2015 Cannes Wish List - Part 2

Wishing or predicting? Trying to do both but from this exercise what really comes out are the films that I want to see hopefully sooner than later during the rest of the current year and -sadly- next year.

Since the last post we have some news. On Wednesday, April 25 organizers announced that Georges Miller's Mad Max: Fury Road will be part of the Official Selection as an Out of Competition film with screening on May 14, which means that is NOT the opening film. When the official poster was unveiled they also announced a film in the Cannes Classics section: a documentary by Stig Bjorkman, Ingrid Bergman - In Her Own Words. Then we know by now that Far From The Madding Crowd by Thomas Vinterberg will not be in Cannes as is in competition at the Istanbul Film Festival that runs from April 4 to 19. Most unpleasant news relate to Nanni Moretti's Mia Madre opening in Italy on April 16, so there are high possibilities that film will NOT make it to Cannes.

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FIPRESCI 90th Anniversary

Ninety years ago, in 1925, some film journalists from Paris and Brussels founded a Professional Association of the Film Press, which only in a bit more than a year became the International Federation of Film Press during the Congress of Cinema held in Paris from September 27 to October 3, 1926. But was until June 1930 that the Federation as we know it was founded. Still the idea of a worldwide film press has 90 years and FIPRESCI is celebrating its anniversary with some activities.

Perhaps the most interesting is the one that has eight (8) master classes by renown filmmakers. Here is the info from a FIPRESCI press release.

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9th Asian Film Awards Winners

The 9th Asian Film Awards (AFA) ceremony was held at The Venetian Macao last night, commemorating another year of excellence in Asian cinema. The 9th AFA was jointly organized by the Asian Film Awards Academy (AFAA), and its constituent partners – Busan Film Festival, Tokyo Film Festival and Hong Kong Film Festival.

Hong Kong pop star, and breakout actress Ivana Wong opened the 9th AFA ceremony with a heartfelt singing performance. Later, South Korean band Infinite entertained guests with an energetic musical set, which was then followed by loud applause from their dedicated fans.

Overall, Mainland China’s films stole the show, winning awards in 10 categories out of 14, including 3 out of the 4 major accolades. This year’s coveted Best Film Award went to Blind Massage. Other major winners this year include Ann Hui who took home the Best Director award for The Golden Era. Liao Fan beat out other nominees for the Best Actor Award for his role in Black Coal, Thin Ice. However, it was South Korean Bae Doo-na who was awarded Best Actress for her stunning performance in A Girl At My Door.

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68th Festival de Cannes Poster

The 68th Festival de Cannes (13-24 May 2015) has chosen to pay tribute to Ingrid Bergman with this year’s poster, following on from Marcello Mastroianni in 2014.

Hollywood star Ingrid Bergman was a modern icon, an emancipated woman, an intrepid actress, and a figurehead for the new realism. She changed roles and adoptive countries as the mood took her, but never lost sight of her quintessential grace and simplicity.

This year’s poster captures the actress, who worked with Alfred Hitchcock, Roberto Rossellini and Ingmar Bergman, and starred opposite Cary Grant, Humphrey Bogart and Gregory Peck, in all her beauty, her face lit up by a calm serenity that seems to herald a promising future.

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2015 Cannes Film Festival Wish List - Part 1: France and Italy

By mid-April Thierry Fremaux and the new festival president, Pierre Lescure, will announce the 2015 Cannes Official Selection and a few days after the parallel sections Quinzaine and La Semaine de la Critique will do the same. All this will happen in less than a month, but today I'm sharing my wish list with films that I hope will make Cannes not only in the official selection but in any of the parallel sections or activities.

The more we get close to the official selection announcement, the more buzz about the selection appears in several languages. Perhaps the most interesting from the latest news are the ones that speculate about the opening film. Many were speculating about Tomorrowland or Mad Max: Fury Road as the most likely options. In paper both look appealing as the first means George Clooney will be on opening day activities, the second means Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron doing the same; consequently, both assure wide world press coverage. But buzz about release date has changed the perspective as first has a USA release date of May 22 (France May 20), second has USA release date of May 15 (and multiple country release date of May 13, including France).

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2015 The Carrosse d'Or (Golden Coach)

The Carrosse d’Or Prize has been awarded since 2002 by the filmmakers of the Société des réalisateurs de films (SRF) to honor one of their own during Cannes Film Festival.  The Carrosse d'Or is a bronze statuette inspired by the figures of the Comedia dell'Arte and Jean Renoir's film of the same name – it was created by painter-sculptor Lili Legouvello.  The recipient is chosen from the international filmmaking community for the innovative qualities, courage and independent-mindedness of his or her work.

Since its creation in 2002, this prize has been given to Jacques Rozier, Clint Eastwood, Nanni Moretti, Sembene Ousmane, David Cronenberg, Alain Cavalier, Jim Jarmusch, Naomie Kawasé, Agnès Varda, Jafar Panahi, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Jane Campion and Alain Resnais.

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2015 Swiss Film Awards Winners

Docufiction The Circle was the big winner of the night as won four Quartz trophies out of the five nominations it had. Another multiple winner is documentary Electroboy that picked two awards.

Jean-Luc Godard was the recipient of the 2015 Honorary Award in recognition of his outstanding body of work. For health reasons, he was not able to collect the award in person. However, the director sent a video message greeting the guests. Federal Councilor, Alain Berset, paid tribute to the contribution that the internationally acclaimed director has made during his career: “Your films blend genres and forms. They transform the banal into poetry. They are deftly suffused with a knowing amateurism, with cheerless folly and joyous pessimism. They are sometimes sociological, sometimes political. They are the melody of phrases, the grammar of sound. Your work is to cinema what jazz is to music.”

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2015 Cannes Possible Films - The Buzz

This is NOT my wish list but a compendium of possible films that could make it to Cannes this year. List is made from several Cannes articles plus some lists with most anticipated films of 2015 and what I know from my daily readings.

As one Le Monde article says: "It is no secret, Cannes begins in Berlin" and it does, not in red carpet but in the industry market. Consequently it's no surprise that in the last days of the Berlinale press articles (see my pinterest here) started to appear with possible films that surely are fast running to reach La Croisette on time.

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17th Polskich Nagród Filmowych Orły (Eagle Awards) Winners

Gods by Łukasz Palkowski was the big winner in last night awards ceremony as won seven (7) awards from the 12 nominations it got. Palkowski's film was a Polish box office success so is no surprise that film also won the Audience Award.

The second film in the award winners ranking is Warsaw '44 with 3 awards. Although nominated in 11 categories, Jack Strong only collected one, Best Actress for Maja Ostaszewska.

Winners are in *BLUE.  To check winners in all categories go official site here, available only in Polish; for English go here.

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68th Bodil Awards Winners

Big winner in last night awards ceremony was Silent Heart by Billie August that won Best Film, Best Actress and Supporting Actor. In photo the Silent Heart winners: Danica Curcic, Billie August and Pilou Asbæk.

Viggo Mortensen was honored with this year's Honorary Bodil, Niels Thatum received the Best Cinematography award for his work in visually outstanding When Animals Dream, editor Molly Malene Stensgaard received a Special Bodil for her work in Nymphomaniac, production designer Rie Lykke got the Henning Bahs award for Speed Walking and the new award for Best Screenplay went to Christian Thorpe for his Silent Heart script.

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