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Exclusive: Stephen Graham (Boardwalk Empire), Andrea Riseborough (Birdman) and Anson Boon (1917) are leading under-the-radar thriller Good Boy, from director Jan Komasa (Corpus Christi) and producers Jeremy Thomas (The Last Emperor), Ewa Piaskowska (Essential Killing) and Jerzy Skolimowski (Eo).

Filming recently completed on the movie at studios in Warsaw and on location in Yorkshire, UK, with HanWay films set to introduce footage to buyers at the upcoming American Film Market in Las Vegas.

The synopsis reads: “Nineteen year old Tommy likes his life as a criminal, and leads his friends in acts of horrifying violence, until one night he is kidnapped by a stranger, Chris (Graham). Waking up with a chain around his neck in the basement of an isolated home, Tommy (Boon) finds himself at the centre of a dysfunctional family dynamic as Chris and his mysterious wife Kathryn (Riseborough) try to make Tommy a “good boy”, in a process of forced rehabilitation.

Nicholas Hytner’s The Choral headlined by Ralph Fiennes, Paul Andrew Williams’ The Nest starring Andrea Riseborough and Jan Komasa’s Jeremy Thomas-produced Good Boy are among the projects backed by the Yorkshire Content Fund and in production across the summer.

The Yorkshire Content Fund, administered by Screen Yorkshire, has been supporting local production since 2012. It was initially set up with funding from the European Regional Development Fund (Erdf), which was awarded through the now-defunct regional development agency, Yorkshire Forward.

Following the demise of the regional development agency structure in 2012, the Yorkshire Content Fund continued to support production in...

A Prayer For The Dying from UK-France outfit The Bureau and Good Boy, produced by Jeremy Thomas’s Recorded Picture Company, are among the seven international co-productions to receive backing from the UK Global Screen Fund (Ukgsf).

In addition, 23 UK screen content businesses have been awarded funds to boost their international activities.

Ukgsf is financed through the UK government’s Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Dcms) and administered by the British Film Institute (BFI). The latest batch of awards sees over £1.3m being allocated through the international co-production strand and over £2m being allocated through the international business development strand.

The British Film Institute has revealed the list of TV, film, and animation companies that have won funding from its latest £3.3M ($4.2M) Global Screen Fund payout.

Thirty cash awards have been allocated this round, including seven new international co-productions and what the BFI has described as 23 UK screen content businesses. Financed through the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Dcms), the latest batch of awards sees over £1.3 million allocated through the fund’s International Co-production strand and over £2 million allocated through the fund’s International Business Development strand.

The funding, awarded in the form of non-recoupable grants ranging between £50,000 and £150,000, is paid out over three years. This year, the International Co-production strand has, for the first time, supported collaborations with Hungary, Norway, and Spain. The funding will also support partnerships with Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Lithuania, New Zealand, Poland and Sweden. Check out the full list of awardees below.

Poland’s Oscar committee has selected The Peasants, a sumptuous animated literary adaptation from Loving Vincent directors Dk and Hugh Welchman, as the country’s submission for the best international feature category at the 2024 Oscars, over The Green Border, a critically-acclaimed film from two-time Oscar nominee Agnieszka Holland (Europa Europa, In Darkness).

The decision, announced by the committee in Warsaw Monday afternoon, comes after a concerted attack on The Green Border by Poland’s far-right government, with the justice minister and the country’s president condemning the film and comparing it to “Nazi propaganda” for its depiction of the refugee crisis on Poland’s border with Belarus.

The head of Poland’s Oscar committee, producer Ewa Puszczyńska, whose credits include the Oscar-winner Ida, the Oscar-nominated Quo vadis, Aida? and Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest, the U.K. entry for the 2024 best international feature race, said deliberations were “tough...

Exclusive: Poland will submit animated feature drama The Peasants for Best International Feature Film at the 96th Academy Awards.

The picture is the latest work from Dk Welchman (previously known as Dorota Kobiela) and Hugh Welchman, the creative duo behind the groundbreaking, Oscar-nominated, hand-painted biopic Loving Vincent.

The pair co-wrote The Peasants screenplay adaptation from Nobel Prize-winning writer Władysław Reymont’s classic 1905 novel of the same name about a young woman determined to forge her own path within the confines of a late 19th century Polish village.

Poland’s Oscar entry choice was made Monday by a selection committee overseen by the Polish Film Institute. There was a strong offering of Polish films this year, with other potential contenders including Agnieszka Holland’s migrant drama Green Border and Malgorzata Szumowska and Michal Englerts’ transgender drama Woman Of.

Related: Agnieszka Holland’s Migrant Crisis Drama ‘Green Border’ Posts Record Opening Weekend...

The Palace, Roman Polanski's latest film, received a dismal 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on nine negative reviews from approved critics. This suggests it may be a major disappointment in his body of work. Critics describe The Palace as tasteless, lacking in style and fun, and a major misfire. Some even go as far as saying the film is so bad that it tarnishes Polanski's genius. Despite a 3-minute standing ovation at the Venice Film Festival, The Palace faces challenges with distribution and a bleak future. It remains to be seen if the film can overcome initial obstacles and find an audience.

Recently, The Palace by Roman Polanski had an unfortunate start at the Venice Film Festival, reflected by a bleak 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. This dismal score is based on a total of ten reviews, all submitted by Rotten Tomatoes-approved critics, and all expressing their unanimous displeasure for the film.

