Rooftop Films brings fresh movies to unusual places

By Sarah Sluis

As my companions and I grumbled on our way up the last flight of stairs at New Design High School on Manhattan's Lower East Side, volunteers cheered our arrival. Our hard work was rewarded. Though I'd passed by this neighborhood high school hundreds of times before, I was astonished by the size of the venue, which could hold at least three basketball courts and 1,000 people. In the distance, the Empire State Building shined in red, white, and blue for the Memorial Day weekend. Above, a couple of planets shone their way through the light pollution.

Rooftop Films, a non-profit that emerged more than a decade ago, is as much about the venue and the community as the film itself. Even people in the neighborhood may have no idea about the "big, fantastic, or unusual space" up above, program director Dan Nuxoll states. "Part of our whole ethos is to show people those spaces... It recontextualizes the city and the films." The screening I saw, Bad Posture, had some "recontextualize" moments. During a fight, I heard the sound of sirens in the background. Were the cops arriving in the movie, or the film? (Turned out they were in real life). As the friends in the film graffitied their house, my eyes drifted to the walls of the high school, which were also decorated in spray paint sketches.

Bad Posture, which screened on May 28th at the New Design High School, is an atmospheric tale of two friends with an appetite for delinquency set in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It's the kind of film that fits squarely into Rooftop Films' selections. Nuxoll describes their programming as a focus on the "personal." A social action documentary, for example, might not make the cut if it isn't also a personal story. Nuxoll cites last year's Gasland, which went on a special tour (co-presented with help of the Fledgling Fund) to areas affected by fracking (the extraction of natural gas from rock), like Harrisburg and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, as a documentary that brought the filmmaker's personal story into the mix.

With so many New York City events plagued by long lines, waits, and a VIP atmosphere, Rooftop Films stands apart. Live music a half-hour before the show helps set the mood and encourages people to show up early to enjoy the rooftop ambiance. After the show, there's always an afterparty, often with complimentary drinks courtesy of an alcohol brand looking for exposure. Filmmakers show up to the afterparty, but you won't find them "caged off in a VIP section," Nuxoll notes. "You can approach them. They're part of the event. We keep everything very inclusive."

Rooftop Films no longer holds screenings just on rooftops, a decision that came pretty naturally to the organization, especially when there are unique venues on the ground. While in New York City they have the ability to grow "organically," since they have centralized staff and equipment, Rooftop Films has been dipping its toe into other waters, often through co-presentations. This summer there will be screenings in Philadelphia, and they have also had discussions about holding screenings in places like Austin, Texas, San Francisco and Los Angeles, among other places. New York City has plenty of occasions to see free movies in outdoor spaces, but Rooftop Films isn't about battling crowds for a chance to kick back on your picnic blanket with a hunk of brie. Instead, Rooftop Films is about making filmgoing a neighborhoody experience. "Going to the movies can be about escaping, leaving the community," Nuxoll says. "We want to keep people interacting with the environment."

What's cooking at the 4th Annual NYC Food Film Festival

By Sarah Sluis

Forget popcorn and a movie. Try oysters, grits, pig ear sandwiches, burgers and craft brews. From June 23rd-27th, the NYC Food Film Festival will be giving festivalgoers the chance to "Taste What You See on the Screen." As someone who used to watch TBS' "Dinner & A Movie" while wishing someone would cook me the meal on the screen, this idea is pretty exciting. After attending the press preview of the event, I can say this: the Widow's Hole Oysters are not to be missed. They will be featured in one of four oyster-themed short films playing at the June 23rd event. The organizers have ordered six thousand oysters--apparently, larger quantities than any supplier has ever seen for one event.

Returning for its fourth year, the festival will show 39 films in five days, including thirteen world premieres, a record for the festival. I spoke with the director of Florent: Queen of the Meat Market (trailer here), which will make its world premiere on June 24th. Describing himself as more of an "8 a.m. breakfast" kind of patron of the Meatpacking District restaurant, which was famous for its after-hours crowd, director David Sigal had a chance to see the other side while making the documentary. Filmed during the restaurant's last six months before it closed, the doc also includes interviews with patrons such as Julianne Moore, Diane von Furstenberg and Isaac Mizrahi. Sigal cited Warhol's Factory as well as a documentary about Harvey Milk (which he mentioned you can watch for free on Hulu) as his inspirations. Why Milk? The restaurant owner, Florent Morellet, was a well-known community and gay activist. Sigal also revealed one of the crazier moments he filmed: people disrobing in the restaurant. At the Food Film Festival event, the movie will be paired with menu items from the restaurant, such as Evelyne's Goat Cheese Salad, which includes potatoes, goat cheese and pecans over a bed of greens.

Other highlights of the festival include the thirty-year-old film It's Grits paired with a grits throwdown for the best take on the Southern classic. "The World's First Food Truck Drive-In Movie" will feature food trucks and outdoor films, and on the final day, the festival will screen Beer Wars along with burgers and craft brews (the movie documents the David and Goliath struggle between small breweries and large beer companies). It's long been known that New York City is a cinephile city and a place to get great food, but it's pretty amazing that the creator of the film festival, George Motz (also the director of Hamburger Wars), found a way to combine the two.

