There are years when everyone knows which film will win. 2015 was not one of them, although there was some consensus among the major press that CAROL and MIA MADRE were the strongest films, cinematographically and stylistically and the Hou Hsiao-Hsien-directed THE ASSASSIN, the rare film by a filmmaker who's completely in control of his art, would not go home empty-handed. We expected the Coen Brothers-led jury would award them but not

Every Cannes Festival (and so, every festival) needs a good shoot-em-up movie. We got ours this year with SICARIO, starring Benicio Del Toro, Emily Blunt, and Josh Brolin in the supporting role. SICARIO's at-times lack of depth and the expeditious nature of certain plot twists make this solid revenge drama imperfect. But an extraordinary lensmanship by Roger Deakins and ominous, queasiness-inducing sound by Tom Ozanich complemented by the tense three-way tug-of-war between the characters played by Blunt, Del Toro and Brolin as they somehow try to work together to take out the top of a drug cartel is a joy to watch. SICARIO hasn't stayed with

In a recent interview that she gave to French magazine […]

The 68th Cannes Film Festival will open next Wednesday under the jury presidency of a pair of brothers from Saint Louis Park, Minnesota. The Coen Brothers aren't strangers to Cannes since most, if not all, of their films have been shown here over the years.

The brothers will be in good company: A-listers, stars and outstanding actors and actresses and filmmakers--the likes of

From this year’s Cannes Festival selection. Mexican filmmaker David Pablos’s […]

This year’s Cannes Selection was announced this morning and in fact features a less american-centric selection of films than in years past. That’s not to say Cannes's programmers won’t indulge a little of their flair for filmmakers representative of the commercially-viable but frankly independent fringe made in USA. Two of our best filmmakers alive today, Gus Van Sant and Todd Haynes, will be both competing for the Palme D’Or

Although Isabella Rossellini is less known stateside than in Europe the pedigreed doyenne of the moving pictures is bona fide cinema royalty. Her father is filmmaker Roberto Rossellini and her mother, Ingrid Bergman. Oh, she was married to a certain Martin Scorsese in the late seventies and later dated David Lynch. Naming her head of the jury of the Un Certain Regard (U.C.R.) program at this year’s Cannes Festival will add cachet and a dash