It’s hard to believe that it’s now over 60 years since Roman Polanski teamed with Jerzy Skolimowski for the landmark 1962 Polish thriller Knife in the Water. But it’s even harder to believe that these two giants of international cinema reunited more recently to pool their braincells and come up with The Palace, the most terrible, joyless farce since the heyday of the ’70s British sex comedy. Forget for a moment, if you can, the furor surrounding Polanski’s controversial status as a fugitive from justice and concentrate instead on the fact that the Venice Film Festival, in its infinite wisdom, went ahead and booked this entirely dreadful offering anyway, deeming it somehow worthy of a prestigious Out of Competition slot.

The setting is The Palace, a plush Alpine hideaway where the jet set of Europe are gathering to see in the year 2000. There are fears that the Y2K...

The Palace, the newest movie from Roman Polanski, has landed with a heavy splat with its debut on Rotten Tomatoes.

Following the movie's premiere at Venice Film Festival, The Palace has opened with the unwanted score of 0%. This is based on nine total reviews submitted by Rotten Tomatoes-approved critics, with each one of them unanimous with their displeasure for the film. It's possible the number will rise after more reviews are submitted, though it's also worth noting that those that are currently live are not kind on the movie whatsoever, suggesting The Palace is particularly bad.

Related: Emma Stone's Poor Things Debuts With Perfect Score at Rotten Tomatoes

"[The Palace is] a film that wears its bad taste like a mink coat while offering little in terms of fun, less still in terms of style," writes Rory O'Connor of The Film Stage. THR reviewer Jordan Mintzer agrees, labeling the movie a "major misfire.

Roman Polanski’s black comedy “The Palace” was given a tepid three-minutes of applause when it world premiered in the Palazzo del Cinema’s Sala Grande on Saturday night.

Producer Luca Barbareschi, French star Fanny Ardant and other key cast members including German actor Oliver Masucci (“Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore”), Portugal’s Joaquim de Almeida and Italy’s Fortunato Cerlino (”Gomorrah”) stood up and took a bow, but the audience’s response seemed to be more polite than exited, though there were occasional bursts of laughter during the screening.

Before the film’s premiere “The Palace” set designer Tonino Zera received Venice’s Campari Passion for Film prize from artistic director Alberto Barbera.

Polanski directed the black comedy from a screenplay he wrote alongside Jerzy Skolimowski and Ewa Piaskowska. “The Palace” takes place during New Year’s Eve in 1999, when a dinner party at Switzerland’s Gstaad Palace hotel takes an unexpected turn.

Roman Polanski’s Venice Film Festival feature The Palace received a 3 minute ovation tonight at its world premiere screening.

The Palace unfolds against the backdrop of Switzerland’s luxury Gstaad Palace hotel and revolves around the chasm between its ultra-rich clients and those who serve them in the lead-up to a lavish New Year Party on the eve of 2000.

Featuring Mickey Rourke, Fanny Ardant and John Cleese in the ensemble cast, the film took inspiration from Polanski’s own stays at the Gstaad Palace. He wrote the screenplay with Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski and producer Ewa Piaskowska. Longtime collaborator Alexandre Desplat composed the score.

As we revealed earlier this week, the film has closed multiple distribution deals in international markets.

There remains fierce debate in the film world and beyond over whether Polanski should be endorsed or not as an artist while 1973 charges of unlawful sex with a minor in the U.

Setting aside all the necessary caveats about art and artists, Roman Polanski’s “The Palace” throws a greater fact into stark relief. For all the digital ink we spill, journalists and critics are more often than not responsive to wider industry forces, and in Polanski’s case – as in the wider European industry — something has definitely shifted.

Heck, you could even the place the specific date to Feb. 28, 2020 – the night Polanski’s Venice Grand Jury Prize winner “An Officer and a Spy” won best director at France’s Cesar awards, prompting boos, a few notable walkouts, and a clash between protesters and police out in the streets. Two weeks prior, the French academy’s board of directors resigned in scandal.

So the fact that Polanski’s 2019 film has yet to find U.S. distribution is not a particular surprise; the fact that his follow-up, “The Palace,” has had similar tough...

As any critic will tell you, when you’re watching a comedy with an audience, it doesn’t matter how bad the movie is — even the jokes that are making you groan are going to provoke laughter. (That’s why comedies are always screened with a crowd; the studios want the audience giggles to rub off on you.) But at the Venice Film Festival, when I saw “The Palace,” Roman Polanski’s garish debacle of an ensemble comedy, I was sitting in the Sala Darsena, which seats 1400 (and was full), and on the rare occasion when a line in the movie got laughs, it was literally coming from about six people. I’m not sure if I’ve ever heard a giant theater this deadly silent for a movie that’s working this strenuously to amuse you.

Polanski, if you look back over his credits, has an astoundingly consistent track...

For an admirer of his work, writing about a new movie by Roman Polanski is like facing a minefield of unsolvable questions: Can this film be judged like the others given the director’s criminal record and tarnished reputation? Is it possible to praise a work of art if certain parts of an artist’s life are reprehensible, or should the two be separated? Should Polanski still be allowed to make movies? Should this movie even be written about?

Those questions would be harder to answer if Polanski, who’s now 90, made something on the level of say, Chinatown or Rosemary’s Baby. Or even something like The Tenant or Frantic or Repulsion or his debut feature, Knife in the Water, which came out over 60 years ago and earned him his first Oscar nomination.

But the director’s latest, The Palace, leaves little room for ambiguity. It’s the worst thing...

Actor, producer and director Luca Barbareschi is at the Venice Film Festival this year as one the main representatives of Roman Polanski’s new film The Palace.

