Romanian director won Golden Bear at Berlinale in 2013 for ’Child’s Pose’.
Beta Cinema is to handle international sales on Familiar, the new film from Berlinale Golden Bear-winning director Călin Peter Netzer.
Familiar stars Romanian actor Emanuel Pârvu, known for films such as Graduation, Miracle and Tales From A Golden Age, as a movie director investigating the darkest secrets intoxicating his family.
Netzer wrote the script with the film’s main actress Iulia Lumânare and produced together with Oana Iancu through Parada Film, the company behind Romanian director Netzer’s 2013 Golden Bear winner Child’s Pose and his 2017 Silver Bear winner Ana, Mon Amour.
Beta Cinema is to handle international sales on Familiar, the new film from Berlinale Golden Bear-winning director Călin Peter Netzer.
Familiar stars Romanian actor Emanuel Pârvu, known for films such as Graduation, Miracle and Tales From A Golden Age, as a movie director investigating the darkest secrets intoxicating his family.
Netzer wrote the script with the film’s main actress Iulia Lumânare and produced together with Oana Iancu through Parada Film, the company behind Romanian director Netzer’s 2013 Golden Bear winner Child’s Pose and his 2017 Silver Bear winner Ana, Mon Amour.
- 4/26/2023
- by Tim Dams
- ScreenDaily
Exclusive: Matt Brodlie and Jonathan Kier’s Upgrade Productions has boarded world sales rights to Shoah feature Shttl, which played at the London and Rome Film Festivals (where it won the audience award) this fall.
The film was previously with Bron Releasing but is no longer on the slate after Bron needed to streamline its film business.
Black and white drama Shttl follows the inhabitants of a Yiddish Ukrainian village on the eve of the Nazi invasion, known as Operation Barberossa.
Shot in Ukraine last year (with an almost entirely Ukrainian crew), the production fully reconstructed a traditional shtetl (or village) outside of Kiev to recreate life prior to the Nazi onslaught (as few traces of that life now remain), but it was subsequently destroyed by the Russian invasion earlier this year. Following the filming in 2021, the set (which included a synagogue which had been blessed and consecrated) had been...
The film was previously with Bron Releasing but is no longer on the slate after Bron needed to streamline its film business.
Black and white drama Shttl follows the inhabitants of a Yiddish Ukrainian village on the eve of the Nazi invasion, known as Operation Barberossa.
Shot in Ukraine last year (with an almost entirely Ukrainian crew), the production fully reconstructed a traditional shtetl (or village) outside of Kiev to recreate life prior to the Nazi onslaught (as few traces of that life now remain), but it was subsequently destroyed by the Russian invasion earlier this year. Following the filming in 2021, the set (which included a synagogue which had been blessed and consecrated) had been...
- 12/16/2022
- by Andreas Wiseman
- Deadline Film + TV
It is 1972, in Bucharest. Ceaușescu has been in power for seven years, and the fabric of ordinary life has been steeped long enough in his regime’s corrosively oppressive mandate that it has begun to fray. Yet against this backdrop of gathering gloom, bright, fresh first love is blossoming. This is already a fertile setup for an atmospheric, doomed romance, but Alexandru Belc’s slow, stylish, richly imagined feature debut is much more than a Romanian riff on Romeo and Juliet. A metronome keeps time for musicians; “Metronom” describes how insidiously even the young — those most inclined toward rebellion and optimistic self-expression in any society — can be made to fall in step with authoritarianism’s joyless, frogmarching beat.
With this story of individual relationships stressed by systemic fearmongering, writer-director Belc — who previously worked with Cristian Mungiu and Corneliu Porumboiu, and picked up the directing award in this year’s Un...
With this story of individual relationships stressed by systemic fearmongering, writer-director Belc — who previously worked with Cristian Mungiu and Corneliu Porumboiu, and picked up the directing award in this year’s Un...
- 5/30/2022
- by Jessica Kiang
- Variety Film + TV
Bowing in Canneseries official selection, six-episode miniseries “Infiniti” isn’t just for sci-fi aficionados, Empreinte Digitale producer Eric Laroche told Variety.
Co-produced between France and Belgium, the latest Canal Plus offering – created by Stéphane Pannetier and Julien Vanlerenberghe – interweaves multiple storylines, moving from the International Space Station (Iss) that suddenly goes silent to an investigation in Kazakhstan, where a beheaded, wax-covered body is found by a local cop.
Discouraged by his superiors, Isaak (Daniyar Alshinov) decides to solve the mystery, while French astronaut Anna Zarathi (Céline Sallette) pursues her dream of space travel.
“Having more than one genre, especially in a TV series, is very interesting. But one of them still needs to form the skeleton of the show. In our case, it’s the murder mystery,” says Laroche.
“I am not a big traveler, but I live for cinema and for series. The first time I went to New York,...
Co-produced between France and Belgium, the latest Canal Plus offering – created by Stéphane Pannetier and Julien Vanlerenberghe – interweaves multiple storylines, moving from the International Space Station (Iss) that suddenly goes silent to an investigation in Kazakhstan, where a beheaded, wax-covered body is found by a local cop.
Discouraged by his superiors, Isaak (Daniyar Alshinov) decides to solve the mystery, while French astronaut Anna Zarathi (Céline Sallette) pursues her dream of space travel.
“Having more than one genre, especially in a TV series, is very interesting. But one of them still needs to form the skeleton of the show. In our case, it’s the murder mystery,” says Laroche.
“I am not a big traveler, but I live for cinema and for series. The first time I went to New York,...
- 4/4/2022
- by Marta Balaga
- Variety Film + TV
Germany’s Patra Spanou negotiated the deal with distributor Film Buró.
San Sebastian winner Blue Moon, which won the Golden Shell award for best film at this year’s 69th edition, has been secured for distribution in Spain by Film Buró.
German sales outfit Patra Spanou negotiated the deal with Film Buró’s Susana Rizzuti and Luis Angel Bellaba.
Romanian writer-director Alina Grigore’s debut feature is about a dysfunctional family living in a rural mountain region, a toxic environment that the film’s young heroine, played by Iona Chitu, is desperately trying to escape.
Grigore’s Blue Moon world-premiered...
San Sebastian winner Blue Moon, which won the Golden Shell award for best film at this year’s 69th edition, has been secured for distribution in Spain by Film Buró.
German sales outfit Patra Spanou negotiated the deal with Film Buró’s Susana Rizzuti and Luis Angel Bellaba.
Romanian writer-director Alina Grigore’s debut feature is about a dysfunctional family living in a rural mountain region, a toxic environment that the film’s young heroine, played by Iona Chitu, is desperately trying to escape.
Grigore’s Blue Moon world-premiered...
- 10/5/2021
- by Melissa Kasule
- ScreenDaily
An imperfect, attention-grabbing debut feature from Romanian actor-turned-director Alina Grigore, “Blue Moon” is named for a song, though not the one you might expect: a somewhat mordant local lullaby, sung late in proceedings, at a point when any hope of rest has long deserted its frazzled protagonist. Still, it’s impossible to approach the film without that Rodgers & Hart lonely-hearts standard running through your head — which, accidentally or otherwise, turns out to be an effective bit of misdirection. For the more time we spend with 22-year-old Irina (Ioana Chitu), the clearer it becomes that what she’s missing isn’t a love of her own or someone to care for: What she really, really needs is just to be left alone for longer than five minutes at a time.
That’s easier said than done in what turns out to be a . Whenever Irina tries to escape the noise, it...
