The Oak (Balanţa)
Romanian master Lucian Pintilie constructs a “Theatre of the Absurd” darker and more acerbic than any from Eugene Ionesco’s imagination.
Category Archives: Reviews
The Show Must Go On
Set in an unspecified near future, Croatian director Nevio Marasovic’s THE SHOW MUST GO ON begins with a daunting play on the familiarity of a certain reality television show; a handful of contestants stuck in an enclosed space where their every move is exposed to both a variety of cameras and projected to thousands of baying voyeurs.
Tirza
The Dutch entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at this year’s Academy Awards (though it didn’t make the final shortlist), TIRZA stars Gijs Scholten van Aschat as Jörgen Hofmeester, a weary, bemused man who is deemed superfluous both at work and at home, not least by his demanding ex-wife.
Under Control (Unter Kontrolle)
Attempting a somewhat strict dogmatic stance to the state, or lack there of, of nuclear power stations and their rigorous maintenance, Volker Sattel’s second documentary is a serene, sterile and stimulating assessment of such a hotly debated subject in modern society.
The City Below (Unter Dir Die Stadt)
Jim Ross reviews Christoph Hochhäusler’s THE CITY BELOW (UNTER DIR DIE STADT), an interesting film with some fine acting performances that falls slightly short due to its muddled approach to a serious but confused script.
Zodiac
Claire Henry reviews David Fincher’s ZODIAC (2007) which expands and extends on the 2005 feature about the Zodiac serial killer, THE ZODIAC.
Surprise Films
Every year at CFF we screen a surprise film. Nobody except Tony Jones knows what the film will be until the very last minute. We like to have a stab at writing up a preview anyway. That’s the way we roll.
White White World (Beli Beli Svet)
If the Serbian drama WHITE WHITE WORLD (BELI BELI SVET) deserves a subtitle it would be ‘The Great Depression’. Filmed mostly in a shaky hand camera perspective, the connected stories of several inhabitants of the Serbian mining town Bor are told.
Local Tastes
‘A promising taste of local talent’ says TAKE ONE writer Lillie Davidson of this collection of Cambridge shorts, screened at CFF2011
Gibraltar
Ana Garcia’s Gibraltar sets out a journey into the complex history produced by the hate and love between England and Spain on this territory.