Festivals
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Venice 2011: ‘Faust’ review
★★★★☆ Alexander Sokurov’s Faust (2010) – awarded the Golden Lion at this year’s Venice Film Festival – begins high above the earth, gazing into a mirror that looks like a cinema screen, before we – flapping and twirling in the wind – descend towards a teeming city, a cramped besieged metropolis; part-European citadel, part biblical-Babel.This…
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Venice 2011: ‘Faust’ wins Golden Lion
The gongs have been distributed at this year’s Venice Film Festival and the winner of the coveted Golden Lion is Aleksandr Sokurov‘s Faust, starring Hanna Schygulla, Isolda Dychauk, Georg Friedrich and Maxim Mehmet. The film looks remarkable, with cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel employing all sorts of distortion from fairground mirrors to fuzzy lenses, creating a world which…
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Venice 2011: ‘Chicken with Plums’ review
★★★★☆ After her highly acclaimed adaptation of her autobiographical graphic novel Persepolis (2007), Marjane Satrapi comes to this year’s Venice Film Festival with her first live-action film, Chicken with Plums (2011, Poulet aux prunes), again an adaptation of her eponymous graphic novel and directed together with Vincent Paronnaud. This time, the film is less overtly…
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Venice 2011: The Race for the Golden Lion
The Venice Film Festival has never been the type of festival where the awards are particularly important – its gongs have never quite have the same marketability as the Cannes Film Festival’s Palme d’Or. Yet competition is fun; meaningless and irritating – but entertaining nonetheless.I was delighted when it was announced that Golden Lion-winner Darren…
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Venice 2011: ‘Killer Joe’ review
★★★★☆ Memories of director William Friedkin’s former glories, specifically The Exorcist (1973) and The French Connection (1971), have made sitting through past tripe like Jade (1995) and Rules of Engagement (2000) palpably depressing. So it is with great pleasure that I can report that Killer Joe (2011), which premiered at this year’s Venice Film Festival…
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Venice 2011: ‘Shame’ review
★★★★☆ British director Steve McQueen was first in Venice back in 2009, donning his artist’s hat and representing the UK at the Biennale Art Exhibition. Two years later and McQueen is back at the Venice Film Festival with his Hunger (2008) follow-up Shame (2011), starring Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan.Shame is the story of a successful,…
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BFI London Film Festival 2011: Preview
The BFI today announced the full programme for this year’s 55th BFI London Film Festival, which takes place between 12-27 October. The undoubted highlights of the 300-strong list of features and shorts were the world premieres of Fernando Meirelles’ 360, Terence Davies’ The Deep Blue Sea, as well as UK premieres for George Clooney’s The…
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Venice 2011: ‘Wuthering Heights’ review
★★☆☆☆ If you have been waiting for Andrea Arnold’s Wuthering Heights (2011) – which screened today at the 2011 Venice Film Festival – because you’re anticipating something akin to Ang Lee’s Sense and Sensibility (1995), full of 19th century banter and longing looks across windswept hills, then prepare yourself for disappointment.Almost the entire focus of…
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Venice 2011: ‘Dark Horse’ review
★★★☆☆ Todd Solondz writes and directs Dark Horse (2011), in competition at the 2011 Venice Film Festival. It tells the story of kidult Abe (Jordan Gelber), a 30-something avid collector of toys and action figures. Though initially portrayed as a comic character – driving his banana-coloured Hummer whilst listening to what sounds like an American…
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Venice 2011: ‘Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy’ review
★★★★★ Fresh from its premiere at the 2011 Venice Film Festival, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) is without doubt the finest film of 2011 so far. With an ensemble cast showcasing the very best of British talent – including Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, Benedict Cumberbatch, Mark Strong, Ciarán Hinds and John Hurt – and…