People starting the movie Spaceman would be forgiven for thinking that their Netflix had glitched. Yes, we do see Adam Sandler’s character Jakub dressed in a space suit. But he’s not floating through the cosmos. He’s walking through a wooded stream, the greenery of the trees and bushes reflecting off his mask.
What the heck does this have to do with being a space man, one might ask? By the end of the movie, directed by Johan Renck and written by Colby Day (adapting the novel Spaceman of Bohemia by Jaroslav Kalfař), Spaceman answers all your questions. Or rather, Jakub’s new friend, an alien spider named Hanuš, explains everything in the gentle, dulcet tones of Paul Dano.
Spaceman‘s strange, but ultimately clear, approach may frustrate some viewers. It may excite others, leaving them wanting to watch more sci-fi movies with a surrealist approach. Regardless of...
What the heck does this have to do with being a space man, one might ask? By the end of the movie, directed by Johan Renck and written by Colby Day (adapting the novel Spaceman of Bohemia by Jaroslav Kalfař), Spaceman answers all your questions. Or rather, Jakub’s new friend, an alien spider named Hanuš, explains everything in the gentle, dulcet tones of Paul Dano.
Spaceman‘s strange, but ultimately clear, approach may frustrate some viewers. It may excite others, leaving them wanting to watch more sci-fi movies with a surrealist approach. Regardless of...
- 3/4/2024
- by Joe George
- Den of Geek
When Paul Thomas Anderson went against the industry grain and cast Adam Sandler as the lead in his fourth feature, "Punch Drunk Love," many people in Hollywood felt the brashly talented filmmaker's ego had inflated to Welles-ian proportions. After the dazzling excess of "Magnolia" (which was more divisive at the time than it is now), there was a sense that he was provoking for provocation's sake. Outside of Steven Seagal, it's possible there wasn't a more critically loathed star in America — and it wasn't just the movies they hated. They detested him. They considered him a charisma vacuum who needed someone as irresistibly lovable as Drew Barrymore to render his presence in a film tolerable.
Anderson shattered these misconceptions. Though Sandler didn't dive headlong into dramas after "Punch Drunk Love," he'd take on a non-comedic part every few years and remind us of his untapped potential — which he fully realized...
Anderson shattered these misconceptions. Though Sandler didn't dive headlong into dramas after "Punch Drunk Love," he'd take on a non-comedic part every few years and remind us of his untapped potential — which he fully realized...
- 12/21/2023
- by Jeremy Smith
- Slash Film
Polish science-fiction writer Stanisław Lem is best known for his 1961 novel Solaris, which was adapted a decade later for the screen by Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky. The film would go on to be widely heralded as a classic of the medium, but Lem criticized Tarkovsky’s focus on human relationships over the technical detail and theorizing of the source material. The author’s work, then, is a particularly odd fit for a video game, as the medium often prioritizes action and instant gratification above all else. But with their adaptation of Lem’s 1964 novel The Invincible, Krakow-based developer Starward Industries very nearly succeeds at translating Lem’s work to gaming without losing sight of its density of ideas.
As a sly way of incorporating long stretches of sci-fi description, the game models itself on the back-and-forth radio conversations of Firewatch. The player character, a biologist named Yasna, is sent to...
As a sly way of incorporating long stretches of sci-fi description, the game models itself on the back-and-forth radio conversations of Firewatch. The player character, a biologist named Yasna, is sent to...
- 11/7/2023
- by Steven Scaife
- Slant Magazine
After several years in development, Starward Industries’ hard sci-fi thriller The Invincible will finally be coming home this November. Thanks to a new trailer, The Invincible will launch for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, and PC via Steam, the Epic Games Store, and Gog on November 6. In addition, those attending Gamescom this year will be able to play the demo of The Invincible.
Based on the motifs of the iconic novel of the same name by hard science-fiction author and Polish futurologist Stanisław Lem, The Invincible casts the player as Yasna, a sharp-tongued astrobiologist who is sent on a scientific mission to discover what lies on the dusty surface of the uncharted Regis III.
However, things turn dire when Yasna’s crew disappears, resulting in her having to search for them and bring them back “dead or alive”. Your task is clear: harness every atom-powered device at your disposal
and summon every molecule of your unwavering determination.
Based on the motifs of the iconic novel of the same name by hard science-fiction author and Polish futurologist Stanisław Lem, The Invincible casts the player as Yasna, a sharp-tongued astrobiologist who is sent on a scientific mission to discover what lies on the dusty surface of the uncharted Regis III.
However, things turn dire when Yasna’s crew disappears, resulting in her having to search for them and bring them back “dead or alive”. Your task is clear: harness every atom-powered device at your disposal
and summon every molecule of your unwavering determination.
- 8/22/2023
- by Mike Wilson
- bloody-disgusting.com
As the writers' strike pushes against Hollywood's embracing of A.I., one underseen drama, "The Congress," reminds us why humanity in filmmaking matters.
After months of speculation and failed negotiations, the Writers Guild of America put down their pens and went on strike this month. The entertainment industry has shifted exponentially in the past 15 years since the last WGA strike, thanks to the dominance of streaming services and changes in the residual process. One of the key areas where the guild is fighting for security is the growing presence of artificial intelligence in their field. In a list of their proposals, sent to the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), the WGA sought to regulate the use of A.I. in writers' rooms and wanted assurances from studios that it would not be used to write or rewrite material. They also want to block it from being used as source material.
After months of speculation and failed negotiations, the Writers Guild of America put down their pens and went on strike this month. The entertainment industry has shifted exponentially in the past 15 years since the last WGA strike, thanks to the dominance of streaming services and changes in the residual process. One of the key areas where the guild is fighting for security is the growing presence of artificial intelligence in their field. In a list of their proposals, sent to the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), the WGA sought to regulate the use of A.I. in writers' rooms and wanted assurances from studios that it would not be used to write or rewrite material. They also want to block it from being used as source material.
- 5/8/2023
- by Kayleigh Donaldson
- Slash Film
A Coenesque caper-gone-wrong and an interactive mother-daughter saga told in bite-size form, Xr titles “Kidnapped in Vostok” (pictured) and “Rock, Paper, Scissors” are among the 17 projects leading distributor Astrea picked up in a recent bout of acquisitions.
Both titles are playing in competition at this year’s NewImages Festival, while other recent Astrea pickups include the Stanislaw Lem inspired short “Cosmogonic,” the award winning interactive film “Glimpse” from Oscar winner Benjamin Cleary and VR designer Michael O’Connor, and all five episodes of the “Missing Pictures” series, in which filmmakers Abel Ferrara, Tsai Ming-Liang, Catherine Hardwicke, Lee Myung-Se and Naomi Kawase reflect on the dream projects they could never get made.
Rounding out the list of recent pickups are “Child of Empire,” “Evolver,” “Gondwana,” “The Mutek Collection,” “Norn Vol. 1: The Nine Daughters of Ran” and “On the Morning You Wake.”
The recent round of acquisitions caps a period of breakneck growth for the young distributor.