That’s easier said than done in what turns out to be a . Whenever Irina tries to escape the noise, it...
- 9/30/2021
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
German sales outfit Patra Spanou Film has acquired the international sales rights to “Blue Moon,” the feature debut of Romanian director Alina Grigore, which will world premiere in main competition at September’s San Sebastian Film Festival.
“Blue Moon” follows the psychological journey of a young woman, played by Ioana Chitu, who struggles to receive a higher education and escape her dysfunctional family. An ambiguous sexual experience with an artist will spur her intention to fight the family’s violence.
Pic stars Chitu alongside Mircea Postelnicu, Mircea Silaghi, and Vlad Ivanov, and is produced by Gabi Suciu for InLight Center (“Illegitimate”), in co-production with Atelier de Film, Forest Film, Smart Sound Studios (“Monsters”) and Avanpost. It’s Grigore’s second feature as a writer, after she wrote and starred in Adrian Sitaru’s Berlinale prize winner “Illegitimate.”
“Romanian cinema has been in the focus of the international arthouse film scene for a while,...
“Blue Moon” follows the psychological journey of a young woman, played by Ioana Chitu, who struggles to receive a higher education and escape her dysfunctional family. An ambiguous sexual experience with an artist will spur her intention to fight the family’s violence.
Pic stars Chitu alongside Mircea Postelnicu, Mircea Silaghi, and Vlad Ivanov, and is produced by Gabi Suciu for InLight Center (“Illegitimate”), in co-production with Atelier de Film, Forest Film, Smart Sound Studios (“Monsters”) and Avanpost. It’s Grigore’s second feature as a writer, after she wrote and starred in Adrian Sitaru’s Berlinale prize winner “Illegitimate.”
“Romanian cinema has been in the focus of the international arthouse film scene for a while,...
- 8/3/2021
- by Christopher Vourlias
- Variety Film + TV
New features by Gabriel de Achim, Sebastian Mihailescu, Alina Grigore and Octav Chelaru.
The new feature by Gabriel de Achim and Sebastian Mihailescu’ debut documentary feature are among the new projects being presented to sales agents and festival programmers in the Closed Screenings industry strand of the Transilvania International Film Festival this week.
De Achim’s Snowing Darkness, which is produced by Anca Puiu and Smaranda Zarnoiau of Bucharest-based Mandragora, centres on a film director living through the traumatic experience of the death of his young daughter.
The director said the film “arose from a personal depression I thought I’d never overcome,...
The new feature by Gabriel de Achim and Sebastian Mihailescu’ debut documentary feature are among the new projects being presented to sales agents and festival programmers in the Closed Screenings industry strand of the Transilvania International Film Festival this week.
De Achim’s Snowing Darkness, which is produced by Anca Puiu and Smaranda Zarnoiau of Bucharest-based Mandragora, centres on a film director living through the traumatic experience of the death of his young daughter.
The director said the film “arose from a personal depression I thought I’d never overcome,...
- 7/30/2021
- by Martin Blaney
- ScreenDaily
Shame, self-reproach and secret communications fill this deeply disturbing story of two students in 80s Czechoslovakia
As if in a succession of scenes from a starkly remembered bad dream, this deeply disturbing film in haunting monochrome, from director Ivan Ostrochovský and co-writers Rebecca Lenkiewicz and Marek Lescák, tells the story of two students in a Catholic seminary in early-80s Czechoslovakia, part of the (real life) Pacem in Terris organisation, a collaborationist body through which the church submitted to state control in return for the right to (notional) existence.
Juraj (Samuel Skyva) and Michal (Samuel Polakovič) are fresh-faced boys who arrive at the seminary to find themselves in an austere haunted house of shame, reeking of paranoia, exhaustion and self-reproach. Dissident young priests are secretly communicating with the Vatican and with Radio Free Europe and the priestly authorities have neither the courage to endorse this defiance nor the ruthlessness to suppress it,...
As if in a succession of scenes from a starkly remembered bad dream, this deeply disturbing film in haunting monochrome, from director Ivan Ostrochovský and co-writers Rebecca Lenkiewicz and Marek Lescák, tells the story of two students in a Catholic seminary in early-80s Czechoslovakia, part of the (real life) Pacem in Terris organisation, a collaborationist body through which the church submitted to state control in return for the right to (notional) existence.
Juraj (Samuel Skyva) and Michal (Samuel Polakovič) are fresh-faced boys who arrive at the seminary to find themselves in an austere haunted house of shame, reeking of paranoia, exhaustion and self-reproach. Dissident young priests are secretly communicating with the Vatican and with Radio Free Europe and the priestly authorities have neither the courage to endorse this defiance nor the ruthlessness to suppress it,...
- 5/10/2021
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
The success of Paweł Pawlikowski’s Ida and Cold War has revealed, among arthouse audiences, a heretofore unimagined ravenous hunger for Eastern Bloc period dramas of Catholic conviction and political compulsion, shot in academy ratio and shimmery digital grayscale. Thus Servants, a hushed drama about underground activism, secret police, fear and trembling at a seminary in the former Czechoslovakia.
Two young seminarians, Juraj (Samuel Skyva) and Michal (Samuel Polakovic), arrive in Bratislava to further their studies. The seminary’s dean (Vladimir Strnisko) has maintained this sanctified space, with its almost medieval-brutalist bare walls, by accommodating himself and his institution to the state-affiliated Catholic movement Pacem in Terris, which in reality really was the Czechoslovak communist government’s primary check on the activity of the church post-Prague Spring. But the sounds of Radio Free Europe penetrate the cloistered environment, and students and teachers distribute fiery pamphlets. Juraj is drawn to an...
Two young seminarians, Juraj (Samuel Skyva) and Michal (Samuel Polakovic), arrive in Bratislava to further their studies. The seminary’s dean (Vladimir Strnisko) has maintained this sanctified space, with its almost medieval-brutalist bare walls, by accommodating himself and his institution to the state-affiliated Catholic movement Pacem in Terris, which in reality really was the Czechoslovak communist government’s primary check on the activity of the church post-Prague Spring. But the sounds of Radio Free Europe penetrate the cloistered environment, and students and teachers distribute fiery pamphlets. Juraj is drawn to an...
- 12/9/2020
- by Mark Asch
- The Film Stage
Dea Kulumbegashvili’s debut feature Beginning (Main Slate selection of the New York Film Festival), co-written with Rati Oneli, executive produced by Carlos Reygadas and Gaetan Rousseau, stars Ia Sukhitashvili with Oneli and Kakha Kintsurashvili. Matthieu Taponier, the editor of László Nemes’s Oscar-winning film Son Of Saul, starring Géza Röhrig, was also the editor and co-writer with Nemes and Clara Royer on Sunset (Napszállta), featuring Juli Jakab and Vlad Ivanov. Taponier edited Beginning, shot by Arseni Khachaturan with music by Nicolas Jaar.
Beginning begins in a small Jehovah's Witness prayer house in rural Georgia. The woman Yana (Ia Sukhitashvili) whose story this is, greets the congregation one by one as they enter. The carpet is red, the people are happy to attend. Yana’s husband David (Rati Oneli) gives the sermon about Abraham and Isaac, and asks if Abraham was really intent on killing Isaac, his...
Beginning begins in a small Jehovah's Witness prayer house in rural Georgia. The woman Yana (Ia Sukhitashvili) whose story this is, greets the congregation one by one as they enter. The carpet is red, the people are happy to attend. Yana’s husband David (Rati Oneli) gives the sermon about Abraham and Isaac, and asks if Abraham was really intent on killing Isaac, his...
