A beleza da (des)construção
Jia Zhang-Ke aprofunda o olhar sobre seu país natal

WILSON SAIKI JR.
O FINO DA MOSTRA    

Em seu novo filme, 24 City, o diretor Jia Zhang-ke continua a construção de um painel sobre as transformações pelas quais a China vem passando nos últimos anos. Homenageado na última edição da Mostra, o chinês, que ainda não chegou aos 40 anos, consegue um impressionante olhar maduro com suas imagens em digital representando um questionamento aos críticos do formato.

Assim como em Jogo de Cena, de Eduardo Coutinho, Zhang-ke se utiliza do gênero documental misturado à ficção. Porém, em 24 City existem não apenas depoimentos, mas também uma situação central: um grande complexo industrial na cidade de Chengdu que será demolido para a construção de um condomínio comercial e residencial de luxo. Uma versão em larga escala do que vemos no Cidade Jardim, em São Paulo.

O lugar, que ficou conhecido como Fábrica 420, tinha uma posição militar estratégica, pois ali eram produzidas peças para os aviões de guerra chineses. Devido ao grande tamanho do local, era considerado uma verdadeira cidade, pois proporcionava aos trabalhadores toda a estrutura de que necessitavam, como escolas, o hospital, o centro comercial e o cinema.

Nota-se o contraste entre o antigo regime comunista (músicas cantadas em coro onde todos estão simetricamente posicionados e uniformizados) e a nova China que se abre ao mundo, representada por uma jovem entrevistada que viveu com os pais na Fábrica e passou a comercializar produtos trazidos de Hong Kong para mulheres de classe alta.

A história das últimas décadas na China é contada por pessoas de diferentes gerações, e entre os depoimentos vemos imagens belíssimas que retratam o local em seus espaços vazios e maquinários inutilizados que serão demolidos, além da mudança pelo lado de fora da Fábrica.

Uma impressão já constatada é a rápida urbanização e o acelerado crescimento do país. A resposta para como as pessoas estão se adaptando a uma nova realidade que chega sem pedir licença, e coloca novos ideais para as gerações que crescem hoje é uma tarefa que Zhang-ke consegue cumprir quase perfeitamente.

24 CITY
(24 City, 2008. China. 107 min.)
Dir.: Jia Zhangke

25/10 (Sab) | 20:00 | iG Cine
28/10 (Ter) | 17:30 | CineSesc
29/10 (Qua) | 17:10 | Reserva Cultural

Conhecer a programação do New York Film Festival deve ser uma das primeiras providências de quem vai acompanhar a Mostra. Ao contrário do que ocorre aqui, onde mais de 450 filmes são selecionados, em Nova York são exibidos apenas 28 longas-metragens, sendo que a maioria são os destaques dos festivais de Cannes, Veneza e Berlim.

Dos 28 longas que estiveram no festival novaiorquino até o domingo, 12/10, 11 foram selecionadas para a Mostra. Ficaram de fora os grandes vencedores de Cannes (The Class / Entre les murs) e de Berlim (The Wrestler, protagonizado por Mickey Rourke), além de filmes que eram bastante esperados por aqui, como A Mulher Sem Cabeça (La Mujer Sin Cabeza), da argentina Lucrecia Martel, Happy-Go-Lucky, de Mike Leigh, e A Troca (Changeling), de Clint Eastwood e protagonizado por Angelina Jolie.

Entre os curta-metragens exibidos em Nova York, apenas um será exibido em São Paulo – Cry Me a River, do chinês Jia Zhangke, cineasta homenageado com uma retrospectiva na Mostra do ano passado. Veja abaixo quais são os 11 filmes que estiveram no New York Film Festival e estão confirmados para a 32ª Mostra Internacional de Cinema de São Paulo:

GOMORRA. Dir.: Matteo Garrone
Vencedor do Grand Prix em Cannes.
[O FINO DA MOSTRA: Leia a crítica e confira os horários >>]

HORAS DE VERÃO. Dir.: Olivier Assayas
Filme exibido na coletiva de imprensa, com Juliette Binoche no elenco.
[O FINO DA MOSTRA: Leia a crítica e confira os horários >>]

CHE. Dir.: Steven Soderbergh
Quatro horas de duração e o melhor de ator em Cannes, Benicio del Toro, no papel do revolucionário. Benicio estará no Brasil para prestigiar a exibição filme, que encerra a programação da Mostra. (Clique aqui para ver trecho da palestra de Steven Soderbergh no Festival de Nova York).

