Starring: Masataka Kubota, Nao Omori, Shota Sometani, Sakurako Konishi
The film is the prolific auteur Takashi Miike at his most fun and anarchic. A noir-tinged yakuza film blending genres in the story of a young boxer and a call girl who fall passionately in love while getting innocently caught up in a drug-smuggling scheme over the course of one night in Tokyo.
We close the 2019 Nitehawk Shorts Festival with eight short films that present stories on the intimacy of the nail salon, absurdist, dark comedies, and powerful coming-of-age stories about friendship.
Q&A WITH FILMMAKERS
PROGRAM
THE NEIGHBORS’ WINDOW
MARSHALL CURRY / U.S.A. / 2019 / DRAMA / 20 MIN
A mother of young children who’s grown frustrated with her daily routine and husband has her life shaken up when two free-spirited twenty-somethings move in across the street and she discovers that she can see into their apartment.
SEE YOU NEXT TIME
CRYSTAL KAYIZA / U.S.A. / 2019 / DOCUMENTARY / ENGLISH & MANDARIN WITH SUBTITLES / 6 MIN
See You Next Time reaches across the nail salon table to capture the intimate moments shared between a Chinese nail artist and her Black client.
PRINCESS RITA
BLAIR WATERS / U.S.A. / 2019 / DARK COMEDY / 10 MIN / NEW YORK PREMIERE
A lonely insurance adjuster becomes consumed by his desire to meet his internet girlfriend, who claims to be a princess from a faraway country.
LAYING OUT
JOANNA ARROW / U.S.A. / 2019 / COMEDY, FANTASY, DRAMA / 5 MIN
An absurd comedy about a woman who examines her relationship with a man she has just started seeing in depth, and begins to explore her own misogyny, fantasies about having a penis and hatred for traditional gender roles.
THE DISHWASHER
NICK HARTANTO & SAM RODEN / U.S.A. / 2019 / DRAMA, COMEDY / ENGLISH & SPANISH WITH SUBTITLES / 13 MIN
A chef at a fine dining restaurant in New York City asks a Mexican dishwasher to find good tortillas.
ADA
ELEANORE PIENTA / U.S.A. / 2018 / SILENT COMEDY / 16MM TO DIGITAL / 11 MIN
Ada is an unlikeable competitive walker who makes a dress out of toilet paper and has an unfortunate run-in with a hose.
NIGHT SWIM
VICTORIA RIVERA / U.S.A. / 2019 / DRAMA / 12 MIN
Three teenage girls break into a shut down pool. When uninvited guests show up, their friendship is tested and one of them is left behind.
SKIP DAY
IVETE LUCAS & PATRICK BRESNAN / U.S.A. / 2018 / DOCUMENTARY / 17 MIN
Intimate glimpses of one very special day in the lives of high-school seniors from an industrial corner of the Florida Everglades: prom’s over, the future is uncertain, and the irresistible pull of the beach makes the long-time friends drive 60 miles to chill, pose and revel in the waves.
The eight shorts in the NSF19 OPENING NITE program feature documentaries on New York communities, Brooklyn drag queens, and a firefighter’s love of cinema along with narrative stories about immigration, coming of age, sex, and self-pleasure.
Q&A WITH FILMMAKERS
PROGRAM
SYMPHONY
JAI MOSELEY / U.S.A. / 2019 / DOCUMENTARY / 4 MIN
A kaleidoscopic film of unencumbered moments between people and places, centered in feelings, memory, and experiences that are intrinsic to us all. Filmed in Harlem, Inwood, and Washington Heights, New York.
FEATHERS
A.V. ROCKWELL / U.S.A. / 2018 / DRAMA / 20 MIN
Elizier, an emotionally-dejected new enrollee at The Edward R. Mill School for Lost Boys, must overcome memories of a tragic past and the present hazing by his peers in order to tackle larger issues dominating his young life.
A LINE BIRDS CANNOT SEE
AMY BENCH / U.S.A. / 2019 / DOCUMENTARY, ANIMATION / 9 MIN / NEW YORK PREMIERE
Separated from her mother by smugglers, a determined 12-year-old sets out across a desert with only a plastic sack for cover, survives starvation on the streets of Ciudad Juarez, and escapes kidnappers to seek her mother and a place where they can be safe again.
NARMIN’S BIRTHDAY
JENNY GROZA & LYDIA CORNETT / U.S.A. / 2018 / DOCUMENTARY / 18 MIN
The story of Narmin, an Azerbaijani teenager living in Brooklyn, and her grandmother Ismat, as Narmin plans her 16th birthday party to be as “American” as possible–much to the dismay of Ismat.
MEMORY XPERIMENT: KATHY ACKER
AIDA RUILOVA / U.S.A. / 2019 / DRAMA / 16MM & VIDEO TO DIGITAL / 7 MIN / WORLD PREMIERE
A short film based on the literary work of author Kathy Acker. Set in the 70’s, the film is a coming of age story of a young female writer exploring her identity through sex and her writing.
HOW DOES IT START
AMBER SEALEY / U.S.A. / 2019 / DRAMA / 16 MIN
It’s 1983 and 12-year-old Rain wants sex, the only problem is she has no idea what that means. With her self-absorbed parents distracted by their recent divorce, Rain is left alone to navigate the complexities of love and adulthood, and learns to do it her own way.
THE MAKING OF PANTHERA
SAVANNAH O’LEARY & RENEE MAO / U.S.A. / 2019 / DOCUMENTARY / 5 MIN
Weaving cinéma vérité and choreographed drama, this short documentary follows Brooklyn-based drag queen Panthera Lush and her chameleonic friends to take a closer look at the creative process behind the ever-evolving art form of drag.
