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Filmmaker Nick Sasso On Multiple Hats, Muay Thai, and the Importance of Complex Relationships in 'Haymaker'

February 2, 2021

Writer-director-producer and star Nick Sasso's Haymaker is a film that follows Nick, a retired Muay Thai fighter, now working as a bouncer. One night, Nick prevents an assault on a Trans performer which forges a trust that results in her hiring him a...

‘Sound of Metal’ Challenges Audiences to Consider the Value of Silence

January 29, 2021

There is no denying that America is grappling with the idea spending time alone, and thus ultimately, the silence that comes with it. That makes watching Sound of Metal all the more poignant. The film follows Ruben (played brilliantly by Riz Ahmed) a...

Rising Through The Ranks: Filmmaker Kevin Bachar

January 28, 2021

Documentary filmmaker and screenwriter Kevin Bachar didn't let the COVID-19 pandemic slow him down; 2020 was full of new and exciting moments for his career. Aside from finishing up his ninth film for PBS Nature on the sharks of Hawaii, as well as an...

A California Christmas' filmmaker Lauren Swickard is a #WomenInFilm powerhouse

January 19, 2021

I happily stumbled upon an actress recently who was not only the lead in one of Netflix’s top Christmas movies last year, but wrote the screenplay and produced it as well. As if writing a screenplay isn’t a feat in itself! At the age of twenty-seven,...

Looking Beyond Labels With Isabel Sandoval: Part 2

January 15, 2021

In Part 1 of our interview with Isabel Sandoval we discussed her latest film Lingua Franca, the power of the trans female gaze and giving women agency on screen, as well as making films as an immigrant in the era of Trump. We continue our conversatio...

Write On with 'Promising Young Woman' Writer-Director Emerald Fennell

January 12, 2021

Promising Young Woman writer-director Emerald Fennell and our host Phil Galasso discuss the tonal tightrope of the film, its use of music, her unconventional writing process, and more.

Looking Beyond Labels With Isabel Sandoval: Part 1

January 11, 2021

It’s no coincidence that writer-director Isabel Sandoval’s latest film Lingua Franca finds the most power in things left unsaid. It’s a delicate drama that touches on being an undocumented immigrant and a trans woman under the reign of Trump, and beg...

Adam Mason & Simon Boyes on Writing 'Songbird' During a Pandemic

January 5, 2021

Screenwriters Adam Mason and Simon Boyes didn't initially plan to write a movie about a pandemic during a pandemic. But when COVID-19 shut down the movie they had originally planned to shoot in 2020, they ended up doing just that with Songbird.

Sing Me A Song' Chronicles a Buddhist Monk's Struggles With Internet Temptations

January 1, 2021

Sing Me A Song is a fascinating examination of what happens when an isolated community slowly but surely is exposed to the outside world through the internet and television... To the point that young monks are now aware of internet dating. While one ...