The 59th BFI London Film Festival
by Joanna Orland
The BFI London Film Festival has come to a close for another year. The 59th edition had quite an impressive selection of 240 films in its lineup including opening gala Suffragette, closing gala Steve Jobs and other memorable movies such as The Lobster, Youth, Room, Beasts of No Nation, Son of Saul, Black Mass, Brooklyn, High-Rise, Truth, The Lady in the Van, Trumbo and Carol but to name a few. I attempted to narrow it down to my top five picks:
1. The Lobster – Not just my favourite film of the festival, but my favourite of the year. This film strongly appeals to the cynic in me.
2. Room – I nearly cried about five times in this harrowing drama about a relationship between mother and son who are held captive in a room. Jacob Tremblay is a remarkable young actor!
3. Son of Saul – Clearly the best film of the year, but such a harrowing watch that I can’t put it in the top place. It is by far the most profound, immersive holocaust film ever made.
4. Youth – My immediate reaction to this film was – GIVE IT ALL THE PRIZES! But having calmed down a bit, I see its flaws…. many many flaws… but I choose not to care. Classic Sorrentino directorial style and a moving performance from Michael Caine, this film riled my emotions, fully engaged me, and was a clear standout of all the drabness of the other festival films when I saw it in Cannes. I absolutely loved it.
5. High-Rise – A dark examination of social breakdown, set to the backdrop of a dystopian 1970’s high-rise. As a work, it possibly surpasses the J.G. Ballard novel it’s based on.
It was a tough list to narrow down, so a special mention has to go to the film festival’s closing gala Steve Jobs which I may regret not putting in my top 5 once I’ve had some time to digest it.
It wasn’t just screenings that kept me busy at this year’s LFF. Red carpets, screen talks, and other industry events were thriving at this year’s festival. It’s all a bit of a blur on day twelve, but here we’ve captured all of our 59th BFI London Film Festival coverage, divided by the same categories that the festival classifies its film into:
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View all of our videos from the 59th BFI London Film Festival.
View our 59th BFI London Film Festival photo gallery.
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OFFICIAL COMPETITION
Beasts of No Nation
Directed by Cary Fukunaga
Starring Idris Elba and Abraham Attah
by Joanna Orland
Beasts of No Nation is a disturbing depiction of the plight of child soldiers in Africa, told from the perspective of a young boy named Agu. The film is the first of Netflix’s original movies to stream on the site, and with its success in the festival circuit, it is immediately establishing Netflix as a contender in the film awards race.… read more
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Desierto
Directed by Jonás Cuarón
Starring Gael García Bernal and Jeffrey Dean Morgan
by Joanna Orland
Jonás Cuarón demonstrates that he has inherited some of his father’s skill for building tension and depicting beautiful visuals, but Desierto lacks the story and substance to make this a truly spectacular film.
As a group of migrant workers cross the U.S.-Mexican border, they are picked off one by one in a brutal fashion by a misguided patriotic racist American man (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) who decides to take patrolling the border into his own hands. Gael García Bernal is the last man standing as he fights for survival in this tense thriller set in a beautiful desert landscape… read more
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Room
Directed by Lenny Abrahamson
Starring Brie Larson and Jacob Tremblay
by Ruth Thomson
The room in question is small, cramped, dirty, lit only by a skylight, and aesthetically unpleasant in every imaginable way. It’s home to five year old Jack (Jacob Tremblay) and his mother Joy (Brie Larson), or ‘Ma’ as she’s commonly known throughout the film. Both are pale, malnourished, and blue lipped when the heating’s turned off, and yet they seem to have a way of life with some hallmarks of normality. Apart from when ‘Old Nick’ (Sean Bridgers) turns up, seemingly the only outsider to enter their universe – at which point Jack hides in the wardrobe with only the noises of Nick and Ma’s union for company. For the opening portion of the film we’re none the wiser as to why Jack and Ma live in such an unpleasant environment. Believe me, when the penny drops, it’s not good… read more
Our interviews with Brie Larson and director Lenny Abrahamson.
