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Cannes film festival A taut, charged procedural from Dominik Moll follows a conflicted officer investigating violence to a teenage protester Dominik Moll’s Dossier 137 is a serious, focused, if slightly programmatic movie about police brutality in France; there are docu-dramatic storytelling reflexes and a determined procedural tread. The movie takes its cue from the horrifying real-life cases of gilets-jaunes protesters in France’s 2019 demonstrations who suffered near fatal injuries due to the police’s trigger-happy use of the LBD gun : the lanceur de balle de défense or “flash ball” gun which (deafeningly) fires vicious rubber bullets. Stéphanie, played by Léa Drucker, is a conscientious police officer in the IGPN, the Inspection Générale de la Police Nationale, effectively the Internal Affairs bureau, investigating horrific head injuries suffered by a teen protester, which could only be caused by the cops’ flash-ball weapons. She is divorced from a cop, Jérémy (Stanislas Merhar...

The star, who at 62 performed his own stunts for the forthcoming Final Reckoning, tells Cannes press conference ‘I don’t mind encountering the unknown’ Tom Cruise got stuck on the wing of a biplane shortly before it ran out fuel during the filming of Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, the director of the eighth instalment of the action franchise has revealed. Speaking to an audience at the Cannes film festival hours before the film’s premiere, director Christopher McQuarrie recounted the filming of a stunt sequence in which Cruise, in his long-running role as the field agent Ethan Hunt, walked between between the two wings of a biplane as the aircraft was mid-air over South Africa. Continue reading... from Film | The Guardian https://ift.tt/pOBI39Q via IFTTT

Cruise does things his way in this eighth and last Mission: Impossible, as his maverick agent Ethan Hunt takes on the ultimate in AI evil Here it is: the eighth and final film (for now) in the spectacular Mission: Impossible action-thriller franchise, which manifests itself like the last segment jettisoned from some impossibly futurist Apollo spacecraft, which then carries on ionospherically upwards in a fireball as Tom Cruise ascends to a state beyond stardom, beyond IP. And with this film’s anti-AI and internet-sceptic message, and the gobsmacking final aerial set piece, Cruise is repeating his demand for the echt big-screen experience. He is of course doing his own superhuman stunts – for the same reason, as he himself once memorably put it, that Gene Kelly did all his own dancing. Final Reckoning is a new and ultimate challenge (actually the second half of the challenge from the previous film) which takes Cruise’s buff and resourceful IMF leader Ethan Hunt on one last maverick, ...

As many films struggle to find distribution, Watermelon Pictures has stepped in to help tell stories from Palestine and other marginalized communities In March, The Encampments , a documentary on the pro-Palestinian protest movement on US college campuses, opened at the Angelika Film Center in New York. The nonfiction theatrical marketplace has never been breezy in the US, but this is a particularly difficult time for documentaries, let alone films about hot-button issues considered politically sensitive or, under the new administration, outright dangerous; one of the Encampments’ primary subjects, the Columbia University student-activist Mahmoud Khalil , remains in detention by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) without charge for any crime. Large-scale distributors, including all of the major streaming services, are increasingly wary of anything deemed controversial , leaving such films as Union , on the Amazon Labor Union, or the Oscar-winning Palestinian-Israeli documenta...

The writer and director, whose credits also include Bonnie and Clyde, Superman and Places in the Heart, died at his New York City home Oscar-winning writer and director Robert Benton has died at the age of 92. He won his two Academy awards for divorce drama Kramer vs Kramer . His longtime assistant and manager confirmed his death to the New York Times . Continue reading... from Film | The Guardian https://ift.tt/ZqjQOXI via IFTTT

French actor, 76, convicted of assaulting set dresser and assistant director during film shoot in Paris in 2021 Gérard Depardieu has been found guilty of sexually assaulting two women during a film shoot in 2021 and given an 18-month suspended prison sentence, in a turning point for the #MeToo movement in France. Depardieu, France’s biggest film star who has made more than 200 films and TV series, is the highest-profile figure in the French film industry to be convicted of sexual assault after years of the country being accused of being slow to take women’s claims of abuse seriously. Continue reading... from Film | The Guardian https://ift.tt/XtKJHEg via IFTTT

Depardieu’s sexual assault verdict overshadowed first day of the film festival which once championed the actor, with jury president Binoche commenting on the ‘interesting timing’ Gérard Depardieu was the ghost in the wings at the opening of the Cannes film festival, after a court found the French star guilty of sexual assault. The Oscar-winning actor Juliette Binoche had barely begun her duties as Cannes jury president when she was asked to pass judgment on Depardieu and the wider culture of misogyny and sexual violence within the French film industry. “Interesting timing,” she said of the verdict. Depardieu denied allegations that he had sexually assaulted two women – a 54-year-old set dresser known only as Amélie and an unnamed 34-year-old assistant director – during production of the 2021 French drama The Green Shutters. But the judge ruled that the actor’s explanation of events was “unconvincing” before sentencing him to an 18-month suspended jail term . Depardieu’s legal team sa...

