Bitter Christmas review – grief, loss and artistic betrayal in Almodóvar’s film within a film

-
Cannes film festival: Spaniard’s latest life-v-art auto-metafiction feels slightly muddled as he directs a director directing a director With its rich, warm, summery colours, nothing could surely be less bitter or less Christmassy than this film. It’s the latest from Cannes competition regular Pedro Almodóvar, partly set during Christmas; the female lead actually complains about the yuletide traffic at one stage. But there’s no tinsel or sleigh bells or shopping for presents. Like Die Hard, it eludes classification. It is another – which is to say, yet another – double-layered creation by Almodóvar, a kind of movie auto-metafiction of the sort that he has virtually invented, a life-v-art dialectical process that he is evidently unable to do without. Like the recent Pain and Glory , Bitter Christmas is a candidly personal movie, circling around ideas like grief, loss, the vampirism of art and the betrayal involved in basing fictional characters on real people. Perhaps by emphasising thi...
Post a Comment

Rojek review – unsettlingly intimate portraits of Islamic State militants

-

Documentary collects sequence of interviews with prisoners, not all repentant, alongside footage of war-blasted Syrian Kurdistan

Here is an astringent, devastating and truly extraordinary film that is hard work to watch, but entirely worth it. Rojek probes the roots and fallen leaves of the Syrian civil war, a conflict the western media has practically forgotten as news of Ukraine and Gaza-Israel-Yemen dominates international reporting. Director Zayne Akyol, heard off-camera throughout, interviews members of Islamic State, now being held in high security prisons by the Syrian Democratic Forces, about their lives, with some recalling more innocent days when they hunted goldfinches to sell in markets or liked Canadian pop music. Many recount how they were recruited into IS by cells in local mosques in assorted countries – Germany, say, or Saudi Arabia – and came to have positions both high-ranking and menial in the organisation in the part of Syria with a dense Kurdish population.

In the film’s present, some are still unrepentant, believers that they fought honourably in a holy war; others see things differently and are riven with regrets. Some are women who recall their time of service to IS as the happiest days of their lives. In stately procession, each person speaks straight to the camera in almost disconcerting closeup, and however repugnant some of the things they say might be, it’s impossible to not recognise and see most of them as broken human beings.

Continue reading...

from Film | The Guardian https://ift.tt/WQcRXdY
via IFTTT

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Miracle Club review – Maggie Smith can’t save this rocky road trip to Lourdes

-
Laura Linney is upstaged by older co-stars Smith and Kathy Bates in this sentimental tale about a group of Dublin women who go on a spiritual journey together Who’s up for a golden-hued heartwarmer set in 60s Ireland starring Kathy Bates and Maggie Smith about women with secret fears and dreams going on a church trip to Lourdes and finally finding the real miracle is their new compassion for each other? The answer to this question could well have been … me. I have a liking for a gentle tale and there is nothing necessarily wrong with, just occasionally, showing Ireland and the church of this period with something other than outrage and horror. But The Miracle Club does not at any time, to use a discredited metaphor, throw away its crutches and walk. And it’s painful to note that this is largely because of the way film can’t convincingly use that estimable actor Laura Linney in a central role. She is upstaged by the older, fruitier performances and doesn’t hold her own with a more seri...
Read more

‘I lost a friend of almost 40 years’: Nancy Meyers pays tribute to Diane Keaton

-
Film-maker who directed Keaton in Something’s Gotta Give, and wrote Baby Boom and Father of the Bride, says ‘we have lost a giant’ Film-maker Nancy Meyers has paid tribute to the late Diane Keaton, her “friend of almost 40 years” and collaborator on celebrated comedies Something’s Gotta Give, Baby Boom and Father of the Bride. On Monday, Meyers wrote on Instagram that she’d had a difficult 48 hours since Keaton’s death was announced on Saturday, but “seeing all of your tributes to Diane has been a comfort.” Continue reading... from Film | The Guardian https://ift.tt/TFc820j via IFTTT
Read more

Malaika Arora scolds 16-year-old dancer for inappropriate gestures: “He is winking, giving flying kisses”

-
Bollywood diva Malaika Arora found herself at the center of an unexpected controversy during the filming of Hip Hop India Season 2. The popular dance reality show, judged by Arora alongside choreographer-director Remo D’Souza, took an awkward turn when a 16-year-old contestant made suggestive gestures toward her during his performance. The incident, which left Malaika visibly uncomfortable, was captured on video and has since gone viral. What Happened on Hip Hop India Season 2? The incident unfolded during a recent episode of Hip Hop India Season 2, which streams on Amazon MX Player and showcases India’s top hip-hop talent. While judging a contestant’s performance, Malaika noticed the young dancer directing inappropriate gestures her way, including winking and blowing flying kisses. Clearly taken aback, the actress and fitness icon didn’t hold back her disapproval. In the now-viral footage, she can be heard reprimanding the teenager, sternly demanding, “Mummy ka phone number do!” (Giv...
Read more