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Gerald Fox’s documentary about the power-guzzling temporary city for eco-themed art in the Nevada desert already looks like a postcard from another era

If the inhabitants of Mad Max ever managed a mini-break from the grimness of post-apocalyptic life to a festival, it might look a bit like Burning Man – the hippyish summer solstice celebration held every year in the Nevada desert. Gerald Fox’s documentary shows how organisers impressively erect a city for 70,000 people out of nothing in 18 days. It’s a behind-the-scenes look without much in the way of history or context; certainly no voice is given to concerns that Burning Man’s countercultural credentials may go up in smoke as it becomes another destination on the global festival scene, a spectacular backdrop for a sunlit celebrity selfie.

The film focuses on a handful of artists installing their large-scale works in the desert. The French London-based architect...

Ed Lachman and New York remember Robert Frank: "Robert was the truest of poets but without words...his heart, mind and eye will always be missed...." Photo: Ed Bahlman

Robert Frank died on September 9, in Inverness, Nova Scotia, at the age of 94. He was the director of Me And My Brother on Julius and Peter Orlovsky, co-written by Sam Shepard; an infamous Rolling Stones documentary; Candy Mountain with Rudy Wurlitzer, and the short Pull My Daisy with Alfred Leslie, written by Jack Kerouac. Robert Frank, best known for his photography book The Americans, has been the subject of two recent documentaries.

The last time I saw Robert Frank and his wife June Leaf, was on June 1. They were sitting on the bench pictured here on Bleecker Street ... Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

There is Laura Israel’s Don't Blink: Robert Frank, shot by Edward Lachman and Lisa Rinzler, featuring archival footage of Allen Ginsberg,...

Shy of breathless revelations, this documentary about the sylph of steel is a strong introduction into Natalia Osipova’s magic

Film-maker Gerald Fox has made documentaries about artists Bill Viola and Marc Quinn, and directed an interesting feature adaptation of Edward St Aubyn’s book Mother’s Milk. Now he gives us this lucid, high-minded study of the 33-year-old Russian ballerina Natalia Osipova, principal dancer of the Royal Ballet.

She is shown in rehearsal for classical roles, but also combining this with a bold and exploratory approach to contemporary work, collaborating with dancers such as Jonathan Goddard and developing new pieces such as Arthur Pita’s wackily comic yet disturbing Mother, which requires Osipova to dance alongside a babushka figure that is a bit like the mother in Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho.

Specialties were mostly sidelined this weekend, as audiences turned to studio offerings. Some limited release holdovers, however, grabbed some attention from moviegoers looking for alternatives, including Greenwich Entertainment’s second weekend holdover, Echo In The Canyon, which took the best per theater average among the specialties in the three-day with added runs. The doc grossed an estimated $105,678 in 14 locations, averaging $7,548 bringing it cume to over $260K.

Greenwich reported “multiple sold-out shows” for the title’s second frame. The company said it added, “10 mostly mainstream locations” in the Los Angeles metro area with “stronger results in the dedicated arthouses.” Echo In the Canyon also expanded to the Angelika and Landmark 57 West in New York, buoyed by select Q&As and live performances featuring music from the documentary performed by executive producer/musician Jakob Dylan and accompanying band.

Greenwich will add over two dozen runs for the film next weekend with locations in San Francisco,...

Relatively few new limited releases are launching against the likes of Rocketman and Godzilla this weekend. Sony Pictures Classics is rolling out The Fall Of The American Empire, from French-Canadian filmmaker Denys Arcand and starring Alexandre Landry, in New York and Los Angeles, and after more than a decade of very limited screenings at a few film festivals, British filmmaker Gerald Fox’s doc Leaving Home, Coming Home: A Portrait of Robert Frank is finally getting a regular theatrical release. Indie Rights is heading out with satirical comedy Loners in Los Angeles, and Strand Releasing is launching Cannes 2018 title Yomeddine by Abu Bakr Sawky in New York.

Among other limited release titles headed to theaters this weekend are Mouthpiece from Crucial Things and First Generation Films, and Dogwoof’s For The Birds and Vertical Entertainment’s Rich Boy, Rich Girl.

The Fall Of the American Empire

Director-writer: Denys Arcand

Cast: Alexandre Landry,...