24 CITY. Dir.: Jia Zhangke
O novo filme do diretor que foi homenageado com a exibição de todos os seus filmes na Mostra do ano passado. Veja também o curta CRY ME A RIVER.

TONY MANERO. Dir.: Pablo Larrain
Única co-produção brasileira no New York Film Festival deste ano.

TULPAN, de Sergey Dvortsevoy. Uma das duas co-produções cazaques do NYFF, ganhou o prêmio Un Certain Regard em Cannes
DEPOIS DA ESCOLA, de Antonio Campos. Um dos destaques do festival independente Sundance.
CINZAS DO PASSADO REDUX, de Wong Kar-Wai.
SERBIS, de Brillante Mendoza
UM CONTO DE NATAL, de Arnaud Desplechin
WALTZ WITH BASHIR, de Ari Folman

(escrito por Luiz Felipe Fustaino)

For A Full Review Visit Static Multimedia “46th New York Film Festival” Film News Item

Documentary and fiction are sometimes uneasy bedfellows, but having made both back-to-back in many of his film projects (most recently, STILL LIFE and DONG), filmmaker Jia Zhangke finally marries the two media in 24 CITY. In his chronicle of the changing fortunes of a defunct but once glorious aeronautic factory and its workers through talking heads and wordless images exclusively, the documentary strain prevails to simple, yet emotionally reverberating effect. 24 CITY balances the human cost of change with a self-renewing future as witnessed by the re-development project on the demolished factory site. It’s pure clarity and pristine cinematography will appeal to a more serious and aesthetically inclined audience.

—–

A stunning new film in Zhang Ke’s exploration of the effects neoliberal capitalism plays on modern China, 24 City refuses to reduce the incredibly richness of life to a set of statistics useful only to a biopolitical cost-benefit analysis. Refusing to believe that “life is better” in developing China and that “discontent” perfectly describes any and all negativity felt by those who are anything but “prosperous,” Zhang Ke contests the macropolitics of neoliberal state narratives with the micropolitics of affective intimacy. Interweaving real and staged testimonies to deliver an aesthetic rather than historical experience tells a story not of the “prestige” a worker has in the factory, nor expounds the economic virtues of development. Nor is it a story about memory, although memory becomes a particularly crucial site within which we attend the true lesson of the film: that those involved in some way or another with the inhumanization incurred by factory labor and the transformative effects of capitalist development struggle to survive and retain a sense of dignity with and through each other in intimacies possible within those very degrading conditions. Undoing the generalizations afforded by the heinous dichotomies of individual/collective, capitalist/communist, developing/developed, modern/postmodern, the film liberates not life but lives, lives hidden by rational subsumption to the cold calculations of capital that only makes visible comparative economic success. 26 year-old Su NA points to the chilling irony of developed China–that her parents would never be able to afford an apartment in the housing complex 24 City being built on the grounds of the factory to which they gave all their humanity in labor. But not all. For, as 24 City beautifully illustrates, the brutal conditions of factory work, the violences of the state’s fascist tendencies, and the crudities of neoliberal capitalism and its corollary logics always leave a remnant of humanity behind as they march on: a daughter’s newfound compassion for her parents, the intimacy shared between workers throughout the day and throughout their lives, all the attachments changing space into place, and the narratives of those who refuse to be fodder for development.

The dark always casts a shadow of light.

A leading figure in China’s contemporary independent cinema, Jia Zhangke returns to the New York Film Festival with two powerful new works. Fresh from its premiere at this year’s Cannes, 24 City is a genre hybrid of fiction and documentary that chronicles the conversion of a factory in Chengdu into a luxury apartment complex. With a playfulness offsetting the film’s often painful subject matter, Jia combines interviews of three generations of factory workers with monologues from instantly recognizable actors, including Joan Chen and Jia regular Zhao Tao. The stories they share range from heart-wrenching tales of family separation to recollections of youthful romance, and the result is both Jia’s most emotionally direct film and his most self-consciously aestheticized. His visual style—once dominated by long shots and long takes—undergoes a shift in this film, as he and master cinematographer Yu Lik-wai frame their subjects in intimate close-ups and punctuate scenes with poetic imagery. Underlying this bold genre experimentation is Jia’s continued commitment to capturing Chinese history in transition, and his interest in examining the blurred line between realism and artificiality hidden in all historical narratives.

