When Adi (Ciprian Chiujdea) is beaten up outside the one dance club in the village where he grew up, his father takes up the cudgels, chivvying the local police chief into finding out who did it. It would be obvious enough to anyone but dad Dragoi (Bogdan Dumitrache) that this is a straight-up case of gay-bashing, which would seem to signal that Emanuel Parvu’s Cannes Competition title Three Kilometers to the End of the World, a slice of Romanian life, will be a worthy but familiar story of a boy’s coming out to a hostile world. Indeed, bloodied Adi with his black eyes and traumatic lesions is soon being punished, locked in his room by his parents as his desperate mother prays to the icons on the wall for guidance. We have undoubtedly been down this donkey-track before.
Nothing in a small village, however, happens in isolation. The...
Nothing in a small village, however, happens in isolation. The...
- 5/17/2024
- by Stephanie Bunbury
- Deadline Film + TV
A hot, strong summer wind is the overriding soundtrack to “Three Kilometers to the End of the World” — the kind of dry, whirring weather that swallows conversations held even a short distance away, and carries stray, light objects far from where they meant to land. For 17-year-old Adi, however, it’s not loud enough to keep his secrets safe, nor heavy enough to lift and float him away from the home in which he feels increasingly imprisoned. A rural village in thrall to the Romanian Orthodox Church proves as hostile an environment as you’d expect for a closeted gay teen in writer-director Emanuel Pârvu’s claustrophobic study of personal and institutional prejudice closing in on a community misfit: If the breeze would just die down for a second, you might hear Adi’s inner clock tensely counting down his slim shot at freedom.
An accomplished actor now making his third feature behind the camera,...
An accomplished actor now making his third feature behind the camera,...
- 5/17/2024
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
The Cannes competition line-up has premiered some outstanding Romanian films over the last 20 years, works on the very foamy, frothy edge of the Romanian New Wave. But this year’s talky, ensemble-driven neo-realist entrant, Three Kilometers to the End of the World, isn’t on the same level as The Death of Mr. Lazarescu or 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days.
Still, actor-turned-director Emanuel Parvu (Meda or The Not So Bright Side of Things) has fashioned the kind of competent if predictable drama that will tick the right boxes for festival regulars hungry for work that affirms their prejudices against bigoted hicks in all the fly-over countries of the world. A drama about a vicious beating that ends up turning over rocks that hide corruption and cruelty, Three Kilometers at least wrings maximum benefit from its beautiful Danube Delta location, a sun-dappled marshland full of whispering reeds fringed by unspoiled beaches. If...
Still, actor-turned-director Emanuel Parvu (Meda or The Not So Bright Side of Things) has fashioned the kind of competent if predictable drama that will tick the right boxes for festival regulars hungry for work that affirms their prejudices against bigoted hicks in all the fly-over countries of the world. A drama about a vicious beating that ends up turning over rocks that hide corruption and cruelty, Three Kilometers at least wrings maximum benefit from its beautiful Danube Delta location, a sun-dappled marshland full of whispering reeds fringed by unspoiled beaches. If...
- 5/17/2024
- by Leslie Felperin
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
“Three Kilometers to the End of the World,” the new film from Romanian actor turned filmmaker Emanuel Parvu, feels old-fashioned in its conceit and approach to a homophobic attack that spurs a remote Romanian village into moral panic. It’s obvious from the first frames what Parvu owes to Cristian Mungiu, the great Romanian filmmaker whom Parvu starred for in the film “Graduation.” “Three Kilometers” employs a clinical-distance perspective toward the story of how a brutally beaten, closeted 17-year-old’s trauma is doubted and exploited by his parents and townspeople. The feature, Parvu’s third, blends suspenseful procedural with family drama but is missing a key point of view: That of the victim, whose assault is a Trojan horse into the film’s more macro interest in how bigotry and conformity entwine, and how emotionally repressed adults deal with teen homosexuality when it hits close to home.
On Western screens of all sizes,...
On Western screens of all sizes,...
- 5/17/2024
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
In “Familiar,” Berlinale Golden Bear-winning director Călin Peter Netzer follows Dragoş Binder, a film director, as he delves into the murky secrets of his family, and tries to exorcise the trauma of his childhood by making a film about it. Beta Cinema is handling world sales for the film, which has its world premiere this month at Black Nights Film Festival in Tallinn, Estonia.
In the film, Dragoş is trying to understand how his family were able to leave Romania in the early 80s, during the most oppressive period of Nicolae Ceausescu’s rule. Dragoş also seeks to discover the truth of the breakdown in the marriage between his father, Emil, and mother, Valentina, and the true nature of Valentina’s relationship with swimming instructor Harald Stern, a suspected informant for the secret police, the Securitate.
The trailer for “Familiar”
Emanuel Pârvu, who appeared in Cristian Mungiu’s Cannes award winner “Graduation,...
In the film, Dragoş is trying to understand how his family were able to leave Romania in the early 80s, during the most oppressive period of Nicolae Ceausescu’s rule. Dragoş also seeks to discover the truth of the breakdown in the marriage between his father, Emil, and mother, Valentina, and the true nature of Valentina’s relationship with swimming instructor Harald Stern, a suspected informant for the secret police, the Securitate.
The trailer for “Familiar”
Emanuel Pârvu, who appeared in Cristian Mungiu’s Cannes award winner “Graduation,...
- 11/3/2023
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
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
"She's nothing like her grandmother... Queen Victoria." Samuel Goldwyn Films has released the US trailer for a Romanian historical epic called Queen Marie, originally known as Queen Marie of Romania. This opened in Romania back in 2019 and has been playing around Europe, but is only now getting a US release on VOD this spring. Devastated by the First World War and plunged into political controversy, Romania's every hope accompanies its queen on her mission to Paris to lobby for international recognition of its great unification at the 1919 peace talks. Starring Romanian actress Roxana Lupu as "Queen Marie of Romania", and a full cast including Daniel Plier, Anghel Damian, Adrian Titieni, Iulia Verdes, Patrick Drury, Caroline Loncq, Iulia Verdes, Philippe Caroit, and Emil Mandanac. This has an epic look and feel, but it also seems a bit drab and melodramatic, lost in all the historical accuracy more than the storytelling. Here's...
- 3/26/2021
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
The drama centres on a man who finds out he has only months to live. Romanian director Mihai Sofronea is currently in post-production with his first feature, The Windseeker. A Libra Film Productions project produced by Tudor Giurgiu and Bogdan Crăciun, the film is being co-produced by Chouchkov Brothers (Bulgaria), represented by Boris Chouchkov, and Living Pictures (Serbia), represented by Stefan Orlandic. Post-production is expected to wrap in the spring. Written by Sofronea, the screenplay centres on Radu (Dan Bordeianu), a man fighting depression. A promising job interview seems to augur a better future for him, but the medical tests required by the new company come with a terrible diagnosis. With only a few months to live, Radu seeks solace in the Romanian seaside, where an old man (Adrian Titieni) takes him in. A love story with one of the man’s nieces (Olimpia Melinte) may bring a new ray of.
May is going to be a good month for fans of the Romanian New Wave, as Cristian Mungiu’s two most recent films are both joining the Criterion Collection. “Graduation” and “Beyond the Hills” will be released alongside new additions “Midnight Cowboy,” “The Other Side of Hope,” and “Moonrise”; “Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters” and “Au hasard Balthazar,” which have already been released on DVD, are getting Blu-ray upgrades.
“Au hasard Balthazar”
“A profound masterpiece from one of the most revered filmmakers in the history of cinema, director Robert Bresson’s ‘Au hasard Balthazar’ follows the donkey Balthazar as he is passed from owner to owner, some kind and some cruel but all with motivations outside of his understanding. Balthazar, whose life parallels that of his first keeper, Marie, is truly a beast of burden, suffering the sins of humankind. But despite his powerlessness, he accepts his fate nobly.
“Au hasard Balthazar”
“A profound masterpiece from one of the most revered filmmakers in the history of cinema, director Robert Bresson’s ‘Au hasard Balthazar’ follows the donkey Balthazar as he is passed from owner to owner, some kind and some cruel but all with motivations outside of his understanding. Balthazar, whose life parallels that of his first keeper, Marie, is truly a beast of burden, suffering the sins of humankind. But despite his powerlessness, he accepts his fate nobly.
- 2/16/2018
- by Michael Nordine
- Indiewire
(l-r) Dr. Romeo Aldea (Adrian Titieni) talks to his daughter Eliza (Maria Dragus), director Cristian Mungiu’s drama Graduation. Courtesy of Sundance Selects ©
Romanian director Cristian Mungiu grabbed international attention and the Palme d’Or with his 2007 pregnancy drama Four Months, Three Weeks, And Two Days. That harrowing film presented a tour through Romanian creaky bureaucracy and a murky underworld of bribes and corruption in a story built on a controversial topic. In the director’s latest film Graduation, the subject is less heated, but it also explores the difficulties of life in Romania.
Graduation (“Bacalaureat”) centers on a doctor trying to ensure his straight-a student daughter’s best chance at a college scholarship in England, while showing the challenges and complexities of life in Romania. The subject is more universal – the desire of parents for the child to do well – but also paints a bleak picture of Romania life.
Romanian director Cristian Mungiu grabbed international attention and the Palme d’Or with his 2007 pregnancy drama Four Months, Three Weeks, And Two Days. That harrowing film presented a tour through Romanian creaky bureaucracy and a murky underworld of bribes and corruption in a story built on a controversial topic. In the director’s latest film Graduation, the subject is less heated, but it also explores the difficulties of life in Romania.
Graduation (“Bacalaureat”) centers on a doctor trying to ensure his straight-a student daughter’s best chance at a college scholarship in England, while showing the challenges and complexities of life in Romania. The subject is more universal – the desire of parents for the child to do well – but also paints a bleak picture of Romania life.
- 4/28/2017
- by Cate Marquis
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Internationally Acclaimed The Constitution Opens South East European Film Festival April 27 at the Writers Guild in Beverly Hills
Largest-Ever Selection with 56 Films from and about South East Europe
The eight-day SEEfest 2017 runs April 27 — May 4, and includes 12 features, 8 documentaries, 1 special out-of-competition screening, and 36 shorts films (short features, short docs, and animation shorts). Festival audience comprises filmmakers and international art house aficionados, industry professionals and cultural dignitaries from Los Angeles and South East Europe. Screenings are held at the Writers Guild Theater and Laemmle Music Hall in Beverly Hills, the Goethe-Institut in Miracle Mile area and West Hollywood Council Chambers @ Library campus.
The 12th annual South East European Film Festival (SEEfest) has selected Montreal’s Grand Prix of Americas and Santa Barbara’s Best International Feature Film Winner, “The Constitution” by Croatian director Rajko Grlić to open 2017 Festival with a gala event on Thursday, April 27, at 7:00 pm at the Writers Guild Theater theater in Beverly Hills.
Largest-Ever Selection with 56 Films from and about South East Europe
The eight-day SEEfest 2017 runs April 27 — May 4, and includes 12 features, 8 documentaries, 1 special out-of-competition screening, and 36 shorts films (short features, short docs, and animation shorts). Festival audience comprises filmmakers and international art house aficionados, industry professionals and cultural dignitaries from Los Angeles and South East Europe. Screenings are held at the Writers Guild Theater and Laemmle Music Hall in Beverly Hills, the Goethe-Institut in Miracle Mile area and West Hollywood Council Chambers @ Library campus.
The 12th annual South East European Film Festival (SEEfest) has selected Montreal’s Grand Prix of Americas and Santa Barbara’s Best International Feature Film Winner, “The Constitution” by Croatian director Rajko Grlić to open 2017 Festival with a gala event on Thursday, April 27, at 7:00 pm at the Writers Guild Theater theater in Beverly Hills.
- 4/20/2017
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Graduation Opens In St. Louis On Friday, April 28th At Landmark’S Plaza Frontenac.
Sundance Selects invites you to an advance screening of Graduation.
