NYFF 2011 in Perspective

The New York Film Festival 2011
By Cole Smithey

Easily the best New York Film Festival I’ve experienced in the 15 consecutive years I’ve attended it, 2011 was truly an exceptional year. Of the 17 films I saw there was only one disappointment (Alexander Payne’s “The Descendants”) and one unforgivable dog (“Martha Marcy May Marlene” – I compulsively make fun of the title every time I say it). Martin Scorsese personally introduced a surprise screening of his latest film “Hugo” to a packed house.

Documentary filmmaking enjoyed strong entries with Chris Hall’s and Mike Kerry’s “The Ballad of Mott the Hoople” (which sadly will go to DVD), Joe Berlinger’s and Bruce Sinofsky’s “Paradise Lost 3,” and Alex Stapleton’s Corman’s World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel.” Martin Scorsese’s named also showed up on the MTV-aired doc “George Harrison: Living in the Material World.”

While overrated festivals like Toronto pretend to compete with Cannes, and unfocused festivals like Tribeca continue to feel around for an identity, the New York Film Festival has proven once again that it knows how to treat filmmakers, celebrities, and its participating journalists. Kudos to Richard Peña, John Wildman, Courtney Ott, and the rest of the staff at Lincoln Center for making 2011 a festival to remember.

Le Havre

Aki Kaurismaki's humanist themed comedy of manners and intentions is a whimsical allegory about the desperate plight of immigrants and the communal actions needed to address the issue. There's an air of magical realism in the film's tone that places shoeshine man Marcel (Andre Wilms) in the unique position of harboring a young illegal immigrant named Idrissa (Blondin Miguel) from West Africa in Marcel’s French hometown of La Havre.

Marcel leads a frugal existence with his loving wife Arletty (Kati Outinen) in a small house on a little back street of the sleepy seaside town. The couple's minimalist lifestyle still allows for simple pleasures. With his wife's approval Marcel slips out to his favorite bar for an aperitif while Arletty prepares their dinner. Arletty doesn't want her husband know she's dying from cancer. So it comes as a shock when she has to be rushed to the hospital for an extended stay. When a dock guard hears the cry of a baby coming from a sealed shipping container, local officials are called in to open the giant London-bound metal box. Inside are a group of immigrants from which Idrissa escapes before running into the sympathetic Marcel who agrees to help the boy get to London to reunite with his mother.

Filmed with a deliberately simplistic regard, Kaurismaki embraces a regional sense of identity that allows supporting characters to flourish. Police Inspector Monet (Jean-Pierre Darroussin) gets wind of Marcel’s complicity in hiding the boy, and makes his position clear to Marcel. Enjoyable scenes between Darroussin and Wilms play out with a suspenseful sense of deadpan humor. As with all of the Finnish auteur’s films, there’s a bitter sweetness at play. When Kaurismaki adds the story’s final grace note it comes as rich reward. Few filmmakers have such delicate command of the poetic potential of cinema.

The Kid With a Bike

The Dardenne brothers tweak slightly their polished neorealist formula of personalized socially consciousness cinema related to their home country of Belgium, and their hometown of Seraing in specific. Composed music plays a role. The Dardennes continue the focus of their oeuvre on the plight of the country's youth. The result is a somewhat less than convincing story about a troubled 11-year-old boy named Cyril (Thomas Doret).

Having been recently abandoned by his single-parent father Guy (Jérémie Renier), Cyril searches desperately for his dad, and for his bicycle which has also gone missing. The manic boy escapes from the boys' home where he has been placed to return to the now empty apartment he once occupied with his father. Chased by his keepers back into the home Cyril throws himself at a visiting woman who sits in a lobby. Hairdresser Samantha (Cecile de France) helps reunite Cyril with his bike and agrees to look after the violence-prone boy on weekends. Samantha is at a loss to understand Cyril's self-destructive impulses that land him in a string of violent altercations. Still, Cyril's good fortune expands when Samantha agrees to keep him with her full time. Cyril’s guardian angel helps him track down his dead-beat dad at the restaurant where he works. Guy gradually makes clear that he wants nothing to do with his needy son. The filmmakers explore too shallowly Guy's reasoning for essentially throwing his son away. This, coupled with a lack of perspective on Samantha's backstory, weighs heavy on the film as a narrative contrivance that is nonetheless buffered by Thomas Doret’s exceptional performance.

Martha Marcy May Marlene

"Work-shopped in a Sundance writing and directing lab" proves to be the kiss of death for an overwrought and underdeveloped psychological thriller that refuses to either poop or get off the pot. Newbie writer/director Sean Durkin wears his obsession with Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke on his snot-covered sleeve. Evidently they don't teach that flashbacks are a bad idea at NYU film school—where Durkin attended--or at Sundance since exactly half of Durkin's story is told using the most common crutch in narrative existence.

Durkin has an ace up his sleeve in newcomer Elizabeth Olsen, whose beguiling nubility and haunting mood shifts the filmmaker milks for all they’re worth. Olsen plays the title character whose name Martha gets transmogrified to Marcy Mae by a creepy cult leader named Patrick (John Hawkes) who feeds on the flesh of his mostly female clan on a remote farm commune in the Catskills. Martha's "Marlene" identity is the least explained, and is left dangling along with every other plot thread the filmmakers bother to create.

Martha runs away from the commune at the beginning of the story. She calls her sister Lucy (Sarah Paulson), who she hasn't been in touch with for two years, to come pick her up. Lucy and her husband Ted (Hugh Dancy) take Martha into their spacious riverside home in Connecticut. Martha displays odd behaviors such as skinny dipping in broad daylight and crawling in bed with Ted and Lucy while they're having sex. She doesn’t believe in such capitalist traps as pursuing a career. She holds onto firm but unstated beliefs about “the right way to live.”

Flashbacks reveal Martha's rape at the hands of Patrick, and her indoctrination as a "leader and teacher" at the commune. The filmmaker constantly jockeys back and forth between Martha's increasingly problematic situation with Lucy and Ted, and her not so distant past that informs her subconscious and conscious mind. Martha is an unreliable protagonist the audience is tempted to side with in spite of her volatile personality. "Martha Marcy May Marlene" comes across as an extreme right-wing fantasy about the leftist mind. If we take Martha, as the filmmakers seem to intend, to represent the kind of person engaged in the global protests against savage corporate greed then we are forced to admit that they are emotionally disturbed sociopathic human beings. The big problem with the movie is the filmmakers forgot to tell a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end.

In spite of its all-too-obvious machinations “The Kid with a Bike” touches on social ills in a direct fashion without preaching. When Cyril falls in with a neighborhood thug to perform a violent crime with no reason other than for the approval of an older male figure, we see clearly what the filmmakers are getting at. A kid with a bike is nothing without both a mother and a father figure. The Artist Inspired proof that a black-and-white silent film with a 4:3 aspect ratio can be more entertaining than a 3D anything, "The Artist" conjures a bygone age of Hollywood that reminds us why we love cinema. Director Michel Hazanavicius's wonderful movie made a splash at Cannes before becoming the critical darling of the 2011 New York Film Festival.

The Artist

Jean Dujardin ("OSS 117 - Lost in Rio") combines Errol Flynn and Fred Astaire in his role as silent film superstar George Valentin. The story finds matinee idol Valentin enjoying a glamorous silent film career in Los Angeles near the end of the Roaring Twenties. Flawlessly tailored and groomed, here is a man who can do no wrong. His marriage to a grumpy wife (Penelope Ann Miller) isn't all it's cracked up to be but George has his constant companion, a Jack Russell terrier, to keep his sprits up. Valentin goes along for the ride when Peppy Miller (Berenice Bejo), an ambitions young starlet, creates a welcome bit of impromptu romantic zing during a public photo op. The kiss she plants on George’s cheek makes front page news. With her infectious smile and adorable dance moves Peppy's silent film career catches fire in the company of the suave and urbane Valentin. The advent of the Talkies doesn't bode well for Valentin, who refuses to participate for a reason that only becomes clear late in the story. Peppy is more adaptable. Cast aside by his producer (John Goodman), Valentin dips into his personal savings to produce, direct, and act in silent movie that necessarily flops on the same day as the release of Peppy's breakout sound role. Our impeccable hero hits the skids.

Apart from a precise use of appropriate music, Michel Hazanavicius teases the audience with sound as a delightful narrative ingredient. Will we ever hear Valentin speak? It is a silent movie after all.

Between brilliantly executed performances, dance numbers, and an exquisitely told romantic story about loss and redemption, is a flawlessly crafted film that shimmers. Visually, it’s astoundingly gorgeous. Equal parts drama, romance, spectacle, and comedy, "The Artist" is an instant classic. There is a line of thinking that states a film has to linger around for a decade before it can have a "classic" status bestowed upon it. To that notion I say, watch "The Artist."

Pina

Like his German compatriot Werner Herzog, Wim Wenders has a knack for the documentary form. Wenders's 1999 Buena Vista Social Club remains one of the best music documentaries ever made. Unlike Herzog however, Wenders may want to consider sticking exclusively to this type of storytelling in light of his recent failing efforts with narrative film. His last film "Palermo Shooting" (2008) is a film better left forgotten.

In discovering the human and artistic impact of his friend, the famed late choreographer Pina Bausch, Wenders takes a unique approach that involves set piece reenactments of Bausch dance routines performed by her fiercely devoted company of dancers, the Tanztheater Wuppertal. Bausch started the company in 1973. Wenders puts state-of-the-art 3D technology to ideal usage in capturing the dynamic vibrancy of transformative dance numbers that reveal the personalities of the individual dancers, as well as the bold vision of their artistic muse. Interspersed between the dances are brief direct-to-camera reminisces from individual dancers about Pina that tell the story of an artistic force of nature who lived and breathed nothing but dance.

Wenders had been in discussions with Bausch for many years about making such a film. Sadly, the visionary choreographer passed away in 2009 just as "Pina" was entering pre-production. Audiences will find much inspiration in the film's many passionate solo, pas de deux, and group dances performed in public spaces and in various theatrical settings. Natural elements such as dirt and water take on mystical qualities in dynamic dance performances that truly take your breath away. There are many aural, visual, and visceral surprises in this sublime film. If you aren’t a fan of dance, you will be after seeing Pina’s magnificent dances performed by dancers who worked with her for decades. "Pina" was one of the highlights of the 2011 New York Film Festival.

Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel

One of the most influential filmmakers in the history of cinema gets his due in a comprehensive love-letter documentary that celebrates Roger Corman's illustrious film career from top to bottom and inside-out. The inspirations, ideologies, and methodologies of Corman’s "one-man-band" of independent filmmaking come through in exhaustive clips from his more than 200 films, and from a plethora of interview segments. Aside from outspoken interview sequences with Corman himself, documentarian Alex Stapleton interviews everyone from the filmmaker's wife and business partner Julie Corman to Jack Nicholson, Martin Scorsese, Peter Bogdanovich, Jonathan Demme, Ron Howard, John Sayles, Peter Fonda, William Shatner, and Pam Grier. The effect is a raucous celebration of Roger Corman's polite demeanor, colorful films, and his stripped-down approach to movie-making that gave so many directors and actors their start.

"Monster From the Ocean Floor," "Apache Woman," The Little Shop of Horrors," "Bucket of Blood," "The Fast and the Furious," "Death Race 2000," "The Intruder," and his psychedelic exploration of LSD "The Trip" are just a handful of Corman's many films examined with more insights than seem possible for such a fast-paced documentary. It would be a daunting task for any filmmaker to even attempt a documentary about such a prolific and influential figure as Roger Corman, but Alex Stapleton lovingly crafts a 95 minute filmic encyclopedia that touches all of the bases. "Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel" fills an essential chapter of cinema history. It is destined to become an integral addition to the curriculum of more than a few college film courses.

The Descendants

Death and dying play a big part in Cinema's current zeitgeist. From apocalyptic films like "Melancholia" to cancer-themed comedies like "50/50" there is a pressing dialogue of facing up to the reality of certain death with some amount of courage and dignity. So it is that Alexander Payne struggles to make funny the pending death of a comatose adulterous wife whose husband Matt (George Clooney) must facilitate a socially responsible passage for the mother of his two daughters. Perhaps the best thing "The Descendants" has to offer is its depiction of Hawaii as a place like any other that only appears as a tropical paradise on the surface. Payne has mastered a certain style of deadpan humor exemplified in a scene where Clooney's cuckold runs down a suburban street in sandals. He is anxious to question his friends about their knowledge of the man his wife was cheating on him with before she was critically injured in a waterskiing accident. There’s a slapstick air to Clooney’s gawky physicality and the sound of flip-flops hitting asphalt. Still, it’s a scene you feel like you’ve seen a hundred times before. There’s numbness to the humor. Alexander Payne is certainly a competent director. He knows just where to put the camera. But as a writer he remains stuck in a navel-gazing kind of rut. “About Schmidt” (2002) fell prey to Payne’s sluggish sense of ponderous humor. “Sideways” was his best film because he stepped outside the need to gaze upon ugliness. In “The Descendants,” the writer/director takes a brighter disposition in a literal sense. Hawaii’s bright sunlight and natural beauty work some magic. But it’s not enough to resuscitate a script that is as depleted as the comatose character toward which the narrative steers. 

