French actress-director Fanny Ardant, feted this week at the Transilvania Intl. Film Festival with lifetime achievement honors, said her latest role, portraying the free-spirited mother of a “square” son in “Ma Mere Est Folle,” presented her with a dilemma. “I have only daughters, not a son,” she told Variety, “so for me men are still a mystery.”
The production, directed by Diane Kurys and just wrapped following a shoot in Belgium and the Netherlands, is the story of a relationship between a mother with great imagination and “a very square boy.” The role gave the veteran actress a chance “to learn how to know your own soul,” Ardant says. Although her character shares much with Ardant’s life and work in stage and film, she explains that the only real way to grasp what raising a boy is like is to experience it.
Working with Kurys was a great experience,...
The production, directed by Diane Kurys and just wrapped following a shoot in Belgium and the Netherlands, is the story of a relationship between a mother with great imagination and “a very square boy.” The role gave the veteran actress a chance “to learn how to know your own soul,” Ardant says. Although her character shares much with Ardant’s life and work in stage and film, she explains that the only real way to grasp what raising a boy is like is to experience it.
Working with Kurys was a great experience,...
- 6/2/2018
- by Will Tizard
- Variety Film + TV
If there's anything more exciting than speculating on who will win a Nobel Prize in literature, it's placing actual bets on it. Your odds-on favorite for this year's honors, according to British gambling site Ladbrokes: Haruki Murakami, with ten-to-one odds! (According to the Times, Ladbrokes is pretty reliable for these sorts of things.) Murakami's followed by Chinese author Mo Yan (twelve-to-one), Dutch author Cees Nooteboom (twelve-to-one), and Albanian author Ismail Kadare (fourteen-to-one). Cormac McCarthy comes in with 16-to-1, Alice Munro with 20-to-1, Bob Dylan with 33-to-1, Margaret Atwood with 50-to-1, and Jonathan Franzen's alllll the way at the bottom with 100-to-1 odds. Place your bets, cats and kittens.
- 8/23/2012
- by Margaret Lyons
- Vulture
Stockholm -- Is it time for the Nobel Prize in literature to come from the east?
After last year's South American win and years of European dominance, many experts expect the Swedish Academy to do just that when it announces this year's winner on Thursday.
Many of the big names in Asian and Middle Eastern literature, including South Korean poet Ko Un and Syria's Adonis, have been mentioned as possible candidates for years, but still haven't received the prestigious, 10 million kronor ($1.4 million) award. The same goes for Algerian poet Assia Djebar and Israeli author Amos Oz.
"I know the academy doesn't think in this way, but I still feel it would be timely to give the prize to a Syrian poet during this period of uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa," said Maria Schottenius, a literature expert at the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter. She has Adonis as her...
After last year's South American win and years of European dominance, many experts expect the Swedish Academy to do just that when it announces this year's winner on Thursday.
Many of the big names in Asian and Middle Eastern literature, including South Korean poet Ko Un and Syria's Adonis, have been mentioned as possible candidates for years, but still haven't received the prestigious, 10 million kronor ($1.4 million) award. The same goes for Algerian poet Assia Djebar and Israeli author Amos Oz.
"I know the academy doesn't think in this way, but I still feel it would be timely to give the prize to a Syrian poet during this period of uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa," said Maria Schottenius, a literature expert at the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter. She has Adonis as her...
- 10/5/2011
- by AP
- Huffington Post
This weekend: sisters take over their family's alligator park in Swamplandia!, Allison Pearson visits the cruel fates of adolescent fandom, and the haunting novels of Albania's Ismail Kadare.
Into the Swamp
Related story on The Daily Beast: This Week's Hot Reads
Swamplandia!, the talented short-story writer Karen Russell's debut novel, gives us two more of those precocious children who overcrowd the last 60 years of American fiction. From J.D. Salinger's Glass children to William Gaddis' Jr to Jonathan Safran Foer's Oskar Schell, our literature has clamored with intellectually overdeveloped but socially stunted children. Through their eyes, we're traditionally afforded fresh perspectives-often poignant or satirical-on modern society. Swamplandia!'s unique twist is to present two youths who at first seem to be Everglades savants, but turn out to be just regular kids in swampy circumstances.
The children in question are 13-year-old Ava Bigtree and her older brother Kiwi,...
Into the Swamp
Related story on The Daily Beast: This Week's Hot Reads
Swamplandia!, the talented short-story writer Karen Russell's debut novel, gives us two more of those precocious children who overcrowd the last 60 years of American fiction. From J.D. Salinger's Glass children to William Gaddis' Jr to Jonathan Safran Foer's Oskar Schell, our literature has clamored with intellectually overdeveloped but socially stunted children. Through their eyes, we're traditionally afforded fresh perspectives-often poignant or satirical-on modern society. Swamplandia!'s unique twist is to present two youths who at first seem to be Everglades savants, but turn out to be just regular kids in swampy circumstances.