The satire, poking fun at the ultra-rich against the backdrop of Switzerland’s luxury Gstaad Palace Hotel and featuring Mickey Rourke, Fanny Ardant and John Cleese in the ensemble cast, world premieres Out of Competition in a gala screening on Saturday.

Its selection for Venice’s 80th edition has sparked debate in the film world, which remains split over whether Polanski should be celebrated as an artist while 1970s charges of unlawful sex with a minor in the U.S. remain unresolved.

The director, who turned 90 in August, has not travelled to Italy, where it remains unclear whether he would be subject to Italy’s extradition treaty with the U.S., while a number of the film’s international stars including John Cleese...

Roman Polanski still has no trouble finding an audience in Europe, regardless of the ongoing debates in the U.S. over his proper place in the film culture of past and present.

French sales outfit Goodfellas has inked a slew of deals for the 90-year-old director’s upcoming dark comedy The Palace, which premieres at the Venice Film Festival on Saturday.

Distribution agreements are set for Spain (Vértigo Films), Germany (Weltkino), Greece (Spentzos), Portugal (Nos Lusomondo), Benelux (Paradiso Films), Bulgaria (Beta Film), Yugoslavia (McF), Hungary (Cirko), the Czech Republic and Slovakia (Pilot Films), the Baltics (Best Film), Cis (Pro:vzglyad) and Israel (United King).

The Palace takes place in Switzerland’s Gstaad Palace luxury hotel and centers its black comedy on the interactions between the venue’s serving staff and the wildly wealthy guests who stay there during the run-up to a New Year party to ring in the new millennium...

Exclusive: Roman Polanski’s dark comedy The Palace has sold to a host of key territories ahead of its Venice premiere, with distributors getting behind the film in spite of the controversy surrounding the director.

Goodfellas has unveiled deals to Benelux (Paradiso Films), Spain (Vértigo Films), Germany (Weltkino), Greece (Spentzos) and Portugal (Nos Lusomondo) in Western Europe.

Eastern and Central European distributors have also snapped up the film with sales to Bulgaria (Beta Film), Yugoslavia (McF), Hungary (Cirko), the Czech Republic and Slovakia (Pilot Films), the Baltics (Best Film) and Cis (Pro:vzglyad). United King has acquired Israeli rights, while Teleview has taken Middle East.

The Palace will be launched theatrically in Italy on September 28 by 01 Distribution. Its parent Rai Cinema is a key partner on the production alongside lead producer Luca Barbareschi.

Lausanne-based Cab Productions, which is also a producer, holds Swiss rights. Tomasz Przybecki is handling Polish rights in a deal brokered by Barbareschi.

Exclusive: Deadline can reveal the international trailer for Roman Polanski’s ensemble dark comedy The Palace ahead of its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival in September.

Shot against the backdrop of Switzerland’s luxury Gstaad Palace hotel, the film unfolds in the lead-up to a lavish New Year Party on the eve of 2000.

Mickey Rourke is unveiled as a demanding client with a Trump-style blond wig; Fanny Ardant as a wealthy marquise fretting over her constipated chihuahua, and John Cleese as a business magnate, who pitches up with his much-younger, new bride (Bronwyn James) and a live penguin.

The motley assortment of guests seeing in the new millennium also features a party of wealthy Russians (who tune into Vladimir Putin’s real-life News Year’s Eve Speech declaring he had been made interim president following Boris Yeltsin’s resignation), and a former porn star.

In the backdrop, the...

Italian production designer Tonino Zera, whose credits include Roman Polanski’s upcoming drama The Palace, will be feted with the Campari Passion Award at the 80th edition of Venice Film Festival, running from August 30 to September 9.

The prize, which was launched at the 75th Venice Film Festival, pays tribute to cinema crafts professionals who have made a “remarkable contribution” to the films on which they have worked.

Previous recipients span U.S. film editor Bob Murawski, Italian cinematographer Luca Bigazzi, U.S. jazz trumpeter and composer Terence Blanchard, UK production designer Marcus Rowland, and U.S. artist and costume designer Arianne Phillips.

Zera will be presented with the award on September 2 ahead of the Out of Competition world premiere of The Palace in the Sala Grande.

“To receive the prestigious Campari Passion for Film Award during the Venice Film Festival is not only a personal honor, it is also a...

Odds are low we’ll watch Roman Polanski’s The Palace through strictly legal means in the United States, those of us who maintain interest instead waiting for The.Palace.2023.1080p.BluRay.x264-ea.mkv.torrent. But with a Venice premiere right around the corner and Italian release set for September 28 (one day after another director returns) we have a dubbed trailer and first clip.

Co-written by Eo‘s Jerzy Skolimowski (some 60 years since Knife in the Water) and Ewa Piaskowska, Polanski’s comedy is set in Switzerland’s stunning Gstaad Palace on New Year’s Eve 1999 with throw-a-dart casting that suggests chaos of the highest order. These first two previews play into that wholesale: while Rourke dubbed into Italian is simply a demonic experience, the subtle long take in this full clip again shows Polanski’s mastery of space finding dividends in an ongoing relationship with Dp Paweł Edelman.

You can pre-set your Twitter (er, X?) alerts to outrage.

The 80th Venice Film Festival unveiled an impressive and — SAG-AFTRA and Wag strike-permitting — star-studded lineup on Tuesday, that should draw international critics and press in droves to the Lido again this year.

But controversy will also again be part of the 2023 Biennale, thanks to a selection of movies from directors nearly as well known for their scandals as for their films.