My Week With Marilyn

Michelle Williams delivers an Oscar-worthy performance as Marilyn Monroe in director Simon Curtis's thoughtful adaptation of the legendary actress' diaries by Colin Clark. At 23 Clark served as 3rd assistant director to Laurence Olivier for his 1956 romantic comedy "The Prince and the Showgirl." Here Eddie Redmayne movingly portrays a star-struck young Brit who momentarily wins the heart of the most sensual creature on the planet while working as Marilyn’s hand-picked liaison to the British theatrical world—a culture upon which she is an obvious encroachment. Michelle Williams effortlessly evokes the tragic icon's layers of insecurity and hopeless romanticism, which slip into fits of manic depression. Williams's mesmerizing set-piece performance of songs, such as a climatic rendition of "That Old Black Magic" transports the film into the erotic euphoria that Monroe stirred in the hearts and libidos of men. Equally effective is a charming dance number Williams reenacts from the film within the film. Williams's magical transformation into Marilyn Monroe is uncanny; you never question it for a moment. Although the movie has its weak spots--Julia Ormond turns in a one-note portrayal of Vivian Leigh and Zoe Wanamaker veers toward caricature as Paula Strasberg--Michelle Williams delivers a deft multidimensional character study built on truthfulness and soul. “My Week With Marilyn” isn’t just a gem; it’s a diamond.

The Skin I Live In 

Pedro Almodóvar proves himself an apt technician at sustaining suspense in the thriller genre. Antonio Banderas returns to work with Almodóvar for the first time in over 20-years, since his memorable performance "Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!." The years have been kind to Banderas who brings his A-game to a deliciously diabolical role. Plastic surgeon Robert Ledgard (Banderas) is a mad scientist with plenty of method to his particular madness of creating an indestructible skin. His wife died in a car fire. His daughter committed suicide. He harbors vengeance. But why? The Toledo-based doctor conducts experiments in the privacy of his luxurious mansion laboratory. Not even Dr. Frankenstein had it so good. His mother (Marisa Paredes) serves as his dutiful maid. Almodovar's meticulous attention to detail keeps you hypnotized. Every visual component is exact in color, placement, and scale. Naturally, the evil doctor is using a human being to live inside the hybrid-pig-DNA membrane he has perfected. His comely patient Vera (Elena Anaya) is confined to a large room. She wears a skin-tight body suit and practices yoga for hours on end. Dr. Ledgard secretly observes Vera through a large two-way mirror. Elena Anaya is an exquisite object of fetishistic delight for Almodovar to pour his patient camera over.

Based on Thierry Jonquet's novel "Mygale" "The Skin I Live In" is a haunting film that tips its hat to Alfred Hitchcock. There's a goodly dose of Georges Franju's 1960 French horror classic "Eyes Without a Face." Elliptical time shifts tell the story in a disjointed fashion that makes you want to see the film twice even as you're watching it. There's mystery here to savor as you would any great piece of cinematic art. Pedro Almodóvar has created a masterpiece. Plan on seeing it twice.

Once Upon A Time In Anatolia

Nuri Bilge Ceylon continues his minimalist yet universal exploration of society with a fascinating police procedural that values story over plot and character over prejudice. The mastermind behind such instant classics as "Climates" and "Three Monkeys" uses every detail of atmosphere and human communication to tell a quietly complex story about a murder and the imperfect methods of the men assigned to solve the crime.

At night Doctor Cemal (Muhammet Uzuner) accompanies a group of police officers and a soldier as they drive around the dark outskirts of the Anatolian steppe. They have with them two incarcerated suspects they hope will lead them to the grave of a missing man. Police Commissar Naci (Yilmaz Erdogan) lets his temper flare at his prisoner who leads the three-vehicle caravan on a wild goose chase in search of a "round tree" by one of the road's many fountains that provide water for travelers in the arid region. Prosecutor Nusret (Taner Birsel) reigns in Naci when the Commissar turns violent against his prisoner. The cops joke about food and engage in a bland kind of non-specific repartee that diffuses tension even as it subtlety discloses fragments of personal information. They stop for food at the home of man whose beautiful daughter momentarily entrances them.

"Once Upon a Time in Anatolia" is a film about how detectives communicate. It’s also about how entrused public servants wrangle with overpowering emotions and personal secrets. Anger and sadness are traits to be submersed under rote routines of professional conduct. Their personal sense of justice can be confused and arbitrary. And yet, these men are doing a job that must be done. Nuri Bilge Ceylon is a lover of humanity. His great concern for every one of his characters that goes beyond their innocence or guilt. He recognizes the balance of both qualities in their actions. As a sociological study, the film is edifying on many levels. As a drama it is at turns inscrutable, revealing, and moving. The cinema of Nuri Bilge Ceylon is a transformative one. It is unique and honest. Most significantly, it is rare.

Carnage

Roman Polanski's cinematic chamber-piece rendition of Yasmina Reza's celebrated stage play "The God of Carnage" is an outsized comedy contained in the confines of a New York apartment.

Jodie Foster and John C. Reilly play Penelope and Michael Longstreet, a bourgeoisie married couple whose son lost a couple of teeth to a schoolyard bully who hit him in the mouth with stick. Rather than take America's kneejerk legal route, the mostly well-intentioned couple attempt to resolve matters via an afternoon discussion with the parents of the offending bully. Kate Winslet and Christoph Waltz play the bully’s parents Nancy and Alan Cowan. Alan is a corporate attorney with a mind like a steel-trap and a constantly ringing cell phone that takes precedence to all other concerns. Nance is an investment broker with a queasy stomach. The Cowans and the Longstreets are equally matched in the area of self-righteousness, but not so much in the realm of what used to be called political correctness. Hiding behind a veneer of politeness, each character digs deeper into their personal bag of tricks to articulate a holier-than-thou brand of intellectual independence. Tempers flare, insults are tossed, vomit flies, and a bottle of scotch is consumed on the way to seeing a myriad of hypocrisy that lurks inside high-minded examples cultured, educated, and civilized society. The laughs come hard and fast.

There's considerable gratification in watching this quartet of great film actors working in Polanski’s deliciously theatrical setting. The film was shot in real time. The director himself makes a cameo appearance as a curious neighbor. Brief, explosively funny, and sardonic as hell “Carnage” is what you might get if you condensed three of Woody Allen’s early films into a 75 minute one-act. This movie is a kick. The Woman WIth Red Hair Japan's Pink Film genre lasted from the early '60 through the mid-'80s. Although Western audiences are most familiar Nagisa Ōshima's 1976 film “In the Realm of the Senses” as the genre’s most representative film, Japan’s Pink Film industry provided several generations of filmmakers with a lucrative outlet for their creativity. One of the country's oldest production studios “Nikkatsu” turned exclusively to making what it termed Roman Porno in the early '70s to compete for audiences distracted by television. Each Roman Porno film had to have four nude or sex scenes per hour. Nikkatsu served as an ideal training ground for Tatsumi Kumashiro, who directed his first film "Front Row Life" in 1968 and went on to be one of the genre's most prolific directors.

The Woman with Red Hair

Kumashiro's 21st film, "The Woman with Red Hair" is a study in social commentary disguised as porn. Construction worker Kozo and his pal have outdoor sex with the boss’s daughter before picking up a red-haired woman eating noodles at a truck stop in the pouring rain. Kozo takes the girl (Junko Miyashita) back to his squalid apartment where the lovers slip into a marathon of love-making interrupted by economic and social pressures that surround them. Character-discovery occurs during ravenous sex acts that extend to kinky expressions of fantasy and revealing post-coital conversations. The woman is on the run from an abusive boyfriend. She has a son she left behind. She might be a recovered heroin addict. One thing is certain; the woman with red hair is insatiable.

In keeping with strict codes of Japanese law that forbade the showing of genitalia or pubic hair, Tatsumi Kumashiro composes the sequences of unbridled love-making with clever angles and purposefully placed foreground objects. There’s a nervousness and honesty in the way the lower class couple express themselves. Anger and violence tempers their efforts at finding fresh paths toward a fleeting pleasure that must be refreshed immediately lest it vanish forever. Incredibly lusty and inflected with a cinéma vérité style “The Woman with Red Hair” aspires to a degree of social realism that features the surroundings of its characters as an influence that causes them to live in a state of constant fear. It compares favorably with Michelangelo Antonioni's 1964 film “Red Desert.” The emotionally exposed characters battle against oppression by an industrial world with a confused humanity hungry for release.

A Dangerous Method

Christopher Hampton's stage play "The Talking Cure" provides the basis for David Cronenberg to dive into the largely overlooked story of Sabina Spielrein and her influence on the fathers of modern psychoanalysis--Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. Sabina (played with astonishing authority by Keira Knightley) is a Russian Jewish patient brought to Jung's Burgholzli Clinic in Zurich in 1904. Her "hysteria" impedes her speech as she contorts her face, neck, and head in violent spasms. Outwardly, she appears quite insane. Michael Fassbender's Jung is able to calmly look beyond Sabina's off-putting physical demeanor in the interest of curing her. Jung is intent on using Sabina as a premier test patient for Freud's conversational therapy which he mistakenly calls "psychanalysis."

The film glides effortlessly across years as Jung meets Freud (Viggo Mortensen) to discuss psychoanalysis. Cronenberg masterfully controls the soundscape. Music is never allowed to intrude on a scene. Ugliness becomes beautiful; beauty becomes divine. Jung and Freud share a special bond of intellectual endeavor that comes through in their candid conversations about dreams. Jung shares his nighttime reveries for Freud to openly dissect. Privately, Jung questions Freud’s insistence that sex is the crucial element to all mental dysfunction even if his own experience with rehabilitating Justine points to just such a conclusion. Jung assists the perceptive and unguarded Sabina in her pursuit to become a psychoanalyst. He also seeks out a rationalization to ignore his wife and children long enough to enter into an adulterous BDSM affair with the heretofore virginal Sabina.

“A Dangerous Method” is a lush character study and history lesson that tenaciously explores the personal conflicts of ego and id between Jung and Freud. The film also pays generous homage to the woman whose outré sexual desires enabled her to turn Freud’s theories around. Freud entrusted her with several of his patients for her to treat. As an actors’ showcase the film is stunning. Vincent Cassel gives a memorable portrayal as the nihilistic psychiatrist Otto Gross, who encourages Jung to take sexual advantage of his patient. David Cronenberg has matured into a director of immeasurable confidence and gracefulness. He maintains his trademark fearlessness toward sexual obsessions and their potentially cataclysmic effects. Like Otto Gross he is incapable of “passing by an oasis without stopping to drink.”

Melancholia

Melancholia 2011 is the year of apocalypse in cinema. "The Tree of Life," "Take Shelter" and "Melancholia" each offer differing visions of Earth's waning days. Lars von Trier evinces consolation for the end of planet Earth and all its evil inhabitants in the form of a colossal planet named Melancholia, which is travelling on an elliptical collision course. Von Trier opens the film with one of the most haunting and lushly composed sequences ever captured on film. Kirsten Dunst's Justine placidly observes in hyper slow motion as electricity flows between an overcast sky and her fingertips. Black birds fall around her like harbingers of a funeral procession. Dunst’s delicate features are filled with stern ambivalence. As she reveals through her actions during the night of her wedding party, Justine’s atheism has prepared her bettern than believers to live out the final hours of human existence with a composure calculated to allow for whatever choices she might make. Telling off her demanding boss, and cheating on her doting husband (Alexander Skarsgård) of just a few hours, are obligatory actions. Justine is an anti-heroine without a trace of superficiality. She's a lying, cheating hypocrite just like everyone else. The difference is she admits it to herself. If Justine sounds like an alter-ego of the filmmaker who shook the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, getting himself thrown out of the festival for his incendiary comments during a press conference; she most certainly is.

Had the jury at Cannes chosen von Trier's superior "Melancholia" over Terrence Malick's cluster-bomb "The Tree of Life" in spite of von Trier's "persona non grata" status, justice would have been served. As with all of von Trier’s films, “Melancholia” will divide audiences. Atheist audiences can take special pleasure in von Trier’s exquisitely uncompromising vision. After all, what’s a beginning without an end?

Lars von Trier - Persona non Grata

Danish Lars von Trier is a great filmmaker. He's also as inept a masochist as he is a humorist. Von Trier's snarky comment "Okay, I'm a Nazi," made during his press conference in Cannes in support of his competing movie "Melancholia," was delivered with a heavy dose of grandstanding irony that doesn't translate well on paper. It was as if he was saying, yeah, and I'm a mass murderer too, as a way of putting a cherry on a fallen cake. It wasn't a smart way to wrap up his attempt at being entertaining. He fed himself to the hungry wolves—i.e. and international press itching for something incendiary to write about. To watch Kirsten Dunst sitting next to him at the press conference trying to stop him with harsh looks and even a whispered request, as he digs himself into pit of idiocy, was as squirm-inducing as von Trier's outlandish comments. His statements about empathizing with Hitler as he sat in his bunker proved a self-fulfilling prophecy. More interesting than von Trier's Johnny Rotten-styled attempt at giving the press what they wanted was their response. Von Trier succeeded in shocking them to their fragile core. The Cannes Festival board of directors took quick steps to extract an apology from von Trier before kicking him out of the festival as a persona non grata. Von Trier blamed his "stupid" behavior on his recent return to sobriety and a "perverse need to please." Masochism is a tough business."

Von Trier says he's proud to be persona non grata and that he won't be doing anymore press conferences in the future. That’s too bad. He certainly has a great headstone epitaph now. As von Trier did with the self-imposed limitations of his influential "Dogma 95" film theory, he has placed himself in a kind of exile. One thing you can bet on is that his films will be as interesting and controversial as ever.

