Med Hondo’s 1979 musical extravaganza West Indies: The Fugitive Slaves of Liberty is a satirical skewering of the legacy of French imperialism in the West Indies and beyond. From the outset, it defies categorization through its distinct sense of free association as it leaps from one colorful image to the next, often shunning context along the way. Throughout Hondo’s film, the xenophobic and racist rhetoric of haughty, predominately white French aristocrats, bureaucrats, and citizens is combatted, challenged, or lampooned by various African figures. Some are slaves, some are revolutionaries, while some are simply power hungry. The result is a deliriously iconoclastic anti-colonialist work that’s worthy of the finest films from roughly the same period by Ousmane Sembene and Dijbril Diop Mambéty.
Adapted by Hondo and Daniel Boukman from the latter’s novel Les Negriers, West Indies traces an epic history of colonial oppression and enslavement in the West Indies,...
Adapted by Hondo and Daniel Boukman from the latter’s novel Les Negriers, West Indies traces an epic history of colonial oppression and enslavement in the West Indies,...
- 3/17/2024
- by Clayton Dillard
- Slant Magazine
A Different Man.The Berlinale have begun to announce the first few titles selected for the 74th edition of their festival, set to take place from February 15 through 21, 2024. This page will be updated as further sections are announced.COMPETITIONAnother End (Piero Messina)Architecton (Victor Kossakovsky)Black Tea (Abderrahmane Sissako)La Cocina (Alonso Ruiz Palacios) Dahomey (Mati Diop)A Different Man (Aaron Schimberg)The Empire (Bruno Dumont)Gloria! (Margherita Vicario)Suspended Time (Olivier Assayas)From Hilde, With Love (Andreas Dresen)My Favourite CakeLangue Etrangère (Claire Berger)Small Things Like These (Tim Mielants)Who Do I Belong To (Meryam Joobeur)Pepe (Nelson Carlos De Los Santos Arias)Shambhala (Min Bahadur Bham)Sterben (Matthias Glasner)Small Things Like These (Tim Mielants)A Traveler’s Needs (Hong Sang-soo)Sleep With Your Eyes Open. ENCOUNTERSArcadia (Yorgos Zois)Cidade; Campo (Juliana Rojas)Demba (Mamadou Dia)Direct ActionSleep With Your Eyes Open (Nele Wohlatz)The Fable (Raam Reddy...
- 1/23/2024
- MUBI
“The Belgians cut off my hands in the Congo,” Langston Hughes wrote in his poem “Negro.” “They lynch me now in Texas.” The year was 1922, and racial segregation was the norm in the United States. Anti-Black racism in the South was such a millstone that the U.S. Senate failed to pass an NAACP-sponsored anti-lynching bill in January of that year, a list of simple protections that was prevented from coming to a vote due to filibusters.
Hughes’s poem is one piece of ephemera that comprises the massive tapestry that is Soundtrack to a Coup d’État. Director Johan Grimonprez’s documentary is primarily focused on the Democratic Republic of Congo and its struggle for independence from Belgian colonialism, during which time our government was using Black jazz musicians to, in its diplomatic tango with the Soviet Union, paint a portrait of American liberalism as benevolent.
The documentary focuses on...
Hughes’s poem is one piece of ephemera that comprises the massive tapestry that is Soundtrack to a Coup d’État. Director Johan Grimonprez’s documentary is primarily focused on the Democratic Republic of Congo and its struggle for independence from Belgian colonialism, during which time our government was using Black jazz musicians to, in its diplomatic tango with the Soviet Union, paint a portrait of American liberalism as benevolent.
The documentary focuses on...
- 1/23/2024
- by Greg Nussen
- Slant Magazine
Berlinale co-directors Carlo Chatrian and Mariette Rissenbeek are going out with a bang in their final year, with a lineup unveiled today featuring the latest works by Olivier Assayas, Bruno Dumont, Mati Diop, Hong Sang-soo, Abderrahmane Sissako, Jane Schoenbrun, Alonso Ruizpalacios, Matias Pineiro, Travis Wilkerson, Kazik Radwanski, Annie Baker, and more.
When the co-directors were asked by Screen Daily about their departure, Chatrian said, “It’s quite simple. Mariette and I had a mandate of five years. It is true that at the beginning I said that I was willing to go on because there was a shared will with the [German] Ministry [of Culture] to go on. But then the people who have the responsibility to see the future of the Berlinale thought this structure of two leaders was not the right one and I don’t consider myself able to run the festival alone. And that was the decision of the Ministry.
When the co-directors were asked by Screen Daily about their departure, Chatrian said, “It’s quite simple. Mariette and I had a mandate of five years. It is true that at the beginning I said that I was willing to go on because there was a shared will with the [German] Ministry [of Culture] to go on. But then the people who have the responsibility to see the future of the Berlinale thought this structure of two leaders was not the right one and I don’t consider myself able to run the festival alone. And that was the decision of the Ministry.
- 1/22/2024
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
The Berlinale has completed the lineup for its Panorama, Generation, Forum and Forum expanded sections, with new films from Levan Akin and Andre Techine, plus the debut feature of US playwright Annie Baker.
Swedish filmmaker Akin, who scored an international hit in 2019 with And Then We Danced, will open the Panorama strand with Crossing, about two people travelling from Georgia to Istanbul in search of a young transgender woman.
Scroll down for the full list of Panorama, Generation and Forum features
Also among the 31 films in Panorama are My New Friends from French filmmaker Techine, starring Isabelle Hupert, Hafsia Herzi...
Swedish filmmaker Akin, who scored an international hit in 2019 with And Then We Danced, will open the Panorama strand with Crossing, about two people travelling from Georgia to Istanbul in search of a young transgender woman.
Scroll down for the full list of Panorama, Generation and Forum features
Also among the 31 films in Panorama are My New Friends from French filmmaker Techine, starring Isabelle Hupert, Hafsia Herzi...
- 1/17/2024
- by Ben Dalton¬Orlando Parfitt
- ScreenDaily
Argentinian director Lola Arias will world premiere her musical documentary Reas about trans people in prison.
The world premiere of Argentinian director Lola Arias’s musical documentary Reas is one of the first eight titles of the 2024 Berlinale Forum unveiled today.
Arias’ second feature explores cis and trans people living in a Buenos Aires prison through musical re-enactment. The filmmaker’s debut Prisoner Of War also premiered in Berlinale Forum where it picked up the Ciace award as well as screening at SXSW, London, Jerusalem and San Sebastian.
Also world premiering in Berlinale’s sidebar is Vinothraj Ps’s The...
The world premiere of Argentinian director Lola Arias’s musical documentary Reas is one of the first eight titles of the 2024 Berlinale Forum unveiled today.
Arias’ second feature explores cis and trans people living in a Buenos Aires prison through musical re-enactment. The filmmaker’s debut Prisoner Of War also premiered in Berlinale Forum where it picked up the Ciace award as well as screening at SXSW, London, Jerusalem and San Sebastian.
Also world premiering in Berlinale’s sidebar is Vinothraj Ps’s The...
- 12/13/2023
- by Ellie Calnan
- ScreenDaily
The Berlinale Forum, the Berlin Film Festival’s avant-garde sidebar, has announced the first 8 films confirmed for its 2024 line-up.
The 8 films come from 8 different countries, reflecting the Forum’s global reach and a broader push towards greater diversity in it’s line-up. New Forum head Barbara Wurm, who took over running the Forum section in October, highlighted how her program selection team was “diverse with respect to age, ethnicity and cinematic focus.”
One focus of the selection is on cinema coming from regions outside the centers of the Western film industry. “We are looking for worldly films beyond self-referentiality – but those that get involved,” says Wurm. “By being open and resolute in dealing with cinematic forms, we want to bridge the gap between the real worlds we live in and a cinema aware of its public impact.”
The announced titles include the Indian drama The Adamant Girl from director Vinothraj Ps,...
The 8 films come from 8 different countries, reflecting the Forum’s global reach and a broader push towards greater diversity in it’s line-up. New Forum head Barbara Wurm, who took over running the Forum section in October, highlighted how her program selection team was “diverse with respect to age, ethnicity and cinematic focus.”
One focus of the selection is on cinema coming from regions outside the centers of the Western film industry. “We are looking for worldly films beyond self-referentiality – but those that get involved,” says Wurm. “By being open and resolute in dealing with cinematic forms, we want to bridge the gap between the real worlds we live in and a cinema aware of its public impact.”
The announced titles include the Indian drama The Adamant Girl from director Vinothraj Ps,...
- 12/13/2023
- by Scott Roxborough
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Awards season is in full swing, and Davy Chou’s “Return to Seoul” was in the center of all the buzz. Chou’s film made it to the ten shortlisted films for Best International Feature – a coveted position that in previous years included winners like “Parasite” (2019) and “Drive My Car” (2021) — and this time represented, for the first time, Cambodia’s bid for the Oscars. As the title indicates, however, “Return to Seoul” is not about Cambodia at all. It instead tackles the slipperiness of national identity.
“Jiseok” is screening at Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema
Chou’s sophomore feature follows the coming-of-age revelations of the fictional Freddie Benoit (Park Ji-min), a Korean adoptee raised by French parents. By a stroke of luck (or is it fate?) she finds herself in Seoul for the first time since her birth, at age twenty-five. Over the course of eight years,...
“Jiseok” is screening at Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema
Chou’s sophomore feature follows the coming-of-age revelations of the fictional Freddie Benoit (Park Ji-min), a Korean adoptee raised by French parents. By a stroke of luck (or is it fate?) she finds herself in Seoul for the first time since her birth, at age twenty-five. Over the course of eight years,...
- 3/3/2023
- by Grace Han
- AsianMoviePulse
Awards season is in full swing, and Davy Chou’s “Return to Seoul” was in the center of all the buzz. Chou’s film made it to the ten shortlisted films for Best International Feature – a coveted position that in previous years included winners like “Parasite” (2019) and “Drive My Car” (2021) — and this time represented, for the first time, Cambodia’s bid for the Oscars. As the title indicates, however, “Return to Seoul” is not about Cambodia at all. It instead tackles the slipperiness of national identity.
Return to Seoul plays in Sf Bay Area theaters on 24 February 2023.
Chou’s sophomore feature follows the coming-of-age revelations of the fictional Freddie Benoit (Park Ji-min), a Korean adoptee raised by French parents. By a stroke of luck (or is it fate?) she finds herself in Seoul for the first time since her birth, at age twenty-five. Over the course of eight years,...
Return to Seoul plays in Sf Bay Area theaters on 24 February 2023.
Chou’s sophomore feature follows the coming-of-age revelations of the fictional Freddie Benoit (Park Ji-min), a Korean adoptee raised by French parents. By a stroke of luck (or is it fate?) she finds herself in Seoul for the first time since her birth, at age twenty-five. Over the course of eight years,...
