کافیلم

برچسب: Part

  • Scholars Spotlight: Stanley Kubrick – Part One


    Introduction

    Stanley Kubrick is widely regarded as one of the most important directors in film history. From his earliest documentary shorts to major works like 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and The Shining (1980), Kubrick continually redefined cinematic form and storytelling, consistently pushing the boundaries of the medium. Often reclusive, fiercely private, and demanding to the point of obsession, he is a figure surrounded by both myth and meticulous reality. His work was rarely hurried, his methods often controversial, but the results—nearly always extraordinary—cemented his legacy in world cinema.

    Throughout his career, Kubrick directed thirteen feature films, many of which are now regarded as masterpieces. He earned thirteen Academy Award nominations, winning once for Best Visual Effects for 2001: A Space Odyssey. His films, including Dr. Strangelove (1964), A Clockwork Orange (1971), Barry Lyndon (1975), and Full Metal Jacket (1987), were all nominated for Best Picture or Best Director. Credited with pioneering new techniques in cinematography and special effects, and with his meticulous attention to detail, Kubrick has influenced generations of filmmakers.

    Cinema Scholars shines the Spotlight on the life and career of Stanley Kubrick. This two part article traces his development from a Bronx-born photographer to one of the greatest film directors the world has ever known.
    Stanley Kubrick
    Stanley Kubrick on the set of “Dr. Strangelove” in 1963. Photo courtesy of Columbia Pictures, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

    Beginnings

    Stanley Kubrick was born on July 26, 1928, in the Bronx, New York City, to Jacques and Gertrude Kubrick. His father, a homeopathic physician, fostered in young Stanley an early love of literature and chess, both of which would later play key roles in his films. A mediocre student by all academic accounts, Kubrick’s intelligence was never in doubt. His passions lay elsewhere: jazz music, photography, and the emerging art of cinema.

    Chess became a lifelong fascination for Kubrick. He spent countless hours playing in city parks as a teenager, developing a strategic mindset that would come to define his methodical approach to filmmaking. The game taught him patience, foresight, and the ability to anticipate and control outcomes. These qualities are evident in the construction of his films. He would often play chess with cast and crew on set, sometimes using it as a subtle means of asserting authority or delaying production until he reached a desired outcome.

    Kubrick attended William Howard Taft High School, joining the school’s photography club. Graduating in 1945, his grades were insufficient for college entrance. But formal education was never to be the primary catalyst of his intellectual and artistic development. Kubrick’s schooling occurred in the libraries of New York, in the darkrooms of Look magazine, and in the theaters of Manhattan’s film houses. Kubrick would state in a 1966 interview with Jeremy Bernstein:

    “As a child, I was a school misfit, and considered reading a book ‘school work’. I don’t think I read a book for pleasure until I graduated high school. I had one thing that I think perhaps helped me get over being a school misfit, and that is that I became a student of photography”

    Stanley Kubrick
    Stanley Kubrick was a Look magazine photographer when he caught himself in the mirror of Rosemary Williams, a showgirl, in 1949. Photo courtesy of Stanley Kubrick, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

    Photography

    At age thirteen, Kubrick was given a Graflex camera by his father. The result was igniting a lifelong obsession with imagery and visual structure that would shape and define the director’s career. His early photographs showed a keen eye for composition, mood, and human behavior. In 1946, at the age of sixteen, Kubrick sold a photo to Look magazine—an evocative image of a newsvendor reacting to the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

    Kubrick was soon hired as an apprentice photographer by the magazine, where he worked until 1950. During his tenure, he took thousands of images, many of which were portraits and candid shots of post-war American life. The experience honed his instincts for visual storytelling and taught him how to manipulate lighting and frame shots. These skills would later translate seamlessly into his forays into mainstream filmmaking.

    Kubrick has often cited his time at the magazine as a formative experience where he learned to think cinematically even while working with still images. His photo essays were structured with the rhythm and arc of a short film. Each sequence tells a story, reveals a character, and illustrates a conflict. His early assignments with Frank Sinatra, Leonard Bernstein, Erroll Garner, and Betsy von Furstenburg solidified the director’s early career.

    Short Films and the 1950s

    In 1951, Kubrick financed his first short documentary film, Day of the Fight. A 16-minute portrait of middleweight boxer Walter Cartier, it was shot on a shoestring budget of $3,900. It was eventually sold to RKO Pictures for modest distribution. A minor commercial success, this gave the young Kubrick the signal that he could handle the moving image with the same precision he had mastered in photography.

