Por Monica Delgado
En esta breve entrevista, el cineasta filipino Lav Diaz nos cuenta un poco más sobre The Halt, una de las mejores películas de este Cannes 2019.
By Monica Delgado
Lav Diaz’s The halt (Ang Hupa) was presented in the latest edition of the Directors’ Fortnight in Cannes. Because of a previous commitment with Film School San Antonio de los Baños, in Cuba, Lav couldn’t assist to the usual Q&A after the screenings, and we were disappointed not to have, first hand, his impressions about this new almost five-hour film.
By Mónica Delgado
Thirty pieces, over forty films seen in eleven days, a film almost 5-hours long, three masterpieces, at least a couple of rubbish films from “renowned” filmmakers, an inmmense disappointment, two great documentaries, a lot of zombies, Robbert Pattinson, the first black woman to get recognition, a beautiful feminist allegation set in the late 19th century, the return of Quentin Tarantino, the first Peruvian filmmaker in the Quinzaine des Realizateurs, a poor participation of Latin American cinema in the official sections, Serra and Dumont, two movies in film, Carpenter and Argento, or Stallone with his Rambo. This edition of Cannes 2019 has been without a doubt, memorable.
By Mónica Delgado
The most combative film in all this edition of Cannes came in hand with the emblematic Lech Kowalski. If it’s indeed true that in this eleven-day journey, certain demonstrations of a militant and political cinema had indeed happened with two Latin American filmmakers (Patricio Guzmán and Juan Solanas), in Blow it to bits (On va tout péter) we finally got some room for the workers’ voice.
By Mónica Delgado
In this edition of Cannes, we joked several times among critics and journalists about the zombie theme that unintentionally, had overtaken the screens this year: the inauguration of the Jarmusch film, the Bonello film in La Quinzaine des Realizateurs, or the drowsy beings of the Mati Diop’s film. Alice Furtado’s Sick, Sick, Sick (Sem Sue Sengue) also follows this path.
Por Mónica Delgado
A diferencia de años anteriores, podemos afirmar que nos hemos ido de Cannes con la Palma de Oro que queríamos. Si bien, La Gomera de Cristi Poroumbiu era nuestra favorita, el reconocimiento unánime del jurado a Parasite de Bong Joon-ho confirmó una edición que tuvo un mejor nivel, a pesar de algunos tropiezos encarnados en los trabajos de Xavier Dolan o Arnaud Desplechin.
Por Mónica Delgado
Por primera vez en la historia de Cannes, un film surcoreano se lleva la Palma de Oro. El mérito es indiscutible, por tratarse de una de las mejores películas en la carrera de Bong Joon-ho (quizás solo comparable a la proeza de Memories of Murder en 2003) y por ser una comedia agridulce que lo marca como un cineasta que se sigue entregando con creatividad a cualquier género (ya sea drama, thriller, monster movie o ciencia ficción) que se le apetezca.
By Mónica Delgado
With over six features under her sleeve, Austrian filmmaker Jessica Hausner returns to Cannes yet again, but this time with a feature film in the official competition: an exercise in science fiction but with quotas of family drama, stylized and plentiful in carefully composed tonalities and different color pallets. It’s a science fiction film with touches of horror, elegant and refined.
By Mónica Delgado
Land of Ashes is the first feature in the history of Costa Rica participating in Cannes. Directed by Sofía Quirós, it’s an intimate film with oneiric touches, about an adolescent without parents who lives with her grandparents in a jungle zone. Presented in Critics’ Week, Land of Ashes can’t escape some classic elements of Latin American exotization; however, it does possess a wonderful actress: Smashleen Gutiérrez.
Por Mónica Delgado
La película más combativa de toda esta edición de Cannes vino de la mano del emblemático Lech Kowalski. Si bien durante esta jornada de once días hubo demostraciones de un cine militante y político en los trabajos de Patricio Guzmán o en el de Juan Solanas (como apoyo a la campaña por el derecho al aborto en Argentina), dos latinoamericanos, con Blow it to bits (On va tout péter) se dio espacio para la voz obrera.
By Mónica Delgado
What a better figure that the one of an imposing lighthouse to inquire about masculine fears? If in The Witch (2015), American filmmaker Robert Eggers explores the fears of trickeries and religious precepts in a community of New England in the seventeenth century, in The Lighthouse (2019), he stops in two solitary characters trapped in an island at the end of the nineteenth century, who survive among hallucinations, the effects of alcohol and the majesty of a lighthouse (the father, the libido or the symbolic power) which rules it all.
By Mónica Delgado
Tarantino’s request of “no spoilers” for his film, made for the general audience, critics and journalists around the world, has little to do with revealing plots, or some turn of the screw that could’ve ruined the tension of the spectator. Quentin’s request has to do with another aspect of the film, which lies in its core itself. When Once upon a time… in Hollywood ends, one has the impression of having assisted to an exemplary act which shows the capacity of cinema of transforming reality, of proposing an exit and creating an evasion, maybe even accomplishing a dream. What Tarantino did in this film is closer to the highest degree of sublimation of cinema. The filmmaker of Reservoir dogs and Death proof has materialized that which cinema can achieve to mean for several people: a way of salvation.