- 2/18/2023
- by Grace Han
- AsianMoviePulse
It is fair to assume Criterion could plunder the world of licensed film to build an ultimate noir playlist; credit, then, for focusing sharp and nabbing deep cuts. The Criterion Channel’s November / Noirvember program will be headlined by “Fox Noir,” an eight-title program with Otto Preminger deep cut Fallen Angel, three by Henry Hathaway, Siodmak, Dassin, Kazan, and Robert Wise, and while retrospectives of Veronica Lake and John Garfield will bring some canon into the fold, I’m mostly thinking about that potential for discovery.
Following “Free Jazz,” Bob Hoskins, and Joyce Chopra programs, the other big series is a 30-year survey of Sony Pictures Classics: Sally Potter, Satoshi Kon, Panahi, Errol Morris, Almodóvar, Haneke, Mike Leigh, just a murderer’s row. Streaming premieres include 499 and A Night of Knowing Nothing, two recent epitomes of I Wish I Had Seen That; Criterion Editions comprise Cure, Brazil, Sullivan’s Travels,...
Following “Free Jazz,” Bob Hoskins, and Joyce Chopra programs, the other big series is a 30-year survey of Sony Pictures Classics: Sally Potter, Satoshi Kon, Panahi, Errol Morris, Almodóvar, Haneke, Mike Leigh, just a murderer’s row. Streaming premieres include 499 and A Night of Knowing Nothing, two recent epitomes of I Wish I Had Seen That; Criterion Editions comprise Cure, Brazil, Sullivan’s Travels,...
- 10/26/2022
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
Venice’s industry head is predicting a return to pre-pandemic attendance levels.
Industry delegates will be back in Venice in significantly higher numbers than during the Covid-affected editions of 2020 and 2021.
“We have more distributors, more producers and, of course, far more immersive professionals,” Pascal Diot, head of Venice Production Bridge (Vpb), says of the 11th edition of the festival’s industry event (running September 1-6). He is predicting that around 2,700 accredited industry representatives will be on the Lido, roughly the same number as in 2019, the last event held pre-pandemic.
Diot also says many of these guests are intending to “stay...
Industry delegates will be back in Venice in significantly higher numbers than during the Covid-affected editions of 2020 and 2021.
“We have more distributors, more producers and, of course, far more immersive professionals,” Pascal Diot, head of Venice Production Bridge (Vpb), says of the 11th edition of the festival’s industry event (running September 1-6). He is predicting that around 2,700 accredited industry representatives will be on the Lido, roughly the same number as in 2019, the last event held pre-pandemic.
Diot also says many of these guests are intending to “stay...
- 8/30/2022
- by Geoffrey Macnab
- ScreenDaily
One of the key character traits of snotty college duo Olivia (Sydney Sweeney) and Paula (Brittany O’Grady) on HBO’s “The White Lotus” is their choice of poolside reading material. They’re skimming through Nietzsche and Freud when not casting side eye and throwing withering commentary about the people around them.
Later, they also pick up Frantz Fanon, Camille Paglia and Aimé Césaire. But Sweeney, speaking Saturday at the Atx TV Festival in Austin, revealed something more about that character: She believes it’s all an act. “Oh, she was not actually reading any of these books,” Sweeney told moderator Danielle Turchiano.
Sweeney said that that at the very least she was excited to read those books on set — only to learn they were props. “They were blank!” she said. The overall series experience, especially the show’s heavy dose of humor, was a delight for the actor. ““Jennifer Coolidge...
Later, they also pick up Frantz Fanon, Camille Paglia and Aimé Césaire. But Sweeney, speaking Saturday at the Atx TV Festival in Austin, revealed something more about that character: She believes it’s all an act. “Oh, she was not actually reading any of these books,” Sweeney told moderator Danielle Turchiano.
Sweeney said that that at the very least she was excited to read those books on set — only to learn they were props. “They were blank!” she said. The overall series experience, especially the show’s heavy dose of humor, was a delight for the actor. ““Jennifer Coolidge...
- 6/4/2022
- by Michael Schneider
- Variety Film + TV
Albert Dupontel’s “Bye Bye Morons” won seven prizes, including best film and director, at the 46th Cesar Awards which took place as an in-person, yet socially distanced event at the Olympia concert hall in Paris on March 12. The ceremony was held in the presence of nominees only.
“Bye Bye Morons” also won awards for best supporting actor for Nicolas Mairé, original screenplay, cinematography and set design, as well as a prize voted on by high school students. A dark comedy, “Bye Bye Morons” stars Virginie Efira as a seriously ill woman on a mission to reunite with her long-lost child with the help of a man who’s having a burnout. Efira,
Emmanuel Mouret’s “Love Affair(s),” which was nominated for 13 awards, picked up the best supporting actress nod for Emilie Dequenne.
The best actor nod went to Sami Bouajila for his performance in Mehdi M. Barsaoui’s Tunisian drama “A Son.
“Bye Bye Morons” also won awards for best supporting actor for Nicolas Mairé, original screenplay, cinematography and set design, as well as a prize voted on by high school students. A dark comedy, “Bye Bye Morons” stars Virginie Efira as a seriously ill woman on a mission to reunite with her long-lost child with the help of a man who’s having a burnout. Efira,
Emmanuel Mouret’s “Love Affair(s),” which was nominated for 13 awards, picked up the best supporting actress nod for Emilie Dequenne.
The best actor nod went to Sami Bouajila for his performance in Mehdi M. Barsaoui’s Tunisian drama “A Son.
- 3/12/2021
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
Fatimah Warner’s verified Twitter page is an endless sprawl of revolutionary reading material (she’s been studying Karl Marx), a bulletin of global atrocities (LGBTQ activists in Ghana are living in fear of violent persecution, don’t you know), and a celebration of advocates and activists (Nina Simone and communist writer Claudia Jones, recently). With only four songs released since her last album as the rapper Noname, 2018’s triumphant Room 25, Warner has been engaging fans, detractors, and spectators in her radical education. On the internet, she behaves more like a peer (a comrade,...
- 2/26/2021
- by Mankaprr Conteh
- Rollingstone.com
“I must be some great feeler,” Katie Gavin sings with a wink on Muna’s latest record. “I must be really deep.” On Saves the World, Muna’s second effort, the L.A. trio builds upon the thoughtful electro-pop-rock they began sculpting on their 2017 debut, navigating weighty topics like addiction, alienation and romantic abjection with spry sing-alongs and crisp choruses that can mask the heaviness of the material at hand.
Comprising lead vocalist Katie Gavin, guitarist Josette Maskin and multi-instrumentalist Naomi McPherson, Muna establishes its mastery of pop songcraft on this follow-up collection,...
Comprising lead vocalist Katie Gavin, guitarist Josette Maskin and multi-instrumentalist Naomi McPherson, Muna establishes its mastery of pop songcraft on this follow-up collection,...
- 9/6/2019
- by Jonathan Bernstein
- Rollingstone.com
Enough with Summertime frivolity, time to get serious. Really, here’s a real thought-provoking, and debate-provoking, drama featuring some award-winning actors and a fresh new actor who could be up for several of those with this work. Though set in the world of high school, this film focuses on the parents and teachers as much as the students. Yes, it is a drama, but it’s also a mystery, as loyalties change and evolve, and unlikely alliances are formed. Throw in explorations of class and race and you’ve got a compelling tale that swirls all around the title high school student, the young man named Luce.
The story opens at the start of his senior year as Luce Edgar (Kelvin Harrison Jr.) delivers a speech to a most appreciative audience of fellow students, faculty, and parents including his folks, Amy (Naomi Watts) and Peter (Tim Roth). Ten years ago...
The story opens at the start of his senior year as Luce Edgar (Kelvin Harrison Jr.) delivers a speech to a most appreciative audience of fellow students, faculty, and parents including his folks, Amy (Naomi Watts) and Peter (Tim Roth). Ten years ago...
- 8/23/2019
- by Jim Batts
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
In the smart psychological thriller “Luce,” Kelvin Harrison Jr., plays a reluctant poster boy for the new American Dream. The film finds white liberal couple Amy and Peter Edgar (Naomi Watts and Tim Roth), reconsidering their impressions of their adopted black son after they discover he has written a disturbing essay for a history class at school. In the process of exploring the teenager’s mindset, writer-director Julius Onah envisioned the young character’s identity crisis with some very precise reference points.
“There were two models I gave Kelvin for the character while we rehearsed — Barack Obama and Will Smith,” Onah said. “I see them as the epitome of a cool, non-threatening black masculinity. They have power, they’re charismatic and are greatly influential, and, particularly with Obama, are highly intelligent.”
Those names never come up in the movie, but much of the depth in “Luce” comes from everything that’s left unsaid.
“There were two models I gave Kelvin for the character while we rehearsed — Barack Obama and Will Smith,” Onah said. “I see them as the epitome of a cool, non-threatening black masculinity. They have power, they’re charismatic and are greatly influential, and, particularly with Obama, are highly intelligent.”
Those names never come up in the movie, but much of the depth in “Luce” comes from everything that’s left unsaid.
- 8/2/2019
- by Tambay Obenson
- Indiewire
In the middle of a summer of dumb fun and comic-book escapism, it’s some kind of miracle to find a film as seriously ambitious, scrappy and suspenseful as Luce. A provocation about race, privilege and the expectations that come with both, the movie follows the title character, played by star-in-the-making Kelvin Harrison Jr. He’s an African-American student and academic all-star at the Arlington, Virginia high school he attends. His white parents, a doctor named Amy (Naomi Watts) and a financier named Peter (Tim Roth), couldn’t be prouder...
- 7/30/2019
- by Peter Travers
- Rollingstone.com
When we first meet Luce, he seems to be the product of a successful adoption that took him from his native Africa and allowed him to flourish with a doting (and white) American family. He’s a smart kid, a talented athlete, and he’s got a very bright future ahead of him. But what’s really going on?
In Sundance sensation “Luce,” Julius Onah’s big screen adaptation of J.C. Lee’s 2013 play of the same name, that question lingers throughout a drama that also functions as a mystery. When Luce turns in an incendiary essay about African writer Frantz Fanon, praising the controversial Pan-Africanist’s support of violence to combat colonization, his teacher Harriet (Octavia Spencer) is unsettled enough to go snooping deeper into his life.
She doesn’t like what she finds, and Luce isn’t excited about what unfolds either, and as the film winds on,...
In Sundance sensation “Luce,” Julius Onah’s big screen adaptation of J.C. Lee’s 2013 play of the same name, that question lingers throughout a drama that also functions as a mystery. When Luce turns in an incendiary essay about African writer Frantz Fanon, praising the controversial Pan-Africanist’s support of violence to combat colonization, his teacher Harriet (Octavia Spencer) is unsettled enough to go snooping deeper into his life.
