Trân Anh Hùng’s “The Taste of Things” is no popcorn movie. Concession stands are downright vulgar compared to the farmhouse kitchen at the center of Hùng’s tranquil story about food, art and passion. Set in fin-de-siècle rural France, the movie opens with a nearly wordless sequence in which the camera spends half an hour delicately […]
MFF 2024: Week Two Picks Read More »
While most teenagers premiere their videos in front of family squeezed onto the living room couch, Zach Church will debut his latest movie on the big screen in front of hundreds of filmgoers. Church’s “Making ‘The Chair’” is one of 16 short films invited by the Milwaukee Film Festival to participate in this year’s Milwaukee
MFF 2024: Cream City Cinema selection spotlights local filmmakers Read More »
If you wear the right shoes, it takes only 12 minutes to walk between the Oriental and Downer Theatres on Milwaukee’s East Side. That’s enough time to tell the story of how Milwaukee Film, which revitalized the Oriental after taking over operations in 2017, has now resurrected the historic Downer Theatre. Built as a silent
Introducing the 2024 Milwaukee Film Festival Read More »
Never read your reviews, goes the old adage. But maybe it’s not so easy for an actor to ignore a bad notice while being heckled by his own director during their movie’s hometown premiere. “Boo!,” bellowed Mike Cheslik from the right aisle of the Oriental Theatre’s main auditorium, which was packed April 28 for the
MFF 2023: Festival Highlights Read More »
If the Mexican horror movie “Huesera” turned over a blood sample, its genetic makeup might prove startling. There’s a malignancy inside of Valeria, the young, pregnant wife at the center of Michelle Garza Cervera’s feature debut, and not just because the fetus inside her belly seems hijacked by dark forces. Valeria says she wants a
MFF 2023: Worldviews section packs plenty of global pedigree Read More »
To get invited to the Milwaukee Film Festival, all Hasti Ghasemivaghar needed was a good idea and 10 bucks. Ghasemivaghar’s “Coming to Small Town America” is one of six nonfiction shorts included in a festival package called The Milwaukee Youth Show: Recording Reality. The program, which is new this year, showcases documentaries made by area
MFF 2023: Local documentary spotlights four immigrant stories Read More »
Throw a spatula at this year’s Milwaukee Film Festival, and you’re likely to hit a movie about movies. One of them, “I Like Movies,” has a title that might double as a tagline for the festival’s 15th annual edition. The something-for-everyone event, which opens Thursday, will present 135 feature films and 148 shorts over 15
Introducing the 2023 Milwaukee Film Festival Read More »
Might a third dimension be too much for the Milwaukee Film Festival? That prospect crossed my mind as I accepted a pair of 3D glasses for “Long Day’s Journey Into Night,” a fluorescent Chinese marvel about Luo Hongwu, a man returning home to the Guizhou province to search for a past lover. Seventy minutes into
The 2019 Milwaukee Film Festival – Top Five Read More »
Two seconds and three quick cuts is all Alfred Hitchcock needed to traumatize me. Watching “The Birds” on television as an impressionable 12-year-old seemed like a good idea until Jessica Tandy discovered the farmer with his eyes pecked out. Rather than a traditional zoom, Hitchcock used three staccato shots to close in on the wounded
MFF 2019: Cinema Hooligante Picks for Halloween Read More »
While it won’t win any trophies for elegance, “Mouth Harp in Minor Key: Hamid Naficy in/on Exile” still has one of the best titles of any movie at this year’s Milwaukee Film Festival. The documentary is indeed a minor, restrained affair about Hamid Naficy, a distinguished film scholar at Northwestern University. But when he demonstrates
MFF 2019 Interview: Maryam Sepehri Says Her New Documentary is ‘Very Personal’ Read More »
