Closing Film of the 2009 Cannes Film Festival
They both desired something entirely new, they had to be experts on the world of feelings. They both had only a one-year age difference and they died in the same year. The black and white keys on piano... And the constant play of black and white in Chanel's dresses. The passion of Stravinsky was music, but Chanel's – perfume. Dutch-born French film director and producer Jan Kounen translated all of this in the language of cinematography and every scene in his work tends to be perfect.
Cast: Mads Mikkelsen, Anna Mouglalis, Anatole Taubman, Yelena Morozova, Erick Desmarestz
Director: Jan Kounen
Movie and French with subtitles in Latvian and Russian.
The Back-up Plan is a comedy that explores dating, love, marriage and family “in reverse.” After years of dating, Zoe has decided waiting for the right one is taking too long. Determined to become a mother, she commits to a plan, makes an appointment and decides to go it alone. That same day, Zoe meets Stan – a man with real possibilities. Trying to nurture a budding relationship and hide the early signs of pregnancy becomes a comedy of errors for Zoe and creates confusing signals for Stan. Anyone can fall in love, get married and have a baby but doing it backwards in hyper-drive is the real pregnancy test
Cast: Jennifer Lopez, Alex O'Loughlin, Eric Christian Olsen, Michaela Watkins, Noureen DeWulf, Melissa McCarthy, Danneel Harris
Director: Alan Poul
Producer: Todd Black
Writter: Kate Angelo
In the not-too-distant future, some 30 years after the final war, a solitary man walks across the wasteland that was once America. Empty cities, broken highways, seared earth—all around him, the marks of catastrophic destruction. There is no civilization here, no law. The roads belong to gangs that would murder a man for his shoes, an ounce of water…or for nothing at all.
But they’re no match for this traveler.
A warrior not by choice but necessity, Eli (Denzel Washington) seeks only peace but, if challenged, will cut his attackers down before they realize their fatal mistake. It’s not his life he guards so fiercely but his hope for the future; a hope he has carried and protected for 30 years and is determined to realize. Driven by this commitment and guided by his belief in something greater than himself, Eli does what he must to survive—and continue.
Only one other man in this ruined world understands the power Eli holds, and is determined to make it his own: Carnegie (Gary Oldman), the self-appointed despot of a makeshift town of thieves and gunmen. Meanwhile, Carnegie’s adopted daughter Solara (Mila Kunis) is fascinated by Eli for another reason: the glimpse he offers of what may exist beyond her stepfather’s domain.
But neither will find it easy to deter him. Nothing—and no one—can stand in his way. Eli must keep moving to fulfill his destiny and bring help to a ravaged humanity.
Cast: Denzel Washington, Gary Oldman, Mila Kunis, Ray Stevenson, Jennifer Beals, Evan Jones
Directed by Allen Hughes, Albert Hughes
Scriptwriter: Gary Whitta, Anthony Peckham
Producer:
Catherine and David, she a doctor, he a professor, are at first glance the perfect couple. Happily married with a talented teenage son, they appear to have an idyllic life. But when David misses a flight and his surprise birthday party, Catherine's long simmering suspicions rise to the surface. Suspecting infidelity, she decides to hire an escort to seduce her husband and test his loyalty. Catherine finds herself 'directing' Chloe's encounters with David, and Chloe's end of the bargain is to report back, the descriptions becoming increasingly graphic as the meetings multiply.
Cast: Julianne Moore, Liam Neeson, Amanda Seyfried
Directed by Atom Egoyan
Script: Erin Cressida Wilson, Anne Fontaine
Producer: Jeffrey Clifford
AD 117. The Roman Empire stretches from Egypt to Spain, and East as far as the Black Sea. But in northern Britain, the relentless onslaught of conquest has ground to a halt in face of the guerrilla tactics of an elusive enemy: the savage and terrifying Picts. Quintus Dias (Fassbender), sole survivor of a Pictish raid on a Roman frontier fort, marches north with General Virilus' (West) legendary Ninth Legion, under orders to wipe the Picts from the face of the earth and destroy their leader Gorlacon. But when the legion is ambushed on unfamiliar ground, and Virilus taken captive, Quintus faces a desperate struggle to keep his small platoon alive behind enemy lines. Enduring the harsh terrain and evading their remorseless Pict pursuers led by revenge-hungry Pict Warrior Etain (Kurylenko), the band of soldiers race to rescue their General and to reach the safety of the Roman frontier.
