IFC.com - The Daily

Hello, I must be going.

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 16:48:45 -0500

On the one hand, it feels like I just got here. On the other, we've been through another Sundance, another Cannes - and now, here comes another summer, and I'll be heading out soon on holiday. I won't be returning to this particular spot, though you may see my byline appearing now and then elsewhere at IFC.com; the Daily, at least as we've known it and watched it evolve over the past six years, won't be returning, either. But that doesn't mean I'll stop doing what I do; I've been dreaming up a new format and, if all goes according to plan, it'll be rolling out slowly in two phases at an entity that'll be named when that entity's good and ready. Really, I don't mean to be cryptic, but you know how these things work. In the meantime, have a great summer. Bye for now, but see you soon....

Shorts, 6/30.

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 16:32:44 -0500

A new issue of Cinema Scope has just gone up, featuring editor Mark Peranson's opener: "2009 was, far and away, the stupidest Cannes ever." He also interviews Corneliu Porumboiu ("Police, Adjective"), while Dennis Lim talks with João Pedro Rodrigues ("To Die Like a Man") and Scott Foundas with Marco Bellocchio ("Vincere"). Beyond Cannes, Michael Sicinski talks with Richard Dutcher about his "Post-Morman Cinema" and Max Goldberg with Lee Anne Schmitt about "California Company Town." Also: Shelly Kraicer on the Jeonju International Film Festival, Olaf Möller's books roundup, Jonathan Rosenbaum's DVDs roundup, Jay Kuehner on "Humpday," Andrew Tracy on "The Limits of Control," Andrew Nayman on "Encirclement: Neo-Liberalism Ensnares Democracy" and, coming full circle, Mark Peranson on Mark Lewis's installation in Venice, "Backstory." Vanity Fair bullet-points its cover story for the August issue, "The Last of Heath," written by Peter Biskind. Plus: Bruce Weber photographs Heath Ledger; and Kevin Sessums's 2000...

Fests and events, 6/30.

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 16:12:16 -0500

At Twitch, Andrew Mack relishes the full lineup of the Fantasia International Film Festival, happening July 9 through 27 in Montreal. "Dialogues with Films: Four Decades of the Forum" is happening in Berlin from tomorrow through Sunday. Do click that title; as I explain at Artforum, for this 40th anniversary event, directors are being flown in from all over the globe to introduce films that've influenced them - and some of those intros are online. On a related note: "The Berlinale will celebrate its 60th anniversary in 2010 - and the public is invited to play a special role on this occasion." They're looking for memories: "What were your loveliest and most moving, thrilling, tearful, erotic, funny, upsetting, embarrassing and/or tender moments at the Berlinale?" "Isabelle Huppert: Woman of Many Faces," on view at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art in Beijing through July 19. DIY Days is a "roving...

DVDs, 6/30.

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:38:47 -0500

"Seemingly nonchalant, impeccably crafted, borderline delirious, 'My Dinner with André' is the result of an inspired collaboration among its actor-writers, Wallace Shawn and André Gregory, and its director, Louis Malle," writes Amy Taubin in Criterion's Current. "In the nearly three decades since its 1981 debut, this tiny independent movie has inspired myriad prose pieces and a slew of witticisms that riff on its title. Nothing, however, captures its eccentricity and perhaps the reason for its effect on viewers as neatly as this line from Vincent Canby's New York Times review: 'At times,' Canby wrote, '"My Dinner with André" suggests a reunion of Christopher Robin (Mr Gregory) and Winnie-the-Pooh (Mr Shawn) thirty years after each has left the nursery to pursue separate careers in the theater." And, indeed, the film evokes the exalted space of childhood friendship, where confidences are exchanged and imaginations run wild without fear of judgment." "A decade...

Shorts, 6/29.

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 13:38:28 -0500

"Jerry Lewis is headed back to Broadway, this time in the director's chair," reports Dave Itzkoff for the New York Times. "The veteran comedian, last seen in 1995 on a Broadway stage as Applegate in the revival of 'Damn Yankees,' will direct a musical adaptation of his hit 1963 comedy 'The Nutty Professor' that is planned for the 2010-11 season." Also in the NYT: "Although ['Conquest of the Useless: Reflections from the Making of "Fitzcarraldo"' (excerpt)] provides a hypnotic chronicle of the film crew's daily progress, it inevitably heats up when [Klaus] Kinski arrives," writes Janet Maslin in the New York Times. "No malevolent tarantula in the rain forest can match this volcanically hot-tempered actor for entertainment value. And the Kinski presence brings out the best in [Werner] Herzog's invective. Complaining constantly about his star's divalike behavior - Mr Herzog predicts there will be trouble when the steamship becomes more...

