Cannes 2008

[dadaistnun]

Tom Mes reviews Tokyo Sonata for Midnight Eye, calling it the director's masterpiece.

I really, really hope this get U.S. theatrical distribution.

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

Just in case you thought I was kidding about Derek Elley and the "x minutes of trimming" thing:

When the father is canned at work, an average Tokyo family goes into slo-mo freefall in “Tokyo Sonata,” a quizzical dramedy by Kiyoshi Kurosawa that puts some fresh juice into the waning step of the onetime J-horror specialist. Movie never develops the blackly comic bite of others dissecting the modern Japanese family unit —classically repped by “Family Game” — and would also benefit from 10 to 15 minutes’ worth of trimming.

A far more helpful insight from Variety's Cannes coverage: Van Damme's new movie is his deepest yet!

I really, really hope this get U.S. theatrical distribution.

Unfortunately I'm counting on a lot of worthwhile films from this year's festival going undistributed, especially in the U.S. -- one theme that the trades seem to be hammering home is the relative lack of buyers at the markets, what with the general economic situation and the Administration's extremely forward-looking policy of letting the dollar sink to the bottom of the Mariana Trench. I hope the situation isn't as bad as all that, but I doubt distributors are willing to take as many chances these days.

[rs98762001]

Spielberg, Indiana Jones and KOCS. Out of Competition. More fun than 2 and 3, but chase scenes are a bit rote. The principals’ ages are really showing. Constant jokes about “grandpa” and “old man” from the unwitting Henry Jones III seem a but too appropriate as Ford tries to negotiate his physically demanding role. Grade: well, you’ll probably like it if, like the enthusiastic crowd in the Lumiere, you’re IJ fans.

Great to hear this, and it seems as though most of the official reviews today have been similarly enthusiastic. Props to Spielberg for seemingly pulling this off or, at least, not making it as disastrous as Lucas' Star Wars prequels.

[yoshimori]

Just in case you thought I was kidding about Derek Elley and the "x minutes of trimming" thing ...

Not at all. It's a standard Variety (and Elley) line. Though I'm not an Elley fan, I do believe that most movies would be better shorter. But why stop at 10-15? Why not 30? One of the truisms of filmmaking is the audience'll never know what you didn't show it.

Unfortunately I'm counting on a lot of worthwhile films from this year's festival going undistributed, especially in the U.S.

I believe I read that the Desplechin was already bought by IFC. Fortissimo is handling the Kurosawa ... and many other pics in the fest. Here's hoping they find US distributor.

Day 5 (II)

Salles and Thomas, Linha de passe. Competition. Well-made film about a poor, single mother and her four sons – one obsessed with soccer, another with Jesus, another with finding his father, another a petty thief. But I felt minimal connection to the characters or to the filmmaking. Grade: B-

Wong, Ashes of Time redux. Special Screening. Wong, Doyle, Leung, Young, and (strangely, since he's not in the film) Chen Chang in attendance. Beautiful new print – the redux seems mainly to do with the sound, but I’m no expert on this film, so ... The new version will of course recommend itself to Wong fans, Doyle fans, fans of the actors, and martial arts fans. This was my third viewing. It’s quite beautiful, but I still think it treats love too abstractly. Another Fortissimo film.

[AWA]

Spielberg, Indiana Jones and KOCS. Out of Competition. More fun than 2 and 3, but chase scenes are a bit rote. The principals’ ages are really showing. Constant jokes about “grandpa” and “old man” from the unwitting Henry Jones III seem a but too appropriate as Ford tries to negotiate his physically demanding role. Grade: well, you’ll probably like it if, like the enthusiastic crowd in the Lumiere, you’re IJ fans.

Great to hear this, and it seems as though most of the official reviews today have been similarly enthusiastic. Props to Spielberg for seemingly pulling this off or, at least, not making it as disastrous as Lucas' Star Wars prequels.

I haven't seen it yet, and while I'm no major fan-boy of Lucas or anything, I have to wonder if this is as little CGI as they say it is will it sort of ignite a trend to put the CGI shit in check? Perhaps Lucas will also finally admit that he leaned a little too heavily on the CGI for the Star Wars prequel stuff... of course, if he did ever think that, he might just go and make prequels to the prequels or something to have another go at it.

