No Man's Land/Ничија земља (Ničija zemlja) (2001) - Gimmicky Bosnia War hit

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Two grown men in underpants wave white cloth in the air as UN soldiers look on in this poster for Danis Tanovic's No Man's Land

During the Bosnian War (1992-95) a soldier trips and lands on top of a landmine. Can he now cooperate with an enemy about this matter, and how do the media and UN play a role in the war?

No Man's Land is written and directed by feature-debuting Danis Tanovic (Budjenje (1999, documentary)), who also composed the score. The English title is a literal translation of the original Serbian one. 

Become a bit more knowing about the Bosnia War by watching this Oscar-intended feature that has brutality and high ambitions but no promising core or any greater cinematic qualities. There are no surprises and little insight to gain from this film about unthinking killing in a beautiful landscape by people that the surrounding world take little interest in. The news media need their stories; and the UN are without balls. Spend an hour and a half to learn this here in Tanovic's unremarkable film.

  

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 2 mil. €, approximately 1.8 mil. $

Box office: 4.8 mil. $

= Box office success (returned 2.66 times its cost)

[No Man's Land premiered 12 May (Cannes Film Festival, main competition) and runs 98 minutes. 19 companies and support bodies collaborated in the financing and production of the film. Shooting took place in Slovenia. The film opened #53 to a 22k $ first weekend in 2 theaters in North America, where it peaked at #39 and in 38 theaters (different weekends), grossing 1 mil. $ (20.8 % of the total gross). The film won the Best Foreign Language Oscar and the Best Screenplay award at Cannes as well as 1/2 César award nominations. It was also nominated for 2 David di Donatello awards, won 1/2 European Film award nominations, a Golden Globe, 2/3 AFI award nominations, a National Board of Review award and many other honors. Roger Ebert gave it a 3.5/4 star review, translating to 3 notches over this one. Tanovic returned with a segment of September 11 (2002) and with a proper feature with L'Enfer (2005). Branko Djuric (Teater Paradiznik (1994, TV-series), director) returned in Kajmak i marmelada (2003); Rene Bitorajac (Minions (2015)) with a voice performance in Cats & Dogs (2001) and a physical performance in 24 sata (2002). No Man's Land is certified fresh at 93 % with a 7.80/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of No Man's Land?

I Am Not Your Negro (2016, documentary) or, America's Race Problems

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A huge-sized title and James Baldwin's human stare resting atop makes up this poster for Raoul Peck's I Am Not Your Negro

African-American activist and writer James Baldwin was a sensitive, intelligent, enormously eloquent man, whose expressions on racism in America still resound today.

 

I Am Not Your Negro is written, co-produced and directed by Raoul Peck (Haitian Corner (1987)). It is based on Baldwin's unfinished, 30-page novel manuscript entitled Remember This House.

Presented as a documentary essay, the film shows us three central friends of Baldwin; Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X and Medgar Evers, who were all assassinated for their racial and civil rights activism. Sharply and with a ripe sense of grief their time is portrayed, and straight lines are drawn from this era to the current police murders and Black Lives Matter movement. It is a bitter, bordering on hatefully poisonous image of the US as a morally bankrupt wonderland of the white, which is painted here. 

Many aspects are missing in the personal perspective on Baldwin, due to racism being the defining trait in everything in I Am Not Your Negro. 

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 1 mil. $

Box office: 9.6 mil. $

= Mega-hit (returned 9.6 times its cost)

[I Am Not Your Negro premiered 10 September (Toronto International Film Festival) and runs 95 minutes. The film opened #24 to a 686k $ first weekend in 43 theaters in North America, where it peaked at #15 and in 313 theaters (different weekends), grossing 7.1 mil. $ (74 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were France with 480k $ (5 %) and the Netherlands with 214k $ (2.2 %). The film was nominated for the Best Documentary Oscar, lost to O.J.: Made in America. It also won a BAFTA, a César award and was nominated for an Independent Spirit award, among many other honors. The-Numbers.com assert that the film additionally made in excess of 2.6 mil. $ on the domestic home video market alone. Peck returned with The Young Karl Marx (2017). I Am Not Your Negro is certified fresh at 99 % with an 8.90/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of I Am Not Your Negro? 

