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| Tribeca Festival Artistic Director Frédéric Boyer with Anne-Katrin Titze on David Verbeek’s The Wolf, the Fox and the Leopard and Naomi Kawase (whose short “Seed” is featured in Miu Miu Tales & Tellers “Extraordinary! One of my favorites … It’s a pure ambitious utopian film.” |
In the first instalment of my annual conversation with artistic director Frédéric Boyer, we touch upon some of the highlights in the 24th edition of the Tribeca Festival. In Viewpoints there’s Mihal Brezis and Oded Binnun’s witty Dead Language (with Sarah Adler, Ulrich Thomsen, Yehezkel Lazarov, Lars Eidinger), in the Spotlight program Matt Tyrnauer’s Nobu on chef Nobu Matsuhisa (with Robert De Niro, Cindy Crawford, Wolfgang Puck, Jean-Georges Vongerichten), and in Spotlight Documentary Ebs Burnough's Kerouac's Road: The Beat Of A Nation (Michael Imperioli, Josh Brolin, Matt Dillon, Natalie Merchant, Ann Charters, David Amram, Jay McInerney, Kim Jones, Joyce Johnson). Susan Lacy and Jessica Levin’s two-part documentary Billy Joel: And So It Goes is the Opening Night Gala selection.
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| Aviad (Yehezkel Lazarov) and Aya (Sarah Adler) dancing to Depeche Mode’s Enjoy The Silence (imported by Ed Bahlman for the US) in Dead Language Photo: Tribeca Festival |
The British bands Culture Club and Depeche Mode (first heard in the United States at music producer and 99 Records founder Ed Bahlman’s shop 99 in NYC) are featured in Alison Ellwood’s Boy George & Culture Club (George O'Dowd, Jon Moss, Mikey Craig, Roy Hay) and Fernando Frías’s Depeche Mode: M (Dave Gahan, Martin Gore), plus Christine Turner’s Sun Ra: Do The Impossible and Jonas Åkerlund’s Metallica Saved My Life (Metallica, Jason Momoa, Tony Hawk, Metallica fans) are music documentaries for the fans.
In the International Narrative Competition there is David Verbeek’s animalistic The Wolf, The Fox & The Leopard (Jessica Reynolds, Nicholas Pinnock, Marie Jung, Naomi Kawase, Lucas Lynggaard Tønnesen) and in Spotlight Narrative: Jim Sheridan and David Merriman’s dubious Re-Creation (Vicky Krieps, Jim Sheridan, Aidan Gillen, Colm Meaney) and Christian Nilsson’s Westhampton (Finn Wittrock, RJ Mitte, Jake Weary, Amy Forsyth, Tovah Feldshuh, Dan Lauria).
And in Spotlight Documentary: Brandon Kramer’s Holding Liat (Liat Beinin Atzili, Yehuda Beinin, Chaya Beinin, Tal Beinin, Netta Atzili, Joel Beinin, produced by Darren Aronofsky); Paco Plaza’s Mugaritz: No Bread, No Dessert (Andoni Luis Aduriz); Cecilia Aldarondo, Alice Gu, and Salima Koroma’s Dear Ms.:The Revolution in Print (Gloria Steinem, Patricia Carbine, Letty Cottin Pogrebin, Lindsy Van Gelder, Marcia Ann Gillespie, Susanne Braun Levine) round out some of the early highlights we discussed.
From New York City, before the Cannes Film Festival, Frédéric Boyer joined me on Zoom for an in-depth conversation on this year’s Tribeca Festival.
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| Alison Ellwood’s Boy George & Culture Club - Fernando Frías’s Depeche Mode: M Photo: Alison Ellwood and Fernando Frías |
Anne-Katrin Titze: Good morning!
Frédéric Boyer: Hello! Good to see you again. This is a tradition, for so many years!
AKT: Yes it is, before Cannes! Are you putting the final touches on Tribeca?
FB: Yes, we invited the films, which is good. We're going to announce things. There's a new film in the international section, called Dead Language. It's an Israeli film with Lars Eidinger. You know the German actor?
AKT: Yes, of course. He’s very good in a lot of very different things.
FB: I really like this guy. I think it’s pretty good, this film, called Dead Language, very interesting. You're going to see, there's a lot of surprise. It doesn't look like an Israeli film. But yes, no, it's more and more difficult to have access to films before Cannes. After Sundance for the Americans, it's super difficult to find really high level quality films. For the International it's still good. And this year I think the quality is good. We have 12 films. And then the Spotlight. There's a lot. And docs. They are fine. There's an American film which is produced by Darren Aronofsky, it is called Holding Liat. This film is about the attack of October 7th and it's a focus on the family who is checking on the whereabouts of the daughter who was kidnapped. It's really well done. And it's an American film. It's not Israeli, but this one is quite solid and a world première.
