Thursday, June 19, 2008
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Florent: the Final Days
By FRANK BRUNI
Florent has served bistro fare at all hours in the meatpacking district since 1985. (Photo: Lars Klove for The New York Times)
It’s been widely noted, and widely lamented, that the restaurant Florent’s days are numbered. But just how will it go out?
In a telephone conversation last night, Florent Morellet, the restaurant’s owner, filled in some of the details.
Beginning on Monday, May 26, and continuing over the five weeks until the restaurant’s last day in business — which he said would be June 29, chosen because it’s the Sunday of Gay Pride — it will have a changing series of five themes, reflecting the Kubler-Ross stages of grief.
Week One, he said, would be Denial. Week Two: Anger. Week Three: Bargaining. Week Four: Depression. Week Five: Acceptance.
“I decided to close with a bang,” said Mr. Morellet, who opened Florent in 1985.
He said that he himself is already at the Acceptance stage. But, he added, “So many of our customers are either at the stage of Anger or Denial. Some are just in a state of shock. We’re going to gather together to go through those stages and celebrate those stages, and end with a bang, and with irony, which we’ve always done.”
Rising rents, of course, are compelling Mr. Morellet to close Florent’s doors — and at present, he said, he has no plans to recreate it in another part of the city, the way the caretakers of the Second Avenue Deli did with that beloved establishment.
His long lease on the space on Gansevoort Street that Florent inhabits expired Monday, he said. He said that his landlord wasn’t willing to accept the $6,000 a month he was paying, which was well under market rates at this point, or even an increase of triple that amount that Mr. Morellet said he proposed. The Meatpacking District isn’t what it used to be, and the property there has a value much, much higher than in years past.
But though his lease has expired, Mr. Morellet said he wanted to keep the restaurant open another three months so it was still there for one more Gay Pride day. He said that he and his landlord hadn’t yet settled on the monthly rent he’ll need to pay for April, May and June.
For a while Mr. Morellet vacillated between closing on Gay Pride and closing on Bastille Day, which is later, in mid-July.
Why Gay Pride?
“I didn’t feel like being Marie Antoinette one more time,” he said, referring to his habit of dressing as her every year for Bastille Day. “I’ve been Marie Antoinette since 1989. And I wasn’t sure about an aging Marie Antoinette, because she was chopped at 36 and I’m going to be 55 in June. That is totally uncharted territory.”
He said each of the five theme weeks would probably have special dishes, would definitely have specially chosen performers and performances, and would also have its own dedicated, new décor. He made the final-days Florent sound like some sort of down-market, downtown analogue to Park Avenue Spring/Summer/Fall/Winter.
Performers he’s reaching out to include Jackie Hoffman — “she’d be great for Anger,” he said — and Dirty Martini, who might be stuck with Denial on account of scheduling limitations.
On the subject of some resurrection of Florent somewhere else, he said, “You can’t recreate Florent. It happened organically, because of the neighborhood, because of the space. It would be wrong to recreate it, and I realize I’m going to be 55. I don’t really feel like running a restaurant.”
But he said he could see lending the Florent name to some different kind of establishment that was true to the Florent spirit. He said he has a business partner considering a Florent “in an airport terminal around New York.”
“I love the concept,” he said, declining to get into specific details. “I love airports. I’m the kind of person who goes to a new terminal just to see it.”
Florent has served bistro fare at all hours in the meatpacking district since 1985. (Photo: Lars Klove for The New York Times)
It’s been widely noted, and widely lamented, that the restaurant Florent’s days are numbered. But just how will it go out?
In a telephone conversation last night, Florent Morellet, the restaurant’s owner, filled in some of the details.
Beginning on Monday, May 26, and continuing over the five weeks until the restaurant’s last day in business — which he said would be June 29, chosen because it’s the Sunday of Gay Pride — it will have a changing series of five themes, reflecting the Kubler-Ross stages of grief.
Week One, he said, would be Denial. Week Two: Anger. Week Three: Bargaining. Week Four: Depression. Week Five: Acceptance.
“I decided to close with a bang,” said Mr. Morellet, who opened Florent in 1985.
He said that he himself is already at the Acceptance stage. But, he added, “So many of our customers are either at the stage of Anger or Denial. Some are just in a state of shock. We’re going to gather together to go through those stages and celebrate those stages, and end with a bang, and with irony, which we’ve always done.”