- 10/12/2020
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Ia Sukhitashvili stars in Dea Kulumbegashvili's Beginning
Dea Kulumbegashvili’s debut feature Beginning, co-written with Rati Oneli, executive produced by Carlos Reygadas and Gaetan Rousseau, stars Ia Sukhitashvili with Oneli and Kakha Kintsurashvili. Matthieu Taponier, the editor of László Nemes’s Oscar-winning film Son Of Saul, starring Géza Röhrig was also the editor and co-writer with Nemes and Clara Royer on Sunset (Napszállta), featuring Juli Jakab and Vlad Ivanov. Taponier edited Beginning, shot by Arseni Khachaturan with music by Nicolas Jaar.
Koné Bakary in Night Of The Kings
During the Rethinking World Cinema panel discussion with Chaitanya Tamhane (The Disciple), Philippe Lacôte (Night of the Kings), Louis Henderson and Olivier Marboeuf (Ouvertures) at the New York Film Festival, I sent in the following comment and question for Dea Kulumbegashvili: You worked with Matthieu Taponier, the editor of László Nemes’s Son Of Saul and Sunset. Can you talk about your collaboration with him?...
Dea Kulumbegashvili’s debut feature Beginning, co-written with Rati Oneli, executive produced by Carlos Reygadas and Gaetan Rousseau, stars Ia Sukhitashvili with Oneli and Kakha Kintsurashvili. Matthieu Taponier, the editor of László Nemes’s Oscar-winning film Son Of Saul, starring Géza Röhrig was also the editor and co-writer with Nemes and Clara Royer on Sunset (Napszállta), featuring Juli Jakab and Vlad Ivanov. Taponier edited Beginning, shot by Arseni Khachaturan with music by Nicolas Jaar.
Koné Bakary in Night Of The Kings
During the Rethinking World Cinema panel discussion with Chaitanya Tamhane (The Disciple), Philippe Lacôte (Night of the Kings), Louis Henderson and Olivier Marboeuf (Ouvertures) at the New York Film Festival, I sent in the following comment and question for Dea Kulumbegashvili: You worked with Matthieu Taponier, the editor of László Nemes’s Son Of Saul and Sunset. Can you talk about your collaboration with him?...
- 10/7/2020
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Chicago – The Music Box Theatre of Chicago remains the premiere destination for cutting edge art and independent films. During the pandemic stay-at-home order, they began offering screenings to download last week, and this week expands their selection with “The Whistlers” and “Saint Frances.”
Music Box Theatre Presents The Whistlers
The Whistlers
Photo credit: Magnolia Pictures
The Music Box Theatre will get a percentage of the proceeds from any download in this partnership with Magnolia Pictures.
Scheduled: Now until the theater re-opens or changes the film.
Description: Premiering at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, “The Whistlers” is from Romania, directed by Corneliu Porumboiu. Not everything is as it seems for Cristi (Vlad Ivanov), a police inspector in Bucharest who plays both sides of the law. Embarking with the beautiful Gilda (Catrinel Marlon) on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception. A trip...
Music Box Theatre Presents The Whistlers
The Whistlers
Photo credit: Magnolia Pictures
The Music Box Theatre will get a percentage of the proceeds from any download in this partnership with Magnolia Pictures.
Scheduled: Now until the theater re-opens or changes the film.
Description: Premiering at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, “The Whistlers” is from Romania, directed by Corneliu Porumboiu. Not everything is as it seems for Cristi (Vlad Ivanov), a police inspector in Bucharest who plays both sides of the law. Embarking with the beautiful Gilda (Catrinel Marlon) on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception. A trip...
- 4/2/2020
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
“You have to understand, we’re not here to be happy,” a so-called spiritual adviser counsels one of his wards in a Catholic seminary — a rare moment of truth in the shadowy morass of governmental and theological manipulation that consumes Ivan Ostrochovský’s impressively icy Iron Curtain noir “Servants.” Though happiness has never seemed the objective of priesthood so much as a kind of affectless peace, both are in short supply in a film that jitters and shivers with anti-authoritarian sentiment beneath its serene monochrome aesthetic. Form and feeling are at odds throughout this steadily transfixing tale of young seminarians standing up to the Communist Party’s infiltration of their school in the former Czechoslovakia.
All hard, clipped lines and spectral quietude, from performances to production design, this is a period piece with a dystopian bent. It may be set in 1980, though as its opaquely fragmented storytelling and hyper-meticulous mise-en-scène combine to disorienting effect,...
All hard, clipped lines and spectral quietude, from performances to production design, this is a period piece with a dystopian bent. It may be set in 1980, though as its opaquely fragmented storytelling and hyper-meticulous mise-en-scène combine to disorienting effect,...
- 3/12/2020
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
There’s plenty of wit to be found in the films that constitute the Romanian New Wave, but any laughs they elicit wind up sounding more like dry coughs. These movies tend to find their humor in subjects like an overburdened health-care system (“The Death of Mr. Lazarescu”), corruption in the education system (“Graduation”), family strife (“Sieranevada”) and other topics relevant to the nation dealing with the lingering aftereffects of the Ceausescu era.
So even if writer-director Corneliu Porumboiu seems more amenable to absurdist comedy — and genre conventions — than his peers in this talented community, his latest film “The Whistlers” still traffics in bleak chuckles.
It’s a wonderfully labyrinthine story of cops and robbers that might not be an official sequel to Porumboiu’s 2009 “Police, Adjective” (that year’s Romanian Oscar entry), but it does explore many of that film’s concerns, from the subtle distinctions between law and...
So even if writer-director Corneliu Porumboiu seems more amenable to absurdist comedy — and genre conventions — than his peers in this talented community, his latest film “The Whistlers” still traffics in bleak chuckles.
It’s a wonderfully labyrinthine story of cops and robbers that might not be an official sequel to Porumboiu’s 2009 “Police, Adjective” (that year’s Romanian Oscar entry), but it does explore many of that film’s concerns, from the subtle distinctions between law and...
- 2/28/2020
- by Alonso Duralde
- The Wrap
Say “the Romanian New Wave” to folks who tend to order their cinema off-menu, and they’ll happily regale you with tales of long takes, deliberate paces, dour perspectives and a serious distrust of authority. They’ll also tell you that the country has produced some of the most complex, captivating movies of the past 15 years, and they’d be correct. Like sushi or Brian Eno’s solo albums, the bounty that’s come from the Eastern European nation’s post-Ceaușescu generation of filmmakers is an acquired taste; once that taste has been acquired,...
- 2/28/2020
- by David Fear
- Rollingstone.com
"The Whistlers" (aka "La Gomera") is the new crime comedy feature, written and directed by Corneliu Porumboiu, starring Vlad Ivanov, Catrinel Marlon and Rodica Lazar, opening February 28, 2020:
"...not everything is as it seems for 'Cristi', a policeman who plays both sides of the law.
"Embarking with the beautiful 'Gilda' on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception..."
Click the images to enlarge and Sneak Peek "The Whistlers"...
"...not everything is as it seems for 'Cristi', a policeman who plays both sides of the law.
"Embarking with the beautiful 'Gilda' on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception..."
Click the images to enlarge and Sneak Peek "The Whistlers"...
- 2/27/2020
- by Unknown
- SneakPeek
When it comes to feature film output in Central and Eastern Europe, it’s all about marshaling indie forces and breaking out of familiar tropes this year, say producers and filmmakers.
