Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger were one of the best directing duos of the 20th century; their varied output included comedies, drama, war stories, and a few musicals. Though none was quite so extravegant, rich, and ambitious as The Tales of Hoffman. Based on the fantasy opera by Jacques Offenbach, who is turn based his opera on the fantastic tales of E.T.A. Hoffman, Criterion has a newly restored edition, with rediscovered footage, as well as a host of extras that are a feast for the eyes. If ever a film was as deserving of extras, both visual and aural, it's a film like this, a rather rare and unique opera film, which combines the best of theatre, opera, and cinema. A story within a story:...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 6/23/2022
- Screen Anarchy
The term ‘filmed opera’ in no way describes this phantasmagoria. Powell & Pressburger re-envisions the Offenbach work with dance sequences refracted through a cinematic prism. It’s high art made for the movies, without the condescenscion seen in Disney’s Fantasia. The stars are Moira Shearer and Robert Helpmann. Powell perfects techniques from Black Narcissus and The Red Shoes to fuse music, theater, dance and cinema; Martin Scorsese calls it a ‘composed film.’ This full restoration reinstates footage not seen since the first previews in 1951.
The Tales of Hoffmann
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 317
1951 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 133 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date June 7, 2022 / 39.95
Starring: Moira Shearer, Robert Helpmann, Ludmilla Tchérina, Anne Ayars, Pamela Brown, Léonide Massine, Frederick Ashton, Mogens Wieth, Robert Rounseville;
— And the voices of: Robert Rounseville, Monica Sinclair, Bruce Dargavel, Fisher Morgan, Rene Soames, Dorothy Bond, Grahame Clifford, Murry Dickie, Margherita Grandi, Owen Brannigan, Ann Ayars, Joan Alexander...
The Tales of Hoffmann
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 317
1951 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 133 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date June 7, 2022 / 39.95
Starring: Moira Shearer, Robert Helpmann, Ludmilla Tchérina, Anne Ayars, Pamela Brown, Léonide Massine, Frederick Ashton, Mogens Wieth, Robert Rounseville;
— And the voices of: Robert Rounseville, Monica Sinclair, Bruce Dargavel, Fisher Morgan, Rene Soames, Dorothy Bond, Grahame Clifford, Murry Dickie, Margherita Grandi, Owen Brannigan, Ann Ayars, Joan Alexander...
- 6/14/2022
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
The Oscars were announced on February 9, almost a month ago, and yet awards season didn’t end until just this last week, when the results of the 14th Annual Muriel Awards were finally fully announced. Muriel is the beloved late guinea pig who burrowed her way into awards founder Paul Clark’s heart a decade-plus-or-so ago, and it is for her and her furry, indefatigable spirit that Clark named the award, a gathering of critic-based honors aimed at focusing the spotlight on the truly deserving film achievements of the year– some well-known and already well-celebrated, some owning much less of the bandwidth generated by the publicity machine of marketing, promotion and mainstream film journalism.
I’ve been in the Muriel fold since the very beginning, for 14 years now, and it’s an end-of-the-year (or start of the new year) event I always look forward to, because I get to vote...
I’ve been in the Muriel fold since the very beginning, for 14 years now, and it’s an end-of-the-year (or start of the new year) event I always look forward to, because I get to vote...
- 3/8/2020
- by Dennis Cozzalio
- Trailers from Hell
Based the homonymous manga by Osamu Tezuka’s, which was inspired by Jacques Offenbach’s opera, “The Tales of Hoffman”, “Barbara” is a very strange but quite appealing film, which also functions as a great sample of how directors can handle pretentiousness.
“Tezuka’s Barbara” is available from Third Window Films
Yosuke Mikuro is a successful novelist, who has succumbed to the calling of commerciality, however, during the last years, in essence writing books whose only aim is to please readers. Acknowledging the fact, he suffers from a kind of depression, until he meets upon Barbara, a beautiful, seemingly homeless girl whom he stumbles upon in the street, and, acting on a completely unjustified impulse, invites home. Barbara, however, is soon revealed to be much more than her looks suggested: she has read all of Mikuro’s books and she can quote French poetry at whim, but is also quite judgmental about his recent works,...
