* A reader wrote in recently to request some commentary regarding the varying quality of cinematic remakes. His note was inspired by the news that a new version of True Grit starring Jeff Bridges in the role originally played by John Wayne is coming to cinemas. Sacrilege, you say? Or welcome news? Some of the best [...]
* Guillaume Depardieu (son of French actor Gérard Depardieu) died in October 2008 at the age of 37 after contracting severe viral pneumonia while filming The Way Beyond (L’Enfance d’icare) in Romania. The film is screening at Světozor, Nov. 27 at 9 and Slovanský dům, Dec. 1 at 7:30. The disturbingly ironic subject of the [...]
* Veteran actor Eli Wallach will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences in recognition for a long career of iconic turns in legendary films and television programs. Wallach made a name for himself in a series of ethnically diverse roles, including 1966’s The Good, the Bad and [...]
* Emir Kusturica’s film career spans most of four decades, beginning with a Golden Lion Award at Venice in 1981 for Do You Remember Dolly Bell? and 1995′s Underground, a.k.a. Once Upon a Time There Was a Country, which won him his second Palme d’Or at Cannes. After a 10-year absence, the controversial director has returned [...]
* The iconic director Oliver Stone is set to direct a big-screen adaptation of John D. MacDonald’s excellent genre classic, The Deep Blue Goodbye (the first in a series of 21 character-driven suspense novels). This is excellent news for your critic, as he is currently hard at work on a biography of the author. It’s [...]
* Having reveled in John Malkovich’s splendid turn as a deranged former covert operative in director John Schwentke’s recent black comedy/action film Red, I was reminded of the actor’s directorial debut, 2002’s excellent The Dancer Upstairs. Starring Javier Bardem and Laura Morante, the film features a love affair that unfolds amid political unrest and terrorist [...]
* Fans of New Zealand cinema have one night to revel in two choice examples at Kino Atlas Nov. 25 starting at 8 p.m. The films on hand will include Coffee and Allah (by director Sima Urale), which had its international premiere at the 2007 Venice Film Festival, followed by the much-acclaimed first feature film from director [...]
* Kino Světozor will screen Director Franny Armstrong’s 2008 drama-documentary-animation hybrid The Age of Stupid (2008) and 2006′s An Inconvenient Truth as part of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic’s Science and Technology Week. Armstrong’s film is a dystopian fantasy featuring a solitary man (Pete Postlethwaite) reflecting mournfully on the virtual extinction of the human [...]
* Jean-Luc Godard—the famous director who, along with a likeminded band of critics and filmmakers, remade French cinema and introduced the auteur theory to the modern world—has returned with yet another artsy snooze-fest dedicated to undermining the social order and exposing the rotten fruit within. Socialism (Film socialisme) unfolds in three movements. The first takes [...]
* Mark, a new, experimental documentary by the controversial writer, filmmaker and critic Mike Hoolboom, explores the life of his longtime collaborator and friend Mark Karbusicky. Described by Hoolboom as, “a transsexual force of nature”, Karbusicky was an Animal rights activist, militant vegan and punk maestro who was instrumental in editing and supporting the director’s [...]