She doesn’t like what she finds, and Luce isn’t excited about what unfolds either, and as the film winds on,...
- 6/4/2019
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
Since any New York City cinephile has a nearly suffocating wealth of theatrical options, we figured it’d be best to compile some of the more worthwhile repertory showings into one handy list. Displayed below are a few of the city’s most reliable theaters and links to screenings of their weekend offerings — films you’re not likely to see in a theater again anytime soon, and many of which are, also, on 35mm. If you have a chance to attend any of these, we’re of the mind that it’s time extremely well-spent.
Metrograph
Three by Ringo Lam are still playing.
Love is Colder Than Death and Ghost in the Shell have late-night showings, while Some Like It Hot screens through the weekend.
Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask can be seen on Sunday.
Bam
Banned by Nyff for being “too controversial” and “likely to incite racial tension,...
Metrograph
Three by Ringo Lam are still playing.
Love is Colder Than Death and Ghost in the Shell have late-night showings, while Some Like It Hot screens through the weekend.
Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask can be seen on Sunday.
Bam
Banned by Nyff for being “too controversial” and “likely to incite racial tension,...
- 3/8/2019
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
At the root of “Luce” is a fascinating mystery, but its solution is beside the point. This smart and sophisticated inquiry into race and class does little to alter the underlying appeal of J.C. Lee’s 2013 play. As questions swirl around whether black Virginia teen Luce, an accomplished football player and debate-team team captain, harbors revolutionary beliefs and violent tendencies, the movie allows the audience to see it both ways.
His adoptive white parents, Amy (Naomi Watts) and Peter (Tim Roth), don’t know whether to defend their son from the accusations of Luce’s stern teacher Harriet (Octavia Spencer) or take them at face value. That oscillating perspective allows this grounded drama to develop a remarkable degree of moment-to-moment suspense, and it remains an actors’ showcase even as the premise risks turning into a gimmick.
The third feature from director Julias Onah (and a significant comeback following his disappointing...
His adoptive white parents, Amy (Naomi Watts) and Peter (Tim Roth), don’t know whether to defend their son from the accusations of Luce’s stern teacher Harriet (Octavia Spencer) or take them at face value. That oscillating perspective allows this grounded drama to develop a remarkable degree of moment-to-moment suspense, and it remains an actors’ showcase even as the premise risks turning into a gimmick.
The third feature from director Julias Onah (and a significant comeback following his disappointing...
- 1/27/2019
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
Film Movement Classics Acquires Seven Movies Including John Woo, Viggo Mortensen, Maggie Cheung Pics
Exclusive: U.S. arthouse buyer Film Movement has picked up North American rights to seven movies for its classics label, including John Woo’s first contemporary action film Heroes Shed No Tears (1984) and Viggo Mortensen starrer The Reflecting Skin (1990) by Philip Ridley (U.S. rights only).
Also new to the label are King Hu’s martial arts film The Fate Of Lee Khan (1973); Stanley Kwan’s Hong Kong New Wave drama Center Stage (1991), starring Maggie Cheung; biopic Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask (1995) about the charismatic and influential anti-colonial writer and theorist; Véra Belmont’s baroque dramedy Marquise (1997), featuring Sophie Marceau in one of her first starring roles; and Gérard Corbiau’s Oscar-nominated lavish costume drama, Farinelli (1994).
Shed No Tears, Center Stage and The Fate Of Lee Khan were licensed from Fortune Star Media. Farinelli and Marquise came from Screenbound Pictures while The Reflecting Skin was picked up from...
Also new to the label are King Hu’s martial arts film The Fate Of Lee Khan (1973); Stanley Kwan’s Hong Kong New Wave drama Center Stage (1991), starring Maggie Cheung; biopic Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask (1995) about the charismatic and influential anti-colonial writer and theorist; Véra Belmont’s baroque dramedy Marquise (1997), featuring Sophie Marceau in one of her first starring roles; and Gérard Corbiau’s Oscar-nominated lavish costume drama, Farinelli (1994).
Shed No Tears, Center Stage and The Fate Of Lee Khan were licensed from Fortune Star Media. Farinelli and Marquise came from Screenbound Pictures while The Reflecting Skin was picked up from...
- 1/16/2019
- by Andreas Wiseman
- Deadline Film + TV
The past is a home country in Corsica-born French director Thierry de Peretti’s second feature, A Violent Life. A crime saga chronicling Corsica’s gruesome 1990s nationalist feuds via the rise and fall of the lost generation who took part in them, it captures a topic seldom shown on the big screen, but a few scattered hints of old and recent mafia classics aside (from Coppola’s Godfather trilogy to Francesco Munzi’s 2014 Black Souls), the end result never quite feels like the gripping thriller it could have been.
The entry point in the island’s troubled decade is Stéphane (played here by newcomer Jean Michelangeli, in an assured debut). A bespectacled and tame-looking Paris-based Corsican, his cushy life in the capital takes a U-turn after an old time friend is murdered in the island by local thugs. Shaken but seemingly not surprised by the assassination, he ignores his...
The entry point in the island’s troubled decade is Stéphane (played here by newcomer Jean Michelangeli, in an assured debut). A bespectacled and tame-looking Paris-based Corsican, his cushy life in the capital takes a U-turn after an old time friend is murdered in the island by local thugs. Shaken but seemingly not surprised by the assassination, he ignores his...
- 4/3/2018
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
Long before “Galang” and “Paper Planes,” and prior to her Oscar nomination and universal fame, there was a time M.I.A. was Mathangi Arulpragasam, the daughter of Tamil refugees who fled conflict-stricken Sri Lanka to settle in 1980s England. More an account of her origins than a stylized tour documentary, Matangi/Maya/M.I.A. draws from over 700 hours of footage M.I.A. personally recorded at different stages of her career to offer an intimate pre- and-post-stardom bio-doc that feels just as magnetic as the artist it brings and dissects on screen.
Chronological and linear as it may be in its structure–Matangi, Maya, and M.I.A.; alluding to the different stages in the singer’s life before and under the spotlight–Stephen Loveridge’s debut feature and insider look conjures up an artist whose creative path and inspiration have drawn from several overlapping personas. M.I.A. the artist,...
Chronological and linear as it may be in its structure–Matangi, Maya, and M.I.A.; alluding to the different stages in the singer’s life before and under the spotlight–Stephen Loveridge’s debut feature and insider look conjures up an artist whose creative path and inspiration have drawn from several overlapping personas. M.I.A. the artist,...
- 3/28/2018
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
Norman Jean Roy for Rolling Stone
Two years ago, Chadwick Boseman was in a movie called Gods of Egypt. It was not a very good movie. But in addition to its not-goodness, it also became infamous for whitewashing – casting, as ancient African deities, a white guy from Scotland, a white guy from Denmark and at least seven white people from Australia. Boseman, the sole black lead, played Thoth, the Egyptian god of wisdom and inventor of mathematics. Before the movie came out, an interviewer asked him about the criticism, and...
Two years ago, Chadwick Boseman was in a movie called Gods of Egypt. It was not a very good movie. But in addition to its not-goodness, it also became infamous for whitewashing – casting, as ancient African deities, a white guy from Scotland, a white guy from Denmark and at least seven white people from Australia. Boseman, the sole black lead, played Thoth, the Egyptian god of wisdom and inventor of mathematics. Before the movie came out, an interviewer asked him about the criticism, and...
- 2/18/2018
- Rollingstone.com
Raoul Peck dramatises the author’s memoir of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr and Medgar Evers, in this vivid and vital documentary
Raoul Peck’s outstanding, Oscar-nominated documentary is about the African American activist and author James Baldwin, author of Go Tell It on the Mountain and The Fire Next Time. Peck dramatises Baldwin’s unfinished manuscript Remember This House, his personal memoir of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr and civil rights activist Medgar Evers, murdered by a segregationist in 1963. Baldwin re-emerges as a devastatingly eloquent speaker and public intellectual; a figure who deserves his place alongside Edward Said, Frantz Fanon or Gore Vidal.
Related: The 'I Am Not Your Negro' episode - Token podcast
Continue reading...
Raoul Peck’s outstanding, Oscar-nominated documentary is about the African American activist and author James Baldwin, author of Go Tell It on the Mountain and The Fire Next Time. Peck dramatises Baldwin’s unfinished manuscript Remember This House, his personal memoir of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr and civil rights activist Medgar Evers, murdered by a segregationist in 1963. Baldwin re-emerges as a devastatingly eloquent speaker and public intellectual; a figure who deserves his place alongside Edward Said, Frantz Fanon or Gore Vidal.
Related: The 'I Am Not Your Negro' episode - Token podcast
Continue reading...
- 4/7/2017
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
The arrival of the cell phone camera may be the single greatest advancement in the fight for racial justice, allowing witnesses to hold police accountable and turning the average citizen into a chance documentarian. Grainy footage of police shooting 12-year-old Tamir Rice for playing with a Bb gun, or the shaky handheld live stream of Philando Castile’s last breaths are etched indelibly into the national memory, recalled in fragments with each fresh report of an unarmed black person gunned down by police violence.
For the black residents of Ferguson, Mo, the killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown Jr. in 2014 was neither the first nor the last in a long line of police shootings, but it was the final straw. In the wake of Brown’s murder, what began as communal mourning swelled into an unstoppable movement that, as one subject of the electrifying new documentary “Whose Streets?” puts it: “Ain...
For the black residents of Ferguson, Mo, the killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown Jr. in 2014 was neither the first nor the last in a long line of police shootings, but it was the final straw. In the wake of Brown’s murder, what began as communal mourning swelled into an unstoppable movement that, as one subject of the electrifying new documentary “Whose Streets?” puts it: “Ain...
- 1/20/2017
- by Jude Dry
- Indiewire
Now Streaming on Netflix - 'Concerning Violence' Visualizes Frantz Fanon’s 'Wretched of the Earth' Continue Reading →...
- 12/6/2016
- by shadowandact
- ShadowAndAct
Mubi is showing William Klein's The Pan-African Festival of Algiers (1969) in many countries around the world from October 25 - November 23, 2016.The colonised is elevated above his jungle status in proportion to his adoption of the mother country's cultural standards. —Frantz Fanon Mubi's William Klein retrospective presents a rare opportunity to watch one of his lesser known films, 1969's Le festival Panafricain d'Alger. Filmed on the occasion of the first edition of the eponymous festival in the Algerian capital which had recently been the set of an historic victory of the anti-colonialist movement, this legendary documentary was produced by the Office national pour le commerce et l'industrie cinématographiques (Oncic). The festival celebrated African culture in its emancipatory passage from passive receptacle of Orientalist projections into a proactive agent of self-representation. Much more than an anti-colonialist Woodstock, Klein's film is an ethnographic piece of internationalist agit-prop that traces the significance of the...
