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CONTENTS Page 4 5-8
Editorial Maggie A teenage girl in the Midwest becomes Infected by an outbreak of a disease that slowly turns those infected into zombies. During her transformation, her loving father stays at her side.
9-12
Manglehorn Left heartbroken by the woman he loved and lost many years ago, Manglehorn, an eccentric locksmith, tries to start his life over again.
13-16
The Diary of a Teenage Girl A teenage girl living in San Francisco in The 70s enters into an affair with her mother’s boyfriend.
17-21
Gemma Bovary Martin Joubert, an ex-Parisian well-heeled hipster passionate about Gustave Flaubert, settles into a Norman village as a baker. He sees an English couple who move in as neighbours. Their names are Gemma and Charles Bovary and their behaviour seems to be inspired by Flaubert’s heroes.
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Arthouse Ambiance The Ultimate Picture Palace MbM visits Oxford to report on the first and oldest Independent Cinema in UK
25-28
Film Fest Follower Melbourne & Venice MbM previews the programme of Australia’s and Italy’s biggest Film Festivals.
29-31
The Ultimate Extras MbM examines The Criterion Collection and its special features
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Gemma Bovary
PHOTO CREDITS: Grapevine 5,7,8 Curzon Film World 9,11.12 Vertigo Releasing 13,15,16 Soda Pictures 1,17,20,21,32 UPP 24 Metrodome 30 Artificial Eye 31
Acknowledgements We would like to thank the following for their invaluable help. Clare Stimpson at UPP Chris Boyd at Curzon Nicola Barnes at Grapevine Hannah Farr & Preet at Soda Pictures
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EDITORIAL One of the joys that any film lover has is finding a film which defines excellence, which epitomises what real cinema is, which after seeing it you want to go through the whole experience again. They rarely come along, though we pray that they will. This month those prayers have been answered by the cinematic gods with Gemma Bovary. A beautifully written, directed, photographed and acted film. Suffice to say, it is this month’s cover: the beautiful Gemma Arteron as Gemma Bovary, as well as being our main feature review. On occasion MbM spotlights a cinema in Arthouse Ambiance and this month we travelled to Oxford to view an historic independent cinema – The Ultimate Picture Palace. A single screen cinema that runs a repertory programme of films to delight its discerning audience. While amongst our film reviews you will read about The Diary of a Teenage Girl, Maggie, Manglehorn. The former arriving with dazzling plaudits from around the globe and introducing a young actress to be remembered – Bel Powley, carrying the film on her delicate shoulders. We are entering the time of year when the film calendar is laden with international film festivals, which is why FilmFest Follower peruses the daily schedules of two major ones in this issue: Melbourne, already on its third day today, and running until the eleventh. The seventeen day programme is the longest of any film festival. Venice is the oldest film festival in the world and runs from September 2-12. The thing to remember about these celebrated events is that this may be the only chance you will ever have of seeing some of these films, as they may never be theatrically distributed or released on Blu-Ray or DVD. Toronto, Tacoma, San Sebastian, Busan, Torino, London, Mar del Plata, Dubai are forthcoming festivals. Our regular feature Extras examines the Criterion Collection – The Ultimate Extras. Any film connoisseur will have displayed among their collection of DVDs films from Criterion. If one of your favourite films is in their collection then it should be in yours without question. So, hopefully that has whet your appetite to reading and digesting the information within these passionately written pages and please, we do like to hear from you, so drop us a comment to brian@movies-by-mills.com .
