Nuri Bilge Ceylan elegantly channels the spirit and self-reflexivity of Atom Egoyan’s Calendar and Roberto Rossellini’s seminal Voyage in Italy (that in turn, paved the way for Michelangelo Antonioni’s psychological landscape films) to create an equally sublime, serenely composed, and understatedly bittersweet chronicle of the dissolution of a relationship through the austerity and desolation of […]
Popular novelist and first-time filmmaker Emmanuel Carrère takes a decidedly more affirming and compassionate adaptation of his twenty-year old dark, psychological novel on obsession, identity, and alienation for his debut feature, La Moustache. While getting ready for a dinner party with mutual friends, a comfortably settled, middle-aged married man and successful architect named Marc (Vincent […]
One of the clear highlights of the Norwegian cinema series for me was Liv Ullmann’s personal appearance for the introduction of her film debut as lead actress in what would prove to be the final film by Norway’s first female director, Edith Carlmar, The Wayward Girl. Admitting that she initially found it odd that program […]
Iconic character actor and inimitable personality Timothy Carey’s eccentrically flawed, indescribably lowbrow, and madly egocentric, yet indelible satire, The World’s Greatest Sinner, is a commendable exposition on opportunism, moral bankruptcy, and idolatry as a bored insurance salesman, Clarence Hilliard, re-invents himself as a youth attuned, hip-gyrating pop star in order to gain public exposure and […]
A thematic structure that continues to surface in several of the post 1989 Revolution films during the Shining Through a Long, Dark Night: Romanian Cinema, Then and Now series is the use of an intertwining, circular narrative as a metaphor for national self-reflection – and re-evaluation – in the aftermath of the Nicolae Ceauşescu regime […]
Composed as a lyrical comedy of errors, Frantisek Cáp’s charming and whimsical Vesna chronicles the misadventures of handsome university student and glider pilot Samo (Franek Trefalt) and his mischievous friends Kristof (Jure Furlan) and Sandi (Janez Cuk) as they try to hatch a plan for passing their mathematics professor’s (Stane Sever) final exam – that […]