The children in question are 13-year-old Ava Bigtree and her older brother Kiwi,...
- 2/5/2011
- by The Daily Beast
- The Daily Beast
A worthy but somewhat less-than-satisfying follow-up to the Oscar-nominated "Central Station", Brazilian director Walter Salles and producer Arthur Cohn's "Behind the Sun" is a somber tale of a blood feud depicted as an endless cycle of ritual violence. Distributor Miramax can count on Salles' name to lure dedicated cineastes for limited engagements, but "Sun" is probably not destined for boxoffice or awards vindication.
Inspired by Ismail Kadare's novel "Broken April", set in Albania, Salles and co-writers Sergio Machado and Karim Ainouz have fashioned a widescreen period drama that holds one's attention but comes up short as a cinematic experience that will resonate strongly with all viewers.
Transporting Kadare's original to the Inhamuns Badlands in northern Brazil's Ceara state, "Sun" plays like a lengthy short story or a short novella stretched to feature length. There are a handful of characters and few plot points that entail long scenes. As with his previous film, Salles tells much of the story with minimal dialogue and proves again to be a very talented visual artist.
What's missing in the film is the one character who can command the same attention as the film's technical virtues, while the horrid atmosphere of dread that hangs over the film is predictably destined to be broken. One comes away from the film in perhaps a gloomier mood than was intended, however, because there is nobody to enthusiastically root for. It's more a case of just hoping one or two folk survive the carnage.
The Breves family was once a proud supplier of sugar in the desert-y nowhere they call home, but the decline began with the abolition of slavery, and now the reigning patriarch (Jose Dumont) is forced to drive the oxen himself at the old mill where the sugar is processed. A very hard man who proudly remembers his many brothers and uncles who died defending the family's honor, this nameless father has a 20-year-old son, Tonho (Rodrigo Santoro), who is next in line to gun down one of the hated Ferreiras family. Tonho's younger brother Ravi Ramos Lacerda), who doesn't have a name -- his father and mother (Rita Assemany) call him "kid" -- has nightmares of the latest murder that needs avenging, but he doesn't want his older sibling to become a killer.
Nonetheless, once the blood on the shirt worn by the victim turns yellow, Tonho is sent on his mission of assassination. He succeeds and must wait for his demise, prohibited from leaving by his psychotic father. Enter a wandering pair of circus entertainers, Salustiano Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos) and Clara Flavia Marco Antonio). The latter is a multitalented beauty who responds to Tonho's obvious infatuation, while her companion refuses to keep calling the younger boy "kid" and gives him the name Pacu.
A little romance and playfulness with swings and circus ropes provide an upbeat contrast to Tonho and Pacu's doomed-to-die-young fates, but it takes an unexpected tragedy and stronger-than-hate familial love to break the death cycle. Newcomer Lacerda, Dumont, Santoro and real-life circus performer Antonio are skilled at making their minimal characters fully dimensional, but the darkly atmospheric movie's biggest stars are Salles, cinematographer Walter Carvalho, soundman Felix Andrew and composer Antonio Pinto.
BEHIND THE SUN
Miramax Films
An Arthur Cohn production
Director: Walter Salles
Producer: Arthur Cohn
Screenwriters: Walter Salles, Sergio Machado, Karim Ainouz
Inspired by the novel "Broken April" by: Ismail Kadare
Executive producers: Mauricio Andrade Ramos, Lillian Birnbaum
Director of photography: Walter Carvalho
Art director: Cassio Amarante
Editor: Isabelle Rathery
Sound designer: Felix Andrew
Costume designer: Cao Albuquerque
Music: Antonio Pinto
Color/stereo
Cast:
Father: Jose Dumont
Tonho: Rodrigo Santoro
Pacu: Ravi Ramos Lacerda
Clara: Flavia Marco Antonio
Mother: Rita Assemany
Salustiano: Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos
Running time -- 90 minutes
MPAA...
Inspired by Ismail Kadare's novel "Broken April", set in Albania, Salles and co-writers Sergio Machado and Karim Ainouz have fashioned a widescreen period drama that holds one's attention but comes up short as a cinematic experience that will resonate strongly with all viewers.
Transporting Kadare's original to the Inhamuns Badlands in northern Brazil's Ceara state, "Sun" plays like a lengthy short story or a short novella stretched to feature length. There are a handful of characters and few plot points that entail long scenes. As with his previous film, Salles tells much of the story with minimal dialogue and proves again to be a very talented visual artist.
What's missing in the film is the one character who can command the same attention as the film's technical virtues, while the horrid atmosphere of dread that hangs over the film is predictably destined to be broken. One comes away from the film in perhaps a gloomier mood than was intended, however, because there is nobody to enthusiastically root for. It's more a case of just hoping one or two folk survive the carnage.
