AWFJ @ Middleburg Film Festival 2023 – Sandie Angulo Chen reports

The Middleburg Film Festival turned eleven this year, showcasing 39 feature and documentary films in the bucolic Virginia town just an hour from Washington, D.C. The festival, founded by billionaire entrepreneur Sheila Johnson and run by executive director Susan Koch, always highlights women filmmakers and an impressive slate of titles. This year, the festival’s Best Narrative Feature went to American Fiction, written and directed by Cord Jefferson; Best Documentary Feature went to Invisible Nation, directed by Vanessa Hope; Best International Feature was director J.A. Bayona’s Society of the Snow; and the Special Presentation Audience Award went to filmmaker Ben Proudfoot and Kris Bowers’ The Last Repair Shop.

Several AWFJ members, including Mae Abdulaki, Lauren Bradshaw, Sandie Angulo Chen, Leslie Combemale, Roxana Hadadi, Nell Minow, Jazz Tangcay and Lauren Veneziani, are festival regulars. All of us attended the annual Women in Film luncheon, which featured Priscilla star Cailee Spaeny and costume designer Stacey Battat, Past Lives writer-director Celine Song, Rustin producer Tonia Davis, and a group of Ukrainian women filmmakers. Another favorite festival moment all AWFJ members attended was the annual concert celebrating a particular composer. This year, the composer to win the Distinguished Composer Award was Michael Giacchino, whose film scores include The Incredibles, Up, Inside Out, The Avengers, Star Trek, Coco, and the festival title Society of the Snow. Giacchino joined composers Michael Abels, Mark Isham, Kris Bowers, and Charles Fox, who also won the Distinguished Composer Award at previous festivals.

Here is what AWFJ critics @Middleburg had to say about this year’s festival offerings:

Mae Abdulbaki: Of all the films at the Middleburg Film Festival, All of Us Strangers was the most genuinely touching. Written and directed by Andrew Haigh, the film beautifully captures memory, regret and a loving, but complicated relationship between Adam (Andrew Scott) and his parents (Claire Foy and Jamie Bell). All of Us Strangers is compelling, deeply exploring difficult conversations, childhood trauma and the fear of diving head first into a relationship. Jamie Ramsay is doing some excellent cinematography work here and Scott’s emotional, nuanced performance, along with Paul Mescal’s tender portrayal of Adam’s neighbor-turned-lover Harry, brings everything together.

Lauren Bradshaw: Middleburg’s closing night film, Maestro, is an absolute masterpiece, showcasing some of the best direction, performances, and cinematography of the year. Directed, written by, and starring Bradley Cooper, the film’s intimate, emotional story grabs hold of you from the very beginning and never lets go. One scene in particular, which takes place in a church, is the film’s crescendo and still gives me goosebumps. It almost feels like the entire movie has been leading up to this moment as we see Cooper’s Bernstein conducting Mahler’s Second Symphony in his element. You may think that with a title like Maestro, the film is solely about legendary composer Leonard Bernstein, but what I was most struck by was the focus on his wife, Felicia (Carey Mulligan). Felicia was an artist in her own right, whose stabilizing power, support, and sacrifices enabled Leonard to cultivate his genius. The film ensures her own incredible legacy is not lost in her husband’s story. Mulligan is the film’s emotional center; her scenes left me a puddle of tears.

Sandie Angulo Chen: This year, I screened eight films at Middleburg, and my first movie remained one of my unexpected favorites. Biopics can be a mixed bag, but Nyad, written and directed by award-winning documentarians Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi in their first narrative feature, was surprisingly effective. The film is a well-executed chronicle of its subject’s achievements and a showcase for its stars, Annette Bening and Jodie Foster, who play record-breaking long-distance swimmer Diana Nyad and her best friend and coach Bonnie Stoll, respectively. The movie is just as much a tribute to the empowering bond between the fit-and-fabulous best friends as it is the story of the badass 64-year-old woman who made her lifelong dream come true. Here’s to more movies about 60-something characters played by 60-something actors (Foster is 60 and Bening 65).

