Currently Browsing: Jan Lisa Huttner
NYC Shout-Out: In 2019, Nadine Labaki’s film “Capernaum” was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, thrilling those of us have cherished her work for years now. Labaki’s breakout film “Caramel” was firmly set in contemporary Beirut. Her second film “Where Do We Go Now?” is Magical Realism. A mythical Lebanese village, surrounded by […]
Friday, Soraya Chemaly posted a passionate cri de coeur urging us to boycott Sunday’s Oscar broadcast. Soraya, I felt your pain! Furthermore, the situation was even worse than you described it. Not only was the only female contender with buzz swiftboated (making this the 81st year out of 85 in which all Best Director nominees […]
Oscars 2013: What You Will Not See in Zero Dark Thirty – Debunking the Myth that Kathryn Bigelow Endorses Torture The first time I saw Zero Dark Thirty was on December 3, 2012. It was a Monday night, and I was at a screening for New York-based film critics. No one I knew had seen […]
Oscars 2013: Director Kathryn Bigelow Gets Swiftboated I went to bed last night totally sure what today’s lead would be: “What a difference one year makes,” I wrote in my draft. I went on: Last February, I posted a piece on Huffington Post (“Oscars 2012: Where Are the Women?“) about how the absence of women […]
Nora Ephron died on Tuesday, June 26, at the age of 71. Although she had been very ill for several years, she kept her condition a secret, so her “sudden” death came as a shock to many people. Tributes began flowing into the Blogosphere, and the avalanche of anecdotes swelled as famous people with well-known […]
Last week, California Congressman Darrell Issa convened a hearing in DC. The topic: Should the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka “Obamacare”) require employers to pay for birth control? The panel: Five men representing various faith constituencies. “The hearing is not about reproductive rights and contraception but instead about the Administration’s actions as they […]
Interview with director/screenwriter Bill Condon by Jan Lisa Huttner, November 19, 2004 ‘Kinsey’, Bill Condon’s new biopic about 1940s sex researcher Alfred Kinsey, raises questions about morality in our own time as well. Jan Lisa Huttner talked to the director in October at this year’s Chicago International Film Festival. JLH: ‘Kinsey’ arrives in a highly […]
Interview with director Deborah Kampmeier by Jan Lisa Huttner March 11, 2005 Deborah Kampmeier’s film ‘Virgin’ was nominated for two Independent Spirit Awards in 2004, but none of the usual suspects were interested in distributing it. Fortunately ‘Virgin’ was recently released on DVD. Jan Lisa Huttner called Kampmeier at her home in New York to […]
Interview with Mira Nair, director of ‘Vanity Fair’, by Jan Lisa Huttner August 20th, 2004 Internationally-acclaimed director Mira Nair stopped in Chicago recently to promote her new film Vanity Fair. Reel Chicago correspondent Jan Huttner caught up with her at her elegant suite in the Peninsula Hotel for a heart-to-heart chat about sex, love, and […]
Interview with Michael Radford, the director and screenwriter of ‘The Merchant of Venice’ by Jan Lisa Huttner January 6th, 2005 ‘The Merchant of Venice’, Michael Radford’s new adaptation of one of William Shakespeare’s most controversial plays, has people talking once again about Shylock, the play’s most intriguing character. Jan Lisa Huttner talked to the director during […]
Jan chats with French actress Julie Delpy about her new film ‘2 Days in Paris’ Julie Delpy made her film debut at age 14 in a Godard’s DETECTIVE (released in 1985), and she’s been a successful actress ever since. But for years now she’s been yearning for more, and the success of Richard Linklater’s […]
