"But did he have rhythm?" Madman Films has revealed the first look trailer for an acclaimed documentary film titled Soundtrack to a Coup d'Etat, made by Belgian filmmaker Johan Grimonprez. This film is an entrancing look back at a major moment in global politics during the Cold War, intertwining music history & pop culture with these events. Jazz & decolonization are entwined in this historical rollercoaster that led musicians Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach to crash the Un Security Council in protest against the murder of Patrice Lumumba. After Lumumba was murdered in 1961, the US State Department swings into action by sending jazz ambassador Louis Armstrong to Congo to deflect attention from the CIA-backed coup in the country. The doc features excerpts from My Country, Africa by Andrée Blouin (narrated by Marie Daulne aka Zap Mama), Congo Inc. by In Koli Jean Bofane, To Katanga & Back by Conor Cruise O’Brien (narrated...
- 5/5/2024
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Bollywood actress Sara Ali Khan, who is awaiting the release of her upcoming streaming movie ‘Ae Watan Mere Watan’, has shared that she loves Russian history of the 20th century and Russian literature.
The actress, who has been a student of history, recently spoke with Ians ahead of the release of her period film and shared that she finds it very interesting how landmark moments in Russia from the rise of Vladimir Lenin to the fall of the Soviet Union happened within a span of 100 years.
She told Ians: “I like 20th-century Russian history a lot. I think it’s very interesting how they went from Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev to the fall of the Soviet Union, ye sab 100 salon mein hua hai. It’s very interesting to observe it that way.”
In fact, Nikita Khrushchev was the one who denounced his predecessor Joseph Stalin...
The actress, who has been a student of history, recently spoke with Ians ahead of the release of her period film and shared that she finds it very interesting how landmark moments in Russia from the rise of Vladimir Lenin to the fall of the Soviet Union happened within a span of 100 years.
She told Ians: “I like 20th-century Russian history a lot. I think it’s very interesting how they went from Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev, and Mikhail Gorbachev to the fall of the Soviet Union, ye sab 100 salon mein hua hai. It’s very interesting to observe it that way.”
In fact, Nikita Khrushchev was the one who denounced his predecessor Joseph Stalin...
- 3/20/2024
- by Agency News Desk
- GlamSham
Juxtaposing the story of the murder of Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba with a musical tour of jazzman Louis Armstrong and with the expansion of the United Nations after the independence of many African countries in the 1960s might be tall order. Trickier still would be telling this complex story, full of many characters and plot swerves, in a nonlinear manner while filling the screen with written clues providing context like a bibliography of an academic thesis. Writer and director Johan Grimonprez sets himself a difficult task with “Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat,” yet accomplishes it with astonishing success. The film plays like both a dense historical text and a lively jazz concert while proving itself to be an invigorating piece of documentary filmmaking.
Touching on far more than the decolonization of Africa, Grimonprez’s ambitious essay film encompasses the political and historical upheavals the world over — including the alleged involvement...
Touching on far more than the decolonization of Africa, Grimonprez’s ambitious essay film encompasses the political and historical upheavals the world over — including the alleged involvement...
- 3/11/2024
- by Murtada Elfadl
- Variety Film + TV
Louis Armstrong arrived in the Congolese capital, Leopoldville (now known as Kinshasa), on October 28, 1960, armed with his trumpet and wiping sweat from his brow. His visit was part of a U.S. State Department-sponsored tour of Africa, an arrangement Armstrong felt ambivalent about. Still, the Congolese people gave Satchmo, as the American jazz trumpeter was known, a near royal welcome. Drummers and dancers carried him to his performance venue on a red chair, fashioned like a throne. Civilians cheered him on. Ten thousand people showed up to watch him play.
This was a momentous occasion, a storied event for the newly independent republic of the Congo. Four months before Armstrong came to play jazz, the country had freed itself from the colonial grip of Belgium to become one of the more than dozen postcolonial African nations formed in 1960. But the region was still plagued with problems, most of them stemming...
This was a momentous occasion, a storied event for the newly independent republic of the Congo. Four months before Armstrong came to play jazz, the country had freed itself from the colonial grip of Belgium to become one of the more than dozen postcolonial African nations formed in 1960. But the region was still plagued with problems, most of them stemming...
- 3/1/2024
- by Lovia Gyarkye
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Odesa, Ukraine — The American Century is ending, with external adversaries outmaneuvering the United States in critical strategic contests worldwide, while internal extremists destroy American leadership.
Whether one believes — as American officials say they do — that the purpose of U.S. power is to enforce a “rules-based” liberal international order and defend human rights, or whether one believes — as Russian President Vladimir Putin and his friends say they do — that the U.S. uses its espoused ideals as cover for rapacious empire-building, it’s clear Washington is capable of doing neither effectively.
Whether one believes — as American officials say they do — that the purpose of U.S. power is to enforce a “rules-based” liberal international order and defend human rights, or whether one believes — as Russian President Vladimir Putin and his friends say they do — that the U.S. uses its espoused ideals as cover for rapacious empire-building, it’s clear Washington is capable of doing neither effectively.
- 2/23/2024
- by Mac William Bishop
- Rollingstone.com
Sundance Review: Soundtrack to a Coup d’État is a Vibrant, Complex, and Jazz-Infused Political Essay
It was Mark Twain who said, “History doesn’t repeat itself but it often rhymes,” which is one way of approaching Belgian filmmaker and multimedia artist Johan Grimonprez’s sprawling, jazz-infused Soundtrack to a Coup d’État. The political essay revisits 1960, a turbulent year in global affairs: Patrice Lumumba rises to power in Congo just as the United States, through the CIA-backed Voice of America radio network, aims to soften America’s image aboard, sending jazz musicians Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Nina Simone, Dizzy Gillespie, Abbey Lincoln, and Max Roach to tour the world. The film positions the jazz musicians as a kind of political cabinet while Gillespie envisions his own run for the White House on TV talk shows back home. It proceeds with a rather kinetic, defiant tone in which the jazz, breaking news, citations, and quotes interrupt the historical footage a more standard documentary may have primarily focused on.
- 2/9/2024
- by John Fink
- The Film Stage
On Jan. 29, 1964, a triple premiere — in New York, London and Toronto — launched one of Stanley Kubrick’s signature masterpieces into the chilly Cold War atmosphere: Dr. Strangelove, with the marquee-challenging subtitle Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. Kubrick described it as a “nightmare comedy.” Sixty years later, the comedy still works, but the immediacy of the nightmare may be missed.
Shot in Shepperton Studios outside of London from February through November 1963, Dr. Strangelove was conceived and realized in the shadow of a real-life nightmare scenario that no one laughed at: the Cuban Missile Crisis, which unfolded over 13 terrifying days in October 1962.
On Oct. 14, 1962, a U-2 spy plane detected facilities for the launching of nuclear ballistic missiles from Cuba, a Soviet client state since 1959. President John F. Kennedy convened an executive committee of the National Security Council to consider options. The consensus from the Joint Chiefs...
Shot in Shepperton Studios outside of London from February through November 1963, Dr. Strangelove was conceived and realized in the shadow of a real-life nightmare scenario that no one laughed at: the Cuban Missile Crisis, which unfolded over 13 terrifying days in October 1962.
On Oct. 14, 1962, a U-2 spy plane detected facilities for the launching of nuclear ballistic missiles from Cuba, a Soviet client state since 1959. President John F. Kennedy convened an executive committee of the National Security Council to consider options. The consensus from the Joint Chiefs...
- 1/29/2024
- by Thomas Doherty
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
“The Belgians cut off my hands in the Congo,” Langston Hughes wrote in his poem “Negro.” “They lynch me now in Texas.” The year was 1922, and racial segregation was the norm in the United States. Anti-Black racism in the South was such a millstone that the U.S. Senate failed to pass an NAACP-sponsored anti-lynching bill in January of that year, a list of simple protections that was prevented from coming to a vote due to filibusters.
