The Brief

There’s a new film fest in town.

The Los Angeles Festival of Movies opens Thursday night, bringing favorites from festivals like Sundance and Rotterdam to L.A. for the first time. The 12-film lineup includes everything from experimental documentaries to supernatural coming of age stories.

And while many films are highlights from other fests, there are a few world premieres in the mix, like a brand new restoration of the '90s film, Naked Acts, and comedian Conner O’Malley’s directorial debut.

The founders of LAFM, Sarah Winshall and Micah Gottlieb, have never run a festival before, but they know a lot about independent film and programming in L.A. Winshall is an independent film producer, part of the team behind film fest favorites like Strawberry Mansion and We’re All Going To The World’s Fair. Gottlieb is the artistic director of Mezzanine, an L.A. film screening nonprofit.

Now you might be asking yourself, don’t we have an event like this in L.A.? Not quite.

An industry town, not a festival center

Los Angeles does have an abundant film festival scene, but it’s more geared toward filmmakers than film lovers. As Winshall put it, fests in L.A. are more focused on “giving filmmakers an opportunity to learn more about how to get things made.” And those big international film festivals you’ve heard of like Sundance, Telluride, or TIFF aren’t necessarily inviting or accessible to folks outside the industry.

Without cash for a plane ticket, a hotel room, and access to a pass, film lovers based in L.A. likely have to wait until festival highlights get picked up for distribution and hopefully get a release. And that’s all a big “if,” or a long wait, to catch a great independent film.

Add the fact that the L.A. Film Festival shut down and Outfest’s future is uncertain, there really is a void to fill.

Winshall said, “we're really trying to shift our focus to more of a film series that is hoping to pull in more people who are interested in watching films with a critical or cinephilic eye."

An opening for indie film and indie venues

Screenings for LAFM will be taking place in three recently opened, independent venues across the city: Vidiots in Eagle Rock, 2220 Arts + Archive in Historic Filipinotown, and Now Instant Image Hall in Chinatown. These are spaces Gottlieb and Winshall attend as regular audience members, and they realized the three venues form a sort of moviegoing triangle.

The lobby of 2220 Arts + Archives

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Courtesy or Los Angeles Festival of Movies

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“I think that some of our favorite film festivals that we've been to have a kind of regional or village feel where you feel like you can easily hop from one venue to the next. You can go get a cup of coffee, maybe run into somebody who you just met,” said Gottlieb.

That’s the feeling LAFM is hoping to achieve by screening out of spaces that are “no more than kind of a 15 minute drive away” from each other.

Tickets for films and talks range from $20 to $30, and there will be spaces to gather after, to grab a drink and talk.

When asked about their participation in Los Angeles Festival of Movies, directors, and brothers, Bill Ross and Turner Ross sent this comment via email: "We lived in Los Angeles for a handful of years and always longed for something like this festival. We're hopeful LAFM is creating a space for those who don't necessarily strive to make run of the mill stuff but are pushing the medium further."

They'll attend the festival in person when their film Gasoline Rainbow plays at 2220 Arts + Archive on Friday at 5pm.

Co-founder Gottlieb said the festival is a chance to platform films, and to also “take advantage of this burgeoning audience for independent and repertory cinema that's been happening in L.A.”

The Vidiots theatre on Feb. 27, 2024.

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Julie Leopo

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LAist

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In the last year, iconic spaces for film have been revamped and reopened, showing repertory films and new releases, and audiences are filling seats. There’s Vidiots, The Egyptian, The Vista and, just a few years back, the theaters at The Academy Museum opened. Not to mention the renewed love that’s been found for older venues like Gardena Cinema.

“There’s a great film playing in L.A. every night of the week, and it really was not that way as far back as I can remember growing up here,” said Gottlieb.

“People like movies and it's fun to see them in a theater with other people,” added Winshall. “It's good to see a movie that’s good no matter what year it's from, and it feels good to talk to your friends about it afterwards.”

