In Diego Ongaro’s Down With the King, rapper Freddie Gibbs plays Mercury Maxwell—a rapper who’s lost his taste for the game and has decamped from New York to The Berkshires. While Mercury considers ...

In the new film “Down with the King” directed by Diego Ongaro and co-written by Ongaro and Xabi Molia: rap star Money Merc is struggling with the music industry and the pressures of being a celebrity.

Diego Ongaro moved from Paris to New York to a tiny burg in the Berkshires before he found his subject. A local logger with a lot of wear and tear and craggy character, Bob Tarasuk plays himself in ...

Director Diego Ongaro discusses the Hip Hop community’s connection to his latest movie. Diego Ongaro wrote and directed Down with the King. The filmmaker’s previous motion picture, titled Bob and the ...

With its logline of "rapper goes to live with farmers," if Down With the King had been pitched to a major studio, it would have ended up a goofy comedy starring Kevin Hart. Instead, writer/director ...

Whenever a tree falls in western Massachusetts, there’s at least one person around to hear it. Bob. That’s because the rural middle-aged logger and protagonist of “Bob and the Trees” is likely the one ...

Diego Ongaro's debut feature boasts an authentic, nonprofessional cast and striking Berkshire Mountain locations. By Justin Lowe Rural subsistence activities and the residents who rely on them get ...

When a film features real people played by themselves, enacting their own stories in their own environment, is it fiction or nonfiction or something in between? In the case of “Bob and the Trees,” the ...

Bob is a 50-something farmer who loves golf, “gangster rap,” and his beloved trees; but he dreams of a better life. When a large wood lot goes on sale for a good price, Bob invests, hoping things will ...

In Diego Ongaro’s patient and subtle new film, Freddie Gibbs plays a hip-hop artist struggling with a career malaise. By A.O. Scott When you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film ...

SANDISFIELD — An odd thing has happened along the way in Bob Tarasuk’s simple plan of living happily ever after. He became the muse for a French filmmaker. It’s true that, two weekends ago, Tarasuk ...

Whenever a tree falls in western Massachusetts, there’s at least one person around to hear it. Bob. That’s because the rural middle-aged logger and protagonist of “Bob and the Trees” is likely the one ...