“Tezuka’s Barbara” is available from Third Window Films
Yosuke Mikuro is a successful novelist, who has succumbed to the calling of commerciality, however, during the last years, in essence writing books whose only aim is to please readers. Acknowledging the fact, he suffers from a kind of depression, until he meets upon Barbara, a beautiful, seemingly homeless girl whom he stumbles upon in the street, and, acting on a completely unjustified impulse, invites home. Barbara, however, is soon revealed to be much more than her looks suggested: she has read all of Mikuro’s books and she can quote French poetry at whim, but is also quite judgmental about his recent works,...
- 12/7/2019
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
It’s amusing to think that Jacques Offenbach’s piece Galop Infernal was considered to be scandalous during its time when now it’s considered something quite whimsical and pleasant. Those were different times I suppose and what was considered risque back then is in this time considered quite comical and light compared to some of the other music of the time. In fact I think I’ve heard this tune performed in a number of cartoons and movies that have gone on to entertain children and become quite well known for their appealing soundtrack. I wonder how the folks from that time would
The Top Uses of Jacques Offenbach’s “Galop Infernal” in Movies or TV...
The Top Uses of Jacques Offenbach’s “Galop Infernal” in Movies or TV...
- 4/14/2018
- by Tom
- TVovermind.com
Mubi is showing Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger's The Small Back Room (1949), The Tales of Hoffmann (1951) and Michael Powell's Peeping Tom (1960) in November and December, 2017 in the United States in the series Powell & Pressburger: Together and Apart.The story goes that when they were casting their first flat-out masterpiece together, The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger sent a letter to an actress outlining a manifesto of their production company, called "the Archers." At the time, the Archers was freshly incorporated, with Powell and Pressburger sharing all credit for writing, directing, and producing, and their manifesto had five points. Point one was to ensure that they provided their financial backers with "a profit, not a loss," which may raise eyebrows among those who are used to manifestos burning with anti-capitalist fire—but then, in a system like commercial cinema, profitability buys freedom.
- 11/8/2017
- MUBI
“Pour out the wine for drinking is divine!”
Tales Of Hoffmann (1951) screens Friday September 1st through Sunday September 3rd at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium (470 East Lockwood). The movie starts each evening at 7:30pm.
This a film version of the 1881 opera by Jacques Offenbach “The Tales of Hoffmann”, however it is Not just a film of a staged performance. ‘Michael Powell’ & Emeric Pressburger work their usual magic here. The opera dramatizes the three great romances in the life of the poet-hero presented in a series of flashbacks. Hoffmann’s tales depict the struggle between human love and the artist’s dedication to his work. Hoffmann loses each of the women he loves but gains instead poetic inspiration — the ability to transform painful experiences into art.
Tales Of Hoffmann is an anthology of fantastic and romantic adventures, recounted by the fableist Hoffmann (Robert Rounseville) and featuring Moira Shearer (The Red Shoes), Ludmilla Tchérina,...
Tales Of Hoffmann (1951) screens Friday September 1st through Sunday September 3rd at Webster University’s Moore Auditorium (470 East Lockwood). The movie starts each evening at 7:30pm.
This a film version of the 1881 opera by Jacques Offenbach “The Tales of Hoffmann”, however it is Not just a film of a staged performance. ‘Michael Powell’ & Emeric Pressburger work their usual magic here. The opera dramatizes the three great romances in the life of the poet-hero presented in a series of flashbacks. Hoffmann’s tales depict the struggle between human love and the artist’s dedication to his work. Hoffmann loses each of the women he loves but gains instead poetic inspiration — the ability to transform painful experiences into art.
Tales Of Hoffmann is an anthology of fantastic and romantic adventures, recounted by the fableist Hoffmann (Robert Rounseville) and featuring Moira Shearer (The Red Shoes), Ludmilla Tchérina,...
