Courtesy of A24 Films
Along with the return of its partnership with the Park City Filmmakers Showcase on May 12, Park City Film filled the month of May with entertaining and thought-provoking films.
by Pierre Pinaud “The Rose Maker” unclassified, continues its race this weekend on Saturday and Sunday 7 and 8 May.
The film is about Eve (Catherine Frot), who is a world famous rose grower who is going through some tough times. It’s an easy-going, good-natured comedy where Eve reluctantly allows herself to accept help from an unlikely source, and in the process discovers new aspects of life worth nurturing.
The May 13-15 weekend screening is by Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert “Everything, everywhere, all at once” rated R, said Katharine Wang, executive director of Park City Film.
The film, which Park City Film has scheduled to celebrate Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month, stars Michelle Yeoh. Some see this film as a love letter to what an underrated actor she is.
“She’s amazing, but didn’t get that lead role,” Wang said. “So here she’s in the foreground, and she’s holding this whole movie together.”
“Everything Everywhere All At Once” is about a range of things, according to Wang.
“It’s about the metaverse, which is a big thing now, but it’s also about the paths not taken,” she said. “It’s about what your life would be like if you made different choices.”
Yeoh plays a Chinese immigrant stuck working in the IRS audit office.
“She is raising her family and trying to keep the family business together,” Wang said. “But life is not going as she hoped. Then there’s this spin-off of what else could have been, because it’s about the various characters that Michelle Yoeh has played throughout her career. So, there’s this weird cinephile thing when you see all these different movies coming to the fore.
Ultimately, the film is about family, Wang said.
“It tells you that maybe it’s not the reality you were anticipating, it’s the reality you have,” she said.
The Friday May 13 screening is sold out, but tickets are still available for May 14 and 15, Wang said.
Next up for the program is a special Reel Community Series screening of Robin Hauser’s documentary “$avvy”, unrated, May 18 for the local Latinx community.
“$avvy” explores how and why the financial culture in the United States marginalizes women, and the film will screen with Spanish subtitles, Wang said.
There will also be a panel discussion after the film with director Robin Hauser, Yanely Espinal of Next Gen Personal Finance, who is in the film, and Rebeca Gonzalez, Community Outreach Coordinator for Bright Futures. The panel will be moderated by Sarah MacCarthy, Director of Community Impact for the Park City Community Foundation.
On May 19, Park City Film will host another screening of the Reel Community series. This one will be Matt Smiley’s “By love,” not rated, Wang said.
“For Love” is a film of resilience and resurgence. It shows how colonization had many adverse effects on the family and societal structures of Canada’s Indigenous population, she said.
Courtesy of Dogwoof
Next weekend’s screenings, May 20-22, will be Renan Ozturk and Freddie Wilkinson “The Sacredness of Space”, unclassified.
Ozturk, a Turkish-American rock climber, is well known in the Park City community for his story and cinematographic work in Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi’s award-winning Sundance Film Festival documentary, “Meru.”
“The Sanctity of Space” is a documentary about Brad Washburn, a 1930s mountain aerial photographer,” Wang said.
Washburn used his photographs to create topographic maps of Alaska and the Denali region and opened people’s imaginations to want to explore those areas, like what the Hudson River School painters did in West, she said.
“The side story is that Renan and Freddie Wilkinson looked at some of Washburn’s images of Moose’s Tooth Massif, which is next to Denali, and is a series of mountain ranges that have never been climbed, and decided to explore and climb it.” she says. “It’s a mountaineer’s dream to go where no one else has gone before, and the film tells their story and why they wanted to tell that story.”
The last film scheduled in May is that of Roger Michell “The Duke,” rated R, will screen May 27-29.
“I first saw this at the Telluride Film Festival, and it’s based on a true story that took place in the 1960s,” Wang said. “It’s about this 60-year-old taxi driver who steals a portrait from the National Gallery because he’s protesting the way the English government is mistreating its veterans and elderly people. It’s his statement on the fact to be an activist. It’s about ordinary people doing extraordinary things. There are great actors, Jim Broadbent and Helen Mirren, who can bring this story to life.
