I rarely go into a film without knowing anything about it but at the back end of the last TIFF, the programmers recommended Romanian film Intregalde [a comedy drama by Radu Muntean]. I just loved it. It subverted every trope that I expect to happen next.
Angelica Bastién [at Vulture] is a great critic. If you’re a critic, the turnaround’s very quick yet she’s able to do such in-depth, well-reasoned looks at films and addresses the larger context and history. I used to work with a critic, Martin Tsai [freelance who has worked at the Los Angeles Times and The Star-Ledger] with whom I went to NYU, and I find his stuff great. I like local critic Carolyn Hinds [freelance critic who has written for Mediaversity Reviews, Observer and ButWhyTho?]. She has a podcast about Asian dramas called Beyond The Romance.
I enjoy podcasts and listen to A Year In Film by Canadians Becky Shrimpton, Cameron Maitland and Alicia Fletcher. They always have very interesting takes on a range of films. I grew up with very middlebrow films, very B-list and cult films, and this pod goes through all of that and looks at the larger arc of what was happening in the industry at a certain time, politically and socially.
I follow critics lists and the film lists on Twitter. I also look to our programmers. I trust all of their tastes, even though we don’t always agree on films. I do WhatsApp group chats with people that formerly worked at and still work at TIFF.
Because of the pandemic, I’ve only been to Cannes this year. I had a Berlin trip planned and I attended Sundance virtually. I’ve always wanted to go to Busan. I taught Korean cinema for four years. I lived in New York for a long time and want to go back to New York Film Festival.
I’m a very big David Cronenberg fan and enjoyed Crimes Of The Future. I went to grad school thinking I was going to research Cronenberg films and then went in a totally different direction. One film I was really excited about, which I think everybody’s going to love, is Kelly Fyffe-Marshall’s When Morning Comes [to premiere in Discovery]. She’s an exciting new voice in Canadian cinema, which in general is going through another golden age.
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