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Son of Saul
Directed by László Nemes
Starring Géza Röhrig, Levente Molnár and Urs Rechn
by Joanna Orland
Son of Saul is by far the most profound, immersive Holocaust film ever made. It is completely unbelievable that this is director László Nemes’ first feature film. It is a true masterpiece… read more
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GALAS
Black Mass
Directed by Scott Cooper
Starring Johnny Depp, Joel Edgerton, Benedict Cumberbatch, Rory Cochrane and Jesse Plemons
by Ruth Thomson
Black Mass is another gritty tale of Boston crime lords, gang warfare, and corrupt cops: but what makes it pack such a convincing punch is the fact that the incredible story of James ‘Whitey’ Bulger of the White Hill Gang (charged with racketeering, 19 counts of murder, extortion, narcotics distribution, money laundering, and shoplifting) and his brother Billy (esteemed politician and longest running President of the Massachusetts Senate) is true. That and Johnny Depp’s eyeliner and creepy coloured contact lens combo. Depp as Whitey conveys rare moments of tenderness to his mother, brother and young son, but largely is a swaggering psychotic, ready to snap murderously at any moment – director Scott Cooper (hats off, it’s only his third film) describes him as a cobra, and you can certainly see the similarities as he slithers threateningly around the wife of (increasingly corrupt) FBI agent John Connolly… read more
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Brooklyn
Directed by John Crowley
Written by Nick Hornby
Starring Saoirse Ronan, Domhnall Gleeson, Emory Cohen, Jim Broadbent and Julie Walters
Brooklyn is a visually stunning film and touching story about a young Irish girl named Eilis (Saoirse Ronan) as she makes herself a new home away from Ireland. Saoirse Ronan is captivating as Eilis, as she transforms from a meek homesick girl from small-town Ireland into a strong woman confident in her decisions. The story is about the difficulty in choosing a path in life, and watching Eilis’ torment at the prospect is empathetically infatuating... read more
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Carol
Directed by Todd Haynes
Starring Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara
by Joanna Orland (reviewed at 68th Cannes Film Festival)
Todd Haynes beautifully directs this adaptation of author Patricia Highsmith’s 1950’s lesbian love story.
The visuals are stunning, with Carol clearly being an excellent companion piece to Haynes’ other works Far From Heaven and Mildred Pierce. The visuals alone provide enough of an impact to make Carol worth watching, but performances from Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara are also garnering much buzz from the 2015 Cannes Film Festival... read more
Our interviews with Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, writer Phyllis Nagy and producer Christine Vachon.
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Steve Jobs
Directed by Danny Boyle
Written by Aaron Sorkin
Starring Michael Fassbender, Kate Winslet, Seth Rogen, Jeff Daniels, Michael Stuhlbarg and Katherine Waterston
by Joanna Orland
What Danny Boyle and Aaron Sorkin have created with the Steve Jobs biopic can only be described as a Jobs well done. The film was initially tainted by a long and complicated development process, with director David Fincher (The Social Network) first attached to direct, and Christian Bale and Leonardo DiCaprio among the stars rumoured to be vying for the title role. Eventually Sorkin’s script fell into the hands of Danny Boyle, with Michael Fassbender cast to give an outstanding performance as the man himself, Steve Jobs... read more
Our Steve Jobs press conference coverage featuring audio, video and photo gallery.
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Suffragette
Directed by Sarah Gavron
Written by Abi Morgan
Starring Carey Mulligan, Helena Bonham Carter, Anne-Marie Duff, Brendan Gleeson, Ben Whishaw and Meryl Streep
Suffragette is a hugely important and relevant story, but bleak and hollow in its execution.
A movie made by women to highlight the struggles of inequality that women have gone through to get the vote in the UK, and continue to go through in modern society, Suffragette should have focused on the star players of this movement such as Emmeline Pankhurst (Meryl Streep) or Emily Davison (Natalie Press). Instead, the film focuses on Maud Watts (Carey Mulligan) in what feels like a manufactured role whose purpose is to work as Oscar bait come awards season. While Maud is the focus, larger characters in the movement such as Davison and Pankhurst are reduced to a bit part and cameo appearance respectively. It’s hard to get on Maud’s side as Mulligan is a very meek actress, and while I feel empathy for the movement of the Suffragettes, I never feel the same way for the plight of Maud... read more
Our interviews and coverage from the Suffragette Opening Gala at the 59th BFI London Film Festival.
