The Screengrab : 4 months 3 weeks 2 days

Cannes Roundup: Day One

Scott Von Doviak — Thu, 14 May 2009 16:30:00 GMT

The Cannes Film Festival kicked off last night with the latest from Pixar, Up, and the early word is predictably positive. “Up possesses all the aesthetic and philosophical values that audiences have come to expect from Pixar: rich, intricately detailed visuals, un-snarky humor and a genuinely affecting story,” writes Ann Hornaday of the Washington Post. Eugene Hernandez of Indiewire calls it “a grand visual spectacle on a big screen, pulling viewers into a striking three dimensional world and eschewing the sort of visual sight gags found in typical 3-D movies.” The Telegraph reports a minor quibble: “I'm not convinced it needs to be seen in 3-D: the images are less distinct than is ideal. But the quality of writing, its delicious sound design, and the emotional punch it packs all make this one of Pixar's finest achievements to date.”

Charlotte Higgins of the Guardian does her best to reassure us that we aren’t missing anything by not being there. “Most news journalists I know have a love hate relationship with it. My day (I'm writing this Wednesday evening) is far from over – but at least I wasn't sitting up till 3am, like my colleague at the BBC Razia Iqbal, putting together a package for the Today programme. Mostly it consists of queuing, with some occasional shoving or sweaty rushing, spliced with trying to ask questions in enormous press conferences – but the mic rarely gets passed to you, because there are hundreds of reporters, from everywhere from Iceland to Hong Kong, also competing to get a word in.”

As he prepares for the Cannes premiere of The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus on May 24, Terry Gilliam speaks to The Independent about completing the project without Heath Ledger. “I suppose I’m in an interesting position because while I’m cutting the film I’m basically working with him every day and he’s fine; he’s in good shape…Ideas are floating around. Then finally we decided, ‘OK, let’s get three other people to take over the part’. And we were lucky because we have a magic mirror in this movie. Not every movie has a magic mirror. So you can very genuinely say that these other actors are different aspects of the character that Heath plays. And it works.”

Tales from the Golden Age, which will have its premiere in the Un Certain Regard section, has secured distribution from IFC. “I am very glad that IFC Films decided to stay close to me and continue the difficult work of presenting Romanian films in US,” said director Cristian Mungiu (4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days).

The Best of 2008: Leonard Pierce's Picks for the Best Movies of the Year, Part Two

Leonard Pierce — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 19:45:00 GMT

5. WALL*E (Andrew Stanton, dir.)

Pixar has been on such a roll of late that if they were a single director, they’d be getting mention in the same breath as the golden age greats. But they’re not; they’re an aggregate of many clever, talented folks who make computer-generated cartoons that are at least partly intended for children. I’m not going to argue that this isn’t sometimes a weakness; in WALL*E, the environmental message only seems fitting and appropriate because I happen to agree with it, and the crypto-Objectivism in The Incredibles only bothered me because I don’t. But regardless of the heavy-handedness of the moral, it can’t be denied that WALL*E is flat out the most wonderful film of the year, hopeful and funny and romantic and bittersweet all at the same time, and wrapped up in a package so beautiful to look at you wonder why anyone ever questions the potential of CGI. And if this astounding motion picture spawned an obnoxious marketing empire, one can only shake one’s head and say “Damn kids don’t know how good they’ve got it.”

4. RACHEL GETTING MARRIED (Jonathan Demme, dir.)

If you ever want to flummox a music critic, ask him to describe one of his favorite new bands without comparing them to another band. Of course, Rachel Getting Married proves that the same can occasionally be said for movie critics: it seems impossible to talk about without referencing something else. It’s got the dysfunctional family dynamics of Il y a Longtemps Que Je T’aime; the comeback-kid story of The Wrestler; the hateful-misanthrope-as-vehicle-for-joyous-redemption jawn of a Wes Anderson film (only better) and the structure and form of the late Robert Altman’s best work (only different). With all of these elements at play, though, it never seems derivative of anything else, only reminiscent in the best possible way. In the end, Rachel Getting Married is its own film, familiar yet new and impressive, and carried along by some of the finest acting of the year, most especially from Anne Hathaway and Bill Irwin.