Casting: Michael Fassbender, Dominic West, Olga Kurylenko, Noel Clarke
Directed by Neil Marshall
Script: Neil Marshall
Producer: Christian Colson, Robert Jones
Jim Sheridan's film, adapted from Susanne Bier's 2004 movie, concerns Captain Sam Cahill (Tobey Maguire), a Marine who receives orders to ship out for yet another tour of duty in Afghanistan. But before he leaves his supportive wife, Grace (Natalie Portman), and his two elementary-school-age daughters, Sam picks up his black sheep brother, Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal), who has finished a prison stretch for robbing a bank. While overseas, Sam's aircraft gets shot down and he's thought dead. Back home, irresponsible Tommy gets his act together in order to be an anchor for Grace and the girls, and the two grow emotionally -- though not physically -- close. As the family finally begins to make peace with their grief, soldiers rescue POW Sam and he returns home. Sam's experiences overseas have caused him such emotional turmoil, he has a difficult time adjusting to civilian life, and soon his fear and paranoia manifest themselves in the form of jealousy for his brother's relationship with his wife.
Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Natalie Portman, Tobey Maguire, Clifton Collins Jr., Bailee Madison, Sam Shepard
Directed by Jim Sheridan
Script: David Benioff
Producer: Michael De Luca, Ryan Kavanaugh, Sigurjon Sighvatsson
Can you imagine what a stoned cop can do?
The only criminal he can’t catch is ... himself.
This film is not just another “cop story”. There are rumours that Nicolas Cage used cocaine to make his role of hallucinating stoned cop working on homicide as realistic as possible. Scene: magical New Orleans right after the hurricane Catherine.
No one knows, whether the story with the cocaine is true: maybe exept the director of the film Werner Herzog who is known to be demanding maniac capable of taking his actors across the limits of their abilities. After playing at various film festivals, the film has, thus far, been awarded generally positive reviews by critics. The critics praise this film, compare it to the ones of Quentin Tarantino or Cohen brothers and acknowledge it to be the “film of the decade” for Nicolas Cage.
Nicolas Cage is Terrence McDonagh - a New Orleans Police Sergeant who has recently received a meda and a promotion to Lieutenant for his heroism. After he injured his back when saving a prosoner after the hurricane, he becomes addicted to prescription pain medication and quickly graduates to cocaine, heroin, crack and marijuana. The film follows McDonagh as he investigates the murder of a family of Senagalese immigrants while dealing with his drug addictions, gambling debts and other personal problems - passionate, yet twisted relationships with a high-class prostitute (Eva Mendes) among them - while routinely and flagrantly abusing his authority when his gun is being used more frequently then his badge.
The film is drenched in Werner Herzog’s unique perspective on reality (let’s not forget his huge experience in documentary) as well as sharp sarcasm and dark humour. The result of all these factors is an unforgetable story which is equally sad and playful.
Director: Werner Herzog
Cast: Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes, Val Kilmer, Alvin “Xzibit” Joiner.
AMAYA– is a story about a romantic guy Paul (actor Andris Mamontovs), who wanders around the world after a dramatic divorce from his girlfriend Lori (actress Kristīne Nevarauska). The USA, Chile, Japan, India, Thailand... After three years Paul finds himself in Hong Kong. Here he meets Amaya (actress Kaori Momoi) and her comic family. This strange Western guy Paul applies to take massage courses organized by Amaya’s brother-in-law Tao (actor Lau Dan). In the saloon he meets Jasmine (actress Monie Tung). Prior feelings do not go away easily, and show up again in the least expected times and places. Three different women help Paul go through unexperienced feelings of “love”, “longing”, “joy”, “divorce” and find new meaning in life. The movie explores different types of relationships. It shows the differences between Eastern and Western cultures, and sometimes comic and even absurd situations that can occur in everyday lives.
