lifestyle TUESDAY, MAY 19, 2015

Cannes Film Festival Behind Cannes’s glitz, B-grade movies do booming TV trade ou’ve seen the movie “Black Swan”, ly agree with, is that it can cannibalize their but what about “White Swan”? Or market. But we would completely disagree, Y“Avengers Grimm”? Or “Darker because what would cannibalize their mar- Shades of Grey”? Or “Attack of the ket is a pirated movie of their movie,” said Lederhosen Zombies”? You won’t catch Rimawi. “We’ve all settled in an area where these features at your local movie theatre, we’re not too egregious. It’s clearly a differ- but they and other B and C-grade flicks are ent movie but there’ll be some word or doing booming business in the Cannes term that’s similar to the other ones.” market running in parallel with the film fes- The Asylum has a catalogue of 200 films tival. and makes around 15 a year, each with a Sales to television and video-on- budget of $500,000 to $2 million (436,000 demand companies are strong, with China Euros to 1.7 million Euros) and done mostly emerging as a key customer for the trashy in-house, with hired directors. Apart from niche, producers and distributors dealing mockbusters such as “Age of Tomorrow” with such films told AFP. Those in the sector and Mad Max-inspired “Road Wars”, it also are frank about what they’re selling. “I think makes its own zany horror movies, of which there’s really good independent movies “Sharknado” (killer sharks swept inland by a that deserve to be seen. And outside that tornado) is probably the most famous. there’s a bunch of crap,” said Lawrence Silverstein, vice-president for sales and China hungry for B-grade movies marketing at one Los Angeles-based outfit Other fare, driven by client demand- called Osiris Entertainment. often Japanese-includes “3-Headed Shark Silverstein pointed to a poster of “House Attack” and “Mom, Tommy Made a of Bad” on his stand (plotline: three fugitive Dinosaur”. A zombie series, “Z-Nation”, is sisters with a suitcase of stolen heroin hide showing on the US cable channel SyFy. out in their childhood home, haunted by Films made for TV and video-on-demand their parents) and said, “It’s not a great hor- (VOD) are the main outlets for this fare, ror movie, but it’s not bad.” (Reviews on the though occasionally distributors in small Internet disagree.) But he also showed a territories such as Romania pick them up teaser of a crowd-funded indie horror-com- for theatrical release. edy called “Clinger”, in which an accidental- The massive, recent shift away from DVD ly decapitated teen returns to stalk his sales to VOD has fragmented the market, (From left) US producer Jonas Rivera, US Chief creative officer Disney/ John Lasseter and US director pose during a photocall unrequited love. It looked well-paced and but the players are seeing signs of strong for the film “Inside Out” at the 68th Cannes Film Festival. — AP entertaining. buyer interest from Asian nations, especial- ly China. “There’s a big VOD market in ‘Mockbusters’ China,” said Douglas Price, CEO and produc- Other posters around the Cannes mar- er at D3 Telefilm, which is looking to get Pixar gets ‘Inside’ our heads ket, including one showing a Thor-like around Chinese quotas on foreign film superhero wearing a red cap and brandish- imports by co-producing with Chinese ing a hammer over the title “God of companies. “They have to understand that Thunder”, underlined a whole category in you have to bring more the niche known as “mockbusters”. These American/European actors into the movies- with latest animation knockoffs, made to resemble small-budget they can’t just be all purely Chinese,” he versions of Hollywood blockbusters, ride said. Although the Chinese co-producers ixar went underwater with “”, anything for anybody. But in the film they are strength to strength with “Monsters, Inc.”, the marketing slipstream of the originals to demand all distribution rights in China, that into the toybox with “” and now and that’s a fairly good way of thinking about it,” “Finding Nemo” and “”. In 2006, tempt people looking for something to “is no big problem for me,” he said. “They Pit’s going inside our brains with its latest, he told AFP in an interview. Producer Jonas Disney bought the studio for $7.4 billion. Under watch at home, not at the cinema. will give you the rights for around the “Inside Out”. The US animation studio, now part Rivera added that the team thought: “We like to the Mouse House, it came up with hits in the “We find a similar genre and hint at it in world, which to me I think is a good deal.” of the Disney empire, on Monday