Enjoy the read Brian Mills Magazine Editor
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Paul Ridler Magazine Designer
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MAGGIE * Spoiler Alert *
Directed by Henry Hobson Starring: Arnold Schwarzenegger. Abigail Breslin. Joely Richardson. Dad, you’ve protected me all my life. Now it’s my time to protect you. There is life with you, not with me. Don’t come looking for me. I’m safe. I’m fine. Brave words spoken to a father by a daughter who has contacted a rare disease that will turn her into a zombie, pleading with him not to come looking for her, but of course he does. The father is played by Arnold Schwarzenegger and the daughter, Maggie, by Abigail Breslin, and what is so remarkable about the film is not the storyline which has been told before, but the casting of Schwarzenegger in his first serious role. He has terminated, pun intentional, the musclebound movie franchise to appear in a role where he is called upon to act and to be taken seriously. As a father fending off the military and police who want to put the girl into quarantine or persuade him to kill her as the visible effects horrifically transform her, he does everything he can to protect her: I promised your mother I would always look after you. And he takes up a gun to do just that. An image of Arnold Schwarzenegger with a gun is already firmly embedded in our minds when we think of him, but of a loving man cradling his daughter in his arms is not. This is the actor’s best role by far and is an obvious career move to better parts. Though he may want to take up the gun again to shoot the film cynics who quickly smirk at the likelihood of the actor being considered anything else but a former politician and bodybuilder. He will be back but according to his dissenters, definitely not as a real actor. Abigail Breslin in the title role is a young actress whose career is impressive and worth examining.
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She started out acting at the age of three in commercials and debuted as Mel Gibson’s daughter in M Night Shyamalan’s Signs. Everybody was so nice. The director would ask me if I was OK with my scenes and if something was too scary. Joaquin (Phoenix) was great, too. We would thumb-wrestle between takes. I always won! Her natural acting talent was obvious and casting directors were soon putting her name forward for coveted roles. One of these was in Keane. Abigail played Kira, Keane’s child, who he somehow loses at the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York. He is already a troubled man trying to fight schizophrenia, and losing Kira has not helped his condition at all.
But the one film which Abigail Breslin will always be remembered for came in 2006 when she was cast as Olive in Little Miss Sunshine. She made the role her own of a seven year old who is invited to compete in the “Little Miss Sunshine” pageant in faroff California, the eccentric family piles into their rusted Volkswagen bus to rally behind her – with riotous results all the way: how could it not be with a depressed brother on board who has just come out of hospital after being jilted by his lover, or Dwayne a Nietzsche-reading teen who has taken a vow of silence, a father who is desperately trying to sell his motivational success programme – with no success. And of course the foul-mouthed grandad whose outrageous behaviour got him evicted from his retirement home. Abigail’s performance won awards including Tokyo Best Actress. Of the films she has done it is her favourite: Everybody’s always like, “Are you sick of people saying Little Miss Sunshine?” No, because I’d so much rather them say that than, like, “Little Miss Effed Up in the Head” I love the movie; it’s part of me and it always will be. In The Gift, she befriends a young man who needs a friend as one of the many tasks he has to perform in order to receive “The Ultimate Gift”, even though he has no idea what that gift will be, from his deceased billionaire grandfather. In 2013 she auditioned for the part of Jean Fordham in August – Osage County and got it despite having a 103 degree fever. Ewan McGregor was her father in a starred-cast film which included Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, Chris Cooper, Sam Shepard, Juliette Lewis, Margo Martindale and Benedict Cumberbatch.
Maggie was released on 24 July.
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Arnold Schwarzenegger and Abigail Breslin in Maggie
Arnold Schwarzenegger and Abigail Breslin in Maggie www.moviesbymills.com
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Arnold Schwarzenegger and Abigail Breslin in Maggie
Arnold Schwarzenegger in Maggie 8
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MANGLEHORN Directed by David Gordon Green Starring: Al Pacino. Holly Hunter. Chris Messina. Harvey Korine. Dear Clara. Loving you is the only thing I ever done right. The opening sequence shows Manglehorn (Pacino), a locksmith, reacting to a light bulb going out by replacing it, only to see it also failing. It is symbolic of events to come: the light that Manglehorn carries for the love of his life, Clara, must burn out or his destruction is guaranteed. David Gordon Green is known for being a director for making films centred on misfits and sympathetic to his characters and many critics praise him. Manglehorn is a grouchy seventysomething writing letters every day to Clara, a past love that he lost but still obsesses about. He holds conversations with her in his head believing that somehow she will hear him and may return. His only distractions are his call-out jobs on fixing locks on cars or front doors, his devotion to his cat, his granddaughter, and chatting to Dawn (Holly Hunter) a bank teller. He is invited to have lunch with his son, Jacob (Chris Messina) a successful businessman. He tells him that he never loved his mother and even thinks the restaurant that his son has chosen is pretentious. Between them it seems love was never lost because it was never found. It is difficult to cheer for a protagonist who comes swathed in anger, admits to not loving his wife and obviously his son too, and is an obsessive freak. It is uncomfortable for them and us to be around him. Only when he is with his cat and nursing her because she won’t eat and learning from the vet that she has swallowed a key that we know Manglehorn does love his cat. And he has love for his granddaughter too and these scenes are warmly and sincerely played.