Enter for the chance to win Two (2) seats to the advance screening on Tuesday, April 25 at 7Pm in the St. Louis area.
To Enter, Add Your Name And Email In Our Comments Section Below.
Official Rules:
1. You Must Be In The St. Louis Area The Day Of The Screening.
2. No purchase necessary. A pass does not guarantee a seat at a screening. Seating is on a first-come, first served basis. The theater is overbooked to assure a full house. The theater is not responsible for overbooking.
Acclaimed filmmaker Cristian Mungiu (4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days) returns with this searing human saga about a father driven to extremes in order to protect his daughter’s future. Romeo Aldea (Adrian Titieni) is a seemingly honest doctor who regrets having settled in his native Romania,...
Sundance Selects invites you to an advance screening of Graduation.
Enter for the chance to win Two (2) seats to the advance screening on Tuesday, April 25 at 7Pm in the St. Louis area.
To Enter, Add Your Name And Email In Our Comments Section Below.
Official Rules:
1. You Must Be In The St. Louis Area The Day Of The Screening.
2. No purchase necessary. A pass does not guarantee a seat at a screening. Seating is on a first-come, first served basis. The theater is overbooked to assure a full house. The theater is not responsible for overbooking.
Acclaimed filmmaker Cristian Mungiu (4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days) returns with this searing human saga about a father driven to extremes in order to protect his daughter’s future. Romeo Aldea (Adrian Titieni) is a seemingly honest doctor who regrets having settled in his native Romania,...
- 4/19/2017
- by Movie Geeks
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
When Cristian Mungiu goes to the Cannes Film Festival, he’s an internationally renowned filmmaker, with the distinction of being the first Romanian to win the venerated Palme d’Or. That was over a decade ago, when Mungiu’s abortion thriller “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days” took the festival’s top prize. His subsequent features, “Beyond the Hills” and “Graduation,” have also played in its Official Selection. Mungiu continues to travel the world and land raves for his sociopolitical cinema, which explores the country’s problems on an intimate scale.
But that hasn’t made it any easier to get his movies seen back home.
Read More: Cristian Mungiu’s ‘Graduation’ Trailer: Father-Daughter Relations Get Tense In The Cannes-Bound Family Drama
Ever since the success of his sophomore feature “4 Months,” Mungiu has self-distributed his work in Romania, reviving a caravan-style approach to screening movies in small towns that was once used...
But that hasn’t made it any easier to get his movies seen back home.
Read More: Cristian Mungiu’s ‘Graduation’ Trailer: Father-Daughter Relations Get Tense In The Cannes-Bound Family Drama
Ever since the success of his sophomore feature “4 Months,” Mungiu has self-distributed his work in Romania, reviving a caravan-style approach to screening movies in small towns that was once used...
- 4/7/2017
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
Adrian Titieni in GraduationWinner of the Best Director prize at Cannes for Romanian filmmaker Cristian Mungiu, Graduation is a tense dramatic conflict between the private and public spheres. As in Antigone, here we have a member of family—a father (Adrian Titieni), in this case—who wants to protect another family member, his daughter (Maria-Victoria Dragus), from the moral role of the state. This intent leads him to act against the conventional morality of his time. Seeing no future in Romania, the sacrificing father cannot tolerate the fact that his daughter has not been accepted into a prestigious school in London and is ready to do everything in his power to save her life—even if it is immoral and corrupt. Graduation is a well-crafted drama that pays attention to every detail. Yet Mungiu has not attempted to exhaust his audience with a totally predictable narrative. Instead, he brings elements...
- 4/6/2017
- MUBI
To director Cristian Mungiu, Romania is not just a country – it's a state of mind. The 48-year-old filmmaker grew up in a post-communist society, one where citizens still feel the boot of Soviet rule that ended nearly three decades ago with the overthrow of Stalinist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. His latest, Graduation, isn't quite on the landmark level of his searing 2007 abortion drama 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, but this gripping film still sizzles with Mungiu's social-realist concern for people who believe they can't raise their position based on merit alone. In that sense,...
- 4/5/2017
- Rollingstone.com
Graduation (Bacalaureat) Sundance Selects Director: Christian Mungiu Written by: Christian Mungiu Cast: Adrian Titieni, Maria Dragus, Lia Bugnar, Malina Manovici, Vlad Ivanov, Gelu Colceag Screened at: Dolby24, NYC, 3/15/17 Opens: April 7, 2017 If Christian Mungiu believes that corruption in government and dysfunction in society are unique to Romania, he is wrong. If he believes […]
The post Graduation Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
The post Graduation Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.
- 4/5/2017
- by Harvey Karten
- ShockYa
A philandering doctor’s life starts to unravel in Romanian director Cristian Mungiu’s superb satire
In the bottom right-hand corner of the opening shot of Graduation is somebody – we never see who – digging themselves into a deep hole. This throwaway image brilliantly sums up the plight of Romeo (Adrian Titieni) and of the country itself in this scalding satire of Romanian corruption.
A doctor, father, husband and philanderer, Romeo is a man besieged even before an incident sends his life into a tailspin. Barely a scene goes by without at least one niggling unanswered phone ringing just out of shot. In a typically bold directorial decision, Cristian Mungiu, who in 2008 guided audiences through a Ceaușescu-era maze of underhand payoffs with 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, allows the most crucial phone call of the film to play out in a different room while the camera follows Romeo’s lover elsewhere. The...
In the bottom right-hand corner of the opening shot of Graduation is somebody – we never see who – digging themselves into a deep hole. This throwaway image brilliantly sums up the plight of Romeo (Adrian Titieni) and of the country itself in this scalding satire of Romanian corruption.
A doctor, father, husband and philanderer, Romeo is a man besieged even before an incident sends his life into a tailspin. Barely a scene goes by without at least one niggling unanswered phone ringing just out of shot. In a typically bold directorial decision, Cristian Mungiu, who in 2008 guided audiences through a Ceaușescu-era maze of underhand payoffs with 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, allows the most crucial phone call of the film to play out in a different room while the camera follows Romeo’s lover elsewhere. The...
- 4/2/2017
- by Wendy Ide
- The Guardian - Film News
Cristian Mungiu on Cannes Artistic Director Thierry Frémaux: "The only thing he has doubts about is that it's too clear who throws the stone."
Scenes of delicate opacity haunt Graduation (Bacalaureat). At a police lineup, one of the suspects of an assault is hidden from our view by the back of the head of Eliza, the victim (Maria-Victoria Dragus). From a bus, her father Romeo (Adrian Titieni) sees someone and follows that specter into the night and crosses over to a neighborhood soaked in sounds of invisible people and dogs. In a scene of real horror, Eliza's boyfriend Marius (Rares Andrici) shows himself willing to go a step further.
Maria-Victoria Dragus as Romeo's daughter Eliza
Cristian Mungiu is a Cannes Film Festival favourite - Palme d'Or win for 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days; Best Screenplay for Beyond The Hills and Best Actress honors to Cristina Flutur and Cosmina Stratan, and...
Scenes of delicate opacity haunt Graduation (Bacalaureat). At a police lineup, one of the suspects of an assault is hidden from our view by the back of the head of Eliza, the victim (Maria-Victoria Dragus). From a bus, her father Romeo (Adrian Titieni) sees someone and follows that specter into the night and crosses over to a neighborhood soaked in sounds of invisible people and dogs. In a scene of real horror, Eliza's boyfriend Marius (Rares Andrici) shows himself willing to go a step further.
Maria-Victoria Dragus as Romeo's daughter Eliza
Cristian Mungiu is a Cannes Film Festival favourite - Palme d'Or win for 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days; Best Screenplay for Beyond The Hills and Best Actress honors to Cristina Flutur and Cosmina Stratan, and...
- 3/28/2017
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Author: Stefan Pape
Since the turn of the 21st century, Romanian cinema has thrived, as a new wave of filmmakers crafting distinctively naturalistic, minimalist endeavours, mostly casting a harsh light into working class society. And they’ve been recognised too, with Child’s Pose taking home top prize at the Berlinale back in 2013, and Christian Mungiu’s 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days doing the same in Cannes by winning the Palme d’Or. The helmer of the latter production returns now with his latest picture Graduation, and it’s completely, both tonally, and narratively, within this same movement, as fans of the Romanian New Wave are sure to find plenty to admire about this nuanced character drama.
Adrian Titieni plays Romeo Aldea, a doctor who strives, tirelessly, to give his teenage daughter Eliza (Maria-Victoria Dragus) a life he never had, hoping she will pass her forthcoming exams and be granted a...
Since the turn of the 21st century, Romanian cinema has thrived, as a new wave of filmmakers crafting distinctively naturalistic, minimalist endeavours, mostly casting a harsh light into working class society. And they’ve been recognised too, with Child’s Pose taking home top prize at the Berlinale back in 2013, and Christian Mungiu’s 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days doing the same in Cannes by winning the Palme d’Or. The helmer of the latter production returns now with his latest picture Graduation, and it’s completely, both tonally, and narratively, within this same movement, as fans of the Romanian New Wave are sure to find plenty to admire about this nuanced character drama.
Adrian Titieni plays Romeo Aldea, a doctor who strives, tirelessly, to give his teenage daughter Eliza (Maria-Victoria Dragus) a life he never had, hoping she will pass her forthcoming exams and be granted a...
- 3/27/2017
- by Stefan Pape
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
One moment can change everything, and the journey to try to adjust a life that’s forever been rerouted can be perilous. This is what Cristian Mungiu explores in his upcoming “Graduation,” which won Best Director at the Cannes Film Festival last year.
Read More: The 20 Best Movies Of 2017 That We’ve Already Seen
The latest from the mastermind behind “4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days” and “Beyond The Hills” stars Adrian Titieni, Lia Bugnar, Maria-Victoria Dragus, and Malina Manovici in the story of a young woman headed for college, but whose future is changed when she’s attacked.
Continue reading The Future Is Forever Changed In New Trailer For Cristian Mungiu’s Cannes-Winning ‘Graduation’ at The Playlist.
Read More: The 20 Best Movies Of 2017 That We’ve Already Seen
The latest from the mastermind behind “4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days” and “Beyond The Hills” stars Adrian Titieni, Lia Bugnar, Maria-Victoria Dragus, and Malina Manovici in the story of a young woman headed for college, but whose future is changed when she’s attacked.
Continue reading The Future Is Forever Changed In New Trailer For Cristian Mungiu’s Cannes-Winning ‘Graduation’ at The Playlist.
- 3/14/2017
- by Kevin Jagernauth
- The Playlist
"A father will do anything to save his daughter's future." Sundance Selects + IFC Films have debuted the official Us trailer for a film titled Graduation, made by acclaimed Romanian filmmaker Cristian Mungiu. Mungiu won the Palme d'Or at Cannes a few years ago for 4 Months 3 Weeks and 2 Days, and this new film also premiered in competition at Cannes last year. Graduation (or Bacalaureat in Romanian) is about a father and his daughter, who is just about to graduate and go to a university in the UK. But an attack against her jeopardizes everything. It's a complex film about compromises and the implications of the parent's role. The cast includes Adrian Titieni, Maria Dragus, Rares Andrici, Lia Bugnar, Malina Manovici and Vlad Ivanov. This received fairly positive reviews at Cannes, but it's not better than Mungiu's other films. Here's the new official Us trailer (+ poster) for Cristian Mungiu's Graduation, direct...
- 3/14/2017
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Author: Stefan Pape
Having picked up the Golden Bear with his preceding endeavour Child’s Pose, auteur Calin Peter Netzer returns to the Berlinale with Ana, Mon Amour – and while belonging to the quite remarkable Romanian New Wave, it’s a film that bears uncanny similarities to Blue Valentine, following a near-identical formula, different only in that the paramount relationship at the core of this narrative is flailing for different reasons. Even the male protagonist’s progressive hair loss is identical to Ryan Gosling’s in the Derek Cianfrance movie. Just shave it off mate.
