Interview with Bill Morrison – Cambridge Film Festival – 26 October 2017

Mike O'Brien and Bill Morrison. Photo credit: Jean-Luc Benazet and Cambridge Film Festival This interview was first published in Take One. Dawson City: Frozen Time, the latest film from renowned American director Bill Morrison, is a complex, poetic, multi-stranded tale featuring the fortuitous discovery of buried nitrate film stock. The telling of this story reveals …

My Favourite Films of 2017

It's been a pretty awful year in politics, so I find looking back at my year in film is a pleasant diversion. The following is a list of my current 2017 favourites, but before I go through them, there are a few special film-related highlights to mention: In January I hosted a Q&A with producer …

Interview with Joanna Hogg

Photo: Toby Miller Recently I had the opportunity to interview British filmmaker Joanna Hogg, someone I greatly admire. She was incredibly generous with her time, genuinely engaged and thoughtful in her answers, and patient with my questioning. A lovely, inspiring woman. The full transcript of that interview has been published in Take One and is reproduced …

Mania Akbari and some special Cambridge screenings

There is a scene in the film ONE.TWO.ONE which is so brilliant in its conception and execution that it takes my breath away. I wish that every film student would carefully examine its construction and try to understand how an apparently simple static camera shot can be so richly textured, so simple yet full of elegance and poetry. Mark Cousins …

Cambridge Film Festival 2012

And so another successful Cambridge Film Festival drew to a close yesterday. I'm already missing it... Here are some very quick thoughts on this year's experience. Lead by the inspirational director Tony Jones and his team of programmers, this important, ambitious festival prides itself on bringing a wide-range of quality films to Cambridge. What is …