Festival Circuit 2018

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#251 Post by Ribs » Tue Aug 14, 2018 5:19 pm

House that Jack Built releases 12/28, per EW Fall Preview. Non-Fiction is at the major festivals this Fall.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#252 Post by DarkImbecile » Fri Aug 17, 2018 6:28 pm


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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#253 Post by mfunk9786 » Thu Aug 23, 2018 4:01 pm


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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#254 Post by FrauBlucher » Mon Aug 27, 2018 6:24 am


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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#255 Post by Persona » Mon Aug 27, 2018 1:58 pm

Old news but I guess Cold War will be getting some U.S. distribution late December?

Really hope it makes it to my neck of the woods as I am dying to see it. Ida has to be a top 10 film of the decade so far for me.

So excited for the reports out of Venice this year. Moreso than I was for Cannes.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#256 Post by DarkImbecile » Mon Aug 27, 2018 4:00 pm

Telluride finally (more than six weeks later than last year's) released their poster for this week's 45th edition and it, uh, could have been better:
SpoilerShow
Image
The redesign on their site is also less than stellar, to say the least... I know some people who I'm sure could have produced some better work in exchange for a pass or two.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#257 Post by Persona » Tue Aug 28, 2018 3:44 pm

DarkImbecile wrote:
Wed Aug 08, 2018 1:09 pm
Speaking of Kusama, the international premiere status of her latest (Destroyer, with Nicole Kidman) indicates that it will likely screen at Telluride the weekend prior; excited for this, as I was one of the supporters of The Invitation.
Pic of Kidman's character and a story with interview bits in Vanity Fair.

Sounds pretty great. Can't wait to see some footage.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#258 Post by DarkImbecile » Thu Aug 30, 2018 11:17 am

The 45th Telluride Film Festival has released its program; I've bolded some of those that are my main priorities to catch below, but I'm open to suggestion if anyone can point me to something I'm overlooking. The actual schedule hasn't been released yet, so I'm sure I'll get timed out of a handful of films I'm interested in (I can probably get to 17-20 total), but as of now hope springs eternal. I'm totally unfamiliar with the revival slate (though I'm sure some have been covered in the recent decades list projects), so any input there would be especially welcome! Those are also of note as the festival has close ties with Criterion/Janus/Filmstruck, so there may be some connection between restorations there and future releases.

Telluride Main Slate:
· ANGELS ARE MADE OF LIGHT (d. James Longley, U.S.-Denmark-Norway, 2018)

· BE NATURAL: THE UNTOLD STORY OF ALICE GUY-BLACHÉ (d. Pamela E. Green, U.S., 2018)

· BIRDS OF PASSAGE (d. Ciro Guerra and Cristina Gallego, Colombia-Denmark-Mexico, 2018)

· BORDER (d. Ali Abbasi, Sweden, 2018)

· BOY ERASED (d. Joel Edgerton, U.S., 2018)

· CAN YOU EVER FORGIVE ME? (d. Marielle Heller, U.S., 2018)

· COLD WAR (d. Pawel Pawlikowski, Poland-France-U.K., 2018)

· DESTROYER (d. Karyn Kusama, U.S., 2018)

· DOGMAN (d. Matteo Garrone, Italy-France, 2018)

· DOVLATOV (d. Aleksei German, Russia-Poland-Serbia, 2018)

· FIRST MAN (d. Damien Chazelle, U.S., 2018)

· FISTFUL OF DIRT (d. Sebastián Silva, U.S., 2018)

· FREE SOLO (d. Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, U.S., 2018)

· GHOST FLEET (d. Shannon Service and Jeffrey Waldron, U.S., 2018)

· GIRL (d. Lukas Dhont, Belgium-Netherlands, 2018)

· GRAVES WITHOUT A NAME (d. Rithy Panh, France-Cambodia, 2018)

· MEETING GORBACHEV (d. Werner Herzog and André Singer, U.K.-U.S.-Germany, 2018)