The second Jia film in the festival, Cry Me a River has been programmed with Kelly Reichardt’s Wendy and Lucy. This short uses its setting and theme of missed romantic connections to pay homage to Fei Mu’s 1948 classic Spring in a Small Town—often regarded as the greatest Chinese film of all time. Reuniting ten years after college graduation, a group of ex-lovers confide in each other the regrets and disappointments of early adulthood, as the river that runs through their town provides them with a constant reminder of the past’s irretrievability. In his first straightforward love story, Jia unites his two main muses, Zhao Tao and Wang Hongwei, with the stars of Lou Ye’s controversial 2006 film Summer Palace. Through a series of subtle allusions, Jia suggests that he envisions himself in communion not only with the legends of Chinese cinema’s past, but also with his compatriots in the present.

หนังยาวหมายเลขเจ็ด ของอาเจี่ย  เจี่ยจางเคอะ ที่ในที่สุดคว้าสิงโตทอง จาก STILL LIFE หนังเรื่องก่อนหน้า

กลับมาคราวนี้อาเจี่ยเลือนรูปแบบของสารคดีกับหนังเล่าเรื่องเข้าด้วยดัน โดยยังสำรวจตรวจตราสภาวะจของจีนใหม่อย่างเข้มข้น ว่ากันว่าหนังแบบออกเป็นสามส่วน ทั้งสารคดีของเมืองที่เคยเป้นโรงงานขนาดใหญ่ ที่ผิดตัวไป และผลกระทของมันที่มีต่อชีวิตเล็ฏๆรายรออบ สลับกับหนังเล่าเรื่องของผู้หญิงสองคนที่แสดงโดยโจนเช็ง และเจ๊จ้าวเต๋า แม่ย่านางของอาเจี่ย

เรื่องย่อจากทางเทศกาลครับ

 ในปี 1958  โรงงานสร้างเครื่องบินและผลิตอาวุธถูกย้ายจากภาคตะวันออกเฉียงเหนือของจีนไปอยู่ทางตะวันตกเฉียงใต้ ด้วยเหตุผลทางยุทธศาสตร์ โรงงานนี้มีรหัสเรียกว่า โรงงาน 420  ในปี 2008 โรงงาน 420 ถูกย้ายอีกครั้งหนึ่ง  เพราะที่ตั้งของโรงงานใจกลางเมืองเฉิงตู  กลายเป็นที่มีราคาสำหรับแผนการพัฒนา  ภายใต้ชื่อโครงการ 24 เมืองใหญ่   ดังนั้นโรงงานเก่าจึงถูกทำลายเพื่อให้พื้นที่แก่โครงการนี้  จากปากคำส่วนตัวของคน 8 คน   เล่าถึงประวัติของโรงงานและชะตาชีวิตของคนงาน    ให้ความเข้าใจถึงการเปลี่ยนแปลงในประเทศจีนจากวิสาหกิจที่ครอบครองโดยรัฐมาเป็นของเอกชน    และผลลัพธ์ที่มีต่อสถานะของคนงาน  หลายสิ่งหลายอย่างเปลี่ยนไป  จากการรับเอาระบบแข่งขันทางตลาด  โรงงานแบบเก่า - เช่นเดียวกับระบบสังคมนิยมของจีน - ได้กลายเป็นอดีตไปแล้ว

ดูเวบไซต์ไม่เป็นทางการของหนังที่นี่ครับ

http://www.filmswelike.com/pages/24city.html

มี presskit ให้โหลดอ่านด้วย สวยเชีัยว ที่นี่ครับ

http://www.filmswelike.com/media/24city/24City_PressKitFWL.pdf

อ่านเกี่ยวกับหนังอาเจี่ยเรื่องก่อนหน้าได้ที่นี่ครับ

XIAO WU ( JIA ZHANGKE /1997 ) ตัวละครตกสมัย

UNKNOWN PLEASURES (JIA ZHANGKE / 2002 ) : ปรารถนาไร้นาม

THE WORLD โลกของเรา

DONG (JIA ZHANGKE /2007) ภาพฉายแห่งแรงงานไร้นาม

     Dernier week-end cannois.

Samedi 24 : début de journée avec à 8h30, dans la grande salle Lumière, la projection de ce qui s’avère être le meilleur film de ce Festival, le magnifique et remarquable ‘Entre les Murs‘ de Laurent Cantet. Film sur l’école, avec ses tensions, ses conflits et ses espoirs, ses réussites. Film sur la parole qui circule (sous toute ses formes), parole qui structure les individus, au moment où le gouvernement entend faire passer ses réformes par la force. Beaucoup de vie et d’émotion dans ce film engagé qui ne prétend pas apporter de réponses toutes prêtes. ‘Entre les Murs‘ devrait beaucoup intéressé Spider-Marc, le Jeannot et Zineb. On attend leurs réactions. Reste que ce film constitue notre Palme d’Or à nous.

