IFFI Goa 2015, Festival Diary, VIII: Did the best ones win?
Without any doubt, my favourite for Best Picture was Embrace of the Serpent (Colombia) directed by Ciro Guerra. The Jury, too, found the black and white film about the Amazon, its rape by greedy foreigners and the destruction of the mythical but pristine lives of its native inhabitants “mind-blowing”, which is reason for feeling vindicated. This is the eighth or ninth time, out of eleven IFFIs at Goa, that my pick for the...
Even if The Act of Killing doesn't slay the 86th Oscars in the Best Documentary Feature category, it will still stand as one of 2013's most compelling and creative films. Director Joshua Oppenheimer came to the subject while making a documentary about efforts to unionize in Indonesia, where many workers had lost loved ones to the mid-60s purge targeting such "subversives" as union members. When Oppenheimer dared to speak with the killers, he was astonished to discover their exu...
Werner Herzog deletes all of his unused footage when he's done making a movie. Why? 1: Storage takes up too much space; and 2) "A carpenter doesn't sit on his shavings either."
This means that he doesn't have the option to go back and re-edit films. "I accept all my errors, and my films have many of them." You have to accept that the "child has a stutter, a squint, a limp."
The great filmmaker delivered many gems and to a packed house of filmmakers and asp...
BANGKOK ~ More than 80 films from some 30 countries are to be screened at this year’s edition of Bangkok’s World Film Festival (WFF), the longest-running film festival in Thailand.
Scheduled for November 4 to 13, the ninth edition of the festival appears to have a stronger and more balanced selection than last year and should prove popular with cineastes not only from Thailand but also from neighboring countries.
Still under the enthusiastic control of festival director V...
I have been delaying it long enough, it's time to write about experiencing Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams Monday night. Not that I have much to say besides SEE IT AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. Let the film envelop you and enjoy the ride.
I won't be a fool and spoil for you or try describe the near out of body experience in too many words. Here are just a few thoughts:
As she introduced the film festival programmer Rachel Rosen said, "This film reminds us how extraordinarily wonderful...
With a slate of 300 films over 11 days, the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) which successfully wrapped on Sunday September 19th, is positioned as the second most important film festival in the world (behind Cannes). Like children in a candy store, the festival attracts 3,000 industry and press representatives from around the world, all eager to see the hotly anticipated fall Oscar contenders and the newest art-house offerings. In this report, Carol Coombes
looks back at some of th...
Werner Herzog, one of the most important filmmakers of Auteur Cinema, will be the President of the International Jury at the Berlinale 2010.
As one of the most significant personalities of New German Cinema, he has influenced an entire generation of filmmakers. In his almost 50-year career, Herzog has made over 50 films, which include not only his well-known feature films, but an array of impressive documentary films as well. He has also made a name for himself as an opera director...
THE ONGOING publicity surrounding the insults being traded by Werner Herzog and Abel Ferrara over whether “The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” is a remake of Ferrara’s 1992 original or not, maybe of interest to the industry, and particularly to film critics, but is of little interest to movie-goers.
Both versions tell the story of a drug-addled cop trying to solve a case of murder, but the interpretation is as different as chalk from cheese.
Herzog, more highly thou...
Friday, June 22-------The Museum of the Moving Image, the only New York cultural institution exclusively devoted to the study and appreciation of film and the media arts, is joining with erstwhile entertainment trade publication Variety to present the Variety/Moving Image Screening Series, premiering twelve significant new films, followed by conversations with the directors and/or actors. The series is being launched on Tuesday, June 26th with the advanced preview of the new Werner Herzog wa...