Fests and events, 6/29.

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 10:05:05 -0500

Anne Thompson wraps up the Los Angeles Film Festival, and of course, she's got the list of award-winners, too, topped by Sam Fleischner and Ben Chace's "Wah Do Dem" (Target Filmmaker Award) and Juan Carlos Rulfo and Carlos Hagerman's "Those Who Remain" (Target Documentary Award). The festival closed last night with Hayao Miyazaki's "Ponyo," a "singular experience," writes Drew McWeeney at Hitfix, "animation as pure emotion, a love story and an adventure and one of the real treats for 2009 so far." Meantime, Chris MaGee reports that a few dates and appearances have been added to Miyazaki's itinerary for his visit to California next month. For the London Times, Bryan Appleyard talks with Adam Curtis, whose "latest work is called 'It Felt Like a Kiss.' But it's like nothing he's ever done before, and he's nervous, not least because its first appearance will be not on television, but on the...

Wrapping Edinburgh 09.

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 13:39:33 -0500

[Updated through 6/30] This year's edition of the Edinburgh International Film Festival wraps with an announcement of the award-winners. Looking back on his predictions, we can see that Neil Young hit one on the nose: "Easier With Practice" is named the Best New International Feature. In other categories, he came close. "Moon" did pull out in front of "Fish Tank" after all, taking the Michael Powell Award for Best New British Feature. Even so, Andrea Arnold's Cannes entry isn't coming away empty-handed: Katie Jarvis wins the PPG Award for Best Performance in a British Feature Film. Among the other awards: "Boris Ryzhy" (Best Documentary), "The Secret Life of Kells" (Audience Award), "Sin Nombre" (New Directors) and "Humpday" (Rotten Tomatoes Critical Consensus Award). Meantime, Jonathan Romney has a roundup for the Independent and David Cairns has seen "Antichrist": "Bergman's 'Persona' might hint at what's being aimed at here, and Altman's 'Three...

"Public Enemies"

Sat, 27 Jun 2009 15:47:05 -0500

[Updated through 6/30] "Public Enemies" opens on Wednesday not only in the US but also in the UK. As mentioned earlier, the trades' reviews are in (Hollywood Reporter, Screen and Variety), and now, the Guardian's run a special issue of its "Film & Music" weekly: John Patterson profiles Michael Mann, while David Thomson looks back on the director's career - and lists his top 10 gangster movies. Jeff Guinn looks back to the 30s and notes that "the idea of swashbuckling crooks sticking it to the rich and powerful epitomised the daydreams of working-class America. It was what people wanted to believe, and the media provided the stories to reinforce the myth." "This month," notes Joe Queenan, "the British Film Institute hosts a series of high-quality gangster films made between the Great Depression and the end of the millennium. It is entirely possible that the scheduling of the series is...

Shorts, 6/27.

Sat, 27 Jun 2009 15:33:12 -0500

"Werner Herzog is famous for his cinematic depictions of obsessives and outsiders, from the El Dorado-seeking Spaniard played by Klaus Kinski in his 1972 international breakthrough, 'Aguirre: The Wrath of God,' to Timothy Treadwell, the doomed bear-worshiper of his 2005 documentary, 'Grizzly Man.'" Lawrence Levi in the Los Angeles Times: "Herzog's own reputation as an obsessive, not to mention daredevil and doomsayer, was solidified by 'Burden of Dreams,' a documentary chronicling Herzog's trials while filming 'Fitzcarraldo' in the Peruvian jungle in 1981. 'Conquest of the Useless: Reflections From the Making of "Fitzcarraldo"' comprises Herzog's diaries from the three arduous years he worked on that movie, which earned him a best director award at Cannes in 1982 yet nearly derailed his career. It reveals him to be witty, compassionate, microscopically observant and - your call - either maniacally determined or admirably persevering." As Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing" turns 20,...

Fests and events, 6/27.

Sat, 27 Jun 2009 14:12:52 -0500

"[T]he question of what becomes an LGBT icon most was very much at the forefront of the [Frameline33's] first week," writes Matt Sussman at SF360. "Frameline's closing night happens to fall on the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, and a special subset of programming highlights films related to the heady years of Gay Liberation and the early queer outbursts to emerge from underground cinema in the 60s and 70s. And while it was thrilling to get to rub shoulders with the likes of former Warhol and Paul Morrissey pin-up Joe Dallesandro (who quipped during the post 'Little Joe' Q&A that all he wanted to do nowadays was eat ice cream and get fat), and see local legends such as George and Mike Kuchar and Vickie Marlene have their fascinating lives and storied careers paid tribute to onscreen, this week has also had its share of unsung heroes and icons-in-the-making."...

