Over the years, the Oscar for best documentary feature has provided the Academy Awards with some of the ceremony’s most contentious and divisive moments: In 1975, when the Vietnam War doc Hearts and Minds claimed the prize, producer Bert Schneider read a letter of thanks from the Viet Cong, so incensing hosts Bob Hope and Frank Sinatra that they took it upon themselves later in the broadcast to apologize “for any political references.” In 2003, while accepting his Oscar for the anti-gun doc Bowling for Columbine, Michael Moore was greeted with both cheers and boos when he cried “Shame on you, Mr. Bush” for launching the war in Iraq.
In the past couple of years, as Academy membership has grown larger and more diverse, the feature documentary results have been a lot more mellow, with crowd-pleasing choices — like the 2021 concert film Summer of Soul and the 2020 nature doc My Octopus Teacher — prevailing.
In the past couple of years, as Academy membership has grown larger and more diverse, the feature documentary results have been a lot more mellow, with crowd-pleasing choices — like the 2021 concert film Summer of Soul and the 2020 nature doc My Octopus Teacher — prevailing.
- 3/6/2023
- by Gregg Kilday
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The Levelling
Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song, Netflix, streaming now
Leonard Cohen's seminal song gets the full treatment in this documentary, which comes at the musician from it's perspective. Although not offering as deep a profile of the artist himself, Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine do succeed in charting the full evolution of his best known track. The film explores Cohen's tightrope walk between holiness and hedonism, while also indicating how he felt about the song's resurgence. Footage of the man himself late in his career is a treat.
Phantom Thread, 11.15pm, BBC2, Monday, January 30
Jennie Kermode writes: Featuring the last film performance by Daniel Day-Lewis, who announced his retirement shortly before it was released in 2018, Paul Thomas Anderson’s sumptuously presented drama has echoes of Hitchcock’s Vertigo in its portrait of a romance which hinges on the reshaping of a woman (played by Vicky Krieps) into somebody else.
Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song, Netflix, streaming now
Leonard Cohen's seminal song gets the full treatment in this documentary, which comes at the musician from it's perspective. Although not offering as deep a profile of the artist himself, Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine do succeed in charting the full evolution of his best known track. The film explores Cohen's tightrope walk between holiness and hedonism, while also indicating how he felt about the song's resurgence. Footage of the man himself late in his career is a treat.
Phantom Thread, 11.15pm, BBC2, Monday, January 30
Jennie Kermode writes: Featuring the last film performance by Daniel Day-Lewis, who announced his retirement shortly before it was released in 2018, Paul Thomas Anderson’s sumptuously presented drama has echoes of Hitchcock’s Vertigo in its portrait of a romance which hinges on the reshaping of a woman (played by Vicky Krieps) into somebody else.
- 1/30/2023
- by Amber Wilkinson
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Screen’s analysis of the 2023 Bafta Film Awards longlists, which have been unveiled following the first round of voting.
The final nominations will be announced on January 19, and the Bafta Film Awards will take place on February 19.
All Quiet On The Western Front lands with a bang
Edward Berger’s First World War drama All Quiet On The Western Front is a surprise success on the longlists, included more times than any other film (The Banshees Of Inisherin is second with 14 longlist nods). The Netflix production has been represented in every category for which it was eligible, including best film,...
The final nominations will be announced on January 19, and the Bafta Film Awards will take place on February 19.
All Quiet On The Western Front lands with a bang
Edward Berger’s First World War drama All Quiet On The Western Front is a surprise success on the longlists, included more times than any other film (The Banshees Of Inisherin is second with 14 longlist nods). The Netflix production has been represented in every category for which it was eligible, including best film,...
- 1/6/2023
- by Ben Dalton¬Charles Gant¬Orlando Parfitt¬Michael Rosser¬Mona Tabbara
- ScreenDaily
On Dec. 21, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences unveiled its shortlists for the 2023 Oscars in 10 categories, which included advancing 15 documentary features to the next round. A total of 144 documentary features this year were eligible, and those that moved on include All That Breathes, Fire of Love and Moonage Daydream.
Among the more surprising omissions was Mars Rover doc Good Night Oppy. Members of the documentary branch vote to determine the shortlist and the nominees for documentary feature as well as documentary short (15 films were shortlisted from 98 qualified shorts).
A list of the 15 documentaries on this year’s Oscars shortlist follows.
All That Breathes
Winner of the Cannes Golden Eye and Sundance Grand Jury Prize (World Cinema Documentary), All That Breathes follows two brothers in New Delhi racing to save a bird falling from the sky. Shaunak Sen directs the HBO documentary. It premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival,...
Among the more surprising omissions was Mars Rover doc Good Night Oppy. Members of the documentary branch vote to determine the shortlist and the nominees for documentary feature as well as documentary short (15 films were shortlisted from 98 qualified shorts).
A list of the 15 documentaries on this year’s Oscars shortlist follows.
All That Breathes
Winner of the Cannes Golden Eye and Sundance Grand Jury Prize (World Cinema Documentary), All That Breathes follows two brothers in New Delhi racing to save a bird falling from the sky. Shaunak Sen directs the HBO documentary. It premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival,...
- 1/5/2023
- by Beatrice Verhoeven
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Oscar contender Moonage Daydream
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) today announced the list from which the coming year's Oscar nominees will be selected. It includes All The Beauty And The Bloodshed, which has already acquired several other major award nominations - Nan Goldin, Laura Poitras, Harry Cullen and Megan Kapler - recently shared their thoughts on it - and Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song, which directors Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller discussed with us. Other nominees cover diverse issues from wildlife protection in India to the life and work of David Bowie, the attempted assassination of a Russian opposition figure and the life of the Hmong people in the remote hill country of northern Vietnam.
The full list:
All That Breathes All The Beauty And The Bloodshed Bad Axe Children Of The Mist Descendant Fire Of Love Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song...
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) today announced the list from which the coming year's Oscar nominees will be selected. It includes All The Beauty And The Bloodshed, which has already acquired several other major award nominations - Nan Goldin, Laura Poitras, Harry Cullen and Megan Kapler - recently shared their thoughts on it - and Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song, which directors Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller discussed with us. Other nominees cover diverse issues from wildlife protection in India to the life and work of David Bowie, the attempted assassination of a Russian opposition figure and the life of the Hmong people in the remote hill country of northern Vietnam.
The full list:
All That Breathes All The Beauty And The Bloodshed Bad Axe Children Of The Mist Descendant Fire Of Love Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song...
- 12/21/2022
- by Jennie Kermode
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Leonard Cohen’s signature song, “Hallelujah,” had its journey to music immortality stopped almost at birth by a record executive. The chief of Cohen’s label, Columbia, vetoed the finished album containing the track in 1984 because he considered it unmarketable in the United States.
An intervention by an influential labelmate of Cohen’s, one Bob Dylan, helped “Hallelujah” to escape front-office purgatory and, over time, become the soaring secular hymn that musicians love to cover and listeners play at both weddings and funerals.
Related: The Contenders Documentary – Deadline’s Full Coverage
Dylan, in fact, might have been the first to cover the song. “Dylan loved ‘Hallelujah,’” filmmaker Dayna Goldfine said at Deadline’s Contenders Documentary event. Goldfine and her husband, Daniel Geller, are co-directors and co-writers of Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song, from Sony Pictures Classics.
Pairing archival footage of Cohen himself with interviewees including Brandi Carlisle, Eric Church and Judy Collins,...
An intervention by an influential labelmate of Cohen’s, one Bob Dylan, helped “Hallelujah” to escape front-office purgatory and, over time, become the soaring secular hymn that musicians love to cover and listeners play at both weddings and funerals.
Related: The Contenders Documentary – Deadline’s Full Coverage
Dylan, in fact, might have been the first to cover the song. “Dylan loved ‘Hallelujah,’” filmmaker Dayna Goldfine said at Deadline’s Contenders Documentary event. Goldfine and her husband, Daniel Geller, are co-directors and co-writers of Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song, from Sony Pictures Classics.
Pairing archival footage of Cohen himself with interviewees including Brandi Carlisle, Eric Church and Judy Collins,...
- 12/4/2022
- by Sean Piccoli
- Deadline Film + TV
Deadline’s Contenders Film: Documentary awards-season event kicks off Sunday at 8 a.m. Pt and promises to open up distant lands and even a distant planet—no passport required.
Click her to register for and watch today’s Contenders livestream.