· NON FICTION (d. Olivier Assayas, France, 2018)

· PETERLOO (d. Mike Leigh, U.K., 2018)

· REVERSING ROE (d. Ricki Stern and Annie Sundberg, U.S., 2018)

· ROMA (d. Alfonso Cuarón, U.S.-Mexico, 2018)

· SHOPLIFTERS (d. Hirokazu Kore-eda, Japan, 2018)

· THE BIGGEST LITTLE FARM (d. John and Molly Chester, U.S., 2018)

· THE FAVOURITE (d. Yorgos Lanthimos, Ireland-U.K.-U.S., 2018)

· THE FRONT RUNNER (d. Jason Reitman, U.S., 2018)

· THE GREAT BUSTER (d. Peter Bogdanovich, U.S., 2018)

· THE OLD MAN & THE GUN (d. David Lowery, U.S., 2018)

· THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND (d. Orson Welles, U.S., 1976/2018)

· THE WHITE CROW (d. Ralph Fiennes, U.K., 2018)

· THEY’LL LOVE ME WHEN I’M DEAD (d. Morgan Neville, U.S., 2018)

· TRIAL BY FIRE (d. Ed Zwick, U.S., 2018)

· WATERGATE — OR, HOW WE LEARNED TO STOP AN OUT-OF-CONTROL PRESIDENT (d. Charles Ferguson, U.S., 2018)

· WHITE BOY RICK (d. Yann Demange, U.S., 2018)

Silver Medallion Presentations:
Alfonso Cuaron
Emma Stone
Rithy Panh

Guest Director Program (Jonathan Lethem):
· ANGEL (d. Ernst Lubitsch, U.S., 1937)

· BIGGER THAN LIFE (d. Nicholas Ray, U.S., 1956)

· NEVER CRY WOLF (d. Carroll Ballard, U.S., 1983)

· THE TARNISHED ANGELS (d. Douglas Sirk, U.S., 1957)

· THE WHITE MEADOWS (d. Mohammad Rasoulof, Iran, 2009)

· TO BE OR NOT TO BE (d. Ernst Lubitsch, U.S., 1942)

Revival Program:
· CHRISTIAN WAHNSCHAFFE, PARTS I & II (d. Urban Gad, Germany, 1920 – 1921)

· FIEÈ̀VRE (d. Louis Delluc, France, 1921)

· COEUR FID È̀̀LE (d. Louis Delluc, France, 1923)

· REMOUS (d. Edmond T. Gréville, France, 1934)

Backlot:
· A FINAL CUT FOR ORSON: 40 YEARS IN THE MAKING (d. Ryan Suffern, U.S., 2018) + THE EYES OF ORSON WELLES (d. Mark Cousins, U.K., 2018)

· HAL (d. Amy Scott, U.S., 2018)

· HUGH HEFNER’S AFTER DARK: SPEAKING OUT IN AMERICA (d. Brigitte Berman, Canada, 2018)

· IT MUST SCHWING! THE BLUE NOTE STORY (d. Eric Friedler, Germany, 2018)

· THE GHOST OF PETER SELLERS (d. Peter Medak, U.K.-Cyprus, 2018)

· WHAT SHE SAID: THE ART OF PAULINE KAEL (d. Rob Garver, U.S., 2018)

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#259 Post by Persona » Thu Aug 30, 2018 11:54 am

I'm totally with you on your boldeds but also would be interested in that Welles documentary, though I suppose that will be on Netflix at some point.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#260 Post by dda1996a » Thu Aug 30, 2018 12:14 pm

Unless it's something truly revolutionary, I'd always skip a documentary when a festival's slate is packed

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#261 Post by zedz » Thu Aug 30, 2018 4:04 pm

Of the ones you haven't bolded, the only one I've seen that I could recommend is Girl, which is way better than a summary sounds. Of the ones I haven't seen my top priority would be German's Dovlatov. He's a fantastic filmmaker in the scarcer and scarcer epic, ambitious European arthouse tradition (Tarkovsky, Angelopoulos etc.), and I haven't seen a film from him yet that's less than great.

