According to our Cannes Critics’ Panel, it may not top Topsy Turvy, but Mike Leigh’s 2 plus hour portrait starring Timothy Stall paints a strong portrait of a tortured artist with his fifth trip to the festival and our set of critics responded favorably. Prior to Mr.Turner, his previous entries include, Naked (award for Best Director in ’93), Secrets and Lies (Palme d’Or in ’96), 2002′s All or Nothing and 2010′s Another Year.
Having premiered yesterday and receiving its official red carpet screening today, Abderrahmane Sissako’s Timbuktu is arresting for its combination of humor and deep sorrow. The still very fresh true events, saw the Maurinania born filmmaker broke down during the press conference. While this was his first trip in the Main Comp, the filmmaker has also been to Cannes on four separate visits dating back to Octobre (Un Certain Regard – 1993), La Vie Sur Terre (1998), Heremakono (Un Certain...
Having premiered yesterday and receiving its official red carpet screening today, Abderrahmane Sissako’s Timbuktu is arresting for its combination of humor and deep sorrow. The still very fresh true events, saw the Maurinania born filmmaker broke down during the press conference. While this was his first trip in the Main Comp, the filmmaker has also been to Cannes on four separate visits dating back to Octobre (Un Certain Regard – 1993), La Vie Sur Terre (1998), Heremakono (Un Certain...
- 5/16/2014
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
Cannes, France (AP) — It was all too much for the director of Timbuktu, a touching humanist account of the jihadist takeover of Northern Mali in 2012. Abderrahmane Sissako broke down in tears at a Cannes press conference as he described his film's depiction of brutal Islamist law that shattered the lives of innumerable families. "It's difficult... We become more and more indifferent to the horrors if we're not careful," said Sissako, at times clutching his head in his hands with his voice trailing off. Cannes Photos: The Complete 2014 Official Selection The wounds from the Mali conflict —
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- 5/16/2014
- by The Associated Press
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Cannes, France (AP) — It was all too much for the director of "Timbuktu," a touching humanist account of the jihadist takeover of Northern Mali in 2012. Abderrahmane Sissako broke down in tears at a Cannes press conference as he described his film's depiction of brutal Islamist law that shattered the lives of innumerable families. "It's difficult... We become more and more indifferent to the horrors if we're not careful," said Sissako, at times clutching his head in his hands with his voice trailing off. The wounds from the Mali conflict — which made headlines in 2012-13 after the French army intervened to oust foreign Islamists — are clearly still fresh. And the award-winning director's film — competing for this year's Palme d'Or — is the world's first to look at the dramatic jihadist takeover of the city of Timbuktu. Though there is plenty of drama in the realities of the unrest which ended with France's Operation Serval,...
- 5/16/2014
- by Thomas Adamson (AP)
- Hitfix
Taxi driver strikes and delayed flights caused headaches for Cannes-goers not already feeling it from too many glasses of rosé, but another day of bright blue skies brought out the stars as the festival got into full swing. Gus Van Sant and Matthew McConaughey talked the recent Oscar winner's next film, Sea of Trees, while Halle Berry signed on to star in thriller Kidnap, and a new Michael Jackson documentary made its market debut. And the first competition films -- Mike Leigh's Mr. Turner and Abderrahmane Sissako’s Timbuktu -- were both warmly received by critics, with Turner's star Timothy Spall generating buzz for his "masterful" performance.
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- 5/15/2014
- by THR Staff
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Rival red-carpet magnet Grace of Monaco, the much-scoffed opening night selection of the Festival de Cannes, as if counter-programmed for the smaller, glamour-adverse contingent of the press corps on the Riviera, was the press screening of Abderrahmane Sissako's Timbuktu. Placed mid-way or endwise of the festival, it would have appeared as a cool glass of water in a drought of clear-headed, thinking cinema engaged with the world. Placed at the festival's onset, I can only hope Sissako's bracingly direct, droll, earnest and politically acute drama serves to set the tone, engagement, and expertise we can expect from the premieres on the Croisette in 2014.