Rising rents, of course, are compelling Mr. Morellet to close Florent’s doors — and at present, he said, he has no plans to recreate it in another part of the city, the way the caretakers of the Second Avenue Deli did with that beloved establishment.
His long lease on the space on Gansevoort Street that Florent inhabits expired Monday, he said. He said that his landlord wasn’t willing to accept the $6,000 a month he was paying, which was well under market rates at this point, or even an increase of triple that amount that Mr. Morellet said he proposed. The Meatpacking District isn’t what it used to be, and the property there has a value much, much higher than in years past.
But though his lease has expired, Mr. Morellet said he wanted to keep the restaurant open another three months so it was still there for one more Gay Pride day. He said that he and his landlord hadn’t yet settled on the monthly rent he’ll need to pay for April, May and June.
For a while Mr. Morellet vacillated between closing on Gay Pride and closing on Bastille Day, which is later, in mid-July.
Why Gay Pride?
“I didn’t feel like being Marie Antoinette one more time,” he said, referring to his habit of dressing as her every year for Bastille Day. “I’ve been Marie Antoinette since 1989. And I wasn’t sure about an aging Marie Antoinette, because she was chopped at 36 and I’m going to be 55 in June. That is totally uncharted territory.”
He said each of the five theme weeks would probably have special dishes, would definitely have specially chosen performers and performances, and would also have its own dedicated, new décor. He made the final-days Florent sound like some sort of down-market, downtown analogue to Park Avenue Spring/Summer/Fall/Winter.
Performers he’s reaching out to include Jackie Hoffman — “she’d be great for Anger,” he said — and Dirty Martini, who might be stuck with Denial on account of scheduling limitations.
On the subject of some resurrection of Florent somewhere else, he said, “You can’t recreate Florent. It happened organically, because of the neighborhood, because of the space. It would be wrong to recreate it, and I realize I’m going to be 55. I don’t really feel like running a restaurant.”
But he said he could see lending the Florent name to some different kind of establishment that was true to the Florent spirit. He said he has a business partner considering a Florent “in an airport terminal around New York.”
“I love the concept,” he said, declining to get into specific details. “I love airports. I’m the kind of person who goes to a new terminal just to see it.”
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Netflix Partners With LG to Bring Movies Straight to TV
AP Photo/Paul Sakuma
Netflix customer Carleen Ho returns three DVD movies in Palo Alto, Calif. The company announced a deal that would allow it to send movies over the Internet straight to television sets.
By BRAD STONE
Published: January 3, 2008
Correction Appended
SAN FRANCISCO — Netflix, the DVD-by-mail company with more than seven million customers, has a new strategy that may one day make those red envelopes obsolete.
Related
Wal-Mart Pulls Plug on Movies via the Web (December 29, 2007)
Bits: We Need a Browser for TVs
The company wants to strike deals with electronics companies that will let it send movies straight to TV screens over the Internet. Its first partnership, announced Wednesday night, is with the South Korean manufacturer LG Electronics to stream movies and other programming to LG’s high-definition televisions.
The partnership will extend a novel feature from Netflix, announced a year ago, that allows paying subscribers to watch any of 6,000 movies and television shows on its Web site free. But that service can be accessed only with a personal computer.
Reed Hastings, chief executive of Netflix, said he hoped to strike other such deals and that Netflix would soon be viewed as a movie channel that might appear on myriad devices.
“We want to be integrated on every Internet-connected device, game system, high-definition DVD player and dedicated Internet set-top box,” he said. “Eventually, as TVs have wireless connectivity built into them, we’ll integrate right into the television.”
The move could help transform Netflix from a successful company with a cumbersome dependence on physical media and the Postal Service into an important player in a rapidly emerging digital media landscape.
That landscape has recently been characterized by a frenzy of experimentation, as technology and media companies try to figure out how to bring the unlimited media choices of the Internet to the traditionally restricted confines of the television.
The players include cable, satellite and telephone companies. Newer entrants include Amazon.com, which lets customers buy movies over its Unbox service and download them to their TiVo boxes. Wal-Mart, which experimented with movie downloads on its Web site, pulled the plug on the service last month when Hewlett-Packard, its partner in the project, stopped supporting the technology.
Then there is the digital media heavyweight Apple. At the annual Macworld expo opening on Jan. 15, the company plans to announce a deal to allow users of its iTunes service to rent films from some Hollywood studios and watch them on their computers and iPods.
