So I picked up the new Cineaste today at Borders and it’s a great issue. One of the more serious magazines on film widely sold in the US, Cineaste tends to emphasize political readings, but also expands to encompass a variety of commentary. Here are some excerpts:
ïAn interview with Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, the Belgian filmmakers who have been making documentaries since the ’70s, but whose first three fictional works (1996’s La Promesse, 1999’s Rosetta, and 2002’s The Son) have made significant waves in recent international cinema:
Jean-Pierre: “[The Son] is a story about transmission.”
Luc: “Yes, about what one gives to the next generation. We do not wish to get carried away with accusations against adults, against parents; as La Promesse suggests, we feel that these days it is as if we adults no longer want to die to allow the generation coming after us to live. In order to educate someone, you have to know how to die so that he or she can live; so that, simply put, they can take your place. We adults want to be immortal, we want not to die. Somehow it is as if, when all is said and done, we have this desire to eat our children, like the Greek god, Cronos. In short, we have nothing to say to our children anymore unless it is, ‘Hey, go play, get out of our hair! We like you. We give you birthday parties. We do everything you want, but we have absolutely nothing to say to you. We have nothing to pass on to you.’ That is a bit of what we felt and what we attempted to show, how adults were trying to be adolescents and not fathers, not mothers–just buddies.”
(The Son is available in Region 2 as a two-disc DVD in France that will also be released in the UK with English subtitles on July 28. La Promesse and Rosetta are available on VHS/DVD from a variety of sources. All three films are remarkable achievements.)
ïAn interview with Tilman B¸ttner, the cinematographer of two quite stylistically divergent films, Run Lola Run (1997), a fast-paced montage film by Tom Tykwer, and Russian Ark (2002), an entire feature shot within the Hermitage in one take by Alexander Sokurov. These comments relate to the latter film:
Cineaste: You used a Steadicam [a device allowing a cameraman to actually carry a camera and produce a gliding image], meaning that you were constantly in motion, running through the hallways, and following the actors–you were in good shape! And I don’t think there was any tracking.
B¸ttner: “No, but for some parts I had a special dolly built. The Steadicam was always on my body, but occassionally, for thirty seconds at a time, I would have to rest and stretch by half-sitting on a barstool placed on the dolly and wheeled over by a grip [or stagehand].”
Cineaste: Placement was obviously very important. The ensembles of actors and extras had to be placed so that the camera could move around them, and so on. Did you have anything to do with that, did you offer suggestions as to where they should be positioned?
B¸ttner: “The [Assistant Directors] were responsible for placing and moving. We weren’t able to have a complete rehearsal. Only some parts were rehearsed, and only with the lead actor. It was only on the day of shooting that Sokurov, my shooting team, and I saw the whole array of actors for the first time. The AD’s had done good work with the actors and extras–in churches and gymns. But it was the first time we were all together in the Hermitage! Eight people were always behind me–Sokurov, the translators, continuity people, my assistants.”
(Russian Ark will be released on DVD in North America on September 9 and various others countries throughout the year.)
ï A review of The Criterion Collection’s DVD of Andrei Tarkovsky‘s magisterial Solaris by Chris Fujiwara:
“All Tarkovsky’s films are nostalgic: they view the world as in danger of being lost, and see it from the point of view of someone striving to hold on to it. The heightened awareness of aural and visual detail in Tarkovsky’s films testifies to this emotional imperative, as does his astonishingly sensitive and elaborate evocation of the flow of time.
The melancholy opening of Solaris (1972) is characteristic. The hero, psychologist Kris Kelvin (Donatas Banionis), wanders alone by a pond near his father’s dacha. He, and the camera, linger over the pond’s depths and among grass and trees. Surprised by a sudden downpour, Kris stands with his eyes closed, as if memorizing the experience of rain washing over his skin. He is taking leave of Earth, perhaps for the last time, before his trip to a space station near the planet Solaris, where most of the film will be set. Set in a future when space travel is routine, the film affirms that Earth can always be, and is always being, created by the human spirit. The struggle to remain human–or, in the case of the simulacrum of Kris’s dead wife Hari (Natalya Bondarchuk), to become human–gives value to existence under the most hostile conditions.”
(More information regarding this DVD can be found here. The article also mentions the excellent website of my friends Trond Trondsen and Jan Bielawski, Nostalghia.com.)