Also in theaters, 6/26.

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 16:16:20 -0500

Seems pretty safe to say that your best bet this week is "The Hurt Locker." If you have to see "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen," let's hope you've gotten it out of way by now. Then, of course, there's "Chéri," "Quiet Chaos" and... "Afghan Star" "'Afghan Star' sets out with a delectably postmodern agenda," writes Joseph Jon Lanthier in Slant: "Closely following four contestants in the eponymous television program, Afghanistan's burqa-busting answer to 'American Idol,' the documentary compassionately argues that one region's pop detritus is another's ideological maturation." "[I]f nothing else, 'Afghan Star' offers a reminder of how much has changed in Afghanistan from the late 70s - when Kabul was a secular-oriented city with co-ed universities and a thriving nightclub scene - to the rise of the Taliban," writes Noel Murray at the AV Club. "Yet even during the country's most repressive era, people would watch TV or listen...

"Quiet Chaos"

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 14:39:01 -0500

"The wanton slaughter of mothers and the consequent struggles of grieving single dads has been an epidemic in Hollywood for a long time, and not only in movies starring John Cusack," writes AO Scott in the New York Times. "'Quiet Chaos,' a new film from the Italian director Antonello Grimaldi, demonstrates that the sad-dad melodrama is a global (or at least a midlevel European art film) phenomenon. If the film is less maudlin and more psychologically astringent than most American specimens, this is partly a matter of Mr Grimaldi's restraint and partly thanks to Nanni Moretti's sharp and unpredictable turn as the dad in question." "[T]he film inevitably seems like an afterthought inspired by 'The Son's Room,' Mr Moretti's own much-lauded take on the grief process," writes Martin Tsai in the Critic's Notebook. "The two films share thematic threads, but Mr Grimaldi has extended every strand by a mile, including...

Michael Jackson, 1958 - 2009.

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 03:55:08 -0500

[Updated through 6/30] "Michael Jackson was fascinated by celebrity tragedy," write Geoff Boucher and Elaine Woo in the Los Angeles Times. "He had a statue of Marilyn Monroe in his home and studied the sad Hollywood exile of Charlie Chaplin. He married the daughter of Elvis Presley. Jackson met his own untimely death Thursday at age 50, and more than any of those past icons, he left a complicated legacy. As a child star, he was so talented he seemed lit from within; as a middle-aged man, he was viewed as something akin to a visiting alien who, like Tinkerbell, would cease to exist if the applause ever stopped." "This is the fucking all-time black diamond of obits," blogs Rob Harvilla at the Voice. "How do you reconcile the unimpeachable genius of his artistic prime with the train-wreck horror of his public descent, especially given the fact that the former...

"Chéri"

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 14:18:29 -0500

[Updated through 6/27] "Putting aside her fragrant memoirs, 'Chéri' and 'The Last of Chéri' are probably Colette's finest achievement as a writer; they lucidly express her faith in materialism as well as her convincing belief that sensuality is the highest of all human pursuits." Dan Callahan in Slant: "These two novels about an aging courtesan and her devouring passion for a young pretty boy are many things, but most of all they are French to their core, and the rude English narration that begins Stephen Frears's adaptation of 'Chéri' strikes a jarring note right from the start." The film "is ostensibly an examination of an aging Michelle Pfeiffer," observes Michael Koresky at indieWIRE. "Pfeiffer's Lea de Lonval still wears her beauty well, yet the lines on her washed-out visage are difficult to ignore. There's no doubt that Pfeiffer is brilliantly cast as this worn-down yet still vital woman, as her...

Farrah Fawcett, 1947 - 2009.

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 13:45:21 -0500

"Farrah Fawcett, an actress and television star whose good looks and signature flowing hairstyle influenced a generation of women and, beginning with a celebrated pinup poster, bewitched a generation of men, died Thursday morning in Santa Monica, Calif," writes Susan Stewart in the New York Times. "She was 62.... Ms Fawcett won praise for her serious acting later in her career, typically as a victimized woman and notably in the television movie 'The Burning Bed.' But she remained best known for the hit 1970s television show 'Charlie's Angels,' in which she played Jill Munroe, one of three beautiful female private detectives employed by an unseen male boss who (in the voice of John Forsythe) issued directives and patronizing praise over a speaker phone." Joe Leydon has "much fonder memories of her sporadic appearances as the elusive object of David Janssen's bemused desire in 'Harry O' (1974 - 76), a cult-fave...