After about 10 minutes of Alex Cross you realize you've just watched ten minutes that could have been cut from the film. We're introduced to the title character, detective (and doctor) Alex Cross (Tyler Perry) and his team -- Tommy (Ed Burns) and Monica (Rachel Nichols) -- in a routine foot chase as a means of getting to know the generic group dynamic. This is followed by an introduction to the film's villain (Matthew Fox) whose been hired to carry out a series of high-profile killings, the first of which he carries out by worming his way into an underground boxing match as a means of capturing the attention of a young female we'll soon come to know as his first victim. It's at this point Alex Cross could have actually kicked in. To do so would have introduced us to the film's killer, knowing nothing about him other than the...
- 10/18/2012
- by Brad Brevet
- Rope of Silicon
- I wasn't completely sold on Heitor Dhalia's Adrift (À Deriva), I thought that the Un Certain Regard selected film had its merits. It boasts a well crafted story that sends viewer on a road initially frequently travelled but then surprisingly lands well on its feet. On the other hand I didn't care for some of the theatrics – especially an allusion to the nightmare scenario of having a gun involved. Laura Neiva, the young lead actress as I mentioned here might have a bright future ahead while the cinematography from Ricardo Della Rosa (Andrucha Waddington's The House of Sand) might be the film's strong suit. Here is my initial post-screening reaction last May. Earlier today, Firstshowing.net has posted the French trailer for the film which features Vincent Cassel speaking Portuguese – and not the dubbed kind either. I think that would make him fluent in five languages? Adrift
- 6/16/2009
- IONCINEMA.com
PARK CITY -- Inspired by "Women of the Dunes", perhaps the most famous film about the ravages of the desert, and a newspaper photograph of a house buried by sand, "House of Sand" is an intriguing meditation on aging, the impermanence of time and man's place in nature. Well-crafted film by Brazilian Andrucha Waddington ("Me You Them") follows the fate of three generations of women over sixty years. It's definitely not a movie for the multiplex, but could generate some interest among sophisticated moviegoers.
Film opens in 1910 with a rag-tag caravan of settlers led by the half-crazed Vasco de Sa (Ray Guerra) arriving at a desolate plot of land on the edge of the desert on the coast of northern Brazil. A barren landscape of wind-swept sand dunes, this for Vasco is the promise land. For his wife Aurea (Fernanda Torres) and her mother Maria Fernanda Montenegro) it's hell.
When Vasco's men abandon the mission and the old man gets crushed under the fallen timbers of a shack he's building, the women are left to fend for themselves in this no-women's land. Fortunately, Massu (Luiz Moldia), part of a settlement of freed slaves living nearby, gives them fish and other necessities. Aurea misses the music and culture of her native Rio and is desperate to return, but she's pregnant and has to pass up a chance to leave with a traveling merchant, a chance that might not come again.
All there is to do in this forgotten land is watch the basic elements at play--the wind, the sun, the stars--and mark the pure passage of time. In that way ten years go by before a group of international scientists arrive to study a solar eclipse. Again Aurea plans her escape, but time is not on her side and the scientists leave without her.
Although there is not a lot of action, Waddington and editor Sergio Mekler find the rhythms in a daily live pared down to its essentials. Like an hourglass, the sand slowly moves and buries the house little by little. And before you know it, Aurea has become as old as her mother and her daughter has become her age, a passage visualized by the actors trading roles. It's a bold juxtaposition that makes the passage of time concrete.
Aurea's daughter Maria, now played by Torres, is grown up and as eager to leave as her mother was. For her part, Aurea has made peace with her fate and settled in to semi-domesticity with Massu and his son. When a battalion of soldiers arrives to investigate a plane crash, it is Maria who leaves with them, leading to a teary good bye with her mother. But Waddington has one more clever and profoundly moving twist up his sleeve that allows the cycle to come full circle.
"House of Sand" is like a chamber piece for these two women played out on a grand outdoor stage. It's as if these extraordinarily expressive faces become a part of the natural landscape. Interestingly, Montenegro and Torres are mother and daughter in real life and perhaps that gives their work here an extra dose of reality. In any case, they are wonderfully watchable performances.
Camerawork by Ricardo Della Rosa captures the raw beauty of nature, and the creative and destructive march of time. Deliberate pace may turn off some viewers, but for those who are not too impatient, the journey is more than worth it.