Hughes’s poem is one piece of ephemera that comprises the massive tapestry that is Soundtrack to a Coup d’État. Director Johan Grimonprez’s documentary is primarily focused on the Democratic Republic of Congo and its struggle for independence from Belgian colonialism, during which time our government was using Black jazz musicians to, in its diplomatic tango with the Soviet Union, paint a portrait of American liberalism as benevolent.
The documentary focuses on...
Hughes’s poem is one piece of ephemera that comprises the massive tapestry that is Soundtrack to a Coup d’État. Director Johan Grimonprez’s documentary is primarily focused on the Democratic Republic of Congo and its struggle for independence from Belgian colonialism, during which time our government was using Black jazz musicians to, in its diplomatic tango with the Soviet Union, paint a portrait of American liberalism as benevolent.
The documentary focuses on...
- 1/23/2024
- by Greg Nussen
- Slant Magazine
Premiering out of Sundance’s World Cinema Documentary Competition, the impressionistic essay film “Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat” refracts the plot against Patrice Lumumba through a kaleidoscopic lens. Cutting between historical footage of the Un General Assembly and home movies shot in liberation-era Congo, weaving in a diverse set of perspectives, and setting the pace to a non-stop rhythm of bebop, rumba and classic jazz, director Johan Grimonprez evokes the euphoria of post-colonial possibility and the heartbreak of the dashed hopes and violent reprisals that would ensue.
“At first, I wanted to explore the colonial legacy of my own country,” says the Belgium-born Grimonprez. “I was already mesmerized by the story of Andrée Blouin, who was an independence leader, an advisor to [Ghana president] Kwame Nkrumah and chief of protocol for [first Congolese prime minister] Patrice Lumumba, but who was almost written out of history. And as a filmmaker, I like to explore those intimate stories within a wider,...
“At first, I wanted to explore the colonial legacy of my own country,” says the Belgium-born Grimonprez. “I was already mesmerized by the story of Andrée Blouin, who was an independence leader, an advisor to [Ghana president] Kwame Nkrumah and chief of protocol for [first Congolese prime minister] Patrice Lumumba, but who was almost written out of history. And as a filmmaker, I like to explore those intimate stories within a wider,...
- 1/17/2024
- by Ben Croll
- Variety Film + TV
Audacy today announced an expansion of its relationship with Puck and the launch of About a Boy: The Story of Vladimir Putin — a five-part documentary podcast series exploring the forces that shaped Russian President Vladimir Putin’s childhood (and life) and why it's critical to understanding what he might do next in the war against Ukraine.
The series is written and narrated by Julia Ioffe, Founding Partner and Washington Correspondent, Puck, and one of the leading journalists covering Russia and Putin.
As Puck celebrates its second anniversary, “About a Boy” marks its first-ever audio documentary and second series in partnership with Audacy following the March 2022 launch of The Powers That Be: Daily—a daily show bringing listeners inside the four corners of power in America: Wall Street, Washington, Silicon Valley, and Hollywood.
“About a Boy: The Story of Vladimir Putin” will launch with the first two episodes on October 4, 2023, on...
The series is written and narrated by Julia Ioffe, Founding Partner and Washington Correspondent, Puck, and one of the leading journalists covering Russia and Putin.
As Puck celebrates its second anniversary, “About a Boy” marks its first-ever audio documentary and second series in partnership with Audacy following the March 2022 launch of The Powers That Be: Daily—a daily show bringing listeners inside the four corners of power in America: Wall Street, Washington, Silicon Valley, and Hollywood.
“About a Boy: The Story of Vladimir Putin” will launch with the first two episodes on October 4, 2023, on...
- 10/4/2023
- Podnews.net
Angela Bassett, Austin Butler, Doja Cat, and King Charles III are on the list.
Time’s “100 Most Influential People in the World” list was announced today. Each year, the media outlet honors 100 individuals that it perceives as holding sway, pairing the list with praiseful blurbs from contemporaries. The logrolling list contains comedians, sports stars, authors and other influential figures.
The list was first published in 1999. Nominations are secured from Time 100 alumni and the international writing staff. The final list is exclusively chosen by Time editors. There is also a commemorative gala held to celebrate the list winners.
Unlike the Time Person of the Year, which has selected Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, and Nikita Khrushchev among its honorees, the Time 100 is far less controversial.
Among those on this year’s Time 100 list from entertainment:
Salma Hayek (tribute written by Penélope Cruz) Rian Johnson (tribute written by Jamie Lee Curtis) Ali Wong...
Time’s “100 Most Influential People in the World” list was announced today. Each year, the media outlet honors 100 individuals that it perceives as holding sway, pairing the list with praiseful blurbs from contemporaries. The logrolling list contains comedians, sports stars, authors and other influential figures.
The list was first published in 1999. Nominations are secured from Time 100 alumni and the international writing staff. The final list is exclusively chosen by Time editors. There is also a commemorative gala held to celebrate the list winners.
Unlike the Time Person of the Year, which has selected Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, and Nikita Khrushchev among its honorees, the Time 100 is far less controversial.
Among those on this year’s Time 100 list from entertainment:
Salma Hayek (tribute written by Penélope Cruz) Rian Johnson (tribute written by Jamie Lee Curtis) Ali Wong...
- 4/13/2023
- by Bruce Haring
- Deadline Film + TV
It may well be an unconscious impulse but the writers are directly or indirectly influenced by their socio-political millieu, even when opposing it, and you don’t need to be a Marxist to acknowledge that.
As Edward Said showed in his examination of ‘Orientalism’, or recent works showcasing the overt or covert politics of such literary figures as William Wordsworth (Jonathan Bate’s "Radical Wordsworth: The Poet Who Changed the World") and Jane Austen, politics can intrude into the poetic realm or comedies of manners — or other forms of fiction, too. And this can span the entire gamut from literary classics to pulp fiction.
The Cold War is a fitting example. As two contrasting systems of social and political organisation vied for global influence, the conflict for influencing hearts and minds underpinned the diplomatic and military manoeuvres.
Duncan White’s "Cold Warriors: Writers Who Waged the Literary Cold War" (2019) offers...
As Edward Said showed in his examination of ‘Orientalism’, or recent works showcasing the overt or covert politics of such literary figures as William Wordsworth (Jonathan Bate’s "Radical Wordsworth: The Poet Who Changed the World") and Jane Austen, politics can intrude into the poetic realm or comedies of manners — or other forms of fiction, too. And this can span the entire gamut from literary classics to pulp fiction.
The Cold War is a fitting example. As two contrasting systems of social and political organisation vied for global influence, the conflict for influencing hearts and minds underpinned the diplomatic and military manoeuvres.
Duncan White’s "Cold Warriors: Writers Who Waged the Literary Cold War" (2019) offers...
- 9/4/2022
- by Glamsham Bureau
- GlamSham
Click here to read the full article.
Meeting the Terminator
It seems implausible now, but there was once a time when a studio could force James Cameron to take a lunch. In 1982, Orion and Hemdale, the studios backing The Terminator, set the young director up on a lunch meeting with a rising European actor whom executives thought might boost their 6 million sci-fi film’s foreign box office potential: Arnold Schwarzenegger. Schwarzenegger’s agents wanted their client, who was transitioning from body building to acting, considered for the role of Kyle Reese, the heroic warrior from the future ultimately played in the movie by Michael Biehn. Cameron thought that was an absurd idea given Schwarzenegger’s size and background. He planned to attend the lunch to appease the studios but intended to pick a fight with Schwarzenegger to make the whole thing go away.
Instead, that lunch became the start of...