was present- make movies that have emotion, why not make form of “Ratatouille”, “WALL-E”, “Up” and “Brave”. the title,” said David Rimawi, a producer Certainly the appetite in Asia and the ing its latest cartoon feature at the Cannes Film one about emotions, right?” The English-lan- But in recent years, it has been in danger of and seller at The Asylum, one of the bigger Middle East for B-grade movies is buoying Festival ahead of a June worldwide rollout guage version of the picture features the voices being overshadowed by Disney Animation LA outfits in the sector. Naturally, the big the market. So much so, that-as the tagline expected to do big family box-office business. of “Parks and Recreation” star Amy Poehler, “Twin Studios, which made the top-grossing animation US studios aren’t happy, especially with for the snowbound Austrian flick “Attack of The film delves into the imagination-literally- Peaks” actor Kyle MacLachlan and the ever- of all time, “Frozen”. piracy also squeezing revenues. But the B- the Lederhosen Zombies” says-”it’s all by portraying human emotions of Joy, Anger, adaptable Hollywood actress Diane Lane. Cannes, therefore, is a prestigious fillip for grade merchants are careful to stay just on downhill from here”. — AFP Disgust and Sadness as distinct characters, who Pixar, and market watchers are seeing if “Inside the right side of the line of what constitutes sit at the control panel in the mind Cannes-friendly cartoons Out” can succeed in maintaining its profile a copy and what is sufficiently different. “Headquarters” of a young girl, Riley. Her mind- Although not in the Cannes competition for against the competition it faces-inside and out. “Their feeling, which we don’t necessari- scape also features “cities” representing her main the Palme d’Or, the official screening slot on the For Docter, being part of Disney is only positive. personality traits, and a maze-like memory bank. Riviera on Monday gives valuable and global “Disney, you know, when they bought Pixar, they Director Pete Docter (who also made the media attention to the movie. Other animations were like, ‘OK we paid a lot of money for these Pixar hits “Up” and “Monsters, Inc”) said the that have launched in Cannes in years past guys, we don’t want to break anything.’ And so anthropomorphic approach came from watch- include “Up” from Pixar, and “” and “Shrek 2” far, it (the studio) really has remained ing his own 11-year-old daughter Elizabeth and from rival studio DreamWorks. autonomous.” — AFP wondering what was going on inside her head. Pixar, founded by George Lucas and financed “Emotions are not really little people running by late Apple boss Steve Jobs, made a big open- around in your head-I hope that doesn’t spoil ing splash with “Toy Story” and went from Film Review: ‘Louder Than Bombs’ n the 35 years since “Ordinary People,” the neurotic academic) seems more well adjust- repeatedly putting herself in harm’s way as being American cinema has told and retold stories ed at first, having just fathered an infant son, worthier than whatever domestic satisfaction she Iof how a death in the family can reveal the though he clearly has no shortage of issues to might take from staying home, but rather the dysfunction no one wanted to admit was there. work through as well. kind that challenges the accepted modes of cine- “Louder Than Bombs” is just such a picture, Frankly, the sight of these characters coping matic expression. One clue (falling on the more studying how a widower and his two sons cope with Isabelle’s death isn’t nearly as rich or ambi- obvious side of things) presents itself when with learning the “circumstances” of the accident tious as another parallel theme that Trier and Conrad relays a lesson learned from his mother, that killed his war-photographer wife, but it also writing partner Eskil Vogt have opted to explore who taught him how changing the framing of a manages to be the opposite of nearly every other with the project: the issue of artistic ambition photograph can completely change its meaning- film in the genre. Directed by Joachim Trier, who’s and how committing to a creative career (or which invites us to reflect on what Trier has certainly gifted enough to have turned in a pas- abandoning it, as the case may be) shapes our cropped out of his own story, a contempo spin (From left) Actress Rooney Mara, director Todd Haynes, and actress Cate Blanchett sive-viewing tearjerker, “Bombs” asks audiences lives and the relationships we maintain with on James Agee’s “A Death in the Family,” com- pose for photographers upon arrival for the