Temps between 0˚F and 25˚F as the Anchorage International Film Festival opens tonight at 8pm at the Bear Tooth. Deadfall, the opening film, is an invited film and is not in competition. This is good, because in the past many of the opening night films turned out to be the winning movie. (Though last year this was not the case.)
As I looked at the trailer with a car crash, lots of stolen money, some blood, I wasn't particularly excited. This is not the sort of movie I'd go to see. It's not what I think of as a film festival film. Instead it's a Hollywood movie. While these do play at a lot of festivals, they don't show up - fortunately - that often at the Anchorage International Film Festival.
Here's part of what a writer for Entertainment Weekly wrote about it at the Tribeca Film Festivale:
[Eric] Bana plays a smooth-talking thief who, along with his sister (Wilde), is involved in a casino robbery gone wrong which forces them to flee into the snowy terrain near the Canadian boarder in whiteout conditions. They split up to better to reach Canada without detection, and through a series of twists and (violent) turns are destined to cross paths with a boxer just out of prison (Humnam) and his parents (Spacek and Kristofferson).Maybe it's the blizzard that makes this seem appropriate for the Anchorage Festival.
It’s a tense 94 minutes set in blizzard conditions that sports one insanely thrilling chase scene on snowmobiles.
I do think that tomorrow's 11 am showing at the Alaska Experience Theater of four shorts (about 20 minutes each) will prove to be a satisfying film experience. I've already written about these films here and about one of them - Mossadegh - here. And I've yet to post on the Skype chat I had with Gilles Gurrez in Paris on his film in that program, Lapse.
I recommend getting into the Festival Genius (a software program for film festivals) and poke around. You can look for specific categories of films, countries, venues, days, etc.
Here's what Saturday (tomorrow) looks like from Festival Genius:
Saturday, December 1st
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Shorts Program | 88 min.
screens with...
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Alaska Experience Theater - Large Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Mixed Media, Shorts Program | 60 min.
screens with...
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Alaska Experience Theater - Small Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Shorts Program, Snowdance Program | 94 min.
screens with...
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Alaska Experience Theater - Large Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Tobias Tobbell 2012 | Feature, In Competition | 90 min.
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Alaska Experience Theater - Small Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Snowdance Program | 101 min.
screens with...
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Alaska Experience Theater - Large Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Joel Heath 2011 | Documentary, In Competition | 90 min.
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Alaska Experience Theater - Small Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Shorts Program | 86 min.
screens with...
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Alaska Experience Theater - Large Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Andrew Simpson | Documentary | 90 min.
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Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center | + add to cal | |||
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Antonio Mendez Esparza 2011 | Feature, In Competition | 110 min.
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Alaska Experience Theater - Small Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Stephen Gyllenhaal | Feature, In Competition | 97 min.
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Alaska Experience Theater - Large Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Dan Hartley 2012 | Feature, In Competition | 96 min.
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Bear Tooth Theatre | + add to cal | |||
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Hugh Hartford | Documentary, In Competition | 80 min.
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Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center | + add to cal | |||
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Director-Sean Branney, Composer-Troy Sterling Nies | Feature | 104 min.
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Alaska Experience Theater - Large Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Zsolt Pozsgai 2010 | Feature | 100 min.
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Alaska Experience Theater - Small Theater | + add to cal | |||
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Mixed Media, Shorts Program | 94 min.
screens with...
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