The aforementioned, balding individual is Toma (Mircea Postelnicu), who falls hopelessly in love with Ana (Diana Cavallioti) – a likeminded student who shares a passion for literature. Coming from different social backgrounds, and with two sets of parents refusing to accept their child’s new partner, the hardest obstacle for the couple to overcome is Ana’s illness,...
Having picked up the Golden Bear with his preceding endeavour Child’s Pose, auteur Calin Peter Netzer returns to the Berlinale with Ana, Mon Amour – and while belonging to the quite remarkable Romanian New Wave, it’s a film that bears uncanny similarities to Blue Valentine, following a near-identical formula, different only in that the paramount relationship at the core of this narrative is flailing for different reasons. Even the male protagonist’s progressive hair loss is identical to Ryan Gosling’s in the Derek Cianfrance movie. Just shave it off mate.
The aforementioned, balding individual is Toma (Mircea Postelnicu), who falls hopelessly in love with Ana (Diana Cavallioti) – a likeminded student who shares a passion for literature. Coming from different social backgrounds, and with two sets of parents refusing to accept their child’s new partner, the hardest obstacle for the couple to overcome is Ana’s illness,...
- 2/21/2017
- by Stefan Pape
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
James Baldwin is voiced by Samuel L Jackson in Raoul Peck's Oscar nominated I Am Not Your Negro Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Kleber Mendonça Filho's Aquarius, starring Sônia Braga; Adrian Titieni and Maria-Victoria Dragus in Cristian Mungiu's Graduation (Bacalaureat); A Quiet Passion, directed by Terence Davies with Cynthia Nixon as Emily Dickinson, and Raoul Peck's extraordinary documentary, I Am Not Your Negro, based on James Baldwin's 30 pages of notes for a book project titled Remember This House, which takes us on an American journey with the writings of Baldwin, are four highlights of this year's Glasgow Film Festival.
Graduation (Bacalaureat)
Graduation
Who throws the first stone in Cristian Mungiu's latest Romanian tale is a mystery - the first of many. Romeo (Adrian Titieni), a doctor in the hospital of a provincial town wishes nothing more urgently than for his daughter Eliza (Maria-Victoria Dragus) to be...
Kleber Mendonça Filho's Aquarius, starring Sônia Braga; Adrian Titieni and Maria-Victoria Dragus in Cristian Mungiu's Graduation (Bacalaureat); A Quiet Passion, directed by Terence Davies with Cynthia Nixon as Emily Dickinson, and Raoul Peck's extraordinary documentary, I Am Not Your Negro, based on James Baldwin's 30 pages of notes for a book project titled Remember This House, which takes us on an American journey with the writings of Baldwin, are four highlights of this year's Glasgow Film Festival.
Graduation (Bacalaureat)
Graduation
Who throws the first stone in Cristian Mungiu's latest Romanian tale is a mystery - the first of many. Romeo (Adrian Titieni), a doctor in the hospital of a provincial town wishes nothing more urgently than for his daughter Eliza (Maria-Victoria Dragus) to be...
- 2/14/2017
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Graduation (Bacalaureat) director Cristian Mungiu: "Everything in the film has a real level and a real explanation." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
The director of Beyond The Hills, starring Cristina Flutur and Cosmina Stratan, and Cannes Palme d'Or winner for 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days, explored his latest film with me when we met for a conversation at the 54th New York Film Festival. Graduation (Bacalaureat), co-produced by Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne, had its World Premiere at the Cannes Film Festival where he shared Best Director honors with Olivier Assayas.
Romeo (Adrian Titieni), a doctor in the hospital of a provincial town wishes nothing more urgently than for his daughter Eliza (Maria-Victoria Dragus) to be awarded a scholarship to Cambridge so that she can leave for "civilised" England. All Eliza has to do, is pass the graduation exams with her usual, excellent grades.
Marius (Rares Andrici), Eliza (Maria-Victoria Dragus) and Romeo...
The director of Beyond The Hills, starring Cristina Flutur and Cosmina Stratan, and Cannes Palme d'Or winner for 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days, explored his latest film with me when we met for a conversation at the 54th New York Film Festival. Graduation (Bacalaureat), co-produced by Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne, had its World Premiere at the Cannes Film Festival where he shared Best Director honors with Olivier Assayas.
Romeo (Adrian Titieni), a doctor in the hospital of a provincial town wishes nothing more urgently than for his daughter Eliza (Maria-Victoria Dragus) to be awarded a scholarship to Cambridge so that she can leave for "civilised" England. All Eliza has to do, is pass the graduation exams with her usual, excellent grades.
Marius (Rares Andrici), Eliza (Maria-Victoria Dragus) and Romeo...
- 2/13/2017
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
How far would you go to ensure your daughter’s future? In Cristian Mungiu‘s (“4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days” and “Beyond The Hills“) new film “Graduation,” a father is in a moral and ethical bind that has unexpected consequences, in what looks like another terrific effort from the Romanian filmmaker.
Adrian Titieni, Lia Bugnar, Maria Dragus, and Malina Manovici all feature in the film that kicks off when the college-bound Eliza is the victim of an assault that could alter her plans forever.
Continue reading Rules Are Broken In New U.K. Trailer For Cristian Mungiu’s Cannes-Winning ‘Graduation’ at The Playlist.
Adrian Titieni, Lia Bugnar, Maria Dragus, and Malina Manovici all feature in the film that kicks off when the college-bound Eliza is the victim of an assault that could alter her plans forever.
Continue reading Rules Are Broken In New U.K. Trailer For Cristian Mungiu’s Cannes-Winning ‘Graduation’ at The Playlist.
- 2/8/2017
- by Kevin Jagernauth
- The Playlist
The 2017 Berlin Film Festival has revealed its first slate of 14 films for the Competition and Berlinale Special sections, including new work from Aki Kaurismaki (“The Man Without a Past”), Oren Moverman (“Time Out of Mind”) and Sally Potter (“Ginger & Rosa”). The festival will also screen a restored version of Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s 1972 TV series “Eight Hours Don’t Make a Day.”
Read More: The 2016 Indiewire Berlin International Film Festival Bible: Every Review, Interview and News Item Posted During Run of Festival
So far, ten films have been invited to screen in Competition, and four films have been selected for Berlinale Special. These productions and co-productions are from the United State, the United Kingdom, Hungary, Belgium, Poland, Senegal and more.
The 67th Berlin International Film Festival will run from February 9 through 19. Further films will be revealed in the coming weeks. For more information, visit the official website.
Read More: The...
Read More: The 2016 Indiewire Berlin International Film Festival Bible: Every Review, Interview and News Item Posted During Run of Festival
So far, ten films have been invited to screen in Competition, and four films have been selected for Berlinale Special. These productions and co-productions are from the United State, the United Kingdom, Hungary, Belgium, Poland, Senegal and more.
The 67th Berlin International Film Festival will run from February 9 through 19. Further films will be revealed in the coming weeks. For more information, visit the official website.
Read More: The...
- 12/15/2016
- by Vikram Murthi
- Indiewire
After Sundance Film Festival concludes in late January, the next big cinematic event on the globe is the Berlin International Film Festival. With Paul Verhoeven serving as jury president for the 67th edition of the festival, they’ve now announced their first line-up of titles, including Aki Kaurismäki‘s The Other Side of Hope (pictured above), Oren Moverman‘s Richard Gere-led The Dinner, Sally Potter‘s The Party (pictured below), and Agnieszka Holland‘s Spoor, as well as a restoration of a Rainer Werner Fassbinder TV show.
Check out the first titles below, and return for our coverage from the festival.
Competition
A teströl és a lélekröl (On Body and Soul)
Hungary
By Ildiko Enyedi (My 20th Century, Simon the Magician)
With Géza Morcsányi, Alexandra Borbély, Zoltán Schneider
World premiere
Ana, mon amour
Romania/Germany/France
By Călin Peter Netzer (Child‘s Pose, Maria)
With Mircea Postelnicu, Diana Cavallioti,...
Check out the first titles below, and return for our coverage from the festival.
Competition
A teströl és a lélekröl (On Body and Soul)
Hungary
By Ildiko Enyedi (My 20th Century, Simon the Magician)
With Géza Morcsányi, Alexandra Borbély, Zoltán Schneider
World premiere
Ana, mon amour
Romania/Germany/France
By Călin Peter Netzer (Child‘s Pose, Maria)
With Mircea Postelnicu, Diana Cavallioti,...
- 12/15/2016
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Aki Kaurismäki, Oren Moverman, Agnieszka Holland, Sally Potter among Competition lineup.
The first 14 films have been announced for the Competition and Berlinale Special sections of the 67th Berlin International Film Festival.
Among directors with movies in competition are Aki Kaurismäki, Oren Moverman, Agnieszka Holland, Andres Veiel, Sebastián Lelio and Sally Potter.
Festival veteran Kaurismäki will debut new film The Other Side Of Hope about a Finnish travelling salesman who meets a Syrian refugee.
Moverman’s (The Messenger) mystery-drama The Dinner stars Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Steve Coogan, Rebecca Hall and Chloë Sevigny. Based on the novel by Herman Koch, the film looks at at how far parents will go to protect their children.
Oscar-nominated Holland, who was nominated for the Golden Bear in 1981, will be at the Berlinale with crime-drama Pokot.
Potter returns to Berlin with ensemble comedy-drama The Party starring Patricia Clarkson, Bruno Ganz, Cherry Jones, Emily Mortimer, Cillian Murphy, Kristin Scott Thomas and [link...
The first 14 films have been announced for the Competition and Berlinale Special sections of the 67th Berlin International Film Festival.
Among directors with movies in competition are Aki Kaurismäki, Oren Moverman, Agnieszka Holland, Andres Veiel, Sebastián Lelio and Sally Potter.
Festival veteran Kaurismäki will debut new film The Other Side Of Hope about a Finnish travelling salesman who meets a Syrian refugee.
Moverman’s (The Messenger) mystery-drama The Dinner stars Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Steve Coogan, Rebecca Hall and Chloë Sevigny. Based on the novel by Herman Koch, the film looks at at how far parents will go to protect their children.
Oscar-nominated Holland, who was nominated for the Golden Bear in 1981, will be at the Berlinale with crime-drama Pokot.
Potter returns to Berlin with ensemble comedy-drama The Party starring Patricia Clarkson, Bruno Ganz, Cherry Jones, Emily Mortimer, Cillian Murphy, Kristin Scott Thomas and [link...
- 12/15/2016
- by andreas.wiseman@screendaily.com (Andreas Wiseman)
- ScreenDaily
Aki Kaurismäki, Oren Moverman, Agnieszka Holland, Sally Potter among competition lineup.
The first 14 films have been announced for the Competition and Berlinale Special sections of the 67th Berlin International Film Festival.
Among directors with movies in competition are Aki Kaurismäki, Oren Moverman, Agnieszka Holland, Andres Veiel, Sebastián Lelio and Sally Potter.
Moverman’s (The Messenger) mystery-drama The Dinner stars Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Steve Coogan, Rebecca Hall and Chloë Sevigny.
Fernando Trueba’s comedy-drama The Queen of Spain, starring Penelope Cruz, will get its international premiere in the Berlinale Special strand.
More to follow…
Competition
A teströl és a lélekröl (On Body and Soul) (Hungary)
By Ildiko Enyedi (My 20th Century, Simon the Magician)
With Géza Morcsányi, Alexandra Borbély, Zoltán Schneider
World premiere
Ana, mon amour (Romania / Germany / France)
By Călin Peter Netzer (Child‘s Pose, Maria)
With Mircea Postelnicu, Diana Cavallioti, Carmen Tănase, Adrian Titieni, Vlad Ivanov
World premiere
Beuys - Documentary (Germany)
By Andres Veiel ([link...
The first 14 films have been announced for the Competition and Berlinale Special sections of the 67th Berlin International Film Festival.
Among directors with movies in competition are Aki Kaurismäki, Oren Moverman, Agnieszka Holland, Andres Veiel, Sebastián Lelio and Sally Potter.