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There is no faulting Al Pacino in living the part, great actor that he is, the trouble is that he is not a likeable person, we ask ourselves, why would we care what happens to him? The scenes that play the best are the ones that underline his tactless and selfish character: the ones with his son and the finest scene in the whole film when he succumbs to Dawn’s invite to a dinner date. For Dawn, she has been looking forward so much to the evening because she is falling in love with him but the conversation is reduced to painful embarrassment when all Manglehorn does is talk only about Clara, about how she was the perfect woman, that there would never be anyone like her. He is totally insensitive and oblivious to how this is making Dawn feel. Dawn receives this verbal adoration of another woman with increasing shock as her wonderful evening begins to crumble around her. Can we please change the subject? She pleads, but it is too late and she leaves the restaurant in tears. We then watch Manglehorn’s reaction as instead of going after her, he looks at her plate and begins shovelling the food onto his own. The scene confirms, if we had not got the message already, what sort of a man this is by labouring voice overs and arty-crafty cinematography using a variety of colours to power drill the point home to us. The big fault with the film, except the aforementioned scene, is that the director uses far too many expositions from the characters rather than showing their feelings. There is also a subplot concerning Gary (*Harmony Korine) a friend of Manglehorn, who runs a sex club and tries to encourage him to use it. The character seems to be an afterthought and superfluous to requirements as does the surrealistic automobile pile-up with everything covered by squashed and squidgy watermelons covering everything. The only conclusion being is that this is meant to show that life is a mess. Unfortunately so is the script and I think the key to finding the solution to its problem was swallowed by the cat? Green’s best film to date has been All the Real Girls, which was over eleven years ago. *Korine is also a friend of Green’s as well as a director of films.
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quirky
Al Pacino in Manglehorn
Al Pacino in Manglehorn www.moviesbymills.com
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Al Pacino & Holly Hunter in Manglehorn
Al Pacino & cat in Manglehorn 12
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THE DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL * Spoiler Alert *
Directed by Marielle Heller Starring: Bel Powley. Alexander Skarsgard. Kristen Wiig. I know nothing’s changed but everything looks totally different to me now.
Based on the graphic novel by Phoebe Gloeckner about a 15year-old girl who falls in love with her mother’s boyfriend, The Diary of a Teenage Girl is the best film I have ever seen which shows what it is like to be a girl at that age: challenging all boundaries by experiencing for herself sexual taboos, heavy drugs, alcohol, and digging her way out of the resulting consequences that they bring and their effect on relationships. It is 1970’s San Francisco, Minnie (Bel Powley) has aspirations of being a cartoonist, and her caricatures and comic strips inhabit her daily life and visually appear alongside her at any given moment. This visual ingenuity raises the film several rungs on the film fantasy ladder compared to others in the genre. The relationship with Monroe (Alexander Skarsgard) is a temptation that Minnie cannot resist and is encouraged by her desire to be touched and leading to a passionate affair with a man twenty years her senior, but despite the age gap she remains in control. They both try to make their relationship work, while her mother Charlotte (Kristen Wiig) continues to party, appearing oblivious to her daughter’s affair.
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Bel Powley is an exceptional talent who made her film debut in Side by Side. Some of the sexual scenes are so naturally played that you get the feeling that you are an uninvited voyeur. What were the actor’s feelings about the project? A good piece for women and for teenage girls. It’s groundbreaking in the sense that not a lot of people have made films about girls discovering their sexuality and sexual feeling. I think this is the first one that has done something like that. I think it is something that everyone feels, boys and girls growing up. It’s not really addressed with women, so I want people to feel that is what we have done here. – Bel Powley. It is really a unique story and I don’t think that there has been so many coming-of-age adolescent stories. What I loved about the script when I first read it was that it’s not....most have been written by old or middle-aged men or women. They have a tendency to become judgemental or sentimental - and this felt so real. – Alexander Skarsgard Bel Powley was recently seen in A Royal Night Out as a young Princess Margaret. Alexander Skarsgard will be seen next in the title role of Tarzan.
