LFF 2010: five final festival films to wrap up with...

Craig here from Dark Eye Socket with my LFF wrap-up.

As of tonight the BFI London Film Festival is done for another year. It's been a stellar year all told, if the surplus of reports are to be believed. And I'd willingly add a further approving nod to the list. I didn't manage to see everything I wanted (juggling festival times and dates with travel arrangements is an art – one that's open to fateful intervention...and multiple tube delays), but what I saw was on the whole a bumper crop. Roll on next year, I say. Here are five previous reviews, selected from the films I saw:  Uncle Boonmee, A Screaming Man, Winter Vacation, Rare Exports and What I Love the Most. And below are five final mini reviews of a few festival highlights.

Thomas Vinterberg introduced his new film, Submarino, in a cheeky fashion: “if all goes well, you’ll be depressed at the end of the film. Enjoy yourselves!” It was no happy time sure, but it was an enthralling film, despite its determinedly grim subject matter. It follows two brothers’ hard, poverty-stricken lives in contemporary Copenhagen; a family tragedy as kids has left them scarred and emotionally unable to cope with adult existence. Hope is hard to grasp, but not too far away; redemption comes at a cost but may just stop dead the cycle of despair plaguing one or both of the brothers. The characters' direness isn’t forced or over baked and sympathy is well-earned. Lead actors Jakob Cedergren and Peter Plaugborg are excellent as, respectively, the older and younger siblings. Vinterberg’s humanistic approach is thoroughly rewarding and the tautness of the script ensures we become embroiled in the brothers’ plights. It’s strangely an easy film to like, but not always pleasant to watch. B-

 Submarino

Abel, the second directorial effort by actor Diego Luna, was a complete contrast to Submarino (I saw them consecutively). The story of a boy, the titular Abel, who returns home from a stay at a psychiatric hospital to resume living with his mother and siblings – only to assume the role of patriarch of the house, brought on by his father’s disappearance years earlier. The family go along with the ruse in the hope that it aids the boy’s recovery. It’s an amusing, sweet-natured look at how families are truly peculiar to themselves more so than to others. It also questions the role of the father in modern Mexican life and makes more than a few choice and aptly conveyed criticisms of male-dominated hierarchies.

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The Cannes Lineup (Thus Far)

Updated 04/19 They've added two titles but none to the actual competition list just yet. Updates are included below

04/15 Yes, they will add a few titles. Looking round the web people expect something like 4 to 5 more films to show up. Speculation that Malick's Tree of Life or Nolans Inception or Schnabel's Miral probably won't die until after they add said missing titles. But if you're heading over to the South of France next month or merely reading along on various Twitter feeds or film blogs, these are some of the titles you'll be hearing about.

Blanchett. Crowe. Scott

Opening Night Film
Because you have to kick off with a starry entry for that maximum red carpet kick. It gets the international and mainstream press excited and you need their eyeballs... even if your festival is for the global cinephiles.

• Robin Hood (Ridley Scott)
  I'm amused that the tagline is marketing this as an "untold story". Hee. If you look up 'Robin Hood' at ye olde IMDb you get 22 "exact matches" and many more options as well. But it gives us a chance to see Cate Blanchett work the red carpet again and after that one year break (thanks Cate!) the carpet will welcome her back with... uh... open fibers.
  

Competition Titles
The Cannes selection committee is really stingy about this field, nearly always erring on the side of the establishment. You rarely see first time auteurs and they're even stingy about second time auteurs who made a big splash the previous year (See: Xavier Dolan in Un Certain Regard instead).

• Another Year (Mike Leigh)
  Only one more month until we know something (anything!) about Leigh's latest. Such as vague plot. Who has the lead role. Etcetera.
  
• Biutiful (Alejandro González Iñárritu)
  
  


• Burnt by the Sun 2 (Nikita Mikhalkov)
  Russia's sole competition entry is the longest competition film at 2 hours and 21 minutes. It's also one we have to watch for the Best Foreign Language Film at next year's Oscars since the original won the top prize.
• Certified Copy (Abbas Kiarostami)
• Fair Game (Doug Liman)
  This is the Valerie Plame story again, only with Naomi Watts and Sean Penn in the top roles. As Guy Lodge said on Twitter

  Doug Liman goes from "Jumper" to a Cannes competition slot. He's been reading Lee Daniels's self-improvement manual.

  
  
• The Housemaid (Im Sang-soo)
  This is where we're reminded that IMDb is sometimes months behind on movies. Must be a bear to keep that site fresh with a never-ending stream of thousands of movies in various stages of development. It's listed as in pre-production but next month it shows at Cannes! I'm looking forward to this one -- not that I'll ever get a chance to see it -- because it stars the lead actress of Secret Sunshine Do-Yeon Jeon.
  
