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23.05.2023 - 07:49 / variety.com
Guy Lodge Film Critic On the mean streets of Casablanca dartingly navigated in “Hounds,” all life is shown to be casually disposable; an actual human body, however, is another matter. Taking place over one sleepless night of mounting misfortune in the Moroccan metropolis, writer-director Kamal Lazraq’s first feature is a trim, unsparing crime tale that pits social desperation against a nagging spiritual conscience. Its gig-economy gangsters may follow almost any grisly orders for a quick buck, but are equally bound to Muslim creeds and customs, glumly shrugging off any disparity between these two authorities. Following an impoverished father-son duo as an ostensibly rote criminal errand goes bloodily awry, the film is briskly told and humidly atmospheric, though a little tonal variation wouldn’t have gone amiss amid an overriding air of hardscrabble, stomach-knotted discomfort. As its central crisis deepens and darkens, Lazraq’s script keeps teasing a gear-shift into mordant farce to which it never quite commits, leaving both the characters and the drama a bit stymied. Still, this is a notably punchy debut, both visceral and confidently cavalier in its depiction of everyday underworld brutality, with a sharp, streetlit sense of place — and just enough genre-film vigor to hook distributor interest after its Un Certain Regard premiere at Cannes.
It is no slight on the convincingly ragged, on-edge performances of the ensemble to say it’s immediately apparent that Lazraq and his casting director Amine Louadni have filled most of the roles with nonprofessionals: “Hounds” is rich in weathered, storied faces of the kind not typically found by the dozen in acting schools. Angular and twitchily expressive, leading man
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There is a suggested line to when a superhero movie relies too much on the fleeting high of fan service and special effects. Andy Muschietti’s “The Flash” blitzes past that line and then proceeds to run out of ideas.
Katherine Ryan has signed on for ‘Celebrity Gogglebox’. The 39-year-old comic said she is “excited” to appear on the star-studded edition of the Channel 4 show alongside her husband Bobby Koostra, 40. She told The Sun: “It’s usually just the dogs who get to see us watch TV, so we’re excited to welcome viewers into our home as we decompress in our favourite spot – the sofa.
Spider-Man: Across The Spider-Verse has received overwhelming praise from critics, who have described it as “in the running for the best superhero film ever”.Directed by Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson, the animated superhero film is the sequel to 2018’s Oscar-winning Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse.In the follow-up, Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) is launched on another adventure into the multiverse alongside Gwen Stacy (Hailee Steinfeld).A synopsis reads: “Miles Morales catapults across the multiverse, where he encounters a team of Spider-People charged with protecting its very existence.
Simon Cowell was unwittingly dragged into Boycanto's act on Britain's Got Talent on Thursday night, as one cheeky little chap pied him in the face. In the VT prior to the young theatre boys' performance, Simon could be seen telling them to "be more naughty" after watching their previous show. And they clearly took the advice on board, as they put on an energetic and choreographed routine which included running out into the audience with silly string.
For Nick Thompson and Danielle Ruhl, the work grind never stops — not even for their wedding day!
Owen Gleiberman Chief Film Critic Nearly every mainstream animated feature (and just about every comic-book movie too) sets a tone and visual design that the audience plugs into; the movie, bold and shiny and clever as it may be, won’t deviate much from that. But the images in “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” have an intoxicating unpredictability. The film makes you feel like you’re dropping through the floors of a modern art museum on acid, yet there’s a thrilling moment-to-moment logic to it all. The madly eclectic images express something — an eyeball-tickling explosion of quantum physics, or a subliminal nod to some comic-book style from decades ago that’s so retro it’s new, not to mention bedazzling. This feels like it could have been the first movie designed to earn a thumbs up from Andy Warhol and Stephen Hawking.
Angela Bassett received her first Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Tina Turner in the iconic 1993 biopic What’s Love Got To Do With It?
“I didn’t make a film against the pope or to condemn the Pope,” Italian filmmaker Marco Bellocchio said of his Cannes competition title Kidnapped at the official festival presser this morning.
Niall Horan is getting back on the road.
Jessica Kiang Fogs, dogs and toxic smogs are just the headliner adversities hurled at the motley band of misfits determined to survive Kim Tae Gon’s “Project Silence,” by no means a classic in the Korean action-thriller pantheon, but a good enough stopgap for a rainy Sunday until the next one comes along. Set on a cataclysm-prone Seoul highway bridge with suspension cables, like those of our disbelief, destined at some point to snap, Kim’s screenplay — co-written with Park Joo Suk and Kim Hong Hwa — cleaves so close to disaster-movie formula it’s hard to believe it needed three human screenwriters to gin it up. Given that its most lunatic flourish is the addition of dozens of slavering government-engineered superdogs, maybe it was partially generated by algrrrithm.
The journey for Jin Wang in “American Born Chinese” couldn’t have begun at a more opportune time. The protagonist of Gene Luen Yang’s 2006 graphic novel — now a Disney’s eight-episode series from showrunner Kelvin Yu — springs forth when narratives with an Asian identity are stratospheric-high in demand and popularity.
