All articles by Dan Fainaru – Page 40
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Reviews
Hardcore
Dir. Dennis Iliadis. Gre.2004. 98minsA promising sketch ratheran actual probe into Athens' sleazy dives, lo-fi drama Hardcorenevertheless shows distinct promise for debut feature film-maker DennisIliadis.While his film-making giftsclearly need more mileage to mature, Iliadis' first feature neverthelessmaintains a steady course between coyness and titillation, conveying in theprocess a credible and ...
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Reviews
Watermarks (Hakoach Liskhot)
Dir/scr. Yaron Zilberman.Is-Fr-Us. 2004. 80mins.Science graduate YaronZilberman had never worked in film industry until he came across the story ofVienna's Jewish swimming team. The result is Watermarks, a lively andsurprisingly uplifting documentary set on the eve of World War Two.Having already takenaudience awards at festivals in Vienna, Boston and Washington, ...
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Reviews
Hostage
Dir/scr. ConstantineGiannaris. Gre-Tur. 2004. 102minsThe two Albanians whorecently hijacked a bus in Athens probably did not know that they werere-enacting the screenplay of Constantine Giannaris' Hostage, itselfbased on a similar real-life incident that took place in 1999.As told through the eyes ofan disoriented and angry young Albanian immigrant, this is ...
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News
Israeli cinema grows on all fronts
While Israel's overallcinema attendance figures for 2004 shows no significant increase over the lastcouple of years (approx. 9.5 million admissions), the local industry has made amajor leap forward, recording its best results for the last 20 years. Less than 1% of the localaudience went to see home-grown films five years ...
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Reviews
A Midwinter Night's Dream
Dir. Goran Paskaljevic.Serbia-Montenegro. 2004. 95mins.More introspective andless explosive than his remarkable feature Powder Keg (1998), GoranPaskaljevic's A Midwinter Night's Dream may, in many respects, be ametaphor for Serbia today, but it is still a powerful and moving personaltragedy that functions well, regardless of its political subtext.The finely tunedrelationship between a ...
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Reviews
Les Soeurs Fachees
Dir/scr. AlexandraLeclere. Fr. 2004. 93mins.A vehicle for theconsiderable thespian prowess of Isabelle Huppert, film-maker Alexandra Lecleremakes an effective debut with Les Soeurs Fachees, a family drama thatshould play well in mainstream Francophone markets.The traditional French feeland the cast attraction of Huppert (enjoying a higher profile of late through IHeart Huckabee's) ...
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Reviews
Rolling Family (Familia Rodante)
Dir/scr: Pablo Trapero.Arg-Braz-Fr-Ger-Sp. 2004. 103mins.Put Robert Altman's TheWedding on wheels, give it an Argentine passport and send it rolling1,000km out of Buenos Aires - and it would look pretty much like PabloTrapero's latest feature Rolling Family.While it may be less flashyand more populist than Altman's work, it still has a ...
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Reviews
Kings And Queen (Rois Et Reine)
Dir. Arnaud Desplechin.France, 2004. 150mins.Arnaud Desplechin'sstatus as a hero of the French intelligentsia, whose charms remain largelyunfathomable to the rest of the world, continues with Kings And Queen,which is as delightful and infuriating as his previous work.For two-and-a-half hours hespins two parallel tales that eventually converge to become one. Along ...
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Reviews
An Italian Romance (L'Amore Ritrovato)
Dir. Carlo Mazzacurati.It-Fr. 2004. 108mins.Two of Italy's hottestyoung stars combine with one of the country's most talented directors for AnItalian Romance (L'Amore Ritrovato), a disappointing melodrama whosefuture depends exclusively on their names; without them, it could not hope foranything better than a straight-to video release.As it is, the glamour ofStefano ...
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Reviews
The Bridesmaid (La Demoiselle d'Honneur)
Dir. Claude Chabrol.Fr-Ger. 2004. 110mins.By now veteran film-makerClaude Chabrol should be able to deliver a film like The Bridesmaid (LaDemoiselle d'Honneur) with his hands tied behind his back - so comfortableand familiar and comfortable is he with the troubled, frayed fringes of theFrench bourgeoisie and their efforts to disguise themselves ...