2011 is the year of apocalypse in cinema. "The Tree of Life," "Take Shelter" and "Melancholia" each offer differing visions of Earth's fast waning days. Lars von Trier evinces consolation for the end of planet Earth and all its evil inhabitants in the form of a colossal planet named Melancholia, which is travelling on an elliptical collision course.

Von Trier opens the film with one of the most haunting and lushly composed sequences ever captured on film. Kirsten Dunst's Justine placidly observes in hyper slow motion electricity that flows between an overcast sky and her fingertips. Black magic is upon her. Black birds fall around her like harbingers of a funeral procession. Dunst’s delicate features are filled with stern ambivalence. As she reveals through her actions during the night of her wedding party, Justine’s atheism has prepared her better than believers to live out the final hours of human existence with a composure calculated to allow for whatever impulsive choices she might make. Telling off her demanding boss, and cheating on her doting husband (Alexander Skarsgård) of just a few hours during the wedding party, are obligatory actions. Justine is an anti-heroine without a trace of superficiality. She's a lying, cheating hypocrite just like everyone else. The difference is she admits it to herself. If Justine sounds like an alter-ego of the filmmaker who shook the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, she most certainly is.

If von Trier’s more deserving "Melancholia" had won the Palme d'or over Terrence Malick's winning "Tree of Life," in spite of von Trier's "persona non grata" status, there would have been a hurricane of journalists going wild. Justice would have been served. Having seen both films, I can say with certainty that "Melancholia" is the far better of the two. No contest. It's interesting to see what makes the media go ballistic in an era when there's 25% unemployment in America and Mother Nature is demolishing wide swaths of the planet every other week.

As with all of von Trier’s films, “Melancholia” will divide audiences. Atheist viewers can take special pleasure in von Trier’s exquisitely uncompromising vision. After all, what’s a beginning without an end?

What to See at This Year's Tribeca Film Festival

Whether you're visiting New York for a few days or a Manhattan local used to asking people next to you in film screenings to put their fucking cell phones away, you probably have some inclination to see what all the hubbubs about over the film festival that got its start at the hand of Robert De Niro after the 9/11attacks to attract people back downtown. With 85 features screening at this year's festival it can be a tough decision about which one or two films most deserve your $16.

Ignore Time Out New York's predictable picks like "Joan Rivers - a Piece of Work" (bleck!) and go straight to Mat Whitecross's punk icon Ian Dury biopic "sex & drugs & rock & roll." Chameleon character actor Andy Serkis is on fire as the polio-afflicted singer who led his band The Blockheads through London's '70s and '80s pub rock circuit with a vengeance of catchy rhymed couplets. You will not be disappointed.

(Public screenings: Sat. 4/24 9pm--Village East Cinema 181 2nd ave @12th street, Mon. 4/26 3pm--School of Visual Arts 333 West 23rd st., Wed. 4/28 11pm---School of Visual Arts 333 West 23rd st., Thurs. 4/29 11:30pm--Village East Cinema 181 2nd ave @12th street).

If you're more in the mood for an unconventional drama, Robert Duvall can do no wrong as Felix Bush, a '30s Tennessee hermit who decides to stage his own living "funeral party" where people can gather to tell infamous stories of his life. Bill Murray gives an understated performance as funeral director Frank Quinn. There's clever humor and muted pathos in this deceptively sophisticated drama from debut director Aaron Schneider.

(Public screenings: Tues. 4/27 6pm--BMCC Tribeca Pac 189 Chambers st. (btwn.Greenwich & West st.), Thurs. 4/29--Chelsea Clearview Cinema 260 West 23rd st. (betn. 7th and 8th st.), Fri. 4/30 4pm--Chelsea Clearview Cinema 260 West 23rd st. (betn. 7th and 8th st.)

Suspense tightens in J. Blakeson's UK thriller "The Disappearance of Alice Creed." Eddie Marsan ("Happy-Go-Lucky") and Martin Compston ("Sweet Sixteen") play a couple of hoods who kidnap a young woman (Gemma Arterton - "Quantum of Solace") with 2 million euros worth of ransom plans. There's nothing like a good British crime thriller, and this one is packed to the gills with talent.

(Public screenings: Sat. 4/24 7pm----School of Visual Arts 333 West 23rd st., Sun. 4/25----Village East Cinema 181 2nd ave @12th street, Mon. 4/26 7:30pm--Village East Cinema 181 2nd ave. @12th street).

Want get into a gritty New York mood? Then check out Jay Anania's drama "William Vincent" in which the always impressive James Franco plays a Manhattan loner who drifts toward crime as he wanders in and out of places and situations. Julianne Nicholson plays Anne, the woman who will draw William out of his shell.

(Public screenings: Sun. 4/25 6pm--Chelsea Clearview Cinema 260 West 23rd street, Tues. 4/27 6pm--Chelsea Clearview Cinema 260 West 23rd street, Thurs. 4/29 7:30pm--Village East Cinema 181 2nd ave. @12th street, Fri. 4/30 9:15pm--Village East Cinema 181 2nd ave. @12th street).

You could go farther into the mind of a sociopath with Michael Winterbottom's modern noir "The Killer Inside Me." Casey Affleck plays Lou Ford, a small-town Texas deputy sheriff who makes a pact with the devil, or in this case Jessica Alba as prostitute with bad ideas. Escalating violence attends.

(Public screenings: Tues. 4/17 7pm SVA Theater 333 West 23rd street, 4/29 9:45pm--Village East Cinema 181 2nd ave @12th street, 4/30 10:30pm--Village East Cinema 181 2nd ave @12th street).

Tribeca 2009: It's a Wrap

In its eighth year, the Tribeca Film Festival finally found its identity as a medium-scaled arena for an eclectic collection of documentaries, independent films, horror movies, dramas, comedies, science fiction, and foreign fare to vie for audience attention. From a press standpoint, the festival has become a friendlier place for journalists to ply their trade. The inclusion of a screening library, while not comprehensive in its scope, provided some much needed freedom to screen films, and is a system that should be adopted by every other film festival in the world. Attracting its share of celebrities--Eric Bana, Spike Lee, and Steven Soderbergh were easy to spot--this year's festival maintained the right amount of movie biz glitz without cramping the style of Manhattan's been-there-done-that attitude.
 
Bette Gordon's 1984 independent psychological thriller "Variety," written by Kathy Acker, was shown in a special retrospective screening. A stunning proto-feminist noir experiment set in the sex shops of 1983 Times Square during Manhattan's economic downturn, Christine (Sandy McLeod), a Midwest transplant, takes a job as a ticket booth clerk at a Times Square porn theatre called the "Variety." Surprisingly, the sleazy urban atmosphere fires her erotic desires, and curiosities about the power of her own sexuality. Christine goes on a baseball game date at Yankee Stadium with Louie (Richard Davidson), a wealthy regular patron at the Variety with underworld connections, and secretly follows him after he's called away from their date. When she isn't stalking Louie, Christine tests the influence of her dirty imagination by speaking erotic fantasy monologues to her non-pulsed journalist boyfriend Mark (Will Patton). Daring, raw, and in tune with the social crosscurrents of the period, "Variety" achieves a cumulative effect of short-circuiting preconceived notions of taboo sexual stereotypes via Christine's journey of discovery. It's a thriller that takes poetic liberties equal to the harmonic leaps of John Lurie's evocative musical score.

With "Outrage," documentarian Kirby Dick brought the same methodical approach he applied to "This Film is Not Yet Rated," about Hollywood's shadowy ratings board, to examine the practice of closeted gay, largely Republican, politicians to systematically vote against gay rights issues as a way of deflecting attention from their own sexuality. Former closeted politicians, such as ex-New Jersey governor James McGreevey and current U.S. Representative Barney Frank candidly expound on their personal experiences of living double lives. Gay blogger Michael Rogers provides fervent discourse about the necessity of outing closeted politicians as a public service in a media environment that savors heterosexual scandals--see John Edwards--yet avoids exposing the hypocrisies of people like Ken Mehlman or Florida Governor Charlie Crist. From the film, it seems clear that Washington is full of closeted gays, some self-hating and some merely desperately frightened for their livelihoods. Either way, the winds of generational change are upon us.

In "Rudo y Cursi," writer/director Carlos Cuaron (screenwriter on "Y tu mama") told the story of rival Mexican step-brothers Beto (Luna) and Tato (Bernal) who get a golden opportunity to leave behind their impoverished lives as fruit-pickers when Batuta (Guillermo Francella), a soccer agent, discovers their skills and brings them into the fast paced world of pro soccer. Tato dreams only of achieving fame as a singer in spite of his lack of ability--he earns the undesirable nickname Cursi (Corny), while the more serious Beto, nicknamed Rudo ("rough"), falls prey to gambling leaches out to steal his soccer fortune. Bernal and Luna cherish their roles with palpable delight and play off one another with an authentic chemistry that is infectious. Both actors bring their A-game to the film, and the result is a pure delight. As prosaic as the story seems on the surface, there's plenty of heartfelt subtext in every frame.

Scott Sanders' Blaxploitation homage "Black Dynamite" had me rolling on the floor kicking and laughing with its perfectly timed jokes and sight gags. "Black Dynamite" could just be the big break that Michael Jai White deserves for his unforgettable performance as a super soul brother cut from the same cloth as Shaft and Dolomite. It's easy to get a contact high watching "Black Dynamite" as if you were sitting in a Times Square movie house circa 1976 watching the man get his comeuppance.

Mandy Stein's "Burning Down the House: The Story of CBGB" was a welcome reminder of the famous East Village haunt where The Ramones, Talking Heads, Richard Hell, Wayne County, The Dead Boys, Patti Smith, and every other punk group that mattered performed back in the good old/bad old days of New York. Although Stein's film left out a lot of significant information about its martyred subject, CBGB founder Hilly Kristal, it adds yet another essential chapter to the story of New York's Punk Rock movement.

Yojiro Takita's Oscar-winning "Departures" wet the eyes of everyone in the audience, and proved that the Academy voters can get right a category like Best Foreign Film.

Stephan Eliott's Noel Coward adaptation "Easy Virtue" hit a lilting gallop of '20s era England with Jessica Biel playing a racecar-driving American interloper to Kristen Scott Thomas' snooty matriarch.

Steven Soderbergh's "The Girlfriend Experience" succeeded on the efforts of its extreme-porn-queen-cum-legit-thespian Sasha Grey as a $2,000-an-hour-call girl living in NYC with her fitness-trainer boyfriend. Former Premiere magazine Editor Glenn Kenny is hilarious in his role as a very sleazy know-it-all opportunist.

Ti West's "The House of the Devil" sent chills as an old-school horror film homage to an '80s that should have been. Even with some rumored butcher-edit job by the film's producers, it's a dark treat that ramps up suspense from three or four angles at once. Former Warhol Superstar Mary Woronov ("Rock 'n' Roll High School") is perfectly creepy.

Anders Banke's "Newsmakers" proved to be a super slick remake of Johnie To's "Breaking News," about a Russian Public Relations effort to glamorize for television a tense stand-off between some heavily-armed bad guys holed up with hostages in a post communist block apartment complex. Super action eclipses the upside of sexy.

Duncan Jones' "Moon" is the best Sci-Fi movie to come along in a generation or two. Sam Rockwell gives a pure tour de force performance as a lonely astronaut worker on the moon in this must see sci-fi thriller. I'll give you a clue--there's a clone involved. "Moon" was my favorite new film of the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival.

"In the Loop" could be the most hilarious British political satire of the past 20 years. Based on the BBC TV show "The Thick of It," about the wonky inner workings of US and British politics during an unintended build-up to war, the movie was a crowd favorite.

2009 Tribeca Film Festival Awards:

Heineken Audience Award: City Island

Raymond De Felitta's "City Island," a comedy about a family of misfits staring Andy Garcia, Julianna Margulies, Alan Arkin, and Emily Mortimer, won the Heineken Audience Award of $25,000 at this year's festival.

Best Narrative Feature: About Elly

Asghar Farhadi's Iranian mystery on the Caspian Sea captured the hearts of World Narrative Feature Jurors Bradley Cooper, Uma Thurman, Todd Haynes, Meg Ryan and Richard Fischoff: "The universality of the characters and themes and the director's riveting grasp of this story make About Elly a film that collapses barriers and deepens our understanding of the world we share.”

Best Actor in a Narrative Feature Film: Ciaran Hinds
Magnolia Pictures picked up world rights to writer/director Conor McPherson's psychological drama "The Eclipse," staring Ciaran Hinds as a recently widowed husband and father who sees ghosts in the Irish seaside town where he lives.

Best New Narrative Filmmaker: Rune Denstad Langlo for North

Rune Denstad Langlo's first narrative feature, after working in the documentary format, is a wry road comedy about a ski lift operator making his way to the north of Norway, to meet a son he never knew he had. The jurors have noted that Denstad's "consummate vision, strong grasp of story and command of the language of cinema make him a standout amidst a strong pool of candidates."

Best Actress in a Narrative Feature Film: Zoe Kazan in The Exploding Girl

After a smattering of small roles here and there, Zoe Kazan has truly broken out with her performance in Bradley Rust Gray's The Exploding Girl, a film about a young woman during a summer home from college. "Zoe shines in this understated role," the jurors comment. "Every component of this brilliantly restrained performance displays a command of her craft that stunned and moved this jury.”

