NewFest Pride 2023: Celebrating Pride Month With the Most Anticipated Queer Films of the Year5/31/2023 Review by Tatiana Miranda  New York's largest LGBTQ+ film presenter, NewFest, is kicking off Pride Month with NewFest Pride, a 5-day event full of film premieres, filmmaker Q&As, and parties. While NewFest's annual festival is in the fall, NewFest Pride is happening in early June, which allows the festival to take advantage of the spring festival circuit and the plethora of films slated to release in the summer.
NewFest Pride opens with Fairyland, a star-studded film about growing up with a gay father in 1970s and '80s San Francisco. Several other films showing take place in the '80s, including the queer coming-of-age love story Aristotle & Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. Based on the award-winning YA book of the same name, Aristotle & Dante centers around two Mexican-American teenagers as they learn about each other and themselves in return. Produced by Lin-Manuel Miranda and directed by Aitch Alberto, this film gives an honest voice to queer Hispanics. Problemista is another notable film showing at NewFest Pride from a Hispanic writer-director. Directed by and starring comedian Julio Torres, Problemista tells the story of Alejandro, a Salvadoran immigrant hoping to become a toy designer in New York City. The film also stars Tilda Swinton as an art world outcast and Alejandro's last chance to keep his work visa. Produced by A24, Problemista has recently gained a lot of buzz from its premiere at SXSW. Surreal and intensely comedic, this movie takes Julio Torres' beloved wry humor from shows like Los Espookys to a new level. Emma Seligman and Rachel Sennott's follow-up to Shiva Baby, Bottoms, was another hit at SXSW. Along with Rachel Sennott, the comedy stars The Bear's Ayo Edebiri. The two play teenagers who start a fight club in order to impress their cheerleader crushes. With Sennott and Edebiri's recent roles and work on Comedy Central's Ayo and Rachel Are Single, it's no wonder that this is one of the more anticipated movies of the festival. After the screening of Bottoms, there will also be a Women's Night Out Party, which is a chance for both filmmakers and film lovers to mingle and unpack the film. Meanwhile, other films will be followed by a discussion with their respective filmmakers. Along with the festival's live screenings at SVA Theater, NewFest Pride is hosting virtual showings for attendees to enjoy in the comfort of their own homes. Some virtual showings include 1946: The Mistranslation That Shifted Culture and Before I Change My Mind. That's just the beginning, as there are even more movies showing at NewFest Pride. From much-anticipated indie comedies to documentaries about queer history, this festival has something for everyone and is the perfect way to kick off Pride Month. NewFest Pride runs from June 1-5 in New York City.
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The Criterion Voyages (Spine #1179): TARGETS -- Bogdanovich's Underrated and Eerily Timeless Debut5/15/2023
By Sean Boelman
Targets is the directorial debut of iconic filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich (The Last Picture Show) produced by genre film extraordinaire Roger Corman. Although the movie was already pretty widely available on home media, it’s rare to see genre cinema get picked up by the Criterion Collection, so physical media collectors should be frothing at the mouth to own this new edition of an underrated masterpiece.
The film follows an aging horror star who begins to contemplate retiring, believing that the movies are no longer as scary as the real world, as a disillusioned young man begins to plan and execute a killing spree. Although these two storylines seem somewhat independent at first, the way that Bogdanovich ties them together — both narratively and thematically — is often nothing short of brilliant. Of course, given that the movie features a late-career performance by the legendary Karloff, there’s certainly a metatextual element to be found here. Yet, Bogdanovich doesn’t seem overly preoccupied with the novelty of his approach. It’s an interesting and provocative take, but Karloff just gives a damn good performance — preventing it from ever feeling gimmicky. On the other side of the film is little-known actor Tim O’Kelly, who only had 18 credits in his filmography in his short stint in Hollywood — most of which were one-off roles in television series. In fact, Targets is his sole leading role. However, O’Kelly is simply chilling in his role here, giving a performance that will rattle you to your core. 
Bogdanovich is known to be a talented director, but for this to be his debut and him to already be so accomplished is certainly impressive. This movie could effectively be a masterclass in suspense — and on a Roger Corman-sized $130k budget, the filmmaker does a lot with a little. The actual shooting sequences when they occur are absolutely terrifying.
That said, the most unsettling thing about this movie is how it still rings true, even 45 years later. Recent months have even seen an uptick in senseless violence, and the condemnation that Bogdanovich offers of the institutions that allowed our country to reach such a depressing point of desperation is just as accurate today as it was in the ‘60s. The Criterion Collection Blu-Ray of Targets boasts an impressive 2K restoration of the film supervised by the late director before he passed last year. Most of the bonus features are recycled from previous releases of the movie, with the exception of one: a new interview with filmmaker Richard Linklater. Targets is a film that might have flown under many cinephiles’ radars, but its addition to the Criterion Collection is a perfect opportunity to check out this eerily timeless thriller. Bogdanovich was truly one of the best to do it, and this debut is perfect proof of that. The Criterion Collection edition of Targets is available beginning May 16. |