Both titles are playing in competition at this year’s NewImages Festival, while other recent Astrea pickups include the Stanislaw Lem inspired short “Cosmogonic,” the award winning interactive film “Glimpse” from Oscar winner Benjamin Cleary and VR designer Michael O’Connor, and all five episodes of the “Missing Pictures” series, in which filmmakers Abel Ferrara, Tsai Ming-Liang, Catherine Hardwicke, Lee Myung-Se and Naomi Kawase reflect on the dream projects they could never get made.
Rounding out the list of recent pickups are “Child of Empire,” “Evolver,” “Gondwana,” “The Mutek Collection,” “Norn Vol. 1: The Nine Daughters of Ran” and “On the Morning You Wake.”
The recent round of acquisitions caps a period of breakneck growth for the young distributor.
- 4/5/2023
- by Ben Croll
- Variety Film + TV
"The Simpsons" was not the first TV sitcom to parody pop culture, but it may have been the most ambitious one when it originally premiered. Some of its best episodes remake classic films with "Simpsons" characters. "Rosebud" recasts "Citizen Kane" with local wealthy despot Mr. Burns. "Bart of Darkness" puts child hellraiser Bart Simpson into Alfred Hitchcock's "Rear Window." Then there's the fan-favorite "Treehouse of Horror" episodes, which riff on classic horror films and television. A generation of young fans were given the "Simpsons" version of the canon before they even knew the source material existed. But that was not such a bad thing. At its best, "The Simpsons" is judicious in its pick of source material, and exacting in its detail. Characters in the show rarely just say, "This reminds me of a popular movie!" There's always a recreated "camera angle," a guest star or a deep cut...
- 3/25/2023
- by Adam Wescott
- Slash Film
Welcome to the return of Intermission, a spin-off podcast from The Film Stage Show. Led by yours truly, Michael Snydel, I invite a guest to discuss an arthouse, international, or experimental film of their choice.
For the fifteenth episode, I talked to The Film Stage co-founder/The B-Side co-host Dan Mecca about the ever-prolific Steven Soderbergh’s 2002 reimagining of Polish author Stanisław Lem’s seminal 1961 science fiction novel, Solaris.
Coming off a disparate and largely consistent run of projects, Soderbergh was and remains an unpredictable filmmaker who’s as likely to knock out a four-quadrant-blockbuster as an obtusely rendered conspiracy thriller throwback like Kimi.
Today’s conversation touches on Soderbergh’s ongoing fluency switching between different filmmaking modes and how those successes and failures inform both each other––and the exact timing of 2002’s notoriously poorly received Solaris. Coming after one of the most successful commercial and critical runs...
For the fifteenth episode, I talked to The Film Stage co-founder/The B-Side co-host Dan Mecca about the ever-prolific Steven Soderbergh’s 2002 reimagining of Polish author Stanisław Lem’s seminal 1961 science fiction novel, Solaris.
Coming off a disparate and largely consistent run of projects, Soderbergh was and remains an unpredictable filmmaker who’s as likely to knock out a four-quadrant-blockbuster as an obtusely rendered conspiracy thriller throwback like Kimi.
Today’s conversation touches on Soderbergh’s ongoing fluency switching between different filmmaking modes and how those successes and failures inform both each other––and the exact timing of 2002’s notoriously poorly received Solaris. Coming after one of the most successful commercial and critical runs...
- 3/1/2023
- by Michael Snydel
- The Film Stage
It’s been a good two years since we last heard about Starward Industries’ sci-fi thriller The Invincible, which was originally aiming for a 2021 release. Obviously that never happened, but the devs are still working away on the game, which now has a new trailer.
Entitled “Life on Regis III”, the trailer harkens back to those old-time newsreels, this one talking up the planet Regis III, and how “safe” it is. However, as these things go, you know that means very little.
Based on the motifs of the iconic novel of the same name by hard science-fiction author and Polish futurologist Stanisław Lem, The Invincible puts you as Yasna, a highly qualified astrobiologist sent on a scientific mission to discover what lies on the dusty surface of the uncharted Regis III. When your crew disappears, things quickly get out of hand, and the mind-boggling scientific phenomena that you experience throughout...
Entitled “Life on Regis III”, the trailer harkens back to those old-time newsreels, this one talking up the planet Regis III, and how “safe” it is. However, as these things go, you know that means very little.
Based on the motifs of the iconic novel of the same name by hard science-fiction author and Polish futurologist Stanisław Lem, The Invincible puts you as Yasna, a highly qualified astrobiologist sent on a scientific mission to discover what lies on the dusty surface of the uncharted Regis III. When your crew disappears, things quickly get out of hand, and the mind-boggling scientific phenomena that you experience throughout...
- 11/23/2022
- by Mike Wilson
- bloody-disgusting.com
Remaking a classic film is always a dangerous endeavor. If a remake tries too hard to capture the same tone as the original it can feel very repetitive, but stray too far and it's no longer the same story. There has been no shortage of terrible science fiction remakes in recent memory. "The Day The Earth Stood Still" from 2008 paled in comparison to the original because the 1951 version works as a grim warning about the dangers of militarism, while the remake is simply a generic alien invasion movie.
Similarly, 2012's "Total Recall" was a major disappointment. The advancements in computer-generated imagery somehow made the new film look less imaginative than the original, while Paul Verhoeven's 1990 film is still as awe-inspiring and exhilarating today as it was during its initial release. That doesn't mean that remaking a classic is never a good idea. A remake has the opportunity to enhance the visual sensibilities,...
Similarly, 2012's "Total Recall" was a major disappointment. The advancements in computer-generated imagery somehow made the new film look less imaginative than the original, while Paul Verhoeven's 1990 film is still as awe-inspiring and exhilarating today as it was during its initial release. That doesn't mean that remaking a classic is never a good idea. A remake has the opportunity to enhance the visual sensibilities,...
- 10/12/2022
- by Liam Gaughan
- Slash Film
Part of the fun of the science fiction genre is the way that some stories try to see the future. Sci-fi novelists have been hitting close to home since H.G.Wells predicted wireless communication, or when Stanislaw Lem imagined today's e-readers. Our favorite movies sometimes have a window to the future, too. A story is rarely completely accurate of course. The details rarely line up exactly. Although, it's still funny that "I Am Legend" nailed the promotional logo "Batman Vs. Superman" would later use.
Sometimes, the movies get close to a clear glimpse of our future — uncomfortably close — especially in the case of older, more pessimistic films. These predictions...
The post Sci-fi movies that accurately predicted the future appeared first on /Film.
Sometimes, the movies get close to a clear glimpse of our future — uncomfortably close — especially in the case of older, more pessimistic films. These predictions...
The post Sci-fi movies that accurately predicted the future appeared first on /Film.
- 7/3/2022
- by Margaret David
- Slash Film
Riding the high of a production-servicing boom, Estonia’s domestic industry has likewise shown no signs of slowing down. Here’s a roundup of top local productions in the pipeline, from producers who are searching for international partners in Cannes:
The Invisible Fight
Director: Rainer Sarnet
Producers: Katrin Kissa, Homeless Bob Production (Estonia), Alise Gelze, White Picture (Latvia), Amanda Livanou, Neda Film (Greece), Helen Vinogradov, Helsinki-filmi (Finland)
Sarnet, whose fantasy-drama “November” played at Tribeca in 2017, returns with a ‘70s-set kung-fu comedy about a guard on the Soviet-Chinese border who, after surviving a deadly attack, decides to become a monk but must continually prove along the way that he’s capable of becoming the enlightened man he set out to be.