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| Mother (Marie Jung), One (Jessica Reynolds), and Father (Nicholas Pinnock) in David Verbeek’s The Wolf, The Fox And The Leopard |
AKT: You brought up Lars Eidinger. Reiner Holzemer, who made a documentary on Lars Eidinger [Lars Eidinger - To Be or Not To Be, also Thom Browne: The Man Who Tailors Dreams] also has a film in your program on Akris, the Swiss fashion house, it's called Akris - Fashion with a Heritage. I’m not sure which strand it is in [since our conversation added to Tribeca X on June 9].
FB: I'm going to check on this one. It's just the thing that we are so used to play documentaries which are just archival footage and interviews. It's going to be fine, a lot of documentaries about music, musicians and things. There's a film that I think is very interesting. It's a new film by Jim Sheridan (My Left Foot, In The Name of the Father) and David Merriman, called Re-Creation. So being French, of course, I'm very interested because it's about the murder of the wife of Daniel Toscan du Plantier, who was a huge producer, producer of Polanski, well-known, controversial.
AKT: Yes, yes, I know about the case.
FB: Yes, in Ireland, so it's extremely well done for a topic nobody knows. The topic the programmers don't even know, and they were fascinated by the film and the filmmaking.
AKT: Vicky Krieps is playing a part, isn’t she?
FB: Yes, exactly. She's in it.
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| Anne-Katrin Titze (in Miu Miu jacket) at Tales & Tellers, featuring Naomi Kawase’s short Seed in Miu Miu’s Women’s Tales |
AKT: I noticed it, because I know about the case. I've seen a documentary series [Sophie: A Murder in West Cork, directed by Jim Sheridan] and news reports.
FB: Yes, it's a case that's not resolved. It’s made with passion, and it's really very interesting. I don't know why, I really enjoyed watching the film.
AKT: I saw that there is Nobu. Matt Tyrnauer’s take on things is always smart.
FB: Exactly. Nobu. Next year, I'm sure we will have, I hope, a section dedicated to food, food and wine and food and film. Because I think it's a fantastic topic, because you can have docs, but also fictions. And we have also another film which opened the culinary section in San Sebastian, called Mugaritz [Mugaritz: No Bread, No Dessert]. And I went to Mugaritz with Sarah, my girlfriend. We went in San Sebastian. It's another type of restaurant. It's totally unique, because you don't have bread. No dessert. You don't have a fork. You don't have a knife, you don't have a plate, you have nothing. And it's totally extraordinary. So we're going to have probably a talk between Andoni [Luis Aduriz], the chef from Mugaritz and the guy from Nobu [Nobu Matsuhisa]. So maybe we'll do that. Let's see what happens.
AKT: What about Kerouac's Road: The Beat of a Nation by Ebs Burnough?
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| Ebs Burnough's Kerouac's Road: The Beat Of A Nation |
FB: Yes, this is great. Yeah, it's fantastic, Kerouac’s Road. Also, there's two films about artists which are super good. One is about Andy Kaufman. We had one film about him, Andy Kaufman Is Me, we played some years ago, but I think it's always interesting. And the other one, I think it's something for people who love jazz. In a way, it's a documentary about Sun Ra, Sun Ra: Do The Impossible. We received two docs about Sun Ra, one French, and this one. It’s a kind of introspection. Of course Sun Ra is a master of the universe, and a really interesting character. I know the saxophonist of the Sun Ra is 101 years old, and he was playing two weeks ago in Brooklyn.
AKT: I saw Sun Ra and His Arkestra last summer in Central Park with Kim Gordon!
FB: No!
AKT: Yes, Kim Gordon had a concert, and they were performing before her.
FB: Whoa! So it's gonna be good. And we're gonna have a cocktail or something. So this is pretty cool.
AKT: And some films as always are probably fine if people are interested in the subject. Dear Ms.: The Revolution In Print about the magazine?
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| Music producer/99 Records founder Ed Bahlman with chef/owner Jay Kumar of Lore Photo: Anne Katrin Titze |
FB: Yes, yes, yes, it's fine. Of course there's always an interest. No, no, this is well done for what it is. Of course this type is exactly what you find in Tribeca. But it's super well done. No problem.
AKT: If people are interested in Culture Club, there’s one for them.