The festival already has its great opening: a digital-sleek image of a small gazelle's flight across the desert, chased, in a cut to a flag and then a hurtling vehicle, by a pickup full of radical Muslim gunmen bent on "tiring" it rather than "killing" it.
The festival already has its great opening: a digital-sleek image of a small gazelle's flight across the desert, chased, in a cut to a flag and then a hurtling vehicle, by a pickup full of radical Muslim gunmen bent on "tiring" it rather than "killing" it.
- 5/15/2014
- by Daniel Kasman
- MUBI
Timbuktu
Written by Abderrahmane Sissako and Kessen Tall
Directed by Abderrahmane Sissako
France/Mauritania, 2014
The opening scenes of Abderrahmane Sissako’s Timbuktu present jihadists taking potshots at female sculptures with their Ak-47s, leaving one with half a face, yet its breasts emphasized. It’s a visual statement that remains at the core of the film as practical villagers learn to live under the stresses of Sharia and the local thugs who enforce it. Based on the true events of a filmed, yet under-publicized stoning of a young couple in Mali, Timbuktu displays a harrowing, yet briefly humorous drama of Islamic militancy and what it means to lead a religious life.
Though focusing on the satellite family of Kidane (Ibrahim Ahmed), Sissako interweaves the crimes and judicial processes of several members of the Mauritanian village. Members of the vigilante police force sport a loudspeaker, announcing the incoming new laws: no sports,...
Written by Abderrahmane Sissako and Kessen Tall
Directed by Abderrahmane Sissako
France/Mauritania, 2014
The opening scenes of Abderrahmane Sissako’s Timbuktu present jihadists taking potshots at female sculptures with their Ak-47s, leaving one with half a face, yet its breasts emphasized. It’s a visual statement that remains at the core of the film as practical villagers learn to live under the stresses of Sharia and the local thugs who enforce it. Based on the true events of a filmed, yet under-publicized stoning of a young couple in Mali, Timbuktu displays a harrowing, yet briefly humorous drama of Islamic militancy and what it means to lead a religious life.
Though focusing on the satellite family of Kidane (Ibrahim Ahmed), Sissako interweaves the crimes and judicial processes of several members of the Mauritanian village. Members of the vigilante police force sport a loudspeaker, announcing the incoming new laws: no sports,...
- 5/15/2014
- by Zach Lewis
- SoundOnSight
Cannes - It is the very nature of film festival scheduling to turn up odd juxtapositions, but even by the usual standards, the first two premieres of this year's Cannes Film Festival couldn't have been more gauchely incompatible. As if "Grace of Monaco's" fretting over the political liberties of a gilded tax-haven state weren't silly enough in isolation, its vapidity only intensifies when considered back-to-back with Abderrahmane Sissako's "Timbuktu" -- a breathing, bleeding response to a genuine human rights crisis that doesn't view tragedy as a zone exempt from beauty or humor. You'd probably have guessed that between the two films, "Timbuktu" would be the one containing more human suffering; less obvious was that it'd feature rather more joy too. Mauritanian-born, Mali-raised director Sissako is perhaps best known to arthouse audiences for "Bamako," an impassioned essay film of sorts that parsed Africa's social and economic imbalances with elegant complexity,...
- 5/15/2014
- by Guy Lodge
- Hitfix
It's to the credit of Malian (by-way-of Mauritania) director Abderrahmane Sissako that he manages at time to make even the most horrifying of human behaviour still, in some ways, darkly funny. Timbuktu is a story as dessicated as the landscape it depicts, an interwoven story of an Arab infusion into Mali's rural muslim communities, bringing the zealotous and radicalized branch of Islam to a populace that chafes in various ways to these new restrictions. It is a tragedy, yes, but a very human one, with an overall caustic, almost nihilistic absurdity running throughout.The very word for the location has for decades meant isolation and foreignness, a place as remote as to be almost otherworldly. With rocket-shaped mud structures and a sand-blown dreariness, the landscape of...
