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 The excerpt above is from "The Translator," a film by Sonya Di Renzo, and one of the films selected for the Lunafest from the 600 or so entries the organization receives each year from aspiring women filmmakers. Women make less than 6 percent of the 250 top-grossing films in today's industry, and Lunafest offers a venue for women to break through and get their work seen.

These are not "chick flicks." The films that get selected and screened by Lunafest are created by women, about women and for women, but these are not saccharine romances with corny dialogue and predictable endings. This is cinema at its most powerful: great storytelling with compelling subjects and important messages, and above all, entertaining.

12 October, 2010 /

 

(Above is a trailer from Tucker and Dale vs. Evil, one of the feature films playing at the Oct. 15-17 Telluride Horror Show.)


One of my earliest childhood memories is of being shooed out of the TV room when the movie my aunt and uncle were watching turned really gory. I can vividly recall the scientist, whose arm had just been torn off by the monster he’d created, streaking blood across the wall as he died a slow, horrific, cinematic death. I don’t remember my first day of kindergarten or much else from those tender years, but that movie has stuck with me all this time.

Over the years, there were other things that contributed to my closet fascination with the horror genre: old Twilight Zone reruns, Stephen King novels, a masked Michael Myers lumbering after Jamie Lee Curtis in "Halloween." Scary movies are one of my guilty pleasures, but it’s always been hard to find someone to catch a flick with me. Until now.

11 October, 2010 /
[click "Play" to hear Susan's conversation with Cindy Lee]

 

 

Popovich_2 Telluride is known for many fine things: gnarly ski terrain, a robust cultural economy – and the fact we are a pet paradise. Raise your hand if you are a local who weeps at the thought of an animal in need. That's most of us, right? (Ok, except the guy at the east end of town who messed with the poop.)

On Sunday, October 17, 2010, 4 p.m. Telluride's Michael D. Palm Theatre presents the Popovich Comedy Pet Theatre, featuring Gregory Popovitch and his 16 cats and 10 dogs, all rescues from animal shelters. The event sponsor is Cindy Lee's Wags & Menace Foundation, also a big-time supporter of Second Chance Humane Society. Second Chance plans to bring a cast of thousands from its Ridgway shelter to the show in the hopes of finding some of them loving homes. Popovitch could be the show that keeps on giving.

10 October, 2010 /

by Tracy Shaffer

As the leaves turn in the high country, Denverites turn out in style. Theatres open their season, ball fields close up shop and a flurry of arty events fills the calendar.

There's a not-to-be-missed show at the Denver Center Theatre  as four actors glide through more than fifty characters as fluidly as a flip-book. The 39 Steps is a Hitchcock spoof extraordinaire led by DCTC staple, Sam Gregory as our Everyman caught in a high-stakes international crime caper. Mr. Gregory is always good, but watching him in this film noir frolic opens up the throttle of his comic talent, while Victoria Mack makes an impressive Denver debut as the vixen, victim and vamp. It is by far, the boffo ballet of Rob Nagle and Larry Paulsen that brings this roller-coaster to its vaudevillian knees. My jaw was on my chest in simultaneous awe and laughter. Director, Art Manke, takes the play out of the script's British music hall setting and brilliantly lands it smack in the middle of a black & white movie reel: fast and suspenseful, like Cary Grant running from a crop duster. The result is perfection. Also at the Center, the Caridad Svich adaptation of Isabele Allende's gripping novel, "The House of Spirits", starring the amazing Franca Sofia Barchiesi in the role of Clara, and Thursday's opening of Bram Stoker's "Dracula". Three medium adapted for stage... spooky.

09 October, 2010 /
[click "Play" for Seth Berg's interview with Susan]

 

 

10-11 TFFThe Telluride Film Festival and our five-star Wilkinson Public Library co-host the second in the fall Cinematheque film series programmed by Telluride Film Fest co-director Gary Meyer, celebrating the work of director Martin Scorsese.

"Mean Streets" screens Monday, October 11, 6 p.m. (Pre-SHOW reception is 5:30 p.m.).

Sit down. Getta grip. I'll lay this on you as gently as possible: Italian-American gangster films did not begin on the Jersey shore with "The Sopranos." The origin of the species is not  "Saturday Night Fever." Or "Married to the Mob."  Or "Casino." Or, god help us, the reality TV show "Jersey Shore," that so artfully extols the virtues of shellacked hair, boobs, bad language, and barfing. Or even Scorsese's "Goodfellas."

