Introduction
The Tribeca Film Festival was founded by Robert De Niro, Jane Rosenthal, and Craig Hatkoff in 2002 to try and revitalize lower Manhattan after the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center back in September 2001. For the last twenty years, the festival has been a well-needed injection of both culture and money into the veins and coffers of New York City.
Renamed the Tribeca Festival last year after lengthy COVID-related delays and a new hybrid platform for remote attendees, the festival is once again back, and in person. Putting forth a wide variety of programming, the Tribeca 2022 Festival includes films, retrospective events, art exhibits, concerts, masterclasses, talks, and red carpet events. Additionally, those who would rather take part in the festival from home can do, courtesy of the Tribeca At Home platform.
This year’s Tribeca Festival took place in lower Manhattan from June 8-June 19 and featured a wide variety of films, both feature-length and short. The topics at this year’s festival covered a broad berth of topics and showcased culturally, politically, and socially important films. Cinema Scholars is pleased to highlight some of the films from the 2022 Tribeca Festival.
Corner Office (2022)
dir. Joachim Back
[2.5 out of 5]
Sporting an unflattering mustache, Jon Hamm is playing against type in director Joachim Back’s new surrealistic office comedy Corner Office. Winning the Emmy in 2015 for Outstanding Lead Actor In A Drama Series, Hamm has been doing his best to not be typecast after his portrayal of advertising guru Don Draper launched the actor to stardom. When watching Back’s dark and grim film, one cannot help but think about how Hamm’s ‘Orson’ is the polar opposite, both physically and emotionally, to that of Draper.
Based on the novel The Room by Swedish author Jonas Karlsson, Corner Office premiered at the 2022 Tribeca Festival. Loosely paying respects to the works of Franz Kafka, The Coen Brothers, and Charlie Kaufman, the film serves up a fantastically understated performance by Hamm. However, the thin screenplay by Ted Kupper and the slow-moving pace of the film makes it difficult to sit through for long stretches.
Taking a page from the wildly popular Apple TV+ series Severance (read our review here), Orson has a bland and mindless office job for The Authority. We know little of Orson’s home life. Instead, the film focuses on his ambition to move up in the Orwellian-like organization. When Orson discovers a secret office that, apparently, only he has access to, Orson begins to sink deeper into his own psychosis while alienating his coworkers. While not much actually happens in The Office, the film is visually stunning. Additionally, Back hammers home the oppressive work environment. One that so many of us are desperate to escape from in a post-COVID world.
Corner Office is directed by Academy-Award-winning director Joachim Back and written by Ted Kupper. The film, based on the novel The Room by Jonas Karlsson, stars Jon Hamm, Danny Pudi, Sarah Gadon, and Christopher Heyerdahl. Corner Office had its world premiere at the Tribeca Festival on June 9, 2022. The film is currently available to stream in New York via the Tribeca Festival website.
McEnroe (2022)
dir. Barney Douglas
[3.5 out of 5]
John McEnroe is a legendary tennis icon. Along with Jimmy Connors and Chris Evert, McEnroe galvanized the sport’s popularity for American audiences in the 1970s and 1980s. He was also an incredibly polarizing figure that pissed off fans, officials, and his fellow competitors. Writer/director Barney Douglas lays all of this out for the viewer to absorb in his new documentary McEnroe which had its world premiere at the Tribeca Festival.
While McEnroe is chronologically structured like your typical documentary, that is where the similarities end. Douglas shoots his film in very low lighting, following the tennis star throughout the course of a night in his native New York City. Additionally, the film goes deep into McEnroe’s inner psyche as the legendary athlete tries to come to terms with the damaging things he has done as both a professional athlete and as a human being. This includes his past drug use.
McEnroe wouldn’t be a quality documentary if it didn’t deliver the goods with regards to talking heads. It’s here where the film shines. We hear from all of the vital people that shaped and defined John McEnroe as a person and athlete. Interviews with Bjorn Borg, Billie Jean King, Peter Fleming, and rock legends Chrissie Hynde and Keith Richards are particularly engrossing. However, it’s interviews with McEnroe’s children and wife Patty Smyth that give the documentary its gravitas and intimacy.
McEnroe is a fascinating sports documentary. It’s certainly not groundbreaking in any meaningful way. However, fans of the tennis legend, as well as fans of tennis in general, will enjoy this documentary immensely. McEnroe begins streaming Friday, September 2 on Showtime. Additionally, the documentary hits theaters across the UK, starting on July 15.
American Dreamer (2022)
dir. Paul Dektor
[2.5 out of 5]
In American Dreamer Dr. Phil Loder (Peter Dinklage) is a depressed and lonely professor at Harvard University. Lecturing uninspired students about economics, he lives a drab existence. Living in a messy and grim-looking apartment, Loder whittles away his free time by feeding his neighbor’s cats and looking on the internet for houses that are clearly out of his price range. We have seen Dinklage play this role before. Most notably in the spectacular The Station Agent, released in 2003.
Directed by Paul Dektor from a screenplay by Theodore Melfi, American Dreamer is based on a podcast episode of This American Life. Loder, longing to have a home of his own, agrees to purchase the sprawling estate of a wealthy widow (Shirley MacLaine) for pennies on the dollar. The condition is that the widow Astrid remains a permanent tenant until her death. Loder has his real estate contact and somewhat friend Dell (Matt Dillon) check things out. After a thumbs up by Dell, Loder decides this opportunity is too good to pass up.
