Editors note: This review was originally published May 18 after its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival where it co-won the Jury Prize. It opens in New York theaters Friday.
After breaking out internationally in 2012 with his Oscar-nominated drama The Broken Circle Breakdown, and making his Hollywood debut in 2018 with Beautiful Boy, Felix van Groeningen makes his Competition debut in Cannes with The Eight Mountains, perhaps the most understated film of his career so far.
This is a gentle tale of a decades-spanning friendship that seems a little out of its depth in such a heavyweight showcase. With terrific cinematography and two engaging leads, it’s easy on the eye — as well it should be at two hours and 27 minutes — but it’s lackluster in its telling and pales next to Paolo Sorrentino’s The Hand of God, which covered similar themes of adolescence and young adulthood last awards season.
After breaking out internationally in 2012 with his Oscar-nominated drama The Broken Circle Breakdown, and making his Hollywood debut in 2018 with Beautiful Boy, Felix van Groeningen makes his Competition debut in Cannes with The Eight Mountains, perhaps the most understated film of his career so far.
This is a gentle tale of a decades-spanning friendship that seems a little out of its depth in such a heavyweight showcase. With terrific cinematography and two engaging leads, it’s easy on the eye — as well it should be at two hours and 27 minutes — but it’s lackluster in its telling and pales next to Paolo Sorrentino’s The Hand of God, which covered similar themes of adolescence and young adulthood last awards season.
- 4/28/2023
- by Damon Wise
- Deadline Film + TV
As news about the 2023 Cannes lineup begins to trickle in, American audiences are finally getting a chance to catch up on some of the films that played at last year’s festival. Felix van Groeningen and Charlotte Vandermeersch’s “The Eight Mountains” made waves when it competed for the Palme d’Or and won the Prix Jury prize in 2022, and now the film is just weeks away from premiering at arthouses in New York and Los Angeles.
The film tells the story of a close relationship between two young Italian boys who spent their childhoods together in a mountain village before going in different directions. At Cannes, critics praised the film’s attention to detail and the way it used elements of nature to conjure the feelings of magic that childhood friendships can create.
“Here, you feel it all, because there is so much heartfelt detail,” Ella Kemp wrote in...
The film tells the story of a close relationship between two young Italian boys who spent their childhoods together in a mountain village before going in different directions. At Cannes, critics praised the film’s attention to detail and the way it used elements of nature to conjure the feelings of magic that childhood friendships can create.
“Here, you feel it all, because there is so much heartfelt detail,” Ella Kemp wrote in...
- 4/7/2023
- by Christian Zilko
- Indiewire
Click here to read the full article.
Sideshow and Janus Films have nabbed the North American rights to The Eight Mountains, the Cannes Jury Prize winner.
The film stars Luca Marinelli and Alessandro Borghi as unlikely friends whose lives are inextricably linked to the Alpine village of Aosta where they met as boys in this retelling of Paolo Cognetti’s novel. Sideshow and Janus Films plan a theatrical release at the end of the year.
Sideshow and Janus Films said: “We fell in love with The Eight Mountains, a sweeping, deeply moving film about friendship filled with heart and featuring tremendous performances by Luca Marinelli and Alessandro Borghi. We are thrilled to collaborate with Felix van Groeningen, Charlotte Vandermeersch, Mario Giannani and Lorenzo Gangarossa to bring this special film to North America,” Sideshow and Janus Films said in a joint statement.
The Eight Mountains is written and directed by van...
Sideshow and Janus Films have nabbed the North American rights to The Eight Mountains, the Cannes Jury Prize winner.
The film stars Luca Marinelli and Alessandro Borghi as unlikely friends whose lives are inextricably linked to the Alpine village of Aosta where they met as boys in this retelling of Paolo Cognetti’s novel. Sideshow and Janus Films plan a theatrical release at the end of the year.
Sideshow and Janus Films said: “We fell in love with The Eight Mountains, a sweeping, deeply moving film about friendship filled with heart and featuring tremendous performances by Luca Marinelli and Alessandro Borghi. We are thrilled to collaborate with Felix van Groeningen, Charlotte Vandermeersch, Mario Giannani and Lorenzo Gangarossa to bring this special film to North America,” Sideshow and Janus Films said in a joint statement.
