NYFF51 Cinephiliacs Podcast

by Tony Dayoub

If you want to hear (that's right... hear) my thoughts on a few of the top films I saw at the 51st New York Film Festival, then you should check this out. Peter Labuza of LabuzaMovies had me on this week's Cinephiliacs podcast to discuss some of 2013's top movies, most of which you'll be hearing about come awards time but have yet to be released. It's a wide-ranging conversation which, thanks to Peter's astute questioning, produces some interesting insight into some of the festival's finest films. Download it here or on iTunes.

NYFF51 Review: 12 Years a Slave (2013)

by Tony Dayoub

What makes 12 Years a Slave so incisive isn't that it is a particularly apt depiction of slavery. It's that director Steve McQueen makes the viewer feel like it is. In his previous film Shame, McQueen got us to identify with a lascivious sex addict. In 12 Years, his third film (and his third entry in the New York Film Festival), McQueen does something quite ingenious by choosing to follow the true story of Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor). In electing to tell of the ordeal of an educated, free African American from the North, kidnapped and sold into slavery, he makes Northup's fear and outrage our own.