3. CHE (Steven Soderbergh, dir.)

Steven Soderbergh keeps on making great movies, and never the same one twice. His latest is getting lots of what child care experts call “good attention” and “bad attention”; it’s certain that Soderbergh intended it that way, with its rigid formal structure, back-spasm-inducing length, difficult tonal shifts, and…oh, yeah, it’s a biopic about one of the most controversial figures of the 20th century. It’s just as hard to figure out how much of the negative reception is due to political and moral judgment of the revolutionary Che Guevara as it is to figure out how much of the positive reception comes from those who valorize him, but taken purely as a movie, Che is hard to beat: it’s formally daring, adventurously directed, risk-taking, well-made, and held together by a powerful performance that shows its subject neither as a heroic rebel or a vicious murderer, but simply as a man so consumed by his cause that he didn’t know what else to do than keep fighting for it.

2. WENDY AND LUCY (Kelly Reichardt, dir.)

There have been a number of exceptionally well-done documentaries in recent years about ordinary people dangling from the precipice of financial ruin in economically uncertain times, but successful narrative films dealing with the same subject have been few and far between. That’s largely because it’s hard to approach the topic in fiction without becoming didactic, maudlin, or treacly – and those challenges are certainly, and perilously, evident in Kelly Reichardt’s story about a young woman in brutally limited circumstances who loses her beloved dog while pursuing a slender chance at a decent job. But the miraculous thing about Wendy and Lucy is that it toes that line from its first frame to its last without ever tumbling down and making a mess of itself. That’s a testament to the top-notch script, the surprisingly deep direction, and the beautiful performance by lead actress Michelle Williams. No one could ever have predicted that an heir to the Italian neo-realist tradition would emerge in 2008 from America’s Pacific Northwest; that it happened is one of the year’s greatest surprises.

1. SYNECHDOCHE, NEW YORK (Charlie Kaufman, dir.)

There are so many things that could have gone wrong with Charlie Kaufman’s directorial debut. I first heard him talk about his desire to direct way back in 2004, when I interviewed him for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and when Synechdoche, New York was finally announced, I was full of dread. The video stores of America are choked with mediocre-to-bad movies by talented writers who decided what they really wanted to do was direct. I needn’t have worried: Synechdoche, New York is easily my favorite film of the year. Kaufman approached directing with the same meticulous, self-searching approach that he does writing, and the result is nothing short of astounding. The best movies, for me, are the ones that seem to completely rewire my head – that are so profound and well-crafted that they redefine my basic approach to their subject, form or content. Charlie Kaufman accomplishes that his first time out of the gate, and that’s the mark of a major talent.

ALMOST MADE IT: The Strangers, Doubt, Iron Man, The Wrestler, Bigger Stronger Faster*.

DIDN'T SEE THEM: Entre les Murs (The Class), Standard Operating Procedure, Lat den Ratte Komme In (Let the Right One In), Dear Zachary: A Letter To His Son About His Father, Trouble the Water, Full Battle Rattle, Le Voyage du Ballon Rouge (Flight of the Red Balloon).

PERFORMANCES OF THE YEAR: Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler; Bill Irwin, Rachel Getting Married; Kristin Scott Thomas, Il y a Longtemps Que Je T'aime; Viola Davis, Doubt.

MADE IN 2007, BUT GREAT IN 2008: 4 Luni 3 Saptamani si 2 Zile (4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days); Paranoid Park; My Winnipeg; Une Vielle Maitress (The Last Mistress); Auf der Anderen Seite (The Edge of Heaven); Encounters at the End of the World; Chop Shop.

OVERRATED: Waltz with Bashir; In Bruges; Happy-Go-Lucky; Slumdog Millionaire; Kung Fu Panda.