Richard Doherty, research director of the Envisioneering Group, a market research firm, said Netflix’s model had the virtue of being free to existing subscribers and relatively easy for consumers to understand. “You’re already a subscriber and you don’t pay anything extra. That’s called a slam dunk in most businesses we follow,” Mr. Doherty said.
The companies said LG products with Netflix’s movie service would begin shipping in the second half of this year. They did not say which devices would have it.
Mr. Doherty, who was briefed on the Netflix announcement and LG’s other plans to be unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas next week, said LG could integrate the Netflix service into a future version of its dual-mode HD DVD/Blu-ray DVD player, which now sells for $799, and a new line of high-definition TVs with wireless connections to the Internet, among other products.
Mr. Hastings said the new service would combine the benefits of an Internet browser with the luxury of watching movies and TV shows on large, high-definition TV screens. He said subscribers would be able to go to the Netflix Web site to create lists of movies they wanted to see. The Netflix service on the TV would offer a simple way to watch those movies.
“We think we have solved the real fundamental problem, which has been that choosing movies on a television has been extremely challenging,” Mr. Hastings said. “Video-on-demand companies worked at it for a long time, but choosing movies on the TV just doesn’t have the power of the Web.”
The Netflix streams will not initially be in high definition, and there are some limits to how many programs customers can watch. For example, customers who pay Netflix’s most popular $17-a-month rate are allowed 17 hours of viewing on their PCs, though a spokesman said the company had been experimenting with unlimited digital viewing.
Netflix says it is able to offer the online service free to subscribers because when customers watch online, the company does not have to spend the money to mail them a DVD.
The deal with LG is something of a strategy shift for Netflix. The company had been experimenting with building its own Netflix-brand set-top box. Last spring, to help create the device, the company hired Anthony Wood, the founder of ReplayTV and a pioneer of the digital video recorder.
But Mr. Hastings said that integrating Netflix into other companies’ devices made more sense. He said Mr. Wood would soon leave Netflix to return to another company he founded, Roku.
Michael Gartenberg, an analyst with JupiterResearch, said the move was a wise one. “Software and services companies that get into hardware and try to sell hardware usually don’t end up doing particularly well,” he said.
Mr. Hastings said that the company’s new digital effort did not augur the end of its valuable DVD-by-mail business, which helped the company earn around $1.2 billion in 2007. “If anything, we are going to see some extra life and growth in DVD rental,” he said. “This doesn’t reflect a view that DVD rental is going to shrink any time soon.”
Correction: January 7, 2008
An article in Business Day on Thursday about a partnership between Netflix and LG Electronics to send movies directly to televisions misstated the amount of free-streaming video Netflix subscribers were entitled to under its $17-a-month plan. They are allowed 17 hours of viewing a month, not 17 movies.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Olympic Dream Stays Alive, on Synthetic Legs
By JOSHUA ROBINSON and ALAN SCHWARZ
Published: May 17, 2008
When an international court ruled Friday that a double-amputee sprinter from South Africa was eligible to compete in this summer’s Olympic Games in Beijing, the stage was set for disabled athletes to meet their own trailblazer.
Enlarge This Image
Mauro Donato/European Pressphoto Agency
South Africa's Oscar Pistorius at the "Golden Gala" competition in Rome in July 2007.
Multimedia
Interactive Graphic
An Amputee Advantage
Related
Sports of The Times: Admirable Spirit, but Rules Are Rules (January 10, 2008)
Study Suggests That Amputee Holds an Unfair Advantage (January 10, 2008)
Ruling Halts Amputee Sprinter’s Olympic Bid(January 15, 2008)
Effect of Prosthetics Ruling Is Unclear (January 18, 2008)
Amputee Sprinter Appeals (February 14, 2008)
An Amputee Sprinter: Is He Disabled or Too-Abled? (May 15, 2007)
Readers’ Opinions
Post a Comment
Enlarge This Image
Craig Owen
Oscar Pistorius, the double-amputee sprinter, at the University of Pretoria in South Africa in April 2007.
The watershed ruling made the runner, Oscar Pistorius, the first amputee to successfully challenge the notion that his carbon-fiber prosthetics gave him an unfair advantage and assured his right to race against able-bodied athletes in the Olympics, should he qualify. Previously barred from competing in such races by track and field’s world governing body, Pistorius will continue to stoke the debate over the competitive issues created by evolving technology in sports.
The ruling’s direct impact on disabled athletes could be limited, in part because Pistorius, 21, still must post a time fast enough to qualify for the Games. Yet his victory Friday in the Court of Arbitration for Sport sent a message that could long resonate among Paralympians.
