1.
My Blueberry Nights
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My Blueberry Nights is a 2007 romance/drama/road art film directed by Wong Kar Wai, his first feature in English. The screenplay by Wong and Lawrence Block is based on a short Chinese-language film written and this film was the debut of jazz singer Grammy-winner Norah Jones as an actress, and also starred Jude Law, David Strathairn, Rachel Weisz, Natalie Portman, and Benjamin Kanes. The cinematographer of this film was Darius Khondji, christopher Doyle was Wongs cinematographer for his last seven features before My Blueberry Nights, starting from 1990s Days of Being Wild. Jeremy is an émigré from Manchester who owns a small New York City cafe, the cafe becomes a haven for Elizabeth, a young woman, as Jeremy tells her that he saw her boyfriend cheating on her. Devastated, she stays in his cafe the entire night, eating a pie he made. Elizabeth leaves her key of her apartment and leaves Jeremys cafe, later on, he decides to send out postcards to any restaurants she may be to try to find her. He confesses to Lizzie his many attempts at achieving sobriety have ended in failure, taking many AA meetings, one night off duty in the bar where Lizzie works, he drunkenly threatens Sue Lynne with his gun if she leaves. Later on, Arnie drives drunk and dies after crashing into a pole. Lizzie comforts Sue Lynne at the site, before leaving town, and is given the money towards Arnies tab at the bar, revealing to Lizzie that she made a mistake. The place where he died is also the place where they met, heading west, Elizabeth – now calling herself Beth – gets another waitress job at a casino in a small town in Nevada. Here she meets Leslie, a poker player who has lost all her money. Beth agrees to lend her $2200 she has in exchange for a third of her winnings or her car, a Jaguar XK, if she loses. When she does lose, she fulfills her promise by giving Beth her Jaguar, but asks her to drive her to Las Vegas so she can borrow money from her father, whom she has not seen in a long time. While en route Leslie receives a call from a Vegas hospital and she believes the call is simply a ruse to lure her home, but upon arrival in Vegas she discovers her father died the previous night. Leslie announces she wants to keep the car, which she had stolen from her father and she confesses she really won the card game and gives Beth her promised share of the winnings, which she uses to finally purchase the car she always wanted. As she eats a slice of pie, Elizabeth realizes her feelings for him are reciprocated. She passes out on the counter after spending the night, and Jeremy kisses her while she is asleep, main Norah Jones as Elizabeth Jude Law as Jeremy David Strathairn as Arnie Copeland Rachel Weisz as Sue Lynne Copeland Natalie Portman as Leslie Support Chan Marshall. Wong expanded the idea into a movie that would take place in other locations besides New York
2.
Cannes
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Cannes is a city located on the French Riviera. It is a commune of France located in the Alpes-Maritimes department, and host city of the annual Cannes Film Festival, Midem, the city is known for its association with the rich and famous, its luxury hotels and restaurants, and for several conferences. On 3 November 2011 it also played host to the G20 organisation of industrialised nations, by the 2nd century BC, the Ligurian Oxybii established a settlement here known as Aegitna. Historians are unsure what the name means, the area was a fishing village used as a port of call between the Lérins Islands. In 69 AD, it became the scene of violent conflict between the troops of Otho and Vitellius, in the 10th century, the town was known as Canua. The name may derive from canna, a reed, Canua was probably the site of a small Ligurian port, and later a Roman outpost on Le Suquet hill, suggested by Roman tombs discovered here. Le Suquet housed an 11th-century tower which overlooked swamps where the city now stands, most of the ancient activity, especially protection, was on the Lérins Islands and the history of Cannes is closely tied to the history of the islands. An attack by the Saracens in 891, who remained until the end of the 10th century, the insecurity of the Lérins islands forced the monks to settle on the mainland, at the Suquet. Construction of a castle in 1035 fortified the city by then known as Cannes, one took a century to build. Around 1530, Cannes detached from the monks who had controlled the city for hundreds of years, during the 18th century, both the Spanish and British tried to gain control of the Lérins Islands but were chased away by the French. The islands were controlled by many, such as Jean-Honoré Alziary. They had many different purposes, at the end of the 19th century, henry Brougham, 1st Baron Brougham and Vaux bought land at the Croix des Gardes and constructed the villa Eleonore-Louise. His work to improve living conditions attracted the English aristocracy, who built winter residences. At the end of the 19th century, several railways were completed, in Cannes, projects such as the Boulevard Carnot and the rue dAntibes were carried out. After the closure of the Casino des Fleurs, an establishment was built for the rich winter clientele. This casino was demolished and replaced by the new Palace in 1979, in the 20th century, new luxury hotels such as the Carlton, Majestic, Martinez, and JW Marriott Cannes were built. The city was modernised with a centre, a post office. There were fewer British and German tourists after the First World War, winter tourism gave way to summer tourism and the summer casino at the Palm Beach was constructed
3.
