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FAHRENHEIT 9/11 WINS CANNES
The jury of the 57th Festival de Cannes awarded its top prize, the Palm D'or, to Michael Moore for Fahrenheit 9/11, a scathing indictment of White House actions after the September 11 terror attacks. The film is the first documentary to receive the award since Jacques Cousteau's The Silent World in 1956. A visibly overwhelmed Moore thanked the festival and jury for putting a spotlight on the film, adding, "I have a sneaking suspicion that what you have done here and the response from everyone at the festival, you will assure that the American people will see this film. I can't thank you enough for that... Many people want the truth, and many [others] want to put it in the closet, and just walk away. There was a great Republican president, [Abraham Lincoln], who once said, if you just give the people the truth, the republic will be saved... I dedicate this Palme d'Or to my daughter, to the children of Americans and to Iraq and to all those in the world who suffer from our actions."For the first time in the history of the Festival de Cannes, Gilles Jacob gave the jury an opportunity to explain their Palme d'Or award choices:
"Judging a film by its politics is a bad thing," Quentin Tarantino explained. "If it wasn't some of the best filmmaking, then I would not have chosen it.... You can't strangle this movie with the title documentary. Michael Moore is fucking with the format to bring us a movie/documentary/critical essay."
"One of the reasons it is radical in its politics is because of its relation to the media," said Tilda Swinton. "It starts and ends with a question. It is sophisticated cinema. It wouldn't have served its political end if it wasn't a good piece of filmmaking. He has matured as a filmmaker since Bowling for Columbine... It is not a film about Bush, nor Iraq but rather the system. In the words of Godard, 'We spend so much time looking for the key to the problem; we need to begin looking for the lock.'"
Swinton also revealed that the jury had thought about "giving a special award for best comedic performance to George W. Bush. Seriously, we did."
"We had long and passionate debates, " said Benoit Poelvoorde. "We put the politics aside so as to talk film. We are not here to give a morality lesson. Personally, I think that the festival is very politically correct; on the other hand, it is hard to not be... At the same time, Fahrenheit 9/11 is a political tract. His unique viewpoint is not a problem for me since we have the possibility to inform ourselves elsewhere and also listen to other opinions."
"What struck me most was that I was laughing one minute, sobbing the next," said Edwidge Danticat. "I was taken to emotional heights. It let the voices speak for themselves, voices that are otherwise silent."
The festival's second-place honor, The Grand Prize, went to South Korean filmmaker Park Chan-wook for Old Boy, a blood-soaked thriller about a man out for revenge after years of inexplicable imprisonment.
The Jury Prize was awarded to the Thai film Tropical Malady by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, an enigmatic film exploring the passionate relationship between two men. The jury also acknowledged the actress Irma P. Hall, who stars in the Coen brothers' The Ladykillers.
Best Director was presented by Egyptian director Youssef Chahine to Tony Galtif, a French-Algerian of gypsy descent, whose film Exiles features actors Romain Duris and Lubna Azabalin as descendents of Algerian exiles who journey from Paris back to Algiers in search of their roots. "This film is about a new generation who are part of a mix, a fusion in motion," Gatlif explained. "This young generation of people with North African, sub-Saharan or South American origins is in the process of bringing an extraordinary richness from all points of view; these young people from the 16th arrodissement in Paris who listen to Arab music without speaking the language. I find this fusion of cultures wonderful."
Maggie Cheung was singled out by the jury as Best Actress for her performance in Olivier Assayas's Clean, (co-produced by Filmmaker editor Scott Macaulay and his partner at Forensic Films, Robin O'Hara); and 14-year-old Yagira Yuuya was awarded Best Actor for his performance in Kore-Eda Hirokazu's Nobody Knows.
The jury prize for Best Screenplay went to Agnes Jaoui and Jean-Pierre Bacri for Comme une image (Look at Me), in which Jaoui and Barci co-star, and which Jaoui also directed.
The festival's Camera d'Or, for Best First Feature, was awarded to Keren Yedaya for the French-Israeli co-production Or, about the daughter of an aging prostitute whose mental health is deteriorating. Yedaya dedicated her award in a moving speech to "all who are not free," including not only those who live today as prostitutes, but also, "as an Israeli, [in solidarity] for the Palestinians," who continue to suffer due to the persecution of the Israeli government.
The Camera d'Or jury awarded special mentions to the Chinese film Passages, directed by Yang Chao, which screened in Un Certain Regard, and to the Iranian film Bitter Dream, directed by Mohsen Amiryoussefi, which screened in Directors Fortnight.
