The Official Blog of Laemmle Theatres.

blog.laemmle.com

The official blog of Laemmle Theatres

Home » News » Page 23

“Filmmaking allows me to recreate memories that tend to substitute for the reality that inspired them.” Mia Hansen-Løve on BERGMAN ISLAND, opening October 15.

by

French filmmaker Mia Hansen-Løve’s latest, BERGMAN ISLAND, follows a couple of American filmmakers, Chris (Vicky Krieps) and Tony (Tim Roth), who retreat to the mythical Fårö island for the summer. In this wild, breathtaking landscape where Bergman lived and shot his most celebrated pieces, they hope to find inspiration for their upcoming films. As days spent separately pass by, the fascination for the island operates on Chris and memories of her first love resurface. Lines between reality and fiction progressively blur and strain the couple.

We open the film October 15 at the Claremont, Playhouse and Town Center, October 22 at the Glendale and Newhall, and October 29 at the Monica Film Center.

“I felt a new reverence for Hansen-Løve’s talent — she sweeps you up and brings the movie to a slow boil.” (Variety)

“Among other things, BERGMAN ISLAND is an ode to a female artist’s freedom to derive creative inspiration and sustenance where she chooses.” (Hollywood Reporter)

“A beautifully shot portrait of Bergman’s beloved island of Faro, the film is also a self-reflexive jeu d’esprit about gender, desire, creativity and the magic of cinema.” (Screen Daily)

Interview with writer-director Mia Hansen-Løve:

Do you believe in the power of landscapes?

I do – and that’s one of the things that drew me to Fårö. Oddly enough, these Swedish landscapes remind me those of Haute-Loire that I shot in Goodbye First Love. The happiness I felt in Fårö brings to mind childhood and teenage memories, although these are very different landscapes – the Baltic Sea on the one hand, Ardèche and the Loire River source on the other. But what they have in common is a wild, pristine quality, a silent atmosphere that invites you to a kind of meditation and that left an impression on my imagination.

Mia Hansen-Løve.

Is nature an inspiration to you?

It always has been. The pleasure, the emotion you feel when watching nature can easily go hand in hand with a character’s journey and inspire fiction in me. A landscape may trigger my writing – especially when I feel it’s haunted. That’s what happened with BERGMAN ISLAND. I felt drawn to this physical place, which is also a mental, inner place, naturally.

Vicky Krieps as ‘Chris’ in Mia Hansen-Løve’s BERGMAN ISLAND. Courtesy of IFC Films. An IFC Films Release.

The film is two-fold – it’s a film about love for cinema, and Bergman particularly, but also about a double love story. Why did you build the film like this?

I didn’t go about it theoretically – it just came to me as an obvious choice. BERGMAN ISLAND is probably my first film that somehow got written “all by itself”, without the pain I usually feel during the writing process. I felt like doors that had been locked so far were opening and that the island made it possible. For the first time, I felt I had the freedom to move playfully between different dimensions – past, present, reality within fiction or fiction within reality… The construction comes from the subject matter that could come down to two interconnected questions – that of couples and that of inspiration. When you deal with a filmmakers couple, how much of their dynamic is based on loneliness and how much on camaraderie? Where does fiction come from? How does it find its way into a script? I’d been wanting to make a film about this but it’s only when I thought of bringing these two filmmakers to Fårö and of using landscapes and Bergman’s world as a backdrop that the project came together. And as I decided to work from there, moving in one of Bergman’s houses and somehow experimenting the film I was writing, I found the structure – in other words, the two parts, a glimpse into the heroine’s film-in-the-making, a painful first love experience without closure inspiring filmmaker Amy’s writing, the subsequent episodes that you can’t tell which part of the narrative they belong to – past or future, reality or fantasy… This confusion echoes my own writing process. I sometimes feel like filmmaking allows me to recreate memories that tend to substitute for the reality that inspired them.

Vicky Krieps and Tim Roth in Mia Hansen-Løve’s BERGMAN ISLAND.

Why did you pick Fårö?

