An original story of friendship, love and survival - and finding humour in the most unlikely places.
Inspired by writer Will Reiser's own experiences, 50/50 is an original story of friendship, love, survival - and finding humour in unlikely places. Adam (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and Kyle (Seth Rogen) are best friends whose lives are changed when Adam is diagnosed with cancer. If Adam is ill equipped to deal with this shocking news, Kyle is even less so, though he offers medicinal marijuana and advice on how to get a sympathy hook-up. Adam, who's also dealing with a girlfriend and Mom variously freaking out, tries to take a methodical approach, keeping his emotions firmly in check. So he's less than delighted to be sent to counselling with Katie (Anna Kendrick), a well-intentioned but inexperienced therapist. Reisner, director Jonathan Levine (The Wackness) and their excellent cast (Bryce Dallas Hall, Anjelica Huston and Philip Baker Hall also feature) bring a refreshingly schmaltz-free approach to the twists and turns of life with cancer, but that's not to suggest the film is lacking in emotion or depth. Rooted in reality, funny and with well-developed characters and truthful performances, this is a welcome antidote to more conventional treatments.
Sandra Hebron
ALPS
The eagerly anticipated follow-up to Dogtooth from Yorgos Lanthimos.
A gymnast and her coach argue about why she can't perform her routine to pop music, rather than classical. A paramedic wheels a car-crash victim into hospital, guessing who her favourite movie star might be. A nurse reads the contents page of a celebrity magazine to a blind woman, who indicates she would like to hear what a day in the life of Winona Ryder is like. The eagerly awaited follow up to the award winning, Oscar-nominated Dogtooth, the latest feature from Yorgos Lanthimos intrigues in the curiously unsettling way its predecessor did, even before these characters come together. The paramedic, the nurse, the coach and the gymnast form Alps, a small clique who each adopt the name of one of the mountains in the region and offer their services as substitutes for the late loved ones of the grieving. The leader is paramedic Mont Blanc, and the others find it hard to live by his strict manifesto. The combination of pitch-black humour with shocking moments is quickly becoming a trademark for Lanthimos, and Alps delivers both while confirming its director as one of the most provocative, inventive and exciting emerging talents of world cinema.
Michael Hayden
THE AWAKENING
A classy haunted house yarn that boasts a great cast, as deceptively moving as it is chilling.
London, 1921, and in a country recovering from the emotional and physical demands of the First World War, some are turning to séances and spiritualism for solace. Academic and writer Florence Cathcart (Rebecca Hall) is a determined realist with an unwavering confidence in logic and science, who revels in exposing the supernatural as a lie. Schoolmaster Robert Mallory (Dominic West) tracks Florence down to tell her of incidents at Rockwood, a boys' boarding school in the country, where a child has recently died. This has caused panic amongst parents, while the pupils are driven to distraction by tales of a ghostly presence roaming the hallways. Though naturally cynical, Florence feels compelled to travel to Rockwood, determined to find a reasoned explanation for the troubling events. Yet in an environment populated by characters who are often curious or furtive, Florence starts to uncover more secrets than she bargained for. Referencing classics of the genre from The Innocents to The Others, Nick Murphy's debut feature is a classy haunted-house yarn that boasts a reliably great cast, plenty of surprises and is as deceptively moving as it is chilling.
Michael Hayden
BERNIE
Based on a true-life story, Jack Black stars in Richard Linklater's playful treatment of the strange story of a Texan funeral director.
From an opening sequence of Jack Black giving a masterful and very funny lesson in how to 'cosmetise' a corpse, it's clear that Richard Linklater is in playful mood. Bernie sees him re-united with Black (School of Rock) and Matthew McConaughey (Dazed and Confused) to tell the strange but true story of Bernie Tiede, assistant funeral director and stalwart community member in Carthage, Texas. Beloved by the locals, Bernie (Black) is kind and generous, always finding time for people, whether to give a comforting word or to step into the lead in the local am-dram production. Often to be found making house calls to grieving relatives, his pastoral duties take on a new twist when he befriends the recently-widowed Marjorie Nugent (Shirley MacLaine), widely held to be Carthage's most mean-spirited inhabitant, as well as one of its wealthiest. Linklater's familiarity with and affection for small-town Texas life shines through, and his novel approach includes using a chorus of townspeople (a mix of actors and real Carthagians) to give credence to Bernie's saintliness. It's left to the local district attorney (McConaughey in his best role for years) to question whether Bernie is quite as untarnished as he seems.
Sandra Hebron
CARNAGE
The Brooklyn bourgeoisie under the microscope in Roman Polanski's beautifully acted adaptation of The God of Carnage.
Polanski turns his attention to the satirical skewering of the hypocrisies of the middle classes with this crisp adaptation of playwright Yasmina Reza's The God of Carnage. Following a fight between their children, two New York couples come together to discuss the unfortunate event. Zachary, the son of Nancy and Alan (Kate Winslet and Christoph Waltz) has bashed his schoolmate Ethan with a stick, breaking a couple of his teeth. Ethan's parents Penelope and Michael (Jodie Foster and John C Reilly) have called the tête-à-tête at their home, but what starts out as a civilised attempt at resolution turns uglier by degrees. As coffee and cobbler give way to hard liquor, surface niceties start to slip, the couples get to sniping then to arguing and worse, and soon the fractures in their own relationships are showing. Watching the foursome descend into behaviour far worse than that of their children is horrible and funny, often both at the same time. Tightly scripted and confidently directed, with resonances that go beyond its Brooklyn walls, Carnage is also a terrific showcase for the remarkable performances of its heavyweight ensemble cast.
