>> My name is Margaret Hue. >> Hi, welcome to the annual Wisconsin Film Festival edition of Director's Cut. I'm Pete Schwaba. And my fellow film fans, if you love movies and love Wisconsin, then today's your day, or hour at least. Today we'll talk to talented filmmakers and see clips from entries in this year's festival, which takes place April 3-10, right here in Madison. Our first guest today is Wisconsin Film Festival's director of programming, Jim Healy. Jim, welcome back to Director's Cut. >> Thanks, Pete. >> Okay, so you've done this for four years now, right? >> I've been working for the festival for four years. This is the third year I've been in charge of the programming. >> How has it changed? It seems like it's growing exponentially every year. >> Yeah, I mean, film exhibition has changed a lot in the last three years. The first year I was working here, I'd say about 40%-50% of the festival was on actual film, 16mm, 35mm. >> Just four years ago. >> Yeah, and now, we're down to probably less than 5% of what will be shown at the festival you'll see on actual film. Maybe between 5%-10%. >> So, what are you looking forward to this year? Tell us about some of the films that you're excited about. >> The movies are great. We have a sidebar of film, new independently produced films from Mexico, including one of the funniest films I've seen in the last couple of years. It's called Club Sandwich. It's a terrific comedy about a mother and her teenaged boy who go on a vacation together, and things change. It's a really terrific film. >> That's a great title. >> Yeah, and we've got a number of new films by really important auteur directors from all over the world and all walks of life. Everything from avant garde masters like Nathaniel Dorsky who's been making movies for 50 years to Tsai Ming-liang, who's been a Taiwanese master. He's been around and a big figure since the '80s. And even directors like David Gordon Green, who premiered, he had his Wisconsin premiere of George Washington at the festival in 2001 and now is a big Hollywood director. He's here with his new film Joe. >> He's here too? >> He'll be joining us in person, yeah. >> You have a lot of first-time directors in this year's... >> A number of first-time directors, both in the Wisconsin Zone selections, making short films and features. And also in the regular line ups of the festival we have a lot of great first features by new and talented directors of things that we've seen all over the world. >> Yeah, hey, talk a little about the connection between the Wisconsin Film Festival and Cinematheque. >> Well, I'm also the director of programming of the Cinematheque. The Cinematheque is a screening program here on campus that screen films year-round that are open to the public and are completely free. We have two ongoing series right now. One is a tribute to Alfred Hitchcock, which we're screening films every Sunday. >> I'm not familiar with his work. Who's he? >> Yeah, he's a little obscure. >> He's coming into his own. >> I think he's Norwegian. I'm not sure. Yeah, his films are showing every Sunday at the Cinematheque. And in the Film Festival we have a sidebar of Hitchcock rarities. We're showing an alternate German version of a film he directed in 1931 called Mary. It was his second sound film. It was called Murder, and Hitchcock shot the same film with an almost entirely different cast in German for the German market. That version is called Mary. We're showing that in the festival. And we're showing the silent version of what was his first sound film, Blackmail. He also made an alternate version for those theaters that hadn't converted to sound yet. We're showing that as well. Then the Cinematheque also has a series in the spring of films by Jacques Demy, who was one of the more prominent members of the French New Wave. He made films that kind of were variations on musicals, or outright musicals. In the festival, before our Cinematheque series begins, we're showing a whole series of new Demy restorations of The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, probably his best known film. Also, a really neglected film he made in the early '80s called A Room in Town, which is just one of the best French films of the '80s. >> That's great. We're going to see some more right now. >> Great. >> A music teacher falls under the spell of a student, a successful singer returns to Memphis in search of direction, and a family struggles through a financial crisis in Singapore. Here are clips from three of the films that have been selected for the 2014 Wisconsin Film Festival. >> Uh, everybody. This is Sophie Williams. She's a new student from the UK. Make her welcome. In fact, Sophie, why don't you play something for us as a way to introduce yourself to the class. >> I just haven't really prepared anything. >> That doesn't matter. It's just a way of saying hi. >> So, are you excited? >> Yeah, I've been wanting to come out to the States for ages.