The Diary of a Teenage Girl has won the following prestigious awards:
SUNDANCE 2015 Cinematography Brandon Trost BERLIN 2015 Grand Prix of the Generation 14plus Best Feature Film EDINBURGH 2015 Best International Feature Film
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Bel Powley in The Diary of a Teenage Girl
Bel Powley in The Diary of a Teenage Girl www.moviesbymills.com
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Bel Powley & Kristen Wiig in The Diary of a Teenage Girl
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Alexander Skarsgard & Kristen Wiig in The Diary of a Teenage Girl www.moviesbymills.com
GEMMA BOVARY * Spoiler Alert *
Directed by Anne Fontaine Starring: Gemma Arterton. Fabrice Luchini. Jason Fleming. I’m me. I’m free. I’m not that woman. More than you think.
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Gemma Martin
A graphic novel is a perfect storyboard for a film and Gemma Bovary is based on Posy Simmonds book. She reread Flaubert’s novel and borrowed his plot: a woman marries a man who she doesn’t really love, then gets tired of him and is so bored that she imagines that by changing her surroundings, she’ll be able to change her life. The idea of the novel had come to Posy Simmonds when she was in a café in Italy and saw a beautiful woman carrying lots of designer shopping bags and with a husband who didn’t seem to know what to do to please her to relieve her obvious ennui. Anne Fontaine, the film’s director, already knew Posy Simmonds through Tamara Drewe, which was also made into a film and starred Gemma Arterton. When she read the novel, the characters intrigued her. She was seduced by Simmond’s tone which was somewhere between dark comedy and great irony. She was aware of the improbability of the meeting between a baker and this young modern Englishwoman who ends up enlightening his life, whilst he had been convinced he had his libido under control and believed himself to effectively be in sexual retirement! Here he is, getting excited about the link between a fictional character – Emma Bovary – and the real Gemma Bovary. What struck me in Posy Simmonds’s style of writing is the need to keep a keen sense of the comedy, because there’s a side of “French Woody Allen” in the depressed baker whose imagination and uniqueness come from a funny place. The character of Martin is living vicariously through a love that is forming for a girl with incredible sensuality – who www.moviesbymills.com
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doesn’t look at him as a desirable man, but as a neighbour and local baker. Martin Joubert is the storyteller, halfway between a director and a writer, who works with real life. At the market, in front of his bakery, he confides in the audience that he’s like “a director who has just called action!” He sees the young chateau owner that he himself introduced to Gemma, coming to meet him; then he imagines their conversation aloud, and they repeat his own lines, as if he were the author of their lives. For Martin, his passion is twofold: Gemma represents a parallel world of what could be to him and displaces him by being so irresistible. When he says that ten years of sexual peace has been eliminated at once by a mere “insignificant gesture,” he reveals his hyper-sensitivity. And as happens so often, unrequited love hurts and is difficult to face up to. When I read the graphic novel, I immediately imagined Martin Joubert as Fabrice Luchini, not just as an actor but as being that he has Flaubert in his blood. I have so often talked to him about Madame Bovary being a real person I had the feeling that this role had been waiting for only him. I was lucky to have such an actor as Fabrice Luchini as only Fabrice could pass off this obsession for Madame Bovary as something utterly natural. It was especially more important that it be about a character that observes other peoples’ lives through a window and that places him in the position of a voyeur who invents stories. Fabrice Luchini stated: From a visual point of view, what’s great is that the character I play watches the novel be played out right in front of his eyes whereas we are not in the book. We are taken in with this sensuality that we don’t look for Flaubert references. We are in Flaubert. In the first scene, when Gemma comes into the bakery she is literally in ecstasy looking at all these breads in display, she practically orgasms! And it’s what makes this scene so sublime. As soon as she enters the shop, we’re someplace else. “What is beauty?” asks Stendhal, “it’s a promise of happiness.” This woman who comes into the bakery, is a promise of happiness. As for casting Gemma Arterton, Anne Fontaine said that as soon as she opened the door and read a little extract in French that she had written, I knew that I was dealing with an atomic bomb; she gives off an energy that means you cannot help but love her. I didn’t even need her to test, she came to France and spent three months really emerged in the local culture before working on her character. Gemma Arterton exudes sexuality out of every pore as Gemma Bovary and it is obvious by just looking at her that every man would be besotted in her company. Her naturalness, whether enthusing over the variety of breads which Martin 18