On account of Bergman, naturally. Some ten years ago, I began developing a passionate relationship with his work, his life… I began feeling magnetically drawn to the island. Bergman directed some of his most famous films there and spent the last years of his life there. Remotely located in the middle of the Baltic Sea, the island embodies an ideal both terrifying and attractive, austere and exciting – it’s the ultimate place of absolute artistic integrity that I associate Bergman with. After he died in 2007, a book was published for the auction sale of his properties and all that they contained – it was Bergman’s will, considering it was impossible to divide his properties among his nine children. I held this book in my hands. The pictures of his paintings, of the rooms of his houses, of his objects echoing his everyday life didn’t make his work any less fascinating – all these things, whether highly personal or trivial, only added to the aura and the mystery of an island haunted by his work and his presence. And increased my desire to venture there… Luckily, Bergman’s legacy hasn’t been scattered. All of it was bought out at the last minute by a Norwegian businessman. He brought back all the objects into the houses, putting them each back where they belonged. He then started a Foundation with Linn Ullmann (Bergman’s and Liv Ullmann’s daughter) allowing artists and researchers from all walks of life, just as Bergman wished, to stay in one of the latter’s houses and work on a project that doesn’t necessarily have to be connected to his work. As far as I know, I’m the only one who worked on a script that is directly related to Bergman.

You said that you enjoyed the writing and the shooting as never before. Can you be more specific?

BERGMAN ISLAND is actually a film that, despite a few incidents, brought me unprecedented joy. Fårö was, and still is, a magical place. I’ve been there every year since 2015 to write, prep, and shoot, without ever tiring of it. I’d never been so elated as I prepped for a movie. First, I absolutely relate to the island’s timeless landscapes, stone walls, wildflowers, black sheep, countless birds. To the island’s harshness and silence. And I didn’t feel like Bergman’s presence was overwhelming, but it turned out to be both soothing and stimulating instead. Does it have to do with the fact that I’m not a genius able to make sixty films and have nine children? In no way have I ever felt in competition with Bergman. Although my film touches on the passion of filmmakers for his work, I’ve never tried to imitate it. I’ve always sought to do my own thinking, to find my own voice, and let myself be immersed in the films that I grew up with.

Mia Wasikowska.

Although the film is not about Bergman, the latter’s presence is palpable through the film’s mood, which raises very interesting issues, including the working of our imagination – it’s clear that our perspective on certain landscapes or places may be entirely shaped by how a filmmaker like Bergman has influenced it. Does our imagination belong to us or is it also shaped by films?

That’s what the film’s about – how a fantasy leaves such a mark on a place that it shapes our perspective on it. As the lady guide explains, Bergman’s Fårö Island existed before the actual Fårö. Bergman fell in love with the place because it echoed a landscape that had been on his mind for some time. But his Fårö is a rougher place than the one I discovered as I got to the island. Most importantly, he explores faces, and with him, you hardly see the actual places, the horizon or the sky, which have such an intense presence on the island. Bergman’s Fårö is a mental construct that tells about his obsessions and inner demons. So, when you’re there, this Fårö is both everywhere and nowhere…

Characters/Actors: Mia Wasikowska and Anders Danielsen Lie.

It’s actually what the film addresses – the Bergman diehards featured in the film are desperately seeking for a Bergmanian place that, by nature, is nowhere to be found.

It’s an impossible quest. But that’s also how I made the place my own, without being a prisoner of it. In this respect, going for the scope format, which Bergman had never used, was key. I’d only shot in this way for Eden as I don’t usually trust the format. In the end, what convinced us, Denis Lenoir, my cinematographer, and me, was that we could have a different perspective on the island. This format best did justice to what impressed me the most – the endless sea and sky, the very small number of houses, people, trees even – in essence, the void. Actually, the scope format came as an obvious choice at some point, but I experienced this option as a liberation. And really, the film’s about this liberation. BERGMAN ISLAND is an emancipation story. It’s about emancipation from our masters, but also about a woman’s emancipation from a man. It’s what the Chris character, who considers herself as vulnerable and dependent, finds out about her own creative force.

