The 35th Philadelphia Film Festival

Incredible Year That Is Growing Bigger Every Time

This was the best year the Philadelphia Film Festival has ever had. I truly didn’t want it to end. They sold more tickets than any prior festival; audiences were packed and genuinely excited to be there, and the staff and volunteers were so friendly and worked so hard to ensure everyone had an amazing time. I’m so grateful to all of them for providing a utopia where cinephiles can gather and enjoy the artistry of motion pictures together at various theaters across Philadelphia. This year's program featured films from around the world and stories from so many diverse voices and perspectives. I can’t wait to watch them all again. 

My top five would be “Josephine”, "Elephants In The Fog", "Coward, BenI’mana and Labrador - Autopsy Of Silence. One of the first two will be my number one film of the year, as I have to see them both again first and reflect more on them, as they were both so amazing. Josephine follows the title character (Mason Reeves), an eight-year-old girl in San Francisco whose innocence is lost forever after accidentally separating from her father, Damian (Channing Tatum), and witnessing the brutal rape of a woman in the park (Syra McCarthy). The rapist (Philip Ettinger) is arrested, and Damian and Josephine’s mother, Claire (Gemma Chan), both try to explain to Josephine what she saw in ways she’ll understand. The efforts are genuine but prove useless in the long run as Josephine's confusion turns to fear, turning to rage then lashing out. An attorney (Michael Angelo Covino) requests that Josephine testify in the rapist’s trial, as she’s the only witness to the crime. As the trial date nears, Josephine must battle all of her inner turmoil and face the truth dead in the face - the truth that will set her and the victim free. Beth de Araujo’s sophomore feature is a rippling effect of lasting trauma handled with empathy and care. Everything is in all the details. The slow motion of Josephine holding a thumbtack as she pops an entire balloon, the immediacy with which she pushes Damian off the bed when she hears him and Claire having sex, the tightening grip she holds on her sharp pencil as she walks down the hall knowing a man is walking behind her. The entire cast delivers career-best work, but this is Mason Reeves' film. She delivers the best performance I’ve seen this year, possibly the entire decade. I can’t wait to see her nominated in January. 

“Elephants In The Fog” is Nepel’s official submission for the 99th Academy Awards, and I’m holding onto all hope it gets nominated because it’s absolutely this year's most extraordinary film alongside Josephine. A diverse community of transgender individuals led by matriarch Pirati (Pushpa Thing Lama) lives next to a village in Thori on the edge of a forest where villagers carry torches at night to drive away wild elephants. As Pirati contemplates leaving her community for New Delhi with Jungey (Aashant Sharma), the man she loves, one of her “Daughters,” Apsara (Aliz Ghimire), goes missing after a town festival. Apsara is hilarious and proud and has grand visions for herself, leading the community to teasingly refer to her as a “Princess”. She’s the life of the party, and Pirati has a special soft spot for her, a soft spot wounded after having a fight with her the night she disappeared over her contemplation of leaving the community. The transphobic village shows little interest and judges Apsara, blaming her for whatever has become of her. Apsara’s wig is eventually found in the forest, and Pirati’s plans to leave come to light, souring her relationship with her community, who blame her for Apsara’s disappearance. 

As time to find her runs out, Pirati’s journey to find her best friend grows more challenging as her persistence fuels the villagers' transphobic rage, which culminates in vandalism, assault, and other atrocities the trans community faces daily. The metaphor of wild elephants for the trans community is absolutely tragic but so beautiful in how the execution is portrayed. These are proud, beautiful creatures roaming the forest for survival, and they will attack when they see danger. Pirati comes across a murdered elephant as she and the judgemental, begrudging villagers search the forest at dusk with lanterns. Pirati glides her hand over the beautiful creature and lies on it, offering the destroyed creature one last act of love. To the villagers, the elephants are grotesque and dangerous beasts. Just like Pirati and her friends. Towards the film’s explosively liberating climax, Pirati goes back to the forest and breaks down sobbing in grief and regret after losing all hope. A wild elephant approaches her and doesn’t attack her, opting instead to offer her comfort, and the weeping Pirati strokes the elephant’s welcoming trunk. This entire scene, and the way it was shot and the tone and pacing of it, is great filmmaking at its most holy. As a story, it reminded me of The Hunger Games prequel, where the snakes slither all over Rachel Zegler as she sings. Elephants In The Fog is a humane film vital for a most inhumane time we’re living in. 

