NYFF: NLF Revolutionary Leader Saadi Yacef Talks The Battle of Algiers

"...On the day that you invade Iraq, that's the day you lose the war."
**Saadi Yacef Talks The Battle Of Algiers. On the occasion of the restoration of the Gillo Pontecorvo cinematic classic on its 50th anniversary, the National Liberation Front revolutionary leader revisits writing the very personal narrative of the film while a political prisoner sentenced to death. And recreating his own struggle for the drama as he faced the challenge of slipping into the skin of an actor to portray his life. Also, what Yacef told the CIA and the Pentagon when they approached him to view the film, in order to pick up pointers for the US invasion of Iraq. And, what all of this may have to do with Napoleon, Paul Newman, and the lessons of Vietnam.
At the NY Film Festival

LISTEN TO THE SHOW HERE

**Doctor Thorne: A conversation with Julian Fellowes, the creator and writer of the Anthony Trollope adapted novel for the small screen. Delving into the Victorian convergence of class and privilege, political rivalries, moral conscience - if any - and money. The eminent British screenwriter, novelist, film director, actor and creator of Downtown Abbey who once assumed the identity of a female as a  writer and has played Churchill twice, also mulls a comparison of Brexit to the strange US presidential election period in progress.

"...I certainly know as an actor, you can lose track of who you are because you spend so much time behaving like somebody else." And playing a CIA agent, "how long before you lose your authentic self, and what would be the first thing to go - I assume that would be your moral compass."
**Berlin Station: A look at the dramatic television series scrutinizing the CIA and whistleblowers like Snowden, in an exchange with the stars, Richard Armitage and Michelle Forbes. While comparing actors and undercover agents, when it comes to masks, deceptions and multiple identities - whether dramatic or political.

NY FILM FESTIVAL: FIRE AT SEA

"We Cried On Our Knees. What Shall We Do. The People Could Not Hide Us. And We Ran To The Sea."

Gianfranco Rosi’s Fire at Sea begins by presenting the grim statistics that 400,000 migrants have continually arrived on the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, while 15,000 have died during the dangerous journey, setting the documentary within a context thematically. Or does it?

Rossi's cinematic strategy configures two parallel universe human worlds, much like the incongruous combination of fire and water of the title - that of the migrants in distress, alongside a serene local population nearly indifferent to their plight. But if human indifference is the implication and interpretation here, the director whether intentionally or not, would seem to have succumbed somewhat to that state of mind himself.

As horrifying as the intermittent scenes of hysteria, trauma, suffering and apparent if not imminent death are for these tragic migrants, Rosi has situated them as increasingly offensive backdrop to the ordinary, eccentric or humorous lives of the oblivious locals. And continuing a rather odious tradition in Western cinema, of poverty porn and the exotic rendering of the Other.

And with no background material as to what led to this horrific predicament brought upon these unfortunate Third World victims - ironically fleeing war or exploitation visited upon them by these very Europeans from whom they seek sanctuary in the first place, their plight is rendered as essentially enigmatic. And seemingly as inevitable as the weather, rather than an indictment of those countries to blame. 

More information about the screenings of Fire At Sea and The Battle Of Algiers at the NY Film Festival, is online at filmlinc.org.

Prairie Miller