    Stanley Kubrick
    A still from Stanley Kubrick’s first short film “Day of the Fight” (1951), which featured Irish-American middleweight boxer Walter Cartier. Photo courtesy of RKO Pictures.

    He followed this with Flying Padre (1951), another short documentary that focused on a Catholic priest who flew a small plane to various rural parishes in New Mexico to deliver sermons. Like Day of the Fight, this second short film was distributed by RKO and further proved Kubrick’s aptitude for handling complex logistical challenges and framing strong visual sequences.

    Kubrick’s final short film of the period, The Seafarers (1953), was commissioned by the Seafarers International Union. Though lacking the intensity of his earlier work, it showcased his growing confidence with camera movement and scene transitions. This was notably the director’s first use of the dolly shot. A technique he would later refine in his feature films. These shorts, while minor in scale, were major stepping stones in Kubrick’s evolution as a filmmaker.

    During this time, Kubrick married his high school sweetheart, Toba Metz. The couple lived just north of Greenwich Village, New York City, on 16th Street, a bohemian enclave in lower Manhattan. Their time together coincided with Kubrick’s early struggles and experimentation as a filmmaker. The marriage was short-lived and ended in divorce in 1955. However, it marked a period of creative transition as Kubrick moved from still photography to motion pictures.

    Early Feature Films

    Kubrick’s first full-length feature, Fear and Desire (1953), was an experimental war film he disavowed later in life. With an allegorical narrative and a minuscule budget, the film was visually inventive but dramatically stilted. Nonetheless, it drew attention from critics and producers who saw potential in Kubrick’s command of the medium. The New York Times would say of the director’s work on the film:

    “Stanley Kubrick, a 24-year-old producer-director-photographer, and his equally young and unheralded scenarist and cast have succeeded in turning out a moody, often visually powerful study of subdued excitement. Mr. Kubrick’s professionalism as a photographer should be obvious to an amateur”

    Stanley Kubrick
    The cast and crew of “Fear and Desire” (1953). Stanley Kubrick is second from the right in the top row. Photo likely courtesy of Virginia Leith, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

    Kbrick’s next two efforts, Killer’s Kiss (1955) and The Killing (1956) signaled a major leap forward. Killer’s Kiss, a noir drama set in New York’s underworld, displayed a more confident sense of place and tension. With The Killing, a heist film told in fractured chronology, Kubrick demonstrated a boldness and technical mastery that far outweighed the limited resources he had at his disposal. It was a breakthrough, both artistically and professionally.

    Paths of Glory (1957) elevated Kubrick to the ranks of serious American directors. Starring Kirk Douglas, the World War I courtroom drama offered a scathing indictment of military hierarchy and injustice. For the first time on film, the director’s elaborate tracking shots, stark cinematography, and meticulous attention to detail were on full display. Douglas, who was impressed and signed Kubrick to a three-picture deal, would say in 1966 to The New York Times:

    “He made the veteran actor Adolphe Menjou do the same scene 17 times. ‘That was my best reading’ Menjou announced. ‘I think we can break for lunch now.’ It was well past the usual lunch time but Kubrick said he wanted another take. Menjou went into an absolute fury…Kubrick merely listened calmly and after Menjou had spluttered to an uncomplimentary conclusion said quietly: ‘All right, let’s try the scene once more.’ With utter docility, Menjou went back to work. Stanley instinctively knew what to do,” 

    The 1960s

    Kubrick’s international breakthrough came with Spartacus (1960), a Hollywood epic produced by and starring Kirk Douglas. Douglas hired Kubrick for a reported $150,000 fee to take over directing duties from Anthony Mann, who Douglas fired soon after production started. Although Kubrick did not have full creative control over the film, the experience gave him insight into the mechanics and pitfalls of the studio system. Dissatisfied with the lack of autonomy, Kubrick vowed never again to work without having the final cut.

    With Spartacus, Kubrick was firmly entrenched as one of the top young film directors in the industry. It also marked the end of the working relationship he had with Kirk Douglas. However, a new muse would arrive in the form of Peter Sellers.

