Seven men and one woman -myself- screened 410 feature films for the 39th International Critic's Week at the Cannes Film Festival. We focused on first-timers and second-timers. It was exhausting, exciting, titillating and sometimes very brutal. Tell us about the committee and how many films were viewed?...
Why are there so many women filmmakers in France as compared to elsewhere in the world?...
Are there any American films in the selection this year?...
The Unapproachable offers insight on the cultural significance of the Fall of the Berlin Wall. Director Oscar Roehler and Actress Hannelore Elsner commented on the film. ...
Venezuelan director Fina Torres debuted in 1985 with the French produced Oriane, which took the Camera d'Or at Cannes that year. She was in Cannes with her latest film Woman on Top starring Penelope Cruz. ...
I fell in love with these characters, what can I say? says writer/director Frank Novak, about his outrageous satire, Good Housekeeping. Winner of the Grand Jury prize at Slamdance, it explores the white-trash life of loud-mouthed long-time married couple Don (Bob Miller) and Donatella (Petra Western). FilmFestivals.com met with Frank, Bob and Petra....
In Cannes presenting Purely Belter, Herman talked about the term, his past working in bacon and the music chosen for the film....
Novelist, screenwriter, actor, documentarist, director, producer... no one knows the twists and turns of film-making, from the inside out, from concept to release, better than Amos Kollek. Born in 1947 in Jerusalem, Kollek has always gone his own way. He is in Cannes with competition film Fast Food, Fast Women starring AnnaThomson. ...
Star of Directors' Fortnight film Koroshi. The film tells the story of Yuhi Hamazaki (Ryo Ishibashi), a gentle and honest man a typical Japanese salaried man, says director Kobayashi who gets laid off from his job during the recent Japanese recession. Ryo shared his thoughts about the character. ...
French writer Jeanne Labrune (who wrote and directed the 1998 drama Si Je T'Aime, Prends Garde A Toi) wrote the screenplay for Vatel while Oscar-winning playwright Tom Stoppard (Shakespeare In Love) adapted the it for English audiences. What was your inspiration for the screenplay?...
Did you and Tom Stoppard write the screenplay together?...
We are all guilty, myself more than the others, said Dostoyevsky in the introduction to Crime and Punishment. The quote is used to set the stage for Serge Le Péron's L'Affaire Marcorelle, a psycho-drama featuring a prosecutor who suffers from nightmares and walks the line between dream and reality. ...
This is her second year in charge of the selection Directors' Fortnight, which she shares with Jacques Gerber and Christine Ravet. Her ideal reason for selecting a film: un coup de coeur, the process of falling in love with a film. Every time you see something that's really good, your faith and hope are reborn. It happens all the time. My only real fear is of not spotting a film that's of superior quality.What is the specific orientation of the Directors' Fortnight?...
As a woman, would you consider yourself in a privileged position?...
How do you work with hundreds of sheep? It's not easy, ackowledged the 20-year-old Iranian director, whose second feature Blackboards was screened in official competition. Directing sheep as compared to human actors to advice from her father (Moshen), Samira expresses herself in English...
Ten years after the fall of the Wall in Berlin, The Unapproachable is appropriate in helping to redress some of the imbalance in measuring the cross-border cultural significance of that historical event. Director Oscar Roehler and Actress Hannelore Elsner commented on the film. ...
For her first feature film, Le premier du nom, Sabine Franel left her post as editor (notably for docu-filmmaker Emile Weiss and Manoel de Oliveira) and put thoughts into movement tracing her family tree back to the first to carry the name (premier du nom). It is screened in the Certain Regard section. Tell us about your film and the role Judaism played?...
What were your personal revelations while making this film and was the Holocaust an integral factor?...
What was your reaction to being selected at Cannes?...
Do you consider this film to be a film made by a woman?...
Critics' Week featured a special encounter with Melvin Van Peebles - actor, musician, writer and journalist - who presened his latest made-in-France film shot in digital format, Le conte de ventre plein (Bellyful). ...
Founder of Troma, Kaufman has been digging his own niche for more than 30 years now. In his own wild and crazy style, he announced that he likes women with a big heart making a gesture that conforms more to the size of their breasts....
Since he took over in 1996, Cannes Market boss Jerome Paillard has not been one to let things drift. Each year he has brought either major changes or minor adjustments designed to make the Cannes Market more efficient, easier to use and more internationally oriented. FilmFestivals.com met with Jerome at his office in Paris. What is the program for MITIC this year?...
What percentage of the films screening at the festival will also be screened at the market?...
Are there an increasing number of Internet companies present this year?...
