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Talkhouse

Erik Nelson is the director of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tmwm4VPW7RY" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Cold Blue</a>, which airs on HBO on June 6, and the 2017 documentary A Gray State. He is the producer of Werner Herzog&#8217;s award-winning documentaries Grizzly Man, Encounters at the End of the World, Into the Abyss and Cave of Forgotten Dreams. His previous work as a director includes the Harlan Ellison documentary, Dreams with Sharp Teeth, which premiered at SXSW in 2008. (Photo by Galen Fletcher, courtesy Walker Art Center, Minneapolis.)

Erik Nelson

Film

Nostalgia Ain’t What It Used to Be

When Hernan Barangan was 15 years old he was diagnosed with Leukemia &#8211; and he beat it. His professional path emerged during the long months undergoing treatment, as he fell in love with cinema. Barangan has since worked on numerous music videos and commercials, as well as produced various multimedia films, including 3 Apartments, a technically and creatively challenging triptych installation film. Returning to the origins of his career, Barangan turned the camera back on cancer itself. The resulting feature film, Cancer Rebellion, follows as he travels to all 50 states, conducting nearly 100 interviews with young cancer fighters. Executive Produced by Roger Daltrey of The Who, <a href="http://www.cancerrebellion.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Cancer Rebellion</a> is now available to pre-order on Amazon and iTunes. He is also currently attached as writer-director on a provocative feature film dramedy titled Something’s Fishy with Springbok Entertainment.

Hernan Barangan

My Cancer Vendetta, or The Long Road to Making Cancer Rebellion

Jill Magid’s debut feature, <a href="https://theproposal.oscilloscope.net/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Proposal</a>, is in select theaters through Oscilloscope from May 24. American artist and writer Magid’s work is deeply ingrained in her lived experience, exploring and blurring the boundaries between art and life. Through her performance-based practice, Magid has initiated intimate relations with a number of organizations and structures of authority. She explores the emotional, philosophical and legal tensions between the individual and “protective” institutions, such as intelligence agencies or the police. To work alongside or within large organizations, Magid makes use of institutional quirks, systemic loopholes that allow her to make contact with people “on the inside.” Her work tends to be characterized by the dynamics of seduction, the resulting narratives often taking the form of a love story. It is typical of Magid’s practice that she follows the rules of engagement with an institution to the letter – sometimes to the point of absurdity. She has had solo exhibitions at institutions around the world including Tate Modern, London; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Berkeley Museum of Art, California; Gagosian Gallery, New York; and the Security and Intelligence Agency of the Netherlands. She lives in Brooklyn.

Jill Magid

Rendezvous with Akerman

Ritesh Batra’s debut work The Lunchbox, was supported by the Sundance Institute and premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. It was nominated for the 2015 BAFTAs. He has since worked on Our Souls At Night, starring Robert Redford and Jane Fonda, and The Sense of an Ending with Jim Broadbent and Charlotte Rampling. <a href="https://www.photograph.movie/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Photograph</a>, his newest work, is in theaters through Amazon Studios from May 17. He has a passion for running, reading, and fountain pens. His favorite color is blue.

Ritesh Batra

My Favorite Car is a Bicycle, or Why I Must Create Things vs. Making Them

David Dastmalchian’s latest film <a href="http://www.samuelgoldwynfilms.com/all-creatures-here-below/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">All Creatures Here Below</a>, which he both wrote and stars in with Karen Gillan, is in theaters from May 17 through Samuel Goldwyn Films. The film is his second collaboration with director Collin Schiffli; Dastmalchian won a Special Jury Prize for Courage in Storytelling at SXSW 2014 for their previous film, Animals, which he also wrote and acted in. Dastmalchian made his feature acting debut in Christopher Nolan&#8217;s The Dark Knight and has been a regular in Denis Villeneuve&#8217;s films, including Prisoners, Blade Runner 2049 and the upcoming Dune. He played Kurt in Marvel Studios&#8217; Ant-Man and Ant-Man and the Wasp, and on TV appeared as Murdoc in MacGyver and Pit Boss Warrack in Twin Peaks: The Return.

David Dastmalchian

How Much of This Shit Should I Use?

Ash Mayfair&#8216;s new feature, <a href="https://www.filmmovementplus.com/videos/skin-of-youth-trailer" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Skin of Youth</a>, an all-consuming love story between a transgender singer and a dog-cage fighter set in 1990s Saigon, Vietnam, is out now on Film Movement Plus from June 26. She was born in Vietnam and educated in the UK and the US. Ash received a BA from Oxford University for English Literature, trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts in London for theatre directing and received an MFA in filmmaking at NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Her first feature, The Third Wife, was released by Film Movement in 2019 and is now available through leading digital platforms and Film Movement Plus. The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, where it won the NETPAC Jury Award, and also won awards at the San Sebastian, Milano, Chicago, Minsk, Kolkata and Cairo film festivals.