Roman Polanski new feature, The Palace, scored an out-of-competition slot, as did Coup de Chance, the latest feature from Woody Allen. And Luc Besson will premiere his new feature, DogMan, in competition in Venice. All three filmmakers have been the focus of abuse allegations and, in the wake of #MeToo, the targets of online attacks and cancellation campaigns. Though Polanski, who fled the U.S. in 1978 after being convicted of sexually assaulting a teen girl, is the only one...

Those who accept will be only additions to Academy’s membership in 2023.

Vicky Krieps, Paul Mescal, Warner Bros Discovery head David Zaslav, Aftersun writer-director Charlotte Wells, She Said director Maria Schrader, and Kerry Condon are among 398 who have been invited to join the Academy.

Some 40% of the 2023 class identify as women, 34% belong to underrepresented ethnic/racial communities, and 52% are from 50 countries and territories outside the United States. There are 76 Oscar nominees including 22 winners among the invitees.

Those who accept the invitations will be the only additions to the Academy’s membership. Should they all accept, the total number of members...

Italy’s 01 Distribution has announced a September 28 release for Roman Polanski’s new feature The Palace, fueling speculation that the film will world premiere at the upcoming edition of the Venice Film Festival (August 30-September 9).

The distributor, which had previously set an April date for the work which came and went, announced the new release date via its social media accounts on June 7 and revealed the artwork for the film.

È il 31 Dicembre 1999 e al lussuoso The Palace Hotel fervono i preparativi per il Capodanno più atteso di sempre. Ospiti milionari da tutto il mondo si preparano ad entrare nel Nuovo Millennio, tra vezzi, vizi e stravaganze. #ThePalace, di #RomanPolanski, dal 28.09 al cinema. pic.twitter.com/bkSRBtqs1R

— 01Distribution (@01Distribution) June 7, 2023

The move immediately sparked suggestions that the film is headed to Venice, where last film An Officer And A Spy also world premiered in 2019.

Artistic director Alberto Barbera...

Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI, and sign up for our weekly email newsletter by clicking here.Extra! Extra!A new Notebook publication has been released into the world! Our limited-edition, print-only Notebook Cannes Special is exclusively available at the Cannes Film Festival. It includes interviews with Souleymane Cissé and Alice Rohrwacher, an insider’s guide to the festival, a crossword, a comic, and much more. The publication is pictured above, but the bright red Pantone color must be seen on the page to be truly appreciated! (As an online preview: Yasmina Price's interview with Souleymane Cissé is available online.)NEWSIn production news, writer Durga Chew-Bose will make her directorial debut with an adaptation of Françoise Sagan's Bonjour Tristesse, starring Chloë Sevigny and Claes Bang (The Square). Filming began last week in the south of France.Noémie Merlant (of...

“I was always a big fan of the original movie, but I did feel while watching subsequent American or British war films that is a question of perspective that I can’t tell,” All Quiet on the Western Front director Edward Berger said of his motivation in finally bringing a German version of the iconic World War I tale to the big screen.

“There is a different perspective on the war, that they can go out of it with pride or honor even and victoriously — you can tell that type of story. In Germany, you can’t tell that story.”

Related Story ‘All Quiet On The Western Front’: Read The Screenplay That Turned The Classic German Novel Into A German Movie For The First Time Related Story Guillermo Del Toro Says "Artisanal Beauty" Of Stop-Motion Was Only Way To Make 'Pinocchio' – Contenders Film: The Nominees Related Story...

“I saw the Disney film when I was very, very young, and it made a huge impression,” Guillermo del Toro said during a panel for Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio at Deadline’s Contenders: The Nominees event, where he was joined by director Mark Gustafson. “What sat wrong with me was the idea that you needed to be obedient to be a real boy, and that you needed to be transformed into something you were not to be loved.”

Related Story ‘Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio’: Read The Screenplay For Oscar Winner’s Take On Classic Tale Related Story 'Eo' Director Jerzy Skolimowski And Co-Writer Ewa Piaskowska On Challenges Of Working With Animals: "We Were Terribly Optimistic" – Contenders Film: The Nominees Related Story 'Fire Of Love' Team On Their Volcanic Love Story For The Ages – Contenders Film: The Nominees

Del Toro’s Netflix adaptation of...

Now in his mid-80s, Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski proved that age is just a number when his film Eo premiered in Cannes last year, earning him the Jury Prize for this picaresque story of a donkey on the move, from good situations to bad. His lucky streak continued this year when the film was Oscar-nominated for Best International Feature — surprisingly, his first nod from the Academy in a career spanning 60 years.

Related Story Pawel Mykietyn Admits He Loved The “Crazy” Of Composing Music For A Wandering Donkey In Poland’s Oscar Entry ‘Eo’ – Sound & Screen Related Story 'Fire Of Love' Team On Their Volcanic Love Story For The Ages – Contenders Film: The Nominees Related Story Alice Rohrwacher & Alfonso Cuarón's 'Le Pupille' Draws Inspiration From Classic Italian Cinema – Contenders Film: The Nominees

Accompanied by his wife and writing partner Ewa Piaskowska for a panel at Deadline’s Contenders Film: The Nominees event,...

Deadline’s Contenders Film: The Nominees is underway Saturday with 12 panels featuring some of the year’s biggest crowd-pleasing movies as well as its most artistic critical hits. This final round of Contenders events this Oscar season features virtual Q&a panels with the on-screen stars, creatives and craftspeople behind 12 of the films that will be going for gold at the Dolby Theater less than a month from now.

Click here to sign up for and launch the livestream.

Streaming Contenders events has opened up a whole new global audience, and also offers quick and convenient access to filmmakers who are either dealing with busy production schedules or, as is the case with several of the panels here, based in locations all around the world. In that respect, Contenders is here to bust open the myth that the Academy Awards are solely a vehicle for the American film industry: you...

