Film at Lincoln Center Announces CURRENTS For 62nd NYFF

Currents Centerpiece is world premiere of Jem Cohen’s Little, Big, and Far

Feature films from voices new to NYFF include Dimitris Athiridis’s exergue — on documenta 14, Madeleine Hunt-Ehrlich’s The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire, Lilith Kraxner and Milena Czernovsky’s bluish, Yashaddai Owens’s Jimmy, and Matthew Rankin’s Universal Language

New works by returning NYFF filmmakers include Matías Piñeiro’s You Burn Me, Guillaume Cailleau and Ben Russell’s DIRECT ACTION, Pierre Creton and Vincent Barré’s 7 Walks with Mark Brown, and more

[New York, NY — August 15, 2024] Film at Lincoln Center announces Currents for the 62nd New York Film Festival, taking place September 27-October 14 at Lincoln Center and in venues across the city. The Currents slate includes 12 feature films and 28 short films in six programs, representing more than 20 countries, and complements the Main Slate, tracing a more complete picture of contemporary cinema with an emphasis on new and innovative forms and voices. The section presents a diverse offering of productions by filmmakers and artists working at the vanguard of the medium.

The Currents Centerpiece selection is the world premiere of Jem Cohen’s Little, Big, and Far, which depicts present catastrophes through the travels of an astronomer in search of a sky dark enough to study the stars. Like Cohen’s film, many in the NYFF62 Currents slate employ and expand forms of portraiture, among them: Madeleine Hunt-Ehrlich’s The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire, a fragmented recomposition of the Martiniquan writer and activist’s legacy; returning Currents filmmaker Pierre Creton and Vincent Barré’s 7 Walks With Mark Brown, following the path of a paleobotanist in search of native plants; Yashaddai Owens’s debut feature, Jimmy, which imagines, in impressionistic fashion, a young James Baldwin as he arrives to Paris from New York; and Lilith Kraxner and Milena Czernovsky’s bluish (winner of the Grand Prix at FIDMarseille), portraying the day-to-day life of two young women recently transplanted to a big city as their early adulthood unfolds.

A number of films in the Currents section, as in the Main Slate and Spotlight sections, reflect sociopolitical concerns. These include: Guillaume Cailleau and Ben Russell’s DIRECT ACTION (winner of the Best Film award in the Berlinale’s Encounters section), which traces the actions of a French political eco-activist group; and Dimitris Athiridis’s exergue — on documenta 14, in which politics collide with art in a 14-part serial that looks behind the scenes of the making of the global contemporary art showcase Documenta 14 and how it signaled major impending political shifts in Europe.

Elements of fabulation and absurdity are evident in Currents selections such as returning NYFF filmmaker Nicolás Pereda’s Lázaro at Night, the story of an awkward love triangle among actors auditioning for the same film that elevates Pereda’s unique blend of the theatrical and the mundane; Matthew Rankin’s Universal Language (winner of the Audience Award at Cannes’ Directors Fortnight), which conflates, with a smartly comedic tone, several scenarios of diaspora and grasps at connection among relocated Iranians in Canada; and Marta Mateus’s Fire of Wind, which mingles past and present traditions, superstitions, ecological conditions, and modes of living through a small community during the harvest season.

Among the feature filmmakers making their NYFF debut are visual artist Madeleine Hunt-Ehrlich ( The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire) and photographer Yashaddai Owens ( Jimmy), both first-time feature directors; Dimitris Athiridis ( exergue — on documenta 14); Canadian experimental filmmaker Matthew Rankin ( Universal Language); and Austrian duo Lilith Kraxner and Milena Czernovsky ( bluish), whose first film Beatrix was shown in FLC’s Art of the Real (2022). Approximately one-third of the 28 short films in this year’s program are by filmmakers making their NYFF debut, including Jordan Lord ( An All-Around Feel Good); Sebastián Schjaer ( Like an Outburst); Zuza Banasińska ( Grandmamauntsistercat); Danielle Dean ( Hemel); Maiko Endo ( Jizai); Karimah Ashadu ( Machine Boys, winner of the Silver Lion at the 2024 Venice Biennale); Francisco Rodríguez Teare ( October Noon), whose work was previously shown in New Directors/New Films (2024) and FLC’s Art of the Real (2018); Lei Lei ( re-engraved), whose work was also previously presented at New Directors/New Films (2024) and Art of the Real (2019); Johann Lurf and Christina Jauernik ( Revolving Rounds); and Pascal Viveros and Luciana Merino ( Towards the Sun, Far from the Center).

The short films in Currents reflect similar stylistic and thematic concerns. Currents short filmmakers who also employ forms of portraiture include John Smith ( Being John Smith), Rosalind Nashashibi ( The Invisible Worm), Lei Lei ( re-engraved), Karimah Ashadu ( Machine Boys), and Danielle Dean ( Hemel). Relevant current political issues are addressed by revisiting historical moments in Adam Piron’s Black Glass, Miranda Pennell’s Man number 4, Cauleen Smith’s The Deep West Assembly, Zuza Banasińska’s Grandmamauntsistercat, Maryam Tafakory’s Razeh-del, Francisco Rodríguez Teare’s October Noon, and Kevin Jerome Everson’s Practice, Practice, Practice. Jordan Strafer’s No Spank, Zachary Epcar’s Sinking Feeling, Rosalind Nashashibi’s The Invisible Worm, Maiko Endo’s Jizai, and Sebastián Schjaer’s Like an Outburst are playing with the absurd. Place or landscape are the focus of a number of shorts, such as Chanyeol Lee, Hanna Cho, Samgar Rakym, and Ali Tynybekov’s Track_ing; Johann Lurf and Christina Jauernik’s Revolving Rounds (the only 3-D film in the NYFF lineup this year); Laura Kraning’s ESP; Richard Tuohy and Diana Barrie’s The Land at Night; Malena Szlam’s Archipelago of Earthen Bones — To Bunya; Pablo Marín’s Vibrant Matter; Pascal Viveros and Luciana Merino’s Towards the Sun, Far from the Center; Danielle Dean’s Hemel; and Simon Liu’s Refuse Room.

The New York Film Festival will offer festival screenings in four partner venues across the city: Alamo Drafthouse Cinema (Staten Island), BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music) (Brooklyn), The Bronx Museum (Bronx), and the Museum of the Moving Image (Queens). Each venue will present a selection of films throughout the festival; a complete list of films and showtimes will be announced later this month.

For more updates and ticket information, visit the festival website.

Originally published at http://behindtherabbitproductions.wordpress.com on August 16, 2024.