Meeting the Terminator
It seems implausible now, but there was once a time when a studio could force James Cameron to take a lunch. In 1982, Orion and Hemdale, the studios backing The Terminator, set the young director up on a lunch meeting with a rising European actor whom executives thought might boost their 6 million sci-fi film’s foreign box office potential: Arnold Schwarzenegger. Schwarzenegger’s agents wanted their client, who was transitioning from body building to acting, considered for the role of Kyle Reese, the heroic warrior from the future ultimately played in the movie by Michael Biehn. Cameron thought that was an absurd idea given Schwarzenegger’s size and background. He planned to attend the lunch to appease the studios but intended to pick a fight with Schwarzenegger to make the whole thing go away.
Instead, that lunch became the start of...
- 8/5/2022
- by THR staff
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Babi Yar. Context The most harrowing detail in Sergei Loznitsa’s Babi Yar. Context is not an image but a sound. Culled entirely from archive footage shot by Nazi and Soviet filmmakers, the film chronicles of one of the darkest chapters in World War II and Jewish history, the massacre of nearly 34,000 Jews in German-occupied Kiev in September 1941. But it opens with a tragedy from three months before, the pogrom that decimated the Jewish community in Lvov—now Lviv—a city in western Ukraine. It’s June 30, 1941; no sooner have the Nazis arrived in town than the local Jews are accused of working for Stalin’s secret police, and forced to exhume the bodies of fellow Ukrainians whom Soviet forces murdered and buried in the city’s prison. The corpses, mostly males, are brought out in the courtyard, and a small army of women (their mothers? Wives? Sisters?) rushes to identify their loved ones.
- 4/1/2022
- MUBI
The news focus on Presidents Day was of Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin, as he ordered troops to enter two separatist regions of Ukraine for “peacekeeping” purposes after he recognized their independence.
Cable news networks carried parts of Putin’s speech, with his move viewed by correspondents and foreign policy analysts as another step toward war.
The White House responded with a vow to begin imposing sanctions, with President Joe Biden poised to issue an executive order to prohibit trade, investment and financing in those areas. The sanctions also will include any person “determined to operate” in those areas.
“To be clear: these measures are separate from and would be in addition to the swift and severe economic measures we have been preparing in coordination with Allies and partners should Russia further invade Ukraine,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement.
A senior administration official said that the U.
Cable news networks carried parts of Putin’s speech, with his move viewed by correspondents and foreign policy analysts as another step toward war.
The White House responded with a vow to begin imposing sanctions, with President Joe Biden poised to issue an executive order to prohibit trade, investment and financing in those areas. The sanctions also will include any person “determined to operate” in those areas.
“To be clear: these measures are separate from and would be in addition to the swift and severe economic measures we have been preparing in coordination with Allies and partners should Russia further invade Ukraine,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement.
A senior administration official said that the U.
- 2/21/2022
- by Ted Johnson
- Deadline Film + TV
For the first time, the Time Person of the Year award is moving to YouTube. The 2021 reveal is set to premiere at 7:30 Am Et on Mon. Dec. 13 on the media outlet’s YouTube channel,
The move to the net is a break with past protocol, which typically saw a broadcast network make the announcement. NBC most recently broke the news on the Today show.
Person of the Year (which was called Man of the Year or Woman of the Year until 1999) is an annual issue that profiles a person, a group, an idea, or an object that, “for better or for worse… has done the most to influence the events of the year”. The selection is made solely by the magazine’s editors.
That has led to some controversial choices in the past, including Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev and the Ayatollah Khomeini. Environmetnal activist Greta Thunberg, pictured above,...
The move to the net is a break with past protocol, which typically saw a broadcast network make the announcement. NBC most recently broke the news on the Today show.
Person of the Year (which was called Man of the Year or Woman of the Year until 1999) is an annual issue that profiles a person, a group, an idea, or an object that, “for better or for worse… has done the most to influence the events of the year”. The selection is made solely by the magazine’s editors.
That has led to some controversial choices in the past, including Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev and the Ayatollah Khomeini. Environmetnal activist Greta Thunberg, pictured above,...
- 12/10/2021
- by Bruce Haring
- Deadline Film + TV
Benedict Cumberbatch in The Courier.
Photo Credit: Liam Daniel. Courtesy of Lionsgate and Roadside Attractions
Benedict Cumberbatch stars in the true-story The Courier, an entertaining Cold War-era spy tale told in a pleasingly classic style. Grounded by sterling performances by Cumberbatch and Merab Ninidze, from TV’s “McMafia,” this is a true story about an ordinary British citizen Greville Wynne (Cumberbatch) recruited by MI6 and the CIA to contact a high-level Soviet military intelligence colonel Oleg Penkovsky (Ninidze), and who ends up at a courier carrying intelligence back to London as the Cold War heats up, intelligence that proves crucial in the Cuban Missile Crisis. The two men form a unexpected friendship, bonding as family men who both want to avoid nuclear war, something the Russian colonel fears Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev is moving towards.
In the long Cold War, the most heated moment was the Cuban Missile Crisis, when...
Photo Credit: Liam Daniel. Courtesy of Lionsgate and Roadside Attractions
Benedict Cumberbatch stars in the true-story The Courier, an entertaining Cold War-era spy tale told in a pleasingly classic style. Grounded by sterling performances by Cumberbatch and Merab Ninidze, from TV’s “McMafia,” this is a true story about an ordinary British citizen Greville Wynne (Cumberbatch) recruited by MI6 and the CIA to contact a high-level Soviet military intelligence colonel Oleg Penkovsky (Ninidze), and who ends up at a courier carrying intelligence back to London as the Cold War heats up, intelligence that proves crucial in the Cuban Missile Crisis. The two men form a unexpected friendship, bonding as family men who both want to avoid nuclear war, something the Russian colonel fears Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev is moving towards.
In the long Cold War, the most heated moment was the Cuban Missile Crisis, when...
- 3/21/2021
- by Cate Marquis
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Andrei Konchalovsky’s historical drama won the special jury prize in Venice.
The UK’s Curzon Artificial Eye and France’s Potemkine Films have acquired Andrei Konchalovsky’s Dear Comrades!, in a series of fresh deals by Films Boutique.
The historical drama, which is Russia’s Oscar submission and earned a special jury prize at Venice, has also been picked up for Canada (Films We Like) and Japan (New Select).
It follows a recent deal with US distributor Neon, which previously handled the release of Bong Joon Ho’s South Korean Oscar-winner Parasite.
Berlin-based international sales outfit Films Boutique previously...
The UK’s Curzon Artificial Eye and France’s Potemkine Films have acquired Andrei Konchalovsky’s Dear Comrades!, in a series of fresh deals by Films Boutique.
The historical drama, which is Russia’s Oscar submission and earned a special jury prize at Venice, has also been picked up for Canada (Films We Like) and Japan (New Select).
It follows a recent deal with US distributor Neon, which previously handled the release of Bong Joon Ho’s South Korean Oscar-winner Parasite.
Berlin-based international sales outfit Films Boutique previously...
- 11/20/2020
- by Geoffrey Macnab
- ScreenDaily
Film won special jury prize in Venice.
Neon has picked up US rights from Films Boutique to Andrei Konchalovsky’s Russian Oscar submission Dear Comrades!
The film premiered at Venice, where it earned a special jury prize, and centres on the Novocherkassk Massacre of June 1962 during Nikita Khrushchev’s rule, when workers were slaughtered for going on strike over rising food prices.
Julia Vysotskaya, Vladislav Komarov, Andrei Gusev, Yulia Burova, and Sergei Erlish star.
Konchalovsky co-wrote the screenplay with Elena Kiseleva, and Alisher Usmanov produced. His previous films include Il Peccato (The Sin). The White Nights Of Postman, and Paradise.