- 11/29/2016
- MUBI
Louisa Mellor Sep 30, 2016
Out now, Woody Allen’s new six-part half-hour comedy for Amazon is familiar, mild, unadventurous but serves its purpose…
In the world of chichi parties and exclusive product launches, there’s a buoyant market in celebrity personal appearances. A host will pay a star roughly the annual salary of your average Latin American dictator to turn up at their event and lend it the patina of glamour. It doesn’t matter what said celebrity does while they’re at the party, the key thing is that they’re seen to be there. So what if Beyoncé spends the entire contracted time checking her phone? They got Beyoncé.
That’s the sense coming from Woody Allen’s Amazon deal. As Allen tells it, the multinational giant “badgered and badgered [him] for two years, sweetening the pot until [he] could not afford to turn it down”. Sign the deal and he...
Out now, Woody Allen’s new six-part half-hour comedy for Amazon is familiar, mild, unadventurous but serves its purpose…
In the world of chichi parties and exclusive product launches, there’s a buoyant market in celebrity personal appearances. A host will pay a star roughly the annual salary of your average Latin American dictator to turn up at their event and lend it the patina of glamour. It doesn’t matter what said celebrity does while they’re at the party, the key thing is that they’re seen to be there. So what if Beyoncé spends the entire contracted time checking her phone? They got Beyoncé.
That’s the sense coming from Woody Allen’s Amazon deal. As Allen tells it, the multinational giant “badgered and badgered [him] for two years, sweetening the pot until [he] could not afford to turn it down”. Sign the deal and he...
- 9/30/2016
- Den of Geek
Kino Lorber has announced the DVD release of "Concerning Violence," the critically acclaimed, award-winning documentary by Göran Hugo Olsson ("The Black Power Mixtape") and narrated by Lauryn Hill, which examines the Pan-African struggle against colonialism by juxtaposing archival footage depicting key African liberation movements with text from Frantz Fanon's book, "The Wretched of the Earth." On May 5, 2015, "Concerning Violence" will become available on DVD, with bonus features including the full preface by Professor Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (11 minutes) and the trailer. In recent times there have been...
- 4/15/2015
- by Zeba Blay
- ShadowAndAct
“And it is clear that in the colonial countries the peasants alone are revolutionary, for they have nothing to lose and everything to gain. The starving peasant, outside the class system is the first among the exploited to discover that only violence pays. For him there is no compromise, no possible coming to terms; colonization and decolonization a simply a question of relative strength.” ― Frantz Fanon, "The Wretched of the Earth" When psychiatrist and writer Frantz Fanon published "The Wretched Of The Earth" in 1961, it was immediately banned in France, and given the provocative nature of the text, perhaps it's not a surprise. The quote of above is just one of many viewpoints Fanon presents in his book without compromise, with the author taking the position that an oppressed and/or occupied people will eventually push back against their oppressors/occupiers, and that this isn't so much a decision as it is a (justifiable) inevitability.
- 12/3/2014
- by Kevin Jagernauth
- The Playlist
Whew, where do I begin.... Concerning Violence, a new stock footage documentary from Goran Hugo Olsson (Black Power Mixtape) is an extremely sharp indictment on the colonization and its aftermath of the African continent. The matter of fact headiness of Olsson's style may turn off some viewers in its college thesis paper dryness, but one can not deny its power of arresting images and portent words.Borrowing the text of Frantz Fanon, a Martinique born controversial Afro-French thinker and revolutionary, from his book The Wretched of Earth and powerfully narrated by musician Lauryn Hill as the large white texts appear on screen, the film explains how Europe's five hundred years of exploitation and violent oppression led dehumanization of the whole continent.Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, a Columbia professor,...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
- 12/3/2014
- Screen Anarchy
Göran Hugo Olsson's profound essay doc aspires to upset in the truest sense. As its vintage footage of the cruelties of colonial life shocks and disgusts, its narration — excerpts from Frantz Fanon's thundering 1961 text The Wretched of the Earth — demands that Western viewers fundamentally upset their conceptions of everything. A commanding indictment of the exploitative nature of geopolitics, and of Europe's and the U.S.'s abuse of native peoples around the world, Concerning Violence pairs up hard truths from Fanon — Lauryn Hill reads his words, each blunt and burning like a cigarette she's putting out in your ear — with damnable scenes shot in colonized countries in the 1960s, '70s, and '80s: In Rhodesia, Ghana, Liberia, Guinea, we meet loca...
- 12/3/2014
- Village Voice
Watch First USA Release Trailer for 'Concerning Violence' - Next from 'Black Power Mixtape' Director
After attempting to contextualize the Black Power Movement, in a format more accessible to a new generation - what we call a "mixtape" hence the title, "The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975" - Swedish director Goran Hugo Olsson continues on that same path, in a similar style, with his next film, which made its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival this year. Titled "Concerning Violence," and produced by Annika Rogell and Tobias Janson for Story Ab, the project incorporates the words from Frantz Fanon’s "The Wretched of the Earth," using newly-discovered archive...
- 12/2/2014
- by Tambay A. Obenson
- ShadowAndAct
Premiering at the Sundance Film Festival in January, 2014 has been nothing but a string of acclaim for the documentary "Concerning Violence." Picking up the Cinema Fairbindet Prize in Berlin, and screening at festivals around the world, the powerful film is now headed to cinemas, and today we have the exclusive trailer. Directed by Göran Hugo Olsson, ("The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975") and narrated by Ms. Lauryn Hill, the film is based on Frantz Fanon’s seminal anticolonial text "The Wretched of the Earth," and is an exploration of the forces of repression and colonialism in Africa. As we wrote in our review, the documentary provides "a searing look at Europe's painful involvement in participating, encouraging and backing regimes of oppression." It's light fare, but a necessary, and important film. "Concerning Violence" opens on December 5th at the IFC Center, with Olsson on hand for a Q&A following...
- 11/26/2014
- by Kevin Jagernauth
- The Playlist
After attempting to contextualize the Black Power Movement, in a format more accessible to a new generation - what we call a "mixtape" hence the title, "The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975" - Swedish director Goran Hugo Olsson continues on that same path, in a similar style, with his next film, which made its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival this year. Titled "Concerning Violence," and produced by Annika Rogell and Tobias Janson for Story Ab, the project incorporates the words from Frantz Fanon’s "The Wretched of the Earth," using newly-discovered archive...
- 11/26/2014
- by Tambay A. Obenson
- ShadowAndAct
★★★★☆In answer to what he would do to follow 2011's multi-layered collage The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975, Göran Hugo Olsson has settled on the fight against Colonists in Africa by its indigenous people by again raiding the archives of Swedish Television for Concerning Violence (2014). This time he is using as the contextual device the words of Frantz Fanon spoken by Lauryn Hill, from Fanon’s book The Wretched Of The Earth. With a filmed introduction by postcolonial theorist Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, the film is split into nine chapters that delve into different perspectives on the African uprising that sprung up all over the continent from 1975 onwards.
- 11/26/2014
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
After attempting to contextualize the Black Power Movement, in a format more accessible to a new generation - what we call a "mixtape" hence the title, "The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975" - Swedish director Goran Hugo Olsson continues on that same path, in a similar style, with his next film, which made its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival this year. Titled "Concerning Violence," and produced by Annika Rogell and Tobias Janson for Story Ab, the project incorporates the words from Frantz Fanon’s "The Wretched of the Earth," using newly-discovered archive...
- 11/5/2014
- by Tambay A. Obenson
- ShadowAndAct
Narrated by former Fugee Lauryn Hill, this documentary explores the liberation struggles across Africa in the 1960s and 70s, as colonial masters were overthrown. Directed by Black Power Mixtape's Göran Olsson, and drawing on the Frantz Fanon essay of the same title (from The Wretched of the Earth), Concerning Violence is released in the UK on 28 November and in the Us on 5 December.
• Concerning Violence director Göran Olsson: 'Why can't a writer advocate violence?' Continue reading...
• Concerning Violence director Göran Olsson: 'Why can't a writer advocate violence?' Continue reading...
- 11/4/2014
- by Guardian Staff
- The Guardian - Film News
Vive la Flq: Revolutionary Tactics as Performance of Identity
With Corbo, Mathieu Denis’ second feature-length film, the Quebecois director has established an auteur focus on the nature of identity. He’s also raises some potentially incendiary subjects by depicting the events leading up to the October Crisis without necessarily criticizing the use of violence to incite social revolution. It’s a very fine line that he walks, making a rather serviceable, mostly flat, film about the psychology of aggressive activists, while tethering it to a larger, overriding cultural ethos in modern day Francophone Quebec.
The vessel for these didactics is 16-year-old Jean Corbo (Anthony Therrien), an idealistic adolescent trapped in the vicious cycle of lacking a clear sense of community and identity. Born of Quebecois and Italian descent, he’s marginalized by merit of being Francophone but removed from the plight of those mired in the issue by sheer merit of coming from a mixed,...
With Corbo, Mathieu Denis’ second feature-length film, the Quebecois director has established an auteur focus on the nature of identity. He’s also raises some potentially incendiary subjects by depicting the events leading up to the October Crisis without necessarily criticizing the use of violence to incite social revolution. It’s a very fine line that he walks, making a rather serviceable, mostly flat, film about the psychology of aggressive activists, while tethering it to a larger, overriding cultural ethos in modern day Francophone Quebec.
The vessel for these didactics is 16-year-old Jean Corbo (Anthony Therrien), an idealistic adolescent trapped in the vicious cycle of lacking a clear sense of community and identity. Born of Quebecois and Italian descent, he’s marginalized by merit of being Francophone but removed from the plight of those mired in the issue by sheer merit of coming from a mixed,...
- 9/24/2014
- by Robert Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Based on Martinique-born philosopher Frantz Fanon's book about decolonisation, The Wretched of the Earth, and narrated by ex-Fugee Lauryn Hill, Concerning Violence explores Fanon's view that breaking free of colonial rule inevitably involves violent upheaval. Director Göran Hugo Olsson explains why he was unsure he was the right person to make the film and how he hopes the documentary will provide audiences with tools for combating oppression, rather than merely displaying suffering Continue reading...
- 6/11/2014
- by Henry Barnes and Leah Green
- The Guardian - Film News
★★★★★Illustrating the provocative and combative concepts of Martinique-born Afro-French psychiatrist and philosopher Frantz Fanon's anti-colonial text The Wretched of the Earth, Göran Hugo Olsson's Concerning Violence (2014) aims to explore Africa's subjugated past in hope of understanding the continent's current geopolitical condition. An abrasively worded thinkpiece, Olsson's follow-up to 2011's The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975 - screening at this year's Sheffield Doc/Fest after stints at Sundance and Berlin - is a damning indictment of European imperialism and an eloquent tirade of inflammatory imagery that explores the human, social and cultural consequences of decolonisation.
