Cinematalk

In conjunction with UW Cinematheque's view-at-home presentation of the newly restored Jazz on a Summer's Day (1959), this episode of Cinematalk takes a close look at the influential concert documentary filmed at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival. In the first segment, UW Madison Film Professor Jeff Smith talks with the Cinematheque's Mike King about the cultural and historical significance of the artists who appeared at Newport and the influence of Jazz on a Summer’s Day on subsequently made concert movies. In the second segment, Cinematheque's Ben Reiser talks with his fellow SUNY Purchase classmates, filmmakers Jeff Kushner and Bob Gosse, about their Film Professor, Aram Avakian, and Avakian's contributions to Jazz on a Summer's Day.

This week’s Cinematalk guests are two of the most exciting and forward-thinking contemporary American filmmakers, Bill and Turner Ross, who join us to discuss their new film, Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets. Originally scheduled to play the 2020 Wisconsin Film Festival, the film is set at the last night of a dive bar on the outskirts of Las Vegas. The Ross Brothers shed light on the unusual production methods behind the film, and its relationship to their past work.

July 2020 marks 40 years since the death of the brilliant actor and comedian Peter Sellers (1925-1980). In conjunction with the Cinematheque's "Peter Sellers: Lost and Found" selections, this episode features Cinematheque Programmers Jim Healy and Ben Reiser discussing The Ghost of Peter Sellers, Peter Medak's new documentary about the making - and unmaking - of his unreleased Sellers comedy Ghost in the Noonday Sun, and Mr. Topaze, Sellers lone effort as a feature film director.

On Cinematalk this week, we are privileged to welcome one of the finest of all contemporary filmmakers, Alexander Payne. Our discussion begins with a look at THE GREAT SILENCE and the mythic qualities of the Western genre. We also touch on the development of his cinephilia and the future of moviegoing. Usually writing in collaboration with Jim Taylor, Alexander Payne is the renowned director of sophisticated comedies for adults like CITIZEN RUTH, ELECTION, ABOUT SCHMIDT, SIDEWAYS, THE DESCENDANTS, NEBRASKA, and DOWNSIZING. He is the recipient of two Academy Awards for his screenplays and he is also a passionate movie-lover. In 2014, he visited madison to present a Wisconsin Film Festival screening of another 60s Italian classic, Dino Risi’s IL SORPASSO. He also joined us at that time for a Cinematheque screening of NEBRASKA. This week he spoke to us from his hometown and the frequent setting of his movies, Omaha, Nebraska.

This week, we are delighted to be joined on the podcast by the great film scholar David Bordwell. David Bordwell is the Jacques Ledoux Professor of Film Studies right here at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and is the author of numerous essential texts on cinema, including Planet Hong Kong, Ozu and the Poetics of Cinema, and most recently Reinventing Hollywood: How 1940s Filmmakers Changed Movie Storytelling, to name a just a few. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. You can find him on the world wide web at davidbordwell.net, where many of his books are available for purchase as downloadable pdfs, along with a wealth of supplemental materials, as well as his invaluable blog and where he and Kristin Thompson write about all manner of cinema. Professor Bordwell has been following Hong Sang Soo since his very first film, and our discussion touches on Hong’s filmography as a whole, Hill of Freedom (presented by UW Cinematheque with support from the Center for East Asian Studies) in particular, and Hong’s visit to the 2001 Wisconsin Film Festival right here in Madison. Here’s that conversation.

Bill Forsyth is our very special guest on Cinematalk this week. Forsyth’s achievements as a Scottish filmmaker are pioneering to say the least. He started a career in film at age 18 and spent nearly a decade and a half making commissioned documentaries and industrial films. This experience partly explains why his sublime and distinctly personal brand of filmmaking was fully realized when he made his first two narrative features, That Sinking Feeling and Gregory’s Girl. The international success of these two movies kicked off a wave of national filmmaking that led to the creation of what would become Screen Scotland, a national agency dedicated to the development and support of Scottish filmmaking. For Forsyth, the personal success paved the way for his next, and best-loved movie, 1983’s Local Hero, and several films made in the U.S., including his masterful 1987 adaptation of Marilynne Robinson’s novel Housekeeping. This week, he spoke with us from his home outside of Edinburgh, about the making of Gregory’s Girl, its influences, and his approach to the art of cinema.

The show focuses on The Grey Fox through an interview with the film's producer Peter O'Brian, who remembers Phillip Borsos and the "Tax Shelter" era of Canadian Film Production. Later on in the podcast, a chat with Mary Sweeney, co-writer, producer and editor of The Straight Story, who shares her memories of Grey Fox and Straight Story leading man Richard Farnsworth.

On the first segment of the podcast, Cinematheque programmers, Jim Healy and Ben Reiser discuss Ice Cold in Alex and assess the fascinating career of director Thompson. In the second segment, we are joined by our special guest, UW Madison alum and esteemed editor Mark Goldblatt. Goldblatt offers his own praise of Ice Cold in Alex and reflects on his time as the editor of J. Lee Thompson’s 1984 movie The Ambassador, which screened at the Cinematheque in 2017.

As a supplement to the Cinematheque's view-at-home presentation of Werner Herzog's Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin, this episode of Cinematalk features Cinematheque Director of Programming Jim Healy in conversation with Rob Thomas, Film Critic for Madison's Capital Times. The discussion revolves around Nomad and its relation to Herzog's prolific body of work. Plus, Rob reports from the front lines on the current state of cinema exhibition here in Madison.