Neon has picked up US rights from Films Boutique to Andrei Konchalovsky’s Russian Oscar submission Dear Comrades!
The film premiered at Venice, where it earned a special jury prize, and centres on the Novocherkassk Massacre of June 1962 during Nikita Khrushchev’s rule, when workers were slaughtered for going on strike over rising food prices.
Julia Vysotskaya, Vladislav Komarov, Andrei Gusev, Yulia Burova, and Sergei Erlish star.
Konchalovsky co-wrote the screenplay with Elena Kiseleva, and Alisher Usmanov produced. His previous films include Il Peccato (The Sin). The White Nights Of Postman, and Paradise.
- 11/13/2020
- by Jeremy Kay
- ScreenDaily
With another day at the (virtual) 56th Chicago International Film Festival comes another batch to sift through. It was a lighter batch too, not just in numbers but also in runtimes. Day three consisted of two short documentaries and another scripted feature, but did the quality make up for quantity? Not quite, but at least they all had their moments.
Making its Midwest premiere at the festival is Gregory Monro’s Kubrick by Kubrick (Grade: C), a 72-minute documentary about Stanley Kubrick’s work. Here, Monro zips us from the filmmaker’s childhood to death, touching on a majority of his offerings in between. Yet it’s not so much Monro doing it: It’s Kubrick himself through interviews and recordings. The idea of making a documentary about the man isn’t inherently flawed, but this one’s approach is, lacking the insight or visuals to make it feel like...
Making its Midwest premiere at the festival is Gregory Monro’s Kubrick by Kubrick (Grade: C), a 72-minute documentary about Stanley Kubrick’s work. Here, Monro zips us from the filmmaker’s childhood to death, touching on a majority of his offerings in between. Yet it’s not so much Monro doing it: It’s Kubrick himself through interviews and recordings. The idea of making a documentary about the man isn’t inherently flawed, but this one’s approach is, lacking the insight or visuals to make it feel like...
- 10/17/2020
- by Matt Cipolla
- The Film Stage
The “How do you do, fellow kids” meme is funny because Steve Buscemi has looked 51 since he was 25 and it’s funny when someone who can play Nikita Khrushchev turns his cap backward and lugs a skateboard over his shoulder. Paul Rudd, on the other hand, looks 25 at the age of 51, so when he dresses like a stereotypical…...
- 9/14/2020
- by Randall Colburn on News, shared by Randall Colburn to The A.V. Club
- avclub.com
When humans first landed on the moon in July 1969, among the tens of millions of people watching was a rapt 10-year-old in England, future filmmaker Robert Stone.
“It was like four o’clock in the morning,” Stone recalls. “My mother woke me up, sat me down in front of the TV, and we watched…It was kind of in the sweet spot of life where it left really an indelible impression upon me.”
Five decades later Stone immersed himself anew in NASA’s historic lunar mission to write and direct the documentary Chasing the Moon for the PBS series American Experience. The six-hour film, told in three parts, is nominated in the prestigious Emmy category of Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking.
“I was really looking to try to make a film that would capture my memory of what it was like growing up as a child in this time where...
“It was like four o’clock in the morning,” Stone recalls. “My mother woke me up, sat me down in front of the TV, and we watched…It was kind of in the sweet spot of life where it left really an indelible impression upon me.”
Five decades later Stone immersed himself anew in NASA’s historic lunar mission to write and direct the documentary Chasing the Moon for the PBS series American Experience. The six-hour film, told in three parts, is nominated in the prestigious Emmy category of Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking.
“I was really looking to try to make a film that would capture my memory of what it was like growing up as a child in this time where...
- 8/13/2020
- by Matthew Carey
- Deadline Film + TV
Early on in Ironbark, directed by Dominic Cooke, British salesman Greville Wynne (Benedict Cumberbatch) realizes he’s sitting at a table with both a MI6 officer (Angus Wright) and a CIA officer (Rachel Brosnahan). Excited, he admits: “I can’t believe I’m having lunch with spies!” It’s a moment of brevity that speaks to the interesting tonal dance the filmmakers are trying at.
In 1960, Russian colonel Oleg Penkovsky (codename “Ironbark”) sent a message to the West: he wanted to avert catastrophe under the impulsive rule of Nikita Khrushchev. To help recruit their source, Western intelligence enlisted Wynne to begin a business relationship with Penkovsky in order to smuggle confidential documents out of the Soviet Union. The two men become fast friends, complicating a dangerous situation that will ultimately converge at the Cuban Missile Crisis.
From the start, Cooke directs this film at a fast clip. Montages abound with...
In 1960, Russian colonel Oleg Penkovsky (codename “Ironbark”) sent a message to the West: he wanted to avert catastrophe under the impulsive rule of Nikita Khrushchev. To help recruit their source, Western intelligence enlisted Wynne to begin a business relationship with Penkovsky in order to smuggle confidential documents out of the Soviet Union. The two men become fast friends, complicating a dangerous situation that will ultimately converge at the Cuban Missile Crisis.
From the start, Cooke directs this film at a fast clip. Montages abound with...
- 1/26/2020
- by Dan Mecca
- The Film Stage
Introducing “Ironbark” on Friday night at Sundance 2020, festival President John Cooper said the Cold War drama starring Benedict Cumberbatch was a “unique” choice for the annual event, which has only rarely featured period dramas.
Based on a true story most people have never heard of, the film from director Dominic Cooke tells the story of Greville Wynne (Cumberbatch), a British businessman recruited to travel to Moscow and acquire information about the Soviet Union’s missile plans from a Russian source, Oleg Penkovsky (Merab Ninidze). As tensions escalate into the Cuban Missile Crisis, they smuggle documents back to the west, with severe consequences for both men.
Cumberbatch is currently shooting Jane Campion’s “The Power of the Dog” in New Zealand and wasn’t able to attend the screening, but he did send a video message to audience members expressing his regret for not being there. Even so, excitement was high...
Based on a true story most people have never heard of, the film from director Dominic Cooke tells the story of Greville Wynne (Cumberbatch), a British businessman recruited to travel to Moscow and acquire information about the Soviet Union’s missile plans from a Russian source, Oleg Penkovsky (Merab Ninidze). As tensions escalate into the Cuban Missile Crisis, they smuggle documents back to the west, with severe consequences for both men.
Cumberbatch is currently shooting Jane Campion’s “The Power of the Dog” in New Zealand and wasn’t able to attend the screening, but he did send a video message to audience members expressing his regret for not being there. Even so, excitement was high...
- 1/25/2020
- by Beatrice Verhoeven
- The Wrap
Sergei Loznitsa’s multi-faceted filmmaking approach, these days focused on documentary, blend archival material and sometimes re-enactments with actors, resulting in unique insights and subtle visual commentary on the Soviet and ex-Soviet sphere. His latest nonfiction film, “State Funeral,” constructed from once-banned footage of the epic events surrounding Joseph Stalin’s death and funeral in 1953, is screening at Marrakech Film Festival following its debut in Venice.
In researching the project, the Ukrainian filmmaker and former mathematician employed his trademark precision and methodology in mining through 35 hours of material at the Russian State Documentary Film and Photo Archive in Krasnogorsk.
“I constructed the film based on the actual order of the events during the period from March 6 till March 9,” says Loznitsa. “We begin with the scene when the coffin with Stalin’s body is placed in the Pillar Hall of the House of the Unions and end with the moment when...
In researching the project, the Ukrainian filmmaker and former mathematician employed his trademark precision and methodology in mining through 35 hours of material at the Russian State Documentary Film and Photo Archive in Krasnogorsk.
“I constructed the film based on the actual order of the events during the period from March 6 till March 9,” says Loznitsa. “We begin with the scene when the coffin with Stalin’s body is placed in the Pillar Hall of the House of the Unions and end with the moment when...