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Trumbo
Directed by Jay Roach
Starring Bryan Cranston, Diane Lane, Helen Mirren, Louis C.K., Elle Fanning and John Goodman
Trumbo is a biographical drama about the life of Hollywood screenwriter Dalton Trumbo. Starring Bryan Cranston, John Goodman and Helen Mirren, the film was screened at the 59th BFI London Film Festival where we interviewed Bryan Cranston about playing the real-life Dalton Trumbo.
Our interview with Bryan Cranston.
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High-Rise
Directed by Ben Wheatley
Starring Tom Hiddleston, Jeremy Irons, Sienna Miller, Luke Evans, Elisabeth Moss and James Purefoy
by Joanna Orland
Taking on an adaptation of a J.G. Ballard novel is no easy feat. Known primarily for his dystopian portrayal of society, Ballard’s High-Rise is one of his more extreme takes on class division and societal breakdown.
Set in a dystopian 1970’s, residents of this particular high-rise living complex know their place. The floors represent the classes, the higher you live, the higher your social standing. High-Rise is a stylistic take on anarchy as the film explores how people in their places descend into brutalism in order to achieve their goals of social balance... read more
Our interviews with director Ben Wheatley and stars Stacy Martin and Enzo Cilenti.
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The Lady in the Van
Directed by Nicholas Hytner
Written by Alan Bennett
Starring Maggie Smith, Alex Jennings, Jim Broadbent, Frances De La Tour, Roger Allam, Dominic Cooper and James Corden
Award-winning collaborators Nicholas Hytner and Alan Bennett (The Madness of King George, The History Boys), bring their latest fare The Lady in the Van to the 59th BFI London Film Festival. Our interviews from The Lady in the Van gala:
Our interviews with Alan Bennett, Alex Jennings and the producers of The Lady in the Van.
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The Lobster
Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos
Starring Colin Farrell, Rachel Weisz, Jessica Barden, Olivia Colman, Ashley Jensen, Ariane Labed, Angeliki Papoulia, John C. Reilly, Léa Seydoux and Ben Whishaw
by Joanna Orland (reviewed at 68th Cannes Film Festival)
The Lobster is a most cynical commentary on both romance and single life in modern society. No film can make you feel as brilliantly awful as this film does.
The premise is a strange one – single people are imprisoned in a hotel and are obliged to find a mate in 45 days. If they fail to do so, they are transformed into an animal and released into the wild. You only have four choices in the world of The Lobster – become an animal, become part of a couple, commit suicide, or run away into the woods to live with The Loners who are a feral society that forbids love. While this may sound slightly confusing and unbelievable, director Yorgos Lanthimos has built the world of The Lobster meticulously and interestingly that it is at once easy to embrace such an odd premise filled with just as odd characters, including Colin Farrell as the desperate David… read more
Our interviews with Colin Farrell (David), Ariane Labed (The Maid), Jessica Barden (Nosebleed Woman), Michael Smiley (Loner Swimmer), Rachel Weisz (Short Sighted Woman) and Yorgos Lanthimos (the actual director of The Lobster).
