Organizers announced on Friday that renowned film director Werner Herzog (Aguirre, the Wrath of God, Fitzcarraldo, Grizzly Man, Cave of Forgotten Dreams) is coming to Iowa City as part of the Refocus Film Festival, Infinite Dream and the Iowa City Book Festival on Sunday, Oct. 15. His appearance, scheduled for 7:30 p.m. at the Englert Theatre, is part of a tour promoting his memoir Every Man for Himself and God Against All.
As part of the visit, FilmScene will be awarding Herzog the Cinema Savant award. This award was last given to screenwriter/director Charles Burnett (Killer of Sheep, Nambia: The Struggle for Liberation) in the fall of 2019.
Tickets for this event are currently open to festival passholders for $30 (which includes an autographed hardcover copy of Herzog’s book) and will go on sale to the public for $40 on Sept. 8.
Among classic films like Orlando, starring Tilda Swinton, and exciting new experimental films like Framing Agnes, the undeniable “big get” of last year was the opening night premiere of Luca Guadagnino’s Bones and All (currently streaming on Prime Video). That film’s appearance was paired with a dialogue from screenwriter and producer David Kajganich (a University of Iowa alum), and author Camille DeAngelis.
According to organizers, acquisitions of that same notoriety present a challenge this year, with major studios refusing to meet fair wages demanded by the WGA and SAG-AFTRA, limiting press for festival premieres.
“It’s a bit of a difficult year for film festivals and for the film industry just because of the ongoing SAG and Writers Guild strikes,” said Andrew Sherburne, the executive director and co-founder of FilmScene. “So being able to pull off a successful festival, [on] just our second year under some of those added pressures … if we can do that this year, I’ll feel pretty happy.”
“We want to make sure that we’re standing in solidarity with the various guilds with our programming,” Programming Director Ben Delgado added, “so we’re being pretty careful as to who we invite and what films we invite. Making sure that we’re not crossing any picket lines.”
That considered, this year’s Refocus Film Festival — taking place Thursday through Sunday, Oct. 12-15 — isn’t lacking in celebrity presence. Academy Award-winning screenwriter of The Cider House Rules John Irving will take the Hancher stage on Friday, Oct. 13 to talk about his life and creative process with Iowa Writers’ Workshop Director Lan Samantha Chang.
“I think that is really one of our biggest goals for this second year is just to have greater participation,” Sherburne said. “We’re in partnership with the Iowa City Book Festival, as we were last year, as well as the new Hancher Infinite Dream Festival. So we’re creating a weekend that really showcases art in many ways. So whatever it is you’re interested in, and wherever you are in the state of Iowa, you should be in Iowa City that weekend, because there’s something there for you.”
Herzog will close out the four-day film festival, but not before dozens of other events. Little Village asked Refocus’s organizers at FilmScene to describe four of the featured films. Passes and more information about the festival are available on their website.
Eileen
Starring Thomasin McKenzie and Anne Hathaway, and directed by William Oldroyd (Lady Macbeth), this thriller about a young secretary working at a juvenile corrections facility adapts a novel of the same name.
Egoist
Directed by Japanese filmmaker Daishi Matsunaga, Egoist is also a book adaptation. FilmScene Programming Assistant Jane Keranen described it as an “interesting reflection on love and selfishness” that presents “a refreshing romantic perspective on queer romance.”
Time Bomb Y2K
This HBO documentary comes from directors Brian Becker and Marley McDonald. According to Ben Delgado, FilmScene’s programming director, “Time Bomb Y2K is an archival film repurposed to make a new work” that’s “about the millennial Y2K panic.”
Ernest & Celestine: A Trip to Gibberitia
This 2022 French animated film tells the charming story of a bear and mouse journeying to repair a broken violin. “It’s fun to be able to include this film because we played the original in our first six months down on the Ped Mall,” said FilmScene co-founder Andrew Sherburne.
Isaac Hamlet contributed to this article, originally published in Little Village’s September 2023 issue.