The other two I've seen that you're not interested in are Dogman and Border. The former is well-made but ordinary, and the latter is just plain bad.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#262 Post by DarkImbecile » Thu Aug 30, 2018 5:16 pm

Thanks, Zedz! That’s very helpful input; I’m already agonizing over schedule choices, so I’ll take any excuse to exclude something on the margins to prioritize something like Girl. They haven’t posted all the scheduled screening times yet and will be filling TBD slots on Sunday and Monday as the weekend progresses, but based on the current showtimes it’s looking like I might miss Shoplifters, which would be heartbreaking.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#263 Post by zedz » Thu Aug 30, 2018 5:56 pm

Shoplifters is a really solid Koreeda, and one of his best films in some time, but I'm sure it will be readily available on Home Video afterwards. It's a handsome enough film, but I don't think will lose much impact off the big screen.

Cold War looks absolutely gorgeous, but I found it a bit of shrug. It's a rather extreme tale of l'amour fou, but because I felt like the leads had no real chemistry it all fell flat for me: their actions seemed reckless, stupid and implausible rather than heady and passionate. (I've only met one other person who felt that way, however: most people loved it.) But it's a film that I imagine will be much more impressive on the big screen than on the small, so that's a significant factor to take into account.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#264 Post by DarkImbecile » Fri Aug 31, 2018 2:07 am

Thanks again for your thoughts; I loved Ida, so I’ve definitely prioritized seeing Cold War on one of the bigger screens here, and I think I found a way to make space for Shoplifters later in the weekend.

My schedule for Friday looks like it’ll consist of Charles Ferguson’s five-hour documentary Watergate - Or, How We Learned To Stop An Out-of-Control President, followed by the North American premiere of First Man, and finally the World Premiere of Karyn Kusama’s Destroyer (Kusama coincidentally sat at the table directly behind me at the restaurant this evening). I’ll try to post some brief impressions of each as I go along.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#265 Post by Omensetter » Fri Aug 31, 2018 8:38 am

Thank you DarkImbecile, but if you want to just soak up that Telluride ambience, that's cool too! I had no idea Ferguson had a FIVE hour Watergate documentary. I know the story inside-out but, yes, sign me up.

I haven't much time to post, but early reactions for Assayas's latest have been fairly effusive. I hope to look at it more after work, but this is obviously exciting despite the general Assayas Policy that the more mixed the first reactions, the better.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#266 Post by Persona » Sat Sep 01, 2018 12:31 pm

DarkImbecile wrote:
Fri Aug 31, 2018 2:07 am
Thanks again for your thoughts; I loved Ida, so I’ve definitely prioritized seeing Cold War on one of the bigger screens here, and I think I found a way to make space for Shoplifters later in the weekend.

My schedule for Friday looks like it’ll consist of Charles Ferguson’s five-hour documentary Watergate - Or, How We Learned To Stop An Out-of-Control President, followed by the North American premiere of First Man, and finally the World Premiere of Karyn Kusama’s Destroyer (Kusama coincidentally sat at the table directly behind me at the restaurant this evening). I’ll try to post some brief impressions of each as I go along.
Did you get to see Destroyer?

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#267 Post by DarkImbecile » Sat Sep 01, 2018 2:56 pm

I did (quick thought is mixed-positive on a sometimes overly gritty and grim LA noir that somewhat redeems itself after a shaky start), and Watergate (solid, very much in line with Ferguson’s prior work — with one major exception — and infused with obvious topicality)!

Roma was my first screening this morning, and it is a masterpiece — if it’s not the film of the year, then this will be a truly spectacular year for film. A must see in a high quality theater if it all possible for maximum aural and visual effect.