    Production photo of Stanley Kubrick (left, seated) and actor Tony Curtis (right) on the set of “Spartacus” (1960). Photo courtesy of Universal Pictures Company, Inc., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

    Kubrick and his new wife, Christiane Harlan, and their two young daughters, Vivian and Anya, moved to Great Britain to begin production on Lolita (1962). The director and his family would make it their home for almost the next four decades. This was convenient for Kubrick, as he had long shunned the Hollywood machine as well as the publicity.

    With Lolita (1962), Kubrick pushed boundaries further. The adaptation of Vladimir Nabokov’s controversial novel was a risky proposition in Cold War America. Yet Kubrick’s version walked the fine line between satire and sensuality, and it benefited from memorable performances by James Mason, Shelley Winters, and Peter Sellers. Lolita also marked a transition for Kubrick. He was merging fantasy with reality. His imagery was becoming more surreal. Author Gene Yongblood wrote for The Criterion in 1992:

    “…Stylistically, it’s a transitional work, marking the turning point from a naturalistic cinema (Paths of Glory, Spartacus) to the surrealism of the later films. Reality and fantasy coexist for the first time in a Kubrick film…”

    Just One More Take

    By the 1960s, Stanley Kubrick was developing a reputation as a director who wanted what he wanted when he wanted it. Difficult. Extreme. Methodical. These are all words that have been used to describe Kubrick’s directing style. Kubrick’s perfectionism and need to film dozens upon dozens of takes for a single shot have become the stuff of legend. Indeed, this only increased as the director gained more creative control over his films.

    Kubrick’s excessive number of takes was considered by some critics to be irrational. However, the director believed that repetition was the key to getting an actor to suppress their conscious thoughts about the dialogue and act on a purely subconscious level. Nicole Kidman and the late Shelly Duvall both have relayed the horror stories of working with Kubrick. At the same time, both have said that the result was some of the finest work of their careers. A select few actors were exempt from this. We’ll explore that in part two of this Spotlight article.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gb706VANkfA

    Coming in August, we’ll bring you part two of this two-part series on the legendary Stanley Kubrick. As we continue to dive into the maestro’s career, we’ll further explore his excellent work in the 1960s with such films as Dr. Strangelove and 2001: A Space Odyssey. We’ll also cover his controversial and polarizing work in the 1970s (A Clockwork Orange and Barry Lyndon) and his venture into the realm of horror (The Shining) in 1980. Finally, we’ll dissect his last two films (Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut) as well as Kubrick’s unrealized projects.

    If You Enjoyed This Article, We Recommend:

    Scholars’ Spotlight: Steve McQueen (Click Here)

    Scholars’ Spotlight: Audrey Hepburn (Click Here)

    Keep up with Cinema Scholars on social media. Like us on Facebook, subscribe on YouTube, and follow us on Threads and Instagram.





    Source link

  • The Rise And Fall Of The Hollywood Studio System – Part 2: Hollywood At WAR! 1939


    Introduction

    In 1939, Hollywood was basking in an almost mythic glow. It was the year of Gone with the Wind, The Wizard of Oz, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, and Stagecoach—a cinematic apex unmatched in American history. The studio system was operating at full throttle, its stars luminous, its moguls wealthy, its audiences faithful. Then the world changed.

    Cinema Scholars looks back on how the outbreak of World War II in Europe and America’s entry into the war after the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 shifted the role of the film industry from escapism to engagement. The golden machinery of Hollywood became an arm of the American war effort, voluntarily, zealously, and sometimes self-servingly. From 1939 to 1945, the studio system reached both its peak in patriotism and its structural limits.

    Hollywood
    John Wayne as The Ringo Kid in John Ford’s “Stagecoach” (1939). Photo courtesy of United Artists.

    The Studio System: Still King, But Under Strain

    At the heart of the system were still the Big Five—MGM, Warner Bros., Paramount, 20th Century-Fox, and RKO—and the Little Three—Columbia, Universal, and United Artists. These vertically integrated studios controlled the flow of content from the soundstage to the theater marquee. The stars were bound by contract, and the films rolled out on a strict schedule.

    In the early 1940s, despite material shortages and labor tensions, the studios remained profitable. War was good for business. Audiences flooded theaters for both newsreels and narrative films. By 1943, weekly movie attendance in the U.S. reached a staggering 90 million—more than half the country’s population. Yet the pressure to support the war effort, maintain public morale, and adhere to federal messaging introduced unprecedented constraints—and opportunities.