- 6/9/2014
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
Swedish director Göran Hugo Olsson, who many will know from his archival triumph The Black Power Mixtape, returns from Sundance and Berlin at a rather opportune moment to present his new film, Concerning Violence. Many incendiary debates have escalated over Boko Harām and the ‘BringBackOurGirls’ campaign: one side arguing that awareness and education are the primary steps to success, while others brush off such digital profile-raising as a form of clicktivism (and at worst further Western interference into African affairs).
There was one period in African history when this meddling was irrefutable: Apartheid. To excavate it, Olsson once again mines the Swedish archives to magic up some gorgeous 16mm footage from all across Africa, predominantly shot between the 1960s and ‘70s. With an introduction by postcolonial theorist Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, and utilising extracts from Frantz Fanon’s newly-revived (at least in the mainstream) text The Wretched of the Earth, this...
There was one period in African history when this meddling was irrefutable: Apartheid. To excavate it, Olsson once again mines the Swedish archives to magic up some gorgeous 16mm footage from all across Africa, predominantly shot between the 1960s and ‘70s. With an introduction by postcolonial theorist Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, and utilising extracts from Frantz Fanon’s newly-revived (at least in the mainstream) text The Wretched of the Earth, this...
- 6/9/2014
- by Andrew Latimer
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Company also acquires UK rights to Concerning Violence.
Dogwoof will handle international sales, outside of North America, for Dior and I [pictured].
Frédéric Tcheng’s documentary premiered at this year’s Tribeca and is a behind-the-scenes look at the historic French fashion house.
The deal was brokered by Anna Godas, CEO of Dogwoof, with David Koh and Josh Braun of Submarine. It will also see Dogwoof distribute the film across all platforms in the UK.
Koh and Braun commented: “We are excited to work with our dear friends at Dogwoof on another exemplary film and on another successful collaboration. The film-makers are in great hands and we are excited to share this special film around the world.”
Dior and I is making its market premiere at this year’s Cannes.
Meanwhile, Dogwoof has acquired UK rights to Concerning Violence in an all-rights deal.
Göran Hugo Olsson’s study of the African liberation struggles of the 1960s and 1970s...
Dogwoof will handle international sales, outside of North America, for Dior and I [pictured].
Frédéric Tcheng’s documentary premiered at this year’s Tribeca and is a behind-the-scenes look at the historic French fashion house.
The deal was brokered by Anna Godas, CEO of Dogwoof, with David Koh and Josh Braun of Submarine. It will also see Dogwoof distribute the film across all platforms in the UK.
Koh and Braun commented: “We are excited to work with our dear friends at Dogwoof on another exemplary film and on another successful collaboration. The film-makers are in great hands and we are excited to share this special film around the world.”
Dior and I is making its market premiere at this year’s Cannes.
Meanwhile, Dogwoof has acquired UK rights to Concerning Violence in an all-rights deal.
Göran Hugo Olsson’s study of the African liberation struggles of the 1960s and 1970s...
- 5/15/2014
- by ian.sandwell@screendaily.com (Ian Sandwell)
- ScreenDaily
After attempting to contextualize the Black Power Movement, in a format more accessible to a new generation - what we call a "mixtape" hence the title, The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975 - Swedish director Goran Hugo Olsson will continue on that same path, in a similar style, with his next film, which made its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival this year. Titled Concerning Violence, and produced by Annika Rogell and Tobias Janson for Story Ab, the project incorporates the words from Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth, using newly-discovered archive footage (as was the case with Mixtape),...
- 3/19/2014
- by Tambay A. Obenson
- ShadowAndAct
You hear it all the time: Quality a bit soft. Not a lot of Big Titles. Not a lot of Big News. But Americans were buying all the same, and to quote Screen International: “The current market is focused on smart money and smart deals, not volume of product”. Business at Afm was also solid though unspectacular. Moreover, the pre-buying of projects may be below the radar of this $3 billion business of international film buying and selling. TrustNordisk’s CEO Rikke Ennis says that 70% of their films are pre-sold. As you look at the upcoming Winter Rights Roundup due out in two weeks from SydneysBuzz.com/Reports, you will notice many of the films have been pre-buys this market and many films screening were already pre-sold during Afm in November.
And for all the complaints about Berlin, many sales agents set up private screenings before the market kicked off. What is that about?
Beki Probst, who has run the Efm since 1988, responded to the many media reports of a quieter market in an interview with ScreenDaily which sounds almost the same as the one she gave in 2009.
Quoting her current statement which I take the liberty of quoting here as it appears in Screen:
“I think that there was a good movement of business this year,” she said. In the opinion of Probst, there had been a muddying of the distinction between the Efm and the more general term of the ‘market’.
“Daphné Kapfer of Europa International representing 35 sales agents said that it was a very good Berlin, and Glen Basner of FilmNation commented that it was ‘the best Berlin’.
“Even Harvey Weinstein came just for 24 hours to sign a $7m check, and Aloft was bought by Sony Pictures Classics.
“It’s the players, and not the market, that is important. The players come here if they have the right line-up. All we can do is provide the best infrastructure, but what happens after that is up to them.”
"Sales agents were not sitting idle at their stands if one takes the example of one company in the Martin Gropius Bau: the CEO met with 90 buyers and the members of staff responsible for marketing had no less than 180 meetings in addition to ad-hoc discussions at events in the evenings."
Coproductions are the engine driving the business these days.
This year’s Berlinale Co-Production Market ended after two-and-a-half days with awards handed out to projects from Kazakhstan and Belgium.
The €6,000 Arte International Prize went to Kazakh film-maker Emir Baigazin’s planned second feature The Wounded Angel, the second part of a trilogy after his Silver Bear-winning Harmony Lessons. The €1.2m Almaty-based Kazakhfilm Jsc production has already attracted France’s Capricci Production as a co-producer and has backing in place from the Doha Film Institute and the Hubert Bals Fund.
The €10,000 Vff Talent Highlight Pitch Award was presented to Belgian director Bavo Defurne for his romantic dramedy Souvenir. The €2m co-production by Oostende-based Indeed Films with Belgium’s Frakas Productions and Germany’s Karibufilm already has backing from Flanders Audiovisual Fund, Cinefinance and public broadcaster Vrt/ Een.
India-Norway’s $55 million film to be directed by Hans Petter Moland (In Order of Disappearance)’s The Indian Bride is an exciting example of an unusual pairing of countries.
Bavaria and Senator’s joint venture Bavaria Pictures’ The Postcard Killers to be directed by Mexican director Everardo Gout shows the international expansion of talent.
The Hungary-Austria-Germany co-production of Stefan Zweig’s Beware of Pity, or U.K.-Lithuania action comedy Redirected being sold by Content brings unusual European partners together.
U.S. born Damian John Harper’s coproduction with the German producers, brothers Jakob and Jonas Weydemann, on Los Angeles will be followed by In the Middle of the River now being developed with Zdf’s Das Kleine Fernsehspiel unit.
Shoreline’s The Infinite Man produced with Australia’s Hedone Productions in association with Bonsai Films with investment from South Australia Film Corporation through its Filmlab funding initiative, development assistance from Screen Australia is also a new sort of pairing.
Film and Music Entertainment (F&Me), Bac Films, 20 Steps Productions and Bruemmer & Herzog’s The President is shooting in Tbilisi, Georgia and is being directed by Mohsen Makhmalbaf.
Italian-Canadian producer Andrea Iervolino and Monika Bacardi’s Sights of Death starring Danny Glover, Daryl Hannah, Rutger Hauer, Stephen Baldwin and Michael Madsen is directed by Allessandro Capone in Rome.
The Spain-u.K. co-production Second Origin is based on the best selling Catalan novel Mecanoscrit Del Segon Orgen.
The Golden Bear Winner Black Coal, Thin Ice is a Boneyard Entertainment (New York & Hong Kong) co-production with Boneyard Entertainment China (Bec), Omnijoi Media (Jiangsu, China), China Film co-production.
A sign of the times is the Swedish Film in Berlin advertisement which lists all Swedish co-productions:
In Competition: In Order of DisappearanceOut of Competition: NymphomaniacBerlinale Special: Someone You Love Generation Kplus: A Christmoose StoryPerspektive Deutsches Kino: Lamento
All are with European co-producers as is Antboy a Danish-German co-production.
One of my favorites is Gallows Hill, being sold by Im Global and already picked up by IFC for U.S. Starring Twilight actor Peter Facinelli, U.K. actress Sophia Myles, Nathalia Ramos and Colombian model and actress Carolina Guerra, it was entirely financed from within Colombia by television network Rcn’s affiliate Five 7 Media which produced with Peter Block's A Bigger Boat, David Higgins and Angelique Higgins' Launchpad Productions and Andrea Chung. The screenplay was written by Rich D’Ovidio ( The Call, Thir13en Ghosts) about a widower who takes his children on a trip to their mother’s Colombian hometown.
Another interesting combo is the Australian-Singapore co-production Canopy being sold by Odin’s Eye which was acquired by Kaleidoscope for U.K., by Kinosmith for Canada and Odin’s Eye itself for Australia. After its Tiff 2013 premiere, Monterrey acquired U.S. rights.
Cathedrals of Culture, was produced by Wim Wenders’ production company: Neue Road Movies in Germany and co-produced by Final Cut For Real (Denmark), Lotus Film (Austria), Mer Film (Norway), Les Films d'Ici 2 (France), Sundance Productions / RadicalMedia (U.S.), Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg In collaboration with Arte (Germany and France) and Wowow (Japan).
Grand Budapest Hotel is a co-production of Scott Rudin in U.S. and Studio Babelsburg in Germany.
Wouldn't you say there had to be an awful lot of business going on? If only the media knew where to look for it. Instead, they moan the same old tired tune, "Quality a bit soft. Not a lot of Big Titles. Not a lot of Big News". Oh well...
Efm Coproduction Market
Asian producer Raymond Phathanavirangoon, who was pitching the Hong Kong comedy Grooms by writer-director Arvin Chen at the Berlin Coproduction Market, announced that Germany’s augenschein filmproduktion will be a coproducer on Singaporean director Boo Junfeng’s second feature Apprentice. The film has already received backing from France’s World Cinema Support, the Film- und Medienstiftung Nrw of Germany and Germany's second network, Zdf’s Das kleine fernsehspiel unit. It also has Cinema Defacto as its French co-producer. Junfeng’s first film, Sandcastle, was screened at the Critics’ Week in Cannes in 2010.
