If the best way to critique a film is to make a film, then The Tree of Life officially has its soul-crushing rebuke. With this morning’s world premiere of Lars Von Trier’s Melancholia, the dour Dane punched a hole into the buoyant spirituality of Terrence Malick’s hymn to existence. Punched a hole? More like stuck Read More
What do you make of a pre-ordained masterpiece? Terrence Malick’s breathlessly-awaited The Tree of Life had its world premiere this morning in Cannes, and the smattering of livid boos against the torrent of applause felt delicious, if only to puncture an expectation of instant coronation for the Texan auteur.
Film fanatics have been reverently drooling over The Tree of Life Read More
The fairer sex is getting a beat-down this year at Cannes, and the wounds are self-inflicted. More than a dozen women directors have movies playing on the Croisette–a rare surge for any festival–and the first four whose films unspooled in the opening days have delivered dark, bleak, tough struggles.
The strangest and most chilling has to be Julia Leigh’s Read More
One of the best parts of the Cannes Film Festival is seeing movies in the Marché du Film, the marketplace where filmmakers pay neighborhood theaters to exhibit anything and everything – and a handy way to tell people that your film screened in Cannes without actually having to face a quality-conscious selection committee.
Today’s Read More
Want to know how the 64th Cannes Film Festival gets gritty to honor Robert De Niro? Imagine gnomish Brit crooner Jamie Cullum delivering a painfully jazzy version of Jay-Z’s “Empire State of Mind” on his grand piano while New York’s native son squirms helplessly onstage at the cavernous, VIP-filled Grand Théâtre de Lumière. Nothing like watching 2,000 black-tie film fanatics Read More
We report that D.A. Pennebaker, who made The War Room, is shooting a Freddy campaign film. Roberto likes the idea, Axelrod not so much. We tie that into the national and ethnic Big Themes that many of Freddy’s aides see in this campaign, and wonder whether it all adds up Read More
For a time there, between the invasion of the Republicans and vapid Fashion Week, one couldn’t be blamed for thinking that the cultural elite in New York might never return.
During the dark days of summer, Times Square became our cultural fiefdom and The Lion King its jewel in the crown. Elitism and intellectualism Read More
Sean (P. Diddy) Combs is not known for being at a loss for words.
But the hip-hop impresario was speechless for several seconds when The Transom asked him about his own voting record at a press conference on Tuesday morning to introduce Citizen Change, the voter-registration task force that he founded. Asked about the last Read More
Vincent Gallo posed a question. “Would you want to go see your movie with 3,500 people?” the shaggy-haired, fierce-eyed filmmaker asked, his sinewy voice piercing the Art Deco stillness of Petrossian. “Just think about it. Would you want to go see your movie with 3,500 opinions?”
Mr. Gallo clanked his fork against his untouched plate Read More
On Saturday, August 10, the selection committee for the 2002 New York Film Festival-composed of Film Society of Lincoln Center program director Richard Peña, associate program director Kent Jones, New York Times film columnist and City Search critic Dave Kehr, Newsday film critic John Anderson and Los Angeles Times film critic Manohla Dargis-finished deliberating over Read More
