Things are winding down in Telluride. I saw the last film I’ll see here last night (Jacques Audiard’s “A Prophet”) and have a few things to square away before I hop the shuttle for Montrose and, finally, the flight back to Los Angeles.
The fest has been a low key delight. An IFC-sponsored dinner Saturday night brought out a number of the principals from films on display (where I had fun throwing back a few and discussing “that moment” when you decide film will be your life with “Red Riding” producer Andrew Eaton). Nicolas Cage was strolling the streets last night with his kid, free of the usual adoring mob. Jason Reitman, Viggo Mortensen, Paul Schneider, Carey Mulligan, etc. have made themselves available for interviews, priming the pump for Oscar season. Good times all around.
The big winners of the fest, from what I can gather from conversations with a number of attendees, are Michael Hoffman’s “The Last Station,” Todd Solondz’s “Life During Wartime” and, of course, Jason Reitman’s “Up in the Air,” among others. Unfortunately, I missed (again) Michael Haneke’s “The White Ribbon” and a number of the once-in-a-lifetime screenings from Alexander Payne’s program, but I had a full, enjoyable time regardless. I have a few more interviews to get to today, but I thought I’d rattle off the last pair of capsule reviews before I head off into town for some meet-and-greets.
It was always a safe bet that, in spite of the curiosity value of Heath Ledger’s final screen performance, Terry Gilliam’s “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus” wasn’t cut out to be a crowdpleaser. It’s been over a decade since the defiantly eccentric filmmaker made anything approaching the term “accessible,” much less something widely liked. And the apparent opacity of his latest, beginning with that unwieldy title, didn’t suggest he was going any easier on his audience, or himself.
So it’s no surprise to report that the reviews thus far are mixed at best, with some vocal detractors already apparent. (Catherine Shoard at the Guardian describes it as “a horrible mix of reheated Munchhausen and stale Faustian mumbo-jumbo.) Still, several critics have salvaged some value from the project, and are unexpectedly supportive in their reviews.
Todd McCarthy asserts that Gilliam has made “a pretty good thing out of a very bad situation,” commending him for his “visual panache” and “considerable discipline,” but is careful to defuse any exaggerated expectations of Ledger’s work:
It’s another “Alice in Wonderland”-like playground for Gilliam, and while all the specific action may not be entirely coherent or exciting, it’s always visually stimulating and allows the three incarnations of Tony to host assorted guests.
Tony is not a demanding dramatic role, nor a particularly flamboyant one like the Joker, so this can’t legitimately be described as one Ledger’s most striking performances. Like most of the other actors here, he’s antic and frantic, dirty and sweaty, as the principals flail around trying to cope with their desperate straits.
Here’s some fantastic news. You may remember that, a couple of months ago, I totally flipped for “Red Riding,” a trilogy of British TV movies deftly adapted from David Peace’s quartet of crime novels about the Yorkshire Ripper murders of the 70s and early 80s.
Actually, to be specific, I went crazy for the first film in the trilogy, Julian Jarrold’s “1974,” a haunting, exquisitely realized mood piece with a sterling cast led by rising Brit stars Andrew Garfield and Rebecca Hall — the latter’s sad, sensual performance even topping her breakthrough work in “Vicky Cristina Barcelona.” The next two films, helmed by Oscar-winner James Marsh and Anand Tucker respectively, were strong pieces of work too, but it’s Jarrold’s film that I can’t shake from my system.
Anyway, I said at the time that the film belonged on a bigger screen, and I’ve got my wish. Fresh from their acquisition of another outstanding Brit TV effort, Oliver Hirschbiegel’s Sundance winner “Five Minutes of Heaven,” IFC has picked up the U.S. rights to the entire trilogy:
IFC plans to release The Red Riding Trilogy this autumn in theatres and on demand through its IFC In Theaters platform following a festival circuit run.
IFC Entertainment president Jonathan Sehring called The Red Riding “an absolutely thrilling work of cinema and one of the great true crime adaptations of recent times.
So justice is done. You’ll see what I mean in the fall. A brief taster after the cut.
Last week, I mentioned how fully in the tank I am for Lynne Ramsay’s upcoming “We Need To Talk About Kevin.” Today, meanwhile, brings updated news of another British-funded adaptation with a mighty literary source, perfect-on-paper cast and exciting filmmaker who has been quiet for too long.
The film in question is Mark Romanek’s take on Kazuo Ishiguro’s 2005 masterpiece, “Never Let Me Go.” Both Fox Searchlight and Film4 (a pairing that previously brought us “Slumdog Millionaire”) have a hand in the project, which started principal shooting today in the UK. Anyone familiar with Ishiguro’s novel will see why it’s a potentially snug fit for Romanek, the music video auteur extraordinaire who hasn’t settled on a feature-length vehicle for his gifts since the mixed bag that was 2002’s “One Hour Photo.”
Ishiguro’s supremely elegant science-fiction tale — a romantic dystopian narrative hard to synopsise without entering spoiler territory — should provide the right balance of elegiac emotional texture to complement Romanek’s sometimes distancing visual sheen. With Alex Garland (“The Beach,” “28 Days Later”) handling script duties, the project promises a very exciting merger of three pristine stylists.
Meanwhile, the cast — a veritable showcase of Britain’s brightest rising talent — isn’t too shabby either: Sally Hawkins has just been added to a roster that already includes Keira Knightley, Carey Mulligan and Andrew Garfield (so riveting in “Boy A” and “Red Riding”), with Charlotte Rampling adding veteran class.
Even if you don’t know the source material, you have to admit this sounds pretty exciting on paper. Of course, Ishiguro’s opalescent, china-fragile prose (okay, I’m a long-time devotee) provides numerous opportunities to trip up less delicate filmmakers — but as the Merchant-Ivory team proved back in 1993, it can be done, and with less intrinsically cinematic source material to boot. I’m sensing something special in the works here.
