Tag: San Francisco

"Great news, we're gonna make this movie!" Two years later, when Sarah Silverman finally got the email that she thought she'd never get she hit reply-all and wrote "Yay!" Then, she said last night at the premiere of I Smile Back at the Mill Valley Film Festival, she spiraled into a little...

MVFF38 opens with heavy weight films about heavy weight topics.

Stark Insider is on location north of San Francisco for the 38th annual Mill Valley Film Festival. "This script made me cry." Director Tom Hooper is back. We last saw him here on Stark Insider when he introduced the world to The King's Speech. That film, which proved impediments could be...

Welcome Ilana Walder-Biesanz! You may have noticed a new voice on Stark Insider. Ilana spent the last year on a Fullbright Scholarship in Germany watching and writing about theater and opera, and I am so pleased that she opted to contribute her talents to this web site upon returning to San Francisco. (Ilana's...

Armen Ohanian was clearly a fascinating person whose story deserves to be told. A genderqueer Armenian over a century ago, she began life as an "honest woman" in an upper-class family but pursued a career as an artist. She danced on tour in Europe, wrote poetry, and composed Orientalized...

Are you married to a Squid Mother? Then, what are you waiting for, you could have a star in the making! All it takes is some polyurethane, a filmmaking partner based in San Mateo, and dreams of Hollywood. Such is the fate of creature feature filmmaker Checkers Rosario (Sean San José). He's been...

Fred's Diner is kind of a quirky joint. That's my initial gut reaction after spending time at one of San Francsico's newest eateries. The vibe is distinctly 1950's Americana. A jukebox at one end tees up no shortage of Elvis, and Buddy Holly. And the wait staff -- entirely good...

Elle Fanning, on this episode of Stark Insider Uncut! Watch as Elle, as fashionable and as graceful a young star as you're likely to see, arrives at the Mill Valley Film Festival. We talk film, acting, and female role models including Angelina Jolie, and Glenn Close, before she graciously works...

"The ugliest girl wins the dough for the guy who brought her." On their last night before deployment, six Marines make a bet—a dogfight. The tough-talking Eddie Birdlace finds a waitress for his entry, but he quickly discovers himself falling for her in spite of her appearance. As produced by...

This seductive dreaminess even penetrates the second movement, but dreamy woodwinds yield to more assertive sounds, and the dancers (starting with a group of four men and a woman) respond in kind.