Speaking to Variety by Zoom from Warsaw, Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski – the director of Oscar contender “Eo” – sits on his sofa with his dog Bufon, a German Shepherd, by his side.

Bufon, or “Buffon” as Skolimowski prefers to spell his name – as a tribute to the Italian soccer player Gianluigi Buffon – is an actor, having appeared in an early scene in “Eo” as a “chained barking beast,” in Skolimowski’s words. It is the only time that Bufon has been secured by a chain. “He was very, very nervous about that,” Skolimowski says.

Skolimowski and Ewa Piaskowska – “Eo’s” co-writer, producer (alongside Skolimowski), and Skolimowski’s wife – lived for many years in California, but then they came back to Poland, and moved to a 19th century hunting lodge deep in a wild forest. “We lived away from civilization, but enjoyed the full spectacle of nature once we left the house,...

The Palace

Understandably this next item on our list comes with a lot of heat. An Officer and a Spy (J’Accuse) won a trio of 45th César awards and just prior won the Silver Lion for Best Director at the Venice film festival in 2019. Moving towards a template from Jerzy Skolimowski and Ewa Piaskowska, The Palace is about a hotel in Switzerland on New Year’s Eve 1999, blending stories of guests and staff with the likes of Mickey Rourke, Joaquim de Almeida and John Cleese. Roman Polanski shot for four months in Gstaad, Switzerland. Rai Cinema backed this project.…...

Before making Eo, their dreamy tale of a donkey traveling across Europe, director Jerzy Skolimowski and his partner/co-screenwriter Ewa Piaskowska had been playing with the idea of making an animal the protagonist of their next film, following their 2010 award-winning drama Essential Killing. But they couldn’t decide on the species. “We eliminated cats and dogs. There are too many movies about cats and dogs already,” Skolimowski says. “But otherwise — pigs, sheep, cows — it was all open.”

Then, on holiday in Sicily over Christmas, they stumbled on a reenactment of the biblical story of the birth of Jesus. The manger scene involved hundreds of extras, both human and animal. “There were chickens and geese, pigs and sheep. A cow. It was a whole zoo,” Skolimowski recalls. “In the midst of this enormous cacophony, in the corner, I noticed this donkey: standing without making a sound, just looking on the whole...

Eo, the furry, sad-eyed friend in Jerzy Skolimowski’s Polish film of the same name, was played by not one but six donkeys: Marietta, Tako, Hola, Rocco, Mela, Ettore. While accepting the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival this year, the director thanked them all for their contribution to this film about the four-legged creature’s melancholy, mundane trudge through life from one exploiting hand to another adoring one. In an exclusive featurette courtesy of Janus Films, which is currently rolling out the movie across the country in limited release, you can meet all six and hear a little bit about each from director Skolimowski and writer-producer Ewa Piaskowska.

As it turns out, playing a donkey passing through life’s cruel indifferences requires half a dozen to do the job properly. “We found [Marietta] on Facebook,” Skolimowski says, adding that this donkey starred in the film’s hallucinatory opening sequence,...

Eo Sideshow/Janus Films Reviewed for Shockya.com by Abe Friedtanzer Director: Jerzy Skolimowski Writer: Ewa Piaskowska, Jerzy Skolimowski Cast: Sandra Drzymalska, Lorenzo Zurzolo, Isabelle Huppert Screened at: Raleigh Studios, LA, 11/18/22 Opens: November 18th, 2022 Having a human protagonist makes it easy to carry a film, since the main character is, typically, able to speak and […]

The post Eo Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.

The veteran Polish film-maker’s latest movie stars a donkey – and is up for an Oscar. He talks about how he became a donkey whisperer to get the best performance, his career as a painter and playing a villain in The Avengers

In his rolling, sonorous, Polish-accented English, veteran director Jerzy Skolimowski explains how he became a donkey whisperer. “I make a very close bond with the animal,” he says. “Every time I was not doing anything else, I sit with donkey. I look very closely at him, eye to eye. I speak to donkey, talking in his ears gently. All my free time I spent with donkey.” There is a reason for describing this inter-species bonding: Skolimowski is about to release his amazing new film that features a donkey as the main – indeed, only significant – character; its title is simply Eo, designed to imitate a donkey’s bray.

Skolimowski,...

“It gives me a lot of satisfaction. It’s an honor,” says Jerzy Skolimowski, the director and co-writer of “Eo,” Poland’s official entry for Best International Feature at the 95th Academy Awards. “It’s also proof that the film must be one of the better films made in Poland last year, so I’m very glad that I can represent with my film ‘Eo.'” Watch our exclusive interview with Skolimowski and his wife, the film’s co-writer and co-producer, Ewa Piaskowska, above.

“Eo” follows a donkey, born into a Polish circus and then released, as he encounters on his journey good and bad people, experiences joy and pain, exploring modern Europe through his eyes. The film was awarded a Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival as well as the Cannes Soundtrack Award for composer Pawel Mykietyn (who also won Best Original Score at the European Film Awards...

A version of this story first appeared in the International issue of TheWrap’s awards magazine.

Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski made his first film in 1960, but his new “Eo” was one of the most adventurous and freshest films to premiere at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. The central character is a wandering donkey who takes a road trip across Europe and has adventures that can be charming, frightening and heartbreaking. But “Eo” doesn’t sit back and observe its protagonist — instead, Skolimowski uses drones, effects and a jarring sound design to put viewers in the donkey’s head.