Sandra Hebron
CHICKEN WITH PLUMS
The creators of Persepolis follow their terrific debut with an inspired adaptation of another of Marjane Satrapi’s award-winning graphic novels.
The creators of Persepolis follow their terrific debut with an inspired adaptation of another of Marjane Satrapi's award-winning graphic novels. Chicken with Plums, seamlessly welding the eponymous book's striking visual aesthetic to live action, spirits us back to 1958 Tehran. Here temperamental musician Nasser Ali lives for his music, loftily negligent of his two young children and nagging wife. When the beloved violin bequeathed to him by his musical and spiritual master is damaged and he can no longer find any pleasure in playing, Nasser Ali decides to retreat to his bed and await death. Days of reverie and rumination, wending back through his life and magically into his children's respective futures, then unfold. Although sharing with us their great affection for Nasser Ali, Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud are also alert to his foibles, and adroitly lace his melancholy tale with rich, dark comedy and wry digressions fitting to life's joys and discontents. Mathieu Amalric, sterling as Nasser Ali, heads a super cast; their performances, even when just cameos, perfectly attuned to the film's heightened, expressive style.
Sandra Reid
CRAZY HORSE
A fascinating behind-the-scenes glimpse of Paris' legendary nude review, directed by renowned documentarian Frederick Wiseman.
For his latest film, renowned documentary filmmaker Frederick Wiseman spent ten weeks filming at Paris's legendary cabaret club, Crazy Horse. A major fixture on the tourist map, Crazy Horse aspires to present the best nude dancing show in the world, and Wiseman films the processes and personalities that shape it. His time there coincides with the tenure of well-known choreographer Philippe Decouflé, charged with revitalising the show. Filming rehearsals and back-stage discussions as well as the on-stage set pieces, Wiseman weaves together a number of threads, some of which recall those in his earlier film, La Danse. As Decouflé attempts to balance creativity with the interests of the shareholders, Wiseman captures the gruelling work schedule and exacting standards required of the dancers, many of them recruited from ballet conservatoires. He excels in drawing on apparently incidental detail and flashes of humour to weave together a compelling picture of this fifty-year-old institution. One of the Crazy Horse staff remarks 'the ultimate thing is to seduce through restraint'. The same could be said of Wiseman's filmmaking process.
Sandra Hebron
DARK HORSE
Todd Solondz draws dark comedy from the story of two dysfunctional thirtysomethings planning to marry.
Director Todd Solondz continues his exploration of the darker side of suburban Jewish life in Dark Horse, which is perhaps gentler in tone but no less agonisingly funny than his previous work. Abe (Jordan Gelber) is 30-something, going on 13. He lives at home with his parents and works, reluctantly and ineffectively, for his father (Christopher Walken). An avid collector of toys, Abe's lack of physical charms seems matched by his personality, apparently stuck somewhere around adolescent fantasist. His social life largely consists of playing backgammon with his mother (Mia Farrow), a pursuit that loses its appeal somewhat when Abe meets Miranda (Selma Blair), another 30-something who has moved back in with her parents to recover from romantic and literary failure. Doggedly pursued by Abe, the heavily medicated Miranda agrees to marry him, and they start to plan their life together. But just when Abe seems about to get what his heart desires, things start to go horribly wrong. Solondz's ability to draw comedy out of the most painful situations makes Dark Horse a treat, albeit one that will have you squirming with embarrassment at times.
Sandra Hebron
THE EXCHANGE
Eran Kolirin's follow up to The Band's Visit is a curious vision full of wit and invention.
Oded (Rotem Keinan) is an earnest scholar of physics with a PhD teaching post at a Tel Aviv university, and appears contentedly married to Tammy (Sharon Tal), a recently-graduated architect looking for a job. A slave to routine, one day Oded leaves a folder at home and returns to retrieve it. He realises that he's never been in his apartment at this time of day, and this familiar environment is at once strange and alien. This triggers Oded to become increasing fascinated with the world around him, driven to distraction as he takes in texture, light and space. His curious behaviour is encouraged by neighbour Yoav (Dov Navon), who introduces Oded to the pleasures of shouting into empty rooms, and to the possibility he might be invisible. Oded neglects his responsibilities at work and to his wife, but it's not like he's become a bad person, more that he's rediscovered innocent wonder. Eran Kolirin's latest feature is as charming as his award-winning debut The Band's Visit (LFF 2007), a curious vision full of wit and invention. Lovely to watch and often very funny, The Exchange provides further evidence that Kolirin is a daring and singular talent.
Michael Hayden
FAUST
A richly imagined journey of a search for impossible redemption from one of Russia’s greatest living directors.
The long-awaited conclusion of Sokurov's tetralogy about the spiritual shortcomings of men of power, which has previously revealed the home lives of Hitler, Lenin and Hirohito, reaches back to our key modern myth in a provocative account of the archetypal over-reacher. Set in a Gothic world that evokes Gilliam as well as Goethe, this is the story of a dour, sceptical and hard-up seeker after knowledge who is gradually seduced by an epicene moneylender, superbly played by the Russian performance artist Anton Adasinsky. There are echoes of Sokurov's beloved Caspar David Friedrich, especially in the bleakly transcendent finale, and of Murnau's great Faust, but this teeming, sensual world, half-medieval and half-modern, most obviously recalls the small towns of Herzog's Kasper Hauser and Woyzeck, enhanced by the CGI wizardry behind Middle Earth and Hogwarts (cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel previously shot The Half-Blood Prince as well as Amélie). Like Sokurov's Whispering Pages, it's a floating world of allusion and reflection - informed by much theological expertise, but above all a richly imagined journey in search of an impossible redemption.
