Books: Here s looking at Casablanca, with author Leslie Epstein
By Tom Meek
This Monday, Leslie Epstein the longtime Professor of English and Director of the Creative Writing Program at Boston University, debuts his latest work of fiction, Hill of Beans: A Novel of War and Celluloid, which like several of Epstein s books weaves history and real life characters seamlessly into the fabric of fiction with a typical tight focus on the evils of the Holocaust and its repercussions across time.
Epstein s release party will be a free and virtual affair put on by the Brookline Booksmith at 7 p.m. Monday. The conversation will be hosted by writer/film critic A.S. Hamrah.
Class action, power chords, and a walrus-loving whistleblower
By Peter Keough Globe Correspondent,Updated February 25, 2021, 11:54 a.m.
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An image from Un Film Dramatique. Cinema Guild
One way to explore the truth of a subject is to allow the subject to film itself. Or in the case of Ãric Baudelaireâs
âUn Film Dramatique,â to allow the subjects to make a film about whatever they want and film their process doing so.
Commissioned by the brand-new Dora Maar middle school (named after the photographer, painter, and companion to Picasso) in the racially and ethnically troubled St. Denis district of Paris, Baudelaire enlisted 21 engaged and engaging students of diverse races and backgrounds to undertake the project. Giving them basic technical instructions, he set them off on their own and filmed their efforts over the course of four years. They begin by brainstorming ideas and wrestling with basic questions (What is a film? Is this a documentary
Brookline s Leslie Epstein explores Casablanca, family legacy wickedlocal.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from wickedlocal.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Katherine Waterston (left) and Casey Affleck in The World To Come. (Courtesy Vlad Cioplea/Bleecker Street)
The last time I saw Casey Affleck was after an 8:30 a.m. Sundance Film Festival screening of “Manchester by the Sea,” which left my colleagues and I so emotionally drained we were pretty much useless for the rest of the day. Affleck finds this very funny. “Oh man, that’s awesome,” he laughs. “That was a tough screening. At Sundance I’m usually just going to sleep at 8 a.m.” We’re talking on the phone a few days after the festival’s virtual premiere of his latest movie, “The World to Come,” which made its Sundance debut last month under very different circumstances. “It’s so strange doing these things sitting in front of your computer,” he sighs.
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Ghost Tropic: A Muslim cleaning woman sleeps through her subway stop and must get home on foot. (Belgium)
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Fire Will Come: A released prisoner returns to his rural home to live with his hermit mother. (Spain)
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Vitalina Varela: A Cape Verdean woman travels to Lisbon to rejoin her husband, learns he has died, and follows traces of his secret life. (Portugal)
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His House:An allegorical horror film about a couple from South Sudan who relocate in an English town. (U.K.)
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Black Bear: A filmmaker and a couple sharing a remote Adirondack cottage are drawn into a convoluted, compelling artful experiment. (U.S.A.)