For our most comprehensive year-end feature we’re providing a cumulative look at The Film Stage’s favorite films of 2023. We’ve asked contributors to compile ten-best lists with five honorable mentions––some of those personal selections will be shared in coming weeks––and from tallied votes has this top 50 been assembled.
Without further ado, check out our rundown of 2023 below, our ongoing year-end coverage here (including where to watch many of the below picks, both on streaming and in theaters), and return in the coming weeks as we look towards 2024.
50. Sick of Myself (Kristoffer Borgli)
Kristoffer Borgli’s first Norwegian feature is a work of disgusting, hilarious, horrifying genius. Signe (played brilliantly by Kristine Kujath Thorp) is an early-20s narcissist who, galled by the success of her equally self-centered boyfriend, spirals into full-on Munchausen syndrome. As timely as it is hard to watch, Sick of Myself doesn’t...
Without further ado, check out our rundown of 2023 below, our ongoing year-end coverage here (including where to watch many of the below picks, both on streaming and in theaters), and return in the coming weeks as we look towards 2024.
50. Sick of Myself (Kristoffer Borgli)
Kristoffer Borgli’s first Norwegian feature is a work of disgusting, hilarious, horrifying genius. Signe (played brilliantly by Kristine Kujath Thorp) is an early-20s narcissist who, galled by the success of her equally self-centered boyfriend, spirals into full-on Munchausen syndrome. As timely as it is hard to watch, Sick of Myself doesn’t...
- 12/14/2023
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
For over 20 years, the Australian video artists Soda Jerk have been making work that samples film, music and other various forms of pop culture. Their films are kaleidoscopic and psychedelic, irreverent and constantly surprising. Their newest film, Hello Dankness, is no different. Set in a fictional suburbia populated by Tom Hanks, Annette Bening, Bruce Dern, and Wayne and Garth from Wayne’s World, Dankness is a response to–and a film about–the 2016 election and its aftermath. After all, an era of American history and politics that so ferociously shred away societal norms and imbued daily life with a lasting weirdness […]
The post “We Think of Trump as the First Meme to Hold Office in the White House”: A Conversation with Hello Dankness Creators Soda Jerk first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post “We Think of Trump as the First Meme to Hold Office in the White House”: A Conversation with Hello Dankness Creators Soda Jerk first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 9/9/2023
- by Conor Williams
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
For over 20 years, the Australian video artists Soda Jerk have been making work that samples film, music and other various forms of pop culture. Their films are kaleidoscopic and psychedelic, irreverent and constantly surprising. Their newest film, Hello Dankness, is no different. Set in a fictional suburbia populated by Tom Hanks, Annette Bening, Bruce Dern, and Wayne and Garth from Wayne’s World, Dankness is a response to–and a film about–the 2016 election and its aftermath. After all, an era of American history and politics that so ferociously shred away societal norms and imbued daily life with a lasting weirdness […]
The post “We Think of Trump as the First Meme to Hold Office in the White House”: A Conversation with Hello Dankness Creators Soda Jerk first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post “We Think of Trump as the First Meme to Hold Office in the White House”: A Conversation with Hello Dankness Creators Soda Jerk first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 9/9/2023
- by Conor Williams
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Top award comes with a $96,500 prize.
Ramata-Toulaye Sy’s first feature, Banel & Adama, has won the $96,500 Melbourne International Film Festival (Miff) Bright Horizons Award, it was announced at Forum Theatre at the closing night gala today (August 19).
Banel & Adama, which is in the Pulaar language and features a cast of non-professionals, was the only debut in competition in Cannes this year. Only first and second time directors are eligible for the Bright Horizons Award.
The director was born and raised in Paris but draws on her Senegalese ancestry to tell this story about Banel and Adama, who are passionately in love,...
Ramata-Toulaye Sy’s first feature, Banel & Adama, has won the $96,500 Melbourne International Film Festival (Miff) Bright Horizons Award, it was announced at Forum Theatre at the closing night gala today (August 19).
Banel & Adama, which is in the Pulaar language and features a cast of non-professionals, was the only debut in competition in Cannes this year. Only first and second time directors are eligible for the Bright Horizons Award.
The director was born and raised in Paris but draws on her Senegalese ancestry to tell this story about Banel and Adama, who are passionately in love,...
- 8/19/2023
- by Sandy George
- ScreenDaily
On the final weekend of a bustling 18-day event, the in-person edition of this year’s Melbourne Film Festival has drawn to a close with an awards ceremony that saw a whopping $300,000 Aud in prize money handed out across six categories. The biggest individual award of $140,000 Aud was presented to the winner of the fest’s international Bright Horizons competition: “Banel & Adama,” an arresting debut feature by Franco-Senegalese filmmaker Ramata-Toulaye Sy.
