Mubi's retrospective, Catherine Breillat, Auteur of Porn?, is showing April 4 - June 3, 2017 in Germany.Sex Is ComedyThroughout her career, Catherine Breillat has provided viewers with a long-form meta-cinema experience. While metacinema is as old as the medium itself, since her debut feature A Real Young Girl in 1976, Breillat has developed a distinct form of it: one that collapses ‘autobiographical’ material, various artistic sensibilities, and the process of filmmaking itself.Like dozens of other English words—such as ‘aesthetic’ or ‘abject’—the word ‘meta’ has been largely misused or misapplied with regard to the film and literary criticism. Regarding the consumption of fiction, the appropriate use of the term 'metafiction,' 'metafilm,' et cetera, has its basis in the Greek meta, which does not translate directly into English but can be understood as a preposition similar to the English word ‘about’ (‘having to do with,’ or ‘on the subject of’). Metafiction is therefore,...
- 4/24/2017
- MUBI
Christian Petzold took a bold step into history with 2012's Barbara, exiling Nina Hoss's heroine into the diaphanous threats and suspicions of a provincial, 1980s East Germany. With Phoenix, his follow-up, Petzold takes this movement into history even further, striking starkly, deeply at questions of identity in a post-war Germany quivering silently with destitution, rage, and willful blindness. In a spectral sequence opening the film directly evoking the eerie clinical imagery of Georges Franju's lyrical horror film Eyes without a Face, Nelly, a concentration camp survivor, returns in quiet to Berlin after having reconstructive surgery following wartime mutilations. The woman who emerges from under the knife cannot be recognized. She emerges as embodied by Nina Hoss—a true queen in today's cinema—and her slender, lean physique becomes that of a post-war zombie, a ghost embodied, tottering and halting, a body not familiar with movements outside the camp,...
- 2/26/2015
- by Daniel Kasman
- MUBI
Visage...
Voice...
Vitaphone...
In Dimitri Kirsanoff's Menilmontant a destitute waif, betrayed and abandoned by the man who seduced her, sits on a park bench with her newborn infant. Beside her is an old man eating a sandwich. This wordless exchange is one of the greatest moments ever committed to film. Nadia Sibirskaia’s face reveals all of life’s cruel mysteries as she gazes upon a crust of bread.
The persistence of hope is the dark angel that underlies despair, and here it taunts her mercilessly. A whole series of fluctuations of expression and movement in reaction to anguish, physical pain involving hesitation, dignity, ravenous hunger, survival, self-contempt, modesty, boundless gratitude. All articulated with absolute clarity without hitting notes (without touching the keys). Chaplin could have played either the old man on the bench (his mustache is a sensory device!) or Nadia. And it would have been masterful and deeply affecting,...
Voice...
Vitaphone...
In Dimitri Kirsanoff's Menilmontant a destitute waif, betrayed and abandoned by the man who seduced her, sits on a park bench with her newborn infant. Beside her is an old man eating a sandwich. This wordless exchange is one of the greatest moments ever committed to film. Nadia Sibirskaia’s face reveals all of life’s cruel mysteries as she gazes upon a crust of bread.
The persistence of hope is the dark angel that underlies despair, and here it taunts her mercilessly. A whole series of fluctuations of expression and movement in reaction to anguish, physical pain involving hesitation, dignity, ravenous hunger, survival, self-contempt, modesty, boundless gratitude. All articulated with absolute clarity without hitting notes (without touching the keys). Chaplin could have played either the old man on the bench (his mustache is a sensory device!) or Nadia. And it would have been masterful and deeply affecting,...
- 6/30/2014
- by Daniel Riccuito
- MUBI
Walking around Edinburgh today it almost felt like there was a Film Festival taking place – an improvement over last year, when even the city’s residents seemed oblivious to the whole thing. Between films today I spotted a group of journalists snapping Festival patrons Tilda Swinton and Mark Cousins (whose film What Is This Film Called Love? I am seeing tomorrow). Elliott Gould could be seen hanging around the Cineworld in Fountainbridge. I was genuinely moved to look up from the DVDs in the Filmhouse foyer today and find that the sweet little lady smiling back at me was Thelma Schoonmaker, long-time collaborator of Martin Scorsese, widow of British film legend Michael Powell, and one of the finest editors in cinema history.