Lioness
Director: Liina Trishkina-Vanhatalo
Producers: Ivo Felt (Estonia), Guntis Trekteris (Latvia)
The sophomore feature from Trishkina-Vanhatalo, whose debut “Take It or Leave It” was Estonia’s submission for the international feature Oscar,...
The Invisible Fight
Director: Rainer Sarnet
Producers: Katrin Kissa, Homeless Bob Production (Estonia), Alise Gelze, White Picture (Latvia), Amanda Livanou, Neda Film (Greece), Helen Vinogradov, Helsinki-filmi (Finland)
Sarnet, whose fantasy-drama “November” played at Tribeca in 2017, returns with a ‘70s-set kung-fu comedy about a guard on the Soviet-Chinese border who, after surviving a deadly attack, decides to become a monk but must continually prove along the way that he’s capable of becoming the enlightened man he set out to be.
Lioness
Director: Liina Trishkina-Vanhatalo
Producers: Ivo Felt (Estonia), Guntis Trekteris (Latvia)
The sophomore feature from Trishkina-Vanhatalo, whose debut “Take It or Leave It” was Estonia’s submission for the international feature Oscar,...
- 5/21/2022
- by Christopher Vourlias
- Variety Film + TV
French parable features a ‘red moon’ that provides Earth with fuel, but our last hope refuses a mission to destroy it
This ambitious French sci-fi parable has some quiet moments of beauty and poignancy, but otherwise it’s a long slog – and so bombastic, jejune and ill-considered that it feels far more drawn out than the 87 minutes running time would suggest. In writer-director Romain Quirot’s vision of the future, humanity has worked out how to mine an inexhaustible power supply from an astral object that happens to wander by; it is called, unimaginatively, “the red moon”. This heavenly body appears to be like the living, sentient planet in Stanislaw Lem’s novel Solaris, and our hero Paul Wr (Hugo Becker) can somehow sense that the red moon is quite cross with us earthlings for some reason.
That would appear to be why he refuses to fly a mission to destroy the approaching lunar body,...
This ambitious French sci-fi parable has some quiet moments of beauty and poignancy, but otherwise it’s a long slog – and so bombastic, jejune and ill-considered that it feels far more drawn out than the 87 minutes running time would suggest. In writer-director Romain Quirot’s vision of the future, humanity has worked out how to mine an inexhaustible power supply from an astral object that happens to wander by; it is called, unimaginatively, “the red moon”. This heavenly body appears to be like the living, sentient planet in Stanislaw Lem’s novel Solaris, and our hero Paul Wr (Hugo Becker) can somehow sense that the red moon is quite cross with us earthlings for some reason.
That would appear to be why he refuses to fly a mission to destroy the approaching lunar body,...
- 2/28/2022
- by Leslie Felperin
- The Guardian - Film News
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSAbove: Steve McQueen and his installation "Year 3" at Tate Britain. Steve McQueen will be unveiling a new installation, “Sunshine State,” at the International film festival Rotterdam as part of its Art Directions section, which is dedicated to "daring films, installations, exhibitions and live performance." This is McQueen's first major commission since "Year 3," which was exhibited at Tate Britain in 2019. Martin Scorsese has set his eyes on his next project with Apple: a biopic about the Grateful Dead, starring Jonah Hill as frontman Jerry Garcia. As Variety points out, Scorsese did executive produce a 2017 documentary series about the band entitled Long Strange Trip. For that series, he described the Grateful Dead as "more than just a band." Hill and Scorsese previously worked together on Wolf of Wall Street (2013), and a Coca-Cola ad for last year's Super Bowl.
- 11/26/2021
- MUBI
The series Stanislaw Lem Centennial is playing on Mubi in the US starting September 12, 2021.SolarisYou may have heard, the new global space race is on. Hardly a week goes by without an update about its latest stage. Jeff Bezos has gone into space as a tourist. We’re looking for life on Mars. China and Russia have banded together to explore the Moon. But if the world would just hit a pause button, and listen to the late Stanislaw Lem (1921-2006), whose centenary is being celebrated this month, we’d halt the interstellar dibs, and divert our limited resources to save the Earth first. Such advice might seem odd coming from one of the world’s great science-fiction writers. After all, Lem’s imaginary planet, Solaris, was a blueprint for humanity’s galactic appetites. But with Solaris, Lem actually issued a warning: We’re not fit to shoulder the grave responsibility of outer space exploration.
- 9/10/2021
- MUBI
Barry Jenkins has kept busy in quarantine, as IndieWire learned during an Instagram live discussion with the Oscar-winning “Moonlight” filmmaker last month. He’s been sheltering with his partner, fellow filmmaker Lulu Wang, and continuing work on “The Underground Railroad” series as best he can remotely. He’s also busily devouring movies, just like the rest of us, and the filmmaker recently shared eight movies he recommends streaming during quarantine with The Atlantic’s David Sims.
Among his picks is Steven Soderbergh’s science-fiction film “Solaris,” adapted from the Stanislaw Lem novel, currently streaming on Starz. The misunderstood, 2002 romantic drama follows George Clooney as a psychologist who gets more than he bargained for when he’s sent to outer space.
“Though it’s a sci-fi movie, it’s about these very simple human emotions between Chris [Clooney] and his wife, Rheya [Natascha McElhone],” Jenkins said. “In one moment, I’m thinking...
Among his picks is Steven Soderbergh’s science-fiction film “Solaris,” adapted from the Stanislaw Lem novel, currently streaming on Starz. The misunderstood, 2002 romantic drama follows George Clooney as a psychologist who gets more than he bargained for when he’s sent to outer space.
“Though it’s a sci-fi movie, it’s about these very simple human emotions between Chris [Clooney] and his wife, Rheya [Natascha McElhone],” Jenkins said. “In one moment, I’m thinking...
- 5/2/2020
- by Ryan Lattanzio
- Indiewire
The most defining and far-reaching decision made by German Chancellor Angela Merkel during her 15 years in office is the focus of a new film making its debut at Berlin’s European Film Market.
“Merkel — Anatomy of a Crisis,” directed by Stephen Wagner, stars Imogen Kogge as the German leader during the dramatic days leading up to her decision in 2015 to allow nearly a million refugees, mostly from war-torn Syria, to enter Germany.
“We can consider this the most important political weeks of Angela Merkel’s life as chancellor,” says Alexander van Dülmen, who produced the film with Wagner via their Potsdam-based company Carte Blanche International.
Penned by Florian Oeller, “Merkel” is based on journalist Robin Alexander’s 2017 bestselling book “The Driven Ones” (“Die Getriebenen”) and examines the political wrangling among Merkel’s cabinet members and European actors like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán as they struggle to deal with a...
“Merkel — Anatomy of a Crisis,” directed by Stephen Wagner, stars Imogen Kogge as the German leader during the dramatic days leading up to her decision in 2015 to allow nearly a million refugees, mostly from war-torn Syria, to enter Germany.