Best Documentary Feature: Racing Dreams

Marshall Curry's documentary is a gripping tale about young go-karters who one day dream of driving in the big leagues of NASCAR. "We reacted with unanimous, unquestioned affection for Racing Dreams," the jurors state, "and found it a completely compelling, entertaining film of incredible quality.”
 

Special Jury Mention: Defamation

Yoav Shamir's documentary analysis of anti-Semitism existing today has earned him a Special Jury Mention in this year's Festival. Examining the issue from a wide variety of angles, the accolade for this open-minded film is not surprising. The jurors state that the award is for "lifting the veil on a subject so openly discussed."

Best New Documentary Filmmaker:
Ian Olds for Fixer: The Taking of Ajmal Naqshbandi

Olds' film about the murder of a kidnapped Afghani hired by news organizations to work in Afghanistan is a mesmerizing tale, as horrifying as it is fascinating. According to the jurors, the work is “a film about an unsavory world, and its unsavory characters, which through its superb direction, shines a light on a world unfamiliar to many Americans."

Best New York Narrative: Here and There

Darko Lungulov's debut narrative feature about a New Yorker who travels to Belgrade is as geographically diverse and sensitive as the city of New York itself. The jurors were pleased by the fact that "it gave us not only New York, it gave us great characters, a great story, it gave us the world.”

Honorable Mention: Entre nos

Paola Mendoza and Gloria LaMorte's beautiful film is based on Mendoza's real-life experiences as a child, when her family moved from Colombia to New York City. Their sensitive depiction of issues ranging from immigration to poverty to single motherhood earned them an Honorable Mention in this year's Festival.

Best New York Documentary: Partly Private

Documentarian Danae Elon's look at the practice of circumcision in the modern-day world, especially modern-day New York, is a gripping look at the ancient practice, as well as so much more. "There were moments in this film that brought the whole world back to New York," the jurors said. "They were uniquely New York moments."

Best Narrative Short: The North Road

Actor Carlos Chahine steps into the role of director for the first time to make a touching short about a man driving his father's remains back to his hometown. The jurors feel that "The director, Carlos Chahine, portrays the absurdities and contradictions of how we deal with grief through humor, freshness and subtlety.”

Best Documentary Short: home

A touching work that deals with how Hurricane Katrina affected the house he grew up in, Matthew Faust's home seems a natural pick to win the Best Documentary Short award. "It tells a post-Hurricane Katrina story in a new, inventive and poignant way.”

Special Jury Mention: The Last Mermaids

The runner-up for Best Short Doc is this fantastic short, a film about female deep-sea divers off of the Jeju Island. The film's glimpse into a lost world is particularly eye-opening, and the jurors said that "the filmmaker provides a glimpse into a closed sisterhood—proud of their traditions, yet accepting the disappearance of their way of life.”

Student Visionary Award: Small Change

A film about a six year old girl hoping for the Tooth Fairy to arrive, Australian filmmaker Anna McGrath's student film Small Change is deceptively simple. The jurors state that "The filmmaker uses minimal storytelling to achieve maximum emotional impact and we commend the terrific performances of the young actors.”

Special Jury Mention: Oda a la Piña

This homage to a famous Cuban poem deals with a struggling cabaret dancer. Helmed by student filmmaker Laimir Fano, the film "captures the cultural rhythms and unmistakable sounds of the city to artistically portray a sense of poverty in what remains of old Havana and its beauty.”

The 61st Cannes Film Festival Awards its Favorites

By Cole Smithey

CANNES, France May 25. At this year's Cannes Film Festival, the jury, presided over by Sean Penn, awarded the Palme d'Or to Laurent Cantet for his heavily work-shopped film about a French junior high school teacher in a tough neighborhood, whose teaching style is challenged by his difficult students.

The Palme d'Or award in the Court Metrages (Shorts Films) category went to director Marian Crisan for "Megatron," about a young Romanian boy whose single mother takes him, for his eighth birthday, to Bucharest where his father lives.

The Camera d'Or (First Film Prize) went to director Steve McQueen (no not that one) for "Hunger," about Bobby Sands' 1981 hunger strike in Northern Ireland's Maze Prison.

The Prix Un Certain Regard went to director Sergey Dvortsevoy for "Tulpan," about a young Kazakh naval officer who returns to the steppe to live a nomadic life.

The Prix Du Scenario (Best Screenplay) went to Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne for "Lorna's Silence," about a young Albanian woman (Arta Dobroshi) in cahoots with Fabio, a Belgian mobster, to make money so she can open a snack bar with her boyfriend. Lorna suffers through a fraud marriage to Claudy (well played by Jeremie Renier), a junkie that Fabio plans to kill in order to put Lorna in another sham marriage, this time to a rich Russian. If the plot sounds convoluted it doesn't impede an inevitable flood of surprising physical and emotional responses from the poker-faced Lorna. "Lorna's Silence" was one of the strongest films in competition.

The Prix Du La Mise En Scene award (Best Director) went to Nuri Bilge Ceylan for "Three Monkeys," about a father, mother, and son caught in a web of corruption, betrayal, and murder.

The Prix Du Masculine (Best Actor Prize) went to Benicio Del Toro for Steven Soderbergh's unconventional two-for-one Che Guevara biopic "Che."

"The Argentine" begins with Che's famous 1964 speech at the United Nations, and finishes with Batista's overthrow at the hands of Che's well-organized guerilla troops. The second half "Guerilla" picks up after Che's lost year in Africa when he slipped into Bolivia to help lead a doomed revolution. Problematically, the two films are scheduled to be released separately, drawing into question tonal differences between them. Soderbergh doesn't attempt to consolidate the story of Guevara's life, but rather to concentrate on the way the rebel leader attempted to build on his success in Cuba to spread revolution around the world.

The Prix Du Feminine (Best Actress Prize) went to Sandra Corveloni for her performance in Walter Salles' and Daniela Thomas' "Linha de Passe," about four brothers attempting to break out of limited opportunities in Sao Paulo.

The honors for the Grand Prix (Grand Prize) went to Matteo Garrone's "Gomorra," based on Roberto Saviano's tell-all mafia expose. Director Matteo Garrone weaves together five stories of mob-related corruption sucking dry the provinces of Naples and Caserta. A tailor, enslaved to his occupation since childhood, two would-be teen gangsters, a pair of illicit toxic disposal contractors, and a young boy living in a drug-infested housing project, make up the indelible characters in this devastating picture of social collapse.

New Values: Corruption and Death in Cannes

By Cole Smithey

 

The big movies at Cannes this year treated the subject of corruption, from betrayal of personal ethics for cash to systematic governmental abuse, with cinematic inoculations of hope for an equalizing justice for humanity. Films like Arnaud Desplechin’s “A Christmas Tale,” Steven Soderbergh’s “Che,” Charlie Kaufman’s directorial debut “Synecdoche, New York,” and even Wim Wenders’ embarrassing “The Palermo Shooting” contributed context to the importance of death to life. Several days of rain on the usually sun-drenched Riviera beaches allowed the thousands of journalists and critics many hours of guilt-free screenings while the likes of Clint Eastwood and Robert de Niro brought Hollywood glamour to the ever-busy red carpet. If you came here in my skin, these are the films you would have seen.

 

Lorna’s Silence (In Competition)

Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne craft an evocative story about Lorna, a young Albanian woman (played flawlessly in the festival’s most impressive break-out performance by Kosovo-born Arta Dobroshi) in cahoots with Fabio, a Belgian mobster, to make money so she can open a snack bar with her boyfriend. Lorna suffers through a fraud marriage to Claudy (well played by Jeremie Renier), a junkie that Fabio plans to kill in order to put Lorna in another sham marriage, this time to a rich Russian. If the plot sounds convoluted it doesn’t impede an inevitable flood of surprising physical and emotional responses from the poker-faced Lorna. “Lorna’s Silence” was one of the strongest films in competition.

 

Waltz With Bashir (In Competition)

Writer/director Ari Folman adopted a graphic novel-like animated approach to address his haunting but vague recollections as a soldier in the 1982 Israeli Army invasion of Beirut, including the massacre of Palestinian civilians at the hands of the Christian Phalangist militia. Informed by confessional discussions with friends, the film gradually connects his abstract visions and short-circuited memory clips toward fleshing out Folman’s traumatic experiences. Visually inventive and viscerally sincere, “Waltz With Bashir” is a cathartic and unforgettable film.

 

A Christmas Tale ("Un Conte de Noel") (In Competition)

It wouldn't be Cannes without at least one French movie about familial angst, social ennui, and the specter of death. Arnaud Desplechin brought the goods this year with his irreverent, multi-layered story, set in his hometown of Roubaix, about Abel (Jean-Paul Roussllon) and his wife Junon Vuillard (Catherine Deneuve) whose loss of a son to lymphoma informs their existence. Now years later with three grown children-Ivan (Melvil Poupaud), a hopeless romantic, Henri (Mathieu Amalric), the family black sheep, and Elizabeth (Anne Consigny), who disowned Henri five years ago--reunite for Christmas. In need of a bone-marrow transplant, Junon has limited choices for a donor, but doesn't let the threat of death ruffle her Gallic feathers. There are no martyrs in this anti-sentimental ironic movie that nevertheless percolates with emotion and accepts its quirky characters for all of their flaws.

 

Che (“The Argentine” and “Guerilla”) (In Competition)

The biggest buzz of the festival was Steven Soderbergh’s unconventional two-for-one Che Guevara biopic that ran four hours and twenty minutes long. “The Argentine” begins with Che’s famous 1964 speech at the United Nations, and finishes with Batista’s overthrow at the hands of Che’s well-organized guerilla troops. The second half “Guerilla” picks up after Che’s lost year in Africawhen he slipped into Bolivia to help lead a doomed revolution. Problematically, the two films are scheduled to be released separately, drawing into question tonal differences between them. Soderbergh doesn’t attempt to consolidate the story of Guevara’s life, but rather to concentrate on the way the rebel leader attempted to build on his success in Cubato spread revolution around the world. Benicio Del Toro is predictably mesmerizing as Che, and however flawed the concept, “Che” was the most gratifying screening experience in Cannes.

 

Three Monkeys (“Uc Maymun”) (In Competition)

On first sight a strong contender for the Palme d’Or, Turkish director/co-writer Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s (“Les Climats”) film is about a father, mother, and son caught in a web of corruption, betrayal, and murder makes thoughtful use of its see no, hear no, speak no evil, metaphor. Troubles begin when Servet (Ercan Kesal) an ambitious politician kills a pedestrian at night with his car and bribes his regular driver Eyup (played by popular Turkish folk singer Yavuz Bingol) to take responsibility and serve the nine-month jail sentence that comes with it. Eyup’s lazy teenage son Ismael (Ahmet Rifat Sungar) talks his mother Hacer (Hatice Aslan) into requesting an advance on the bribe from Servet, and the family spirals down a self-perpetrating path of depravity. This sparsely-told story speaks volumes with a cinematic poetry that you would expect to find in Cannes.

 

Blindness (In Competition)

Director Fernando Meirelles’ adaptation of Jose Saramago’s allegorical novel about a society that goes blind loses all credibility in Don McKellar’s particularly naïve screenplay. Julianne Moore strives valiantly to single-handedly hold up the film as its only seeing character, but doesn’t stand a chance against implausible sequences of a group of quarantined blindness victims who can’t agree on where to evacuate their bladders and bowels. “Blindness” opened the festival as an embarrassment.

 

Adoration (In Competition)

Atom Egoyan’s latest film follows a 16-year-old boy’s (Devon Bostick) search for truth about his parents’ death from a head-on collision that occurred after a tense family gathering with his volatile grandfather. At his high school teacher’s (Arsinee Khanjian) provocation, Simon writes a fictional essay about how his middle-eastern father secretly planted a bomb in his pregnant girlfriend’s (Rachel Blanchard) luggage on her way to Israel, only to have it discovered and defused by airport security. Simon posts the story on his facebook page, and sets off an online discussion beyond his control. As with all of Egoyan’s films, “Adoration” is a forward-thinking exploratory work of cinema meant to invigorate audiences into social discussions past its narrative structure. Simon’s search for resolution comes with a symbolic personal gesture that seeks to sort out the present from the future with the dubious aid of modern-day technology’s social interaction. It’s all about the effort.

 

Gomorra (In Competition)

Roberto Saviano’s tell-all mafia expose provides rich narrative soil for director Matteo Garrone to weave together five stories of mob-related corruption sucking dry the provinces of Naples and Caserta. A tailor, enslaved to his occupation since childhood, two would-be teen gangsters, a pair of illicit toxic disposal contractors, and a young boy living in a drug-infested housing project, make up the indelible characters in this devastating picture of social collapse.

 

Two Lovers (In Competition)

After stinking up the competition at last year’s festival with “We Own the Night,” co-writer/director James Gray grinds gears switching from his typical predilection for crime genre stories to make an imitation love story. There isn’t an empathetic character to be had. Manic depressive thirty-something Brooklynite Leonard Kraditor (Joaquin Phoenix) still lives at home with his parents and works at his father’s dry cleaners. Leonard falls for Michelle (Gwyneth Paltrow in her first film role in two years), a romantically bemused girl dating a married man (Elias Koteas). It doesn’t help that Leonard’s parents have set him up with Sandra (Vinessa Shaw), the daughter of Leonard’s dad’s business partner. Sandra is to Leonard as he is to Michelle. Yawn.