Ian Christie
FOOTNOTE
Dazzlingly inventive, this biting, darkly witty tale of father-son rivalries within the Israeli academic establishment is an astute study of pride, envy and temptation.
Notwithstanding its abundant wry humour, Cedar's fourth feature is an intimate tragedy about pride, envy, sacrifice and temptation. It concerns the bitter rivalry between a father and son, both professors in Talmudic studies at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, which intensifies when it's announced each is to receive a prestigious honour. Cedar's acerbic, Cannes prize-winning script is almost novelistic in its deft analysis of the pair's differences and similarities and its often hilarious depiction of the arcane rituals of Israel's academic establishment. At the same time, a brilliantly inventive, truly cinematic style echoes the film's content; even the title alludes to a tiny but crucial plot point, to the personality of the modest but conscientious father and to an aspect of the film's own sophisticated narrative structure. The fabulous score, meanwhile, at times fittingly reminiscent of late Shostakovich symphonies, perfectly suits a study of small-scale familial and academic conflict which assumes, for all involved, the dimensions of an epic struggle between old and new, truth and lies, right and wrong. Utterly fresh, it's a real treat.
Geoff Andrew
THE FUTURE
The offbeat and funny story of a couple whose modern romance starts to change as they wonder about their future.
The Future will likely be the only film you'll see this year with a narration from an injured stray cat, a clear indication that we are entering the delightfully idiosyncratic world view of Miranda July. In her debut feature (Me and You and Everyone We Know) and her short stories alike she has shown her fascination with offbeat, stranded individuals and their efforts to connect with each other, a thread she extends here to look at whether and how love can endure. July herself plays Sophie, a children's dance teacher with modest aspirations toward self-expression, living with Jason (Hamish Linklater), her boyfriend of five years. They're a flaky, geeky and low-acheiving pair, and theirs is a modern romance: they share a sofa but talk via their laptops, and have so far avoided any responsibilities or commitments. As they approach their forties, nagging anxiety and insecurity about the future prompts some decidedly odd behaviour. With a plot that consistently confounds expectations, this bittersweet tale shows July's ability to create a distinctive, off-kilter milieu, and to deliver consistently surprising and amusing dialogue. She does both with aplomb and sincerity, helped by her own and Linklater's engagingly awkward performances, nicely underscored by music from Jon Brion, no stranger to quirkiness himself.
Sandra Hebron
HARA-KIRI: DEATH OF A SAMURAI
Takashi Miike follows 13 Assassins with a neo-classical remake of the Yasuhiko Takiguchi story about desperate, impoverished ronin and implacably cruel feudal lords.
Working in 3D but showing even greater classical restraint than he did in 13 Assassins, Takashi Miike has remade Masaki Kobayashi's famous indictment of feudal inhumanity by returning to its source (a story by Yasuhiko Takiguchi) and amplifying its clash between the values of military and civilian life. Edo is peaceful under the Shogun, and many former samurai are now unemployed, impoverished ronin. Some, in desperation, approach noble houses and request permission to commit ritual suicide on their premises, secretly hoping to be bought off. The story opens with the ronin Hanshiro petitioning the House of Ii in exactly this way; instead of paying him to go away, the unsympathetic clan lord Kageyu (Koji Yakusho, a bad guy this time) recounts the gruesome fate of the last ronin who came with that request, a young man named Motome. But Hanshiro is actually Motome's father-in-law, and he has actually come to the House of Ii to exact revengeÖ Miike and his composer Ryuichi Sakamoto are not the men to get nostalgic for a lost 'golden age' of Japanese cinema. This chiaroscuro reimagining of 17th-century Japan is as fresh and vivid as anything Miike has ever done.
Tony Rayns
HEADHUNTERS
A stylish, pacy and sometimes blackly funny adaptation of Jo Nesbo's bestselling Norwegian thriller.
Award-winning Scandinavian thriller writer Jo Nesbø has resisted film adaptations of his work until now, but this satisfyingly suspenseful and handsome film version of his best-selling Headhunters should do much to allay any nervousness he might have felt. A glossy but gritty and very modern story, it centres on Roger, Norway's most successful headhunter. Married to a beautiful and stylish wife and the owner of a stunning home, he seems to have it all. But Roger is anxiously living beyond his means, and running art scams on the side to keep himself solvent. When his wife introduces him to the handsome and urbane Clas Greve, this seems fortuitous indeed, for Greve is not only the perfect candidate for a job Roger is recruiting for, he also owns a very valuable painting. Roger sees a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but needless to say, things don't go quite according to plan... Director Morten Tyldum (Buddy, LFF 2003) contrasts a cool aesthetic with pacy plot twists, bursts of stomach-churning viscerality and the odd dash of mordant humour, making for an irresistible combination, and an assured and intelligent rollercoaster of a movie.
Sandra Hebron
HORS SATAN
The latest from Bruno Dumont is a stark, enigmatic drama about the relationship between a woman and a mysterious outsider on Northern France's Opal Coast.
