I was out of town this year and missed the entire Tribeca Film Festival. Here is a roundup of some articles I found about the festival from the female side:
Programmer Roundtable: Women Filmmakers (Tribeca FilmFest site)
It is a great year for women filmmakers at Tribeca. Tribeca Film Senior Programmer Genna Terranova had the chance to speak with several of them (Jacqueline Schaeffer, writer/director of TiMER; Lucia Puenzo, writer/director of The Fish Child; Paola Mendoza and Gloria La Morte, co-writer/directors of Entre nos; and Bette Gordon, director of Variety and Handsome Harry) and ask some questions that have been on her mind since she saw their films for the first time a few months ago. Here is a snapshot of what these incredibly talented women had to say.
Faces of the Festival: Cheryl Hines (Tribeca FilmFest Site)
Funny lady Cheryl Hines makes her debut as a director with the ‘09 Festival pick Serious Moonlight, a dark comedy about infidelity and commitment starring Meg Ryan, Timothy Hutton, and Kristen Bell. Filming a script by Adrienne Shelly (the writer/director of Waitress), Hines brings her impeccable comic timing to this ever-so-human mix of a romantic comedy. We got the comedienne on the phone to talk about the transition from acting to directing, the seventh season of Curb Your Enthusiasm, and Larry David’s performance in Whatever Works.
Documentary examines U.S. child sex trade (Reuters)
Filmmaker Libby Spears wanted to make a documentary about the sexual exploitation of kids in Asia and Latin America, but that changed when she discovered that child sex trafficking is a big problem in the United States.
Porn and Being Poor, Then & Now: Bette Gordon Interview, Tribeca 2009 (Spout)
The Tribeca Film Festival has often shown a predilection for a certain type of New York feature and filmmaker — see this year’s Woody Allen-directed opener, or last year’s opening night film Baby Mama, or the many virtually interchangeable Ed Burns pictures that have played the festival in previous years –– all reflecting a version of the city so plasticine that their use of actual locations seems to offer no more authenticity than a Hollywood soundstage.
I saw most of the female directed films this year at Tribeca but was blown away by “Playground by Libby Spears. To say it heart wrenching would be an understatement and I will never look at a “MISSING CHILD” in the same way. This issue, trafficking and child abuse, is one so overlooked in our nation is tragic.