Drama

Quote:
John Fowles’s novel The Collector was written in the form of a dual diary, one kept by a kidnapper, the other by his victim. The film is told almost exclusively from the point of view of the former, a nerdish British bank clerk named Freddy Clegg (Terence Stamp). A neurotic recluse whose only pleasure is butterfly collecting, Clegg wins $200,000 in the British Football Pool. He purchases a huge country estate, fixes up its cellar with all the comforts of home, then kidnaps Miranda (Samantha Eggar), an art student whom he has worshipped from afar. The demented Clegg doesn’t want ransom, nor does he want to rape the girl: he simply wants to “collect” her. She isn’t keen on this, and tries several times to escape. After several weeks, Clegg and Miranda grow increasingly fond of one another, and Clegg promises to let her go. When time comes for the actual release, however, Clegg decides that Miranda hasn’t completely come around to his way of thinking and changes his mind, leading to a further series of unfortunate events.Read More »

“Now Lars von Trier, one of Dogma’s founders, has used these techniques to produce a two-hour, semi-pornographic Mentos commercial.” – A.O. Scott, The New York Times

Lars von Trier is, to me, one of the most consistently intriguing media figures of the last few years. He’s so determined to carve a niche for himself in film history that he seems to be guaranteed one, at very least, due to his grandstanding. Critical reception to this self-proclaimed genius is certainly mixed. It’s not surprising that he is usually able to alienate a good portion of his audience before they even view his film. Others, like Scott, seem unable to get a concrete grasp on what they’re watching. For my money, the film is a masterpiece. Combined with his other 2000 U.S. release, Dancer in the Dark, von Trier has proven his self-proclamations of cinematic genius to be true.Read More »

Review from IMDB:

The Title, Sadly, Says It All, 23 October 2006
10/10
Author: gradyharp from United States

‘La Femme de Gilles’ (‘Gilles’ Wife’) began as a novel by Madeleine Bourdouxhe and was transformed for the screen by Philippe Blasband, Marion Hänsel and Frédéric Fonteyne who also directs this stunning and controversial art piece. Certainly one of the most visually magnificent films of recent years (cinematographer Virginie Saint-Martin) ‘Gilles’ Wife’ succeeds on every level: the story is unique, the direction is liquid and languorous, and the cast is superlative.Read More »

Story about gymnast Nadia Comaneci from her childhood beginning as a gymnast and how she was discovered by Belya Karolyi. Nadia received 7 perfect 10’s in the Montreal Olympics. The film follows her from childhood through the 1980 Olympics.Read More »

It has been two years since Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Dreamers revisited the incendiary events in Paris over May of 1968. Philippe Garrel recasts his own memories of this momentous period when students and workers almost toppled a government in a film that will have critics and audiences searching for superlatives. Les Amants réguliers is masterly in every respect. Garrel shot the film in black and white and very much in the film style of the day; we can literally feel Godard, Rohmer and Bresson looking over his shoulder. It has an unadorned sense of verisimilitude that captures the spirit of the sixties and the lives of the students who form the narrative’s core, balancing the contradictory idealism and nihilism of a generation trying to grapple with its restless ambitions.Read More »

Synopsis

reassurance.blogspot.com wrote:

La vie nouvelle, with its schizophrenic camera and piercing audio frequency, provokes a dangerous sensation. It pulsates like a tremor, as if we’re entering a universe after some unnamed, unmentioned nuclear disaster. While it’s easy to make visual association to familiar images of horror like Night of the Living Dead when the film opens on a dark pasture with zombie-like peasants, Salò; or The 120 Days of Sodom while a group of Russian criminals strip a group of beautiful youths naked or Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me as characters malevolently scream into the air, Grandrieux’s vision is wholly unique.Read More »

NY Times:
The notion that our sexual behavior is the purest expression of our deepest selves is delicately explored in “9 Songs,” Michael Winterbottom’s lyrical, graphically explicit chronicle of an ordinary love affair between two attractive people. The movie isn’t the first art film to show real as opposed to simulated sex, but it’s the first to scrutinize at length one couple’s bedroom etiquette in a search for their identities. If anything, “9 Songs,” conceived and directed by Mr. Winterbottom, the British filmmaker responsible for movies like “In This World” and “Welcome to Sarajevo,” that boldly enter the topical fray, proves that showing what people do in bed may not reveal all that much. The truth lies hidden in their minds.Read More »

The members of a British working-class family see their lives starting to come apart as the Nation prepares to celebrate Guy Fawkes Day (named for an anarchist who tried to blow up Parliament) in Michael Winterbottom’s drama Wonderland. Eileen (Kika Markham) and Bill (Jack Shepherd) are a married couple with four grown children. Bill has lost his job and is drifting through life, unsure of what to do. He’s also having sexual problems with Eileen, who is being driven insane by their noisy neighbors. Neither Bill nor Eileen have seen their son Darren (Enzo Cilenti) for a long time, and his birthday is a heartbreaking experience for them. (Darren, on the other hand, would prefer to celebrate his birthday by spending the night in a hotel with his girlfriend rather than seeing his parents.) Bill and Eileen also have three daughters, Nadia (Gina McKee), Debbie (Shirley Henderson) and Molly (Molly Parker). Nadia works in a cafe and has trouble meeting men; she’s signed up with a dating agency, but has yet to meet anyone she likes.Read More »

Making its debut with Romeo and Juliet on 3 December 1978, and concluding nearly seven years later with Titus Andronicus on 27 April 1985, the BBC Television Shakespeare project was the single most ambitious attempt at bringing the Bard of Avon to the small screen, both at the time and to date.Read More »