Moverman’s (The Messenger) mystery-drama The Dinner stars Richard Gere, Laura Linney, Steve Coogan, Rebecca Hall and Chloë Sevigny.
Fernando Trueba’s comedy-drama The Queen of Spain, starring Penelope Cruz, will get its international premiere in the Berlinale Special strand.
More to follow…
Competition
A teströl és a lélekröl (On Body and Soul) (Hungary)
By Ildiko Enyedi (My 20th Century, Simon the Magician)
With Géza Morcsányi, Alexandra Borbély, Zoltán Schneider
World premiere
Ana, mon amour (Romania / Germany / France)
By Călin Peter Netzer (Child‘s Pose, Maria)
With Mircea Postelnicu, Diana Cavallioti, Carmen Tănase, Adrian Titieni, Vlad Ivanov
World premiere
Beuys - Documentary (Germany)
By Andres Veiel ([link...
- 12/15/2016
- by andreas.wiseman@screendaily.com (Andreas Wiseman)
- ScreenDaily
Chicago – The recently completed 52nd Chicago International Film Festival offered a world perspective on cinema, and honors the films that will influence the arts culture for years to come. Their Awards Night was October 21st, 2016, and was hosted by Richard Roeper, film critic of the Chicago Sun Times. The recipient of the top prize of the fest, the Gold Hugo, was “Sieranevada” (Romania), directed by Cristi Puiu.
The 52nd Chicago International Film Festival Awards Night was Oct. 21, 2016
Photo credit: Chicago International Film Festival
The awards event took place at the AMC River East Theatre. Presenters included Programming Director Mimi Plauché, programmers Anthony Kaufman and Sam Flancher, plus various jury members – which included Geraldine Chapman (actress and daughter of Charlie Chaplin), who presided over the International Feature Film Competition Jury. Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com sat on the Animation Shorts jury. The Festival’s highest honor is the Gold Hugo, named...
The 52nd Chicago International Film Festival Awards Night was Oct. 21, 2016
Photo credit: Chicago International Film Festival
The awards event took place at the AMC River East Theatre. Presenters included Programming Director Mimi Plauché, programmers Anthony Kaufman and Sam Flancher, plus various jury members – which included Geraldine Chapman (actress and daughter of Charlie Chaplin), who presided over the International Feature Film Competition Jury. Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com sat on the Animation Shorts jury. The Festival’s highest honor is the Gold Hugo, named...
- 10/30/2016
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
Cristi Puiu’s Romanian drama won the Gold Hugo for best film in International Feature Competition as the 52nd Chicago International Film Festival wrapped at the weekend.
Puiu himself earned the Silver Hugo for best director, while the Gold Hugo in the New Directors Competition went to Juho Kuosmanen for The Happiest Day In The Life Of Olli Mäki (pictured).
Rebecca Hall won the Silver Hugo for best actress for her lead role in Christine and Gold Hugo best actor honours went to Adrian Titieni for Graduation.
For the full list of winners click here.
Puiu himself earned the Silver Hugo for best director, while the Gold Hugo in the New Directors Competition went to Juho Kuosmanen for The Happiest Day In The Life Of Olli Mäki (pictured).
Rebecca Hall won the Silver Hugo for best actress for her lead role in Christine and Gold Hugo best actor honours went to Adrian Titieni for Graduation.
For the full list of winners click here.
- 10/24/2016
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
Bill Curran reporting from the New York Film Festival. Hot takes on two titles...
Hermia and Helena
Matías Piñeiro’s newest Bard-based roundelay belongs to that venerable arthouse tradition, the stranger-here-in-this-town movie. Far from attempting a fully foreign pose, the Argentina-bred but Brooklyn-living Piñeiro is driven by the same impulse found in Hou Hsiao-hsien’s Flight of the Red Balloon and Wim Wender’s 70’s USA road trilogy: flaunt the outsider perspective. When Carmen (Maria Villar) hustles back to Buenos Aires with an unfinished manuscript, Camila (Agustina Muñoz) all but assumes her friend’s spot—not to mention a few dangling relationships—in a literary translation fellowship in New York City. Camila’s choice of text: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, naturally, giving Hermia and Helena license to oscillate between North and South America as if they were different worlds, and to riff on the impermanency of love and self.
Hermia and Helena
Matías Piñeiro’s newest Bard-based roundelay belongs to that venerable arthouse tradition, the stranger-here-in-this-town movie. Far from attempting a fully foreign pose, the Argentina-bred but Brooklyn-living Piñeiro is driven by the same impulse found in Hou Hsiao-hsien’s Flight of the Red Balloon and Wim Wender’s 70’s USA road trilogy: flaunt the outsider perspective. When Carmen (Maria Villar) hustles back to Buenos Aires with an unfinished manuscript, Camila (Agustina Muñoz) all but assumes her friend’s spot—not to mention a few dangling relationships—in a literary translation fellowship in New York City. Camila’s choice of text: A Midsummer Night’s Dream, naturally, giving Hermia and Helena license to oscillate between North and South America as if they were different worlds, and to riff on the impermanency of love and self.
- 9/29/2016
- by Bill Curran
- FilmExperience
John Waters, a big fan of Isabelle Huppert, star of Valley Of Love, Elle and Things To Come Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Cristian Mungiu's (Beyond The Hills and 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days)Graduation (Bacalaureat) with Adrian Titieni, Maria-Victoria Dragus, Lia Bugnar and Malina Manovici; Ken Loach's I, Daniel Blake, starring Dave Johns and Hayley Squires; Isabelle Huppert in Paul Verhoeven's Elle and Mia Hansen-Løve's (Goodbye First Love and Eden) Things To Come (L’Avenir) are four early highlights of the 54th New York Film Festival.
In Elle, shot by Stéphane Fontaine (Jacques Audiard's A Prophet and Rust And Bone written by Thomas Bidegain), Anne Consigny, Laurent Lafitte, Judith Magre, and Charles Berling make up a smashing ensemble cast. Things to Come features Edith Scob, André Marcon, and Roman Kolinka with costumes by Rachèle Raoult (Jalil Lespert's Yves Saint Laurent and Léos Carax's Holy Motors) filmed...
Cristian Mungiu's (Beyond The Hills and 4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days)Graduation (Bacalaureat) with Adrian Titieni, Maria-Victoria Dragus, Lia Bugnar and Malina Manovici; Ken Loach's I, Daniel Blake, starring Dave Johns and Hayley Squires; Isabelle Huppert in Paul Verhoeven's Elle and Mia Hansen-Løve's (Goodbye First Love and Eden) Things To Come (L’Avenir) are four early highlights of the 54th New York Film Festival.
In Elle, shot by Stéphane Fontaine (Jacques Audiard's A Prophet and Rust And Bone written by Thomas Bidegain), Anne Consigny, Laurent Lafitte, Judith Magre, and Charles Berling make up a smashing ensemble cast. Things to Come features Edith Scob, André Marcon, and Roman Kolinka with costumes by Rachèle Raoult (Jalil Lespert's Yves Saint Laurent and Léos Carax's Holy Motors) filmed...
- 9/4/2016
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
The Cannes Film Festival doesn’t much care what the American public likes. Hollywood entries at Cannes 2016, which included recent releases “Money Monster and “The Nice Guys,” played out of competition. And most of the award winners won’t register at the North American box office, no matter how much the critics adore them.
However, there was another set of movies at Cannes. While largely ignored by the jury, these titles have serious aspirations to make a mark at the arthouse this year — and at the Oscars next year. They’re the Cannes films you’re most likely to see.
Here’s our ranking of the movies with distributors that most likely to reach a sizable North American audience this fall.
1. “Loving” Director: Jeff Nichols Distributor: Focus Features
Stars: Joel Edgerton and Ruth Negga Release date: November 4, 2016 Cannes section: Competition Reviews: Metascore: 71 Critics’ take: Some reviewers admired this sincere biopic,...
However, there was another set of movies at Cannes. While largely ignored by the jury, these titles have serious aspirations to make a mark at the arthouse this year — and at the Oscars next year. They’re the Cannes films you’re most likely to see.
Here’s our ranking of the movies with distributors that most likely to reach a sizable North American audience this fall.
1. “Loving” Director: Jeff Nichols Distributor: Focus Features
Stars: Joel Edgerton and Ruth Negga Release date: November 4, 2016 Cannes section: Competition Reviews: Metascore: 71 Critics’ take: Some reviewers admired this sincere biopic,...
- 5/26/2016
- by Anne Thompson and Graham Winfrey
- Thompson on Hollywood
Forget the Cannes jury awards. This year, the most famous film festival in the world showcased something much bigger than a couple of prize-winners: Women filmmakers and actors at the top of their game.
It was hard to miss how much the women before and behind the camera were front and center, dominating the conversation in Cannes. More of the Official Selection films were focused on women than ever before. And a new kind of protagonist emerged at Cannes 2016. She’s independent, strong, often androgynous, and not defined by her relationships with men.
Hollywood producers, executives and filmmakers, take note. This is how it can be done.
Check out the fabulous women of Cannes 2016.
Isabelle Huppert
In Paul Verhoeven’s provocative thriller “Elle,” Isabelle Huppert plays a videogame entrepreneur who refuses to allow her violent rape in her own home to ruin her life. She doesn’t miss a beat. She doesn’t call the cops. She changes the locks, gets an Std test, buys pepper spray and learns how to use a gun. She’s a sophisticated, elegant, powerful, modern woman who lives alone, runs her own company, manipulates her family, has sex with whomever she fancies, and is free to do as she pleases.
At 63, Huppert believably plays a younger woman in her sexual prime, bringing all her experience to bear on the role, which was adapted from a French novel by an American screenwriter (David Birke) and then translated back into French when Huppert came aboard. She elevates the character into almost making sense. Typically, Verhoeven refuses to supply psychological underpinnings for what she does. But Huppert makes us believe. With critics and awards-savvy Sony Pictures Classics behind “Elle,” this commercial movie could wind up a North American hit this fall, a French Oscar nominee (if France submits it), and a Best Actress Oscar contender.
Kristen Stewart
Another independent woman is at the center of Olivier Assayas’ “Personal Shopper,” his second English-language film starring Stewart (Cesar-winner for “Clouds of Sils Maria”). She plays Maureen, who acquires fashionable clothes for a rich client, flits around Paris on a scooter, and reaches the people in her life via Skype and mobile. She’s trying to use her skills as a medium to communicate with her twin brother, who has recently died, when mysterious texts suddenly appear on her iPhone. “Who is this?” she asks. “Personal Shopper” tracks a lost and lonely soul who is disconnected from herself. As she tries on her client’s sexy costumes and figures out who is tracking her, she eventually finds her identity again.
Stewart had a good Cannes, showing her stripes not only in her roles in “Personal Shopper” and opener Woody Allen’s “Cafe Society,” but by deftly fielding, with finesse and poise, the many questions thrown at her during press conferences and interviews. She refused to be drawn into the Allen controversy (unlike co-star Blake Lively), wore flats when she could have worn heels, and explained why she likes working with intellectual directors like Assayas. She’s a smart career shaper with a rosy future who rather than conform to Hollywood demands, prefers to make her own choices on the world stage.
Maren Ade and Sandra Hüller
Father-daughter tension forms the backbone of two of the best films in Competition, Screen International’s critics’ poll winner “Toni Erdmann” and directing prize co-winner Cristian Mungiu’s “Graduation.”
German filmmaker Maren Ade‘s third feature is a generational comedy that pits a goofy father (Peter Simonischek) against his workaholic corporate strategist daughter Ines (Sandra Hüller). She’s a woman in a man’s world who thinks she doesn’t need feminism, who Ade sees as almost “a gender-neutral character.” After anxiously trying to prove herself to her male bosses, Ines eventually gets what her father is trying to tell her via his crazy antics and humor. She sees things more clearly, reconnects with him, and takes control of her own life.