- 8/28/2017
- by Tom Stockman
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Festival to open with Gere-starrer Time Out Of Mind. Other guests include Harvey Keitel, 50 Shades of Grey star Jamie Dornan and George A. Romero.
Us actor Richard Gere is to receive the highest honour of the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (Kviff) during its 50th anniversary edition, which runs July 3-11.
Gere, star of American Gigalo, Pretty Woman and Chicago, will receive the Crystal Globe for Outstanding Contribution to World Cinema at the festival in the Czech spa town.
Previous winners include Helen Mirren, John Travolta and last year’s recipient Mel Gibson.
This year’s Kviff will open with Time Out Of Mind, starring Gere who will present the film alongside director Oren Moverman and co-star Jena Malone. The psychological drama follows a man seeking a way to reach his estranged daughter.
The festival will also screen Gere’s latest film, Andrew Renzi’s drama Franny, the story of a philanthropist who gets involved in the...
Us actor Richard Gere is to receive the highest honour of the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (Kviff) during its 50th anniversary edition, which runs July 3-11.
Gere, star of American Gigalo, Pretty Woman and Chicago, will receive the Crystal Globe for Outstanding Contribution to World Cinema at the festival in the Czech spa town.
Previous winners include Helen Mirren, John Travolta and last year’s recipient Mel Gibson.
This year’s Kviff will open with Time Out Of Mind, starring Gere who will present the film alongside director Oren Moverman and co-star Jena Malone. The psychological drama follows a man seeking a way to reach his estranged daughter.
The festival will also screen Gere’s latest film, Andrew Renzi’s drama Franny, the story of a philanthropist who gets involved in the...
- 6/22/2015
- by michael.rosser@screendaily.com (Michael Rosser)
- ScreenDaily
TV Picks: Tune in to PBS this May 10th for Vittorio Grigolo Stars in Offenbach’s “Les Contes d’Hoffmann” on “Great Performances at the Met.”Featured is Italian Tenor Vittorio Grigolo, cast as the tortured poet unlucky in love tortured by the devil in Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann on Great Performances at the Met, Sunday, May 10 at 12 p.m. on PBS. Soprano Deborah Voigt hosts the broadcast Les Contes d’Hoffmann will be broadcast on Thirteen’S Great Performances at the Met Sunday, May 10 at 12 p.m. on PBS. (Check local listings.) (In New York, Thirteen will air the opera at 12:30 […]...
- 4/28/2015
- by April Neale
- Monsters and Critics
★★★★☆ The technicolor mastery of the films of Powell and Pressburger is legendary. It is a hallmark of their oeuvre, a signpost of their significance. Add to that a mastery of technical, dramatic film construction and you find yourself in the presence of twentieth century icons. Such is the nature that surrounds this directorial duo who rose to prominence in the forties and fifties. Following hot on the heels of Black Narcissus (1947) and The Red Shoes (1948), they adapted The Tales of Hoffman (1951), based on Jacques Offenbach's fantastical opera. Building on the musical and fantastical themes of these earlier films, it arrived in an era that can be noted for its high output of musical films.
- 3/24/2015
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
By Mark Cerulli
The 1951 film The Tales of Hoffmann, the acclaimed British adaptation of the opera by Jaques Offenbach, was an early influence on major directors like Cecil B. DeMille, George Romero (who said it was “the movie that made me want to make movies”) and Martin Scorsese. They were drawn to co-directors, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressberger’s inventive camera work, vibrant color palette (each of the three acts has its own primary color) and smooth blending of film, dance and music. According to an interview found on Powell-Pressburger.org, Powell wanted to do a “composed film” – shot entirely to a pre-recorded music track, in this case, Offenbach’s opera. Not having to worry about sound meant he could remove the cumbersome padding that encased every Technicolor camera and really move it around production designer Hein Heckroth’s soaring sets. (Heckroth’s work on the film earned him two 1952 Oscar nominations.
