Interviewed for Purist Magazine, the Oscar winning documentarian Alex Gibney was asked, how significant was it that his epic film on Paul Simon, IN RESTLESS DREAMS: THE MUSIC OF PAUL SIMON, would screen at this year’s HIFF. “Very, he’s coming home.” At a “Conversation With Paul Simon,” Simon spoke about his inspirations in music—doo wop and folk—his breakup with Art Garfunkel, Aretha Franklin’s cover of Bridge , his dislike of the song “Feeling Groovy,” Mike Nichols, Hugh Masekela, and strummed a bit on acoustic guitar. While he now lives outside of Austin, Texas with his wife Edie Brickell, the erstwhile resident of Montauk who had helped save the lighthouse in the late 1990’s inaugurating a series of yearly benefit concerts featuring such legendary stars as James Brown, Don Henley, the Allman Brothers, and Carly Simon, at 80, with a new album, he seems unstoppable, and though he had a plane to catch, did not want to leave the stage.
Seems like the Hamptons was a homecoming for many: Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi brought their film about champion swimmer Diana Nyad for the festival’s opening night. A first feature for the Oscar winning documentarians who specialize in harrowing true life adventure stories, NYAD, starring Annette Bening and Jodie Foster was particularly challenging, keeping its star in water eight hours a day.
Local film notables came to screenings: Julianne Moore, Bruce Weber, Bob Balaban and others supported by attending, despite strikes. Alec Baldwin with Hilaria and seven kids in tow attended the yearly party. Others such as Griffin Dunne and Celia Weston were present with their latest films, EX-HUSBANDS and A LITTLE PRAYER respectively. The funniest line in any movie comes from the hugely entertaining AMERICAN FICTION, when a character talks about the kind of literature—ghetto-- white folks in the Hamptons would love.
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