The terrain covered by the cast and creatives from our 20 participating films astonishes with its variety and range: an enclave of Delhi, India in All That Breathes, a remote section of Paraguay in Eami, and possibly an even more remote outpost of the Brazilian rainforest in Wildcat. Moscow is the ultimate destination of Navalny, the documentary about Russia’s imprisoned and poisoned opposition leader, and Descendant takes us to a neighborhood of Mobile, Alabama settled by survivors of the last slave ship known to have navigated U.S. waters.
About 5,600 miles separate Moscow from Mobile, mere inches apart compared to the far-flung rendezvous point of Good Night Oppy, about NASA...
Click her to register for and watch today’s Contenders livestream.
The terrain covered by the cast and creatives from our 20 participating films astonishes with its variety and range: an enclave of Delhi, India in All That Breathes, a remote section of Paraguay in Eami, and possibly an even more remote outpost of the Brazilian rainforest in Wildcat. Moscow is the ultimate destination of Navalny, the documentary about Russia’s imprisoned and poisoned opposition leader, and Descendant takes us to a neighborhood of Mobile, Alabama settled by survivors of the last slave ship known to have navigated U.S. waters.
About 5,600 miles separate Moscow from Mobile, mere inches apart compared to the far-flung rendezvous point of Good Night Oppy, about NASA...
- 12/4/2022
- by Matthew Carey
- Deadline Film + TV
Vladimir Putin may prefer that people forget about imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, but the Cinema Eye Honors isn’t.
The awards show dedicated to the art and craft of documentary film today announced its 2023 Unforgettables list of the most memorable subjects of nonfiction films this year, and Navalny’s name was front and center. The story of the lawyer and anti-corruption crusader, who was almost killed in a Kremlin poisoning plot in 2020, is told in the award-winning film Navalny, directed by Daniel Roher.
Joining Navalny on the Unforgettables list is another political leader — Gabby Giffords, the former Congresswoman from Arizona who was severely injured in an assassination attempt in 2011. Her difficult road to recovery and return to activism is told in Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down, directed by Betsy West and Julie Cohen.
Artist Nan Goldin
Nan Goldin, the artist at the center of the Laura Poitras...
The awards show dedicated to the art and craft of documentary film today announced its 2023 Unforgettables list of the most memorable subjects of nonfiction films this year, and Navalny’s name was front and center. The story of the lawyer and anti-corruption crusader, who was almost killed in a Kremlin poisoning plot in 2020, is told in the award-winning film Navalny, directed by Daniel Roher.
Joining Navalny on the Unforgettables list is another political leader — Gabby Giffords, the former Congresswoman from Arizona who was severely injured in an assassination attempt in 2011. Her difficult road to recovery and return to activism is told in Gabby Giffords Won’t Back Down, directed by Betsy West and Julie Cohen.
Artist Nan Goldin
Nan Goldin, the artist at the center of the Laura Poitras...
- 10/26/2022
- by Matthew Carey
- Deadline Film + TV
Universal’s ‘Moonage Daydream’ and Sony’s ‘Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song’ both out.
Two modern music icons face off at UK-Ireland cinemas this weekend, with the release of David Bowie documentary Moonage Daydream and Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song.
Opening in 50 sites, most of which are Imax, Universal’s Moonage Daydream is a journey through Bowie’s creative and musical output. The film, which launched as an out-of-competition Midnight Screening in Cannes this May, is written, directed, edited and produced by US filmmaker Brett Morgen.
Moonage Daydream has the backing of the David Bowie estate...
Two modern music icons face off at UK-Ireland cinemas this weekend, with the release of David Bowie documentary Moonage Daydream and Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song.
Opening in 50 sites, most of which are Imax, Universal’s Moonage Daydream is a journey through Bowie’s creative and musical output. The film, which launched as an out-of-competition Midnight Screening in Cannes this May, is written, directed, edited and produced by US filmmaker Brett Morgen.
Moonage Daydream has the backing of the David Bowie estate...
- 9/16/2022
- by Ben Dalton
- ScreenDaily
To mark the release of Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song on 16th September, we’ve been given a signed poster and a copy of Leonard Cohen’s book of short stories, A Ballet Of Lepers to give away to one winner.
Directed by Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller, Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song is An exploration of the life of singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen as seen through the prism of his internationally renowned hymn, `Hallelujah’.
A Ballet of Lepers is an uncovered novel & stories written by Leonard Cohen between 1956 in Montreal, just as Cohen was publishing his first poetry collection, and 1961, when he’d settled on Greece’s Hydra island. The pieces in this collection offer startling insight into Cohen’s imagination and creative process, and explore themes that would permeate his later work, from shame and unworthiness to sexual desire to longing, whether for love, family,...
Directed by Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller, Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song is An exploration of the life of singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen as seen through the prism of his internationally renowned hymn, `Hallelujah’.
A Ballet of Lepers is an uncovered novel & stories written by Leonard Cohen between 1956 in Montreal, just as Cohen was publishing his first poetry collection, and 1961, when he’d settled on Greece’s Hydra island. The pieces in this collection offer startling insight into Cohen’s imagination and creative process, and explore themes that would permeate his later work, from shame and unworthiness to sexual desire to longing, whether for love, family,...
- 9/15/2022
- by Competitions
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
The International Documentary Association (IDA) has announced the full program for its annual screening series, including the 10 films that have been chosen for its Awards Campaign Access Initiative (Acai).
The program will open with Netflix’s “Descendant,” a film produced by the Obamas’ company Higher Ground Productions. The documentary sees director Margaret Brown return to her hometown of Mobile, Alabama to document the search for The Clotilda, the last known ship to arrive in the United States, illegally carrying enslaved Africans, and the ramifications its discovery has on the community.
What will follow is a showcase of 43 feature-length documentary films that are eligible for consideration for the upcoming Academy Awards; 20 films will be screened both in-person and online, and 35 will be available for virtual viewing only.
The films selected for the Acai, a program meant to support independent filmmakers from historically excluded communities currently pursuing a film awards campaign, are:
Beba | Dir.
The program will open with Netflix’s “Descendant,” a film produced by the Obamas’ company Higher Ground Productions. The documentary sees director Margaret Brown return to her hometown of Mobile, Alabama to document the search for The Clotilda, the last known ship to arrive in the United States, illegally carrying enslaved Africans, and the ramifications its discovery has on the community.
What will follow is a showcase of 43 feature-length documentary films that are eligible for consideration for the upcoming Academy Awards; 20 films will be screened both in-person and online, and 35 will be available for virtual viewing only.
The films selected for the Acai, a program meant to support independent filmmakers from historically excluded communities currently pursuing a film awards campaign, are:
Beba | Dir.
- 8/30/2022
- by Marcus Jones
- Indiewire
There’s something about Canadian writer/poet/singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen that seems to shine so brightly that people always want to approach his life from an angle and never succeed in getting very close. Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man, did have an extensive interview but was intercut it with a tribute concert while Marianne & Me: Words Of Love came at Cohen via his love for his Swedish muse Marianne Ihlen, with Nick Broomfield shoehorning himself into the film for good measure. Now it’s the turn of Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine, whose previous films include Ballets Russes, and who approach the musician largely from the perspective of his most famous song, Hallelujah. The end result could do with less tangent and more of the gent himself.
Things start well, with a decent potted history of how Cohen came to move from the written word to the sung and how his Jewish roots.
Things start well, with a decent potted history of how Cohen came to move from the written word to the sung and how his Jewish roots.
- 8/11/2022
- by Amber Wilkinson
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
The film Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song proffers the supposition that the multifaceted and layered career of the poet/singer/songwriter Leonard Cohen can be extrapolated by studying his enduring and internationally renowned composition “Hallelujah.” While there may be far more to explore about this remarkable man’s life than can be contained in one documentary, this piece by Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine does an extraordinary job in doing just that.
As a whole, the film chronicles Cohen’s song, “Hallelujah,” long (and dramatic) journey from rejection to international acclaim. The film also explores the many artists for which the song served as a sort of gauge for their own creative output or spirituality.
Artists like John Cale, Jeff Buckley, Rufus Wainwright, Brandi Carlile, Eric Church, Judy Collins, Glen Hansard, Myles Kennedy, Sharon Robinson, and Regina Spektor are all allotted ample time to extol the virtues and nuances of Cohen’s composition,...
As a whole, the film chronicles Cohen’s song, “Hallelujah,” long (and dramatic) journey from rejection to international acclaim. The film also explores the many artists for which the song served as a sort of gauge for their own creative output or spirituality.
Artists like John Cale, Jeff Buckley, Rufus Wainwright, Brandi Carlile, Eric Church, Judy Collins, Glen Hansard, Myles Kennedy, Sharon Robinson, and Regina Spektor are all allotted ample time to extol the virtues and nuances of Cohen’s composition,...