Cologne-based augenschein, who produced Maximilian Leo’s My Brother’s Keeper, the opening film of this year’s Perspektive Deutsches Kino and is handled internationally by Media Luna, is currently in post-production on Romanian filmmaker Florin Serban’s Box, his second feature after the 2010 Berlinale Competition film If I Want To Whistle, I Whistle.
Argentinian filmmaker Santiago Mitre whose debut The Student established him as one of the brightest and most courted young directors in Latin America was in the Co-production Market with his untitled second feature which France’s Full House connected to along with Argentina’s Union de los Rio, Argentine broadcast network Telefe, Ignacio Viale and the ubiquitous Lita Stantic.
Full House was also at the Coproduction Market with Peter Webber’s Fresh about a young thief learning the art of pickpocketing in Bogota, Colombia. It will be co-produced with Rcn affiliate Five 7 Media and 4Direcciones in Colombia and by Webber himself.
Raymond van der Kaaij, the producer of Tamar van den Dop’s Panorama title Supernova, is now financing Sundance winner Ernesto Contreras’ next feature I Dream In Another Language. The Spanish-English language project will be produced with Mexico-based Agencia Sha, and it is now casting the American lead according to producer van der Kaaij of Revolver Amsterdam. Developed at the Sundance Screenwriters Lab and the winner of the Sundance-Mahindra Global Filmmaking Award, I Dream has already received support from Imcine in Mexico. Shooting is scheduled in Mexico for the end of 2014.
Revolver is now editing Bodkin Ras, the debut film of Iranian-Dutch director Kaweh Modiri, an English-language documentary-thriller set in North Scotland. The Dutch-Belgian-u.K. coproduction is set for release at the end of 2014.
Finnish film-maker Jukka-Pekka Valkeapaa’s is editing his latest feature They Have Escaped, which Revolver coproduced with Helsinki Film.
Trend of smart art genres
Another continuing trend, which began with Xyz and Celluloid Nightmares and continued with Memento, is the character-driven art genre films with tight budgets, like the Danish coming-of-age-werewolf-romance, When Animals Dream, directed by first timer Jonas Arnby, sold by Gaumont to Radius-twc for No. Americ. The Scandinavians, formerly making a mark with "Nordic Noir" are now making what they call "Nordic Twilight".
Trend of remake rights
Another trend is that of remake rights. Film Sharks reports it makes more from selling remake rights than from licensing distribution rights.
The Intouchables is selling remake rights to more countries than only India as is the sale of Other Angle’s Babysitting remake rights. Negotiations are underway with Russia, Italy and Germany.
Fruit Chan is considering an English language remake of his 2004 cult horror film Dumplings.
The market is bit too calm?…Then let us look at Cannes…
Usually by Afm you can begin the Tipped for Cannes List (which Gilles Jacob detested), but even that is a little on the quiet side. I begin to question whether all media fueled news is accurate: the slow sales being reported, the lack of pre-Cannes buzz… Is the media really investigating deeply?
Of all the trades, while Screen has the most international news and deepest analyses, Variety reports things no other trade is covering. But…still the non-news of a quiet market persists as if it were headline news. We always hear this and we are still in an economic slump, so what we wish for is not apparent, but this is not news.
Tipped for Cannes
Tipped for Cannes are Zhang Yimou’s Coming Home staring Gong Li and to be sold by Wild Bunch, Stealth’s First Law starring Mads Mikkelsen (Cannes 2012 Best Actor Award for The Hunt); Self Made (Boreg) by Shira Geffen and to be sold by Westend, shot in Hebrew and Arabic by the production and sales team behind Oscar nominated 2011 drama Footnote, the second film after Geffen’s 2007 debut Jellyfish which won the Cannes Camera d’Or. MK2’s Clouds of Sils Maria by Olivier Assayas and starring Juliette Binoche, Chloe Grace Moretz and Kristen Stewart, and Naomi Kawase’s Still the Water will be delivered in time for Cannes. Pyramide International is plannng for Leviathan, a modern retelling of the biblical story which deals with some of Russia’s most important social issues to be ready for Cannes. It is directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev and produced by Alexander Rodnyansky (Stalingrad) as their followup to Elena. Gaumont-cj co-production, The Target, the Korean remake of Fred Cavaye’s action thriller Point Blank will be ready in time for Cannes.
Rumors and truths about people changing positions
Rumors about Dieter Kosslick replacing Berlin’s Culture Secretary who resigned after a tax evasion scandal in which he admitted to stashing $575,000 in a Swiss bank account…Charlotte Mickie has left eOne and knowing her, she is bound to find something good elsewhere as she's too good to lose...StudioCanals Harold van Lier now leads eOne’s newly ramped international sales team and Montreal based Anick Poirier leads its subsidiary label, Seville International. Jeff Nuyts is leaving Intramovies. Nigel Sinclair and Guy East seem to be leaving Exclusive Media the company they founded as discussions with partners from Dasym Investment Strategies Bv move forward. Kevin Hoiseth from Voltage Pictures has joined International Film Trust as their director of international sales...and of course, Nadine de Barros has founded her own company, Fortitude, and was holding court at the Ritz Carlton the buzziest spot outside of the Martin Gropius Bau.
What I Saw and What I Thought
For what it's worth, here is my limited list of screenings of films seen only in the last 3 days of the festival when I was no longer "working". I am including some I actually saw at Sundance.
First and foremost -- and to be written about further in a "thought piece" as I term the articles I think long about before writing and to include my interview with the director Goran Hugo Olsson's (The Black Power Mixtapes winner of Sundance 2011 World Cinema Documentary Film Editing Award) -- Concerning Violence (Isa: Films Boutique, U.S.: Cinetic), based on Frantz Fanon's The Wretched of the Earth and seen at Sundance this year next to Stanley Nelson's outstanding Freedom Summer (PBS) and Greg Barker's We Are The Giant (Submarine), is a call to action for new societal models ringing out loud and clear.
Golden Bear Winner, Black Coal, Thin Ice by Diao Yinan, a Chinese noir, lacked the momentum and substance I would have expected in a winning film, though it was a fascinating way to see today's urban China. Had I been on the jury, I would have chosen the Best Director Award winning Boyhood (Isa: IFC) by Richard Linklater. But perhaps because James Schamus, an American who loves Chinese films, was President of the Jury, there might have arisen a question of disinterested objectivity. I would have to hear what jurists Barbara Broccoli, Trine Dyrhom, Chistoph Waltz, Tony Leung, Greta Gerwig, Mitra Farahani and Michel Gondry would have to say about the deliberations.
Speaking of jury prizes, it was a surprise the much acclaimed '71 (Isa: Protagonist, now headed by our dear Mike Goodridge) won nothing, and good Alain Renais' Life of Riley (Isa: Le Pacte) received recognition. I found Christophe Gans' La belle et la bete (Beauty and the Beast) (Isa: Pathe) an overproduced unwieldy special effects-ridden mess, even though it was exec-produced by Jérôme Seydoux who also produced the masterpiece La Grande Belleza (The Great Beauty), and starred his granddaughter Lea Seydoux. I'll stand by Cocteau's versoin. I heard Claudia Llosa (Milk of Sorrow)'s Aloft was also not widely admired.
About the best actress winning film The Little House (Isa: Shochiku could have marketed it more widely), I heard nothing at all, though it sounds really good. Kreuzweg (Stations of the Cross) (Isa: Beta) by brother and sister team Anna and Dietrich Brueggemann (any relation to our own Tom Brueggeman?) had a satisfying denouement and was quite engrossing with moments of humor lightening the heavy weight of the cross carried by 14 year old Maria played by Lea van Acken, a picture face out of a George de la Tour painting (Magdeline with a Smoking Flame or A Piece of Art). Macondo (Isa: Films Boutique - again! ) by Sudabeh Mortezai of Austria was a window on a world never seen before and very engrossing although the coming of age story was one we have seen before.
Not sorry to say I missed The Monuments Men and Nymphomaniac Volume I, but sorry that I missed Beloved Sisters (Isa: Global Screen) of Dominik Graf, The Grand Budapest Hotel (will see it in U.S.), Argentinian Benjamin Naishat's History of Fear (Isa: Visit) -- I'll catch it in Carthegena, Guadalajara or San Sebastian I'm sure, Jack, In Order of Disappearance which sounds like the sleeper hit of the festival, Argentinan (again!) La tercera orilla (The Third Side of the River), Lou Ye's Tui Na (Blind Massage) and Rachid Bouchareb's Two Men in Town (Isa: Pathe - again!), which I heard was rather flat which is not surprising, for when non-Americans try to make an American genre, it usually misses a certain verve, but still is such an interesting subject for him to tackle, Zwischen Welten (Inbetween Worlds) (Isa: The Match Factory) from Germany, another "American" subject, but here about a German soldier in Afghanistan, not an American one.
Among the Berlinale Specials, I wish I had seen Nancy Buirski's Afternoon of a Faun which everyone said was good (Isa: Cactus Three the doc production company of Krysanne Katsoolis and Caroline Stevens) and Volker Schloendorff's 1969 Brecht piece Baal starring Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Margarethe von Trotta. I did see his Diplomacy (Isa: Gaumont) which was a great treat, erudite, intimate and reminiscent of the novels of Sandor Marai (Embers and Casanova in Bolzano). Wish I could have seen Wim Wenders' Cathedrals of Culture (Isa: Cinephil), Diego Luna's Cesar Chavez (Isa: Mundial) and In the Courtyard aka Dans la cours (Isa: Wild Bunch) starring Catherine Deneuve and The Kidnapping of Michel Houllebecq (Isa: Le Pacte - again!!). I will see The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden (Isa: The Film Sales Company) by Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller, produced by Jonathan Dana, Dayna Goldfine, Dan Geller and Celeste Schaefer Snyder (Ballets Russes), back home. The Turning (Isa: Level K), an experimental omnibus produced by my favorite Australian producer, Robert Connelly who also directed in part and Maggie Myles, is also a must-see as is Errol Morris' companion piece to The Fog of War, The Unknown Known (Isa: HanWay) and Houssein Amini's Two Faces of January (Isa: StudioCanal) starring my favorites Viggo Mortenson and Kirsten Dunst. We Come as Friends (Isa: Le Pacte), by Hubert Sauper whose earlier film Darwin's Destiny astounded me, was worth watching although so often his films plunge one into a hopeless helplessness. Fresh from Sundance, it was raising controversy and the story of the Sudan is worth knowing. His particular and peculiar Pov is valuable. Watermark (Isa: Entertainment One), another social issue worth knowing about will have to wait for a more propitious time. Personally I'm hoping Israel's current venture into desalination of water will lead the world into peace and that I will rejoice watching the doc about that.
Difret (Isa: Films Boutique - again!), fresh from Sundance where I saw it was really good and it sold well. I got to hang out with the team at the Panorama party. Gueros (Isa: Mundial - again!), was a disappointment -- too like The Year of the Nail (though different) in tone. But what a great company Canana is!