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The Assassin (Nie Yinniang)
Directed by Hou Hsiao-hsien
Starring Shu Qi, Chang Chen, Zhou Yun and Tsumabuki Satoshi
by Joanna Orland (reviewed at 68th Cannes Film Festival)
While I can certainly appreciate The Assassin‘s elegance, I sadly cannot enjoy it. The film excels in its beauty and grace, but completely neglects to engage its audience in this slow-burning but beautiful work by Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-hsien… read more
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SURPRISE FILM
Anomalisa
Directed by Charlie Kaufman, Duke Johnson
Starring Jennifer Jason Leigh, David Thewlis, Tom Noonan
by Katharine Fry (reviewed at 72nd Venice Film Festival)
Anomalisa is the latest offering from Charlie Kaufman’s idiosyncratic mind. Our protagonist is Michael Stone – a name whispered on many lips as he touches down in Cincinnati and checks into the Fregoli hotel. What manor of celebrity is this grey, portly yet shrunken man who appears withdrawn and irascible?… read more
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LOVE
Dheepan
Directed by Jacques Audiard
Starring Jesuthasan Antonythasan, Kalieaswari Srinivasan, Claudine Vinasithamby and Vincent Rottiers
by Joanna Orland (reviewed at 68th Cannes Film Festival)
Jacques Audiard’s latest film Dheepan is a powerful drama about three strangers who are brought together through the hardship of war. To escape war torn Sri Lanka, refugee Yalini finds nine year-old Illayaal to pose as her daughter in order to act as the family for former Tamil Tiger fighter Dheepan. Yalini and Illayaal take the place of Dheepan’s true wife and daughter who have perished in the fighting. Together, these three refugees need each other in order to build new lives for themselves in France… read more
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Heart of a Dog
Directed by Laurie Anderson
by Dana Jammal (reviewed at 72nd Venice Film Festival)
Heart of a Dog is Laurie Anderson’s latest work, an homage to her beloved dog Lolabelle, who passed away in 2011. This is Anderson’s first feature film since her 1986 concert film Home of the Brave and she certainly does a remarkable job at writing, directing, narrating and composing music for this film. While the film centres on Lolabelle, it explores broader themes of love and death, integrating many topics such as surveillance in a post 9/11 state, storytelling and Buddhist teachings of life after death. Laurie narrates the film in a way that feels both personal yet profoundly relatable – something that is quite rare in experimental film. As she recounts memories of her childhood and Lolabelle, her voice is soothing and her words are poetic, the atmosphere is haunting, lighthearted, melancholic and dreamlike... read more
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My Skinny Sister (Min lilla syster)
Directed by Sanna Lenken
Starring Rebecka Josephson, Amy Deasismont, Annika Hallin, Henrik Norlén, Maxim Mehmet, Ellen Lindbom, Åsa Janson, Hugo Wijk and Karin de Frumerie
by Laura Patricia Jones (reviewed for 65th Berlinale)
Growing pains and teenage struggles are a bleak time that none of us would want to go back to. The melodramas of fitting in, body image and inappropriate crushes are something everyone can relate to on some level, but the darker realms of eating disorders and sibling rivalry are what takes the forefront in Swedish director Sanna Lenken’s coming of age tale… read more
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Valley of Love
Directed by Guillaume Nicloux
Starring Gérard Depardieu and Isabelle Huppert
by Joanna Orland (reviewed at 68th Cannes Film Festival)
With a contrived premise working against it, Valley of Love manages to withstand the heat due solely to heartfelt performances by Isabelle Huppert and Gérard Depardieu.
Long-divorced couple Isabelle and Gérard have reunited to honour their dead son Michael, who has committed suicide after suffering from depression. Each parent has received a letter from Michael stating that they must together pilgrimage to the scalding hot Death Valley on specific dates, and if they do, he will appear to them… read more
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DEBATE
The Apostate (El apóstata)
Directed by Federico Veiroj
Starring Álvaro Ogalla
by Ruth Thomson
In Spanish existential comedy The Apostate, Gonzalo Tamayo (first time actor Álvaro Ogalla) wants to do something pretty simple. He wants to leave the Catholic church, into which he, along with millions of others, was baptized as an unassuming infant. A chilled out, bearded, cord clad philosophy graduate he is however wrong to assume that this will be a straightforward process. With a traumatized mother (Vicky Pena) insisting he’s bringing shame on the family, and the distraction of his hot cousin Pilar (Marta Larralde) to contend with, it takes all his remaining energy to battle with the Bishop Jorge (Juan Calot) who is immovable in his refusal to hand over Gonzalo’s baptismal record… read more
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Chronic
Directed by Michel Franco
Starring Tim Roth, Sarah Sutherland and Robin Bartlett
by Ruth Thomson
In this quietly observed drama by Michel Franco, David (an understated Tim Roth) cares for the chronically, terminally, terribly ill. He bathes, comforts, feeds, and lifts his stricken adult charges with little fuss, going about the business in a clinical methodical way. A good egg by all accounts. Or is he? Why does he spend so much time parked outside someone else’s house? Who is the teenage girl whose Facebook page he pours over in isolation every night? And why does he lie with such ease about his relationship with his clients? Pretending to be the widower of one, and the brother of another?.. read more
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Nasty Baby
Directed by Sebastián Silva
Starring Sebastián Silva, Kristen Wiig, Tunde Adebimpe and Alia Shawkat
by Joanna Orland (reviewed at 65th Berlinale)
You should know better than to expect a straightforward story when director Sebastián Silva is at the helm. The director of Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus and Magic Magic has created Nasty Baby, which on the surface is the story of a gay couple trying to have a baby with their closest female friend. At its core, the film is about human nature, primal urges and morality. There is charm in the authenticity and vulgarity of its characters, who are complex human beings rather than two dimensional bohemian types, which they would perhaps be viewed as from an outside perspective... read more
Our interview with director Sebastián Silva.
