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In This Dispatch:
- What's New: Tulpan, O'Horten, and more.
- What We're Watching: Observe & Report, Trumbo, Treeless Mountain.
- Contests: Woodstock winners announced.
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Following his Russian naval service, a young dreamer returns to his sister’s nomadic brood in desolate Kazakhstan to begin a hardscrabble career as a shepherd. But before he can tend a flock of his own, he must win the hand of the only eligible bachelorette for miles. "In every respect, this unclassifiable movie is an amazing accomplishment," raved J. Hoberman. Adds A.O. Scott: "Might be described as an epic landscape film, a sweetly comic coming-of-age story or a lyrical work of social realism. But the setting...gives the movie a mood that sometimes feels closer to that of science fiction." |
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A train driver retiring after 40 years of service finds himself on an odd journey after missing his last train in Norwegian director Bent Hamer's ( Kitchen Stories) warm and a bit absurdist tale. "O’Horten feels like a waking dream," wrote AV Club's Nathan Rabin. "It's a film of subtle, insinuating charm, a character study about an eminently sane, reasonable man unsteadily navigating an increasingly insane, unreasonable world." Ty Burr calls it "a precise, deadpan drama of slapstick existentialism - a Bent Hamer movie, in other words." |
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Jody Hill's Observe and Report is a tough nut to crack about a tough nut who cracks. The dark, dark comedy, which Hill wrote and directed, is a more subversive take on the bedraggled mall cop comedy than patrons watching it (ironically) in mall multiplexes probably expected, so it's little surprise it wasn't a huge box office hit. But because Observe is more challenging, in both good and bad ways, it's far more interesting because of it... read review >>
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Dalton Trumbo (1905-1976) was a great liberal/progressive, a smart man and a terrific writer of letters, if not screenplays (have you seen Johnny Got His Gun or The Sandpiper lately?). Yes, he won two Oscars -- for story ( Roman Holiday in 1953) and screenplay ( The Brave One in 1956) -- under pseudonyms, as he was blacklisted during these years. For the most part, however, he was a journeyman screenwriter, always competent and sometimes more than that. What he is most noted for now, and what the fine documentary Trumbo brings home so clearly, is his character and his unusual ability and courage in speaking truth to power and then paying for it.... read review >>
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Each year there are a handful of new "coming of age" movies, and they all seem based more on memories of movies than on memories of life. But So Yong Kim's new Treeless Mountain, from South Korea, takes extraordinary steps to climb out of that rut and place these movies back into the eyes of children. Her simple technique is to film her heroines, six-year-old Jin (Hee-Yeon Kim) and four-year-old Bin (Song-Hee Kim), mainly in close-up. The adult world is cut off... read review >> |
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Far out man, we just picked the five lucky winners of our Taking Woodstock contest! Congratulations to: f0xym0pmama, Pat Connors, Mswearingen, Stephanie Willis, Dain Binder. Stay tuned to this space for the winners of the "9" contest, announced here soon. |
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