Tribeca 2021 Showbiz and Celebrity Breaking News

Silly film fan, you didn’t think Tribeca was going to sit back and let Venice, TIFF, Telluride, and NYFF have all the fall festival fun, did you? Sure, the annual Tribeca Film Festival is typically in the late spring, but starting this year, the event is ready to branch out into the fall, as well, with the announcement of the Tribeca Fall Preview.

The challenges of bipartisanship are easy to spot. It’s casting a die for cooperation, a hope that with your differing neighbor you can find not just common cause but common decency.

When attempting a biopic about a rock ‘n roll icon, there’s an inherent conflict of style and substance. Biopics are traditionally dramatic, yet glossy affairs that bring an air of prestige to every story, whether it’s the tale of a stuttering king, a cagey criminal, or the man who made McDonald’s an international chain.

Much can be said about Megan Mylan’s latest documentary “Simple As Water.” Yet, as its title insinuates, the film succeeds in its calculated minimalism. Cataloging the plight of four Syrian families in the aftermath of war, Mylan’s heartfelt exploration of human strife infuses informative insight with harrowing revelations.

Acclaimed photojournalist Gordon Parks was something of a renaissance man. A photographer, writer, composer, film director, and activist—he imbued the American Black experience with a sense of gravitas, esteem, and pathos through his Black gaze.

Based, in part, on Father James Martin’s bestselling book “Building a Bridge: How the Catholic Church and LGBT Community Can Enter into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion, and Sensitivity,” Evan Mascagni and Shannon Post’s compassionate documentary “Building a Bridge” use Martin as an entry point into a larger discourse surrounding the relationship between the Catholic Church and the LGBTQ+ community.

Using Leonard Bernstein’s own voice, collected from his myriad interviews throughout his life, as well as personal letters, many of which were published in the 2013 book “The Leonard Bernstein Letters,” Douglas Tirola’s “Bernstein’s Wall” works as both a broad overview of the famous conductor’s life, as well as a deep dive into his political activism.

There is a particular type of mind-bending genre pulp that seems to arise from the wounded psyche of a freshman filmmaker. Often, these transfixing head-trips feel constructed to play better on repeat viewings by design — one thinks of Christopher Nolan’s “Following,” or Shane Carruth’s close to impenetrable “Primer.” Screening as part of Tribeca’s Midnight Movie selection, Rob Schroeder’s hypnotic debut “Ultrasound,” falls into this category.

For most adults under the age of forty, “I’m Rick James, bitch” was a statement of intent. The artefactual pop-culture catchphrase stems from The Chappelle Show sketch “Charlie Murphy’s True Hollywood Stories,” which catapulted the “Super Freak” hitmaker back into public consciousness.

Reflective and stoic, sometimes to a fault, Levan Koguashvili’s film “Brighton 4th” explores the hyper-masculine world of Georgian wrestlers and gamblers in Brooklyn.

Out of the darkness, some voices rise above the others. At the 2021 Tribeca Film Festival, director Josef Wladyka is that voice.

In the span of only three films, writer/director Adam Leon has proven to have a significant feel for New York City and those who populate its streets. His debut film “Gimme the Loot” premiered at SXSW and then the Cannes Film Festival; his follow-up “Tramps” premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and was picked up by Netflix.

Opening with the sound of crashing waves over a black screen before a grave voice begins narrating, “I guess when you consider it, life is chains,” the voice (of writer/director/actor Tyler Riggs) reflects.

You might know him best from Cameron Crowe’s seminal teenage road trip movie “Almost Famous.” Dressed replete in John Lennon glasses, long ink-black shaggy hair, and loud-open collar shirt, he is the editor from Rolling Stone Magazine who sends the intrepid Will on the road with the fictional band Stillwater. That man is Ben Fong-Torres.

Unlike recent Bundy projects (a’la 2019’s “Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile”), the movie couches his forbidden allure in Hagmaier’s perspective.

Unlike recent Bundy projects (a’la 2019’s “Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile”), the movie couches his forbidden allure in Hagmaier’s perspective.

A man dressed as a Viking goes into a convenience store to trade furs for groceries; a trio of smugglers is on the verge of an escape across the border when a moose totals their car; a cop calls for a tracker dog, only to be told that it, “isn’t working today.” When asked what the hound could be doing, the other cop responds honestly, “No idea.

Narrative-averse portmanteau films are a tough nut to crack, yet not impossible.

One person assembles plastic bottle pumps, another paints areola on sex dolls, and a different individual takes a business etiquette class to learn the proper way to smile (one shows eight teeth…the top ones). All of them are Chinese citizens struggling to find and maintain a foothold in their country’s race towards global domination, and in “Ascension,” they give audiences a peek at what increasingly appears to be a devil’s bargain.

Social media as a way of hiding ourselves and assuming a new identity is an increasingly familiar cinematic concept, and in most genre films, that flexibility can introduce a kind of threat. In Gia Coppola’s recent “Mainstream,” Jan Komasa’s “The Hater,” and Leo Gabriadze’s “Unfriended,” Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram allow for a veiling of users’ true identities.

There is no shortage of films about the difficulties of being an artist. But when you have a film about the creative difficulties of being a musician that features a cast led by Alia Shawkat and Eiza Gonzales, suddenly it doesn’t matter if the premise seems familiar.

This year’s Tribeca Film Festival is expected to be very different than previous events. Not only is it the 20th anniversary of the festival, but it’s also the first year the event will be held outdoors in multiple open-air venues, providing the chance for audiences to experience a film festival in person in the age of COVID.

With vaccines getting distributed pretty damn fast in the US, we’re starting to see some cities begin to recover and make plans for in-person events in the summer and fall. In the world of film festivals, it appears that the first event to really attempt a full in-person experience is going to be this year’s Tribeca.