Palme d'Or
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The Palme dOr is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the organising committee, from 1939 to 1954, the highest prize was the Grand Prix du Festival International du Film. In 1964, it was replaced again by the Grand Prix du Festival before being reintroduced in 1974 as the Palme dOr again. In 1954, the Jury of the Festival de Cannes suggested giving an award titled the Grand Prix of the International Film Festival with a new design each year from a contemporary artist. At the end of 1954, the Festivals Board of Directors invited several jewellers to submit designs for a palm, in tribute to the coat of arms of the City of Cannes. The original design by the jeweller Lucienne Lazon had the lower extremity of the stalk forming a heart. In 1955, the first Palme dOr was awarded to Delbert Mann for Marty, and it remained the highest award until 1964, as of 2015, Jane Campion is the only female director to have won the Palme dOr, for The Piano. These choices were due to a Cannes policy that forbids the Palme dOr-winning film from receiving any additional awards, according to Spielberg, Had the casting been 3% wrong, it wouldnt have worked like it did for us. Since its reintroduction, the prize has been redesigned several times, at the beginning of the 1980s, the rounded shape of the pedestal, bearing the palm, gradually transformed to become pyramidal in 1984. In 1992 Thierry de Bourqueney redesigned the Palme and its pedestal in hand-cut crystal, the current design, first presented in 1997, is by Caroline Scheufele from Chopard. A single piece of cut crystal forms a cushion for the 24-carat gold palm, the winner of the 2014 Palme dOr, Winter Sleep—a Turkish film by Nuri Bilge Ceylan—occurred during the same year as the 100th anniversary of Turkish cinema. Note, The Palme dOr for Union Pacific was awarded in retrospect at the 2002 festival, the festivals debut was to take place in 1939, but it was cancelled due to World War II. The organisers of the 2002 festival presented part of the original 1939 selection to a jury of six members. The films were, Goodbye Mr. Chips, La Piste du Nord, Lenin in 1918, The Four Feathers, The Wizard of Oz, Union Pacific, and Boefje. In 2011 the festival announced that the award would be given out annually, however plans for this fell through, american director Woody Allen was the inaugural recipient while pioneering French filmmaker Agnès Varda was the first woman to receive the award in 2015. In 2016 Jean-Pierre Léaud became the first person to be awarded solely for acting. com Cannes Film Festival IMDB
4.
4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
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4 Months,3 Weeks and 2 Days is a 2007 Romanian art film written and directed by Cristian Mungiu. It won the Palme dOr and the FIPRESCI Award at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, the film is set in Communist Romania in the final years of the Nicolae Ceaușescu era. It tells the story of two students, roommates in the university dormitory, who try to arrange an illegal abortion, after making its worldwide debut at Cannes, the film made its Romanian debut on 1 June 2007, at the Transilvania International Film Festival. It opened to acclaim, and has since been considered one of the major films of the 2000s. The film follows the story of Otilia Mihartescu and Gabriela Găbița Dragut, the film is set in 1987, one of the last years of the Ceaușescu government. When Găbița becomes pregnant, the two girls arrange a meeting with Mr. Bebe in a hotel, where he is to perform an illegal abortion. At the college dorm Găbița and Otilia review the items they need for the day, afterwards, Otilia takes a bus to visit her boyfriend Adi, from whom she borrows money. Adi asks Otilia to visit his family that night, as it is his mothers birthday, and to buy flowers on the way, to which Otilia initially declines, but she relents after Adi becomes upset. Otilia heads to a hotel where Găbița has booked a room, Otilia goes to another hotel, and after much begging and haggling is able to book a room at an expensive rate. Afterwards Otilia goes to a point to meet with Mr. Bebe, although he had asked Găbița that she meets him. Mr. Bebe grows angry upon hearing that Găbița is not at the planned hotel, Mr. Bebe discovers that Găbițas claim that her pregnancy was in its third month is a lie, in fact, it has been at least four months. The two women were certain that they would pay no more than 3000 lei for the abortion, however, it slowly becomes clear to the women that he expects both women to have sex with him. Otilia reluctantly has sex with Mr. Bebe so that he not walk out on them. Mr. Bebe then performs the abortion by injecting a probe and a fluid into Găbițas uterus. Otilia is exasperated by Găbițas lies, yet continues to help her, Otilia leaves Găbița at the hotel to go to Adis mothers birthday. She is still disturbed but stays and has dinner with Adis mothers friends and they all talk about trivial things while Otilia and Adi remain silent. The phone rings in the background, but no one answers it, after fighting with Adi, Otilia calls Găbița from Adis house. Găbița does not answer, so Otilia decides to go back to Găbița, when Otilia enters the room Găbița is lying on the bed, and she tells Otilia that the fetus has come out and is in the bathroom
5.