Panorama's Finding Vivian Maier (Isa: HanWay - again!) is brilliantly interesting. It is about to be released in U.S. by IFC. I highly recommend seeing this documentary about an eccentric, unknown photographer. It premiered at Tiff 2013. Fresh from Sundance where it won a Special Jury Prize, Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter (Isa: Submarine) was a treasure; Velvet Terrorists was about the oddest piece I have ever seen. About three former opponents of the Czechoslovakian Soviet Regime, each has continued to enjoy blowing up things. One is still training the next generation in urban guerilla warfare. They are otherwise unremarkable, sweet even, but twisted. What an odd documentary.
A quick look at the Market Films I have seen: of the 400+ premieres: Zero -- no I did see German Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Language Film, Two Lives (Isa: Beta), and I will soon be home to celebrate its nomination at the famous Villa Aurora, the former home of German expatriate writer Leon Feuchtwanger. So many more films look sooooo attractive! A pity I may never get to see them. I would need all the time in the world, and I have so little. I have so much and yet I want more!
And for all the complaints about Berlin, many sales agents set up private screenings before the market kicked off. What is that about?
Beki Probst, who has run the Efm since 1988, responded to the many media reports of a quieter market in an interview with ScreenDaily which sounds almost the same as the one she gave in 2009.
Quoting her current statement which I take the liberty of quoting here as it appears in Screen:
“I think that there was a good movement of business this year,” she said. In the opinion of Probst, there had been a muddying of the distinction between the Efm and the more general term of the ‘market’.
“Daphné Kapfer of Europa International representing 35 sales agents said that it was a very good Berlin, and Glen Basner of FilmNation commented that it was ‘the best Berlin’.
“Even Harvey Weinstein came just for 24 hours to sign a $7m check, and Aloft was bought by Sony Pictures Classics.
“It’s the players, and not the market, that is important. The players come here if they have the right line-up. All we can do is provide the best infrastructure, but what happens after that is up to them.”
"Sales agents were not sitting idle at their stands if one takes the example of one company in the Martin Gropius Bau: the CEO met with 90 buyers and the members of staff responsible for marketing had no less than 180 meetings in addition to ad-hoc discussions at events in the evenings."
Coproductions are the engine driving the business these days.
This year’s Berlinale Co-Production Market ended after two-and-a-half days with awards handed out to projects from Kazakhstan and Belgium.
The €6,000 Arte International Prize went to Kazakh film-maker Emir Baigazin’s planned second feature The Wounded Angel, the second part of a trilogy after his Silver Bear-winning Harmony Lessons. The €1.2m Almaty-based Kazakhfilm Jsc production has already attracted France’s Capricci Production as a co-producer and has backing in place from the Doha Film Institute and the Hubert Bals Fund.
The €10,000 Vff Talent Highlight Pitch Award was presented to Belgian director Bavo Defurne for his romantic dramedy Souvenir. The €2m co-production by Oostende-based Indeed Films with Belgium’s Frakas Productions and Germany’s Karibufilm already has backing from Flanders Audiovisual Fund, Cinefinance and public broadcaster Vrt/ Een.
India-Norway’s $55 million film to be directed by Hans Petter Moland (In Order of Disappearance)’s The Indian Bride is an exciting example of an unusual pairing of countries.
Bavaria and Senator’s joint venture Bavaria Pictures’ The Postcard Killers to be directed by Mexican director Everardo Gout shows the international expansion of talent.
The Hungary-Austria-Germany co-production of Stefan Zweig’s Beware of Pity, or U.K.-Lithuania action comedy Redirected being sold by Content brings unusual European partners together.
U.S. born Damian John Harper’s coproduction with the German producers, brothers Jakob and Jonas Weydemann, on Los Angeles will be followed by In the Middle of the River now being developed with Zdf’s Das Kleine Fernsehspiel unit.
Shoreline’s The Infinite Man produced with Australia’s Hedone Productions in association with Bonsai Films with investment from South Australia Film Corporation through its Filmlab funding initiative, development assistance from Screen Australia is also a new sort of pairing.
Film and Music Entertainment (F&Me), Bac Films, 20 Steps Productions and Bruemmer & Herzog’s The President is shooting in Tbilisi, Georgia and is being directed by Mohsen Makhmalbaf.
Italian-Canadian producer Andrea Iervolino and Monika Bacardi’s Sights of Death starring Danny Glover, Daryl Hannah, Rutger Hauer, Stephen Baldwin and Michael Madsen is directed by Allessandro Capone in Rome.
The Spain-u.K. co-production Second Origin is based on the best selling Catalan novel Mecanoscrit Del Segon Orgen.
The Golden Bear Winner Black Coal, Thin Ice is a Boneyard Entertainment (New York & Hong Kong) co-production with Boneyard Entertainment China (Bec), Omnijoi Media (Jiangsu, China), China Film co-production.
A sign of the times is the Swedish Film in Berlin advertisement which lists all Swedish co-productions:
In Competition: In Order of DisappearanceOut of Competition: NymphomaniacBerlinale Special: Someone You Love Generation Kplus: A Christmoose StoryPerspektive Deutsches Kino: Lamento
All are with European co-producers as is Antboy a Danish-German co-production.
One of my favorites is Gallows Hill, being sold by Im Global and already picked up by IFC for U.S. Starring Twilight actor Peter Facinelli, U.K. actress Sophia Myles, Nathalia Ramos and Colombian model and actress Carolina Guerra, it was entirely financed from within Colombia by television network Rcn’s affiliate Five 7 Media which produced with Peter Block's A Bigger Boat, David Higgins and Angelique Higgins' Launchpad Productions and Andrea Chung. The screenplay was written by Rich D’Ovidio ( The Call, Thir13en Ghosts) about a widower who takes his children on a trip to their mother’s Colombian hometown.
Another interesting combo is the Australian-Singapore co-production Canopy being sold by Odin’s Eye which was acquired by Kaleidoscope for U.K., by Kinosmith for Canada and Odin’s Eye itself for Australia. After its Tiff 2013 premiere, Monterrey acquired U.S. rights.
Cathedrals of Culture, was produced by Wim Wenders’ production company: Neue Road Movies in Germany and co-produced by Final Cut For Real (Denmark), Lotus Film (Austria), Mer Film (Norway), Les Films d'Ici 2 (France), Sundance Productions / RadicalMedia (U.S.), Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg In collaboration with Arte (Germany and France) and Wowow (Japan).
Grand Budapest Hotel is a co-production of Scott Rudin in U.S. and Studio Babelsburg in Germany.
Wouldn't you say there had to be an awful lot of business going on? If only the media knew where to look for it. Instead, they moan the same old tired tune, "Quality a bit soft. Not a lot of Big Titles. Not a lot of Big News". Oh well...
Efm Coproduction Market
Asian producer Raymond Phathanavirangoon, who was pitching the Hong Kong comedy Grooms by writer-director Arvin Chen at the Berlin Coproduction Market, announced that Germany’s augenschein filmproduktion will be a coproducer on Singaporean director Boo Junfeng’s second feature Apprentice. The film has already received backing from France’s World Cinema Support, the Film- und Medienstiftung Nrw of Germany and Germany's second network, Zdf’s Das kleine fernsehspiel unit. It also has Cinema Defacto as its French co-producer. Junfeng’s first film, Sandcastle, was screened at the Critics’ Week in Cannes in 2010.
Cologne-based augenschein, who produced Maximilian Leo’s My Brother’s Keeper, the opening film of this year’s Perspektive Deutsches Kino and is handled internationally by Media Luna, is currently in post-production on Romanian filmmaker Florin Serban’s Box, his second feature after the 2010 Berlinale Competition film If I Want To Whistle, I Whistle.
Argentinian filmmaker Santiago Mitre whose debut The Student established him as one of the brightest and most courted young directors in Latin America was in the Co-production Market with his untitled second feature which France’s Full House connected to along with Argentina’s Union de los Rio, Argentine broadcast network Telefe, Ignacio Viale and the ubiquitous Lita Stantic.
Full House was also at the Coproduction Market with Peter Webber’s Fresh about a young thief learning the art of pickpocketing in Bogota, Colombia. It will be co-produced with Rcn affiliate Five 7 Media and 4Direcciones in Colombia and by Webber himself.
Raymond van der Kaaij, the producer of Tamar van den Dop’s Panorama title Supernova, is now financing Sundance winner Ernesto Contreras’ next feature I Dream In Another Language. The Spanish-English language project will be produced with Mexico-based Agencia Sha, and it is now casting the American lead according to producer van der Kaaij of Revolver Amsterdam. Developed at the Sundance Screenwriters Lab and the winner of the Sundance-Mahindra Global Filmmaking Award, I Dream has already received support from Imcine in Mexico. Shooting is scheduled in Mexico for the end of 2014.
Revolver is now editing Bodkin Ras, the debut film of Iranian-Dutch director Kaweh Modiri, an English-language documentary-thriller set in North Scotland. The Dutch-Belgian-u.K. coproduction is set for release at the end of 2014.
Finnish film-maker Jukka-Pekka Valkeapaa’s is editing his latest feature They Have Escaped, which Revolver coproduced with Helsinki Film.
Trend of smart art genres
Another continuing trend, which began with Xyz and Celluloid Nightmares and continued with Memento, is the character-driven art genre films with tight budgets, like the Danish coming-of-age-werewolf-romance, When Animals Dream, directed by first timer Jonas Arnby, sold by Gaumont to Radius-twc for No. Americ. The Scandinavians, formerly making a mark with "Nordic Noir" are now making what they call "Nordic Twilight".
Trend of remake rights
Another trend is that of remake rights. Film Sharks reports it makes more from selling remake rights than from licensing distribution rights.
The Intouchables is selling remake rights to more countries than only India as is the sale of Other Angle’s Babysitting remake rights. Negotiations are underway with Russia, Italy and Germany.
Fruit Chan is considering an English language remake of his 2004 cult horror film Dumplings.
The market is bit too calm?…Then let us look at Cannes…
Usually by Afm you can begin the Tipped for Cannes List (which Gilles Jacob detested), but even that is a little on the quiet side. I begin to question whether all media fueled news is accurate: the slow sales being reported, the lack of pre-Cannes buzz… Is the media really investigating deeply?
Of all the trades, while Screen has the most international news and deepest analyses, Variety reports things no other trade is covering. But…still the non-news of a quiet market persists as if it were headline news. We always hear this and we are still in an economic slump, so what we wish for is not apparent, but this is not news.
