Browse by Tags

All Tags » Festivals » Cannes 2009 (RSS)
"Drag Me To Hell."
Thu, May 28 2009 4:18 PM
By the B-movie ethics of Sam Raimi's "Drag Me To Hell," the torments inflicted on poor Christine Brown are grossly (and grossly) unfair and yet, there's no denying it, also at least a little bit deserved. Christine (Alison Lohman) is the bank loan officer who makes the fateful final call to kick a zestfully unlovable old lady out of her house... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , ,
Cannes 2009: "Inglourious Basterds."
Wed, May 20 2009 5:08 AM
Quentin Tarantino's a great writer of dialogue, and no one's more convinced of the fact than Quentin Tarantino. The ratio of talk to action -- not gun fights or explosions, but just people doing stuff -- in "Inglourious Basterds" is, generously, nine to one. Again and again, characters sit down over drinks (whiskey, champagne, milk), and the... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , , , , , , ,
Cannes 2009: "Vincere."
Tue, May 19 2009 5:19 AM
If Giovanna Mezzogiorno wants to be Italy's answer to Angelina Jolie, "Vincere" is her "Changeling," and how unfortunate. "Vincere," directed by Marco Bellocchio, is the story of Ida Dalser, the first wife of Benito Mussolini and mother to his first son, Benito Albino Mussolini. By World War I, Mussolini had finished with her... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , , ,
Cannes 2009: "Kinatay."
Mon, May 18 2009 6:47 PM
There are two easy types of film provocation. You can prod an audience with boundary-pushing images -- say, Chloe Sevigny painting Vincent Gallo's tree -- or by testing their tolerance for style or narrative experimentation -- say, Vincent Gallo driving, driving, driving, driving. "Kinatay" (which translates to "Butchered") tries out both... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , ,
Cannes 2009: "Vengeance."
Sun, May 17 2009 7:55 AM
We're far enough away from the golden age of Hong Kong John Woo action excess that a little nostalgia is warranted, and Johnnie To's "Vengeance" is meant to fondly recall every operatic slow-mo shoot-em-up of the era, though until that sinks in, it just looks ungainly. Singer Johnny Hallyday, who's often shorthand summed-up as France's... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , , , , ,
Cannes 2009: "Thirst."
Sat, May 16 2009 2:32 PM
"Thirst," Park Chan-wook's plague-vampire-priest-black-comedy-gothic-family-drama-noir, has enough going on for at least an entire other movie, if not two. Its developments are impossible to predict, but that's because half are unnecessary -- by the time clergyman-turned-secular-bloodsucker Sang-hyun (Song Kang-ho) and his lover Tae-joo (Kim... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , , , ,
Cannes 2009: "Taking Woodstock."
Fri, May 15 2009 3:43 PM
Some many questions for such a straightforward comedy! Why would the apparently grown-up Elliot spend himself broke supporting his parents' run-down Catskills resort in the first place? Why is his mother so crazy? What's up with the money hoarding? Where did the mafia end up? Did the town actually manage to do anything to fight the concert's arrival... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , , , ,
Cannes 2009: "Spring Fever."
Fri, May 15 2009 1:29 PM
Lou Ye was banned from making films for five years by the Chinese government after "Summer Palace" screened at Cannes in 2006 without their approval. Which means it's some sort of act of defiance and bravery, sure, for him to have since then made "Spring Fever," which this year premieres in competition. But the film is pure soap opera... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , ,
Cannes 2009: "Up."
Thu, May 14 2009 5:00 AM
Pixar's proven, again and again, a miraculous ability to spin cinematic gold out of almost perversely unlikely scenarios, but the beginning of "Up," the opening night film at this year's Cannes, is something else entirely. A boy, Carl, watches a newsreel in a '30s theater about larger-than-life adventurer Charles Muntz, and when making his... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , ,
Cannes do.
Thu, Apr 23 2009 6:17 AM
The competition line-up for this year's Cannes Film Festival has been announced! A fair amount of Euro provocateurs -- Lars von Trier, Gaspar Noé, Michael Haneke -- and France in general, and only two American films, the expected Tarantino and the unexpected Ang Lee comedy, which hopefully has more to it than its trailer would indicate. New films from Jane... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
L'affiche.
Wed, Apr 22 2009 10:55 AM
This year's Cannes poster, created by Annick Durban and inspired, according to the festival, by "L'Avventura": "A mysterious female silhouette, caught in mid-movement, seems to be opening a window onto the magic of cinema and invites us into a dream..." Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , ,
Opening nights.
Wed, Jun 18 2008 2:25 PM
Yesterday, the Toronto International Film Festival announced that its opening night film will be "Passchendaele," a $20 million World War I epic from actor/director Paul Gross, whose other helming credit is 2002's "Men With Brooms," as far as I know, the only curling rom-com in existence. Guy Dixon at the Globe and Mail talks with Gross... Read More...
by IFC.com - Indie Eye
Filed under: , , , , ,