MILL VALLEY FILM FESTIVAL: see ’em here first

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Photo caption: John Tuturro in THE ONLY LIVING PICKPOCKET IN NEW YORK, Courtesy of Mill Valley Film Festival.

The Mill Valley Film Festival is always the best opportunity for Bay Area film goers to catch an early look at the Big Movies – the prestige films that will be released during Award Season. MVFF49 begins on October 1 and runs through October 11. Today I’m revealing my choice for the under-the-radar Must See at the festival. But first, let’s look at the most likely audience-pleasers:

  • Wild Horse Nine: The opening night film from director Martin McDonagh (In Bruges, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) unleashes John Malkovich and Sam Rockwell as CIA agents on Easter Island before Chile’s 1973 Pinochet coup. Just for good measure, the cast includes Steve Buscemi, Parker Posey and Tom Waits.
  • I Play Rocky: The most Rocky of real life Rocky stories – unknown actor Sylvester Stallone refuses to sell his sure-fire winner of a screenplay unless he is cast in the lead role. From director Peter Farrely (Green Book).
  • Paper Tiger: James Gray, who single-handedly revived the historical adventure epic with The Lost City of Z, delivers a crime thriller with Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson and Miles Teller, Premiered at Cannes.
  • Ink: Jack O.Connell plays Larry Lamb, the editor whose trashy sensationalism made Rupert Murdoch (Guy Pearce) the titan of tabloids. Director Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, 127 Hours, 28 Days Later) critiques both Murdoch and Britain’s posh snoots.

And, now, let’s go high-brow. MVFF49 has assembled an astonishing showcase of films by the world’s greatest directors.

  • Fjord: Let’s start with the Palm d’Or winner at Cannes.  With a family’s unity at risk, cultures clash in this psychological drama from Romanian auteur Cristian Mungiu (4 months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days). Romania’s official submission for the Best International Feature Oscar.
  • All of a Sudden:   Another intimate drama from Ryûsuke Hamaguchi (Drive My Car)  Premiered at Cannes. Japan’s official submission for the Best International Feature Oscar.
  • Minotaur:   From exiled Russian auteur Andrey Zvyagintsev (The Return, Leviathan). Premiered at Cannes. France’s official submission for the Best International Feature Oscar.
  • Bitter Christmas: Pedro Almodovar explores the ethics of turning someone else’s life into art. Played at Cannes.
  • Tender Loving Care: Sure to be another piercing glimpse into human behavior by British cinema icon Mike Leigh (Naked, Secrets & Lies, Topsy-Turvy, Vera Drake, Happy-Go-Lucky, Another Year).
  • Fatherland   Pawel Pawlikowski (the Oscar-winning Ida) takes on Thomas Mann’s return to a post-war Berlin. Sandra Huller stars. Premiered at Cannes. Poland’s official submission for the Best International Feature Oscar.
  • Look Back  The latest from Hirokazu Koreeda (Shoplifters, Broker).
Suzanne Gerin in LA GRADIVA. Courtesy of MVFF.

And here are two acclaimed films from emerging directors:

  • La Bola Negra:  This exploration of gay identity over the decades from the Spanish filmmaking partners Los Javis just won the People’s Choice Award at Toronto. Premiered at Cannes and purchased by Neyflix. Spain’s official submission for the Best International Feature Oscar.
  • La Gradiva: The directorial debut from cinematographer Marine Atlan follows a French high class on a trip to Naples and Pompeii. Hormones rage, and so does teen angst, as Atlan guides her non-professional cast to the emotionally powerful ending.  I’ve screened it, and every moment is authentic. Premiered at Cannes.

But don’t overlook one of the best films of 2026 – The Only Living Pickpocket in new York with its gripping, perhaps career-topping, performance by John Tuturro. In his third feature, writer-director Noah Segan, a prolific actor and protege of Rian Johnson, has created a portrait of a man who has evaded all of life’s responsibilities except one, and now finds himself desperate, not for survival, but for redemption. The performances by Tuturro and Tatiana Maslany (Orphan Black, She-Hulk in the Marvel Universe) are award-worthy, and the cast includes Giancarlo Esposito, Steve Buscemi, Will Price, and Jamie Lee Curtis. Don’t miss this one.

