PLACE AND TIME: THE NORTH SHORE

USA 2023 - DCP - 10 minutes

Directors, Print Courtesy: John Meader, Shawn Burke

The title says much. The images and sound say the rest. Ace MIFF photographer John Meader and equally exemplary sound recordist Shawn Burke combine forces on a moment in space and time on the north shore of Massachusetts. The idea of adding audio to stills is a way to add depth and time to the viewing of still imagery. By focusing on a specific area—as they did in last year’s MIFF selection, Place And Time: Portland, Maine—they give the viewer a thoughtful way to see and hear the coast without the sense of action expected in video or film footage. We see and hear anew. —KE

Sponsored by Donald Cragen

Sunday, July 9 6PM | MFC 1

Monday, July 10 3:20PM | MFC 3

France 2023 - DCP - 91 minutes, in English and in French with English subtitles

Director: Ira Sachs

Screenplay: Ira Sachs, Mauicio Zacharias

Producers: Saïd Ben Saïd, Michel Merkt

Cast: Franz Rogowski, Ben Wishaw, Adèle Exarchopoulos

Print Courtesy: MUBI

In a pre-release review from its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year, critic Alissa Wilkinson (Vox) went to the heart of the many complicated contradictions at work in Ira Sachs’ Passages: “It’s an extremely European film from the American director Ira Sachs, full of homages to classics of European cinema, and a portrait of a rascal and the helplessness of the human heart.” The “rascal” here is Tomas (Franz Rugowski, A Hidden Life), a magnetic if narcissistic charmer, married to the steady, far less flashy Martin (Ben Whishaw, The Personal History of David Copperfield) whose many virtues are not enough to keep Tomas from sleeping with Agathe (Adele Exarchopoulis, Blue is the Warmest Color), a schoolteacher he meets at a party. Yes, it’s a triangle of emotion, eroticism, and extremes, and Sachs (Love Is Strange) never shies from the sparks in this powerful drama. —KE