- 8/6/2022
- by Mike Tyrkus
- CinemaNerdz
Leonard Cohen. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Leonard Cohen Family Trust. © Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc.
The new documentary Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song is a double biography of sorts, of beloved Canadian-Jewish songwriter/singer Leonard Cohen, who has had a cult-like following, particularly among musicians, and his most famous song “Hallelujah,” a song that seems to be everywhere and has taken on a life of its own, transforming from a more sacred form about King David to more secular form that appears in countless movie soundtracks and has become a favorite at weddings, funerals and singing contest. This excellent documentary, from co-directors Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine, has plenty for both long-time fans and those new to the musician’s work.
Unlike some previous documentaries about Leonard Cohen, who passed away in 2016, this one focuses more on his career and its evolution than on his personal or romantic life.
The new documentary Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song is a double biography of sorts, of beloved Canadian-Jewish songwriter/singer Leonard Cohen, who has had a cult-like following, particularly among musicians, and his most famous song “Hallelujah,” a song that seems to be everywhere and has taken on a life of its own, transforming from a more sacred form about King David to more secular form that appears in countless movie soundtracks and has become a favorite at weddings, funerals and singing contest. This excellent documentary, from co-directors Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine, has plenty for both long-time fans and those new to the musician’s work.
Unlike some previous documentaries about Leonard Cohen, who passed away in 2016, this one focuses more on his career and its evolution than on his personal or romantic life.
- 7/29/2022
- by Cate Marquis
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
The Forgiven with Jessica Chastain opens in 122 theaters this weekend as the flow of indie films continues to build with well-reviewed, festival-pedigreed product including Mr. Malcolm’s List and Clara Sola. Meanwhile, producers and most other U.S. businesses are hoping economic storm clouds won’t ding their industry’s nascent revival.
“I think we have seen a slow recovery. We are feeling bullish,” said Howard Cohen, co-president of The Forgiven distributor Roadside Attractions. He cited a helpful “knockoff effect” from popular wide releases Elvis and Top Gun: Maverick, where a significant chunk of the audience is an arthouse-friendly 55 and over. He’s talking about moviegoing, a great value for people during economic slowdowns when box office grosses have tended to rise. But down the chain, higher inflation, “while it doesn’t mean movies won’t get made, will affect decision making and things may be more complicated,” said Cohen.
“I think we have seen a slow recovery. We are feeling bullish,” said Howard Cohen, co-president of The Forgiven distributor Roadside Attractions. He cited a helpful “knockoff effect” from popular wide releases Elvis and Top Gun: Maverick, where a significant chunk of the audience is an arthouse-friendly 55 and over. He’s talking about moviegoing, a great value for people during economic slowdowns when box office grosses have tended to rise. But down the chain, higher inflation, “while it doesn’t mean movies won’t get made, will affect decision making and things may be more complicated,” said Cohen.
- 7/1/2022
- by Jill Goldsmith
- Deadline Film + TV
This review of “Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song” first appeared when the film premiered at the Venice Film Festival in 2021.
Like the blind men of lore groping to understand an elephant by focusing on a tail or a tusk or an ear, filmmakers have tended to approach the late singer, songwriter, poet and novelist Leonard Cohen in bits and pieces. Lian Lunson looked at his career through the lens of a 2005 tribute concert in “Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man,” Tony Palmer’s “Leonard Cohen: Bird on a Wire” was a long-lost chronicle of a single European tour in 1972 and Nick Broomfield’s “Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love” is as much about Broomfield’s own relationship with one of Cohen’s muses, Marianne Ihlen.
And now there’s Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine’s “Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, a Song.” It purports to be about a single...
Like the blind men of lore groping to understand an elephant by focusing on a tail or a tusk or an ear, filmmakers have tended to approach the late singer, songwriter, poet and novelist Leonard Cohen in bits and pieces. Lian Lunson looked at his career through the lens of a 2005 tribute concert in “Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man,” Tony Palmer’s “Leonard Cohen: Bird on a Wire” was a long-lost chronicle of a single European tour in 1972 and Nick Broomfield’s “Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love” is as much about Broomfield’s own relationship with one of Cohen’s muses, Marianne Ihlen.
And now there’s Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine’s “Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, a Song.” It purports to be about a single...
- 6/30/2022
- by Steve Pond
- The Wrap
Vintage songs are regularly remade, sampled and, most recently, interpolated into new ones. But even in that context, the saga of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” remains singular. A song that was initially rejected and ignored by the music business in the Eighties has, over the last two or three decades, become a go-to pop hymn for TV talent shows, soundtracks, even a Saturday Night Live sketch. For a long time, “Suzanne” was in the running as Cohen’s leading contribution to the post-rock pop repertoire. “Hallelujah” has now overtaken it: Pick nearly any genre,...
- 6/30/2022
- by David Browne
- Rollingstone.com
Dan Geller on Leonard Cohen: ‘Leonard is a very very clever writer. I believe someone had asked James Joyce about Ulysses, which is, you know, famously impenetrable …” Photo: Cohen Estate
The 21st edition of the Tribeca Film Festival hosted a special New York première screening of Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller’s poetically keen Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song, with an original score by John Lissauer at the Beacon Theatre, followed by a Leonard Cohen tribute concert with Judy Collins, Amanda Shires, Sharon Robinson and Daniel Seavey. The documentary is dedicated to the distinguished music producer Hal Willner (recently Ethan Silverman’s Angelheaded Hipster: The Songs of Marc Bolan & T. Rex and the Lou Reed: Caught Between The Twisted Stars exhibition).
Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine with Anne-Katrin Titze: “The Beacon Theatre, which is historically so important, not only in terms of Hallelujah the song, where John Cale...
The 21st edition of the Tribeca Film Festival hosted a special New York première screening of Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller’s poetically keen Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song, with an original score by John Lissauer at the Beacon Theatre, followed by a Leonard Cohen tribute concert with Judy Collins, Amanda Shires, Sharon Robinson and Daniel Seavey. The documentary is dedicated to the distinguished music producer Hal Willner (recently Ethan Silverman’s Angelheaded Hipster: The Songs of Marc Bolan & T. Rex and the Lou Reed: Caught Between The Twisted Stars exhibition).
Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine with Anne-Katrin Titze: “The Beacon Theatre, which is historically so important, not only in terms of Hallelujah the song, where John Cale...
- 6/29/2022
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Judy Collins is singing the praises of Leonard Cohen. Bob Dylan, not so much. “Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, A Journey, A Song” unspools Sunday, June 12, at the Tribeca Film Festival. A tribute concert featuring Collins follows the screening. She is driving through Colorado when we chat. She says she loves the film, but this song? Not at first. And she wasn’t alone.
SEEBig Grammy changes for 2023 include new categories: Songwriter of the Year, Best Visual Game Score …
Gd: It’s remarkable that this song ever got recorded, isn’t it?
Jc: (Laughs) It was a bust at first. No one wanted it. It had something like 4,000 verses when it started. Then people started recording it and the rest is kind of history. I didn’t like it at first. Now I’m entranced by it. He’s an icon and my story with him is a kind of fairy tale.
SEEBig Grammy changes for 2023 include new categories: Songwriter of the Year, Best Visual Game Score …
Gd: It’s remarkable that this song ever got recorded, isn’t it?
Jc: (Laughs) It was a bust at first. No one wanted it. It had something like 4,000 verses when it started. Then people started recording it and the rest is kind of history. I didn’t like it at first. Now I’m entranced by it. He’s an icon and my story with him is a kind of fairy tale.
- 6/10/2022
- by Bill McCuddy
- Gold Derby
The new documentary Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song is arriving on July 1, and there’s a premiere party this Sunday evening at New York’s Beacon Theatre featuring performances by Judy Collins, Amanda Shires, Sharon Robinson, and Why Don’t We’s Daniel Seavey.
Directed by Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller, the film utilizes never-before-seen footage to dive deep into the creation of Cohen’s 1984 classic “Hallelujah” and the broader saga of his life. It was inspired by Alan Light’s book The Holy or the Broken: Leonard Cohen,...
Directed by Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller, the film utilizes never-before-seen footage to dive deep into the creation of Cohen’s 1984 classic “Hallelujah” and the broader saga of his life. It was inspired by Alan Light’s book The Holy or the Broken: Leonard Cohen,...