• La Nostra Vita (Daniele Luchetti)
• Of Gods and Men (Xavier Beauvois)
• Outrage (Takeshi Kitano)
• Outside the Law (Rachid Bouchareb)
• Poetry (Lee Chang-dong)
• The Princess of Montpensier (Bertrand Tavernier)
• A Screaming Man (Mahamat-Saleh Haroun)

The great Mathieu Amalric (and cast) for Tournée

• Tournée (Mathieu Amalric)
• Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
  The sometimes confounding Thai director's latest has the longest title (love it) but is actually the shortest film in competition (90 minutes)
  
• You, My Joy (Sergei Loznitsa)

Un Certain Regard
This popular sidebar of films, a competition which runs parallel to the main field, is generally where they put younger still maturing talent and "original and different" films. Though a certain 101 year old Portuguese master is here, so...

• Adrienn Pál (Ágnes Kocsis)
• Angelica (Manoel de Oliveira)
  This 101 year-old's 49th project -- god he has more stamina than Clint Eastwood! -- also goes by the titles The Strange Case of Angelica or O Estranho Caso de Angélica
  
• Aurora (Cristi Puiu)
  From the director of the acclaimed Romanian film (is there any other kind?) The Death of Mr. Lazarescu. Like that film, this one is lengthy... the lengthiest from either lineup with a 179 minute running time.
  
• Blue Valentine (Derek Cianfrance -first feature!)
  I'm already eager to see his second (third?) feature I liked this one so much. Cannes lists this as a first feature -- meaning he's eligible for their directorial debut award (a very big deal) but according to the IMDb his feature debut came some 10 years back when he made Brother Tied. Maybe that one doesn't count for some reason. The IMDb can be a confusing place.
  
• Chatroom (Hideo Nakata)
• Chongqing Blues (Xiaoshuai Wang)
• The City Below (Christoph Hochhäusler)
• Hahaha (Hong Sang-soo)

Xavier Dolan (I Killed My Mother) returns to Cannes, the scene of his debut triumph

• Heartbeats (Xavier Dolan)
  This film from the writer/director/actor/gay wunderkind is also referred to as Les Amours Imaginaires which is a much more evocative title, don't you think? Click here for more info on the film
  
• Life Above All (Oliver Schmitz)
• The Lips (Iván Fund & Santiago Loza)
• Octubre (Daniel Vega -first feature!)
• R U There (David Verbeek)
• Rebecca H. (Return to the Dogs) (Lodge Kerrigan)
• Simon Werner Disappeared… (Fabrice Gobert -first feature!)
• Socialisme (Jean-Luc Godard)
• Tuesday, After Christmas (Radu Muntean)
• Udaan (Vikramaditya Motwane -first feature!)

Out of Competition
Who knows the politics behind the Out of Competition field each year. But this is where you'll find big name directors who can benefit from a Cannes premiere without the nerve wracking 'will it win anything?' drama.

Brolin. Stone. Douglas. LaBeouf. Mulligan

• Carlos (Olivier Assayas)
  One of France's most fascinating directors returns with this true story of the infamous criminal "Carlos the Jackal"
  
• Tamara Drewe (Stephen Frears)
  I liked Chéri more than most but I still think it was something like a textbook definition of Missed Opportunity in a few substantial ways. Will Frears regain his artistic footing? Can we get something on the level of his late 80s / early 90s work again any time soon? Please. Pretty please. This is based on a graphic novel and stars Gemma Arterton
  
• Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (Oliver Stone)
  I can't decide whether this movie needed a sequel or not. One can make an argument either way. But the movie will answer the question as to whether or not it did. It's 136 minutes long which... well, I hope Stone has enough to say to keep that going.
  
• You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger (Woody Allen)
  Just discussed here.
  

Special Screenings
"Special" Interpret that however you will.

• 5XFavela (Carlos Diegues)
• Abel (Diego Luna -first feature!)
  Both of the Y Tu Mama Tambien boys have moved into direction. I remember two teenagers talking about this one on the bus in Park City this past January (it played at Sundance). I can't for the life of me recall their conversation other than that they thought it was "weird"
  
• Chantrapas (Otar Iosseliani)
• Draquila: L'Italia Che Trema (Sabina Guzzanti)
  trailer here
  
• Inside Job (Charles Ferguson)
• Nostalgia For The Light (Patricio Guzmán)
• Over Your Cities Grass Will Grow (Sophie Fiennes)
  a documentary about an installation artist
  

Midnight Screenings

They'll have to add more of these. The festival lasts a fortnight!

Thomas Dekker (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) does
leading manboy duties for indie favorite Gregg Araki

• Blackhole (Gilles Marchand)
  This is also known as L'Autre Monde and stars Gallic hotties Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet (from the sticky Love Songs) and Melvill Poupaud (from the brilliant A Christmas Tale)
  
  the trailer for Blackhole. Me want
  
  
• Kaboom (Gregg Araki)
  Quiet Earth calls this an oversexed sci-fi romp. I can still remember vividly seeing The Living End (his debut) in the movie theater. I hadn't ever seen anything like it.
  

Don't you wish you were in France?

Other Blog Reactions to Check Out:
Thompson on Hollywood some chatter about the films that didn't make the cut or weren't finished in time
Women and Hollywood No female directors in competition
Independent Eye Light on American films
Indie Wire the lineup and poll. which film are you most excited for?
Guardian Cannes '09 will definitely be a tough act to follow
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Under the Same Roof With Luna.