It’s also about relationships in the increasingly interconnected region, as Katarina Tomkova, one of the Slovak producers for “Servants,” says of the
communist-era drama focused on priests facing pressure to spy for the state. The fact-based idea — a Slovak, Czech, Romanian and Irish co-production that premieres in Berlinale’s Encounters section — grew out of a deal structure created “very organically, and was based on personal relationships and friendships,” says Tomkova of Slovakia’s Punkchart.
“Servants” star Vlad Ivanov was a juror at the Vilnius fest, which awarded Ivan Ostrochovsky’s previous film, “Koza,” which led to Romanian producers Oana Bujgoi Giurgiu and Tudor Giurgiu — and later composer Cristi Lolea — joining the project.
Czech producer Pavel Strnad of Negativ...
It’s also about relationships in the increasingly interconnected region, as Katarina Tomkova, one of the Slovak producers for “Servants,” says of the
communist-era drama focused on priests facing pressure to spy for the state. The fact-based idea — a Slovak, Czech, Romanian and Irish co-production that premieres in Berlinale’s Encounters section — grew out of a deal structure created “very organically, and was based on personal relationships and friendships,” says Tomkova of Slovakia’s Punkchart.
“Servants” star Vlad Ivanov was a juror at the Vilnius fest, which awarded Ivan Ostrochovsky’s previous film, “Koza,” which led to Romanian producers Oana Bujgoi Giurgiu and Tudor Giurgiu — and later composer Cristi Lolea — joining the project.
Czech producer Pavel Strnad of Negativ...
- 2/23/2020
- by Will Tizard
- Variety Film + TV
The iconic guitar riff of Iggy Pop’s “The Passenger” is the type of musical vignette that immediately evokes a scene in one’s mind. It’s an anthemic celebration of aimless wandering that stands as a testament to the drifters of the world, so when it plays during the opening moments of Corneliu Porumboiu’s The Whistlers, it feels like a match long overdue. In the context of the film, which premiered in competition at Cannes, the song serves as an introduction to the character of Cristi (Vlad Ivanov), a stoic and reluctant policeman. By merely going through the motions, Cristi finds himself in the middle of a criminal web of deception in the exotic sights of La Gomera island in Spain, but “The Passenger” could really describe any of the protagonists in the Romanian filmmaker’s oeuvre. Ever since his Caméra d’Or-winning debut, 12:08 East of Bucharest...
- 2/7/2020
- MUBI
The 70th Berlin International Film Festival (Feb 20 – March 1) unveiled its Encounters program today, featuring the premieres of new works by Tim Sutton and Romanian director Cristi Puiu.
Also screening is Josephine Decker’s Shirley with Elisabeth Moss and Michael Stuhlbarg, marking the film’s international premiere after its upcoming Sundance bow, and Gunda by Victor Kossakovsky, whose last pic was the 2018 Venice doc Aquarela.
Encounters is a newly-created competitive section at the Berlin festival that looks to highlight “new voices in cinema and to give more room to diverse narrative and documentary forms.” A three-member jury will choose the winners for Best Film, Best Director and a Special Jury Award.
“As a result of passionate research, the 15 titles chosen for Encounters present the vitality of cinema in all of its forms. Each film presents a different way of interpreting the cinematic story: autobiographical, intimate, political,...
Also screening is Josephine Decker’s Shirley with Elisabeth Moss and Michael Stuhlbarg, marking the film’s international premiere after its upcoming Sundance bow, and Gunda by Victor Kossakovsky, whose last pic was the 2018 Venice doc Aquarela.
Encounters is a newly-created competitive section at the Berlin festival that looks to highlight “new voices in cinema and to give more room to diverse narrative and documentary forms.” A three-member jury will choose the winners for Best Film, Best Director and a Special Jury Award.
“As a result of passionate research, the 15 titles chosen for Encounters present the vitality of cinema in all of its forms. Each film presents a different way of interpreting the cinematic story: autobiographical, intimate, political,...
- 1/17/2020
- by Tom Grater
- Deadline Film + TV
A month or so before No Time to Die arrives in theaters, we’ll be getting a spin on a James Bond-esque adventure from one of the world’s greatest international directors. Romanian director Corneliu Porumboiu’s new film The Whistlers, which premiered at Cannes Film Festival, follows a police inspector who travels to the Canary Islands to uncover a plot of intrigue, mystery, murder, sex, and a strange new language. Ahead of a February release, Magnolia Pictures has unveiled the U.S. trailer.
Rory O’Connor said in our review, “Of all the great deadpan, acerbic realists that the Romanian cinema has thrown our way in the last twenty years, Corneliu Porumboiu has always been the best at using humor to compliment the more dense and philosophical aspects of his movies. He has managed to strike that delicate balance time and again, so it’s difficult to know quite...
Rory O’Connor said in our review, “Of all the great deadpan, acerbic realists that the Romanian cinema has thrown our way in the last twenty years, Corneliu Porumboiu has always been the best at using humor to compliment the more dense and philosophical aspects of his movies. He has managed to strike that delicate balance time and again, so it’s difficult to know quite...
- 12/8/2019
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Magnolia Pictures award-winning feature "The Whistlers" aka "La Gomera" is a Romanian crime thriller directed by Corneliu Porumboiu, starring Vlad Ivanov:
"... in 'The Whistlers', not everything is as it seems for 'Cristi', a police inspector in Bucharest who plays both sides of the law.
"Embarking with the beautiful 'Gilda' on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception.
"Maybe a trip to the Canary Islands to learn a secret whistling language might just be what they need to pull it off..."
Click the images to enlarge and Sneak Peek "The Whistlers"...
"... in 'The Whistlers', not everything is as it seems for 'Cristi', a police inspector in Bucharest who plays both sides of the law.
"Embarking with the beautiful 'Gilda' on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception.
"Maybe a trip to the Canary Islands to learn a secret whistling language might just be what they need to pull it off..."
Click the images to enlarge and Sneak Peek "The Whistlers"...
- 12/5/2019
- by Unknown
- SneakPeek
"A sly and intricate crime drama." Magnolia has unveiled the official Us trailer for Romanian filmmaker Corneliu Porumboiu's acclaimed film The Whistlers, which first premiered at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year. The film didn't win any awards, but it did win over critics, especially A.O. Scott (here's his review) who is quoted all over the marketing. This fun neo-noir stars Vlad Ivanov in the lead role, Cristi, a Romanian police officer who is secretly working inside the mafia. He heads to La Gomera Island to learn an ancestral whistling language. In Romania he is under police surveillance and by using this coded language he will continue to communicate with the mobsters to try and get Zsolt out of prison. Also starring Catrinel Marlon, Rodica Lazar, Agustí Villaronga, Sabin Tambrea, István Teglas, Cristóbal Pinto, and George Pistereanu. I caught this in Cannes and I had a great time - here's my glowing review,...
- 12/4/2019
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Which film will follow on from ‘Roma’ in winning the prize?
Submissions for the best international feature film award at the 2020 Academy Awards have started to come in, and Screen is keeping a running list of each film below.
This is the first year the award will be given under the new name of ‘best international feature film’, after a change in April from ‘foreign-language film’.
The eligibility rules remain the same: an international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture produced outside the Us with a predominantly non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.
Submissions for the best international feature film award at the 2020 Academy Awards have started to come in, and Screen is keeping a running list of each film below.
This is the first year the award will be given under the new name of ‘best international feature film’, after a change in April from ‘foreign-language film’.