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shows her, sniffing its aroma, dancing on her own to Bambou, kneading bread as though it was an orgasmic experience, voicing her passion for France: Oh, this is France, Charlie; she epitomises joie de vivre. When Gemma leans over Martin to pour his tea, her closeness for him is ecstatic and when she urgently ask him to remove a bee from her back and he tells her that he will have to unzip her dress to do so, she tells him to Do it! For her it is an annoyance, for him it is intimate joy. I must admit that when I got the script initially, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to take the part in the project because I’d already filmed Tamara Drewe, which is a film adaptation of another Posy Simmond’s novel. The style of it was similar, but the main character was very different, and there was something about her that attracted more: I see more of myself in Gemma than in Tamara. Besides, the story takes place in France and I was pleased at the prospect of learning French! The relationship between Gemma and Martin is an interesting one. She doesn’t know anyone, and he helps her to heal a bit: she sees him every day when she goes to buy bread, and she finds him kind, although a bit strange. She appreciates him, without being conscious that he’s obsessed with her. It’s important because he’s romantic and he lives in fiction – and she too has always looked for ways to escape her daily life – so they have that in common. The other major character in the story is Normandy which is beautifully captured by cinematographer Christophe Beaucaire. Its scenery is as addictive as the femininity of Gemma Bovary. It is Anne Fontaine’s third collaboration with Beaucaire, a cinematic bond. They wanted natural, enhancing lighting so it’s truthful, but that it’s reinterpreted, in relation to the emotion of each scene. They chose to film at the time of year when the Normandy countryside is at its most beautiful. It was especially important to give a sunny side to the film since the subject matter is quite dark. Anne Fontaine stated: We filmed in Scope, but the camera is often projected, which gives an impression of fluidity and sensuality, without needing any big camera movements. In reality, I thought of the film through Luchini’s eyes; even when he’s not in frame, we still have the feeling that there’s someone permanently in the background. Besides, I wanted the camera to shift smoothly between Martin’s dreamlike visions – such as the hallucination in the cathedral or the ballroom scene in another time – and reality. So it means that we’re always in his head. And after seeing Gemma Bovary I guarantee it will remain in your head and your heart too.
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Gemma Arterton & Nils Schneider in Gemma Bovary
Gemma Arterton & Fabrice Luchini in Gemma Bovary 20
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Gemma Arterton & Fabrice Luchini in Gemma Bovary
Fabrice Luchini & Gemma Arterton in Gemma Bovary www.moviesbymills.com
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ARTHOUSE AMBIANCE THE ULTIMATE PICTURE PALACE OXFORD AN INDEPENDENT CINEMA Located in East Oxford is a single screen cinema with a rich and vibrant history which shows films approximately three weeks after their general release. It is unique in that it does not exhibit adverts only trailers for forthcoming films. The art-deco auditorium has 108 seats and at the rear there is a small bar serving drinks and snacks. The cashier’s box is located outside at the front entrance, arched by a facia that announces the cinema’s name. The cinema opens every day of the week for two evening screenings, with matiness on Saturday, Sunday and Thursday. Baby Club offers lunchtime screenings exclusively for parents with babies under 1 year old (and their friends) Tickets are only £5 and can be bought at the box office or online. It was originally called The Oxford Picture Palace when it first opened on 24 February 1911 and Frank Stuart, licensee of the Elm Tree Tavern, was its founder. Unfortunately it was forced to close in 1917 when the manager was called up for war service. The cinema