“We can consider this the most important political weeks of Angela Merkel’s life as chancellor,” says Alexander van Dülmen, who produced the film with Wagner via their Potsdam-based company Carte Blanche International.
Penned by Florian Oeller, “Merkel” is based on journalist Robin Alexander’s 2017 bestselling book “The Driven Ones” (“Die Getriebenen”) and examines the political wrangling among Merkel’s cabinet members and European actors like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán as they struggle to deal with a...
- 2/24/2020
- by Ed Meza
- Variety Film + TV
A journalist attempts to track down his scientist father in this trippy adaptation of the Stanislaw Lem science fiction classic, His Master's Voice. Péter (Csaba Polgár) is a thirty-something on the cusp of fatherhood, but an incredibly fraught relationship with his own Dad sends him on a journey around the world to try and track down the man who disappeared decades ago, leaving Péter and his brother Zsolt (Ádám Fekete) to wonder what became of him. What begins as a simple story of a man looking for his father, and by extension his own roots, quickly morphs into an incredibly complex conspiracy thriller in this bizarre adaptation of an already complex literary work. Director György Pálfi is well known in the arthouse world for having created some of the...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 10/9/2019
- Screen Anarchy
Instead of births, Althusser seeks unforeseen and stupefying eruptions. Autobiography becomes a kind of science fiction. Philip K. Dick might have dreamed up these memoirs without memory, without genesis or origin. More than a philosopher’s account of his life, replicants with mnemonic implants come to mind – as do the vertiginous temporalities that provide the framework for novels such as Ubik and The Man in the High Castle. This conception of temporality extending from future to the past – where the origins amounts to either a lure or an agent of chaos – evokes Dick’s theories, according to which the commonplace understanding of History is only a fiction, and the world we inhabit just one version of reality among others.—Nicolas Bourriaud, The ExformGyörgy Pálfi thrives on low budgets. Rather than a masochistic personal choice intended to sharpen his artistic sensibilities, the tight purse strings are more the result of limited...
- 8/1/2019
- MUBI
With immense style and audacity, Steven Soderbergh has done well to create a remake of the original Solaris Movie. Set in Russia cinema landmarks, he has mentioned that this should not be seen as a copy of Andrei Tarkovsky 1972 version of the movie, but a new version of the 1961 bestselling novel by Stanislaw Lem. In fact, every frame does well to show that this movie has somewhat drawn insights from Tarkovsky, and some inspiration the initial film by Tarkovsky which was known as Kubrick 2001. In this movie, George Clooney takes on the character of Chris Kelvin, who
Why “Solaris” Sets the Standard for Movie Remakes...
Why “Solaris” Sets the Standard for Movie Remakes...
- 8/16/2017
- by Nat Berman
- TVovermind.com
For the discerning science fiction fan, this is the best of the Eastern-bloc Cold War Sci-fi epics, a genuinely brilliant and warmly human ‘Voyage to the End of the Universe,’ restored in 4k resolution. It’s from before 2001: A Space Odyssey, and has an equally wondrous but totally different vision of the future.
Ikarie Xb 1
Blu-ray
Nfa (Czechoslovak National Film Archive)
1963 / B&W / 2:35 widescreen / 88 min. / Street Date March, 2017
Starring: Radovan Lukavský, Zdenek Stepánek, Frantisek Smolík, Otto Lackovic, Irena Kacírková Dana Medrická
Cinematography: Jan Kalis, Sasa Rasilov
Production Designer: Jan Zázvorka
Special Effects: Jan Kalis
Film Editor: Josef Dobrichovský
Original Music: Zdenek Liska
Written by Jindrich Polák and Pavel Jurácek, adapted from the novel The Magellanic Cloud by Stanislaus Lem.
Produced by Filmové Studio Barrandov
Directed by Jindrich Polák
The trailer for the new restoration of Ikarie Xb 1 (no hyphen) pretty much tells the story. A shot...
Ikarie Xb 1
Blu-ray
Nfa (Czechoslovak National Film Archive)
1963 / B&W / 2:35 widescreen / 88 min. / Street Date March, 2017
Starring: Radovan Lukavský, Zdenek Stepánek, Frantisek Smolík, Otto Lackovic, Irena Kacírková Dana Medrická
Cinematography: Jan Kalis, Sasa Rasilov
Production Designer: Jan Zázvorka
Special Effects: Jan Kalis
Film Editor: Josef Dobrichovský
Original Music: Zdenek Liska
Written by Jindrich Polák and Pavel Jurácek, adapted from the novel The Magellanic Cloud by Stanislaus Lem.
Produced by Filmové Studio Barrandov
Directed by Jindrich Polák
The trailer for the new restoration of Ikarie Xb 1 (no hyphen) pretty much tells the story. A shot...
- 7/4/2017
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
Stars: Donatas Banionis, Natalya Bondarchuk, Anatoli Solonitsyn, Jüri Järvet | Written by Andrei Tarkovsky; Fridrikh Gorenshtein | Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky
It’s Will Self’s favourite movie, it spawned a good remake which barely nudged the box office, and it has been described as the Soviet answer to 2001: A Space Odyssey. It combines the laid-back, character-based storytelling of the French New Wave with the trippy impulses of late-60s psychedelia. It is a true cult movie, one which played for decades in Soviet cinemas. But what is Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris actually like to watch? I hesitate to call it a blast – but I would call it beautiful, dense, mesmerising and moving.
On the surface, Kubrick’s 1968 film and Tarkovsky’s 1972 film couldn’t be more different in their approaches (something Tarkovsky himself was keen to point out). While 2001 looks proudly outward, Solaris delves inward, deeply and directly. But what...
It’s Will Self’s favourite movie, it spawned a good remake which barely nudged the box office, and it has been described as the Soviet answer to 2001: A Space Odyssey. It combines the laid-back, character-based storytelling of the French New Wave with the trippy impulses of late-60s psychedelia. It is a true cult movie, one which played for decades in Soviet cinemas. But what is Andrei Tarkovsky’s Solaris actually like to watch? I hesitate to call it a blast – but I would call it beautiful, dense, mesmerising and moving.
On the surface, Kubrick’s 1968 film and Tarkovsky’s 1972 film couldn’t be more different in their approaches (something Tarkovsky himself was keen to point out). While 2001 looks proudly outward, Solaris delves inward, deeply and directly. But what...
- 4/18/2017
- by Rupert Harvey
- Nerdly
Ryan Lambie Jul 7, 2016
Marred by a troubled production, Event Horizon was a box office flop in 1997. But time has been kind to the sci-fi horror, Ryan writes...
In the spring of 1997, movie journalism was dominated by discussions of doomed ships. James Cameron’s Titanic, originally scheduled for the lucrative 4th July slot that summer, had suffered yet another delay. It added fuel to the growing speculation that Cameron was at the helm of a potential disaster akin to Heaven's Gate. The cost of making the movie had swollen to such huge levels - $200m according to some accounts, and possibly higher according to others - that the financial burden was shouldered by two of Hollywood’s biggest studios, Fox and Paramount.
Speaking to the La Times in April that year, Titanic’s first assistant director Sebastian Silva admitted that “The horror stories are true” - referring to the news of an unhappy cast and crew,...
