New Directors/New Films 2021:
Opening Night
El Planeta
Amalia Ulman, 2021, Spain, 80m
English and Spanish with English subtitles
With unforced deadpan humor, writer-director-star Amalia Ulman presents a captivating portrait in miniature of a mother and daughter barely scraping by in Spain’s northwestern seaside town Gijón.
Whether shoplifting, trying to get out of paying for an extravagant meal, or weighing the pros and cons of low-key sex work, Leo and María—played by Amalia and her real-life mother, Ale—are constantly transacting deals, large and small, their daily urban life given to a bemused sort of desperation.
Coasting on the considerable charms and chemistry of its two stars, and shot in evocative, black and white, El Planeta is a delightful and slyly dark breakthrough for multidisciplinary artist Ulman.
Her film reminds us that every day, every gesture in our contemporary world is a performance.
A Utopia Release.
Closing Night
All Light, Everywhere
Theo Anthony, 2021, USA, 109m
His new film is a breakthrough, using the increased regularity of body cams in U.S. law enforcement as the anchor point for an ever-expanding treatise on perception, power, and policing, and how these ideologies stem from legacies of racial profiling that in part define the makeup of the Western world. Anthony’s compelling film eschews “ripped-from-the-headlines” issue-oriented documentary filmmaking for a burrowing, intellectual curiosity, interrogating subjectivity itself and reminding the viewer that the camera, with the ingrained perceptual biases of those who wield it, can be the deadliest weapon of all.
A Super Ltd Release