Following his provocative, politically charged Hadewijch (LFF 2009), Bruno Dumont gives us a spare, parable-like drama that, while seemingly metaphysical, is situated very firmly in the contemporary real. In a film that sees the director stripping his style to the bare bones, the narrative is set along a sparsely vegetated strip of Northern France's 'Opal Coast', where a ragged, nameless outsider (David Dewaele) camps out on a deserted beach. He has a close but chastely detached bond with a young local woman (Alexandra Lematre), a bond sealed in a dramatic act of violence. The man's remedies for her troubles are surprisingly drastic, but all methods seem legitimate when you are seemingly beyond good and evil. It's up to the viewer to interpret the title. Is the outsider safeguarding this enclosed world against Satan? Is he himself good and evil combined in one form? The saturnine Dewaele and Lematre, with her quasi-Goth pallor, make a strikingly against-the-grain duo, while Yves Cape's 'Scope camerawork explores landscapes in downbeat, deglamourised fashion, with some heightened visual effects lending this ostensible real world an arresting touch of the apocalyptic.
Jonathan Romney
HUNKY DORY
Marc Evans' latest feature is a sweet and sincere paean to the pre-punk 1970s.
It's the start of the sweltering summer of 1976, and the end of term is approaching at a secondary school in Swansea. Idealistic drama teacher Vivienne (Minnie Driver) is holding rehearsals for an ambitious musical production, a take on The Tempest that incorporates the contemporary songs of her pupils' pop heroes, a version of the play that 'both Shakespeare and David Bowie could be proud of'. She faces an uphill battle. Her cynical colleagues aren't shy about voicing philistine opinions on the project, there are concerns from parents, and the kids are distracted by the business of being teenagers; arguing with adults, playing in bands, cooling off at the lido, worrying about their post-school futures and falling in and out of love. Vivienne ploughs on doggedly, inspired by the kids' talent and the deeply-held belief that music and the arts matter. Marc Evans' latest feature is a sweet and sincere paean to the 1970s, an invigorating blend of genres, neither a traditional social realist film nor a straight musical. With a refreshing lack of cynicism, its soundtrack celebrates pre-punk pop, and features stirring versions of songs made famous by Bowie, Nick Drake, ELO and The Beach Boys, among others.
Michael Hayden
I'M CAROLYN PARKER
Jonathan Demme presents a compelling study of a New Orleans woman's five year struggle to return to her home following the post Katrina floods.
When a mandatory evacuation order was issued as Hurricane Katrina approached New Orleans in summer 2005, Carolyn Parker was one of the last to leave her Lower 9th neighbourhood. And when the floodwaters subsided, this sixty-something African-American was one of the first to return, with the understandable hope of rebuilding her home. Filmmaker Jonathan Demme set out to make a film tracking her progress, little knowing that it would be some five years and 21 visits before she was able to move back into her renovated family house. Demme's film is an illuminating study of the frustrations of the displaced and disenfranchised who lost their homes in the hurricane, and an indictment of the feet-dragging on the part of the authorities. But most of all it is a warm, intimate portrait of a redoubtable woman who grew up poor in segregated New Orleans in the 1940s, did duty in the Civil Rights movement of the 60s, and who has juggled work and family all her life. Determined, opinionated, sometimes (righteously) outspoken, often funny, Carolyn Parker is the embodiment of the extraordinariness of 'ordinary' people.
Sandra Hebron
INTO THE ABYSS: A TALE OF DEATH, A TALE OF LIFE
Werner Herzog's powerful exploration of violence and its consequences, told through Death Row inmates and others close to their crimes.
Forming part of Werner Herzog's Death Row project (which also includes a series of shorter TV films), Into the Abyss is an outstanding exploration of violent crime and its consequences. Herzog focuses on two main characters, Michael Perry and Jason Burkett, convicted of a triple homicide committed in their home state of Texas. Perry was interviewed on camera just days before his execution; Burkett did not receive the death sentence, but was sentenced to life in prison after his father, himself a convicted felon, pleaded for clemency. Alongside these protagonists, Herzog talks to their families and those of the victims, as well as to a chaplain and others intimately involved in administering the death sentence. Much of the strength of the film lies in Herzog's interview style, which is respectful, but never precludes him asking uncomfortable questions ('destiny has dealt you a bad deck of cards, which doesn't exonerate you and which does not mean I have to like you'). What emerges is a coruscating study of the senselessness of violence, whether from individuals or state, and a particularly disturbing picture of the society that breeds it.
Sandra Hebron
I WISH
Two young brothers at opposite ends of Kyushu devise a magical plan to reunite their separated parents in Hirokazu Kore-eda's benign and superbly acted picture of family life.
It was clear from the start (Maboroshi, After Life) that Hirokazu Kore-eda was deeply interested in hidden feelings and unvoiced wishes. His recent films (Nobody Knows, Hana, Still Walking) reveal an equal commitment to family structures and parenting, especially as seen by kids. Kore-eda's wonderful new film I Wish combines both themes with the story of two young brothers plotting to reunite their divided family. The parents separated six months ago. The elder son Koichi lives with his mother and grandparents in Kagoshima, in the shadow of a constantly rumbling volcano. The younger son Ryu stays with his rock-musician father in Fukuoka. Stuck at opposite ends of Kyushu, the boys stay in touch by phone. Hearing that wishes will come true for anyone who witnesses the first north- and south-bound bullet-trains passing each other when the western extension of the high-speed network opens inspires them to play truant for the day to meet up in Kumamoto... Without a single false or sentimental note, this benign, superbly acted film gets everyone right: the parents and grandparents, the teachers, family friends and most of all the kids themselves.
Tony Rayns
LIKE CRAZY
A couple find themselves stuck on opposite sides of the Atlantic in a fresh and original story of young love.