“I am extremely shocked that the C.A.S. has made that decision,” said Marlon Shirley, a single amputee who holds world records in the 100 meters, the 200 meters and the long jump in his Paralympic class. “It’s a very brave decision and one that’s definitely going to revolutionize sports.”
Ann Cody, a seven-time Paralympic medalist for the United States in basketball and track and field who sits on the governing board of the International Paralympic Committee, added: “It sends a message. People with disabilities can see people like them compete, and they’ll connect. They’ll say, ‘Maybe I can do that, too.’ ”
In overturning a ban imposed by the International Association of Athletics Federations, track and field’s governing body, the court deemed that there was not enough evidence to prove that Pistorius’s flexible j-shaped blades, attached below his knees, gave him an advantage.
“It’s not just about me,” Pistorius said in a telephone interview from Milan. “It’s about the extra opportunity for amputee athletes.”
Pistorius must meet the qualifying standard of 45.55 seconds in the 400 meters to gain an automatic berth in Beijing (or 45.95 seconds for a provisional spot); his current personal best is 46.33, according to his coach, Ampie Louw. With 64 days left, he is in a race to race.
Several Paralympic athletes and officials said that the court’s ruling would probably not affect many athletes, at least immediately. A large portion of athletes in the Paralympic Games, which take place two weeks after the Olympics, compete in wheelchairs; those who do not rarely reach the elite levels that Pistorius has. And the wording of the ruling appeared to caution against extrapolation, clearly stating that it “has absolutely no application to any other athlete, or other type of prosthetic limb. Each case must be considered by the I.A.A.F. on its own merits.”
“I knew they would have to do it somehow to protect themselves,” said Brian Frasure, a single amputee who will try out for his fourth United States Paralympic team in June. Frasure also works for Ossur, the company that designed and manufactured the Cheetah Flex-Foot, the prosthetics that Pistorius and many other athletes use.
“In the world of prosthetics, with so many variables, they need a stipulation for down the road, when we come to the day and age when bionics come to the fore,” Frasure said. “If they say it’s O.K. for all amputees to compete in the Olympics, they would be setting themselves up for even more controversy, more than Oscar dealt with, in the future.”
The I.A.A.F. thought it had made that stipulation when it barred Pistorius in January, despite clearing him to compete with able-bodied athletes last spring; he ran at international meets in Rome and Sheffield, England.
Disabled athletes have competed in the Olympics before — for example, the AmericanMarla Runyan, who is legally blind, made the final of the 1,500 meters at the 2000 Sydney Games. Natalie Du Toit, whose left leg was amputated above the knee seven years ago, will swim for South Africa in Beijing.
But very few have raised the issue of whether their disability, or their compensation for a disability, presents an advantage. One was Neroli Fairhall, a paraplegic archer from New Zealand, who competed in the 1984 Olympics while in her wheelchair; there was some question as to whether the chair provided her better stability than archers standing on legs, but she was allowed to compete.
Gina Kolata contributed reporting.
Published: May 17, 2008
When an international court ruled Friday that a double-amputee sprinter from South Africa was eligible to compete in this summer’s Olympic Games in Beijing, the stage was set for disabled athletes to meet their own trailblazer.
Enlarge This Image
Mauro Donato/European Pressphoto Agency
South Africa's Oscar Pistorius at the "Golden Gala" competition in Rome in July 2007.
Multimedia
Interactive Graphic
An Amputee Advantage
Related
Sports of The Times: Admirable Spirit, but Rules Are Rules (January 10, 2008)
Study Suggests That Amputee Holds an Unfair Advantage (January 10, 2008)
Ruling Halts Amputee Sprinter’s Olympic Bid(January 15, 2008)
Effect of Prosthetics Ruling Is Unclear (January 18, 2008)
Amputee Sprinter Appeals (February 14, 2008)
An Amputee Sprinter: Is He Disabled or Too-Abled? (May 15, 2007)
Readers’ Opinions
Post a Comment
Enlarge This Image
Craig Owen
Oscar Pistorius, the double-amputee sprinter, at the University of Pretoria in South Africa in April 2007.
The watershed ruling made the runner, Oscar Pistorius, the first amputee to successfully challenge the notion that his carbon-fiber prosthetics gave him an unfair advantage and assured his right to race against able-bodied athletes in the Olympics, should he qualify. Previously barred from competing in such races by track and field’s world governing body, Pistorius will continue to stoke the debate over the competitive issues created by evolving technology in sports.