The eligibility rules remain the same: an international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture produced outside the Us with a predominantly non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.
- 8/30/2019
- by Ben Dalton
- ScreenDaily
Vlad Ivanov, Catrinel Marlon star in crime saga.
Corneliu Porumboiu’s Toronto-bound The Whistlers will fly the flag for Romania in this season’s best international feature film Oscar race as it bids to become the first from the country to earn a nomination.
The crime thriller premiered in Cannes where Magnolia Pictures snapped up Us rights. Vlad Ivanov plays a police inspector who teams up with a beautiful woman (Catrinel Marlon) on a heist and heads to the Canary Islands to learn a secret whistling language that might help them pull off the crime.
Porumboiu’s Police, Adjective represented...
Corneliu Porumboiu’s Toronto-bound The Whistlers will fly the flag for Romania in this season’s best international feature film Oscar race as it bids to become the first from the country to earn a nomination.
The crime thriller premiered in Cannes where Magnolia Pictures snapped up Us rights. Vlad Ivanov plays a police inspector who teams up with a beautiful woman (Catrinel Marlon) on a heist and heads to the Canary Islands to learn a secret whistling language that might help them pull off the crime.
Porumboiu’s Police, Adjective represented...
- 8/26/2019
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
Romania has submitted Corneliu Porumboui's La Gomera (The Whistlers) for the international feature category at the 2020 Academy Awards.
Anything but a police procedural, the film — which screened in May in competition at Cannes, where it was picked up for U.S distribution rights by Magnolia Pictures — is the story of a plot by a police inspector, Cristi (Vlad Ivanov, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days), to spring a corrupt businessman from jail on a Spanish island. But before he can embark with the beautiful Gilda (Catrinel Marion) on the high-stakes heist, the Bucharest native will need to ...
Anything but a police procedural, the film — which screened in May in competition at Cannes, where it was picked up for U.S distribution rights by Magnolia Pictures — is the story of a plot by a police inspector, Cristi (Vlad Ivanov, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days), to spring a corrupt businessman from jail on a Spanish island. But before he can embark with the beautiful Gilda (Catrinel Marion) on the high-stakes heist, the Bucharest native will need to ...
- 8/26/2019
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
Romania has submitted Corneliu Porumboui's La Gomera (The Whistlers) for the international feature category at the 2020 Academy Awards.
Anything but a police procedural, the film — which screened in May in competition at Cannes, where it was picked up for U.S distribution rights by Magnolia Pictures — is the story of a plot by a police inspector, Cristi (Vlad Ivanov, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days), to spring a corrupt businessman from jail on a Spanish island. But before he can embark with the beautiful Gilda (Catrinel Marion) on the high-stakes heist, the Bucharest native will need to ...
Anything but a police procedural, the film — which screened in May in competition at Cannes, where it was picked up for U.S distribution rights by Magnolia Pictures — is the story of a plot by a police inspector, Cristi (Vlad Ivanov, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days), to spring a corrupt businessman from jail on a Spanish island. But before he can embark with the beautiful Gilda (Catrinel Marion) on the high-stakes heist, the Bucharest native will need to ...
- 8/26/2019
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Corneliu Porumboiu’s “The Whistlers,” which premiered in competition at the Cannes Film Festival, has been selected as Romania’s official Oscar entry in the international feature film category.
Magnolia Pictures has U.S. distribution rights to the film. The distributor has had much success in the category, having distributed nominees in five of the last seven years, including back-to-back Palme d’Or-winners “The Square” (2017) and “Shoplifters” (2018).
In “The Whistlers,” not everything is as it seems for Cristi, a police inspector in Bucharest who plays both sides of the law. Embarking with the beautiful Gilda (Catrinel Marlon) on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception. A trip to the Canary Islands to learn a secret whistling language might just be what they need to pull it off.
“The Whistlers” is the second of Porumboiu’s features to be Romania’s Oscar entry,...
Magnolia Pictures has U.S. distribution rights to the film. The distributor has had much success in the category, having distributed nominees in five of the last seven years, including back-to-back Palme d’Or-winners “The Square” (2017) and “Shoplifters” (2018).
In “The Whistlers,” not everything is as it seems for Cristi, a police inspector in Bucharest who plays both sides of the law. Embarking with the beautiful Gilda (Catrinel Marlon) on a high-stakes heist, both will have to navigate the twists and turns of corruption, treachery and deception. A trip to the Canary Islands to learn a secret whistling language might just be what they need to pull it off.
“The Whistlers” is the second of Porumboiu’s features to be Romania’s Oscar entry,...
- 8/26/2019
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
Toni Erdmann director Maren Ade among co-producers.
Magnolia Pictures has acquired Cannes Competition selection and Romanian crime thriller The Whistlers from mk2 Films in the latest deal struck on the Croisette.
Corneliu Porumboiu’s film centres on a police inspector who plans a heist and embarks on a trip to the Canary Islands to learn a secret whistling code. Toni Erdmann director Maren Ade is among the co-producers.
Magnolia senior vice-president of acquisitions John Von Thaden negotiated the deal with mk2 Films’ Fionnuala Jamison and the distributor has earmarked a theatrical release for later this year. mk2 Films represents worldwide rights.
Magnolia Pictures has acquired Cannes Competition selection and Romanian crime thriller The Whistlers from mk2 Films in the latest deal struck on the Croisette.
Corneliu Porumboiu’s film centres on a police inspector who plans a heist and embarks on a trip to the Canary Islands to learn a secret whistling code. Toni Erdmann director Maren Ade is among the co-producers.
Magnolia senior vice-president of acquisitions John Von Thaden negotiated the deal with mk2 Films’ Fionnuala Jamison and the distributor has earmarked a theatrical release for later this year. mk2 Films represents worldwide rights.
- 5/25/2019
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
Magnolia Pictures has bought North American rights to the Romanian crime thriller “The Whistlers” following its premiere in competition at the Cannes Film Festival.
Written and directed by Corneliu Porumboiu, the film stars Vlad Ivanov, Catrinel Marlon, Rodica Lazar, Antonio Buil, Agustí Villaronga, Sabin Tambrea, Julieta Szonyi and George Pisterneanu. Magnolia is eyeing a theatrical release for later this year.
Ivanov plays a corrupt police inspector in Bucharest who has been sent to the island of La Gomera in the Canaries to learn the ancient whistling language to pull off a high-stakes heist.
“‘The Whistlers’ is an incredible gush of pure entertainment,” said Magnolia president Eamonn Bowles. “Corneliu Porumboiu has been making brilliant films for the last few years and he has outdone himself with his most crowd-pleasing work yet.”
Porumboiu’s 2006 feature “12:08 East of Bucharest” won the Caméra d’Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival. His 2015 film...
Written and directed by Corneliu Porumboiu, the film stars Vlad Ivanov, Catrinel Marlon, Rodica Lazar, Antonio Buil, Agustí Villaronga, Sabin Tambrea, Julieta Szonyi and George Pisterneanu. Magnolia is eyeing a theatrical release for later this year.
Ivanov plays a corrupt police inspector in Bucharest who has been sent to the island of La Gomera in the Canaries to learn the ancient whistling language to pull off a high-stakes heist.
“‘The Whistlers’ is an incredible gush of pure entertainment,” said Magnolia president Eamonn Bowles. “Corneliu Porumboiu has been making brilliant films for the last few years and he has outdone himself with his most crowd-pleasing work yet.”
Porumboiu’s 2006 feature “12:08 East of Bucharest” won the Caméra d’Or prize at the Cannes Film Festival. His 2015 film...