- 12/1/2019
- by Will Tizard
- Variety Film + TV
Music videos have long been a proving ground for some of the most innovative filmmaking ideas. Sometimes those breakthroughs come as stylistic flourishes. Other times, it means breaking down a simple story to its purest form.
If the 2000s were the decade when music videos embraced the internet, the 2010s were left to reckon with what the internet became. Over 10 years when viral moments were valuable cultural currency, some videos seemed perfectly tailor-made to create them. Whether manufactured to become a sensation or becoming so by pure chance, music videos embraced the weird spirit and sobering reality of the overall trajectory of the decade.
So, acknowledging that winnowing down all that time and creativity to 25 picks is going to inevitably leave out some worthy contributions, here’s our attempt at highlighting the best of what the art form had to offer:
25. Rob Cantor — “Shia Labeouf (Live)” (dir. Scott Uhlfelder)
The 2010s were absurd,...
If the 2000s were the decade when music videos embraced the internet, the 2010s were left to reckon with what the internet became. Over 10 years when viral moments were valuable cultural currency, some videos seemed perfectly tailor-made to create them. Whether manufactured to become a sensation or becoming so by pure chance, music videos embraced the weird spirit and sobering reality of the overall trajectory of the decade.
So, acknowledging that winnowing down all that time and creativity to 25 picks is going to inevitably leave out some worthy contributions, here’s our attempt at highlighting the best of what the art form had to offer:
25. Rob Cantor — “Shia Labeouf (Live)” (dir. Scott Uhlfelder)
The 2010s were absurd,...
- 11/27/2019
- by Leo Garcia and Steve Greene
- Indiewire
Hollywood loves a good baddie, and for the last 50 or so years, a large proportion of those villains have been Russian. Take Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren), who killed Apollo Creed in the ring in “Rocky IV,” or Ivan Korshunov (Gary Oldman), who hijacked the President’s plane in “Air Force One,” or more recently the Terminator-like Grigori (Andrey Ivchenko), battling Jim Hopper in the latest season of “Stranger Things.”
Between the Cold War’s impact on the American consciousness and more recent allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election and President Trump’s entanglement with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Hollywood has utilized Russians and people from the former Soviet Union as the bad guys for decades. However, two of this year’s TV shows are trying to re-frame the narrative a little: HBO’s “Catherine the Great” and “Chernobyl.”
In “Catherine the Great,” which premieres Oct. 21, Helen Mirren...
Between the Cold War’s impact on the American consciousness and more recent allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election and President Trump’s entanglement with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Hollywood has utilized Russians and people from the former Soviet Union as the bad guys for decades. However, two of this year’s TV shows are trying to re-frame the narrative a little: HBO’s “Catherine the Great” and “Chernobyl.”
In “Catherine the Great,” which premieres Oct. 21, Helen Mirren...
- 10/21/2019
- by Will Thorne
- Variety Film + TV
The death of Joseph Stalin on March 5, 1953 sent political reverberations around the world, marking a significant power shift that would inevitably alter the geopolitical landscape altogether; Stalin, widely controversial but influential nonetheless, had been involved in Soviet politics for nearly three decades–serving as de facto dictator for two–and his passing would inevitably usher in a new era of international policy. Before the torch could be passed and a new form of Soviet politics could become inaugurated however, there would need to be a long funeral service worthy of Stalin’s grandiosity. Prolific Ukranian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa, continuing the found footage documentary style of latest efforts Maidan, The Trial, and The Event, composes a chronology of the four days of mourning that followed Stalin’s death. Composed of rarely seem archival footage–shot for Soviet film effort The Great Farewell, that would be banned before release by members of...
- 10/15/2019
- by Jason Ooi
- The Film Stage
Exclusive: With AMC’s Preacher coming to a close this summer, Dominic Cooper is set to star in the six-part espionage Cold War series Spy City from Miramax and Germany’s H&v Entertainment and Zdf.
Novelist and screenwriter William Boyd is currently writing Spy City. German-Portuguese filmmaker Miguel Alexandre will direct, and Johanna Wokalek and Leonie Benesch (The Crown, Babylon Berlin) also star.
Cooper will play an English spy who is sent to Berlin in 1961 to sift out a traitor in the UK Embassy or among the Allies, shortly before the construction of the Berlin Wall. The city, declared by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev as “the most dangerous place on earth,” is teeming with spies and double agents. One wrong move could trigger the looming threat of nuclear war as American,...
Novelist and screenwriter William Boyd is currently writing Spy City. German-Portuguese filmmaker Miguel Alexandre will direct, and Johanna Wokalek and Leonie Benesch (The Crown, Babylon Berlin) also star.
Cooper will play an English spy who is sent to Berlin in 1961 to sift out a traitor in the UK Embassy or among the Allies, shortly before the construction of the Berlin Wall. The city, declared by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev as “the most dangerous place on earth,” is teeming with spies and double agents. One wrong move could trigger the looming threat of nuclear war as American,...
- 7/11/2019
- by Anthony D'Alessandro
- Deadline Film + TV
A version of this story about Armando Iannucci and “The Death of Stalin” first appeared in the Actors/Directors/Screenwriters issue of TheWrap’s Oscar magazine.
Long before Donald Trump became president, Italian-born “Veep” creator Armando Iannucci kept an eye on the news from Italy under the leadership of far-right Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and wanted to do a film about authoritarianism. “These are leaders who claim they are for democracy and rise to power through democracy, but use their power to shut down democracy,” Iannucci said in an interview with TheWrap.
“I saw something troubling rising in politics even before Trump, and I wanted to make a film reminding people that just because you have democracy now doesn’t mean you can’t lose it.”
Also Read: 'The Death of Stalin' Review: Is This 1950s Russia, or Today's Washington?
The result was one of the most darkly...
Long before Donald Trump became president, Italian-born “Veep” creator Armando Iannucci kept an eye on the news from Italy under the leadership of far-right Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and wanted to do a film about authoritarianism. “These are leaders who claim they are for democracy and rise to power through democracy, but use their power to shut down democracy,” Iannucci said in an interview with TheWrap.
“I saw something troubling rising in politics even before Trump, and I wanted to make a film reminding people that just because you have democracy now doesn’t mean you can’t lose it.”
Also Read: 'The Death of Stalin' Review: Is This 1950s Russia, or Today's Washington?
The result was one of the most darkly...
- 12/20/2018
- by Jeremy Fuster
- The Wrap
With Mikhail Gorbachev — the eighth and final President of the Soviet Union — Werner Herzog has finally met his match. In the opening seconds of the legendary filmmaker’s latest documentary, Herzog sits across from the retired world leader responsible for hits like glasnost and perestroika, and attempts to hijack the man’s life story for his own ecstatic purposes.
“Meeting Gorbachev, for a German, is burdened by history” he narrates in his signature drone of despair, alluding to the violence of World War II and already trying to reframe the facts in order to heighten the emotional truths behind them. “The first German you met wanted to kill you,” Herzog declares to his star, hoping to gaslight Mikhail Gorbachev into believing that his life has always been a Herzog movie waiting to happen. It’s the same technique the filmmaker used to portray Dieter Dengler, the Woodcarver Steiner, and Timothy Treadwell,...
“Meeting Gorbachev, for a German, is burdened by history” he narrates in his signature drone of despair, alluding to the violence of World War II and already trying to reframe the facts in order to heighten the emotional truths behind them. “The first German you met wanted to kill you,” Herzog declares to his star, hoping to gaslight Mikhail Gorbachev into believing that his life has always been a Herzog movie waiting to happen. It’s the same technique the filmmaker used to portray Dieter Dengler, the Woodcarver Steiner, and Timothy Treadwell,...
