Two of Morgen’s favorite films from SIFF 2023 happened to be the midnight features on the first and last Friday of the fest. Find out why a wacky time-traveling joint and Taiwanese puppetry made it to the top of her list.
SIFF 2023: the show’s the thing with Pianoforte and A Disturbance in the Force
Two documentaries about the performing arts: prodigious pianists and a spectacular failure of capitalism.
Fast X: Infinity War?
Fast X is the tenth F&F movie and it’s reported to be the penultimate in the franchise. Number eleven will be the final chapter. Or maybe not. How many farewell tours has KISS embarked on? Either way, Fast X is the first half of what will likely be a film epic. In 2025, we’ll see things blow up in ways people in 2023 never dreamed of. Consider it: Fast and the Furious: Infinity War.
SIFF 2023: Circus of the Scars Revisits Jim Rose’s crazed Circus Sideshow
For a few years in the ‘90s, The Seattle-born Jim Rose Circus Sideshow was everywhere. How this band of sideshow misfits scraped, lifted, regurgitated, and self-mutilated their way to international notoriety (for awhile, at least) is told with a veteran carnival barker’s rumpled, robust zing in Chickory Wees’ great documentary.
SIFF 2023: Adoptees find their places in Egghead & Twinkie and The Quiet Migration
Two stories of adoptees finding their places, screening as part of the Seattle International Film Festival.
SIFF 2023: The Last Exit, Douglas Sirk, and Satan Wants You
Reviews of three films playing at the Seattle International Film Festival; all will stream on SIFF.tv next week.
SIFF 2023: Recommendations for the rest of the Festival
Picks for the second half of the Seattle International Film Festival, plus a rundown of the guests who will be in town to support their films.
SIFF interview: Documentary filmmaker Penny Lane is a Good Samaritan
I believe most writers, especially those of us who cover the arts, have a small “dream interview” list, people that we’d love to talk to, should the stars align. High on my shortlist for about a decade has been documentarian Penny Lane. She’s directed some of the most unique and memorable documentaries in recent years, full of vivid characters. Some of her most notable films include Our Nixon, Nuts!, Hail Satan?, and Listening to Kenny G. She’s like a Gen X Errol Morris and she’s amazing.
SIFF 2023: Shout at the devil with Even Hell Has Its Heroes and Satan Wants You
Short reviews of two documentaries: Even Hell Has Its Heroes, about the NW rock band Earth, and Satan Wants You about the Canadian roots of the Satanic panic.
SIFF Interview: Director Megan Griffiths reflects on Year of the Fox and the Seattle film scene
Yet again local (and beloved) director Megan Griffiths has a SIFF favorite on her hands. Year of the Fox is set in Aspen, CO where Ivy (Sarah Jeffrey) is on the cusp of womanhood but hesitant to grow up too fast. Unfortunately with her parents imminent divorce, a father far too distracted by the opulent world of Aspen “royalty” and her mother dealing with the fallout of not only losing marriage but the life she’d always known. Confronted with the harsh realities of the very real caste system that still exists in our country, toxic masculinity, and the realization that her dad may not be the man he’d convinced her he was… she’s forced to figure it out on her own. I don’t know about you, but at her age, I wouldn’t have been able to feed myself much less upend my whole reality and come out the other side in one piece.