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The Program
Directed by Stephen Frears
Starring Ben Foster, Chris O’Dowd, Guillaume Canet, Jesse Plemons, Denis Ménochet and Dustin Hoffman
by Ruth Thomson
Stephen Frears what are you playing at??!! The meteoric rise of cancer conquering cyclist Lance Armstrong and his subsequent spectacular fall from grace, which culminated in his confession to Oprah Winfrey that he had indeed been using banned substances throughout his yellow jersey clad career, is a fascinating story. As such it made for a fascinating documentary two years ago: Alex Gibney’s The Armstrong Lie. And as such it should have made for a great movie. But sadly in Frear’s hands it doesn’t... read more
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DARE
The Endless River
Directed by Oliver Hermanus
Starring Nicolas Duvauchelle, Crystal-Donna Roberts, Clayton Evertson, Darren Kelfkens and Denise Newman
by Katharine Fry (reviewed at 72nd Venice Film Festival)
The Endless River by Cape Town-born Director Oliver Hermanus was my second Venice foray into a film broken down into chapters, here three, each dedicated to a different protagonist Gilles, Percy and Tiny.
We open with diner waitress Tiny (Crystal-Donna Roberts) collecting her husband Percy from prison and taking him back to her mother’s house. Their family meal is strained; Tiny and her mother Mona are clearly hard-working God-fearing women both hoping that this time Percy can be a good husband to Tiny following his four year stretch for rape and assault as part of a gang. Cut to Tiny and Percy’s first night together. This is no passionate reunion, his performance is lacklustre and her eyes are empty with sadness… read more
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Queen of Earth
Directed by Alex Ross Perry
Starring Elisabeth Moss, Katherine Waterston and Patrick Fugit
by Joanna Orland (reviewed at 65th Berlinale)
Queen of Earth is a psychological thriller about a very complex female friendship. Catherine (Elisabeth Moss) and Virginia (Katherine Waterston) have been best friends for most of their lives. Last year Virginia (“don’t call her Ginny”) was in a dark place – Catherine wasn’t there for her. This year, Catherine is in a very dark place – will Virginia be there?… read more
Our interview with director Alex Ross Perry.
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LAUGH
A Perfect Day
Directed by Fernando León de Aranoa
Starring Benicio Del Toro, Tim Robbins, Olga Kurylenko, Mélanie Thierry and Fedja Stukan
by Joanna Orland
I was initially surprised when I read that this Balkan War set story starring Benicio Del Toro and Tim Robbins was classified as a comedy. I mean, what’s funny about the Balkan War in the mid-90’s? Is the director trying to pull off a M*A*S*H-like war set comedy with Benicio Del Toro in the lead? It just didn’t make sense… Until the opening titles... read more
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Grandma
Directed by Paul Weitz
Starring Lily Tomlin, Julia Garner, Marcia Gay Harden, Judy Greer, Laverne Cox, John Cho and Sam Elliott
by Joanna Orland
We first meet Elle (Tomlin) as she is breaking up with her younger girlfriend Olivia (Greer), subtly revealing the heartache she still feels after losing her partner Violet after 38 years of companionship. Elle’s grieving and nostalgia are put on hold as her teenage granddaughter Sage arrives on her doorstep, desperate for her grandmother’s help in gathering the funds she needs to have an abortion. As Elle herself has no money, and both are terrified of Sage’s mother, so begins a grandmother / granddaughter adventure as they seek to collect enough money before Sage’s appointment later that afternoon... read more
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Men and Chicken (Mænd & høns)
Directed by Anders Thomas Jensen
Starring Mads Mikkelsen, David Dencik, Soren Malling, Nicolas Bro and Nikolaj Lie Kaas
by Joanna Orland
The darkest of comedies, Men and Chicken borders on the genre of body horror as the film explores one of the most twisted fictional family trees in Denmark.