Un Certain Regard
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Un Certain Regard (French pronunciation, is a section of the Cannes Film Festivals official selection. It is run at the salle Debussy, parallel to the competition for the Palme dOr and this section was introduced in 1978 by Gilles Jacob. The name literally means a certain glance, but is understood by French speakers to mean from another point of view, here it means films with various types of visions and styles, which tell their stories in nontraditional ways. This section presents 20 original and different works which seek international recognition, since 2005, the prize consists of €30,000 financed by the Groupama GAN Foundation. * Denotes first win for a country
6.
Short Film Palme d'Or
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The Short Film Palme dOr is the highest prize given to a short film at the Cannes Film Festival. It is chosen by the jury of the Cinéfondation. Sometimes a Special Mention or a Jury Prize is awarded to other short films of that certain year. The following list shows all the short films in Cannes through the years. The Palme dOr equivalent or most important prize of that appears in bold. Cannes Film Festival official website Cannes Film Festival at IMDb
7.
Cannes Film Festival
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Founded in 1946, the invitation-only festival is held annually at the Palais des Festivals et des Congrès. On 1 July 2014, co-founder and former head of French pay-TV operator Canal+ Pierre Lescure took over as President of the festival, the Board of Directors also appointed Gilles Jacob as Honorary President of the festival. The 2016 Cannes Film Festival took place between 11 and 22 May 2016, australian film director George Miller was the President of the Jury. I, Daniel Blake, directed by British director Ken Loach, in 2017, The Festival de Cannes will celebrate its 70th anniversary edition from May 17 to 28. In 1947, the festival was held as the Festival du film de Cannes, at that time the principle of equality was introduced, with a jury made up of only one representative per country. The festival is now held at the Palais des Festivals, expressly constructed for the occasion, although for its 1949 inaugural the roof was unfinished, the festival was not held in 1948 and 1950 on account of budgetary problems. Although its origins may be attributed in part to the French desire to compete with Autumns Venice Film Festival, in 1955, the Palme dOr was created, replacing the Grand Prix du Festival which had been given until that year. In 1957, Dolores del Rio was the first female member of the jury as a Sélection officielle – Member, in 1959, the Marché du Film was founded, giving the festival a commercial character and facilitating exchanges between sellers and buyers in the film industry. Today it has become the first international platform for film commerce, in 1962, the International Critics Week was born, created by the French Union of Film Critics as the first parallel section of the Cannes Film Festival. Its goal was to showcase first and second works by directors all over the world. In 1965, an hommage was paid to Jean Cocteau after his death, the next year, Olivia de Havilland was named the first female president of the festival. The 1968 festival was halted on 19 May, some directors, such as Carlos Saura and Miloš Forman, had withdrawn their films from the competition. The filmmakers achieved the reinstatement of the President, and they founded the Film Directors Society that same year, during the 1970s, important changes occurred in the Festival. In 1972, Robert Favre Le Bret was named the new President and he immediately introduced an important change in the selection of the participating films. Until that date, the different countries chose which films would represent them in the festival, Bessy created one committee to select French films, and another for foreign films. In 1978, Gilles Jacob assumed the President position, introducing the Caméra dOr award, in 1983, a new, much bigger Palais des Festivals et des Congrès was built to host the Festival. It was nicknamed The Bunker and provoked many reactions against it, in 1984, Pierre Viot replaced Robert Favre Le Bret as President of the Festival. It was not until 1995 that Gilles Jacob created the last section of the Official Selection and its aim was to support the creation of works of cinema in the world and to contribute to the entry of the new scenario writers in the circle of the celebrities
8.
