Movies

Like a beloved monarch, Alicia Vikander was greeted with an eight-minute standing ovation at the May 21 Cannes premiere of Brazilian director Karim Aïnouz’s “Firebrand,” from a crowd that included best actress Oscar winners Michelle Yeoh and Marion Cotillard. With her husband Michael Fassbender beaming on from the row behind, Vikander motioned for the cheering
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Oscar winner Jennifer Lawrence and her producing partner Justine Ciarrocchi touched down at the Cannes Film Festival on Sunday to promote their label’s first ever documentary feature, “Bread and Roses” — a harrowing and emotional look at the lives of women in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. After two decades of American occupation, the nation fell
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Romania’s culture minister Lucian Romașcanu is confident that the country’s beleaguered cash rebate system is back on track, insisting in Cannes on Sunday that the government is committed to “repairing” a scheme that has ground to a halt in recent years. “Everyone in politics, starting with the future Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu, understands the importance
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A bold departure from France’s cinema tradition of social realism, Thomas Cailley’s widely ambitious sophomore outing “The Animal Kingdom” is equally a creature-filled dystopia, an emotionally charged father-and-son drama and a coming-of-age tale. The character-driven film world premiered to warm reviews at the Cannes Film Festival where it bowed the Un Certain Regard section. “The
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Afghan director Sahra Mani‘s well-received “A Thousand Girls Like Me” documented the quest for justice of a young incest victim, and now, Mani has returned with a similarly hard-hitting documentary, “Bread and Roses”, premiering in the official selection of Cannes as a special screening. Produced by Jennifer Lawrence, this film tackles an urgent and timely
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Tudor, or not Tudor. That is the question in “Firebrand,” a revisionist royal portrait of Henry VIII’s last wife, Katherine Parr (played here by Alicia Vikander), that features all the pageantry you’d expect from a lavish costume drama, while showing the ahistorical audacity to call “Time’s Up” on the gluttonous king (Jude Law). Never mind
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After an illustrious four-decade career, Michelle Yeoh finally became an Oscar-winning actor just two months ago for “Everything Everywhere All At Once.” Yeoh says Asian performers were ignored for far too long, but she is hopeful for the future. Speaking during the Kering Women in Motion talks at Cannes, Yeoh reflected on the first time
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Spain’s Revelations showcase has focused on shorts, not features, unveiling the huge breadth of animation talent and techniques in Spain. Some shorts directors are already stars, such as Alberto Mielgo with the Oscar-winner “The Windshield Wiper.” Diego Porral, director of “Leopoldo From the Bar,” served as animation lead on “Love, Death + Robots” episode “Kill
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Adrian Wootton, CEO of Film London and the British Film Commission, will preside over the jury of the Malta Film Commission’s inaugural Mediterrane Film Festival celebrating movies from the Mediterranean Basin. The fest, which will take place in Valletta, Malta’s capital, and other locations on the island between June 25-30, will showcase films from each of
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“Fast X,” the 10th installment in Universal’s high-octane franchise, powered to $320 million worldwide, including an uninspired $67.5 million in its domestic debut. It secured the second-biggest global opening weekend of the year following another Universal title, “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” ($377 million). Even though “Fast X” arrived on the higher end of projections,
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Todd Haynes is the latest auteur to use Cannes as a launching pad for a potential Oscar contender, debuting his delicious dramedy “May December” at the festival on Saturday. Premiering less than one hour after Martin Scorsese’s 202-minute “Killers of the Flower Moon” conquered Cannes, the torrential downpour on Saturday night couldn’t keep many patrons
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Rio de Janeiro city authorities are looking to increase Rio’s cash rebate for international shoots launched last October by city org RioFilme with a 35% deduction rate on expenditure and R$15 million ($3.0 million) in total funding.  “We have on the table a proposal to double that,” Marcelo Calero, Rio de Janeiro city secretary of culture