Ash Mayfair

Pieces of Myself

Shahnaz Mahmud is an award-winning journalist who has served as a staff writer for such publications as Adweek and freelanced for Screen Daily, Sports Business Journal and The Hollywood Reporter. She is a recipient of the 2017 Development Studio Screenwriting Fellowship through the NYU Production Lab and in 2018 was one of six selected participants of First Three Pages Live, sponsored by the Austin Film Festival, for her narrative feature, Olivia and the Fat Girl. Mahmud began her career as a researcher with ABC News and also worked on documentary programming for the A&amp;E Television Networks. She has an MA with concentrations in screenwriting and film studies and a BA in English &amp; American literature and journalism from NYU. She is based in New York City.

Shahnaz Mahmud

The Myth of Sundance

Following its world premiere in Toronto, Annabel Jankel’s latest feature, <a href="http://gooddeedentertainment.com/tellittothebees" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Tell It to the Bees</a>, starring Anna Paquin and Holliday Grainger is in theaters through GDE from May 3. Annabel, with Rocky Morton, was the creative force behind Cucumber Studios, which pushed the boundaries of filmmaking with innovative combinations of animation, CGI and live action, such as in the seminal video for Elvis Costello’s “Accidents Will Happen.” In the mid-eighties, Jankel co-created and co-directed Max Headroom, which led to co-directing Hollywood features, including the cult movies D.O.A., with Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid, and Super Mario Bros., with Dennis Hopper and Bob Hoskins. Back in London, Jankel created the music documentary series Live From Abbey Road, and directed the TV feature Skellig, starring Tim Roth. A U.S. and U.K citizen, Annabel divides her time between London and Los Angeles.

Annabel Jankel

Sketch in Time

Born and raised in New York City, Jonathan Levine has been making films since the age of 12. A graduate of Brown University&#8217;s Art/Semiotics program and the AFI Conservatory, he made his directorial debut in 2006 with All the Boys Love Mandy Lane, following it up two years later with The Wackness, starring Josh Peck and Ben Kingsley, which won the Audience Award at Sundance and an Independent Spirit Award nod for Best First Screenplay. Levine has made two films with Joseph Gordon Levitt and Seth Rogen, 50/50 (2011) and The Night Before (2015), and in 2013 wrote and directed the hit adaptation of Isaac Marion&#8217;s YA bestseller Warm Bodies. He directed the pilot of the Showtime drama <a href="http://www.sho.com/im-dying-up-here" target="_blank">I&#8217;m Dying Up Here</a>, which debuts June 4, and the Amy Schumer-Goldie Hawn comedy <a href="http://www.foxmovies.com/movies/snatched" target="_blank">Snatched</a>, out May 12 through 20th Century Fox.

Jonathan Levine

I’m on a Train with a Hangover, But By God, I Will Fulfill My Obligation to Write This Talkhouse Piece About My New Movie, Long Shot!

Pollyanna McIntosh is an actor, writer and director who currently plays Jadis on The Walking Dead. Her feature debut as writer-director, Darlin&#8216;, had its world premiere at SXSW 2019, has subsequently played at festivals such as What the Fest!?, and is forthcoming in theaters later this summer. Her recent work in film has included The Woman, Filth, Let Us Prey, Burke and Hare and Tales of Halloween, while on TV she appeared in Sundance Channel&#8217;s Hap and Leonard and was the female lead in the BBC political comedy, Bob Servant Independent, starring alongside Brian Cox. Born in Scotland, she grew up in Portugal and Colombia and now lives in Los Angeles. (Picture by Lexus Gallegos.)

Pollyanna McIntosh

Naked and Barefoot in the Snow: A Day on Darlin’

Ant Timpson&nbsp;studied law before working in all facets of the industry from festivals and exhibitions to distribution and production. He created the hit series of films the ABCs of Death with his partner in crime Tim League and has produced a slew of successful features, including Housebound, Turbo Kid, and The Greasy Strangler. Timpson sports no tattoos, collects 35mm film prints, and loves animals. His first feature as director, Come to Daddy, has its <a href="https://www.tribecafilm.com/filmguide/come-to-daddy-2019" target="_blank" rel="noopener">world premiere</a> at the Tribeca Film Festival on April 25. (Image by David White.)

Ant Timpson

The Very Long, Dark and Strange Journey to Directing My First Feature

Pamela B. Green is the director of<a href="https://benaturalthemovie.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché</a>, which is now in select theaters through Zeitgeist Films and Kino Lorber. In 2005, Green founded PIC, an entertainment and motion design boutique based in Los Angeles, California. Nominated for an Emmy for the documentary Bhutto, Green has produced main titles, created and advised on internal story sequences and marketing campaigns for films such as the Bourne series, Fast and Furious, The Muppets, Rings and several Marvel comic-book franchises. She has also worked on films such as The Cabin the Woods and The Kingdom. For television and streaming, she has created titles for Supergirl, The Flash and Quantico among many others. She lives in Los Angeles.

film essay