lay dormant for many years until it was taken over as a furniture warehouse. A further resurrection of the building as a cinema happened in 1976 when Bill Heine and Pablo Butcher reopened it as The Penultimate Picture Palace. Bill Heine was running a cinema in Headington, the Moulin Rouge, and added the cinema to his empire. The Moulin Rouge had black and white striped cancan legs and the Penultimate Picture Palace Al Jolson hands on their roofs, but there were complaints about the legs regarding planning permission and they had to be removed and were installed overhanging the parapet of Bill’s cinema in Brighton – the Duke of Yorks. The sculptures were designed by John Buckley as was the 25ft fibreglass shark that appears to be crashing through the roof of Bill’s own house at No 2 New High Street, Oxford, otherwise known as the Shark House. Bill Heine joined the BBC Radio Oxford as a presenter in 1983 and now hosts his own Sunday show from 11am to 12 noon. He closed the Penultimate Picture Palace in the 90s and it remained closed for two years. 22
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Squatters moved in to the abandoned building, highlighting the sad plight of the cinema, and a public outcry helped it to become a listed building and added a clause to its lease saying that it must be a cinema. In 1996 Saied Marham took over the cinema and renamed it The Ultimate Picture Palace. He wanted to show films that needed to be shown which meant juggling mainstream cinema, arthouse, and forgotten masterpieces such as the Maxim Gorky trilogy (a series of films based on the Russian socialist’s autobiography, released 1938–1940. The screenings were not well attended but gave great satisfaction to one patron who had waited 40 years to see them all. In contrast, Saied showed a season of Monty Python films on a Sunday night. Membership deals offering good value on films were successfully introduced. He also had a flare for quirkiness, once waiting for a couple of patrons to finish their takeaway on the bench outside the cinema before he started the reels rolling. His rein ended in July 1999. Enter Jane and Phillipa who took over from Saied. They transformed the cinema by creating more comfort and redecorating. They replaced the seating with seats that allowed more legroom and purchased them from EBay and made it up from Cornwall and were installed ready for the day’s 5.30 showing. They also added a bar at the rear of the auditorium. For distributors the Ultimate Picture Palace is the only cinema on their books with a single screen, with no digital projector, and independently run. Jane and Phillipa remained as owners until April 2011 when the current owner Becky Hallsmith took over. She has brightened up the building’s façade, repainting and carpeting inside the auditorium as well as overseeing a successful Kickstarter campaign which helped fund the new seats which were installed in May. There were also improvements done to the ventilation system in December 2014 and a new screen and speakers installed in June 2015. Long live The Ultimate Picture Palace! Long live independent cinemas!
NB: On 24 February 2011 The Ultimate Picture Palace celebrated its 100th birthday with a free screening of The Smallest Show on Earth and a documentary The Ultimate Survivor, the story of The Ultimate Picture Palace, which was made by local filmmaker Philip Hind. www.moviesbymills.com
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UPP's auditorium
Exterior of UPP 24
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FORCE OF DESTINY
Directed by Paul Cox Starring: David Wenham. Jacqueline McKenzie A journey of love on a transplant waiting list.
MISTRESS AMERICA
Directed by Noah Baumbach Starring: Greta Gerwig. Lola Kirke. A lonely college freshman’s life is turned upside down by her impetuous adventurous soon-to-be stepsister.
600 Miles Directed by Gabriel Ripstein Starring: Tim Roth. Kristyan Ferrer. Arnulfo Rubio smuggles weapons for a deadly Mexican cartel. ATF agent Hank Harris attempts to apprehend him, but gets kidnapped by Rubio, instead.
99 Homes Directed by Ramin Bahrani Starring: Andrew Garfield. Michael Shannon. A father struggles to get the home that his family was evicted from by working for the greedy real estate broker who’s the source of his frustration.
Chronic Directed by Michael Franco Starring: Tim Roth. David Dastmalchian A homecare nurse works with terminally ill patients.
Chrystal Fairy and www.moviesbymills.com
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the Magic Cactus Directed by Sebastian Silva Starring: Michael Sera. Gary Hoffman. While travelling in Chile, Jamie invites an eccentric woman to join his group’s quest to score a fabled hallucinogen.
