What I saw in Cannes this year

Favorites

Sicario

Since Enemy, Denis Villeneuve is my new favorite director. In Sicario, he tackles the Mexican cartels with realism, intensity, and emotional depth. The result is a hard action thriller that leaves you feeling bewildered and vulnerable.

Best and worst movies of the Cannes Film Festival {part 2}

This is part two of the best and worst movies of the Cannes Film Festival. The first part can be found here.

What We Do In The Shadows

Because the Flight Of The Conchords team is behind What We Do In The Shadows, the film is getting more attention than it probably deserves. It's an almost exact copy of a low budget Belgian film, Vampires by Vincent Lannoo, which I saw at the Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival in 2010. Both are about a television crew making a documentary about modern vampires and their daily problems (read: household chores). The similarities are so obvious, surely the filmmakers must have seen this obscure film and been inspired. So, please, give the original one some credit and watch Vampires instead of this one.

The Curse Of Downers Grove

Based upon the novel Downers Grove by Michael Hornburg and scripted by Brett Easton Ellis, The Curse Of Downers Grove follows a group of teenage friends who believe that every year a schoolmate will die on graduation day. As the big day approaches, several tensions between the teens are created which could eventually lead to the death of one of them. But are these teens creating their own fate? Or is the curse of Downers Grove a reality? The story is well built-up and you get to care about what happens to the characters. However, what misses is a bit of mystery and a satisfying ending.

Murder Of A Cat

Produced by Sam Raimi, Murder Of A Cat is a cozy mystery about a cat owner who sets out to uncover the truth behind the murder of his feline friend. He finds out that his cat was leading a double life and that he may be linked to a local conspiracy. The beginning of Murder Of A Cat was hilarious. After that, the story becomes rather lame and uninspired. Overall, a cute family movie that may do well on TV.

Welcome To New York

Abel Ferrara tackles the story of DSK (here called Deveraux), the French politician who assaulted his hotel maid. This translates in a succession of graphic, elaborate sex scenes and conversations revealing his obsession with sex. Welcome To New York is superficial as it only shows Deveraux in a mono-linear way. Surely there must have been more to his personality. On several occasions The Wolf Of Wallstreet sprang to mind, usually to remind me that similar subjects can be portrayed in a more exhilarating way. With Gérard Dépardieux and Jacqueline Bisset, both of which were present for the screening of their movie.

Horsehead

This movie about a girl and her attempts at lucid dreaming was a walk-out. Shallow and boring.

Killers

Two serial killers put their crimes online and battle for notoriety in this Japanese/Indonesian thriller. The violent scenes are solid, but all the others border on the ridiculous. Impossible to sit through the 137 minutes of this film. But on the positive note: Horsehead was much worse.

White God

White God was one of my favorites of the Cannes Film Festival. A father obliges his daughter to abandon her beloved dog on the streets. While the animal tries to survive the hardships he encounters, the girl refuses to give up on him and sets out on a search. When they'll meet again, neither of them will be the same. White God is a mix between fairy tale and horror. A strange combination that's incredibly touching and hard at the same time. I cried for two hours straight, mostly because I couldn't stand to see the dogs suffering.

Kiki's Delivery Service

Because of an ancient law, the thirteen-year-old witch Kiki must leave home and live on her own for one year. With Jiji, her black cat, she flies off with her broom towards a group of islands far over the sea where she starts a broom-based delivery service. Kiki's Delivery Service is cute but a bit bland. What makes the film worth seeing, though, is Jiji the cat who is hyper-funny and omnipresent. If possible, watch Miyazaki's original from 1989.

It Follows

After the first screening of It Follows, the audience claimed it was the best and creepiest horror film they'd seen in a long time. Because everyone was talking about it, getting into another screening was hard. My first reaction when I finally saw It Follows was that it was over-hyped. Script-wise, it could have been just your ordinary horror film, but because of great sound design and a constant thread that lurks around every corner, it works, and just as everyone else I was creeped out of my skin.

When Animals Dream

A girl discovers she's a werewolf at the same time as she discovers love. Directed and written with taste and talent, When Animals Dream is a beautifully made film, but it never made me feel a single emotion.

Wild Tales (Relatos Salvajes)

Wild Tales is a combination of six short stories about people who can't cope with the injustices of life and react by behaving savagely. Each story is surprising, original and laugh-out-loud funny. Could have been shorter, though.

5 Minutes

The concept was intriguing (the world will end in 5 minutes; should you tell your children?), but the acting, direction and photography were so amateurish I was glad this short film only lasted five minutes.

One For The Road

In this Mexican version of the The Bucket List, three retired men go on a road trip through Mexico to grant the last wish of their lifelong friend. One For The Road is charming and funny, but also a little too easy and uneventful.

Lost River

Ryan Gosling does everything right in his directorial debut. The filming locations, the soundtrack, the actors, the photography... They all complement each other perfectly and I can't say there's one element that stands out in Lost River, because every single one is mesmerizing. It all reminded me of Nicolas Winding Refn, which is not surprising as Gosling collaborated with him for Drive and Only God Forgives. And is Gosling as talented as Refn? Absolutely.

