Cannes at Home: Day 11 – A Tale of Two Realisms

by Cláudio Alves

Well, it's over. Another festival ends, and so does another edition of the Cannes at Home series. I've watched many a great film this past week and hope you have enjoyed the ride. To finish things off, it's time to consider the last two filmmakers to present their latest works at the Croisette. Alice Rohrwacher dazzled away with her La Chimera, starring a scruffy-looking Italian-speaking Josh O'Connor, and Ken Loach's The Old Oak proved as divisive as all his late-career films have been. 

This last Cannes at Home dispatch looks at these auteurs' greatest pictures, titles that crystalize the two distinct forms of realism each work within. There's Rohrwacher's magical spin on Italian neorealism with Happy as Lazzaro and Ken Loach's perpetuation of the kitchen-sink tradition of British social realism in Kes…

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Cannes at Home: Days 7 & 8 – The Grand Tour of Europe

by Cláudio Alves

Victor Erice's "Close Your Eyes"

The last few days of the Cannes Film Festival have been a whirlwind. The titles premiering out of the main competition have given audiences reason to talk. Why on earth would Thierry Frémaux doom them to less prestigious sections? Victor Érice's grand return to feature filmmaking after a 30 years absence is the most glaring example. The director spoke out in an open letter about being blindsided by the programmer, having been persuaded to present Close Your Eyes at the Croisette under false pretenses. Less controversial is the announcement of a Fists in the Pocket English-language remake which will star Josh O'Connor, Kristen Stewart, and Elle Fanning. The director will be none other than Karim Aïnouz who is currently in competition against the original Fists in the Pocket director, Marco Bellocchio...

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Best International Film Reviews: Croatia, Italy, and Portugal

by Cláudio Alves

Let's continue our travels through the Best International Film Oscar submissions, with a focus on Southern European cinema this time. Specifically, today's subjects are the films from Italy, Croatia, and my beloved Portugal. This is a tale of one victor and two persevering losers who still manage to send in new films for consideration every year. While Italy is the category's reigning champion with eleven wins, Croatia and Portugal have yet to be nominated. They've never even made it into the shortlists. In the latter case, the country holds the record for the most submissions without a single nod. With great sadness in my heart, I must say that Portugal's Oscar fate is unlikely to change this season…

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Rome Diary #1: 'Robbing Mussolini' and digging graves

by Elisa Giudici

It’s not a Festival, it is a party! So please be my guest on a short journey to Festa del Cinema di Roma (Rome Cinema’s Party). This is my first year in Rome for this strange festival which is now in its 17th year. Rome Film Festival wants to be something different from its older sisters in Europe (Berlin, Cannes, and Venice), yet it seems unable to let go of the old dream of becoming as big and relevant as them.

A Rome Film Festival in 2022 will be a strange combination of leftovers from festival season, Hollywood latecomers hoping for Oscar traction, and a place for smaller films to shine alongside the more popular, acclaimed ones that have already premiered elsewhere. And Apple Originals likes this Festival a lot. Let’s discover some titles, shall we?

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Venice at Home – Day 7: Between Reverie and Realism

by Cláudio Alves

In 1986, Joanna Hogg presented her thesis film at the National Film and Television School. Unlike the Sunderland photographs and experimental super-8 footage that had won her a place to study, Caprice feels like a repudiation of reality altogether. The short considers the Alice in Wonderland-esque journey of a mousy young woman through the pages of her favorite fashion magazine, all rendered in stylized staging and haute-couture. That work marked another's cinematic debut besides Hogg – Caprice was Tilda Swinton's first appearance on film. The schoolmates turned longtime friends turned artistic collaborators present their latest project at this year's Venice Film Festival – The Eternal Daughter, where the actress plays a double role.

Our Venice at Home program takes us back to one of the Italian director's first international hits and the second chapter in Hogg's multi-film memory play...

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