The 1998 Boston Film Festival
Written by Jen Muehlbauer | Posted by: Anonymous
The Boston Film Festival can be hard to pin down. It screens independent films, but mostly wide-release independent films. It’s called the Boston Film Festival, but viewers can be hard-pressed to find much Boston in it. There aren’t any locally filmed and produced "North End" equivalents this year, but take heart – with some probing, we can find some New England roots in this year’s festival.
The most obvious local flavor at the festival comes from "Monument Ave," named for Monument Avenue in Charlestown and filmed in Boston, Charlestown, East Boston, Chelsea, Malden, and Wellesley. It stars Denis Leary as a car-stealing, hard-drinking Irish-American gangster and Colm Meaney as his ruthless crime boss. If Boston showings of "Good Will Hunting" were any indication, expect sporadic whoops of audience recognition as familiar scenery crops up.
"Rounders" doesn’t have any scenes shot at The Tasty or M.I.T., but it does star former Cantabrigian Matt Damon, as well as Edward Norton, Gretchen Mol, John Turturro, Femke Janssen, John Malkovich, and Martin Landau. Damon plays Mike McDermott, a poker pro who lays down his deck, turns over a new leaf, and goes to law school. Since Mike’s studying torts wouldn’t make a very exciting movie, an old friend with some big debt tempts Mike back into the poker underground.
"Monument Ave" has local scenery covered, but "Six Ways to Sunday" is the only locally produced movie in the festival. This Scout Productions film concerns an 18-year-old (Norman Reedus) who lives with his overbearing, washed-up mother (Debbie Harry) and falls into a life of organized crime. The film is based on Charles Perry’s novel "Portrait of a Young Man Drowning." Scout Productions has also recently produced "Home Before Dark," a family drama filmed in Waltham, Newton, and Hyde Park, Massachusetts. (It has screened at various film festivals but not, alas, this one).
The latest movie adaptation of Nabokov’s classic love/pedophilia story also has a New England connection. The screenwriter of "Lolita" is former Boston Phoenix movie critic Stephen Schiff, who will appear at the festival when the movie screens. Until recently, you could only catch "Lolita" on Showtime or overseas, since American distributors have been reluctant to touch the film’s subject matter. A U.S. theatrical release is finally planned, but you can see it here first.
The festival takes place from September 10-20 at Loews Theatre Copley Place, 100 Huntington Ave, in Boston (unlike past years when the festival was divided between Copley Place and the Landmark Kendall Square Cinema in Cambridge). Admission is $8 per film; $25 for the opening night reception and a movie ticket. Discount tickets books are $70 and will be available at the festival information booth at the theater. Children over six will be charged the regular admission price, and children under six will not be admitted. For updated information, including any last-minute cancellations or reschedulings, call 617-266-2533.
The Boston Film Festival is sponsored by the Massachusetts Film Office, Lowes/Sony Theatres, the Boston Phoenix, Legal Sea Foods, the Sundance Channel, the Independent Film Channel, The Lenox, MediaOne, Kiss 108FM, the Massachusetts Port Authority, 101.7 WFNX, OptimumTV, West Coast Video, and New England Cable News.
See entire line up for the festival.
