Showing 131-137 of 137 results
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Embracing anonymity
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 15/02/2012
» Over the years it's become something of a cliche: Isabelle Huppert is a small woman who's built up an illustrious career by playing emotionally powerful roles _ roles so big in attitude that we tend to forget the size of the actress playing them. She's played Madame Bovary; she's played the amoral mother in a film based on a George Bataille novel; and she's probably best known to Thai audiences as the intensely masochistic Erika Kohut in The Piano Teacher.
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Berlinale, it's a wrap
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 22/02/2012
» In Berlin last weekend, Roman inmates performed Shakespeare and won the Golden Bear, the year's first major prize in world cinema handed out at Europe's premiere film festival. Decking the sidebar awards were a Hungarian movie about violence against gypsies, a poignant East-West German drama, a rapturously eccentric Portuguese black-and-white film, while the only Asian title to score was a Chinese epic set during the last days of imperial rule. It was the usual distribution of honours to cover every base by the jury led by Mike Leigh (and including Jake Gyllenhaal and Charlotte Gainsbourg).
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Evil of election
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 02/03/2012
» Politics is a poison that eats the soul _ especially the soul of a mangenue who dips his foot in the acid water completely believing it's a fountain of hope. The Ides of March, George Clooney's fourth film as writer/director, says that much, which is not much, given the time of cynicism and embittered tussle we all (and not just the US citizens in their election year) are inhabiting. The machination of the plot and escalating disillusionment of the Ryan Gosling's character, a visionary press secretary turned rookie viper, have just enough stings to keep us involved, yet this liberal's guilt trip treats the dark side of democracy with such cerebral knowingness. Politics hurts, and when it does it kicks the guts _ I wish the dagger had been more ruthless and visceral.
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Parallel ambitions
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 25/01/2012
» We wish them the best of luck, and we pray Hua Hin International Film Festival won't turn out to be a lemon. A month ago hardly anybody had heard about this brand-new event, and now those who've heard about it are wondering if they'll take the trouble of making a trip down to the seaside town to watch the films. Our advise is, if the sky is blue and you have nothing else to do (and if you want to forsake the Bangkok Experimental Film Festival that will also happen this weekend) just go for the fun of it. Worst case, you can always decamp to the beach, or one of the seafood joints in Khao Takieb.
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Three flavours
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 03/02/2012
» Baseball geeks will revel in the chance to cheer along with the underdog that makes it, the league-stinker that stuns the big-spender, with the help of digital tinkering. But even if you're illiterate in the great American game, this sport drama has enough of a broad sweep to hook you along with Billy Beane, the real-life manager of Oakland Athletics who, in 2001, gambled with the then-unthinkable strategy of computer analysis and took his team on a 20-match winning streak. That Beane is played by Brad Pitt _ boyish, beaming and bright-eyed _ is, if not exactly a grand slam, a pretty swooping homerun.
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Film festival needs direction
Life, Kong Rithdee, Published on 01/02/2012
» If the Red Carpet works, the film festival works. That seems to be the motto of the hype machine behind last weekend's Hua Hin International Film Festival, which proudly paraded stars down the sandy, horse-free beach of the InterContinental while the cinemas were haunted by ghosts. Nothing's wrong with using a movie festival to support tourism, as long as some attention is paid to what it's all about: film, and the film-going experience.
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Heeding the call of history
Muse, Kong Rithdee, Published on 04/02/2012
» It is one of those sensational, semi-stupid questions that a journalist sometimes cannot summon his wit and restraint from asking: Would she, Michelle Yeoh, have made the same decision as the character she plays, Aung San Suu Kyi?
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