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NEWS
Office Space (Mike Judge, 1999).
- Some Hollywood insiders are blaming post-pandemic work-from-home policies—rather than rampant financialization and an overinvestment in stale intellectual-property tentpoles—for the industry’s recent decline.
- A coalition of human-rights groups have penned an open letter to Netflix demanding the renewal of its “Palestinian Stories” collection, which expired earlier this month after three years on the platform.
- Workers in RadicalMedia’s nonfiction division have launched a union drive, having collected an “overwhelming majority” of signature cards from the 65-person bargaining group. They plan to join the Writers Guild of America East.
- China will not have an Oscar entry this year, after the Academy deemed the documentary The Sinking of the Lisbon Maru (2023) ineligible for the Best Foreign Picture award, which requires “a predominantly (more than 50 percent) non-English dialogue track.”
DEVELOPING
- Danny Ramirez, who was slated to appear across from Joaquin Phoenix in an untitled Todd Haynes film, reports that the project is “hopefully” moving forward. The period piece was to revolve around two men leaving Los Angeles for Mexico, but instead Phoenix left the film and stayed in LA.
REMEMBERING
Tootsie (Sydney Pollack, 1982).
- Teri Garr has died at 79. The American actress and singer stole scenes in The Conversation (1974), Young Frankenstein (1974), and Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), followed by larger roles in Mr. Mom (1983), Tootsie (1982), and After Hours (1985). She is remembered by David Letterman for her whip-smart and highly animated Late Night appearances that “gave [the show] a cachet and importance not possible without her.”
- Gary Indiana has died at 74. The American writer and artist set a new standard for acerbic, engaged arts criticism at the Village Voice during the Reaganite ’80s. He appeared in a number of underground films, including those of Michel Auder, Beth and Scott B, Ulrike Ottinger, and Valie Export. He began to publish fiction in his thirties, and the novel Gone Tomorrow (1993) draws on his experiences on the set of Dieter Schidor’s Cold in Columbia (1979). Later in life, he began exhibiting video work, including Soap (2004–12), Plutot la vie (2005), Stanley Park (2013), and Young Ginger (2014). Christian Lorentzen calls him “an undeluded romantic.” Tobi Haslett, introducing a 2021 interview, calls him “a mix of prince and punk.”
Trash (Paul Morrisey, 1970).
- Paul Morrissey has died at 86. The American filmmaker was a frequent collaborator of Andy Warhol’s, codirecting Chelsea Girls (1966) and taking sole directorial credit on such Factory productions as Flesh (1968), Trash (1970), and Heat (1972), as well as the camp-gore Italian coproductions Flesh for Frankenstein (1973) and Blood for Dracula (1974).
- Vladimir Carvalho has died at 89. The Brazilian filmmaker is known as one of the nation’s foremost documentarians, producing many of his films in the midst of Médici’s brutal “years of lead.” O País de São Saruê (1971), which depicts the plight of farmers in the Northeast, was banned by the military dictatorship, inciting widespread outrage and defiance of the censors, resulting in a three-year suspension of the Brasília Film Festival. He was the founder of the Brazilian Association of Documentarians (ABD) and the Cinememória Foundation.
RECOMMENDED READING
On the Beach at Night (Hong Sang-soo, 2017).
- “I am careful to not use the word ‘muse’ when referring to Kim’s roles in Hong’s work—a word that re-animates an uneven power dynamic, relegating women to the sidelines of cinema—especially when Kim is a one of a kind movie-star auteur.” For A Rabbit’s Foot, Cici Peng considers Kim Min-hee’s collaborations with Hong Sang-soo.
- “I’ve always failed in institutions…. I have no high school degree, I have no acting degree, no dance degree, nothing.” For Another Man, Ted Stansfield profiles Franz Rogowski, who discusses bouldering, living in a van, and getting expelled from a Swiss clown school.
- “Her innate sense of herself as unstoppable allowed her to gently mock tragic female creators who couldn’t navigate these changes with her own sense of ease and her willingness to fight.” For Bookforum, A. S. Hamrah reviews two new books on Agnès Varda.
- “In [librarians’ and booksellers’] insistence on utility and relevance, something important about books gets obscured: their obscurity.” For 4Columns, Sukhdev Sandhu reviews Jeff Preiss and Josiah McElheny’s The Secret World (2023), a “slantways documentary” on the reading life of the gallerist and publisher Christine Burgin.
RECOMMENDED EVENTS
Still Film (James N. Kienitz Wilkins, 2023).
- New York, November 1 and 2: Triple Canopy presents its annual symposium of “conversations, performances, and festivities,” including a conversation between Silvia Federici and Yasmine Price, an illustrated lecture by Sky Hopinka, and “a table read of a misappropriated screenplay” facilitated by James N. Kienitz Wilkins.
- London, November 2: Institut Francais puts John Akomfrah in conversation with Abderrahmane Sissako on the subjects of “identity, migration, and cultural clash in cinema.”
- London, November 5: The Barbican Centre presents Efforts of Nature VI, a program of experimental films and spoken word arranged by Morgan Quaintance that “both includes and expands from his film of the same name.”
- Amsterdam, through January 5: Eye Filmmuseum presents Underground, an exhibition and film program on American avant-garde cinema of the 1960s, including works by Shirley Clarke, Jack Smith, Marie Menken, and others.
RECOMMENDED VIEWING
- MUBI has released a trailer for Luca Guadagnino’s Queer (2024), featuring Sinéad O’Connor’s unbeatable cover of “All Apologies” and Daniel Craig as William S. Burroughs in Mexico.
- Mushroom Studios has released a trailer for Mike Leigh’s Hard Truths (2024), which centers the pugnacious brio of Marianne-Jean Baptiste’s Pansy as she drifts into a mental-health crisis.
RECOMMENDED LISTENING
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (Frank Capra, 1939).
- On a new series of his Past Present Future podcast, David Runciman discusses “The Great Political Films,” including thus far such titles as Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), and The Manchurian Candidate (1962).
RECENTLY ON NOTEBOOK
The Idea of You (Michael Showalter, 2024).
- “Saleka peddles a soulful but safe brand of mid-aughts pop, heavy on synthesized strings, which feels dated in a movie full of iPhones and TikTok-style dances.” Zach Schonfeld explores the shallow spectacles at the center of Trap and The Idea of You (both 2024), which stumble as they try to walk in the footsteps of our best pop-star fictions.
- “Like Boris Karloff’s Frankenstein’s monster or Bela Lugosi’s Dracula, Vampira presented something simple and elemental lurking in the human mind, a perfect intersection of sex and death, painted with strokes broad enough for anyone to see and feel.” Chris Shields traces the lineage of the horror host from Vampira, to Zacherley, to Elvira, identifying Beavis & Butthead as their foul-mouthed nephews.
- “The devil cannot scare us because he is no longer to blame.” Robert Rubsam considers the throwback Satanic panic of Oz Perkins’s Longlegs (2024) in light of Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s more contemporary grasp of evil.
WISH LIST
Deep Red (Dario Argento, 1975).
- Creation Cabin will republish Twilight of the Warriors: The Art of Cinematic Set Construction, based on Soi Cheang’s recent film, in a bilingual Chinese-English edition (with thanks to al_tran).
- Mutant and Unbox Industries will release a soft vinyl “Mad Puppet” toy, inspired by Dario Argento’s Deep Red (1975).
EXTRAS
Klute (Alan J. Pakula, 1971).
- The FBI has released its declassified surveillance files on Donald Sutherland, which landed him on a watchlist during the production of Alan J. Pakula’s conspiracy thriller Klute (1971) (with thanks to Robert Skvarla).