However, Chris must also free herself from the man she lives with in order to find her freedom…

If they must break up, then it should happen once the film is over. As a rule, I need to feel an off-screen space to be able to believe in my characters’ lives. If the film ends with closure, I don’t believe in their existence as much as if a sequel remained to be written… You may think the journey of this couple is bound to end, but what I was interested in was to show that there’s still some understanding between them. How can they journey on together, in spite of what drives them apart, of a gap widening because of their respective fictions? It all hangs by a thread, but it’s still there…

Chris seems to come to terms with Tony’s sometimes unpleasant attitude…

You can tell this couple’s connectedness and intellectual camaraderie are strong – they have an experience together. Besides, they have a child. But it’s not easy for an artist couple to find the right balance between dialogue and sharing that are desirable, on the one hand, and necessary loneliness, on the other. You need to accept to stay outside the mental space that only belongs to your partner. Some intimate things can only be entrusted to fiction – some confessions can only be made through it. Which may cause some pain – how can you figure out what is said, what is left unsaid? This echoes a more universal question – how well do you know the person you live with? When Chris lays claim to the mill, next to the main house, as her office, it points to her ambivalent relationship with Tony’s filmmaker self. It’s far enough for her to have a chance to forget about him and take hold of the place, and close enough to be able to sense him and watch him through the window… His own relationship to writing doesn’t seem to be as complicated, and he doesn’t seem to have to confide his doubts. But you can wonder if Tony’s resilience isn’t only shallow and if, deep down, his imperviousness isn’t a smokescreen for even greater vulnerability. Regardless, I don’t judge either of my two characters – I just bear witness to what they experience, to what happy and unhappy moments come out of it, and to what my heroine must do to come out on top. The film is about how something unlocks in Chris, how she embraces fiction, imagines a film – a film in the making that’s originally called The White Dress but that could also be named Bergman Island in the end…

“Coming out on top,” that’s just what happens throughout the film. You could think the film also portrays the awakening of self-confidence, of a calling you must pursue…

I’m obsessed with callings, and most of my films deal with them. But BERGMAN ISLAND goes about it in the most straightforward way – for the first time, it’s about a woman filmmaker. And even two, actually – Amy, Chris’s double in the fiction, does the same job. It’s a way for Chris to own up to the fact that in film, her life can inspire fiction, and that fiction can reflect life, like a ping-pong game, or two parallel mirrors reflecting the same story endlessly. This has always been my writing process and I thought it was exciting to try and portray it. To me, BERGMAN ISLAND is the culmination of a thinking process I began in my first film.

Can you tell us about the cast?

For a long time, Greta Gerwig was attached to the role of Chris. At the time, she hadn’t directed her first film yet. But reality surpassed fiction as Greta became a filmmaker in the meantime. Because of her commitment to Little Women, she had to say ‘no’ to my film as our shooting schedules overlapped. When Greta left the project, we were two months away from the shoot, in May 2018. She suggested I wait for her for a year, but if I delayed the shoot, I might lose Mia Wasikowska and Anders Danielson Lie, two actors I just love and without whom I couldn’t possibly consider doing the film! With my producer Charles Gillibert, we made a risky decision – especially for him – but which, I think, was the right one: we’d shoot half the film during summer of 2018 with Mia and Anders, and the second half the following summer. Luckily it didn’t take me too long to come up with a new idea for Chris. I’d just discovered Vicky Krieps in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Phantom Thread, and I’d found her wonderful. Although she was unknown at the time, she stole the show from Daniel Day-Lewis. Her being half-German, half-Luxembourgish could give a European flair to the character, which I found interesting. In less than twenty-four hours, her name came as an obvious choice. Fortunately, she was available and, a few weeks later, Vicky was shooting her first scenes with us… Tim Roth joined the cast only the following year. Finding the right actor for this role was much more challenging. In the beginning, I could only consider an American actor for the role. And then I thought of Tim Roth. Not so much for his famous performances, his manly image, but rather for what eludes him, something almost feminine about his presence, far from the tough guys he likes to portray. There’s something both dark and fragile, something complex, about him that I like. Besides, Tim made The War Zone, a painful, challenging film – he has it in him and I think it shows. Shooting the film over two periods of time was a unique experience, we’ve tried to look at the whole thing with humor, to play with it, as in a balancing act…

Do you intend to go back to Fårö one day?