The same can be said for Lukas Dhont’s “Coward”, a beautiful queer love story between Pierre (Emmanuel Macchia) and Francis (Valentin Campagne), two young men in 1916 serving at the Belgian front alongside other comrades. The very flamboyant Francis is tasked with putting on a theatrical revival of music and comedic entertaining the troops and for those in the hospital.  Pierre finds great comfort in the performances, having been greatly traumatized by the trenches, which included battling in them and collecting bodies. We’ve all heard from history that so many “Boys” and “Young Men” were the ones who were drafted and called to the front, but Coward really hammers the nail into the psychological wounds these boys carry, making their youth and innocence portrayed here in a way that feels very new. That Macchia and Campagne are both so young and youthful-looking is definitely crucial in the film's portrayal of just how innocent and vulnerable these people are. When soldiers “desert” the war, they’ll be killed upon discovery. Pierre and Francis’s sexual and romantic relationship takes the already beautiful story to new heights. 

Coward is truly a very poignant work about the ways in which men move through the world and society’s limitations placed on men regarding their worth as caregivers. Men are allowed to give love but only up to a point. Given that there are no women around, a lot of the performances are caricatures of women, one of which involves a birthing sequence for a fellow soldier who just became a father. That performance is extremely offensive, but what I took away from it is that there are societal consequences for carrying out gender segregation, and so much of it looks normal on paper but, in real life, creates a society that keeps men and women from fully understanding each other. The cheers and cries of happiness these men bellow upon going to the sea for the first time have such appreciative warmth that it’s angelic. The way Pierre and Franics hold each other's heads in a tender embrace and what that moment means is what Coward is all about. One must believe that love can truly be found even in the most despairing of places.

“Ben’Imana” almost has the opposite effect. Many of these wounded people have love and the capacity to love, but they’ve been so broken down by trauma and are so set in their ways of suspicion that it might be too late. One hopes this is not true as we follow Veneranda (Clementine U. Nyirinkindi), a survivor of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda who, eighteen years later in 2012, is involved in ‘Community-led justice and reconciliation. As she faces mounting pressure within her work, her teenage daughter Tina’s (Kesia Kelly Nishimwe) unexpected pregnancy forces her to confront the limits of her beliefs and whether she can go on carrying her own wounds in silence. Despite Tina's insistence from Tina that the baby’s father (Who is not Tutsi) is a good young man and she plans to keep it as well as continue her studies, Veneranda’s blood continues to simmer and boil over the situation as the outdoor trials grow more tense. Every second, it becomes clearer that reconciliation has a very limiting point past which this community can go no further. Veneranda’s sister Suzanne (Isabelle Kabano) has always been seen as the “hothead” of the community despite her valid reasons for rage and despair, having most of her family and children killed. Years of invalidation from her home push her to the brink.  Tina finds some comfort from her aunt after Veneranda banishes her from the house. It comes as no surprise that Veneranda’s rage comes from her own sexual and violent traumas, and her hypocrisy in how she leads these reconciliation groups becomes too great a cross to bear. The cinematography is dazzling and enchanting with bright red and orange skies over the horizon. Writer/director Marie Clementine Dusabejambo (Whose own family history greatly influenced this film) is a genius filmmaker, and I couldn’t be more honored to have been in Philly to witness the first of what will surely be many profound and beautiful bodies of work from her. Praise to her and to Philadelphia for welcoming her with such open eyes and embracing hearts. 

“Labrador - Autopsy Of Silence” follows Alupa (Christopher Angatookalook), a gay Inuk mechanic on a cargo ship traveling the Labrador region of the Canadian Arctic whose grief over his murdered white boyfriend Alex (Alexandre Landry) haunts him 24/7 as he becomes in need of a lawyer following false accusations. There’s no music during these moments, and the camera angle is completely still. It’s clearly Alupa’s grief manifesting these moments, but they never play out that way on screen in the sense that they don’t feel imaginary; they feel completely authentic. It’s as though he really goes inside to speak with him one more time before leaving with the police. 

Autopsy Of Silence is very procedural, with many comparing it to Anatomy Of A Fall. I definitely felt that resemblance, but Anatomy Of A Fall gave Sandra Huller a moment to breathe in relief after the entire film puts her through the wringer. Autopsy of Silence never gives Alupa that moment. There’s testimony and proceedings, but an official arrest and trial are always impending. The film never reaches that stage, opting instead to look back at the night of the murder during which the cargo ship glides through stormy waves amongst a severe blizzard. The yellow neon lighting inside the empty corridors and engine rooms is all beautifully shot for what’s supposed to symbolise something so frightening. The murder is eventually revealed, and the murderer, as well as the context, is enraging, as it all easily could’ve been avoided. It does shine light, however, on why Alupa doesn’t put up a bigger fight for his innocence. He visits his cousin Donna (Arsaniq Deer) and stays with her in her tent under a highway bridge with other homeless Inuk people. The police arriving early in the morning demanding they leave is portrayed the way an exhausted person would carry boxes of heavy items to the trash. 

Every day is a struggle but never a scream. Alupa’s moments with Alex before and after his murder carry the emotional weight of the film as well as his scenes with Donna. Autopsy of Silence is extremely bleak but riveting and engaging the whole time. A claustrophobic pressure cooker I greatly look forward to seeing again when it releases next year. 

