Click here for Pixilated Photobooth’s full album of our Closing Night Party photos.

“This week’s feature helps kick off the Maryland Film Festival with stories about Lotfy Nathan’s 12 O’Clock Boys, Matthew Porterfield’s I Used to Be Darker, and Ryan White’s Good Ole Freda, about the Beatles’ longtime secretary. We also have shorter reviews of I Am Divine, If We Shout Loud Enough, After Tiller, Teacher, Fill the Void, and Post Tenebras Lux, plus listings for all movies at the festival (including CP recommendations), and a complete schedule.

Click here for more information in the Baltimore City Paper!

Baltimore City Paper also has a feature article on MFF 2013′s 12 O’Clock Boys – click here for Baynard Woods‘ article, “It’s 12 O’Clock in Baltimore.”

A TEACHER

A TEACHER (HANNAH FIDELL)

Behind closed doors, a young woman working as a suburban Texas high-school teacher risks everything for an affair with a student. As their romance grows, each new element—text messages, photographs, increasingly public meeting places—carry reckless whiffs of both excitement and danger, but also send their lives further and further out of balance. Built around remarkable lead performances by Lindsay Burdge and Will Brittain, and avoiding expected beats at every turn, Hannah Fidell’s bold first feature A Teacher is a riveting psychological portrait that keeps viewers on the edge of their seats.

You have two chances to see A Teacher within MFF 2013, with director Hannah Fidell hosting! Read more: http://www.mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/26

MOTHER OF GEORGE

MOTHER OF GEORGE (ANDREW DOSUNMU)

Maryland Film Festival is proud to present as our 2013 Closing Night selection the first public screening of Andrew Dosunmu’s Mother of George since its premiere at Sundance in January. The story of a Nigerian couple in Brooklyn struggling to make their young marriage work while running a restaurant, Mother of George boasts gripping performances from Danai Gurira (of The Visitor, The Walking Dead, and Treme) and Isaach De Bankolé (whose distinguished filmography includes career-spanning collaborations with such directors as Claire Denis and Jim Jarmusch). Also of note is the film’s gorgeous cinematography from Bradford Young (of Pariah, Middle of Nowhere, and Dosunmu’s 2011 feature Restless City), who won the U.S. Dramatic Cinematography award at Sundance 2013 for his gorgeous work on both this film and David Lowery’s forthcoming Ain’t Them Bodies Saints.

Don’t miss Mother of George, our Closing Night film, with director Andrew Dosunmu and cinematographer Bradford Young presenting! Attendees also get access to MFF 2013’s Closing Night party! Read more: http://www.mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/59

WHITE REINDEER

WHITE REINDEER (Zach Clark)

Many young filmmakers love John Waters, but few find a way to digest Waters’ anarchic humor and unleash it with their own warped sensibility as well as Zach Clark (MFF 2009’s Modern Love Is Automatic). The story of Suzanne, a suburban everywoman whose Christmas dreams are dashed by tragedy and then resurrected by an unlikely new friendship, White Reindeer offers intriguing characters, sharp dialogue, and fresh twists in both narrative and tone. Shot in and around the DC/MD/VA area and starring Anna Margaret Hollyman (also of MFF 2013’s Opening Night short Social Butterfly), White Reindeer is an irreverent yet poignant holiday treat.

You have two chances to see White Reindeer within MFF 2013, with Zach Clark and Anna Margaret Hollyman hosting! Read more: http://www.mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/40

WATCHTOWER

WATCHTOWER (Pelin Esmer)

Turkish cinema has produced some evocative gems in recent years, such as MFF 2012’s Once Upon a Time in Anatolia. Cut from similar cloth but telling a more intimate story is Pelin Esmer’s brooding, redemptive drama Watchtower. Nihat is an emotionally damaged man who takes a job as a fire warden in a remote, densely forested region of rural Turkey; Seher is a cook at the bus station near the base of the mountain Nihat occupies. Both characters seek solitary lives undisturbed by outsiders, but a strange magnetism forms between the two. Esmer’s characters are superbly drawn, her cinematography lush and immersive, and her setting utterly unique.