I’ll go back to present the film anyway when we can travel again. I owe a lot to some islanders and keepers of Bergman’s legacy that I can’t wait to meet again. But then again, it’s definitely a place that invites to dream, and I’d like to stay there again, to come across ghosts, to get lost there… and maybe to write there again. Probably not to write a sequel, but something different, why not?

Exclusive clip from GOLDEN VOICES, “an original, unusual, and quite disarming film about the immigrant experience,” opening October 8.

by

The Israeli romantic dramedy GOLDEN VOICES, which we open on October 8 at our Encino, West L.A. and Pasadena theaters, follows Raya and Victor who built a shared career as the Soviet Union’s most beloved film dubbers. For decades they worked translating the films of auteurs like Federico Fellini and Stanley Kubrick into Russian. Upon the collapse of the USSR in 1990, the Jewish couple must immigrate to Israel and reinvent their talents to find employment.

Vladimir Friedman and Mariya Belkina.

As they strive to acclimate to their adopted home, opportunities for first-rate vocal performances are few and far between. Raya answers a help wanted ad searching for women with “pleasant voices” and finds herself catering to a lonely Russian community as a phone-sex operator, while Victor falls in with a band of black market film pirates from the VHS underground. A charming comedy about disrupting dynamics, starting anew, and rediscovering yourself in the most unexpected places, GOLDEN VOICES is also a stirring tribute to the redemptive power of cinema.

Here’s an exclusive clip:

Tablet Magazine described GOLDEN VOICES as “a sensitive and heartwarming film about immigration, growing old, love, and new beginnings” and The Australian called “an original, unusual, and quite disarming film about the immigrant experience.”

Director/co-writer Evgeny Ruman says of GOLDEN VOICES, “I came to Israel in 1990 when I was a kid with my family. Going to the cinema was too expensive, so the films I had seen in my first years in Israel were from illegal video libraries for Russian speakers. This is when my love of cinema was born – watching bleak pirate copies that were shot directly from cinema screens and amateurishly dubbed. I was a kid in a strange country and the world of films was the best escape from the harsh reality. Nowadays, being a part of Israeli society and the film industry, I like to look back at the past from a different perspective and turn it into a movie. This film was born from a love of cinema, but while developing the project I discovered it expresses something much bigger than that – the story of grown people that had to reinvent themselves completely in order to start a new life in Israel. The story of my parents.

Evgeny Ruman.

“I see this film as a sad comedy. I believe this story has very touching human moments, as well as very funny and entertaining ones. I want the viewers to experience both fully while watching the film. I certainly would prefer to get the audience to laugh out loud rather than just smile during the most absurd and funniest moments in the film, just as I want them to be deeply engaged in the dramatic storylines and maybe even shed a tear. The story is told in a simple, clean way. Shot in cinemascope wide lenses, the images are rich in details, telling the story visually. In addition to the dialogue and music, we use the point of view of the protagonists – so the audience can have the same experience as Victor and Raya.”

LA PISCINE, the Arthouse Hit of the Reopening, Back by Popular Demand October 8 at the Royal.

by

The summer of 2021 is over but not at the movies. Rialto Pictures’ restoration of Jacque Deray 1969 crime-romance has proven irresistible to cinephiles looking for something sexy, decadent, French, and from another time. We’re happy to bring it back for another fling.

Glynnis MacNicol wrote a terrific piece for the New York Times last month examining the film’s success, headlined “A Steamy French Thriller Is a ‘Sleeper Smash Hit;’ The 1969 film LA PISCINE was supposed to run for two weeks at New York’s Film Forum, but it’s been extended to the fall.” Here’s an excerpt:

“For the past 14 weeks at Film Forum, a longstanding independent and repertory theater on West Houston Street in Manhattan, the 1969 French film LA PISCINE has been playing — a run that has extended its initial engagement by 12 weeks, and counting.

Romy Schneider, top, and Alain Delon. Rialto Pictures

“Rear Window, 8 ½, La Strada and a popular Humphrey Bogart series that included Casablanca have all come and gone, but LA PISCINE swims on.

“If there is a film of New York’s 2021 summer, this may be it.

“LA PISCINE (which means “The Swimming Pool”) revolves around Jean-Paul (played by Alain Delon) and Marianne (Romy Schneider), who have retreated to a house with a large pool outside St. Tropez.

