VTIFF Program-Guide 2024 - Flipbook - Page 21
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FILMS A TO Z
ON BECOMING A GUINEA FOWL
Directed by Rungano Nyoni
Zambia| 2024 | Fiction | 95 min | Bemba, English w/subtitles
Sponsored by: Ravi Venkataraman
SHOWTIMES
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 27 | 12 PM | FH
Proving that her startling debut, I Am Not a Witch, was no fluke, writer/director Rungano
Nyoni’s offers On Becoming a Guinea Fowl, a brilliant and provocative film that examines
how community and tradition can clash with right and wrong. In the middle of the night,
Shula, apparently driving home from a costume party where she has dressed like Missy
Elliott, stumbles across the dead body of her uncle. As funeral proceedings begin and
deeply embedded rituals are enacted, they become increasingly at odds with revelations
about the character of the deceased. While there’s a quirky, off-center storytelling
sensibility here that’s quite exciting, On Becoming a Guinea Fowl has serious subjects on
its mind. Ultimately, Nyoni’s film is about how cruelty and injustice are woven into social
systems, and for many people the perpetuation of those systems is far more important
than those who suffer within them. Beautifully written, photographed, and acted, On
Becoming a Guinea Fowl is a big step forward for a major young African filmmaker. ~SM
ONE NIGHT AT BABES
Directed by Angelo Madsen Minax
USA | 2024 | Documentary | 30 min | English
PAINTING THE DANDELION RESURRECTION
Directed by Susan Bettmann
USA | 2024 | Documentary | 28 min | English
PAVEMENTS
Directed by Alex Ross Perry
USA | 2024 | Documentary | 128 min | English
Sponsored by: Ryan Chartier; Charles Kahn
SHOWTIMES
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 23 | 7:15 PM | BB (WITH FILMMAKERS)
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 26 | 12 PM | FH
This double feature of shorter films brings together two filmmakers living in Vermont who
made films about Vermonters in Vermont. Angelos Madsen Minax’s lovely One Night at
Babes is certainly a left-turn from Madsen’s more experimental work, but it’s a fabulous
cinematic snapshot of a town feeling its way towards positive change. At a small-town
dive bar called Babes, cribbage tournaments overlap afternoons of karaoke and nights of
raucous queer dance parties. When the aging conservative townsfolk of Bethel, Vermont,
and the younger queer leftists begin sharing the same watering hole, a delicate alliance
flourishes. Susan Bettmann’s Painting the Dandelion Resurrection trains the camera on
Vermont icon Peter Schumann, co-founder and creative force of Bread and Puppet
Theater. And basically he does what the title says—he paints. Schumann narrates in real
time as he begins and completes the painting over the course of the film’s half-hour,
offering us the rare opportunity to hang out with an artistic heavyweight. ~SM
There is an in-person Q&A with both filmmakers at the 10/23 screening.
VTIFF.ORG | VERMONT INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2024
SHOWTIMES
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 20 | 7 PM | FH
Like the other rock biopic in this year’s festival (Eno), Alex Ross Perry’s Pavements
subverts the traditional format and comes up with something that far more accurately
reflects the famed alt-rock band, which came to prominence in the ’90s. The poster
children for ironic detachment, the band clearly doesn’t take the process too seriously,
but ends up coming up with something surprisingly endearing. The film’s audacious
structure juggles four separate narrative strands: the actual band preparing for its first
concerts in 12 years; a (fake?) off-Broadway musical called Slanted! Enchanted!; a
gallery show designed to look like the Whitney Museum; and a fake biopic called Range
Life, that features actors playing the band, and Jason Schwartzman as the group’s
bumbling manager. Perry, who directed the feature Her Smell in 2018 but is
predominantly a video director, clearly loves Pavement, going so far as to call them “the
world’s most important and influential band.” Okay. Ultimately, his indirect approach
pays off in capturing the band’s spirit, its restless experimentation, and its ever-glorious
sense of humor. ~SM
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