Tipped for Cannes
Tipped for Cannes are Zhang Yimou’s Coming Home staring Gong Li and to be sold by Wild Bunch, Stealth’s First Law starring Mads Mikkelsen (Cannes 2012 Best Actor Award for The Hunt); Self Made (Boreg) by Shira Geffen and to be sold by Westend, shot in Hebrew and Arabic by the production and sales team behind Oscar nominated 2011 drama Footnote, the second film after Geffen’s 2007 debut Jellyfish which won the Cannes Camera d’Or. MK2’s Clouds of Sils Maria by Olivier Assayas and starring Juliette Binoche, Chloe Grace Moretz and Kristen Stewart, and Naomi Kawase’s Still the Water will be delivered in time for Cannes. Pyramide International is plannng for Leviathan, a modern retelling of the biblical story which deals with some of Russia’s most important social issues to be ready for Cannes. It is directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev and produced by Alexander Rodnyansky (Stalingrad) as their followup to Elena. Gaumont-cj co-production, The Target, the Korean remake of Fred Cavaye’s action thriller Point Blank will be ready in time for Cannes.
Rumors and truths about people changing positions
Rumors about Dieter Kosslick replacing Berlin’s Culture Secretary who resigned after a tax evasion scandal in which he admitted to stashing $575,000 in a Swiss bank account…Charlotte Mickie has left eOne and knowing her, she is bound to find something good elsewhere as she's too good to lose...StudioCanals Harold van Lier now leads eOne’s newly ramped international sales team and Montreal based Anick Poirier leads its subsidiary label, Seville International. Jeff Nuyts is leaving Intramovies. Nigel Sinclair and Guy East seem to be leaving Exclusive Media the company they founded as discussions with partners from Dasym Investment Strategies Bv move forward. Kevin Hoiseth from Voltage Pictures has joined International Film Trust as their director of international sales...and of course, Nadine de Barros has founded her own company, Fortitude, and was holding court at the Ritz Carlton the buzziest spot outside of the Martin Gropius Bau.
What I Saw and What I Thought
For what it's worth, here is my limited list of screenings of films seen only in the last 3 days of the festival when I was no longer "working". I am including some I actually saw at Sundance.
First and foremost -- and to be written about further in a "thought piece" as I term the articles I think long about before writing and to include my interview with the director Goran Hugo Olsson's (The Black Power Mixtapes winner of Sundance 2011 World Cinema Documentary Film Editing Award) -- Concerning Violence (Isa: Films Boutique, U.S.: Cinetic), based on Frantz Fanon's The Wretched of the Earth and seen at Sundance this year next to Stanley Nelson's outstanding Freedom Summer (PBS) and Greg Barker's We Are The Giant (Submarine), is a call to action for new societal models ringing out loud and clear.
Golden Bear Winner, Black Coal, Thin Ice by Diao Yinan, a Chinese noir, lacked the momentum and substance I would have expected in a winning film, though it was a fascinating way to see today's urban China. Had I been on the jury, I would have chosen the Best Director Award winning Boyhood (Isa: IFC) by Richard Linklater. But perhaps because James Schamus, an American who loves Chinese films, was President of the Jury, there might have arisen a question of disinterested objectivity. I would have to hear what jurists Barbara Broccoli, Trine Dyrhom, Chistoph Waltz, Tony Leung, Greta Gerwig, Mitra Farahani and Michel Gondry would have to say about the deliberations.
Speaking of jury prizes, it was a surprise the much acclaimed '71 (Isa: Protagonist, now headed by our dear Mike Goodridge) won nothing, and good Alain Renais' Life of Riley (Isa: Le Pacte) received recognition. I found Christophe Gans' La belle et la bete (Beauty and the Beast) (Isa: Pathe) an overproduced unwieldy special effects-ridden mess, even though it was exec-produced by Jérôme Seydoux who also produced the masterpiece La Grande Belleza (The Great Beauty), and starred his granddaughter Lea Seydoux. I'll stand by Cocteau's versoin. I heard Claudia Llosa (Milk of Sorrow)'s Aloft was also not widely admired.
About the best actress winning film The Little House (Isa: Shochiku could have marketed it more widely), I heard nothing at all, though it sounds really good. Kreuzweg (Stations of the Cross) (Isa: Beta) by brother and sister team Anna and Dietrich Brueggemann (any relation to our own Tom Brueggeman?) had a satisfying denouement and was quite engrossing with moments of humor lightening the heavy weight of the cross carried by 14 year old Maria played by Lea van Acken, a picture face out of a George de la Tour painting (Magdeline with a Smoking Flame or A Piece of Art). Macondo (Isa: Films Boutique - again! ) by Sudabeh Mortezai of Austria was a window on a world never seen before and very engrossing although the coming of age story was one we have seen before.
Not sorry to say I missed The Monuments Men and Nymphomaniac Volume I, but sorry that I missed Beloved Sisters (Isa: Global Screen) of Dominik Graf, The Grand Budapest Hotel (will see it in U.S.), Argentinian Benjamin Naishat's History of Fear (Isa: Visit) -- I'll catch it in Carthegena, Guadalajara or San Sebastian I'm sure, Jack, In Order of Disappearance which sounds like the sleeper hit of the festival, Argentinan (again!) La tercera orilla (The Third Side of the River), Lou Ye's Tui Na (Blind Massage) and Rachid Bouchareb's Two Men in Town (Isa: Pathe - again!), which I heard was rather flat which is not surprising, for when non-Americans try to make an American genre, it usually misses a certain verve, but still is such an interesting subject for him to tackle, Zwischen Welten (Inbetween Worlds) (Isa: The Match Factory) from Germany, another "American" subject, but here about a German soldier in Afghanistan, not an American one.
Among the Berlinale Specials, I wish I had seen Nancy Buirski's Afternoon of a Faun which everyone said was good (Isa: Cactus Three the doc production company of Krysanne Katsoolis and Caroline Stevens) and Volker Schloendorff's 1969 Brecht piece Baal starring Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Margarethe von Trotta. I did see his Diplomacy (Isa: Gaumont) which was a great treat, erudite, intimate and reminiscent of the novels of Sandor Marai (Embers and Casanova in Bolzano). Wish I could have seen Wim Wenders' Cathedrals of Culture (Isa: Cinephil), Diego Luna's Cesar Chavez (Isa: Mundial) and In the Courtyard aka Dans la cours (Isa: Wild Bunch) starring Catherine Deneuve and The Kidnapping of Michel Houllebecq (Isa: Le Pacte - again!!). I will see The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden (Isa: The Film Sales Company) by Dayna Goldfine and Dan Geller, produced by Jonathan Dana, Dayna Goldfine, Dan Geller and Celeste Schaefer Snyder (Ballets Russes), back home. The Turning (Isa: Level K), an experimental omnibus produced by my favorite Australian producer, Robert Connelly who also directed in part and Maggie Myles, is also a must-see as is Errol Morris' companion piece to The Fog of War, The Unknown Known (Isa: HanWay) and Houssein Amini's Two Faces of January (Isa: StudioCanal) starring my favorites Viggo Mortenson and Kirsten Dunst. We Come as Friends (Isa: Le Pacte), by Hubert Sauper whose earlier film Darwin's Destiny astounded me, was worth watching although so often his films plunge one into a hopeless helplessness. Fresh from Sundance, it was raising controversy and the story of the Sudan is worth knowing. His particular and peculiar Pov is valuable. Watermark (Isa: Entertainment One), another social issue worth knowing about will have to wait for a more propitious time. Personally I'm hoping Israel's current venture into desalination of water will lead the world into peace and that I will rejoice watching the doc about that.
Difret (Isa: Films Boutique - again!), fresh from Sundance where I saw it was really good and it sold well. I got to hang out with the team at the Panorama party. Gueros (Isa: Mundial - again!), was a disappointment -- too like The Year of the Nail (though different) in tone. But what a great company Canana is!
Panorama's Finding Vivian Maier (Isa: HanWay - again!) is brilliantly interesting. It is about to be released in U.S. by IFC. I highly recommend seeing this documentary about an eccentric, unknown photographer. It premiered at Tiff 2013. Fresh from Sundance where it won a Special Jury Prize, Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter (Isa: Submarine) was a treasure; Velvet Terrorists was about the oddest piece I have ever seen. About three former opponents of the Czechoslovakian Soviet Regime, each has continued to enjoy blowing up things. One is still training the next generation in urban guerilla warfare. They are otherwise unremarkable, sweet even, but twisted. What an odd documentary.
A quick look at the Market Films I have seen: of the 400+ premieres: Zero -- no I did see German Academy Award nomination for Best Foreign Language Film, Two Lives (Isa: Beta), and I will soon be home to celebrate its nomination at the famous Villa Aurora, the former home of German expatriate writer Leon Feuchtwanger. So many more films look sooooo attractive! A pity I may never get to see them. I would need all the time in the world, and I have so little. I have so much and yet I want more!
- 2/27/2014
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
After years as a multihyphenate creator of a raft of documentaries (one of which is titled, wonderfully, Fuck You, Fuck You Very Much [1998]), Sweden’s Göran Hugo Olsson has recently come to greater prominence. His documentary on soul singer Billy Paul, Am I Black Enough For You, secured international distribution in 2009, while 2011’s vibrant archive collage The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975 took him to another level. Olsson’s new film, like its predecessor, screens in the Panorama Documentary strand of the Berlinale. Concerning Violence is based on Frantz Fanon’s famous 1961 book, The Wretched of the Earth, and focuses, in nine discrete chapters, […]...
- 2/11/2014
- by Ashley Clark
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
After years as a multihyphenate creator of a raft of documentaries (one of which is titled, wonderfully, Fuck You, Fuck You Very Much [1998]), Sweden’s Göran Hugo Olsson has recently come to greater prominence. His documentary on soul singer Billy Paul, Am I Black Enough For You, secured international distribution in 2009, while 2011’s vibrant archive collage The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975 took him to another level. Olsson’s new film, like its predecessor, screens in the Panorama Documentary strand of the Berlinale. Concerning Violence is based on Frantz Fanon’s famous 1961 book, The Wretched of the Earth, and focuses, in nine discrete chapters, […]...
- 2/11/2014
- by Ashley Clark
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
Frantz Fanon's The Wretched of the Earth (Les Damnés de la Terre, 1961) functions as the inspiration and spine for Göran Hugo Olsson's Concerning Violence. Featuring excerpts of Fanon's text read by Lauryn Hill, Olsson presents us with his own visual text on the dehumanizing effects of colonization and the importance of promoting social movements that strive for decolonization. Focusing on the unfathomable psychological damage caused by colonization, Olsson channels Fanon in advocating that the colonized people resort to violence in order to liberate themselves from colonizing forces. For a pacifist, this might be a bitter pill to swallow, but Olsson's unmatched finesse in assembling archival footage might just be enough to convert some naysayers over to the legitimacy of violence.
- 2/4/2014
- by Don Simpson
- SmellsLikeScreenSpirit
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