I'll probably go see it when it comes out, if for no other reason than all my friends want me to come see it and I grew up as a little kid loving the original 3 films in the 80's... the first film I ever truly loved was Raiders... so I'll go see what happened to my childhood.

[Cold Bishop]

Perhaps Lucas will also finally admit that he leaned a little too heavily on the CGI for the Star Wars prequel stuff... of course, if he did ever think that, he might just go and make prequels to the prequels or something to have another go at it.

We'll see special editions with the cgi all replaced by miniatures, mattes, and optical effects.

[miless]

Perhaps Lucas will also finally admit that he leaned a little too heavily on the CGI for the Star Wars prequel stuff... of course, if he did ever think that, he might just go and make prequels to the prequels or something to have another go at it.

We'll see special editions with the cgi all replaced by miniatures, mattes, and optical effects.

or just the whole film in front of a green screen.

[yoshimori]

Day 6

Dardenne bros, Le silence de Lorna. Competition. Classic Dardenne except for the character disintegration in the last ten minutes. Otherwise, everything you expect: excellent performances; natural, unobtrusive handheld camera. Grade: B+

Davies, Of Time and the City. Special Screening. Doc about Liverpool featuring Davies’ often flamboyantly bitchy VO commentary. His hometown is “the asshole of the world”; the Beatles "spoiled everything”, lots of poetry and bon mots. Nice use of music (no surprise). 72 minutes, though “it could’ve been trimmed by 10-15” [for TFN!]. In fact, almost all the stuff Davies and crew shot (on video) themselves, maybe about 10 minutes of footage, looks pretty generic and out of place. The rest is engaging archival material. Grade: B

Straub, “Le genou d’Artemide”. Typical of his static-shots-of-actors-reading-poetry-in-the-forest genre. Beautifully composed, but only five or six set-ups during 35 minutes of recitation. Straub and Huillet, “Itinéraire de Jean Bricard”. A tedious, at least 15 minute-long boat ride with the camera pointed at the trees on the shore, followed by shots of houses and streets in a run-down port town. Pretty torturous. Directors’ Fortnight.

Alonso, Liverpool. Directors’ Fortnight. Could be trimmed by about 87 minutes! Synopsis: he asks permission to leave the freighter when it docks, does so, eats, sleeps, waits for a ride (35 min); rides up the snowy mountainside (15 min); waits, eats (10 min); visits his senile mother (10 min); and leaves (2 min); his father and sister (?) check fox traps and feed the sheep (15 min). A real butt-buster. A torture chamber of boredom. Grade: F.

[miless]

Alonso, Liverpool. Directors’ Fortnight. Could be trimmed by about 87 minutes! Synopsis: he asks permission to leave the freighter when it docks, does so, eats, sleeps, waits for a ride (35 min); rides up the snowy mountainside (15 min); waits, eats (10 min); visits his senile mother (10 min); and leaves (2 min); his father and sister (?) check fox traps and feed the sheep (15 min). A real butt-buster. A torture chamber of boredom. Grade: F.

Now I think this sounds fascinating. Los Muertos, which could be just as easily boiled down to a list of actions with subsequent run-times, was much more than just a simple observation of a journey. He has a very unique sense of timing and structure that seems to include all those parts missing from typical narrative storytelling. It's like a mixture of Reygadas and Warhol.

It merely seems that you have no patience for the avant-garde of narrative cinema (Béla Tarr, Carlos Reygadas, Tsai Ming-Liang, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Pedro Costa, José Luis Guerín, etc...) that populates the director's fortnight (and, alternately, certain film festivals such as Rotterdam).

[Antoine Doinel]

Spielberg, Indiana Jones and KOCS. Out of Competition. More fun than 2 and 3, but chase scenes are a bit rote. The principals’ ages are really showing. Constant jokes about “grandpa” and “old man” from the unwitting Henry Jones III seem a but too appropriate as Ford tries to negotiate his physically demanding role. Grade: well, you’ll probably like it if, like the enthusiastic crowd in the Lumiere, you’re IJ fans.

Just as I predicted.

It's Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade.....Again!

I bet for Indy V, he'll be just one more day away from retirement!

[yoshimori]

It's like a mixture of Reygadas and Warhol.