Click for Part One

Bummercore

Leonard Pierce — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 15:15:00 GMT

We've always been distrustful of the notion that "art film" must always mean "depressing slog". For that matter, we've always been distrustful of the notion that "depressing slog" must always mean "unenjoyable film". As Chicago author Amy Krause Rosenthal once wrote, defending her decision to avoid feel-good Hollywood fare, when she sees a movie with a bunch of rich, beautiful people who end up getting whatever they want the most, her own life seems like a failure by comparison, and she ends up being depressed -- but when she sees a movie with a bunch of miserable, unhappy people who just can't get their shit together, her own life seems pretty good by comparison, and she ends up being happy.

That said, we can't really dispute the Guardian's Catherine Shoard, who writes -- inspired by the British opening of the mercilessly grim Austrian arthouse flick Import/Export -- that sitting through some such 'masterpieces' is the cinematic equivalent of an endurance marathon. Will the movie be more or less depressing than 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days? Will it be more or less ugly than Rosetta? Will it have a greater or lesser number of extremely unattractive naked people than Japon? Shoard then sets forth a checklist of required unpleasantries for any readers contemplating their own arthouse masterpieces, including "kinky yet joyless sex", inclement weather, feral children, beat-up mopeds, and humor that isn't funny ("a clarinet on the soundtrack tends to signal when it's time to smile").

All in all, it's our favorite snotty takedown of self-important Eurocinema since the late, lamented Harvard Lampoon's Mediagate, in which readers were vouchsafed a peek at the catalog of a sound effects company that specialized in arthouse fare; it featured such essential purchases as "Industrial Noise #2", "C Sharp Tone (Thirty Minutes Long, Just Won't Stop", and "Tasteful, Natural Sex Between Two Women".

Related Posts:

Revenge of the Almodovar Curse

Stupid Little Bastard Makes Film

Thursday Morning Poll for September 11, 2008

Paul Clark — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 14:00:00 GMT

With the year two-thirds over, we thought it was a good time to look back at some of the most acclaimed titles of 2008 so far. But while IMDb users and tough-talking bands of blog commenters are largely in agreement that The Dark Knight is pretty much the greatest thing ever (or at least since The Shawshank Redemption), it might come as a surprise that the Screengrab readership does not concur with this opinion. To wit: in last week’s poll of the top five best-reviewed major releases of 2008 (according to Rotten Tomatoes), the winner was Pixar’s latest contemporary classic, Wall-E, which brought in 39% of the vote. Furthermore, The Dark Knight actually tied for second (22% of the vote apiece) with a film that was never released on more than fifty screens at any given time, last year’s Palme d’Or winner 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days. As for me, I cast my vote for the James Marsh’s thrilling documentary Man on Wire, which came in a solid fourth (17%) but at least fared better than Best Foreign Language Film Oscar-winner The Counterfeiters, which garnered no votes whatsoever.

This week, in conjunction with my colleague Andrew Osborne’s run-down of the biggest hits and flops of the summer, we get your opinions on the hottest tickets from the last four months. As you might have guessed, two of the titles this week were also included in last week’s poll, but we’re hoping that perhaps some of you Iron Man fans out there were waiting for your chance to cast your vote here. So, which of the summer’s biggest box-office winners was your favorite?

Favorite of this summer's biggest blockbusters? | BuzzDash polls

In addition, we’d like to know how many of the summer’s reigning blockbusters you managed to see.

How many of the blockbusters in question did you see? | BuzzDash polls

As always, the comments section is open. See you next week!

DVD Digest for June 10, 2008

Paul Clark — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 14:00:00 GMT

The run-up to Father’s Day continues with more dad-friendly DVDs, including a handful of the most acclaimed films of 2008 to date.

DVD of the Week: After last week’s wide selection of testosterone-heavy actioners, this week finally brings a DVD for the thinking dad- HBO’s critically-feted seven-part miniseries John Adams. Based on the book by David McCullough and starring Oscar nominees Paul Giamatti and Laura Linney, John Adams is a prestige project through and through. But the big surprise is how exhaustive and complex a portrait of the man and his time this really is. Some highly unpleasant events take place on the way to revolution, and the film doesn’t shy away from this reality. Likewise, in addition to Giamatti and Linney’s accomplished turns as John and Abigail, the film also boasts some note-perfect supporting work from the likes of David Morse as George Washington and Tom Wilkinson as Ben Franklin. As far as founding fathers go, Adams has long taken a backseat in popularity to these two men as well as Thomas Jefferson, but if nothing else, John Adams is invaluable in helping to pin down his importance in the history of this nation.

