Monday, May 21---------The BAMcinématek, the repertory film program at BAM Rose Cinemas, will present a series of films from May 23 to 30 to coincide with the mainstage festivities for 30 Years of DanceAfrica. The series kicks off on May 23 and 24 with the critically acclaimed Bamako (2006) directed by Mauritanian filmmaker Abderrahmane Sissako. Set in Mali , Sissako’s film employs Brechtian techniques to stage a trial against the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in a small v...

The Tribeca Film Festival came to a smashing close today with the final screenings of THE GATES, the world premiere HBO documentary on last year's public art phenomenon in New York's Central Park. The concept of artists/collaborators Christo and Jeanne-Claude, who have made a career of wrapping prominent public spaces (including the Pont Neuf in Paris, the Reichstag in Berlin and Biscayne Bay Islands in Miami), the project to create fabric-paneled gates in Central Park was always a controversial...

Sunday, May 6------The Tribeca Film Festival came to a smashing close today with the final screenings of THE GATES, the world premiere HBO documentary on last year's public art phenomenon in New York's Central Park. The concept of artists/collaborators Christo and Jeanne-Claude, who have made a career of wrapping prominent public spaces (including the Pont Neuf in Paris, the Reichstag in Berlin and Biscayne Bay Islands in Miami), the project to create fabric-paneled gates in Central Park...

Bob and I headed out to La Guardia Airport 2/15 for a 11am flight to attend a screening of our film KNOW WHO YOUR TALKING TO at the Magnolia Independent Film Festival in Starkville, Mississippi but we never got there. The earlier snowstorm got us bumped and placed on standby for two days(Thurs and Fri). Our festival contacts were going back and forth to the airport to pick us up and were worried. It was totally draining and disappointing. We really wanted to be at the festival. After two days of...

Thursday, March 29----With Spring (finally) making its arrival after an unexpected early March frost and series of snowstorms, one of the rites of Spring in New York is the NEW DIRECTORS/NEW FILMS festival, which is entering its final weekend with a spring bouquet of films. The series, which is celebrating its 36th anniversary, is a joint presentation of the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the Film Department of the Museum of Modern Art, with screening at both MoMA and the Film Society's ...

    Wednesday, March 28------David Freeman has been selected as the winning screenwriter in the Tribeca/Sloan Screenplay Development Program, a joint project of the Tribeca Film Festival and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, whose purpose is to support film and video projects that educate and inform the public on matters of science.  Freeman's project A FIRST CLASS MAN, a fictional examination of the life of Indian mathematician Srinivasa Aiyangar Ramanujan, will receive finan...

Denise Kasell, who joined forces with the Hamptons International Film Festival in 1998 and was instrumental in helming its rise to the forefront of American festivals, is leaving her post as Executive Director. Board Chairman, Stuart Match Suna, and the Hamptons Board are in the process of searching for a candidate to take over the position. Artistic Director, Rajendra Roy, remains firmly in place to guide the festival’s acclaimed programs and creative vision. When Denise Kasell took the re...

Tuesday, January 20----Three filmmakers, whose young careers have been nurtured by Tribeca All Access (TAA), the Tribeca Film Institute program, will have world premieres of their films at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. The Tribeca All Access program,now in its fourth year, selects thirty directors and screenwriters from an open call for submissions and provides them with one-on-one meetings with industry insiders. The 2007 Tribeca All Access participants will be announced in early March. A...

Thursday, December 21----The Museum of Modern Art, usually known for its rather highbrow offerings, presents a family-friendly series of Holiday Classics during the busy Christmas/New Year holiday season. Movies for the Holidays, a series of favorites from MoMA’s extensive film collection, will feature screenings in MoMA’s Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters from December 19 through January 2, 2007. Films to be featured in the series include: ELF (2003), directed by Jon Favreau and starring W...

Women were the power last week at the 6th annual High Falls Film Festival in Rochester, NY (Nov. 8-12). High Falls is a festival with a difference - its mission. Susan B. Anthony lived in Rochester, as did George Eastman. The creators of High Falls chose to honor the founders of film and the women’s movement with a program that celebrates the achievements of women in the industry and to help correct the imbalance of employment for women (as Susan B. might have) in many areas. On each night of...

Saturday, October 14----Aside from all the films, the parties, the music concerts and other special events, the Woodstock Film Festival offers local filmmakers and visiting film talents an intensive education on all aspects of the filmmaking and distribution process through an exhaustive series of professional seminars. Drawing mainly on film executives, film critics and film mavens from Manhattan (only 100 miles to the south), the Festival offers a rare opportunity to get the lowdown on the s...

The Hippie Ethos In Woodstock, New York Thursday, October 5---The town of Woodstock, New York, set in the majestic Catskill Mountain region of New York's Hudson Valley, is often confused with the famous rock concert that defined the 1960s. The actual Woodstock Music and Arts Festival happened 30 miles away in Bethel, NY. However, the modern Woodstock is a place where millionaires, artists, bohemians and left-over hippies rub shoulders in an eclectic atmosphere of individualism, personal express...

Alice Tully Hall Tuesday, October 3----Audiences attending the NEW YORK FILM FESTIVAL screenings cannot help but notice that there is massive construction going on in and around Lincoln Center these days. The front of the Festival's main screening venue, Alice Tully Hall, is being remodeled, and the overpass on West 65th Street has been torn down to create a more airy environment. Missing is the escalator entrance from Broadway and the colonaded walkway that took adventurous filmgoers past the...

The 6th annual installment of the Coney Island Film Festival hits the shores of Coney Friday, October 6th through Sunday, October 8th. This year's festival features eighty-one films from around the world; a stunning array of high and low-brow fare, as diverse as the neighborhood it represents. Subjects range from the profound to the profane, showcasing the independent spirit and irreverent nature of the one and only Coney Island.This year's centerpiece film is director Stephen Verona's lost clas...