Austin Critics Announce the Five Best Austin Films of 2022: Linklater and mountain lions, the pandemic, the legacy of slavery, and the fight for abortion rights all part of this year’s AFCA Austin Film Award short list – Screens

Apollo 10½: Space Age Childhood

Pandemic or not, Austin remains a vital center of filmmaking, and 2022 was no exception as the Austin Film Critics Association’s Austin Film Award shortlist. Announced Jan. 3, the selection includes documentaries about abortion rights and wildlife struggles, an archeological search for a hidden sin, and two experiments by local filmmaking legends pushing the form of cinema.

The selections are just a portion of the full list of award nominees voted on by the AFCA membership (which includes several Austin Chronicle staff and writers), and winners will be announced on January 10. But if you can’t wait to see all five nominees, here’s where you can catch them streaming now.

Apollo 10½: Space Age Childhood

Richard Linklater has never been one to shy away from experimental films, bittersweet looks at the past, or quasi-autobiographies, and these three urges combine in perhaps his most personal film to date. Set in the suburbs around NASA’s Space Shuttle Center at the height of the space race, Apollo 10½ is a fantastical look at Houston in the time of AstroWorld and psychedelia, all seen through the eyes of a young boy (newcomer Milo Coy ) who dreams he becomes part of the adventure. The live footage is given extra life through character animation by an international team, including Austin’s Malin Minnow.

Streaming now on Netflix. Read our glowing review, as well as our interviews with director Richard Linklater and stars Milo Coy and Glen Powell.

Deep in the heart

Deep in the heart

Ben Masters follows up his acclaimed 2019 South by Southwest journey through the wild and spectacular environments of the Texas border, River and Wall, with a gentle and surprising exploration of the Lone Star State’s wildlife. Many of the creatures will be familiar, like the giant colony of Mexican free-tailed bats at Bracken Cave in the Hill State, but Masters and his team spent months patiently waiting for a glimpse of the state’s rarest inhabitants , from bears turned to the endangered ocelot. Narrated by Matthew McConaughey, it is a call to all human Texans to remember that they are not the only inhabitants of the state and that the destinies of all its creatures are very much intertwined with ours.

Available now on VOD. Read our four-star review and interview with director Ben Masters.

successor

successor

Margaret Brown returns to her hometown of Mobile, Alabama, where she filmed her 2008 breakout hit, Order of Myths, to track detective work after uncovering evidence of a very special crime: the Clotilda, the last ship of America’s slaves, was destroyed in 1860 somewhere. in the swamps. While the importation of slavery had been banned four years earlier, Clotilda’s very existence has been controversial, and Brown portrays how her discovery validated the family histories of descendants of the Africatown community.

Streaming now on Netflix. Read our SXSW review and interview with director Margaret Brown.

Shouting Down Midnight

Shouting Down Midnight

June 26, 2013: a date that will live on in Texas political history because of Fort Worth Democrat Wendy Davis’ Senate Bill 5, the Republican effort to take away reproductive rights. It was actually her second parade, following the oft-forgotten failure of the school finance bill in 2011, and while the night was won, the battle was lost as Gov. Rick Perry simply called the Legislature into a special session and passed the bill two weeks later. Later. But as documentary Gretchen Stoeltje shows, the fight continues through women inspired by that night to become activists.

Streaming now on Peacock. Read our SXSW review and interview with director Gretchen Stoeltje.

There there

There there

Andrew Bujalski was at the center of the DIY filmmaking revolution known as mumblecore, though he’s moved on to bigger, star-studded studio projects like Support the Girls and Results. When the pandemic hit, he responded by going back to his “work with what you’ve got” roots—though what he did have was a roster of well-known actors (Lili Taylor, Lennie James, Jason Schwartzman, and more) and a string of known scene with two hands, interlocking. Rather than creating a single, COVID-19-safe group, Bujalski’s experimental piece keeps each performer in exquisite isolation, expanding the concept of the Zoom film beyond lockdown into a unique investigation into the spaces between us.

Available now on VOD. Read our review and our interview with director Andrew Bujalski.