MovieMaker

"I've been accused of being the hangout movie guy, and that's fine. Because cinema can do that really well," says Richard Linklater, whose latest film is the beautiful Apollo 10 1/2.

Richard Linklater is one of our all-time favorite filmmakers, and Apollo 10 1/2 may be the most Richard Linklater of all Richard Linklater movies. He amicably fields our questions about how his beloved Austin has changed, the importance of '70s cartoons, the dumbest conspiracy theory, and the state of movies. He also knows a lot about NASA.

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Kat Coiro went from acting to directing, becoming a very in-demand director of shows like Modern Family and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and directing the pilots of Girls5Eva and the upcoming Marvel series She-Hulk. She's also the director of four films, including the brand-new music-packed rom-com Marry Me, starring Jennifer Lopez and Owen Wilson.

We talk about how working on her own smaller-budget films led to efficient problem-solving on Marry Me, how she made time for small moments, and why Jennifer Lopez and Owen Wilson were the only people who could play their roles. We also talk about people who don't give rom-coms their due, and both honoring and breaking with the conventions of the genre.

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We had the honor of speaking with one of our greatest directors just days after his film Dune earned 10 Oscar nominations, including for Best Picture.

Our favorite part is hearing him talk about the interconnected shots in Dune, "trying to create a melody" in the story, and watching Lawrence of Arabia in an empty theater when no one else showed up.

He ends the interview with some excellent advice for anyone who wants to make films.

Here are some highlights:

on Best Director Oscar Snub (1:50)

-Creating the camera language for Dune (2:30)

-On Paul's reluctant POV (5:03)

-Framing the "Internal" (5:20)

-Working with your actors (7:15)

-Style changes throughout the years (8:30)

-Visual differences in Blade Runner 2049 and Dune (9:35)

-Cinematic Storytelling between Paul and Lady Jessica (11:00)

-Talking about subtle juxtapositions in images (12:43)

-We geek out about seeing Lawrence of Arabia alone (15:30)

-Advice to moviemakers (17:46)

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Therapy Dogs is one of the highlights of the latest Slamdance Film Festival, and Ethan Eng made it during his senior year of high school.

He and his friend Justin Morrice enlisted their classmates in the class of 2019 to tell a stunning and beautiful story of teenagers who feel invincible, but aren't.

They brilliantly combine real and staged moments — including strapping Morrice to the roof of a car — for a film that makes us question what really happened, what didn't, and whether it matters. It's funny, sweet, shocking, and gutsy.

One of the best thing about Therapy Dogs is that — unlike many films you hear hyped at festivals — you can watch it right now. It's on the new Slamdance streaming site slamdancechannel.com.

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Mija starts at a party store, to celebrate a birthday. It's one of many milestones in the life of Doris Muñoz that director Isabel Castro captures with charm and relatability as we see Muñoz suffer a huge career setback, then rebuild. Rejecting the tropes of depressing documentaries, she tells a story filled with incredible challenges, but also joy, hope and love.

Mija has all the calling cards of a great music movie, but it's also a magnificent story about immigration and two families' paths to the elusive American Dream. Muñoz's livelihood, and her family's security, depends on her ability to discover pop stars. She sees thrilling potential in Jacks Haupt, a young Texas singer-songwriter who could be the next big pop star.

In this episode, Castro talks with us about telling a different kind of immigration story, one that often feels more like an enthralling feature than a documentary. And we hear some pretty great music along the way, too.

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The Nicholl Fellowship is one of the most important and prestigious screenwriting competitions. There are countless articles online about how to win — but we thought it would be best to just ask the 2021 Nicholl Fellows about their achievement.

Here are their names and some details about their winning scripts:

Haley Hope Bartels (Los Angeles), Pumping Black: After a desperate cyclist takes up a team doctor’s dangerous offer, he seems on course to win the Tour de France. But as the race progresses and jealous teammates, suspicious authorities, and his own paranoia close in, he must take increasingly dark measures to protect both his secrets and his lead.

Karin delaPeña Collison (West Hollywood), Coming of Age: In 1965 Britain, Charlotte, a sheltered, studious schoolgirl, lands on a British Farce tour her mother stage manages, where private tutoring by company members replaces her formal schooling, with surprising success, and she experiences a Lolita-like flirtation in the morally wobbly era of Free Love, which leads both her and her mother to "come of age."

Byron Hamel (Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada): Shade of the Grapefruit Tree: When a severely abused white boy befriends his sci-fi obsessed Black landlady, his fantasy of becoming a robot empowers him to recklessly confront his murderous stepdad.

R. J. Daniel Hanna (Los Angeles), Shelter Animal: A fiery, female prison trustee working at the county animal shelter finds purpose rehabilitating an abused pit bull, but her attempts to rally employees and the broader community for shelter

reform puts her own freedom at risk.

Laura Kosann (New York City), The Ideal Woman: Set in American suburbia during the Cuban Missile Crisis: A 1960’s ex-actress and housewife finds her house-of-cards world begin to tumble as she continues to be pitted against two identities.

Here's some information on how to enter the competition this year.

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Dasha Nekrasova is the director, co-writer and star of The Scary of Sixty-First, a horror story about two roommates (Madeline Quinn, Betsey Brown) who discover that their affordable new Manhattan apartment was previously owned by Jeffrey Epstein.

She talks about Hollywood's "self-imposed code," why she kept the harsh language in, Epstein enabler Ghislaine Maxwell (played briefly in the film by Anna Khachiyan), and the wonderful name of her beleaguered Succession character, Comfrey Pellets.

You can read MovieMaker's Spring 2021 Dasha Nekrasova cover story here.

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In Red Rocket, the latest from Sean Baker, a washed-up porn star named Mickey Saber (Simon Rex) returns to his Texas town and begs his wife (Bree Elrod) and her mother (first-time actor Brenda Deiss) to let him move in.

They're skeptical, with good reason. He soon devises a secret plan to weasel his way back into the porn industry with help from a 17-year-old donut shop employee named Strawberry (Suzanna Son).

Your host hasn't seen every movie released in 2021, but of the ones he has seen, Red Rocket is his favorite.

We talk this episode with Sean Baker, Simon Rex and Bree Elrod about working with first-time actors, how COVID fears fueled the frenetic energy of Red Rocket, shooting non-explosive sex scenes and how not to look like a suitcase pimp.

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House of Gucci went through several writers before the project found one who could do justice to the surreally messy story of the feuding Guccis.

Married producers Ridley Scott and Giannina Facio finally found the right writer for the job in Roberto Bentivegna, who said the key to cracking the story was not approaching it too seriously.

In this episode, he talks about the role of comedy in the film, and the ruthless and elegant changes he had to make to the Gucci saga to tell his fun, breezy and at times tragic story. We also talk about a scene Jared Leto thought up on-set, writing an extra scene for Al Pacino and Jeremy Irons, and playing as a child near the site of the most violent movie in the film.

And we make fun of critics who think the movie is "unintentionally funny."

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Robert Weide, perhaps best known for his Emmy-winning work on Curb Your Enthusiasm, first reached out to Kurt Vonnegut in 1982, asking if he could interview the Breakfast of Champions and Slaughterhouse-Five writer for a documentary. His new film, Kurt Vonnegut: Unstuck in Time, explains what has happened since, while chronicling Vonnegut's life of struggle and truth-telling.

This is a short but wide-ranging interview that includes:

—Vonnegut's fondness for this symbol: *

—Why he was often ignored by the highbrow literary world

—His favorite joke

Enjoy!

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