“Sadly, he only gets one month of vacation. The lovers are unexpectedly joined by Harry (Maurice Ronet), Marianne’s former paramour and Jean-Paul’s former best friend, and his 18-year-old daughter, Penelope (Jane Birkin). Much decadence and extremely French crossover love ensues.”

You can read the rest of the piece here (spoiler alert!) but better yet, come take a dip in LA PISCINE again or, if you haven’t yet gotten wet, come on in, the water’s fine!

“Icily erotic! Seething passion and emotional chaos lie beneath the symbolically placid surface of the villa’s swimming pool, which becomes the site for both seduction and violent revenge.” — Dave Kehr, The New York Times

“Romy Schneider’s crowning cinematic moment, where she delivered her most enchanting onscreen performance.” — Manon Garrigues, Vogue Paris

“Erotic languor turns gradually into fear and then horror in this gripping and superbly controlled thriller…The pool is a primordial swamp of desire, a space in which there is nothing to do but laze around, furtively looking at semi-naked bodies.” — Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian

“Set in a to-die-for villa in the verdant hills overlooking Saint-Tropez, this icily elegant pas de quatre involves four of the most outrageously photogenic actors to ever appear on screen… We sit and revel in the glamour of it all, waiting for those hormonal and homicidal impulses to boil over – as, of course, they do.” — David Melville, Senses of Cinema

“Pretty people behaving poorly in beautiful settings is something we don’t see as much of in cinema as we used to. This is a master class in the subgenre, and one of unusual depth.” (Glenn Kenny, New York Times)

Bernardo Bertolucci’s THE CONFORMIST ~ 50th Anniversary Screenings.

by

We continue our Anniversary Classics series with Bertolucci’s stunner at 7 o’clock on Wednesday, September 29 at our Glendale, Newhall, Pasadena and West L.A. theaters. The film follows Marcello Clerici (Jean-Louis Trintignant), a member of the secret police in Mussolini’s fascist Italy. He and his new bride, Giulia (Stefania Sandrelli), travel to Paris for their honeymoon, where Marcello also plans to assassinate his former college professor Luca Quadri (Enzo Tarascio), an outspoken anti-fascist living in exile. But when Marcello meets the professor’s young wife, Anna (Dominique Sanda), both his romantic and his political loyalties are tested.

“It’s easy to overlook how stark THE CONFORMIST‘s political and allegorical message is because it’s just so damn beautiful.” (Aja Romano, Vox)

“Bertolucci’s masterpiece—made when he was all of 29—will be the most revelatory experience a fortunate pilgrim will have in a theater this year.” (Michael Atkinson, Village Voice)

“THE CONFORMIST is celebrated for cinematographer Vittorio Storaro’s tumbling autumn leaves, but its emotional impact involves a tumbling soul.” (Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out New York)

“THE CONFORMIST is a beautiful and provocative film, and its theme could not be more timely.” (John Hofsess, Maclean’s Magazine)

Peter Bennett’s New Book THE LOS ANGELES RIVER Now Available for Pre-Order.

by

Local fine art photographer Peter Bennett has a beautiful new, long-in-the-works book coming out called The Los Angeles River and Greg and Tish Laemmle are thrilled to help spread the word: “Peter had a terrific Art in the Arthouse show at our NoHo theatre a few years back. We now have some of the photos at our other venues, and we also have several prints in our permanent collection. We’ve been longtime supporters of Friends of the L.A. River, FOLAR, via the Laemmle Charitable Foundation, and believe that anything that can be done to change the perception of the River will be for the benefit of the city. The River is there, trying to break through the concrete and bring nature back to the city.  We just have to stop fighting and instead help it. Peter’s photographs help bring that message to the fore.”
Learn more about Peter’s book and pre-order a copy here.

Culture Vulture Returns! Tickets Now on Sale.

by

Nature is healing and Culture Vulture is back! We will restart the weekly series this month with Monday evening (7:30 PM) and Tuesday matinee (1:00 PM) screenings at our Claremont, Glendale, Newhall, Playhouse and Royal venues. We have something for everyone, including fine art, musical theatre, legitimate theatre, ballet and much more. The schedule, starting with something from London’s West End:

09/20 & 09/21 – SKYLIGHT – On a bitterly cold London evening, schoolteacher (Carey Mulligan) receives an unexpected visit from her former lover (Bill Nighy), a successful and charismatic restaurateur whose wife has recently died. David Hare’s highly-anticipated production, directed by Stephen Daldry (The Audience), was recorded live on the West End by National Theatre Live.

