Showing 161 - 170 of 226
Sometimes transcendental, always relevant
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 25/05/2018
» The American films were on short supply this year at Cannes -- which in turn deprived the assembly line of red carpet material -- but nobody seemed to mind that except, well, some American media and fashion bloggers. That superfluous caveat aside, the recently wrapped 71st Cannes Film Festival was nearly unanimously praised as one of the best editions in recent memory, with a string of good, sometimes very good, titles playing night after night -- and even the bad films weren't so offensively bad, as was often the case. In the midst of soul-searching following the question of relevance (the world wants Avengers), the rise of streaming (the world watches films on phones), the decline of arthouse popularity, Cannes insists on the sacredness of cinema, on the future of the art, and this year it paid off solidly.
Beyond the cinematic glitz
B Magazine, Kong Rithdee, Published on 20/05/2018
» In the past 10 days the seaside city of Cannes has been in the news with noisy fanfare and dazzling colour, led by pictures of bare-shouldered stars sauntering down the red carpet on a daily basis. It happens every year in May, as the world's largest cine-event, the Cannes Film Festival, attracts thousands of journalists, photographers and industry professionals to the Mediterranean resort town made out to become a self-contained universe of glamour. Throughout its 71st edition, which ended yesterday, Cannes once again commanded the attention of the world.
Dream, murder and reality
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 18/05/2018
» The 11-day Cannes Film Festival will close tomorrow, and as the race for the Palme d'Or is the most breathtaking in years, we look at some of the highlights of the second week of the world's largest movie festival
Hoping to take the top prize East
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 16/05/2018
» Asian filmmakers have so far fielded a strong force at the 71st Cannes Film Festival, and when the Palme d'Or is decided on Saturday by the Cate Blanchett-led jury there's a real chance that the top prize might go to one of the Asian titles -- after a Turkish film in 2014 (Winter Sleep) and a Thai film back in 2010 (Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives).
Image is everything
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 15/05/2018
» Cinema, Jean-Luc Godard said via FaceTime, is X+3 = 1. The X, of course, is -2.
Mahathir's win shows voting works
News, Kong Rithdee, Published on 12/05/2018
» This week all my friends went to vote. In Malaysia, of course.
Really, who gets to walk the red carpet?
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 11/05/2018
» This is the question I've been asked several times -- not because I'm a veteran of the fabled Cannes red carpet (it's long, intimidating and tedious, plus I'll never invest in a tuxedo that would make me look like a waiter anyway), but because I've been a ringside witness to the said red carpet in the past 16 years of my visiting the festival. All the thousands of photographs of stars, models, actors -- beautiful people of planet Earth, or planet Cinema -- preening down the tapis rouge at Cannes have become even more famous, more recognisable, more awe-inspiring than most of the films shown here. The aura of glamour, fame and radiance actually makes a lot of people think of Cannes as the red carpet, and not the films it shows or its coveted top prize, the Palme d'Or.
Truth and lies
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 11/05/2018
» By some description, this is one of the most political editions of Cannes Film Festival in recent memory, both on screen and off. After three days, the brouhaha over #MeToo (the festival has a dedicated hotline for sexual harassment report, which begs the question: why here and now?), the comment by Jury President Cate Blanchett on the small percentage of female filmmakers in the programme, and the fact that two of the directors whose films are in the competition are under house arrest in their respective countries (Iran and Russia) -- all of this cast a mixed shadow over the 71st edition of the world's largest film festival that still boasts influence and glamour while struggling to maintain its relevance.
The French Connection
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 09/05/2018
» In the opening episode of Ten Years Thailand, a group of soldiers arrives at an art gallery to inspect a potentially subversive artwork. What constitutes a kernel of subversion, however, is hard to lay a finger on. So the story shifts: one of the soldiers begins to chat up a pretty maid, and as the Sun is setting the two of them look out from the gallery to the horizon full of shadows. Maybe of hope.
Apocalypse again
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 08/05/2018
» Colonel Kurtz is returning to Scala. Nearly 30 years after it opened in Bangkok, Apocalypse Now will be screened this Sunday at noon at Scala, as part of Thai Film Archive's World's Classic Cinema series.