All posts tagged: Berlin Film Festival

Warwick Thornton’s Indigenous Australian Western

Warwick Thornton’s Indigenous Australian Western

Published by Daniella Wilson

An experienced cinematographer before he turned to directing, Warwick Thornton has a feel for the Central Australian desert and the craggy MacDonnell Ranges that’s both epic and intimate. His refined sense of composition is directly informed by the landscape around Alice Springs where he grew up and his subcutaneous connection to it imbues his films with soulful beauty. Wolfram is no exception. A four-chapter saga of escape, pursuit and survival, the film, for all its brutality, ultimately becomes less a lament for stolen lands and stolen children than a stirring account of endurance. Family and community are the thematic foundation of this sequel of sorts to Thornton’s 2017 drama Sweet Country, again co-written by Steven McGregor and David Tranter. It picks up a few years after the events of the earlier film in and around the same fictional Northern Territory town of Henry, though all but two of the principal characters here are different. That gives the two movies the feel of a shared ancestral map, marked by overlaps and diverging tangents. Wolfram The Bottom …

‘Four Minus Three’ Wins Berlin’s Europa Cinemas Prize

‘Four Minus Three’ Wins Berlin’s Europa Cinemas Prize

Published by Daniella Wilson

Austrian director Adrian Goiginger’s film Four Minus Three, the true story of a professional clown struck by tragedy, has won the Europa Cinemas Label as best European film in the Panorama section of the Berlinale. The film, based on Barbara Pachl-Eberhart’s autobiographical novel, follows Barbara (A Hidden Life actress Valerie Pachner), a professional clown who lives with her partner Heli (Robert Stadlober), also a clown, and their two children. When Heli and the children die in a car accident, Barbara’s belief in humor, hope and humanity is put to the ultimate test. The Europa Cinemas jury said the film “succeeds in giving us a very moving and inspiring experience … the excellent script manages to evoke a sense of hope while not hiding away from the despair of loss.” Four Minus Three will now benefit from promotional support from the Europa Cinemas group, which operates, with its partners, more than 3,200 screens across 39 European countries. The group, backed by funding from Europe’s MEDIA program and France’s national film board, the CNC, is the first …

Emin Alper’s Trenchant Political Allegory

Emin Alper’s Trenchant Political Allegory

Published by Daniella Wilson

The title of Turkish writer-director Emin Alper’s Salvation (Kurtuluş) carries a bitter sting, pointing up how a perceived enemy threat can be manipulated to seed survivalist panic that escalates into genocide. Salvation for one side means elimination of the other, and establishing which is the righteous side can be entirely subjective, especially when the aggrieved become the aggressors. Those blurred boundaries are the subject of Alper’s powerful slow-burn drama. The movie is an occasionally confusing but mostly gripping account of inter-clan conflict fueled by the nightmares of an ordinary man, who overnight becomes a mystic religious leader. But it’s also a timely and chilling allegory for strongmen rulers across the globe whose nationalist rhetoric fuels “us or them” hostility. Patient attention is required to sort out the characters and geography but once the fuse is fully lit and the material elevated by the introduction of dreams and superstitions, Salvation burns. Salvation The Bottom Line A provocative allegorical powder keg. Venue: Berlin Film Festival (Competition)Cast: Caner Ci̇ndoruk, Berkay Ateş, Feyyaz Duman, Naz Göktan, Özlem Taş, Eren …

‘Soumsoum, the Night of the Stars’ Review: Chadian Arthouse Horror

‘Soumsoum, the Night of the Stars’ Review: Chadian Arthouse Horror

Published by Daniella Wilson

Director Mahamat-Saleh Haroun is known for hard-hitting, evocative dramas set in his native Chad, a country that was embroiled in sectarian conflict for decades. Movies like Dry Season, A Screaming Man (which won Cannes’ Jury Prize in 2011) and Grigris followed men in various states of turmoil, beset by violence and other hardships in the Sub-Saharan desert. Along with his unflinching documentary on the humanitarian crimes committed by Chadian dictator Hissen Habre, Haroun’s films form an uncompromising body of work that’s definitely bleak, but can also be rather luminous. His previous feature, Lingui, The Sacred Bonds, marked a change of direction for the auteur, who focused on female characters for the first time and offered a more hopeful vibe than before. He continues this streak with Soumsoum, the Night of the Stars (Soumsoum, la nuit des astres), a modern-day fable of adolescence and resilience that plays, at times, like a classic teen horror flick — minus the jump scares but with similar twists and motifs. Soumsoum, the Night of the Stars The Bottom Line Languid, …

Strangers Connect in Mexican Charmer

Strangers Connect in Mexican Charmer

Published by Daniella Wilson

Fernando Eimbcke’s fifth feature, Moscas (Flies), opens with a loose string of vignettes. Teresita Sánchez —  a 2022 Sundance Special Jury Prize winner for Dos Estaciones, also known for her roles in Lila Avilés’ The Chambermaid and Tótem — plays Olga, a weary-looking middle-aged woman who wakes up to the insistent buzzing of one of the insects that provide the title, gets out of bed with an indignant sense of purpose and sets about trying to shoo the pest out a window, or better yet, kill it. When her initial efforts fail she resorts to insecticide, nearly asphyxiating in a toxic cloud of her own making. No sooner has the buzzing stopped than her ears tune into a different irritant, the upstairs neighbors, in the middle of what sounds like vigorous sex. Which interferes with her usual pastime of playing Sudoku on her boxy old desktop. Olga turns up her television to drown out the noise and soon falls back to sleep, this time on the sofa. Moscas (Flies) The Bottom Line Small is beautiful. …