The 1951 film The Tales of Hoffmann, the acclaimed British adaptation of the opera by Jaques Offenbach, was an early influence on major directors like Cecil B. DeMille, George Romero (who said it was “the movie that made me want to make movies”) and Martin Scorsese. They were drawn to co-directors, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressberger’s inventive camera work, vibrant color palette (each of the three acts has its own primary color) and smooth blending of film, dance and music. According to an interview found on Powell-Pressburger.org, Powell wanted to do a “composed film” – shot entirely to a pre-recorded music track, in this case, Offenbach’s opera. Not having to worry about sound meant he could remove the cumbersome padding that encased every Technicolor camera and really move it around production designer Hein Heckroth’s soaring sets. (Heckroth’s work on the film earned him two 1952 Oscar nominations.
- 3/13/2015
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
Certain varietals of grandly gestured cinema inspire mad, inexplicable devotion among cinephiles: The films of Welles, Ophüls, Sirk, Leone, Scorsese, and Wong, for example, tend to magnetize our nerve endings more than our frontal lobes, and such infatuations often last a lifetime. Of course Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger belong on the list; it's not a question of whether you're in love with a Powell/Pressburger film, but which one.
Cultists stake their ground all over the duo's peculiarly mysterious and rhapsodic filmography, but the team was never as grand or wildly sensual as in The Tales of Hoffmann (1951), in a new 4K restoration at Film Forum. A hellzapoppin' filmization of the Offenbach opera, with stops pulled out by P&P's resident design team a...
Cultists stake their ground all over the duo's peculiarly mysterious and rhapsodic filmography, but the team was never as grand or wildly sensual as in The Tales of Hoffmann (1951), in a new 4K restoration at Film Forum. A hellzapoppin' filmization of the Offenbach opera, with stops pulled out by P&P's resident design team a...
- 3/11/2015
- Village Voice
Perhaps even more hallucinatory than The Red Shoes, Powell and Pressburger’s tale of a poet regaling a tavern with tales of his impossible loves is a thing of pure, dreamlike strangeness
“Made in England” is how Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger finally stamped their unworldly, otherworldly Tales of Hoffmann from 1951, an adaptation of the Jacques Offenbach opera, which is now on rerelease. It actually negated English and British cinema’s reputation for stolid realism. This is a hothouse flower of pure orchidaceous strangeness, enclosed in the studio’s artificial universe, fusing cinema, opera and ballet. It is sensual, macabre, dreamlike and enigmatic: like Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. In his autobiography, Powell recalls talking to a United Artists executive after the New York premiere, who said to him, wonderingly: “Micky, I wish it were possible to make films like that … ” A revealing choice of words. It was as if...
“Made in England” is how Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger finally stamped their unworldly, otherworldly Tales of Hoffmann from 1951, an adaptation of the Jacques Offenbach opera, which is now on rerelease. It actually negated English and British cinema’s reputation for stolid realism. This is a hothouse flower of pure orchidaceous strangeness, enclosed in the studio’s artificial universe, fusing cinema, opera and ballet. It is sensual, macabre, dreamlike and enigmatic: like Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. In his autobiography, Powell recalls talking to a United Artists executive after the New York premiere, who said to him, wonderingly: “Micky, I wish it were possible to make films like that … ” A revealing choice of words. It was as if...
- 2/26/2015
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Over the past decade, Thelma Schoonmaker, Martin Scorsese's editor and Michael Powell's widow, has overseen the restoration of many of her husband's classic films. The latest is Powell and Pressburger's vibrant 1951 adaptation of Jacques Offenbach's opera of the same name, which can be seen in UK cinemas from 27 February
• The Tales of Hoffmann is being re-released by Park Circus and opens at the BFI Southbank and selected cinemas nationwide. It was restored by The Film Foundation and the BFI National Archive in association with Studiocanal Continue reading...
• The Tales of Hoffmann is being re-released by Park Circus and opens at the BFI Southbank and selected cinemas nationwide. It was restored by The Film Foundation and the BFI National Archive in association with Studiocanal Continue reading...