- 6/9/2022
- by Andy Greene
- Rollingstone.com
‘Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song’ Review: A Unique and Gratifying Pop-Music Documentary
“Hallelujah: Leonard Cohen, a Journey, a Song” is a documentary about the Leonard Cohen song “Hallelujah,” and if that sounds like a lot of movie to devote to one song — well, “Hallelujah” is a lot of song. The way we think of it now, it’s epic and lovely and trancelike: a hymn cast in a pop idiom. You might call it a feel-good hymn for a secular society, because the word “hallelujah” has obvious religious connotations, and part of the reason that people feel so good listening to “Hallelujah,” or singing along with it in oversize stadiums, is that the song says to its audience: If you find this beautiful, then you’re a spiritual person.
The documentary, which was directed, written, photographed, and co-edited by the team of Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine, is also a portrait of Leonard Cohen, who in a career that spanned half a...
The documentary, which was directed, written, photographed, and co-edited by the team of Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine, is also a portrait of Leonard Cohen, who in a career that spanned half a...
- 10/10/2021
- by Owen Gleiberman
- Variety Film + TV
Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine’s respectful doc tells the story of the artist through the life of his 1984 song, by turns a modern prayer, symbolist poem and divine gift
In the mid-1980s, Leonard Cohen met Bob Dylan for coffee in a Paris cafe. In the course of the conversation, Dylan asked how long it had taken to write the song Hallelujah; Cohen, embarrassed, said that it had been about seven years. Then Cohen asked Dylan how long he had spent on one of his own compositions. “Fifteen minutes,” said his rival, without missing a beat.
Pundits now suspect that Bob Dylan was lying, keen to foster the image of himself as a freewheeling genius, a man who tossed off casual masterpieces as naturally as taking a leak. But Cohen was not being entirely honest either. In fact, he had toiled at Hallelujah for nearly a decade, filling his...
In the mid-1980s, Leonard Cohen met Bob Dylan for coffee in a Paris cafe. In the course of the conversation, Dylan asked how long it had taken to write the song Hallelujah; Cohen, embarrassed, said that it had been about seven years. Then Cohen asked Dylan how long he had spent on one of his own compositions. “Fifteen minutes,” said his rival, without missing a beat.
Pundits now suspect that Bob Dylan was lying, keen to foster the image of himself as a freewheeling genius, a man who tossed off casual masterpieces as naturally as taking a leak. But Cohen was not being entirely honest either. In fact, he had toiled at Hallelujah for nearly a decade, filling his...
- 9/3/2021
- by Xan Brooks
- The Guardian - Film News
The programme for the 2021 Venice Film Festival has been unveiled, and includes new films from Pedro Almodóvar, Jane Campion, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Michelangelo Frammartino, Pablo Larraín, Paul Schrader, Ridley Scott, and more.Parallel MothersCOMPETITIONParallel Mothers (Pedro Almodóvar)Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon (Ana Lily Amirpour)Un Autre Monde (Stephane Brize)The Power of the Dog (Jane Campion)America LatinaL’Evenement (Audrey Diwan)Official CompetitionThe Hole (Michelangelo Frammartino)Sundown (Michel Franco)Lost Illusions (Xavier Giannoli)The Lost Daughter (Maggie Gyllenhaal)Spencer (Pablo Larrain)Freaks Out (Gabriele Mainetti)Qui Rido Io (Mario Martone)On The Job: The Missing 8 (Erik Matti)Leave No Traces (Jan P. Matuszyński)Captain Volkonogov EscapedThe Card Counter (Paul Schrader)The Hand of God (Paolo Sorrentino)Reflection (Valentyn Vasyanovych)The Box (Lorenzo Vigas)Out Of COMPETITIONFeaturesDune (Denis Villeneuve)Il Bambino Nascosto (Roberto Andò)Les Choses Humaines (Yvan Attal)Ariaferma (Leonardo Di Costanzo)Halloween Kills (David Gordon Green...
- 8/3/2021
- MUBI
“The 78th Venice International Film Festival is organized by La Biennale di Venezia and directed by Alberto Barbera. It will take place at Venice Lido from 1 – 11 September 2021. The Festival is officially recognised by the Fiapf (International Federation of Film Producers Association). The aim of the Festival is to raise awareness and promote international cinema in all its forms as art, entertainment and as an industry, in a spirit of freedom and dialogue. The Festival also organises retrospectives and tributes to major figures as a contribution towards a better understanding of the history of cinema.” Venezia 2021 – Competition Madres Paralelas, dir: Pedro Almodovar Mona Lisa And The Blood Moon, dir: Ana Lily Amirpour Un Autre Monde, dir: Stéphane Brizé The Power Of The Dog, dir: Jane Campion America Latina, dir: Damiano D’Innocenzo, Fabio D’Innocenzo L’Evénement, dir: Audrey Diwan Competencia Oficial, dirs: Gaston Duprat, Mariano Cohn Il Buco, dir: Michelangelo Frammartino Sundown,...
- 7/26/2021
- by HollywoodNews.com
- Hollywoodnews.com
Taking place September 1 through 11, the Venice Film Festival has now unveiled its lineup, after a few teases of what it contains (the opening night selection of Madres Paralelas by Pedro Almodovar and Denis Villeneuve’s Dune). Among the selections are Jane Campion’s The Power of a Dog, Paul Schrader’s The Card Counter, Pablo Larrain’s Spencer, Ana Lily Amirpour’s Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon.
Maggie Gyllenhaal’s directorial debut The Lost Daughter, Ridley Scott’s The Last Duel, Paolo Sorrentino’s The Hand of God, and Edgar Wright’s The Last Night in Soho will premiere there, along with new shorts by Radu Jude and Tsai Ming-liang.
Check out the line below for the festival that will feature 50% capacity at screenings.
Venezia 78 – Competition
Madres Paralelas, dir: Pedro Almodovar
Mona Lisa And The Blood Moon, dir: Ana Lily Amirpour
Un Autre Monde, dir: Stéphane Brizé
The Power Of The Dog,...
Maggie Gyllenhaal’s directorial debut The Lost Daughter, Ridley Scott’s The Last Duel, Paolo Sorrentino’s The Hand of God, and Edgar Wright’s The Last Night in Soho will premiere there, along with new shorts by Radu Jude and Tsai Ming-liang.
Check out the line below for the festival that will feature 50% capacity at screenings.
Venezia 78 – Competition
Madres Paralelas, dir: Pedro Almodovar
Mona Lisa And The Blood Moon, dir: Ana Lily Amirpour
Un Autre Monde, dir: Stéphane Brizé
The Power Of The Dog,...
- 7/26/2021
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
The 2021 Cannes Film Festival brought the international film circuit back to life in roaring fashion earlier this month (French filmmaker Julia Ducournau became the second woman director to win the Palme d’Or thanks to Neon release “Titane”), and next up are the trio of major fall film festivals in September: the Venice Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, and Toronto International Film Festival. Venice is first out of the gate by launching its 78th edition Wednesday, September 1. The lineup for Venice 2021 has now been revealed.
As previously announced, Pedro Almodóvar will kick off the 2021 Venice Film Festival with the world premiere of his new drama “Parallel Mothers.” The film will debut in competition and vie for the festival’s top prize, the Golden Lion. “Parallel Mothers” is written and directed by Almodóvar, and stars both regular and new collaborators, including Penélope Cruz, Milena Smit, Israel Elejalde, Aitana Sánchez-Gijón, Julieta Serrano,...
As previously announced, Pedro Almodóvar will kick off the 2021 Venice Film Festival with the world premiere of his new drama “Parallel Mothers.” The film will debut in competition and vie for the festival’s top prize, the Golden Lion. “Parallel Mothers” is written and directed by Almodóvar, and stars both regular and new collaborators, including Penélope Cruz, Milena Smit, Israel Elejalde, Aitana Sánchez-Gijón, Julieta Serrano,...
- 7/26/2021
- by Zack Sharf
- Indiewire
This year’s line-up includes five female directors in competition.
The line-up of the 78th Venice Film Festival (September 1-11) has been announced by festival president Roberto Cicutto and artistic director Alberto Barbera.
Scroll down for the full line-up
This year’s selection saw the festival take a backward step for gender balance, with five female directors selected in the main competition, down from last year’s eight. 26% of films in the overall line-up are directed by women, down from 28% in 2020.
The high-profile titles picked for competition this year include Pablo Larrain’s Spencer; Paolo Sorrentino’s The Hand Of God...
The line-up of the 78th Venice Film Festival (September 1-11) has been announced by festival president Roberto Cicutto and artistic director Alberto Barbera.
Scroll down for the full line-up
This year’s selection saw the festival take a backward step for gender balance, with five female directors selected in the main competition, down from last year’s eight. 26% of films in the overall line-up are directed by women, down from 28% in 2020.
The high-profile titles picked for competition this year include Pablo Larrain’s Spencer; Paolo Sorrentino’s The Hand Of God...