screening of the film ‘Carol’. — AP to bring their brains, eschewing grand catharsis loved ones. Isabelle put her work before her fam- plete with multiple re-enactments of the fatal in favor of subtle psychological nuance, resulting ily, presumably using its political importance to crash and a dizzyingly modern found-footage in a film that runs both slender and cold on the justify the addiction she felt to the front lines. montage. surface, but rewards the arthouse audiences will- Gene, on the other hand, started his career as an As conceived, “Louder Than Bombs” remains a Blanchett lesbian tale, Holocaust ing to give it a deeper reading. actor, but put that aside at a certain point in melodrama, but a curiously non-explosive one. Ever since Trier’s 2006 feature debut, “Reprise” order to focus on his wife and children, ultimately The fuses appear to be burning on the inside shocker lead Palme d’Or race (which landed him on Variety’s “10 Directors to taking a non-glamorous job teaching at the local here, as Trier focuses on the surviving Reeds’ Watch” list), Hollywood has been courting the high school (where he’s struck up a covert affair almost tragic inability to connect. Conrad shuts powerful lesbian love story starring Colin Farrell and Rachel Weisz in a story Norwegian helmer with offers to come and make with Conrad’s teacher, played by Amy Ryan). down Gene’s every attempt at father-son com- Cate Blanchett and a groundbreak- about single people sequestered in a hotel a film in the States. Switching to English is no Both of Trier’s previous features, “Reprise” and munication, including a desperate workaround Aing Holocaust drama emerged as and given 45 days to find a partner, or be trouble for Trier, who studied at the UK’s National the suicide-centered “Oslo, August 31st,” concern Gene attempts, going undercover in his son’s favourites as the Cannes Film Festival hit transformed into the animal of their choos- Film & Television School, although there remains themselves with tortured intellectuals who ques- favorite role-playing game. At first, Johan has the halfway mark yesterday. Critics are call- ing. something far more alien about the cinematic tion their own existence, vacillating between more encouraging words for Conrad, but then, in ing it a banner year at the world’s top cine- syntax and language he uses to express his ideas. whatever force drives them to create and the a horrifying conversation on the school bleach- ma showcase, with the selection of 19 con- Potential gems Strangely, “Louder Than Bombs” manages to equally compelling impulse to self-destruct. Early ers, we realize just how scarred and cynical his tenders for the coveted Palme d’Or top The darkly comic send-up of modern be glaringly obvious and admirably subtle in the on, the film identifies most strongly with Gene, older brother is. It’s as if all the trauma Isabelle prize filled with delights and surprises. love packed an emotional punch, with BBC same breath. Consider the title, which, apart from but in time, it shifts to each of his sons before took upon herself were passed on to her family, In an early stand-out, Todd Haynes’s critic Nicholas Barber giving it five out of being a reference to the Smiths’ classic compila- finally settling on Conrad. When we meet the kid, the battle scars she wears with pride internalized “Carol” features Blanchett as a wealthy five stars and calling it a “shrewd commen- tion album, feels like false advertising for such a he seems awkward and angry, although in time, by those who spent every day afraid she might 1950s housewife who falls hard for a bud- tary on the societal pressures we’re all quiet film, which is carried along by Ola Flottum’s by replaying a series of events through the char- die in the field. ding photographer (Rooney Mara). The under to form relationships, and the decep- low, trancelike score, yet is set so far away from acter’s perspective rather than his father’s, we see Those looking for a sexy in-the-trenches lushly shot period piece sees Carol, in the tions and self-deceptions some of us resort the front lines where Isabelle Reed (Isabelle that he, too, has artistic talent, as a writer-a career thriller would do better to track down “1,000 process of divorcing her businessman hus- to as a result”. Italian veteran Nanni Moretti Huppert) is out trying to change the world. Your for which Trier himself sometimes seems more Times Good Night,” in which Michael Haneke’s band, threatened with the loss of custody also drew high marks for his new picture, average picture may say a thousand words, but suited. After