     On enchaîne à 11h30 avec le western asiatique ‘Le Bon, la Brute, le Cinglé‘ de Kim Jee-Woon, qui confirme tout le mal qu’on pensait de son précédent  ‘A Bittersweet Life‘. Pauvre Sergio Leone, il doit se retourner dans sa tombe devant cet hommage en toc ! Du maître Italien, ce Michael Bay Coréen n’a retenu que le sens du spectacle (ici, grandes chevauchés et gunfights interminables filmés en scope numérique). Car on ne retrouve rien de la nostalgie ou des désillusions politiques de Leone. Ici, les images sont vides de sens et la violence complaisante. On est dans le cool, jusque dans la bande son qui reprend un extrait du ‘Kill Bill‘ de Tarantino. Leone et Tarantino, deux grands réalisateurs dont les films rendent hommage à leurs influences, tout en proposant un univers personnel. On sauvera juste quelques moments de comédie dus au talent de l’acteur Song Kang-Ho (’Memories of Murder‘, ‘The Host‘, ‘Secret Sunshine‘).

     Et fin de journée avec la reprise de ‘My Magic‘, film indonésien de Eric Khoo, soit l’histoire d’un père alcoolique qui décide de reprendre son ancien métier de magicien, quitte à y risquer sa vie, pour subvenir à l’éducation de son petit garçon. Univers sombre, parfois teinté de poésie et filmé très simplement au risque d’être un peu ennuyeux, ‘My Magic‘ se laisse regarder d’autant qu’il ne dure que 1h15.

Dimanche 25 Mai : le Festival se termine dans le vent et la pluie. Avis de tempête, ça souffle sur la Croisette ! On en profite pour voir les rediffusions des films en compétition loupés durant ces dix jours. On commence tardivement à 11h (nouvelle grève des trains) avec le très bon documentaire chinois ‘24 City‘ de Jia Zhangke (’Still Life‘) qui s’intéresse à la fermeture de l’usine 420 (longtemps usine militaire), à son histoire, celle de ses ouvriers et de leurs enfants. Film sur la mémoire, qui confronte la Chine communiste à celle de la réussite économique. En plus de traiter son sujet avec talent, Jia Zhangke sait aussi le filmer : son documentaire n’est pas austère comme on aurait pu le craindre, il déborde de vie, alternant interviews face caméra et séquences plus esthétiques, magnifiquement filmées en numérique et pleines de poésie comme cette adolescente patinnant sur un parking désert, sur fond de musique électro. Une époque cède la pas à une autre, mais le film n’est pas figé dans la nostalgie du temps qui passe.

     Retour ensuite en Europe avec ‘Delta‘, film hongrois de Kornél Mundruczo (’Johanna‘) et histoire d’inceste entre un frère et sa soeur, filmé comme une tragédie antique et qui vaut mieux que l’indifférence dans laquelle il a été accueilli. Et on termine la journée et le Festival de Cannes 2008 par ‘Gomorra‘, de Matteo Garrone, drame italien et plongée réaliste dans la mafia napolitaine qui fait froid dans le dos.

     Bonne journée cinéma et retour à la maison pour découvrir le palmarès en direct.

Palme d’Or : ‘Entre les Murs’ de Laurent Cantet

Grand Prix : ‘Gomorra’ de Matteo Garrone

Prix Spécial du 61e Festival : Clint Eastwood (pour l’ensemble de sa carrière)

Prix Un Certain Regard : ‘Tulpan’ de Sergey Dvortsevoy

Palmarès complets : http://www.festival-cannes.fr/fr/festival/awards.html

“Linha De Passe”

Day 4 on the Rivera, and I still have not found my ticket. I will, however, update this as more reviews come streaming in. This is only a round up of a few reviews. Films include 24 City, Linha De Passe, Boogie, It’s Hard Being Loved By Jerks, Better Things, with The Chaser, Tokyo Sonata, Wolke 9 (Cloud 9) and Je Veux Voir as well.

In Competition:

“24 City” by Jia Zhangke

Derek Elley, “Result is far more accessible than Jia’s previous two pictures, with moments of genuine emotion by the real-life interviewees. But technique of interweaving name actors into the docu fabric smacks of auteurism for the sake of it, and pic says nothing new or revealing that hasn’t been said in countless other movies and docus.”

