Independent & Repertory
For decades New York department store Bergdorf Goodman has been a destination for discerning shoppers from all across the globe, both those of means and those who only aspire to own the high end, and often fashion-forward, merchandise that they stock. The 5th Avenue institution was started more than a century ago by a couple of immigrants who decided to open a tailoring business that eventually switched over to retail and soon occupied an entire city block of prime Manhattan real estate on what was the former home of the Vanderbilt Mansion. This slick celebratory documentary from Director Matthew Miele...
In 1994, General Roméo Dallaire was the UN Force Commander during the Rwandan genocide. Now retired, Dallaire is haunted by memories of child soldiers, recruited by various groups to fight their wars. In an attempt to put an end to the use of children in combat, General Roméo Dallaire heads back to Rwanda to meet with leaders of the various militias, as well as members of the UN currently working with child soldiers who are attempting to leave that life behind them. While the motivation behind Fight Like Soldiers, Die Like Children is a worthy one, the final result is...
Michel Gondry, unleashed from the commercial shackles of oh, say The Green Hornet, returns a bit more to form with The We and the I. Basically plotless, the film takes a bus ride through the Bronx with a group of teenagers, on the way home after the last day of school before summer break. Gondry lets his non-professional cast have free rein here and he lets the narrative ramble, but in a compelling way. Details tease out slowly and characters come into sharper focus as the bus empties. This is less a movie, and more a nature documentary – teens...
Robbie (Paul Brannigan) has barely avoided a prison sentence from an assault charge, helped by the fact that he’s about to become a father. His girlfriend’s family hates him, and after years of being an unemployed thug, Robbie wants nothing more than to change his life. Given community service for his assault charge, Robbie meets Harry (John Henshaw), his community service worker, and a few other unlucky individuals in the same position that he’s in. Harry decides to take the group to a whiskey distillery tour, where Robbie learns he has quite the nose for whiskey. With an auction for...
The untimely death of an actor, artist or, in this case, musician, always seems to add a layer of mysticism to the legacy of the work that’s left behind. But that layer gets even deeper in the case of Tim and Jeff Buckley. A father and his son, both musicians, both died early. This is pop culture gold. Except, apparently when it’s translated into a film. Greetings from Tim Buckley is a film that chronicles the days leading up to a tribute concert for a folk music icon, Tim Buckley, that features none other than Tim’s own son, Jeff Buckley,...
Have you ever found yourself watching The Shining and wondering what’s up with all of the Native American imagery? Have you ever wanted to watch it frame-by-frame to deconstruct its hidden meaning or plot out a perfect map of the ominous Overlook Hotel to determine whether or not that window in that one scene is in the correct place? Unless you’re the subject of Rodney Ascher’s documentary about the various theories concerning the subtext found in Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 film, the answer is: probably not. Using clips from other Kubrick films as well as footage from The Shining itself, Ascher...
Cullen (Thomas Dekker) is a rather broody young man living the life of a swinging college student when his Mother, Doris (Julie Le Breton), is suddenly killed in a car crash. This sends Cullen into an even moodier place because not only is he devastated by the death, he’s angry at himself for treating his Mom rather flippantly the last time they spoke. A few months later, while digging through some of his Mother’s things, Cullen stumbles across the shocking revelation that his Mom was violently attacked, raped and left for dead 21 years before. Cullen’s existence, he finds out,...
By day, Marlon (Arnold Reyes) is a driver and clean-up man for a wealthy, corrupt congressman named Chango (Menggie Cobarrubias) but by night he’s a devoted Father to his daughter. One afternoon, while on a school run with his daughter as well as the congressman’s in the car, he’s carjacked by kidnappers who hope to kidnap and collect a healthy ransom from the congressman. When the kidnappers accidentally kill the wrong kid and make off with Marlon’s daughter instead, Marlon’s forced into a deal with the bad guys: he must keep what he knows about the rich man’s daughter to...
Sean comes to a small East Coast town to live with his father from a much larger city, bringing with him a big city aesthetic in the form of “goth” clothing, dyed black hair, black nail polish and facial piercings. Despite all outward appearances, Sean is an average teenager. He likes girls, is wrought with emotion, dresses weird and is bullied by the “cooler” kids for being different. When an online journal entry–“a therapeutic creative writing exercise“–is discovered by his community, an investigation begins into Sean’s alleged “plan” to kill his fellow students. His arrest and subsequent trial challenge Sean...
In neighbourhoods all over the country, kids play elaborate games of hide and seek, keepaway and, yes, even war. I Declare War brings you a look at one game of war, played in one neighbourhood. The game involves two sides trying to capture the other’s flag. There are three rules: you cannot move your base once the game has started, if you get shot (with a paintball bullet) you must stay down for 10 “Mississippis”, and if you get hit with a (paint) grenade you’re dead and you have to go home. The stakes are high in this particular game...
When Leon’s (Aaron Poole) mother passes away, he returns to her home to take care of final affairs. Inside her home, Leon finds that she has spent much of her life buying the antiques that Leon sold over the years. She was also a member of a very strange cult, and her religious beliefs were a large part of why Leon had left home in the first place. Back home, and surrounded by memories he had try to leave behind, Leon starts to believe that his mother is trying to contact him with an urgent message, but will he be...
ChristCore is a documentary taking an inside look at Christian hardcore music and its influence on the next generation of Christians. Following new band Messengers, and Christian hardcore superstars Sleeping Giant, as they tour the country, ChristCore explores how this subculture of Christian music is becoming a connecting force between young people and the church. Director Justin Ludwig opens his documentary by describing himself as a hardcore fan, musician, and atheist. After leaving behind his Christian upbringing, he turned to the world of hardcore music, and was shocked to eventually learn that it was a style of music that Christian...