Political debate casts a shadow over 76th Berlin Film Festival – arts24

Political debate casts a shadow over 76th Berlin Film Festival – arts24

Published by Sam Flores

Of the three major European film festivals, Berlin’s annual event has often featured political films and commentary. Yet this year’s jury president Wim Wenders stirred up controversy when he said that artists should “stay out of politics”, prompting Indian author Arundhati Roy to cancel her appearance at the festival. Film critic Emma Jones brings us up to date on this heated debate and flags up the movies making headlines at the Berlinale so far. We also check out the rich people problems of “Rosebud Pruning” with Jamie Bell and Pamela Anderson and hear about Sandra Hüller’s impressive performance in 17th-century drama “Rose”. Emma also takes us through the French cinema stars with premieres at the Berlinale this year, as Isabelle Huppert and Juliette Binoche present daring new films. Source link

Isabelle Huppert in Vampire Camp

Isabelle Huppert in Vampire Camp

Published by Daniella Wilson

If you ever looked at the ageless face of Isabelle Huppert onscreen — the alabaster skin, the enigmatic smile, the eyes that seem to have a default setting of disdainful superiority — and thought all that was missing were a glistening pair of fangs and a tiny trickle of blood from the corner of her mouth, this is the movie for you. Likewise, if you ever wondered what kind of bizarro Mittel European mutant baby would result from the marriage of Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu and Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel. Perhaps it would look something like Ulrike Ottinger’s Viennese waltz of grotesquerie, The Blood Countess (Die Blutgräfin). A painter and photographer as well as a cult filmmaker, Ottinger understands the power of a striking image. She opens with a mesmerizing sequence in which a barge upholstered in plush vermillion velvet cruises ever so slowly through an underground cave system and grotto in Vienna. Standing with regal stillness on the front of the boat, like a carved figurehead on a prow, is Huppert as Countess …

Dozens of filmmakers slam Berlin Film Festival’s ‘silence’ on Gaza

Dozens of filmmakers slam Berlin Film Festival’s ‘silence’ on Gaza

Published by Sam Flores

More than 80 film industry figures including Oscar-winning actors Javier Bardem and Tilda Swinton issued a statement on Tuesday slamming the Berlin Film Festival’s “silence” on Gaza.  The signatories to the open letter said they were “appalled” by the festival’s “institutional silence” and “dismayed” at its “involvement in censoring artists who oppose Israel’s ongoing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza”. Their statement came after the Berlinale’s jury president, German director Wim Wenders, answered a question on Gaza last week by saying: “We cannot really enter the field of politics.” Prominent directors who signed Tuesday’s letter, coordinated by the Film Workers for Palestine collective, include British filmmaker Mike Leigh and the American Adam McKay. The signatories include many artists who have presented work at the Berlin Film Festival. Swinton was herself last year awarded its prestigious Honorary Golden Bear award. They said they “fervently disagree” with Wenders’s comments, arguing that filmmaking and politics cannot be separated.  “Just as the festival has made clear statements in the past about atrocities carried out against people in Iran and Ukraine, we call on the …

Ethan Hawke Talks Politics, Fascism & New Film The Weight at Berlinale

Ethan Hawke Talks Politics, Fascism & New Film The Weight at Berlinale

Published by Daniella Wilson

Ethan Hawke embraced politics head-on at the Berlin Film Festival on Tuesday ahead of the premiere of his latest movie, The Weight. “Anything that fights fascism, I’m all for it,” the Blue Moon star told a Berlinale presser when asked about the role of “famous artists” during a time when “fascism is on the rise in Europe and the U.S.” Hawke started his response by cautioning “the last place you probably want to look for advice in your spiritual counsel is a bunch of jet-lagged drunk artists talking about their film.” But Hawke then referenced director Padraic McKinley’s historical drama, set in 1930s Oregon and about gold rush greed and survival. “It’s about a group of people who don’t think they have anything in common, who band together to fight institutional greed and malevolence to realize that they have so much more in common, and that’s worth fighting for. So I love that that is what we’re offering the world in response,” he continued. European journalists at the Berlinale have expressed disapproval about film talent and festival …

Anthony Chen’s Lovely Singapore Story

Anthony Chen’s Lovely Singapore Story

Published by Daniella Wilson

After two features set far from home — respectively Drift in Greece and The Breaking Ice in China — Anthony Chen returns to Singapore with the minor-key magical We Are All Strangers (Wo Men Bu Shi Mo Sheng Ren). As flavorful and satisfying as the Hokkien noodles seen being stir-fried, seasoned and served with a cold beer at various intervals, the film is a hypnotic conclusion to what the writer-director calls his Growing Up trilogy — preceded by the poignant domestic drama Ilo Ilo and the melancholic intergenerational romance Wet Season. What these movies have in common is their fresco-like attention to the ebb and flow, the minute details, the disappointments and rewards of ordinary lives and imperfect families, both biological and chosen. We Are All Strangers The Bottom Line An unpolished gem. Venue: Berlin Film Festival (Competition)Cast: Yeo Yan Yan, Koh Jia Ler, Regene Lim, Andi LimDirector-screenwriter: Anthony Chen 2 hours 37 minutes Shot with unflashy elegance (this time by Teoh Gay Hian) and imbued with a strong sense of place, they are intimate …