I kicked off today with a documentary about which I knew zip: One Mile Away. It explores gang culture in Birmingham, and the long-standing feud between the Burger...
I kicked off today with a documentary about which I knew zip: One Mile Away. It explores gang culture in Birmingham, and the long-standing feud between the Burger...
- 6/23/2012
- by Adam Whyte
- Obsessed with Film
Second # 1128, 18:48
1. “The first thing I need,” Jeffrey tells Sandy, “is to get into her apartment and open a window that I can crawl into later.” As it turns out, this plot line never develops, as Jeffrey spots a key to Dorothy’s apartment which he takes instead. It seems like a minor point, the window, (although in the apartment in his bug overalls Jeffrey does glance twice at the window above Dorothy’s sink) and we soon forget about it. It’s one of those moments in Blue Velvet that only obliquely and in the most obscure ways references Hollywood’s past, in this case Rear Window, itself a movie about vision, about watching, about discovering oneself by looking at others, and which also features a protagonist named Jeff. (“You look out the window. You see things you shouldn’t,” Stella tells Jeff, played by Jimmy Stewart.)
2. In his novel Suspicion,...
1. “The first thing I need,” Jeffrey tells Sandy, “is to get into her apartment and open a window that I can crawl into later.” As it turns out, this plot line never develops, as Jeffrey spots a key to Dorothy’s apartment which he takes instead. It seems like a minor point, the window, (although in the apartment in his bug overalls Jeffrey does glance twice at the window above Dorothy’s sink) and we soon forget about it. It’s one of those moments in Blue Velvet that only obliquely and in the most obscure ways references Hollywood’s past, in this case Rear Window, itself a movie about vision, about watching, about discovering oneself by looking at others, and which also features a protagonist named Jeff. (“You look out the window. You see things you shouldn’t,” Stella tells Jeff, played by Jimmy Stewart.)
2. In his novel Suspicion,...
- 10/3/2011
- by Nicholas Rombes
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Actor Al Freeman Jr. is 77 today. The accomplished actor, who began his career in an episode of the 1958 TV series Suspicion, became the first African-American actor to be honored with an Emmy award in the Best Lead Actor category. His credits include a long list of various television programs and movies such as Kojak, Roots: The Next Generation, Dutchman, soap opera One Life To Live and Down In The Delta. Playing Elijah Muhammed in Spike Lee’s Malcolm X may be considered his most memorable role.
Actress Sabrina LeBeauf will be 53 today. The actress is probably best known for her role as Sondra Huxtable on The Cosby Show. She beat out Whitney Houston for that role. She earned a BA in Theatre Arts from UCLA and an Mfa in acting from the Yale School of Drama where she was a classmate of John Turturro, Charles S. Dutton and Oscar-nominee Angela Bassett.
Actress Sabrina LeBeauf will be 53 today. The actress is probably best known for her role as Sondra Huxtable on The Cosby Show. She beat out Whitney Houston for that role. She earned a BA in Theatre Arts from UCLA and an Mfa in acting from the Yale School of Drama where she was a classmate of John Turturro, Charles S. Dutton and Oscar-nominee Angela Bassett.
- 3/21/2011
- by Cynthia
- ShadowAndAct
Charlie Chan definitely has a place among the pantheon of famous fictional detectives. He is certainly one of the more controversial ones. Although Chan is undoubtedly a hero, many Asians resent the character as an ethnic stereotype. Chan is polite and soft spoken, never lacking an appropriate old Chinese proverb to suit the occasion.
The character of Charlie Chan was created by Earl Derr Biggers in 1923 as a rebuttal to the “Yellow Peril” stereotypes so common in literature of the day, such as Fu Manchu. Biggers lived in Hawaii and resented the unflattering Asian clichés so he invented a benign Chinese Investigator working for the Honolulu Police Force. He wrote several Chan novels. The honorable Chinese Detective became so popular that he was soon adapted into film. There were many Chan films, starting in the silent film era. Early films actually starred Chinese actors but the Audience didn’t respond to Asian Leading men.
