SLIFF 2016 – The St. Louis International Film Festival Schedule Announced

The schedule for the 25th Annual Whitaker St. Louis International Film Festival (SLIFF) has been announced and once again film goers will be offered the best in cutting edge features and shorts from around the globe. The festival takes place November 3-13,  2016.

SLIFF kicks off on November 3 with the opening-night selection ST. LOUIS BREWS, the latest home-brewed documentary by local filmmaker Bill Streeter, director of BRICK BY CHANCE AND FORTUNE: A ST. LOUIS STORY (read my interview with Bill HERE)

According to SLIFF, the festival will feature more than 125 filmmaking guests, including honorees: Actress Karen Allen (RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, ANIMAL HOUSE), director Charles Burnett (KILLER OF SHEEP, TO SLEEP WITH ANGER), winner of the Cinema St. Louis Lifetime Achievement Award; and director Steve James (HOOP DREAMS).

Full information on SLIFF films, including synopses, dates/time, and links for purchase of advance tickets is available on the Cinema St. Louis website.

Check the site regularly for updates: http://cinemastlouis.org/about-festival

The St. Louis International Film Festival is one of the largest and highest­ profile international film festivals in the Midwest. The majority of the films screened – many of them critically lauded award winners – will receive their only St. Louis exposure at the festival.

Celebrating its 25th anniversary in 2016, SLIFF is presented by the nonprofit Cinema St. Louis, which also annually produces the locally focused St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase, the LGBTQ-­focused QFest, and the Classic French Film Festival. In addition, Cinema St. Louis is the local producer of the 48 Hour Film Project and hosts educational programs, competitions, screenings, and special events throughout the year. Attendance has increased steadily during the festival’s 35 years, with over 24,000 filmgoers attending in 2015.

Because SLIFF is one of only three dozen fests that serve as qualifying events for Oscar live­-action and animated narrative shorts, the festival has an especially strong selection of short subjects. In fact, in 2006, the Best Short Film­Live Action winner, “West Bank Story,” received Oscar consideration because it won SLIFF’s “Best of Fest” shorts award in 2005. In 2014, the Academy added SLIFF as a qualifying festival for documentary shorts.

Highlights from this year’s festival include:

JACKIE Sunday, Nov. 13 at 6:00pm
Directed by Pablo Larraín (“No,” the upcoming “Neruda”), “Jackie” is a searing and intimate look at one of the most important and tragic moments in American history, as seen through the eyes of the iconic First Lady, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy (Natalie Portman). The film places the viewer in Jackie’s world during the days immediately following her husband’s assassination, offering a psychological portrait of the First Lady — known for her extraordinary dignity and poise — as she struggles to maintain her husband’s legacy and the “Camelot” that they created together and loved so well. The extraordinary cast includes Peter Sarsgaard (as Bobby Kennedy), Greta Gerwig, Billy Crudup, and John Hurt. Hailing Portman as “altogether astonishing,” Britain’s Guardian describes “Jackie” as “great cinema”: “a singular vision from an uncompromising director that happens to be about one of the most famous women in American history.”

A TRIBUTE TO KIM TUCCI Wednesday, Nov. 9 at 6:30pm
Cinema St. Louis pays tribute to longtime board chair Kim Tucci as part of SLIFF’s 25th-anniversary celebration. Kim’s service to the St. Louis region includes investing in the community, raising funds to fight disease, and enabling projects of civic pride. And still, somehow, he finds time to enjoy the movies. While many cinephiles would be content with outings to the local multiplex, Kim has put his love of film to greater use by serving on the board of Cinema St. Louis for the past decade, chairing the organization since 2008. He also served for many years as chair of the Missouri Film Commission. His selfless work has both helped build the film industry here in Missouri and allowed Cinema St. Louis to bring some of the world’s best films to St. Louis. The evening — held at the recently opened Delmar Hall — begins with a cocktail reception at 6 p.m. and is followed by a program that includes a Lifetime Achievement Award presentation, a live auction to benefit Cinema St. Louis, and a short conversation about movies between Kim and Y98’s Guy Phillips. The night is capped with a screening of one of Kim’s favorite films, “Harold and Maude” (see listing in Film Features section). The tribute portion of the program is a fundraiser for Cinema St. Louis, but the screening of “Harold and Maude” — which starts at 8 p.m. — is free and open to all (though donations are encouraged).