He spoke to TheWrap through a translator.

When your film premiered in Cannes, lots of people commented on how it had a boldness and youthful energy to it. At the age of 84, do you feel like a youthful filmmaker?

No, I am fully aware of my age and my limits. But...

Polish maestro Jerzy Skolimowski calls Eo, winner of the Cannes Film Festival Jury Prize and just this week the Best Foreign Film award from the New York Film Critics Circle, “practically a road movie” whose POVs from the titular donkey “were the most effective element of the whole filming and editing.”

Eo is a vision of modern Europe seen through the eyes of a donkey on a stoic journey through a world where disaster and despair alternate with unexpected bliss. From Sideshow & Janus Films, it’s Poland’s entry into the Best International Feature Film Oscar race.

Related: The Contenders International – Deadline’s Full Coverage

Comparisons have been made to Robert Bresson’s 1966 study of the same breed of animal in Au Hazard Balthazar, something Skolimowski welcomes. During Deadline’s Contenders Film: International event, Skolimowski discussed the profound impact that movie had on him.

“I was a young unknown filmmaker...

Eo Review — Eo (2022) Film Review, a movie directed by Jerzy Skolimowski, written by Ewa Piaskowska and Jerzy Skolimowski and starring Sandra Drzymalska, Isabelle Huppert, Lorenzo Zurzolo, Mateusz Kosciukiewicz, Tomasz Organek, Lolita Chammah and Andrzej Szeremeta. Eo is a harrowing Polish movie directed by Jerzy Skolimowski that makes the audience feel a lot of [...]

Continue reading: Film Review: Eo (2022): Jerzy Skolimowski’s Film is Powerful and Overwhelming in Scope...

Poland’s Oscar© 2023 Entry for Best International Feature: ‘Eo’ directed by Jerzy Skolimowski'Eo' is the first motion picture to turn the spotlight onto the plight of animals as victims of persecution going as far as setting up an analogy to the genocide of the Jewish people.

Twice this is alluded to. First when Eo wanders into the woods and visits ancient gravestones which are marked by Hebrew letters. The second time is at the end after his endless odyssey on earth searching for the one who loved him most and lost him. “Like sheep to the slaughter” is a phase often associated with the Jews who were herded into conditions worse than those of animals, into boxcars and into gas chambers. So we see cattle herded into slaughter.

This is no Bambi. No Disneyification for this Burro. The animal is lovable and one senses its view of the outside world from its actions, one even senses its emotions.

The world is a mysterious place as seen through the eyes of an animal.

On his journey, Eo, a gray donkey with melancholic eyes, meets good

and bad people, experiences joy and sorrow as the wheel of fortune at every turn transforms his luck into disaster and his despair into

unexpected happiness. But never, at any instant, does he lose his innocence.

Watch the trailer here.

The telling of Eo’s story is also particularly Polish featuring the woods of of Jerzy Kosinski’s novel and feature The Painted Bird, the woods of Polansky’s childhood and of countless others who as as children, women and partisans during the war took to the woods as a means of escape. But here the victim has no voice and humans are only the willing and unwilling accessories to his plight as he tries to avoid the pitfalls of the world.

And we feel deeply for Eo who never says a word. What is the magic Skolimowski employs to make this movie so moving?

Jerzy Skolimowski and Eo, played by Taco, Ola, Marietta, Ettore, Rocco and Mela

This is the first movie that the 84-year-old Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski has made in seven years.

His wish was to pay homage to the cinema of Robert Bresson who inspired him to write this modern tale, whose main character is a Sardinian donkey:

“Several decades ago, I said in an interview (I think it was Cahiers du Cinéma) that the only film that moved me to tears was Au Hasard Balthazar (1966). I think I discovered it right after it came out. Since then, I haven’t shed a single tear at the cinema. Thus, what I owe to Robert Bresson is to have acquired a strong conviction that making an animal a character in the film is not only possible, but can also be a source of emotion."

Eo is a poetic work, a metaphorical vision of the world.

“I wanted above all to make an emotional film, to base the narration on emotions, much more than in all my previous films.”

During his career Jerzy Skolimowski has directed very great actors like Robert Duvall, or Jeremy Irons —” two of the most generous with whom I have worked, wonderful beings — but, directing a donkey on the screen, calls for any obviously other springs.”

“Directors use intellectual arguments to get actors the desired effect, use language to provoke their emotions. With my donkey, the only way to persuade him to do anything was tenderness: words whispered in his ear and a few friendly caresses. Raising your voice, showing impatience or nervousness would have been the shortest path to disaster.”

“In Poland we have an animal protection law. Everyone, including the donkeys, can work up to 8 hours on a set. When they shoot, we are responsible for them, they are our actors. We make sure that they do not feel stress during the shots, that they enjoy the work and the contact with the film crew. We also ensure their comfort throughout their presence on set. In this specific case, they were also under the permanent supervision of a veterinarian, which gave us additional assurance for their good health and well-being. During the preparations and during the realization, we ensured that the breaks and the night rest conditions were respected.”

Watch the trailer here.

Eo, in the words of NY Times review by Manohla Dargis, “adheres to the hero’s journey only to deviate drastically from that template. In short, Eo sets off on an adventure, enters a realm of near-supernatural wonder, encounters fabulous and less so forces, experiences challenges and temptations (including a wreath of carrots). He also meets Isabelle Huppert in an Italian villa, though she ignores him. His journey is strange, absurd, exhilarating and terrifying.”

We pity the poor animal and in our pity we should recognize our own cruelty to animals as well as to other human beings who are treated like animals within our own society and in front of our own eyes.