It merely seems that you have no patience for the avant-garde of narrative cinema (Béla Tarr, Carlos Reygadas, Tsai Ming-Liang, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Pedro Costa, José Luis Guerín, etc...) that populates the director's fortnight.

Oh? Silent Light and Syndromes and a Century were my favorite films (of the 300+ I saw) last year. I always like Tsai's work. Warhol is sometimes hilarious. Tarr and Costa at least sometimes create beautiful images - though, except for Satantango I do find their work tedious. Alonso's is a bore.

[miless]

I forgot to mention that I have not seen the film (Liverpool), of course, and my comments were about an earlier film. I'll wait and see the film myself before I reserve judgment. Thanks for answering, your response was fully satisfying.

[ellipsis7]

Tood McCarthy just given Eastwood's CHANGELING a rave... With Penn chair of the Competition Jury, game on I suspect!....

A thematic companion piece to "Mystic River" but more complex and far-reaching, "Changeling" impressively continues Clint Eastwood's great run of ambitious late-career pictures. Emotionally powerful and stylistically sure-handed, this true story-inspired drama begins small with the disappearance of a young boy, only to gradually fan out to become a comprehensive critique of the entire power structure of Los Angeles, circa 1928.

[John Cope]

Speaking of things which prompt polarized reactions, I get the impression that Glenn Kenny's assessment of the reaction to James Gray's Two Lovers is pretty accurate. However, comments such as this...

most of my U.S. colleagues here hated James Gray's new film even more than they did last year's booed-right-here We Own The Night, which I wasn't too crazy about myself. But I gotta give it up—as earnest and awkward as this loose rethink of Dostoevsky's "White Nights" can get, it frequently moved me.

and this...

Turning away from the crime-steeped mileus of his previous features, Gray aims for a kind of deliberately ache-filled romanticism that no other filmmaker I can think of is particularly interested in today.

actually give me hope as they suggest that Gray is continuing on with what makes him great and is, in fact, refining it. Kenny is certainly right that it's not a remotely fashionable stance so the reception of US critics doesn't surprise me in the least, though it still disappoints and disheartens me that they're unwilling to be receptive to Gray's profound melancholic heartache and elevated stylistic approach. I optimistically anticipate yet another critical rescue for Gray by the French. It would certainly be wonderful if the jury would do something truly disruptive and recognize what he is going for and award him for it. I'm not holding my breath for that to happen, though.

[yoshimori]

More first reactions.

Day 7

Serra, Birdsong. Directors’ Fortnight. Wasn’t really looking forward to this as I didn’t care for Serra’s Knight’s Honor movie, but this new one – which features some stunning black&white images, especially in low light conditions – is for me a huge improvement. Three bumbling, bickering kings wander through Spain’s deserts in search of the newborn Jesus. They, and the carefully composed, decentered compositions they find themselves in, are often quite hilarious. The dull middle section – Mary and Joseph sitting around at home – cost 20% of the audience. Grade: B+

Mundruczo, Delta. Competition. From a Tarr assistant. Some nice photography, but the ponderous camerawork – slow pans to “significant” gazes and longish Tarr-light wide-shot tracks – and “meaningful” extremes of action – a rape that comes out of nowhere, for example – spoil everything. Grade: C-

HBO doc, Polanski: Wanted and Desired. Special Screening. Pro-forma cable doc re the Polanski “sex with a minor” trial. Nothing new here. Grade: C-

Escalante, Los Bastardos. Un certain regard. From a Reygadas assistant. Genre du jour: we follow some poor and/or down-and-out characters, nothing happens for 90 minutes, and then there’s a burst of violence. Here, it’s about Mexican workers in LA. The burst of violence follows a 20-minute cut-rate version of Funny Games – the workers steal into a gringa’s house and hold her hostage while they eat, watch TV, etc. Technically quite poor. Grade: D.

Martel, Woman without a Head. Competition. More weak Latin American cinema – apparently something of a theme this year. A woman runs someone over in the third scene and then can’t remember who she or her husband or her daughters etc are for the rest of the movie. Strangely, no one seems to notice there’s something wrong with her. Significant booing at the press screening. Horrible direction of the actors. Grade: F.

[domino harvey]

You sure do love handing out Fs

[yoshimori]

You sure do love handing out Fs

I do?