Stephen Frears
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Stephen Arthur Frears is an English film director. Frears has directed British films since the 1980s including My Beautiful Laundrette, Dangerous Liaisons, High Fidelity, The Queen, Philomena and he has been nominated for two Academy Awards for Best Director for The Grifters and The Queen. In 2008 The Telegraph named him among the most influential people in British culture, Frears was born in Leicester, England. His father, Russell E. Frears, was a practitioner and accountant. Frears was brought up Anglican, and did not find out that his mother was Jewish until he was in his late 20s, Frears later went on to study law at Trinity College, Cambridge, from 1960 to 1963. After graduating from Cambridge, Frears worked as an assistant director on the films Morgan and he spent most of his early directing career in television mainly for the BBC, but also for the commercial sector. In the late 1980s, Frears came to attention as a director of feature films. His directorial film debut was the detective spoof Gumshoe, but it was his direction of My Beautiful Laundrette that unexpectedly led to wider notice. In 1987, Frears worked with Adrian Edmondson on Mr Jolly Lives Next Door, for a 45-minute programme by cult ensemble The Comic Strip Presents, in 1985, Frears also directed a Comic Strip parody of Rebecca. The following year, Frears made Dangerous Liaisons in France, with a cast that included Glenn Close, John Malkovich and Michelle Pfeiffer. Based on the novel of romantic game playing, the film received numerous Academy Awards and BAFTA nominations, Frears had further critical success with his next film The Grifters, another tale of con-artists. The film earned Frears his first Academy Award nomination for best direction, in 2006, Frears directed The Queen, that depicts the death of Princess Diana on 31 August 1997. The Queen also achieved critical acclaim, box-office success. Frears himself received his second Academy Award nomination for best direction, Frears returned to directing for television with The Deal, which depicts an alleged deal between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown over which of them should become leader of the Labour Party in 1994. Frears has also directed two films based on novels by Roddy Doyle, The Snapper and The Van and he holds the David Lean Chair in Fiction Direction from the National Film and Television School in Beaconsfield, where he teaches. His 1992 film Hero, starring Dustin Hoffman, was a box office disappointment. Frears was nominated for a Razzie Award for his direction of Mary Reilly and it stars Coogan and Judi Dench. His biopic of disgraced cycling champion Lance Armstrong The Program was premiered in the 2015 BFI London Film Festival, many of Frears films are based on stories of real life characters, but Frears has never met any of them
9.
Cristian Mungiu
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Cristian Mungiu is a Romanian filmmaker, winner of the Palme dOr in 2007. After studying English literature at the University of Iaşi, he worked for a few years as a teacher, after that, he enrolled at the University of Film in Bucharest to study film directing. After graduating in 1998, Mungiu made several short films, in 2002, he debuted with his first feature film, Occident. Occident enjoyed critical success, winning prizes in film festivals. In 2007 Mungiu wrote and directed his feature,4 Months,3 Weeks and 2 Days. Mungiu has said that early Miloš Forman and Robert Altman are important filmmakers who influenced him and he also respects the realism of Bicycle Thieves, among other famous realistic films. Mungiu is the brother of political analyst Alina Mungiu-Pippidi, the film was also selected as the Romanian entry for the Best Foreign Language Oscar at the 85th Academy Awards, making the January shortlist. In 2013 he produced the film of Nae Caranfil 6.9 on Richter In April 2013 he was selected as a member of the main competition jury at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. After Beyond the Hills Cristian Mungius new project will deal with parenting, the producer/writer/director hopes to shoot it in 2015 ideally while there are still leaves on the trees. net
10.
Wong Kar-wai
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His film In the Mood for Love, starring Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung, notably garnered widespread critical acclaim. Wong Kar-wai was born on 17 July 1958 in Shanghai, the youngest of three siblings and his father was a sailor and his mother was a housewife. By the time Wong was five years old, the seeds of the Cultural Revolution were beginning to take effect in China and his parents decided to relocate to British-ruled Hong Kong. The two older children were meant to them later, but the borders closed before they had a chance. In Hong Kong, the family settled in the Tsim Sha Tsui district, as a youth, Wong was frequently taken to the cinema by his mother and exposed to a variety of films. He later said, The only hobby I had as a child was watching movies, at school he was interested in graphic design, and earned a diploma in the subject from Hong Kong Polytechnic in 1980. After graduating, Wong was accepted onto a course with the TVB television network. He soon began a career, firstly with TV series and soap operas, such as Dont Look Now. He worked as part of a team, contributing to a variety of genres including romance, comedy, thriller and he is credited with ten screenplays between 1982 and 1987, but claims to have worked on about fifty more without official credit. Wong spent two years co-writing the screenplay for Patrick Tams action film Final Victory, for which he was nominated at the 7th Hong Kong Film Awards, by 1987 the Hong Kong film industry was at a peak, enjoying a considerable level of prosperity and productivity. Gangster films were popular at the time, in the wake of John Woos highly-successful A Better Tomorrow, specifically, unlike Hong Kongs other crime films, he chose to focus on young gangsters. The film, named As Tears Go By, tells the story of a youth who has to watch over his hot-headed friend. Because he was acquainted with the producer, Alan Tang, Wong was given considerable freedom in the making of As Tears Go By. His cast included what he considered some of the hottest young idols in Hong Kong, singer Andy Lau, Maggie Cheung, as Tears Go By was released in June 1988 and was popular with audiences. It was also a success, as several journalists named Wong among the Hong Kong New Wave. While it was a crime film, critic David Bordwell said that Wong out from his peers by abandoning the kinetics of comedies. As Tears Go By received no attention from Western critics upon its initial release, for his follow-up film, Wong decided to move away from the crime trend in Hong Kong cinema, to which he felt indifferent. He was eager to make something unusual, and the success of As Tears Go By made this possible
11.