Jerzy Skolimowski worked with Ewa Piaskowska on writing the screenplay, following a now well-established method: “Eo is the third screenplay we have written together. The method is simple: one of us has an idea (in the case of Eo, it was Ewa, in the case of Essential Killing, it was me), then we give ourselves a good session of brainstorming. Then it’s Ewa who takes care of most of the writing, with me making adjustments, whether it’s additions or cuts. We usually write in Polish, then it’s always Ewa who takes

in charge of the English translation.”

The Directors’ Fortnight has shown the films of Skolimowski starting in 1965 with Walkover, his second feature film, acclaimed for its innovative form. “At the time, a young American filmmaker came to congratulate me after the screening of Walkover, and although my English was limited at the time, we instantly became friends. It was Jack Nicholson, who was also discovering Cannes. Smoking a joint with him on the beach that night remains one of my fondest memories from Cannes.”

This is the seventh time in his career that Jerzy Skolimowski has been invited in Competition to Cannes. “Coming back is a bittersweet experience. Many people I have met at the Festival over the years are no longer of this world, others cannot come. I myself have become a bit of a recluse and I feel better in my house in the forest in the middle of nowhere. The world today does not inspire much optimism — a war is raging in Europe. It seems absurd to celebrate the premiere of a movie, with the tragedy unfolding every day in Ukraine.”

Despite its dramatic nature, Eo is also a film rich in funny moments. What makes Jerzy Skolimowski laugh? “I don’t think I’ve laughed heartily in a long time. But I do smile sometimes — especially at my dog, Bufon, for his playfulness, or for the way he tilts his head when he listens to men’s conversations, as if he doesn’t want miss a word.”

International sales agent, Hanway, was founded by Jeremy Thomas who announced his own retirement this year in Cannes. Skolimowski and Thomas have a long-standing relationship that began when Thomas produced his second film Le Cri, which won the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes in 1978. They also collaborated on Essential Killing, which won the Special Prize of the Jury and the Best Actor Prize at the Venice Film Festival, as well as 11 Minutes, also screened in Competition in Venice.

Says Skolimowski, “Jeremy is a production icon. It’s always been a real privilege to see how he thinks, what he prioritizes, how he makes decisions or works with directors. He is in a separate class.”

Jeremy Thomas was born into a film family — his father and uncle were directors. He started in film laboratories and graduated as an editor, working on many films and eventually editing Family Life by Ken Loach. In 1974, Thomas produced his first film, Mad Dog Morgan by Philippe Mora with Dennis Hopper, then founded Recorded Picture Company. Thomas then produced numerous personal films, including Investigaton of a Passion, Eureka and Insignificance by Nicolas Roeg, and Furyo by Nagisa Ôshima with David Bowie. He eventually founded Hanway as the nternational sales agent for his films.

Hanway and its distributors did not stint on giving the film plenty of festival exposure, a good way to create word of mouth actively as it rolls out theatrically. After debuting in Cannes where Skolimowski won the Jury Prize and the Best Composer Award went to Pawel Mykietyn, it went on to a list of festivals that reads like a a primer for filmmakers to try to follow themselves: Jerusalem, Hong Kong, Hungary’s Miskolc International Film Festival, Toronto, Gdynia, Vancouver, Hamburg, Busan, Rio, London, New York, Mill Valley, Hamptons, Grand Lyon in France, Bergen, Santa Fe, Cologne, Philadelphia, Valladolid, Montclair, Vienna, Geneva, Seville, AFI Fest, Hawaii, Belfast, Tallinn, Ljubljana, MoMa, Taipei’s Golden Horseshoe.

Isa Hanway has licensed the film to Sideshow for US (the new kid on the block who is working with Janus on the theatrical release as they did with Oscar Winner Drive My Car. Founded by longtime IFC President Jonathan Sehring and his acquisitions chief Jason Hellerstein, Sideshow is also distributing Cannes films The Eight Mountains, Tori and Lokita, and All That Breathes. Other distriutors include Films We Like for Canada, Arp Selection for France, Soda for Peru and Colombia, Nitrato for Portugal, Rapid Eye for Germany, Applause for Taiwan, DDDream for China, Fine Films for Japan, Front Row for Mena and Iran, Odeon for Greece and The Searchers for Belgium.

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Husband-and-wife writing and producing partners Jerzy Skolimowski and Ewa Piaskowska had the Deadline Contenders Film: Los Angeles crowd doubled over in laughter with their charming back and forth banter. The pair behid Eo joined Saturday’s event via video and discussed their choice to create a film from a donkey’s point of view.

“We decided that we are not going to follow the traditional linear narration of the film,” Skolimowski said. “We were fed up with it. There were so many films made following the three act structure and the linear narration where you have to tell the story from A to Z … and keeping within the rules of the three-act structure. … Let other people make those films under those rules.”

Related: The Contenders Film: Los Angeles – Deadline’s Full Coverage

A film from a Polish circus donkey’s Pov might give you pause, but Eo already has taken...

Eo Janus Films Reviewed for Shockya.com & BigAppleReviews.net, linked from Rotten Tomatoes by Harvey Karten Director: Jerzy Skolimowski Screenwriter: Ewa Piaskowska, Jerzy Skolimowski Cast: Hola, Tako, Marietta, Ettore, Rocco, Mela, Sandra Drzymalska, Isabelle Huppert, Lorenzo Zurzolo, Mateusz Kosciukiewicz, Tomasz Organek, Lolita Chammah Screened at: Critics’ link, NYC, 11/19/22 Opens: November 18, 2022 Travel broadens. When […]

The post Eo Movie Review appeared first on Shockya.com.

