Film festival – Page 8

Downtown Independent (Cont’d)

June 14, 2010 Robert Koehler Film festival

By Robert Koehler

(Click on thumbnails for larger pictures.)

The lobby of Downtown Independent, where the first New Media film festival played Friday through Sunday, June 11-13. The festival is one of the first to be located purely at Downtown Independent, 251 S. Main St., located on the west side of Main between 2nd and 3rd and the only independently run cinema in downtown Los Angeles.

As ImaginAsian, the venue struggled, but reconfigured as a home to a broad range of independent cinema wedged somewhere between a more commercial house like the Nuart and a microcinema like Cinefamily at …

Cannes 2010: Filmmaker Gallery

May 25, 2010 Robert Koehler Film festival

By Robert Koehler

(Click on the thumbnails for larger pictures.)

Apichatpong approximately 72 hours before he won the Palme d’Or. He had just arrived in Cannes from turmoil in Bangkok, as a group of us greeted him at the Princess Stephanie Hotel (also home to the premiere screenings of films in the Quinzaine). He presented his producers (and partners in the UK-based Illumination Films) with gifts of electric mosquito swatters, which are featured in an amusing nighttime scene in Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives. At this point during the festival, nobody had inflated expectations that Uncle …

Cannes 2010 Awards: The Future of Cinema Wins

May 23, 2010 Robert Koehler Commentary, Film festival

By Robert Koehler

You would have to go back to either 1999–when the Dardennes won for Rosetta–or 1997–when Abbas Kiarostami won for Taste of Cherry in a tie with Imamura Shohei for The Eel and when Tim Burton was a member of the jury–to find a Palme d’Or winner quite as satisfying and unconventional as tonight’s prize for Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s endlessly inventive, mystical and funny Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives.

Going in, there were plenty of concerns about a jury comprised of such wildly disparate personalities as Tim Burton, Victor Erice, Alberto Barbera, Benicio Del …

Cannes 2010: Before the Awards

May 23, 2010 Robert Koehler Commentary, Film festival

By Robert Koehler

Less than an hour before the announcement of the Palme and other prizes, rumors are swirling over possible winners based on sightings of who’s in Cannes….and who’s not.

In the latter category, count Mike Leigh, which makes Another Year unlikely to win any prizes. Based on who has returned or stayed in Cannes, look to the following as strong contenders for awards: Apichatpong for his masterpiece on Monkey Ghosts, catfish, rookie monks who can see themselves and the infinite recyclings of life, Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (pictured above); Xavier Beauvois for the widely …

Cannes 2010: Favorites

May 22, 2010 Robert Koehler Film festival

Robert Koehler submitted his favorite titles to Fotogramas‘ Manu Yáñez:

Competition:
Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives
Poetry
Des Hommes et des dieux

Out of Competition:
The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceaucescu
Carlos (based on viewing the first 100 minutes)

Special Screenings:
Chantrapas

Un Certain Regard:
The Strange Case of Angelica
Tuesday, After Christmas
Aurora
I Wish I Knew
Film Socialisme

Quinzaine:
Le Quattro Volte
Todos vós sodes capitáns

Semaine:
Belle épine
Rubber

ACID:
Cuchillo de Palo / 108…

Cannes 2010: Day Godard

May 22, 2010 Robert Koehler Film festival, Film review

By Robert Koehler

Jean-Luc Godard (and his Les Inrocks interview) marked the starting point for this year’s Cannes blogging, partly because I anticipated that his Film Socialisme would certainly be one of the major films at the festival. It is that, and more, since the film’s impact will long outlast the mere week and a half of Cannes. Godard retains his tendency to upset conservative-minded critics, such as the army of Anglo-Saxon writers (with the anticipated exceptions like the New York Times‘ Manohla Dargis) who continue to refuse to allow that the movies can be anything more than be …