all, behind the pic’s highly technical other muse, Juliette Binoche, also plays a war of her young daughter on “moral grounds”. “My Mother”. one of Reed’s, snapped in hot zones around the framing is a literary-minded helmer who appears photographer. Here, it hardly matters that The film makes a strong case for equal Moretti stars alongside US actor John world and routinely landing on page one of the to view screenwriting as an extension of the Isabelle worked as a front-line shutterbug. That’s rights at a time when, as Blanchett noted Turturro in a semi-autobiographical film New York Times, is potentially powerful enough Nouveau Roman (or “new novel”) tradition, con- one of the few concrete details in a film that lacks after the screening, dozens of countries still about a director suffering personal and to have an almost nuclear effect. stantly bending the rules and toying with such much of the specificity that made Trier’s two pre- have anti-homosexuality laws on the professional crises that left many Cannes Obviously, such a career can ruin a person, elements as narrative continuity, structure and vious films so fascinating-and the photos he books. critics weepy as they emerged from the too, making it impossible to readjust to a society form in bold but always elegant ways. attributes to her so arresting. —Reuters Rapturous reviewers in this Riviera port giant Palais main venue. Audiences also that’s not only too calm, but too far removed In Trier’s hands, storytelling becomes a politi- town said “Carol” had already emerged as embraced Hirokazu Koreeda’s “Our Little from the action to raise awareness, creating a cal act-not the sort that sees Isabelle’s reasons for an Oscar favorite. Film industry bible Sister”, a gentle Japanese family drama domino effect where post-traumatic stress is Variety called it “an exquisitely drawn, adapted from manga, and the Italian-made, concerned. Huppert barely appears in the film, deeply felt love story that teases out every English-language “Tale of Tales,” a bloody haunting the edges like some sort of ghost, shadow and nuance of its characters’ inner Gothic fable starring Salma Hayek and John viewed slightly differently by everyone who lives”. The unflinching Holocaust feature C. Reilly. But in one of the biggest Cannes remembered her-precisely the sort of formally “Son of Saul” by Hungarian newcomer flops in recent memory, Gus Van Sant gar- intriguing challenge at which Trier excels, consid- Laszlo Nemes also drew rave reviews from nered howls for “The Sea of Trees” starring ering the way he shuffles chronology and per- shocked critics. Cannes watchers said the Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey as a spective. unique relentlessness of Nemes’s depiction man who travels to Japan to commit sui- For Times colleague Richard Weissman (David of a 36-hour period in the Auschwitz death cide. Strathairn), Isabelle represents a fallen hero camp could win over the jury led by US London’s The Guardian newspaper whose memory he seeks to honor by writing an filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen. called it a “fantastically annoying and dis- in-depth column timed to coincide with a French daily Le Monde said Nemes, who honest tear-jerker”. Always a potpourri of posthumous retrospective of her work-a story in lost several members of his family to the high art and big-money commercial fare, which he intends to reveal that Isabelle’s death gas chambers, said he clearly made the film the festival also saw the rip-roaring pre- was almost certainly a suicide. For Isabelle’s hus- to keep the history of the Holocaust alive miere of a new “Mad Max” blockbuster star- band, Gene (Gabriel Byrne), that deadline means for “the generations that soon will have no ring Charlize Theron and Tom Hardy. Scott having to re-examine his feelings toward his wife, direct contact with the witnesses who can Roxborough of trade magazine The as well as breaking the news to his sulky teenage share with them their memories”. Among Hollywood Reporter told AFP that the sec- son, Conrad (played by “Olive Kitteridge’s” prom- the more bizarre entries, which neverthe- ond half of the festival still had many ising Devin Druid). Meanwhile, older sibling (From left) Actors Gabriel Byrne, Isabelle Huppert, Devin Druid, Rachel Brosnahan and director less won ardent fans, was “The Lobster” by potential gems in store.—AFP Jonah (Jesse Eisenberg, once again typecast as Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos starring Joachim Trier pose for photographers during a photo call for the film ‘Louder than Bombs’. —AP