Director/Writer Interviews

Unless you’ve been living under a rock over the past few weeks, you would have heard countless accounts of people being terrified out of their wits by Ari Aster’s brilliant debut feature, Hereditary. Earlier this month, during the Sundance London film festival, The London Economic had a chance to chat to Ari about one of the most eagerly awaited films of the year, and the process he went through trying to make it. TLE: First of all, congratulations on such...

“It’s good to look at life again, through another lens,” we’re told about halfway through The Eyes of Orson Welles, Mark Cousins’ swooning love letter to one of cinema’s greatest pioneers. Many will know Welles most prominently for his iconic screen roles – as newspaper tycoon Charles Foster Kane in Citizen Kane, or Harry Lime in The Third Man. While others will recognise his pioneering work behind the camera – the ‘Hall of Mirrors’ sequence in The Lady from Shanghai,...

A-list star George Clooney hit back at Donald Trump and his claims that "coastal elites" look down upon the rest of the US. Clooney, being a Hollywood actor, would fall under Trump's catch all phrase. However, in an interview with the Daily Beast recently, while promoting his new film "Suburbicon" he didn't pull any punches as he replied to the President's incendiary comments. He said... "Here’s the thing: I grew up in Kentucky. I sold insurance door-to-door. I sold ladies’...

By Linda Marric Hope Dickson Leach’s brilliant first feature The Levelling is a fantastically accurate and highly authentic look into the flood-battered West-country regions. This beautifully acted film, not only manages to tell a touching story of despair and isolation in rural England, but also succeeds in making a valid social commentary about those who lost so much in the floods a couple of years ago. Last week I had the chance to meet with both Dickinson Leach and the...

By Linda Marric After the success of highly acclaimed 2013 film The Lunchbox, and the accolades showered on him from film fans and critics alike, Indian director Ritesh Batra is back, this time with this brilliantly accurate and honest adaptation of Julian barnes’ novel The Sense of An Ending. This long awaited production, which stars amongst others, Jim Broadbent, Charlotte Rampling and the excellent Harriet Walter is released this week. The film is sure to attract the attention of fans...

By Linda Marric Kelly Reichardt Is fast becoming one of the most iconic director of her generation, her features have been hailed as some of most beautifully crafted and understated pieces of filmmaking of the last decade. In Certain Women, which was adapted from three different short stories by Maile Meloy, Reichardt delves into the lives of three different women living in Livingston, Montana and brings us a unique look at rural America from a fresh perspective. Earlier this week,...

By Joe Mellor, Deputy Editor Controversial filmmaker has called Britain a “toxic place” and refused to visit the UK for his latest film. The film, Where To Invade Next, doesn’t feature the UK as Moore didn’t think he could learn anything from Britain, a place that has “damaged the world.” He made the comments while promoting his new film, and the 62-year-old was unrepentant on his views on the UK. In the film Moore travels across Europe to try and...

Review and round table interview with director Morgan Neville by Miranda Schiller @mirandadadada After meeting world-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma and succumbing to his charm, documentary filmmaker Morgan Neville set out to document his ensemble of musicians from around the world, playing traditional instruments of their home countries, and morphing all these different traditions together to make something entirely new. Yo-Yo Ma's charm is hard not to succumb to, and Neville's storytelling is as light-footed, smooth and masterful as in his...

Interview by Miranda Schiller @mirandadadada Nakom is a tiny village in northern Ghana. Iddrisu, a talented medical student, has to return there after the sudden death of his father. He has to face the expectations of responsibility for his family, and his new life in the city slips further and further away from him. Through his story, Nakom tells the story of daily life in a remote village, the challenges of preserving traditional life in modern times, the conflict of...