09/27 & 09/22 – LIVE AT MR. KELLY’S – A look back at the legendary Chicago club Mister Kelly’s, which launched talent like Barbra Streisand, Woody Allen, Bette Midler, and Richard Pryor. Its visionary owners George and Oscar Marienthal smashed color and gender barriers to put fresh, irreverent voices in the spotlight and transform entertainment in the 50s, 60s, and ’70s.

10/04 & 10/11 – ALGREN – A journey through the gritty world, brilliant mind, and noble heart of Nelson Algren, the writer who defined post-war American urban fiction. Featuring John Sayles, William Friedkin, Philip Kaufman, Billy Corgan and more, the film paints an intimate, witty portrait.

10/11 & 10/12 – THE FAITHFUL – This documentary powerfully explores fandom, memorabilia and the magnetic appeal of three of the most influential cultural icons of our time: Elvis Presley, Princess Diana, and Pope John Paul II.

10/18 & 10/19 – RAPHAEL REVEALED – Marking the 500th anniversary of Raphael’s death, the greatest exhibition ever held of his works took place in Rome. This film provides beautifully-filmed access to this once-in-a-lifetime show featuring over two hundred masterpieces.

10/25 & 10/25 – FOLLIES – New York, 1971. There’s a party on the stage of the Weismann Theatre. Tomorrow the iconic building will be demolished. Thirty years after their final performance, the Follies girls gather to have a few drinks, sing a few songs and lie about themselves. After a sold-out run in 2017, the winner of the Olivier Award for Best Musical Revival returned for a strictly limited season in 2019. Stephen Sondheim’s legendary musical includes such classic songs as Broadway Baby, I’m Still Here and Losing My Mind.

11/01 & 11/02 – PUTIN’S WITNESSES serves as a fascinating look at Putin in the earliest days of his presidency, when the seeds of his authoritarianism were already being sown, filmed by a former friend and colleague, now living in exile, who had intimate access.

11/08 & 11/09 – PRISM – Filmmakers Eléonore Yameogo of Burkina Faso, An van. Dienderen of Belgium, and Rosine Mbakam of Cameroon examine biases and racism in the cinematic technology, deconstructing the camera’s objectivity, exposing its inherent power imbalance. At the same time, they work together collaboratively to construct and reconstruct. Like a chain letter, PRISM brings interviews, monologues, and images on the racism of cinematic technology into emotional, aesthetic, and intellectual dialogue.

11/15 & 11/16 – DELPHINE’S PRAYERS – A portrait of a Cameroonian immigrant to Belgium. Quick-witted, engaging, passionate, and intense, she shares her incredible survival story.

11/22 & 11/23 – M.C. ESCHER: JOURNEY TO INFINITY – Equal parts history, psychology, and psychedelia, Robin Lutz’s entertaining, eye-opening portrait gives us the famous Dutch graphic artist through his own words and images: diary musings, excerpts from lectures, correspondence and more are voiced by British actor Stephen Fry, while Escher’s woodcuts, lithographs, and other print works appear in both original and playfully altered form.

11/29 & 11/30 – SPARTACUS – Huge in scale and spectacular in effect, SPARTACUS is a true tour de force of a ballet, set to Aram Khachaturian’s superb score. With an incredible display of might from the four leading dancers to the entire corps de ballet and its passionate pas de deux, it is the ultimate spectacle of virtuosity and lyricism born at the Bolshoi Theatre.

12/06 & 12/07 – THE DANISH COLLECTOR: DELACROIX TO GAUGUIN – Denmark’s Ordrupgaard Collection is a treasure trove featuring some of the finest Impressionist works ever painted. Includes Realist paintings by Corot, Delacroix and Courbet; landscapes of Monet, Pissarro, Cézanne and Sisley; and beautifully observed portraits by Degas, Manet, Morisot, and Gonzalès.