A hunger for movies

“There's a lot of conversation happening in the independent film industry about waning appetites for indie movies, or something like that,” Winshall said. “My experience is that that's not the case.”

And given that nearly all screenings at LAFM are sold out…it sounds like she’s right. But fear not, there are still passes and individual tickets available for some films and talks with folks like Rachel Kushner and Kim Gordon.

You can learn more about the festival here.

Find more independent film coverage on LAist in our Revival House series:

LA’s New Beverly Cinema And The Magic Of Being 'Always On Film'

Amazing Acoustics, $10 Tickets, And A New View On 'Classics': Your Guide To The Academy Museum's Movie Theaters

With 60,000 DVDs In Its Collection, Vidiots Has Made Renting Cool Again

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a first-in-the-nation law that requires large companies to disclose if they or their predecessors profited from chattel slavery.

The Truth in Disclosure Act will require major companies operating in the state to disclose these historical and financial ties to enslavement-related transactions. 2

The bill was a top priority for the California Legislative Black Caucus this year. No other state requires corporations to account for their historical role in the slave economy, according to advocates.

Authored by Assemblymember Isaac Bryan, a Democrat from Culver City, the law applies to companies with annual worldwide gross receipts over $100 million. Assembly Bill 2599 also requires relevant records and disclosures to be made publicly available through a searchable digital to be established by the state’s Civil Rights Department.

The sworn filings will be subject to the penalty of perjury. The first affidavits are due by Jan. 15, 2029.

Supporters say the database could be a useful tool for academics, journalists and advocates to examine the connections between current corporate wealth and historical participation in the slave economy.

An example of a type of company that would likely have to make such disclosures in California is JP Morgan Chase. According to the California Reparations Task Force report, in 2005, the banking giant wrote a formal apology because two banks that it had taken ownership of had taken 13,000 enslaved people as security for loans in Louisiana. When enslavers could not pay back the loans, the banks took ownership of 1,200 people.

The law only applies to companies that existed or whose predecessor company existed on or before December 1964.

“I’m thinking agriculture. I’m thinking banking, insurance. I’m thinking anything in the financial sector,” Bryan said about the types of companies he expects may have to file disclosures.

“Once the public has this disclosure and we have a full accounting of the impact, then it’s up to us to decide what that means and what we’re going to do about it,” he added.

Several insurance companies opposed the measure as it moved through the Legislature. They said they already disclosed their connections to slavery through a 2000 California law that resulted in a publicly available report.

The newest law is the latest in a slow, uneven effort to act on the findings of the state’s reparations task force.

Newsom created the task force in 2020. After two years of study, it released a 2023 report detailing California's history of enslavement and discriminatory policies and made more than 100 recommendations. Economists estimated the state owes Black residents at least $800 billion for harms in policing, housing, and health.

Lawmakers have since taken small steps. In 2024, Newsom signed six of the Legislative Black Caucus' 14 priority bills that drew from the task force report, including a formal state apology. That year, the caucus declined to advance two ambitious reparations bills, opening a painful split with grassroots advocates.

The California chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Alliance for Reparations, Reconciliation and Truth applauded Newsom and Bryan for the new law.

“California has long been a state that prides itself on justice and equity and AB 2599 moves the needle closer to the transparency that is necessary to recognize and rectify these historical injustices and understand the roots of modern economic disparities,” said CAIR-CA Chief Executive Hussam Ayloush in a written statement.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

The Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office has been investigating the Lineage warehouse fire since the first week of July, contradicting Mayor Karen Bass’ recent statement that the elected attorney had chosen not to.

City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto had not publicly disclosed the investigation, and it’s unclear whether Bass knew about it when she told student journalists at The LA Local that she had asked Feldstein Soto and state officials to investigate the fire but was met with inaction.

The rare public admission of the nearly three-month old investigation came a week after The LA Local reported that the two candidates vying to replace Feldstein Soto said her office could do more to help Angelenos in the wake of the fire. The City Council asked the city attorney to report in closed session on what legal options are available to them. But that report has not yet been completed and may not reach the public when it is.

