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Browsing All Posts filed under »Cinema: English«
‘My Life with James Dean’, ‘gay cinema’, and whether cinema should be classified as ‘gay’
Read the full article on Firstpost, here: https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/my-life-with-james-dean-queer-gaze-and-whether-cinema-should-be-categorised-into-inclusive-labels-5216091.html/ In the June 25 column, written on the occasion of Pride month, I wrote, “There are, of course, many filmmakers who are homosexual, but it’s interesting to explore whether this ‘gayness’ manifests itself in the films they make, and what really makes for a ‘gay film’. Is […]
Interview: Aishwarya Rajesh
September 14, 2018
Aishwarya Rajesh talks about TV serials and her entry into cinema with films like Pa Ranjith’s Attakathi. She talks about casting couch, about North Indian heroines and the opportunities they get. Despite performance-oriented roles like the ones in Dharma Durai (with Vijay Sethupathi) or Kaaka Muttai, she emphasises the need for glamorous roles opposite big stars […]
Running between films at Venice, Cannes, Berlin… Why put yourself through the festival grind?
September 13, 2018
Read the full article on Firstpost, here: https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/running-between-films-at-venice-cannes-berlin-why-put-yourself-through-the-festival-grind-5175061.html At the Venice Film Festival, this year, I ran into Peter Bradshaw, chief film critic at The Guardian. We were in line for a press screening, and we were generally chatting about the films we liked and disliked. The topic shifted to the nature of film festivals, […]
FC @ Venice 11: New films from Zhang Yimou and ‘The Babadook’ director, plus ‘Soni’, a terrific Indian drama
September 8, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-zhang-yimou-ying-jennifer-kent-the-nightingale-ivan-ayr-soni/ Zhang Yimou’s Ying (Shadow; Chinese) plays like an all-action, zero-psychology take on Kurosawa’s Kagemusha (which shared the Palme d’Or with Bob Fosse’s All That Jazz at the 1980 Cannes Film Festival). The latter film was about a shadow warrior, a lookalike used as a body double […]
On the 20th death anniversary of Kurosawa, remembering his Golden Lion winner ‘Rashōmon’, and his only female-centric film
September 6, 2018
Read the full article on Firstpost, here: https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/on-kurosawas-20th-death-anniversary-remembering-rashomon-and-his-only-female-centric-film-5128341.html/ You’re lucky if you get one solid peg for an article. This one, about Akira Kurosawa, has two. First, it’s the 20th death anniversary of the great filmmaker – he died on September 6, 1998. Second, the Venice film festival is underway, and it’s a good time […]
FC @ Venice 9: Willem Dafoe as van Gogh, Natalie Portman in ‘Vox Lux’, plus ‘Acusada’
September 6, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-willem-dafoe-as-van-gogh-natalie-portman-in-vox-lux-plus-acusada/ How many versions of the same story do we need? I saw Utøya 22.juli (U – July 22) at the Berlin Film Festival. The nerve-shredding thriller, directed by Erik Poppe, depicts a terrible chapter in Norway’s history, when a right-wing extremist set off bombs in the […]
Readers Write In #48: Clive’s Angels: Whitney and Phyllis, united in tragedy
September 5, 2018
I usually do not find biographical documentaries about celebrities very interesting to watch. I mean fairly contemporary figures here as opposed to long dead legends who offer fertile ground for historians. They have a tendency to tell us what we already know or, at least, can find out with not much effort and veer to […]
FC @ Venice 8: Joaquin Phoenix in ‘The Sisters Brothers’, ‘Charlie Says’, ‘La Quietud’
September 5, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-joaquin-phoenix-in-the-sisters-brothers-charlie-says-la-quietud/ Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is reportedly centered on the Manson Family murders. Mary Harron’s Charlie Says is less about the murders, more about Manson’s family, especially the women. The film’s title is a manifestation of how brainwashed this bunch was, how absurdly […]
FC @ Venice 7: Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga in ‘A Star is Born’, plus ‘Close Enemies’
September 4, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-bradley-cooper-and-lady-gaga-in-a-star-is-born-plus-close-enemies/ Forget the original, the 1937 A Star is Born, and consider only the remakes, all of them musicals. The 1954 version starred Judy Garland. The 1976 remake had Barbra Streisand. And this latest reincarnation, tenderly directed by Bradley Cooper, is toplined by Lady Gaga. The similarities […]
Recalling ‘Raise the Red Lantern’ by Zhang Yimou, this year’s recipient of the Jaeger-LeCoultre award at Venice
September 3, 2018
Read the full article on Firstpost, here: https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/recalling-raise-the-red-lantern-by-zhang-yimou-this-years-recipient-of-jaeger-lecoultre-award-at-venice-5103761.html This year, Chinese director Zhang Yimou will receive the Jaeger-LeCoultre Glory to the Filmmaker award of the Venice Film Festival. This is the recognition (dedicated to personalities who have made a significant contribution to contemporary cinema) that went to Mani Ratnam in 2010, and other recipients include […]
FC @ Venice 6: Luca Guadagnino’s ‘Suspiria’ and Mike Leigh’s ‘Peterloo’
