The 20th St. Louis International Film Festival kicked off on Thursday night at the Tivoli with a cocktail-party catered by civic boosters Stella Artois beer and the Pasta House Company, followed by a gala screening of the pseudo-silent comedy "The Artist."
The festival continues through Nov, 20 at the Tivoli and Plaza Frontenac cinemas, with ancillary events at the Wildey Theatre in Edwardsville, COCA, the St. Louis County Library headquarters, the Museum of Contemporary Art, and Webster and Washington universities.
Last night's glittering curtain raiser was a big success, culminating in "The Artist," crowd-pleasing film about 1920s Hollywood that was a hit at Cannes (and which I will be reviewing when it starts an extended run in St. Louis later this season).
Among the guests we chatted with was Bill Plympton, the acclaimed animator who is the subject of a best-of retrospective tonight at 7 at Webster's Moore Auditorium, the subject of a documentary on Saturday at 5 in the same venue, and the instructor for a free seminar on Saturday afternoon at 1 in the university's Sverdrup Hall.
Plympton, a two-time Oscar nominee, an Academy member and a juror in the AMPAS shorts categories, lamented the recent bad publicity for the awards. (This week, boorish director Brett Ratner was forced to resign as the telecast producer after he made a gay slur and other inappropriate remarks while publicizing his new movie "Tower Heist," which led to Ratner pal Eddie Murphy quitting as host and veteran Billy Crystal riding to the rescue.)
This evening's fest highlights include screenings of Ralph Fienne's Shakespeare update "Coriolanus" (7 p.m. at the Tivoi); the body-snatchers comedy "Burke and Hare" from "Blues Brothers" director John Landis (7:15 at Plaza Frontenac); Takeshi Kitano's Japanese gangster flick "Outrage" (9 p.m. at Plaza Frontenac); Brian Jun's gritty, shot-in-Alton "Joint Body (6:30 p.m. at the Wildey); and a free screening of the Vincent Price comedy/Western "The Baron of Arizona" (7 p.m. at Wash U.'s Brown Hall).
Saturday's highlights include competing screening of the school-shooting drama "We Need to Talk About" (6 p.m. at Plaza Frontenac) and the sex-addictkion shocker "Shame" (6:45 at the Tivoli); a free screening of the Missouri-lensed romance "Bubba Moon Face" (11 a.m. at the Tivoli); free screening of the local docs "Give a Damn?" and "The Pruitt-Igoe Myth" a Brown Hall (at noon and 3 p.m. respectively); the silent comedy "The Wildcat" at Webster; and docs about Kurt Cobain and roots rocker Hugh Deneal at the Wildey (at 5:30 and 8 respectively).
Sunday's highlights include the new-wavers reunion comedy "I Melt With You" at 8 p.m. at the Tivoli; Deborah Yates' Guatemalan death-squad documentary "Granito" at noon at Brown Hall (free); and two events with "Hoop Dreams" documetarian Steve James: his stop-the-violence film "The Interrupters" (1 p.m. at the Wildey) and a free screening of his troubled-youth profile "Stevie" (6 p.m. at Brown Hall).
Tickets for most screenings are $12 and are available at the retrospective box offices 30 minutes before curtain; advance tickets are available for Tivoli, Plaza Frontenac and Wildey events. For more info about the films or online ticketing, visit www.cinemastlouis.org.
