Search results for: Wong Kar-wai

I spent all of last week divulging some of films that I expect to be in Cannes this year, and Screen Daily happened to do the same. There are a good number of films that are mentioned of both sites' lists, but I mention about twenty films that the trade makes no mention of, and of course they have got a long list as well of films that I either passed on as potential selections or I was totally oblivious as to their existence.

Every now and then a film comes along and gets at a certain universal truth in an obscure time and place.

The festival kicked off on Friday night with the Palme d’Or winning The Class by veteran Laurent Cantet. The Class is a low-fi, brilliant, slice-of-life that teased expectations of greater cinema to come.

Get ready for the most minimalistic martial arts epic ever mounted. Hou Hsiao-Hsien has finally gotten the funding to begin work on his long in development entry into the wuxia canon The Assassin. Taiwan’s newly established National Development Fund has stepped up with $2.6 million dollars for the project, the fund’s first. With a total budget of around $8.65 million the film is far and away the biggest budget Taiwanese production ever and certainly the famed director’s largest undertaking in his 28 year career.

"A penchant for pretty things and pretty faces, mood over action, saturated, hazy, and glossy colours and tints, odd cuts, extensive use of slow and fast motion, skeletal storylines and explorations on the themes of loneliness and the passing of time—all Kar-Wai’s trademarks are present..."