Dan Fainaru, “The latest chapter in Jia Zhangke’s chronicles of modern Chinese history is certain to reinforce the director’s status as an international arthouse icon.”

Mary Corliss, “24 City is eloquent testimony to a China that is vanishing with each swing of the wrecking ball. But the memories of the workers in their factory microcosm, and telling documentaries like these, keep the past alive, so that later generations will know what once was, and what’s been lost.”

“Linha De Passe” by Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas

The film is about four brothers who try to reinvent themselves, each looking for a way out of Brazil, the film’s backdrop, which is out of control.

Deborah Young, “Linha de passe is a far more successful film [than Foreign Land], both as a drama and in depicting the reality of growing up poor without no future in sight…. Comparisons to Luchino Visconti’s Rocco and His Brothers are inevitable, but without name actors in the cast, this is not going to be as easy a commercial ride as Salles’ cultish The Motorcycle Diaries.”

Ty Burr, “Oy, what a movie to start Day 5 with. An expertly filmed slice of Sao Paulo kitchen-sink realism, it tells of a family of poverty-stricken brothers who between them represent the many aspects of Brazil’s soul: soccer, sin, Jesus Christ, etc. Also bleak, bleak, bleak. Salles can really make movies, and he just lovingly ground my face in this one.”

Jonathan Romney, think the film is “a down-to-earth alternative to the more romantic and stylistically flashy films (City of God, Lower City, Berlin winner Elite Squad) with which Brazilian cinema has been identified lately. Very much in the mode of Salles’ 1998 breakthrough Central Station, Linha de Passe offers a compelling cast and a narrative fail-safe - the travails of a tough mum and her unruly brood - that should give it modest but significant international appeal.”

Un Certain Regard:

“Je Veux Voir” by Joana Hadjithomas, Khalil Joreige

Howard Feinstein, “The film-making couple of [Joana] Hadjithomas and [Khalil] Joreige, who proved their imaginative skills with the 2005 Lebanese-set fiction A Perfect Day, succeeded in making it happen. And brilliantly.”

Alissa Simon, “An uneasy mix of scripted scenario, improvisation and surprising reality, pic professes to want to show destruction wrought during Lebanon’s 2006 summer war through the French star’s eyes, but seems more concerned with capturing her image as she’s trundled about…”

Dwayne Byrge, “Ali G wants to know: Will a new cutting-edge fragrance emerge from the adventure; will Mid-east peace talks be spurred by the appearance of an international star amid the ruins, will her hoop ear-rings inspire Hillary Clinton to spruce up her pants-suit ensemble; will the trek inspire reality-show producers to launch Paris Hilton into Darfur?”

“Wolke 9” by Andreas Dresen

Ray Bennet, “The 30-year itch proves to be pretty much like the seven-year version in German director Andreas Dresen’s Cloud 9, a cautionary tale about infidelity that suggests the temptations and pleasures are the same but so may be the consequences,”

Derek Elley, “Wisely, pic doesn’t spend any time leading up to or justifying the coup de foudre between Inge and Karl: crux of the story is her decision whether to go with a relationship that has revived her spirit or stay in one that is safe but predictable,” I love the way they always say pic….”Only the ending seems dramatically over-contrived compared with the downplayed material to that point.”

Ty Burr, “Sure, you have to be willing to watch old people have sex,….A lot of it. Fairly explicitly, too. Which, in a culture that says only strapping youth and firm skin can and should be contemplated, makes Cloud 9 something of a rebel yell.”

“Tokyo Sonata” by Kurosawa Kiyoshi 

Derek Elley, “Though there’s nothing here that hasn’t been dealt with in other Japanese movies, pic benefits considerably from its pitch-perfect performances - especially [Teruyuki] Kagawa as the diminutive, wild-eyed paterfamilias, and the graceful [Kyoko] Koizumi as the wife in desparate need of companionship,”

Tom Mes, “A two-year break later, the arrival of Tokyo Sonata seems to confirm the impression. The story of a salaryman who keeps up appearances to his family after he has been laid off, it is entirely devoid of anything vaguely supernatural….Yet it is without doubt the most terrifying film Kiyoshi Kurosawa has ever made.”

Directors’ Fortnight:

“Boogie” by Radu Muntean

Jay Weissberg, “Playing on themes similar to Old Joy, Muntean uses his cool yet sympathetically observational eye to chart the distance between a responsible family man and his long-lost buddies who have yet to grow up - problem is, auds are aware that the guys are losers long before the protag. Though more universal in theme than the helmer’s superior The Paper Will Be Blue travel is unlikely to be widespread outside fest berths.”