- 7/26/2021
- by Orlando Parfitt
- ScreenDaily
The Venice film festival runs September 1-11.
The line-up for the 78th Venice Film Festival (September 1-11) is being unveiled this morning at around 11:00 Cest (10:00 BST) by festival president Roberto Cicutto and artistic director Alberto Barbera.
The press conference will be live-streamed here below, and the story will be updated with the films as they are announced.
As previously announced, Pedro Almodóvar’s Parallel Mothers will open the festival in competition. Denis Villeneuve’s Dune will also have its world premiere at the festival out of competition on September 3.
Bong Joon Ho will preside over the competition jury that also includes Chloé Zhao,...
The line-up for the 78th Venice Film Festival (September 1-11) is being unveiled this morning at around 11:00 Cest (10:00 BST) by festival president Roberto Cicutto and artistic director Alberto Barbera.
The press conference will be live-streamed here below, and the story will be updated with the films as they are announced.
As previously announced, Pedro Almodóvar’s Parallel Mothers will open the festival in competition. Denis Villeneuve’s Dune will also have its world premiere at the festival out of competition on September 3.
Bong Joon Ho will preside over the competition jury that also includes Chloé Zhao,...
- 7/26/2021
- by Orlando Parfitt
- ScreenDaily
Batgirl Yvonne Craig. Batgirl Yvonne Craig dead at 78: Also featured in 'Star Trek' episode, Elvis Presley movies Yvonne Craig, best known as Batgirl in the 1960s television series Batman, died of complications from breast cancer on Monday, Aug. 17, '15, at her home in Pacific Palisades, in the Los Angeles Westside. Craig (born May 16, 1937, in Taylorville, Illinois), who had been undergoing chemotherapy for two years, was 78. Beginning (and ending) in the final season of Batman (1967-1968), Yvonne Craig played both Commissioner Gordon's librarian daughter Barbara Gordon and her alter ego, the spunky Batgirl – armed with a laser-beaming electric make-up kit “which will destroy anything.” Unlike semi-villainess Catwoman (Julie Newmar), Batgirl was wholly on the side of Righteousness, infusing new blood into the series' increasingly anemic Dynamic Duo: Batman aka Bruce Wayne (Adam West) and Boy Wonder Robin aka Bruce Wayne's beloved pal Dick Grayson (Burt Ward). “They chose...
- 8/19/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
★★★☆☆There's a legend on the South American Galapagos Islands that the famous tortoises that inhabit their shores have the power to stare into the souls of men. These enormous reptiles are said to judge each new arrival on their archipelago, and curse those that alight there with nefarious intent. The question is raised whether such a hex was placed upon a group of settlers in the 1930s, who are the subject of historical documentary, Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine's handsome The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden (2013). A real-life whodunnit provides a riveting narrative backbone but despite some juicy melodrama, this languid doc never quite lives up the intrigue of its central conundrum.
- 7/27/2014
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
There is so much depth and suspense to the real life happenings from the Galapagos Islands back in the 1930s, that this documentary feels almost like the film Alfred Hitchcock never made. This tale was Hitchcockian before Hitchcockian ever became a thing. Yet where this Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine production truly comes into its element, is with the quite staggering amount of footage that illustrates this fascinating tale, which has such linearity.
Primarily, we follow the adventures of Dore Strauch and Friedrich Ritter, who, in 1929, decided to get as far away from normal civilisation as possible, abandoning their friends and family in Germany, for a serene life on the tiny island of Floreana. Living off the land, they inadvertently gained notoriety in their native country, when their personal letters back home were intercepted by the press. Naturally, others were too inspired to move out to this idyllic paradise, though no sooner after people arrived,...
Primarily, we follow the adventures of Dore Strauch and Friedrich Ritter, who, in 1929, decided to get as far away from normal civilisation as possible, abandoning their friends and family in Germany, for a serene life on the tiny island of Floreana. Living off the land, they inadvertently gained notoriety in their native country, when their personal letters back home were intercepted by the press. Naturally, others were too inspired to move out to this idyllic paradise, though no sooner after people arrived,...
- 7/25/2014
- by Stefan Pape
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Inhospitable locations are prompt to be the source of legends and enigmatic theories. For most people the Galapagos Islands, off the coast of Ecuador, are only relevant due to their biodiversity made universally famous by none other than Darwin. His findings are studied by millions of children around the world as feasible proof of evolution. What they don't teach in school is the human history of this exuberant archipelago. One chapter in particular within this short, but surely captivating account of people settling there, is rather intriguing. As if pulled from the pages of a crime novel, what filmmakers Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine found is a story that involves deceit, deviant romances, and possibly even murder.
In 1929, Freidrich Ritter, a German doctor and a fan of Nietzsche's ideology, decides to leave his wife and head for the islands, his only companion was Dore Strauch, a woman who was enticed by the idea of leaving civilized society for the emptiness of an untouched paradise. Soon after their arrival to the uninhabited Floreana island, the pair discovers life in the wilderness is a serious endeavor. With Ww II lurking on the horizon, it wasn't long before other Germans decided to follow on their footsteps, thus when the Wittmer family arrived, Ritter's ideal solitude was disturbed. Still, it appears as if the two groups would manage to share the space, but when a third party settles in, an Austrian woman claiming to be a Baroness and her two lovers, conflict unravels leaving behind a trail of mysterious events - unsolved to this date. Such is the premise of Geller and Goldfine's documentary The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden, which compiles archive footage, interviews, and narrations by the likes of Cate Blanchett , Sebastian Koch , and Diane Kruger This highly entertaining, darkly comedic, and well-crafted real-life melodrama tells a story almost impossible to believe. The directors shared with us the challenges and the huge undertaking that this project required, as well as their individual perceptions on such an incredible and, until now, hidden anecdote that adds to the allure the islands evoke.
Aguilar: How did you get involved with this fascinating and insane project?
Dayna: We were asked by a friend way back in 1998 to do camera and sound work on a sort of Darwin-type science project down in the Galapagos. We went not knowing anything about the islands except that Darwin had used them for his experiments and they had lots of really cool animals on them. Certainly not knowing that anyone lived there, because there is actually no indigenous people on the islands. Anyone that’s there now has emigrated, or their parents have emigrated, from some other place. While we were down there on our little boat traveling from island to island, one night we picked a book off the tiny little library shelf in the boat, and it was about the human history of the islands. We were like “Wow there is enough human history to fill a book?”. Then, even more cool was chapter 3 or 4, which was called “Murder in Paradise.”
Aguilar: What a title
Dan: [Laughs] Dayna loves her true crime books, so from that moment on, the fixation began for the rest of our trip around the islands that time
Dayna: Basically at that moment I sort of grabbed this little chapter and I said “Dan you’ve got to read this, it’s just so wacky” Then our naturalist guide, who had lived in the islands forever and knows everyone, he said to us “Well guess what you guys, the old lady [Margret] is still alive” This was back in 1998, she didn’t die until 2000. At that moment I became obsessed, I was like “We are in the islands for two weeks, there is no way we can’t go to Floreana and meet this woman,” but what we didn’t know at that point was that the way it works in the Galapagos, you got this very specific itinerary that’s attached to each boat and our boat was not supposed to go to Floreana.
Dan: The project we were working on, the science foundation project that we were shooting, had very specific animals and variations of species that our friend Doug needed, and none of them were the ones particular to Floreana. That’s why it wasn’t on the itinerary, and you can’t bend the itinerary once you get going, unless your boat breaks down in front of the island, which is what happened [Laughs]
Dayna: Literally every morning we’d wake up and I’d say, “So today Doug we are going to Floreana right? We are gonna go meet Margret Wittmer”, and it got to be kind of a joke but I know we were pissing off our friend Doug who hired us. He would roll his eyes [Laughs]. Finally almost towards the very end of our two weeks, the boat literally broke down in front of Floreana. We had to get off, we even got to take showers on the island, and we got to have tea with Margret.
Aguilar: What did she say? Was she open to speak about what happened to the Baroness?
Dan: She was mostly talking about how president Roosevelt came to visit because there was an airbase built in Galapagos during World War II to protect the Panama Canal. She was proud of that and kept talking about it, and then would wander into some different topics. In a moment where there was just a little bit of quiet in the conversation we all looked around for a beat, that’s when she blurted out apropos of nothing “En la boca cerrada no entran moscas”.We saw Miguel Mosquera, who was our naturalist on that trip, and who became our location manager for all the subsequent trips for our film, and his eyes popped out wide. I said, “What did she say?” because at the time neither Dayna nor I spoke Spanish, we’ve subsequently started to learn. After we left, Dayna and I said “ Miguel what did she just say?” and he translated for us: “A closed mouth admits no flies.” We thought, “Oh my God, she is toying with the reputation and the legacy, and teasing people about it”. Whether she did that because it was just her way to antagonize people because she was sick of being asked or because she has a devilish sense of humor. I think it's the latter because certainly her son and daughter, Rolf and Floreanita, have very sly senses of humor, so I think they inherited it from her.