Kapil Sharma debuted as a leading actor with Kis Kisko Pyaar Karoon (2015). Thanks to the popularity of the comic actor, plot and the funny scenes, the film was a success at the box office. Now, the makers are ready with the second part, Kis Kisko Pyaar Karoon 2, and if sources are to be believed, it is expected to release within a few months. A source told Bollywood Hungama, “The makers are considering multiple dates and one of the dates being seriously looked at is September 26, 2025. There’s not much competition on that day and moreover, the date has an importance. The first part was released exactly ten years ago in that week – September 25, 2015. This has added to the significance of the date.” The source continued, “A final decision is yet to be taken whether September 26 will be locked as the release date. The makers are clear that they want the best possible date for the film as they are confident of its prospects at the box office.” Meanwhile, the promoti...

Speaking in London as he received a BFI fellowship, the actor praised Brando and Nicholson for knowing how to use ‘every tool’ of cinema From sleuthing around the world as Ethan Hunt in the Mission Impossible films to whizzing through the skies as “Maverick”, Tom Cruise has always known the difference a team makes. Now, the Hollywood superstar has told fledgling thespians to take heed of this approach on set and to understand the work of those behind the scenes who help make movie magic. Continue reading... from Film | The Guardian https://ift.tt/TuA4yrm via IFTTT

The Cannes Film Festival 2025 is set to witness a glamorous Indian presence once again, as Alia Bhatt and Janhvi Kapoor are expected to join the ever-elegant Aishwarya Rai Bachchan on the red carpet of the prestigious international event. Held annually in the scenic French Riviera, the festival this year will not only celebrate global cinema but also showcase a dynamic mix of Indian fashion, heritage, and cinematic talent. Speaking about the debuts to watch out for this year, we have Alia Bhatt, who has been making waves on the global fashion circuit as she will grace Festival De Cannes for the first time this year. She will be attending the prestigious film festival as the ambassador of the Italian luxury brand Gucci. Known for her chic and contemporary style, Alia's Cannes debut under Gucci’s banner is expected to merge high fashion with Bollywood charm. This will mark another significant milestone in her expanding international presence. Adding to the star quotient is Janhvi K...

A Swiss film-maker’s parent leaves behind a visual diary that raises questions about the limitations of art in a fascinating documentary debut The genesis of Jules Guarneri’s documentary – his first – comes from an unusual gift. Having made more than 20 hours of a filmed diary, his father, Jean, entrusted the material to the budding director, hoping that it would form the building blocks for his son’s first feature. These visual journals, in which the older man addresses the camera – and ultimately Guarneri – with recollections from his past, are awash with nostalgia and regret. As Jean’s recordings are interspersed with Guarneri’s own footage of his family, what starts out as a monologue gradually transforms into an intergenerational dialogue between father and son. Filmed with a fixed camera, Jean’s diaries have a static quality that echoes the stagnancy of his life story. Christabel, his wife and Guarneri’s mother, was an heiress, and the couple lived as idle rich in the Swiss vil...

After stepping into film production with Toaster, which is yet to release on Netflix, actor-producer duo Rajkummar Rao and Patralekhaa are already gearing up for their next project. Their second venture under their production banner will feature National Award-winning actors Rajkummar Rao and Keerthy Suresh in lead roles and is set to go on floors in Mumbai on June 1. According to a report by Mid-Day, the untitled film will be a satirical take on India’s current education system, examining how profit motives have increasingly overshadowed the sector's primary purpose—imparting knowledge. The story will unfold through the lens of two educators, played by Rao and Suresh, who seek to expose the commercialization of education. The narrative reportedly uses humour and irony to shed light on how education in India has evolved into a lucrative business, often at the cost of academic integrity and student welfare. The project marks a collaboration with director Aditya Nimbalkar, who rece...