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ianungstad wrote: Sat Dec 07, 2019 1:49 am The press release makes it sound like there could be other NEON/Criterion releases in the future. Not sure what else Criterion would want to release. Universal is releasing Parasite. It could end up being a situation like IFC where the "big" titles get a studio release followed by a Criterion "special" edition a year later.

therewillbeblus wrote: Sat Dec 07, 2019 1:53 am Vox Lux + scholarly material = Heaven

therewillbeblus wrote: Mon Nov 04, 2019 6:08 am The script is perfect and self-reflexive in how Sciamma engages her characters in discussions to try to channel unexplainable feelings such as love or music into the limits of language (or art, whether a film or a painting) only to show how futile these efforts are at expressing what must be accessed through intangible means. Ultimately the film isn’t interested in the validity of these arguments, only that they need to occur, if not verbally than in thought, to come to the realization that emotion is life.

Never Cursed wrote: Mon Dec 09, 2019 5:42 amDoes anyone know if Sciamma's other films have English-friendly distribution? I hadn't heard of her before this, and now I rather desperately want to see what else she's done.

Never Cursed wrote: Mon Dec 09, 2019 5:42 am Marianne's depiction of a moment in the Orpheus myth is both perfect and unexplainable to anyone else in her world. The brilliance of the film is in allowing us not just insight into the personal meaning attached to Marianne's painting, and thus the depictions and interpretations of all kinds in the film, but also insight into the emotions that created that meaning, something impossible to us in our daily lives or to the characters in this film.

hearthesilence wrote: Tue Oct 01, 2019 8:20 pm Immediately the artist's gaze is fused with the audience's, and we have a model bringing to mind the movie stars that studios wanted to put up on screen (as well as how they wanted those women to be filmed and be seen). The way she's scrutinized by an artist made me very self-conscious about the way general audiences scrutinize movie stars, particularly women. I can't say this was the intention, but it feels like a natural by-product from a film that Sciamma said was a conscious attempt in bringing perspectives and stories to the cinema that she felt were missing.

Elizabeth Harris wrote:Sciamma, who wrote and directed the movie, told me: “There’s all this surprise that lies within equality, that’s the new tension. You don’t know what’s going to happen if it’s not about the social hierarchy, gender domination or intellectual domination.”

Emily VanDerWerff
I’ve been wondering how you captured some of those shots in such low light. Was it shot digitally?

Céline Sciamma
Yeah. It was a very strong choice to shoot in digital, especially with a period piece. We tried 35 [millimeter film]. When we did the tryouts, my director of photography Claire Mathon and I wanted to shoot digital for one reason.

We wanted to give back to these women from the past their hearts, their desire, the rush of blood to the cheek. It was a love story, of course, but it was also a movie about the rise of desire. We wanted to look at desire, which is something we rarely see because of the strong convention in cinema of love at first sight. We always agree that of course you’re going to totally fall in love. Digital was about the rush of blood. Like, can you feel this?

We began with shooting the exteriors for eight days. I wanted it to be kind of gothic, so it’s colorful, but it’s more Brontë sisters, the gray and the rain. And it was super sunny [when we shot the exteriors]! Cinema is about welcoming things with enthusiasm, especially things that you don’t have power over. You have so much power over everything that sometimes it can be super disturbing that you don’t get what you expect, especially with period pieces where you design everything. And the fact that the sun came in, we were like, this is good news, and we have to bring back this light now to our castle in the Parisian periphery [where the interiors were shot].

The lighting was taking a lot of time, because the castle was very old, so we couldn’t put anything on the walls — no lighting, nothing. So it was all coming from the outside. You know, this big structure with a lot of light involved. So every scene was very smoothly lit [to mimic the look of the bright sun]. Sometimes it’s painful, because you have less time with the actors and you dedicate a lot of time to the light. In cinema, the time you devote says a lot. And every shot was very, very precisely lit.

Emily VanDerWerff
Greta Gerwig gave an interview where she said that before she shot Little Women, Steven Spielberg told her that if you’re making a movie set in the 1800s, it really needs to be shot on film. Normally, I’d agree with that, but I think your film captures how it would feel to be in a room where there’s only the one light source, a fireplace or candle or something. How did you create that world where there might be only the one light source over in the corner or the wall, and it’s dark everywhere else?

Céline Sciamma
You had to be very inventive. Period pieces are all about choosing what you’re going to do with the candles. And a character walking with a candle took so much [light] around. Sometimes the actors, they couldn’t move. They were surrounded with rope lights that were invented by the camera crew. You invent your own way of lighting things, which is a lesson you can learn from Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon, where he actually invented optics to find the right candle lighting. I entered the room, and I was amazed. It was really like a fantasy world with a lot of rope lights everywhere. And it’s pretty radical in a way, because it’s not naturalistic, yet it feels so true.

Emily VanDerWerff
I have been thinking about love stories where it feels like the two lovers actually see each other, and they almost always end tragically, like we can’t believe that could be a sustainable dynamic in some way.

Céline Sciamma
Yeah. For instance, Titanic. Titanic is the hugest success, and it’s because it’s totally queer. Leonardo DiCaprio was totally androgynous at the time. DiCaprio and Kate Winslet were both not known — not stars — so there was no power dynamic between them. Like, if you look at the sex scene in Titanic, she’s on top. He’s the one who’s being totally fragile and insecure. I think it was a huge success because it’s a love story with equality and with emancipation.

I think the movies are in dialogue. I thought a lot about Titanic because it’s also the present of a love story and the memory of a love story. A successful love story should not be about eternal possession. No, it should be about emancipation. And it is an emancipation story, because maybe [Kate Winslet’s character in Titanic] lost this love, but we see her being free and riding horses and wearing pants. It’s all about emancipation.

The success of a love story is not about how long it lasts. It’s not about ending your life together. Him dying is tragic, but it’s not the end of the story. In equality, there is emancipation.

domino harvey wrote: Sat Mar 14, 2020 3:58 amLetterboxd is having some fun with this movie in their app