Jessica Kiang It is unlikely that this Cannes will yield many characters as strikingly well-drawn as Cléo (Louise Mauroy-Panzani), the star of Marie Amachoukeli’s small but acutely affecting Critics’ Week opener “Ama Gloria.” Over the course of an efficient 84 minutes, Cléo changes and resists change, she learns and rejects life lessons, she befriends and betrays. She is funny, somber, silly, conniving, shockingly selfish and shiningly pure, sometimes all in the space of an afternoon. She is six years old. Cléo, a bundle of personality under a tangle of hair and pair of thick glasses, lives in Paris with her affable widower Dad, Arnaud (Arnaud Rebotini), but is raised mostly by her beloved Cape Verdean nanny Gloria (Ilça Moreno Zego). Their relationship is close as a goodnight kiss, and obviously mutually adoring — witness the exchange of incandescent smiles when Cléo sees Gloria waiting at the school gates. So it’s a heavy blow to both when Gloria has to return to Cape Verde following the death of her mother. Gloria’s own daughter Fernanda (Abnara Gomes Varela) is already a young woman, and pregnant with her first child. But her son César (Fredy Gomes Tavares) is still a kid, and now needs the motherly supervision that Gloria has spent many years lavishing on Cléo.
Guy Lodge Film Critic “Does everyone have to be a hero?” The question comes from thirtysomething art teacher Samet (Deni̇z Celi̇loğlu), burst out in frustration in the heat of an intense argument with his fellow educator and would-be girlfriend Nuray (Merve Di̇zdar), as they disagree over just how, or how much, any individual is obliged to contribute to society. It’s a familiar cry from a male protagonist in a film by Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan, even if it hasn’t ever been worded quite so directly: “About Dry Grasses,” his long, languid but slowly captivating ninth feature, is merely his latest work to examine man’s right, for better or worse, to be selfish, to be an anti-hero, to crave attention and isolation all at once, and to talk about it all night long.
Recently split from his co-worker girlfriend, Vincent (Karim Leklou) is having a bad day at the office. First, a young intern batters him over the head with a laptop, and then Yves from accounting stabs him savagely with a pen. And after a meeting with human resources, the poor guy is left with the curious feeling that, somehow, he deserved it. Even his shrink, who has a print of J.M.W. Turner’s ironic masterpiece “The Fighting Temeraire” on his wall, thinks so, planting further seeds of doubt in Vincent’s mind. “I think you’re looking for attention from those who attack you,” he decides.
Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Taiwan-based Screenworks Asia is using the Cannes Market to launch international rights sales on “Lost in Perfection.” The film, previously titled “Love is a Bitch,” is a female-led psychological thriller that marks the live-action debut of Sung Hsin-ying, who is already established as an award-winning animation director. The story follows a TV anchor, played by Shao Yu-Wei, whose apparently perfect life unravels when she discovers that her father may have become the victim of a romance scam. To make matters worse, the scammer is accused of murdering men she dated. In an attempt to protect her family, the woman partners with the local prosecutor to investigate the crime. Yet, she quickly finds herself lost in the twists and turns while uncovering the truth.
You will either watch “Fast X” or you won’t. It’s not a film series that people are on the fence over, and they’ve probably made up their minds long before now.
Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor Nine more minutes of footage would take Pedro Almodóvar’s film “Strange Way of Life” from a live action short frontrunner to a best picture contender. To be eligible for the Academy Awards’ best picture category, a film must have a minimum 40-minute runtime. Almodóvar’s movie runs 31 minutes. With those extra nine minutes, we could also highlight the worthiness of actors Ethan Hawke and Pedro Pascal and the project’s artisan categories. But for his second English language endeavor, coming three years after “The Human Voice” with Tilda Swinton, the Spanish auteur’s sensibilities are never lacking. His new Spanish Western stands proudly next to some of his most audacious movies such as “Talk to Her” and “Volver.”
Guy Lodge Film Critic Appealing a conviction for two murders he insists he didn’t commit — while candidly, even proudly, admitting to multiple armed robbery charges — French activist turned criminal Pierre Goldman refuses to call any witnesses in his defense. “I’m innocent because I’m innocent,” he says flatly, rejecting the idea that testaments to his character and conduct have anything to do with it, and professing himself “disgusted” by courtroom pomp and theatricality. Except Goldman knows the power of fiery rhetorical speechifying when it suits him: In “The Goldman Case,” Cédric Kahn’s formally restrained but ultimately electrifying dramatization of a trial that gripped and divided France in 1976, that canny inconsistency is but one unexpected fold in a courtroom drama that finds equal intrigue in legal order and human chaos.
Good news for families at Cannes who couldn’t score tickets to “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” or “Elemental”: Producer Thomas Negovan is bringing “Caligula” to Paris! “Caligula: The Ultimate Cut” will make its debut at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. The entirely new edit, created from scratch using over 90 hours of original camera negatives and audio recorded on-location, will feature copious never-before-seen footage featuring Helen Mirren, Malcolm McDowell and Peter O’Toole.