An unrecognizable Mads Mikkelsen turns in a bawdy performance as Elias, who along with brother Gabriel (Dencik) go in search of their true parentage. Their fraternal bond is anything but normal, in fact, this entire film is anything but normal – it is properly sick and twisted in a hilarious but overly disturbing way. The brothers find their way to the Danish island of Ork where they meet their other three brothers (Malling, Bro and Kaas), all baring the same harelip and other deformities. These three brothers are anything but welcoming and basically beat the shit out of Elias and Gabriel before accepting them into their fold. An abusive, animalistic, insane fold... read more
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Ryuzo and His Seven Henchmen (Ryuzo to Shichinin no Kobuntachi)
Directed by Takeshi Kitano
Starring Tatsuya Fuji, Ben Hiura and Kôjun Itô
by Joanna Orland
I’m a sucker for a good Takeshi Kitano film, and Ryuzo and His Seven Henchmen combines his two greatest assets – yakuza battles and over-the-top quirky comedy.
Ryuzo (Fuji) is an old retiree, living with his son’s family under his son’s rule. He longs for the days when things were happening for him, when he was part of the yakuza. But the yakuza are no more in this world – all having died out or aged past the point of usefulness. And here we have the perfect Japanese old geezer comeback movie premise!… read more
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THRILL
Assassination
Directed by Choi Dong-hoon
Starring Gianna Jun, Lee Jung-jae and Ha Jung-woo
by Richard Hamer
Director Dong-hoon Choi’s follow up to 2012’s excellent crime caper The Thieves takes us back to the Japanese occupation of Korea in 1933, and a resistance assassination plot to take out two key figures in the Japanese military. Much like his previous effort, Assassination is an extremely enjoyable action film, surprisingly complex in construction and seemingly effortless in execution... read more
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Remember
Directed by Atom Egoyan
Starring Christopher Plummer, Martin Landau, Bruno Ganz, Jürgen Prochnow, Heinz Lieven, Dean Norris and Henry Czerny
by Dana Jammal (reviewed at 72nd Venice Film Festival)
Remember is a “contemporary fable” according to director Atom Egoyan (Ararat, The Sweet Hereafter), a present day story of a dark period in modern history. The story is told from the perspective of Zev Guttman (Christopher Plummer), who suffers from early onset dementia, as he sets out on a revenge journey with the goal to find and murder a Nazi guard whom he believes killed his family at Auschwitz many years ago. Following the death of his wife Ruth, Zev is instructed to go on a mission in the form of a letter by his friend Max (Martin Landau), who claims to have found the person responsible for the death of both their families... read more
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CULT
Green Room
Directed by Jeremy Saulnier
Starring Patrick Stewart, Imogen Poots, Anton Yelchin and Alia Shawkat
by Joanna Orland
Green Room is a perfect follow up to Blue Ruin, heightening the stakes, tension and gore of director Jeremy Saulnier’s first film.