Leslie Combemale: This year at the Middleburg Film Festival, which is always one of the highlights of my festival experiences of the year, I was most impressed and appreciative of the fest’s hosting of Ukrainian filmmakers. Over the weekend, I met and spoke with several directors and producers and attended a panel in which they talked about their films and their experiences continuing to create art as the invasion by Russian forces put them at risk and devastated their country. Bringing international filmmakers specifically connected to the American Film Showcase to the fest is a new program MFF is committing to long-term. It is wonderful and speaks to the festival’s desire to expand their educational and cultural reach into the community. Hearing from these artists not only made me aware of films that would have been hard to access and likely not on my radar, it also reminded me of the importance of art and creativity as an expression of an entire citizenry. Fests have to support these kinds of programs to allow for a wider variety of cinematic expression.

Roxana Hadadi: Director J. A. Bayona’s Society of the Snow, about the 1972 crash-landing of a Chilean rugby team who was then stranded in the Andes for months and forced into cannibalism to survive, is the best film I saw at Middleburg Film Festival this year. Bayona is a strong horror director, and the film is full of genre details, like the terrifyingly immersive sound design and literally bone-breaking production design of the crash scene. You’ll find it difficult to forget the image of half this plane simply shearing off itself and flying into the night air, taking screaming people along with it. But what works best about Society of the Snow is its exploration of faith, both religious and humane. The survivors were mostly staunchly Catholic, and the idea of eating their friends and family causes among them both personal and communal doubt. Will they be forgiven for this, or is this a higher power offering them a way to endure? Would their beloved dead allow their bodies to be used in this way; are they able to consent? And why did some of them die, while others lived? The screenplay by Bayona, Bernat Vilaplana, Jaime Marques, and Nicolás Casariego thoughtfully considers these questions without becoming heavy-handed or binary, and coupled with the transformative cinematography and Bayona’s well-organized pace, the film’s 144 minutes fly by fast. The film is Spain’s Best International Feature Film contender for the 96th Academy Awards, and one of the most impactful films you’ll see this year (if you catch it in theaters) or next (it arrives on Netflix on January 4).

Nell Minow: The Holdovers reunites director Alexander Payne with his Sideways star Paul Giamatti, who plays a teacher of classics at a boys’ boarding school in 1969, disliked by the students and faculty. He is ordered to stay on at the school over the Christmas holidays with the boys who could not go home to their families, alone with just the janitor and head cook (Da’Vine Joy Randolph), the relationships evolve and adventures occur. The cast is superb, including newcomer Dominic Sessa as the brightest and bitterest student. Read Nell’s Middleburg Film Festival recap.

Jazz Tangcay: Middleburg Film Festival continues to celebrate women, and that’s such a rare thing to see. A highlight is the Women’s luncheon which celebrates all of the women filmmakers attending. I was moderating panel discussions,, so I didn’t have a chance to watch many films. But I did sit in on the screening of one of my favorite’s of the year, Saltburn. Oh my goodness! Emerald Fennell did that. Her second film and what a luscious sinful commentary on the class system. Beautifully shot. Incredible casting and what a script. This woman is a genius. I also need to say that it was a delight to celebrate Variety’s creative collaborators at the festival and give the award to Priscilla. Sofia Coppola was unable to attend due to unforeseen circumstances, but Cailee Spaney accepted on her behalf with costume designer Stacey Battat. Priscilla‘s story has finally been told, and by one of the finest visionaries out there.

Lauren Veneziani: Middleburg Film Festival is one of my favorite film festivals in the world! Set in beautiful wine country Virginia and founded and led by the fantastic Sheila Johnson, I always look forward to attending every year. The festival always highlights talented women in film, both in front of and behind the camera. This year I saw Priscilla, Saltburn, The Killer and Maestro, as well as interviewing Celine Song for her exceptional directorial debut Past Lives, which is one of my favorite films of the year. My favorite film of the festival was Priscilla. Sofia Coppola never misses and showcases Priscilla Presley’s love story with Elvis in a way that has not been told on film before. Cailee Spaeny is electric in the role completely transforming into Priscilla and Jacob Elordi captures Elvis’ charm, talent and love yet possible quality he had over his wife. One of the best films of the year, Priscilla is not to be missed in theatres.