Dayna: I think she was sort of playing with the visitors that came to the island. By that point and time she was in her 90s and so many years had gone by. There is no way she would’ve talked about it explicitly, but I think she really did get a kick out of it. She knew that when a visitor came to the island, front and foremost in their mind was “Ok what happened to the Baroness?” [Laughs]. Although no one would ask her about it at that point, I think it was her way of sort of joking around with us,
Aguilar: The search behind the film must have been extensive, how difficult was to find the footage and making a film out of a story hidden away for so long?
Dan: What happened is that, even though we were at that point fascinated with the story, there was no way to tell it without any kind of visual material. We were starting another movie called Ballets Russes, so we just thought “All right we’ll let it be for now” Then when the same friend Doug was starting a different science education project, he was working with a USC professor who also had brought his students down to Galapagos over the years. Of course because he was at USC, he happened to know of the archive in Doheny Library of all that footage. So our friend Doug, who we definitely owe a cocktail or two for this [Laughs], said “You guys have got to get down to USC and talked to this professor, Bill McComas, and see if you can get access because the archive is falling apart. There may be gold in there” We did, we started talking to the archivist, and then the university gave thumps up for us to take the footage with us and try to save it because they didn’t have the means to do it. We took that big risk, financially at least, and once we started seeing what was on those reels we thought “Ok, now we’ve got something going, we got a way to tell the story” I think that’s one reason why the story hadn’t been told for all those years, because you need to see those people in that situation to believe it! This story is so crazy you’d say “No, no that could’ve never happened.”
Aguilar: It is very ironic that people that wanted to be left alone and be isolated had so much footage of themselves and pictures. It feels as if they wanted to be noticed.
Dayna: It was one of those weird unfathomable ironies. First of all, we did use a little bit of an “artistic light,” basically all the footage or 99% of it was actually shot by Captain Allan Hancock and his cameraman. What he did is, once he and his crew of scientists landed on the island in 1931 and discovered Friedrich and Dore, he started asking them to reenact their lives for the camera. We always sort of say “Who knows, maybe he was inspired by Nanook of the North", because Robert J. Flaherty went in and actually had his protagonist go through his life again. Hancock asked them to reenact what they were doing, and he took photos and filmed, it was actually shot originally on 35 mm nitrate, which doesn’t exist any longer. Luckily he made a bunch of 16mm safety prints which were what we found in the archive. Once they got to the island, Friedrich, Dore, the Wittmers, certainly the baroness and her lovers, they were all pretty proud of the fact that they had managed to create these lives in this very unfriendly terrain, and they were willing to show it off. The other irony is that not only did they pose for the cameras, but they all brought typewriters. In Friedrich Ritter’s case it made sense because he really did want to go into seclusion so he could write the great philosophical manifesto.
Dan: Part of it is, I think, that in those days everyone wrote letters, and I suppose the odds of a typewritten letter getting there across all the moisture in the oceans might have been better than one written with a pen.Margret ultimately wrote a memoir, Dore Strauch wrote a memoir, they also wrote letters, Ritter wrote articles for magazine and newspapers around the world, John Garth, the scientist on the Velero, kept his journal. We wound up with a wealth of first person expressions that could be used to form this script where the characters come to life through their own words in writing. In our case we put them in opposition to each other and it didn’t take much work because they all had their own point of view, and sometimes insinuated that the other one was responsible for what was going on down there. That became more or less a screenwriter adaptation job, not adapting one book, but adapting 2 books, 2 sets of journals, and who knows how many articles, and letters. Dayna and I, and our fellow writer Celeste Schaefer Snyder, bit by bit went through the murder mystery story and tried to give everyone voice, and also keep it kind of fun and suspenseful.
Aguilar: With all the sexual tension and intrigue, this could have easily been a narrative drama. As a documentary, how did you balance the interviews with current islanders, the first person narratives, the footage, and all the other different sources to create something cohesive?
Dayna: It’s funny, Hollywood had been trying to make it as a fiction forever. The reason why it hasn't happened yet, although scripts have been flying around for over 20 years, is that it is such a complicated story, and there are so many characters. Each one is worthy of their own script, certainly they are all larger than life. That was really what took us the longest, I would say we worked with Bill Weber, our editor, for about two years. We went down so many dead ends, I can’t even tell you, we had so many work-in-progress screenings, scratch our heads, rewrote, re-cut, tried different balances of one character vs. another, or vs. the islanders perspective.
Dan: I think one thing that was important in setting each character onto the island was that we wanted to give them at least some moments where they could state clearly, and with real seriousness, why they were going and what their first impressions were like. Then that way, when things begin to verge toward the melodramatic or darkly humorous, there was already a foundation where you understood these people weren’t just cartoon characters. They had thought this through as much as they could and were trying to do something with a good spirit behind them. Even the Baroness, though her notions of the hotel or certainly her ability to fulfill the notion of the hotel was suspect from the beginning.
Aguilar: Even though you focus on this set of characters, the islands themselves have a mystifying personality and they appear to affect the people in them. Was this idea part of your creative process?
Dayna: Thank you so much, that’s exactly how we felt!. You are right when that woman tries to get away from the island it kind of sucks her back, in much the same way that Lorenz was sucked back and landed on Marchenta Isaland. In many ways the fact that the island had a drought, a really severe drought one of the worst in decades, we deeply believe it led to whatever happened to the Baroness and Phillipson. It’s funy, when were just starting to do the project, the series Lost was playing. Lost really did have the island as a character, and as we were watching the early episodes were chuckling and saying “It’s not so far from reality”
Dan: I wouldn’t have been surprised if we got into a backroom in a hotel and found the Dharma machine and someone was punching in the numbers every 90 minutes [Laughs]. Talking about the island reaching out, it turned out that Margery Simkin, who was our casting director on the movie, was in the Galapagos in 1986, her boat broke down, and she met Margret Wittmer in an unscheduled stop on Flroreana also. Maybe there is something about those islands, the fact that they’ve been uninhabited for so long, or that they are sitting over a volcanic hotspot. I don’t know what kind of lore you want to assign to it, but I agree with you, there is something weirdly mystical and prehistoric about the whole place.
Aguilar: Through their writing and the footage, both of you essentially met these characters, what are your thoughts on these characters who wanted to get away and begin again some place new?
Dayan: They each had different reasons. One of the things that sort of drew me to the project on a philosophical and emotional level was that I’m not sure there is anyone who hasn’t had that, momentary at least, dream of forsaking everything and going off to live on some deserted island somewhere. Everyone has his or her own reasons for wanting to do that at any specific moment. What was so interesting is that each of those people or collective groups in the film, had their own very specific reasons for going. In a way, each had its own very specific notions of what paradise might look like. One of the things that we talked about between us since the beginning of the project is that the film is about what could happen if you do take that leap? You leave society and you go in pursuit of your own little deserted island, in search of paradise. But when you get there, someone else is already situated on that same island and their notion of paradise clashes explicitly with your notion of paradise. What do you do?...
In 1929, Freidrich Ritter, a German doctor and a fan of Nietzsche's ideology, decides to leave his wife and head for the islands, his only companion was Dore Strauch, a woman who was enticed by the idea of leaving civilized society for the emptiness of an untouched paradise. Soon after their arrival to the uninhabited Floreana island, the pair discovers life in the wilderness is a serious endeavor. With Ww II lurking on the horizon, it wasn't long before other Germans decided to follow on their footsteps, thus when the Wittmer family arrived, Ritter's ideal solitude was disturbed. Still, it appears as if the two groups would manage to share the space, but when a third party settles in, an Austrian woman claiming to be a Baroness and her two lovers, conflict unravels leaving behind a trail of mysterious events - unsolved to this date. Such is the premise of Geller and Goldfine's documentary The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden, which compiles archive footage, interviews, and narrations by the likes of Cate Blanchett , Sebastian Koch , and Diane Kruger This highly entertaining, darkly comedic, and well-crafted real-life melodrama tells a story almost impossible to believe. The directors shared with us the challenges and the huge undertaking that this project required, as well as their individual perceptions on such an incredible and, until now, hidden anecdote that adds to the allure the islands evoke.