FB: Absolutely, Boy George & Culture Club exactly the same, and they're going to be there. So it's cool. Depeche Mode, I didn't see it. They're coming, but they're not performing. The Linda Lindas, they are performing. Everybody's going to be so crazy to have a ticket. [On another music film] I don't know why I'm not fond of it. I have respect about the band, it's called Metallica Saved My Life. It's a film, not about Metallica, but about the fans of Metallica from the Nineties, so now they are 65, 70 years old, and you follow them following them. So there is a kind of a friendship and finally, they're coming.
AKT: Westhampton with Finn Wittrock?
FB: Yes, yes, I know they love it. Yes, it's a film about a Sundance girl making a film. I don't know what to say. No, it's fine. It's watchable for people who want to watch this. I'm not against it.
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| Chef Nobu Matsuhisa in Matt Tyrnauer’s Nobu |
AKT: There's one where the title struck me. The Wolf, the Fox & the Leopard.
FB: Extraordinary! One of my favorites! This is a Dutch film. This is by a really nice guy. I was thinking, wow, the film could have been in Cannes or Venice, I don't know. His name is David Verbeek, and I know him, and I met him again in Rotterdam. By the way, he had also an installation. But this film is really interesting because the film starts as a film directed by Naomi Kawase in the forest. And the voiceover is Naomi Kawase and Naomi Kawase is playing a role in it [as Tanaka]. But then there's another thing behind this, but I think it's really interesting to know absolutely nothing about the film. It’s a pure ambitious utopian film. I don't know if they are revealing much in the synopsis? Are they revealing something?
AKT: Not much, no, no.
FB: Nothing.
AKT: Not from what I can tell.
FB: Yeah, without spoiling, there in the center of the story is the education of a young girl who was raised by wolves. That's exactly the same topic of François Truffaut.
AKT: Yes, The Wild Child, his Kaspar Hauser story.
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| Tom (Finn Wittrock) in Westhampton |
FB: This is exactly this type of how to educate, re-educate. What can we do with these people? So the film is made with chapters, super solid, super ambitious. I even told them the film should be screened in IMAX, because of the sound. By the way, in Cannes there is a film from the Netherlands which is at Critics’ Week. So we have to check a little bit what's happening in this country. Because they didn't have cinema except Paul Verhoeven, Alex von Van Warmerdam, and a few others. But now, since five years, you see, there's so much talent, and people are starting to make really good films, like the Flemish started to do good films ten years ago. Now it's the turn of the Dutch, and they are doing really good cinema.
AKT: You’ve had great food films in the past in Tribeca. Chef Mauro Colagreco, for instance, on Mirazur.
FB: Mauro, yes, it was fantastic.
AKT: He was a great interview and invited me to Mirazur.
FB: Yes, and me, too, and now Chef Andoni is coming. But if you read about Mugarit, it's totally different. So he has two stars. He cannot have access to three stars, because what he's doing is he's opening his restaurant, then he is thinking six months, cooking six months. It's closed for six months. So you are just philosophical? It's an experience totally unique. And I'm used to go to very good restaurants. But this - if you read about this, some people hate it, and some people love it. So I love it. But people say, Wow! How come? It's not molecular cuisine at all. It's something totally different. It's really something.
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| Linda Linda Linda 20th Anniversary - 4k Remaster directed by Nobuhiro Yamashita |
AKT: In the Pan Nalin film [The Last Film Show, also in Tribeca], which was fiction from a few years ago, the featured food was extraordinarily beautiful.
FB: Yes, exactly!
AKT: That would be a great new section for Tribeca. I hope you’ll get there.
FB: I think it will be a great section. We need to have five or six things, and Mugaritz is much more philosophical because he's talking a lot, but I think it's interesting.
AKT: Oh, by the way, a restaurant that I just tried out last weekend in Brooklyn, called Lore, is great!
FB: How do you spell it?
AKT: LORE. Chef/owner Jay Kumar is from India, and he cooked in Switzerland for many years, and had restaurants in Basel.
FB: Oh! I will go, maybe this weekend, thank you.
AKT: Your opening night at Tribeca is Billy Joel: And So It Goes.
FB: Yes, I didn't see the film, but I will be there, and I will see you.
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| Susan Lacy and Jessica Levin’s Billy Joel: And So It Goes is the Opening Night Gala selection of the Tribeca Festival |
AKT: Maybe. You're on your way to Cannes soon?
FB: Yes, I will be in Cannes the 13th, and let's see what happens. There's a lot of films! And I will see you soon, and if you need any ticket or anything, please let me know.
AKT: Will do! See you soon!
FB: Ciao. Bye-bye.
Coming up - More with Frédéric Boyer on some of the highlights of the 2025 Tribeca Festival.
The 24th edition of the Tribeca Festival runs from Wednesday, June 4 through Sunday, June 15.
