Dan Sallitt

Dan Sallitt (born July 27, 1955) is an American filmmaker and film critic. He is known for his microbudget filmmaking and cinephile film criticism.[1][2]

Dan Sallitt
Born (1955-07-27) July 27, 1955
Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, United States
Alma materHarvard College (BA)
University of California, Los Angeles (MFA)
OccupationFilmmaker and film critic
Websitepanix.com/~sallitt

Early life

Sallitt was born on July 27, 1955 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.[3] He received a Bachelor of Arts in Mathematics from Harvard College in 1976 and a Master of Fine Arts in Screenwriting from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1979.[4]

Film criticism

Sallitt moved to Los Angeles in 1976, where he served as first-string film critic for The Los Angeles Reader from 1983 to 1985.[5] He has written film criticism for outlets such as Slate, The Chicago Reader, MUBI, Masters of Cinema, and The Village Voice. He maintains a film blog called Thanks for the Use of the Hall.[6]

When Sight & Sound published its list of the greatest films of all time in 2012,[7] Sallitt was asked to submit a list of his top-ten films.[8] His selections consisted of Angel, Daisy Kenyon, Diary of a Country Priest, The General, The Mother and the Whore, Morocco, Notorious, Rio Bravo, Ruggles of Red Gap, and The Searchers.

Filmmaking

In 1986, Sallitt wrote and directed his first feature film, Polly Perverse Strikes Again, which he financed solely from his work as a film critic.[5] He moved to New York City in 1992.[5] There, he wrote and directed Honeymoon (1998), followed by All the Ships at Sea (2004).

He released The Unspeakable Act in 2012. It played at several major international film festivals, including the Rotterdam, Viennale, Karlovy Vary, Edinburgh, Melbourne, and BAMCinemaFest. The film won the Independent Visions Competition prize at the Sarasota Film Festival,[9] and was acquired for U.S. distribution by The Cinema Guild.[10] The film appeared on year-end top ten lists by Amy Taubin, Jonathan Rosenbaum, Adrian Martin, and Ignatiy Vishnevetsky and was included in the afterword to the Korean edition of Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema: On the Necessity of Film Canons.[11]

His fifth feature film, Fourteen, premiered in 2019 at the 69th Berlin International Film Festival,[12] and was picked up for U.S. distribution by Grasshopper Film.[13]

Retrospectives and recognition

In 2013, Anthology Film Archives hosted a retrospective of his work in conjunction with the theatrical release of The Unspeakable Act.[14] In Film Comment, Jonathan Robbins noted that Sallitt's work was "rooted in the films of Robert Bresson, Eric Rohmer, Jean Eustache, John Cassavetes, and Maurice Pialat".[15] Later that same year, additional Sallitt retrospectives were held at the Cineuropa Film Festival in Santiago de Compostela, Spain and the CGAI Cinematheque in A Coruña, Spain.[16]

In 2014, the George Eastman House in Rochester, New York held a retrospective called "Three Weekends with Dan Sallitt."[3] In 2019, Filmadrid hosted a retrospective of Sallitt's work.[17]

Filmography
Year Film Notes
1986Polly Perverse Strikes Again!Directorial debut
1998Honeymoon
2004All the Ships at Sea
2012The Unspeakable Act
2019Fourteen
CaterinaShort

References
  1. Hinojosa, José Sarmiento (March 7, 2019). "Dan Sallitt: "Micro-Budgets Are a Liberating Thing for Me"". Desistfilm. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  2. Tuttle, Harry (April 23, 2010). "Auteurist v. Cinephile (Dan Sallitt)". Screenville. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  3. Kushner, Daniel J. (June 25, 2015). "Dan Sallitt's "family films"". City Newspaper. Retrieved March 1, 2020.
  4. Poli, Vincent (October 18, 2019). "Adult Problems: An Interview With Dan Sallitt". Kinoscope. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  5. Sachs, Ben (May 17, 2013). "An interview with Dan Sallitt, director of The Unspeakable Act". Chicago Reader. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  6. "Thanks for the Use of the Hall". Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  7. Christie, Ian (September 2012). "The 50 Greatest Films of All Time". Sight & Sound. British Film Institute. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  8. "Dan Sallitt". Sight & Sound. British Film Institute. September 2012. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  9. Oleszczyk, Michał (July 13, 2012). "My Brother, My Love". RogerEbert.com. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  10. "Cinema Guild Acquires Dan Sallitt's The Unspeakable Act". Blu-ray.com. October 16, 2012. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  11. Rosenbaum, Jonathan (September 8, 2018). "Afterword to the Korean Edition of Essential Cinema (Updated)". jonathanrosenbaum.net. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  12. Ehrlich, David (February 8, 2019). "'Fourteen' Review: Dan Sallitt's Low-Budget, Highly Affecting Portrait of Female Friendship — Berlinale". IndieWire. Retrieved March 3, 2020.
  13. N'Duka, Amanda (February 15, 2020). "Grasshopper Film Nabs Berlin Film Festival Pic 'Fourteen'". Deadline. Retrieved February 23, 2020.
  14. Harris, Brandon (February 27, 2013). "Dan Sallitt on The Unspeakable Act". Filmmaker Magazine. Retrieved March 3, 2019.
  15. Robbins, Jonathan (March 5, 2013). "Review: The Unspeakable Act". Film Comment. Retrieved March 3, 2019.
  16. "Cineuropa: Dan Sallitt". CGAI. Retrieved March 3, 2019.
  17. "Filmadrid 2019 dedica sendas restrospectivas a Dan Sallitt y al nuevo cine brasileño". Audiovisual451. April 25, 2018. Retrieved March 1, 2020.
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