Denys Arcand
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Georges-Henri Denys Arcand, CC GOQ is a French Canadian film director, screenwriter and producer. He has won an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film in 2004 for The Barbarian Invasions, also for The Barbarian Invasions, he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay, losing to Sofia Coppola for Lost in Translation. He won three César Awards in 2004 for The Barbarian Invasions, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best Film, Arcand was born in Deschambault, Quebec, Canada. He grew up in a devoutly Roman Catholic home in a village about 40 km southwest of Quebec City and he attended Jesuit school for nine years. During his university days, he and several friends would drive 600 km to New York City every few months to take in European films playing there that were not available in Quebec. In 1963, he joined the National Film Board of Canada where he produced several award-winning documentaries in his native French language, a social activist, he made a feature-length documentary in 1970 titled On est au coton that showed the exploitation of textile workers. The film caused an uproar that resulted in it not being distributed publicly for several years, Arcand received such publicity that it gave his fledgling career a great boost. He also worked on television series, notably Duplessis, a historical work he wrote about Premier Maurice Duplessis. During the early part of the 1970s Arcand produced a number of films that received critical acclaim. Arcand returned to directing documentaries and did no work for television, in 1982, his documentary, Le confort et lindifférence won the Best Film prize from the Quebec Film Critics Association. In 1986 he wrote and directed what was then the highest grossing film in Quebec history. At the Canadian Genie Awards, it captured best film, best director and it also won the International Critics Prize at the Cannes Film Festival and became the first Canadian feature film nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Three years later Arcand repeated this performance with his widely acclaimed 1989 film Jesus of Montreal winning the same three Genie awards, plus the Jury Prize at Cannes. The movie earned him a second Academy Award nomination, becoming the first Canadian director to accomplish this achievement and he then spent two years writing the script for what many claim is his finest piece of cinematic writing to date, The Barbarian Invasions. In addition, Denys Arcand was nominated for an Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay, the Barbarian Invasions won Frances 2004 César Award for Best Picture and Best Director plus the César Award for Best Original Screenplay. Arcands film Days of Darkness was chosen to close the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, the press opening was subdued, as opposed to receiving a standing ovation as with The Barbarian Invasions and the subsequent reviews were mixed. In 1988, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada and was promoted to Companion in 2005, in 1990 the Government of France awarded him the Legion of Honour. He finally earned from his home one of its highest distinctions
12.