NO CROSSOVER: THE TRIAL OF ALLEN IVERSON Sunday, Nov. 6 at 7:00pm
On Valentine’s Day 1993, 17-year-old Bethel High School basketball star Allen Iverson was bowling in Hampton, Va., with five high-school friends. It was supposed to be an ordinary evening, but it became a night that defined Iverson’s young life. A quarrel soon erupted into a brawl pitting Iverson’s young black friends against a group of white patrons. The fallout from the fight and the handling of the subsequent trial landed the teenager — considered by some the nation’s best high-school athlete — in jail and sharply divided the city along racial lines. Oscar nominee Steve James (“Hoop Dreams”) returns to his hometown of Hampton, where he once played basketball, to take a personal look at this still-disputed incident. With director Steve James.

Fritz Lang’s DESTINY (1921) Saturday, Nov. 5 at 8:00pm
This new restoration of Fritz Lang’s “Destiny (Der müde Tod)” is a dizzying blend of German Romanticism, Orientalism, and Expressionism. The film marked a bold step for Lang, away from conventional melodrama and into the kind of high-concept filmmaking that would culminate in such über-stylized works as “Die Nibelungen” and “Metropolis.” In the film, a young woman (Lil Dagover) confronts the personification of Death (Bernhard Goetzke) in an effort to save the life of her fiancé (Walter Janssen). Death weaves three romantic tragedies, offering to unite the girl with her fiancé if she can prevent the death of the lovers in at least one of the episodes. The great surrealist filmmaker Luis Buñuel once enthused: “When I saw ‘Destiny,’ I suddenly knew that I wanted to make movies. Something about this film spoke to something deep in me; it clarified my life and my vision of the world.” SLIFF’s favorite band, the Rats & People Motion Picture Orchestra, provides an original score and live accompaniment.

A TRIBUTE TO KING KONG Sunday, Nov. 6 at 6:00pm
The St. Louis International Film Festival bows down to the King — Kong, that is — with a double bill of LONG LIVE THE KING and the 1933 classic that introduced the giant gorilla to the awestruck world. The documentary LONG LIVE THE KING explores the enduring fascination with one of the biggest stars in Hollywood history: the mighty King Kong. The documentary devotes primary attention to the 1933 classic, celebrating the contributions of filmmakers Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, stars Fay Wray, Robert Armstrong, and Bruce Cabot, and especially stop-motion innovator Willis O’Brien. But Kong’s legacy is also fully detailed: the sequel SON OF KONG the cinematic kin MIGHTY JOE YOUNG, the Dino DeLaurentis and Peter Jackson remakes, even the Japanese versions by Toho Studios. The double bill concludes — of course! — with KING KONG, allowing viewers to return to the treacherous jungle of Skull Island and thrill again as Kong climbs the Empire State Building with Fay Wray gently cradled in a giant paw.With introduction and discussion by We Are Movie Geeks editor Tom Stockman.

EYES OF FIRE Tuesday, Nov. 8 at 7:30pm
A few years back, SLIFF by chance came into possession of a print of “Eyes of Fire,” an unjustly forgotten horror film shot more than three decades ago in the backwoods of Missouri. On our 25th anniversary, SLIFF felt duty-bound to give a respectful nod to our celluloid past — every other work in the fest screens digitally — by cracking open the film cans and offering a rare opportunity to view this criminally underseen gem in glorious 35mm. Set in the Colonial era, “Eyes of Fire” — the film debut of experimental photographer Avery Crounse — recounts the creepy doings that occur when a preacher accused of adultery is banished with his followers to the unsettled wilderness, an isolated forest haunted by the spirits of long-dead Native Americans. LA’s Cinefamily, which held its own screening of “Eyes of Fire” earlier this year, aptly describes the film as a “supernatural battle between good and evil, rife with impressively fantastical set pieces — from trees with faces and a mysterious naked forest-dwelling sect to rains of skulls and bones — all swung on a shoestring budget.”