One of the most popular and sought-after titles in Sundance this year, Like Crazy takes a fresh and youthful look at the vacillations of long-distance romance. Anna (Felicity Jones) is a young English woman studying in LA, who spies a good-looking man, Jacob (Anton Yelchin) at the back of her class. Soon they're dating, and falling in love. When Anna's student visa expires she can't bear the thought of separation and takes the rash decision to stay on. After finally heading home for a visit, she finds herself denied access back into the US, and the couple are faced with trying to keep their relationship alive from opposite sides of the Atlantic. While they wait out US immigration bureaucracy, they have to figure out whether theirs really is lasting true love, or a rash set of promises that threaten to weigh them down. Director Drake Doremus and his talented cast paint a credible picture of the travails of young love, perfectly complemented by the film's lively visual style. Strong support is provided by Alex Kingston and Oliver Muirhead as Anna's parents, and from Jennifer Lawrence (Winter's Bone) as a rival for Jacob's affections.
Sandra Hebron
MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE
A couple find themselves stuck on opposite sides of the Atlantic in a fresh and original story of young love.
One of the most popular and sought-after titles in Sundance this year, Like Crazy takes a fresh and youthful look at the vacillations of long-distance romance. Anna (Felicity Jones) is a young English woman studying in LA, who spies a good-looking man, Jacob (Anton Yelchin) at the back of her class. Soon they're dating, and falling in love. When Anna's student visa expires she can't bear the thought of separation and takes the rash decision to stay on. After finally heading home for a visit, she finds herself denied access back into the US, and the couple are faced with trying to keep their relationship alive from opposite sides of the Atlantic. While they wait out US immigration bureaucracy, they have to figure out whether theirs really is lasting true love, or a rash set of promises that threaten to weigh them down. Director Drake Doremus and his talented cast paint a credible picture of the travails of young love, perfectly complemented by the film's lively visual style. Strong support is provided by Alex Kingston and Oliver Muirhead as Anna's parents, and from Jennifer Lawrence (Winter's Bone) as a rival for Jacob's affections.
Sandra Hebron
MICHAEL
A disturbing film showing the last few months of the involuntary life together of a 35 year old man and a ten year old boy.
To all outward appearances Michael, 35, leads a normal, unremarkable life. He works in insurance, has a sister he sees from time to time, goes on the occasional trip with colleagues from work but largely keeps himself to himself. Arriving home to his neat and tidy suburban house, he prepares dinner. But what is different about Michael is that he will be sharing the meal with Wolfgang, a ten-year-old boy he is keeping captive in his cellar. Director Markus Schleinzer describes the film as showing the last five months of Michael and Wolfgang's 'involuntary' life together. Schleinzer, who has worked extensively as a casting director in Austria with filmmakers including Michael Haneke and Jessica Hausner, approaches his incendiary subject with restraint, eschewing emotion or judgement. Much of what he shows us is the familiarity and small detail of Michael's life, and that of two people who have lived in close proximity for some time. Schleinzer's low-key approach builds tension and discomfort, and whilst Michael is far from being a sympathetic character, his sheer mundanity makes his actions all the more chilling.
Sandra Hebron
MISS BALA
A thrilling, unrelenting actioner that wears sincere socio-political concerns about the drug wars in Mexico on its sleeve.
Laura is an ordinary girl whose dreams of becoming a beauty queen might see her escaping her humble circumstances in the Mexican border city of Baja. On the eve of a contest audition, she is persuaded to go to a seedy nightclub by her friend Suzu. Laura bears witness to a brutal slaughter and loses Suzu in the ensuing melee. The search for her missing friend brings her into contact with gangster kingpin Lino, who casually takes advantage of Laura's situation to use it for his own ends, forcing her to work while convincing few other than himself that he's acting out of benevolence. Laura's descent into a lawless underworld becomes increasingly desperate. Elegantly directed with sweeping tracking shots and skilfully choreographed shoot-outs, the latest film from Gerardo Naranjo is a bold step on from his previous much-admired features, Drama/Mex and I'm Going to Explode. Miss Bala is a deft feat, a thrilling, unrelenting actioner that wears sincere socio-political concerns about the drug wars in Mexico on its sleeve. At its centre is a breakout performance from model-turned-actress Stephanie Sigman, who is exceptional as the innocent naïf sucked into a punishing world, like Josef K in a swimsuit.
Michael Hayden
ONCE UPON A TIME IN ANATOLIA
Ceylan’s most audacious film yet is a measured, masterly account of a police investigation, Chekhovian in its piercing insights, subtle wit and thematic richness.
Alongside The Tree of Life, Ceylan's Grand Prix-winner was widely regarded as the most rewardingly audacious film in Cannes this year. Its lithe if meticulously constructed story, starting at dusk and ending around the middle of the next day, follows the search by police, prosecutors, a doctor and the alleged culprit for the body of a man buried in the Anatolian steppes (but where exactly?) after a brawl. From this slow yet wholly engrossing account of a rambling, shambling investigation that steadily shifts focus from a group of mostly garrulous characters to the aforementioned doctor, Ceylan fashions a richly quizzical meditation on a range of interwoven themes: the concerns and manners of provincial life; our relationship with the places we inhabit; the balancing of ethics and pragmatism; our need to hold on to the banalities of life when faced with misfortune, absurdity and death. And more; even by his own remarkable standards, this is hugely impressive. The piercing insights and dry wit, the feel for the subtle rhythms of human interaction, the beautiful, superbly expressive Scope images confirm Ceylan's status as a master of cinema.
Geoff Andrew
OSLO, AUGUST 31ST
Stylish and contemplative tale of a young man's wistful return to the city he loves. A stunning new film from the creators of Reprise (LFF 2006).