 

The Exchange (AKA “Changeling”) (In Competition)

Based on a true story from Los Angeles, circa 1928, Christine (Angelina Jolie) is a hard-working single mother whose nine-year-old son Walter is kidnapped. Months pass before a corruption-embattled LAPD delivers to Christine an imposter child three inches shorter than Walter, and circumcised. Christine’s vocal protestations about the boy’s identity are met with impunity by a hostile police captain (Jeffrey Donovan) who has Christine institutionalized in a psych ward, while local radio talk show Presbyterian minister Rev. Gustav Briegleb (played by a miscast John Malkovich) jumps to her defense. Apart from a flashing neon light coda, Eastwood’s drama made for a respectable competition entry. 

 

Synecdoche, New York (In Competition)

Screenwriter Charlie Kaufman’s (“Being John Malkovitch”) directorial debut is a profound, funny, and inevitably surreal love letter to death and its flesh-collapsing reality amid the hopes, fears, and desires of normal people. The ever-dependable Philip Seymour Hoffman plays community theater director Caden Cotard, whose family life with his wife Adele (Catherine Keener) and 4-year-old daughter in Schenectady is falling apart. Nagging health issues eat away at Caden as he uses a McArthur grant to build a sound stage version of Manhattan inside a gigantic warehouse to write and direct a second life version of his pained existence. Synecdoche (pronounced sin-ec-ta-tee) rhymes with Schenectadyand denotes a part of something used to refer to the whole thing, or the other way around. Kaufman’s high concept narrative is an evocative and empathic way of looking at the inevitability of death, and it features a concentrated use of great female actors (Jennifer Jason Leigh, Samantha Morton, Emily Watson, Michelle Williams, and Diane Wiest star).

 

The Palermo Shooting (In Competition)

Leave it to Wim Wenders to make the most beautifully shot and scored, but boring and unintentionally campy, suspense love story you’ve ever seen. Finn (played by Campino, the Pierce Brosnan-looking singer for “Toten Hosen”) is a hotshot German artsy photographer who slums by doing fancy commercial ads against bizarre backgrounds. Able only to sleep for brief naps, Finn is hunted by an invisible-arrow-shooting phantom (Dennis Hopper) that follows Finn from Düsseldorf to Palermo where he meets Flavia (Giovanna Mezzogiorno), a lovely art restoration specialist working on the famous death related fresco “Il Trionfo della Morte.” There would have been more boos at the film’s premiere, but many in the audience were asleep.

 

Tyson (Un Certain Regard)

Director James Toback leverages his twenty-plus year friendship with the former “Baddest Man on the Planet” to capture a warts-and-all documentary confessional from Mike Tyson that feels like the most candid therapy session you’ve ever witnessed. Whatever preconceptions you have about Tyson will be challenged in a modern story of self-destruction and renewal that is as much about one vulnerable man’s desperate need for guidance as it is a reflection on American society, the media, and the sport of boxing. “Tyson” is nothing short of magnificent.

   

Vicky Cristina Barcelona (Outside of Competition)

“Vicky Cristina Barcelona” is a postcard trifle about two American girls (British newcomer Rebecca Hall as Vicky and Scarlett Johansson as Cristina) on a summer vacation complicated be the amorous attentions of local painter Juan Antonio (mischievously played by Javier Bardem) whose bi-polar ex-wife Maria Elena (Penelope Cruz) brings danger into the mix. The movie compulsively hits fast-forward every time Woody interrupts the action with voice-over narration from an extraneous male narrator, but is nonetheless an improvement over his last film, “Cassandra’s Dream.”

Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired (Outside of Competition)

It took a woman filmmaker (Marina Zenovich) to contextualize the behind-the-scenes horse-trading and injustices involved in Polanski's famous 1977-1978 trial for unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor that led to his self-imposed exile from America after serving a brief prison sentence. Zenovich blends a plethora of clips from Polanski's films with precise interview footage from attorneys on both sides of the case to outline judicial abuses by the presiding judge, Laurence J. Rittenband, whose career was shuttered due to his maleficent treatment of the case. Disturbing and informative, the film shows two highly egotistical men with a similar proclivity for young women (Polanski and Rittenband) in a media frenzied dual that neither could escape.

 

Surveillance (Outside of Competition)

From the looks of her latest cinematic abomination, it seems Jennifer Lynch is doomed to forever be regarded as David Lynch’s untalented daughter. Her first film in 15 years, after the unwatchable “Boxing Helena,” is the kind of slapdash gore-fest you’d expect from Rob Zombie, although even he might take offense at the comparison. A violent serial-killer-murder-sequence shifts to a pair of overly affectionate FBI agents (played by Bill Pullman and Julia Ormond) arriving at a desert town police station to interview impudent local cops about a highway massacre that left one cop wounded and his partner dead. Alternating flashbacks show an abusive pair of cops (played by French Stewart and co-writer Kent Harper) shooting out tires on passing cars before playing good-cop-bad-cop with their prey, that necessarily includes a vacationing family with a little girl and a pair of drug addicts. There’s a big twist at the end, but not a bit of competent writing or filmmaking to be had. If you ever wondered how one movie could discredit a festival’s programmer, “Surveillance” is it.

 

Chelsea on the Rocks (Outside of Competition)

 Abel Ferrara combines archival footage and reenacted scenes from Sid and Nancy’s last days while staying at the Chelsea Hotel, with interviews of some of the famous hotel’s more colorful residents to elucidate the passing of one of Manhattan’s landmark havens for artists. Stanley Bard, the hotel’s well-loved manager and caretaker for 45 years, was pushed out by a new management company intent on raising profits with a Chateau Marmont-like renovation. The documentary is just one more reminder of the war on culture taking place on a vast scale all over the world.

What Just Happened (Closing Night Film)

Barry Levinson’s adaptation of producer Art Linson's tell-all "What Just Happened? Bitter Hollywood Tales from the Front Line" closed the festival with an appropriate bit of self-reflexive Hollywood satire. Robert De Niro plays Ben, a twice-divorced LA producer whose status as a key power broker is threatened by the outcome of his latest project, an “edgy” Sean Penn thriller directed by an ego-maniacal auteur (Michael Wincott). To make matters worst, the starting date of Ben’s next picture depends on whether Bruce Willis will agree to shave off six months worth of beard that he is ridiculously attached to keeping. Filled with inside humor about things like the importance of premiering certain kinds of films at Cannes, Levinson’s latest comedy confirmed the first rule of success in the film business; “Nobody knows nothing.”

 

The 2008 Cannes Film Festival Awards:

The Palme d’Or award in the Court Metrages (Shorts Films) category went to "Megatron" (Marian Crisan).

The Camera d'Or (First Film Prize) went to director Steve McQueen (no not that one) for "Hunger," about Bobby Sands’ 1981 hunger strike in Northern Ireland’s Maze Prison.

The Prix Un Certain Regard went director Sergey Dvortsevoy for “Tulpan” (about a young Kazakh naval officer who returns to the steppe to live a nomadic life).

 

The Prix Du Scenario (Best Screenplay) went to Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne for “Lorna’s Silence.”

The Prix Du La Mise En Scene award (Best Director) went to Nuri Bilge Ceylan for "Three Monkeys."

The Prix Du Masculine (Best Actor Prize) went to Benicio Del Toro for Steven Soderbergh’s “Che.”

The Prix Du Feminine (Best Actress Prize) went to Sandra Corveloni for her performance in Walter Salles’ and Daniela Thomas’ "Linha de Passe," about four brothers attempting to break out of limited opportunities in Sao Paulo.

The honors for the Grand Prix (Grand Prize) went to Matteo Garrone’s "Gomorra."

The Palme d'Or was presented by Robert de Niro to Laurent Cantet for "Entre les Murs” (“The Class”), about a French junior high school teacher in a tough neighborhood whose teaching style is challenged by his difficult students.

Cannes So Far

Sean Penn’s 2008 Festival of Response
By Cole Smithey

CANNES, France -- Sean Penn has great taste in film. He championed Russian director Elem Klimov's 1985 "Come and See" long before most critics had ever even heard of it. So it's fitting that the virtuoso actor/writer/director should become the 9th American to preside over a Cannes Film Festival jury, behind such cinema greats as Kirk Douglas, Clint Eastwood and Martin Scorsese. As with any group, institution, or country, the President sets a tone that people respond to. So it's not surprising that an atmosphere of clear-eyed focus, aided by intermittent rain on the usually sunny Riviera, permeated screenings of films ranging from less-than-impressive (Fernando Meirelles' "Blindness" was a dud) to the sublime (Arnaud Desplechin's "A Christmas Tale," which hit nearly every note on its broad emotional range).

In recent years, Cannes has become a more consistent festival as opposed to its previous on-again-off-again years that swung between soaring highs and mediocre lows. There may never again be a Madonna moment, as in the '80s when the singer worked the red carpet with her Madonna/whore shtick that shocked and seduced the world, but then again the world seems much smaller these days.

Hollywood's annual dog-and-pony croisette show included Jack Black doing goofball kung fu poses for his enjoyable kids' movie "Kung Fu Panda." Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Cate Blanchett, Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, Shia LaBeof, John Hurt, and Ray Winstone took up a day of everyone's attention with the surprisingly satisfying "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," and its obligatory press conference where Harrison Ford got choked up about putting on the Indiana Jones costume once again.

There's been plenty of cinematic meat to chew on, as with James Toback's candid Mike Tyson documentary "Tyson." Greek tragedies don't play any better than watching and hearing the once-great boxer openly tell his warts-and-all-story to Toback's accompanied use of archive footage and home movies. Proud of 15 months free of alcohol and drug addiction, Mike Tyson and three of his children attended the film's premiere and were met with an ovation by its enthusiastic audience.

Woody Allen once again stormed the Palais in methodical fashion with a sultry if rushed romantic trifle set in Spain. "Vicky Cristina Barcelona" is a postcard romp about two American girls (British newcomer Rebecca Hall as Vicky, and Scarlett Johansson as Cristina) on a summer vacation complicated be the amorous attentions of local painter Juan Antonio (mischievously played by Javier Bardem) whose bi-polar ex-wife Maria Elena (Penelope Cruz) brings danger into the mix. The movie compulsively hits fast-forward every time Woody interrupts the action with voice-over narration from an irrelevant male narrator, but is nonetheless an improvement over his last film "Cassandra's Dream."

Although he didn't have a film at this year's festival, David Lynch lorded his enigmatic presence with this year's 2008 Cannes Festival poster image of a mysterious blond woman's slightly out-of-focus face made anonymous by a black rectangle covering her eyes, as if to signify a pornographic sin for which she will forever pay. 

The constant flood of production announcements included Oliver Stone's George Bush narrative "W," which began filming in Shreveport, Louisiana, and Michael Moore's revelation about his upcoming Fahrenheit/911 sequel. Moore promised a thoroughly researched documentary about America's path to its current state of fear and suspicion. Uniquely bizarre was the revelation about Werner Herzog's upcoming remake of Abel Ferrara's "Bad Lieutenant," set to feature Nic Cage in the role originally played by Harvey Keitel in a tour de force performance.

At the festival's halfway point, Palme d'Or contenders included Ari Folman's "Waltz with Bashir" (a graphic novel approach to his haunting recollections of an Israeli Army mission during the Lebanon War of the early '80s), and the Dardenne Brothers' "Lorna's Silence" (about a young Albanian woman's involvement in a Mafia plan to marry for Belgian citizenship and murder her junkie husband). It seems highly unlikely that James Gray's "Two Lovers" (starring Joaquin Phoenix, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Isabella Rossellini) will make a dent on the Jury's short list, while Clint Eastwood's "The Exchange" (a '20s era period drama about a woman (Angelina Jolie) whose kidnapped son returns as a different boy) meets with high expectations. Steven Soderbergh snuck in a two-for-one with "Che," a two-part, four-and-a-half-hour Che Guevara biopic (Benicio Del Toro does the honors) that promises to test the bladders and attention span of Cannes' ever-increasing number of film journalists, which increases by 6% every year.

It wouldn't be a proper festival without the selection of Cannes Classics that play in the Palais' "Salle Bunuel" screening room every night. This year's assortment of noteworthy treasures included David Lean's "This Happy Breed" (a Noel Coward drama about a lower middle-class family's feuds during three decades leading up to WWII), and Joseph Strick's radical vision of late '50s America as experienced through the eyes of a lonely divorcee who moves to Los Angeles.

Cannes is much more than an all-you-can-watch buffet of world cinema (more than 2300 films are shown during its 10 days), it's a bellwether of cinematic, economic, and global social values. But to weigh these new values, we have to wait until the climactic awards ceremony on Sunday, May 25th.

28 Films Debut at 45th New York Film Festival

Sept. 28–Oct. 14

Closing Night: "Persepolis"

Five Special Retrospectives, Three Special Event Screenings, Three Sidebars Included

The New York Film Festival Link

 

Five Special Retrospectives, Three Special Event Screenings, Three Sidebars Included

NEW YORK, August 15, 2007—The 45th New York Film Festival will premiere 28 films when it runs Sept. 28-Oct. 14 at the Frederick P. Rose Hall, home of Jazz at Lincoln Center. The festival, presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center and sponsored by Sardinia Region Tourism and The New York Times, also features three unique sidebars, three special event screenings and five retrospective films.

Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud’s "Persepolis" has been selected as the festival’s Closing Night film. The animated coming-of-age story, based on Satrapi’s popular graphic novel about her own childhood in Iran during the Islamic Revolution, won a Jury Prize at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival. It features the voice talents of Catherine Deneuve, Chiara Mastroianni, Danielle Darrieux and Simon Abkarian, several of whom are expected to attend the festival’s Closing Night screening at Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall on Sunday, Oct. 14. Sony Pictures Classics is releasing the film.

The festival’s previously announced Opening Night and Centerpiece selections (Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited and the Coen Brothers’ "No Country for Old Men") now headline a strong American contingent in the 2007 slate. Noah Baumbach, Gus Van Sant, Todd Haynes, Sidney Lumet all return to the festival with American productions; Julian Schnabel and Abel Ferrara come back with international co-productions; and Brian DePalma, John Landis and Ira Sachs each make their festival debuts.

Baumbach will screen his follow-up to "The Squid and the Whale," the very funny and very true Margot at the Wedding. Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Jason Leigh star as contentious sisters thrown into a disastrous family weekend caused by Pauline’s (Leigh) engagement to the underwhelming Malcolm (Jack Black). Scott Rudin produces the film, a Paramount Vantage release.

Van Sant’s "Paranoid Park," based on the novel by Blake Nelson, details the unraveling of a skateboarder’s life after he is involved in the death of a security guard. Newcomer Alex Nevins stars in the film, for which Van Sant won Cannes’ special 60th Anniversary Prize. IFC First Take will release the film.

The other American titles include Haynes’ "I’m Not There"—a rumination on the life of Bob Dylan, with actors Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Richard Gere, Heath Ledger, Ben Wishaw and Marcus Carl Frankin each representing elements the famed musician’s mystique—DePalma’s trenchant vision of the Iraq war, Redacted, and Ira Sachs’ taut melodrama Married Life. Lumet returns to the New York Film Festival for the first time in 43 years (Fail-Safe, 1964) with Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead, a crime story starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Albert Finney and Marisa Tomei. Two documentaries—Landis’ Mr. Warmth, The Don Rickles Project and Ed Pincus and Lucia Small’s The Axe in the Attic—round out the festival’s new U.S. productions.

The 45th New York Film Festival honors worldwide film production with more than half of its slate taken from other countries. Julian Schnabel’s "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" tells the story of magazine editor Jean-Dominique Bauby, who, paralyzed by a stroke, blinks out a memoir that eloquently captures his vibrant interior life. Mathieu Amalric stars as Bauby in the Miramax release, which won Cannes’ Best Director award and Technical Grand Prize.

Spanish director Juan Antonio Bayona will screen his feature film debut "The Orphanage," a supernatural drama about a woman who re-opens the orphanage in which she was raised, only to discover terrible secrets as her seven-year-old son, Simón, begins making imaginary friends. The Picturehouse release is presented and produced by last year’s Closing Night director Guillermo del Toro ("Pan’s Labyrinth").

Among the other international titles in the festival are Carlos Reygadas’ Silent Light, which shared with Persepolis the Jury Prize at Cannes; Abel Ferrara’s Italy/U.S. co-production Go Go Tales; Catherine Breillat’s The Last Mistress; Claude Chabrol’s A Girl Cut In Two; Hou Hsiao-hsien’s The Flight of the Red Balloon; Eric Rohmer’s The Romance of Astrea and Celadon; Alexander Sokurov’s Alexandra; Béla Tarr’s The Man from London; and Jia Zhang-ke’s documentary Useless. Cannes Palme d’Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days and Best Actress prizewinner Secret Sunshine were previously confirmed.

Five films will be featured as special retrospectives of the 45th New York Film Festival: the long-awaited "definitive cut" of Blade Runner by Ridley Scott, honoring the landmark science fiction film’s 25th anniversary; the premiere of a new score by the Alloy Orchestra to accompany Josef von Sternberg’s 1927 film Underworld, winner of the Best Writing Oscar® at the first Academy Awards®; John Ford’s first major film The Iron Horse (1924), a massive production about the building of the transcontinental railroad; Sven Gade and Heinz Schall’s 1920 German production of Hamlet, starring actress Asta Nielsen in the title role; and an evening titled The Technicolor Show, introduced by Martin Scorsese and featuring John Stahl’s Leave Her to Heaven (1945).

The Walter Reade Theater will also host three upcoming music documentaries as part of the New York Film Festival’s special events. Carlos Saura will screen Fados, a exploration of the celebrated Portuguese musical style. Acclaimed rock documentarian Murray Lerner’s The Other Side of the Mirror: Bob Dylan Live at the Newport Folk Festival, 1963-1965 features footage of Bob Dylan’s infamous Newport performances, where the musician first used electric amplifiers. Peter Bogdanovich will complete the set with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: Runnin’ Down a Dream, an in-depth look at the legendary American rock band to be screened at its full 238 minutes, with a 15-minute intermission.

Persepolis joins a select group of films that have closed the New York Film Festival, many of which have gone on to critical acclaim and successful theatrical runs. Over the last 20 years, these have included David Mamet’s House of Games, Jane Campion’s The Piano, Milos Forman’s The People vs. Larry Flynt, Pedro Almodóvar’s Live Flesh and Talk to Her, Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Alejandro González Iñárritu’s 21 Grams, Alexander Payne’s Sideways, Michael Haneke’s Caché and last year’s selection, Guillermo Del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth.

Due to ongoing renovations at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, this year’s New York Film Festival screenings will be held at the Frederick P. Rose Hall, home of Jazz at Lincoln Center, in the Time Warner Center. Opening Night will be held at Avery Fisher Hall, as well as Rose Hall. Closing Night will be held at Avery Fisher Hall only. Special events and some retrospective screenings will be held at the Walter Reade Theater.

The 45th New York Film Festival’s selection committee is made up of Richard Peña, chairman and the Film Society’s program director; Kent Jones, associate director of programming at the Film Society and editor-at-large of Film Comment magazine; Scott Foundas, film editor and critic, L.A. Weekly; J. Hoberman, film critic, The Village Voice, and visiting lecturer at Harvard University; and Lisa Schwarzbaum, film critic, Entertainment Weekly.

As previously announced, this year’s festival sidebar will honor director and screenwriter Joaquim Pedro de Andrade, a renowned member of Brazil’s Cinema Novo movement of the 1950s and ‘60s, who solidified his place as a master filmmaker with his 1969 classic, Macunaima. The series, titled Tropical Analysis: The Films of Joaquim Pedro de Andrade, will run Sept. 29-Oct. 9 at the Walter Reade Theater.

Two other sidebars are included among the festival’s events screening at the Walter Reade Theater. Views from the Avant-Garde returns for its 11th year as a distinguished showcase of experimental film and video, screening films during the second weekend of the festival, Oct. 6-7. The festival also celebrates the 10th anniversary of the establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region with Chinese Modern: A Tribute to Cathay Studios, Oct. 10-16, screening films from the Hong Kong production that, more than any other, introduced a distinctly modern lifestyle to Chinese culture.

Additionally, during the festival, the Film Society will salute New Line Cinema’s 40 years of extraordinary filmmaking at a black-tie gala to benefit the Film Society’s campaign to build a new film center. New Line Cinema’s Co-Chairmen and Co-CEOs Bob Shaye and Michael Lynne will be honored at the event on Friday, Oct. 5, at the Frederick P. Rose Hall, home of Jazz at Lincoln Center.

The 45th New York Film Festival, presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center, is sponsored by Sardinia Region Tourism and The New York Times. The screening of Underworld is made possible through the generosity of the Ira M. Resnick Foundation. Tropical Analysis has been organized by the Film Society of Lincoln Center and Os Filmes do Serro. Chinese Modern is sponsored by the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office New York.

The Film Society of Lincoln Center was founded in 1969 to celebrate American and international cinema, to recognize and support new directors, and to enhance the awareness, accessibility and understanding of film. Advancing this mandate today, the Film Society hosts two distinguished festivals: the New York Film Festival, which annually premieres the best films from around the world and has introduced the likes of François Truffaut, R.W. Fassbinder, Jean-Luc Godard, Pedro Almodóvar, Martin Scorsese, and Wong Kar-Wai to the United States, and New Directors/New Films, co-presented by the Museum of Modern Art, which focuses on emerging film talents. Since 1972 when the Film Society honored Charles Chaplin, the annual Gala Tribute celebrates an actor, filmmaker or industry leader who has helped distinguish cinema as an art form. Additionally, the Film Society presents a year-round calendar of programming at its Walter Reade Theater and offers insightful film writing to a worldwide audience through Film Comment magazine.

45th New York Film Festival Program Information

OPENING NIGHT:
"The Darjeeling Limited" Wes Anderson, US, 2007; 91m. (Fox Searchlight)
Screening with: "Hotel Chevalier" Wes Anderson, US, 2007; 12m. (Fox Searchlight)

Wes Anderson’s latest is as exquisitely poignant and emotionally nuanced as movies get. One year after the accidental death of their father, three estranged brothers (Owen Wilson, Jason Schwartzman and Anderson-newcomer Adrien Brody) board the Darjeeling Limited train and travel across India on a self-proclaimed spiritual journey. They make all the appropriate stops along the way but their jealous (often hilarious) bickering and one-upmanship displace any possibility of enlightenment. And then, something happens. Anderson is, as always, surprising, prodigiously inventive, and utterly masterful in his daring modulation of tones and emotions. He has achieved something quite magical and astonishing here: a grand pageant, a vibrant portrait of a place and a people, a quietly intricate look at sibling love and rivalry. Above all, a Wes Anderson film—and a great one at that.

CLOSING NIGHT:
“Persepolis” Marjane Satrapi & Vincent Paronnaud, France, 2007; 95m. (Sony Pictures Classics)

Marjane Satrapi’s lively and impassioned film version of her popular autobiographical graphic novels, animated by Vincent Paronnaud, about growing up in revolutionary-era Tehran.

CENTERPIECE:
“No Country for Old Men” Joel and Ethan Coen, US, 2007; 122m. (Miramax)

The Coen Brothers’ magisterial adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s laconic, haunting story of a Texas drug deal gone bad, with brilliant performances from Josh Brolin, Javier Bardem and Tommy Lee Jones.

“4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days” Christian Mungiu, Romania, 2007; 113m. (IFC First Take)

Winner of the Palme d’Or at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, Christian Mungiu’s film is a harrowingly methodical and carefully detailed portrait of two girls in search of a secret abortion in Communist-era Romania.

“Actresses” Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi, France, 2007; 110m.
A hilarious yet moving look at the life of a middle-aged actress desperate to marry and have children, directed by and starring the enchanting Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi.

“Alexandra” Alexander Sokurov, Russia, 92m. (Rezo Films)

No living filmmaker has been more obsessed with the state of the Russian soul than Alexander Sokurov. In Alexandra, this great filmmaker ponders the cost of war. Mother Russia herself—a blunt, grimly humorous, and totally confident babushka indelibly played by octogenarian opera diva Galina Vishnevskaya—pays a solo visit to her grandson's unit in Chechnya. She rides among the young recruits in a troop transport and later, a tank; however incongruous, her tour of inspection through this dusty, sun-bleached landscape has a terrible familiarity. Alexandra is too visceral in its filmmaking to feel like allegory. Seldom has a filmmaker so directly addressed his fellow citizens.

“The Axe in the Attic” Ed Pincus & Lucia Small, US, 2007; 110m.
Veteran documentary filmmaker Ed Pincus and his collaborator Lucia Small look at the hardships and sorrows of the Gulf Coast Diaspora two years after Hurricane Katrina.

“Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead” Sidney Lumet, USA, 117m. (ThinkFilm)

In this masterful crime drama from Sidney Lumet, a “perfect crime” plotted by two brothers (Philip-Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke) unravels before their eyes.

RETROSPECTIVE:
“Blade Runner: The Definitive Cut” Ridley Scott, US, 1982/2007; 118m. (Warner Brothers)

Philip K. Dick’s tale of rogue androids on the loose, hunted down by ex-cop Rick Deckard, offered a vision of a time in which the line between the human and the non-human has become perilously thin. Ridley Scott’s masterpiece starring Harrison Ford now seems not only to have anticipated our future but also, with some of the most extraordinary sets ever, to have designed it. So much of the world today appears, well…just so Blade Runner. To commemorate its 25th anniversary, Scott has gone back to the film, correcting a few details and coming up with a version of the film that he feels is closest to what he had always intended to make. One of the greatest American films of the ‘80s has gotten, remarkably, even better.

“Calle Santa Fe” Carmen Castillo, France, 2007; 163m.
Carmen Castillo’s melancholy epic looks back at her life as a revolutionary in Chile, before and after her exile in France.


“The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” Julian Schnabel, France/U.S., 2007; 112m. (Miramax)

Julian Schnabel creates a bold and beautiful adaptation of Jean-Dominique Bauby’s autobiographical story of his paralyzing stroke and his fierce desire to communicate through the one unaffected part of his body: his left eye.

SPECIAL EVENT
“Fados" Carlos Saura, Spain/Portugal, 2007; 92m.