Jonas Geirnaert, whose animated film Flatlife shared the Palm D'Or for Best Short with the Romanian film Trafic, by Catalin Mitulescu, set the tone for the awards ceremony, televised live on IFC, when he implored the festival to focus less on business in the future and more on the art of filmmaking, and, in the event that Michael Moore's film was not recognized by the jury, Geirnaert added, "Do not vote for Bush."
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 5/22/2004 02:28:30 PM Comments (0)
2046 UPDATE
A.O. Scott of the New York Times is one of the first critics to weigh in on Wong Kar-wai's 2046, which finally arrived in Cannes, albeit a bit later than expected. Writing in his "Critic's Notebook" column, Scott says the film is "full of lush, melancholy sensuality and swathed in light as lustrous and supple as the Shantung dresses all of the actresses seem to wear. The title, by the way, refers both to a hotel room in Hong Kong in the late 1960's and a high-speed train racing through the future, and one of the film's themes (aptly enough, given the drama surrounding its arrival) is time. The characters are always falling in and out of love too soon or too late, and the chronology glides forward and backward.
"Like other work from this director, 2046 teases the boundary of incomprehensibility. It is a series of moods, nuances and gorgeous moments -- seductions, couplings, tearful partings -- with the usual connective tissue left out, or implied in title cards or voice-overs. After the two screenings in the early evening, quite a few viewers rushed back to see it again Thursday night, to experience its intoxicating beauty one more time, and also to figure out what on earth it was about."
"In watching the film," writes Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian, "we are marooned in a virtual 'present' time of exquisite unhappiness. It is an absorbingly mysterious, richly sensuous film."
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 5/21/2004 10:25:45 AM Comments (0)
THEY RULE
Via Ratchet Up comes this link to John On's Net-art project, They Rule, which Ratchet's John Schott calls "the best cartography of social and political influence I have ever seen."
"They Rule aims to provide a glimpse of some of the relationships of the U.S. ruling class. It takes as its focus the boards of some of the most powerful U.S. companies, which share many of the same directors. Some individuals sit on 5, 6 or 7 of the top 500 companies. It allows users to browse through these interlocking directories and run searches on the boards and companies. A user can save a map of connections complete with their annotations and e-mail links to these maps to others. They Rule is a starting point for research about these powerful individuals and corporations."
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 5/19/2004 12:32:32 PM Comments (1)
According to BBC News: "The Mexican defense ministry confirmed [11 UFOs had been videotaped] by members of the air force, but did not comment on [the content of the video]. Mexican UFO investigator Jaime Maussan said that, while there were hundreds of UFO videos, it was the first time one 'had the backing of the armed forces'."Scientist speculate that the cluster of mysterious objects that surrounded a Mexican Air Force plane, alarming the pilots and sparking a UFO scare, could be a weather phenomenon known as ball lightning, or possibly just "gases in the atmosphere".
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 5/19/2004 11:47:55 AM Comments (0)
GAY MUST-SEE TV
The explosion of so-called "gay TV" has been seen as damaging by some as it is empowering for others. Indeed, Will & Grace's swishy, neutered males have about as much sex-appeal as a marshmallow, while the not so "fab five" of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy do everything in their power to reinforce stereotypes about gay men that activists have been railing against for years. Controversial Steven Cojocaru, style correspondent for Entertainment Tonight, is adored by straight middle-America, yet reviled by many gays for his effete, surgically enhanced visage and queeny mincing. Queer as Folk serves up a bevy of brain-dead, self-involved beauties only concerned with their next bed partner.Are these the only kind of gay images straight America wants to see: Shallow, callow, safe and ultimately white-washed?
Perhaps, but gay viewers and filmmakers have different ideas. Already, two very different TV series you may not have heard of are coming to DVD, bringing with them a very distinct set of characters, lives and issues.
Bravo Network's "docu-soap" Fire Island details the trials & tribulations of two sets of gay vacationers, one male and the other female. Shot reality-TV style and featuring a cast of 30- and 40-something gay friends and couples, Fire Island rips away the glamorous fantasy most of us have of summers at the Pines, instead painting a gritty portrait of shaky relationships, body issues and sex in the AIDS era. But of course, what reality show worth its salt would be complete without a battle of wills between housemates?Punks' writer, director and producer Patrik-Ian Polk brings us Noah's Arc, a night-time soaper attempting to blend a Sex and the City sensibilty with the whiny angst of Queer As Folk. Importantly, it features an all-black cast, aiming right for an audience that has been shamelessly underserved by the media, the all-but-invisible gay black man.
The first season of Noah's Arc will be available for purchase on DVD/VHS beginning Tuesday, June 22 at a video store near you. Look for Fire Island on May 25 from Win Media Direct.
Lastly, here! TV, the nation's first programming service appealing to gay and lesbian audiences is planning to launch a 24/7 schedule of movies, new original series, classic films and television series and other general entertainment content.