Taron Egerton brought the crowd at the French Riviera to their feet during the Rocketman premiere at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival. The Elton John biopic from Dexter Fletcher is among this weekend's new box office offerings.

Also in theaters will be the Octavia Spencer-led thriller Ma and Godzilla: King of the Monsters.

Documentarian Gerald Fox's Leaving Home, Coming Home: A Portrait of Robert Frank will also hit the big screen 14 years after its original debut.

Here's what critics with The Hollywood Reporter thought about the movies hitting theaters Friday.

Star Taron Egerton brought the crowd at the French Riviera to their feet during the Rocketman premiere at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, and the Elton John biopic from Dexter Fletcher is among this weekend's new box office offerings. 

Also bowing in theaters will be the Octavia Spencer-led thriller Ma and Godzilla: King of the Monsters. 

Documentarian Gerald Fox's Leaving Home, Coming Home: A Portrait of Robert Frank will also hit the big screen 14 years after its original debut. 

Here's what critics with The Hollywood Reporter thought about the movies opening Friday.

Emmy-winning “Sherlock” star Benedict Cumberbatch returned to TV in a big way on May 12 with a critically acclaimed performance in the title role of “Patrick Melrose.” This five-part adaptation of the bestselling series of books by Edward St. Aubyn concludes on June 9, just before TV academy voters start casting their Emmy Awards nominations ballots. Watch an extended video clip from the Showtime limited series above.

St. Aubyn’s quintet of novels — “Never Mind” (1992); “Bad News” (1994); “Some Hope” (1996) “Mother’s Milk” (2005) and “At Last” (2012) — was re-released as “The Patrick Melrose Novels” in 2012. The author adapted “Mother’s Milk,” which contended for the Booker prize, for a 2012 film version directed by Gerald Fox. “Smash” star Jack Davenport played the part.

Tackling the adaptation this time around is BAFTA-nominated David Nicholls. He crafted the 2015 film adaptation of the Thomas Hardy classic “Far From the Madding Crowd” that starred Carey Mulligan as well as...

13 members join advisory body.

London’s Institute Of Contemporary Arts (Ica), the organisation dedicated to showcasing indie and artist filmmakers, is forming the Independent Film Council, a body of experienced industry that will advise on the Ica’s activities.

There are 13 members of the inaugural council: Tilda Swinton, producer Stanley Buchtal, filmmakers Gerald Fox, Laura Poitras, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Naeem Mohaeimen, James Richards, Martine Syms, academics Erika Balsom and Laura Mulvey, editor Walter Murch, the Nfts’ head of Screen Arts Sandra Hebron, and Sundance Institute’s documentary programme director Tabitha Jackson.

The council will convene once a year as a think...

Just weeks after his performance in the acclaimed PBS telefilm “The Child in Time,” Benedict Cumberbatch takes on the title role in Showtime’s lavish new limited series “Patrick Melrose.” This five-part adaptation of the bestselling series of books by Edward St. Aubyn debuts on May 12, just a few weeks before TV academy voters start casting their Emmy Awards nominations ballots. Watch the first extended trailer above that showcases the Emmy-winning “Sherlock” star.

St. Aubyn’s quintet of novels — “Never Mind” (1992); “Bad News” (1994); “Some Hope” (1996) “Mother’s Milk” (2005) and “At Last” (2012) — was re-released as “The Patrick Melrose Novels” in 2012. The author adapted “Mother’s Milk,” which contended for the Booker prize, for a 2012 film version directed by Gerald Fox. “Smash” star Jack Davenport played the part.

Tackling the adaptation this time around is BAFTA-nominated David Nicholls. He crafted the 2015 film adaptation of the Thomas Hardy classic “Far From the Madding Crowd...

Benedict Cumberbatch is returning to TV in a big way with the title role in Showtime’s upcoming limited series “Patrick Melrose.” This five-part adaptation of the bestselling series of books by Edward St. Aubyn debuts on May 12, just a few weeks before TV academy voters start casting their Emmy Awards nominations ballots. Watch an extended clip above that showcases the Emmy-winning “Sherlock” star.

The lavish production traces the devolution of Patrick Melrose, from the hedonism of the French Riviera of the 1960s to the decadence of 1980s New York City to the Rule Britannia era of London in the first decade of this century. Oscar nominee Jennifer Jason Leigh and “Matrix” star Hugo Weaving play Patrick’s parents.