Beginning with his much-loved Flamenco Trilogy and moving on through Tango and Iberia, Carlos Saura has been at the forefront of finding creative ways to blend cinema with music and dance. For his newest film, he headed west to neighboring Portugal for this beautiful celebration of the Portuguese fado. Sometimes thought of as the Portuguese blues, as so many of the songs deal with loneliness and heartache, the fado, like flamenco, remains one of Europe’s hardiest folk cultures; in recent years, fado has fused with everything from African rhythms to rock and hip-hop. Saura presents a broad panorama of fado styles, from the strictly traditional to some rather unexpected variations, and leading us through this musical journey are performers such as Carlos do Carmo, Catarina Moura, Argentina Santos, and Maria da Nazaré, along with guest appearances by Brazilian singers Chico Buarque and Caetano Veloso. Homages are included to such past greats as Lucília do Carmo, Alfredo Marceneiro and of course Amália Rodrigues. A terrific opportunity to discover a vibrant strand of contemporary world music, as well a chance to simply enjoy some wonderful singing and dancing.

“The Flight of the Red Balloon” Hou Hsiao-hsien, France, 2007; 113m. (IFC First Take)

Hou Hsiao-hsien’s ineffably serene film is less of a remake of Albert Lamorisse’s children’s classic than a complex homage refracted through the complications of life in contemporary Paris. Juliette Binoche is Suzanne, the proprietor of a marionette theater and the single mother of a lonely boy named Simon (Simon Iteanu) who spends his days with his Chinese au pair Song (Song Fang). Simon and Song watch as the adults around them come apart at the seams, with joy and anguish, love and hatred…while the red balloon drifts across the Parisian landscape. Hou’s film is heartbreakingly beautiful, and it is graced with a truly magnificent performance from Binoche.

“A Girl Cut In Two” Claude Chabrol, France, 2007; 115m.

Claude Chabrol has directed nearly 60 features and this mordant social satire filled with unforgettably nasty characters—and inspired, he’s said, by the sensational Gilded Age shooting of architect Stanford White—shows him at the top of his game. A jaded novelist (Francois Berleand) competes with the bizarrely unstable heir to a Lyons pharmaceutical fortune (Benoit Magimel) for the affections of a luscious TV weathergirl (Ludivine Sagnier). Chabrol skewers the pretensions of literati and haute bourgeois alike and, although the inevitable crime of passion is committed late in the movie, it’s evident that what we have really been watching the murder of a soul.

“Go Go Tales” Abel Ferrara, Italy/US, 2007; 96m.

The future of downtown strip joint Ray Ruby’s Paradise Lounge may ride on tonight’s New York lottery drawing, but there’s no question that Abel Ferrara hits the jackpot with this hilarious, outrageous and unexpectedly poignant comic fantasy about a disheveled club owner (Willem Dafoe) striving to keep his doors open in the face of potential bankruptcy and, worse, gentrification. As personal in its way as Cassavetes’ The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, Go Go Tales crackles with vaudevillian showmanship, impromptu musical numbers and live-wire performances from Dafoe, Bob Hoskins, Sylvia Miles and Asia Argento (who comes duly heralded as “the scariest, sexiest girl in the world”). Consider it Ferrara’s wistful valentine to a pre-gentrification Big Apple, and to his own unlikely longevity as a maverick of the American independent film movement.

RETROSPECTIVE
“Hamlet” Sven Gade & Heinz Schall, Germany, 1920-21; 110m. Print Courtesy of the German Film Institute (Deutsche Filminstitut) Piano accompaniment by Donald Sosin.

Danish screen diva Asta Nielsen was at the height of her popularity when she embarked on her greatest challenge—to play Hamlet. Other women had already played the beleaguered Danish prince, but Nielsen and screenwriter Erwin Gepard came up with their own twist: the Prince had actually been born a Princess, but for reasons of royal succession a change in gender was made, a secret known only to Hamlet’s parents and his faithful nursemaid. From there the story follows along the general scheme of Shakespeare’s play. While off at university, his father is assassinated and his mother and her lover steal the throne. Hamlet returns home with Horatio, who he secretly loves. When his stepfather and the chamberlain try to set up Hamlet with the chamberlain’s daughter, Ophelia, Hamlet pretends he’s mad. All the well-known sequences of Hamlet’s life take on a different resonance, yet to Nielsen and the filmmakers’ credit, the story maintains its visceral dramatic power. Long available only in black and white, the film has now been restored to its original polychrome tinted version by the German Film Institute, which we are presenting.

"I Just Didn’t Do It" Masayuki Suo, Japan, 2007; 143m.

A terrifying, real-life crime drama and indictment of the Japanese criminal justice system from Shall We Dance director Masayuki Suo, I Just Didn’t Do It follows a young man falsely accused of groping a school girl on a crowded train—guilty until proven innocent.

“I’m Not There” Todd Haynes, US, 2007; 136m. (The Weinstein Company)

Todd Haynes’ “Dylan movie” is a singularity: a cinematic phantasmagoria built around the poetic re-invention of the self, which collapses time and leaves the linear universe of progress and cold logic in the shadows. Haynes swirls through Dylan’s life and legends and allows a series of avatars (including Richard Gere, young Marcus Carl Franklin and, most miraculously of all, Cate Blanchett) to bloom within a variety of settings and styles—black and white London out of Fellini and Don’t Look Back, a TV documentary, the “old weird America” via Peckinpah. Like Dylan’s music, with which it is suffused, I’m Not There is pure quicksilver, slipping into cracks and crevices of intuition and wonder.

“In the City of Sylvia” Jose Luis Guerin, Spain/France, 2007; 90m.

During a few languid summer days, a young foreigner spends his afternoons sketching in an outdoor café. Years before he had visited the same city and met a woman named Sylvia. Now he looks for her, but mainly, he sketches the many attractive young women he sees all around. Then one afternoon he thinks that he actually does see Sylvia, and he sets off to confront his memory. José Luis Guerín’s lovely, exceedingly graceful work captures the feeling of being in love with love, a youthful sense of a world filled with an almost limitless sensuality.

RETROSPECTIVE
“The Iron Horse” John Ford, US, 1924; 132m. (20th Century Fox)

With the release of The Iron Horse, John Ford—known until then for his action-packed two-reel westerns—came to be regarded as one of Hollywood’s most important directors. An epic tale about the building of the transcontinental railroad, this mammoth production was three years in the making, requiring over 5000 extras and the building of two entire towns. Yet beyond the film’s impressive technical achievements lay its brilliant weaving of an edgy revenge tale into the fabric of American history. A veritable treasure chest of themes and motifs that would evolve in Ford’s later work, this milestone of American cinema has now been lovingly restored by 20th Century Fox to its full glory.

“The Last Mistress” Catherine Breillat, France, 2007; 114m. (IFC First Take)

France’s foremost provocatrice, Catherine Breillat, continues to surprise even as she pursues her career-long interest in the ramifications of female desire. Breillat’s sumptuous adaptation of Jules Barbey d’Aurevilly’s Une vieille maîtresse may be set in the reign of the “citizen king” Louis Philippe, but this dangerous liaison is recognizably modern. Disrupting cinematic as well as social conventions, Asia Argento gives another extraordinary performance in the title role as, as the film puts it, “a capricious flamenca who can outstare the sun”—not to mention outmaneuver her erotic rival Roxane Mesquida (the older sister in Breillat’s Fat Girl, NYFF 2001). A star as well as an actress, Argento holds the screen with the force of her carnality, which may be precisely Breillat’s point.

RETROSPECTIVE
“Leave Her to Heaven” John M. Stahl, US, 1945; 110m.

The Film Foundation presents a stunning restoration of this Technicolor noir classic, a favorite of Pedro Almodóvar in which Gene Tierney tries to scheme and connive her way into the complete possession of her beloved husband Cornel Wilde.

“The Man From London” Béla Tarr, Hungary/France/Germany, 2007; 132m.

Maloin, a switchman at a seaside railway depot, witnesses two men fight over a suitcase. One falls into the water and apparently drowns while the other escapes. Retrieving the suitcase, Maloin discovers that it’s stuffed with banknotes. After staring at his newfound fortune in awe, he hides the suitcase in his closet. Then a certain Inspector Morrison arrives, hot on the trail of two robbers. Based on a little-known work by Georges Simenon, this new film by Béla Tarr (Satantango, NYFF 1994) plunges the viewer into nameless, timeless world perpetually encased in darkness—physical, moral and spiritual. In Fred Keleman's luscious cinematography, each image looks like the cover of a long-forgotten pulp noir.

“Margot at the Wedding” Noah Baumbach, US, 2007; 93m. (Paramount Vantage)

Noah Baumbach’s follow-up to The Squid and the Whale is a very funny and very true look at sibling rivalry during a quickly deteriorating family weekend in Connecticut, with Nicole Kidman and Jennifer Jason Leigh as contentious sisters.

“Married Life” Ira Sachs, USA, 2007; 90m.

Ira Sachs’ wonderfully clear-eyed comedy relocates British crime novelist John Bingham’s Five Roundabouts to Heaven to the Pacific Northwest in the late 1940s. Harry (Chris Cooper) is dissatisfied with his marriage to Pat (Patricia Clarkson) and has found love with Kay (Rachel McAdams), who immediately attracts the attention of Harry’s womanizing friend Richard (Pierce Brosnan). Meanwhile, Harry, in order to spare Pat the humiliation of being left, is inspired to take drastic measures. Married Life is a beautifully rendered piece of period Americana and a perfectly acted four-hand roundelay. It is also a wisely comic and at times harrowing look at the pitfalls and pathologies of marriage.

“Mr. Warmth, The Don Rickles Project” John Landis, US, 2007; 90m.
John Landis’ star-filled, fittingly uproarious documentary is a terrific portrait of a bygone era and, most of all, man named Rickles, a giant who continues to stride among us mortal lowlifes at the age of 81, his deadly timing in full working order. Rickles…the mere mention of his name strikes mirth-filled terror in the hearts of actors and fellow comics, not to mention overweight men with bad toupees. When the festival committee saw this movie, they could hear us laughing all the way in Jersey. We know you’ll like it too…you hockey puck.

“The Orphanage” Juan Antonio Bayona, Spain, 100m. (Picturehouse)

Laura, her husband Carlos and their young son Simón move into an imposing country house surrounded by woods and just a short walk to the sea. They plan to turn it into a home for sick and disabled children—that is, until Simón starts collecting a gang of invisible friends. Produced by Guillermo Del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth), this smart, continuously surprising movie starts off as a supernatural thriller, then veers off into some much darker, more unsettling territory, navigated by Belén Rueda’s extraordinary performance as Laura. An impressive debut feature by Juan Antonio Bayona, scripted by Sergio G. Sánchez and featuring a wonderful turn by the great Geraldine Chaplin as a special kind of medium.

SPECIAL EVENT
“The Other Side of the Mirror: Bob Dylan Live at the Newport Folk Festival, 1963-1965” Murray Lerner, US, 2007; 80m.

Throughout the ‘60s, the Newport Folk Festival was one of the era’s most reliable barometers of the changes beginning to rock American society. At the center of those changes was a rail-thin singer hailing from Hibbing, Minn., by way of Greenwich Village: Bob Dylan. Filmmaker Murray Lerner was there too, and he powerfully captured both the spirit of Newport as well as the extraordinary music produced there in his woefully neglected film Festival. Now Lerner has gone back to his footage from his years filming at Newport and created a revealing portrait of the young Dylan during the crucial period of 1963-65. We see the bright, chipper young Dylan—already a great crowd favorite in 1963—grow progressively darker and more withdrawn as he and his band take their first steps towards rock and roll in 1965. The film features Dylan singing stirring versions of many of his most famous songs—“Blowin’ in the Wind,” “A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall,” “Maggie’s Farm,” “Only a Pawn in Their Game”—as well as some of his legendary duets with Joan Baez. A great document of an extraordinary performer, and a fascinating complement to Todd Haynes’ wonderful “I’m Not There.”

“Paranoid Park” Gus Van Sant, US, 2007; 85m. (IFC First Take)

At once a piquant, dreamlike portrait of teen alienation and a boldly experimental work of film narrative, Paranoid Park finds Gus Van Sant working at the height of his powers and very far afield from Hollywood. Made in and around the director’s native Portland, the film follows a withdrawn high-school skateboarder (Gabe Nevins) as he struggles to make sense of his involvement in an accidental murder, recalling past events across tides of unsteady memory and expressing his feelings in a diary that is, in effect, the movie we are watching. The skating scenes, filmed by Van Sant and cinematographers Christopher Doyle and Rain Kathy Li in a lyrical mixture of Super 8 and 35mm, depict their subjects flying through the air with the greatest of ease, momentarily free from the earthly troubles of adolescence.

“Redacted” Brian DePalma, US, 2007; 90m. (Magnolia)

Americans of a certain age may be experiencing a sense of déjà vu, but Brian DePalma hasn’t waited until the end of the war in Iraq to make his movie on the subject. Redacted is ripped from the headlines—or, more precisely, from the cable news. It is a fictionalized account of a murderous 2006 atrocity committed against a teenaged girl and her family by American troops in Mahmoudiya. In its formal invention, it harkens back to the director’s countercultural roots. Certain to inspire controversy, DePalma’s disturbing portrayal of a dazed, confused, vengeful platoon, complete with resident videomaker, is a powerful movie of technical brio and ice-cold fury.

“The Romance of Astrea and Celadon” Eric Rohmer, France, 2007; 109m. (Rezo Films)

Eighty-seven-year-old Eric Rohmer’s glorious new (and allegedly final) film is based on Honoré d’Urfé’s legendary 17th century novel, a pastoral romance set among the shepherds of the Forez plain in 5th century Gaul. Astrea and Celadon are young lovers, pure of heart, torn asunder by fate. They are reunited gradually by chance and time, which are coaxed forward by the magic of river nymphs and the workings of a Druid priest. Rohmer’s film is a rapturous idyll, set in the land of myth, and it ends with one of the most beautiful celebrations of carnal love the cinema has ever seen.