The Breves family was once a proud supplier of sugar in the desert-y nowhere they call home, but the decline began with the abolition of slavery, and now the reigning patriarch (Jose Dumont) is forced to drive the oxen himself at the old mill where the sugar is processed. A very hard man who proudly remembers his many brothers and uncles who died defending the family's honor, this nameless father has a 20-year-old son, Tonho (Rodrigo Santoro), who is next in line to gun down one of the hated Ferreiras family. Tonho's younger brother Ravi Ramos Lacerda), who doesn't have a name -- his father and mother (Rita Assemany) call him "kid" -- has nightmares of the latest murder that needs avenging, but he doesn't want his older sibling to become a killer.
Nonetheless, once the blood on the shirt worn by the victim turns yellow, Tonho is sent on his mission of assassination. He succeeds and must wait for his demise, prohibited from leaving by his psychotic father. Enter a wandering pair of circus entertainers, Salustiano Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos) and Clara Flavia Marco Antonio). The latter is a multitalented beauty who responds to Tonho's obvious infatuation, while her companion refuses to keep calling the younger boy "kid" and gives him the name Pacu.
A little romance and playfulness with swings and circus ropes provide an upbeat contrast to Tonho and Pacu's doomed-to-die-young fates, but it takes an unexpected tragedy and stronger-than-hate familial love to break the death cycle. Newcomer Lacerda, Dumont, Santoro and real-life circus performer Antonio are skilled at making their minimal characters fully dimensional, but the darkly atmospheric movie's biggest stars are Salles, cinematographer Walter Carvalho, soundman Felix Andrew and composer Antonio Pinto.
BEHIND THE SUN
Miramax Films
An Arthur Cohn production
Director: Walter Salles
Producer: Arthur Cohn
Screenwriters: Walter Salles, Sergio Machado, Karim Ainouz
Inspired by the novel "Broken April" by: Ismail Kadare
Executive producers: Mauricio Andrade Ramos, Lillian Birnbaum
Director of photography: Walter Carvalho
Art director: Cassio Amarante
Editor: Isabelle Rathery
Sound designer: Felix Andrew
Costume designer: Cao Albuquerque
Music: Antonio Pinto
Color/stereo
Cast:
Father: Jose Dumont
Tonho: Rodrigo Santoro
Pacu: Ravi Ramos Lacerda
Clara: Flavia Marco Antonio
Mother: Rita Assemany
Salustiano: Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos
Running time -- 90 minutes
MPAA...
A worthy but somewhat less-than-satisfying follow-up to the Oscar-nominated "Central Station", Brazilian director Walter Salles and producer Arthur Cohn's "Behind the Sun" is a somber tale of a blood feud depicted as an endless cycle of ritual violence. Distributor Miramax can count on Salles' name to lure dedicated cineastes for limited engagements, but "Sun" is probably not destined for boxoffice or awards vindication.
Inspired by Ismail Kadare's novel "Broken April", set in Albania, Salles and co-writers Sergio Machado and Karim Ainouz have fashioned a widescreen period drama that holds one's attention but comes up short as a cinematic experience that will resonate strongly with all viewers.
Transporting Kadare's original to the Inhamuns Badlands in northern Brazil's Ceara state, "Sun" plays like a lengthy short story or a short novella stretched to feature length. There are a handful of characters and few plot points that entail long scenes. As with his previous film, Salles tells much of the story with minimal dialogue and proves again to be a very talented visual artist.
What's missing in the film is the one character who can command the same attention as the film's technical virtues, while the horrid atmosphere of dread that hangs over the film is predictably destined to be broken. One comes away from the film in perhaps a gloomier mood than was intended, however, because there is nobody to enthusiastically root for. It's more a case of just hoping one or two folk survive the carnage.
The Breves family was once a proud supplier of sugar in the desert-y nowhere they call home, but the decline began with the abolition of slavery, and now the reigning patriarch (Jose Dumont) is forced to drive the oxen himself at the old mill where the sugar is processed. A very hard man who proudly remembers his many brothers and uncles who died defending the family's honor, this nameless father has a 20-year-old son, Tonho (Rodrigo Santoro), who is next in line to gun down one of the hated Ferreiras family. Tonho's younger brother Ravi Ramos Lacerda), who doesn't have a name -- his father and mother (Rita Assemany) call him "kid" -- has nightmares of the latest murder that needs avenging, but he doesn't want his older sibling to become a killer.
Nonetheless, once the blood on the shirt worn by the victim turns yellow, Tonho is sent on his mission of assassination. He succeeds and must wait for his demise, prohibited from leaving by his psychotic father. Enter a wandering pair of circus entertainers, Salustiano Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos) and Clara Flavia Marco Antonio). The latter is a multitalented beauty who responds to Tonho's obvious infatuation, while her companion refuses to keep calling the younger boy "kid" and gives him the name Pacu.