Cast: Kaori Momoi, Kristine Nevarauska, Andrius Mamontovas, Laura Luize Dzenite, Lau Dan, Hui Shiu Hung, Monie Tung, Dexter Fletcher, camera man Gints Bērziņš, music Andrius Mamontovas
Directed by Maris Martinsons
Scriptwriter: Maris Martinsons
Producer: Linda Krukle, Maris Martinsons (Latvia), Chen On Chu(Honkong)
When asked in an interview whether he ever intended to return to his Motherland, Joseph Brodsky replied: “Such a journey could only take place anonymously...”. The creators of this film imagined that the journey in question was undertaken after all, selecting the genre of an ironic fairytale. The poet sails to the country of his childhood, and with him we traverse not only geographical expanses, but travel through time as well; stringing together a number of facts from the Nobel Prize Laureate's biography, we return to the USSR of the 50s and early 60s, soaking up the atmosphere of the “European” city of Petersburg, to this day Russia's cultural center. Along with live-action sequences, the film features animation, as well as documentary footage concerning Brodsky and his milieu.
– World premiere at Rotterdam IFF, 2009 (program “Spectrum”);
– Grand-Prix and Prize of the Russian Guild of Film Critics “White Elephant” at the IFF “Zerkalo”, 2009;
– Main East of the West Award at the IFF in Karlovy Vary, 2009.
Cast: Grigoriy Dityatkovskiy, Alisa Freyndlih, Sergei Yursky, Artem Smola, Evgeniy Ogandzhanyan
Directed by: Andrei Khrzhanovsky
Script: Yuri Arabov, Andrei Khrzhanovsky
Producer: Andrei Khrzhanovsky, Artem Vassiliev
Bolt, an American White Shepherd, has lived his whole life on the set of his action TV show, where he believes he has superpowers. When separated from the studio by accident, he meets a female alley cat named Mittens and a hamster named Rhino. Along the way, he learns that he doesn't have superpowers and that the show is not real.
In 1966 – British pop music’s finest era – the BBC played just 2 hours of rock and roll every week. But pirate radio played rock and pop from the high seas 24 hours a day. And 25 million people – over half the population of Britain – listened to the pirates every single day.
Recently expelled from school, Carl (Tom Sturridge) has been sent by his jet-set mother to find some direction in life by visiting his godfather Quentin (Bill Nighy). However, Quentin is the boss of Radio Rock, a pirate radio station in the middle of the North Sea, populated by an eclectic crew of rock ‘n’ roll DJ’s. They are led by The Count (Phillip Seymour Hoffman), big, brash, American, a god of the airwaves, and totally in love with the music. He’s faithfully backed up by his co-broadcasters Dave (Nick Frost) – ironic, intelligent and cruelly funny; Simon (Chris O’Dowd), super-nice and searching for true love; Midnight Mark (Tom Wisdom), enigmatic, handsome and possessing an almost uncanny ability to have sex with anything remotely resembling a woman; Wee Small Hours Bob, a hairy late night DJ, whose hobbies are folk music and drugs; Thick Kevin (Tom Brooke), possessor of the smallest intelligence known to mankind; On The Hour John, the newsreader and Angus ‘The Nut’ Nutsford, who may be the most annoying man in Britain. They set about helping Carl on his quest to find himself by, well, mostly trying to find him someone to have sex with.
Life on the North Sea is eventful. Simon finds the woman of his dreams and is married on the boat…only to be left by his bride 11 hours later. Greatest DJ in Britain, Gavin (Rhys Ifans) returns from his drug tour of America to his rightful position as greatest DJ in Britain – and clashes with the Count: A confrontation that ends in a dramatic and dangerous battle of nerve. And Carl discovers that his real father is one of the DJs. Tragically for him, it’s Wee Small Hours Bob, together with his beard.
Cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Bill Nighy, Rhys Ifans, Nick Frost and Kenneth Branagh
Directed by: Richard Curtis
Norma and Arthur Lewis, a suburban couple with a young child, receive a simple wooden box as a gift, which bears fatal and irrevocable consequences. A mysterious stranger, delivers the message that the box promises to bestow upon its owner $1 million with the press of a button. But, pressing this button will simultaneously cause the death of another human being somewhere in the world; someone they don't know. With just 24 hours to have the box in their possession, Norma and Arthur find themselves in the cross-hairs of a startling moral dilemma and must face the true nature of their humanity.
Cast: Cameron Diaz, James Marsden, Frank Langella
Directed by Richard Kelly
Script: Richard Kelly