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- 5/15/2014
- Screen Anarchy
While Mauritanian-born director Abderrahmane Sissako has premiered three films in Cannes (winning a number of prizes including the Fipresci), and has served on three of its juries including the Competition jury in 2007, “Timbuktu” represents his first film In Competition. This unusual profile, coupled with Sissako’s (rightly) outspoken opinions on the underrepresentation of African filmmaking in the average international festival lineup might lead one to suspect a degree of tokenism in this film’s inclusion in the main competition this year. But they are suspicions that the film quickly lays to rest: “Timbuktu” inarguably stands on its own merits as a distinctive film told with both authenticity and artistry, that makes human and visceral the kind of stories that most Western eyes read only as news headlines, if that. Because above and beyond its educational value, “Timbuktu” is an impressively well-made film, eschewing what might be the obvious choice of presenting the events in.
- 5/14/2014
- by Jessica Kiang
- The Playlist
Abderrahmane Sissako's latest is a brilliant portrait of a place ruled by religion and a people traumatised by division
Abderrahmane Sissako's passionate and visually beautiful film Timbuktu is a cry from the heart with all the more moral authority for being expressed with such grace and such care. It is a portrait of the country of his childhood, the west African state of Mali, and in particular the city of Timbuktu, whose rich and humane traditions are being trampled, as Sissako sees it, by fanatical jihadis, often from outside the country. The story revolves around the death of a cow, affectionately named "Gps" an appropriate symbol for a country that has lost its way.
These Islamist zealots are banning innocent pleasures such as music and football, and throwing themselves with cold relish into lashings and stonings for adultery. The new puritans appal the local imam, who has long...
Abderrahmane Sissako's passionate and visually beautiful film Timbuktu is a cry from the heart with all the more moral authority for being expressed with such grace and such care. It is a portrait of the country of his childhood, the west African state of Mali, and in particular the city of Timbuktu, whose rich and humane traditions are being trampled, as Sissako sees it, by fanatical jihadis, often from outside the country. The story revolves around the death of a cow, affectionately named "Gps" an appropriate symbol for a country that has lost its way.
These Islamist zealots are banning innocent pleasures such as music and football, and throwing themselves with cold relish into lashings and stonings for adultery. The new puritans appal the local imam, who has long...
- 5/14/2014
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
At the Cannes Film Festival we rest on the first day, not the seventh day. Traditionally the first Wednesday of the fest sees an onslaught of two types of travellers: film people that are a. recovering from jet lag or b. landing at the Aéroport Nice Côte d’Azur. Opening day festivities include: the opening film (we will get to this in a minute), the presentation of the jury to the media (see my recap below) and the start of the Market screenings (peppered around the town’s handful of movie theatres). It’s an ideal way for journos to catch up on select Sundance and Berlin titles they might have missed. Our Blake Williams and Nicholas Bell (who had to deal with unfortunate upgrade and downgrade badge issues) will be venturing into select titles. The badge system here in Cannes is a complex one — all media organizations including the web,...
- 5/14/2014
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
Jane Campion. Sofia Coppola. Jia Zhangke. Nicolas Winding Refn. If ever there was a competing year that favored a more “personalized” avant-garde cinema, this might be the one, but as we know, the Palme d’Or’s rich, sometimes confusing and/or controversial history has proven that there are no correlations between the backgrounds/filmographies of the set of jury voters and the menu of competing films at hand.
What we do know is that genre items such as the thriller introduced by Atom Egoyan and the film with the shortest run time (Godard’s Goodbye to Language) won’t likely carry the same weight in the field of eighteen. Sight unseen, I’d also bet the house on Saturday 24th that Jane Campion (President of the Jury) remains the only female filmmaker to have won a Palme, that’s not to say that Naomi Kawase and/or Alice Rohrwacher will go home empty-handed.
What we do know is that genre items such as the thriller introduced by Atom Egoyan and the film with the shortest run time (Godard’s Goodbye to Language) won’t likely carry the same weight in the field of eighteen. Sight unseen, I’d also bet the house on Saturday 24th that Jane Campion (President of the Jury) remains the only female filmmaker to have won a Palme, that’s not to say that Naomi Kawase and/or Alice Rohrwacher will go home empty-handed.