    Washington and Hollywood: A New Alliance

    The U.S. government quickly recognized film’s potential as a propaganda tool. In 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the Office of War Information (OWI), which coordinated with Hollywood to ensure that films aligned with national interests. The OWI issued guidelines: portray Allied unity, avoid excessive gore or defeatism, include women in the workforce narrative, and never glorify the enemy.

    Studios collaborated—sometimes reluctantly, often eagerly. Frank Capra, fresh off his Oscar wins, joined the Army and produced the Why We Fight documentary series. John Ford and John Huston also enlisted, making powerful wartime documentaries like The Battle of Midway (1942) and Report from the Aleutians (1943).

    Hollywood
    Still from the 1942 film “The Battle of Midway” shot by John Ford. Photo courtesy of the U.S. Navy, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons.

    Even fictional narratives carried messages. Warner Bros., known for its hard-hitting social dramas, led the charge. Casablanca (1942), though not conceived as propaganda, became a powerful allegory for resistance and sacrifice. Mrs. Miniver (1942), a British-American co-production from MGM, was lauded by Churchill as “worth six divisions.”

    Stars in Uniform—and Bond Drives

    Many of Hollywood’s leading men exchanged tuxedos for uniforms. Jimmy Stewart flew combat missions in Europe. Clark Gable, devastated by his wife Carole Lombard’s death in a war bond flight crash, enlisted in the Army Air Forces. Tyrone Power joined the Marines. Meanwhile, female stars like Bette Davis, Marlene Dietrich, and Hedy Lamarr toured the country raising millions in war bonds.

    The Hollywood Canteen, co-founded in 1942 by Davis and actor John Garfield, served as a star-studded morale booster where servicemen could dance with movie stars and eat for free. Studios encouraged their stars to appear humble, patriotic, and accessible—a vital part of the war machine’s emotional arsenal.

    Films as War Weapons—and Cultural Mirrors

    From 1939 to 1945, genres evolved. War films surged in popularity, but so did musicals, screwball comedies, and noir. Films like Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) wrapped patriotism in razzle-dazzle. The More the Merrier (1943) explored the housing shortages caused by wartime mobilization, blending social commentary with romantic comedy.

    Meanwhile, the shadow of darkness grew. The trauma of war and global instability helped birth film noir—cynical, morally ambiguous stories often featuring returning soldiers and broken dreams. Films like Double Indemnity (1944) and Laura (1944) spoke to a restless, more jaded America.

    Hollywood
    Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray star in “Double Indemnity” (1944). Photo courtesy of Paramount Pictures.

    Cracks in the System

    The war years were profitable, but the old studio machinery was beginning to creak. Labor strikes erupted at Disney and Warner Bros., challenging the studios’ treatment of workers. Independent producers like David O. Selznick and Samuel Goldwyn pushed for greater creative control outside the traditional studio hierarchy. The OWI’s influence, while significant during the war, also opened the door for federal scrutiny. As the Cold War dawned, the alliance between Washington and Hollywood would take a darker turn.

    And looming in the distance was a legal storm: the 1948 Paramount Decree, a Supreme Court ruling that would end the studios’ monopolistic grip over theaters. But the roots of that decision stretched back into the war years, as independent theaters began to question the fairness of the studio stranglehold.

    Curtain Call for an Era

    By 1945, the war had ended, but the world—and Hollywood—had changed irrevocably. The studios were still powerful, but they were no longer unquestioned emperors. Stars wanted autonomy. Directors demanded creative freedom. And audiences, exposed to the harsh realities of war, were growing more sophisticated.

    The studio system would stagger into the 1950s, still producing hits, but its golden age was over. Between 1939 and 1945, Hollywood had become more than entertainment. It had become a national institution—and a battlefield of ideas.

    Key Films and Events, 1939–1945

    • 1939 – Gone with the Wind, The Wizard of Oz, and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington were released. Considered the apex of studio-era filmmaking.
    • 1941 – Citizen Kane challenges traditional narrative structures.
    • Dec 7, 1941 – Pearl Harbor attack; U.S. enters WWII.
    • 1942 – Office of War Information created; Capra begins Why We Fight series; Casablanca released.
    • 1943 – Hollywood Canteen opens; record-high movie attendance.
    • 1944 – Noir classic Double Indemnity released; war themes deepen.
    • 1945 – WWII ends; studios begin facing postwar identity 

    Join for the third and final part of our Rise and Fall of the Hollywood Studio System series: The Unmaking of the Dream Machine 1946 – 1950.