09 October, 2010 /

Salt_smallteaser Inception_smallimax Telluride's Nugget Theatre has two movies on the bill for the week of Friday, October 8-Thursday, October 14: "Salt", rated PG 13, and "Inception", also PG 13.

"Inception" is a repeat, a story about industrial espionage in which a clever spy must plant an idea in the mind of a company principal, and the victim must believe that idea is his own.

Angelina Jolie is a CIA agent on the run in "Salt"; on the run because she has been fingered as a rogue agent, and must use all her skills to stay ahead of her fellows. Staying ahead means using her abilities to run down an elevator shaft by bouncing off the side walls, for example. According to the critics, she makes it believable.

See below for movie times, and the Nugget website for reviews and trailers.

06 October, 2010 /

CARN02-27 Sponsored by the Telluride Council for the Arts and Humanities, the First Thursday Art Walk is a once-a-month opportunity for galleries, studios, and retail stores to strut their considerable stuff. The meet-and-greet takes place all day until 8 p.m. October 7 marks the final Art Walk of the 2010 season. Among the venues not to miss:

Telluride Gallery of Fine Art, 130 E. Colorado Avenue, hosts an artists' reception, 5:30 – 7 p.m. featuring encaustic artists Rebecca Crowell and Shawna Moore, and includes a wine tasting with Wine Mine at Pacific Street Liquors.

Stronghouse Studios, 283 South Fir Street, is pleased to host an opening reception for painter Meredith Nemirov. "Walking Among the Trees: Mapping the Aspen, is a body of work the artist created during her residency at the Vermont Studio Center. Later this month, the Tuesday and Wednesday, October 19  – October 20, 6 – 9 p.m., the artist leads a course at Ah Haa: "Georgia O'Keefe in Watercolors."

06 October, 2010 /
[click "Play" to hear Charlotte Jorgensen's conversation with Susan]

 

 

1__#$!@%!#__unknown October 7 marks the Telluride Council for the Arts & Humanities' final First Thursday Art Walk of the 2010 season. The popular day-long event is a chance for Telluride to flaunt its robust fine art scene. It is also a meet-and-greet for locals and guests: galleries, stores and studios stay open late until 8 p.m.

(The free Art Walk brochure is available at participating venues, hotels, and coffee shops and includes a self-guided map. Or go to http://www.telluridearts.org/humanities.html.)

05 October, 2010 /
[click "Play", Meredith Nemirov speaks with Susan]

 

 

Nemirovposter2010 Meredith Nemirov is a familiar name in the Telluride region. But the artist is also on the national radar. Nemirov has shown her work at the Brooklyn Museum, Yeshiva University Museum, The American Museum of Immigration and more. There have been more recent shows in Denver, both at the airport and at the Red Line Gallery.

In 2008, Meredith Nemirov was awarded a residency at the world-famous Anderson Ranch outside Aspen. In April 2010, a grant enabled her to spend a month as Artist in Residence at the prestigious Vermont Studio Center, a kind of think tank for artists of all persuasions, including painters, sculptors, print-makers, and photographers, 50 in all, who live in this artistic community and work in private studios. While in Vermont, without the pressure of having to produce yet another major one-person show, Nemirov created the very mixed body of work that will be on display Thursday, October 7, at the Stronghouse Studios, 283 South Fir, for the October Art Walk.

05 October, 2010 /

IMG_7909 Telluride Inside... and Out immediately called Shlomi Eldar's "Precious Life" one of the most powerful films we saw at the Telluride Film Festival last month.

"Precious Life" is a documentary about a Palestinian family trying to save the life of their infant son in an Israeli hospital. Susan had only a few moments to chat with Shlomi after the screening, as he was being rushed off to another event. Shlomi promised to take some time after the dust settled (he was headed for the Toronto Film Festival immediately after Telluride) to do an interview with Telluride Inside... and Out. This article, conducted by email, is the result of that conversation.

S_1 Susan Viebrock: At any point in your life did you imagine yourself directing a major documentary?

Shlomi Eldar: I started this project only because I couldn't get into Gaza Strip after Gilad Shalit has been kidnapped and after the blocked of Gaza by Israel. I had to find new stories so when I have got the e-mail from Dr. Raz Somech I said to myself "let's try and make a piece about it, it might be interesting." Only when one single person donated the whole amount of money I found myself following the process and the journey of saving Muhammad. Something inside me told me that it can become a film. In short I didn’t think or mean to make a major documentary and I didn’t realized that I could take 3 years working on that film.

03 October, 2010 /