Other new releases this week include: Doug Liman’s Jumper (Fox, also Blu-Ray); Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman in Meathead’s The Bucket List (Warner, also Blu-Ray); 2007’s Funny Games (Warner), the film so nice Michael Haneke made it twice; Natalie Portman and Scarlett Johansson in the historical bodice-ripper The Other Boleyn Girl (Sony, also Blu-Ray); Cristian Mungiu’s Palme d’Or winner 4 Months 3 Weeks & 2 Days (IFC Films); the Exquisite Corpse-styled indie thriller The Signal (Magnolia); and of course, the best-reviewed theatrical release of 2008, Larry the Cable Guy in Witless Protection (Lionsgate, also Blu-Ray).

In classics on DVD, this week’s big news is Lionsgate’s High Noon Two-Disc Ultimate Collector’s Edition, which brings the guy-movie favorite back to DVD with a number of new features. Included among these are a number of documentaries and featurettes, along with a video of Tex Ritter performing his Oscar-winning song from the film. But if dad’s tastes run more to looking at babelicious European actresses of yore, Lionsgate’s got that covered too, with the Catherine Deneuve 5-Film Collection (including Le Sauvage, Hôtel des Amériques, Manon 70, Le Choc and Fort Saganne) and the Sophia Loren 4-Film Collection (which includes I Girasoli, Carosello Napoletano, Attila, and Madame Sans-Gene).

Finally, being released this week exclusively in Blu-Ray: Broken Trail (Sony), Natural Born Killers (Warner), and The Professionals (Sony).

Indie Box-Office Roundup: Weekend of February 15-17, 2008

Paul Clark — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 00:17:00 GMT

Continuing its strong appeal to arthouse audiences, Eran Kolirin's The Band's Visit has moved up to #1 atop this week's Indie Box-Office Roundup. The Israeli comedy, released in the US by Sony Pictures Classics, managed an impressive per-screen average of $11,267, up from $9,642 last week. At a time when the big Hollywood releases are opening big and falling fast, it's good to see a movie that really catches on with audiences like this. A movie like The Band's Visit may never pull in Cloverfield grosses, but in its limited release it should have more staying power than most would-be blockbusters.

Also maintaining a strong showing over President's Day Weekend was last week's chart-topper, Focus Features' In Bruges, now at #2 with a $10,420 per-screen average in its second week of release. Martin McDonough's film is still expanding its release, so expect the averages to dip somewhat in the following weeks.

The weekend's top premiere was George A. Romero's Diary of the Dead, the inaugural release from Weinstein Company offshoot Third Rail Releasing. Romero's film, his fifth Dead movie to date, garnered a solid $6,549 per screen, and will expand to 10 more markets for the weekend of February 29.

Rounding out the top 5 were Cao Hamburger's The Year My Parents Went on Vacation (City Lights) and the self-distributed David and Layla. Also of note was Magnolia's program of 2007 Oscar-nominated Short Films, which finished #9 on the list. However, I find their figures more than a bit dubious, considering I had to pay separate admissions for the Animated and Live-Action programs.

Finally, Juno-watch! The movie that Roger Ebert called "his true love" finished just outside the top 10 this week, raking in $2,993 per screen, finishing ahead of last week's top wide-ish release, There Will Be Blood. Next week could see a bump in a number of current limited releases, depending on how the Oscars pan out. So hopefully we'll get a nice surge for PT Anderson, not so much for Diablo Cody and Ivan Reitman's kid.