    If You Enjoyed This Article, We Recommend:

    The Rise and Fall of the Brown Derby (Click Here)

    Agua Caliente: Old Hollywood’s Mexican Monte Carlo (Click Here)

    The Celebrity-Owned Restaurants of Old Hollywood (Click Here)

    Keep up with Cinema Scholars on social media. Like us on Facebook, subscribe on YouTube, and follow us on Twitter, Threads, Instagram, and Bluesky





    Source link

  • Till Tech Do Us Part: Romance in the age of…



    “I can feel when you’re watching me, I like it” is the first line uttered by Kathryn (Cate Blanchett) in a cool seductive tone to her loyal husband George (Michael Fassbender) in Stephen Soderbergh’s spy thriller, Black Bag. The couple are no strangers to surveillance as their vocation in MI5 requires it, but George’s gaze is welcomed due to the innate desire and loyalty within. However, as the film progresses and George’s investigation forces him to question whether his wife is the intelligence leak, his once intimate gaze begins to shift. With the help of Clarissa (Marisa Aribela), George uses satellite footage to watch Kathryn’s covert mission, and so the dynamic changes. Although George insists that their marriage works because he watches her and assumes she watches him, the frisson is no longer between the couple, but instead in the satellite control room between Clarissa and George. While feline seductress Clarissa purrs her words, George takes no pleasure from this task; there is no longer any thrill in being the watcher or the watched. 

    George and Kathryn’s marriage is not the only bond that strains under the weight of espionage. Every other agent – Clarissa, Freddie (Tom Burke), James (Regé-Jean Page) and even the agency-mandated therapist Zoe (Naomie Harris) – struggles to maintain healthy relationships. Soderbergh’s latest concerns itself with distrustful spies, with the ability to lie about every encounter, but it could easily be a portrait of the London dating scene. In a densely-populated city where everyone has access to dating apps, the possibilities are presumably endless. No one has to choose, and yet according to Moya Lothian-McLean’s detailed report, no one is having a good time.

    The feeling of being watched even falls to those who don’t partake in vocational voyeurism (like spy Caul or photographer Jeff). The students of Neo Sora’s Happyend are the subjects of surveillance rather than active participants, as their school has just installed a new CCTV system which identifies and automatically penalises students for breaking school rules. One poignant scene perfectly encapsulates the subconscious effects constant surveillance has on its students. After mopping the floor of the music room clean, Ming (Shina Peng) and Ata-Chan (Yuta Hayashi) find themselves stuck in the corner of the room, at least until the floor dries. They have washed away their past transgressions and are paralysed, afraid to leave footprints on the sanitised school floor, while another pair caught embracing in a stairwell are immediately chided by the camera. Much like today’s younger generations who have no memory of a dial-up modem, the students of Happyend are quickly learning to sacrifice sensual experiences for the value judgement of technology.

    Last loves are just as susceptible to surveillance’s lure as first crushes. In Cronenberg’s The Shrouds, no one is surprised that grief-stricken entrepreneur Karsh (Vincent Cassel) is striking out on dates since his wife Becca’s (Diane Kruger) death. Especially when he takes Myrna (Jennifer Dale) to a graveside restaurant and shows her his wife’s decaying corpse through the app he invented on his phone. Karsh has become so accustomed to his new normal, regularly checking on Becca’s decomposing body, that he can no longer comprehend other people’s discomfort around death. His morbid obsession soon takes him to paranoid heights, uncovering a betrayal in his last marriage and so Karsh, with all his tech and intelligence, is right back where Caul started: confirming his paranoias, even at the detriment of himself. Karsh does not end up alone, his money and status prevent that from happening, but even as he finds a new grave partner, this eternally binding contract is ultimately soulless, leaving the viewer hollow.

    Big tech’s encroachment into every corner of our lives has made surveillance so ubiquitous that we take on its invasive roles even when we don’t have to, inevitably leading to breakdowns of trust and intimacy in favour of widespread hypervigilance. These latest additions to surveillance cinema all share a sleek, cold touch in their depictions of surveillance technologies, with observation and objective truth prioritised over the messy, chaotic, nuanced human experience of love. From first crushes to grave encounters, this is how disruptive tech has become in our romantic lives. Our active participation in a culture which values information above all else makes us as detached as the algorithms that categorise us. Perhaps in order to find the love and connection many of us feel is missing from our lives, we need to recognise that all this information won’t bring us any closer. Then, we might even be able to kill the CCTV inside our head.