Recovering drug addict Anders has almost completed his rehabilitation programme. As part of his treatment he's given a day's leave from the countryside rehab centre to attend a job interview in his native Oslo. Smart, handsome and witty, Anders has great promise but also an almost inevitable melancholy and worldweariness about him. Poignantly setting the tone for the piece, Anders begins his day with an aborted suicide attempt, and it is no surprise that he later deliberately flunks the job interview. Anders, it seems, is more interested in using his day to revisit, reassess and try to reconnect with the city and people he loves. His journey through the sights and sounds of Oslo is at once tense and compelling, but is handled with a great warmth and deceptive lightness of touch by director Joachim Trier (Reprise, LFF 2006). Inspired by the Pierre Drieu La Rochelle novel Le feu follet, Oslo, August 31st is imbued with a New Wave sensibility in both style and approach. There is a refreshing freedom in actor Anders Danielsen Lie's intense yet seemingly effortless performance, which is underscored by Trier's stunning direction and sound design.
Sarah Lutton
PARIAH
A distinctive and realistic coming of age and coming out story about a young African-American woman's search for identity.
If the title of this emotionally honest and powerful drama seems familiar, it might be that some of you were able to see director Dee Rees' short film of the same name when it screened in 2008's BFI London Lesbian & Gay Film Festival, winning the Iris prize. For her feature debut, Rees has expanded the story and deepened the character study, and the result is a distinctive, believable coming-out and coming-of-age story about a young African-American exploring her identity and figuring out what kind of woman she wants to be. Brought up in a close middle-class Brooklyn family, Alike (Adepero Oduye) is a straight-A student, a budding poet and an inexperienced lesbian. While Laura, her bolder and more worldly friend, tries to help her get a date, her overprotective parents react with denial and disgust at their daughter's emerging sexuality. Rees, who says Pariah is semi-autobiographical, brings humour and a fresh and youthful feel to Alike's story. Adepero Oduye's restrained central performance is sympathetic and entirely convincing, and Bradford Young's cinematography, which was deservedly given an award in Sundance this year, gives the film a vivid contemporary feel.
Sandra Hebron
RAMPART
The best crime movie of recent times; Woody Harrelson delivers a performance guaranteed to be one of the most talked about of the year.
Los Angeles in the late 1990s, and the city is seeing out a wretched decade. With memories of Rodney King's beating still festering and an investigation into the force's alleged corruption ongoing, the last thing the LAPD needs is a cop as unrepentantly dirty as Dave Brown, who is caught on film administering vicious instant justice to a careless driver. The powers-that-be relish the opportunity to begin disciplinary action that they hope will see Brown out on his ear, sacrificed as evidence of the department cleaning up its act. Brown shrugs off the charges and digs his heels in. Away from the job, Brown indulges in shameless womanising while living with his two ex-wives (Anne Heche and Cynthia Nixon), sisters who are the mothers to his two disaffected daughters. It's not a domestic set-up that provides succour, and the pressures on Brown begin to tell. Working with a James Ellroy screenplay, Oren Moverman and Woody Harrelson have reunited following The Messenger to create the most searing, convincing and brilliant crime movies of recent times, with Harrelson delivering a performance guaranteed to be one of the most talked about of the year, arguably the finest of a stellar career.
Michael Hayden
RESTLESS
An affecting and delicate teen romance which confirms Gus Van Sant as one of Hollywood’s most astute and sensitive chroniclers of American youth.
An affecting and delicate teen romance, Gus Van Sant's Restless charts the first love between students Enoch and Annabelle, a couple of like-minded outsiders who first encounter one another at a funeral in their native Portland. The location of that initial 'meet-cute' points to the tragedy-tinged melancholy that underpins the film's sense of airy charm. Orphaned by a terrible car crash, Enoch (appealingly played by Henry Hopper, son of Dennis) is a withdrawn, sensitive kid whose spare time is spent gatecrashing funerals and conversing with the ghost of a kamikaze pilot; Annabelle (Mia Wasikowska) meanwhile is having to confront mortality in a much starker way, having been diagnosed with life-threatening cancer some time before dating Enoch. Owing something to the gothic whimsy of Hal Ashby's 1971 Harold and Maude, the film combines droll restraint with swoony intensity, and confirms Van Sant as one of Hollywood's most astute and sensitive chroniclers of American youth.
Edward Lawrenson
SARAH PALIN - YOU BETCHA
Nick Broomfield and Joan Churchill travel to Wasilla, Alaska, on the trail of Sarah Palin.
Nick Broomfield's films have been concerned with controversial political figures who wielded genuine power and influence in the past, memorably Margaret Thatcher and Eugene Terreblanche. A gaffe-prone vice-presidential candidate who was on the losing ticket at the 2008 American election would seem small fry in comparison, yet Sarah Palin remains an intriguing, divisive figure in the States and beyond, and, as Broomfield points out, one of the fascinating things about her is not that she failed in a bid to get to the White House, but how close she came to it. Broomfield and Joan Churchill travel to Wasilla, Alaska, where Palin was a school sports star and beauty queen before being elected mayor, a major step on her journey to becoming state governor. He speaks to her parents, and to former aides and supporters, many of whom feel they were thrown 'under the bus' as Palin's political career advanced. While he admits to being briefly charmed when he comes into Palin's orbit, the picture is painted of a disengaged, self-serving opportunist whose political days are numbered. At the time of writing, Palin has yet to deny she'll seek the Republican nomination for the Presidency in 2012. This film could influence how much her candidacy would be cheered or derided.
Michael Hayden
THE SNOWS OF KILIMANJARO
Les neiges du Kilimandjaro (2011) film clip (ΤΑ... by myfilm-gr
Director Robert Guédiguian returns to his old Marseille stamping ground for an entertaining, politically passionate drama starring the director's ensemble regulars.
