SCAD Savannah Film Festival Kicks Off with ‘NYAD,’ a Crowd-Pleaser That Resonates With Dreamers of All Ages

Megan McLachlan is in Savannah, Ga., to cover the SCAD Savannah Film Festival, which kicked off its 26th year with the premiere of NYAD.

It’s great to be back in Savannah for the 26th Annual SCAD Savannah Film Festival! Not only did I get here just in time for the opening night of the fest, but it’s one of the best times of year to be in Savannah—period—since the city goes all out for Halloween (as I was walking to a screening, I spotted a Hearse Ghost Tour). Plus, I also learned it’s Wag-O-Ween Weekend, when pets are out and about trick-or-treating.

NYAD Opens the Festival

For 2023, the fest kicked off opening night with NYAD, the story of Diana Nyad’s (Annette Bening) quest to swim the 100-mile journey from Cuba to Key West. In recent years, biopics have gotten a little stale, hitting the same beats and obstacles as other similar films, but NYAD feels different regarding themes on aging and resonates with its message to never give up on your dream (something the aspiring creative students at SCAD can relate to and cheered for during the screening). In Annette Bening’s most recent bid for an Oscar, she played the more subdued role to Julianne Moore in 2011’s The Kids Are All Right, but in NYAD, she demands attention (literally—ask Diana Nyad what “Nyad” means) and Bening physically and emotionally transforms into the athlete.

Following the screening, Vanity Fair‘s David Canfield interviewed co-director Jimmy Chin, who described why he and his life partner/directing partner Elizabeth Chai Vasarheyli decided to take on the project: “Here’s this incredible story about Diana but the experience from a woman’s perspective. Also, what really stood out to us was the story of friendship as well.”

One of the biggest tricks Bening pulls off playing the prickly Nyad, who loves talking about herself at any chance, is making you love her as much as her best friend Bonnie (Jodie Foster) does. Not only is NYAD a testament of how good Bening is and has always been, but it also serves as a reminder that there’s a reason why Jodie Foster has two Oscars. In many ways, this film hinges on these two actresses’ ability to play off of each other because their personalities and chemistry inform so much of their friendship. In the Q&A, Jimmy Chin said he hit the jackpot with Bening and Foster and said how intimidated he was to be on set with them, having to give Foster her first note of the film by screaming at her from a boat.

Chin and Vasarhelyi’s direction really makes what could be a surface-level story deeper. While some ideas regarding Nyad’s family heritage could be more explored in Julia Cox’s script, NYAD ambitiously covers a lot in a short amount of time while making you feel like you’re in the water with her for every lap.

The Zone of Interest

The most striking thing about Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest is its sense of dread that hangs over every frame like a dead weight. It is truly a horror film, where the monster isn’t lurking in the background, but sitting at a breakfast table, chatting with friends about stealing clothing from dead people your husband had a hand in exterminating. So many arguments have been made in recent years about why we make films about bad people and whether these individuals should get the focus, but The Zone of Interest astutely centers the Höss family with the juxtaposition of the concentration camp in their backyard, through chilling sound design from Johnnie Burn. You’re seeing these evil individuals humanized through their domestic life, but always within a few yards from gunshots and screams. It introduces you to this family but never ever lets them off the hook for their complicity for a second and even makes you think about your own complicity as humans.

Time Magazine West Coast Editor Sam Lansky interviewed actor Christian Friedel following the screening and Friedel ruminated on his reservations about playing Commander Rudolph Höss.

“I had a feeling from the beginning that this is the right way to do this [tell this story]. We need this perspective even in these difficult political times. We had a lot of conversations about what is wrong and what is right. I felt the responsibility toward the victims every time and every day. The set was very close to the original house. It was intense.”

Friedel also talked about what the filming set-up was like, with Glazer shooting with 10 cameras at once.

“Jonathan called the system ‘Big Brother in a Nazi House’ in a way. You want to look through the window and observe these characters, not follow a traditional storyline or emotional wave of this character but observe them. From the beginning, he was very transparent about this approach.”

American Fiction

Ahead of the screening of Cord Jefferson’s American Fiction, an adaptation of the novel Erasure by Percival Everett, I chatted with the writer/director on the red carpet about his film winning TIFF’s Audience Award back in September, which he described as “a little surreal.”

“I wasn’t sure the movie was going to get into Toronto in the first place,” said Jefferson. “This is a year when you have literally the biggest directors in the world releasing a movie. Linklater, Fincher, Scorsese, Alexander Payne. All these people whose work I really love and appreciate. I was told this was going to be a really competitive year, so when I found out it got into TIFF, I didn’t even allow myself to dream of winning the Audience Award.”

American Fiction is certainly a crowd-pleaser, with the SCAD audience reacting with plenty of laughs during the screening. The trailer doesn’t do the film justice, setting you up for an uproarious satire that pokes fun at the book industry, when it’s really about much more than that, bittersweet in the same vein as Alexander Payne’s Sideways (Paul Giamatti’s Miles and Jeffrey Wright’s Monk would have a whole lot to talk about). Jeffrey Wright plays Thelonious “Monk” Ellison, a writer whose latest book can’t get published because it’s not seen as “Black” enough since his characters aren’t slaves, drug dealers, or shot by cops. So on a drunken whim, he writes a book for the lowest common denominator (mostly self-righteous white people) that plays into these stereotypes, and it sells IMMEDIATELY.

During the post-screening Q&A with Rotten Tomatoes’ Awards Editor Jacqueline Coley, Jefferson spoke about the “poverty of imagination” in storytelling around Black people. “We are defined by the bad things that happen to us,” he said.

While reading Erasure, Jefferson said he kept thinking of Monk as Jeffrey Wright, and it’s hard to imagine this character in someone else’s shoes. As a reliable supporting player in Wes Anderson movies and even on HBO’s Westworld, Jeffrey Wright deserves more lead roles like that of American Fiction. The script is especially sharp and compelling when Monk and another author, Sintara Golden (Issa Rae), face off on the topic of Black literature and what they consider “pandering.”

I’ll be back with more updates as I continue my festival coverage!

SCAD Savannah Film Festival runs October 21 through October 28.