Maria Dragus
The young Romanian star of Michael Haneke’s “The White Ribbon” shines in Mungiu’s “Graduation,” which sends a controlling father (Adrian Titieni) into a tailspin when his long-held post-graduation plans for his daughter (Dragus) go terribly awry. At the start of “Graduation,” the daughter’s rape sets in motion a series of revelations, compromises and ethical dilemmas as the father tries desperately to keep things on track. To her credit, his daughter refuses to go along with his schemes, stands up to him with strength and moral fortitude, and finally sets free her two protective parents from all their secrets and lies.
Andrea Arnold, Sasha Lane and Riley Keough British director Arnold took home the Cannes jury prize for the third time for her daring American road movie “American Honey” (A24), an empowering coming of age story starring unknown Sasha Lane, making Arnold three for three at the fest after 2006’s “Red Road” and 2009’s “Fish Tank.”
Critics adored the film, which was shaped by the American midwestern landscape as well as the editing room. Arnold’s final film was vastly different from its original script, turning toward the young woman finding her identity as its through-line—Shia Labeouf and Elvis Presley granddaughter Riley Keough (“Mad Max: Fury Road”) offered stalwart support— and was unlike anything else at Cannes this year.
Jodie Foster and Julia Roberts Foster likes bringing smart movies like “Money Monster” and “The Beaver” to Cannes—it’s a film festival for smart people, after all —and she introduced “Money Monster” star Julia Roberts to the Croisette, who walked up the red carpet with bare feet, reminding us all that she has nothing to prove. “We were thrilled for Julia,” Foster told me in our video interview. “George is so excited to show her Cannes, and wanted her to have that moment seeing that sea of photographers.”
“Money Monster” was the perfect Cannes out-of-competition studio entry, an entertaining populist Wall Street/media critique for festival gala audiences, with major movie stars for the tapis rouge, press conference and junket for a European market launch. Not surprisingly, the actors are terrific: Clooney plays a glib financial TV guru held hostage by an angry victim of his bad advice (a surprisingly sympathetic Jack O’Connell), who fits him with a bomb vest as punishment. Roberts as Clooney’s producer beams the story live as everyone scrambles to come out of the crisis intact.
As a Hollywood movie star who pushed past conventional women’s roles, scoring four Oscar nominations and two wins (“The Accused,” “The Silence of the Lambs”) and has carried many commercial movies on her own (“Contact,” “Panic Room,” “Flight Plan”), Foster beefed up Roberts’ character to give her more purpose and dimension. In the original script she was more of a technician, but Foster turned her into a competent, strong, active producer who helps Clooney’s character find his strength and unravel the mystery.
Adèle Haenel
In Cannes regulars Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne’s “The Unknown Girl” (Sundance Selects), Haenel plays another gender-neutral character, an excellent, empathetic doctor who is not defined by her relationships or friends; she lives a solitary, monastic life devoted to the well-being of her patients. When she ignores a late-hour doorbell at her private practice and finds out from the police that the young woman was murdered nearby, the doctor embarks on a mission, against the wishes of many including the police, to identify the girl and inform her family of her death.
Kim Min-hee and Kim Tae-ri
With erotic mystery “The Handmaiden” (Amazon) great Korean auteur Park Chan-wook moved the Victorian setting of the novel “Fingersmith” to the 30s period when Japan occupied Korea. Told in two parts from two distinct points-of-view, the lushly mounted movie follows a rich Korean gentlewoman (star Kim Min-hee) and her maidservant (newcomer Kim Tae-ri) who not only fall lustily in love, but plot against their oppressive masters. Park has fashioned a luscious tale of sexual expression and female empowerment.
Elle Fanning
Nicolas Winding Refn’s “Neon Demon” also puts women front and center, led by Elle Fanning, who was 16 when she was cast, 17 when she shot the film, and is now 18. She plays a newcomer to the La fashion scene who discovers that starving models literally eat each other alive. In one memorable scene, when one x-ray known as the bionic woman (because she has altered so much of her body) throws up an eyeball, her best friend pops it into her own mouth. Refn said he wanted to make the women characters primary and the men secondary. While the movie was not a critical hit in Cannes and did not win any prizes, the stylishly transgressive genre exercise could become a smart-horror hit stateside when Amazon Studios releases it in June.
Adriana Ugarte and Emma Suárez These two superb Spanish actresses star as the young and older incarnations of Pedro Almodóvar’s latest female creation, “Julieta” (Sony Pictures Classics). The Spanish auteur’s adaptation of three Alice Munro stories was originally going to star Meryl Streep in an English-language version, in which she would have used makeup to play both roles. This way the movie takes on a decidedly Hitchcockian tone, as the very blonde young Julieta (Ugarte) enjoys mad sex with a stranger on a train, while the older and soberer Julieta (Suárez) is less open, prey to feelings of loss and regret. Why is she estranged from her daughter? What went wrong the day her husband went fishing in the face of an impending storm? This twisted family saga unfolds in cinematic ways that could only come from Almodóvar. Related storiesTop Women Cinematographers Reveal 7 Best Tips for Career SuccessCannes Film Festival Awards 2016Cannes Today: New Talent Emerges...
It was hard to miss how much the women before and behind the camera were front and center, dominating the conversation in Cannes. More of the Official Selection films were focused on women than ever before. And a new kind of protagonist emerged at Cannes 2016. She’s independent, strong, often androgynous, and not defined by her relationships with men.
Hollywood producers, executives and filmmakers, take note. This is how it can be done.
Check out the fabulous women of Cannes 2016.
Isabelle Huppert
In Paul Verhoeven’s provocative thriller “Elle,” Isabelle Huppert plays a videogame entrepreneur who refuses to allow her violent rape in her own home to ruin her life. She doesn’t miss a beat. She doesn’t call the cops. She changes the locks, gets an Std test, buys pepper spray and learns how to use a gun. She’s a sophisticated, elegant, powerful, modern woman who lives alone, runs her own company, manipulates her family, has sex with whomever she fancies, and is free to do as she pleases.
At 63, Huppert believably plays a younger woman in her sexual prime, bringing all her experience to bear on the role, which was adapted from a French novel by an American screenwriter (David Birke) and then translated back into French when Huppert came aboard. She elevates the character into almost making sense. Typically, Verhoeven refuses to supply psychological underpinnings for what she does. But Huppert makes us believe. With critics and awards-savvy Sony Pictures Classics behind “Elle,” this commercial movie could wind up a North American hit this fall, a French Oscar nominee (if France submits it), and a Best Actress Oscar contender.
Kristen Stewart
Another independent woman is at the center of Olivier Assayas’ “Personal Shopper,” his second English-language film starring Stewart (Cesar-winner for “Clouds of Sils Maria”). She plays Maureen, who acquires fashionable clothes for a rich client, flits around Paris on a scooter, and reaches the people in her life via Skype and mobile. She’s trying to use her skills as a medium to communicate with her twin brother, who has recently died, when mysterious texts suddenly appear on her iPhone. “Who is this?” she asks. “Personal Shopper” tracks a lost and lonely soul who is disconnected from herself. As she tries on her client’s sexy costumes and figures out who is tracking her, she eventually finds her identity again.
Stewart had a good Cannes, showing her stripes not only in her roles in “Personal Shopper” and opener Woody Allen’s “Cafe Society,” but by deftly fielding, with finesse and poise, the many questions thrown at her during press conferences and interviews. She refused to be drawn into the Allen controversy (unlike co-star Blake Lively), wore flats when she could have worn heels, and explained why she likes working with intellectual directors like Assayas. She’s a smart career shaper with a rosy future who rather than conform to Hollywood demands, prefers to make her own choices on the world stage.
Maren Ade and Sandra Hüller
Father-daughter tension forms the backbone of two of the best films in Competition, Screen International’s critics’ poll winner “Toni Erdmann” and directing prize co-winner Cristian Mungiu’s “Graduation.”
German filmmaker Maren Ade‘s third feature is a generational comedy that pits a goofy father (Peter Simonischek) against his workaholic corporate strategist daughter Ines (Sandra Hüller). She’s a woman in a man’s world who thinks she doesn’t need feminism, who Ade sees as almost “a gender-neutral character.” After anxiously trying to prove herself to her male bosses, Ines eventually gets what her father is trying to tell her via his crazy antics and humor. She sees things more clearly, reconnects with him, and takes control of her own life.
Maria Dragus
The young Romanian star of Michael Haneke’s “The White Ribbon” shines in Mungiu’s “Graduation,” which sends a controlling father (Adrian Titieni) into a tailspin when his long-held post-graduation plans for his daughter (Dragus) go terribly awry. At the start of “Graduation,” the daughter’s rape sets in motion a series of revelations, compromises and ethical dilemmas as the father tries desperately to keep things on track. To her credit, his daughter refuses to go along with his schemes, stands up to him with strength and moral fortitude, and finally sets free her two protective parents from all their secrets and lies.
Andrea Arnold, Sasha Lane and Riley Keough British director Arnold took home the Cannes jury prize for the third time for her daring American road movie “American Honey” (A24), an empowering coming of age story starring unknown Sasha Lane, making Arnold three for three at the fest after 2006’s “Red Road” and 2009’s “Fish Tank.”
Critics adored the film, which was shaped by the American midwestern landscape as well as the editing room. Arnold’s final film was vastly different from its original script, turning toward the young woman finding her identity as its through-line—Shia Labeouf and Elvis Presley granddaughter Riley Keough (“Mad Max: Fury Road”) offered stalwart support— and was unlike anything else at Cannes this year.
Jodie Foster and Julia Roberts Foster likes bringing smart movies like “Money Monster” and “The Beaver” to Cannes—it’s a film festival for smart people, after all —and she introduced “Money Monster” star Julia Roberts to the Croisette, who walked up the red carpet with bare feet, reminding us all that she has nothing to prove. “We were thrilled for Julia,” Foster told me in our video interview. “George is so excited to show her Cannes, and wanted her to have that moment seeing that sea of photographers.”
“Money Monster” was the perfect Cannes out-of-competition studio entry, an entertaining populist Wall Street/media critique for festival gala audiences, with major movie stars for the tapis rouge, press conference and junket for a European market launch. Not surprisingly, the actors are terrific: Clooney plays a glib financial TV guru held hostage by an angry victim of his bad advice (a surprisingly sympathetic Jack O’Connell), who fits him with a bomb vest as punishment. Roberts as Clooney’s producer beams the story live as everyone scrambles to come out of the crisis intact.
As a Hollywood movie star who pushed past conventional women’s roles, scoring four Oscar nominations and two wins (“The Accused,” “The Silence of the Lambs”) and has carried many commercial movies on her own (“Contact,” “Panic Room,” “Flight Plan”), Foster beefed up Roberts’ character to give her more purpose and dimension. In the original script she was more of a technician, but Foster turned her into a competent, strong, active producer who helps Clooney’s character find his strength and unravel the mystery.
Adèle Haenel
In Cannes regulars Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne’s “The Unknown Girl” (Sundance Selects), Haenel plays another gender-neutral character, an excellent, empathetic doctor who is not defined by her relationships or friends; she lives a solitary, monastic life devoted to the well-being of her patients. When she ignores a late-hour doorbell at her private practice and finds out from the police that the young woman was murdered nearby, the doctor embarks on a mission, against the wishes of many including the police, to identify the girl and inform her family of her death.
Kim Min-hee and Kim Tae-ri
With erotic mystery “The Handmaiden” (Amazon) great Korean auteur Park Chan-wook moved the Victorian setting of the novel “Fingersmith” to the 30s period when Japan occupied Korea. Told in two parts from two distinct points-of-view, the lushly mounted movie follows a rich Korean gentlewoman (star Kim Min-hee) and her maidservant (newcomer Kim Tae-ri) who not only fall lustily in love, but plot against their oppressive masters. Park has fashioned a luscious tale of sexual expression and female empowerment.
