my #IFFR schedule: http://iffr.nl/en/myiffr/shared-agenda/?id=8110b185-cbf9-451d-bb29-4cd a91b43f47
January 2011 (continued)
#IFFR zin in 13 Assassins, EssentialKilling, Headshots, Kaidan, Zaborgar, King's Speech, Oki's Movie, Outrage, Parked, Somewhere, Tiger Eyes
niet lang hoeven zoeken naar VK #iffr bijlage zoals sommige mensen op twitter, maar fijn weer kunnen ophalen bij m'n vaste bron, m'n ouders
weer fijn films omcirkelen in volkskrant #iffr bijlage
July 2010
May 2010
Fantastic Mr. Fox ♥
Wikipedia - Diegesis - Film sound and music
Sound in films is termed diegetic if it is part of the narrative sphere of the film. For instance, if a character in the film is playing a piano, or turns on a CD player, the resulting sound is "diegetic." If, on the other hand, music plays in the background but cannot be heard by the film's characters, it is termed non-diegetic or, more accurately, extra-diegetic. The score of a film is "non-diegetic" sound. Some examples...
February 2010
IFFR film 19: Café Noir / 카페 느와르 (Jung Sung-Il, South Korea): 4/5
Wow, very long at over 3 hours (they even included a 15 minute break in the middle which is rare for a festival showing), but quite something special, especially for those well versed in Korean films. Luckily the second half was even better than the first. An interesting mix of styles, switching from colour to b/w for some scenes etc. And I've never seen the city of Seoul itself used as a character quite as beautifully like this, with long single-take shots where the camera just glides along the streets or river for minutes and minutes.
Also: it wasn't until the credits that I realized one of the characters that looked so familiar to me was played by indie music star Yozoh! The little keyboard she continuously carried on her back should have been a hint, I suppose.
IFFR film 16: Eighteen / 회오리 바람 (Jang Kun-Jae, South Korea): 3.5/5
IFFR film 12: Toad's Oil / ガマの油 (Japan): 4.5/5
My favourite film of IFFR 2010. Wonderful directorial debut (and starring role) by one of my favourite actors, Kôji Yakusho. A funny colourful moving story, in some parts reminiscent of the surrealness/sensibility of Taste of Tea. Also a nice role for Satomi Kobayashi of Megane / Kamome Diner.
IFFR film 6: Susa / სუსა (Rusudan Pirveli, Georgia): 3.5/5
Strikingly gritty landscapes. Also, I learned the Georgian alphabet is really pretty.
January 2010
IFFR film 4: A Grammar For Listening (Parts 1-3): 3.5/5
Not so much a film, just a series of dreamy wonderful sound/sightscapes, the kind that make me want to go out and shoot some macro/bokeh photos. Followed by insightful Q&A with director Luke Fowler.
IFFR film 3: Running Turtle / 거북이 달린다 (Lee Yeon-woo, South Korea): 3.5/5.
Lots of fun this one, like a non-gloomy version of last year's excellent The Chaser (starring the same actor even).
December 2009
September 2009
June 2009
May 2009
IFFR 2009 swag
One of my favourite things about film festivals is collecting various posters, flyers and booklets for movies and festivals from all over the world. Here's my loot from the International Film Festival Rotterdam earlier this year! The big items are A4-size.
April 2009
February 2009
November 2008
August 2008
May 2008
April 2008
my AFFF log
The short but fine list of films I saw last week at the Amsterdam Fantastic Film Festival 2008 (rated x out of 5):
- Voices of a Distant Star + 5 Centimeters Per Second: 4/5
- Unfortunately the digital (dvd?) projection in Tuschinksi Arthouse 5 was VERY pixelly (so much for expecting to get something more out of seeing it on the big screen) but it was real nice to see these two anime masterpieces by Makoto Shinkai again, his first and his latest, back-to-back. Truly the master at animating falling cherry blossoms, snow, railroad crossings, electric poles and cellphones. Still have that theme song
One more time, one more chance
stuck in my head. - Timecrimes / Los Cronocrímenes: 4/5
- A very enjoyable, quirky and at times intense little sci-fi story from Spain. Certainly the most well-thought-out depiction of time travel in any movie I've ever seen, how refreshing.
