40 Years of SBIFF 2025 OPENING NIGHT: on a rainy night, the Santa Barbara International Film Festival (SBIFF) opened its 40th edition with the U.S. premiere of “Jane Austen Wrecked My Life,”, offering a much-needed respite after a challenging month marked by devastating wildfires in Los Angeles. Starting on February 4, the festival features 33 world premieres from 60 countries, with over half directed by women. Notable stars expected to attend this milestone celebration in...

Srilankan film The Other Half, Review: Death, despair and despondency In the opening titles, the carries a long message about Srilankans dying of kidney failure, caused by the wide use of contaminated or sub-standard fertilisers and pesticides. As many as 50,000 of them have lost their lives due to such poisoning, and continue to die, making it a tragedy equal to, or perhaps even greater than the Civil War that ravaged the island state in recent decades. This makes you wonder whether a docume...

Deva, Overview: Different, not distinguished It is different. Though the central character is an Assistant Commissioner of Police (A), and a tough nut at that, the film has a modest littering of corpses and a very few incredible, blood-letting or torture sequences. Based on these very qualities, Deva, which is almost poles apart from the spate of current films that are contrary to this approach, should be welcomed. Moreover, it stars Shahid Kapoor, who is yet to be labelled a hit man, most ...

Ilu Ilu 1998, Review: Too many luse ends A good 38 years ago, in a Hindustani hit film titled Saudagar, lyricist Anand Bakhshi coined a sensible nonsensical term in one of its songs, which began with Ilu Ilu, the three letters of the alphabets, standing for I Love U. It was a runaway hit. The song lived in the memory of a unit of Marathi film-makers, who might have been just born then or in their early childhood. Cut to 2025. A Phalke family (any possible connection with the father of Indian ...

Happy Doom © 2023 Billy Roisz 20 films from a total of 18 production countries are celebrating their premieres at the 2025 Berlinale Shorts, of which 15 are world premieres. The programme combines classic storytelling with surreal works, features various styles of animation and presents experimental documentary forms. The films show human beings and the circumstances in which they live. They examine the impact of the past on the present (Rückblickend Betrachtet (In Retrospect); Kok...

In the 2025 Berlinale Classics section, the artistic director of the Deutsche Kinemathek, Dr Rainer Rother, and his team showcase eight digitally restored film classics, seven world premieres and one international premiere. The eras represented range from the 1930s to the 1980s. For the first time, the section features restorations by the Estonian Film Institute (EFI) and the China Film Archive. Berlinale Classics also embraces genre cinema, a nod to the 2025 Retrospective. The section will ope...

As wildfires ravage the planet, a new National Film Board of Canada documentary offers extraordinary stories of survival and adaptation (Image provided by the NFB) Praise to directing partners Nova Ami and Velcrow Ripper who are giving a US premiere, at The Santa Barbara International Film Festival, of their very timely documentary: ‘Incandescence’. Be ready to truly feel the heat while watching this mesmerizing and very scary "anatomy of fire”. Nova and Velcro...

  An interview with Star: Ali Gallo    Meet rising Star, Ali Gallo! You might have catch her in ‘Incoming’ or ‘The Sex lives of college girls.’ Ali is the leading actress of the  new dark comedy ‘I hate myself and want to die’ directed by the very talented J.Davis who had directed a little gem: ‘Manson Family Vacation’. Ali Gallo is the young ‘Hayley’ who, with other friends and family , ar...

Train Dreams Star Joel Edgerton on Red Carpet Premiere at SFF 2025 ROSE WAGNER THEATER in Salt Lake City,  Utah   Watch the trailer!   ...

SkyForce, Review: May the Force be with you That is more like it. When you are making a film about war and real wartime heroes, stick to the basics and let jingoism take a back seat. We have had more than our fair share of war movies, with Indo-Pak conflicts dominating the screen. Many have set their tales in British India, going back up to 200 years. Yet others have flashed back a good 1,000 years, to reawaken the history of Muslim/Mughal rule over our country. SkyForce narrates the story of...

Eaten by the Sea -  a james W. Hawk music film and Winter Shadows on New Snow and Wind in the Old Oak Tree - a James W. Hawk experimental time-lapse film were quarter-finalists at the WideScreen Film & Music Video Festival in Toronto, Canada. ...

 In its 20th edition, Forum Expanded brings together 24 works from 21 countries. Employing practices that span installation, film, video and sculpture, the selected artists and filmmakers employ translucence as a means of engaging with the cataclysmic realities of the present. Whether dealing with personal or collective histories, ongoing wars, extractivism, legacies of colonialism or social inequalities, their approaches frequently hinge on intervention rather than observation. B...

35 film projects from 27 countries have been selected for the 22nd Berlinale Co-Production Market (February 15-19). Their producers will meet potential co-producers and financiers at the event, which this year will take place primarily at the Octogon, a new event location at Leipziger Platz, in order to realise the feature films as international co-productions in the coming years. Women are directing 19 of the 35 projects. There were 351 submissions for the official project selection, ...