laughter
piano music continues
>> Yay! >> It's so hard to actually do what you want to do. You just have to make sure that you choose me. One day you'll be free. >> You don't seem as young as you actually are. >> That's your ex? Breathe in through your nose. And out through your mouth. Breath in. And out. In. And out. Breathe in. And out. >> I look at the trees. Sometimes I wish I was a tree. You ever wish you were a tree? >> Willis-- >> What? >> We need a record. >> We need to be trees.
all laugh
enthusiastic preaching
>> There's a price, man. You have to pay a price to have the talent that you got. I'd hate to be in your shoes where you owe God, 'cause you gonna have to pay that debt. >> You believe in magic? >> Come on back with me, man. Get yourself together. >> You find glory alone by yourself with nobody around. Nobody can hear you. That's where the glory is found. >> You never know how life, how life goes. It can be beautiful. It can be sad. You're gonna have ups and downs. Easy where you're going. True love Is an illusion
tires screeching
>> I'm talking with Jim Healy, the director of programming for the Wisconsin Film Festival. Great films, very diverse looking group of films so far. >> Yeah, you can go to Singapore or Memphis, Tennessee, or Mexico City, or any place around the world. That's the great thing about the festival. You get to really travel virtually. >> You've been in this racket for quite a while. You worked in New York, you worked for the Chicago Film Festival. What is it that makes the Wisconsin Film Festival unique, would you say? >> Well, I think it's the opportunity to show a great number of films over a short period of time, without having the burden of being a kind of a premiere festival. We can premiere new films. There are a number of films that are having their world premieres at our festival. >> That's great. >> But it also means that you can show the best of the best. You can show the best films that you've seen at other festivals and bring them to this audience for the first time. And have retrospectives, too. >> Yeah. Is this the place you've enjoyed working the most, would you say? >> Absolutely. >> You kind of have to say that. >> Absolutely. I love here; I love the audiences here. I love being in Madison. I think that the audiences here are very smart and they know a good movie when they see one. >> If somebody hasn't been to the Wisconsin Film Festival before, what would you say to them? And for those who have been here before, are there any changes this year? >> I would say the main thing is to prepare to experience something different. The idea of a film festival is an alternative to the commercial movie-going experience. So that means actively seek out the different, and if that's too much, then just plunge in a buy a ticket to something. >> Yeah. >> Then the idea of being at a film festival is seeing multiple films, right? So you should buy two or three tickets right away for, maybe, the same day. >> I learned my lesson last year. On this show I saw some great clips and previews, and a couple of them were sold out. You couldn't even get tickets. >> We're experiencing that every year. There's always a few films that are just immediately popular off the bat. But we do have rush lines, so if you're coming to see a film and the advance tickets are already sold out, there are opportunities to still see that film. Show up the day of the film, maybe get there a little bit early, like an hour before the show time, and wait. You could be one of the first ones in. >> Great, you're going to come back and talk to us a little bit later too. >> I'm happy to, thanks. >> We're going to spend the rest of this hour talking with a variety of filmmakers featured at the Wisconsin Film Festival. First up, a look at the design origins of round barns in one Wisconsin county. >> The barn is pretty solid inside. It has a silo in the center. We had to replace some of the boards going up, but otherwise-- I know there's a date of the silo that says 1912, I believe it is. Alga Shivers, is the story that what I heard, had built them. I just knew he was from this area, and I've read that in different books that he built round barns. When you come down Highway 82 there's a cemetery off over in the field that way, and I was told that part of it was an African American cemetery from back when they first come into this area. I think this valley and Pleasant Valley were the two places that ex-slaves came up to live in. >> It was a story that I thought needed to be told with my students. They are from a very white community. There's not a lot of diversity around. Most of my kids had no idea that 20 miles away, 100 years ago, there had been a settlement of African Americans who lived and worked, and got along with, and were on baseball teams with their neighbors. My original goal in my research was to learn the stories and