dignity as a person, an african-american, a woman.

The Rape of Recy Taylor: Recy Taylor, a 24-year-old black mother and sharecropper, was gang raped by six white boys in 1944 Alabama. Common in Jim Crow South, few women spoke up in fear for their lives. Not Recy Taylor, who bravely identified her rapists. The NAACP sent its chief rape investigator Rosa Parks, who rallied support and triggered an unprecedented outcry for justice. Our film exposes a legacy of physical abuse of black women and reveals Rosa Parks’ intimate role in Recy Taylor’s story. An attempted rape against Parks was but one inspiration for her ongoing work to find justice for countless women like Taylor. The 1955 bus boycott was an end result, not a beginning. More and more women are now speaking up after rape. Our film tells the story of black women who spoke up when danger was greatest; it was their noble efforts to take back their bodies that led to the Montgomery bus boycott and movements that followed. The 2017 Global March by Women is linked to their courage. From sexual aggression on ‘40s southern streets to today’s college campuses and to the threatened right to choose, it is control of women’s bodies that powered the movement in Recy Taylor’s day and fuels our outrage today.

For the official page of the film on the festival website click here.

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PODCAST | Chiara Nicoletti interviews Stephen Frears, director of the film Victoria & Abdul.

Director Stephen Frears talks about his latest film, Victoria & Abdul, presented out of competition at the 74th Venice International Film Festival. The great British cineaste, who also received the Jaeger-le Coultre Glory to the Filmmaker Award, stopped by our studio to talk about it. Frears praises the script, talks about Judi Dench’s performance as Queen Victoria and her presence on set, whether he can imagine this type of friendship talked about in the movie Victoria & Abdul being conceivable today.

Victoria & Abdul tells the extraordinary true story of the amazing and unlikely friendship between Queen Victoria and a young clerk, Abdul Karim, who becomes her teacher, her spiritual advisor, and her devoted friend. In 1887, Abdul travels from India to present a ceremonial medal as part of the Queen’s Golden Jubilee but surprisingly finds favor with the elderly Queen. The unprecedented and unlikely relationship causes a battle within the royal household, pitting the Queen against court and family. Victoria & Abdul humorously explores questions of race, religion, power, and the farce of Empire through the prism of a highly unusual and deeply moving friendship.

For the official page of the film on the festival website click here.

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PODCAST | Matt Micucci interviews Annika Berg and Katja Adomeit, director and producer of the film Team Hurricane.

Director Annika Berg presented her film, Team Hurricane, at the International Critics Week of the 74th Venice International Film Festival. She stopped at our FRED studio in Venice to talk about her film, which she calls a punk chick flick, alongside producer Katja Adomeit. Berg tells us what she means by the term “punk chick flick,” about the way in which this is also a personal movie, how she was able to cast the right girls, and more.

Team Hurricane: a punk chick flick about teen girls that mixes highly stylized fictional elements with documentary material: loneliness, pussy-power, Kawaii, electric green, hentai, graffiti, vibrators, friendship, teddy bears, resting bitch face, ART, fire, fear, bubble-gum, mom & dad, anorexia, cactuses, homemade piercings, nail art, cherries, cutting, dolphins, Lolita, secret diaries and daydreaming. Radical girls in an ordinary world.

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PODCAST | Matt Micucci interviews Faouzi Bensaidi, director of the film Volubilis.

Director Faouzi Bensaidi talks about his film, Volubilis, presented at the Giornate degli Autori of the 74th Venice International Film Festival. Bensaidi tells us about his film as a story of beauty and love among ruins, and about the many other themes discussed in the film, including class division, the violence of contemporary times, and more. He also talks about the cinematic form, the way in which he worries about the perception of art and, in particular, cinema as a form of entertainment and how story (intended as “the story”) is not the most important thing in film.

Volubilis is a tale of love in a world of despair, of beauty among the ruins. In the Moroccan city of Meknés, recently married Abdelkader and Malika struggle to make ends meet. They dream of leaving the family house and finally starting a life of their own together. But one day at work, Abdelkader gets mixed up in a violent incident that will turn their lives upside down.

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PODCAST | Matt Micucci interviews Kore-eda Hirokazu and Fukuyama Masaharu, director and actor of the film The Third Murder.

The great filmmaker Kore-eda Hirokazu talks to FRED about his latest work, The Third Murder, in competition at the 74th Venice International Film Festival. Along with him, one of its lead actors, Fukuyama Masaharu. In this short but intense interview, Kore-eda discusses the importance of truth in his film – the many truths it presents, but also a lack of truth – while Masaharu talks about how he was able to connect with his character, the attorney Shigemori, who struggles to find the truth while questioning his own faith in the law.

The Third Murder:  leading attorney Shigemori takes on the defence of murder-robbery suspect Misumi who served jail time for another murder 30 years ago. Shigemori’s chances of winning the case seem low – his client freely admits his guilt, despite facing the death penalty if he is convicted. As he digs deeper into the case, as he hears the testimonies of the victim’s family and Misumi himself, the once confident Shigemori begins to doubt whether his client is the murderer after all.

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PODCAST | Matt Micucci interviews Andrei Severny and Vikas Khanna, director and protagonist of the film Buried Seeds.

Director Andrei Severny presented his documentary Buried Seeds at the 74th Venice International Film festival, in the Giornate degli Autori strand. The film tells the story of the life of Michelin Star Chef Vikas Khanna, and his journey as an immigrant, from India to New York. Both stopped at our FRED studio to tell the story of the journey in the making of the film, but also to discuss passion, cultural divides and more.