- 1/26/2015
- by Guardian Staff
- The Guardian - Film News
This past weekend, Sherlock Holmes fans from all over the world gathered in New York City to celebrate Holmes’ birthday at the annual Bsi Weekend, hosted in main part by The Baker Street Irregulars, a Sherlockian literary society founded by Christopher Morley in 1934. As a longtime Holmes fan myself, this was my third year attending, and, as before, I had a great time with Sherlockian friends old and new, discussing and honoring the great detective, his faithful chronicler Dr. Watson, and the peripheral cast of characters (including the original Bsi, Holmes’ group of street urchin informants) created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
I first attended the Bsi Weekend in January 2012 after organizing a Sherlock Holmes Night at The National Press Club and learning in the process about our local Sherlockian scion society, The Red Circle, and the Bsi Weekend celebrations. And in honor of the Bsi and Sherlock Holmes, today...
I first attended the Bsi Weekend in January 2012 after organizing a Sherlock Holmes Night at The National Press Club and learning in the process about our local Sherlockian scion society, The Red Circle, and the Bsi Weekend celebrations. And in honor of the Bsi and Sherlock Holmes, today...
- 1/13/2015
- by Emily S. Whitten
- Comicmix.com
John Philip Sousa (1854–1932) was dubbed the March King. In the days when every town had its brass band and parades were major social occasions, marches were much more a part of American culture, and Sousa's music was wildly popular. He penned many instantly recognizable marches: "The Stars and Stripes Forever," "The Liberty Bell," "The Thunderer," "Semper Fidelis," "The Washington Post," "El Capitan," and "U.S. Field Artillery" are just a few of the 136 he composed. Far from being merely utilitarian or primitive, his marches are often small masterpieces, with indelible tunes, adept harmonies, and nicely contrasted trios. There is never any superfluous musical material in them -- Sousa wrote in his autobiography that a march "must be as free from padding as a marble statue."
Sousa's father was a trombonist in the U.S. Marine Band, and enlisted his son as an apprentice at age 13. Discharged at 21 in 1875, young Jps...
Sousa's father was a trombonist in the U.S. Marine Band, and enlisted his son as an apprentice at age 13. Discharged at 21 in 1875, young Jps...
- 11/6/2014
- by SteveHoltje
- www.culturecatch.com
Fury (David Ayer)
[via the BFI]
The programme for the 58th BFI London Film Festival launched today, with Festival Director Clare Stewart presenting this year’s rich and diverse selection of films and events. The lineup includes highly anticipated fall titles including David Ayer’s Fury, Bennett Miller’s Foxcatcher, the Sundance smash Whiplash, Jean-Luc Godard’s Goodbye to Language 3D, The Imitation Game starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Mike Leigh’s Mr. Turner, Jason Reitman’s Men, Women and Children and Jean-Marc Vallee’s Wild.
As Britain’s leading film event and one of the world’s oldest film festivals, it introduces the finest new British and international films to an expanding London and UK-wide audience, offering a compelling combination of red carpet glamour, engaged audiences and vibrant exchange. The Festival provides an essential profiling opportunity for films seeking global success at the start of the Awards season, promotes the careers of British and...
[via the BFI]
The programme for the 58th BFI London Film Festival launched today, with Festival Director Clare Stewart presenting this year’s rich and diverse selection of films and events. The lineup includes highly anticipated fall titles including David Ayer’s Fury, Bennett Miller’s Foxcatcher, the Sundance smash Whiplash, Jean-Luc Godard’s Goodbye to Language 3D, The Imitation Game starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Mike Leigh’s Mr. Turner, Jason Reitman’s Men, Women and Children and Jean-Marc Vallee’s Wild.
As Britain’s leading film event and one of the world’s oldest film festivals, it introduces the finest new British and international films to an expanding London and UK-wide audience, offering a compelling combination of red carpet glamour, engaged audiences and vibrant exchange. The Festival provides an essential profiling opportunity for films seeking global success at the start of the Awards season, promotes the careers of British and...