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Reviews
The World (Shijie)
Dir. Jia Zhang-Ke.China-Japan. 2004. 140mins.China's censorship boardhad previously banned the work of film-maker Jia Zhang-Ke - that is until hislatest film, The World, which is as subversive and critical as any ofhis earlier features.While some board members mayhave chosen to regard it as a travelogue selling the charms of Beijing'sgigantic ...
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Reviews
Stray Dogs (Sag-Haye Velgard)
Dir. MarziyehMeshkini. Iran. 2004. 93mins.Put this one downalongside Bunuel's Los Olvidados, de Sica's Sciuscia or Babencos'Pixote as yet another devastating portrait of human folly and what itdoes to its most defenceless victims, its children.Shot on theoutskirts of Kabul, in Afghanistan, by Marziyeh Meshkini, whose 2000 Venicedebut, The Day I Became ...
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Reviews
Arsene Lupin
Dir. Jean-PaulSalome. Fr-UK-Spain-It. 2004. 132mins.At Euros 23m, ArseneLupin is one of the most expensive French films of the year, with sumptuoussets, lavish costumes, picturesque locations and spectacular camerapyrotechnics. But there is little else to recommend it: certainly not thescreenplay, which never quiet makes up its mind what it wants to ...
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Reviews
Yesterday
Dir. Darrell James Roodt.S Africa. 2004. 91mins.Yesterday, DarrellJames Roodt's touching and only too familiar African tragedy, which claims tobe the first Zulu-language feature, has more to offer than unfamiliar language,spectacular landscapes and a touch of exoticism.Without entering any of thepolitical minefields that many films about South Africa (Forgiveness, CountryOf My ...
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News
Campfire burns brightly at Israeli Film Awards
Josef Cedar's Campfire,a coming of age story and a portrait of the right wing settlers on the WestBank and their less than idealistic motivations, picked up five of the topawards at the Israeli Film Academy at its annual ceremony on September 27.Campfire will now automatically go forward asIsrael's submission to ...
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Reviews
Turtles Can Fly (Lakposhtha Ham Parvaz Mikonand)
Dir/scr:Bahman Ghobadi. Iran-Iraq, 2004. 95mins.Fouryears after he first emerged on the international scene, first as an actor inSamira Makhmablaf's Blackboards, then as director of A Time ForDrunken Horses, Bahman Ghobadi returns with Turtles Can Fly.Thestory is again located in Ghobadi's native Kurdistan and deals once more withthe tragic misery of ...
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Reviews
Bombon El Perro
Dir. CarlosSorin. Arg-Sp. 2004. 96mins.As spare,intimate and intentionally unglamorous as Carlos Sorin's previous film MinimalStories, Bombon, El Perro is likely to follow a similar fate: rakingin a bagful of festival awards, collecting plenty of favourable reviews andgenerating better than average business on the arthouse circuit.The film won theFIPRESCI award at ...
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Reviews
3-Iron
Dir/scr/prod/ed: KimKi-duk. S Kor. 2004. 89mins.An arthouse favourite,now firmly established after last year's Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter' AndSpring, Kim Ki-duk's reputation will be enhanced by his latest work, whichis less extreme but no less intriguing.Coming only seven monthsafter Kim won Best Director at Berlin for Samaritan Girl, this sleek,elegant, stylised ...
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Reviews
The Merchant Of Venice
Dir. MichaelRadford. UK-It. 2004. 125mins.Despite beingone of Shakespeare's best known plays, The Merchant Of Venice has seenlittle in the way of film adaptation during the past 50 years or so. While TVhas given us plenty of Shylocks to feast our eyes upon, cinema has offered nocompetition, in part due to ...
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Reviews
5 x 2
Dir. Francois Ozon.France 2004. 90mins.A kind of Scenes FromA Marriage told in reverse, Francois Ozon's latest feature is a pleasant,watchable but rather unexceptional melodrama that catches wedlock gone stale atfive emblematic moments, starting with the divorce and ending with the firstencounter.Given Ozon's smoothprofessional touch and a presentable performance from lead ...