- 5/13/2014
- by Eric Lavallee
- IONCINEMA.com
Among the 18 feature films competing for the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Jean-Luc Godard is presenting his 19th film at the Cannes Film Festival, Adieu au Langage (Goodbye to Language).
Adieu au Langage (Goodbye to Language): Godard’s first film to compete at Cannes was Cleo de 5 a 7, which premiered at the 1962 Cannes Film Festival. Since then, 18 of his films have been screened at the festival, though not all in competition. Goodbye to Language is Godard’s first film in competition in over 10 years.
Nsfw:
Captive (The Captive): Atom Egoyan directs this Canadian thriller starring Ryan Reynolds, Rosario Dawson, Mireille Enos and Scott Speedman. This will be Egoyan’s fifth film in competition at the Cannes Film Festival; the writer/director won the Grand Jury Prize for The Sweet Hereafter in 1997.
Deux Jours, Une Nuit (Two Days, One Night): Directors and brothers...
Adieu au Langage (Goodbye to Language): Godard’s first film to compete at Cannes was Cleo de 5 a 7, which premiered at the 1962 Cannes Film Festival. Since then, 18 of his films have been screened at the festival, though not all in competition. Goodbye to Language is Godard’s first film in competition in over 10 years.
Nsfw:
Captive (The Captive): Atom Egoyan directs this Canadian thriller starring Ryan Reynolds, Rosario Dawson, Mireille Enos and Scott Speedman. This will be Egoyan’s fifth film in competition at the Cannes Film Festival; the writer/director won the Grand Jury Prize for The Sweet Hereafter in 1997.
Deux Jours, Une Nuit (Two Days, One Night): Directors and brothers...
- 5/13/2014
- Uinterview
Welcome back to Cannes Check, In Contention's annual preview of the films in Competition at this year's Cannes Film Festival, which kicks off on May 14. Taking on different selections every day, we'll be examining what they're about, who's involved and what their chances are of snagging an award from Jane Campion's jury. Next up, the Competition's only African entry: Abderrahmane Sissako's "Timbuktu." The director: Abderrahmane Sissako (Mauritanian/French, 52 years old). Another of this year's five newcomers, Sissako has established himself as one of Africa's premier auteurs, though he's been based in France since the early 1990s -- a background that complements his favored themes of globalization and outsider identity. Born in Mauritania, he moved with his family at an early age to Mali, where he completed his schooling, before studying film at Russia's Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography in Moscow -- an institution that also boasts Aleksandr Sokurov and Andrei Tarkovsky among its alumni.
- 5/12/2014
- by Guy Lodge
- Hitfix
Timbuktu and In The Country of Lost Things are stuck in Development Hell, but author Paul Auster may soon have something to celebrate adaptation-wise. Terry Gilliam has just revealed that he's working on a screenplay of Auster's 1994 novel Mr Vertigo.Speaking at a film festival in Poland, Gilliam revealed that work on the book is underway. This being Gilliam, however, the announcement came with the cheerful caveat that we won't necessarily ever see a complete film: "I got a book. It's called Mr Vertigo by Paul Auster. Doesn't mean it will be a film, but I'm working on a script."The novel is stylistically slightly removed from the rest of Auster's work, in that it reads like a sort of magic-realist fable, which obviously kicks it right into Gilliam's field. It's the story of Walt the Wonder Boy, looking back late in life at his youthful fame performing "anti gravitational...
- 7/29/2011
- EmpireOnline
Goofy larks like 1999’s Timbuktu aside, it’s more or less clear what to expect from Paul Auster by now. Dogged by their pasts and undermined by absent parental figures, characters embark on quests for identity that usually cut through a wilderness of self-imposed exile, asceticism, or both. The recession novel Sunset Park chokes up on the formal experimentation and metatextual touches, even as it glides along the narrative grooves cut by Auster’s previous work. They’re well-worn for a reason, and while the size of the cast means some characters are given short shrift, their collective dream ...
- 11/4/2010
- avclub.com
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