“Secret Sunshine” Lee Chang-dong, Korea, 2007; 142m.

Lee Chang-dong’s most ambitious and fully realized film to date, Secret Sunshine is that rare movie that possesses the richness and complexity of a great novel, revealing new layers to us the deeper we move into it. It begins like an Asiatic Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, as a recent widow (Jeon Do-yeon) and her young son adjust to life a small country town after relocating from Seoul. Then, abruptly and without warning, the film becomes something of a thriller, and after that a devastating, Bressonian study in human suffering. Lee navigates these switchblade reversals of comedy and despair, darkness and light, with a master’s grace, as does Jeon in the revelatory performance for which she was duly awarded the Best Actress prize at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

“Silent Light” Carlos Reygadas, Mexico, 2007; 142m.

Never predictable but always audacious, the young Mexican director Carlos Reygadas has made the world’s first talking picture in the medieval German dialect called Plautdietsch. Silent Light is set in Northern Mexico’s ascetic, self-contained Mennonite community and cast almost entirely with Mennonite non-actors. Building in emotional intensity, this elemental tale of love and betrayal is at once an ethnographic documentary and a quasi-remake of Carl-Theodore Dreyer’s Ordet. Reygadas too makes spirituality seem material, not least in the extraordinary, wide-screen landscape shots that bracket the action. With this, his third feature, he has secured a place in the forefront of contemporary film artists.

SPECIAL EVENT Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: Runnin’ Down a Dream” Peter Bogdanovich, US, 2007; 238m.

Rarely, if ever, has the history and development of a major rock band been explored with the care and the depth with which Peter Bogdanovich approaches Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Starting out from Gainesville Florida, the band (as Mudcrutch) headed to Los Angeles in the mid-‘70s and soon attracted the attention of producer Denny Cordell. Their first singles failed to cause much of a stir in the U.S., but in the U.K., they were hailed as the best American band in years. After a hugely successful European tour, they headed home, this time finding a much warmer response from critics and the public alike. Liberally peppered with rare concert footage—from Florida bars to “The Top of the Pops” to major stadium appearances—the film also chronicles Petty’s epic battles with the record industry and collaborations with Bob Dylan, Stevie Nicks, Roger McGuinn and the Traveling Wilburys. Dispensing with the cynicism that usually accompanies longevity in rock music, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers have managed to remain fresh, feisty and popular for over thirty years. Peter Bogdanovich helps us understand why.

RETROSPECTIVE
“Underworld” Josef von Sternberg, US, 1927; 80m. Accompaniment by the Alloy Orchestra

Josef Von Sternberg’s silent masterpiece more or less began the American gangster genre. It screens with a new score from the inimitable Alloy Orchestra.

“Useless” Jia Zhang-ke, Hong Kong, 2007; 80m.

Jia Zhang-ke’s new documentary is one of the rare films that continually re-defines itself as it unfolds, from modern clothing factories to designer shops to a Parisian fashion installation of the work of vanguard designer Ma Ke to Northern Chinese mining country and a series of portraits of local tailors, keenly aware of their own expendable role in a world of mass-produced goods. Useless does not illustrate a thesis. Call it a conversation between Jia and the modern world, which examines what we wear and winds up addressing who we are, with the greatest eloquence.

Grading Cannes 2007

Here’s the list of everything I saw at the 60^th Cannes Film Festival. I always make every attempt to be as liberal as possible in seeing films from various sections of the festival, not just the films in competition, as well as films in the market. Films listed as "In Competition" signifies that these were competing for an award, although not necessarily the Palme d’Or.

Water Lilies (In Competition) (B+)

Brand Upon The Brain! (A-)

Dracula (AKA "The Horror of Dracula") (A-)

He Was A Quiet Man (B-)

XTC: Just Do Not Do It (D)

Broken English (B-)

Terror’s Advocate (In Competition) (A-)

No Country For Old Men (In Competition) (A)

Sicko (B+)

Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten (A)

Chacun Son Cinema (B+)

Blonde and Blonder (D-)

Paranoid Park (In Competition) (C)

A Mighty Heart (D)

Death Proof (In Competition) (B+)

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (In Competition) (B-)

Go Go Tales (D+)

Persepolis (In Competition) (B+)

The Orphanage (B-)

Apres Lui (C+)

Cruising (A-)

Lynch (B)

Ocean’s Thirteen (C-)

We Own The Night (In Competition) (C)

Days of Darkness (C)

Never Apologize (B+)

Mikey & Nickey (B+)

4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days (Palme d’Or Winner) (A)

Borderline (C)

Zodiac (In Competition) (A)

Cannes 2007: From The Wrong Side Up

Cole Smithey

(CANNES, FRANCE) Coming on the heels of the French elections that voted in conservative nominee Nicolas Sarkosy, the Cannes Film Festival kicked off with a whimper rather than the expected bang of its 60th anniversary. On its second day, festival staff were still moving stacks of building materials around the undecorated Palais du Festival, where most of the screenings take place. There were fewer flat-panel monitors than usual displaying the 24/7 Cannes Television coverage of red carpet entrances and endless interviews and press conferences with directors and actors from the farthest reaches of world cinema. It wasn't so much that the film selection this year was inferior to any other year-some would say it was better, but rather that morale seemed low. Still, the French Rivera beaches promised to soak up whatever blues the gloomiest minds could harbor.

British director Stephen Frears' gracious presence as head of the Palme d'Or jury quietly underscored the  fact that there were no British films in competition at a time when the significant BBC Films announced that it is being absorbed into the umbrella of BBC Television's fiction department.

That's not to say that festival films were without British influence. Jude Law redoubled his over-exposure to movie audiences in Wong Kar-Wai's sleep-inducing foray into English language films with "My Blueberry Nights," an American-staged road movie of longing and discontent. Director Michael Winterbottom whored himself out to direct Mariane Pearl's money-grabbing pity party "A Mighty Heart," a tedious police procedural about the kidnapping and assassination of her late husband and Wall Street journalist Daniel Pearl, that would have been better served in documentary form. Perhaps the crass film should have been entitled "Mariane Pearl's Mighty Wallet." Joy Division's Ian Curtis was the enigmatic focus of market favorite "Control," a black-and-white musical biopic that quickly found a buyer.

Under the radar was Julien Temple's inspiring and profound documentary "Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten," a stirring look at the life and philosophies of the man who gave The Clash their bold revolutionary voice.

In the observed absence of Sacha Baron Cohen, who brought laughs to last year's festival with "Borat," we settled instead for a remastered version of "Cruising" from William Friedkin that prodded a different bent of dark humor. The director that taught filmmakers what car chases were all about with "The French Connection," and the nature of pure evil with "The Exorcist," personally presented a beautifully restored version of his Al Pacino thriller. Quentin Tarantino sat middle-row-center in the Noga Hilton cinema where Friedkin poured loving praise on the relatively young director before introducing his gay-themed serial killer movie that defined the genre. Twenty-eight years after its release, "Cruising" stands as a shocking and intense movie with a riveting performance from Al Pacino. A DVD of the restored film, with the naughty bits put back in, is scheduled for release in the near future.

Screening in the "Cannes Classics" section was a fully restored version of Terence Fisher's 1958 Hammer Films horror classic "Dracula," staring Christopher Lee in the title role along with Peter Cushing as Dr. Van Helsing." On the 50th anniversary of the gloriously gothic Hammer Horror cycle, "The Horror of Dracula" (as it was titled in the states) delivered a distinctive tickle of entertainment. A new print of writer/director Elaine May's 1976 film "Mikey & Nicky," starring John Cassavetes and Peter Falk, gave a dramatic New York wallop of friendship and betrayal with the undeniable talent of Cassavetes, the actor, spinning urban male lunacy like gold. 

The subject of film restoration was asserted most prominently by Martin Scorsese, who announced the launch of his "World Cinema Foundation," dedicated to the restoration and preservation of films from all over the world. America's most respected living director also gave a master class in filmmaking to a standing room only crowd of cineastes and film students that counted the ubiquitous Tarantino among its number.

Alejandro Gonzalez, Guillermo del Toro and Alfonso Cuaron carried over some of last year festival's Mexican flavored excitement when they announced the launch of their new company "cha cha cha" in cooperation with "U" and Focus Features. Gael Garcia Bernal is scheduled to star in the company's debut feature "Rudi y Cursi."

Abject failure fell to Harmony Korine with "Mister Lonley," his first film since 1999 when he created his last cinematic debacle "Julien Donkey Boy." Critics walked out in droves at the demented story of a lonely Michael Jackson impersonator living in Paris who falls in love with a Marilyn Monroe imitator. Not far behind Korine was has-been writer/director Abel Ferrara whose "Go Go Tales" tipped afoul of critical acclaim with a story about a lotto-addicted strip club owner (Willem Dafoe) coming to terms with his artificial and insular world.

The 60th anniversary filmic birthday cake, "To Each His Own Cinema," was conceived by festival President Gilles Jacob as an anthology of 33 three-minute films from filmmakers who were asked to create stories from "their state of mind of the moment as inspired by the motion picture theater." Jane Campion, the only woman to have ever been awarded a Palme d'Or, was also the only female director in the group, but her film "The Lady Bug" was one of the worst of an otherwise mostly well-executed lot. Gus Van Sant's "First Kiss" came off like an arty soft drink commercial while directors such as Walter Salles, David Cronenberg, Lars von Trier, Roman Polanski, Takeshi Kitano and Chen Kaige created loving and unforgettable vignettes.

The parties at this year's festival were by all accounts lackluster in comparison with other years. Even the presence of Catherine Deneuve, Angelina Jolie, Eva Mendez, Diane Kruger, Javier Bardem and nearly the entire cast of the underwhelming "Ocean's Thirteen," failed to spark the celebrity blaze we're accustomed to at Cannes. Even so, the Cannes (pronounced "can," not "con") Film Festival has nothing to prove to filmmakers, critics, actors or film audiences to whom the event is a distant dream or a fond memory. To some who have never attended, the festival seems like a hothouse atmosphere where every film is regarded as a masterpiece. But that oversimplification doesn't begin to describe the nature of a robust experience where you can intuit passion for cinema in the distance between continuous hours spent watching films from different countries and eras. Although the festival programming is front-loaded so that by the end of the 9th day there isn't much left to get excited about in its last three days, you'll have had a challenging and rewarding cinema encounter to take with you for the rest of your life.

It seemed like a foregone conclusion that the Coen Brothers would win the Palme d'Or for their haunting and fiery adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel "No Country For Old Men." Tommy Lee Jones is Sheriff Bell, a Texas lawman nearing retirement when a drug deal gone awry, and a sardonic serial killer named Chigurh (Javier Bardem), send him on a journey to the black heart of the modern West. The Coens achieve a sublime combination of action, violence and reflection that is a culmination of every film the brothers have made. Josh Brolin ("Grindhouse") galvanizes the rebirth of his film acting career as Llewellyn Moss, a modern-day cowboy who takes a suitcase full of cash from an unexplained crime scene. Among competition films from David Fincher, Gus Van Sant, Kim Ki-Duk, Julian Schnabel, Fatih Akin, Alexander Sokurov and Naomi Kawase, "No Country For Old Men" could only be rivaled by Romanian director Cristian Mungiu's devastating film "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days," about a young woman's black market abortion during the final days of Communism in Romania.

Of the 29 films I screened at this year's festival, I only hated three. Five were barely tolerable, and six were decent enough not to want to fall asleep. That leaves fifteen films that I liked, and of those there were thirteen that I really loved-they are (in alphabetical order): "Brand Upon The Brain!" (Guy Madden), "Cruising" (William Friedkin), "Dracula" (Terence Fisher), "4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days" (Cristian Mungiu), "Mikey & Nicky" (Elaine May), "Never Apologize: A Personal Visit With Lindsay Anderson" (Mike Kaplan), "No Country For Old Men" (Joel and Ethan Cohen), "Sicko" (Michael Moore), "Terror's Advocate" (Barbet Schroeder), "To Each His Own Cinema" (Various Directors), "Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten" (Julien Temple), "Water Lilies" (Celine Sciamma) and
"Zodiac" (David Fincher).

The awards for the 2007 Cannes Film Festival:

Palme d'Or: "4 months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days" (Cristian Mungiu - Romania).

Grand Prix: "The Morning Forest" (Naomi Kawase - France).

Prix Du 60th Anniversaire: Gus Van Sant ("Paranoid Park" - USA).

Prix Du Scenario (Best Screenwriter Award):
Fatih Akin for "The Edge of Heaven" (Turkey).

Jury Prize: "Persepolis" (Marjane Satrapi & Vincent Paronnaud - Iran) and "Street Licht" (Carlos Reygadas - Mexico).

Prix De La Mise En Scene (Best Director): Julian Schnabel ("The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" - USA).

Prix d'Interpretation Feminine (Best Actress):
Do-Yeon Jeon ("Secret Sunshine" - Korea).

Prix d'Interpretation Masculine (Best Actor):
Konstantin Lavronenko ("The Banishment" - Russia).

The prize for the Un Certain Regard award went to "California Dreamin' - Endless" (Christian Nemescu - Romania).