American Dreamer is, at times, a fun film, with a wild premise. The problem is that Dektor and Melfi’s script doesn’t embrace this concept fully. The constant reminder of Loder’s dark and brooding outlook toward the world keeps the film firmly planted in reality instead of embracing the fantastical elements of the story fully. Dinklage, especially in the first hour of the film, is a joy to watch. The scenes between Dinklage and Dillon are also top-notch. However, the interactions between MacLaine and Dinklage often feel forced and contrived.
Not a bad film by any stretch, American Dreamer often seems to not know which direction it wants to go in. Nor which tone it wants to emit. Slapstick site gags quickly morph into scenes of black comedy. It also doesn’t help that there are subplots involving Astrid’s alleged dementia, and its ramifications, that are confusing. More backstory into MacLaine’s character and a full embrace of the film’s sentimentality would have served the viewers better. Ultimately, Dektor’s film will likely find a nice home on one of the streaming platforms.
American Dreamer is directed by Paul Dektor and written by Theodore Melfi. Based on a segment from the podcast This American Life, the film stars Peter Dinklage and Shirley MacLaine. Matt Dillon, Danny Glover, Kimberly Quinn, and Danny Pudi are also featured. American Dreamer premiered at the Tribeca Festival on June 11, 2022.
The Forgiven (2021)
dir. John Michael McDonagh
[3.5 out of 5]
In The Forgiven, married couple David (Ralph Fiennes) and Jo (Jessica Chastain) are driving to a party at the lavish and remote Moroccan villa that belongs to their friend Richard (Matt Smith) and his lover Dalley (Caleb Landry Jones). Before they arrive, David, who is a functioning alcoholic, recklessly runs over a young local boy, killing him. Drunk and afraid, David takes the corpse to the party. While tragic, this horrific accident doesn’t seem to faze the pampered guests. Further, the authorities rule the whole thing an accident, allowing the party to rage on.
Director John Michael McDonagh’s latest film is a combination of crime thriller, black comedy, and marital drama. While The Forgiven can often get bogged down in its, at times, rambling screenplay, it’s nonetheless a visually stunning film that is enjoyable to watch. McDonagh’s screenplay portrays the bourgeois upper class as uncaring and empty inside. His themes of class warfare and the haves versus the have-nots never go out of style and are especially fitting in today’s hyperaware society.
The drama and the tension ramp up in The Forgiven when Abdellah (Ismael Kanater), the father of the deceased boy, arrives at the villa to identify his son. In movie-of-the-week fashion, David agrees to ride with Abdellah and his passengers to the desert. This is so that they can bury the boy in a traditional manner. In a morality tale in which all of the main protagonists are not very likable, the fantastic performances across the board keep the viewer engrossed, if not rooting for people we really shouldn’t be rooting for.
The Forgiven is written, directed, and produced by John Michael McDonagh. The film stars Jessica Chastain, Ralph Fiennes, Caleb Landry Jones, Christopher Abbott, Matt Smith, and Said Taghmaoui. The Forgiven had its US premiere at the 2022 Tribeca Festival on June 14, 2022. As per IMDB, the film is scheduled for a limited US release date, starting on July 1, 2022. This will be followed by the UK release taking place on September 2, 2022. The film will be playing exclusively in movie theaters.
The Lost Weekend: A Love Story (2022)
dir. Eve Brandstein, Richard Kaufman, and Stuart Samuels
[4 out of 5]
May Pang grew up in Spanish Harlem in the 1960s. An American-born daughter of Chinese immigrants, the future lover, and confidant of Beatles legend John Lennon fell hard for all things American and all things rock and roll, especially The Beatles. When Pang landed a dream job at the production house for the Fab-Four, Apple Records, her dreams quickly became a reality. The 19-year-old soon found herself working exclusively for Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono. Even stranger, as the power couples’ marriage, began to fall apart, Ono convinced Pang to begin an affair with the newly liberated Lennon. A carefully manipulated move on Ono’s part.
Documenting the now legendary “Lost Weekend” with unprecedented access to archival footage, as well as newly-heard home recordings, Pang takes the viewer on an emotional odyssey through these now infamous eighteen months. It was a period in time that would change her life, the lives of Lennon and Ono, and the path of rock and roll, forever. Directed by Eve Brandstein, Richard Kaufman, and Stuart Samuels The Lost Weekend: A Love Story is a touching and inspiring documentary about one of the most important figures in music history. It’s also about a love affair that was simply not meant to be.
What happened in 1973 during The Lost Weekend has become Hollywood legend. Lennon drank incessantly and became a staple at the Rainbow Bar & Grill on Sunset Boulevard. Along with Alice Cooper, Harry Nilsson, Mickey Dolenz, Keith Moon, and others, The Hollywood Vampires were born (read our article on the Vampires here). They were a hard-drinking group of musicians that still exist and perform live today. Inevitably, Ono’s game of chess paid off. After almost two years of hard partying, hard living, and soul searching, Lennon reconciled with Ono.
The narrative that the directors and Pang shape is one of true love and endearing affection between her and Lennon. We as the viewer cannot really argue this assertion as John Lennon is no longer around to provide his version of events, and Yoko Ono isn’t really talking about what happened all those years ago. The Lost Weekend: A Love Story is essential viewing for all Beatles and Lennon fans, and it doesn’t disappoint.
The Lost Weekend: A Love Story is an emotional, touching, and often hilarious portrayal of a young woman’s first true love. Directed and produced by Eve Brandstein, Richard Kaufman, and Stuart Samuels, the film had its world premiere at the Tribeca Festival on June 10, 2022.