[franco]

The dull middle section – Mary and Joseph sitting around at home – cost 20% of the audience.

For those of you who read Cinema Scope magazine, that's Mark Peranson sitting there.

[Cde.]

Speaking of things which prompt polarized reactions, I get the impression that Glenn Kenny's assessment of the reaction to James Gray's Two Lovers is pretty accurate. However, comments such as this...

most of my U.S. colleagues here hated James Gray's new film even more than they did last year's booed-right-here We Own The Night, which I wasn't too crazy about myself. But I gotta give it up—as earnest and awkward as this loose rethink of Dostoevsky's "White Nights" can get, it frequently moved me.

and this...

Turning away from the crime-steeped mileus of his previous features, Gray aims for a kind of deliberately ache-filled romanticism that no other filmmaker I can think of is particularly interested in today.

actually give me hope as they suggest that Gray is continuing on with what makes him great and is, in fact, refining it. Kenny is certainly right that it's not a remotely fashionable stance so the reception of US critics doesn't surprise me in the least, though it still disappoints and disheartens me that they're unwilling to be receptive to Gray's profound melancholic heartache and elevated stylistic approach. I optimistically anticipate yet another critical rescue for Gray by the French. It would certainly be wonderful if the jury would do something truly disruptive and recognize what he is going for and award him for it. I'm not holding my breath for that to happen, though.

Two Lovers sounds fantastic. What Gray does is ask for your full involvement in his stories, and a lot of people aren't prepared to do that for something so emotionally honest and direct. Perhaps he's melodramatic, but why does that have to be a bad thing? The comparisons to the reception to We Own the Night is (while sad for cinema) heartening. From the sounds of it, this could be even more deeply melancholic, and greater, but I wouldn't count on Gray receiving the recognition it deserves just yet...his films aren't cool enough.

[a.khan]

I'm really enjoying your updates, Yoshimori. Keep them coming.

[Oedipax]

I'm really enjoying your updates, Yoshimori. Keep them coming.

Same here. Don't let the snark deter you.

[portnoy]

Mundruczo, Delta. Competition. From a Tarr assistant. Some nice photography, but the ponderous camerawork – slow pans to “significant” gazes and longish Tarr-light wide-shot tracks – and “meaningful” extremes of action – a rape that comes out of nowhere, for example – spoil everything. Grade: C-

yoshi, have you seen Mundruczo's JOHANNA? If so, how does this compare?

[yoshimori]

... have you seen Mundruczo's JOHANNA?

I wanted to see this at some fest last year (was it at Cannes?) since it sounded interesting, but unfortunately I didn't get around to it. Sorry.

Day 8 (3 days to go)

Eastwood, The Changeling. Competition. One of those irritating movies in which people do and say things – or, even more often, don’t do or say what any sensible person would – so that the contrived plot will work. Terrible performances from the adults, terrible direction of the several kids.

Nachtergaele, The Dead Girl Festival. Un certain regard. The fest’s theme continues (see above, day 7). This movie’s novice Brazilian director made his whole cast and crew lock hands and stand silent in front of the uncomprehending audience in the Salle Debussy for one minute. Most of them were clearly uncomfortable with this strange display. On screen, amateur silliness ensued. [Full disclosure: I left, along with dozens of others, 60 minutes into the screening, my first walk-out in over 30 movies, which for me shows unusual dedication.] Grade: F (for first hour)

Soderbergh, Che. Competition. 4 hr and 45 min survival course. Part 1: Cuba. Part 2: Bolivia. Cinematographic excellent and intrinsic interest in the characters kept me in my seat. But there is no drama and little poetry here, just a kind of reportage – day 1, day 87, day 216, day 340 – that often left me wondering what was happening and why. Makes one long for Malick’s Che. Grade: B-

[Berlueur]

You never did comment on Gray's Two Lovers, did you, yoshimori? (Another thumbs up on your reports, BTW.)

[yoshimori]

You never did comment on Gray's Two Lovers ...

I skipped Two Lovers, never having liked a James Gray movie. I hear this one is better, but ...

It's the only competition film I haven't seen, so it'll probably win. Last year I missed just one: 4 months ....

If Gray does win, someone should pay me to skip his or her movie next year if I come here again.