Actualités

Oh, Canada debuting this week on the Croisette is high time to see lesser-seen Schrader on the Criterion Channel, who’ll debut an 11-title series including the likes of Touch, The Canyons, and Patty Hearst, while Old Boyfriends (written with his brother Leonard) and his own “Adventures in Moviegoing” are also programmed. Five films by Jean Grémillon, a rather underappreciated figure of French cinema, will be showing

Series-wise, there’s an appreciation of the synth soundtrack stretching all the way back to 1956’s Forbidden Planet while, naturally, finding its glut of titles in the ’70s and ’80s––Argento and Carpenter, obviously, but also Tarkovsky and Peter Weir. A Prince and restorations of films by Bob Odenkirk, Obayashi, John Greyson, and Jacques Rivette (whose Duelle is a masterpiece of the highest order) make streaming debuts. I Am Cuba, Girlfight, The Royal Tenenbaums, and Dazed and Confused are June’s Criterion Editions.

Clockwise from top left: Booksmart (Annapurna); Bottoms (MGM); Portrait Of A Lady On Fire (Lilies Film); But I’m A Cheerleader (Lionsgate); Red, White & Royal Blue (Amazon Studios) Graphic: The A.V. Club Bottoms, a raunchy, bloody comedy from director Emma Seligman (Shiva Baby), is kicking and punching its way into...

Clockwise from top left: Booksmart (Annapurna); Bottoms (MGM); Portrait Of A Lady On Fire (Lilies Film); But I’m A Cheerleader (Lionsgate); Red, White & Royal Blue (Amazon Studios)

Graphic: The A.V. Club

Bottoms, a raunchy, bloody comedy from director Emma Seligman (Shiva Baby), is kicking and punching its way into theaters...

The 1920s, also known as the Roaring Twenties or the Jazz Age, were a period of great social and political change that has been depicted a fair bit on television, leading to some of the best TV period dramas based in the '20s becoming iconic. Women won the right to vote and entered the workforce in greater numbers. Prohibition in the United States created a black market for alcohol that was a boon to organized crime. In Britain, deference toward the aristocracy began to crumble, blurring the lines between class distinctions. It was a time of unprecedented change with a distinct cultural edge - the era is also known for Art Deco and the iconic flapper.

The excitement and rebellion of this era continue to be prominent features in popular culture. The 20s are frequently the inspiration or setting for the best TV period dramas, exploring stories about flappers and bootleggers,...

When Sidney Poitier was honored as the first African American male to win a competitive acting Oscar in 1964 for his lead performance in “Lilies of the Field,” it had been 24 years since Hattie McDaniel became the Jackie Robinson of the Academy Awards with her breakthrough triumph in 1940 for “Gone With the Wind.” And it would be another 19 years before there was a third: Louis Gossett Jr.’s supporting actor victory in 1983 for “An Officer and a Gentleman.”

Wins for three performers of color in 43 years didn’t exactly represent a trend. But in the 39 years after that, there would be 19 more, including a pair of African American actors (Denzel Washington and Mahershala Ali) who won twice apiece. Poitier’s ’64 triumph proved as surprising as it was stirring, and undeniably political. Leading up to that historic event, his inscrutable countenance and the almost regal way he carried himself made Poitier a...

Sidney Poitier, whose dignity and self-assertion ushered in a new era in the depiction of African-Americans in Hollywood films as the civil rights movement was remaking America, has died, a spokesperson for the Bahamian Prime Minister confirmed to Variety. He was 94. Poitier was the oldest living winner of the best actor Oscar — just one distinction in a career full of distinctions.

“Our whole Bahamas grieves and extends our deepest condolences to his family. But even as we mourn, we celebrate the life of a great Bahamian, a cultural icon, an actor and film director, an entrepreneur, civil and human rights activist and, latterly, a diplomat,” said Phillip Davis, Prime Minister of the Bahamas in a statement. “We admire the man not just because of his colossal achievements, but also because of who he was. His strength of character, his willingness to stand up and be counted, and the way he...

Just last night, the Drama Company NYC celebrated the opening of theOff-Broadway premiere of Lilies, or The Revival of a Romantic Drama written by Michel Marc Bouchard with English translation by Linda Gaboriau, and direction by Andrew Benvenuti. Lilies - fully staged for the first time in New York City - is presented at The Theater Center 50th Broadway with an all-male cast of 11 actors.

After portraits dealing on teenage sexuality (Water Lilies), gender identity (Tomboy), reinvention (Girlhood) and yearning (Portrait of a Lady on Fire), Céline Sciamma will be working with her youngest cast yet in Petite Maman. Filming on her fifth feature film began this week and last until the beginning of December on project that is likely filming in Paris on current lockdown. Details on the film haven’t been divulged but it features two eight-year-old children.

Portrait of a Lady on Fire cinematographer Claire Mathon (also Atlantics) reteam with Sciamma. Lilies Films is producing.…...

MattCanada reporting from the Toronto International Film Festival

Two nights ago I saw J'ai tué ma mère (I Killed My Mother), the Cannes hit from 20 year old Québécois director Xavier Dolan. The film was shown in the University of Toronto's Isabel Bader Theatre, which is hands down my favorite venue for Tiff films. It is like a Frank Gehry version of an Opera House, which always makes me feel like I am about to view a classic in the making. I think for the first time the movie matched up to the theatre's atmosphere. Present at the screening for its North American premiere were director/producer/writer/star Xavier Dolan, the titular mother Anne Dorval, and the shockingly pretty François Arnaud, who plays Dolan's boyfriend. Dolan introduced the film in the most unusual way - by raving about Jacques Audiard's Un prophète, and telling the audience he hopes to...