Hop (2002) - Political blinders restrain Belgian debut

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A mysterious modern structure, majestic elephants and a boy with a quizzical look in his eyes make up this dark and quizzical poster for Dominique Standaert's Hop

A super-intelligent boy from Burundi, Africa gets into trouble, when a banal problem makes his father get arrested as an illegal immigrant by Belgian authorities, and he himself finds shelter in the home of an anarchist couple.

 

Hop is written by Rémi Hatzfeld (Le Navetteur (1985), director), Olivier Malley (Papillon & Mamillon (2005, TV-series)) and debuting co-writer/director Dominique Standaert (Eau (1997, short)). 

It is a beautifully photographed (by cinematographer Rémont Fromont (Eliot (2013, short))) saga that explores power structures with a critical eye pointed towards Belgian authorities in particular, with an enormously charming boy in the central part, Kalomba Mbuyi. But what's symptomatic of this typically left-oriented echo chamber type plot; the 'foreigner' is exceptionally intelligent, domestically superb, well behaved, eternally sweet and understanding (below the surface he appears to be a sprouting homosexual), and across from him; the authorities and the Belgian 'every-man' worker are merely dumb and unfair! Underlying reasons for their positions or any perspectives on enrichment immigration are clearly not worthy of these filmmakers' precious time or attention.

That the boy's conflict nearly results in a terrorism bombing of a tourist attraction (watch the film to learn how) and a dam system are also disturbing facts that the narrative trio obviously think cannot be held against him. Despite qualities, Hop is a prime example of tiring polemics turned into a film.

 

Related post:

 

2002 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: Unknown

Box office: Unknown (Danish gross 119k $)

= Uncertain

[Hop premiered 8 October (International Film Festival Gent, Belgium) and runs 106 minutes. Shooting took place in Belgium, including in Brussels. It was the first Belgian film to be shot on an HD camera. Gross numbers from the film's main markets, Belgium, France and the Netherlands are regrettably unavailable: It sold 10k tickets in Denmark, coming to approximately 119k $ . It was nominated for 2 European Film awards. Standaert returned with Formidable (2007). Mbuyi did not return in front of a camera; Jan Decleir (Ay Ramon! (2015)) returned in Brush with Fate (2003, TV movie) and theatrically in Rosenstrasse (2003). 455 IMDb users have given Hop a 6.9/10 average rating.]

What do you think of Hop?

Close (2022) - Cruel heartache implodes in Dhont's lush countryside youth drama

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Two adolescent boys in close embrace form this warm poster for Lukas Dhont's Close

13 year-olds Leo and Remi are very close friends, who are about to start in a new school. Here classmates are quick to notice and verbalize that the two seem to me more than just best friends. The possibility that they might be a couple shakes them to their core.

Close is written by Angelo Tijssens and co-writer/director Lukas Dhont (Girl (2018), both).

A severely emotional drama, SPOILER Close has a lovely half of the two remarkably loving and close friends that haven't seemingly taken their relation to sexual places (yet); the other half is truly grim and devastating: Remi commits suicide, shockingly, in response to Leo rejecting their relation in favor of attempting to fit in as a straight, sports-interested boy.

SPOILER Is the suicide of the 13 year-old protagonist a serious swerve for the plot that's validated and informed by personal experience for Tijssen and Dhont? Because adolescent suicides (boys probably especially) are very rare, so it seems that there should be a particularly personal drive behind this plot decision in my opinion. But I have not been able to find Dhont explaining any such in the countless eloquent interviews about the film he has given. Otherwise the element is a kind of strong chili narratively (a ploy of questionable taste) that the two storytellers have added to their teen romance. - Is it backed up, or a mere drastic chili?

The question remains unanswered. What does esteem this film is its performances, especially from debuting Eden Dambrine and Gustav De Waele as the two boys, and Émilie Dequenne (An Irrespressible Woman/Je ne Rêve que de Vous (2019)) as the latter's mother. All give stirring, intense and authentic performances that strike strong emotional chords. Prepare to sniffle and issue teardrops with this aesthetic trip to the Belgian countryside of lush flower fields, abrupt loss and cruelest heartache.