- 9/3/2018
- by David Ehrlich
- Indiewire
The set of “Fox & Friends” added their voice to the chorus of criticism which rained down on President Donald Trump after his joint press conference with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki on Monday, telling Trump that he “fell short” of what was required of him and urged him to rectify the situation.
“Thanks to Robert Mueller’s probe we know the names of the 12 people at least on the Russian side, who were part of the hacking into the election,” said co-host Brian Kilmeade. “When President Trump was asked about that, he fell short.”
Kilmeade, who has increasingly emerged as Trump’s toughest critic on the show, then berated the president directly, who is known to be a regular and close watcher of the show.
Also Read: Fox News' John Roberts Defends CNN and NBC News From Trump's 'Unfair' Attacks
“I have news for you, Sen. Schumer and...
“Thanks to Robert Mueller’s probe we know the names of the 12 people at least on the Russian side, who were part of the hacking into the election,” said co-host Brian Kilmeade. “When President Trump was asked about that, he fell short.”
Kilmeade, who has increasingly emerged as Trump’s toughest critic on the show, then berated the president directly, who is known to be a regular and close watcher of the show.
Also Read: Fox News' John Roberts Defends CNN and NBC News From Trump's 'Unfair' Attacks
“I have news for you, Sen. Schumer and...
- 7/17/2018
- by Jon Levine
- The Wrap
Armando Iannucci believes in Nikita Khrushchev. It’s a strange notion to consider at first. For the better part of a decade, the Scottish television and filmmaker has told the stories of a political class both pathologically vain and terminally inept. There’s much to laugh at in the likes of The Thick of It (2005–2012) and Veep (2012–), where politicians much like our own so routinely surrender their convictions to maintain power, and just as routinely end up giving both away, but there’s little to admire. To be a politician, in Iannucci’s world, is to be a coward. All the more conspicuous, then, that for his second feature, The Death of Stalin, Iannucci chose Khrushchev—the figure perhaps most synonymous with churning, mid-century Soviet bureaucracy—as his first bona fide hero.“Hero” is the only word for the role played so expansively by Steve Buscemi. One of the great tragicomic actors working today,...
- 5/4/2018
- MUBI
(left to right) Dermot Crowley as Kaganovich, Paul Whitehouse as Mikoyan, Steve Buscemi as Krushchev, Jeffrey Tambor as Malenkov, and Paul Chahidi as Bulganin. Photo by Nicola Dove. Courtesy of IFC Films. An IFC Films release.
Tragedy plus time equals comedy, the old saying goes. The Death Of Stalin, oddly, is a comedy, a mix of political satire and farce built around the days before and after the death of Josef Stalin. Anything about Stalin, the Soviet Union’s brutal longtime strongman ruler, hardly seems like fodder for comedy yet director Armando Iannucci manages to replace Karl Marx with the Marx Brothers in The Death Of Stalin. Iannucci is no stranger to political satire, having helmed television’s Veep, and assembles a splendid cast of mostly British and American actors, many skilled in comedy, for this often hilarious English-language dark comedy.
That strong cast includes Steve Buscemi, Jeffery Tambor, Michael Palin,...
Tragedy plus time equals comedy, the old saying goes. The Death Of Stalin, oddly, is a comedy, a mix of political satire and farce built around the days before and after the death of Josef Stalin. Anything about Stalin, the Soviet Union’s brutal longtime strongman ruler, hardly seems like fodder for comedy yet director Armando Iannucci manages to replace Karl Marx with the Marx Brothers in The Death Of Stalin. Iannucci is no stranger to political satire, having helmed television’s Veep, and assembles a splendid cast of mostly British and American actors, many skilled in comedy, for this often hilarious English-language dark comedy.
That strong cast includes Steve Buscemi, Jeffery Tambor, Michael Palin,...
- 3/23/2018
- by Cate Marquis
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Chicago – If you want a film to take your mind off the current American power structure, that at the same time provides some truth to the situation, you won’t do better than “The Death of Stalin.” A monster comedic cast – including Steve Buscemi and Jeffrey Tambor – is assembled for this hilarious farce.
Rating: 4.5/5.0
The setting is the Soviet Union in 1953. Josef Stalin, the Premier of the State, continues his iron-fisted rule of the region. When he drops dead, the “Central Committee” of the Communist Party must deal with the transition, which includes a funeral, relatives and their own lust for power. The film is done in the King’s English, with Buscemi and Tambor adding some American flavor, and no attempt is made to have Russian accents. It escalates into a swear-word-filled chaos, an obvious satire and symbol of modern authoritarianism. Using this horrible monster’s death (he executed 600,000 of his own people,...
Rating: 4.5/5.0
The setting is the Soviet Union in 1953. Josef Stalin, the Premier of the State, continues his iron-fisted rule of the region. When he drops dead, the “Central Committee” of the Communist Party must deal with the transition, which includes a funeral, relatives and their own lust for power. The film is done in the King’s English, with Buscemi and Tambor adding some American flavor, and no attempt is made to have Russian accents. It escalates into a swear-word-filled chaos, an obvious satire and symbol of modern authoritarianism. Using this horrible monster’s death (he executed 600,000 of his own people,...
- 3/22/2018
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
Guest reviewer Lee Broughton assesses the Armenian director Sergei Parajanov’s poetic and metaphor-filled biopic about his countryman Sayat Nova, the Armenian poet-troubadour. This new disc edition offers both versions of the picture, Parajanov’s original and the Soviet-approved version cut by seven minutes. As we learn, if a Soviet film director found favor internationally, they often landed in trouble back home.
The Colour of Pomegranates
Region B Blu-ray
Second Sight (UK)
1969 / Color / 1.33 flat full frame / 79 min. / Sayat Nova, Nran Guyne / Street Date, 19 Feb 2018 / £29.99
Starring: Sofiko Chiaureli, Melkon Alekyan, Vilen Galstyan, Gogi Gegechkori, Spartak Bagashvili, Medea Japaridze, Hovhannes Minasyan.
Cinematography: Suren Shakhbazyan
Film Editor: Marfa Ponomarenko
Production Designer: Stepan Andranikyan
Original Music: Tigran Mansuryan
Written and Directed by Sergei Parajanov
Reviewed by Lee Broughton
Sergei Parajanov’s The Colour of Pomegranates is a film with a troubled release history. The Russian censor ruled that Parajanov’s initial cut of the...
The Colour of Pomegranates
Region B Blu-ray
Second Sight (UK)
1969 / Color / 1.33 flat full frame / 79 min. / Sayat Nova, Nran Guyne / Street Date, 19 Feb 2018 / £29.99
Starring: Sofiko Chiaureli, Melkon Alekyan, Vilen Galstyan, Gogi Gegechkori, Spartak Bagashvili, Medea Japaridze, Hovhannes Minasyan.
Cinematography: Suren Shakhbazyan
Film Editor: Marfa Ponomarenko
Production Designer: Stepan Andranikyan
Original Music: Tigran Mansuryan
Written and Directed by Sergei Parajanov
Reviewed by Lee Broughton
Sergei Parajanov’s The Colour of Pomegranates is a film with a troubled release history. The Russian censor ruled that Parajanov’s initial cut of the...
- 3/20/2018
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
New blood! “The Death of Stalin” came along just in time to replace the aging awards titles that dominated the specialized world since October. In its initial two-city platform, audiences embraced the unlikely comedy involving a group of famous Soviet figures who plan to kill the Communist despot. Maybe the Oscar hangover won’t be so bad this year.
Two other wider releases — “The Leisure Seeker” and “Thoroughbreds” — had larger grosses, but far lower per-theater averages. Neither suggest much traction.