“The donkey is cute, but this is not a Disney movie,” said Jonathan Sehring, the former IFC Films head whose young distribution outlet Sideshow, with Janus Films, presents Jerzy Skolimowski’s Cannes Jury Prize winning Eo at two NYC theaters this weekend. “We launched Sideshow for great movies that would otherwise get overlooked to give them the best release that they can possibly get,” he told Deadline.

Eo hits the big screen a year after the partners opened Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Drive My Car, tenderly leading the three hour-long Japanese film about a bereft theater director overseeing a production of Uncle Vanya through a decorated awards season expansion that garnered four Oscar nominations, a win for Best International Feature and some solid box office coin.

“It’s not something we invented. It was a very traditional platform release for, what we hoped when we acquired it, would be a critically acclaimed film.

At the age of 84, Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski has crafted one of the most vigorously energetic and vibrant films of the year. Inspired by Bresson’s seminal classic Au Hasard Balthazar, but taking the idea to formally dazzling new heights, Eo tells the journey of a donkey traversing through Europe. Via a series of striking vignettes, we witness the totality of the human (and animal) experience.

As Poland’s Oscar entry opens in U.S. theaters courtesy of Sideshow and Janus Film, I had the pleasure of speaking with Skolimowski and his co-writer, producer, and wife Ewa Piaskowska about the total freedom they found in creating Eo, the power of Bresson, leaving room for the audience’s imagination, and the Christ-like allegory in the film.

The Film Stage: There’s a sense, watching the film, that you gave yourself total freedom in where this journey would go. Can you talk about developing the structure?...

How do you write music for a wandering donkey in Eo? Composer Pawel Mykietyn didn’t take the responsibility lightly.

“First off this donkey survived,” the Polish composer told the audience, with the help of an interpreter, at Deadline’s Sound & Screen awards-season event. “I hope I don’t disturb the movie by music. … Sometimes it’s difficult to know what a donkey feels.”

Eo, by Polish veteran Jerzy Skolimowski and submitted by Poland to this year’s Oscar International Feature race, is a vision of modern Europe as seen through the eyes of a a precious mule. “In the movie, the donkey is in a lot of different places, the donkey meets different people,” said Mykietyn. “There are different situations, some tragic, sometimes funny. I tried to follow the situation, follow the emotion … add some color.”

Related: Deadline’s Sound & Screen: Full Coverage

“It’s crazy,” added Mykietyn, whose...

Click here to read the full article.

Polish filmmaker Jerzy Skolimowski didn’t always have a donkey in mind when he set out to make the film that would eventually become Eo, his acclaimed Cannes Jury Prize-winning drama that is now Poland’s entry to the Oscars.

Speaking at the BFI London Film Festival following a screening of the deeply moving film, which follows the life of a circus-born donkey — Eo (named after his braying “Eee—Oh” noise) — and his various adventures with some of the more peculiar and unpleasant elements of society, the director said that the original goal was simply to make a film with an animal in one of the lead roles because he was “bored with linear narration.” With an animal as a main character and therefore little dialog, he hoped it would offer something different and less predictable when it came to storytelling.

“So we...

It may officially be the year of the tiger in the Chinese Zodiac calendar, but in the world of film, it’s definitely the year of the wee donkey.

The humble equine features in films such as Searchlight’s “The Banshees of Inisherin” and even Neon’s “Triangle of Sadness,” but nowhere is this loyal beast of burden in the spotlight more than Janus Films and Sideshow’s “Eo,” from legendary Polish director Jerzy Skolimowski.

The film — which shared the Cannes Jury Prize with Félix Van Groeningen and Charlotte Vandermeersch’s “The Eight Mountains” — shares a vision of modern Europe through the prism of a gray donkey, Eo, who is torn away by animal activists from his beloved circus performer owner, and passed from hand to hand in the service of humans. On his life’s path, Eo meets all sorts of people and experiences joy and pain, as well as disasters and unexpected bliss.

Keep track of all the submissions for best international feature at the 2023 Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2023 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

Scroll down for profiles of each Oscar entry

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between January 1, 2022 and November 30, 2022. The deadline for submissions to the Academy is October 3, 2022.

A shortlist of 15 finalists is...

Keep track of all the submissions for best international feature at the 2023 Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2023 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

Scroll down for profiles of each Oscar entry

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between January 1, 2022 and November 30, 2022. The deadline for submissions to the Academy is October 3, 2022.

A shortlist of 15 finalists is...

Click here to read the full article.

Polish auteur’s Jerzy Skolimowski’s latest film, Eo, which follows the adventures of a mule who is stubborn and wise and free-spirited, has been chosen by Poland as its contender for best international feature at the 2023 Academy Awards.

Eo debuted in competition at the Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Jury Prize and the Soundtrack Award. The Polish film will also have a North American premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, before going onto to the New York Film Festival.

Skolimowski (Deep End, Moonlighting) directed the drama about a nomadic gray donkey named Eo. After leaving a traveling circus, Eo begins a trek across the Polish and Italian countryside, experiencing cruelty and kindness in equal measure.

On those travels, the donkey meets a cast of characters played by Lorenzo Zurzolo and Isabelle Huppert, among others. Ewa Piaskowska and Skolimowski wrote and produced the movie.

Keep track of all the submissions for best international feature at the 2023 Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2023 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

Scroll down for profiles of each Oscar entry

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between January 1, 2022 and November 30, 2022. The deadline for submissions to the Academy is October 3, 2022.

A shortlist of 15 finalists is...