12/13 & 12/14 – LOUIS VAN BEETHOVEN – This lavish historical drama illuminates the story of the world-famous composer from different perspectives.

THE LOST LEONARDO, the Whole Story of the Most Talked About Painting of the Century.

by

THE LOST LEONARDO is the inside story behind the Salvator Mundi, the most expensive painting ever sold at $450 million. From the moment the painting is bought for $1175 at a shady New Orleans auction house, and the restorer discovers masterful Renaissance brush strokes under the heavy varnish of its cheap restoration, the Salvator Mundi’s fate is determined by an insatiable quest for fame, money and power. As its price soars, so do questions about its authenticity: is this painting really by Leonardo da Vinci?

Unravelling the hidden agendas of the richest men and most powerful art institutions in the world, THE LOST LEONARDO reveals how vested interests in the Salvator Mundi are of such tremendous power that truth becomes secondary.

Now playing at our Encino and Pasadena theaters, this Friday we are expanding this fabulous documentary to our Claremont, Glendale, Santa Monica, Newhall, and North Hollywood venues as well.

DIRECTOR’S NOTES by Andreas Koefoed:

This is a film about the incredible journey of a painting, the Salvator Mundi, the Saviour of the World, possibly by Leonardo da Vinci. It is a true story, yet a fairytale worthy of H.C. Andersen: A damaged painting, neglected for centuries, is fortuitously rediscovered and soon after praised as a long-lost masterpiece of divine beauty. At its peak in the spotlight, it is decried as a fake, but what is revealed most of all is that the world around it is fake, driven by cynical powers and money.

The story lays bare the mechanisms of the human psyche, our longing for the divine, and our post-factual capitalist societies in which money and power override the truth. The painting becomes a prism through which we can understand ourselves and the world we live in. To this day there is no conclusive proof that the painting is – or is not – a da Vinci and as long as there is a doubt, people, institutions, and states can use it for the purpose that serves them the most.

Making this film has been a huge team effort. The producers, writers, editor, and DOP have worked side-by-side and devoted so much of themselves to the project. For that I am deeply grateful. It has been a fantastic voyage into secret worlds that are otherwise entirely inaccessible. Worlds in which anything can be bought and sold, where prestige, power, and money play out beneath the beautiful surface of the art world.

The main character is the painting. Brooding over it is its restorer, Dianne Modestini, who began working on it just after losing her husband, Mario, a world-famous restorer himself. For Modestini the restoration becomes a symbiotic process of mourning in which the painting and Mario at times become one. After she lets go of the painting, it is locked away in a freeport somewhere, leaving Dianne feeling alone, and criticized for her work. Did her restoration go as far as to transform a damaged painting into a Leonardo? She is forced to defend herself and her integrity, and seek closure on the painting and her grief.

What fascinates — and disillusions — me is that art is being used for economic speculation and as a token in political games. Art is a beautiful manifestation of human feelings and expressions throughout history. In my view, art belongs to humanity. Instead of being publicly accessible, it is hidden away in freeports and used for cynical and speculative purposes.

None of the prominent institutions involved in the story – The National Gallery, Christie’s, the Louvre, or states of France and Saudi Arabia – wanted to talk, perhaps unsurprisingly. The supposedly independent scientific and scholarly approach to the painting is under enormous political pressure. In the end, not only the painting is lost, but also the truth itself. The painting, a product of the very Renaissance that valued freedom of science and art, ultimately becomes a victim of vested interests and power games. As Jerry Saltz says in the film, the story is “a telling fable of our time.”

I hope the film will engage, surprise and intrigue the viewers who themselves become detectives in the story, leaving them with a question: What do I believe to be the truth?”

UNAPOLOGETIC Follows Black Abolitionist Organizers as they Challenge a Complicit Chicago Administration After Two Police Killings.

by

The new documentary UNAPOLOGETIC, opening September 3 at the Monica Film Center and on the Laemmle Virtual Platform, captures a tense and polarizing moment in Chicago’s fight for the livelihood of its Black residents. The film follows Janaé and Bella, two young abolitionist organizers, as they work within the Movement for Black Lives to seek justice for Rekia Boyd and Laquan McDonald, two young Black people killed by Chicago police. They aim to elevate a progressive platform for criminal justice to a police board led by Lori Lightfoot and a complicit city administration, while also elevating leadership by women and femmes. Laemmle Theatres opens UNAPOLOGETIC Friday, September 3 at the Monica Film Center and on the Laemmle Virtual platform.