Buried Seeds, a film by Andrei Severny, is a timeless and true story of human passion, willpower, and resolve in the face of adversity. The film follows Michelin Star Chef Vikas Khanna on his journey as an immigrant. Born with clubbed feet in Amritsar, Vikas is bullied by his classmates. Khanna takes refuge in his grandmothers kitchen and discovers his passion for the vivid traditions of Indian cuisine. At the age of 29, Vikas moves to New York with nothing in his pocket and ends up in a homeless shelter. Through years of struggle and hard work Vikas opens his first Indian restaurant in Manhattan. Vikas Khanna grows to become one of the most influential chefs in the world and a cultural ambassador of his nation. While wealth and glory may be transient, what truly defines him is the will to create himself every single day.

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PODCAST | Chiara Nicoletti interviews Martin McDonagh, director of the film Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.

Irish filmmaker Martin McDonagh presented his latest work, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, in competition at the 74th Venice International Film Festival. We caught up with the director to talk about this darkly comic tale of a grieving mother, played by the great actress Frances McDormand, driven by an implacable thirst for justice. McDonagh discusses the crucial process of casting and the great work done by the cast (which also features Woody Harrelson and Sam Rockwell, among others), the challenge of writing a screenplay with a female protagonist, and more.

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri is a darkly comic drama from Academy Award winner Martin McDonagh. After months have passed without finding a culprit in her daughter’s murder case, Mildred Hayes makes a bold move, painting three signs leading into her town with a controversial message directed at William Willoughby, the town’s revered chief of police. When his second-in-command Officer Dixon, an immature mummy’s boy with a penchant for violence, gets involved, the battle between Mildred and Ebbing’s law enforcement is only exacerbated.

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PODCAST | Matt Micucci interviews John Branca, co–director of the film Estate of Michael Jackson.

John Branca, co-executor of Estate of Michael Jackson, was in Venice at the 74th Venice International Film Festival for the special screening of Thriller, the iconic John Landis directed short film starring Michael Jackson. The film has been restored in 3D: this was the version that was presented at the Lido, one of the highlights of the film and music program at this year’s Venice International Film Festival. We speak with him about the process of restoration and the history of the film, which remains very popular to this day, and has time and time again been described as “game-changing.”

Estate of Michael Jackson: the iconic short film begins with Michael and his date watching a horror film. After leaving mid-way through the movie, they are walking through deserted streets and graveyards where ghosts and ghouls rise in the mist. Michael’s character is more than just a protective boyfriend. The film features one of the most beloved and recreated dance scenes of all time. Michael, surrounded by zombies, is at the height of his powers as a performer and star. In creating Michael Jackson’s Thriller 3D, the process began with Michael’s own original 35 mm film negative, which was not reedited or recut in any way, and resulted in a 3D conversion of the acclaimed film using the latest available technology.

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PODCAST | Chiara Nicoletti interviews James Toback, director of the film The Private Life of a Modern Woman.

James Toback presented his latest film, The Private Life of a Modern Woman, out of competition at the 74th Venice International Film Festival. He stopped by our studio in Venice to talk about it. He tells us that he has been a fan of Sienna Miller, the lead actress of the film, for many years and, indeed, that the film was conceived and written for her. Toback also talks about the dreamlike feel of the movie, and more.

The Private Life of a Modern Woman:  Vera Lockman, a successful actress, living alone in a stunning New York loft, thrashes during a nightmare in which she struggles with, shoots and kills her drug-dealer, ex-boyfriend, Sal. Jolted awake, she reveals in her journal that the killing in her nightmare actually occurred the day before and that Sal, dead, lies in a trunk in her living room. Leon, Vera’s lover, arrives and is dismissed, permanently. Franklin, a filmmaker/ friend, stops by, concerned. He grills Vera, provoking confusion and a hint of dread. Vera drives the trunk to an isolated area and rolls it into a lake. She returns to her loft and is startled by a narcotics detective, McCutcheon, who asks about Sal. Vera believes that McCutcheon accepts her false story. Vera serves dinner to her beloved but decaying grandfather, Arthur, and her mother, Elaine. Carl Icahn, Arthur’s former high school classmate, stops by afterward. Vera and Carl connect emotionally. The next day Vera, calm for the first time, writes. Her mood is shattered by the crescendo of police sirens. She springs to the window and sees McCutcheon. Their eyes meet. Arrest awaits her.

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PODCAST | Chiara Nicoletti interviews George Clooney, Julianne Moore, Matt Damon and Alexandre Desplat, director, actors and composer of the film Suburbicon.

George Clooney presented Suburbicon in competition at the 74th Venice International Film Festival. The film is based on a Coen Brothers screenplay and features among its cast Julianne Moore and Matt Damon. It was also scored by Alexandre Desplat, who not too long ago headed the cometition jury of this very same festival. All three mentioned stopped by our studio for a quick chat about the film, answering questions about their characters, the power of cynical comedies, and more.

Suburbicon is a peaceful, idyllic suburban community with affordable homes and manicured lawns… the perfect place to raise a family, and in the summer of 1959, the Lodge family is doing just that. But the tranquil surface masks a disturbing reality, as husband and father Gardner Lodge must navigate the town’s dark underbelly of betrayal, deceit, and violence. This is a tale of very flawed people making very bad choices. This is Suburbicon.

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