October in the Crescent City includes a number of consistent comforts: cooler weather, fantastic Halloween decorations, and every movie reviewers’ personal favorite, the 2010 New Orleans Film Festival. The 21st annual NOFF will run from Oct. 14-21. The festival began, according to John Desplas, artistic director, with heavy involvement in its first year from Loyola University New Orleans ,that provided services to the festival, including program printing. As the New Orleans Film Society’s flagship film festival, the NOFF provides a valuable function to the community and image of the city. The NOFF justifies the city of New Orleans as holding relevance not only in Louisiana’s film milieu, but in America’s, due to its unique slate of commercial and independent films–along with significant filmmaker attendance.
Some of the highlights this year include the following:
Renowned documentary filmmakers D. A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus will screen four of their films and hosting a Q&A after each screening. “We’re coming to the New Orleans Film Festival this year with films about music, sweet pastries and politics,” Pennebaker said. Hegedus agreed, “It is an exciting time in New Orleans and we are thrilled to be a part of it.”Pennebaker and Hegedus will screen “Kings of Pastry” which follows chef Jacquy Pfeiffer, co-founder of Chicago’s French Pastry School, as he journeys back to his childhood home of Alsace to practice for the Meilleurs Ouvriers de France competition.
“Down from the Mountain” is both a documentary and concert film that begins with a 30 minute introduction to the legendary artists heading to the Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium for the recording session that would become the Grammy Award-winning soundtrack to the Coen Brothers’ film “O Brother, Where Art Thou?”
“The War Room” captures New Orleans resident James Carville and George Stephanopoulos as they organize and execute strategies for the juggernaut that was Clinton’s presidential campaign.
“Don’t Look Back” is the iconic and intimate portrait of one of the most influential songwriters of our times, Bob Dylan, during his three-week concert tour of England in the spring of 1965.
“Welcome to the Rileys” is the opening night film, an emotionally raw, gently humorous drama with penetrating humanity filmed in New Orleans starring James Gandolfini, Melissa Leo and Kristen Stewart.
“Black Swan” the centerpiece film, from the visionary director Darren Aronofsky’s (“Requiem for a Dream”) is a terrifying, psychological thriller set in the world of New York City ballet featuring Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis Vincent Cassel, Winona Ryder and Barbara Hershey.
“Blue Valentine”, the closing night film is an intimate and shattering portrait of a disintegrating marriage. The film fluidly moves between the beginning and end of the relationship, starring Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling.
Helen Mirren and Joe Pesci star as a fictional husband-and-wife team who own and run one of Nevada’s first legalized brothel ranches in the film “Love Ranch”. Director Taylor Hackford (“Ray”) will be in attendance.
Danny Boyle (“Slumdog Millionaire”) directs James Franco in “127 Hours” the harrowing true story of mountain climber Aron Ralston’s remarkable adventure to save himself after a fallen boulder crashes on his arm and traps him in an isolated Utah canyon.
James Franco stars in “Howl” as the young beat poet Allen Ginsberg ,whose most timeless and electrifying work of his career, the poem “Howl”, is recounted along with the freedom of speech trial which tried to ban it. The film also features Jon Hamm, David Strathairn, Jeff Daniels and Mary-Louise Parker.
The final installment in the Stieg Larsson trilogy, “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” again follows journalist Mikael Blomkvist and the elusive computer hacker Lisbeth Salander (Noomi Rapace) as they seek to uncover their most shocking mystery.
“Life During Wartime” in writer/director Todd Solondz’s part sequel/part variation on his acclaimed film “Happiness”, three sisters and the people they love struggle to find their places in an unpredictable and volatile world where the past haunts the present and imperils the future. Shirley Henderson, Allison Janney and Ally Sheedy star in the film.
The New Orleans Film Festival screenings range across the city in such venues as the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Prytania Theatre, Chalmette Movies and the theaters at Canal Place. Tickets can be purchased individually, in six-film passes and as all-access passes. They do not offer student pricing but the cost is reduced for New Orleans Film Society members. The full program listing can be found in the Oct. 5 issue of “Gambit”. It will also be available at all of the screening venues beginning Oct. 8. In addition, the festival is looking for volunteers to help out at the screenings, with the added benefit of free tickets. For more information on the 21st annual New Orleans Film Festival, visit http://www.neworleansfilmsociety.org.
Ari Silber is a Loyola MBA student. Before graduate school, he worked for nine years in the Los Angeles film industry, focusing on marketing, publicity and distribution.
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