Interviews

It is never too late to find your true passion. This is what Iona Morris Jackson found out when she got the opportunity to direct.

In 2002, director Gaspar Noé’s Irreversible created controversy in every big festival where it was screened - first in Cannes where it competed for the Palm d'Or, then in Toronto, and finally in Sundance. By the time it was released in US theaters in March 2003, almost 20 years ago, audiences were eager to see it because of a 9-minute scene with Monica Bellucci that tested the limits of tolerance by illustrating with unusual cruelty how sexual violence destroys lives.

Not rain, sleet or snow could stop our intrepid HFPA members, Yong Chavez and Miriam Spritzer, from attending the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah last week and hitting all the buzzed-about screenings. We quiz the journalists about the vibe, the packed cinemas and great Q&A, and, of course, what they thought of the movies that everyone else was talking about, including: Eileen (Anne Hathaway), Theatre Camp, Magazine Dreams (Jonathan Majors), Past Lives, Shortcomings and You Hurt My Feelings (Julia Louis-Dreyfus).

The documentary Invisible Beauty tells the story of Bethann Hardison, a fashion revolutionary who has been on the front lines of racial justice in her industry for over five decades. Through her life journey as a pioneering Black model, modeling agent and activist, the film explores race, beauty, and representation.

Phumi Tau, formerly Mthembu, is one of the HFPA’s and Film Independent’s Residency Recipients. The South African has produced, stars in, and co-wrote the script for African America.

First there was natural conception. Then medicine discovered artificial insemination.

Elle Márjá Eira is an artist-composer-producer-director from Kautokeino, northern Norway, who is preparing to release her debut feature, Stolen, adapted from the critically acclaimed novel of the same name by author Ann-Helén Laestadius. Based on actual events, Stolen is a coming-of-age story told from the perspective of a young Sámi girl who struggles to defend her family’s reindeer herd while grappling with xenophobic issues that face her culture.

A young man is interrogated by the father of his lover, who has disappeared without a trace during the couple’s trip to a secluded island. This is the premise of Danish director Martin Skovbjerg’s feature film Copenhagen Does Not Exist.

Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio is a dark stop-motion musical adaptation of Carlo Collodi’s “The Adventures of Pinocchio”. The book was published in 1882.