    Source link

  • A Surfer, Police Officer, God and Buddha Are Part of NFMLA’s InFocus: Asian Cinema Program

    A Surfer, Police Officer, God and Buddha Are Part of NFMLA’s InFocus: Asian Cinema Program


    A surfer meeting her mother, a discussion of God and Buddha, and a police officer struggling with cultural identity were among the subjects stories in NewFilmmakers Los Angeles’ InFocus: Asian Cinema program and InFocus: Immigration programs.

    The event, which also included the Los Angeles premiere of Laramie Dennis’s debut narrative feature Where In the Hell, began with a collection of films that told stories of immigration, emigration and activism, as well as navigating two cultures and the contemplation of places aspired to and left behind.

    The day continued with a program that spotlighted Asian-American talent and storytelling in front of and behind the camera. It featured themes of family dynamics, dating pitfalls, fitting in, vulnerability, perseverance and standing up to fight for a brighter future. 

    The night concluded with the Los Angeles premiere of Where In the Hell, a buddy roadtrip “traumedy” about a prop master whose trip with her girlfriend is interrupted and a struggling actor on his way to an audition. The film brings heart and a grounded approach to existential turmoil.

    NFMLA showcases films by filmmakers of all backgrounds throughout the year, across both our general and InFocus programming. All filmmakers are welcome and encouraged to submit their projects for consideration for upcoming NFMLA Festivals, regardless of the schedule for InFocus programming, which celebrates representation by spotlighting various communities of filmmakers as part of the NFMLA Monthly Film Festival. This project is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.

    Here are more details on the filmmakers and films.

    “DelMar” directed by Lucy Morales Carlisle

    About Lucy: Lucy Morales Carlisle is an Emmy-nominated, two-time Webby winner and a multidisciplinary filmmaker with over a decade of experience in digital media and post production. She holds a BFA from the School of Visual Arts and a MFA in Media Arts from The City College of New York. As an immigrant displaced by the Salvadoran Civil War, her work explores themes of identity and isolation.  Lucy is passionate about telling stories that resonate with the Latine community, focusing on women and culture.

    About “DelMar”: A female surfer navigates life between a rural beach town in El Salvador and Maryland, where she goes to live with a mother she has never met. 

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Lucy Morales Carlisle, director of “DelMar”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vtn6BCbIwCA

    “Wabi-Sabi” directed by Josephine Green Zhang

    About Josephine: Josephine is passionate about stories of duality that offer hope to underdogs, outsiders, and misfits while humorously critiquing them. A master of tone, she enjoys bending genres and crafting modern love stories that explore themes of friendship, community, romance, justice, and self-acceptance. She is an alumna of UCLA’s Film Program, Film Independent’s Project Fellowship, UCB’s improv and sketch program, and the Universal Writers Lab. Josephine has written for Seasons 2 and 3 of First Wives Club on BET+ and Season 2 of Dollface on Hulu. Additionally, she has developed projects for Netflix, Disney+, Bound Entertainment, and CJ Entertainment.

    About “Wabi-Sabi”: When an insecure woman goes on a date at a traditional Japanese tea house, her best friend’s advice about white guys with Asian fetishes threatens to ruin her love life and her sanity.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Josephine Green Zhang, director of “Wabi-Sabi”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SdEyAOM5mc

    “God & Buddha Are Friends” directed by Anthony Ma

    About Anthony: Anthony Ma is an award-winning Taiwanese American actor, writer, director, and voiceover artist born & raised in Arcadia, California. “Chinese Antique” (2009), a short film he wrote and produced, was screened at film festivals nationwide and received audience choice awards at the 168-Hour Film Festival and NFFTY. Elevator (2015), a feature he wrote and produced, was filmed in Los Angeles, New York, and Japan, garnering an Honorable Mention for Screenwriting at DisOrient Asian Film Festival. The latest feature he co-wrote, Staycation (2018), premiered at the final LA Film Festival and received the LA Muse Award. As an actor, he most notably guest starred in Scandal, S.W.A.T., and This Is Us. The LA Asian Pacific Film Festival awarded him Best New Actor for the rom-com indie feature Love Arcadia (2015). He was also a co-host on the HBO Max foodie reality series Family Style.