*The Diary of a Teenage Girl Directed by Marielle Heller Starring: Bel Powley. Alexander Skarsgard. Kristen Wiig. *REVIEWED IN THIS ISSUE
The Daughter Directed by Simon Stone Starring: Geoffrey Rush. Sam Neill A man returns home to discover a long-buried family secret.
Eisenstein in Guanajuato Directed by Peter Greenaway Starring: Elmer Back. Luis Alberti The venerated filmmaker Eisenstein is comparable in talent, insight, and wisdom with the likes of Shakespeare or Beethoven.
The End of the Tour Directed by James Ponsoldt Documentary The story of the five-day interview between Rolling Stone reporter David Lipsey and acclaimed novelist David Foster Wallace, which took place right after the 1996 publication of Wallace’s epic novel “Infinite Jest.”
Hungry Hearts Directed by Severio Costanzo Starring: Adam Driver. Alba Rohrwacher. The relationship of a couple who meet by chance in New York City is put to the test when they encounter a life or death circumstance.
Journey to the Shore Directed by Kiyushi Kurosawa Starring: Eri Fukatsu. Tadanobu Asano. Mizuki’s husband drowned at sea 3 years ago suddenly comes back home. She is not that surprised.
Listen to me Marlon Directed by Steven Riley Documentary. Hundreds of hours of audio that Marlon Brando recorded over the course of his life to tell the screen legend’s story.
The Lobster Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos Starring: Colin Farrell. Lea Seydoux. Rachel Weisz. Ben Whishaw.
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In a dystopian near future, single people are obliged to find a matching mate in 45 days or are transformed into animals and released into the woods.
Me and Earl and the Dying Girl Directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon Starring: Thomas Mann. R J Cyler. Olivia Cooke. High Schooler Greg, makes parodies of classic movies with his friend Earl, but finds his outlook altered after a classmate is diagnosed with cancer.
Mississippi Grind Directed by Anna Boden & Ryan Fleck Starring: Ryan Reynolds. Ben Mendelsohn. Sienna Miller. Down on his luck and facing financial hardships, Gary teams up with younger charismatic poker player Curtis in an attempt to change his luck. The two set off on a road trip through the South with visions of winning back what’s been lost.
My Love, Don’t Cross That River Directed by Mo-Young Jin Documentary A couple who have lived together for 76 years face the last moments of their marriage.
EVEREST Directed by Baltasar Kormakur. Starring: Jake Gyllenhaal. Keira Knightley. Robin Wright. Josh Brolin A climbing expedition on Mt Everest is devastated by a severe snow storm.
MR SIX Directed by Guan Hu. Starring: Feng Xiaogang A former gangster living alone with various illnesses, is tempted back into the business by his son.
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REMEMBER Directed by Atom Egolan. Starring: Christopher Plummer. Martin Landau. Dean Norris The darkest chapter of the 20th century collides with a contemporary mission of revenge.
BLACK MASS Directed by Scott Cooper. Starring: Johnny Depp. Benedict Cumberbatch. Dakota Johnson. The true story of Whitey Bulger, the brother of a state senator and the most violent criminal in the history of South Boston, who became an FBI informant to take down a Mafia family invading his turf.
SPOTLIGHT Directed Thomas McCarthy Starring: Michael Keaton. Rachel McAdams. Mark Ruffalo. Lief Schreiber. The true story of how the Boston Globe uncovered the massive scandal of child molestation and cover-up within the local catholic archdiocese, shaking the entire Catholic Church to the core.
DE PALMA Directed by Noah Baumbach, Jake Paltrow. Documentary
Homage to the director Brian De Palma.