It’s a notable coup for a small-scale rural love story that turned heads — but won no prizes — when it premiered in Competition at the Cannes Film Festival in May, and is still seeking distribution in the U.S. and other major territories. Reviewing the film out of Cannes, Variety critic Jessica Kiang commended the “subtly seductive power” of a “striking debut [that] revolves with graceful poetry around the inner experiences of a curious, unknowable woman.”
Its win came...
It’s a notable coup for a small-scale rural love story that turned heads — but won no prizes — when it premiered in Competition at the Cannes Film Festival in May, and is still seeking distribution in the U.S. and other major territories. Reviewing the film out of Cannes, Variety critic Jessica Kiang commended the “subtly seductive power” of a “striking debut [that] revolves with graceful poetry around the inner experiences of a curious, unknowable woman.”
Its win came...
- 8/19/2023
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
Viewership Record
Indian streaming service JioCinema claimed a record for the number of concurrent viewers this week. It reported that 32 million viewers were simultaneously using its service to watch the Ipl cricket final match between The Chennai Super Kings and the Gujarat Titans. The platform’s previous peak was 25 million. Chennai eventually won the rain-affected and one-day delayed match
Dark Matter
Warner Bros Discovery (Wbd) has removed its bouquet of 14 channels from Indonesia’s TV largest platform, Mnc, ending decades-long affiliate arrangements, Content Asia reported. The decision, confirmed by Wbd, involves channels from HBO and Cartoon Network to Discovery and TLC, all of which came off air on May 12. The move is understood to be the culmination of a payments disagreement. In November last year, beIN removds its sports service from Mnc. Wbd content remains available on three smaller platforms in Indonesia, IndiHome First Media and Trans.
Location Attraction
Ausfilm,...
Indian streaming service JioCinema claimed a record for the number of concurrent viewers this week. It reported that 32 million viewers were simultaneously using its service to watch the Ipl cricket final match between The Chennai Super Kings and the Gujarat Titans. The platform’s previous peak was 25 million. Chennai eventually won the rain-affected and one-day delayed match
Dark Matter
Warner Bros Discovery (Wbd) has removed its bouquet of 14 channels from Indonesia’s TV largest platform, Mnc, ending decades-long affiliate arrangements, Content Asia reported. The decision, confirmed by Wbd, involves channels from HBO and Cartoon Network to Discovery and TLC, all of which came off air on May 12. The move is understood to be the culmination of a payments disagreement. In November last year, beIN removds its sports service from Mnc. Wbd content remains available on three smaller platforms in Indonesia, IndiHome First Media and Trans.
Location Attraction
Ausfilm,...
- 5/30/2023
- by Patrick Frater
- Variety Film + TV
Prismatic Ground is becoming a must-attend filmmaker-centered showcase on the rise for underground documentaries, avant-garde, and experimental cinema in the heart of New York City. Founded by Maysles Documentary Center co-programming director Inney Prakash, the initial virtual festival counter-responded to the approaches of many institutions that have inadequately handled virtual exhibitions and poorly supported artists. Prismatic Ground pays filmmakers screening fees, doesn’t divide features and shorts via “waves,” and merges early career and established voices in its accessible presentation of politically engaged, personal, and speculative imagery.
As this hybrid festival adapts the in-person components each subsequent year, the 3rd Prismatic Ground will present works at the Museum of the Moving Image, Maysles Documentary Center, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Dctv’s Firehouse Cinema, Light Industry, and Anthology Film Archives with limited selections available online.
Taking place May 3-7, check out our picks to see below and learn more here.
Hello Dankness (Soda Jerk)
The 2016 U.
As this hybrid festival adapts the in-person components each subsequent year, the 3rd Prismatic Ground will present works at the Museum of the Moving Image, Maysles Documentary Center, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Dctv’s Firehouse Cinema, Light Industry, and Anthology Film Archives with limited selections available online.
Taking place May 3-7, check out our picks to see below and learn more here.
Hello Dankness (Soda Jerk)
The 2016 U.
- 5/1/2023
- by Edward Frumkin
- The Film Stage
Hello Dankness.First the chaos of Trump’s little era, then the grief of the pandemic, and now cinema is becoming indistinguishable from the internet. The newest work from Australian duo Soda Jerk devises an ultra-endurance meme sequence for these times. Hello Dankness, which screened at this year’s Berlinale Panorama, explores the madness of US politics in the age of social media—or, rather, the reeling feeling of it, revisiting the major news stories bridging the Trump and Biden administrations through over 550 pirated audio and visual clippings.Currently based in New York, Soda Jerk consists of siblings Dominique and Dan Angeloro; they are major artists in their home country, with serious institutional support and a burgeoning international reputation for experimental image-making from the frontlines of dystopia. The early incandescence of gallery works like After the Rainbow (2009)—a deeply affective reflection on stardom, loss of self and Judy Garland’s...