    About “God & Buddha Are Friends”: A young Taiwanese American boy falls into an existential crisis when a charismatic Christian pastor comes between him and his overprotective Buddhist mother.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Anthony Ma, director of “God & Buddha Are Friends”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zv4VyznaHtY

    “Three Women Named Svetlana” directed by Natalia Boorsma 

    About Natalia: Natalia Boorsma is a Dutch/Serbian writer and director based in Amsterdam. “Three Women Named Svetlana” (2024) was her graduation film and was selected by film festivals such as Cannes Indie Shorts Awards, Shortcutz Amsterdam, Filmski Front and the Leiden International Film Festival. In the future she wants to experiment with a mixture of documentary and fiction.

    About “Three Women Named Svetlana”: On a sunny spring day, three women, all named Svetlana, are waiting at a small train station somewhere in the south of Serbia.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Natalia Boorsma, director of “Three Women Named Svetlana”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlccwb_VXUg

    “Where in the Hell” directed by Laramie Dennis

    About Laramie: Laramie Dennis got her start in New York directing and developing Off-Off-Broadway plays, most notably at the Flea Theater and Soho Rep. Her background in theater continues to inform her directing style. Where in the Hell, an offbeat road movie completed in 2024, marks her feature film debut as a writer/director. Other projects include Life on sMars, which earned her a spot at Through Her Lens: The Tribeca Chanel Women’s Filmmaker Program, along with a development grant from The Tribeca Film Institute, and Girl Pretending to Read Rilke, an Athena List finalist for 2025.

    About “Where in the Hell”: A pair of defectors from the crumbling L.A. film industry find themselves on an unlikely road trip to track down a missing girlfriend.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Laramie Dennis, director of “Where in the Hell”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrGkm0gsi8s

    “So, That Happened” directed by Neha Aziz

    About Neha Aziz: Neha Aziz  is a Pakistani-born writer, director, film programmer, and podcaster living in Austin She currently works as the Artistic Director for Austin Asian American Film Festival, and as a Film Programmer for Big Sky Documentary Festival and the Cleveland International Film Festival. In 2021 she was named an iHeartRadio NextUP fellow. Her show Partition debuted in August 2022 and has been featured on Apple Podcasts, NPR, The Austin Chronicle, and more. In 2023, Neha was one of five recipients of the WAVE Grant from Wavelength Productions.Her short, “So, That Happened” is currently on the festival circuit. She was a writer for the PBS Digital Series Roots of Resistance, and she was just named a 2025 Unlock Her Potential Directing Mentee. 

    About “So, That Happened”: Sheila and Imran haven’t seen each other since college, but when Imran moves back to Austin, an opportunity arises for the pair to get acquainted once more.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Neha Aziz, director of “So, That Happened”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_LZZWfu1ig

    “Sunflower Girl” directed by Holly M. Kaplan

    About Holly: Holly M. Kaplan is a writer and director of mixed Cantonese heritage born and raised in New York City. She was selected for NALIP and Netflix’s Latino Lens: Narrative Short Film Incubator for Women of Color to write, direct, and produce “Sunflower Girl.” Holly has worked as a Co-Executive Producer/Director’s Assistant on Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin and was a former apprentice to the late Independent producer/director Ben Barenholtz. She earned her BA in Film & Media Arts from American University. Currently, Holly is developing the feature-length script of Sunflower Girl with Stowe Story Labs.

    About “Sunflower Girl”: When a 13-year-old Chinese-American girl has the opportunity to go skateboarding with her crush, it comes at the cost of abandoning her little sister.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Holly M. Kaplan, director of “Sunflower Girl”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrxchANdTkw

    “Bodies” directed by Luca Bueno

    About Luca: Luca Bueno is a Brazilian-born director, producer, and writer with a multicultural background, having lived in South America, France, and the U.S. At 15, he became Brazil’s youngest credited crew member on The Dreamseller (2016). His directing credits include “Bodies” (2024), “Luna” (2022), and “Skyward” (2025), with Luna earning multiple festival awards. Luca holds a Bachelor’s in Film Production and a Master’s in Directing from Loyola Marymount University. Now based in the U.S., he continues to create films while engaging with an audience of 120,000 on social media.