St. Aubyn’s quintet of novels — “Never Mind” (1992); “Bad News” (1994); “Some Hope” (1996) “Mother’s Milk” (2005) and “At Last” (2012) — was re-released as “The Patrick Melrose Novels” in 2012. The author adapted “Mother’s Milk,...

Exclusive: UK sales outfit boards Marco Niemeijer’s documentary.

UK sales outfit Starline Entertainment has boarded rights to Marco Niemeijer’s Holocaust themed documentary, Little Angels.

Produced by Annemiek van der Hell for Windmill Film, the documentary charts the troubled relationship between a 97-year-old Auschwitz survivor and her one remaining daughter born just after the emancipation of the camps.

Premiering at Netherlands Film Festival on Saturday (Sept 26) and nominated for Prix Europe 2015, the film is set for transmission in May 2016 on Joodse Omroep (Jewish Broadcaster) in the Netherlands.

Starline is hoping to pursue a similar release pattern on the film to the one it achieved with Gerry Fox’s documentary Marc Quinn: Making Waves, which earlier this year showed at Picturehouse cinemas, Dochouse and Home Manchester.

Julie Delaney, partner and director of worldwide distribution at Starline, said: “We’re very excited to be enriching our carefully chosen collection of documentaries with Marco Niemeijer’s thoroughly moving...

Exclusive: UK sales and distribution outfit adds TV and digital sales executive.

UK sales outfit Starline Entertainment has appointed Anna Brunelli as sales and acquisitions executive.

Italian, French and English-speaker Brunelli, who previously worked as production and distribution assistant for Italian companies Gabriele Albanesi Productions and as acquisitions and sales assistant at A-Pictures in Rome, will handle TV and digital sales to Southern Europe and Latin America.

Brunelli, who was also a production assistant for Les Films du Requin in Paris, recently started at the company.

Also new to the London-based outfit is marketing executive Tanya Lopes who will handle the company’s arrangements for film and TV markets and all marketing materials.

The English and Portuguese speaker began her career as an apprentice at High Point films, moving on to sales and marketing support before working in marketing outside the film and TV Industry.

Partner and director of worldwide distribution Julie Delaney said of the staff...

Quinn is articulate but not pretentious about his art in this pleasingly straightforward documentary

Filmed over a couple of years, this pleasingly straightforward documentary follows artist Marc Quinn (best known for making casts of his head out of his own frozen blood) as he goes about his travels, collaborating with various fabricators, attending parties and openings, meeting other artists and famous people (from Ai Weiwei to Kanye West and Kim Kardashian), but most of all making art. Articulate about the work without being pretentious about it, Quinn clearly has a real passion for his vocation, although the film doesn’t reveal much about his personal life or inner emotional landscape. Often clad in a baseball cap and cool-dad hoodie, with his poker face and stern manner, he comes across like the manager of a successful startup, keeping one eye on the supply chain and another on maintaining the brand’s core values.

The setting's Provence, but the humour is brittle, British and with a tang of poison

Edward St Aubyn has co-written this movie adaptation of his Booker-shortlisted autobiographical novel Mother's Milk, directed by Gerry Fox. The result looks a bit like television, though it isn't bad: sparky, boisterous, cynical, a little self-conscious but more grownup and literate than most new British movies. Jack Davenport makes the most of a juicy lead role as Patrick Melrose, a cynical, upper-middle-class Englishman deeply angry with his ageing mother, played by the now late Margaret Tyzack, in her final role. She has, in her dotage, agreed to gift the family's beautiful Provençal house to a dodgy guy called Seamus Dorke (Adrian Dunbar) as the HQ for his new age therapies. Patrick is taking his family for one final holiday in this idyllic place, for a last painful interview with his mother, who is in a nursing home nearby,...

★★☆☆☆ With lines as awkward as "Your milk was so laced with gin I could barely drink it", the tone is quickly set for Mother's Milk (2012), Gerry Fox's adaptation of Edward St. Aubyn's novel, a dynastic drama spiked with an overabundance of Freudian froth. The Melroses, once a distinguished, wealthy family, are hitting hard times. With the money drying up, Patrick (Jack Davenport) finds himself trapped in a turbulent marriage with wife Mary (Annabel Mullion), who is ever anxious that she will repeat the sins of her own mother, Kettle (Diana Quick).

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