hear the people, and share how integrated the people of Cheyenne Valley really were. What I wanted to find were the memoirs and the journals and the diaries. They aren't available. There's nothing really out there. >> That was a clip from The Round Barns of Vernon County. Joining us now is the film's co-director, David Macasaet. Thanks for being here, David. >> Thanks Pete. >> Tell us about these round barns and their creator, their architect. Tell us a little more. >> Sure. Yeah, the round barns are a story that kind of evolved because I grew up just around the corner from the red round tiled barn that's featured prominently in the film. This was like my very earliest childhood memory. Only in my 30s did I discover this connection to the African American carpenter who built the majority of these round barns. I was like, why have I never heard this story before, being a local? It was kind of connecting the dots that got us into the story and connects the barns as a very interesting and beautiful subject, into something that has a little bit more of a narrative to it. >> That was fascinating too, that there was this community where it's so racially diverse. You don't always associate rural communities like that. Talk a little bit about your experience with race in Vernon County growing up. >> It's true, like, I always felt deeply a part of the community, but a little different. Viroqua, my hometown where I was born and raised, is 99.9% Scandinavian. So the sense that there was a history in addition to that history was a powerful thing for me. I felt a kinship, in a way, to this story on a personal level because of that. >> When I was reading about your film, I think it was your partner, talked about how you make static shots of barns interesting. How do you do that? What is that challenge like? How do you address that? >> In part, it's like being rooted in the nature of the beautiful environment that we're in and living with that. One of the most dramatic moments in the film that gets a laugh is this little turtle on the road. It's basically nothing. It's that tiny moment, and yet, that's what the film is about, the simplicity of nature, the pastoral environment. The history is what makes the action. >> Yeah, yeah. What is the difference, I mean, from a barn standpoint, I don't know much about farming. Is there a difference in barns, a typical barn, a round barn? How does that affect farming, or barning? If that's a word. I just made it a word. It's barning. >> Jerry Apps, who's like one of the world's most renowned historians and experts on barns, is in the film and talks a little bit about this. It's really part of why the Driftless Region, where Viroqua sits and Hillsboro sits, has captured sort of the imagination of much of Wisconsin. It is so geographically different. That's why the barns themselves are different. They fit into this sort of Midwestern mountain landscape that the Driftless Region presents. There's actually an interview where one of the sort of founding families talks about actually hearing from Alga Shivers who was the architect of all these barns. He tells them why he made these round barns. It was because you didn't have to clean out the corners. There's a lot of other people speculating about why, but right from the person who built them. It was because there was this efficiency. >> Well, good luck at the festival. I hope you have a great screening. I appreciate you being here. >> Thank you very much. >> You're welcome. Next a film about a man who returns home to help his ailing mother and confront his fractured relationships.
knocking
>> Mom. It's Ben.
woman coughs from behind door
>> That was a clip from Sabbatical, and this is the film's director, Brandon Colvin. Brandon, thanks for being here. >> Thanks for having me. >> You're welcome. Okay, so tell us about your film and what is going on in that clip. >> Sure, so the film is called Sabbatical. It's about a middle-aged college professor who is sort of estranged from his family. He is due for a sabbatical to finish a book. But just before that happens, his mother falls ill. So he elects to return home and care for her. So, when he comes back home, it's sort of this confrontation with a lot of problems that he's pushed to the side in his life. So it's sort of about the family dynamics and the relationships he's had, and how they festered, in a way. As for that clip, that's him. That's actually a shot that gets returned to in a very patterned way throughout the film. So, in that scene, it's sort of him establishing his domain that he's going to occupy. And specifically the frame that we're going to return to throughout the film. >> Okay. I'm guessing, after reading about it, that this is somewhat autobiographical, maybe? >> Sort of, yeah. I always tell people it's like an autobiographical prognostication of misery. >> That'll look great on the video