- 9/3/2014
- by John
- SoundOnSight
"Le vieux Paris s’en va!"1
—Rallying cry, late 1800s
"Old Paris is no more (the form of a city
Changes more quickly, alas! than the human heart)"
—Charles Baudelaire, “Le Cygne,” Fleurs du mal
Paris s’en va. Paris goes away. Paris disappears.
Two women lying next to each other on a bench, wake up. A hard cut to a shot of one of the women approaching a newspaper stand on a Parisian street. She scans the rack of postcards and chooses five with a picture of the Arc de Triomphe. The characters played by Bulle and Pascale Ogier in Jacques Rivette’s Le Pont du Nord (1981) could be described as that classic French type, the flâneur, “masking under multiple impressions the void” felt within and around themselves.2 In Paris s’en va (1981), these unnamed characters appear more like spirits, ghosts awoken from a centuries-long slumber by the expansive...
—Rallying cry, late 1800s
"Old Paris is no more (the form of a city
Changes more quickly, alas! than the human heart)"
—Charles Baudelaire, “Le Cygne,” Fleurs du mal
Paris s’en va. Paris goes away. Paris disappears.
Two women lying next to each other on a bench, wake up. A hard cut to a shot of one of the women approaching a newspaper stand on a Parisian street. She scans the rack of postcards and chooses five with a picture of the Arc de Triomphe. The characters played by Bulle and Pascale Ogier in Jacques Rivette’s Le Pont du Nord (1981) could be described as that classic French type, the flâneur, “masking under multiple impressions the void” felt within and around themselves.2 In Paris s’en va (1981), these unnamed characters appear more like spirits, ghosts awoken from a centuries-long slumber by the expansive...
- 2/25/2014
- by Ted Fendt
- MUBI
Turner Classic Movies (TCM) will open the 2014 edition of the TCM Classic Film Festival with the world premiere of a brand new restoration of the beloved Rodgers & Hammerstein musical Oklahoma! (1955). TCM’s own Robert Osborne, who serves as official host for the festival, will introduce Oklahoma!, with the film’s star, Academy Award®-winner Shirley Jones, in attendance. Vanity Fair will also return for the fifth year as a festival partner and co-presenter of the opening night after-party. Marking its fifth year, the TCM Classic Film Festival will take place April 10-13, 2014, in Hollywood. The gathering will coincide withTCM’s 20th anniversary as a leading authority in classic film.
In addition, the festival has added several high-profile guests to this year’s lineup, including Oscar®-winning director William Friedkin, who will attend for the screening of the U.S. premiere restoration of his suspenseful cult classic Sorcerer (1977); Kim Novak, who...
In addition, the festival has added several high-profile guests to this year’s lineup, including Oscar®-winning director William Friedkin, who will attend for the screening of the U.S. premiere restoration of his suspenseful cult classic Sorcerer (1977); Kim Novak, who...
- 2/14/2014
- by Melissa Thompson
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Playwright whose anarchic works were filled with vividly imagined characters
Snoo Wilson, who has died suddenly aged 64, was in the vanguard of the young playwrights revolutionising British theatre in the two decades after 1968, but Snoo was a very different kettle of fish from the others. While David Edgar, Howard Brenton and David Hare were often overtly political, Snoo was a Marxist "tendance Groucho"; more subtly subversive and humorous. Sometimes the surface frivolity of his work made people think he wasn't serious, but he was always trying to mine under the surface of things, to allow the subconscious to drive his imagination. Snoo used fiercely imagined characters in comic and often savage works that nevertheless, in the best plays, demonstrated an insouciant knowledge of dramatic structure. He was not a believer in naturalism.
Throughout his career Snoo refused to accept that mere reality was all there was – if so, it was...