Marred by a troubled production, Event Horizon was a box office flop in 1997. But time has been kind to the sci-fi horror, Ryan writes...
In the spring of 1997, movie journalism was dominated by discussions of doomed ships. James Cameron’s Titanic, originally scheduled for the lucrative 4th July slot that summer, had suffered yet another delay. It added fuel to the growing speculation that Cameron was at the helm of a potential disaster akin to Heaven's Gate. The cost of making the movie had swollen to such huge levels - $200m according to some accounts, and possibly higher according to others - that the financial burden was shouldered by two of Hollywood’s biggest studios, Fox and Paramount.
Speaking to the La Times in April that year, Titanic’s first assistant director Sebastian Silva admitted that “The horror stories are true” - referring to the news of an unhappy cast and crew,...
- 7/5/2016
- Den of Geek
It’s a common image in cinema: a beautiful, but vulnerable woman entering a cold and unforgiving world, where good bone-structure and talent become dangerously interchangeable. While navigating the leering male gaze and sometimes heartless competition of female peers, she also must do battle with her own insecurities and self-doubts, all of which can be seemingly cured with the miraculous kiss of success. But for some, that success can lead directly to their downfall. Sometimes, the consequences can even be lethal, the adversary too ruthless to be conquered, and the beauty is left to rust in tragic defeat. And sometimes, it’s more painfully simple. They merely want to cut the poor girl’s throat.
The Neon Demon, the spellbinding new film from director Nicolas Winding Refn, is now playing in theaters nationwide. The plot follows Jesse (Elle Fanning) a 16-year-old girl who arrives in Hollywood with dreams of becoming a successful model.
The Neon Demon, the spellbinding new film from director Nicolas Winding Refn, is now playing in theaters nationwide. The plot follows Jesse (Elle Fanning) a 16-year-old girl who arrives in Hollywood with dreams of becoming a successful model.
- 6/30/2016
- by Tony Hinds
- The Film Stage
The world is about to get a little bit stranger and I could not be more excited. Taxidermia, Free Fall and Hukkle director Gyorgy Palfi has won an intensely loyal cadre of fans around the globe with his work to date - work that is often challenging, frequently outrageous and never ever boring - and he looks poised to reach his largest audience yet with his first English language work due to begin principal photography on July 18. Titled simply The Voice, Paly's next is an adaptation of Stanislaw Lem's 1968 novel His Master's Voice and will be by far the largest scale production Palfi has engaged in to date. Cineuropa pitches the story like this: The plot follows a thirty-something Hungarian journalist who has...
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[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
- 5/31/2016
- Screen Anarchy
What horrors will we find on the planet Yoo-rah-nuss? A cyclopean dinosaur? Nasty spider monsters? A megalomaniac cerebellum that can turn our X-rated sex fantasies into flesh and blood people? Let's go! Sid Pink's flashy and slightly idiotic adventure stars space cadet John Agar as an average guy willing to have sex with a phantom from his own imagination. Say, doesn't Woody Allen make dirty jokes about that? Journey to the Seventh Planet Blu-ray Kl Studio Classics 1962 / Color / 1:66 widescreen / 77 min. / Street Date April 5, 2016 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95 Starring John Agar, Carl Ottosen, Ann Smyrner, Greta Thyssen, Peter Monch, Ove Sprogoe, Louis Miehe-Renard, Ulla Moritz, Mimi Heinrich, Annie Birgit Garde. Cinematography Aage Wiltrup Visual Effects Krogh, Wah Chang, Jim Danforth, Ronny Scheemmel. Art Director Otto Lund Editor Tove Palsbo Original Music Jerry Capeheart, Ib Glindemann, Mitchell Tableporte Written by Ib Melchior & Sid Pink Produced by Samuel Z. Arkoff & Sid Pink...
- 4/2/2016
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
“There is in every one of us, even those who seem to be most moderate, a type of desire that is terrible, wild, and lawless.”—The Republic, Book IX 572bWhat’s the best way to describe the mania of an Andrzej Żuławski film? William Grimes, eulogizing Żuławski for The New York Times chose “emotionally savage.” J. Hoberman used “hyperkinetic,” “frenzied,” and “‘awful’ in its root sense of inspiring dread. Daniel Bird, writing about the most recent Lincoln Center screenings in New York, chose “deeply disturbing.” These descriptors make perfect sense after experiencing a Żuławski film, but I’ve never been able to sell his films to a newcomer this way. How could I? They’re much too primal for adjectives in our delicate English language, crafted to communicate Enlightenment-era ideas in a pleasing series of vibrations. The intensity of this director’s films could only be described in some sort of ancient Lovecraftian squelching,...
- 3/28/2016
- by Zach Lewis
- MUBI
To paraphrase Jean-Luc Godard, the best way to criticize a movie is to make a movie. This is exactly what Andrei Tarkovsky did when he made “Solaris,” which came out in 1972, four years after Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece “2001: A Space Odyssey.” Surely, Tarkovsky adapted Stanislaw Lem’s novel for a number of different reasons, but the video essay below demonstrates the many ways “Solaris” acts as almost a conscious reaction against the Kubrick film. Read More: Quentin Tarantino Compares 'Interstellar' To Andrei Tarkovsky & Terrence Malick The essay, put together by Kogonada, highlights Tarkovsky’s aim to place the focus on humanity instead of technology. As the video’s narrator points out, Tarkovsky spends little time on the protagonist’s physical journey through space, instead placing a great amount of emphasis on the psychology of these characters and their connection to Earth. Another way Tarkovsky explores the nature of humanity is through love.
- 8/11/2015
- by Ken Guidry
- The Playlist
The Surface #2
Writer – Ales Kot
Artist – Langdon Foss
Colourist – Jordie Bellaire
Letterer – Clayton Cowles
Publisher – Image Comics
There is this creeping feeling expressed as you make your way through The Surface #2, as if the creative team has somehow found a way to experience the surreal minus the substance abuse. The Surface began and is firmly making its imprint as a modern day simulacrum of a cautionary tale, while also being aware of how satirical and meta it is being. There are moments of absurdist humour as well, such as the rubik’s cube hanging from a tree and the group of bugs engaging in coitus while one of them stands up holding a boom box that can only aptly be named John Beesack.
One of the great stand out moments from this issue occurs when a soccer ball appears out of nowhere, knocking into one of the main characters, Mark.
Writer – Ales Kot
Artist – Langdon Foss
Colourist – Jordie Bellaire
Letterer – Clayton Cowles
Publisher – Image Comics
There is this creeping feeling expressed as you make your way through The Surface #2, as if the creative team has somehow found a way to experience the surreal minus the substance abuse. The Surface began and is firmly making its imprint as a modern day simulacrum of a cautionary tale, while also being aware of how satirical and meta it is being. There are moments of absurdist humour as well, such as the rubik’s cube hanging from a tree and the group of bugs engaging in coitus while one of them stands up holding a boom box that can only aptly be named John Beesack.
One of the great stand out moments from this issue occurs when a soccer ball appears out of nowhere, knocking into one of the main characters, Mark.