box. >> Yeah, but the film sort of actually started from a screening at the Wisconsin Film Festival that I saw in 2011 of an experimental film called Pitcher of Colored Light by Robert Beavers. It's sort of this portrait of his elderly mother in the home that they grew up in. I saw the film and started thinking about my own family and my own mother's aging, and sort of thinking about like what that might be like many years from now. And sort of, this was the darkest timeline, so to speak. It was sort of like, what would happen if every rift that exists between me and my family was pushed apart even further, and like, what kind of difficulties would that present. >> So, you teach film. >> Yeah. >> And now you've made a film. Talk about how those two complement each other, and which is more challenging. >> I think making a film is definitely more challenging. Teaching, I think it's enhanced by making films, because the classes I teach are film production classes. I think, you know, one of the problems that often happens in film production classes is you get people teaching them who aren't really active filmmakers. And there's this sort of like, disengagement, or like getting set in your ways. I think making films all the time, and the fact that because I'm making films I'm interacting with a lot of filmmakers, means that when I talk to the students, I'm bringing a context that they might not get in other situations. So that's always really exciting. >> It seems like too, you could tap into your students to help you on a film. >> Oh, totally. >> Is that a good way to get cheap labor? >> Yeah, definitely. I mean, a lot of them have no experience outside of class, so I'm sort of the person who, if they're applying for a job, would be writing a recommendation letter. So in a lot of situations, I know who the best students are, and they want to work on something, so I completely trust them because I know them. So it's a great way to sort of exchange their like, you know, we'll get you out of the classroom and onto a real film set and see if you like it, and what's going on, that kind of thing. >> See and hold a boom mic. >> Yeah, exactly. >> So you're in the Wisconsin Film Festival and you live in Madison. Talk about, that's got to be kind of exciting, huh? >> Yeah, it's really exciting. The only down side is that because the Wisconsin Film Festival is my home festival, you know, I look forward to seeing all these movies all the time, and when you have a film in the festival, there's not enough time to see movies. But it's a trade-off I'll gladly take. You know, I was going down the festival list and there's like over a dozen films I wanted to see. And I was just like, oh, man, you know? >> Wait for video. >> Yeah, exactly. >> Well good luck, it's great having you here. >> Thank you. >> We'll talk with more Wisconsin filmmakers in just a moment. But first, an unflinching vision of the Mexican drug war, a physicist conflict over the creation of a nuclear bomb, a documentary about the roles we take on and the ones we construct for ourselves in an unpredictable Italian classic film. >> It's always much more fun to see something fly than to just scribble on paper. So, on Saturday mornings, we would go out to Point Loma, which was a Navy test stand where they used to test Navy rockets. We flew our little flying models over our spaceship there. So the thing would just go, bang, bang, bang, bang, like that, up in the sky. >> It was sort of like building model airplanes, carried to, you know, a very high degree. What's astonishing was is that they were allowed to play free with that much explosive. They were allowed to have 400 pounds of C4. >> That was fun. And of course, we were quite reckless with who was carrying explosives around, and not particularly-- not being particularly careful. It was amazing nobody ever got hurt. The first ship, of course, would have had a lot more bombs. They would've been nuclear, and it would've been a much more complicated operation. But this gave us a feeling that at least we knew how to make a few bombs go off correctly. >> I was thinking the other day about that scene, where I say I'm a Type A. And I tend to break things. It just occurred to me, it wasn't just the character. It's me. I tend to break things. >> The Wisconsin Film Festival takes place in Madison from April 3-10. With over 150 films to choose from, it is a movie heaven. The festival attracts more than 30,000 movie goers that watch films on several screens around Madison. Go to the 2014 Wisconsin Film Festival website and start picking your movies right now. Or, after the show. We've got more directors and more movies coming your way. Here's a clip from the short film where a photographer shows Mongolian children the possibilities of photography.
indistinct chatter
>> Yeah, that's right. >> Put your coat there. Okay, are you ready to take a picture?