Two years after Blue Ruin, Saulnier returns to the big screen with a darker, bleaker and scarier film. Nudging his work up a notch from the thriller genre to full blown horror, Saulnier brings us a classic predator / prey premise of the backwoods horror genre, with some horrifically gory visuals as accompaniment. Basically, if you thought Blue Ruin was tense, you may not survive a sitting of Green Room... read more
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Yakuza Apocalypse
Directed by Takashi Miike
Starring Ichihara Hayato, Lily Franky and Takashima Reiko
by Joanna Orland
I’m never quite sure how to review a Takashi Miike film. With a ridiculous amount of feature films under his belt (56???), the Japanese director has gained numerous award nominations and a huge cult following outside of his home country. His latest film is a bizarre, nonsensical comedy horror film about a gang of Yakuza vampires who set off events that seem to be leading to the end of the world... read more
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JOURNEY
Right Now, Wrong Then (Jigeumeun matgo geuttaeneun teullida)
Directed by Hong Sang-soo
Starring Jung Jae-young and Kim Min-hee
by Ruth Thomson
The opening fifteen minutes of Right Now, Wrong Then by South Korean director Hong Sang-soo is painfully endearing. Film director Ham Sung (Jae-yeong Jeong) is in a small town for a screening of his new film when he meets shy young artist Hee-jung (Min-hee Kim) drinking banana milk in a local temple. Their ensuing flirtation, which relocates to a coffee house where their bashful interaction is inordinately charming, and then onto a bar where they manage to get completely wasted on lethal local spirit Soju, is something to behold… read more
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Youth
Directed by Paolo Sorrentino
Starring Michael Caine, Harvey Keitel, Rachel Weisz, Paul Dano and Jane Fonda
by Joanna Orland (reviewed at 68th Cannes Film Festival)
Stunning, nostalgic, powerful and divisive, Italian director Paolo Sorrentino has created a dazzling piece of cinema with his latest English language film Youth – a film difficult to review as it must be experienced, not described.
Starring Michael Caine as retired conductor and composer Fred Ballinger and Harvey Keitel as his lifelong friend film director Mick, the film follows the pair who, approaching their eighties, ponder the passage of time. Set in a spa hotel resort in the Swiss Alps, the film is populated with colourful characters including Rachel Weisz as Fred’s daughter, Paul Dano as a serious actor, Jane Fonda as the diva, and Paloma Faith as Paloma Faith. Youth does tend to stray into surrealist territory, with vivid imagery and an indulgent score that often shifts from beautifully bespoke to pop re-purposed... read more
Our interviews with Michael Caine & Harvey Keitel.
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SONIC
Hot Sugar’s Cold World
Directed by Adam Bhala Lough
Starring Nick Koenig (Hot Sugar), Jim Jarmusch, Kool A.D., Martin Starr, Shelby Fero, Neil deGrasse Tyson and Rachel Trachtenburg
Produced by David Gordon Green, Hunter Stephenson, Jody Hill and Danny McBride
by Joanna Orland
Nick Koenig, better known by his stage name of Hot Sugar, is a New York based musician known for a style of music called associative music, with a technique based around sampling the sounds from the environment. His music is beautifully melancholic, as is the man himself as portrayed in director Adam Bhala Lough’s documentary Hot Sugar’s Cold World... read more
Our interview with director Adam Bhala Lough.
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Janis: Little Girl Blue
Directed by Amy Berg
Narrated by Chan Marshall aka Cat Power
by Katharine Fry (reviewed at 72nd Venice Film Festival)
The 27 club keeps adding to its list of illustrious members. Alongside Robert Johnson, Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison sit newer members Kurt Cobain and Amy Winehouse. These later members both share something in common with another of the cohort, Janis Joplin. They are all recent subjects of big screen documentaries put together using archival footage. Janis: Little Girl Blue, written and directed by Amy Berg traces Joplin’s life and career from her childhood in Texas to her death at age 27 from a heroin overdose in what has appeared to be a peaceful and productive time of her with addiction behind. Though some of the archival footage may suffer in quality through its digitization, Berg cleverly weaves together a near seamless narrative. TV interviews, recording sessions and concert performances are interspersed with talking head spots from those who knew, loved and worked with Janis, while Chan Marshall AKA Cat Power breathes life into Janis’ words, an apt choice with her husky Southern accent and sense of understanding due to her own collisions with substance abuse and mental health problems... read more
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EVENTS
The Geena Davis Institute held its 3rd Global Symposium on Gender in Media at the BFI Southbank. In affiliation with the BFI London Film Festival and WFTV, the symposium opened with a keynote from Geena Davis herself, and saw a number of inspiring speakers take the stage to discuss issues on how film can impact and empower women and children.
Geena Davis Institute Global Symposium photo gallery.
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