  AMC+ is thrilled to partner with the Sundance Institute again to celebrate independent filmmaking at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival. AMC+ will spotlight the power of Indigenous stories with The Intersection of Indigenous Documentary & Narrative Storytelling, a dynamic on Saturday, January 25, at 1:30 p.m. in the Filmmaker Lodge.   This discussion will dive into how reality-based filmmaking transitions into captivating fictional narratives. ...

Animated shorts of all kind and techniques are eligible for Fantoche’s 2025 competitions if they’ve been completed after 31 December 2023 and last no longer than 40 minutes. Submission is free of charge and will close on 11 May 2025. You can submit via FilmFreeway:  https://filmfreeway.com/Fantoche The international show of animation film has become one of the world’s most prominent animation festivals and is the largest cultural event in Switzerland that is devoted exclu...

Overview, Game Changer: The Collector, his sideways sidekick, the CM and the game of musical chairs It used to be ‘the end justifies the means’, and the end was always the turnstiles. So, the end was always the same, only the means, or the ways of getting there, were different. Then it became ‘the means are the same, since the end is the same’. So we had similarity in approach too, with only a semblance of difference. Finally, we have reached a stage where ‘the t...

LoveYaPa, Trailer and song launch: Aamir dominates press and fan meet, speaks with characteristic candour It was a roller-coaster ride for the attendees, and a personal nostalgia trip for me, when the title song and trailer of the forthcoming film, LoveYaPa (a pun on Love or Pa), releasing on 07 February, the week preceding Valentine’s Day, in the presence of media and fans. The day was today and the venue was New Excelsior Cinema, now under Mukta A2 ownership, and the time was…w...

Love is Forever, Overview: Unrequited love, unimpressive expression If one were to take a count of films made on the theme of love, in all its splendour, one might find that the overwhelming majority of films made in the past 100 years have love at their core: filial love, maternal love, paternal love, love between spouses, flirtation, love as lust, love as a pursuit, patriotic love, spiritual love, love of a game, platonic love, sublime love, triangular love and unrequited love, are some exa...

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The Heist, by M.K. Shankar: Screenplay-dialogue book review Not many directors/writers publish the screenplay of a film they could not, or did not, make. So, it was surprising when M.K. Shankar, who I first met some 33 years ago, presented me a copy of The Heist, recently. The screenplay of The Heist-One World One Government, is not to be confused with The Heist, a 2024 Hindi-language crime thriller film, directed by Aditya Awandhe, starring Nad Sham, Suman Rao and Siddhanth Kapoor. The scree...

Sky Force trailer launch: Aerial action beyond enemy lines After a spate of films about military engagement and espionage across the border, we have a movie that rises in the air and traces the action of the air force, in 1965. The film is titled Sky Force and its trailer was launched last week at the PVR Cineplex at Juhu, Mumbai. Starring Akshay Kumar and Sara Ali Khan, the film introduces Veer Paharia, an assistant director who graduates to a romantic lead with the film. Akshay and Veer wer...

Last night, at the Golden Globes, "Conclave," won a Best Writing Award.  Best Actor went to Adrian Brody, and like Adrian, Demi Moore won her first Globe Award ever. She was ready to give up acting when the script for "Substance," came along, and she and the film got some love in Cannes as well. The surprise of the night was the award for Fernanda Torres in, Walter Salles, "I'm Still Here."  A title many of us can relate to.  You can see the fil...

Ho! Ho! Ho!  Time to celebrate the good life at Universal Studios Hollywood. Once again this is the time when it wouldn’t be a Holiday if one cannot celebrate “Grinchmas”! Since they are babies rolled in a bugaboo stroller, we have been coming, with my three sons, to Universal Studios Hollywood (https://www.universalstudioshollywood.com/web/en/us ) to celebrate the end of the year and to zoom into the future of another brilliant coming era. Until January 6th you also ca...

  Berlinale Talents Key Visual and Theme for 2025: "Listen Courageously – Cinematic Narratives in Times of Dissonance" © Ada Favaron and Imad Gebrael The art of listening will be the overarching theme for the 23rd edition of Berlinale Talents, the vibrant talent hub of the Berlin International Film Festival.   Listening intently, considerately, carefully, and most importantly, courageously, builds upon the foundation o...

Interview by Emmanuel Itier SNOW WHITE screening at the Red Sea International Fim Festival Interview with director: Taghrid Abouelhassan, Actress: Mariam Sherif and producer: Mohamed Agamy. By Emmanuel Itier   And the Award for Yusr Best Actress goes to: Mariam Sherif! I was so happy for Mariam and the team of director Taghrid Abouelhassam and producer Mohamed Agamy, for such a WIN! Fantastic that this great actress is recognized for her talent and her humanity in this very touc...