Bass had previously declined to comment on possible legal action related to the fire despite residents’ demand for help. On Wednesday, student journalist Edgar Vasquez asked if she would request the city attorney open a corporate accountability investigation.

“I asked [Feldstein Soto] to open one quite a while ago,” Bass responded. “I also asked Attorney General Bonta to open one. I am not in charge of them. They are independent elected officials. They can choose to do it or not. So far, they have not chosen to do it.”

Karen Richardson, the city attorney’s communications director, told The LA Local that Bass may have “misspoke” and defended Feldstein Soto’s decision to keep the investigation from the public and presumably from other elected officials in the city.

“We do not comment on pending investigations or litigations but in this instance our office will confirm that we have had an open investigation since the first week of July and that investigation is ongoing and active,” Richardson said by email. “The City Attorney, in her capacity as Chief Prosecutor for the City, investigates and brings actions without prompting or reporting to City Officials or the press. As a prosecutor, the client of the Office is the People of the State of California, not the City of Los Angeles.”

Richardson did not immediately respond to a follow-up inquiry about the nature and scope of the investigation or if those impacted by the fire will be told of its findings.

Bass’ office also did not immediately respond to questions after the city attorney’s team told The LA Local about the months-old investigation.

The Attorney General’s Office declined to comment for this story.

Marissa Roy and John McKinney, one of whom will become the next city attorney, previously told The LA Local that the city attorney’s office should have acted publicly sooner. Both said they would be more transparent and would launch a corporate accountability investigation of the fire if elected. Depending on how long the current investigation takes to complete, the next city attorney could inherit it.

Past L.A. city attorneys have pursued such investigations and won settlements for people harmed by corporate misconduct. Roy has worked on similar lawsuits for the California Department of Justice, contributing to a landmark settlement against the tech company Meta. 

Community advocacy groups, meanwhile, have asked the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office to open a criminal investigation of the fire. That agency declined to comment for this story. 

McKinney, who currently is a deputy district attorney, said if the investigation found criminal activity, he would pursue filing charges. 

Bass told the student journalists that the fire department’s investigation “was a preliminary one” and that more can be expected. 

“There’s other investigations coming, and by the way, I really want those investigations because you know I’m blocking them from rebuilding,” Bass said Wednesday.

Bass and the City Council established a temporary suspension of the permit to rebuild Lineage’s damaged facility. 

Lineage’s CEO has said that the company has not decided yet if it will rebuild the damaged facility. Bass conceded that the company has a legal path to rebuild if it chooses to. But after several public disputes about blown cleanup deadlines and other matters, Bass said she does not support the company rebuilding.

“I know it’s your right, but you lost your right by the harm you inflicted on this community,” Bass said. “Then if they don’t rebuild. Then the community has to ask itself: then what?”

MacArthur Park will close every night once an 8-foot-tall fence goes up around the green space, with Los Angeles police officers sweeping the park for encampments and people sleeping there before the gates shut. The Board of Recreation and Park Commissioners approved the plan Thursday.

Construction of the green metal fence is expected to begin in November and continue through spring 2027, Recreation and Parks officials said during a public meeting.

The park will stay open while the fence is being built. Once construction is finished, the gates are expected to close from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. LAPD officers will patrol the park while it is open.

Officials said the fence is not intended to be permanent.

The Department of Recreation and Parks plans to review the fence after three years, looking at maintenance, crime and feedback from people who use the park. The department has set specific benchmarks that could eventually lead to the fence coming down.

The three-year review will include a comparison with Lafayette Park, which Recreation and Parks is using as a benchmark for maintenance and crime.

The department wants MacArthur Park to eventually have no more than about twice as many maintenance and repair requests as Lafayette Park. MacArthur Park covers about 35 acres, while Lafayette Park covers about 10 acres. General Manager Jimmy Kim said Thursday that MacArthur Park had a 230% higher rate of repair work orders than Lafayette Park.

