The Taking Drive My Car All These Sons Denver Film Festival 2021

Denver Film Festival Artistic Director Matt Campbell is once again offering his must-have picks for each day of the event, which runs through November 14. Read on for his take on the Friday November 5th selections (The catch), Saturday November 6 (Drive my car) and Sunday November 7 (All these threads).

The catch
Directed by Alexandre O. Philippe
6:45 p.m. Friday 5 November
AMC House 2
4:15 p.m. Saturday 6 November
AMC House 2

Among the specialties of director Alexandre O. Philippe are “fascinating documentaries on cinema”, notes Matt Campbell, “and The catch is no exception. ”

The film’s focus “is Monument Valley, on the border of Utah and Arizona, and how it is imbued with visual imagery from popular culture and the Wild West because John Ford has shot so many of his films. over there, “he notes, including such landmarks. like the years 1946 My dear Clementine and 1956 Researchers. “It looks like this vast space, but it is actually quite a small area, even though it represents the signifying trope of American exceptionalism and manifest destiny – whites conquering the West and taking land from the indigenous peoples. living there.”

The title is a reference to a scene from another film that highlighted Monument Valley – 1994 Forrest Gump, “when he runs through the desert and he stops,” Campbell remembers. “It’s now a tourist spot, where people go to take pictures, so they kind of reinforce the idea of ​​this space as being for the white, conquering civilization and not for the communities that have always been there and live there. currently and often in difficulty There are many elements in the film, many philosophical and psychological foundations that Alexandre integrates into his thesis and his dissection of cinema.
Drive my car
Directed by Ryūsuke Hamaguchi
1:45 p.m. Saturday 6 November
AMC House 9
2:45 p.m. Sunday November 14
AMC House 9

Drive my car “premiered in competition at Cannes earlier this year,” said Campbell. “This is a director whose wife dies very early in the film. After that, he accepts a concert to stage a play at this theater festival in north Tokyo – and he decides to cast it. ex-lover of his late wife, a young man with whom she was having an affair. ”

This is not the only delicate dynamic in the film. According to Campbell, “The director wants to be able to drive his car to and from the rehearsal at his hotel, which is about an hour outside of town. But festival organizers don’t want him to drive for insurance reasons. , so they hire a young driver to drive it back and forth. The two spend a lot of time in the car, talking about life – and they start to have a relationship. ”

Campbell acknowledges that Drive my car is “long enough – about three hours – and methodically paced. But for me, the three hours have slipped right by. It’s about the lies we tell ourselves to rationalize what we do for a living.”
All these threads
Directed by Bing Liu and Joshua Altman
6:45 p.m. Saturday 6 November
Tom Fries Theater (Sie FilmCenter)
4:45 p.m. Sunday 7 November
Tom Fries Theater (Sie FilmCenter)

Directors Bing Liu and Joshua Altman caused a stir with audiences and critics in 2018 Undermine the ditch, which explored three characters from Illinois united by the love of skateboarding. Their latest project, according to Campbell, “is a very powerful look at programs for young African American men on the south and west sides of Chicago, where former gang members are trying to get these young people to choose a different path and to move on. move away from the violence that has ravaged their communities. ”

Liu and Altman “are following some of the younger ones and the hardships they are going through,” he continues. “It’s a problem we see in the news, but it’s usually reported as how many people were killed in Chicago over the weekend. But they really put humanity behind the headlines and tell the stories of people who live this life day to day. ”

Despite the difficult subject, Campbell points out that All these threads is “super powerful, and the general themes are the positive aspects of the change these former gang members are trying to make.” Even if this takes place in Chicago, the ideas, lessons and struggles can be applied to many urban areas across America dealing with this problem. “

Click to ticket information and more details on the 44th Denver Film Festival, including how to access certain selections online.