- 5/24/2019
- by Dave McNary
- Variety Film + TV
Magnolia Pictures has acquired the North American distribution rights to “The Whistlers,” a crime movie from Romanian director Corneliu Porumboiu that premiered in competition at Cannes, an individual with knowledge of the deal told TheWrap.
Magnolia intends to release “The Whistlers” later this year.
Porumboiu is one of the members of the Romanian New Wave of cinema and is the director of 2006’s “12:08 East of Bucharest” and 2009’s “Police, Adjective,” which won the Un Certain Regard at Cannes that same year. Porumboiu’s latest follows a crooked police officer who wants to free a businessman from an island in the Canaries but has to learn a bizarre local language involving whistling, hissing and spitting in order to do so. Here’s the official synopsis:
Also Read: 'The Whistlers' Film Review: Romanian Wild Ride Runs on Black Humor
In “The Whistlers,” not everything is as it seems for Cristi,...
Magnolia intends to release “The Whistlers” later this year.
Porumboiu is one of the members of the Romanian New Wave of cinema and is the director of 2006’s “12:08 East of Bucharest” and 2009’s “Police, Adjective,” which won the Un Certain Regard at Cannes that same year. Porumboiu’s latest follows a crooked police officer who wants to free a businessman from an island in the Canaries but has to learn a bizarre local language involving whistling, hissing and spitting in order to do so. Here’s the official synopsis:
Also Read: 'The Whistlers' Film Review: Romanian Wild Ride Runs on Black Humor
In “The Whistlers,” not everything is as it seems for Cristi,...
- 5/24/2019
- by Brian Welk
- The Wrap
Exclusive: With an eye toward a theatrical release this year, Magnolia Pictures has acquired the North American rights to The Whistlers, the inventive crime thriller from Romanian director Corneliu Porumboiu that just premiered in Competition in Cannes to glowing reviews.
Porumboiu won the Camera d’Or at Cannes in 2006 with his first feature, 12:08 East of Bucharest. With follow-up films such as the shrewdly written Police, Adjective (an arresting 2009 tale about words, crime, and the letter of the law) and Infinite Football (last year’s soccer-obsessed documentary) Porumboiu has shown a gift for material that digs deep into eccentric pursuit.
In The Whistlers, the quirky element is the melodic skill set mentioned in the title. Here’s the official synopsis: “In The Whistlers, not everything is as it seems for Cristi, a police inspector in Bucharest who plays both sides of the law. Embarking with the beautiful Gilda on a high-stakes heist,...
Porumboiu won the Camera d’Or at Cannes in 2006 with his first feature, 12:08 East of Bucharest. With follow-up films such as the shrewdly written Police, Adjective (an arresting 2009 tale about words, crime, and the letter of the law) and Infinite Football (last year’s soccer-obsessed documentary) Porumboiu has shown a gift for material that digs deep into eccentric pursuit.
In The Whistlers, the quirky element is the melodic skill set mentioned in the title. Here’s the official synopsis: “In The Whistlers, not everything is as it seems for Cristi, a police inspector in Bucharest who plays both sides of the law. Embarking with the beautiful Gilda on a high-stakes heist,...
- 5/24/2019
- by Geoff Boucher
- Deadline Film + TV
Of all the great deadpan, acerbic realists that the Romanian cinema has thrown our way in the last twenty years, Corneliu Porumboiu has always been the best at using humor to compliment the more dense and philosophical aspects of his movies. He has managed to strike that delicate balance time and again, so it’s difficult to know quite how to react to a film as broad as The Whistlers, a sort of sun-holiday noir in which the director’s fellow New Wave veteran Vlad Ivanov (on autopilot here) plays a cop who’s in too deep with the mob and, for some reason, must now learn to “speak” Silbo–a centuries-old whistling language from the island of La Gomera–in order to bust out an old accomplice before he rats Cristi and his pals out to the police.
To its detriment, this has the feel of a film that...
To its detriment, this has the feel of a film that...
- 5/20/2019
- by Rory O'Connor
- The Film Stage
Both titles recorded an average of 2.5.
Corneliu Porumboiu’s The Whistlers and Terrence Malick’s A Hidden Life are the latest titles to bed down on Screen’s Cannes 2019 jury grid, with both films receiving the same average of 2.5.
Porumboiu recorded consistent scores across his 10 marks, with four threes (good) and four twos (average) broken only by a four (excellent) from Meduza’s Anton Dolin and a one (poor) from Sight And Sound’s Nick James.
The Whistlers stars Vlad Ivanov as a corrupt cop who gets involved in a high-stakes heist, using the secret whistling language spoken on the Spanish island of La Gomera.
Corneliu Porumboiu’s The Whistlers and Terrence Malick’s A Hidden Life are the latest titles to bed down on Screen’s Cannes 2019 jury grid, with both films receiving the same average of 2.5.
Porumboiu recorded consistent scores across his 10 marks, with four threes (good) and four twos (average) broken only by a four (excellent) from Meduza’s Anton Dolin and a one (poor) from Sight And Sound’s Nick James.
The Whistlers stars Vlad Ivanov as a corrupt cop who gets involved in a high-stakes heist, using the secret whistling language spoken on the Spanish island of La Gomera.
- 5/20/2019
- by Ben Dalton
- ScreenDaily
With all due respect to Lauren Bacall, there’s always been a bit more to whistling than putting your lips together and blowing. Certainly for Cristi (Vlad Ivanov), the corrupt Bucharest policeman embroiled in a comically complex plot to get a local gangster off the hook in Corneliu Porumboiu’s Cannes competition title “The Whistlers,” it is a matter of life and death. It requires practise, training and a bent forefinger, angled between pursed lips, like it’s holding a gun and the bullet will exit the opposite ear.
Cristi has been sent to the island of La Gomera in The Canaries, where he is to learn the ancient whistling language originally, well, whistled by the Guanches, an aboriginal tribe native to the region. This is because, by the slightly lunatic logic of Porumboiu’s screenplay, in these days of easily hackable cellphones and widespread surveillance, whistling has the advantage...
Cristi has been sent to the island of La Gomera in The Canaries, where he is to learn the ancient whistling language originally, well, whistled by the Guanches, an aboriginal tribe native to the region. This is because, by the slightly lunatic logic of Porumboiu’s screenplay, in these days of easily hackable cellphones and widespread surveillance, whistling has the advantage...
- 5/19/2019
- by Jessica Kiang
- Variety Film + TV
Romanian director Corneliu Porumboiu makes playful movies with a lot to say. From the chatty historical inquiries of his debut “12:08 East of Bucharest” to the deadpan musings on the language of justice in “Police, Adjective” to the ethics of filmmaking in “When Evening Falls in Bucharest or Metabolism,” Porumboiu has managed to mine compelling ideas out of slow-burn narrative techniques loaded with unpredictability. With 2015’s heartwarming father-son story “The Treasure” — in which the roving narrative builds to sentimental payoff — he started to enrich his style with more approachable methods. That proclivity grows even stronger with his entertaining noir “The Whistlers,” a polished mashup of genre motifs that suggests what might happen if the “Ocean’s 11” gang assembled on the Canary Islands.
That’s right: One of the directors tied to the so-called Romanian New Wave of the aughts, when dreary masterpieces like “4 Months, 3 Weeks, and Two Days” and “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu...
That’s right: One of the directors tied to the so-called Romanian New Wave of the aughts, when dreary masterpieces like “4 Months, 3 Weeks, and Two Days” and “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu...