Aguilar: How did you get involved with this fascinating and insane project?
Dayna: We were asked by a friend way back in 1998 to do camera and sound work on a sort of Darwin-type science project down in the Galapagos. We went not knowing anything about the islands except that Darwin had used them for his experiments and they had lots of really cool animals on them. Certainly not knowing that anyone lived there, because there is actually no indigenous people on the islands. Anyone that’s there now has emigrated, or their parents have emigrated, from some other place. While we were down there on our little boat traveling from island to island, one night we picked a book off the tiny little library shelf in the boat, and it was about the human history of the islands. We were like “Wow there is enough human history to fill a book?”. Then, even more cool was chapter 3 or 4, which was called “Murder in Paradise.”
Aguilar: What a title
Dan: [Laughs] Dayna loves her true crime books, so from that moment on, the fixation began for the rest of our trip around the islands that time
Dayna: Basically at that moment I sort of grabbed this little chapter and I said “Dan you’ve got to read this, it’s just so wacky” Then our naturalist guide, who had lived in the islands forever and knows everyone, he said to us “Well guess what you guys, the old lady [Margret] is still alive” This was back in 1998, she didn’t die until 2000. At that moment I became obsessed, I was like “We are in the islands for two weeks, there is no way we can’t go to Floreana and meet this woman,” but what we didn’t know at that point was that the way it works in the Galapagos, you got this very specific itinerary that’s attached to each boat and our boat was not supposed to go to Floreana.
Dan: The project we were working on, the science foundation project that we were shooting, had very specific animals and variations of species that our friend Doug needed, and none of them were the ones particular to Floreana. That’s why it wasn’t on the itinerary, and you can’t bend the itinerary once you get going, unless your boat breaks down in front of the island, which is what happened [Laughs]
Dayna: Literally every morning we’d wake up and I’d say, “So today Doug we are going to Floreana right? We are gonna go meet Margret Wittmer”, and it got to be kind of a joke but I know we were pissing off our friend Doug who hired us. He would roll his eyes [Laughs]. Finally almost towards the very end of our two weeks, the boat literally broke down in front of Floreana. We had to get off, we even got to take showers on the island, and we got to have tea with Margret.
Aguilar: What did she say? Was she open to speak about what happened to the Baroness?
Dan: She was mostly talking about how president Roosevelt came to visit because there was an airbase built in Galapagos during World War II to protect the Panama Canal. She was proud of that and kept talking about it, and then would wander into some different topics. In a moment where there was just a little bit of quiet in the conversation we all looked around for a beat, that’s when she blurted out apropos of nothing “En la boca cerrada no entran moscas”.We saw Miguel Mosquera, who was our naturalist on that trip, and who became our location manager for all the subsequent trips for our film, and his eyes popped out wide. I said, “What did she say?” because at the time neither Dayna nor I spoke Spanish, we’ve subsequently started to learn. After we left, Dayna and I said “ Miguel what did she just say?” and he translated for us: “A closed mouth admits no flies.” We thought, “Oh my God, she is toying with the reputation and the legacy, and teasing people about it”. Whether she did that because it was just her way to antagonize people because she was sick of being asked or because she has a devilish sense of humor. I think it's the latter because certainly her son and daughter, Rolf and Floreanita, have very sly senses of humor, so I think they inherited it from her.
Dayna: I think she was sort of playing with the visitors that came to the island. By that point and time she was in her 90s and so many years had gone by. There is no way she would’ve talked about it explicitly, but I think she really did get a kick out of it. She knew that when a visitor came to the island, front and foremost in their mind was “Ok what happened to the Baroness?” [Laughs]. Although no one would ask her about it at that point, I think it was her way of sort of joking around with us,
Aguilar: The search behind the film must have been extensive, how difficult was to find the footage and making a film out of a story hidden away for so long?
Dan: What happened is that, even though we were at that point fascinated with the story, there was no way to tell it without any kind of visual material. We were starting another movie called Ballets Russes, so we just thought “All right we’ll let it be for now” Then when the same friend Doug was starting a different science education project, he was working with a USC professor who also had brought his students down to Galapagos over the years. Of course because he was at USC, he happened to know of the archive in Doheny Library of all that footage. So our friend Doug, who we definitely owe a cocktail or two for this [Laughs], said “You guys have got to get down to USC and talked to this professor, Bill McComas, and see if you can get access because the archive is falling apart. There may be gold in there” We did, we started talking to the archivist, and then the university gave thumps up for us to take the footage with us and try to save it because they didn’t have the means to do it. We took that big risk, financially at least, and once we started seeing what was on those reels we thought “Ok, now we’ve got something going, we got a way to tell the story” I think that’s one reason why the story hadn’t been told for all those years, because you need to see those people in that situation to believe it! This story is so crazy you’d say “No, no that could’ve never happened.”
Aguilar: It is very ironic that people that wanted to be left alone and be isolated had so much footage of themselves and pictures. It feels as if they wanted to be noticed.
Dayna: It was one of those weird unfathomable ironies. First of all, we did use a little bit of an “artistic light,” basically all the footage or 99% of it was actually shot by Captain Allan Hancock and his cameraman. What he did is, once he and his crew of scientists landed on the island in 1931 and discovered Friedrich and Dore, he started asking them to reenact their lives for the camera. We always sort of say “Who knows, maybe he was inspired by Nanook of the North", because Robert J. Flaherty went in and actually had his protagonist go through his life again. Hancock asked them to reenact what they were doing, and he took photos and filmed, it was actually shot originally on 35 mm nitrate, which doesn’t exist any longer. Luckily he made a bunch of 16mm safety prints which were what we found in the archive. Once they got to the island, Friedrich, Dore, the Wittmers, certainly the baroness and her lovers, they were all pretty proud of the fact that they had managed to create these lives in this very unfriendly terrain, and they were willing to show it off. The other irony is that not only did they pose for the cameras, but they all brought typewriters. In Friedrich Ritter’s case it made sense because he really did want to go into seclusion so he could write the great philosophical manifesto.
Dan: Part of it is, I think, that in those days everyone wrote letters, and I suppose the odds of a typewritten letter getting there across all the moisture in the oceans might have been better than one written with a pen.Margret ultimately wrote a memoir, Dore Strauch wrote a memoir, they also wrote letters, Ritter wrote articles for magazine and newspapers around the world, John Garth, the scientist on the Velero, kept his journal. We wound up with a wealth of first person expressions that could be used to form this script where the characters come to life through their own words in writing. In our case we put them in opposition to each other and it didn’t take much work because they all had their own point of view, and sometimes insinuated that the other one was responsible for what was going on down there. That became more or less a screenwriter adaptation job, not adapting one book, but adapting 2 books, 2 sets of journals, and who knows how many articles, and letters. Dayna and I, and our fellow writer Celeste Schaefer Snyder, bit by bit went through the murder mystery story and tried to give everyone voice, and also keep it kind of fun and suspenseful.
Aguilar: With all the sexual tension and intrigue, this could have easily been a narrative drama. As a documentary, how did you balance the interviews with current islanders, the first person narratives, the footage, and all the other different sources to create something cohesive?
Dayna: It’s funny, Hollywood had been trying to make it as a fiction forever. The reason why it hasn't happened yet, although scripts have been flying around for over 20 years, is that it is such a complicated story, and there are so many characters. Each one is worthy of their own script, certainly they are all larger than life. That was really what took us the longest, I would say we worked with Bill Weber, our editor, for about two years. We went down so many dead ends, I can’t even tell you, we had so many work-in-progress screenings, scratch our heads, rewrote, re-cut, tried different balances of one character vs. another, or vs. the islanders perspective.
Dan: I think one thing that was important in setting each character onto the island was that we wanted to give them at least some moments where they could state clearly, and with real seriousness, why they were going and what their first impressions were like. Then that way, when things begin to verge toward the melodramatic or darkly humorous, there was already a foundation where you understood these people weren’t just cartoon characters. They had thought this through as much as they could and were trying to do something with a good spirit behind them. Even the Baroness, though her notions of the hotel or certainly her ability to fulfill the notion of the hotel was suspect from the beginning.
Aguilar: Even though you focus on this set of characters, the islands themselves have a mystifying personality and they appear to affect the people in them. Was this idea part of your creative process?