September 3, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-luca-guadagninos-suspiria-and-mike-leighs-peterloo/ Luca Guadagnino’s reworking of Dario Argento’s most famous giallo work, Suspiria, is similarly set in West Germany, in the late 1970s. But unlike the earlier film, which blew off this time- and place-setting information with a bit of on-screen text, this version takes pains to situate […]
FC @ Venice 5: Yorgos Lanthimos’s ‘The Favourite’, plus Orson Welles’s last work
September 2, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-yorgos-lanthimoss-the-favourite-plus-orson-welless-last-work/ Early 18th century. England is at war with the French. Nevertheless, duck racing and pineapple eating are thriving.” If you guessed these opening lines from the press notes are about the new Yorgos Lanthimos movie, it’s a testament to how bizarre, how surreal, how unique and […]
FC @ Venice 4: Alfonso Cuarón’s magnificent ‘Roma,’ plus the other awards at the festival
September 1, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-alfonso-cuarons-magnificent-roma-plus-the-other-awards-at-the-festival/” With the premiere of Alfonso Cuarón’s Netflix-acquired Roma, the Venice film festival effectively told Cannes: “Stop fussing about the format. Focus on the film.” For if this isn’t CINEMA, then what is? The press booklet called Roma “[Cuarón’s] most personal project to date.” I don’t know […]
FC @ Venice 3: Virtual Reality experiences of war and the cosmos, plus sci-fi based on Philip K Dick
August 30, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/venice-film-festival-2018-virtual-reality-first-man-ryan-gosling/ Okay, I most certainly did not expect to be reminded of Subhash Ghai while watching a VR film at the 75th Venice Film Festival. Eliza McNitt’s Spheres: Chorus of the Cosmos describes the birth (and possible death) of earth, starting from the Big Bang, and when […]
FC @ Venice 2: Thoughts on embargoes, and Daniel Chazelle’s awesome Neil Armstrong biopic, starring Ryan Gosling
August 30, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-thoughts-on-damien-chazelles-awesome-neil-armstrong-biopic-starring-ryan-gosling/ I don’t understand embargoes at a film festival. I mean, I’ll respect them. I just don’t see the point. When a big movie opens on thousands of screens, you see why they don’t want reviews till a certain point. If the reviews are overwhelmingly negative, it […]
FC @ Venice 1: #MeToo makes it to the Lido, though there are compensations
August 29, 2018
Read the full article on Film Companion, here: https://www.filmcompanion.in/fc-at-venice-2018-metoo-makes-it-to-the-lido-though-there-are-compensations/ I saw the strangest sight at the 75th Venice Film Festival. In front of the press room, photographers had formed a semi-circle around someone who was obviously a celebrity. (I later realised it was the Italian actor, Michele Riondino.) The lights kept flashing from cameras, but […]
With the flooding in Kerala, let’s ask why we readily watch disaster movies even as real-life disasters leave us reeling
August 23, 2018
Read the full article on Firstpost, here: https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/with-kerala-floods-lets-ask-why-we-readily-watch-disaster-movies-even-as-real-life-disasters-leave-us-reeling-5019331.html https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/with-kerala-floods-lets-ask-why-we-readily-watch-disaster-movies-even-as-real-life-disasters-leave-us-reeling-5019331.html I was working in the US when 9/11 happened. “Wow, this is just like a movie,” was something I heard over and over. Translation: the visual of a plane slicing through a building was so out-there, so unimaginable, so fantastic, that it took a while to […]
Oscars are more populist than festivals like Cannes, Venice — hence the Best Popular Film category
August 16, 2018
Read the full article on Firstpost, here: https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/oscars-are-more-populist-than-festivals-like-cannes-venice-hence-the-best-popular-film-category-4979251.html T he latest in the “Oscar institutes a Best Popular Film category” row is that the film technicians have weighed in, dismayed that the presentation of some of their categories will not be aired live. The Academy, in its wisdom, has apparently decided that the audience knows […]
A flashback to giallo and Dario Argento’s ‘Suspiria’, a remake of which will premiere at the Venice Film Festival
August 9, 2018
Read the full article on Firstpost, here: https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/flashback-to-dario-argentos-suspiria-as-the-remake-readies-for-venice-film-festival-2018-premiere-4928601.html https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/flashback-to-dario-argentos-suspiria-as-the-remake-readies-for-venice-film-festival-2018-premiere-4928601.html With the dawn of the millennium, Village Voice – the famous New York-based newspaper, and America’s first alternative newsweekly – felt it was time to come to a consensus on the 100 best films of the 20th century. Distinguished film critics were invited to participate in […]
As Hollywood films keep invading Venice and Cannes and Toronto, spare a thought for the artier indies
August 2, 2018
Read the full article on Firstpost, here: https://www.firstpost.com/entertainment/as-hollywood-films-keep-invading-venice-cannes-and-toronto-spare-a-thought-for-the-artier-indies-4875571.html The line-ups for the Venice and Toronto film festivals have been announced, and we’re seeing a lot of the same big names, on and behind the screen – big names from art cinema (say, Doubles Vies, by Olivier Assayas) and big names from mainstream cinema (A Star […]
September 20, 2018
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