- 4/9/2015
- by Anthony Spataro
- SoundOnSight
Drafthouse Films' Obscure Objects of Desire (or Drafthouse Food if you must) is a new regular column assessing the home cinema releases from the Austin-based distributor.Ari Folman's follow-up to his animated Oscar-nominated documentary, Waltz With Bashir, is a loose adaptation of Polish author Stanislav Lem's mind-bending novel The Futurological Congress, transplanting the action from a futuristic Costa Rica to an all-too believable modern-day Hollywood. Arriving on Blu-ray in the Us courtesy of Drafthouse Films, The Congress stars Robin Wright as a thinly fictionalised version of herself, who has struggled to move past early successes in films like The Princess Bride and Forrest Gump as she enters middle-age. Realising her career is coming to an end, Wright reluctantly accepts an offer from Danny Huston's studio head to...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...
- 2/10/2015
- Screen Anarchy
★★★★☆
Director Ari Folman follows up the daring Waltz with Bashir (2008) with an adaptation of Stanislaw Lem’s novel The Futurological Congress, through which he explores the darker side of Hollywood and the human psyche. Robin Wright (playing a version of herself) is an ageing actress - in a world obsessed with youth, beauty and celebrity - given the chance to extend her career’s longevity in exchange for something very precious. The Congress (2013) is be mind-bending fare but the concepts are scarily feasible. Wright (the character) has made so many bad decisions in her career, that she is on her last chance. Her agent (Harvey Keitel) implores her to take one final job, a twenty year contract.
Director Ari Folman follows up the daring Waltz with Bashir (2008) with an adaptation of Stanislaw Lem’s novel The Futurological Congress, through which he explores the darker side of Hollywood and the human psyche. Robin Wright (playing a version of herself) is an ageing actress - in a world obsessed with youth, beauty and celebrity - given the chance to extend her career’s longevity in exchange for something very precious. The Congress (2013) is be mind-bending fare but the concepts are scarily feasible. Wright (the character) has made so many bad decisions in her career, that she is on her last chance. Her agent (Harvey Keitel) implores her to take one final job, a twenty year contract.
- 12/9/2014
- by CineVue UK
- CineVue
We talk to director Ari Folman about Waltz With Bashir, The Congress, his Anne Frank film, and his love of sci-fi, Nolan and Kubrick...
Israeli filmmaker Ari Folman fused poetic animation with brutal reality in his breakout 2008 film Waltz With Bashir, a personal account of the Lebanese conflict of the early 1980s. The Congress, based on the book The Futurological Congress by Solaris author Stanislaw Lem, is an altogether different animal, though it treads a similar line between dreamlike animation and unvarnished reality.
Robin Wright plays a 40-something Hollywood actress (loosely based on her own career) whose advancing years and capricious nature have made new jobs increasingly difficult to come by. Pressured by both her agent (Harvey Keitel) and a shark-like executive (Danny Huston) at Tinseltown studio Miramount, Wright agrees to have her likeness scanned into a computer. Afterwards, the younger, idealised CG version of Robin will appear in movies (but not science fiction,...
Israeli filmmaker Ari Folman fused poetic animation with brutal reality in his breakout 2008 film Waltz With Bashir, a personal account of the Lebanese conflict of the early 1980s. The Congress, based on the book The Futurological Congress by Solaris author Stanislaw Lem, is an altogether different animal, though it treads a similar line between dreamlike animation and unvarnished reality.
Robin Wright plays a 40-something Hollywood actress (loosely based on her own career) whose advancing years and capricious nature have made new jobs increasingly difficult to come by. Pressured by both her agent (Harvey Keitel) and a shark-like executive (Danny Huston) at Tinseltown studio Miramount, Wright agrees to have her likeness scanned into a computer. Afterwards, the younger, idealised CG version of Robin will appear in movies (but not science fiction,...
- 11/28/2014
- by ryanlambie
- Den of Geek
The evolution of eyes, love and death are the themes in director Mike Cahill's latest sci-fi drama. Here's our review of I Origins...
I Origins is the second film from writer and director Mike Cahill, who previously brought us the low-key and beautifully-acted 2011 sci-fi drama, Another Earth. I Origins has a similar sensibility, in that it’s intimately shot and muses on fundamental existential themes - this time love, grief, guilt and the possibility of life after death.
Michael Pitt plays Dr Ian Gray, a scientist who’s set himself the task of charting the evolutionary origins of the eye. A staunch atheist (we know this because he reads Richard Dawkins books) Dr Gray aims to prove that the eye isn’t the product of a divine being, as creationists believe, but rather the result of billions of years of evolution. While Dr Gray's still a young scientist studying...
I Origins is the second film from writer and director Mike Cahill, who previously brought us the low-key and beautifully-acted 2011 sci-fi drama, Another Earth. I Origins has a similar sensibility, in that it’s intimately shot and muses on fundamental existential themes - this time love, grief, guilt and the possibility of life after death.
Michael Pitt plays Dr Ian Gray, a scientist who’s set himself the task of charting the evolutionary origins of the eye. A staunch atheist (we know this because he reads Richard Dawkins books) Dr Gray aims to prove that the eye isn’t the product of a divine being, as creationists believe, but rather the result of billions of years of evolution. While Dr Gray's still a young scientist studying...
- 9/24/2014
- by ryanlambie
- Den of Geek
Another Earth director Mike Cahill returns with a new sci-fi drama, I Origins. Here’s what he had to say about that and other things...
Could the unique makeup of the human eye hold the key to life after death? That’s the tantalising mystery at the heart of director Mike Cahill’s latest film, I Origins. Cahill’s no stranger to making sci-fi dramas on a budget; in 2011, he brought us After Earth, an atmospheric, thought-provoking movie with some great performances from his frequent collaborator Brit Marling and former Lost star William Mapother.
I Origins is cut from the same indie cloth. It’s about a young scientist who’s investigating the evolutionary origins of the eye, and following a shocking personal tragedy, finds himself veering off on a different and less mainstream scientific direction.
Shot on a budget slightly higher than Another Earth, but still tiny by Hollywood standards,...
Could the unique makeup of the human eye hold the key to life after death? That’s the tantalising mystery at the heart of director Mike Cahill’s latest film, I Origins. Cahill’s no stranger to making sci-fi dramas on a budget; in 2011, he brought us After Earth, an atmospheric, thought-provoking movie with some great performances from his frequent collaborator Brit Marling and former Lost star William Mapother.
I Origins is cut from the same indie cloth. It’s about a young scientist who’s investigating the evolutionary origins of the eye, and following a shocking personal tragedy, finds himself veering off on a different and less mainstream scientific direction.
Shot on a budget slightly higher than Another Earth, but still tiny by Hollywood standards,...
- 9/24/2014
- by ryanlambie
- Den of Geek
As the Toronto International Film Festival gets underway with North American and World debuts of films that will hit Awards Season and beyond,a good number of seasoned films that have traveled the festival circuit are finally making their way into the Specialty Box Office. Drafthouse Films will open Cannes ’13 title The Congress starring Robin Wright and Harvey Keitel in a dozen locations this weekend, while SXSW’s Juliette Lewis starrer Kelly & Cal will open exclusively in NYC. Sundance’s Last Days In Vietnam will have a theatrical run before heading to PBS next fall and the Guadalajara Film Festival’s Frontera is taking advantage of a timely topic in the U.S. Venice financed its 2013 premiere Memphis, opening exclusively this weekend in NYC. And China Lion hopes to take a successful template for romantic dramas and apply that to But Always.