- 3/8/2023
- MUBI
Remember that weird movie from the ’90s that somehow starred Tom Hanks as a Bernie Bro, Annette Benning as a Hilary Clinton stan, Wayne and Garth as alt-right drones, Donald Trump as himself and The Phantom of the Opera in a Vladimir Putin cameo? Well, thanks to the Australian artist duo known as Soda Jerk, this film actually does exist — and it just might be the most original and bizarrely elevating movie of the 2023 Berlin International Film Festival.
Titled Hello Dankness, the film is assembled exclusively of samples — some 300 of them from vintage film and TV sources, along with another 250 pilfered audio clips. An array of recognizable characters from the collective unconscious of recent American pop culture are deftly re-deployed into a new narrative that stages them as members of a suburban community living through the bizarro years of 2016 to 2021 — following them “as their shared reality disintegrates into conspiracies and other contagions,...
Titled Hello Dankness, the film is assembled exclusively of samples — some 300 of them from vintage film and TV sources, along with another 250 pilfered audio clips. An array of recognizable characters from the collective unconscious of recent American pop culture are deftly re-deployed into a new narrative that stages them as members of a suburban community living through the bizarro years of 2016 to 2021 — following them “as their shared reality disintegrates into conspiracies and other contagions,...
- 2/16/2023
- by Patrick Brzeski
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI, and sign up for our weekly email newsletter by clicking here.NEWSShadow of the Vampire.Willem Dafoe will join Robert Eggers’s Nosferatu film, news that comes 23 years after he played a fictitious version of Murnau's lead actor, Max Schreck, in Shadow of the Vampire. Dafoe’s supporting role is currently “unknown,” according to Deadline, though Eggers's vampire will be Bill Skarsgard.Sight & Sound continues their rollout of the Greatest Films of All Time, now unveiling the critics’ top 250.The great cinematographer Caroline Champetier will be honored with the Berlinale Camera award at this year’s festival, marking a career of beautifully lensed films for Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet, Jean-Luc Godard, Margarethe von Trotta, Claude Lanzmann, and Leos Carax, among many others.Following Sundance’s closing awards ceremony, we’ve compiled the full list of winners here on Notebook.
- 2/1/2023
- MUBI
Inside (Vasilis Katsoupis).Berlinale have begun announcing the titles selected for the 73rd edition of their festival, set to take place from February 16 through 26. This page will be updated as further sections are announced.PANORAMAThe Burdened (Amr Gamal): When Isra’a discovers she is expecting another baby amid the civil war in Yemen, she and her husband decide she should have an abortion. But this creates enormous difficulties – in their relationship and elsewhere. A moving story from an all-too-often forgotten crisis region.The Cemetery Of Cinema (Thierno Souleymane Diallo): Thierno Souleymane Diallo sets out with his camera in search of the birth of filmmaking in Guinea. Charming and determined, he traces his country’s film heritage and history and reveals the importance of film archives.The Castle (Martín Benchimol): The inheritance from her former boss is a poisoned chalice for Indigenous housekeeper Justina: a huge, derelict mansion in the back of beyond.
- 1/11/2023
- MUBI
The Berlin Film Festival has unveiled the first titles selected for its Panorama section at the upcoming in-person edition that takes place February 16-26. (Scroll down for the full list)
Among the highlights are Tina Satter’s debut feature Reality starring Euphoria and The White Lotus’ Sydney Sweeney and focusing on the arrest of the American whistle-blower Reality Winner.
Jennifer Reeder is also in with Perpetrator, described as a subversive film that throws conventions to the wind. Kiah McKirnan and Alicia Silverstone star.
Willem Dafoe turns up as an art thief in Vasilis Katsoupis’ Inside. And, Ira Sachs is back with Passages, starring Franz Rogowski, Ben Whishaw and Adèle Exarchopoulous.
Of the 14 films selected, eleven are world premieres.
Here’s the full list announced today
Al Murhaqoon (The Burdened)
by Amr Gamal | with Khaled Hamdan, Abeer Mohammed, Samah Alamrani, Awsam Abdulrahman, Shahd Algonfedy
Yemen / Sudan / Saudi Arabia 2023
Panorama | World Premiere...
Among the highlights are Tina Satter’s debut feature Reality starring Euphoria and The White Lotus’ Sydney Sweeney and focusing on the arrest of the American whistle-blower Reality Winner.
