SLIFF 2021, Part 1: Talent and Choices Abound

The 30th Annual Whitaker St. Louis International Film Festival is back with in-person and virtual screenings Thursday, November 4 to 14 and 18 to 21. The roughly one hundred fifty feature films and hundreds of shorts include fiction and nonfiction, live action and animated, U.S. and foreign works. The first half of the fest includes impressive selections.

Tops for me is writer/director Kenneth Branagh’s “Belfast,” based on his first nine years growing up there as the Irish Troubles erupted in 1969. The gorgeous black-and-white that evokes the time period yields to color only when the family at the center of the conflict escapes to the cinema. “Belfast” relates a powerful story of politics, religion, and country.

For foreign film lovers, my discovery this year is South Korean director Hong Sangsoo, represented by three films: “The Woman Who Ran,” “Introduction,” and “In Front of Your Face.” Hong carefully sees and listens to individuals’ interaction, quietly but perceptively revealing human longing and desire. I’m particularly fond of “The Woman Who Ran” in which a wistful young woman visits three friends outside Seoul and bares her life’s struggles through casual conversations at which Hong is a master. Also of note is the Nigerian “Eyimofe, This Is My Desire” which observes two hopeful, ambitious individuals struggling to improve their fortunes.

The documentaries “The Kinloch Doc,” “Ferguson Rises,” and “For the Left Hand,” add another important component. In these, insightful directors turn their cameras on the political and personal in real lives. And the centerpiece for the fest’s first half is “American Underdog” which dramatically presents St. Louis Ram Kurt Warner’s story. Kurt and Brenda Warner will be on hand for a discussion.

There are fifty-year anniversary screenings followed by Q&As for Steven Spielberg’s “Duel” and Melvin Van Peebles’ “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.” And for filmmakers, there’s a master class on Film and the Law on Tuesday, November 11, plus a St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase. There’s so much more on all three screens at the Tivoli, Webster University’s Winifred More Auditorium, Washington University’s Brown Hall, the St. Louis Public Library, and the Contemporary Art Museum. You may check the Cinema St. Louis website for more information: times, places, descriptions, and trailers of programs as well as the COVID-19 protocols.