The character of Charlie Chan was created by Earl Derr Biggers in 1923 as a rebuttal to the “Yellow Peril” stereotypes so common in literature of the day, such as Fu Manchu. Biggers lived in Hawaii and resented the unflattering Asian clichés so he invented a benign Chinese Investigator working for the Honolulu Police Force. He wrote several Chan novels. The honorable Chinese Detective became so popular that he was soon adapted into film. There were many Chan films, starting in the silent film era. Early films actually starred Chinese actors but the Audience didn’t respond to Asian Leading men.
- 6/5/2010
- by Rob Young
- JustPressPlay.net
Saturday’s weather in NYC was too lovely for me to stay inside, and so I missed yesterday’s birthdays. Thus, today will include yesterday’s and today’s.
Yesterday, 3/20/10, Spike Lee turned 53 yesterday. Happy belated b-day Spike! You know we love ya around these parts, despite any criticisms we’ve previously leveled against you .
Today, 3/21/10:vDJ Premier is 44 years old today. The other half of rap duo Gang Starr (Guru being the other) has never acted, but you can find his music on the soundtracks of numerous films, including, most recently, Get Smart in 2008.
Al Freeman Jr is 76 years old today. The first African-American actor to be so honored with an Emmy award in the Best Lead Actor category, began his career in 1958, in an episode of a TV series titled Suspicion. The role he won the Emmy for is possibly his most recognized – as Police Captain Ed Hall on the ABC soap opera,...
Yesterday, 3/20/10, Spike Lee turned 53 yesterday. Happy belated b-day Spike! You know we love ya around these parts, despite any criticisms we’ve previously leveled against you .
Today, 3/21/10:vDJ Premier is 44 years old today. The other half of rap duo Gang Starr (Guru being the other) has never acted, but you can find his music on the soundtracks of numerous films, including, most recently, Get Smart in 2008.
Al Freeman Jr is 76 years old today. The first African-American actor to be so honored with an Emmy award in the Best Lead Actor category, began his career in 1958, in an episode of a TV series titled Suspicion. The role he won the Emmy for is possibly his most recognized – as Police Captain Ed Hall on the ABC soap opera,...
- 3/21/2010
- by Tambay
- ShadowAndAct
It’s that time of year again, when sites the web-over compile helpful holiday shopping lists to guide you into the deepest, darkest pits of retail with a map that will hopefully get you out alive. Here now, without further ado, is the 2009 Quick Stop Holiday Shopping Guide.
(If you see anything you like, please support Quick Stop by using the links below to make your holiday purchases - it’s appreciated!)
I’ve banged on about for years, and I’m going to keep going virtual door to virtual door until the word gets out about Qi. If you’ve never heard of the UK quiz program Qi, you’re missing out on one of the funniest “educational” shows ever devised (the devisee being creator/producer John Lloyd, formerly of Blackadder, Not The Nine O’Clock News, and Spitting Image). The key to Qi (which stands for “Quite Interesting...
(If you see anything you like, please support Quick Stop by using the links below to make your holiday purchases - it’s appreciated!)
I’ve banged on about for years, and I’m going to keep going virtual door to virtual door until the word gets out about Qi. If you’ve never heard of the UK quiz program Qi, you’re missing out on one of the funniest “educational” shows ever devised (the devisee being creator/producer John Lloyd, formerly of Blackadder, Not The Nine O’Clock News, and Spitting Image). The key to Qi (which stands for “Quite Interesting...
- 12/11/2009
- by UncaScroogeMcD
As we creep closer to the 2009 Academy Awards, prognosticators look back as much as forward to try and determine who the favorites will be. By looking back, I mean to suggest that past Academy choices perhaps unfairly paint them in a certain light, and support the group's predictability and oft-whispered bias. For instance, feel good films generally trump depressors. Oscar loves a comeback story almost as much as they love to reward seasoned veterans with lead acting awards and fresh faces in the supporting roles (particularly supporting actress). And despite a requisite surprise or two every year, they mostly play it safe. Usually painfully boringly safe. That, and the fact they get it wrong more often than they get it right. So I present a glance at the ten most egregiously shortsighted Oscars ever given.
I'm focusing solely on the big one: Best Picture. If I included anything and everything,...
I'm focusing solely on the big one: Best Picture. If I included anything and everything,...
- 2/7/2009
- by Matt Medlock
- JustPressPlay.net
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.