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Marie Antoinette

Saturday, May 19, 2007 ★ 12:23 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

I’m a big fan of the films by Sofia Coppola. Both The Virgin Suicides (with a wonderful soundtrack by Air by the way) and Lost in Translation are amongst my all time favourite films, together with e.g. Fucking Åmål and Le Fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain.

Marie Antoinette

Image shamelessly ripped (and cropped) from IMDB.

The latest film by Sofia Coppola is about the Queen consort of Louis XVI of France, Marie Antoinette (Wikipedia), and is titled after her: Marie Antoinette (IMDB).

A well-done blend of a Costume drama and contemporary music, which is at some points hilarious and at some points really melancholic. See it!

Interview

Saturday, May 19, 2007 ★ 12:07 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

I went to see Interview, a remake by Steve Buscemi of the original (Dutch) Interview by Theo van Gogh (who has been murdered some time ago by a muslim extremist) in Kriterion (which is only a couple of minutes from the location of the murder).

Interview still

Image courtesy of Sony Classics

Quick plot outline: a not-so-interested political journalist Pierre (Steve Buscemi) is sent out to interview a famous trash movie and soap actress Katya (Sienna Miller). He is completely unprepared, but after a while he manages to get the conversation going. After a while you start thinking who is actually the interviewer and who is the actor, since the game played by interviewer and the interviewee is not entirely honest, from both persons’ perspectives…

The film has lots of references to the original film, e.g. a truck with ‘Van Gogh movers’ written all over it, a quick appearance of the ‘real’ Katja Schuurman and Pierre Bokma and some photos on a desk.

Anyway, nothing really special about this film, but nice nonetheless to see a local Dutch production getting picked up by others. I didn’t see the original, but it is told the remake is a lot better.

La science des rêves

Wednesday, February 28, 2007 ★ 13:54 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

Last week I visited La science des rêves (English title: Science of Sleep) in Kriterion in Amsterdam.

Science of Sleep

The weird, but wonderful story composed of dreams and absurdistic reality sometimes makes you think it’s real, sometimes lets you know it’s fake (jump out the window and fly…), but often leaves you really puzzled.

Los Amantes del Círculo Polar

Wednesday, November 1, 2006 ★ 00:58 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

Another film broadcasted during the “Spanish summer” progamme by the Dutch public broadcasting service: Los Amantes del Círculo Polar.

Los Amantes del Circulo Polar

A really intruiging film (with absurd scenes) about Otto and Ana, both palindrome names, who meet as kids and grow up and loose each other. Circular lives, circular names, circular love. Some things end, but their love lasts forever…

Abre Los Ojos

Wednesday, November 1, 2006 ★ 00:48 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

A couple of weeks ago the Dutch public broadcasting service had a “Spanish summer” programme featuring Spanish cinema.

One of the films was Abre Los Ojos, the Spanish original of Vanilla Sky, both starring Penélope Cruz.

Abre Los Ojos

Although I did see Vanilla Sky years ago, I had forgotten several parts of the story, so some scenes came as a surprise after all. Pretty interesting to see two identical stories in two different films, highlighting other aspects…

Crash

Wednesday, November 1, 2006 ★ 00:41 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

A while ago I visited Crash (directed by Paul Haggis) in the local cinema. Several story lines intertwine and overlap during the film, and they all show (Americanesque) racism issues in the city of Los Angeles.

Crash

Tragic scenes and such… not too much of my liking, though.

The new world

Saturday, August 5, 2006 ★ 17:01 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

Once again a film about the Pocahontas legend. The New World is an Americanesque film (not my favourite). It happened to show in my local arthouse cinema, otherwise I wouldn’t have bothered…

The new world

The main theme of the score is Mozart’s Symphony No. 23, which was written in 1773. The story itself played around 1600, which annoyed me quite a bit. The film itself wasn’t ‘antropologisch verantwoord’ (‘anthropologically correct’, quoting my girlfriend) either, portraying the natives as stupid people not knowing concepts like ‘love’, ‘faith’ and ‘dignity’. Once again, I don’t like American films…

Mar Adentro

Saturday, August 5, 2006 ★ 16:50 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

The Spanish film Mar Adentro tells the tragic story of a man fighting to die with dignity after being quadriplegic for 28 years. In The Netherlands, euthanasia has long been socially accepted (we even have laws for it), but in Spain this is not as easy.

Mar Adentro

Based on a true story. Well worth seeing.

The Bow

Saturday, August 5, 2006 ★ 16:43 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

The Bow is a film by Kim Ki-Duk, who also directed Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring , about which I blogged earlier.

The Bow

Unlike Ki-Duk’s Bin-Jip, The Bow is a bit boring and also lacks wonderful surroundings with which Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter… and Spring compensated for the slow story.

Junebug

Wednesday, May 3, 2006 ★ 10:32 ★ Category Films ★ Permanent url

Junebug is a film about this Great Thing called American Family Life. Johnny is an anti-social young man who seems disappointed about himself, his family; basically about everything. His naive and pretty dumb girlfriend Bernadette is pregnant, but Johnny can’t be bothered to give her the love and attention she needs. Both live with his parents, a caring, conservative couple too ignorant to look any further than their back yard.

Junebug

Picture by Sony Classics (screenshot by me)

The other son is George, who looks a lot happier. He lives with a woman who runs an art gallery. At first sight he looks like a total different person compared to his family. But is he really?

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