We’ve teamed up with Metro newspaper to spread the good word of the 54th BFI London Film Festival and after the first week is done and dusted, check out our highlights from 7 days of bustling entertainment.
Note. This post will be sticky for the weekend
We’ve teamed up with Metro newspaper to spread the good word of the 54th BFI London Film Festival. We’ve already previewed the festival, so now that it’s under way, check out our top picks so far.
We’ve teamed up with Metro newspaper to spread the good word of the 54th BFI London Film Festival. The London festival is the only major international film festival created specifically with the public in mind. For two weeks in October, a fascinating world of international cinema invades our autumn streets, providing a rare opportunity for you to stumble across films that will remain in your hearts and minds far longer than the summer’s blockbusters. But navigating this cluttered nest of cinematic gems is no easy task… so that’s where we come in! Take your pick of our top 5 recommendations for the festival. Whether you like heart-warming comedies, menacing thrillers, enticing documentaries, or emotional dramas, LFF 2010 has something for everybody…
More exciting new collaborations coming up soon too!
The December issue of Fan the Fire Magazine is out now featuring London Film Festival, The Box, 2012, The Girlfriend Experience, Sasha Grey interview, Dawes, Surfer Blood, Them Crooked Vultures, Francoise Nielly, Brandon Schaefer, Ruud Baan, Igor Termenon and much more.
You can read the issue above, or download it here.
It must be said that British cinema did not promote itself especially well at this year’s London Film Festival. Don’t Worry About Me and Kicks failed to make any positive mark on the critics and audiences that turned out to see them; and while 44 Inch Chest and The Disappearance of Alice Creed boasted fantastic casts and gritty aesthetics, they were poorly written and suffered a similar fate.
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Lebanon tells the story of four young Israeli soldiers, barely out of their teens, who are forced together to operate a tank as the First Lebanon War begins. It is an incredibly ambitious and difficult project, and one that has allowed director Samuel Maoz to create a veritable cinematic masterpiece. Waltz With Bashir employed a vast range of techniques (animation, documentary, non-narrative interviews, etc) to deal with the emotions and psychological issues created by the same war; but Lebanon never leaves the damp, explosive confines of the tank, and uses this claustrophobic microcosm to explore the power-struggles, crippling moral torment, and emotional anguish that defined this horrific event in world history. More
People are calling Paper Heart a mockumentary; but that word doesn’t seem to do the film justice because it bears no resemblance or heritage whatsoever to Spinal Tap. Paper Heart is really an honest study on the nature of ‘love’; it is a quirky docu-drama that blends narrative sequences with documentary footage, and weaves the two together so that they inform and affect each other. And if that doesn’t grab you, there are also some fantastic Gondry-esque animated sequences and original music from the poster boy of geek-chic, Michael Cera. More
After yesterday’s spectacular opening gala film, Wes Anderson’s ‘Fantastic Mr. Fox’, the London Film Festival came crashing back down to earth today with a screening of the distinctly average ‘The Men Who Stare at Goats’. There is nothing really wrong with the film (Ewan McGregor’s unfailingly awful American accent aside), but it lacks depth, beauty, or any of the artistic flourishes that would justify its position as a gala film. More
Adapting a Roald Dahl story is not an easy task. Born in a rural Welsh village to Norwegian parents in 1916, Dahl struggled through the strict British boarding school system during the inter-war years before joining the RAF for World War 2. It was only after this action-packed and dynamic life, when he had settled in a rural village in Buckinghamshire, that he began to write his children’s books; and every story he has written is infected with his confusing and multi-faceted character. More
Abel Ferrera may be a film legend due to cult classics like Driller Killer and King of New York, but it is unlikely his films will ever be entered into the canons of cinema. He has a unique vision and creates entertaining, moody thrillers and gangster flicks; but he has always been on the ‘exploitation’ side of auteur filmmaking. Werner Herzog, on the other hand, has already taken his place amongst the legends of cinema. He is one of the most playful, unrestricted, but undeniably thoughtful and disciplined filmmakers of all time. The idea of Herzog ‘re-imagining’ one of Ferrera’s most engaging and gritty films is therefore an enticing idea. More