 

Related post:

 

Lukas Dhont: Girl (2018) - Debuting Polster impresses in insightful trans drama

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 4.1 mil. $

Box office: 5 mil. $ and counting

= Big flop (has returned 1.21 times at time of writing this)

[Close premiered 26 May (Cannes Film Festival, main competition) and runs 104 minutes. At least 16 companies and support bodies cooperated in the financing and making of the film. Shooting took place around July 2021 in Netherlands and Belgium. Dhont has explained in interviews that the film is about close male friendship between adolescents. The film opened #26 to a 61k $ first weekend in North America, where it peaked at #21 and in 233 theaters (different weeks), grossing 1.1 mil. $ (22 % of the total gross to date). The film's biggest market is France with 1.3 mil. $ (26 %); North America was 2nd biggest and Netherlands 3rd biggest with 1 mil. $ (20 %). The film was Oscar-nominated in the Best Foreign Language Film, lost to All Quiet on the Western Front. It was also nominated for a Golden Globe, 6 European Film awards, a César award, won 7/10 Magritte award nominations (Belgium's Oscar) and a National Board of Review award, among other honors. It lost the Palme d'Or to The Triangle of Sadness. Dhont has not announced his next film yet. Dambrine and De Waele also have not announced their returns yet. Close is certified fresh at 92 % with a 8.30/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Close?

Rust and Bone/De Rouille et d'Os (2012) - Cotillard gives another awe-inspiring performance

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A sensual, strong poster for Jacques Audiard's Rust and Bone

 

A crude single father arrives to a coastal city in France with his son and gets a job as a bouncer in a nightclub, where he meets a beautiful woman in distress, who later loses both of her legs in an Orca accident.

Co-writer-director Jacques Audiard (A Prophet/Un Prophète (2009)) continues his style of telling different stories about underclass people we otherwise rarely meet on the big screen, and he once again strikes with a very corporeal tale with a couple of scenes of ugly violence. SPOILER - One of them involves the father and his son, and I found it very hard not to lose all sympathy for the gorilla-like man (played intensely by Matthias Schoenaerts (The Danish Girl (2015))) here. Moreover, Schoenaerts yells the little, crying boy in the head, and I couldn't help but wonder how (or if) they shot that in an ethically defensible way. (I have since read that Audiard deemed this the film's hardest scene to shoot and that the boy knew he would be yelled at but still started crying for real, which is what is now in the film.)

Schoenaerts has a primitive intensity, but it is Marion Cotillard (La Vie en Rose/La Môme (2007)) who is the center of the film, and she is absolutely stunning, completely melted together with her character and deeply moving in certain scenes, SPOILER especially those in which she overcomes her handicap.

Audiard co-wrote Rust and Bone with Thomas Bidegain (Dheepan (2015)), based on a same-titled 2005 short story by Craig Davidson (The Fighter (2008)). It is a raw film presented without much sugar; it goes for the jugular and should especially be seen for Cotillard's hypnotizing performance.

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 15.4 €, equal to approximately 20 mil. $

Box office: 25.7 mil. $

= Big flop

[Rust and Bone premiered May 17 (Cannes) and runs 123 minutes. Cotillard is an animal activist and fiercely against marine parks. Still she spend a week preparing for her role in a marine park, whereas Schoenaerts practised MMA and gained weight. The film came together as a co-production of no less than 17 companies and institutions. Filming took place in 8 weeks in France and Belgium from October - November 2011. The film opened #56 in 2 theaters to a 27k $ first weekend in North America, where it peaked in 168 theaters and grossed 2 mil. $ (7.8 % of the total gross), the film's second biggest market. Its biggest market by far was its native France with 14.5 mil. $ (56.4 %). The 3rd biggest was Germany with 1.5 mil. $ (5.8 %). The film lost the Palm d'Or to Michael Haneke's Amour. It was nominated for 2 Golden Globes, 9 Césars (France's Oscar, winning 4) and numerous other awards. Roger Ebert added the film to his Great Films list. Rust and Bone is certified fresh at 82 % with a 7.5 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Rust and Bone?