Elle Fanning
Nicolas Winding Refn’s “Neon Demon” also puts women front and center, led by Elle Fanning, who was 16 when she was cast, 17 when she shot the film, and is now 18. She plays a newcomer to the La fashion scene who discovers that starving models literally eat each other alive. In one memorable scene, when one x-ray known as the bionic woman (because she has altered so much of her body) throws up an eyeball, her best friend pops it into her own mouth. Refn said he wanted to make the women characters primary and the men secondary. While the movie was not a critical hit in Cannes and did not win any prizes, the stylishly transgressive genre exercise could become a smart-horror hit stateside when Amazon Studios releases it in June.
Adriana Ugarte and Emma Suárez These two superb Spanish actresses star as the young and older incarnations of Pedro Almodóvar’s latest female creation, “Julieta” (Sony Pictures Classics). The Spanish auteur’s adaptation of three Alice Munro stories was originally going to star Meryl Streep in an English-language version, in which she would have used makeup to play both roles. This way the movie takes on a decidedly Hitchcockian tone, as the very blonde young Julieta (Ugarte) enjoys mad sex with a stranger on a train, while the older and soberer Julieta (Suárez) is less open, prey to feelings of loss and regret. Why is she estranged from her daughter? What went wrong the day her husband went fishing in the face of an impending storm? This twisted family saga unfolds in cinematic ways that could only come from Almodóvar. Related storiesTop Women Cinematographers Reveal 7 Best Tips for Career SuccessCannes Film Festival Awards 2016Cannes Today: New Talent Emerges...
- 5/25/2016
- by Anne Thompson
- Thompson on Hollywood
As juror László Nemes (“Son of Saul”) said at the start of the Cannes Film Festival, juries are by their nature random. One thing you can count on is that the actors on the jury will shift the conversation. From the start, this year’s actors said they were looking for emotion. And that’s what the two top winners boast in abundance. “It was a collective decision,” said Miller of his “nine-headed beast,” describing the awards process as like creating a painting. “We looked at every variable, it’s not like ticking off a vote for the Oscars…we were looking at the awards like a totality. It took so much time, so much rigor, it was exhausting, emotionally, as everyone was talking so passionately.”
Thanks to jury chief Miller, it was Mel Gibson (whose “Blood Father” played well as a Cannes midnight movie) who presented the Palme d’Or to 79-year-old British director Ken Loach, winning for the second time (2006’s “The Wind that Shakes the Barley”); he’s won many other prizes over 18 films selected for Cannes. By far the most emotional movie of the festival, “I, Daniel Blake” (Sundance Selects) brought audiences to wrenching tears, including this writer. Based on research into England’s public welfare crisis, the film is a fictionalized story set in Newcastle about a joiner (Dave Johns) who can’t seem to convince the state to give him the disability he needs after a heart condition makes it impossible for him to work.
“The festival is very important for the future of cinema,” said Loach. “When there is despair, the people from the far right take advantage. We must say that another world is possible and necessary.”
Read More: The 2016 Indiewire Cannes Bible: Every Review, Interview and News Item Posted During the Festival
Many critics did not respond to Loach’s overtly political film because they didn’t think he was doing anything different from what he had done before. But they really didn’t like Xavier Dolan’s very theatrical “It’s Only the End of the World,” which won the consolation prize, the Grand Prix, which means that the jury responded very differently to this heartfelt adaptation of a play about a dysfunctional family, who scream in French in extreme closeup. (Dolan won the jury prize in 2014 for “Mommy.”)
“Thank you for feeling the emotions of the film,” said Dolan (who attacked the critical reaction to his film) in a speech during which he cried, lips trembling, and chewed on his hands. Maybe it will now be picked up for the U.S., although it won’t be a crowdpleaser.
Co-winner of the director prize, Romanian Cristian Mungiu (“Graduation”), had also won the Palme d’Or, for 2007’s “4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days,” and his actresses shared the Actress prize for “Beyond the Hills.” Mungiu’s “Graduation” (Sundance Selects) sends a controlling father (Adrian Titieni) into a tailspin when his long-held post-graduation plans for his daughter (Maria Dragus) go terribly awry. Mungiu points out each individual’s role in doing the right thing when corruption and compromise often rule the day.
Co-winner Olivier Assayas, on the other hand, accepted his first Cannes award for “Personal Shopper” (IFC Films), his second English-language film starring Kristen Stewart (Cesar winner for “Clouds of Sils Maria”), whose character acquires fashionable clothes for a rich client. She tries to use her skills as a medium to communicate with her twin brother, who has recently died, when mysterious texts suddenly appear on her iPhone. It was a great Cannes for Stewart, who was well-received in Woody Allen’s “Cafe Society” (Amazon) as well, and for IFC/Sundance Selects, which is releasing “I, Daniel Blake,” “Graduation” and “Personal Shopper.”
Those who thought that the women who dominated the Cannes would come home with multiple awards were sorely disappointed. British director Andrea Arnold took home the jury prize for the third time for her daring American road movie “American Honey” (A24), a coming of age story starring Shia Labeouf and unknown Sasha Lane, making Arnold three for three at the fest after 2006’s “Red Road” and 2009’s “Fish Tank.”
Critics adored the film, which was shaped by the American midwestern landscape as well as the editing room. The film was vastly different from its original script and unlike anything else at Cannes this year. “Five hours ago I was sitting in my neighbor’s garden drinking tea,” Arnold said in her acceptance speech, thanking her cast and crew for the “team effort” on their “great adventure.”
Meanwhile, critics’ fave and the winner by a mile of the Screen International Critics Poll (see below), German director Maren Ade’s exquisite father-daughter comedy “Toni Erdmann” (Sony Pictures Classics), came home empty-handed. At the jury press conference jury chief Miller cited a “passionate” and long jury deliberation (which Mikkelsen described as “difficult”) on 21 films, directors, writers and many more actors as well as arcane jury rules that demand that the top three winners cannot win a second prize. Miller and Mads Mikkelsen both stated that they judged the films on their excellence, not on the sex of who directed them. “Each film was judged on its merits,” said Miller. “Filmmaking is filmmaking. It did not come up, we were looking at other issues.”
The first-time director prize went to “Divines,” a gangster thriller and female buddy movie directed by Houda Benyamina (Director’s Fortnight).
The jury defended the choice of Best Actress Jaclyn Jose for “Ma’ Rosa,” from Philippine director Brillante Mendoza, which some critics had suggested was a supporting role in a sprawling ensemble. “The critics were wrong,” said Donald Sutherland. “It’s a big-time leading role.”
“She’s the film,” said Arnaud Desplechin. “She broke my heart.”
The jury admitted that there were many strong actress contenders including “I, Daniel Blake”‘s Hayley Squires and Romanian actress Maria Dragus (“Graduation”), but they couldn’t award more than one prize for winners of the top three awards.
Asghar Farhadi’s “The Salesman” (Amazon/Cohen Media) was another surprise winner, taking home two prizes, for Best Actor and Best Screenplay. Shahab Hosseini plays an actor who is in the midst of moving apartments and starring in Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman” when his wife (Taraneh Alidoosti) is assaulted in the shower of their new domicile by a man who assumes that she is the former tenant, a prostitute. When the door buzzes, the wife thinks she is letting in her husband, but winds up in the hospital with more than wounds to her head and psyche — her husband is hellbent on revenge.
The Honorary Palme d’Or went to Jean-Pierre Leaud, who came to the festival with his first film “The 400 Blows” in 1959 when he was 14 years old, and was hugged by Jean Cocteau. Juror Arnaud Desplechin presented the award. Leaud said this was the most joy he had felt since Francois Truffaut told him to take the script for “The 400 Blows.”
Among those who did not need to attend the closing ceremony were Isabelle Huppert, who earned raves for Paul Verhoeven’s provocative thriller “Elle” (Sony Pictures Classics), in which she plays a videogame entrepreneur who refuses to allow her violent rape in her own home to ruin her life. Verhoeven’s first French-language film is likely to play better in North America.
Read More: Cannes 2016: Complete List of This Year’s Winners
Also left out of the awards were “Paterson” (Amazon), American auteur Jim Jarmusch’s spare and austere portrait of a bus driver poet (Adam Driver) and his wife and muse (Golshifteh Farahani), as well as Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardennes’ “The Unknown Girl” (Sundance Selects), starring Adèle Haenel as an empathetic doctor who ignores a late-hour doorbell at her private practice and finds out that the young woman was murdered nearby. She embarks on a mission to identify the girl and inform her family of her death. Park Chan-Wook’s gorgeously wrought erotic drama “The Handmaiden” (Amazon) starring Kim Min-hee and newcomer Kim Tae-ri as secret lesbian lovers was also overlooked.
Among the anticipated films that disappointed the critics at Cannes (not to mention the jury) were Sean Penn’s aid worker romance “The Last Face,” starring Javier Bardem and Charlize Theron, which was seeking a North American buyer, and Nicolas Winding Refn’s “Neon Demon” (Amazon), starring Elle Fanning, who discovers that starving models in the Los Angeles fashion world literally eat each other alive. In one memorable scene, when one x-ray model known as the bionic woman (because she has altered so much of her body) throws up an eyeball, her best friend pops it into her own mouth. (With five films at the festival, Amazon won no awards.)
At the “Neon Demon” party, when I asked Cannes director Thierry Fremaux why so many movies wound up in Competition that the critics did not like, he said that the festival was not set up for the critics, although they clearly play an important role. He said that how movies played for audiences was important too. Clearly that included the Cannes jury.
Stay on top of the all the latest headlines! Sign up for our Daily Headlines email newsletter here. Related storiesCannes Film Festival Awards 2016Cannes Today: New Talent EmergesHow Will the Cannes Film Festival Impact the Rest of the Year in Film? (Podcast)...
Thanks to jury chief Miller, it was Mel Gibson (whose “Blood Father” played well as a Cannes midnight movie) who presented the Palme d’Or to 79-year-old British director Ken Loach, winning for the second time (2006’s “The Wind that Shakes the Barley”); he’s won many other prizes over 18 films selected for Cannes. By far the most emotional movie of the festival, “I, Daniel Blake” (Sundance Selects) brought audiences to wrenching tears, including this writer. Based on research into England’s public welfare crisis, the film is a fictionalized story set in Newcastle about a joiner (Dave Johns) who can’t seem to convince the state to give him the disability he needs after a heart condition makes it impossible for him to work.
“The festival is very important for the future of cinema,” said Loach. “When there is despair, the people from the far right take advantage. We must say that another world is possible and necessary.”
Read More: The 2016 Indiewire Cannes Bible: Every Review, Interview and News Item Posted During the Festival
Many critics did not respond to Loach’s overtly political film because they didn’t think he was doing anything different from what he had done before. But they really didn’t like Xavier Dolan’s very theatrical “It’s Only the End of the World,” which won the consolation prize, the Grand Prix, which means that the jury responded very differently to this heartfelt adaptation of a play about a dysfunctional family, who scream in French in extreme closeup. (Dolan won the jury prize in 2014 for “Mommy.”)
“Thank you for feeling the emotions of the film,” said Dolan (who attacked the critical reaction to his film) in a speech during which he cried, lips trembling, and chewed on his hands. Maybe it will now be picked up for the U.S., although it won’t be a crowdpleaser.
Co-winner of the director prize, Romanian Cristian Mungiu (“Graduation”), had also won the Palme d’Or, for 2007’s “4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days,” and his actresses shared the Actress prize for “Beyond the Hills.” Mungiu’s “Graduation” (Sundance Selects) sends a controlling father (Adrian Titieni) into a tailspin when his long-held post-graduation plans for his daughter (Maria Dragus) go terribly awry. Mungiu points out each individual’s role in doing the right thing when corruption and compromise often rule the day.