# posted by Andre Salas @ 5/18/2004 01:26:00 PM Comments (0)
Every other filmmaker these days references those easy riders and raging bulls of '70s American cinema. Few people, however, remember that other '60/'70s filmmaking style, the syncopated fractured cinema of the Brits. Luckily, a current retrospective of Joseph Losey at the Walter Reade in New York City will help you catch up with what was all the rage 40 years ago. Although Losey was actually an American -- from Wisconsin no less -- his English dramas, starting with the homoerotic upstairs/downstairs s&m drama The Servant (based on his longtime collaborator Harold Pinter's script), showcased his skill at dramatizing the uneasy psychology of class and desire, especially in men with a desire to destroy themselves. But even more fun is to enjoy the film's look -- the sudden unmotivated zooms, the over dramatic score (often my Michel Legrand) punctuated by the jarring edits, the occasional lilting musical montage sequence, the baroque use of mirrors and windows -- which at the time must have felt very new, and now feels new all over again. # posted by Peter Bowen @ 5/18/2004 12:02:35 PM Comments (0)
Variety reports today: "Following Newmarket's enormously successful release of Icon's The Passion of the Christ, the two companies have created an informal alliance to buy movies together for distribution in North America, the U.K. and Australia."
The pact, which was announced at Cannes, "is intended to give Newmarket greater clout to acquire U.S. rights in the face of competition from the specialized arms of the major studios, which often bid for all English-language territories."
"The idea of cooperating," writes Adam Dawtrey in Variety, "grew out of the fact that Newmarket and Icon separately bought U.S. and Australian rights to the Charlize Theron pic Monster."
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 5/18/2004 11:04:50 AM Comments (0)
FAHRENHEIT 9/11 UPDATE
The reviews are beginning to pour in from Cannes for Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11: The Guardian calls it "a powerful film.. about losses on both sides of the Iraq war and the grief of American and Iraqi families," while Peter Brunette at indieWIRE writes, "This time around, Moore drops the zaniness and high entertainment value evident in Bowling for Columbine in favor of an elegiac approach that is less funny but ultiimately, maybe, more politically effective."Time magazine weighs in: "Fahrenheit 9/11 may be seen as another example of the liberal media preaching to its own choir. But Moore is such a clever assembler of huge accusations and minor peccadillos (as with a shot of Wolfowitz sticking his pocket comb in his mouth and sucking on it to slick down his hair before a TV interview) that the film should engage audiences of all political persuasions... In one sense, Michael Moore took George W. Bush's advice. He found 'real work' deconstructing the President's Iraq mistakes. Fahrenheit 9/11 is Moore's own War on Error."
And BBC News Online says: "Moore himself appears less in this film than he has in his previous documentaries, leaving most of the talking to politicians, soldiers, parents, experts and assorted real Americans. There is highly selective editing, but the story is not totally one-sided. For example, there are soldiers in Iraq who believe in their mission, as well as those who say they are disillusioned. But the movie's conclusions -- true or otherwise -- and highly emotional interviews with bereaved parents and injured soldiers will have a big impact on audiences around the world."
Will it influence the election?
"I hope it just influences people to leave the theater and become good citizens," Moore said at a news conference Monday. "I'll leave it to others to decide what kind of impact it's going to have on the election."
Canada.com reports: "Harvey Weinstein showed up outside the Cannes theatre after the first Fahrenheit 9/11 screening. He declined to speak at length, but as reporters asked if the film would be released, he said, 'Have I ever let you down?'"
Hmmm...
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 5/17/2004 03:12:48 PM Comments (0)
The American Avant Garde, a new half-hour TV show about people making cinema across the United States, is seeking work by flim and video makers who take "creative risks". Airing weekly on The Seattle Channel (and Webcast globally) beginning May 27, The American Avant Garde will focus on the history and the future of independent film/video making. All genres and lengths of film/video will be accepted.
"The American Avant Garde production team is headed by Karl Krogstad, who will also host the show. One of Seattle's most celebrated independent filmmakers, Krogstad began his zany and insightful career as writer, director and producer in 1968 and has since created over 60 works of film and video art."
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 5/17/2004 11:35:36 AM Comments (0)
Gus Van Sant, whose film Elephant, produced in conjunction with HBO Films, won the Palm d'Or at the Festival de Cannes last year, will reteam with the cable company to dramatize the final days in the life of Kurt Cobain. Filming in New York, Last Days features Michael Pitt, Asia Argento and Lukas Haas, who will improvise from a "loose script". Harris Savides, returning as d.p., will employ the same "semi-documentary" visual style as Elephant.
# posted by Steve Gallagher @ 5/17/2004 10:51:07 AM Comments (0)
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