by Steve Murray | Feb 28, 2010
In the sweetest emotional exchange in "Fish Tank," a girl throws her arms around her big sister and sobs, “I hate you.”
“I hate you, too,” replies Mia (Katie Jarvis), with a fondness we haven’t heard from her before. A jaded 15-year-old, Mia is a foul-mouthed but open-hearted survivor of the rough coming-of-age trial that constitutes Andrea Arnold’s alternately bracing and contrived movie.
Winner earlier this month of a BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) award -- the Brits' answer to the Oscars -- for outstanding British film, “Fish Tank” sticks to the sort of bleak, low-income housing projects Arnold focused ...
by Steve Murray | Feb 22, 2010
One longtime criticism about the yearly Oscar donkey race is this: How can voters fairly compare the performance of, say, Actress A (who’s nominated for playing a regal Queen Elizabeth) with that of Actress B (playing a comical crack whore with Tourette’s syndrome)? They’re such completely different roles.
The whole apples-vs.-oranges issue is front and center with this year’s selection of the animated and live-action shorts nominated for Academy Awards. Gritty, sociological slice-of-life competes with urbane comedy competes with spooky after-school special. In other words, many of the 10 films emerge from distinctly different molds.
Among the live-action bunch, “Kavi” and “The ...
by Steve Murray | Feb 1, 2010
Claire Denis' “35 Shots of Rum” is the sort of movie that adventurous film lovers will feel almost required to love, so as not to appear too unhip to appreciate its fragmentary, Gallic cool. Both casually beautiful and willfully annoying, the latest from Denis (“Beau Travail”) throws us headfirst into the ethnic melting pot of a Parisian suburb.
Lionel (Alex Descas), a handsome, middle-aged black Metro conductor, comes home to his apartment, where younger, lighter-skinned Josephine (Mati Diop) affectionately cooks dinner while he takes a shower. You don’t really know who these people are, though they certainly seem fond/physical enough to ...
by Steve Murray | Jan 31, 2010
It was called the house that Quentin Tarantino built and was named for its owners’ parents, Max and Miriam. Now, after decades of delivering some of the world’s best films (and, yeah, some duds) into cinemas, Miramax Films has been shut down by Disney, the parent company that bought it from Harvey and Bob Weinstein back in 1993.
Most specialty movie divisions have been shuttered by their big-studio parents in the last few years. But the end of Miramax is truly the end of an indie-film era.
Consider some of the movies the company had a hand in since opening in 1979: ...
by Steve Murray | Jan 22, 2010
The long act of saying goodbye -- to a lost love, a family home, a way of living -- is central to “That Evening Sun,” a pungent, if slight, slice of Southern drama.
Hal Holbrook, fantastic in his tiny role in “Into the Wild,” from 2007, here takes on the lead role of Abner Meecham, a retired Tennessee farmer who decides, after three months in the old folks’ home, to pack up and move back to the old homestead. Problem is, his slick lawyer son Paul (Walton Goggins) has already leased the house to a fellow called Lonzo Choat -- the ...
by Steve Murray | Jan 12, 2010
It’s year 10 for the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival, one of the city’s welcome peeks into world cinema, with titles ranging from feature films to documentaries to animation. The festival runs Jan. 13-24 in various locations. Many screenings are already sold out. Act fast.
The strongest of the mere five movies (out of the festival's 40+) that I watched in advance was also the most challenging. Israel’s official submission for best foreign-language film at this year’s Oscars, “Ajami” (screens Jan. 16, 17 and 24; subtitled) is named for the neighborhood in Jaffa, itself now part of Tel Aviv. Indebted to the ...