Opening
The Death of Stalin (IFC) – Metacritic: 88; Festivals include: Toronto 2017, Sundance 2018
$181,308 in 4 theaters; PTA (per theater average): $45,307
Armando Iannucci’s early-1950s, Moscow-set comedy that surrounding plotting and maneuvers at the dictator’s demise is the first 2018 platform release to suggest crossover appeal. The $45,000 PTA in four New York/Los Angeles theaters is impressive; it’s just behind “The Grand Budapest Hotel” and “While We’re Young,” both in...
Two other wider releases — “The Leisure Seeker” and “Thoroughbreds” — had larger grosses, but far lower per-theater averages. Neither suggest much traction.
Opening
The Death of Stalin (IFC) – Metacritic: 88; Festivals include: Toronto 2017, Sundance 2018
$181,308 in 4 theaters; PTA (per theater average): $45,307
Armando Iannucci’s early-1950s, Moscow-set comedy that surrounding plotting and maneuvers at the dictator’s demise is the first 2018 platform release to suggest crossover appeal. The $45,000 PTA in four New York/Los Angeles theaters is impressive; it’s just behind “The Grand Budapest Hotel” and “While We’re Young,” both in...
- 3/11/2018
- by Tom Brueggemann
- Indiewire
The Death of Stalin opens in Radio Moscow in 1953, where an orchestra is wrapping up the third movement of a Mozart piano concerto. The phone rings. It's Joseph Stalin, personally requesting a copy of the performance. Panic grips the studio. They have no recording – which means they have to re-stage the whole event exactly as it happened. It gets worse: The studio audience is filing out, the conductor has knocked himself unconscious and one of the musicians, Maria Yudina, so detests the dictator that she's refusing to play for him.
- 3/10/2018
- Rollingstone.com
Who'd have thought the demise of a kill-happy Russian dictator could leave you laughing helplessly? That's The Death of Stalin for you, a slapstick tragedy – and for the funniest, fiercest comedy of the year so far – from the fertile mind of Armando Iannucci, the British political satirist behind the HBO's Veep and the sensational, Strangelovian In the Loop (2009). First, imagine a government run by lunatics (In the age of Trump and Kim Jong-un, that's not so hard.) Then rewind to the Moscow of 1953, when Joseph Stalin (Adrian McLoughlin) holds...
- 3/7/2018
- Rollingstone.com
This week the folks at the Northwest Film Center have announced the first wave of films from the upcoming Portland International Film Festival (February 15th – March 1st), along with the opening night film, and it is a Criterion geek’s dream line-up. New films from Claire Denis, Lucrecia Martel, Abbas Kiarostami, Andrew Haigh, and Hirokazu Kore-eda! As we’ve done in the past, we’ll be sure to highlight as many of the films that our readers and listeners here in Portland should be checking out, and reviewing what we can.
The full schedule is set to be announced on January 29th.
Piff 41 Opening Night selection The Death of Stalin
Dir. Armando Iannucci
United Kingdom, 2017
The one-liners fly as fast as political fortunes fall in this uproarious, wickedly irreverent satire from Armando Iannucci. Moscow, 1953: when tyrannical dictator Joseph Stalin drops dead, his parasitic cronies square off in a frantic...
The full schedule is set to be announced on January 29th.
Piff 41 Opening Night selection The Death of Stalin
Dir. Armando Iannucci
United Kingdom, 2017
The one-liners fly as fast as political fortunes fall in this uproarious, wickedly irreverent satire from Armando Iannucci. Moscow, 1953: when tyrannical dictator Joseph Stalin drops dead, his parasitic cronies square off in a frantic...
- 1/11/2018
- by Ryan Gallagher
- CriterionCast
What begins as a fascinating look at the collectivization of formerly privately owned cattle in a small mountain village in Kazakhstan ends as an epic journey of a boy into manhood and even old age before he finds his way back to his mother.
The Road to Mother is set during one of the most tragic periods in the history of the former Ussr Republic of Kazakhstan. Director Akan Satayev tells a story of the power of a mother’s love which endures challenges of the turbulent times. The storyline covers a timespan from the 1930s to the present day with key elements of collectivization, war and postwar years for the Kazakh people.
The director was inspired by what his parents told him when he was a child.
According to Kazakhstan’s tradition, all legends are passed from the older generation to younger generation orally. It is the story of a lonely mother,...
The Road to Mother is set during one of the most tragic periods in the history of the former Ussr Republic of Kazakhstan. Director Akan Satayev tells a story of the power of a mother’s love which endures challenges of the turbulent times. The storyline covers a timespan from the 1930s to the present day with key elements of collectivization, war and postwar years for the Kazakh people.
The director was inspired by what his parents told him when he was a child.
According to Kazakhstan’s tradition, all legends are passed from the older generation to younger generation orally. It is the story of a lonely mother,...
- 11/10/2017
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Anybody who discusses satire in audio-visual media at some point must mention the work of Armando Iannucci. Creator of TV’s The Thick Of It and Veep, with credits that include The Day Today and Alan Partridge, his work is some of the finest in Comedy. And in 2009, Iannucci made his big screen full feature directorial debut with The Thick Of It spin-off In The Loop (one of the best comedies of our times) and now, Iannucci casts his eye to even darker – and even more volatile – political territory with The Death of Stalin.
As concepts go, this film has a pitch black core, as it not only delves into a figure whose actions have reverberated throughout socio-political history but in looking at the events surrounding his death in 1953 and the power struggles within the Soviet Union, it is a brazen era, to say the least, in which to set a Comedy.
As concepts go, this film has a pitch black core, as it not only delves into a figure whose actions have reverberated throughout socio-political history but in looking at the events surrounding his death in 1953 and the power struggles within the Soviet Union, it is a brazen era, to say the least, in which to set a Comedy.
- 11/4/2017
- by Jack Bottomley
- The Cultural Post
MaryAnn’s quick take… Audacious, outrageous, bleakly funny. Not since Charlie Chaplin sent up Hitler and invited us to laugh at terrible reality has there been a movie like this. I’m “biast” (pro): love Armando Iannucci’s work
I’m “biast” (con): nothing
I have not read the source material
(what is this about? see my critic’s minifesto)
Presenting… Monty Python’s production of George Orwell’s 1984. Or damn close to it. So The Death of Stalin is akin to Terry Gilliam’s Brazil, then? Well, sort of. (I definitely scribbled “Brazil” in my notes while watching.) But Brazil was fiction; clearly inspired by actual totalitarian regimes, but entirely fictional. Stalin, however, is based on terrible reality. Perhaps not since Charlie Chaplin’s 1940 satire The Great Dictator has a filmmaker taken on such awful personalities and events and attempted to make us laugh about it all.
I’m “biast” (con): nothing
I have not read the source material
(what is this about? see my critic’s minifesto)
Presenting… Monty Python’s production of George Orwell’s 1984. Or damn close to it. So The Death of Stalin is akin to Terry Gilliam’s Brazil, then? Well, sort of. (I definitely scribbled “Brazil” in my notes while watching.) But Brazil was fiction; clearly inspired by actual totalitarian regimes, but entirely fictional. Stalin, however, is based on terrible reality. Perhaps not since Charlie Chaplin’s 1940 satire The Great Dictator has a filmmaker taken on such awful personalities and events and attempted to make us laugh about it all.
- 10/25/2017
- by MaryAnn Johanson
- www.flickfilosopher.com
Armando Iannucci doesn’t make movies and TV about politics. He certainly features politicians and their endless petty squabbling and power struggles, but that’s adjacent to (though obviously entangled with) the real work of political organizing. Most notably, essentially all of the characters in the likes of The Thick of It, Veep, In the Loop, and now The Death of Stalin are politicians, but I honestly couldn’t tell you a single actual political belief any of them are stated to truly hold. That, of course, is a key part of Iannucci’s satire – that these conflicts are over power for its own sake and not for the betterment of anyone’s welfare, that this world is one of pure venality. Death of Stalin ramps this up to its purest form, depicting a sphere of government within which the will of the people is dismissed as irrelevant, and the...