Inspired not by the Hemingway novel but by a Victor Hugo poem, the latest from Robert Guédiguian sees him returning to L'Estaque, the working-class Marseille neighbourhood that inspired his Marius and Jeannette. Brimming with passion, humanity and political conviction, the film asks what it means to be socialist in the 21st century. Standing shoulder-to-shoulder with laid-off comrades, union rep Michel finds himself jobless, but faces the future with dogged optimism. Then, for their anniversary, he and his wife Marie-Claire are presented with a cash gift and tickets for an African dream holiday. But a shocking event leaves the couple and their circle traumatised, and causes Michel to ponder the nature of solidarity, and on the fact that justice for some can entail deprivation for others. Guédiguian's L'Estaque cycle revives the regionalist pride of Marcel Pagnol and the socialist humanism of Jean Renoir, and these qualities shine in the best scenes between Guédiguian's repertory regulars, who exude a rare sense of family intimacy. Some of the characterisation is unapologetically broad - there's no shortage of cold-eyed bureaucrats and snippy hautes bourgeoises - but this is political storytelling at its most entertaining.
Jonathan Romney
SING YOUR SONG
A celebratory documentary about Harry Belafonte, focusing on his lifelong political activism and human rights work.
By any measure, Harry Belafonte's life has been an extraordinary one, and this celebratory documentary from Susanne Rostock draws on rich archival material and intimate testimonies to reveal the life and legacy of the singer, actor and social activist. What emerges is a portrait of a man whose artistic career is indivisible from his determined and ongoing commitment to fighting political and social injustice. Belafonte's early stage and singing career, inspired by Paul Robeson as well as by his time spent living in Jamaica, his experiences touring and performing in a segregated country, and his later and provocative move into Hollywood, are all woven into a story that charts a generation of struggle. Still active in his eighties, Belafonte was blacklisted in the McCarthy era, mobilised celebrities in the civil rights movement in the 60s, helped the fight against apartheid in South Africa, protested against the regimes in Haiti and the war in Iraq, as well as continuing to fight inequalities in the US that 'we thought we fixed 50 years ago'. Revealing, informative and uplifting, Rostock's film is a fitting tribute to an inspirational man.
Sandra Hebron
SLEEPLESS NIGHTS STORIES
Jonas Mekas invites viewers on a tour through his nightlife, bringing together twenty-five stories of life, love and friendship.
Jonas Mekas' opening confession that he suffers from insomnia will come as no surprise to anyone aware of his singular contribution to cinema. Over 50 years he has established and promoted a viable culture for truly independent and avant-garde filmmaking, and his recent acceptance by the art world has brought a long overdue wave of attention and success. Sleepless Nights Stories is the latest in the series of long-form diary films that Mekas has been making since his arrival in the USA in 1949. Eating, drinking, singing and dancing with friends, the tireless octogenarian is full of life and wonder, casually weaving together contemporary folk tales collected during travels across the globe. Marina Abramovic fantasises about domesticity, Lee Stringer recounts an episode from his crack-addicted past, and the protagonist toasts the 'working class voice' of Amy Winehouse. Treating significant and inconsequential moments with equal import, Mekas' modern-day saga presents the first episodes from his ambitious '1001 Nights' project.
Mark Webber
SNOWTOWN
The shocking dramatisation of Australia's most notorious serial killings.
Jamie is 16 years-old, living with his mother and two brothers in Adelaide's northern suburbs, a disenfranchised community festering with violence, bigotry, rumour and suspicion. Disgusted by the aggression and hopelessness he witnesses, he yearns for escape, though when the charismatic John Bunting starts spending an increasing amount of time with the family, Jamie recognises the man as a father figure. He's not the only one to fall under the spell of Bunting, who spouts hate-fuelled, righteous rhetoric that is empowering for people who have little else. Yet Jamie starts to become suspicious of Bunting's erratic behaviour, and more so when people start to disappear. How far is Jamie prepared to immerse himself in Bunting's dark world? The dramatisation of Australia's most notorious spate of serial killings, the 'bodies in the barrels' murders of 1999, Snowtown is the remarkable directorial debut of Justin Kurzel, a sincere examination of violence that is no cheap slasher movie. Kurzel takes a journalistic fascination in addressing real horror and recent history, and the resulting film is authoritative, disturbing and shockingly convincing.
Michael Hayden
TAKE SHELTER
An extraordinary tale of ordinary madness.
Curtis LaForche (Michael Shannon) is a working stiff in a small Ohio town, a crew chief for a sand-mining company. Money is tight, though Curtis finds solace in his supportive family, and devotion to his loving wife Samantha (Jessica Chastain) and their young daughter Hannah (Tova Stewart), who is deaf. There seems little remarkable about the man, yet he is in the shadow of a dark cloud and becomes increasingly plagued by apocalyptic apparitions. Haunted by his fears, his behaviour becomes erratic, and Curtis risks alienating the local community and stretching relationships with those closest to him beyond breaking point. Following Shotgun Stories from 2007, Jeff Nichols returns to the Festival with an extraordinary tale of ordinary madness that took two awards at Cannes this year, a deeply resonant vision that audaciously probes the psyche of modern America. Michael Shannon is emerging as one of the most significant screen actors working today, and his already considerable reputation is enhanced in this latest collaboration with Nichols. While his actions are often strange or questionable, Shannon's Curtis is a touching and vulnerable character, a thoroughly convincing everyman for our times.
Michael Hayden
TERRI
An affectionate and subtly drawn study of a teenage loner, with strong performances and lyrical visuals.
