White Nights (of a Dreamer)

“It is the hour when practically all business, office hours and duties are at an end, and everyone is hurrying home to dinner, to lie down, to have a rest, and as they walk along they think of other pleasant ways of spending the evening, the night, and the rest of their leisure time. . . . and so at that hour our hero, who has not been wasting his time, either, is walking along with the others. But a strange expression of pleasure plays on his pale and slightly crumpled-looking face. It is not with indifference that he looks

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Latest Update…

I’m flattered to have just been invited to join Cinemarati: The Web Alliance for Film Commentary as a member critic. The organization is a “professional guild for film writers whose work appears primarily on the Web” that includes folks like my friend Acquarello of Strictly Film School and Ed Gonzalez of Slant. I’m looking forward to interacting with them.

Speaking of Acquarello, he’s starting his commentary for the New York Film Festival today, so keep an eye on his site; you won’t want to miss it.

And another friend, Mike Hertenstein, has begun adding some thoughtful reviews of …

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OIAF, fest report

As a follow-up to yesterday’s post, Kevin Nikkel, an independent filmmaker living in Winnipeg, has submitted a festival report for OIAF and some of the best films he saw there. –Doug

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Dial ‘M’ for Monster

By Kevin Nikkel

Film festivals are strange things. I flew to Ottawa for the weekend to attend the now annual Ottawa International Animation Festival. Itís been a long time since I was in Canadaís capital. Itís always a treat wandering the streets of a city with a long history and lots of culture.

The festival took me by surprise in …

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Ottawa IAF, critic-artist


Mr. Reaper’s Really Bad Morning

The Ottawa International Animation Festival, a very large and impressive event, concluded on Sunday and included several retrospectives (Hayao Miyazaki, Robert Breer, and others) and scores of new works. Two of those works involved Canadian friends of mine, John Torvi’s animation in Mr. Reaper’s Really Bad Morning (2004) and director Kevin Nikkel’s Dial ‘M’ for Monster (2004).

Kevin also attended a seminar entitled “Your Criticism Sucks!” Here is its description:

Is critical commentary of the animated film dead? Useless? There was a time when there was a vibrant, if small, voice for popular criticism

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Hourigan on Bresson

One of the pleasures of doing websites devoted to specific filmmakers is meeting people who come out of the woodwork (or cyberwork or something). Not long after starting Robert-Bresson.com, Trond Trondsen and I were contacted by the UK writer-director Jonathan Hourigan, who had assisted on L’Argent (1983). Jonathan has been a great encouragement to us ever since, and we are proud to announce a new interview with him conducted by Colin Burnett that we have just co-published with the film journal Offscreen. It details Jonathan’s friendship with Bresson and his experience on the set of what was to …

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