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THE ULTIMATE EXTRAS
THE CRITERION COLLECTION A continuing series of important classic and contemporary films on Blu-Ray and DVD. If you are an aficionado of film then the chances are that you will be au fait with the name Criterion. And if you are a patron of art house cinemas and a regular reader of Movies by Mills, you want the best value and information on the film when you purchase it - and that means the Extras. There is none better than Criterion for this service - they are the experts. So we at MbM salute them and with this feature we take a closer look at the Criterion Collection. Criterion was founded in 1984. Its headquarters are in New York. It began by releasing special editions of films on laserdiscs, its first being Citizen Kane. Its second was King Kong. Neither of these films were ever reissued on DVD or these: Swing Time, High Noon, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, The Magnificent Ambersons, Help! The Graduate, It’s a Wonderful Life, Sabotage, Secret Agent, Young & Innocent, The Asphalt Jungle, A Night at the Opera, Scaramouche, The Producers, The Princess Bride, Show Boat, North by Northwest, Adam’s Rib, Blowup, Singin’ in the Rain, Forbidden Planet, Zulu, Darling, The Wizard of Oz, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Adventures of Robin Hood, Blade Runner, West Side Story, Casablanca, Some Like It Hot, Ghostbusters, Lawrence of Arabia, Shampoo, Miracle in Milan, Annie Hall, The Great Escape, Burn!, Lolita, Sex Lies, and Videotape, Taxi Driver, The Lacemaker, King of Hearts, Silverado, Raging Bull, Last Tango in Paris, Dr. No, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, Bad Day at Black Rock, Here Comes Mr. Jordan, Arsenic and Old Lace, Lady for a Day, Carnal Knowledge, Carrie, Citizen Kane, Dr. Strangelove, The Adventures of Baron Munchausen, Midnight Cowboy, Boyz n the Hood, Akira, Letter from an Unknown Woman, Blackmail, Jason and the Argonauts, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, The Player, Damage, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Confidentially Yours, Edward II, Get Out Your Handkerchiefs, Evergreen, Polyester, Bodies, Rest and Motion, Menace II Society, Othello, Two English Girls, The Last Laugh, The Prince of Tides, She’s Gotta Have It, Cat People, The Woman Next Door, David Holzman’s Diary, Halloween, Devsu Uzala, Three Cases of Murder, Pulp Fiction, Once Were Warriors, The Atomic Café, Why Has Bodhi Dharma Left for the East? I Am Cuba, Seven, Tristana, Waltz of the Toreadors, Dead Presidents, El Cid, Diva, The Entertainer, Swept Away, The Return of Martin Guerre, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss, Montenegro, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Trainspotting, A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies, Supercop, Shine, The English Patient, Evita, Olympia I and II, Pink Flamingos, Nostalghia, Woman on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Crash, Sling Blade, Boogie Nights. A total of 118 films. The last film Criterion released on a laserdisc was Armageddon on March 16, 1999. MbM will be revisiting Criterion every month to peek into their library but to give you a taster we will look at two films which have been reviewed in MbM.
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FRANCES HA Directed by Noah Baumbach Starring: Greta Gerwig. Mickey Summer. Adam Driver.
She is a prize-winner of nothingness, but in a Woody-whacky-way, she is endearing and funny.
MbM July 2013 – Edinburgh Film Festival Special. -
Criterion Collection FRANCES HA Disc Features Director – Approved Special Edition New High-Definition Digital Master, approved by cowriter and director Noah Baumbach, with 5.1 DTS-HD master audio on the Blu-Ray. New Conversation between filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich & Baumbach. New Conversation between Actor and Filmmaker Sarah Polley and the film’s cowriter and star Greta Gerwig.
New Conversation about the colour of Frances Ha between Baumbach, director of photography Sam Levy, and Pascal Dangin who was responsible for the film’s colour mastering. Trailer Booklet featuring an essay by playwright Annie Baker. 30
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THE GREAT BEAUTY Directed by Paolo Sorrentino Starring: Toni Servillo. Carlo Verdoni. Sabrina Ferilli.
Scenes are beautifully composed with the aesthetical eye of an Antonioni‌ 
MbM September 2013.
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Criterion Collection THE GREAT BEAUTY Director-Approved Two-DVD Special Edition Features New 2k digital film transfer, approved by director Paolo Sorrentino New conversation between Sorrentino and Italian cultural critic Antonio Monda New interview with actor Toni Servillo New interview with screenwriter Umberto Contarello Deleted scenes Trailer New English subtitle translation Booklet featuring an essay by critic Phillip Lopate www.moviesbymills.com
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