You have two chances to see Watchtower within MFF 2013! Read more: http://www.mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/28

Bradford Young

Maryland Film Festival (May 8-12 in downtown Baltimore) is proud to announce that acclaimed cinematographer Bradford Young will co-host its 2013 Closing Night screening, presenting Oscilloscope Laboratories’ Mother of George alongside director Andrew Dosunmu. MFF 2013’s Closing Night, which takes place the evening of Sunday, May 12th in downtown Baltimore’s historic Charles Theater, will be the first public screening of Mother of George since its premiere within Sundance 2013.

Young won the U.S. Dramatic Cinematography award at Sundance 2013 for his gorgeous work on both Mother of George and David Lowery’s Cannes-bound Ain’t Them Bodies Saints. His rich body of work as cinematographer includes Dee Rees’ Pariah (2011) and Ava DuVernay’s Middle of Nowhere (2012), as well as two features screened within Maryland Film Festival: James Spooner’s White Lies, Black Sheep (MFF 2008) and Dosunmu’s earlier feature Restless City (MFF 2011). It’s with great pleasure that MFF welcomes back to Baltimore one of the most talented cinematographers working in contemporary film.

The story of a Nigerian couple in Brooklyn struggling to make their young marriage work while running a restaurant and navigating a new culture, Mother of George boasts gripping central performances from Danai Gurira (of The Visitor, The Walking Dead, and Treme) and Isaach De Bankolé (whose distinguished filmography includes career-spanning collaborations with such directors as Claire Denis and Jim Jarmusch). Maryland Film Festival has proudly supported Mother of George since its earliest stages of development, awarding Dosunmu and screenwriter Darci Picoult the Maryland Filmmakers Fellowship for their script in 2005. It’s a beautiful and fitting selection for the closing night of the festival’s 15th annual edition.

In the days leading up to Maryland Film Festival 2013, our programmers would like to direct your attention to a few titles for your consideration. Up today: 16 Acres, the rigorous documentary about the rebuilding of Ground Zero; and the challenging Mexican art-house mind-bender, Post Tenebras Lux.

16 ACRES

16 ACRES (Richard Hankin)

16 Acres is a riveting documentary about the many behind-the-scenes wrangles, some of them tense and some of them humorous, surrounding the debate of how to rebuild the World Trade Center site after 9/11. While the film is respectful and poignant in its handling of the tragedy at the starting point of this intricate story, it focuses neither on tragedy nor on patriotic fervor, but rather on a very practical question: what forces, public, private, and governmental, get involved when 16 of the most valuable acres in the world suddenly become available? Furthermore, how do these forces interact, and what obstacles do they put in each other’s paths as they all develop their own visions of how to rebuild this immensely valuable and emotionally charged real estate? The story unfolds with remarkable access to the major figures involved, and is masterfully constructed by director Richard Hankin, who edited the seminal documentary Capturing the Friedmans.

You have two chances to see 16 Acres within MFF 2013, with director Richard Hankin presenting! Read our program notes and get showtime and ticket information here:  http://mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/29

POST TENEBRAS LUX

POST TENEBRAS LUX (Carlos Reygadas)

If Andrei Tarkovsky were alive, young, and working in Mexico today, the results might look something like this dreamlike and controversial art-house mindbender.  Carlos Reygadas, the director of challenging art-house favorites Battle in Heaven and Silent Light, returns with his most personal and transgressive film yet, a masterful meditation on natural wonder, sudden violence, and the human condition. If you go to the movies hopeful to see something startlingly new—and are willing to approach material that may take days to process—Post Tenebras Lux might just be the film for you. We’re overnighting a 35mm print of this title, by the way, so our audiences can experience its rare and unusual beauty on film! You can read Manohla Dargis’ Critcis’ Pick review here.