Ty Burr says the film “is the first New Romanian film I’ve seen in a while that didn’t utterly bowl me over; it’s perfectly okay without breaking much new ground…. The scenes between the three pals and the prostitute have a tawdry honesty, and Anamaria Marinca (the discovery of 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days) is believably worn down as Boogie’s wife, but where films like 4 Months or The Death of Mr Lazarescu use grubby realism to accrete powerful meaning over the long haul, Boogie just feels like, well, a long haul.”

Daniel Kasman, “Surprisingly, like most latter-day realism, it has the same intention as those most artificial of Hollywood films: to make the spectator unaware they are watching a movie,..But so what? In the cinema, the quotidian is never just quotidian, but the regular is just that. And so Boogie proceeds, and once we’ve guessed its rhythm and intonation, gives no discerning reason why any five minutes of it is any more or less interesting than any other five minutes. So congratulations, by effacing the sense of filmmaking and entering the every-day, here’s a movie that is indeed everyday.”

Out of Competition:

“The Chaser” by Na Hong-jin

Justin Chang, “Drawing both white-knuckle tension and moral anguish from a maddening succession of red herrings and wrong turns, Na Hong-jin’s overlong but accomplished debut feature has been a runaway hit at home, and should chase down plenty of offshore bookings before its eventual US remake by Warner Bros.”

Dan Fainaru, “Na Hong-jin’s promising but over-long debut is reminiscent of Bong Joon-ho’s highly-regarded Memories of Murder and may possibly achieve similar returns,…What it lacks in subtlety, it makes up for with plenty of action and wild chases which propel it towards a predictably gory climax.”

Glenn Kenny, “For it is the hammer violence, at the picture’s beginning and end, that helps sickeningly sink what could have been an engaging hybrid of Detective Story and The President’s Last Bang…. Without giving too much away, the last twenty minutes had my seatmates and I muttering ‘Jesus!’ over and over.”

Special Screenings:

“It’s Hard Being Loved By Jerks” by Daniel Leconte

Todd McCarthy, “While placing the action firmly in the context of the anti-Western terrorist attacks in New York, Madrid, Bali, Amsterdam, London and elsewhere, the film focuses intently on the cartoon scandal, which flared only in 2006, the year after the drawings were initially published in Denmark,…The verdict is heartening if not surprising by the time it comes.”

Lisa Nesselson, “Freedom of speech and freedom of the press versus religious grievances are explored to edifying effect in It’s Hard Being Loved By Jerks,…This dense, Daniel Leconte-directed documentary boasts eloquent protagonists, high stakes and a certain measure of suspense: will the values of a secular democracy whose law on free speech dates back to 1789 trump broader fears of upsetting Islamic fundamentalists?”  

“Better Things” by Duane Hopkins

Jonathan Romney, “Austere in the extreme, Better Things is shot in a vein (perhaps ‘vein’ isn’t the best word) of poetic realism, Hopkins displaying an intuitive knack for stitching together allusive chains of images. It’s certainly fated to be dismissed by some as the latest chapter in the history of British miserabilism, but Hopkins is a director with an introspective subtlety uncommon in UK filmmaking. Better Things proves the Brits can make Belgian art films as well as anyone - and I hope you realise that’s a compliment.”

Fabien Lemercier, “From the skilful changes in rhythm to the editing and the aesthetic effects of the natural light, Hopkins reveals an originality and talent that the future will no doubt confirm.”

Jason Solomons, “It’s a painful portrait of a fractured Cotswolds community, though not the one on the postcards. Hopkins’s version is a world of teenage heroin addicts shooting up and driving too fast down country lanes, and sad, elderly folk staring out of windows.”

Här har ni listan & spelordern över de lyckliga filmer som skall tävla nere i Cannes.

Totalt fick juryn in 1,792st bidrag från hela 96st olika länder.

Juryn i år består av:
Sean Penn, Amerikansk skådespelare, regissör & manusförfattare
Jeanne Balibar, Fransk skådespelare
Alexandra Maria Lara, Tysk skådespelare
Natalie Portman, Amerikansk/Israelisk skådespelare
Marjane Satrapi, Manusförfattare & regissör från Iran
Rachid Bouchareb, Fransk regissör
Sergio Castellitto, Italiensk skådespelare, regissör & manusförfattare
Alfonso Cuaron, Regissör från Mexico
Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailänsk regissör


Officiella Film listan “Cannes Film Festival 2008″