Conversations Archives - Cinema Without Borders

Cadejo Blanco, an interview with Justin Lerner

By Bijan Tehrani on 05/13/2023 Conversations, Videos

The story of Cadejo Blanco is about Sarita who lives with her sister Bea in a working-class neighborhood in Guatemala City. One night after a party, Bea doesn’t come home. Convinced that her disappearance has something to do with Andrés, her sister’s dangerous ex, Sarita manages to befriend him and infiltrate his gang. Narrowly avoiding death at every turn, and with an unwavering determination in the face of the men who underestimate her, Sarita becomes increasingly involved with Andrés and the ruthless, violent world of his gang. As she searches for answers about what happened to her sister, she realizes…

A conversation Maryam Keshavarz

By CWB News Department on 02/25/2023 Conversations

Maryam Keshavarz’s sophomore feature, “The Persian Version,” premiered with pizzazz at Sundance this year. In-person screenings – even those starting at eight in the morning! – saw packed theaters, inviting audiences to laugh (and cry) each time. In this ode to the director’s own family, Keshavarz maps out the relational entanglements of a lesbian, Iranian American woman (played by fresh faces Layla Mohammadi and Chiara Stella) born to a household of seven boys, who — by some off-chance one-night-stand — becomes pregnant. In this heartfelt mother-daughter tale, Keshavarz invites her audiences on a rollercoaster of tenderness and tough love that…

Where the Wind Blows, Hong Kong’s Oscar entry

By CWB News Department on 12/14/2022 Conversations, Videos

In Where the Wind Blows, Hong Kong’s Oscar entry directed by Philip Yung, Young Lui Lok became a policeman to uphold justice. But the rampant corruption within the police force made it impossible for him to remain independent. He decides to make a name for himself within the police force by controlling organized crime. Nam Kong looks [like a] gentleman, but operates with a dagger under his cloak. He is socially active among the police force as well as the social circles, in fact laying the groundwork for the empire of corruption he builds with Lui Lok. Nam Kong and…

A conversation with Viesturs Kairiss about January, Latvia’s Oscar Entry

By CWB News Department on 12/13/2022 Conversations, Videos

The story of the January , Latvia’s Oscar entry directed by Viesturs Kairiss happens in 1991 in Latvia and nineteen-year-old aspiring cinematographer Jazis’s whole world is thrown into chaos as he is dragged into the people’s peaceful protests against the Soviet Army’s attempted takeover of power in his country. January is an autobiographical take on the political upheaval in the early 1990s that changed the lives of the people of the former Soviet Union. Jazis and his friends Anna and Zeps are all aspiring filmmakers, trying to pursue their dreams of making movies and enjoying the freedom of young adulthood, when…

MAGNETIC FIELDS – Greece’s Oscar entry.

By CWB News Department on 12/07/2022 Conversations, Videos

MAGNETIC FIELDS from director Yorgos Goussis, is the official international feature film Oscar entry from Greece for the 95th Academy Awards. MAGNETIC FIELDS is a tender, humorous road movie about two charismatic but lonely people who meet by chance. Their spontaneous need to connect delays their separation and a return to their everyday lives. The film is a nod towards the classic Claude Lelouch’s “Un Homme et Une Femme” and Richard Linklater’s “Before Sunrise”. Director writer Yorgos Goussis shot MAGNETIC FIELDS, his debut film, with a MiniDV camcorder and is known primarily for his work as a comic book creator.…

An interview with Bahman Maghsoudlou

By CWB News Department on 11/23/2022 Conversations

I had the opportunity of watching Bahman Maghsoudlou’s Dariush Mehrjui Making The Cow and I was absolutely impressed by the great quality of this well-made, informative and at the same time entertaining documentary. Dariush Mehrjui Making The Cow not only deals with all aspects of this icon of international cinema, but also portrays the Iranian society and the state of art and culture state during the time of making The caw. After watching Dariush Mehrjui Making The Cow, I encountered the following interview with Bahman Maghsoudlou by Ali Moosavi in Film International about the past work of this filmmaker and…

Safe Place, Croatia’s Oscar Entry

By Bijan Tehrani on 11/17/2022 Conversations, Videos

Safe Place, Croatia’s Oscar Entry directed by Juraj Lerotić is about a traumatic event—a suicide attempt—creates a rift in the family’s everyday life. Their lives fundamentally change, as if they are waging a war invisible to everyone else. The source of the story is autobiographical, it is addressed in the film and highlighted by the fact that the author/director plays himself. The following is our interview with Juraj Lerotić about making of Safe Place: https://vimeo.com/772185261 Juraj Lerotić was born in 1978, in Kiel, Germany. He studied early childhood education and theology and later graduated from the Academy of Dramatic Art…

Inna Sahakyan talks about Aurora’s Sunrise, Armenia’s Oscar Entry

By Bijan Tehrani on 11/05/2022 Conversations

Aurora’s Sunrise, directed by Inna Sahakyan is the story of Aurora, a teenager when she loses her family to the first genocide of the twentieth century, a nightmare that she herself barely survived. But when asked to not just remember but relive this experience all over again, she said “yes”. https://vimeo.com/767732141 In 1915, as WWI raged on, the Ottoman Empire singled out its entire Armenian population for destruction. Only 14 years old at the time, Aurora’s story was tragically relatable. Forced onto a death march towards the Syrian desert, she lost her entire family before being kidnapped and sold into…

An interview with Claudia Castello, the editor of Hulu’s PREY

By CWB News Department on 08/13/2022 Conversations, Videos

Prey is a Hulu original action/sci-fi movie and a prequel to the movies in the Predator franchise. Set 300 years in the past, this Predator origin story tells the tale of the very first alien encounter, threatening the lives of the Comanche Nation. Before there was Dutch (Arnold Schwarzenegger), there was Naru (Amber Midthunder)—a skilled and resourceful warrior leading the fight against a high-tech predator—leaving her no other choice but to hunt…or be hunted. https://youtu.be/wZ7LytagKlc The following is an interview with Claudia Castello, the Editor of the PREY Bijan Tehrani: How did you start as a film editor and what…

AZOR, Whatever My Grandpa Didn’t Write

By Hamed Sarrafi on 07/21/2022 Conversations

For Andreas Fontana’s full-length feature debut as a director, Azor, he’s chosen to plunge straight into a time of dirty politics and the dictatorship in 1980 Argentina, where wealth insulates the elite. Talking in-depth with Hamed Sarrafi, the Argentine writer-director says he loves collaborating with friends like co-writer Mariano Llinas and using a mix of seasoned and non-professional actors – and he was pragmatic enough to get Swiss funding and place a Geneva banker at the center of the plot – but he also admits he’s something of a control freak. He deliberately interviewed some of the worst people imaginable…

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