Top 10, Weekend of February 15-17:
1. The Band's Visit [Sony Pictures Classics] ($11,267 per screen)
2. In Bruges [Focus Features] ($10,420 per screen)
3. George A. Romero's Diary Of The Dead [Third Rail Releasing] ($6,549 per screen)
4. The Year My Parents Went On Vacation [City Lights Pictures Releasing] ($5,430 per screen)
5. David & Layla [David & Layla, LLC] ($5,007 per screen)
6. 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days [IFC First Take] ($4,808 per screen)
7. How To Cook Your Life [Roadside Attractions] ($3,704 per screen)
8. The Business of Being Born [International Film Circuit] ($3,608 per screen)
9. 2007 Academy Award Nominated Short Films [Magnolia Pictures] ($3,605 per screen)
10. Caramel [Roadside Attractions] ($3,360 per screen)

Source: IndieWire.

It's Back! The Indie Box Office Roundup

Paul Clark — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Normally, Screengrab doesn’t go in for box office figures. After all, most of the movies that top the weekend standings are mediocre at best, and it gets downright depressing when you consider how many shell out their hard-earned wages for Meet the Spartans. Besides, the movies with the highest grosses usually play on upwards of 3,000 screens, so of COURSE they rake in the dough.

Better, I think, to use the yardstick of per-screen averages. Not only does this weed out the overhyped junk that’s playing to 25%-full houses in every mall multiplex from Schenectady to Sheboygan, but it allows some more interesting and esoteric fare to enjoy some time in the sun. And you all know how Screengrab is about esoteric fare. So, we've decided to bring back a feature from back in the day- The Indie Box-Office Charts. Then we decided to throw in the word "Roundup" after it was suddenly dropped from its regular Trailer Roundup gig. We felt so terrible seeing ol'Roundup moping around on the sidewalk in front of Screengrab Tower that we had to find it a job again, to keep it out of trouble and the like.

Moving on... this week’s per-screen winner was Focus Features’ In Bruges, the debut feature from Martin McDonough starring Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, and Ralph Fiennes. While we’re happy that the talented McDonough (to say nothing of Screengrab favorite Gleeson) looks to have an arthouse hit on his hands, much of the film’s draw comes from the name cast.

Of greater interest are the films that reside just below it on the list. Both #2 film The Band's Visit and #4 film 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days were unceremoniously snubbed by the Academy’s Foreign Language Film branch (albeit for different reasons), but it would appear that the controversies have only helped their grosses. 4 Months is a particularly interesting case- last year’s Palme d’Or winner, Cristian Mungiu’s film has also been released on IFC’s On Demand network, so who knows how much better it would be grossing if the big screen was the only option.

Rounding out the top 5 are a pair of single-screen releases: Pere Portabella’s The Silence Before Bach and Jia Zhang-ke’s 2006 Venice winner Still Life. The most widely-released film in the top 10 is Persepolis, currently playing on 125 screens. The wide (1,000+ screens) release with the highest average gross is There Will Be Blood, which is currently sitting at #13, pulling in $2,456 per screen on 1620 screens.

Top 10, Weekend of February 8-10:
1. In Bruges [Focus Features] ($16,330 per screen)
2. The Band's Visit [Sony Pictures Classics] ($9,642 per screen)
3. The Silence Before Bach [Films 59] ($8,814 per screen)
4. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days [IFC First Take] ($5,996 per screen)
5. Still Life [New Yorker] ($4,755 per screen)
6. Caramel [Roadside Attractions] ($4,319 per screen)
7. The Witnesses [Strand Releasing] ($4,260 per screen)
8. Summer Palace [Palm Pictures] ($3,410 per screen)
9. Bab'Aziz [Typecast Releasing] ($3,286 per screen)
10. Persepolis [Sony Pictures Classics] ($3,042 per screen)

Source: IndieWire.

Oscar Nominations: Is the Egg Showin'?

Paul Clark — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 16:00:00 GMT

So. . . what was it William Goldman said again? I suppose my predictions weren't too bad under the circumstances, but just like every other year, the Oscar nominations held plenty of surprises.

A full list of nominations can be found right here.

In no particular order:

- The almost total lack of love for Into the Wild. I figured that the acclaim for this true-life story, and the presence of Sean Penn — an actor they clearly love — in the director's chair, would make the film Academy catnip. Clearly, I was mistaken.