You have two chances to see Post Tenebras Lux on 35mm within MFF 2013! Read our program notes and get showtime and ticket information here:  http://mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/23

PIT STOP

PIT STOP (Yen Tan)

Two gay men in small-town Texas—one maintaining the façade of a family life with his ex-wife and daughter, and one spending much of his spare time visiting an ex-lover in the hospital—live parallel lives with overlapping hopes and dreams. Malaysian-born, Austin-based director Yen Tan’s film functions both as a tender and nuanced drama, and as a statement on LGBT acceptance in America that avoids clichés as it humanizes rather than politicizes its concerns. This exquisitely shot drama, which premiered at Sundance 2013, co-stars familiar faces John Merriman (of MFF 2012’s Opening Night short Modern Man) and Amy Seimetz (director of MFF 2012’s Sun Don’t Shine), and boasts a script co-written by David Lowery (host of MFF 2013’s Opening Night; director of the Cannes-bound Ain’t Them Bodies Saints).

You have two chances to see Pit Stop within MFF 2013, with director Yen Tan presenting! Read more here: http://mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/12

HERE COMES THE DEVIL

HERE COMES THE DEVIL (Adrián García Bogliano)

Some of you have asked for more genre films from Maryland Film Festival, and it’s our pleasure to deliver. Mexico’s Here Comes the Devil offers an artful, crimson-drenched horror vision that channels both Picnic at Hanging Rock and Village of the Damned in the service of something brand new. A family stops at a remote gas station while on a road trip to Tijuana, and two children slip away from their parents to explore a hill. The children return, seemingly shell-shocked—and as they adapt a newly sullen demeanor, their parents begin to suspect something unspeakable may have happened to them during their absence, and set out for answers.

You have two chances to see Here Comes the Devil within MFF 2013! Read more here:  http://www.mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/34

DOWNLOADED

DOWNLOADED (Alex Winter)

A smart, incisive documentary about the rise and fall of Napster, Downloaded gives The Social Network a run for its money in telling a thrilling story about an internet innovation that all too quickly takes on a global life of its own. With remarkable access to Napster creators Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker, Downloaded is expertly crafted by director Alex Winter (of Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Lost Boys fame, not to mention the co-creator of the cult classic Freaked), who will be here to host our screenings. His Q+As at Hot Docs last week were by all reports phenomenal, and we can’t wait to share Downloaded—both a great film and a great conversation-starter—with our audiences!

You have two chances to see Downloaded within MFF 2013; read more here: http://www.mdfilmfest.com/festival/film-guide/33

IT FELT LIKE LOVE

IT FELT LIKE LOVE (Eliza Hittman)

On the outskirts of Brooklyn, a fourteen-year-old girl’s sexual quest takes a dangerous turn when she pursues an older man and tests the boundaries between obsession and love. Eliza Hittman‘s It Felt Like Love, which premiered at Sundance 2013, at times suggests an American counterpart to Catherine Breillat, particularly such films as Fat Girl, 36 Fillette, and A Real Young Girl; it also recalls the impetuous teenaged world of Andrea Arnold’s Fish Tank, and the summery haze of Baltimore’s own Hamilton. But while very worthy of these comparisons, It Felt Like Love weaves its own path through a deceptively simple narrative loaded with complex emotional weight. In the process, it signals an exciting new voice in American film.

You have two chances to see It Felt Like Love within MFF 2013; read more here: http://www.md-filmfest.com/festival/film-guide/10

Frank Bruni

Maryland Film Festival (May 8-12 in downtown Baltimore) is proud to announce our 2013 guest host:  The New York Times’ Op-Ed columnist, Frank Bruni, who has chosen to present a screening of the Oscar-nominated Absence of Malice (1981). Directed by Sydney Pollack and starring Paul Newman, Sally Field, Bob Balaban, and Melinda Dillon, Absence of Malice tells a timely story of misinformation being reported as fact by the mainstream media and causing irreversible damage. The film’s screenplay was written by journalist Kurt Luedtke, and was given real-life resonance by a dispute Paul Newman had with The New York Post.