And there’s more, including films from Ron Howard and Barbara Kopple, movies starring Helen Mirren, Juliette Binoche, Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz, a personal appearance by Lea Seydoux and a Nigerian version of Mrs. Dalloway. Peruse the MVFF49 program. Here’s the festival trailer.

Movies to See Right Now

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Photo caption: Antonio Banderas and Dominic Sesso in TONY: Courtesy of A24.

This week on The Movie Gourmet, a new review of the comic documentary The History of Concrete and recommendations at this year’s Nashville Film Festival. Don’t overlook my recommendations from last week – David Fortune’s emotionally powerful debut Color Book and the gripping doc Sweetheart Deal, a triumph of cinéma vérité; both are available to stream.

CURRENT MOVIES

ON TV

Robert Newton and Sally Gray in OBSESSION

“And the manner in which I dispose of your body presents no obstacles.”

So says Dr. Clive Riordan (Robert Newton), an especially diabolical and chilling movie villain, in The Obsession (The Hidden Room) coming up on October 1 on Turner Classic Movies. 1949

Riordan, a twisted psychiatrist, is addressing his wife’s American lover, Bill Kronin (Phil Brown). Riordan is addressing the infidelity of his wife Storm (Sally Gray) by kidnapping Kronin and hiding him, chained to the wall of a soundproof room behind his garage. Planning the perfect crime, Riordan intends to hold Kronin for months, until the police cease looking for him; then, Riordan intends to dissolve Kronin in a bath of acid. Riordan sadistically explains all of this to his victim, and the plan does look foolproof – but the would-be murderer doesn’t count on an intrepid Scotland Yard inspector (Naunton Wayne) and Storm’s pet dog Monty… Directed by the great classic noir director Edward Dmytryk, now working in Britain after his recent blacklisting in the US.

Robert Newton, Monty the Dog and Phil Brown in OBSESSION

THE HISTORY OF CONCRETE: a lens on absurdity

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Photo caption: John Wilson in THE HISTORY OF CONCRETE. Courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.

The comic doc The History of Concrete finds filmmaker John Wilson looking for a project. His Emmy-nominated HBO series How to with John Wilson is off the air and some of his residual checks are in the single digits. He decides to embark on making a film with built-in absurdity – a documentary on the most uninteresting subject imaginable – concrete.

Off he goes with his camera and his wry sensibility- riffing off concrete and his own distractions. His deadpan movie pitches are funny, and so is the guy who takes outsized satisfaction at every piece of chewing gum that he sandblasts off the sidewalk. Other segments, like members of a Buddhist cults take turns walking around the same block in Queens until they amass 3100 miles, get tiresome.

But the funniest bits are only tenuously related to concrete, if at all. Wilson attends a screenwriting workshop on how to write and sell a Hallmark movie. And then he stumbles across a new business model that preserves the tattooed flesh of departed loved ones, suitable for framing. Yikes!

Now, John Wilson is an acquired taste. I find his nasal voice to be whiny, even when he’s not whining. He also overestimates the humor and insight in some situations and lingers on them too long. The History of Concrete, while in the same vein as Erroll Morris’ Gates of Heaven or Ross McElwee’s Sherman’s March, doesn’t approach matching the mastery of those auteurs. But, if you enjoy Wilson and his How to with John Wilson, then this is your movie.

The History of Concrete releases into theaters this weekend.

Best Bets at the Nashville Film Festival

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Arabella Oz in MALLORY’S GHOST. Courtesy pf Nashville Film Festival.

The Nashville Film Festival opens this Thursday, September 24, and runs through September 30 with its mix of indies, docs and international cinema, including world and North American premieres. I’ve highlighted the highest profile festival events, including Peter Frampton’s personal appearance in my Nashville Film Festival preview.