UNAPOLOGETIC subject Bella Bahhs and director Ashley O’Shay will participate in Q&As at the Monica Film Center after the 7:40 screening on Friday, September 3 and after the 1 and 7:40 PM screenings on Saturday, September 4.

What follows is Ms. O’Shay’s artistic statement:

“In the winter of 2012, Rekia Boyd was just getting started in life. Her friends describe her as someone prone to smiles and laughter. She dotted her i’s with hearts, was a big Drake fan, and expressed herself freely on Facebook while trying to figure out her relationship status. In the winter of 2012, I was also just getting started. I was in my first year at Northwestern University’s film program and was one of less than ten Black people in my class. A slew of racist campus events caused me to feel further isolated and pushed me to begin speaking out about how racism affected my everyday. Slowly but surely, I began integrating these realizations into my art.

“If we don’t get it, shut it down!” Janae takes command at a downtown rally credit: Christine Irvine. 

“In March of that same year, Rekia was hanging out with her friends near her home when she was killed by a stray bullet. It took three years for the police officer who shot her to be brought to court, and after years of waiting for justice, it was deemed a mistrial. It seemed that he would walk away without being held accountable.

“Three years later, people of all ages from neighborhoods throughout Chicago came together to organize around their frustration. With nothing but a borrowed camera and monopod in hand, I joined the hundreds descending upon Chicago Police Headquarters to demand justice. The energy was electrifying. Black women on bullhorns stood in front of crowds leading the space. For the first time, I experienced a different narrative unfolding in the enduring struggle for Black freedom – one led by Black feminist voices. I couldn’t help but see myself in them.

Janae fights to be heard at Chicago Police Board meeting. Credit: Ashley O’Shay

“Shortly after, I began to document two of these voices: Janaé Bonsu, a 24-year-old pursuing her PhD in social work while also rising the ranks of a national activist organization; and Bella Bahhs, a 22-year-old “rap-tivist” from the Westside of Chicago whose artistry and activism seek to heal women harmed by intergenerational effects of incarceration – women like herself. Over the course of two and a half years, we watch as these women grapple not only with what it means to lead a mass movement, but also to enter early adulthood as Black, queer women.

Comrades get in formation to shut down a Chicago highway. Credit: Ashley O’Shay

“I have been a filmmaker for nine years now; Unapologetic is my feature film directorial debut. Five years after beginning production, we have completed the film. While this documentation was certainly important at the time of filming, it proves even more essential now, especially in light of the recent killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor in 2020. As Lori Lightfoot has become the first Black, openly-queer mayor of Chicago, mainstream media has championed her as a symbol of progressive growth. However, the current reality in the city counters that. After years of intentional work, organizers are working to educate the community around abolishing and divesting from policing, despite a new mayor bolstered by representative politics. Unapologetic intentionally centers the narratives of the Black queer feminist organizers who brought forth the progressive platform that set the stage for Chicago’s historic shift in leadership.

Janae’s mom speaks her truth. Credit: Ashley O’Shay

“I have always known and felt the presence of Black resistance in my life. However, the strong feminine leadership in the Chicago movement caused me to question where my history had been placed. How might my world have been different if I saw a young PhD student or a rapper that looked like me organizing a mass movement? Unapologetic has given me an opportunity to discover more about myself through this legacy of resistance, and take a more active role in it.

Bella and her auntie hit a Chicago step at the Black Soul Nation picnic. Credit: Ashley O’Shay

“What does one usually require of a Black movement leader? Certainly not femme. Certainly not queer. Certainly not flawed, or quick to anger, or overly opinionated. By focusing on this refreshing counter narrative within the Movement for Black Lives, I wanted to recognize this heroic and thankless work, catalyzing empathy, understanding, and hope in all viewers at such a critical time for Black lives.” — Ashley O’Shay

UNAPOLOGETIC director Ashley O’Shay.