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In This Dispatch:
- What's New: I Am Love, Darjeeling and more.
- What We're Watching: Fantomas, Great Match and Radical Act.
- Explore: Mid-August Lunch: More Than Old Folks Being Adorable
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Oscar winner Tilda Swinton shows off her multilingual skills in Italian melodrama set in Milan. "An amazing film," writes Roger Ebert. "It is deep, rich, human. It is not about rich and poor, but about old and new. It is about the ancient war between tradition and feeling." It's "an eye-boggling two hours at the movies," says Dana Stevens, "a must for Swinton completists fascinated by her recent turn toward operatic roles in odd, unmarketable films like this one and last year's Julia. She's becoming the Maria Callas of international cinema." |
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Re-released in deluxe fashion via Criterion, Wes Anderson's India-set "tale of filial love and family baggage is [his] most heartfelt feature film yet," wrote Salon's Stephanie Zacharek. And "its companion short [also on the DVD], 'Hotel Chevalier,' is darn near perfect." Adds Peter Travers: "All the acting is exemplary. Adrian Brody, new to Wes' World, is revelatory." The DVDs offer a trainful of bonus items, including new commentary from Anderson and co-scribes Roman Coppola and Jason Schwartzman, a behind the scenes doc, shorts and raw footage. See also: Wes Anderson's Favorite Criterion DVDs, a list. |
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Louis Feuillade worked at the great French movie studio Gaumont, making dozens upon dozens of films, of all different stripes. He made comedies, historical films, "realist" films, and even a series of films with child stars, such as "Bout de Zan." But out of his 700 or so films, his reputation rests mainly on his lengthy crime serials, including Les Vampires (1915), Judex (1916), Tih Minh (1918), and beginning with the five-and-a-half hour Fantômas (1913). These remarkable films were among the first to employ location shooting, and to use a sustained, intertwining plot that lasted... Read more >>
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The World Cup may be over but movies about soccer can be enjoyed year-round, and The Great Match (La Gran Final) is about more than just the world's most popular sport. "A visually breathtaking, gently comic homage to the indigenous communities that are its subject and to soccer's power to penetrate lives," writes Jonathan Holland in Variety. Adds the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: "If Buster Keaton made a globe-trotting National Geographic movie, the results would be something like this silly gem." |
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Radical Act, a documentary by Tex Clark, was filmed back in 1995 and is about the queer/feminist music scene in the USA at that time," writes the bluemilk blog. "The documentary is simple but endearing - Clark interviewed female musicians and music journalists about the impact of their sexual and gender identity on their work. And with the likes of Vicky Starr, Meg Hentges, Toshi Reagon, Kay Turner and Gretchen Phillips there are some wonderful one-liners in their responses to that question." Adds the Venus Zine, it's "an interesting peek into our past," into the riot grrl scene.
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"The arthouse isn't immune from peddling glorified YouTube cutesiness," writes Vadim Rizov in GC Daily. "Earlier this year, Babies offered up viral-adorable burbles on 35mm. Similarly, the masses apparently love to watch sassy old folks being stylish and adorable, without any troublesome bodily failures getting in the way. Mid-August Lunch, full of snippy old ladies and food porn, seemingly offers up more undemanding fare, and let's be clear: there's nothing inherently wrong with that. But Gianni di Gregorio's directorial debut is remarkably tough-minded..." Read More >>
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