It’s a little late in coming, but for those who didn’t know the 33rd Annual Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) started last Thursday with the screening of Garth Jennings and Nick Goldsmith’s Son of Rambow. Running through June 17, SIFF is the largest festival of its kind anywhere in the world, more than 400 films and programs showing at locations throughout the Seattle metropolitan area over a full 25 days.
I’ve covered this festival for Moviefreak every year since 2001. It is, without a doubt, the highlight of my entire year. With 60 different countries represented, 48 World Premiers, 39 North American Premiers and 20 U.S. Premiers, there are certainly choices available a person simply couldn’t see elsewhere.
All that said, I regret it took me so long to finally run a preview for this year’s event. With so much to choose from, I admit to being more than just a wee bit overwhelmed. On the plus side, I haven’t seen one bad film so far, the glorious musical drama Once easily the best picture I’ve seen in 2007. Even better, I had the opportunity to sit down with the entire creative team behind that masterpiece’s production, the interview only one click away.
Other highlights? How about Olivier Dahan’s masterful Edith Piaf biopic La Vie en Rose, David Sington’s Apollo documentary In the Shadow of the Moon, Judd Aptow’s hilariously profound Knocked Up, Christopher Smith’s amusingly horrific Severance or Luc Besson’s engrossing (if uneven) Angel-A. Only the closing night feature, Laurent Tirard’s Shakespeare in Love-like comedy Moliére, has disappointed, and even that had so many positives stewing over the negative aspects of its maudlin narrative seems almost insignificant.
As for what’s coming up, there is certainly plenty to get excited about. From the U.S. Premier of Milos Forman’s Goya’s Ghost with Natalie Portman and Javier Bardem, to Lars von Trier’s latest experimental comedy The Boss of it All, to Andrew Lau and Alan Mak’s cops’n’robbers spectacular Confession of Pain, to the star-studded Lajos Koltai weeper Evening, there is plenty to get excited about.
This year’s crop of Emerging Master’s include France’s aforementioned Dahan, Mauritania’s Abderrahmane Sissako (Bamako), Franco-Iranian Rafi Pitts (It’s Winter) and Israel’s Eytan Fox (The Bubble), each of whom are showing films I’m on the very edge of my seat waiting to see.
Anthony Hopkins stops by for a visit (tonight, actually) to present his directorial debut Slipstream, while Frank Oz (Death at Funeral), Dante Spinotti (Slipstream), Taika Waititi (Eagle vs. Shark), Doug Pray (Big Rig) and Robert Benton (Nobody’s Fool) are just a handful of the big-time guests hitting town to talk about their latest efforts.
And there’s more. Much more. One heck of a lot (including potential Hollywood blockbusters like Surf’s Up and Superbad, as well as Timur Bekmambetov’s Day Watch and the New Zealand mutant horror comedy Black Sheep), but I’m not about to get into it all here. Like 2006, Moviefreak is proud to offer my own personal blog adventure at the 33rd Annual Seattle International Film Festival. Starting tonight, I’ll be updating almost every evening (or, at the very least, every other evening) at http://siff-2007.blogspot.com.
Other than that, check out www.seattlefilm.org for a complete lineup of events, screenings, movies and forums. And, as always, have a great time at the movies!
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