Juliette Binoche
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Juliette Binoche is a French actress, artist and dancer. She has appeared in more than 60 feature films, been recipient of international awards. Coming from a background, she began taking acting lessons during adolescence. Her sensual performance in her English-language debut The Unbearable Lightness of Being, directed by Philip Kaufman, for her performance in Lasse Hallströms romantic comedy Chocolat, Binoche was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress. During the 2000s she maintained a career, alternating between French and English language roles in both mainstream and art-house productions. In 2010, she won the Best Actress Award at the Cannes Film Festival for her role in Abbas Kiarostamis Certified Copy making her the first actress to win the European Best Actress Triple Crown. In 2008 she began a tour with a modern dance production in-i devised in collaboration with Akram Khan. Binoche was born in Paris, the daughter of Jean-Marie Binoche, a director, actor, and sculptor, and Monique Yvette Stalens, a teacher, director, and actress. Her father, who is French, also has one eighth Portuguese-Brazilian ancestry, juliettes mother was born in Częstochowa, Poland. Binoches maternal grandfather, Andre Stalens, was born in Poland, of Belgian and French descent, both of them were actors who were born in Częstochowa, the German Nazi occupiers imprisoned them at Auschwitz as intellectuals. When Binoches parents divorced in 1968, four-year-old Binoche and her sister Marion were sent to a boarding school. During their teens, the Binoche sisters spent their holidays with their maternal grandmother. Binoche has stated that this perceived parental abandonment had an effect on her. She was not particularly academic and in her years began acting at school in amateur stage-productions. At 17 she directed and starred in a student production of the Eugène Ionesco play and she studied acting at the Conservatoire National Supérieur dArt Dramatique, but quit after a short time as she disliked the curriculum. In the early 1980s, she found an agent through a friend and joined a troupe, touring France, Belgium. Around this time she began lessons with acting coach Vera Gregh, after this Binoche secured her first feature-film appearance with a minor role in Pascal Kanés Liberty Belle. Her role required just two days on–set, but was enough to inspire Binoche to pursue a career in film, Binoches early films established her as a French star of some renown
13.
Jane Campion
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Dame Elizabeth Jane Campion DNZM is a New Zealand screenwriter, producer, and director. Campion was born in Wellington, New Zealand, the daughter of Edith, an actress, writer, and heiress, and Richard M. Campion. Her maternal great-grandfather was Robert Hannah, the manufacturer of Antrim House. Her father was from a family of Exclusive Brethren, with her older sister, Anna, born a year and half before her, and brother, Michael, born seven years after, Campion grew up in the world of New Zealand theatre. Her parents founded the New Zealand Players theatre group, while initially rejecting the idea of a career in theatre or acting, she graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology from Victoria University of Wellington in 1975. In 1976 Campion attended Chelsea Art School in London and travelled throughout Europe and she graduated with a Graduate Diploma in Visual Arts from the Sydney College of the Arts at the University of Sydney in 1981. Based on her education at art school, Campion cites surrealist painter Frida Kahlo, dissatisfied with the limits of painting as a medium, Campion turned to film and created her first short film, Tissues in 1980. In 1981 she began studying at the Australian Film, Television and Radio School, where she made several short films. Her first short film, Peel, won the Short Film Palme dOr at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival, and other awards followed for the shorts Passionless Moments, A Girls Own Story and After Hours. Having left the Australian Film and Television School she directed an episode for ABCs light entertainment series Dancing Daze, sweetie was her feature debut, and won international awards. Further recognition followed with An Angel at My Table, a biographical and psychological portrayal of the New Zealand writer Janet Frame, at the 66th Academy Awards, she was the second woman ever to be nominated for Best Director. Campions work since that time has tended to polarize opinion, the Portrait of a Lady, based on the Henry James novel, featured Nicole Kidman, John Malkovich, Barbara Hershey and Martin Donovan. Teamed Campion again with Harvey Keitel, this time with Kate Winslet as the female lead, in the Cut, an erotic thriller based on Susanna Moores bestseller, provided Meg Ryan an opportunity to depart from her more familiar onscreen persona. Her 2009 film Bright Star, a drama about poet John Keats. Campion was a producer for the 2006 documentary Abduction, The Megumi Yokota Story and has worked on the serial Top of the Lake. Campion herself was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Miniseries and she was the head of the jury for the Cinéfondation and Short Film sections at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. And the head of the jury for the competition section for the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Campion responded by rising from her seat to give him a hug, in 2014 it was announced that Campion was nearing a deal to direct an adaptation of Rachel Kushners novel The Flamethrowers
14.