For more information, go to the festival's website, nycfoodfilmfestival.com.

'Please Give' reflects its New York City audience

By Sarah Sluis

Please Give, the latest film by Nicole Holofcener, follows a Manhattan woman (Catherine Keener) who feels incredibly guilty about those less fortunate than her. She runs a business selling vintage furniture, and is

remorseful about buying items from mourning children. Her family has also pre-bought the apartment of the aging lady next door, which they will renovate after her death. Then there's the twenty dollar bills she dispenses to the various homeless people hanging out around 5th Avenue.

As I settled into my seat for the movie, a selection at the Tribeca Film Festival, I overheard the conversation of the two ladies next to me. First, they discussed feeling guilty while on a cruise, because they are staffed with people from third-world countries away from home for nine months of the year. Then, they had a worried discussion about how much to tip delivery men (it was decided that a $5 tip on a $25 purchase was sufficient). They could have been characters right from Holofcener's

movie.

Which is what is so great about Holofcener, who wrote and directed the film. She's spot-on in her characterization and dialogue. The movie is very New York-specific (but that never hurt Woody Allen or "Seinfeld") and captures a specific group of people in New York without becoming too in-jokey. It's the kind of movie that finds humor in truth. A fake tan greeted with an eyebrow raise is much more effective than oompa-loompa jokes about the orange hue. I've seen Holofcener's previous movie, Friends with Money, and was pleasantly surprised. Please Give was so much better, perhaps because each character can be both sympathetic and repulsive.

One of the most telling moments for Keener's character is when she starts crying while a group of young people with Down's Syndrome play basketball. She's so guilty over feeling better off than people, she fails to see that people that are "less fortunate" than her have happy and fulfilling lives in their own way. All she can do is feel bad for people, she can't empathize or see how their lives

have good and bad times just like hers. In between moments like these, there's more superficial concerns, like her daughter's desire for $200 jeans and clear skin. The daughter of the aging woman next door, played by Rebecca Hall, has a sad moroseness around her that channels Noah Baumbach. In a final touch of reality, how the characters act in a group is much different than how they are in twos. Keener's daughter and Hall relate to each other honestly and as friends as they walk dogs together, and the other daughter of the aging woman (Amanda Peet) has an affair with Keener's husband (Oliver Platt). All this, despite the fact that the two families are ostensibly awkward enemies because of the apartment sale. That's why I'll put Holofcener's film among the best that I have seen this year.

Check out FJI's interview with director Nicole Holofcener and our review.

'Morning Glory' ready to blossom, 'Butter' churning

By Sarah Sluis

J.J. Abrams has been busy, recently re-upping his production company's contract with Paramount and signing on for a Star Trek sequel. Next on his plate, however, is producing the workplace comedy

Morning Glory. In a film packed with stars spanning multiple generations, Harrison Ford will lead the cast, portraying a past-his-prime anchorman who switches to a morning news show. There, he butts heads with the other host, Diane Keaton. Rachel McAdams plays the young producer trying to corral the stars in order to score recognition with her boss, Jeff Goldblum. Keaton and McAdams worked together on family-themed romantic comedy The Family Stone, but Keaton and Ford, aged 63 and 66, respectively, have yet to work with each other during the careers--maybe they'll have a nice chemistry onscreen. Director Roger Michell (Venus, Notting Hill) and writer Aline Brosh McKenna (The Devil Wears Prada, 27 Dresses, Laws of Attraction) have an impressive amount of comedy and romance experience between them, making me suspect that Keaton and Ford's dislike of each other might turn into romance. Of course, there's also the possibility the movie emphasize the workplace over the romance, like beloved films Network or maybe even Working Girl. In these films, a job is more than simply a profession for the character to have as they carry on a romance out of the workplace (i.e. Katherine Heigl being an "E!" host in Knocked Up), but their true "love." I also adore behind-the-scenes movies, so I know I'll really relish watching what goes on at a "Today"-type show. Production starts this June in New York, so if the characters aren't spending too much time in the studio, I'll look for them filming on the streets of the city.

Another project that just got off the ground is Butter, a "Best in Show meets Election" that will star (and be produced by) Jennifer Garner. The screenplay by Jason Micallef landed him on the unofficial Black

Book of 2008, a list of unproduced screenplays that executives like best. Garner would lend her dimpled, endearing persona to the Midwestern tale, playing an adopted outsider who discovers a hidden talent for butter carving (an actual farm country endeavor, thus the screenwriter's inspiration). She proves an unlikely source of competition, earning the ire of the overachieving wife of the retired butter-carving champion, who is intent on winning the prize for herself. It sounds like a wacky role that I imagine Garner, who is both likeable and tough (as an action star in "Alias") excelling in. I also sincerely hope there is a hint of Drop Dead Gorgeous in the film, the mockumentary about a Southern beauty pageant that took regional stereotyping to hilarious extremes. Garner's project is being developed with Mandate, which produced Juno, another film Garner played a role in.