- 5/18/2019
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
Saturday night marks the first time that Romanian director Corneliu Porumboiu will climb the steps of Cannes’ Grand Théâtre Lumière to premiere a film in competition. But for a director who’s called himself a “child” of the world’s glitziest film festival, the butterflies are familiar.
“Every time I’m coming to Cannes, I have this type of emotions,” he said. “This time, I think that they’re a little bit more.”
Porumboiu arrives this year with his latest feature, “The Whistlers,” a noir-inspired movie about a Bucharest police inspector who gets entangled in a high-stakes heist that takes him to the Spanish island of La Gomera. The film stars Romanian leading man Vlad Ivanov, whose recent credits include Cristian Mungiu’s Cannes player “Graduation” and Laszlo Nemes’ “Sunset.”
Porumboiu’s inaugural visit to the Croisette came in 2004, when his short film “A Trip to the City” won the Cinéfondation second prize.
“Every time I’m coming to Cannes, I have this type of emotions,” he said. “This time, I think that they’re a little bit more.”
Porumboiu arrives this year with his latest feature, “The Whistlers,” a noir-inspired movie about a Bucharest police inspector who gets entangled in a high-stakes heist that takes him to the Spanish island of La Gomera. The film stars Romanian leading man Vlad Ivanov, whose recent credits include Cristian Mungiu’s Cannes player “Graduation” and Laszlo Nemes’ “Sunset.”
Porumboiu’s inaugural visit to the Croisette came in 2004, when his short film “A Trip to the City” won the Cinéfondation second prize.
- 5/17/2019
- by Christopher Vourlias
- Variety Film + TV
Here’s something for those few who don’t want to see (or can’t get tickets to) the big superhero slugfest that’s on most of this country’s movie screens. It’s a drama set in a turbulent time in another country. It’s full of lush intricate costumes and lavish estates because it’s set near the end of a genteel, refined era, just before the dawning of the coarse, mechanized, violent modern age. Perhaps that’s the reason for the English title: Sunset.
After a title card telling us about the 1913 rivalry between Budapest and Vienna, the camera is locked on the listless face of an aristocratic young woman, perhaps in her early twenties being served at a clothes store. After trying on several fancy decorative hats, she announces that she’s actually there in search of a job. The flustered floor manager Zelma (Evelin Dobos...
After a title card telling us about the 1913 rivalry between Budapest and Vienna, the camera is locked on the listless face of an aristocratic young woman, perhaps in her early twenties being served at a clothes store. After trying on several fancy decorative hats, she announces that she’s actually there in search of a job. The flustered floor manager Zelma (Evelin Dobos...
- 4/26/2019
- by Jim Batts
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Chicago – History is made when you’re often busy making other plans. That is ardently illustrated in “Sunset,” a drama set early in the second decade of the 20th Century in the on-the-brink-of-revolution capital of Budapest, Hungary. A retail store is the town’s centerpiece, plus there is a mysterious woman associated with that store, until she isn’t.
Rating: 3.5/5.0
Juli Jakab portrays the woman, and she single handedly (practically) brings this history to life. The camera focuses on Jakab in a series of episodic vignettes amid the edgy and anarchy-ridden streets of the city, giving the film a sense of confinement from everything going on around her. That is part of the remarkable nature of this film … while the eye of the action is on the woman, squeezed around her in the frame are the events of that moment. This may be as simple as a team of horse thundering by,...
Rating: 3.5/5.0
Juli Jakab portrays the woman, and she single handedly (practically) brings this history to life. The camera focuses on Jakab in a series of episodic vignettes amid the edgy and anarchy-ridden streets of the city, giving the film a sense of confinement from everything going on around her. That is part of the remarkable nature of this film … while the eye of the action is on the woman, squeezed around her in the frame are the events of that moment. This may be as simple as a team of horse thundering by,...
- 4/1/2019
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
Sunset (Napszállta) Sony Pictures Classics Reviewed for Shockya.com & BigAppleReviews.net by: Harvey Karten Director: Lázló Nemes Screenwriter: Lázsló Nemes, Clara Royer, Matthieu Taponier Cast: Juli Jakab, Vlad Ivanov, Evelin Dobos, Marcin Czarnik, Levente Molnr, Julia Jakubowska Screened at: Sony, NYC, 1/31/19 Opens: Tbd The 1950s in America may be looked upon as perhaps the dullest […]
The post Sunset Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
The post Sunset Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
- 4/1/2019
- by Harvey Karten
- ShockYa
László Nemes is a filmmaker who keeps his friends close and his cameras closer. The Hungarian director’s devastating 2015 debut, Son of Saul, distinguished itself not just by sticking right next to its main character but virtually breathing down his neck — the fact that our guide was a Sonderkommando at Auschwitz, grimly trying to survive a waking nightmare, only heightened the effect. The actor Geza Rohrig’s face took up most of the frame’s real estate and blocked out the horror you could hear happening offscreen; it also made...
- 3/23/2019
- by David Fear
- Rollingstone.com
Two historic dramas headline a comparatively slow weekend for new Specialty roll outs vs. last weekend’s heavy roster. Bleecker Street/ShivHans Pictures’ Hotel Mumbai with Oscar-nominee Dev Patel and Golden Globe-nominee Armie Hammer will have a minimal start in New York and Los Angeles ahead of a fairly wide release in the coming weeks. The film recounts the true events in 2008 when terrorists laid siege of the Taj Hotel in Mumbai. Sony Pictures Classics is opening Budapest-set Sunset by László Nemes, whose previous feature, Son Of Saul won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language film. Sunset is a fictional drama set amid the tense days leading up to World War I. The film will have a slow roll out, beginning in New York and L.A. Grand Rapids, Michigan, however, will have the theatrical bow for Oscilloscope’s Relaxer by Joel Potrykus. The company is opening the title...
- 3/21/2019
- by Brian Brooks
- Deadline Film + TV
A few years ago, filmmaker László Nemes blew festival audiences away with his Holocaust tale Son of Saul. Starting with an award winning debut at the Cannes Film Festival, the movie more or less swept the awards season, culminating in an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Feature. Nemes was immediately a new name to watch on the international cinema stage. Now, after screening a bit last year, his follow up effort Sunset hits theaters this week. Unfortunately, he’s not able to repeat the success from last time out. This is a definite letdown of an experience and a real big disappointment. Alas. The film is a drama set in Budapest during the year 1913, before World War I would devastate Europe. When Irisz Leiter (Juli Jakab) first arrives in the Hungarian capital, she aims to work at a special hat store that once belonged to her late parents. Despite the desire to become a milliner,...
- 3/21/2019
- by Joey Magidson
- Hollywoodnews.com
László Nemes (looking at Martin Scorsese) on the stiff collar worn by Írisz in Sunset, costumes by Györgyi Szakács: "And it goes down with the film." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Sunset (Napszállta) is cinema at its astute and enchanting finest. Max Ophüls and Jean Renoir may come to mind and the scene in the shoe department of Romanze in Moll, Helmut Käutner's take on Guy De Maupassant. In a similar mode to the way László Nemes chained us to the back of the neck of Géza Röhrig's Saul Ausländer in his groundbreaking, Oscar-winning Son Of Saul (also shot by Mátyás Erdély), he attaches us firmly to his Sunset heroine Írisz Leiter (Juli Jakab), a young woman who returns, after years of apprenticeship in Trieste, to her native Budapest in hopes of working as a milliner at the famous Leiter department store her deceased parents used to own.
László...
