The 2015 Milwaukee Film Festival runs Thursday, September 24 through Thursday, October 8. Check out our list of 13 reasons to get excited for the fest here. If you’re looking for daily recommendations and/or when and where to stalk us, look no further.
State of Cinema keynote (noon – Kenilworth Square East)
It’s only day three, so if you’re sick of films already, you are such a lightweight. Oh, we kid because we love. But seriously, if you need a break from the darkness of the movie house, don’t waste that precious festival time—hit up a panel. And for our limited time and money (just kidding, they’re free!), your best bet is the State of Cinema keynote at noon with the Chicago Tribune’s Michael Phillips. Past speakers have included Pulitzer-prize winner Wesley Morris (then-Grantland writer, now critic-at-large for The New York Times), the staff of the (sadly) now-defunct Dissolve, and former Village Voice senior critic J. Hoberman, so you know you are in for some very well-respected, possibly high-minded musings on where the film world is at in 2015. Count us in!
Recommended if you like: reading film criticism; getting smart; finding out when that one dude in the front row is going to stop asking that way too long and self-serving question.
Güeros (7:15 p.m. – Times Cinema)
We can understand you not noticing this film in the program book at first. After all, a monochrome image of three bored-looking men in the forest can’t really compete with the gun-to-the-head Korean film still next to it. (He’s gonna die! We’re all gonna die!) But look again. This Mexican road movie set against a backdrop of the capital’s student protests in 1999 walks a fine line between mocking and celerating art-house cinema. Winner of Best First Feature when it debuted at the 2014 Berlin Film Festival, the film also cleaned up at Mexico’s Ariel Awards (Oscar-equivalent). More convincing needed? The associate producer is one Gael Garcia Bernal. If that’s not the Mexican Cinema’s stamp of approval, we don’t know what is.
Recommended if you like: Slacker; French New Wave; hot people shot in black-and-white.
Shorts: The Best Damn Fucking Midnight Program Ever. Shit. (midnight – Oriental Theatre)
If you missed the first of the midnight films yesterday, never fear. You have a chance to redeem your bad-assery tonight at everybody’s favorite nasty, scary, and potentially vomit-inducing shorts program. Short programs are one of the great joys of any film festival, as it’s increasingly hard to see them on the big screen. These days, shorts are mostly relegated to our smaller screens via YouTube, and that’s a shame, Ray, ’cause there are huge amounts of tender loving care put into these films by directors that have mastered the art of brief storytelling. Our sources tell us that “Anal Juke-Anal Juice” is (duh) the must-see short of the fest. Fuck yeah!
Recommended if you like: swearing; late-night insanity; pooping your pants.