Co-winner Olivier Assayas, on the other hand, accepted his first Cannes award for “Personal Shopper” (IFC Films), his second English-language film starring Kristen Stewart (Cesar winner for “Clouds of Sils Maria”), whose character acquires fashionable clothes for a rich client. She tries to use her skills as a medium to communicate with her twin brother, who has recently died, when mysterious texts suddenly appear on her iPhone. It was a great Cannes for Stewart, who was well-received in Woody Allen’s “Cafe Society” (Amazon) as well, and for IFC/Sundance Selects, which is releasing “I, Daniel Blake,” “Graduation” and “Personal Shopper.”
Those who thought that the women who dominated the Cannes would come home with multiple awards were sorely disappointed. British director Andrea Arnold took home the jury prize for the third time for her daring American road movie “American Honey” (A24), a coming of age story starring Shia Labeouf and unknown Sasha Lane, making Arnold three for three at the fest after 2006’s “Red Road” and 2009’s “Fish Tank.”
Critics adored the film, which was shaped by the American midwestern landscape as well as the editing room. The film was vastly different from its original script and unlike anything else at Cannes this year. “Five hours ago I was sitting in my neighbor’s garden drinking tea,” Arnold said in her acceptance speech, thanking her cast and crew for the “team effort” on their “great adventure.”
Meanwhile, critics’ fave and the winner by a mile of the Screen International Critics Poll (see below), German director Maren Ade’s exquisite father-daughter comedy “Toni Erdmann” (Sony Pictures Classics), came home empty-handed. At the jury press conference jury chief Miller cited a “passionate” and long jury deliberation (which Mikkelsen described as “difficult”) on 21 films, directors, writers and many more actors as well as arcane jury rules that demand that the top three winners cannot win a second prize. Miller and Mads Mikkelsen both stated that they judged the films on their excellence, not on the sex of who directed them. “Each film was judged on its merits,” said Miller. “Filmmaking is filmmaking. It did not come up, we were looking at other issues.”
The first-time director prize went to “Divines,” a gangster thriller and female buddy movie directed by Houda Benyamina (Director’s Fortnight).
The jury defended the choice of Best Actress Jaclyn Jose for “Ma’ Rosa,” from Philippine director Brillante Mendoza, which some critics had suggested was a supporting role in a sprawling ensemble. “The critics were wrong,” said Donald Sutherland. “It’s a big-time leading role.”
“She’s the film,” said Arnaud Desplechin. “She broke my heart.”
The jury admitted that there were many strong actress contenders including “I, Daniel Blake”‘s Hayley Squires and Romanian actress Maria Dragus (“Graduation”), but they couldn’t award more than one prize for winners of the top three awards.
Asghar Farhadi’s “The Salesman” (Amazon/Cohen Media) was another surprise winner, taking home two prizes, for Best Actor and Best Screenplay. Shahab Hosseini plays an actor who is in the midst of moving apartments and starring in Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman” when his wife (Taraneh Alidoosti) is assaulted in the shower of their new domicile by a man who assumes that she is the former tenant, a prostitute. When the door buzzes, the wife thinks she is letting in her husband, but winds up in the hospital with more than wounds to her head and psyche — her husband is hellbent on revenge.
The Honorary Palme d’Or went to Jean-Pierre Leaud, who came to the festival with his first film “The 400 Blows” in 1959 when he was 14 years old, and was hugged by Jean Cocteau. Juror Arnaud Desplechin presented the award. Leaud said this was the most joy he had felt since Francois Truffaut told him to take the script for “The 400 Blows.”
Among those who did not need to attend the closing ceremony were Isabelle Huppert, who earned raves for Paul Verhoeven’s provocative thriller “Elle” (Sony Pictures Classics), in which she plays a videogame entrepreneur who refuses to allow her violent rape in her own home to ruin her life. Verhoeven’s first French-language film is likely to play better in North America.
Read More: Cannes 2016: Complete List of This Year’s Winners
Also left out of the awards were “Paterson” (Amazon), American auteur Jim Jarmusch’s spare and austere portrait of a bus driver poet (Adam Driver) and his wife and muse (Golshifteh Farahani), as well as Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardennes’ “The Unknown Girl” (Sundance Selects), starring Adèle Haenel as an empathetic doctor who ignores a late-hour doorbell at her private practice and finds out that the young woman was murdered nearby. She embarks on a mission to identify the girl and inform her family of her death. Park Chan-Wook’s gorgeously wrought erotic drama “The Handmaiden” (Amazon) starring Kim Min-hee and newcomer Kim Tae-ri as secret lesbian lovers was also overlooked.
Among the anticipated films that disappointed the critics at Cannes (not to mention the jury) were Sean Penn’s aid worker romance “The Last Face,” starring Javier Bardem and Charlize Theron, which was seeking a North American buyer, and Nicolas Winding Refn’s “Neon Demon” (Amazon), starring Elle Fanning, who discovers that starving models in the Los Angeles fashion world literally eat each other alive. In one memorable scene, when one x-ray model known as the bionic woman (because she has altered so much of her body) throws up an eyeball, her best friend pops it into her own mouth. (With five films at the festival, Amazon won no awards.)
At the “Neon Demon” party, when I asked Cannes director Thierry Fremaux why so many movies wound up in Competition that the critics did not like, he said that the festival was not set up for the critics, although they clearly play an important role. He said that how movies played for audiences was important too. Clearly that included the Cannes jury.
Stay on top of the all the latest headlines! Sign up for our Daily Headlines email newsletter here. Related storiesCannes Film Festival Awards 2016Cannes Today: New Talent EmergesHow Will the Cannes Film Festival Impact the Rest of the Year in Film? (Podcast)...
- 5/22/2016
- by Anne Thompson
- Thompson on Hollywood
★★★★☆ One of the leading lights of the Romanian New Wave, director Cristian Mungiu returns to Cannes with Graduation, a contemporary morality tale about how, in attempting to free his daughter from the confines of a corrupt country, a previously honest man himself becomes corrupt. Dr. Romeo Aldea (Adrian Titieni) is a good doctor with a reputation for honesty. He left Romania in his youth but returned following the fall of the Ceaușescu regime, a decision he now regrets. With this in mind, he's extremely keen for his daughter Eliza (Maria Drăguş) to pass her final school exams and secure her place in an English university.
- 5/22/2016
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
Cristian Mungiu's film Four Months, Three Weeks, 2 Days heralded the Romanian New Wave when it won the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2007. His other features have since played at the festival, and his latest, Graduation, is in competition, and while not a failure per se, it fails to have the incredible emotional impact of his earlier work, while exploring some of the same issues of the place of women in Romanian society, the negotiation of bureaucracy, the dismal state of the justice system, and the necessity of backroom dealing to get a fair chance. The main character simply doesn't evoke the same sympathy or pathos, and without that connection, any possible impact falls flat. Romeo (Adrian Titieni) and Magda (Lia Bugner) have ensured...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
- 5/22/2016
- Screen Anarchy
Considering the heights he’s reached in the past, Graduation constitutes a disappointing step backwards for erstwhile Romanian New Wave front-runner Cristian Mungiu. After the painterly exorcism tale Beyond the Hills, Mungiu returns to the realist, handheld aesthetic of his first two features to middling results. Neither blackly comic like his debut, Occident, nor as searingly incisive as his Palme d’Or-winning masterpiece 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days, Graduation is a well-acted and efficiently directed but schematic rehash of themes that Mungiu and his fellow new-wavers have expounded time and again over the last decade.
Amongst these themes, the most prominent is systemic corruption and its deeply entrenched roots in Romanian society. Every character in Graduation is in some way implicated. Whether it’s funeral parlors relying on tips from paramedics to stay in business, students hoping to pass their exams, or hospital patients desperately needing to move up the priority list for organ donations,...
Amongst these themes, the most prominent is systemic corruption and its deeply entrenched roots in Romanian society. Every character in Graduation is in some way implicated. Whether it’s funeral parlors relying on tips from paramedics to stay in business, students hoping to pass their exams, or hospital patients desperately needing to move up the priority list for organ donations,...
- 5/22/2016
- by Giovanni Marchini Camia
- The Film Stage
The first trailer for Cristian Mungiu’s Canned-bound film “Graduation” has been released. The drama tells the story of a family that lives in a small Romanian town, where everyone knows each other, and focuses on parenting and a powerful father-daughter relationship. The two-minute sneak peek doesn’t have subtitles but you can get the intensity and distress that the director was trying to achieve. Read More: Watch: New Clip From Cristian Mungiu's 'Graduation,' Premiering at the Cannes Film Festival “Graduation” stars Adrian Titieni, Maria Dragus, and Lia Bugnar. Aside from directing, Mungiu was also the producer and writer of the film. Shortly after the feature was accepted in competition in Cannes, it was also picked up for U.S. distribution by Sundance Selects. A couple weeks ago a new clip and the official poster for “Graduation” were released. You can click here to see them. The Romanian...
- 4/29/2016
- by Liz Calvario
- Indiewire
Romania’s Cristian Mungiu had quite a bit to celebrate during his birthday this week. Not only is his latest feature, Graduation, completed and accepted in competition in Cannes — not necessarily a surprise after deservedly winning the Palme d’Or back in 2007 for 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days — but it was also picked up for U.S. distribution by Sundance Selects before the premiere.
While we don’t have an English-subtitled trailer, the first one has landed ahead of its Cannes premiere. The drama is described as “a powerful and universal study about the imprecision of parenthood, the relativity of truth and the ambiguity of compromise, revealed by a father-daughter relationship.” Check out the trailer below, along with two clips and the poster, for the film starring Adrian Titieni, Maria Dragus, and Lia Bugnar.
Romeo Aldea (49), a physician living in a small mountain town in Transylvania, has raised his daughter Eliza...
While we don’t have an English-subtitled trailer, the first one has landed ahead of its Cannes premiere. The drama is described as “a powerful and universal study about the imprecision of parenthood, the relativity of truth and the ambiguity of compromise, revealed by a father-daughter relationship.” Check out the trailer below, along with two clips and the poster, for the film starring Adrian Titieni, Maria Dragus, and Lia Bugnar.
Romeo Aldea (49), a physician living in a small mountain town in Transylvania, has raised his daughter Eliza...
- 4/29/2016
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
The distributor has picked up Us rights to newly announced Cannes selections Graduation and The Unknown Girl.
Cristian Mungiu’s Graduation (aka Bacalaureat) is a family drama that takes place in small Romanian town where everybody knows everybody.
Adrian Titieni, Maria Dragus and Lia Bugnar star. Mungiu’s Mobra Films produced with Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne of Films du Fleuve; Pascal Caucheteux and Grégoire Sorlat of Why Not Productions; Vincent Maraval of Wild Bunch; and Jean Labadie of Le Pacte. Tudor Reu is executive producer.
Sundance Selects negotiated with Wild Bunch for The Unknown Girl – also known as The Son Of Joseph (La Fille Unconnue) – from Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne.
Adele Haenel, Jeremie Renier, Olivier Gourmet, Fabrizio Rongione and Thomas Doret star in the story about a young doctor who investigates the identity of a mysterious dead body. Denis Freyd and the Dardennes produced.
The buys bring to four the number of Cannes competition selections in the...
Cristian Mungiu’s Graduation (aka Bacalaureat) is a family drama that takes place in small Romanian town where everybody knows everybody.
Adrian Titieni, Maria Dragus and Lia Bugnar star. Mungiu’s Mobra Films produced with Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne of Films du Fleuve; Pascal Caucheteux and Grégoire Sorlat of Why Not Productions; Vincent Maraval of Wild Bunch; and Jean Labadie of Le Pacte. Tudor Reu is executive producer.
Sundance Selects negotiated with Wild Bunch for The Unknown Girl – also known as The Son Of Joseph (La Fille Unconnue) – from Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne.
Adele Haenel, Jeremie Renier, Olivier Gourmet, Fabrizio Rongione and Thomas Doret star in the story about a young doctor who investigates the identity of a mysterious dead body. Denis Freyd and the Dardennes produced.
The buys bring to four the number of Cannes competition selections in the...
