This year's winner, The Arbalest, received less than praise-worthy notices before going on to net the top honor, and is therefore unlikely to follow in the footsteps of the aforementioned successes.
The Arbalest, from first-time film-maker Adam Pinney, won the grand jury prize for narrative feature.
Oh, the title: "arbalest" means "crossbow," and evokes violence in particular, the primal violence on which the story, Foster Kalt's fate, and, for that matter, all culture rests.
Pinney is an exquisite comedic stylist as well, and "The Arbalest" reflects some Andersonian inspiration in Pinney's playful approach to history, in his fanatical sense of décor and costume, in his taste for the cool declamation of epigrammatic dialogue.
"The Arbalest" was obviously a movie unlike the others a historical fantasy of high style, composed dramatically and visually with a shot-by-shot and moment-to-moment profusion of imagination and invention.
By Richard Brody March 18 , 2016Mike Brune as Foster Kalt in Adam Pinney's "The Arbalest".
Few movies exist independently and freely, moment to moment, emblazoned with the act of spontaneous creation, as does "The Arbalest".
The film to which we awarded the Grand Jury Prize Adam Pinney's "The Arbalest"—stirred up a bit of controversy.
The screening of "Little Sister" that I attended was also a world première and I watched the film with a special joy the same one that accompanied the screenings of "The Arbalest," "collective:unconscious," and a few others at SXSW in anticipating these films entering the world and taking their place in the future of the cinema, a future that they'd do their part to shape.
That's the very essence of "The Arbalest".
The subject of "The Arbalest" is a classic one: the dangers of selling out.