    About “Bodies”: Two LAPD officers respond to a disturbing call in an immigrant neighborhood, where Officer Alvarez confronts an unsettling truth that tests his duty, empathy, and cultural identity.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Luca Bueno, director of “Bodies”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQjwg0RwsjA

    “Cartes” directed by Rhym Guissé

    About Rhym: Rhym was born to an Algerian mother and a father from Mali. She grew up in the Ivory Coast before moving to Louisiana and earning a writing degree.  Rhym has a prolific career in entertainment as an actress and director. She is a 2023 CDDP (Commercial Director Diversity Program) fellow and strives to create narrative features with female leads challenging the status quo.

    About “Cartes”: An undocumented Malian goes through great lengths to continue working for a non-profit organization she loves.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Rhym Guissé, director of “Cartes”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Syw1dlTTa5w

    “Unwavering” directed by Alexandra Hsu

    About Alexandra: Alexandra “Alle” Hsu is a Chinese American director/producer from Orange County, California. Alle has directed several short films: “Sophie” (HK),” “Our Way Home” (US), “Rencontres Paysannes” (France), “POP!” (US), and “Unwavering” (US), which have screened at over 20 festivals worldwide including having premiered at Oscar-qualifying festivals Austin, Foyle, and Bend, to name a few. Alle has been a part of prestigious programs SFFILM FilmHouse, CBS Leadership Pipeline, WIF Mentoring, Asian Women Empowered, Unlock Her Potential, Gold House Futures, KSW Interdisciplinary Writers Lab, and the CQNL Storylines Lab. FilmHouse supported her feature Queens, inspired by a family story around the 1960s New York Worlds Fair, which was also a Finalist for the SFFILM Westridge grant, a semifinalist in the Big Vision Empty Wallet Level Up Lab and a Finalist in the Giant Leap Accelerator.  At CQNL, she developed a feature about her great-grandmother, Zhang Youyi.  With a background in documentaries, she strives to tell stories truthfully and authentically, while shining a light on stories that have been left untold and that stimulate conversations. Alle received an MFA from NYU Tisch and a BA from Scripps College double majoring in Media Studies and Asian Studies.

    About “Unwavering”: Carolyn Kim joins a college student movement for Ethnic Studies in 1968. Inspired by real events.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Alexandra Hsu, the director, and Christine Hughes, writer of “Unwavering”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYzv8KAKcK8

    “Lola” directed by Grace Hanna

    About Grace: Grace is a Filipino-American director who excels in genre filmmaking and world-building. Finding magic in the mundane is at the heart of the stories they tell. Their film, “Lola,” has screened at UTA x Gold House, AFI Fest, FilmQuest, and LA Asian Pacific Film Festival, among others, and won awards from the Television Academy, the Directors Guild of America, Imagine Entertainment, Adobe, and Indy Shorts International Film Festival, where they won the Directorial Debut Award. Their latest project, “”Halcyon Days,”” is sponsored by Film Independent and received Panavision’s NFP Grant. Grace was a semi-finalist for the Commercial Director Diversity Program and is a member of the Alliance of Women Directors. Their work has been shortlisted by Disney, Sundance Sloan, and Sony.

    About “Lola”: A thirteen-year-old science prodigy journeys into her grandma’s deteriorating mind to save one precious memory they have together.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Grace Hanna, director of “Lola”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVwI60qFBCA

    “Deep Into the Forest” directed by Xinhao “Violet” Lu

    About Xinhao: Xinhao “Violet” Lu is a Los Angeles-based Asian writer and director. His most recent film, Deep Into the Forest, premiered at 2024 Tribeca Festival and the 9th CAA Moebius Film Festival, and has been officially selected by lots of international film festivals. His dark comedy short film Red Man won Best Experimental film at the 2023 LA Shorts International Film Festival. His first short film Reunion Night was nominated for Best Film and Best Cinematography in “Mao” International Film Week in China. Prior to his MFA in Directing from the AFI Conservatory, he studied Finance at Tianjin University of Finance and Economics in China. He loves to explore the impact of the times on ordinary people and to speak out against social inequality.

    About “Deep Into the Forest”: A talented orienteering athlete makes an unexpected decision under the injury of his foot and the pressure of being pushed to compete at a national competition by everyone.

    Watch the NFMLA interview with Xinhao “Violet” Lu, director of “Deep Into the Forrest”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmePz6Nu21w

    Main image: “Lola”



    Source link