- On the other hand, they loved There Will Be Blood even more than I'd anticipated, looking past its darkness to see how flat-out brilliant it is (sorry, haters), giving PTA not only best director and adapted screenplay, but a best picture nomination as well. The Jonny Greenwood thing stung a bit, but the other technical nods — art direction, cinematography, sound design and editing — compensate pretty well. And Daniel Day-Lewis is looking pretty unstoppable for best actor at this point. All in all, Blood received eight nominations, tying it for the most-honored film with widely-acknowledged frontrunner No Country for Old Men.

- Atonement. Wait, this movie's chances for best picture were supposed to be more or less dead. Don't the voters read the prognosticators? Still, despite the film's considerable pedigree and handsome production values, Joe Wright was shut out of best director (in favor of Ivan Reitman's kid, no less), which leads me to believe this barely squeaked in. But you never know.

- Show of hands: who saw the best actor nod for Tommy Lee Jones coming? Certainly not me. I figured that he had a good chance for his supporting work in No Country for Old Men, but I'm surprised any of the voters actually remembered In the Valley of Elah. But I won't complain. As an avowed Crash hater, nobody was more surprised than me that Elah turned out to be pretty darn good, due in large part to Jones' great performance. I'll certainly take him over, say, John Travolta in a fat suit.

- The double dip for Cate Blanchett. Yes, she was a deserving nominee for playing the most fondly-remembered of Todd Haynes' menagerie of Dylans. But honoring Elizabeth: The Golden Age tells me that the voters ran out of suitable nominees. Lord knows I'm no fan of Angelina Jolie, but at least she tried to give a multilayered performance in A Mighty Heart, which is more than I can say about Blanchett in Nobody But Elizabeth Expects the Spanish Inquisition. Just. . . ugh.

- When I floated my best supporting actress theory — that in recent years, the great majority of nominees in this category appear in films opposite performers who also get nominated — I wasn't just blowing smoke. Seriously, look it up. But, probably just to confound me, the nominations bucked the trend this year, with only one of the nominees (Michael Clayton's Tilda Swinton) appearing opposite another Oscar nominees. Just as unexpectedly, only Clayton managed more than one acting nomination, wrangling three for Swinton, George Clooney, and Tom Wilkinson.

- Three out of five Best Original Song nominations went to Enchanted. Either they really love Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz or it was a really slow year for original songs. Probably both. At least they were smart enough to nominate "Falling Slowly."

- Hey, did you know that people made documentaries this year that didn't deal with the war in Iraq? I only ask because three of the five Best Documentary Feature nominees were Iraq-themed, with only Michael Moore's Sicko and the Uganda-themed War/Dance tackling different subjects. The biggest disappointment is the snubbing of Tony Kaye's exhaustive, empathetic abortion documentary Lake of Fire, by my estimation the year's finest non-fiction film.

- Finally, I leave you with four horrifying words: "Academy Award Nominee Norbit." Sure, it's for best makeup, and considering that the makeup branch loves the hell out of Rick Baker it would've been madness NOT to predict him. But think about it: Norbit, possibly the most reviled film of 2007, received more Oscar nominations than Zodiac, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, Knocked Up, 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days, and Control. . . COMBINED. Hard to believe, but the makeup branch has actually managed to outdo last year's Click nomination.

Trailer Review: 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days

Paul Clark — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 17:00:00 GMT

Normally, I'm not the biggest fan of domestic trailers for foreign films, but this is pretty striking stuff. For one thing, distributor IFC Films doesn't shy away from the subtitles, unlike most studios who want you to fool you into thinking they're advertising English-language films where the characters just aren't very chatty. But beyond that, the editing of the trailer does a good job at playing up the suspense element in the film. Having missed 4 Months at Toronto, I can't attest to how true the trailer is to the spirit of Cristian Mungiu's film (last year's Palme d'Or winner), but I do know that the premise of the film — two girls trying to procure an illegal abortion in Communist Romania — has a considerable amount of built-in tension. By spotlighting this tension, the trailer does exactly what a good trailer should, satisfying the people who are already interested in the film (that's me) while intriguing those who are as yet unfamiliar with it.