Snoo Wilson, who has died suddenly aged 64, was in the vanguard of the young playwrights revolutionising British theatre in the two decades after 1968, but Snoo was a very different kettle of fish from the others. While David Edgar, Howard Brenton and David Hare were often overtly political, Snoo was a Marxist "tendance Groucho"; more subtly subversive and humorous. Sometimes the surface frivolity of his work made people think he wasn't serious, but he was always trying to mine under the surface of things, to allow the subconscious to drive his imagination. Snoo used fiercely imagined characters in comic and often savage works that nevertheless, in the best plays, demonstrated an insouciant knowledge of dramatic structure. He was not a believer in naturalism.
Throughout his career Snoo refused to accept that mere reality was all there was – if so, it was...
- 7/5/2013
- by Dusty Hughes
- The Guardian - Film News
Nicolas Winding Refn is the latest in a long line of directors to find inspiration among plastic dolls
Only God Forgives 2013
For years, Kristin Scott Thomas has been trashing her brittle English upper-classness in French films, but anglophone audiences who still think of her as posh Fiona from Four Weddings and a Funeral might get a shock when they see her in Nicolas Winding Refn's ultra-violent revenge parable. Sample dialogue: "And how many cocks can you 'entertain' with that cute little cum-dumpster of yours?"
Her Crystal is an abrasive, chain-smoking, bottle-blonde Messalina tottering around in fuck-me shoes and too much eye makeup, wielding Virginia Slims as though they were deadly weapons. She's the Barbie from hell, as if Paris Hilton had suddenly lived 20 more years and had a personality transplant from Lucy Liu in Kill Bill: Volume 1. Just as the hotel chain heiress apparently modelled her own makeover on Mattel's fashion doll,...
Only God Forgives 2013
For years, Kristin Scott Thomas has been trashing her brittle English upper-classness in French films, but anglophone audiences who still think of her as posh Fiona from Four Weddings and a Funeral might get a shock when they see her in Nicolas Winding Refn's ultra-violent revenge parable. Sample dialogue: "And how many cocks can you 'entertain' with that cute little cum-dumpster of yours?"
Her Crystal is an abrasive, chain-smoking, bottle-blonde Messalina tottering around in fuck-me shoes and too much eye makeup, wielding Virginia Slims as though they were deadly weapons. She's the Barbie from hell, as if Paris Hilton had suddenly lived 20 more years and had a personality transplant from Lucy Liu in Kill Bill: Volume 1. Just as the hotel chain heiress apparently modelled her own makeover on Mattel's fashion doll,...
- 5/30/2013
- by Anne Billson
- The Guardian - Film News
With the film of Les Misérables on release and a Royal Academy exhibition opening, France's cultural giants and their views of the city take on a fresh importance
The iron gates of the short passageway, a stone's throw from the increasingly trendy Montorgueil district of Paris and a brief walk from the prostitutes of Saint Denis, are closed to the public these days. It was here, in what was Passage Saumon off the Rue du Bout du Monde – the end of the world road – that Victor Hugo is said to have sheltered between the stone pillars of the public baths and a ballroom of low repute from a raging battle between republican and monarchist forces on 5 June 1832. The gates were slammed shut then too, leaving the writer trapped in the crossfire.
A decade on, Hugo would use what he had heard and seen of the failed student uprising, known as the Republican Uprising,...
The iron gates of the short passageway, a stone's throw from the increasingly trendy Montorgueil district of Paris and a brief walk from the prostitutes of Saint Denis, are closed to the public these days. It was here, in what was Passage Saumon off the Rue du Bout du Monde – the end of the world road – that Victor Hugo is said to have sheltered between the stone pillars of the public baths and a ballroom of low repute from a raging battle between republican and monarchist forces on 5 June 1832. The gates were slammed shut then too, leaving the writer trapped in the crossfire.
A decade on, Hugo would use what he had heard and seen of the failed student uprising, known as the Republican Uprising,...