children giggling
The most important piece of the entire project is the tiny, little 2" x 1" remote control. That is the essential magic wand that makes the self project possible. >> That was a clip from Water, Ice, Snow. We're joined by the film's producer, Jeffrey Kurz. Thanks for being here, Jeffrey. >> Thank you for having me. >> I hope after the winter we've had that the title of that film does not keep film goers away from your screening. >> I hope not! That's the-- Here in this country, we have "rock, paper, scissors." That is the Mongolian version of rock, paper, scissors, "water, ice, snow." It's very existential. >> Wow, it is. That's a great title. So tell us about your film. >> Sasha Sicurella is an artist and an arts educator in New York. She works with children around the world, children who are affected by poverty, or prejudice, or war. She teaches them the art of self-portraiture photography. It's an exercise for them in learning self respect and self worth, empowering. She allows them to see the world, themselves, and the people around them in a completely different way. We read about her in the Wall Street Journal last spring. And my producing partner in New York, Jack Turner, called me up and said we've got to make a movie about this woman, and she's going to Mongolia. So we sent the director, Karim Rauol, with her. He followed her around for eight days. They shot the film. My producorial role up to that point was just wiring them money in Mongolia. But once they got back to the United States, we went through many different cuts of the film and arrived at this version. >> So you're in Wisconsin, right? >> I'm based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. >> What is that like? You're a producer who's being kind of geographically challenged. How does that affect making films for a worldwide audience? >> You know, well, it's getting easier. Technology has made the world a very small place. I have a producing partner in New York and another one in London. Between Skype and email, it's really much easier to function. I lived in Los Angeles for ten years. I was an executive at a studio there. I like living in Wisconsin, but my work often takes me outside of it. I feel, as a producer, living in Wisconsin-- Any producer living in Wisconsin, you have to be making films for audiences on a national or international level. You can't just make films for, you know, your friends and family, or people in Wisconsin. You're going to be seeing more and more of that. It's already happening. There are other producers living in Wisconsin who are making films on a much more international level. >> It's interesting, what you said, because I relocated from Los Angeles, too, after 14 years. What I like about being here is there are no distractions. It's like, you really can stay focused on your work. Have you had that same experience? >> Oh, absolutely. When you're someplace like Los Angeles or New York, you're always paying attention to what everybody else is doing. >> Yeah, exactly. >> And, am I not doing enough? Here, you don't really have that same kind of level of self-competition, and consequently, you can get a lot more work done and you can be more creative. >> We have about 30 seconds left here, and I want to ask you, this is a question I have for a lot of people who make short films. How do you decide? Your film is 16 minutes? >> Yes. >> How do you decide this film is going to be 16 minutes? Or, do you start off going, it's going to be 30 minutes? How do you get to that point? >> That's a very good question. I think that it's really about how long does it take you to tell the story. I produced three movies last year. One of them is a short that's actually going to be 35 minutes. You know, that's not a great length for film festivals, but we needed that much time to tell the story. >> Good luck with the screening. Thanks for being here. >> Thank you. >> Next, a fiction documentary charting the complex relationship between an aging motorcycle club leader and his 20-something girlfriend. >> There's a lot of people like Whitley in this world. A lot of people need to be taken care of.
motorcycle engines roaring
>> It's like playing a game of poker. You play the cards that you're given. If you've got four aces and a king, you've got it made. It seems like I always get two, threes, fives, seven, nine. So, it's a piece of ###, so you have to deal with what you've got. You get dealt a hand, and that's the hand you live. >> Now the game has changed a little. But I'm on my own. I don't know anything else. I didn't finish high school. This is who I am. >> I told her she could ride on Number One's bike, if she so chose, and she chose to do that. Now, it's just a matter of me cultivating her into the lifestyle, which we did. >> Hey, baby. >> Hello! >> You ready? >> Uh-huh. >> Okay. Love. It's different for everybody. There's no true definition for it. You ask me if I've ever been? I don't think so.
