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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Karenina and I

Sean McCord with Director Tommaso Mottola and actor/producer Gorild Mauseth

When Norwegian actor Gorild Mauseth receives an offer from the Primorsky Regional Drama Theater in Russia to play Anna Karenina, she agrees, and the role becomes an all-consuming venture. To reach the theater in Vladivostok, she travels along the Trans-Siberian Railway, learning Russian and trying to understand why Tolstoy (Liam Neeson) wrote his acclaimed novel Anna Karenina. As she travels through Russia, Mauseth can feel herself slowly becoming Anna, and begins to hear Tolstoy’s voice in her head. Bringing together documentary and narrative elements, Mauseth works to break free from her character by confronting her traumatic past.

Karenina and I runs Saturday at 8:30 pm.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.

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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Another Slave Narrative

Sean McCord and Michelle Jackson

As part of President Roosevelt’s New Deal in 1936-1938, the Federal Writers’ Project interviewed more than 2,300 former slaves to gain first-hand accounts of slave life. Featuring a multiracial cast, Another Slave Narrative showcases performances of the original transcripts of these federal interviews in the former slaves’ own words.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.

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Apropos Of Something: Recording Rally Turned Riot & Enfranchising Democracy For All

Apropos Of Something hosts Ellen Daniels and Nancy Laurence talk with award-winning, investigative journalist/author Hawes Spencer, about objectively documenting the tragic events in his new book, Summer of Hate: Charlottesville, USA; and Indivisible Charlottesville Steering Committee member Ken Horne, on their strategy for creating a blue wave in the very gerrymandered state of VA.

Apropos Of Something seeks out guests who are passionate about the arts, politics and society at-large. Co-hosts Ellen Daniels in Charlottesville and Nancy Laurence in New York City chat with experts, activists, and the most interesting people they can find. We guarantee every show will be Apropos Of Something.

Join Ellen and Nancy on 94.7 WPVC the Progressive Voice of Charlottesville, every Saturday from 10-11 a.m.

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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Rich Kids

Matias is a bright teenager whose family struggles with harsh financial troubles. When he discovers “Los Ricos”, a wealthy family, are out of town, Matias breaks into their mansion where he and his friends spend an afternoon basking in the good life. The party is soon disrupted when a trouble-making relative shows up uninvited. Loyalties are then pushed to the breaking point as Matias’s desire for power in the house rises. Set over a period of less than 24 hours, Matias grapples with the realities and consequences of living in a community ravaged by the wealth gap and income inequality.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.

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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Lamb and Women in Film

In the wake of the one year anniversary of the #metoo movement, the Virginia Film Festival hosted a panel on Women in Film, a discussion of the opportunities and continuing challenges for women in the industry today. Panelists Caroline Slaughter and Sara Elizabeth Timmins stopped by to talk about the panel and their film Lamb, which screens before the feature film This Changes Everything, Saturday at 1:00 PM at the PVCC Dickinson Center.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.

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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Circles

After being displaced by Hurricane Katrina, Eric Butler moves to Oakland, California, in an impassioned effort to mentor troubled minority youth. The documentary reveals Eric’s no-nonsense approach to counseling for vulnerable Black and Latinx teenagers and reimagines standard approaches to school discipline. Butler’s restorative justice movement replaces sudden suspensions and expulsions with intimate and honest mentorship. By creating an open space for conversation, at-risk students are able to build trust and realize their potential. After his own son is arrested, Butler reevaluates his responsibilities as both father and teacher to be the leader that he never had growing up.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.

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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Spider Mites of Jesus: The Dirtwoman Documentary

When Donnie “Dirtwoman” Corker passed away in 2017, the city of Richmond, Virginia, lost one of its most well-known personalities. A cross-dressing entertainer and a voice of the counterculture movement, Corker embodied the spirit of Richmond through his individuality, his eccentricity, and his perseverance. From running for mayor, to posing for his own pin-up calendar, to starring in a music video for GWAR, he made himself known in all corners of the city. Spanning decades and featuring interviews from several local Richmond personalities, Dirtwoman pays tribute to the life of a local legend.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.

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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Best of Film at George Mason University

Best of Film at Mason returns for a fourth year to present a selection of recent notable and award-winning films from students in the Film and Video Studies Program at George Mason University. Through collaboration with student artists studying screenwriting, producing, cinematography, sound design, and editing, these filmmakers illustrate a wide variety of stories that range from a work place comedy web series to a documentary portrait of an immigrant mother. Highlighting directors innovatively working across genres including documentary, drama, and comedy, this program celebrates the diversity of cinematic storytelling with films centered on connection and community.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.

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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Ingrid

At seventy-six years old, Ingrid Gipson compares her former endeavors as a successful Dallas fashion designer in the 1980s to her current, reclusive lifestyle. After retiring from her creative career, Ingrid moved to the woods. She spends her time creating sculptural ceramic art and creating structures out of nearby rocks. Driven by feelings of uncertainty over whether she had succumbed to the roles that society had chosen for her, Ingrid discusses her newfound sense of fulfillment after dropping everything to become a self-sufficient woman in the wilderness.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.

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Virginia Film Festival 2018: Black in Blue

Before 1967, the American Southeastern Conference boasted a roster composed entirely of white athletes. In the fall of 1967, however, Nate Northington walked on to the University of Kentucky football field and broke the color line. Just a day before, Northington’s roommate and fellow civil rights pioneer Greg Page had died as the result of a tragic accident. In the wake of his death, Northington fulfilled one of Page’s ambitions: to play football alongside white athletes for his university. Documenting this groundbreaking event in sports, Black in Blue gives voice to the role of sports in integration.

The 2018 Virginia Film Festival runs November 1-4, 2018.