The Rep Report (November 2 - 20)

Peter Smith — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 17:00:00 GMT

NEW YORK: From November 2 through the 20th, Film Forum brings back Jean-Jacques Beinex's 1981 romantic comedy-thriller Diva, in a new 35 mm. print. As visually graceful as it is inventive, playfully witty, with actual if improbable characters pushing the plot forward, it remains an especially flavorful example of what used to be called "an exercise in pure style" from back before easy access to computer imagery and MTV syntax resulted in an explosion of would-be prodigies turning out movies that really are exercises in pure style. The new print is reported to also boast some new, improved subtitles. (The first time I saw the movie, on cable TV on my fifteenth birthday — I rode my brontosaurus to the house of my friend who had HBO — a single half-assed glitch in the subtitles served to completely screw up the plot.) If you haven't seen it before, nothing else you have seen can fully prepare you for it; Beinex himself has spent the last quarter century failing to follow it up.

October 30 would have been Louis Malle's seventy-fifth birthday, which makes this a good time to check out what may be his happiest masterpiece, the autobiographical 1971 comedy Murmur of the Heart. (I do not mean to suggest that there might ever be a bad time to check it out.) The Film Society of Lincoln Center will be showing it on November 1 as part of their "Young Friends of Film" program. Andre Gregory, who worked with Malle on two of his finest American films, My Dinner with Andre and Vanya on 42nd Street, will be on hand to introduce the film.

BERKELEY: Romanian cinema, believe it or not, is hot right now and getting hotter, so Pacific Film Archives is offering a handy primer in the form of Revolutions in Romanian Cinema (November 3 - December 9). The country produces fewer feature films than any other European country — half a dozen a year — but as Spencer Tracy used to say, what's there is choice. The schedule includes The Death of Mr. Lazarescu, the Cannes festival winner that really got the West paying attention, as well as the sardonic 12:08 East of Bucharest and the powerful recent New York Film Festival entry 4 Months 3 Weeks 2 Days. Plus five other feature films and a program of shorts.

The Pacific Film Archive also hosts The Passion of Pasolini (November 1 - December 7), dedicated to the work of the still-controversial Italian novelist, poet, and filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini. The series, which includes his adaptations of The Decameron, Arabian Nights, The Canterbury Tales and The Gospel According to St. Matthew opens with his 1961 debut feature Accattone; it closes with his scandalous last film, the 1975 Salo. Just keep telling yourself: it's only chocolate, it's only chocolate. . .

WASHINGTON, D.C.: The twentieth annual 2007 European Union Film Showcase opens November 1 and runs through November 20th at the AFI Silver Theater, showcasing a wide selection of new and recent films from across the continent. The opening night selection is Christopher Columbus: The Enigma, the latest by the startlingly prolific Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira. The director, who will be in attendance, turns ninety-nine on December 12. I just thought I'd put that out there in case you want to show up and give him his birthday card a little early.

— Phil Nugent

Whitefield at NYFF: 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days

Peter Smith — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 18:00:00 GMT

If there is one thing you can say for 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days, this year’s Palme d’Or winner at Cannes, it's that there's no debating the film’s effectiveness in recreating the living hell of obtaining an illegal abortion in late '80s Romania. Still up for debate, however, is why someone would feel compelled to make this film — and why an audience should force themselves to endure this truly disturbing piece of work. As bleak, anxiety-inducing and horrific as any movie I’ve ever seen, Cristian Mungiu’s grim procedural only adds tension with its interminable long shots, and doesn’t allow the viewer a single moment of relief. In a strange sense, that's a compliment, since tension is clearly the film’s intent. The performances, especially from Anamaria Marincaare, are admirable in their authenticity and complete disregard for vanity. But because of the desolation and utter joylessness at this film’s heart, I can’t remember feeling more relieved to see a credit sequence since Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible. The last line of the film translates to, "This is what we're going to do: we're never going to talk about this again." I'm guessing there are more than a few audience members who feel exactly the same way. — Bryan Whitefield