car doors close
engine starts
Love is something that's permanent. I don't see anything permanent in my life. ...On my radio Let the air waves flow The air waves flow >> That was from the film, Shooter and Whitley. Joining us now is the film's director, Laura Stewart. Hi, Laura. >> Hi. >> So tell us about your film. It's a great clip, with some kind of cool music. It almost looks noir-ish. >> Maybe a little bit. >> I've heard the words, when I was researching the film, "fiction," "narrative," "fantasy," and "documentary." How can all those words describe one film? >> Well, I look at the film like it was a collaboration between myself and Shooter and Whitley, and another woman. She's not in the clip that you have, but her name is Lisa, also known as Speedy. She plays a little bit of the older version of Whitley, 20 years down the line, living in a motorcycle club scene as a woman. I wanted this umbrella of a narrative, where underneath that I could bring in elements of documentary. Working with the three of them and myself, and also the cinematographer, we started to pull out elements of the story. We made it up as we went along. We never used-- >> Wow. >> At first, I had an idea of the script and we scripted a film, and it would never happen. Either Shooter wouldn't want to do something, he's like, okay, this isn't really how this would happen, or Whitley would want to do something different. After a while, I realized if I just let it go, and we all worked together, the footage would be much better than anything I'd come up with on my own. >> It must be kind of terrifying though. >> Terrifying, yes. >> Is that how you like to work? Like, let's see what we get here? >> It was the most fun I've ever had working on a project. So there was, yeah, that element of control I had to give up to do it. >> Yeah, were they willing participants? It's kind of an interesting relationship. Were they totally open and uninhibited by everything? >> Yeah, I could not have done anything like this without their full participation. They would show up and give their all every time we'd film. Sometimes I'd go months without filming, because I wanted a certain look on the 16. I wanted this lushness and this luminosity that you can really only get certain months out of the year in Wisconsin. And I was getting my MFA at the time, too, in Chicago, so sometimes we went a couple months without filming, and then to jump back into it, you know, would be, but they'd always be up for the challenge. Yeah, I just had a really good time with them, working on this. >> That was interesting. I read that you decided to shoot on 16mm. That's pretty rare now. How did you come to that decision? >> I had started film school at UC Boulder. And Phil Solomon was my production teacher. I know he showed some films here, I believe last year at the festival. His 16 work, always I find breathtakingly beautiful. I also have Kurt Kren's old 16mm, one of his old 16mm cameras. There's something about the look of 16. I'm a huge fan of the '70s biker flicks. >> You can definitely see that in this, yeah. >> Yeah, California cycle chicks, I watched that on CD when I was 15, with my mom and sister. I never forgot it. It's terrible. It's about this band of chicks who take their motorcycles and ride out to California. But it made a lasting impression, so part of this is a take on the '70s biker films. Also, I'm a big Kenneth Anger, Scorpio Rising, fan. >> Okay. So, have you seen the movie with an audience yet? >> I showed it at the Siskel when I finished my thesis, which was mostly Art Institute people. This will be the first time it's playing to a general audience. I'm pretty excited about that. >> We have about 30 seconds. What's the biggest challenge to going this route? And what would you say your film is, what genre would you put it in? >> Well, working on a documentary, I think there's never a true documentary. You get close to the people you film, and things happen where you have to decide, am I going to include this, even though I may jeopardize my relationship with this, with the narrative and documentary. It gives me the freedom and the actors the freedom to really bring out the story and make it go in directions that perhaps would be more complicated to do otherwise. So, the challenge for me, really, that was the most exciting part in a lot of ways. >> Well said. Thanks for being here. Good luck at the festival. >> My pleasure. >> Next, a beautiful film looking at the creation of traditional Indian saris in urban life. [clanging and sounds of working the loom] >> That was a scene from Strings of Color. Joining us now is the film's director, Sharan Mohanadoss. Thanks for being here. >> Thanks for having me. >> Really interesting. I understand a sari is being made there, but tell us more about your film. >> Actually, this is part of my senior thesis for my final year, for the BFA program at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. I decided to go to India to shoot a movie, actually on child labor. But I couldn't find any child labor, because it's secretly done. It's no longer visible. So, I had to come up with something that would work out for a thesis. So my aunt and my mom came up with the idea of why not go down to our village, you know, we have our own village that we come from. We could go down and shoot, you know, the traditional making of saris. So that's how this whole process of making this film came in. >> Yeah, wow. So, I noticed in your credits, you had a lot of American names. Did you bring a whole crew? >> No, it was all done by myself. It was just me. I had some device on a tripod. It was