Best and worst movies of the Cannes Film Festival {part 1}

As promised, here's an overview of the best and worst movies of the Cannes Film Festival. If you missed my snapshots of the festival, you can find them here.

Home

A real estate agent investigates a house that appears to be haunted by the previous owner who unwittingly welcomed the devil into her life. Bland and banal, Home had that typical TV movie feel, but was never really boring either.

Honeymoon

Two newlyweds travel to a lakeside cottage for their honeymoon. Shortly after arriving, the woman starts to wander through the woods in the middle of the night and ends up being confused and strange.Though not a masterpiece, Honeymoon is definitely better made than many other genre movies. A nice surprise.

Ask Me Anything

A teenage girl blogs about her life full of boyfriends, egoism, and self-discovery. The screenplay is well-written with exceptional detail to characterization and dialogue. The big mistake was to treat this movie as if it were a teen comedy (complete with matching music). With a more adult direction and a different soundtrack it would surely have lived up to its potential. Based on director Allison Burnett's novel Undiscovered Gyrl which was originally written in blog style.

The Trip To Italy

This follow-up to Michael Winterbottom's The Trip follows once more actors Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon while on holiday. They joke about Jules Verne, Lord Byron, Alanis Morissette and Batman, among others, while impersonating a whole range of actors along the way. A funny and pleasing film that would prabably have been much more effective as a stage play. But then we wouldn't have all that lovely Italian scenery and food.

Quantum Love (Une rencontre)

An author meets a man during a book party. They are instantly attracted to each another but decide not to tempt fate as one of them is married. Instead, fate decides to tempt them by offering several chance meetings. Will they be able to resist temptation? Quantum Love is a cute and absolutely charming romance that is sometimes unrealistically romantic and sometimes surprisingly down to earth.

White Bird In A Blizzard

When Kat's mother disappears, she initially seems to cope with the trauma and what preceded it. Little by little, however, the cracks in her sanity and in that of her family start to show. Because of its predictability and lazy execution, White Bird In A Blizzard was the least interesting of all Gregg Araki's movies. It does have a good vibe to it, though, which made it enjoyable nevertheless. Based on the novel by Laura Kasischke and starring Shailene Woodley.

Feed The Gods

Two brothers go looking for their lost parents after they see them on a video tape. They end up in a small village where the locals feed tourists to Bigfoot. Both director and actors aren't top-notch, but the concept is huge fun and the director knows how to keep the viewer's attention.

Frank

A wannabe musician joins a band of eccentric pop musicians and discovers that there's a difference between making music out of passion and making music out of a need to escape. Frank could have been your typical British comedy, if not that the lead wears a huge fake head that he refuses to take off, even when sleeping or showering.That in itself turns Frank into an odd little film. Defininitely a good watch, but also a bit pointless. Fun fact: the mysterious Frank is played by Michael Fassbender, but because of the fake head, we never get to see his face except for the five final minutes of the movie.

Dark Summer

A 17 year old boy gets house arrest for the summer. When his mother is away on business, one of his friends commits suicide, and then stalks him as a ghost. Extremely repetitive and hackneyed. I fell asleep during this one.

Where The Devil Hides
 
After only a couple of minutes, it becomes clear that Where The Devil Hides was made with talent and a decent budget. It tells the story of a prophecy in a small village that on the eve of every girl's 18^th birthday, the devil might inhabit her soul. Now, as the day approaches, six girls, all born on the sixth day of the sixth month, begin to mysteriously disappear one by one. Part slasher part prophecy movie, Where The Devil Hides is a little by-the-numbers but nevertheless entertaining and alluring. Definitely recommended if you're into movies such as The Haunting In Connecticut.

The Go-Go Boys

This onformative and entertaining biography tells the story of two Israeli-born cousins, Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus, who turned Hollywood upside down, producing over 300 films and becoming the most powerful independent film company in the world. The Go-Go Boys examines the relationship between the two opposite personalities whose combined forces fueled their successes and eventual split.

Open Windows

Nacho Vigalondo and Elijah Wood stay in the same vein as their Grand Piano, but Open Windows is much less exhilarating. Elijah Wood plays an obsessed fan who won a date with his favorite actress through a contest. When she turns down the date, the campaign manager allows the fan to spy on her through camera's and a hack of her computer and cell phone. As the story progresses, a mysterious man on the phone continues to give him orders (similar to Grand Piano, right?) and it turns out that he's part of a much bigger plot than he originally though. No matter how much I loved Grand Piano (which I reviewed here), Open Windows irritated me from the very first minute and had me sighing all the way through. Problem is it's too far fetched and artificial both in terms of plot and direction.

Part two of my Cannes Film Festival reviews will follow in a few days.

Visiting the Cannes Film Festival

The weeks have just been flying by like crazy here. I've hardly been able to write as I've been busy cleaning out my old apartment and moving into a new one with my boyfriend while also trying to maintain two blogs.

Now that I'm fully settled, I hope to finish the book I'm writing about Avalon, move forward with a (still secret) new movie project, and publish all the exciting new posts I have in store for you.

Today I'd like to share with you the images I shot at the Cannes Film Festival in May. I didn't have time to share those with you yet, although I really love them!