The Eight Mountains is written and directed by van...
- 7/12/2022
- by Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Felix van Groeningen, Charlotte Vandermeersch co-directed and co-wrote epic tale of friendship.
Sideshow and Janus Films have acquired North American rights to Cannes jury prize winner The Eight Mountains directed by Felix van Groeningen and Charlotte Vandermeersch.
The story about a friendship spanning a lifetime in the Italian Alpine valley of Aosta is based on Paolo Cognetti’s award-winning novel of the same name and stars Luca Marinelli and Alessandro Borghi, Filippo Timi, Elena Lietti and Elisabetta Mazzullo. Van Groeningen and Vandermeersch co-wrote the screenplay.
Mario Gianani and Lorenzo Gangarossa produced for Wildside in co-production with Belgium’s Rufus and Menuetto,...
Sideshow and Janus Films have acquired North American rights to Cannes jury prize winner The Eight Mountains directed by Felix van Groeningen and Charlotte Vandermeersch.
The story about a friendship spanning a lifetime in the Italian Alpine valley of Aosta is based on Paolo Cognetti’s award-winning novel of the same name and stars Luca Marinelli and Alessandro Borghi, Filippo Timi, Elena Lietti and Elisabetta Mazzullo. Van Groeningen and Vandermeersch co-wrote the screenplay.
Mario Gianani and Lorenzo Gangarossa produced for Wildside in co-production with Belgium’s Rufus and Menuetto,...
- 7/12/2022
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
Sideshow and Janus Films have acquired North American rights to Cannes 2022 Jury Prize winner The Eight Mountains for a theatrical release at the end of the year.
The New York-based distribution partners had a busy Cannes this year also acquiring Jerzy Skolimowski’s Eo, which shared the Jury Prize with The Eight Mountains; and Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne’s Tori And Lokita, which won the 75th Anniversary Prize at Cannes.
The Eight Mountains is written and directed by Oscar-nominated Belgian director Felix van Groeningen and his long-time collaborator and life partner Charlotte Vandermeersch.
Adapted from Italian writer Paolo Cognetti’s novel of the same name, the work follows the life-long friendship of two men from very different backgrounds against the backdrop of a remote valley in Italy’s mountainous Aosta Valley region. One is a boy from the city, the other the last child of a forgotten mountain village.
In adulthood,...
The New York-based distribution partners had a busy Cannes this year also acquiring Jerzy Skolimowski’s Eo, which shared the Jury Prize with The Eight Mountains; and Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne’s Tori And Lokita, which won the 75th Anniversary Prize at Cannes.
The Eight Mountains is written and directed by Oscar-nominated Belgian director Felix van Groeningen and his long-time collaborator and life partner Charlotte Vandermeersch.
Adapted from Italian writer Paolo Cognetti’s novel of the same name, the work follows the life-long friendship of two men from very different backgrounds against the backdrop of a remote valley in Italy’s mountainous Aosta Valley region. One is a boy from the city, the other the last child of a forgotten mountain village.
In adulthood,...
- 7/12/2022
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
Mountains are not formed in an instant. Tectonic plates may buckle like the crumpling hoods of crashing cars, but it’s a collision that takes thousands of millennia to play out, and on a human timescale, seems infinitesimally slow. An inch here, a millimeter there, even the most imposing ranges were built in increments; rocky peaks rising pebble by pebble. It’s just one way that the vast, vertiginous landscapes of northwestern Italy so well suit Felix van Groeningen and Charlotte Vandermeersch’s quietly magnificent “The Eight Mountains”: The film, too, is a slow, gradual accretion of detail that builds to a spectacular vista across the ridges and troughs, the spires and valleys of a lifelong, life-defining friendship.
Based on the award-winning Italian bestseller “Le Otto Montagne” by Paolo Cognetti, the movie is novelistic in the best sense. It immerses you in the world of its characters – both human...
Based on the award-winning Italian bestseller “Le Otto Montagne” by Paolo Cognetti, the movie is novelistic in the best sense. It immerses you in the world of its characters – both human...
- 5/18/2022
- by Jessica Kiang
- Variety Film + TV
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