- 4/14/2016
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
After the morning’s quick onslaught of Cannes-related material — the line-up, the images, and, most cherished of all, the Twitter debates about what Thierry Frémaux either got right or how he ruined cinema — a few items are at risk of getting lost in the shuffle. With that in mind, let’s direct you towards a few items that give a taste of what’s to come at the festival and, fortunately, over the next several months (or year) in film: a clip from Cristian Mungiu‘s 4 Months and Beyond the Hills follow-up Family Photos (also going by Graduation); a trailer for Na Hong-jin‘s thriller Goksung; and a trailer for Francisco Márquez and Andrea Testa‘s The Long Night of Francisco Sanctis.
See the previews below, along with synopses of each title:
A Palme d’Or winner for “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days,” Mungiu reportedly scaled back after “Beyond the Hills...
See the previews below, along with synopses of each title:
A Palme d’Or winner for “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days,” Mungiu reportedly scaled back after “Beyond the Hills...
- 4/14/2016
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
Cruel Intentions: Sitaru Aims to Provoke with Abortion Drama
Director Adrian Sitaru makes his most galling effort yet with his fourth film, Illegitimate, a social drama engaging two hot-button taboo topics all rolled up into one unsightly experience. At its core, the film is an abortion drama, which automatically places the title in an arena with the hailed juggernaut of the New Romanian Wave, 2007’s 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days, which famously netted Cristian Mungiu the Palme d’Or. It’s perhaps an unfair comparison since this rudimentary scenario aims to convey nagging intergenerational discord by complicating the issue of abortion as the result of incest. Unfortunately, the end result is as visually putrid as its subject matter is repugnant, never necessitating the narrative extremities which it assumes will shock or unnerve.
While enjoying a family meal with his grown children, widower Victor Anghelescu (Adrien Titieni), an aging obstetrician, gets...
Director Adrian Sitaru makes his most galling effort yet with his fourth film, Illegitimate, a social drama engaging two hot-button taboo topics all rolled up into one unsightly experience. At its core, the film is an abortion drama, which automatically places the title in an arena with the hailed juggernaut of the New Romanian Wave, 2007’s 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days, which famously netted Cristian Mungiu the Palme d’Or. It’s perhaps an unfair comparison since this rudimentary scenario aims to convey nagging intergenerational discord by complicating the issue of abortion as the result of incest. Unfortunately, the end result is as visually putrid as its subject matter is repugnant, never necessitating the narrative extremities which it assumes will shock or unnerve.
While enjoying a family meal with his grown children, widower Victor Anghelescu (Adrien Titieni), an aging obstetrician, gets...
- 2/19/2016
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Family Photos
Director: Cristian Mungiu
Writer: Cristian Mungiu
It’s already been four years since Romanian auteur’s last film, the superb Beyond the Hills in 2012—and that’s the only other feature he’s completed since winning his 2007 Palme d’Or for 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days (though he did contribute to the 2009 omnibus Tales from the Golden Age). Filming wrapped in July for his latest film, Family Photos, a family drama about parenting set in a small Romanian town. Of note, it’s Mungiu’s first feature to revolve around a male protagonist.
Cast: Vlad Ivanov, Adrian Titieni, Lia Bugnar, Ioachim Ciobanu
Production Co./Producers: Mobra Films, Why Not Production, Wild Bunch, Les Films du Fleuve, France 3 Cinema, Mandragora
U.S. Distributor: Rights Available. Wild Bunch (domestic/international)
Release Date: Mungiu seems a sure bet for Cannes 2016 main competition.
Director: Cristian Mungiu
Writer: Cristian Mungiu
It’s already been four years since Romanian auteur’s last film, the superb Beyond the Hills in 2012—and that’s the only other feature he’s completed since winning his 2007 Palme d’Or for 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days (though he did contribute to the 2009 omnibus Tales from the Golden Age). Filming wrapped in July for his latest film, Family Photos, a family drama about parenting set in a small Romanian town. Of note, it’s Mungiu’s first feature to revolve around a male protagonist.
Cast: Vlad Ivanov, Adrian Titieni, Lia Bugnar, Ioachim Ciobanu
Production Co./Producers: Mobra Films, Why Not Production, Wild Bunch, Les Films du Fleuve, France 3 Cinema, Mandragora
U.S. Distributor: Rights Available. Wild Bunch (domestic/international)
Release Date: Mungiu seems a sure bet for Cannes 2016 main competition.
- 1/14/2016
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Romanian director Cristian Mungiu ("4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days") shot "Family Photos" (Fotografii de familie) under the radar from June 11 to July 24, 2015. Adrian Titieni ("Best Intentions," 4Proof Film) is starring in the leading role.
Mungiu's latest film is a family drama about parenting set in a small Romanian town where everybody knows everybody. It is the first feature in which Mungiu focuses on a male protagonist, a doctor. The cast includes Lia Bugnar and Vlad Ivanov. Shooting took place mostly in the town of Victoria, but the story is not set in that city. Thistime around Mungiu didn't work his long time collaborator Oleg Mutu, instead chose young cinematographer Tudor Panduru.
The project received a production grant of approximately 430,000 Eur/1.91 m Ron from the National Film Center at the beginning of 2015, the highest funding for a feature film in that session. The director told Fne at the end of March 2015 that he hoped to work again with the coproducers he had for Academy Award-shortlisted "Beyond the Hills."
"Beyond the Hills" was produced by Mungiu through Mobra Films in coproduction with Why Not Production, Wild Bunch, Les Films du Fleuve (www.lesfilmdufleuve.be), France 3 Cinéma (www.france3.fr) and Mandragora Movies Romania.
Mungiu's latest film is a family drama about parenting set in a small Romanian town where everybody knows everybody. It is the first feature in which Mungiu focuses on a male protagonist, a doctor. The cast includes Lia Bugnar and Vlad Ivanov. Shooting took place mostly in the town of Victoria, but the story is not set in that city. Thistime around Mungiu didn't work his long time collaborator Oleg Mutu, instead chose young cinematographer Tudor Panduru.
The project received a production grant of approximately 430,000 Eur/1.91 m Ron from the National Film Center at the beginning of 2015, the highest funding for a feature film in that session. The director told Fne at the end of March 2015 that he hoped to work again with the coproducers he had for Academy Award-shortlisted "Beyond the Hills."
"Beyond the Hills" was produced by Mungiu through Mobra Films in coproduction with Why Not Production, Wild Bunch, Les Films du Fleuve (www.lesfilmdufleuve.be), France 3 Cinéma (www.france3.fr) and Mandragora Movies Romania.
- 8/13/2015
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Creature Discomfort: Sitaru Returns to Familial Unrest
For his third feature film, Domestic, Romanian director Adrian Sitaru returns to the blackly comedic potential of familial discord that made his successful sophomore feature, Best Intentions, unspool like a jocular slice of Cristi Puiu. While that film had autobiographical roots for Sitaru in its examination of one family’s grappling with matriarchal medical issues, here we get a triptych of nuclear families, all living in the same apartment complex and all suffering various ramifications brought upon by the consequences of interacting with domesticated animals, some of whom have rather murky roles as either an item of entertainment or consumption. What results is a sometimes droll tragicomedy that veers between the maudlin and mundane.
Beginning with a group of apartment complex residents complaining to the building administrator, Mr. Lazar (Adrian Titieni, also appearing in this year’s Child’s Pose) about the annoyances...
For his third feature film, Domestic, Romanian director Adrian Sitaru returns to the blackly comedic potential of familial discord that made his successful sophomore feature, Best Intentions, unspool like a jocular slice of Cristi Puiu. While that film had autobiographical roots for Sitaru in its examination of one family’s grappling with matriarchal medical issues, here we get a triptych of nuclear families, all living in the same apartment complex and all suffering various ramifications brought upon by the consequences of interacting with domesticated animals, some of whom have rather murky roles as either an item of entertainment or consumption. What results is a sometimes droll tragicomedy that veers between the maudlin and mundane.
Beginning with a group of apartment complex residents complaining to the building administrator, Mr. Lazar (Adrian Titieni, also appearing in this year’s Child’s Pose) about the annoyances...
- 12/4/2013
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Feature film competition five world premieres and four regional premieres, including multi award-winner In Bloom.
The Sarajevo Film Festival (Sff), running August 16-24, has announced the Feature, Short and Documentary Competition titles comprising 50 films.
Selectors and the Sff team viewed 750 films from the region, including 200 feature films, 150 documentaries and 400 short and animated films.
Across the three Competition sections are 15 world, seven international and 18 regional premieres.
The main competition will feature five world premieres including Carmen, the first feature by Romanian director Doru Nitescu.
It is a family drama co-written by Tudor Voican, known for Periferic and Medal of Honour. The Filmex Romania production stars Doru Ana from Principles of Life, Adrian Titieni from Child’s Pose and Maia Morgenstern.
Greek director Dimitris Bavellas’ debut feature Runaway Day is a black-and-white film exploring how young Greeks feel lost in modern day Athens, a city under financial occupation. It starts Maria Skoula from Wasted Youth.
Austrian [link=nm...
The Sarajevo Film Festival (Sff), running August 16-24, has announced the Feature, Short and Documentary Competition titles comprising 50 films.
Selectors and the Sff team viewed 750 films from the region, including 200 feature films, 150 documentaries and 400 short and animated films.
Across the three Competition sections are 15 world, seven international and 18 regional premieres.
The main competition will feature five world premieres including Carmen, the first feature by Romanian director Doru Nitescu.
It is a family drama co-written by Tudor Voican, known for Periferic and Medal of Honour. The Filmex Romania production stars Doru Ana from Principles of Life, Adrian Titieni from Child’s Pose and Maia Morgenstern.
Greek director Dimitris Bavellas’ debut feature Runaway Day is a black-and-white film exploring how young Greeks feel lost in modern day Athens, a city under financial occupation. It starts Maria Skoula from Wasted Youth.
Austrian [link=nm...
- 7/18/2013
- by vladan.petkovic@gmail.com (Vladan Petkovic)
- ScreenDaily
Adrian Sitaru's third feature Domestic begins with the residents of an apartment building in modern Romania gathering in the lobby to discuss with their building president Mr. Lazar (Adrian Titieni) the pesky presence of one mangy mutt whose been hanging out in their hallways and stairwells instead of sitting safe and sound inside its owner's apartment. Some residents want to take the dog to a humane and EU-certified animal shelter where it will be warm and well fed. Mr. Lazar caught in the middle of this blustery crowd stumbles his way into writing a notice that is drafted by at least half a dozen people yelling and babbling at the top of their lungs. This is all done in one impeccably composed wide shot. The...
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- 1/24/2013
- Screen Anarchy
Since 2004, Short Film Corner which takes up the bottom lobby portion of the Cannes Film Festival market has granted producers and directors the possibility to show their films and more importantly, shake hands and make connections. This year, the Romanian Short Waves – part of the Short Film Corner – includes 9 short films: Tatăl meu e cel mai tare/My Father is the Best – director Radu Potcoavă, 24 găleți, 7 șoareci, 18 ani/24 buckets, 7 mice, 18 years – director Marius Iacob, Lost Springs 2 – director Andrei Dobrescu, Chefu’ /The Party – director Adrian Sitaru, Hello, Kitty – director Millo Simulov, Numărătoarea manuală – director Daniel Sandu, Fotografii de familie/Family Pictures – director Andrei Cohn, Stremț ’89 – directors Anda Pușcaș and Dragoș Dulea (see pic above), and Wedding Duet – director Goran Mihailov.
These films are joined by Cristi Iftime’s Tabăra din Răzoare/The Camp in Razoare – also selected for Cinefondation, Betoniera – director Liviu Săndulescu, Așteptând zorile – director Mihai Sofronea, Micile vedete...
These films are joined by Cristi Iftime’s Tabăra din Răzoare/The Camp in Razoare – also selected for Cinefondation, Betoniera – director Liviu Săndulescu, Așteptând zorile – director Mihai Sofronea, Micile vedete...
- 5/14/2012
- by Marin Apostol
- IONCINEMA.com
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