I must also give a special congratulatory shout-out to Max Korman’s “Joy Will Prevail”. He worked so hard on this exceptional film, and its quality speaks for itself. Everything from the score to the cinematography to the production design and wonderful cast. It’s so effortlessly grand, which is hard to pull off for a debut feature. It tracks the last three years of Architect Louis Kahn’s (Griffin Dunne) life in Philadelphia and follows his complex personal and romantic relationships alongside his collaboration with Idealistic father Steve Korman (Ben Rosenfield) to design a country home, culminating in his final residential commission. There’s a softness to Kahn and Korman’s chemistry that emotionally pays off in ways it probably wouldn’t in the hands of a lesser filmmaker, but Korman’s finished film looks like it’s made by someone who’s been making films for years. Jennifer Beals and Alexis Bledel also provide a vital presence in Korman’s tender story of creation and new beginnings. It’s cozy, charming, and heartfelt in all the right ways whilst giving homage to someone who meant so much to the great city and community of Philadelphia. 

I also must acknowledge how proud I am of the festival for featuring NAZA, in which there was not ONE empty seat. Very brave and important to show this tremendous and traumatic but important expose on the evil the IDF continues to inflict on innocent civilians and refuses to take accountability for. I’m glad to see The Philadelphia Film Society stand without hesitation on the right side of history. Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor are not just brilliant filmmakers but upstanding citizens and applaudable public servants. 

Additionally, I loved Florian Zeller’s timely drama/semi-thriller “Bunker” with Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz as a long-married couple whose marriage starts to falter when the architecturally brilliant Bardem is approached to design a bunker for an unstable tech billionaire (Paul Dano) whilst contending with a challenging neighbor (Stephen Graham), all while Cruz falls for a sensitive and insightful client (Patrick Schwarzenegger). 

Amanda Seyfried is absolutely heart-shattering in “The Life And Deaths Of Wilson Shedd” as a creative writing teacher in an Oklahoma prison and really sells in a believable way why this woman is so defeated and would blow up her whole life to break out an inmate (Scoot McNairy) who she couldn’t reach in time to prevent him from committing an absolutely unforgivable crime.

 Julianne Moore and Paul Giamatti are dynamite in Jesse Eisenberg’s hilarious musical comedy “The Debut” that I can’t wait to see again over the holidays when it comes out everywhere, and Olivia Colman in “Wicker” immediately makes my soul smile even after all the despair in a lot of these films. She is truly my comfort actor because no matter what she’s in, her humor always makes me feel better.  Wicker is an adorable and explosively funny fable you won’t want to miss. 

“Club Kid” is a gorgeously shot, heartfelt and humane story that tackles Queer parenting, the importance and beauty of club culture for the LGBTQ community, and chosen family. “Clarissa” is a phenomenal new take on Virginia Woolf’s classic novel "Reset in Lagos Nigeria starring Sophie Okonedo and Ayo Edebiri. Spiritually aquatic and profoundly beautiful. 

Palme d’Or-winning “Fjord” is a very politically provocative film that certainly won’t be for everyone, but it’s so interesting and will help spark some of the most important conversations we need to be having right now. Of course, anything starring Renate Reinsve is worth watching, and she’s a powerhouse. 

Adam Driver and Scarlett Johansson are electrifying in the 80s New York Thriller “Paper Tiger” that had not one empty seat at the festival and blew everyone away. John Turturro’s “The Only Living Pickpocket in New York” is a smart, sophisticated New York thriller that’s short, simple, and fun but maintains great substance regarding a fast-changing world and how we romanticize the ideas of the past vs. the reality of them. 

“Wild Horse Nine” is adorably delightful for a political spy thriller, but I expect nothing less from John Malkovich (Who WILL be winning the Oscar next year) and Sam Rockwell as their trip to Easter Island, Chile, in the early 70s, right before the dictatorship begins, makes for a series of moments so funny, you’re guaranteed to return to the theater to see again. Audiences should also look out for Congo Boy, Possible Love, The Meltdown, Look Back, Yellow Letters, Tender Loving Care & Extra Geography, as U.S. release dates should be forthcoming for these and were all worth watching. Possible Love was especially memorable, and Extra Geography was hilarious and perfect for those nostalgic for Sofia Coppola’s early work. 

I truly cannot wait to go back next year. The Philadelphia scene is really committed to its independent cinema, and the festival is continuously building and gaining more momentum each year. It’ll be just a short matter of time before it has the same prominence as New York, Sundance, Cannes, Venice & Berlin. I must again credit our beautiful-hearted and hard-working volunteers who were so friendly and are so passionate about supporting the community of Philadelphia and helping the great city thrive to be the very best version of itself. Hopeful, and I am with happy fingers crossed for next year!!!