HOUSE OF SAND
Sony Pictures Classics
Columbia TriStar Filmes do Brasil, Conspiracao Filmes, Globo Filmes, Quanta Centro de Producoes, Teleimage
Credits:
Director: Andrucha Waddington
Writer: Eleana Soarez
Producers: Leonardo Monteiro de Barros, Pedro Buarque de Hollanda, Pedro Guimaraes, Andrucha Waddington
Director of photography: Ricardo Della Rosa
Production designer: Tule Peake
Music: Joao Barone, Carlo Bartolini
Costume designer, Claudia Kopke
Editor: Sergio Mekler.
Cast:
Aurea/Maria (young): Fernanda Torres
Maria/Aurea (old): Fernanda Montenegro
Vasco de Sa: Ruy Guerra
Massu: Seu Jorge
Massu (old): Luiz Melodia
Luiz: Enrique Diaz
Luiz (old): Stenio Garcia
Chico: Emiliano Queiroz
No MPAA rating
Running time -- 114 minutes...
Film opens in 1910 with a rag-tag caravan of settlers led by the half-crazed Vasco de Sa (Ray Guerra) arriving at a desolate plot of land on the edge of the desert on the coast of northern Brazil. A barren landscape of wind-swept sand dunes, this for Vasco is the promise land. For his wife Aurea (Fernanda Torres) and her mother Maria Fernanda Montenegro) it's hell.
When Vasco's men abandon the mission and the old man gets crushed under the fallen timbers of a shack he's building, the women are left to fend for themselves in this no-women's land. Fortunately, Massu (Luiz Moldia), part of a settlement of freed slaves living nearby, gives them fish and other necessities. Aurea misses the music and culture of her native Rio and is desperate to return, but she's pregnant and has to pass up a chance to leave with a traveling merchant, a chance that might not come again.
All there is to do in this forgotten land is watch the basic elements at play--the wind, the sun, the stars--and mark the pure passage of time. In that way ten years go by before a group of international scientists arrive to study a solar eclipse. Again Aurea plans her escape, but time is not on her side and the scientists leave without her.
Although there is not a lot of action, Waddington and editor Sergio Mekler find the rhythms in a daily live pared down to its essentials. Like an hourglass, the sand slowly moves and buries the house little by little. And before you know it, Aurea has become as old as her mother and her daughter has become her age, a passage visualized by the actors trading roles. It's a bold juxtaposition that makes the passage of time concrete.
Aurea's daughter Maria, now played by Torres, is grown up and as eager to leave as her mother was. For her part, Aurea has made peace with her fate and settled in to semi-domesticity with Massu and his son. When a battalion of soldiers arrives to investigate a plane crash, it is Maria who leaves with them, leading to a teary good bye with her mother. But Waddington has one more clever and profoundly moving twist up his sleeve that allows the cycle to come full circle.
"House of Sand" is like a chamber piece for these two women played out on a grand outdoor stage. It's as if these extraordinarily expressive faces become a part of the natural landscape. Interestingly, Montenegro and Torres are mother and daughter in real life and perhaps that gives their work here an extra dose of reality. In any case, they are wonderfully watchable performances.
Camerawork by Ricardo Della Rosa captures the raw beauty of nature, and the creative and destructive march of time. Deliberate pace may turn off some viewers, but for those who are not too impatient, the journey is more than worth it.
HOUSE OF SAND
Sony Pictures Classics
Columbia TriStar Filmes do Brasil, Conspiracao Filmes, Globo Filmes, Quanta Centro de Producoes, Teleimage
Credits:
Director: Andrucha Waddington
Writer: Eleana Soarez
Producers: Leonardo Monteiro de Barros, Pedro Buarque de Hollanda, Pedro Guimaraes, Andrucha Waddington
Director of photography: Ricardo Della Rosa
Production designer: Tule Peake
Music: Joao Barone, Carlo Bartolini
Costume designer, Claudia Kopke
Editor: Sergio Mekler.
Cast:
Aurea/Maria (young): Fernanda Torres
Maria/Aurea (old): Fernanda Montenegro
Vasco de Sa: Ruy Guerra
Massu: Seu Jorge
Massu (old): Luiz Melodia
Luiz: Enrique Diaz
Luiz (old): Stenio Garcia
Chico: Emiliano Queiroz
No MPAA rating
Running time -- 114 minutes...
- 1/30/2006
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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