“Anything I’ve Enjoyed Doing in My Career I Can Trace Back to a Little Thing That I Did, a Little Step That I Took”: Sarah Coffey, Back To One, Episode 379
Sarah Coffey starred as Eva Shapiro in the feature film 31 Candles, and instantly made her an iconic romanic comedy character. She can also be seen in Queens Of The Dead, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival last year. And her viral success as a comedian led to a role in Stapleview, the first-ever fully produced live sketch show on TikTok. On this episode, she talks about the blessings and drawbacks of finding a spotlight through her own online content. She takes us back to her early days, discovering an early love of singing, and talks about how that […]
As we reported last week, the NYC-based, cinema worker-centric zine Cashiers Du Cinéma has curated a 10-film program at Brooklyn’s BAM Cinema that spotlights the oft-unappreciated labor of front of house theater staff. Today, filmmaker David Cardoza shares an exclusive promo for our readers that stars Bill Heidbreder, a NY writer/critic and subject of the 2002 documentary Cinemania. The promo features Heidbreder donning a movie usher’s red vest, black sunglasses and a microphone headset as he implores commuters in the 6th Ave subway tunnel to check out the BAM series, which is entitled Cinéma Du Cashiers and runs from February […]
Several Futures announces today that it has acquired North American distribution for Revelations of Divine Love, New York-based filmmaker Caroline Golum’s sophomore film. Following her 2017 debut A Feast of Man, Golum’s 14th century-set feature had its world premiere at FIDMarseille last summer. Several Futures, which specializes in “auteurist and anti-imperialist work,” picks up Revelations of Divine Love a few weeks after its North American premiere at the Montreal Critics’ Week film festival. “Caroline Golum’s film is totally unique in the current landscape of American independent film—not only in its ambition, but in its sincerity and artistry,” said Several Futures […]
In 1990, a federal law was passed requiring the return of Indigenous human remains and sacred items to their rightful communities. More than three decades later, most of those ancestors are still waiting—boxed, catalogued, and stored in museum basements and university archives. In Aanikoobijigan, filmmakers Adam and Zack Khalil turn their attention to that unfinished work, following the long, often painful effort to bring ancestors home for proper burial. The film centers on a group of tribal specialists in Michigan who carry out this work day to day, navigating institutions built to hold on to what was never theirs. For […]
Ben Mehl is most recognized for his role as Dante on the hit Netflix show You. Other TV credits include The Good Wife, Supernatural Investigator and films like My Christmas Guide and Viral Beauty. On stage he has performed with The Public Theater and Williamstown Theatre Festival. He’s also a passionate acting teacher and volunteer at the 52nd Street Project. On this episode he tells us the story of finding out he had Stargardt disease, coming to the decision to go ahead with his dream of being an actor despite being legally blind, and the piece of advice a teacher gave him that miraculously made this mountain much […]
As both a resident of Minneapolis and a film and TV critic, it’s been surreal to see my home city become, over the past few weeks, the kind of place you might see in an especially on-the-nose dystopian satire. As thousands of armed, masked ICE agents roam the streets, in SUVs or on foot, everyday Minnesotans have stepped forward to protect their communities. In the aftermath of horrible disasters, survivors often describe the events they witnessed as being like “something out of a movie.” Here, as the ICE occupation stretches week after week, with no meaningful de-escalation and no clear […]
“What I’m saying is, if you want to go, I won’t stop you.” At the final Park City edition of Sundance last week, my 14th consecutive one, I contemplated this line from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid daily. That’s because a gorgeous, Western-style artwork painted on plywood by local artist Ryan Williams stood not far from The Library Theater, displaying the dearly departed Sundance Kid Robert Redford (who passed away last September at age 89) next to these famous words spoken by his character. The quote felt like a homegrown farewell steeped in bittersweet resignation, an ingenious marking of […]
For me, the fun of Sundance—and all festivals—is seeing not the films that everyone is buzzing about pre-fest (I can wait for the streaming release), but discovering the quieter gems that US distributors would do well to take a chance on. While this year’s nonfiction crop was weaker overall than 2025’s exceptional slate—which saw such cinematic revelations as Life After, The Perfect Neighbor and Seeds all competing in the US Documentary Competition—the docs that rose to the top, most notably the handful below, have continued to stay with me long after the final credits rolled in Park City. Barbara Forever […]
Best documentary has become the toughest Oscar category to predict in recent years, especially when it comes to nominations. The documentary branch has become famously quirky in recent years, passing over such populist, acclaimed, and decorated titles as Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, American Symphony, and Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story. Past performance is no guarantee of success—I’ve even heard rumors that some voters will refuse on principle to nominate a film by a previous Oscar winner—and geography is not destiny. Even as the best international feature category has skewed more European in recent years, the documentary branch has gotten […]
Dan Welch and David Cardoza, self-described “editors-for-life” of the NYC-based Cashiers Du Cinéma zine, are taking over Brooklyn’s BAM Cinema for a 10-film series “contemplating cinema work in works of cinema,” running from February 13-19. For those unfamiliar with the pair’s publication, each edition features a variety of comics, essays, and short fiction “about the ragged glory of working at movie theaters,” all penned by current or former movie theater employees. The first issue was published in 2023, and the most recent fourth issue was released back in December to substantial buzz, complete with a shout-out in The Strategist’s “Best […]