It has been nearly six weeks since the Big Board went up in the Denver Film Society offices. Even longer since ace logistical controller Gloria Campbell flew into Denver from Los Angeles to begin marking where a film, a panel, a tribute might fit best in the Starz Denver Film Festival scheme.
It’s been months since society artistic director Ron Henderson, program director Brit Withey and media and industry director Britta Erickson returned from various festivals – Sundance, Cannes, Karoly Vary, Toronto – with ambitions for what might challenge and entertain those who attend the Starz Denver Film Festival starting Nov. 8.
And it has been 30 years since Denver’s international film gathering began. This Thursday, the Denver Film Society will celebrate just that with a happening, an exhibition, a book signing.
“Take 30” is a handsome volume that celebrates the decades-long life of one of the city’s premier cultural events.
In its pages, Robert Altman walks across Colfax Avenue near the Odgen Theatre. A long-haired Bill Murray heads into the Paramount for the screening of “The Razor’s Edge.” Director Wim Wenders and actors Dean Stockwell and Harry Dean Stanton strike a suitably edgy pose outside a long-since shuttered Denver restaurant. A dapper Chuck Jones makes his way up the aisle at the Tivoli muliplex theater, which in 2001 became the Starz FilmCenter.
These are just a smattering of the luminaries captured over the years by Larry Laszlo, whose black-and- white photos provide an impressive historical record.
More recently, his cameras have captured Morgan Freeman, Francis Ford Coppola and the “Ray” trio of Jamie Foxx, Kerry Washington and Taylor Hackford.
Granted, anniversaries can be overrated. But the Denver Film Society seems to be making the most of a milestone. Over the summer, the fest’s parent organization has been refining its mission.
During the summer, the society’s staff moved from LoDo to the Starz FilmCenter. Theater walls had been knocked down and space reconfigured to make room for the open, high-ceilinged offices. Down the way, they created a funky, pleasing space where filmmakers and audience members can gather to continue the conversation. The society’s nerve center was finally at the FilmCenter.
More and more, the Starz FilmCenter is working to become that rare thing found in only a handful of major American cities: a filmgoing hub for a rich, non-pedantic educational experience. The festival and FilmCenter inform each other.
The 30th edition of the festival opens Nov. 8 at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House with “The Savages,” Tamara Jenkins’ painfully funny – emphasis on the ache – story about two adult children forced to figure out the care of their diminished father.
Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laura Linney do telling work as Jon and Wendy Savage, siblings deeply attentive to their own lives (not going swimmingly) when duty calls.
Jenkin’s follow-up to her auspicious indie debut, “The Slums of Beverly Hills,” was a long time coming, but is one of the strongest, smartest films to open the festival in recent memory.
While red-carpet events and other gatherings take place at the Ellie, the Ricketson, and the King Center at Auraria, much of the festival unspools in the Starz FilmCenter theaters. How fitting.
On the one hand, says the society’s Erickson, “The festival is a point of entry not just for audiences but for filmmakers as well.”
In many ways, says society artistic director Henderson, the FilmCenter itself is a year-round film festival. “And we made conscious decisions in the last several months to make that more noticeable.”
The festival and the film center are doing this vibrant dance, says society executive director Scott Rowitz, because “they are partners in making this film community.
“I think you’ll see both entities stepping up and reaching out. We’re looking at 30 as an opportunity to go forward. How do we use film to educate? After all, it’s the greatest art form of the 20th century,” he says, sitting outside in the courtyard in front of the FilmCenter. “That’s both the FilmCenter and the festival’s mission.”
During the festival, director Jason Reitman’s comedy “Juno” owns the “Big Night” (Nov. 10) slot. Canadian Ellen Page suits up her character, sassy-wise 16-year-old Juno MacGuff, in the armor of a too-precocious teen. Her tart observations come in handy – and pinch – when she learns she’s pregnant.
“August Rush,” about a musical prodigy, starring Keri Russell, Jonathan Rhys Meyers and the very talented Freddie Highmore, closes the festival (Nov. 17). And one of the festival’s finest days is the final Sunday (Nov. 18) when award-winners are screened.
On Nov. 9, Mayor John Hickenlooper will give director Norman Jewison the Mayor’s Career Achievement Award after a screening of “In the Heat of the Night.”
Other tribute guests include one-time film executive and full-time cinema chronicler Steven Bach, author of “Leni: The Life and Work of Leni Riefenstahl.”
There are sure to be quibbles about what didn’t make it into in the festival from the global circuit. A disappointed cinephile e-mailed last week that he was aggravated “The Flight of the Red Balloon” and “Secret Sunshine” are not included.
But there’s much with which to be pleased.
Julian Schnabel’s “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” is one of most artfully directed, emotionally true films of the year. Iranian director Marjane Santrapi and best friend Vincent Paronnaud’s adaptation of her graphic novel “Persepolis” comes to vivacious, resonant life onscreen. And “Caramel,” by Lebanese actor-director Nadine Labaki, charms with a story set in a beauty shop.
Frank Langella’s turn in “Starting Out in the Evening” started out the year as a likely best-actor Oscar contender. The category has since turned bloody, but the Tony winner’s portrayal of a well-regarded professor who agrees to a flirtatious student’s wish to write a thesis about him is terribly raw, even as it is wonderfully refined.
This, alas, isn’t even the tip of the peak experience.
The festival program booklet will be included in Friday’s Denver Post. The schedule also is available online at . Thanks to ever-improved software programs, you should be able to construct your own film festival schedule online from the fest’s ample list of movies and panels.
Lisa Kennedy: 303-954-1567 or lkennedy@denverpost.com. Also see blogs. .
30th Starz Denver Film Festival
The Denver Film Society’s extravaganza of red-carpet screenings, provocative panels, international narrative and documentary features and shorts. Nov. 8-18. Here are additional details:
Opening night. “The Savages,” starring Philip Seymour Hoffman and Laura Linney, 7:30 p.m. at the Ellie Caulkins Opera House.
Awards. Tribute to Norman Jewison and awarding of Mayor’s Career Achievement Award preceding a special screening of “In the Heat of the Night,” Nov. 9, 7:30 p.m., Ricketson Theatre.
Kid’s stuff. Saturday Kid special, “Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium,” Nov. 10, 2 p.m., Ellie Caulkins Opera House.
Big Night. “Juno,” with a knockout performance by Ellen Page, Nov. 10, 8:30 p.m. Ellie Caulkins Opera House.
Closing night. “August Rush,” with arguably one of the finest child actors around, Freddie Highmore, Nov. 17, 7:30 p.m., Ellie Caulkins Opera House.
Tickets. Online at or the Starz FilmCenter at the Tivoli, Ninth Street and Auraria Parkway. “The Savages”: film & party $70-$75, film only $20-$25. “Juno”: film & party $35-$40. “August Rush” film & party $40-$45, film only $15-$20. Most other single-ticket prices $7-$8 (matinees), $9-$11. For further information and schedule, check out Friday’s insert in The Denver Post or go to .
