NOW Magazine
Questlove to give keynote talk at Hot Docs 2021
The musician-turned-filmmaker will chat with NOW culture editor Radheyan Simonpillai about his music doc Summer Of Soul By Kevin Ritchie
Michael Baca
Musician-turned-filmmaker Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson will close out this year’s Hot Docs Film Festival with a keynote conversation with NOW Magazine culture editor Radheyan Simonpillai.
The Roots main man and drummer’s Sundance Grand Jury Prize-winning film Summer Of Soul (… Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised) debuts at the festival on Wednesday.
The documentary recounts the overlooked Harlem Cultural Festival from 1969, dubbed the “Black Woodstock” thanks to an epic lineup that included Nina Simone, Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight & The Pips, Sly and the Family Stone, Mahalia Jackson and many more artists that defined that era of Black American music. (Read our 5N-review of the film here.)
The Rossellinis Review: An Outsider s Inside View of a Dysfunctional Celebrity Dynasty The Rossellinis Review: An Outsider s Inside View of a Dysfunctional Celebrity Dynasty
Alessandro Rossellini, grandson of legendary auteur Roberto, attempts to gather his extended family for an indulgent but interesting exercise in documentary therapy.
Guy Lodge, provided by
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Director: Alessandro Rossellini
With: Alessandro Rossellini, Isabella Rossellini, Renzo Rossellini, Robin Rossellini, Ingrid Rossellini, Gil Rossellini, Nur Rossellini, Katherine Cohen, Elettra Wiedemann. (English, Italian, French dialogue)
Running time: Running time: 99 MIN.
Courtesy of B&B Film
“I think you have to go back to therapy. It wasn’t enough,” says Isabella Rossellini, drily and only somewhat jokingly, to her nephew Alessandro, as he interviews her on some hard family truths. The documentary he’s making
The Last Shelter Review: Scenes From a Rest-Stop on a Migrant Route Across Africa The Last Shelter Review: Scenes From a Rest-Stop on a Migrant Route Across Africa
An arresting, artful, fragmentary portrait of a place of temporary refuge for migrants crossing Africa in pursuit of modest dreams.
Jessica Kiang, provided by
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Running time: Running time: 86 MIN.
Courtesy of CPH:DOX
Caritas Migrant House sits where the semi-arid Sahel region gives way to the Sahara Desert, on the edge of the urban sprawl of Gao, a town of more than 85,000 inhabitants in the landlocked West African nation of Mali. But as the location of Ousmane Samassékou’s unobtrusively observant “The Last Shelter,” the refuge can feel far removed from such grounded realities. With a steady stream of travelers passing briefly through, as much as the house is brick and mortar, it is also a metaphor, for a kind of mid-flight mental state. On the edge of the middle of nowhere, at the ver
A.rtificial I.mmortality Review: Surveying New Technologies to Cheat Death
Ann Shin s documentary looks at emerging AI means of preserving the self, particularly her own.
Dennis Harvey, provided by
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Courtesy of Hot Docs
“A.rtificial I.mmortality” provides a diverting if superficial survey of how fast-evolving technology might be able to extend our lives or at least some of our memories and characteristics. Featured as Hot Docs’ opening night selection, this Canadian documentary from director Ann Shin presents once-fantastical ideas now edging toward reality in a form palatable to broadcast viewers looking more for casual entertainment value than weighty investigation. But the film is weakened by its gratuitously first-person perspective, chosen for no obvious reason beyond the director evidently wanting to “star” in her own movie.