- King of the Hill / El Rey de la montaña: 4/5
- Great Spanish lost-and-hunted-in-the-woods thriller. Feels like a mix of Surviving the Game and Elephant.
- Vexille: 2/5
- Your basic Japanese 3D futuristic anime epic, fitting somewhere inbetween Final Fantasy and Appleseed style-wise. A handful of very awesome action scenes and cool robot designs, in an otherwise kinda boring story. Again, the picture quality was rather bad, so that didn't help either.
March 2008
best films I saw in 2007
A kind of loose ordering this time, though Once definitely belongs at the top...
- Once - John Carney, 2006, IE
- Michael Clayton - Tony Gilroy, 2007, US
- Das Leben Der Anderen - Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, 2007, DE
- Paprika - Satoshi Kon, 2006, JP
- I Don't Want To Sleep Alone - Tsai Ming-Liang, 2006, TW
- Memories of Matsuko - Tetsuya Nakashima, 2006, JP
- Dead Man's Shoes - Shane Meadows, 2004, UK
- The Science Of Sleep - Michel Gondry, 2006, FR
- Faces of a Fig Tree - Momoi Kaori, 2006, JP
- Kamikaze Taxi - Masato Harada, 1994, JP
- The Man From Earth - Richard Schenkman, 2007, US
- Inzeyen - Sweet Delight - Vladimir Sivkov, 2007, RU
- Iklimler - Nuri Bilge Ceylan, 2006, TR
- Uzak - Nuri Bilge Ceylan, 2002, TR
- Wattstax - Mel Stuart, 1973, US
- Traveling with Yoshitomo Nara - Sakabe Koji, 2007, JP
- Manufactured Landscapes - Jennifer Baichwal, 2006, CA
February 2008
my IFFR 2008 log
Seen at the International Filmfestival Rotterdam this year (in descending chronological order, rated x out of 5):
- Sad Vacation: 4/5
- Any film with Asano Tadanobu is always worth seeing.
- Persepolis: 4/5
- Beautiful animation, funny and moving. Though I feel I would have liked the version with the original french dialog better than this english dub.
- Japanese 8mm Kicks Ass Beautiful
- Real Dreams
- The Darjeeling Limited: 5/5
- Just wonderful. First Wes Anderson film I actually saw on the big screen. And biiig it was, being Pathé 1.
- Black Snow: 3/5
- Chinese film from 1989 starring a very young Jiang Wen. The overdubbed dialog and cheesily translated subtitles kinda distracted from the okay story. Nice to see the Q&A with director Xie Fei afterwards.
- Of Monster Mode: 4/5
- Entertaining Japanese silliness.
- Magnus: 4/5
- Probably the first Estonian film I've ever seen. From the description I was expecting something bleak and depressing, but it turned out to be very funny at times. Beautiful visuals and landscapes throughout.
- Only Child, Upward, Downward, Forward, Backward, Rightward and Leftward: 2/5
- I noticed quite a few walk-outs during this one, a weird and uneventful story full of strange dialogs, in other words: a perfect filmfestival film to start off with :)
January 2008
Helvetica, documentary about typography and design, now viewable in its entirety on Google Video! [related] [via]
Update: oops, it's offline now :(
December 2007
October 2007
September 2007
June 2007
Faces of a Fig Tree
Watching the charming and very colourful film "Faces of a Fig Tree" at the CAMERA JAPAN film festival in Lantaren/Venster last friday night.
