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Writer/director Niels Arden Oplev made a name for himself in Denmark with such films as Portland and The Eagle, but it was his version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo which really catapulted him to international success. The success of his adaptation of the infinitely popular Stieg Larsson novel has now led him to make his first English language movie in Dead Man Down.

The revenge thriller reunites him with his Dragon Tattoo star Noomi Rapace and co-stars Colin Farrell and Terrence Howars. Niels was at the Dead Man Down press conference that was recently held at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, California. While there he discussed the making of the movie, his take on violence in the media, why he chose Farrell and Rapace to star and much more.

Check it out below.

We Got This Covered: Can you tell us what made you choose...

After three separate announcements (here, here and here), the Toronto International Film Festival has announced the final line-up for their Galas and Special Presentations, as well as a few other categories. Most notable is Andrea Arnold‘s Fish Tank follow-up Wuthering Heights, the next film from Timecrimes director Nacho Vigalondo, as well as Dogtooth director Yorgos Lanthimos’ Alps.

We also get Whit Stillman‘s Damsels in Distress starring Greta Gerwig and Geoffrey Fletcher’s Violet & Daisy starring Saoirse Ronan and James Gandolfini. In what should be a little fun we have Gary McKendry‘s Killer Elite starring Robert De Niro, Clive Owen and Jason Statham. We also get Owen’s horror flick Intruders and Joel Schumacher‘s Trespass starring Nicole Kidman and Nicolas Cage. Check out the full line-ups below.

Galas

Closing Night Film

Page Eight David Hare, United Kingdom

International Premiere

Johnny Worricker (Bill Nighy) is a long-serving M15 officer.

In A Better World (Haevnen)

Directed by: Susanne Bier

Cast: Mikael Persbrandt, Trine Dyrholm, Ulrich Thomsen

Running Time: 2 hrs

Rating: R

Release Date: April 29, 2011 (Portland)

Plot: Anton (Persbrandt) works as a doctor at a refugee camp in Africa. He sees horrors every day, but isn’t prepared for the same thing at home. When his son, Elias (Markus Rygaard) makes a new friend, violence seeps into his home life.

Who’S It For? People who like films that don’t conform to expectations. Fans of unique and beautiful films.

Expectations: Bier’s 2003 Dogme film, Open Hearts, was really spectacular. I was hoping for something equally interesting.

Scorecard (0-10)

Actors:

Mikael Persbrandt as Anton: Caught between two worlds, Anton works as a doctor among victims in an unnamed war-ravaged country in Africa. When he returns to Denmark, he has the comfort of his sons, but is estranged from his wife, Marianne...

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Män som Hatar Kvinnor)

Directed by: Niels Arden Oplev

Cast: Michael Nyqvist, Noomi Rapace, Peter Haber

Running Time: 2 hrs 30 mins

Rating: R

Release Date: April 16, 2010

Plot: A disgraced journalist is hired by the powerful head of a wealthy family to find a woman missing for 40 years. He’s joined by an antisocial hacker and together they uncover way more about the Vanger family than they anticipated.

Who’S It For? Fans of the bestselling novel will line up to see this film. But if you don’t know the book, be prepared for a sometimes violent but also very interesting story.

Expectations: The novel’s great, I was hoping the film would be equally strong.

Scorecard (0-10)

Actors:

Michael Nyqvist as Mikael Blomkvist: The film starts with Mikael Blomkvist being found guilty of libel. He chooses to leave his magazine, but isn’t unemployed...

The 33rd Portland International Film Festival announces the Oregonian Audience Award winners. This year’s Festival wrapped up its 18 day run Sunday, February 28th after 195 total screenings at multiple theater locations in the downtown cultural district of Portland. This year’s Festival was attended by over 30,000 attendees and included 77 features and 39 shorts from over 40 countries.

Complete coverage of Piff 2010

Don’t forget to vote for the 8th Annual Tsr Movie Awards

Audience winners include Best Narrative Feature The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (Sweden) and Best Documentary Feature The Topp Twins: Untouchable Girls (New Zealand). The winner of the Best New Director Award is Hernán A. Goldfrid with Music On Hold (Argentina).

This year’s Short Film Award goes to Portland filmmaker Kyle Bell with the film The Mouse That Soared.

This year’s Piff presenting sponsors include The Oregonian and Regal Cinemas Major sponsors include the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation,...

Not all of the great film festivals are outside of the U.S. Even if you can’t book a ticket to Cannes or Berlin, you should be able to afford a flight out to Austin, Texas for SXSW, which is a festival for not only movies, but music and video games as well. Like the years before, the line-up for the 2010 SXSW Film Festival is the goods. Matthew Vaughn’s Kick-Ass will open up the fest and then there will be other great-looking films throughout including The Duplass Brothers’ Cyrus, SNL’s hard-r adaptation of MacGruber, Tim Blake Nelson’s Leaves of Grass, and Floria Sigismondi’s The Runaways, just to name a few. If you’re going to this year’s SXSW, let me know so I can steal your identity and go in your place.

The 2010 SXSW Film Festival will run from March 12-20. Check out the...

Less than a week worth of recovering from the Sundance Film Festival, and we are already looking forward to our next, big film fest coverage. That would be the South by Southwest Film Festival held annually in Austin, Texas. Last year, Scott and I brought you all kinds of coverage from the Lone Star State, and this year doesn’t look to be much different.

With that, the announcement came last night of the feature films that will be playing at the SXSW Film Festival. Previous announcement were already made about films like Cold Weather, Electra Luxx, Hubble 3D, Lemmy, Saturday Night, and The White Stripes: Under Great White Northern Lights making their debut. Kick-ass was recently announced as the opening night film, as well.

Among the other films being presented this year are some Sundance darlings, a few, highly anticipated premieres, and MacGruber.

Check out the full list...

Late yesterday the SXSW Fim Festival, which runs from March 12-20 in Austin, TX, announced the full lineup of films that will be screening at this year’s event. And baby, it’s quite a list. Mixing big name films with intimate indie gems, the sheer number of films and the vast array of talented filmmakers is sure to be a hit with attendees and critics alike.

This lineup includes premieres of studio films such as Universal’s MacGruber, Lionsgate’s teen superhero actioneer Kick-Ass and smaller films like Tim Blake Nelson’s Leaves of Grass, Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Micmacs, Michel Gondry’s The Thorn in the Heart and Steven Soderbergh’s And Everything Is Going Fine. With so many films to watch, it will be very difficult to find time to seem them all during the events nine days. But hell, we’re going to try.

For more on...

The 2010 SXSW Film Festival and Conference has announced its initial slate of titles. The list is rife with hot world premieres (Kick-Ass), films fresh from Sundance (The Runaways, Cyrus), hot titles from the 2009 editions of Tiff and Cannes that haven't had much U.S. play (Enter the Void, Dogtooth, Trash Humpers), interesting documentaries (Lemmy, The People v. George Lucas) and much, much more. Simon Rumley's Red, White & Blue, which has received much praise on Twitch based on its Iffr screenings, will have its North American premiere.

Midnight programming courtesy of Fantastic Fest is also back with titles like Higanjima, Monsters, Serbian Film, Outcast, and a yet to be announced special film. Keep eye out for SXSW coverage at Twitch, but for now, pursue the massive list below (descriptions courtesy of SXSW).

Headliners

Big names, big talent:  Headliners bring star power to SXSW, featuring red carpet premieres and gala film...