The Maryland Film Festival is honored to have as distinguished a journalist as Frank Bruni participating in their 15th annual festival. After graduating with a B.A. in English from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an M.S. in journalism from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, Bruni launched his career in 1990 at The Detroit Free Press, where he covered the first Iraq war. He moved to The New York Times in 1995, working as a reporter in the Washington, D.C. Bureau and covering Congress and the George W. Bush campaign and administration. His Bush reporting developed into his bestseller, Ambling Into History. He was promoted to Rome Bureau Chief in 2002.

Bruni was chief restaurant critic for The New York Times from 2004-2009, and in 2009 released another bestseller, Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater, about his lifelong struggles with food and fitness. Bruni was a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine, where he profiled people as diverse as Hillary Clinton and Elle Fanning.

Absence of Malice will screen from a 35mm print 11a.m. Saturday, May 11, at downtown Baltimore’s historic Charles Theater. Advance tickets are available for all films online at mdfilmfest.com.

David Lowery

Maryland Film Festival is thrilled to announce that filmmaker David Lowery will be the host for our 2013 Opening Night Shorts Program, which will take place on Wednesday, May 8th at the MICA Brown Center, 8pm.  Tickets for Opening Night and the rest of MFF 2013′s lineup are on sale now – click here to purchase through MissionTix.

Lowery, a multi-year participant in MFF and an alum of the festival’s signature Opening Night Shorts Program, has received widespread acclaim for his forthcoming feature, the Cannes-bound Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, starring Casey Affleck, Ben Foster, and Rooney Mara. Lowery has also made waves in recent months with a series of profile-raising announced projects, ranging from a reinvention of Disney’s Pete’s Dragon to a crime drama with Robert Redford attached as star and producer, The Old Man and the Gun.

MFF has been a proud supporter of Lowery throughout his career. Among Lowery’s films as director, MFF has screened his short film A Catalog of Anticipations in 2008, his feature St. Nick in 2009, and his Will Oldham-starring short Pioneer within MFF 2011’s Opening Night Shorts Program. The many other features Lowery has worked on in various capacities include editing Sun Don’t Shine (MFF 2012), shooting Lovers of Hate (MFF 2010) and Empire Builder (MFF 2012), and co-writing Pit Stop (MFF 2013).

MFF first devoted their Opening Night to short films in 2002, and has done so each year since 2004. Thanks to the ongoing support from the William G. Baker, Jr. Memorial Fund, creator of the Baker Artist Awards, the festival has played a unique role in advocating for short-form film and video work. MFF has presented its Opening Night with a series of fascinating hosts, from acclaimed critics like Andrew O’Hehir and Ann Hornaday to award-winning filmmakers such as Bobcat Goldthwait and Barry Levinson. It’s with great pleasure that the festival welcomes David Lowery, a visionary director and generous film collaborator, as the first Opening Night alumnus to host this special evening.

As announced last week, Maryland Film Festival 2013’s Opening Night Shorts Films are:  Frances Bodomo’s Boneshaker, a drama about an African family lost in rural Alabama starring Academy Award nominee Quvenzhané Wallis; Grainger David’s The Chair, the story of one boy’s reaction to an outbreak of poisonous mold in his small town, nominated for Cannes 2012’s Short Film Palme d’or and winner of SXSW 2012’s Short Film Jury Prize;  Riley Stearns’ 16mm-shot The Cub, a note-perfect dark comedy about humans living amongst wolves that was nominated for Sundance 2013’s short-film grand-jury prize;  Dara Bratt’s observational documentary Flutter, a portrait of an ordinary man living in the extraordinary world of butterfly collecting; Chetin Chabuk’s Jujitsuing Reality, an inspiring documentary about Scott Lew, a screenwriter living with ALS; and Lauren Wolkstein’s elegant and sly Social Butterfly, in which a mysterious American woman (Anna Margaret Hollyman) arrives at a teenage party in the South of France.

Maryland Film Festival 2013 will take place May 8-12 in beautiful downtown Baltimore, presenting approximately 50 features and 80 short films on 7 screens within the Station North Arts and Entertainment District. Its Closing Night film, as announced last week, will be Mother of George by Andrew Dosunmu. For more information, please visit our website at http://www.mdfilmfest.com.