Today, I’m looking at the program, and, as usual, focusing on the first films of emerging directors. I’ve screened most of the New Director Features, and I’m recommending one as a Must See.

  • Mallory’s Ghost: In her screenwriting and directorial debut, Arabella Oz herself plays Mallory, an attractive and talented woman with a self-confidence deficit. Her boyfriend is a self-absorbed playwright, who seeks to disrupt his writer’s block by taking Mallory for a week at his mentor’s Maine retreat. An isolated, spooky mansion in the woods is a perfect setting for a conventional ghost story, but that’s not where Oz takes us – not exactly. When she learns that the boyfriend had co-written plays there before with his ex-girlfriend, Mallory becomes fixated on the ex and becomes consumed by a jealous competition that she is sure she’s losing. Oz is both filmmaker and psychotherapist, and her clever, even ingenious, screenplay embeds a film of self-discovery into a singular and highly original ghost story. I sure didn’t anticipate where the second and third acts were going. Nominated for a jury prize at SXSW, Mallory’s Ghost is an impressive and absorbing film.
Anthony Ippolito in I PLAY ROCKY. Courtesy of Amazon MGM Studios and Nashville Film Festival.

This year’s Nashville Film Festival program is most appetizing. I haven’t seen these five movies yet, but they look most promising.

  • I Play Rocky: Director Peter Farrely’s telling of the most Rocky of Rocky stories – of screenwriter Sylvester Stallone refusing to sell his sure-fire winner of a script unless he could play the lead.
  • The Incomer: A bewildered bureaucrat (Domhnall Gleeson) drops into an isolated and unwelcoming Scottish island; this fable won an award at this year’s Sundance.
  • The Liberation: Based on a true story, this drama is making a big impact on the festival circuit, including Toronto, Telluride and Deauville, Carrie Coon leads a great cast of Lily James, Bella Ramsey and Tracey Letts. Set for release in early January, see it now at Nashville Film Festival.
  • Tender Loving Care: Sure to be another piercing glimpse into human behavior by British cinema icon Mike Leigh (Naked, Secrets & Lies, Topsy-Turvy, Vera Drake, Happy-Go-Lucky, Another Year).

All in all, this year’s Nashville Film Festival presents 150 films from 25+ countries. Peruse the program and get tickets. Here’s the trailer for The Incomer.

Movies to See Right Now

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Photo caption: Jeremiah Daniels and William Catlett in COLOR BOOK. Courtesy of NashFilm.

This week on The Movie Gourmet – new reviews of David Fortune’s emotionally powerful debut Color Book and the gripping doc Sweetheart Deal, a triumph of cinéma vérité.

CURRENT MOVIES

ON TV

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Charles McGraw and Marie Windsor in THE NARROW MARGIN

On September 19, Turner Classic Movies will present The Narrow Margin, a taut 71 minutes of tension from my Overlooked Noir. Growly cop Charles McGraw plays hide-and-seek with a team of hit men on a claustrophobic train. Marie Windsor is unforgettable as the assassins’ target. McGraw and Windsor’s performances are first-rate, and their hardboiled dialogue is terrific. Director Richard Fleisher, early in his career, imaginatively stages the woman-hunt up and down the tight corridors and compartments of the moving train. I just rewatched The Narrow Margin at the 2025 Noir City, and it’s still a masterpiece.

SWEETHEART DEAL: a triumph of cinéma vérité

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Photo caption: Kristine in SWEETHEART DEAL Courtesy of Abramorama; copyright Aurora Stories LLC.

The engrossing documentary Sweetheart Deal follows four Seattle sex workers; none of them want to be working in prostitution, but each is a heroin addict and sees obstacles to getting sober. They are at best indifferent to the men they service, and each night they fear that some customer will turn out to be a murderer.