The ruling’s direct impact on disabled athletes could be limited, in part because Pistorius, 21, still must post a time fast enough to qualify for the Games. Yet his victory Friday in the Court of Arbitration for Sport sent a message that could long resonate among Paralympians.
“I am extremely shocked that the C.A.S. has made that decision,” said Marlon Shirley, a single amputee who holds world records in the 100 meters, the 200 meters and the long jump in his Paralympic class. “It’s a very brave decision and one that’s definitely going to revolutionize sports.”
Ann Cody, a seven-time Paralympic medalist for the United States in basketball and track and field who sits on the governing board of the International Paralympic Committee, added: “It sends a message. People with disabilities can see people like them compete, and they’ll connect. They’ll say, ‘Maybe I can do that, too.’ ”
In overturning a ban imposed by the International Association of Athletics Federations, track and field’s governing body, the court deemed that there was not enough evidence to prove that Pistorius’s flexible j-shaped blades, attached below his knees, gave him an advantage.
“It’s not just about me,” Pistorius said in a telephone interview from Milan. “It’s about the extra opportunity for amputee athletes.”
Pistorius must meet the qualifying standard of 45.55 seconds in the 400 meters to gain an automatic berth in Beijing (or 45.95 seconds for a provisional spot); his current personal best is 46.33, according to his coach, Ampie Louw. With 64 days left, he is in a race to race.
Several Paralympic athletes and officials said that the court’s ruling would probably not affect many athletes, at least immediately. A large portion of athletes in the Paralympic Games, which take place two weeks after the Olympics, compete in wheelchairs; those who do not rarely reach the elite levels that Pistorius has. And the wording of the ruling appeared to caution against extrapolation, clearly stating that it “has absolutely no application to any other athlete, or other type of prosthetic limb. Each case must be considered by the I.A.A.F. on its own merits.”
“I knew they would have to do it somehow to protect themselves,” said Brian Frasure, a single amputee who will try out for his fourth United States Paralympic team in June. Frasure also works for Ossur, the company that designed and manufactured the Cheetah Flex-Foot, the prosthetics that Pistorius and many other athletes use.
“In the world of prosthetics, with so many variables, they need a stipulation for down the road, when we come to the day and age when bionics come to the fore,” Frasure said. “If they say it’s O.K. for all amputees to compete in the Olympics, they would be setting themselves up for even more controversy, more than Oscar dealt with, in the future.”
The I.A.A.F. thought it had made that stipulation when it barred Pistorius in January, despite clearing him to compete with able-bodied athletes last spring; he ran at international meets in Rome and Sheffield, England.
Disabled athletes have competed in the Olympics before — for example, the AmericanMarla Runyan, who is legally blind, made the final of the 1,500 meters at the 2000 Sydney Games. Natalie Du Toit, whose left leg was amputated above the knee seven years ago, will swim for South Africa in Beijing.
But very few have raised the issue of whether their disability, or their compensation for a disability, presents an advantage. One was Neroli Fairhall, a paraplegic archer from New Zealand, who competed in the 1984 Olympics while in her wheelchair; there was some question as to whether the chair provided her better stability than archers standing on legs, but she was allowed to compete.
Gina Kolata contributed reporting.
Friday, May 16, 2008
Uncertain Futures for Bounty at Cannes
Matt Sayles/Associated Press
The Cannes festival opens at a time when fewer companies are shopping for films, and few critics are reviewing new releases.
By MANOHLA DARGIS and A. O. SCOTT
Published: May 14, 2008
CANNES, France — When the 61st Cannes Film Festival opens here on Wednesday, all the customary glamour, spectacle and high Gallic seriousness will be in place: the red carpet, the hatchet-faced guards, the shouting paparazzi, the promenading stars and bleary-eyed journalists. If the Americans look a little more anxious than usual, it’s not just the enfeebled dollar. Everyone may be expecting the bounty of good and even great films from around the world over the next 12 days, but the excitement is tempered by a sense that those films are facing unusually difficult prospects back in the United States.
Related
Times Topics: Cannes Film Festival
Celluloid Dreams
Arta Dobroshi in “Le Silence de Lorna,” showing at Cannes.