Samuel L. Jackson
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Samuel Leroy Jackson is an American actor and film producer. With Jacksons permission, his likeness was used for the Ultimate version of the Marvel Comics character Nick Fury. He has also portrayed the character in the second and final episodes of the first season of the TV show Marvels Agents of S. H. I. E. L. D and he is married to LaTanya Richardson, with whom he has a daughter, Zoe. Samuel L. Jackson is ranked as the highest all-time box office star with over $4.9053 billion total box office gross, Jackson was born in Washington, D. C. the son of Elizabeth and Roy Henry Jackson. He grew up as a child in Chattanooga, Tennessee. His father lived away from the family in Kansas City, Missouri, Jackson only met his father twice during his life. Jackson was raised by his mother, who was a worker and later a supplies buyer for a mental institution. According to DNA tests, Jackson partially descends from the Benga people of Gabon, Jackson attended several segregated schools and graduated from Riverside High School in Chattanooga. Between the third and twelfth grades, he played the French horn, during childhood, he had a stuttering problem. While he eventually learned to pretend to be people who didnt stutter and use the curse word motherfucker as an affirmation word. Initially intent on pursuing a degree in biology, he attended Morehouse College in Atlanta. After joining a local acting group to earn points in a class, Jackson found an interest in acting. Before graduating in 1972, he co-founded the Just Us Theatre, after the 1968 assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. Jackson attended the funeral in Atlanta as one of the ushers. Jackson then flew to Memphis to join an equal rights protest march, in a Parade interview Jackson revealed, I was angry about the assassination, but I wasnt shocked by it. I knew that change was going to something different – not sit-ins. In 1969, Jackson and several other students held members of the Morehouse College board of trustees hostage on the campus, demanding reform in the schools curriculum and governance. The college eventually agreed to change its policy, but Jackson was charged with and eventually convicted of unlawful confinement, Jackson was then suspended for two years for his criminal record and his actions. He would later return to the college to earn his Bachelor of Arts in Drama in 1972, while he was suspended, Jackson was employed as a social worker in Los Angeles
15.
Bruce Willis
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Walter Bruce Willis is an American actor, producer, and singer. His career began on the Off-Broadway stage and then in television in the 1980s and he is known for his role of John McClane in the Die Hard series. He has appeared in over 60 films, including Color of Night, Pulp Fiction,12 Monkeys, The Fifth Element, Armageddon, The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, Sin City, Red, The Expendables 2, and Looper. Willis married actress Demi Moore in 1987, and they had three daughters, including Rumer, before their divorce in 2000, since 2009, he has been married to model Emma Heming, with whom he has two daughters. Willis was born Walter Bruce Willis on March 19,1955, in the town of Idar-Oberstein and his father, David Willis, was an American soldier. His mother, Marlene, was German, born in Kassel, Willis is the oldest of four children, he has a sister, Florence, and a brother, David. His brother Robert died of cancer in 2001, aged 42. After being discharged from the military in 1957, Williss father took his back to Carneys Point Township. Willis has described himself as having come from a line of blue collar people. His mother worked in a bank and his father was a welder, master mechanic, Willis attended Penns Grove High School in his hometown, where he encountered issues with a stutter. He was nicknamed Buck-Buck by his schoolmates, after high school, Willis took a job as a security guard at the Salem Nuclear Power Plant and transported work crews at the DuPont Chambers Works factory in Deepwater, New Jersey. After working as an investigator, Willis turned to acting. He enrolled in the Drama Program at Montclair State University, where he was cast in the production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Willis left school in his year and moved to New York City. Willis left New York City and headed to California to audition for television shows. In 1984, he appeared in an episode of the TV series Miami Vice, in 1985, he was the guest actor in the first episode of the 1980s revival of The Twilight Zone, Shatterday. He auditioned for the role of David Addison Jr. of the television series Moonlighting, competing against 3,000 other actors for the position, during the height of the shows success, beverage maker Seagram hired Willis as the pitchman for their Golden Wine Cooler products. The advertising campaign paid the rising star between $5–7 million over two years, in spite of that, Willis chose not to renew his contract with the company when he decided to stop drinking alcohol in 1988
16.
Wong Kar Wai
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His film In the Mood for Love, starring Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung, notably garnered widespread critical acclaim. Wong Kar-wai was born on 17 July 1958 in Shanghai, the youngest of three siblings and his father was a sailor and his mother was a housewife. By the time Wong was five years old, the seeds of the Cultural Revolution were beginning to take effect in China and his parents decided to relocate to British-ruled Hong Kong. The two older children were meant to them later, but the borders closed before they had a chance. In Hong Kong, the family settled in the Tsim Sha Tsui district, as a youth, Wong was frequently taken to the cinema by his mother and exposed to a variety of films. He later said, The only hobby I had as a child was watching movies, at school he was interested in graphic design, and earned a diploma in the subject from Hong Kong Polytechnic in 1980. After graduating, Wong was accepted onto a course with the TVB television network. He soon began a career, firstly with TV series and soap operas, such as Dont Look Now. He worked as part of a team, contributing to a variety of genres including romance, comedy, thriller and he is credited with ten screenplays between 1982 and 1987, but claims to have worked on about fifty more without official credit. Wong spent two years co-writing the screenplay for Patrick Tams action film Final Victory, for which he was nominated at the 7th Hong Kong Film Awards, by 1987 the Hong Kong film industry was at a peak, enjoying a considerable level of prosperity and productivity. Gangster films were popular at the time, in the wake of John Woos highly-successful A Better Tomorrow, specifically, unlike Hong Kongs other crime films, he chose to focus on young gangsters. The film, named As Tears Go By, tells the story of a youth who has to watch over his hot-headed friend. Because he was acquainted with the producer, Alan Tang, Wong was given considerable freedom in the making of As Tears Go By. His cast included what he considered some of the hottest young idols in Hong Kong, singer Andy Lau, Maggie Cheung, as Tears Go By was released in June 1988 and was popular with audiences. It was also a success, as several journalists named Wong among the Hong Kong New Wave. While it was a crime film, critic David Bordwell said that Wong out from his peers by abandoning the kinetics of comedies. As Tears Go By received no attention from Western critics upon its initial release, for his follow-up film, Wong decided to move away from the crime trend in Hong Kong cinema, to which he felt indifferent. He was eager to make something unusual, and the success of As Tears Go By made this possible
17.
