Sacrifice (2025)

 This curio is in Romanian theaters now -very limited.

For thouse who want a psychedelic experience, with great visuals, music and sound design, go for it !

The rest can wait for the Netflix relase on Oct. 16. 

It's a film by Romain Gavras, the son of legendary Costa-Gavras. 

It's about the end of the world (maybe?), a volcano, a benefit celebrity gala and a group of nutty Nordic eco-terrorists.

Chris Evans playing the Hollywood celebrity actor Mike Tyler ( that is now a mess) looks more like a young Nic Cage. Anya Taylor-Joy is the psychotic Terrorist boss, Vincent Cassel, bald and mean, as Ben Bracken, a bio-billionaire, John Malkovich more cameos as the mad scientist Gunnar. 

 The film looks more like directed by a Panos Cosmatos ;)

Simillarities with Yorgos Lanthimos' Bugonia (tho that was a remake). The film has a weird New Greek Cinema style and feeling.

Read there is a genre. `Eat the Rich' films like those of Ruben Ostlund (The Triangle of Sadness), The Menu and Blink Twice.

It's visully stunning, with great soundtrack, sound design and fabulous locations.

Greece (the stone quarry), Bulgaria (Podhodna cave aka The Eyes of God) and Iceland for the volcano.

Score by GENER8ION 

featuring Leonard Cohen, a cool version of SUPERNATURE with Charliexxx

and This is How We Walk on The Moon by Arthur Russell 

here's a video for GENER8ION -Storm, directed by Romain Gavras, who is a renowned music videos director. 

3 1/2 out of 5, 7 out of 10 !

In Bruges (2008) -Romanian

 In Ingles ;) here:

Scrisă pentru retrospectiva TIFF 25 in AperiTIFF.

"They're Filming Midgets..."

O fi rai, iad sau purgatoriu? E Bruges!

Un debut extraordinar al irlandezului Martin McDonagh (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), In Bruges este unul din cele mai bune filme ale anului 2008 și mult mai mult de atât. Film cult par excellence, îi crește valoarea de fiecare data când îl revăd. Sunt însă siderat, după debutul de la Sundance, filmul nu a luat atunci niciun premiu major, Globul de Aur pentru Colin Farrell și nominalizare la Oscar pentru scenariu original, câștigător la acestă categorie la BAFTA.

Îmi place însă să cred că a făcut pentru turismul din Bruges ceea ce Vacanță la Roma a făcut pentru Roma!

Eu, de exemplu, am fost o zi în 2014 și am mers exact cu opiniie lui Ray versus părerile opuse ale lui Ken.

Cuplul Colin Farrell / Ray -Brendan Gleeson /Ken e fabulos, și McDonagh le-a mai dat un film extraordinar împreună 14 ani mai târziu, The Banshees of Inisherin (2022).

Iar Ralph Fiennes /Harry e impecabil, feroce, un personaj irezistibil.

Se simte că McDonagh e și dramaturg și că influențele lui literare vin din Teatrul Absurdului, dar filmul e extrem de cinematografic.

În primul rind e tributar piesei lui Harold Pinter, din 1959. The Dumb Waiter, tadusă în românește Liftul pentru mâncare sau Micul lift. La rîndul ei, piesa lui Pinter se inspiră din cea a lui Samuel Beckett, Așteptându-l pe Godot (1953). Adaugă un pic de British Gangster Cinema, aici Irish, un pic de peisaj de Breugel din Bruges, nihilism, o traumă mortală, un love story improbabil și un umor negru și absurd de nota 11.

Alte piste: Touch of Evil, Don’t Look Now, Carlito’s Way, picturile lui Hieronymus Bosch.

Muzica lui Carter Burwell, cel mai probabil via frații Coen (v. Fargo în aceeași retrospectivă TIFF de comedii negre), cu care McDonagh a început o frumoasă colaborare pentru toate filmele sale ulterioare.

La fel ca și Fargo, In Bruges nu a rulat la vremea lui în cinema în România.

 

Alin Ludu Dumbravă

The Dog Stars (2026)

Ridley Scott's newest pic, The Dog Stars, is as close to a western as he ever did get to do. A post-apocalyptic story, it's a very slow and intimist film, 1 character, a dog, two characters, three characters, that's it. Oh, and a Cessna 1956 plane. Major character. 

Jacob Elrodi (frankenstein) replaced Paul Mescal as Hig, the pilot. Josh Brolin who worked previously with Scott on American Gangster is the cynical Bangley. They represent opposite views, opposite worlds, one missing his old world, the other one adapting, full survival mode. 

Supporting are Margaret Qualley (OUTiH, Poor Things, The Substance, Kinds of Kindness, Drive-Away Dolls, How to Make a Killing), in her most normal and romantic role (up to now) as Cima and Guy Pearce as Pops (Pearce was the old Peter Weyland in Prometheus). Benedict Wong is also here (he was in Ridey's The Martian) and an Ewen Bremner cameo that works as a red hering. He also worked for Scott in Black Hawk Down.

Now if you already read the reviews which I can't understand...? Worst ever for a Scott film??

Worse than Gladiator II and Napoleon which were painful to sit through? Anyway, this is not that biggie of a film, compared to the scale of these two baaad juggernauts...

The film is very slow and it builds atmosphere gradually. The three acts are separated smoothly. The landscape, the nature is another silent character, the green, the mountains vs. The Wasteland.

Incredibly the whole film was shot in Italy, with the Grand Junction sets built at Cinecitta. DOP is Erik Mesermschmit, David Fincher's later collaborator, here in his 1st cinema fare with Scott (he worked before with RS on TV's Raised by Wolves and The Dope Thief).

Comparisons with The Last of Us or The Walking Dead are wrong, closer is The Road by Cormac McCarthy. 

The Dog Stars is based on the 2012 book by Peter Heller and the script is by Mark L  Smith who wrote The Revenant.

Harry Gregson-Williams composed the score, which is part elegiac, part menacing, it's his 7th for a Scott film.

The soundtrack has also dramatic value, it's folkish and rockish, from the opening credits with Hozier ( Like Real People Do), that gets replayed at the end of the film, to Van Morrison (Tupelo Honey), to Caamp’s “By and By” (on headphones), Dean Martin (Memories are made of This), to the end in The Chieftains and Mick Jagger. (The Long Black Veil). Featuring also Charmaine written by Lew Pollack, Erno Rapee performed by Jack Nitzsche, from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and Fly Me to the Moon, sung by Allison Janney on screen. 

There is a most poetic scene at the end with the "mormons"/ mennonites countryfair that transcends Ridley Scott's cinema, an optimist message in a post-apocalyptic world. I sensed in the interraction betwwen Hig and Bangley could be a sort of tribute to Ridley's late brother, Tony....

To be seen on the Big Screen.

The IMAX thing is a gimmick tho.

3 1/2 out of 5, 7 out of 10 !

The Rule of Jenny Pen (2024)

The Rule of Jenny Pen (2024) id the 2nd film of New Zeelander James Ashcroft. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest: meets Bubbahotep (without the mummy ;) and Misery. Rush and especillay Lihgow are a blast, one of Lithgow's best. Stellar acting. Not for the faint of heart ;)

TBC