Jose here reporting from the 25th Guadalajara International Film Festival.

Earlier today I had a chance to have a meeting with Diego Luna. Not only was he much taller than I expected but his eyes have this incredibly deep color you never see when he's onscreen. His voice has that same childish joy you know from Y Tu Mamá También and he was more than eager to answer questions. Since this was a more technically oriented conversation (I'm in a film workshop) I thought there would be some interesting non-tech things you all might want to know about him.

• Said "it's always shocking to watch a movie" he's in, especially when he has little behind the scenes involvement.
• He mentioned he discovered that first takes are the best when directing child actors and also thinks they are better than grownups (his son was born almost two years ago so that might've affected his perspective on kids)
• He thinks Latin America is living in cinema without risks because of the lack of box office interest in the locals (Avatar took over us too...)
• Mentioned Carlos Reygadas as "an example of how to invent yourself on film".
• Calls cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki "Chivo" and Gael García Bernal ...just "Gael".
  
• He doesn't like to think of himself as just an actor anymore.
• Thinks that the most important thing about making movies is making what audiences want to see (which means he is kinda saying Hollywood is right...but still)
  
• His ideal world would be one where "Sean Penn movies are more popular than Ben Affleck movies".
  

The rest of the meeting with Luna was mostly shop talk about distribution, directing methods and producing strategies to make a profit out of indies. Which I'd be more than happy to tell you about if you're so inclined. Now I'm off to a screening and a tequila party.

[Editors Note: Here's one of my favorite pics of Luna (right), taken by excellent celebrity photographer Fabrizio Maltese at Cannes a couple of years back.

Thanks to Jose for piping in from Guadalajara. Hopefully he'll share more of his adventures there involving actors, screenings and tequila parties... Especially if all three occur simultaneously.]
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Hump Day Hotties, Gael García Bernal & Diego Luna

"Hump Day Hotties" is back (Just pretend this piece arrived yesterday. Go with it!)

Things have been quiet, at least in the US, when it comes to everyone's favorite Mexican Gael García Bernal. In 2008 he gave an against-type performance in Blindness (my review) but the film didn't catch. 2009 should be a better year for Bernal fans. It's already a great year for Bernal himself. He just became a father. His girlfriend, actress Dolores Fonzi (pictured left) gave birth to a baby boy last Thursday who they named Lazaro [src]

Congratulations to the couple!

We don't generally cover birth notices at The Film Experience so we're here to talk about another couple. The reason we're thinking of Bernal this morning (does one need a reason?) is that Sony Pictures Classics just picked up distribution rights to Rudo Y Cursi which is the first onscreen reunion of the Y Tu Mamá También boys. Diego Luna has been higher profile this winter. He's recently snagged a SAG nomination (Best Ensemble) for Gus Van Sant's Milk.

photo from Gael fan

Their new film together is directed by Carlos Cuarón (yes, that's Alfonso's brother who co-wrote Y Tu Mamá) and will be playing at the Sundance Film Festival this month. Can't wait to see these two together again. Apparently Mexican audiences felt the same and the film is already a smash there.

Here's a little about the plot from the press release.

Tato (Gael García Bernal) and Beto (Diego Luna), two brothers living a hard life of manual labor in rural Mexico, have a simple dream of saving enough money to build their mother her dream house. But fate has other plans; a friendly game of soccer leads to first one, then the other being taken on by the nation’s top talent scout, Batuta, and gives rise to the first of many emotional head to heads between brothers. Suddenly, they find themselves living the high life of star athletes—fame, riches, fast cars, and beautiful women. But every dream has a dark side, and when they are forced to compete on rival teams, bitterness brews between them. Mutual trust gives way to resentment and betrayal, while the dangers of their wild new lifestyles threaten debt and the safety of their entire family. In the end, all will ride on the one big game between their two clubs. Tato and Beto must face each other on the pitch but also reunite again as brothers before they lose everything they had once dreamed of.

That's a lot of words but all I'm hearing is that this film contains no makeout session between Gael & Diego.


Regardless, I'm still there when it opens. Every time I think Gael couldn't be any more loveable as a movie star he ups the adorability somehow (Es esto posible? no se) Here's his version of Cheap Trick's "I Want You To Want Me" from Rudo Y Cursi



If we could transport Gael in full cowboy gear over back in time into Madonna's "Don't Tell Me" video my life might finally be complete. Double my pleasure. Now that I've mentioned it it's out there in the ether and someone will surely comply.

But maybe there's no point trying to top Madonna mixed with Brokeback Mountain which has perhaps already cornered the market on orgasmic gay C&W movie/pop collision?



How did this post become about Madonna? It's a sickness.

more Gael gawking:
Gael's first HDH appearance (06)
Top 5 Actors of the Aughts (06... and yes, I will be revising this list in some form this year)
Bad Education (04) TFE top ten list
Y Tu Mamá También (02) TFE Best Picture Nominee
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