just me shooting. Because the whole, the easiest way for me to capture all these different angles were because the process was being done in every single house. It was like a big block with huts and mid-sized houses. So I could go to their house, each house, and they were doing a different step of making the sari. So it was easier for me to get these from different angles, and whatnot. It was easy to get a lot of coverage. >> So, and this is my next question for you, as another short film question. How much do you shoot? How much coverage do you get, and have to weed through to get a ten-minute short film? >> Well, I shot this entire project in 48 hours. I was there for almost 12 hours each day. So all the process that you see indoors was done in 12 hours. Then all the process that you see outside is done in six hours. >> Okay. >> It was in that much. >> The editing process took longer. >> It took almost like three or four months. It took a while, yeah. >> So, from southern India to Milwaukee. Where do you see yourself? Do you want to stay here and make films, or do you want to go back there and make films? >> I'd like to stay a bit over here and gain some more experience in the field of film, maybe go and do my masters, grad school, and then head back to India, and hopefully make Bollywood movies. Not traditional, but something different. >> Or your child labor, maybe you'll get some more. >> Hopefully. >> It must be great when you're in film school, because there are probably a lot of people that want to help you, just for the experience. Talk a little bit about that. Was there a very collaborative effort? >> There's a lot of collaborative effort. And also, you are left independently to make movies by yourself, so that gives a lot of space for you to think, who you are as a filmmaker. It kind of also lets you discover your style of shooting, what you really want to do, and stuff like that. >> And then you get asked, probably, to help in theirs. >> Probably help with other people's. No, we definitely have always been there to help a lot of other people make their narrative stories. I think narratives stories are always the ones that you need a lot of people to help out, and a large crew. >> We have about 30 seconds. What was the biggest challenge making this film? >> I've never seen this process before. It was the first time. So, just going there and seeing it for a few seconds and then to start shooting it was just a huge challenge. I wasn't too sure what I was doing, myself. But you know, the end result was, you know, totally colorful. >> Oh, absolutely. And people were receptive and very helpful. >> Yep. >> That's good. Good luck with the thesis and at the film festival. That's exciting. Thanks for being here. >> Thank you. >> Thanks to all the filmmakers who joined us for this preview. Here's a final grouping of film clips. Acclaimed director, Jacques Demy's first feature film; a vision of consumerist overload; and a lyrical and openhearted documentary of small-town America.
speaking French
singing in French
singing in French
singing in French
>> People think that we're poor. I don't care. But the definition of poor is no roof, no lights, no water, no food. We have lights. We have water. We have a roof. We have food. We have money. We're not poor. I've got to show you all my battle scars from this. That's how you can tell if someone's good. >> I was thinkin' about movin' to China. Movin' to China and becoming an art teacher. >> Right now, my mom's in prison. She's been in since July. So, about nine months. A letter to my mom.
laughter
>> The most important thing for you is your education. >> The most important thing for me is my family. That's all I need.
train whistle blows
>> Trick or treat. I guess God brought me back here for a reason. >> I really do love my mom, and my dad, and my sister. I've been praying since I was about five years old. Nothing's came. But that ain't gonna stop me. This is what goes through my mind. God has to be busy with everyone else. Eventually, he will come into my life and help me. I hope that happens. It's gonna break my heart if it don't. >> We are back with the lovely and talented Jim Healy to wrap things up. Jim, so, great films it looks like this year, as always. But what excites you the most about this? You've seen probably thousands of films. >> Yeah. >> How do you excited every one? What is it about this year that most excites you? >> Well, like any year, every year, when we're looking at films and we're scouting films for the festival, we'll watch them on DVDs on our computers, on our television sets, or even if we go to other film festivals, a lot of time, we're watching movies with other programmers, other industry people, film critics. That's not the same as a regular audience. So what excites me the most is being in a packed theater, watching Sabbatical, and Shooter and Whitley, and Water, Ice, Snow, and any of the films featured on this program with an audience. Good films really come alive with an audience. >> It's all about watching in a theater, I agree. Thanks for being here, Jim. Good luck this year. >> Thank you very much. >> Thanks to all the filmmakers who joined me today, and thank you for watching Director's Cut. For more information on the Wisconsin Film Festival, go to wpt.org and click on "Director's Cut." Also, don't forget that the new season of Director's Cut, our seventh, premieres April 11. We hope to see you then. >> My name is Margaret Hue. My favorite color is salmon. I would very much like to be chosen for the expedition to Mars, please.
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