Dayna: Thank you so much, that’s exactly how we felt!. You are right when that woman tries to get away from the island it kind of sucks her back, in much the same way that Lorenz was sucked back and landed on Marchenta Isaland. In many ways the fact that the island had a drought, a really severe drought one of the worst in decades, we deeply believe it led to whatever happened to the Baroness and Phillipson. It’s funy, when were just starting to do the project, the series Lost was playing. Lost really did have the island as a character, and as we were watching the early episodes were chuckling and saying “It’s not so far from reality”
Dan: I wouldn’t have been surprised if we got into a backroom in a hotel and found the Dharma machine and someone was punching in the numbers every 90 minutes [Laughs]. Talking about the island reaching out, it turned out that Margery Simkin, who was our casting director on the movie, was in the Galapagos in 1986, her boat broke down, and she met Margret Wittmer in an unscheduled stop on Flroreana also. Maybe there is something about those islands, the fact that they’ve been uninhabited for so long, or that they are sitting over a volcanic hotspot. I don’t know what kind of lore you want to assign to it, but I agree with you, there is something weirdly mystical and prehistoric about the whole place.
Aguilar: Through their writing and the footage, both of you essentially met these characters, what are your thoughts on these characters who wanted to get away and begin again some place new?
Dayan: They each had different reasons. One of the things that sort of drew me to the project on a philosophical and emotional level was that I’m not sure there is anyone who hasn’t had that, momentary at least, dream of forsaking everything and going off to live on some deserted island somewhere. Everyone has his or her own reasons for wanting to do that at any specific moment. What was so interesting is that each of those people or collective groups in the film, had their own very specific reasons for going. In a way, each had its own very specific notions of what paradise might look like. One of the things that we talked about between us since the beginning of the project is that the film is about what could happen if you do take that leap? You leave society and you go in pursuit of your own little deserted island, in search of paradise. But when you get there, someone else is already situated on that same island and their notion of paradise clashes explicitly with your notion of paradise. What do you do?...
- 4/17/2014
- by Carlos Aguilar
- Sydney's Buzz
Jean-Paul Sartre wrote that Hell is other people. Several of the ill-fated subjects at the center of Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine’s riveting historical mystery documentary “The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden” would have probably agreed with him.In 1929, German doctor Friedrich Ritter and his mistress Dore Strauch, eccentric intellectuals inspired by Nietzsche, uproot themselves from Berlin and move to Floreana, a completely uninhabited island in the Galapagos. Their Eden of solitude and self-reliance quickly falls apart, as menacing problems in their relationship come to the fore. Then, more alarmingly for the two pioneers, neighbors arrive. First it’s the Wittmers, a family Friedrich and Dore find too bourgeois for their tastes, and then it’s a flamboyant Baroness, with a duo of kept men in tow, who plans to build a tourist hotel on the island. Paradise lost, indeed.What follows plays out like a game of tropical “Clue” writ large.
- 4/1/2014
- by Beth Hanna
- Thompson on Hollywood
2014 is now in full swing, the Sundance Film Festival has closed its doors, and film festivals like South by Southwest and Tribeca are generating more buzz for the year’s noteworthy indie narratives and documentaries. In recent years, documentaries such as Restrepo, Gasland, and Searching For Sugarman went on to become heavyweights. This year’s contenders include topics taken from popular memoirs and biographies, along with subject matter pertaining to youths and youth culture. Below, you’ll find a comprehensive list of Sundance and non-Sundance documentaries to keep an eye out for this year, equipped with official synopsis and trailer when available. 2014 is shaping out to a versatile year in the documentary world, ranging from heavy-handed family dramas such as Tracy Droz Tragos’ and Andrew Droz Palermo’s Rich Hill, to baseball biographies such as Chapman and Maclain Way’s The Battered Bastards of Baseball and Jeff Radice’s No No A Dockumentary,...
- 3/9/2014
- by Christopher Clemente
- SoundOnSight
Exclusive: Film Sales Company also completes deal with Kinosmith for Canada.
The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came To Eden has worked its charms on international buyers as Diane Kruger and Sebastian Koch prepare to attend Monday’s (Feb 10) international premiere at the Berlinale.
According to buyers, Hopscotch has picked up Australia / New Zealand rights while Kinosmith will distribute in Canada.
Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine directed the documentary about sexual intrigue and murder on the remote island.
Kruger and Koch are among an illustrious voice-over cast alongside Oscar nominee Cate Blanchett and Thomas Kretschmann.
Geller and Goldfine produced with Celeste Schaefer Snyder and Jonathan Dana served as executive producer. The producers are in talks with companies over fictional remake rights.
Zeitgeist Films will release in the Us in April and Film Sales Company represents international sales.
The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came To Eden has worked its charms on international buyers as Diane Kruger and Sebastian Koch prepare to attend Monday’s (Feb 10) international premiere at the Berlinale.
According to buyers, Hopscotch has picked up Australia / New Zealand rights while Kinosmith will distribute in Canada.
Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine directed the documentary about sexual intrigue and murder on the remote island.
Kruger and Koch are among an illustrious voice-over cast alongside Oscar nominee Cate Blanchett and Thomas Kretschmann.
Geller and Goldfine produced with Celeste Schaefer Snyder and Jonathan Dana served as executive producer. The producers are in talks with companies over fictional remake rights.
Zeitgeist Films will release in the Us in April and Film Sales Company represents international sales.
- 2/6/2014
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
The 64th Berlin International Film Festival has announced the first set of titles for the main Competition and special screenings. The festival begins on February 6th.
Competition
Above: Director Dominik Graf (far left) and cast from Die geliebten Schwestern
The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson, USA) - Opening Film
'71 (Yann Demange, UK)
Aloft (Claudia Llosa, Spain/Canada/France)
Die geliebten Schwestern (Dominik Graf, Germany)
Life of Riley (Alain Resnais, France)
The Monuments Men (George Clooney, USA/Germany) - Out of Competition
Stratos (Yannis Economides, Greece/Germany/Cyprus)
Berlinale Special
Above: We Come As Friends
A Long Way Down (Pascal Chaumeil, UK)
We Come As Friends (Hubert Sauper, France/Austria)
The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden (Dayna Goldfine & Daniel Geller, USA)
The Turning (various, Australia)...
Competition
Above: Director Dominik Graf (far left) and cast from Die geliebten Schwestern
The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson, USA) - Opening Film
'71 (Yann Demange, UK)
Aloft (Claudia Llosa, Spain/Canada/France)
Die geliebten Schwestern (Dominik Graf, Germany)
Life of Riley (Alain Resnais, France)
The Monuments Men (George Clooney, USA/Germany) - Out of Competition
Stratos (Yannis Economides, Greece/Germany/Cyprus)
Berlinale Special
Above: We Come As Friends
A Long Way Down (Pascal Chaumeil, UK)
We Come As Friends (Hubert Sauper, France/Austria)
The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden (Dayna Goldfine & Daniel Geller, USA)
The Turning (various, Australia)...
- 12/19/2013
- by Notebook
- MUBI
In a preemptive move, Zeitgeist Films has picked up all Us rights to the murder mystery documentary "The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden" ahead of its premiere at Telluride this week. Directed by Daniel Geller and Dayna Goldfine, the film centers on a 1930s unsolved murder mystery involving a group of clashing individualists who settled on an island in the Galapagos. Described as Darwin meets Hitchcock, the documentary features voice performances by Cate Blanchett, Diane Kruger, Connie Nielsen and Josh Radnor, among others, as it interweaves details of the murder with stories of present day Galapagos pioneers. It features newly discovered archival footage, as well as present day HD footage of the Galapagos. Geller and Goldfine previously collaborated on the 2005 National Board of Review winning doc "Ballets Russes." "The Galapagos Affair" will have its theatrical release in NY and La in Spring 2014 before a national rollout.
- 8/28/2013
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Thompson on Hollywood
"All My Children" actress and "Skating With the Stars" winner Rebecca Budig is engaged to Michael Benson, reports People. Benson is a television executive whom Budig met nine months ago. He proposed on Christmas Day, awww!
This is Budig's third marriage, as she recently split with her husband of six years, "The Bachelor's" Bob Guiney. Before that Rebecca was briefly married to Daniel Geller. She met "Bachelor" Bob while hosting "Bachelor" repeats for ABC Family.
Benson proposed with a Platt Boutique ruby and Old European Cut diamond in platinum and yellow gold. It's vintage ring circa 1935.
Congratulations to the happy couple!
This is Budig's third marriage, as she recently split with her husband of six years, "The Bachelor's" Bob Guiney. Before that Rebecca was briefly married to Daniel Geller. She met "Bachelor" Bob while hosting "Bachelor" repeats for ABC Family.
Benson proposed with a Platt Boutique ruby and Old European Cut diamond in platinum and yellow gold. It's vintage ring circa 1935.
Congratulations to the happy couple!
- 1/7/2011
- by editorial@zap2it.com
- Pop2it
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