For one thing, there are suddenly fewer companies shopping for movies. Last week Warner Brothers shut down two of its specialty divisions, Warner Independent Pictures and Picturehouse, a move that followed the downsizing earlier this year of another of its subsidiaries, New Line Cinema. Warner Independent recently released Michael Haneke’s “Funny Games” and David Gordon Green’s “Snow Angels,” neither of which found much of an audience. Its biggest successes had been Luc Jacquet’s “March of the Penguins” (2005) and George Clooney’s “Good Night, and Good Luck” (2005). Picturehouse’s recent releases include Olivier Dahan’s “Vie en Rose,” which won an Oscar for its star, Marion Cotillard, and Guillermo del Toro’s critically revered “Pan’s Labyrinth” (2006), which had its premiere at Cannes.
Studio specialty divisions are not the only ones affected. The number of film critics writing for traditional print outlets has thinned dramatically in the last year as media companies face shrinking revenues and uncertain futures. Whereas big-budget commercial releases can almost always buy a solid opening weekend at the box office with wall-to-wall publicity and advertising, smaller films depend greatly on the support of critics to find their audiences. That’s especially true these days, with so many films opening theatrically — more than 600 titles in 2007 — and competing for a seemingly shrinking audience.
“The current situation is a nightmare,” Gary Palmucci wrote in an e-mail message over the weekend. Mr. Palmucci is a top executive at Kino International, a small New York company whose titles include “Old Joy” (2006) and Mr. Haneke’s original German-language version of “Funny Games” (1997). “The Cuisinarting of accelerated production, release schedules, critics buckling under the strain of reviewing them all, the commensurate effect on attention spans and priorities of various generations of filmgoers — it all adds up to a major migraine for the small, specialized distributor.”
Even bigger companies seem to be approaching this year’s festival with a measure of caution. Peter Rice, president of Fox Searchlight Pictures (distributor of the box office hits “Juno” and “Little Miss Sunshine”), wrote that economic uncertainty “increases the pressure to make smart acquisition choices because the marketplace is very unforgiving at present.”
The challenges are particularly great for foreign-language films, though not only because American audiences resist subtitles. Howard Cohen, co-president of Roadside Attractions, a Los Angeles independent distribution company, observed that the entire independent film business is facing difficulties, using last year’s crop at Cannes as an example. Writing in an e-mail message, he said: “The English-language fare that is available for U.S. rights at Cannes with any box office hope, like ‘We Own the Night’ last year, is a) rare, and b) usually goes to the studios or their dependents. The very arty remainder in the actual festival (i.e., ‘Paranoid Park,’ ‘Clean,’ ‘Factotum,’ ‘Japanese Story,’ ‘Jindabyne’ — the list is long) are of less interest since they don’t tend to perform.”
On a less gloomy note, Mr. Cohen also pointed out that several foreign-language films from last year’s festival, including “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly,” “The Band’s Visit,” “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days” and “Caramel,” which his company released in February, have all grossed (or are approaching) $1 million at the United States box office. (“The Diving Bell” has made more than $6 million domestically.)
This year some of the foreign-language films likely to attract interest, if not frenzied bidding, include new work from several Cannes mainstays. Among them are Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, the Belgian brothers who have twice won the Palme d’Or (for “Rosetta” in 1999 and “L’Enfant” in 2005). Their new film, “Le Silence de Lorna,” is about an Albanian woman living in Belgium who gets mixed up with a mobster. Also returning to the main competition is the Turkish filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan, whose earlier Cannes favorites include “Distant” (2003) and “Climates” (2006). “Three Monkeys,” his new entry, involves the struggle of a family to stay together, a generic description for a film bound to be characteristically elusive and elegant. The Argentine writer and director Lucrecia Martel, one of the few women represented in competition, follows “The Holy Girl,” her 2004 tale of spiritual and sexual confusion, with “The Headless Woman,” about the aftermath of a car accident.
For many, these directors are the real stars of Cannes. In America their names may be met with blank stares, but here they walk up the same red carpet as some of the most prominent Hollywood filmmakers and celebrities. And this may be the ultimate measure of the festival’s integrity as well as a reminder of its noble traditions.
France is the country, after all, that helped establish Clint Eastwood as a major international artist decades ago. Mr. Eastwood, last here in 2003 with “Mystic River,” returns with “Changeling,” a period film about a missing child that stars Angelina Jolie. It is Cannes that made Steven Soderbergh into an instant auteur when his 1989 feature debut, “Sex, Lies and Videotape,” won the Palme d’Or. Mr. Soderbergh, who was here last year with “Ocean’s Thirteen,” a high-priced bagatelle and red-carpet bonanza, is back in competition with “Che,” a two-part biography of Che Guevara that runs more than four hours.