Sunset (Napszállta) is cinema at its astute and enchanting finest. Max Ophüls and Jean Renoir may come to mind and the scene in the shoe department of Romanze in Moll, Helmut Käutner's take on Guy De Maupassant. In a similar mode to the way László Nemes chained us to the back of the neck of Géza Röhrig's Saul Ausländer in his groundbreaking, Oscar-winning Son Of Saul (also shot by Mátyás Erdély), he attaches us firmly to his Sunset heroine Írisz Leiter (Juli Jakab), a young woman who returns, after years of apprenticeship in Trieste, to her native Budapest in hopes of working as a milliner at the famous Leiter department store her deceased parents used to own.
László...
- 3/14/2019
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
mk2 films has scored major sales across its slate, including on Céline Sciamma’s female-driven period drama “Portrait of a Lady on Fire,” an 18th century-set drama that is expected to premiere in Cannes. Other sales standouts on mK2’s slate include “Arab Blues,” “Varda by Agnes” and “The Whistlers.”
“Portrait of a Lady on Fire” marks Sciamma’s fourth feature after the critically acclaimed “Girlhood,” “Tomboy” and “Water Lilies.” mk2 unveiled first footage from the new movie in Berlin at the European Film Market, and sealed deals for the U.K. (Curzon Artificial Eye), Spain (Karma Films), Benelux (Cinéart), and Sweden (Folkets Bio).
Produced by Lilies Films, “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” stars Adèle Haenel (“Bpm”) as Heloise, a reluctant bride-to-be who has just left the convent, and follows her relationship with Marianne (Noémie Merlant), a painter who has been commissioned to do her wedding portrait. Intimacy and...
“Portrait of a Lady on Fire” marks Sciamma’s fourth feature after the critically acclaimed “Girlhood,” “Tomboy” and “Water Lilies.” mk2 unveiled first footage from the new movie in Berlin at the European Film Market, and sealed deals for the U.K. (Curzon Artificial Eye), Spain (Karma Films), Benelux (Cinéart), and Sweden (Folkets Bio).
Produced by Lilies Films, “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” stars Adèle Haenel (“Bpm”) as Heloise, a reluctant bride-to-be who has just left the convent, and follows her relationship with Marianne (Noémie Merlant), a painter who has been commissioned to do her wedding portrait. Intimacy and...
- 2/11/2019
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
The Passenger
Another New Romanian Wave essential, Corneliu Porumboiu borrows a moniker from Antonioni for his fifth feature, The Passenger (previously known as Gomera). A co-production between Romania (42 Km Film), France (Les Films du Worso) and Germany (Komplizen Film), Porumboiu’s latest finds Marcela Ursu as a producer and a host of notable co-producers, including Maren Ade, Sylvie Pialat, Janine Jackowski and Jonas Dornbach. Dp Tudor Mircea reunites with Porumboiu for the fourth time. Described as a dramatic thriller, Porumboiu assembles a notable cast, led by popular Romanian actor Vlad Ivanov, Rodica Lazar, Catrinel Marlon, and famed Catalan director Agusti Villaronga.…...
Another New Romanian Wave essential, Corneliu Porumboiu borrows a moniker from Antonioni for his fifth feature, The Passenger (previously known as Gomera). A co-production between Romania (42 Km Film), France (Les Films du Worso) and Germany (Komplizen Film), Porumboiu’s latest finds Marcela Ursu as a producer and a host of notable co-producers, including Maren Ade, Sylvie Pialat, Janine Jackowski and Jonas Dornbach. Dp Tudor Mircea reunites with Porumboiu for the fourth time. Described as a dramatic thriller, Porumboiu assembles a notable cast, led by popular Romanian actor Vlad Ivanov, Rodica Lazar, Catrinel Marlon, and famed Catalan director Agusti Villaronga.…...
- 1/6/2019
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
After earning an Oscar for Son of Saul, director László Nemes is back with another Hungarian Academy Award entry with Sunset. Following its premiere at Venice and Tiff, the story of a woman in 1913 Budapest as she confronts those in a town that won’t let her take her own path will get a 2019 release from Sony Pictures Classics, who have now debuted the first U.S. trailer.
Rory O’Connor said in his review, “As with any righteous character coming up against unfathomable power, it proves a rather unsafe ride. Like Son of Saul, we follow her every movement and Nemes’ Dantean tendencies soon turn Sunset from sumptuous period piece into an escalating nightmare where horrors lie in wait around every corner. Though this dizzying sense of imminent violence is what Nemes does best, some viewers may be put off by how Sunset uses rape in service of what...
Rory O’Connor said in his review, “As with any righteous character coming up against unfathomable power, it proves a rather unsafe ride. Like Son of Saul, we follow her every movement and Nemes’ Dantean tendencies soon turn Sunset from sumptuous period piece into an escalating nightmare where horrors lie in wait around every corner. Though this dizzying sense of imminent violence is what Nemes does best, some viewers may be put off by how Sunset uses rape in service of what...
- 12/5/2018
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
"Leave this place. Blood will flow here this week." Sony Pictures Classics has released the official Us trailer for the new film from Hungarian director László Nemes (of Son of Saul previously) titled Sunset, which premiered at the Venice Film Festival this year. This sprawling, epic historical drama is set in Budapest in 1913, "in the heart of Europe as World War I approaches." The story is about a young woman named Írisz Leiter, who tries to get a job at a legendary hat store that once belonged to her late parents. She ends up lost in the overwhelming chaos of a bustling Budapest. Juli Jakab stars as Írisz, and the full cast includes Vlad Ivanov, Susanne Wuest, Björn Freiberg, Levente Molnár, Mónika Balsai, Urs Rechn, Evelin Dobos, and Judit Bárdos. A remarkable feat of authentic filmmaking, this film is demands our attention. Here's the official Us trailer (+ new poster) for László Nemes' Sunset,...
- 12/4/2018
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
“Vain trifles as they seem, clothes have, they say, more important offices than to merely keep us warm. They change our view of the world and the world's view of us.”—Virginia Woolf, OrlandoLike any article of clothing, a hat is never simply just a hat. Embedded in it brim, woven into its form are codes and symbols, hints and meanings. The size of the hat, the color of its fabric, the shape of its crown can signify wealth, pride, modesty; it radiates belonging to one social group or another, delivering a message of the wearer’s status, class, vocation, country or city of origin. These nuances, embedded in European society at the turn of the 20th century, become more difficult to decipher from the hatless world in which we live in, for its codes were swept away by the destruction that was the Great War.It is on the...
- 9/9/2018
- MUBI
“Let’s see what’s behind this.” That’s the very first line we hear in Sunset, László Nemes’ masterful follow-up to his 2015 breakout Son of Saul, a daring debut that followed the trials of a Sonderkommando member at Auschwitz-Birkenau. The pointed phrase is spoken by the host of a world-famous Budapestian millinery shop during the dying days of the Austro-Hungarian empire. You may think that all sounds about as far away as one can get from the infamous Nazi death camp, yet Sunset somehow proves to be no less nerve-shredding a descent into hell for its lead character, and like Saul it is another film during which the frightening rumble of war can be heard in the not-so-distant background.
By my count, Son of Saul is the only Cannes Competition title in the last 5 years to be screened on 35mm. This week, Sunset (as well as Brady Corbet’s...
By my count, Son of Saul is the only Cannes Competition title in the last 5 years to be screened on 35mm. This week, Sunset (as well as Brady Corbet’s...
- 9/4/2018
- by Rory O'Connor
- The Film Stage
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