Azazel Jacobs charmed LFF audiences with his previous film Momma's Man, and seems set to do the same with Terri, an affectionate and subtly drawn study of a teenage outsider. Beautifully played by newcomer Jacob Wysocki, Terri is a large, lumbering adolescent who has been left to live with his ailing uncle in a cottage in the woods. His gentle demeanour and outsize physique see him routinely teased and bullied at school, something he deals with by withdrawing and becoming ever more insular. When Mr Fitzgerald (John C Reilly), the school's sincere but embarrassing vice-principal, takes an interest in him, the teacher's efforts to help only compound Terri's outcast status. Fitzgerald's robust but inept encouragements provide much of the film's humour, but they do slowly get through to Terri, who begins to see that life might not have to be quite such a solitary affair. While Terri's story might not sound so different from a host of other high-school misfit movies, Jacobs' approach is highly original and unafraid to surprise us, wise and very funny by turn. Marrying emotional insight with lyrical visuals, he makes Terri's loneliness and sense of difference keenly and compassionately felt.
Sandra Hebron
THIS MUST BE THE PLACE
Oddball retired rock star Cheyenne (Sean Penn) goes on a rambling road trip across the USA in search of someone his father had been trying to find.
Sean Penn is simply astonishing here, playing Cheyenne, a retired , reclusive and oddball rock star (think of Robert Smith from The Cure, crossed with Michael Jackson, replete with the perfectly rendered, high- pitched voice) living just outside Dublin. His father's serious illness forces Cheyenne reluctantly back to America, and onwards to an unusual, offbeat cross-country road trip, in search of someone and something of purpose in his stalled life. This Must Be the Place has a picaresque feel, studded with idiosyncratic encounters, powerful vignettes and wonderful cameos (including one from David Byrne, who also co-wrote the wonderful eclectic roots-and-rock soundtrack). Pleasantly echoing movies like Paris, Texas and True Stories, This Must Be the Place also benefits from a sharp, confident script full of warmth, smart dialogue and, occasionally, laugh-out-loud humour. After a series of impressive Italian films, including the critically lauded Il Divo, director Paolo Sorrentino expands his global horizons to impressive effect with this, his first English-language film, stylishly shot in Ireland and the USA.
Adrian Wootton
WHEN THE NIGHT
Intense bittersweet romantic melodrama about the unusual relationship between a young lonely mother and a mountain guide in the Alps whose family has left him.
A young married woman, Marina (the convincing Claudia Pandolfi) is lonely and emotionally disturbed by the strain of constant ministering to her two-year-old son. While on an enforced 'holiday' in the Alps, she strikes up, in the most distressing circumstances, an unlikely love-hate relationship with Manfred, a misanthropic mountain guide (the wonderful Filippo Timi) whose wife has left him, taking their children with her. Set against a starkly beautiful but wild and dangerous backdrop that is a notable feature of the film's atmosphere and impact, When the Night is a tour de force adult melodrama that recalls both David Lean's Passionate Friends and Ulu Grosbard's Falling In Love but is distinct from both. Unsentimental yet emotionally resonant, Cristina Comencini's striking film is very much from the female protagonist's point of view (allowing her to articulate some of the very real problems a young mother can experience) but is neither dogmatic nor mundane. When the Night has a strong narrative that has some real surprises, and is compelling because of the way it cleverly unfolds a bittersweet love story.
Adrian Wootton
WHERE DO WE GO NOW?
An uplifting story of female solidarity and good sense crossing the religious divide between Christians and Muslims.
One joyous viewing experience in this year's Cannes festival was Nadine Labaki's second feature (following Caramel in 2007), a story of female sense and solidarity crossing religious divides. In a remote Middle Eastern village, Christians and Muslims have lived side by side all their lives, largely in harmony despite the odd outbursts of rage between the menfolk. Although the village is largely cut off from the outside world, with a broken bridge, landmines in the surrounding countryside and next to no television reception to speak of, news of escalating religious conflict does start to filter through, and tension begins to rise. As the men grow increasingly hot-headed, the women hatch inventive and elaborate plans to distract them and defuse the situation. Labaki's warm and funny film plays it broad, with some lovely comic characters and situations, as well as some enjoyable musical numbers. Her cast, a mix of professionals and local villagers, are engaging and convincing, including Labaki herself as the owner of the local café. While some might object to the film's idealistic view, a bit of wishful thinking is often a blessed relief.
Sandra Hebron
WUTHERING HEIGHTS
Andrea Arnold's radical and beautifully filmed adaptation of this classic tale of obsessive love.
Director Andrea Arnold (Red Road, Fish Tank) is one of contemporary British cinema's boldest directors, so who better to put her own distinctive stamp on a tale of obsessive love and class division that has already inspired such cinematic luminaries as Wyler, Rivette and Buñuel? In Emily Brontë's novel, a Yorkshire farmer on a visit to Liverpool finds a homeless boy on the streets and takes him home to live as part of his family at their isolated moorland farm. The boy develops an all-consuming relationship with the farmer's daughter, and provokes jealousy and resentment from her brother. Arnold has brought a timeless universality to the story, and has succeeded in making Heathcliff and Cathy, two of literature's best known characters, feel entirely fresh and new. While respectful of the original text, this is a decidedly radical interpretation, not least in its casting of young unknowns in the lead roles. Equally original is the film's breathtaking visual style; for while there is no shortage of filmed versions of Yorkshire's wild and windy moors, it's unlikely you will ever have seen them so bleakly and beautifully captured as here.
Sandra Hebron