May 2007
April 2007
March 2007
February 2007
January 2007
best films seen in 2006
I figure I'd better get this out of the way before I start logging my films-seen-at-the-IFFR 2007 here, so here is a quick raw list of my faves of all the 112 films I saw for the first time in 2006 (not necessarily released in 2006), to be linkified/explained/possibly reordered in the next couple of days:
The best:
Children of Men
Caché
It's Only Talk
Taking Father Home
Canary
Half Nelson
Tokyo Sora
Su-Ki-Da
Me And You And Everyone We Know
The New World
December 2006
November 2006
October 2006
August 2006
July 2006
poster
June 2006
May 2006
April 2006
February 2006
IFFR 2006 recap
Number of feature-length films seen: 29
Number of short films seen: 7
Number of legs worn out from the constant sitting in cramped theaters: 2
Number of times I found myself sitting next to snoring journalists: 1 (maintaining my record from last year)
Favourites: It's Only Talk, NEXT, Linda Linda Linda, Play, Ahlaam, Princess Raccoon, Haze and Taking Father Home.
Also very good were: Blue Cha Cha, The Magicians, Citizen Dog, Black Brush, Some Kinda Love, Heart, Beating in the Dark and Langer Licht.
Funniest Q&A: David Lammers after Langer Licht.
Cutest producer/director couple: Peng Shan and Ying Liang of Taking Father Home.
Funniest moment in any film: the Don't try this at home, kids!
freeze-frame in The Great Yokai War.
Number of films seen that feature a Susumu Terajima appearance: 1 (out of a possible 3), upping my Susumu-index from 24 to 25.
Best soundtracks: Linda Linda Linda, NEXT and Black Brush.
Best poster (though I can't find a big version online): Blue Cha Cha.
IFFR day 10
-
Seen on the last day of the festival:
- Taking Father Home
- Ultra-low-budget or not, this was a pretty good film, making the absolute most of limited means and amateur actors. The combination of "distant" cinematography and the realistic and close-up feel of cheap-DV-camera footage in general gave this an interesting atmosphere.
- Vendredi Ou Un Autre Jour
IFFR day 9
-
Seen on friday:
- A Little Trip To Heaven
- Best part of this film was seeing Forest Whitaker (who talks with a weird voice here which took some getting used to) walking through all the wonderfully grimy looking landscapes and locations. Interesting soundtrack too. Story could have been a little better though.
- Blue Cha Cha
- Beautifully shot, with quite moving performances.
- Glue
- Midnight, My Love
- Beautiful and funny in a lot of ways, but slightly spoilt by a couple of strange and fantastical plot twists near the end.
IFFR day 8
-
Seen today:
- It's Only Talk
- Another favourite... Simply beautiful. And quite a fun experience to suddenly recognize one of the characters as being the same actor playing the villain in The Great Yokai War, which I saw only hours before.
- The Great Yokai War
Don't try this at home, kids!
- Walking On The Wild Side
- Analife
- Wrong (short)
IFFR day 7
-
Seen yesterday:
- Green Mind, Metal Bats
- 9 Dragons
- Princess Raccoon
- Somehow I was expecting this to be a much grander, epic tale, but it really does have the feel of a theater/musical stage most of the time (though there are a couple of great outside location shots). Simply a very colourful, very uplifting and most of all very silly film, with a wide variety of musical styles. Not a bad choice for 09:45 in the morning.
January 2006
IFFR day 6
-
Seen today:
- Shanghai Dreams
- La Perrerra
- Langer Licht
- One of the best things about this showing was the Q&A with director David Lammers afterwards, which was definitely the funniest and most enthousiastic I've seen yet.
- NEXT: A Primer On Urban Painting
- I wasn't expecting to vote 5-out-of-5 on a documentary this week, but I did today. This film is simply dripping with awesomeness; the first one I'm seriously considering attending a second time. Packed with so much inspirational and original and varied art and design from all over the world - all set to great music of course. Highlights: the trek deep into a cave below the Paris underground to find tags from the 19th century, the ninja-like Tokyo speed-taggers, and the pleasure of seeing the PIPSlab 3D lightsigs on a giant cinema screen.