Also on the schedule today are The Front Runner, Cold War, The Old Man and the Gun, and maybe Trial By Fire (as reluctant as I am to spend time on an Ed Zwick film, the source material is one of the most affecting New Yorker pieces I’ve ever read). More reactions as I can find time, and more in-depth thoughts later.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#268 Post by Omensetter » Sat Sep 01, 2018 4:32 pm

Trying to parse Venice:

As we all know, everyone loves Roma and The Favorite, with the former apparently being something people feel comfortable with throwing the masterpiece tag onto. Naturally, one wishes to see this in a theatre, but that seems more for NY and LA until demand is exhausted.

The Mountain seems an art-object to let bounce in your head, and not something that jumps out at you, which might account for its muted reaction. Or I suppose it sucks.

Flawed methodology aside, Metacritic currently has Non-Fiction at 88 with five reviews (I despise the quantification of everything, but here I am). The narrative around this one seemed to peg it as minor Assayas, as if such a thing existed. Not dipping into reviews on this one, but it seems to be about---what else?---communication in the digital age and I don't think there's another director I'd trust more with such material.

Based off its reception, Peterloo seems perfectly fine. Most of the favorable reactions and reviews I've read kind of revere it as academic, with the detractors slotting it as stodgy and staid. The former sounds quite all right with me, although I wish Leigh returns to modern day Britain after this. In any event, I doubt Leigh cares if his Venice viewers see the film as a stately bore any more than he does about the film's Cannes rejection.

David Oelhoffen's generic-look film looks to be getting brutalized, so I suppose he's the one getting it for not being Roma, A Star is Born, etc.

SPC picked-up László Nemes's Sunset ahead of its debut.

Reygadas's looks beautiful and full of intrigue, almost to the point that it's irrelevant whether it works or not: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GRiOOBPV3a4

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#269 Post by dda1996a » Sat Sep 01, 2018 4:43 pm

Well Alverson's Entertainment was one of the oddest yet unforgettable experiences I had in recent years so I trust I'd love The Mountain as well

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#270 Post by Persona » Sat Sep 01, 2018 8:21 pm

DarkImbecile wrote:
Sat Sep 01, 2018 2:56 pm
I did (quick thought is mixed-positive on a sometimes overly gritty and grim LA noir that somewhat redeems itself after a shaky start), and Watergate (solid, very much in line with Ferguson’s prior work — with one major exception — and infused with obvious topicality)!

Roma was my first screening this morning, and it is a masterpiece — if it’s not the film of the year, then this will be a truly spectacular year for film. A must see in a high quality theater if it all possible for maximum aural and visual effect.

Also on the schedule today are The Front Runner, Cold War, The Old Man and the Gun, and maybe Trial By Fire (as reluctant as I am to spend time on an Ed Zwick film, the source material is one of the most affecting New Yorker pieces I’ve ever read). More reactions as I can find time, and more in-depth thoughts later.
Thank you!

Some of the other things I've read about Destroyer seem pretty in line with your take. A fine (if unpleasant) LA crime noir that's mostly made compelling by Kidman and not much else but kind of comes together really well at the end.

Really excited by your words on Roma. I've kind of felt like this is the movie I've been waiting for Cuaron to make. I don't know if anything can dethrone First Reformed this year for me but Roma probably has the best shot.

As a fellow Ida lover, I look forward to your thoughts on Cold War.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#271 Post by domino harvey » Sun Sep 02, 2018 6:53 am

Well, scratch Boy Erased off your Oscar dance cards

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#272 Post by Omensetter » Sun Sep 02, 2018 9:05 am

...and add The Sisters Brothers to it (or perhaps it was already on it).