- 9/16/2017
- by Daniel Schindel
- The Film Stage
Strangely Ordinary This DevotionHello Danny and Fern, I'll start with personal news: the bad news is that I've had to significantly cut down my over-ambitious pre-tiff schedule to recuperate from several days worth of sensory overload. The good news is that my ankle is healing! Here is some bad Tiff news: for all I said in my last correspondence about contradictions, I wanted to add a belated disclaimer. Sometimes plot (and more importantly, thought) holes are nothing more than just that. Though it starts with a bang, former Veep show-runner Armando Iannucci's The Death of Stalin trips over its own footing with a flimsy jab at the legacy of its own subject, smugly presented as an original hot take. In Iannucci's Communist Russia, the Soviet Union's top players are man-children with no backbone. Together, these bumbling idiots (played by a cast of stuttering, screaming Americans and Brits) mourn their...
- 9/14/2017
- MUBI
Armando Iannucci is one the world’s greatest living satirists. His hilarious depictions of governmental dysfunction give a cartoonish gloss to the hectic nature of real-life leadership. The British satirist’s two rambunctious TV shows — BBC’s “The Thick of It” and HBO’s “Veep” — along with his Oscar-nominated “In the Loop,” show a consistent knack for exposing deranged bureaucracies and the power-hungry, backstabbing lunatics who think they own the place.
In Iannucci’s tilted world of feuding diplomats and narcissistic leaders, scathing one-liners meet the bitter pill of lost causes. He anticipated the modern era of political corruption and remains its greatest truth-teller, so it was only a matter of time before he applied that same uncompromising humor towards earlier periods hobbled by the same authoritarian problems.
Enter “The Death of Stalin.” Iannucci’s first adapted work culls from French writers Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin’s graphic novel (Nury has a screenwriting credit,...
In Iannucci’s tilted world of feuding diplomats and narcissistic leaders, scathing one-liners meet the bitter pill of lost causes. He anticipated the modern era of political corruption and remains its greatest truth-teller, so it was only a matter of time before he applied that same uncompromising humor towards earlier periods hobbled by the same authoritarian problems.
Enter “The Death of Stalin.” Iannucci’s first adapted work culls from French writers Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin’s graphic novel (Nury has a screenwriting credit,...
- 9/8/2017
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
They were America’s closest thing to royalty — and in 1961, President John F. Kennedy and First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy traveled across the pond for an extraordinary meeting with the world’s ultimate royals: Queen Elizabeth and her husband, Prince Philip.
The Buckingham Palace visit is the subject of an upcoming season 2 episode of the Golden Globe-winning drama The Crown, which returns to Netflix December 8. The episode will feature guest stars Michael C. Hall as JFK and Jodi Balfour as Jackie, alongside Claire Foy‘s Elizabeth and Matt Smith’s Philip.
For the glamorous real-life meeting, Jackie looked every inch the...
The Buckingham Palace visit is the subject of an upcoming season 2 episode of the Golden Globe-winning drama The Crown, which returns to Netflix December 8. The episode will feature guest stars Michael C. Hall as JFK and Jodi Balfour as Jackie, alongside Claire Foy‘s Elizabeth and Matt Smith’s Philip.
For the glamorous real-life meeting, Jackie looked every inch the...
- 8/11/2017
- by Tierney McAfee
- PEOPLE.com
Iannucci’s film features a host of acting talent as the Russian dictator’s underlings, including Steve Buscemi, Jason Isaacs and Michael Palin
Attention comrades! The first trailer for Armando Iannucci’s Soviet satire The Death of Stalin has been unveiled.
Adapted by Iannucci, Ian Martin and David Schneider from Fabien Nury’s graphic novel of the same name, the film depicts the frenzied political manoeuvrings that transpired in the aftermath of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin’s death in 1953. The film stars a host of prominent British and American actors as Stalin’s underlings, including Steve Buscemi as Nikita Khrushchev, Jeffrey Tambor as Stalin’s heir apparent Georgy Malenkov, Michael Palin as Vyacheslav Molotov, Jason Isaacs as Georgy Zhukov, Simon Russell Beale as Lavrentiy Beria and Homeland star Rupert Friend as Stalin’s son Vasily.
Continue reading...
Attention comrades! The first trailer for Armando Iannucci’s Soviet satire The Death of Stalin has been unveiled.
Adapted by Iannucci, Ian Martin and David Schneider from Fabien Nury’s graphic novel of the same name, the film depicts the frenzied political manoeuvrings that transpired in the aftermath of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin’s death in 1953. The film stars a host of prominent British and American actors as Stalin’s underlings, including Steve Buscemi as Nikita Khrushchev, Jeffrey Tambor as Stalin’s heir apparent Georgy Malenkov, Michael Palin as Vyacheslav Molotov, Jason Isaacs as Georgy Zhukov, Simon Russell Beale as Lavrentiy Beria and Homeland star Rupert Friend as Stalin’s son Vasily.
Continue reading...
- 8/11/2017
- by Guardian film
- The Guardian - Film News
Last Week’S Tweets: Is The World Going to Hell Because ‘Hannibal’ Got Canceled?
One fascinating aspect of today’s media landscape is that many creators and executive producers enjoy using Twitter to engage with their audiences, share behind-the-scenes information about their shows, chat about politics, and otherwise communicate about what matters to them. So, each week, we’ll compile some of our favorite exchanges representing the wide variety of discourse seen on social media.
This week, we get unique insight into the relationships between two showrunners and their mothers, Loren Bouchard shares an unreleased “Bob’s Burgers” song, and more.
Oh My God, Read All the Replies on These Tweets
If you do, you will get just a taste of how insane the parties at “Saturday Night Live” can apparently be.
@shoemakermike @MrHoratioSanz @DavidHMandel @sethmeyers @LateNightSeth Is that from the infamous 17th floor party? And if yes, when will...
One fascinating aspect of today’s media landscape is that many creators and executive producers enjoy using Twitter to engage with their audiences, share behind-the-scenes information about their shows, chat about politics, and otherwise communicate about what matters to them. So, each week, we’ll compile some of our favorite exchanges representing the wide variety of discourse seen on social media.
This week, we get unique insight into the relationships between two showrunners and their mothers, Loren Bouchard shares an unreleased “Bob’s Burgers” song, and more.
Oh My God, Read All the Replies on These Tweets
If you do, you will get just a taste of how insane the parties at “Saturday Night Live” can apparently be.
@shoemakermike @MrHoratioSanz @DavidHMandel @sethmeyers @LateNightSeth Is that from the infamous 17th floor party? And if yes, when will...
- 5/20/2017
- by Liz Shannon Miller
- Indiewire
The Trump administration isn’t the first to have unsanctioned dealings with Russia.
Amid reports that President Donald Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador to the White House – which he seemingly confirmed on Tuesday – the John F. Kennedy Library revealed that the former president once had to reprimand his own mother for tangling with the country’s leader.
According to the library, Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy was collecting signatures from dignitaries and world leaders – like President Dwight D. Eisenhower – in 1962 when she reached out to then Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev for an autographed photo.
After Khrushchev obliged her request,...
Amid reports that President Donald Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador to the White House – which he seemingly confirmed on Tuesday – the John F. Kennedy Library revealed that the former president once had to reprimand his own mother for tangling with the country’s leader.
According to the library, Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy was collecting signatures from dignitaries and world leaders – like President Dwight D. Eisenhower – in 1962 when she reached out to then Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev for an autographed photo.
After Khrushchev obliged her request,...
- 5/16/2017
- by Lindsay Kimble
- PEOPLE.com
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.