Daily Briefing. Charlie Kaufman's "Frank or Francis": "It's about online film criticism"

Also: New projects from Alice Winocour, Noémie Lvovsky, Yasuo Furuhata and Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden. VIFF @ 30 and NYFF @ 49. And more.
David Hudson

I've only just now caught up with David Jenkins's interview with Charlie Kaufman for Time Out London in which Jenkins has "asked him about some of the dos, don'ts and more don'ts of his very personalized trade." That alone makes it a must-read, of course, but Kaufman also talks a bit about the project he's working on now, Frank or Francis, noting that "the scope of it and the world it inhabits is very, very large. In the broadest possible sense, it's about online film criticism, but as usual, the world that I'm writing about is not necessarily the world that I'm writing about. It's just a place to set it. There's a lot in there about the internet and anger: cultural, societal and individual anger. And isolation in this particular age we live in. And competition: it's about the idea of people in this world wanting to be seen. I hate to use the word 'about,' as it implies that what I'm doing is an analogy and that I'm trying to say something. I'm not. That's for the audience to do." Related reading: David Cronenberg's conversation with Kaufman in Interview in 2008.

"Vincent Lindon and Soko will headline the cast in Alice Winocour's romantic drama Augustine about a 19th century doctor and his patient who grow close as he studies her unknown disease," reports Maria Sell in Screen. Also: "This week shooting commenced on Noémie Lvovsky's Camille Redouble, which centers on a couple that is getting divorced after being married for 25 years. One evening, the woman is transported back to when she was 16 and met her husband, and confronted with the choice to change their lives." The cast features Mathieu Amalric and Yolande Moreau.

More projects in the works: Yasuo Furuhata will direct Ken Takakura, Takeshi Kitano and Tadanobu Asano in Anata e; and Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden are working on Hate Mail.

The 30th Vancouver International Film Festival opened last night and, for the Sun, John Mackie talks with festival director Alan Franey, who tells him that the highlights of the past three decades would have to include introducing audiences to Iranian cinema in the early 80s and to the Fifth Generation of Chinese filmmakers before "the whole world caught on." Shelly Kraicer has posted a guide to the nearly two dozen Chinese-language films he's programmed for this year's edition.

The New York Film Festival opens today and runs through October 16. To the New York Times' Manohla Dargis, "considering the ambition and scope of this year's event, it's apparent that the festival is determined to grab the city's attention and perhaps ditch its reputation as the Tribeca's stodgier uptown counterpart." The roundups will start rolling out later today, but for now, you'll find new overviews of the lineup from Steve Erickson in Gay City News and Cinespect.

The 19th Raindance Film Festival is on in London through October 9.

For Filmmaker, Anthony Kaufman talks with John Gianvito about Far From Afghanistan, the omnibus film I mentioned a few days ago. Gianvito, Jon Jost and Travis Wilkerson will be presenting The October Edition, a work-in-progress cut, at the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival on October 12 following its online premiere on October 6.

Viewing (7'39"). Jim Emerson on Roman Polanski's Chinatown (1974).

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