The Congress
Director-writer: Ari Folman
Writer: Stanislaw Lem (novel)
Cast: Robin Wright,...
The Congress
Director-writer: Ari Folman
Writer: Stanislaw Lem (novel)
Cast: Robin Wright,...
- 9/5/2014
- by Brian Brooks
- Deadline
Ari Folman, director of the bleak animated history Waltz with Bashir, adapted a novella by acclaimed Russian author Stanislaw Lem for the screen in the movie The Congress. Folman's take on Lem's The Futurological Congress is only vaguely true to the source material. Instead of a male hero, we have actress Robin Wright... playing actress Robin Wright. If only this cinematic work didn't hold the talented actress back. While Lem's novella is (supposedly, I haven't read it) a black comedy, Folman's half-animated film is dark and troubling.
Bravo to the director for selecting an older -- by Hollywood standards, anyway -- actress to base this film around. Much is made of Wright's Texan background and decision to age naturally; actually, much is said about Wright, as she sits silently and takes criticism. To put it in terms today's teens will recognize, there is a lot of mansplaining going on here.
Bravo to the director for selecting an older -- by Hollywood standards, anyway -- actress to base this film around. Much is made of Wright's Texan background and decision to age naturally; actually, much is said about Wright, as she sits silently and takes criticism. To put it in terms today's teens will recognize, there is a lot of mansplaining going on here.
- 8/29/2014
- by Elizabeth Stoddard
- Slackerwood
Loosely based on the sci-fi musings of Stanislav Lem, Ari Folman follows up his Oscar-nominated Waltz With Bashir with this ambitious and mostly successful exploration of celebrity, cinema and the subconscious. One of the biggest criticisms of Cinema, and Hollywood in particular, is that there are no good roles for women after they reach a certain age. Once they hit their 30s, their 40s if they're very lucky, then most jobbing actresses either run out of work or find themselves stuck playing wives, mothers, matrons or grannies for the rest of their careers. It is with this sentiment in mind that Ari Folman opens The Congress, his loose yet ambitious adaptation of Solaris author Stanislav Lem's 1971 novel, The Futurological Congress. Robin Wright plays a...
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- 8/28/2014
- Screen Anarchy
Director: Ari Folman; Screenwriter: Ari Folman; Starring: Robin Wright, Harvey Keitel, Jon Hamm, Paul Giamatti, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Danny Huston; Running time: 123 mins; Certificate: 15
The Congress is a striking film that makes a big statement, without knowing precisely what it wants to say. Pictures speak louder than words for director Ari Folman, whose Waltz with Bashir took the documentary format into an animated landscape (reflecting on his own experiences of war in Lebanon), while in this psychedelic, futuristic morality tale, Robin Wright is consumed by her own digitised image.
She is playing herself at a near point on the horizon where the human likeness has become downloadable and fully pliable. For the fading star of The Princess Bride (Folman lingers on her face as she gazes at the poster) that means eternal youth. However, it's not for reasons of vanity that she finally signs the dotted line for slithery studio mogul...
The Congress is a striking film that makes a big statement, without knowing precisely what it wants to say. Pictures speak louder than words for director Ari Folman, whose Waltz with Bashir took the documentary format into an animated landscape (reflecting on his own experiences of war in Lebanon), while in this psychedelic, futuristic morality tale, Robin Wright is consumed by her own digitised image.
She is playing herself at a near point on the horizon where the human likeness has become downloadable and fully pliable. For the fading star of The Princess Bride (Folman lingers on her face as she gazes at the poster) that means eternal youth. However, it's not for reasons of vanity that she finally signs the dotted line for slithery studio mogul...
- 8/12/2014
- Digital Spy
After successfully melding animation and documentary (two cinematic vocabularies that appear incompatible) in 2008’s "Waltz with Bashir," director Ari Folman returns to the big screen with "The Congress," a live action/animation mind-trip loosely inspired by Stanislaw Lem’s novel "The Futurological Congress." Taking a page from "Being John Malkovich" and "Cold Souls" (remember 'Cold Souls'?), 'The Congress' sends another movie star playing herself (Robin Wright) into a trippy sci-fi/fantasy landscape. Desperate to take care of her ailing son, Wright lets a dubious company scan her image and personality for a mysterious project. She eventually finds herself in a 2D-animated future world that resembles Ralph Bakshi’s manic 1970s style. Despite less than stellar reviews, which tend to praise the film’s visual inventiveness while criticizing its overcrowded philosophical ambitions, one hopes that it’s better than...
- 8/11/2014
- by Oktay Ege Kozak
- The Playlist
Robin Wright is best-known for playing Princess Buttercup in the adored 1987 fantasy adventure The Princess Bride. She broke our hearts as the beloved but broken Jenny of Forrest Gump. And now she's downright scary as Claire Underwood in House of Cards. With The Congress, she takes on her most daring role yet, playing a version of herself over decades, in live-action and animation. Get a glimpse of what that means with the film's trailer. Watch it in hi-res at Apple. Based on the Stanislaw Lem novel The Futurological Congress, The Congress has Robin Wright playing a version of herself at the end of her career. Movies are changing, moving away from real actors, and instead scanning them to make new movies where their stars never need age, or even be on set. The journey of this Alamo Drafthouse release goes to all kinds of unexpected places, but a clip from...
- 7/15/2014
- cinemablend.com
Otherness is the inevitable theme of films dealing with extraterrestrials. They are the ultimate foreigners, organisms who inhabit planets unlike our own. The problem for artists who tackle such stories is how to portray this Otherness. A common recourse is to humanize it, as in everything from The Day the Earth Stood Still to Star Wars. Another solution, however, is to accept what Fredric Jameson terms the “unknowability thesis,” which he ascribes to Stanislaw Lem (1). As the latter wrote in his novel Solaris: “Where there are no men, there cannot be motives accessible to men.” The truly alien, then, recedes into the shadows or the margins. It can hardly be portrayed if it cannot be grasped by the imagination, so it becomes a vague intangible presence, as in Tarkovsky’s Stalker, or a sheer force of malignancy and death, as in the two examples we will be covering, 1979’s...
- 7/3/2014
- by Guido Pellegrini
- SoundOnSight
After two seasons of scheming away as Frank Underwood’s whip-smart wife Claire on Netflix’s hit political drama House of Cards, Robin Wright has more than earned our attention. That’s not to say, however, that her next film, an adaptation of The Congress directed by Ari Folman, isn’t a gamble. Loosely based on the book by Stanislaw Lem, The Congress centers on an aging Hollywood starlet (Wright, playing a version of herself) who, in order to pay for her son’s medical treatments, agrees to sell her likeness to a studio in the form of a digital persona which can star in movies for them.
It’s a tricky, unconventional premise, and the movie looks extremely interesting, if mind-bending. Today, we’ve got six new shots from The Congress in addition to a new poster. None of the images really shed any more light on the movie’s plot,...