A little romance and playfulness with swings and circus ropes provide an upbeat contrast to Tonho and Pacu's doomed-to-die-young fates, but it takes an unexpected tragedy and stronger-than-hate familial love to break the death cycle. Newcomer Lacerda, Dumont, Santoro and real-life circus performer Antonio are skilled at making their minimal characters fully dimensional, but the darkly atmospheric movie's biggest stars are Salles, cinematographer Walter Carvalho, soundman Felix Andrew and composer Antonio Pinto.
BEHIND THE SUN
Miramax Films
An Arthur Cohn production
Director: Walter Salles
Producer: Arthur Cohn
Screenwriters: Walter Salles, Sergio Machado, Karim Ainouz
Inspired by the novel "Broken April" by: Ismail Kadare
Executive producers: Mauricio Andrade Ramos, Lillian Birnbaum
Director of photography: Walter Carvalho
Art director: Cassio Amarante
Editor: Isabelle Rathery
Sound designer: Felix Andrew
Costume designer: Cao Albuquerque
Music: Antonio Pinto
Color/stereo
Cast:
Father: Jose Dumont
Tonho: Rodrigo Santoro
Pacu: Ravi Ramos Lacerda
Clara: Flavia Marco Antonio
Mother: Rita Assemany
Salustiano: Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos
Running time -- 90 minutes
MPAA...
Inspired by Ismail Kadare's novel "Broken April", set in Albania, Salles and co-writers Sergio Machado and Karim Ainouz have fashioned a widescreen period drama that holds one's attention but comes up short as a cinematic experience that will resonate strongly with all viewers.
Transporting Kadare's original to the Inhamuns Badlands in northern Brazil's Ceara state, "Sun" plays like a lengthy short story or a short novella stretched to feature length. There are a handful of characters and few plot points that entail long scenes. As with his previous film, Salles tells much of the story with minimal dialogue and proves again to be a very talented visual artist.
What's missing in the film is the one character who can command the same attention as the film's technical virtues, while the horrid atmosphere of dread that hangs over the film is predictably destined to be broken. One comes away from the film in perhaps a gloomier mood than was intended, however, because there is nobody to enthusiastically root for. It's more a case of just hoping one or two folk survive the carnage.
The Breves family was once a proud supplier of sugar in the desert-y nowhere they call home, but the decline began with the abolition of slavery, and now the reigning patriarch (Jose Dumont) is forced to drive the oxen himself at the old mill where the sugar is processed. A very hard man who proudly remembers his many brothers and uncles who died defending the family's honor, this nameless father has a 20-year-old son, Tonho (Rodrigo Santoro), who is next in line to gun down one of the hated Ferreiras family. Tonho's younger brother Ravi Ramos Lacerda), who doesn't have a name -- his father and mother (Rita Assemany) call him "kid" -- has nightmares of the latest murder that needs avenging, but he doesn't want his older sibling to become a killer.
Nonetheless, once the blood on the shirt worn by the victim turns yellow, Tonho is sent on his mission of assassination. He succeeds and must wait for his demise, prohibited from leaving by his psychotic father. Enter a wandering pair of circus entertainers, Salustiano Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos) and Clara Flavia Marco Antonio). The latter is a multitalented beauty who responds to Tonho's obvious infatuation, while her companion refuses to keep calling the younger boy "kid" and gives him the name Pacu.
A little romance and playfulness with swings and circus ropes provide an upbeat contrast to Tonho and Pacu's doomed-to-die-young fates, but it takes an unexpected tragedy and stronger-than-hate familial love to break the death cycle. Newcomer Lacerda, Dumont, Santoro and real-life circus performer Antonio are skilled at making their minimal characters fully dimensional, but the darkly atmospheric movie's biggest stars are Salles, cinematographer Walter Carvalho, soundman Felix Andrew and composer Antonio Pinto.
BEHIND THE SUN
Miramax Films
An Arthur Cohn production
Director: Walter Salles
Producer: Arthur Cohn
Screenwriters: Walter Salles, Sergio Machado, Karim Ainouz
Inspired by the novel "Broken April" by: Ismail Kadare
Executive producers: Mauricio Andrade Ramos, Lillian Birnbaum
Director of photography: Walter Carvalho
Art director: Cassio Amarante
Editor: Isabelle Rathery
Sound designer: Felix Andrew
Costume designer: Cao Albuquerque
Music: Antonio Pinto
Color/stereo
Cast:
Father: Jose Dumont
Tonho: Rodrigo Santoro
Pacu: Ravi Ramos Lacerda
Clara: Flavia Marco Antonio
Mother: Rita Assemany
Salustiano: Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos
Running time -- 90 minutes
MPAA...
- 12/12/2001
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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