All the posts by Stephen Farber
Julie Delpy accepting her award in San Sebastian
The San Sebastian Film Festival offers great programs, along with a spectacular seaside location and irresistible Basque cooking. This year’s edition featured first and foremost an exceptional lineup of films. These were a few of my favorites:
Julie Delpy’s Le Skylab, which won a special jury prize from the panel that included actresses Frances McDormand, Sophie Okonedo, and Bai Ling, is one of the most sheerly enjoyable comedies that …
If it had been released 50 years ago, “The Help” (which opened on Wednesday) would have been the cinematic event of the summer. It has all the elements that once guaranteed critical hosannas. It’s based on a beloved, best-selling novel, has a high-class cast that includes several award-winning actresses (Viola Davis, Sissy Spacek, Cicely Tyson, Mary Steenburgen), along with ingratiating newcomers (Emma Stone, Jessica Chastain, Octavia Spencer). And it tackles a socially momentous theme: the …
Remakes are still running rampant in Hollywood, and it is rare to find one with a valid reason for existing. But the new British film Brighton Rock is one of the most exciting movies of the summer. In a way it’s not fair to call this a remake of the 1947 film that introduced Richard Attenborough as a dynamic movie actor. Instead it’s a new, updated version of Graham Greene’s 1938 novel about a baby-faced …
I can think of a few movies that use voice-over narration effectively: The Magnificent Ambersons and Jules and Jim are two of my favorites, and I’m sure there are two or three others. But in most cases, the device seems like a desperate crutch. As storytelling skills have declined in recent years, the use of voice-over has exploded, with filmmakers floundering to fill plot holes and expository gaps. The use of voice-over is far more …
When the Academy decided to increase the number of Best Picture nominees from five to ten, there was a lot of justifiable skepticism. Are there really more first-rate movies today than there were in 1959, 1962, or 1981, three banner years that had to make do with five nominees? Hollywood insiders clearly wanted to see more blockbusters like Inception andToy Story 3 on the list in order to boost ratings for the Oscar telecast, but …