It’s a tricky, unconventional premise, and the movie looks extremely interesting, if mind-bending. Today, we’ve got six new shots from The Congress in addition to a new poster. None of the images really shed any more light on the movie’s plot,...
- 6/25/2014
- by Isaac Feldberg
- We Got This Covered
From the director of Waltz with Bashir, The Congress is sure to become one of the most talked about films of 2014, and until you see the trailer, there won’t be any way to get an idea of what’s in store.
Robin Wright, playing a fictionalized version of herself, looks back at what kicked off with The Princess Bride. Getting perhaps a little older, and with offers not pouring in to help cover the costs of her sons medical treatment, Wright’s agent (Harvey Keitel) leads her to a potential offer that may solve her problems. The head of Miramount studios (Danny Huston) wants to create a digital version of her, that they can then use in any film they want, in any way they want. 20 years later, worlds collide, as Wright’s contract is set to expire, and she learns that things are not exactly what they seem.
Robin Wright, playing a fictionalized version of herself, looks back at what kicked off with The Princess Bride. Getting perhaps a little older, and with offers not pouring in to help cover the costs of her sons medical treatment, Wright’s agent (Harvey Keitel) leads her to a potential offer that may solve her problems. The head of Miramount studios (Danny Huston) wants to create a digital version of her, that they can then use in any film they want, in any way they want. 20 years later, worlds collide, as Wright’s contract is set to expire, and she learns that things are not exactly what they seem.
- 6/5/2014
- by Marc Eastman
- AreYouScreening.com
Don’t be fooled by the title: Robin Wright is not actually going to Congress. The Congress is the title of the latest film by Ari Folman (Waltz with Bashir), based on The Futuristic Congress by sci-fi author Stanislaw Lem. It stars Wright as a fictional version of herself who agrees to undergo a procedure that will copy her form and thoughts for future use by movie studios. The process has some unintended consequences, however, and Wright finds herself in a futuristic cartoon world that features some pretty spectacular animation.
The latest Us poster for The Congress does not seem to do justice to the subject matter, which is delineated far better in the fascinating trailer for the film. The poster mostly just features a process of digitalizing Wright, but it’s obvious from the trailer that there’s a bit more to the story than that.
The film premiered...
The latest Us poster for The Congress does not seem to do justice to the subject matter, which is delineated far better in the fascinating trailer for the film. The poster mostly just features a process of digitalizing Wright, but it’s obvious from the trailer that there’s a bit more to the story than that.
The film premiered...
- 6/3/2014
- by Lauren Humphries-Brooks
- We Got This Covered
I’ve watched this trailer a handful of times now, and it’s still giving me chills. Waltz With Bashir director Ari Folman returns with The Congress, a trippy and wonderful looking movie that looks to go full meta in all the right ways. It’s a fascinating blend of live action and animation adapted from Solaris author Stanislaw Lem's novel "The Futurological Congress". Not to mention what looks like a career defining performance by Robin...
- 5/28/2014
- by Graham McMorrow
- JoBlo.com
It's surprising that Ari Folman's The Congress, an imaginative adaptation of Stanislaw Lem's novel, has yet to see the light of day outside the festival circuit. True, reception for the movie has been mixed and our own review found the story a bit too far removed from Lem's original and the visual approach only partly successful but there seems to be enough here to warrant some sort of release and it looks like that release is nearly upon us.
In the movie's first half, Robin Wright plays a version of herself whose career hasn't been as successful as early movies suggested. With a sick son to think about, Wright takes a job offer from a sleazy producer played by Dan [Continued ...]...
In the movie's first half, Robin Wright plays a version of herself whose career hasn't been as successful as early movies suggested. With a sick son to think about, Wright takes a job offer from a sleazy producer played by Dan [Continued ...]...
- 5/27/2014
- QuietEarth.us
At turns mesmerizing and confounding, Ari Folman’s The Congress was one of the more talked about titles of any Cannes sidebar last year. Though Drafthouse Films scooped up the rights less than a month after its Director’s Fortnight premiere, it’s only just now making it’s way toward theaters, with an official release set for August 29. A loose adaptation of Stanislaw Lem’s The Futurological Congress, Folman’s followup to the Oscar nominated Waltz with Bashir positions Robin Wright as a fictionalized version of herself, who agrees to replicate her once commodifiable actress for a movie studio’s gain. Playing on recurrent themes of aging in the film […]...
- 5/27/2014
- by Sarah Salovaara
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
At turns mesmerizing and confounding, Ari Folman’s The Congress was one of the more talked about titles of any Cannes sidebar last year. Though Drafthouse Films scooped up the rights less than a month after its Director’s Fortnight premiere, it’s only just now making it’s way toward theaters, with an official release set for August 29. A loose adaptation of Stanislaw Lem’s The Futurological Congress, Folman’s followup to the Oscar nominated Waltz with Bashir positions Robin Wright as a fictionalized version of herself, who agrees to replicate her once commodifiable actress for a movie studio’s gain. Playing on recurrent themes of aging in the film […]...
- 5/27/2014
- by Sarah Salovaara
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
I saw Ari Folman's The Congress at last year's Cannes Film Festival and wasn't exactly impressed, which I feel bad saying considering we're talking about a film that's taken around six years to make it to theaters. Drafthouse will bring The Congress to cinemas on August 29 and today they've premiered the first trailer for the film I called "smart and challenging, but almost too much for its own good". I also added: Folman seems to have lost control of his film and just couldn't find a way to reign it in. He definitely challenged himself and that's something I think we want to see from all of today's talented directors, but as much as I can respect the effort I can't say I enjoyed the film. Of course, this is just the kind of movie I'd rather see today's audiences wrestling with than the endless stream of blockbusters, one...
- 5/27/2014
- by Brad Brevet
- Rope of Silicon
Drafthouse Films has released the first U.S. trailer for Robin Wright's trippy looking new film, The Congress. The movie is partially animated in a very surreal style, and as you'll see from the trailer, it looks incredibly unique and intriguing.
The film is loosely based on Stanislaw Lem's The Futurological Congress, and Wright plays herself as an aged star who sells her likeness to a movie studio. The movie was directed by Ari Folman (Waltz with Bashir), and it also stars Harvey Keitel, Danny Huston, Paul Giamatti, Kodi Smit-McPhee, and more. Here's a full synopsis:
More than two decades after catapulting to stardom with The Princess Bride, an aging actress (Robin Wright, playing a version of herself) decides to take her final job - preserving her digital likeness for a future Hollywood. Through a deal brokered by her loyal, longtime agent (Harvey Keitel) and the head of...
The film is loosely based on Stanislaw Lem's The Futurological Congress, and Wright plays herself as an aged star who sells her likeness to a movie studio. The movie was directed by Ari Folman (Waltz with Bashir), and it also stars Harvey Keitel, Danny Huston, Paul Giamatti, Kodi Smit-McPhee, and more. Here's a full synopsis:
More than two decades after catapulting to stardom with The Princess Bride, an aging actress (Robin Wright, playing a version of herself) decides to take her final job - preserving her digital likeness for a future Hollywood. Through a deal brokered by her loyal, longtime agent (Harvey Keitel) and the head of...
- 5/27/2014
- by Joey Paur
- GeekTyrant
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