A JERRY LEWIS DOUBLE FEATURE Saturday, Nov. 12 at 1:00pm
JERRY LEWIS THE MAN BEHIND THE CLOWN. Since his earliest days, SLIFF Lifetime Achievement Award honoree Jerry Lewis had the masses laughing with his visual gags, pantomime sketches, and signature slapstick humor. But Lewis was far more than just a funny performer. After the breakup of his famed partnership with Dean Martin, Lewis moved behind the camera, writing, producing, and directing many of the adored classics in which he starred: “The Bellboy,” “The Ladies Man,” “The Errand Boy,” and “The Nutty Professor.” By becoming a “total filmmaker,” Lewis emerged as a driving force in Hollywood, breaking boundaries with his technical innovations, unique voice, and keen visual eye. Lewis garnered particular respect and praise overseas, especially in France. But if his French admirers regarded Lewis as a true auteur, American critics proved far more skeptical, often dismissing him as nothing more than a clown. Gregory Munro’s brisk, informative documentary offers answers to questions that have perplexed American pop culture for more than 50 years: Why do Europeans love Jerry Lewis? What is the inexplicable aversion many Americans have toward him? Is he just a brash, anything-for-laugh buffoon or is he a creative genius in the tradition of Chaplin and Keaton? Who is the man behind the clown? Plays on a double bill with THE NUTTY PROFESSOR. With video introduction by Jerry Lewis, a SLIFF Lifetime Achievement Award honoree.

DRAWING HOME Thursday, Nov. 10 at 6:30pm
In 1920s Boston, East Coast debutante Catharine Robb (newcomer Julie Lynn Mortensen) is dating the most eligible bachelor in the world, John D. Rockefeller III. Her future seems set: a dream life in the upper echelons of society. But Catherine finds her careful plans upended when she meets a young painter, Peter Whyte (Juan Riedinger), from one of the most beautiful places on Earth, the Canadian Rocky Mountains. Although their worlds are polar opposites, a mutual love of art draws them together. They soon face a universal question: Can you find “home” in another person? Inspired by the true story of the central couple, “Drawing Home” features a cast that includes Kate Mulgrew (“Orange Is the New Black”), Emmy winner Peter Strauss (“Rich Man, Poor Man”), Kristin Griffith, Rutger Hauer, and Wallace Shawn. The film was shot on location in Canada’s gorgeous Banff and Yoho National Parks.With lead actors Juan Riedinger and Julie Lynn Mortenson and producers Allan Neuwirth and Margarethe Baillou.

WITHIN OUR GATES Saturday, Nov. 12 at 7:30pm
As part of our 25th-anniversary celebration, SLIFF reprises a special event from our 2009 edition by screening “Within Our Gates,” writer-director Oscar Micheaux’s impassioned response to D.W. Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation.” The film shines a revealing light on the racism of U.S. society, provocatively including scenes of lynching and attempted rape. Micheaux was a pioneering African-American filmmaker and novelist whose career stretched from the silent era through the 1940s. “Within Our Gates,” one of the oldest surviving “race” films, was thought lost until a print was discovered in Spain in 1990 and restored by the Library of Congress in 1992. This screening features a new restoration that offers an even more faithful approximation of the film as originally released. SLIFF has again invited Cairo, Ill.’s Stace England & the Salt Kings to play the original score the group created for our 2009 presentation. The band will also offer a few selections from its album “The Amazing Oscar Micheaux,” whose songs were inspired by the filmmaker’s life and work.With live accompaniment by Stace England & the Salt Kings.

And of course there is much much much much more! Check the site for the complete schedule and for updates: http://cinemastlouis.org/about-festival