ME TIME
IYABO BOYD / U.S.A. / 2019 / COMEDY / 11 MIN
After a stressful work day, DEBORAH settles in for some intimate “me time” at home until three other aspects of her psyche appear, dredge up deep-seated inhibitions, and threaten to derail her plan.
BEST PICTURE
JAY GIAMPIETRO / U.S.A. / 2019 / DOCUMENTARY / 6 1/2 MIN
Surprises are in store for a movie-obsessed firefighter who hosts an annual Academy Awards party.
Starring: Philip Brooks, Trieste Kelly Dunn, Sarah Brooks
For married man Don Koch (Philip “CM Punk” Brooks), remodeling his new home gives him the chance to start anew while trying to overcome legal troubles and fidelity struggles. Once inside the fixer-upper, Don is helpless against the house’s goo-dripping walls, sordid history and inner demons, the latter hideously exposing those of its new owner. Utilizing the expertise acquired from producing several critically acclaimed indie horror films, including Starry Eyes and We Are Still Here, Travis Stevens makes his directorial debut with a slick and wildly entertaining haunted house movie that’s truly like no other.
A film about the love affair between Jamaican and British Youth culture told through the prism of one the most iconic record labels in history, Trojan Records. Combining archive footage, interview and drama, Rudeboy tells the story of Trojan Records by placing it at the heart of a cultural revolution that unfolded in the council estates and dance floors of late 60’s and early 70’s Britain and how that period of immigration and innovation transformed popular music and culture.
Featuring a cast of legendary artists including Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, Toots Hibbert, Ken Boothe, Neville Staple, Marcia Griffiths, Dave Barker, Dandy Livingstone, Lloyd Coxsone, Pauline Black, Derrick Morgan and more.
Starring: Miyoko Shôji, Shôzô Îzuka, Mami Koyama
Experience the gorgeous new restoration of what many believe to be Satoshi Kon’s (Perfect Blue, Paprika, Tokyo Godfathers) greatest work, Millennium Actress.
When the legendary Ginei Studios shuts down, filmmaker Genya Tachibana and his assistant are tasked with interviewing its reclusive star, Chiyoko Fujiwara, who had retired from the spotlight 30 years prior. As she recounts her career, Genya and his crew are literally pulled into her memories where they witness her chance encounter with a mysterious man on the run from the police. Despite never knowing his name or his face, Chiyoko relentlessly pursues that man in a seamless blend of reality and memory that only Satoshi Kon could deliver.
Boasting countless awards, including the Grand Prize in the Japan Agency of Cultural Affairs Media Arts Festival, which it shared with Hayao Miyazaki’s Spirited Away, Millennium Actress is a must-see for anime fans of all ages.
Starring: Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin, Zoey Deutch, Rosario Dawson, Luke Wilson, Thomas Middleditch
After a fight between Columbus and Wichita creates a deep rift in the make-shift family that causes Little Rock to leave with a strange man, the group must band together to find Little Rock and mend the family ties. Facing new kinds of zombies along the way, the group are forced to adjust their strategies until they find an incredible new zombie hunter known only as Nevada.
Starring: Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Joe Pesci, Harvey Keitel, Jesse Plemons, Bobby Cannavale, Anna Paquin, Ray Romano
This biographical crime thriller follows Frank Sheeran (Robert De Niro) as he recalls his past years working for the Bufalino crime family. Now older, the WWII veteran once again reflects on his most prolific hits and, in particular, considers his involvement with his good friend Jimmy Hoffa’s disappearance in 1975.
One of the most controversial and influential American men of the 20th Century, Roy Cohn was a ruthless and unscrupulous lawyer and political power broker whose 28-year career ranged from acting as chief counsel to Senator Joseph McCarthy’s Communist-hunting subcommittee to molding the career of a young Queens real estate developer named Donald Trump.
Where’s My Roy Cohn? tells Cohn’s story from his birth in 1927 to his death in 1986, a picaresque journey that carries us from the Depression, through the Red Scare of the 50s, to the 70s and 80s New York high life of wealth, celebrity, and Studio 54. Known for Tony Kushner’s fictionalized version of him in his Pulitzer Prize-winning play, “Angels in America,” Roy Cohn’s best known exploits include: secretly and unethically communicating with the judge to send Julius and Ethel Rosenberg to the electric chair; collaborating with Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anti-Communist witch hunt; spearheading J. Edgar Hoover and McCarthy’s crusade to hound homosexuals out of government; choreographing the New York State primary to split the vote and place Ronald Reagan in the oval office; spreading damaging stories about Geraldine Ferraro in 1984, scuttling her historic bid for the Vice Presidency; abusing the law to keep many of America’s murderous mafiosos out of jail; and looting the bank accounts of many of his legal clients.
Accessibility: Closed Captions, Assisted Listening
Starring: Roman Griffin Davis, Thomasin McKenzie, Scarlett Johansson, Taika Waititi, Rebel Wilson, Stephen Merchant, Alfie Allen, Sam Rockwell
A World War II satire that follows a lonely German boy named Jojo (Roman Griffin Davis) whose world view is turned upside down when he discovers his single mother (Scarlett Johansson) is hiding a young Jewish girl (Thomasin McKenzie) in their attic. Aided only by his idiotic imaginary friend, Adolf Hitler (Taika Waititi), Jojo must confront his blind nationalism.