Elliott is a man in his 60s who lives in an RV parked on the strip. He says his mission is to keep the prostitutes safe, offer them comfort and encourage them to kick their addiction. All four women drop in to Elliott’s RV for a meal or a nap. Elliot’s RV is the hub of Sweetheart Deal.

This is a remarkably empathetic film. Each woman tells her own story of addiction, and we witness the ravages of heroin addiction upon their health and the carnage in their family relationships. In the third act, there’s an an unexpected betrayal, sickening and monstrous. Not every heroin addict who works the streets is going to survive. But even the most vulnerable can sometimes find the power to find justice and save themselves – and that’s the ultimate redemption in Sweetheart Deal.

It’s harder to identify with Elliott, despite his self-proclaimed altruism. Essentially, he’s just another homeless guy who is getting a form of status and authority from his vocation with the women. He enjoys the attention of the documentary crew and reporter, so much so that he doesn’t notice that the reporter is appalled by an inappropriate boast.

Sweetheart Deal is a triumph of cinéma vérité. A project of over seven years, Sweetheart Deal is the first feature directed by Elisa Levine and the late Gabriel Miller, and it is brilliant filmmaking on several levels. The filmmakers managed to engender an amazing level of trust with their subjects, resulting in the access that allows the audience inside their world. It’s also brilliantly constructed and edited; the very first shot of the film – a man feeding pigeons – takes on new meaning and importance by the end of the film.

When I screened this movie in 2024, I had already seen fifteen documentaries and screened another 80 while helping to program a film festival – Sweetheart Deal was the best of them all.

Sweetheart Deal had a brief theatrical run in 2024 and is now available to stream on Amazon and AppleTV.

COLOR BOOK: authentic and endearing

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Photo caption: Jeremiah Daniels and William Catlett in COLOR BOOK. Courtesy of NashFilm.

Yesterday I previewed the upcoming Nashville Film Festival. One of the Must Sees from last year’s NashFilm is now available on Netflix – David Fortune’s emotionally powerful drama Color Book.

After the sudden death of his wife, Lucky (William Catlett) is left to parent their son Mason (Jeremiah Daniels), who has Down syndrome. Now grieving and trying to make ends meet on a one income, Lucky faces the unrelenting struggles of single parenting –  why does everything have to be so hard? 

Although he has a hard time asking for help, in many ways, Lucky is the ideal dad – affectionate, patient and consistent. Lucky wants to thrill Mason with his first major league baseball game, but, on the way, the two get a bigger dose of Atlanta’s transit system than they would ever want. The journey is far more more meaningful than is the destination.

Atlanta writer-director David Fortune has won eight festival awards in the US and France with his inaugural film. The black and white cinematography by Nikolaus Dummerer is exquisite.

Without a hint of sentimentality, Color Book is authentic and endearing. Color Book is now streaming on Netflix.

Movies to See Right Now

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Photo caption: Robert De Niro, Adam Scott and Michelle Monagan in THE WHISPER MAN. Courtesy of Netflix.

This week on The Movie Gourmet: a preview of the upcoming Nashville Film Festival, and new reviews of Ross McElwee’s poignant memoir Remake and the unsettling Netflix serial killer thriller The Whisper Man.

CURRENT MOVIES

Hannah Einbinder in TEENAGE SEX AND DEATH AT CAMP MIASMA: Courtesy of MUBI,

REMAKE: a father asks how we got here

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Photo caption: Ross McElwee in REMAKE. Courtesy of Music Box Films.

In his poignant documentary Remake, filmmaker Ross McElwee traces the joys, frustrations, absurdities, resilience and heartbreak that he has experienced, always questioning how he got here.

First, let’s talk about McElwee’s style of filmmaking, which centers on his filming his own everyday life. I would be annoyed of a friend or family member only conversed with me through a view finder, and McElwee’s family and friends have definitely been annoyed. McElwee has a self-deprecating appeal, as he shows us how he stumbles through his own life, as we all have done, missteps and all. Sure, it’s often navel-gazing, but McElwee is not the least bit pretentious about it.