I've seen nothing but praise for this one, more in the audience friendly vein. I thought this one was going to be a dud of the lineup (and it still might)---director working in new language, let alone new dialect (potentially)---but people seem to loving it across the board, moreso than Buster Scruggs at least. Obviously, this is good! I'd rather have the Oscar contenders be well-made and not I, Tonya or The Help. Why this is not playing Telluride is beyond me. If Hell or High Water can go from Cannes to the Oscars, then obviously this ostensible-audience friendly Phoenix/Gyllenhaal/O'Reilly starrer directed by a former Palme winner can do fine.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#273 Post by DarkImbecile » Sun Sep 02, 2018 10:29 am

Persona wrote:
Sat Sep 01, 2018 8:21 pm
As a fellow Ida lover, I look forward to your thoughts on Cold War.
It is pretty great, a rich and sensual evocation and contrast of late-50s/early-60s European cool and the Stalinist repression of the same period with two captivating leads ravishingly filmed by Pawlikowski — between this and Roma, yesterday was a great day for black and white cinematography.

Both The Front Runner and The Old Man and the Gun exceeded very modest expectations, enough to make both recommendable without any serious urgency behind it.

Reitman often employs an Altman-lite style of drifting his camera through multiple strands of dialogue in what is a real ensemble portrait (despite the Jackman awards buzz) of the meltdown of Gary Hart’s ‘88 campaign; the script and Reitman’s direction are largely agnostic as to the major thematic questions, presenting multiple perspectives on relatively even ground without straying into didacticism nearly as much as I had feared.

David Lowery decides to let Old Man coast on a laid-back score, the bigger-than-life true story of its inspiration, and the considerable charm and talent of its leads (Redford, Spacek, and Affleck), and that approach pays off in a delightful if feather-light portrait of people who find joy in what they do, however unconventional that might be.

Trial by Fire squanders its incredibly compelling source material and an excellent lead performance by Jack O’Connell with Zwick’s usual condescension to his audience, inability to be anything but thuddingly literal, and failure to maximize the dramatic and emotional payoffs inherent in its powerful story. Just read David Grann’s New Yorker article (compiled in his book The Devil and Sherlock Holmes) and skip the TV movie melodrama Zwick has offered here; I only wish almost anyone else in Hollywood had won the rights.

On the docket for Sunday: The Favourite, Shoplifters, Lubitsch’s To Be or Not to Be, White Boy Rick, and Peterloo. There have only been two screenings scheduled for The Other Side of the Wind so far, and I’ve been unable to make them work but I’m hopeful they’ll add at least one for Monday.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#274 Post by DarkImbecile » Mon Sep 03, 2018 2:56 pm

For the first time in two whole years at this festival, being a pass-holder didn’t keep my schedule on track yesterday, as I was frozen out of one of the smaller theaters for Shoplifters, which then mangled nearly my entire schedule for the day.

I did manage to catch Birds of Passage (a very pleasant surprise given the respectful at best responses I’ve seen thus far), Ralph Fiennes’ The White Crow (a solid but not particularly noteworthy biopic of Rudolfo Nureyev), and Peterloo, which isn’t quite the worst film I’ve seen at the festival but is certainly the biggest disappointment.

This morning I’ve seen the new Rithy Panh documentary Graves Without a Name — which is a fairly hypnotic aural and visual experience with a little more repetition in its structure than necessary, but a solid extension of his work documenting the Cambodian genocide — and am currently waiting for the Herzog documentary on Gorbachev to start. I might be able to catch Shoplifters this afternoon (if not, probably the Bogdanovich documentary on Buster Keaton) and one more from the pile of foreign features to which I’ve heard mixed responses - I may end up in Border depending on timing, which Zedz has very explicitly warned against but which might be the most interesting of scarce options.

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Re: Festival Circuit 2018

#275 Post by John Cope » Mon Sep 03, 2018 3:28 pm

domino harvey wrote:
Sun Sep 02, 2018 6:53 am
Well, scratch Boy Erased off your Oscar dance cards
I don't know. I've heard mostly positive things about it and that the Hedges performance is great. The book it's based on is certainly excellent and would provide any actor a lot to work with.

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