Just as anticipated is the rather shorter “Synecdoche, New York,” the directorial debut of Charlie Kaufman, best known for narratively kinked, intellectually venturesome screenplays like “Being John Malkovich,” “Adaptation” and “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.”
“Synecdoche, New York,” which stars Philip Seymour Hoffman and Michelle Williams in a Kaufmanesque tale about a theater director facing physical and metaphysical crises, does not have an American distributor. We can only wait and see what the anxious Americans will do.
The Cannes festival opens at a time when fewer companies are shopping for films, and few critics are reviewing new releases.
By MANOHLA DARGIS and A. O. SCOTT
Published: May 14, 2008
CANNES, France — When the 61st Cannes Film Festival opens here on Wednesday, all the customary glamour, spectacle and high Gallic seriousness will be in place: the red carpet, the hatchet-faced guards, the shouting paparazzi, the promenading stars and bleary-eyed journalists. If the Americans look a little more anxious than usual, it’s not just the enfeebled dollar. Everyone may be expecting the bounty of good and even great films from around the world over the next 12 days, but the excitement is tempered by a sense that those films are facing unusually difficult prospects back in the United States.
Related
Times Topics: Cannes Film Festival
Celluloid Dreams
Arta Dobroshi in “Le Silence de Lorna,” showing at Cannes.
For one thing, there are suddenly fewer companies shopping for movies. Last week Warner Brothers shut down two of its specialty divisions, Warner Independent Pictures and Picturehouse, a move that followed the downsizing earlier this year of another of its subsidiaries, New Line Cinema. Warner Independent recently released Michael Haneke’s “Funny Games” and David Gordon Green’s “Snow Angels,” neither of which found much of an audience. Its biggest successes had been Luc Jacquet’s “March of the Penguins” (2005) and George Clooney’s “Good Night, and Good Luck” (2005). Picturehouse’s recent releases include Olivier Dahan’s “Vie en Rose,” which won an Oscar for its star, Marion Cotillard, and Guillermo del Toro’s critically revered “Pan’s Labyrinth” (2006), which had its premiere at Cannes.
Studio specialty divisions are not the only ones affected. The number of film critics writing for traditional print outlets has thinned dramatically in the last year as media companies face shrinking revenues and uncertain futures. Whereas big-budget commercial releases can almost always buy a solid opening weekend at the box office with wall-to-wall publicity and advertising, smaller films depend greatly on the support of critics to find their audiences. That’s especially true these days, with so many films opening theatrically — more than 600 titles in 2007 — and competing for a seemingly shrinking audience.
“The current situation is a nightmare,” Gary Palmucci wrote in an e-mail message over the weekend. Mr. Palmucci is a top executive at Kino International, a small New York company whose titles include “Old Joy” (2006) and Mr. Haneke’s original German-language version of “Funny Games” (1997). “The Cuisinarting of accelerated production, release schedules, critics buckling under the strain of reviewing them all, the commensurate effect on attention spans and priorities of various generations of filmgoers — it all adds up to a major migraine for the small, specialized distributor.”
Even bigger companies seem to be approaching this year’s festival with a measure of caution. Peter Rice, president of Fox Searchlight Pictures (distributor of the box office hits “Juno” and “Little Miss Sunshine”), wrote that economic uncertainty “increases the pressure to make smart acquisition choices because the marketplace is very unforgiving at present.”
The challenges are particularly great for foreign-language films, though not only because American audiences resist subtitles. Howard Cohen, co-president of Roadside Attractions, a Los Angeles independent distribution company, observed that the entire independent film business is facing difficulties, using last year’s crop at Cannes as an example. Writing in an e-mail message, he said: “The English-language fare that is available for U.S. rights at Cannes with any box office hope, like ‘We Own the Night’ last year, is a) rare, and b) usually goes to the studios or their dependents. The very arty remainder in the actual festival (i.e., ‘Paranoid Park,’ ‘Clean,’ ‘Factotum,’ ‘Japanese Story,’ ‘Jindabyne’ — the list is long) are of less interest since they don’t tend to perform.”
On a less gloomy note, Mr. Cohen also pointed out that several foreign-language films from last year’s festival, including “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly,” “The Band’s Visit,” “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days” and “Caramel,” which his company released in February, have all grossed (or are approaching) $1 million at the United States box office. (“The Diving Bell” has made more than $6 million domestically.)
