While coping with the usual workaday demands of life in New York City, Ann (Joanna Arnow), a thirty-something Jewish woman with a taste for BDSM sex, struggles to maintain a series of casual relationships with various “masters.” When one of her long-term partners suddenly ends things, however, she is forced to reflect on what she really wants out of life. The question is whether she can figure this out before it’s too late. One of the year’s most distinctive and accomplished debut features, The Feeling That the Time for Doing Something Has Passed showcases Arnow, who also wrote and directed the film, in a fearless and uninhibited lead performance as Ann. Witty, wry, and sexually frank, the film also demonstrates Arnow’s remarkable directorial control, featuring precise, static compositions that draw out physical humour in most every scene. Shot on a shoestring budget, this perceptive, off-kilter comedy finds endless amusement in the uncomfortable, even absurd ways that our bodies move through the world.
Audaciously raw, revealing, and excruciatingly funny.
RogerEbert.com
Joanna Arnow, Scott Cohen, Babak Tafti
USA
2023
Panorama
English
Strong Sexual Content
At International Village
At The Rio
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Credits
Executive Producer
Sean Baker, Adam Mirels, Roberts Mirels.
Producer
Graham Swon, Pierce Varous
Screenwriter
Joanna Arnow
Cinematography
Barton Cortright
Editor
Joanna Arnow
Production Design
Grace Sloan
Original Music
Robinson Senpauroca
Director
Joanna Arnow
Joanna Arnow is a filmmaker, actor and writer based in Brooklyn. She wrote and directed Bad at Dancing, a narrative short that was awarded the Berlinale Silver Bear Jury Prize and is currently streaming on the Criterion Channel paired with Jules and Jim. Joanna’s most recent short Laying Out premiered at New York Film Festival and was selected as a festival highlight in The New Yorker. In addition to making films, Joanna works as an actor and writer. As an actor, she has appeared in Aaron Schimberg’s Chained for Life, Zach Fleming’s Staycation, Todd Verow’s Fucked in the Head, Kati Skelton’s Wet Shapes, and more. Joanna also writes fiction and draws comics. Her pieces have been published in Glimmer Train Press, Popula, Monkeybicycle, Crack the Spine, Nanoism and Dogzplot.
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
All We Imagine as Light
What Wong Kar-wai did for Hong Kong, Payal Kapadia does for Mumbai: the Cannes Grand Prix winner is a romantic heartbreaker about three nurses at different stages of life. It's a future classic.
Arthur Erickson: Beauty Between the Lines
This new documentary offers the most complete account so far of the life and work of Canada's greatest architect, the man responsible for several of the finest buildings in Vancouver -- including the Museum of Anthropology and the SFU Campus.
Memoir of a Snail
A stellar Australian cast voice this charming and emotional animated feature by Adam Elliot, the tale of a lonely foster kid befriended by an eccentric elderly woman who turns her life around. (Not for kids!)
Bird
In Andrea Arnold's latest, 12-year-old Bailey (Nykiya Adams) lives in a squat near the English seaside. Neglected by her chaotic father (Barry Keoghan), she pursues an adventure with a magnetic stranger named Bird (Franz Rogowski).