When I stepped into my local art house in 1986, I had never before seen a film like McElwee’s Sherman’s March. McElwee, as a modern Southerner, wanted to make a movie reflecting on the impact of General Sherman’s March through Georgia in the Civil War. But his mind wanders on to thoughts of nuclear annihilation and Burt Reynolds. His sister scolds him abut his dating life, and his poet friend Charleen hilariously critiques his lack of game with the ladies.

Sherman’s March is a uniquely whimsical film. Shot and constructed in the same way, Remake is not.

Remake includes a lot of footage of his son Adrian, who was especially adorable as a child. But Adrian struggled as a young man, became addicted to drugs and was eventually diagnosed as bipolar. That arc turns any parent’s life into a rollercoaster, and McElwee ultimately suffers the most profound tragedy – the death of his son.

Remake also chronicles joyful child-raising, the breakup of a marriage, the gift of a second love and the absurdity of Hollywood trying to monetize an adaption of Sherman’s March. Charleen reappears, with her unfiltered vibrancy intact, despite a loss of memory.

But it is Adrian’s death that provokes McElwee’s deepest questioning of what has often bewildered him. And he does so with the courage to face the unfiltered truth.

Ross McElwee is a treasure to American documentary filmmaking. After Sherman’s March, he went on to teach film at Harvard, and to make a few more offbeat films. His masterpiece, Sherman’s March, has been re-released. Do you need to have watched Sherman’s March to appreciate Remake? No, Remake samples enough of Sherman’s March so that Remake can be appreciated on its own.

Thought-provoking, evocative and Intimately personal (sometimes painfully so), Remake will be available on digital on September 8.

Previewing the Nashville Film Festival

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Peter Frampton in FRAMPTON. Courtesy of NashFilm.

The always exquisitely curated Nashville Film Festival opens on Thursday, September 24 and runs through September 30 with a diverse menu of cinema. The Nashville Film Festival is the oldest running film festival in the South (this is the 57th!) and is an Academy Award qualifying festival. The program includes a mix of indies, docs and international cinema, including world and North American premieres.

The most high profile events at NashFilm will be:

  • Frampton: The festival opens with this profile of the iconic rock guitarist readying his final tour. Peter Frampton himself will appear personally.
  • A Talent for Murder: Anton Corbijn’s latest thriller, starring Helen Mirren, Alden Ehrenreich and Olivia Cooke.
  • Tender Loving Care: On the fest’s final night, the latest from venerated auteur Mike Leigh.
  • The Incomer: This comedy starring Domhnall Gleeson was a hit at this year’s Sundance.
  • world premieres of Jackrabbit, Brother, Save Us and 23 other films.
  • Not high profile, but really intriguing – there’s even a program of Kurdish shorts.
Helen Mirren in A TALENT FOR MURDER. Courtesy of NashFilm.

The Nashville Film Festival embraces its home in Music City with a strong program of music films. This year, NashFilm will present Songs from the Circle, a Grand Old Opry concert in London, and the singer-songwriter profile Sara Bareilles: Good Grief.

My favorite element of most NashFilm fests is the discovery of new auteurs with their ballyhooed first films. This year’s slate includes these first films:

  • Compliance: Kyle Mangione-Smith wrote, directed, produced and edited his first narrative feature.
  • Crystal Cross: Director Richie James Follin costars and already has a few wins on the filmfest circuit.
  • Mallory’s Ghost: Arabella Oz also stars in her directorial debut, nominated for a jury prize at SXSW.
  • Seahorse: Canadian actress Aisha Evelyna’s fist feature as a director was in the narrative competition at SXSW.
  • Sparks: Fegrus Campbell’s offbeat first feature has already racked up one festival win.

All in all, this year’s NashFilm presents 150 films from 25+ countries. Peruse the program and get tickets. I’ll be publishing my festival recommendations on September 22. Here’s the fest trailer.