A rendering shows a proposed green metal gate at one of MacArthur Park’s entrances.

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Courtesy LA Recreation and Parks

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From January through August 2026, MacArthur Park also recorded 136 robberies and aggravated assaults, compared with 20 at Lafayette Park. Neither park recorded a homicide during that period.

MacArthur Park recorded 694 arrests during those eight months, compared with 36 at Lafayette Park.

The department also plans to survey park users and conduct another community survey through the council office as part of the three-year review. 

The nightly closures will also change how law enforcement handles the park. 

LAPD plans to sweep the park every night before the gates close, according to Capt. Ben Fernandes, who represented the Rampart Division at Thursday’s Recreation and Park Commission meeting.

“For right now, we will do a full sweep of the park before the gates close on each side of the park,” Fernandes said. He added that LAPD has been “very good about keeping encampments out of the park.”

Officers will monitor the park while it is open, working with LAPD’s Security Services Division, Fernandes said. First responders will have keys and access to the park at all hours.

Community members attend a Recreation and Park Commission meeting Thursday, Oct. 1, where commissioners approved final plans for a new fence around MacArthur Park.

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Hanna Kang

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The LA Local

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The nightly sweeps also raised the question of what will happen to people who are found sleeping in the park. 

Fernandes said the mayor’s office would provide service providers who can assist people struggling with substance use and people experiencing homelessness.

“So, if we do come across someone who is asleep in the park during our sweep, we will be able to hopefully make them be involved in those services and hopefully get them housed,” he said.

Recreation and Parks says the fence would give the department more control over the park after hours. The department said MacArthur Park had a 230% higher rate of repair work orders for lighting, plumbing and graffiti than Lafayette Park between January 2025 and June 2026, and that damage and vandalism typically occur overnight.

Those improvements are part of a larger list of changes planned for the park. Recreation and Parks plans to restore access through the tunnel connecting the park’s north and south sides, improve accessibility, add free Wi-Fi and replace some of the park’s existing lights with solar-powered fixtures.

The department listed more recreational programming, including run and walk events, movies in the park, sports and fitness classes, quarterly community events and the return of pedal boats on the lake.

Recreation and Parks plans to return to the community later this month with another update on the project.

The post LA will start building a fence around MacArthur Park in November appeared first on LA Local.

The second of two state-commissioned, independent reports on the 2025 L.A. fires has been released.

The analysis by the Fire Safety Research Institute details the effectiveness of the response to the Palisades and Eaton fires, which killed at least 31 people and destroyed more than 16,000 homes and buildings, mostly in the Pacific Palisades and Altadena.

Gov. Gavin Newsom called for an independent investigation into the response to the fires just a few days after they started on Jan. 7, 2025. His administration commissioned the nonprofit Fire Safety Research Institute to carry it out. L.A. County (via the McChrystal Group) and the L.A. Fire Department have released similar reports.

The 724-page analysis released today details “the effectiveness of prevention and alerting efforts, conditions influencing the original fire situation, attempts to stop its rapid progression, and evacuation efforts.” The first report by the Fire Safety Research Institute recreated the timeline of each fire’s progression and associated emergency alerts.

The latest report highlights the unprecedented weather conditions ahead of the fires, the chaotic nature of the fires themselves and a lack of planning and coordination among authorities, despite many heroic rescues by field deputies, officers and civilians.

In the Eaton Fire, the report includes that observations by paramedics of embers into West Altadena was not conveyed to incident command hours before the first evacuation alert was sent there. In the Palisades, the report found that the L.A. Fire Department did not have a proper protocol to ensure the Lachman Fire was out, and a lack of communication among authorities led to heavily disorganized evacuations. And with multiple major fires occurring across a heavily urban landscape, firefighting and evacuation resources were stretched beyond capacity.

“The fires revealed implementation challenges, operational limitations, and areas where policies and practices have not evolved at the same pace as the wildfire risk facing California communities,” the report states.

The report also lays out 266 recommendations to improve before the next fire.

Find the whole report here.