Fin de Cinema (Free subscription) | 11/05/2009
Well, here it is, the first of sure-to-be-many end of the year/decade lists on the blog. As most of the DVD releases for 2009 have already been announced, I figured it safe to cross the Region 1, US DVD premieres off the list early. All of the DVDs below are for films that were previously unavailable on DVD in the States (though it's possible one or two might have had an unofficial bootleg circulating)....
LAist (Free subscription) | 10/21/2009
[ed. note: so, yeah, my new job has been keeping me incredibly busy so the DVD Tuesday column has slipped to Wednesday for a second consecutive week. I apologize to my one, true fan who logs in every Tuesday at two o'clock to read my blurbs. I know I have at least one fan because -- yes -- he writes to me and tells me how funny he thinks I am. I love him. He is incredibly smart.] Great to see Stephen...
The Washington Times (Free subscription) | 10/19/2009
BUSAN, SOUTH KOREA | Oscar-nominated French director Jean-Jacques Beineix has some advice for younger filmmakers hungry for industry accolades — be careful what you wish for. "Being nominated for any award is an honor," said the 63-year-old director of "Betty Blue," who chaired the headline prize jury at the 14th Pusan International Film Festival, Asia's biggest cinematic...
Blogger News Network (Free subscription) | 10/13/2009
French cinema seems to be highly associated with independent cinema and foreign films, at least in the minds of most American citizens. Some of it certainly comes from a place of Francophobia, but much of it is because a lot of French filmmakers have been before their time and they tell stories of such light [...]
Red Ink: Texas (Free subscription) | 10/02/2009
Most are two bit "arts film" nobodies, and most are from the french film industry as well, but there are a few big names that you'll recognize. I'll update with new names and/or links as time permits. Polanski petition signatories, as of September 29th : Fatih Akin Stephane Allagnon Woody Allen known pedophile, married his adopted daughter and was accused of molesting his 7 year old stepdaughter...
DCist (Free subscription) | 10/01/2009
DCist's highly subjective and hardly comprehensive guide to the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week. Betty Blue Jean-Jacques Beineix managed to define an entire aesthetic of French cinema in the 1980s ("Cinéma du look," which featured highly stylized visuals and stylishly disaffected youth) through just two films, 1981's Diva , and 1986's Betty Blue . The...
The Lonely Conservative (Free subscription) | 09/30/2009
It’s sickening to witness liberal Hollywood elites defend Roman Polanski. Whoopie Golberg said it wasn’t “rape-rape.” What’s that supposed to mean? Drugging a thirteen year old girl and then raping and sodomizing her while she says “no” isn’t “rape-rape?” Where? In Whoopie’s mind? Follow the link for the video, I don’t even want...
Movie Talk (Free subscription) | 09/29/2009
Luc Besson is better known these days as the producer of high-octane Euro thrillers in the Taxi and Transporter series, but from the mid-1980s to the mid-90s he was one of the principal exponents of the so-called Cinéma du look, a mini wave of French directors turning out glossy movies that seemed to favour spectacle [...]
DVD Talk (Free subscription) | 09/26/2009
Skip It The Movie: Somewhere on the movie genre spectrum, there's a line that separates the grand epic from the particularly long road movie. The version integrale of Roselyne and the Lions falls on the road movie side of that line. It is the story of a young couple who set out to become lion tamers in the circus, but delivers a frustratingly tame experience everywhere but the lion cage. A new Cinema...
The Agitation of the Mind (Free subscription) | 09/02/2009
There's an interesting project going on at Wonders in the Dark , counting down the 50 top films of the 1980s. Plentiful comments have been left, the responses delineating into a straight-down-the-middle schism: those who find it difficult to compile 50 essential films from the '80s and those who proclaim it nigh on impossible to whittle the list down to just 50 titles. My initial reaction was to wonder...
Moon in the Gutter (Free subscription) | 08/28/2009
Ten years before Julian Schnabel delivered his absolutely mesmerizing feature length film on Jean-Dominique Bauby, The Diving Bell and The Butterfly , director Jean-Jacques Beineix captured the real Bauby in his final year in the powerful thirty minute documentary Locked-In Syndrome . Here are some images from Beineix’s haunting work, which is now available on DVD from Cinema Libre .
Variety.com (Free subscription) | 08/25/2009
Pusan Film Festival News: Filmmaker tapped to top New Currents -- French filmmaker Jean-Jacques Beineix has been tapped to top the New Currents jury at the 14th Pusan Film Festival, which runs Oct. 8-16.
Wise Kwai's Thai Film Journal (Free subscription) | 08/25/2009
Pen-ek Ratanaruang will serve on the jury for the New Currents Award at the 14th Pusan International Film Festival, according to a festival press release . The New Currents panel is headed by French filmmaker Jean-Jacques Beineix. Other members are Turkish director Yesim Ustaoglu, Taiwanese actress Terri Kwan, South Korean cinematographer Kim Hyungkoo. Pen-ek is no stranger to Pusan. All his features...
Westword | Complete Issue (Free subscription) | 08/20/2009
Early in Betty Blue , aspiring novelist Zorg (Jean-Hugues Anglade) declares, "She was like a flower with translucent antennae and a mauve plastic heart" in so solemn a tone that it practically dares the viewer to laugh. And so it goes throughout this divisively fleshy 1986 opus. Bett...
Seattle Times (Free subscription) | 08/07/2009
"Betty Blue," "The Godfather," "Spirited Away": Seattle-area screens welcome screen gems this week.
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