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Robert De Niro blasted Donald Trump as a “stupid” man during the Cannes Film Festival press conference for “Killers of the Flower Moon,” comparing the former president to the twisted power player he portrays in Martin Scorsese’s crime epic, which premiered on Saturday night. De Niro admits he struggled to connect with William Hale, saying
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This year at Cannes Iran is being repped by just one film, the timely underground drama “Terrestrial Verses,” co-directed by Canada-based Alireza Khatami and Iran-based Ali Asgari, premiering in Un Certain Regard. Shot after the Mahsa Amini movement started, “Verses” consists of 12 tableaus depicting the increasingly absurd and tragic plight that Iranians face in
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Christopher Nolan has finally weighed in on the “Oppenheimer” runtime, confirming to Total Film magazine that it is his longest movie to date. The director’s confirmation means “Oppenheimer” at least runs longer than 2 hours and 49 minutes. That was the runtime on “Interstellar,” the director’s longest movie until “Oppenheimer.” Previous reports pegged the “Oppenheimer”
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Maxime Rappaz’s debut film “Let Me Go,” which plays in the Cannes ACID sidebar, has been sold to Brazil and Taiwan. The film stars Cannes regular Jeanne Balibar in the lead role as a fiftysomething woman torn between her family commitments and pursuing her own desires. Every Tuesday, a neighbor takes care of Claudine’s son
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“Prey” producer Jhane Myers has joined the “Will To Win” film production team as an executive producer. The film is a high school baseball drama featuring appearances by Hollywood pioneer Will Rogers (1879-1935). The lead character is a Native American teen girl who lives with her more traditional Native grandmother. When the softball team is
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The 2023 Cannes Film Festival is jam-packed with buzzy world premieres, from Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon” to Wes Anderson’s “Asteroid City.” Todd Haynes is also back to unveil “May December,” featuring the A-list pairing of Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore, while Disney is bringing Harrison Ford to the Croisette for “Indiana Jones
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Italy’s Intramovies has acquired global rights outside of Israel and France on Israeli director Dani Rosenberg’s Gaza-Strip conflict drama “The Vanishing Soldier.”  “Vanishing Soldier” is Rosenberg’s second feature after “The Death of Cinema and My Father Too,” which was in the official selection in Cannes 202O and won the Jerusalem Film Festival’s top prize. The
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XYZ Films has acquired North American sales rights to “StayOnline,” from Ukrainian director Anton Skrypets, which uses the innovative Screenlife format to tell the story of a young Kyiv woman who risks her life to help a boy whose parents have gone missing after the Russian invasion. “StayOnline” was co-written by Skrypets and Eva Strelnikova,
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In Britain, schoolchildren learning about Tudor history are taught a handy rhyme to remember the order of King Henry VIII’s six wives: “Divorced, beheaded, died. Divorced, beheaded, survived.” Hollywood has for decades been transfixed by the “beheaded” and “died” bits — essentially, the stories about women suffering — but what moviegoers are rarely reminded of
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Brussels-based company Best Friend Forever has acquired the international rights of Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir’s debut feature “City of Wind.” The film is in post-production and will be ready for a world premiere in fall 2023. Purev-Ochir is known for several high-profile short films, including “Mountain Cat,” which was in Cannes Competition in 2020, and won best
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Flawless, XYZ Films and Tea Shop Productions have acquired the Cannes Critics’ Week selection “Vincent Must Die” for all English-speaking territories from Goodfellas. Flawless, the pioneering film technology company and a leader in the field of visual translation, recently announced it has launched a partnership with XYZ Films and Tea Shop Productions to acquire rights
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Beta Cinema has closed the first deals on tragicomedy “One Last Evening,” the inventive debut feature film from up-and-coming German director Lukas Nathrath. The Munich-based sales agency discovered the film at the Locarno Film Festival last year, where it screened in the Works-in-Progress section, and took the main prize, the First Look Award. The film
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