- 1/27/2013
- by Kim Willsher, Vanessa Thorpe
- The Guardian - Film News
Creative cinematographer and a key member of the Powell-Pressburger movie production team
Although the cinematographer Christopher Challis, who has died aged 93, was an essential member of the Archers production company of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, he joined them as director of photography at the time of their decline. However, he worked on more of the great British writing-directing team's films than any other cinematographer. These eccentric, extravagant, intelligent and witty fantasies went against the British realist tradition, allowing more scope for a creative cinematographer such as Challis. The sensuous use of Technicolor and flamboyant sets and designs made them closer to the MGM world of Vincente Minnelli and of Stanley Donen, who used Challis on six of his films.
Perhaps Challis's finest achievement was on Powell and Pressburger's The Tales of Hoffmann (1951) which, as he explained, had "no optical effects or tricks. It was all edited in...
Although the cinematographer Christopher Challis, who has died aged 93, was an essential member of the Archers production company of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, he joined them as director of photography at the time of their decline. However, he worked on more of the great British writing-directing team's films than any other cinematographer. These eccentric, extravagant, intelligent and witty fantasies went against the British realist tradition, allowing more scope for a creative cinematographer such as Challis. The sensuous use of Technicolor and flamboyant sets and designs made them closer to the MGM world of Vincente Minnelli and of Stanley Donen, who used Challis on six of his films.
Perhaps Challis's finest achievement was on Powell and Pressburger's The Tales of Hoffmann (1951) which, as he explained, had "no optical effects or tricks. It was all edited in...
- 6/10/2012
- by Ronald Bergan
- The Guardian - Film News
Midge Ure became the first celebrity to leave ITV’s Popstar To Operastar last night, when he and former Pussycat Dolls star Melody Thornton found themselves in the bottom two after receiving the lowest amount of public votes.
The decision between the two singers was then in the hands of the judging panel and while Rolando and Vanessa Mae voted to save Midge, Simon Callow voted to save Melody, leading to Katherine Jenkins casting the deciding vote, as this week’s head judge.
The Welsh singer voted to save Melody saying:
“The biggest improvement for me, and if we were to give them another song, they could come up with more, is Melody.”
Upon being voted out, Midge Ure said: “I’ll have to go back to my day job. No-one wants to go in the first round but I think I did a reasonable job and I go out with great aplomb.
The decision between the two singers was then in the hands of the judging panel and while Rolando and Vanessa Mae voted to save Midge, Simon Callow voted to save Melody, leading to Katherine Jenkins casting the deciding vote, as this week’s head judge.
The Welsh singer voted to save Melody saying:
“The biggest improvement for me, and if we were to give them another song, they could come up with more, is Melody.”
Upon being voted out, Midge Ure said: “I’ll have to go back to my day job. No-one wants to go in the first round but I think I did a reasonable job and I go out with great aplomb.
- 6/6/2011
- by Lisa McGarry
- Unreality
Ne change rien opens this evening for a two-week run at New York's Anthology Film Archives. Keith Uhlich in Time Out New York: "In this captivating black-and-white documentary portrait, Portuguese auteur Pedro Costa (Colossal Youth) follows the French performer Jeanne Balibar while she records a drone-rock album and readies for a production of Jacques Offenbach's comic opera La Périchole. The actor-singer is mostly photographed in canted chiaroscuro, face half-hidden in darkness, or in a deep-focus long shot, her slender and sultry figure writhing slowly in the distance. It's as if she's addressing us from the void."...
- 11/3/2010
- MUBI
Bartlett Sher, the director of South Pacific revival just next door to the Met Opera is finished with the wash-that-man-right-out-of-my-hair mission and onto a trickier task: washing that man out of four different pretty heads in Les Contes d'Hoffman. Once again, we visit the tragic love affairs of the 19th Century, only this time, it's not one, but four girls and a guy. Those are not the kind of odds that generally appeal to me. Jacques Offenbach, the composer, actually died before he finished it which may say something about how tough the piece was to conceive or more likely how difficult it is to manage so many women at the same time. Sher says he is interested in the "outsider" themes that Contes offers up which makes his take on the opera unconventional -- yet because the opera...
- 12/3/2009
- by Patricia Zohn
- Huffington Post
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