What are Your Favorite Films?
For the 2015 Phoenix Film Festival we encourage you to Find YOUR New Favorite Movie! We have asked filmmakers who will be screening their films at this year’s festival about some of their favorite movies.
Liz Manashil, writer/director of PFF Feature Competition film BREAD AND BUTTER, will be in attendance for all three PFF screenings on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Check the schedule here. And, if that weren’t enough, she has shared a few of her fave films with us!
- Favorite Comedy
BROADCAST NEWS is my favorite movie of all time and it also happens to be a comedy. I think Jane Craig is one of the best female characters ever written and there are scenes in this movie that I actually have based life decisions off of because I feel so in sync with what it's trying to say. Plus, it's absolutely hilarious. Also, best casting ever. "I think we have the kind of friendship where if I were the devil, you'd be the only one I would tell."
- Favorite Drama
THE LAST DAYS OF DISCO. It's more of a comedy drama and it's by one of my favorite directors, Whit Stillman. I love how subtle and unpredictable each of the characters are. I also love the overarching theme of not wanting time to move on, not wanting to get older, not wanting to move past "disco." It's a great, underappreciated movie. Also ROCKY has to be on the list as well, because... it's Rocky!
- Favorite Documentary
THE CRUISE. Bennett Miller has recently transitioned to fiction, as of late, and there are scads and scads of documentaries that I love, but this one gives me a little bit of doc street cred because it's not as well known as the host of others I could mention. A fantastic movie about a New York bus tour guide that allows you to see the beauty in things you might pass over upon first viewing.
- What film(s) are you looking forward to seeing at PFF 2015 (besides your own of course!!)?
A good friend of mine is screening his short VALIANT at PFF, and I haven't seen it yet!
- What is a favorite film that you think most people have never seen, but should?
TUSK and FRIGHT NIGHT (both versions). It's a little bit of a joke with me, but I bring up these movies all the time. I think they are really well done and capture a great medium ground between camp, horror and comedy, that isn't often depicted. Also, they're just fun. Sometimes you need a ridiculous movie to get you out of a mood slump.
- Do you have a favorite film poster?
One of my favorite movies of all time is STOLEN KISSES by Francois Truffaut. The poster is hanging in my hallway and I love it. BREAD AND BUTTER is about thirty year-old AMELIA KARINSKY – who obsessed with her virginity, struggles to take control of her life when two emotionally arrested men fall for her. BREAD AND BUTTER chronicles how Amelia learns that independence is more important than a mismatched romance.
Among many accolades, The Valley Star declares that, “Bread and Butter” charms as it effectively demonstrates the flaws and instability in romance, assuring viewers that they are not alone in their weirdness or intricate love affairs.”
Liz tells us that Bread and Butter world-premiered at Woodstock Film festival, won Best Feature at Big Apple Film Festival and has been traveling around the country for the past few months ~ and will continue to do so until the film’s release in July 2015. “Stay tuned for details, and sign up for our mailing list on our website!”
- Laurie Smith
What are Your Favorite Films?
LISTENING is a sci-fi thriller about penniless grad students who invent mind-reading technology that destroys their lives and threatens the future of free will itself. It's really about communication, relationships, and technology, and is told as a domestic drama where the stakes keep rising until it's a full-blown thriller and the world hangs in the balance.
A Town Called Panic — I saw A Town Called Panic at what must have been a 10 or 11 p.m. showing at the 2010 festival. The theater was maybe half full, and I don’t think anyone was quite ready for this quirky stop-motion film about characters named Cowboy, Indian and Horse. The premise is zany: it’s Horse’s birthday, so his roommates go online to order 50 bricks, but due to a keyboard snafu they accidentally order 50 million bricks. The bricks start coming in a huge caravan of delivery trucks, which is only the beginning of this ridiculously fun French film. It’s after movies like this you realize how important film festival are, because without one how else would anyone have seen A Town Called Panic?
The Movie Hero — In 2003, during one of my first festivals, I happened to catch The Movie Hero, Brad T. Gottfred’s meta-comedy about a man who is convinced he’s starring in his own movie. The man, and Movie Hero, is played by Clueless co-star Jeremy Sisto, who spends much of the movie dialoging with the audience. It’s all bonkers, with lots of citing of movie cliches and tropes, but it works and works well. It was a fun find.
Anthony Tarsitano and his wife (and co-filmmaker) Deborah accepted the Copper Wing Award at PFF 2014 for Best Live Action Short for their film ICE.
Larry King called Arizona’s Joe Arpaio the “P.T. Barnum of Sheriffs”; Variety’s Dennis Harvey lauded Randy Murray’s award winning documentary, The Joe Show, “an equally entertaining … and infuriating overview of a very American self-made phenomenon whose means of enforcing the law often seem to trample upon it. This vivid warts-and-all portrait has good potential to attract niche home-turf theatrical (distribution), and broadcast sales in other select territories.”
Do you have a favorite film poster?
This week, Howard Goldberg, the film's Producer/Writer/Director, shares a few of his favorite films to add to your ever-growing must-see list!