Jennifer Reeder is also in with Perpetrator, described as a subversive film that throws conventions to the wind. Kiah McKirnan and Alicia Silverstone star.
Willem Dafoe turns up as an art thief in Vasilis Katsoupis’ Inside. And, Ira Sachs is back with Passages, starring Franz Rogowski, Ben Whishaw and Adèle Exarchopoulous.
Of the 14 films selected, eleven are world premieres.
Here’s the full list announced today
Al Murhaqoon (The Burdened)
by Amr Gamal | with Khaled Hamdan, Abeer Mohammed, Samah Alamrani, Awsam Abdulrahman, Shahd Algonfedy
Yemen / Sudan / Saudi Arabia 2023
Panorama | World Premiere...
- 12/15/2022
- by Nancy Tartaglione
- Deadline Film + TV
The Berlin Film Festival has revealed the first tranche of titles for its Panorama and Generation strands.
The Panorama lineup includes films from Ukraine, Yemen and about Iran. Of the 14 films selected, 11 are world premieres. There are new films by Sepideh Farsi, Jennifer Reeder, Tina Satter, Sacha Polak, Malene Choi and Ira Sachs.
The films selected for the Generation Kplus and Generation 14plus competitions include nine shorts and nine features, including 11 world premieres.
Stars featured in titles across the strands include Willem Dafoe, Ben Whishaw, Adèle Exarchopoulous, Leon Dai and Sydney Sweeney.
The festival takes place Feb. 16-26, 2023.
Panorama Titles
“Al Murhaqoon” (“The Burdened”)
by Amr Gamal. With Khaled Hamdan, Abeer Mohammed, Samah Alamrani, Awsam Abdulrahman, Shahd Algonfedy
Yemen/Sudan/Saudi Arabia
“Au cimetière de la pellicule” (“The Cemetery of Cinema”)
by Thierno Souleymane Diallo
France/Senegal/Guinea/Saudi Arabia
“El castillo” (“The Castle”)
by Martín Benchimol. With Justina Olivo,...
The Panorama lineup includes films from Ukraine, Yemen and about Iran. Of the 14 films selected, 11 are world premieres. There are new films by Sepideh Farsi, Jennifer Reeder, Tina Satter, Sacha Polak, Malene Choi and Ira Sachs.
The films selected for the Generation Kplus and Generation 14plus competitions include nine shorts and nine features, including 11 world premieres.
Stars featured in titles across the strands include Willem Dafoe, Ben Whishaw, Adèle Exarchopoulous, Leon Dai and Sydney Sweeney.
The festival takes place Feb. 16-26, 2023.
Panorama Titles
“Al Murhaqoon” (“The Burdened”)
by Amr Gamal. With Khaled Hamdan, Abeer Mohammed, Samah Alamrani, Awsam Abdulrahman, Shahd Algonfedy
Yemen/Sudan/Saudi Arabia
“Au cimetière de la pellicule” (“The Cemetery of Cinema”)
by Thierno Souleymane Diallo
France/Senegal/Guinea/Saudi Arabia
“El castillo” (“The Castle”)
by Martín Benchimol. With Justina Olivo,...
- 12/15/2022
- by Naman Ramachandran
- Variety Film + TV
One part revisionist documentary, one part LSD-infused YouTube compilation video, Soda_Jerk’s controversial film shatters old narratives
Remember the scene from the original Mad Max, when a wounded Max Rockatansky lies on the road and Nicole Kidman from BMX Bandits arrives and jumps over him? Remember how Olivia Newton-John from Grease, glammed up in a leather jacket and skin-tight black pants, observed this interaction from the side of the road while smoking a cigarette?
Remember how one of the cars in Mad Max was destroyed by a group of angry women, including Lucy Fry from the Wolf Creek TV series and Jacqueline McKenzie from Romper Stomper? Remember how Essie Davis from The Babadook throws a match on the vehicle while Toni Collette and Rachel Griffiths from Muriel’s Wedding laugh as it goes up in flames?...
Remember the scene from the original Mad Max, when a wounded Max Rockatansky lies on the road and Nicole Kidman from BMX Bandits arrives and jumps over him? Remember how Olivia Newton-John from Grease, glammed up in a leather jacket and skin-tight black pants, observed this interaction from the side of the road while smoking a cigarette?
Remember how one of the cars in Mad Max was destroyed by a group of angry women, including Lucy Fry from the Wolf Creek TV series and Jacqueline McKenzie from Romper Stomper? Remember how Essie Davis from The Babadook throws a match on the vehicle while Toni Collette and Rachel Griffiths from Muriel’s Wedding laugh as it goes up in flames?...
- 3/20/2018
- by Luke Buckmaster
- The Guardian - Film News
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