This year some of the foreign-language films likely to attract interest, if not frenzied bidding, include new work from several Cannes mainstays. Among them are Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, the Belgian brothers who have twice won the Palme d’Or (for “Rosetta” in 1999 and “L’Enfant” in 2005). Their new film, “Le Silence de Lorna,” is about an Albanian woman living in Belgium who gets mixed up with a mobster. Also returning to the main competition is the Turkish filmmaker Nuri Bilge Ceylan, whose earlier Cannes favorites include “Distant” (2003) and “Climates” (2006). “Three Monkeys,” his new entry, involves the struggle of a family to stay together, a generic description for a film bound to be characteristically elusive and elegant. The Argentine writer and director Lucrecia Martel, one of the few women represented in competition, follows “The Holy Girl,” her 2004 tale of spiritual and sexual confusion, with “The Headless Woman,” about the aftermath of a car accident.
For many, these directors are the real stars of Cannes. In America their names may be met with blank stares, but here they walk up the same red carpet as some of the most prominent Hollywood filmmakers and celebrities. And this may be the ultimate measure of the festival’s integrity as well as a reminder of its noble traditions.
France is the country, after all, that helped establish Clint Eastwood as a major international artist decades ago. Mr. Eastwood, last here in 2003 with “Mystic River,” returns with “Changeling,” a period film about a missing child that stars Angelina Jolie. It is Cannes that made Steven Soderbergh into an instant auteur when his 1989 feature debut, “Sex, Lies and Videotape,” won the Palme d’Or. Mr. Soderbergh, who was here last year with “Ocean’s Thirteen,” a high-priced bagatelle and red-carpet bonanza, is back in competition with “Che,” a two-part biography of Che Guevara that runs more than four hours.
Just as anticipated is the rather shorter “Synecdoche, New York,” the directorial debut of Charlie Kaufman, best known for narratively kinked, intellectually venturesome screenplays like “Being John Malkovich,” “Adaptation” and “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.”
“Synecdoche, New York,” which stars Philip Seymour Hoffman and Michelle Williams in a Kaufmanesque tale about a theater director facing physical and metaphysical crises, does not have an American distributor. We can only wait and see what the anxious Americans will do.
Cannes International Film Festival
2008 Films in Competition
Information on films in competition at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival.
Adoration
Director: Atom Egoyan
Blindness
Director: Fernando Meirelles | Trailer
Che
Director: Steven Soderbergh
Delta
Director: Kornel Mundruczo
The Class
Director: Laurent Cantet
Gomorra
Director: Matteo Garrone
Il Divo
Director: Paolo Sorrentino
The Changeling
Director: Clint Eastwood
La Frontiere De L’aube
Director: Philippe Garrel
The Headless Woman
Director: Lucrecia Martel
Le Silence De Lorna
Directors: Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne
Leonera
Director: Pablo Trapero
Linha De Passe
Directors: Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas
My Magic
Director: Eric Khoo
The Palermo Shooting
Director: Wim Wenders
Serbis
Director: Brillante Mendoza
Synecdoche, New York
Director: Charlie Kaufman
Two Lovers
Director: James Gray
Three Monkeys
Director: Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Waltz With Bashir
Director: Ari Folman
Un Conte De Noel
Director: Arnaud Desplechin
Information on films in competition at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival.
Adoration
Director: Atom Egoyan
Blindness
Director: Fernando Meirelles | Trailer
Che
Director: Steven Soderbergh
Delta
Director: Kornel Mundruczo
The Class
Director: Laurent Cantet
Gomorra
Director: Matteo Garrone
Il Divo
Director: Paolo Sorrentino
The Changeling
Director: Clint Eastwood
La Frontiere De L’aube
Director: Philippe Garrel
The Headless Woman
Director: Lucrecia Martel
Le Silence De Lorna
Directors: Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne
Leonera
Director: Pablo Trapero
Linha De Passe
Directors: Walter Salles and Daniela Thomas
My Magic
Director: Eric Khoo
The Palermo Shooting
Director: Wim Wenders
Serbis
Director: Brillante Mendoza
Synecdoche, New York
Director: Charlie Kaufman
Two Lovers
Director: James Gray
Three Monkeys
Director: Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Waltz With Bashir
Director: Ari Folman
Un Conte De Noel
Director: Arnaud Desplechin
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Ida Corr vs Fedde Le Grand Let Me Think About It (Extended)
Ida Corr vs Fedde Le Grand Let Me Think About It (Extended)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)