Enrico Marini
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Enrico Marini is an Italian comics artist. His works include Gipsy with writer Thierry Smolderen and Le Scorpion with writer Stephen Desberg, Marini was born in and studied graphic arts in the School of Fine Arts of Basel. 1990, T.1 La colombe de la place Rouge, scénario Marelle, alpen Publishers 1992, T.2 Bienvenue à Kokonino World, scénario Thierry Smolderen, éd. Alpen Publishers 1992, T.3 Raid sur Kokonino World, scénario Thierry Smolderen, alpen Publishers 1993, T.4 Le parfum du magnolia, scénario Georges Pop, éd. Alpen Publishers 1993, T.1 Létoile du Gitan, scénario Thierry Smolderen, dargaud 1999, T.5 Laile blanche, scénario Thierry Smolderen, éd. Dargaud 2002, T.6 Le rire Aztèque, scénario Thierry Smolderen, dargaud 1996, LÉtoile du désert T.1, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd. Dargaud 1996, LÉtoile du désert T.2, scénario Stephen Desberg, dargaud 1999, Carnet de Croquis, éd. Dargaud 1998, Les Héritiers du Serpent, scénario Exem, éd, suzanne Hurter 1998, Rapaces 1, scénario Jean Dufaux, éd. Dargaud 2000, Rapaces 2, scénario Jean Dufaux, éd, dargaud 2001, Rapaces 3, scénario Jean Dufaux, éd. Dargaud 2003, Rapaces 4, scénario Jean Dufaux, éd, dargaud 2000, T.1 La marque du diable, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd. Dargaud 2001, T.2 Le secret du Pape, scénario Stephen Desberg, dargaud 2002, T.3 La croix de Pierre, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd. Dargaud 2004, T.4 Le Démon au Vatican, scénario Stephen Desberg, dargaud 2004, T.5 La vallée sacrée, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd. Dargaud 2005, T.6 Le trésor du Temple, scénario Stephen Desberg, dargaud 2006, T.7 Au Nom du Père, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd. Le procès scorpion, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd, dargaud 2008, T.8 Lombre de lange, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd. Dargaud 2010, T.9 Le masque de la vérité, scénario Stephen Desberg, dargaud 2012, T.10 Au nom du fils, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd. Dargaud 2013, Integral in two volumes, éd, dargaud 2014, T.11 La Neuvième Famille, scénario Stephen Desberg, éd
18.
Orhan Pamuk
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Ferit Orhan Pamuk is a Turkish novelist, screenwriter, academic and recipient of the 2006 Nobel Prize in Literature. One of Turkeys most prominent novelists, his work has sold over thirteen books in sixty-three languages. Pamuk is the author of novels including The White Castle, The Black Book, The New Life, My Name Is Red, Snow, The Museum of Innocence, and A Strangeness in My Mind. He is the Robert Yik-Fong Tam Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University, born in Istanbul, Pamuk is the first Turkish Nobel laureate. He is also the recipient of other literary awards. My Name Is Red won the 2002 Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger,2002 Premio Grinzane Cavour and 2003 International Dublin Literary Award, the European Writers Parliament came about as a result of a joint proposal by Pamuk and José Saramago. In 2005, the ultra-nationalist lawyer Kemal Kerinçsiz sued Pamuk over his statement regarding the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire and his intention, according to Pamuk himself, had been to highlight issues relating to freedom of speech in the country of his birth. The court initially rejected to hear the case, but in 2011 Pamuk was ordered to pay 6,000 liras in compensation for having insulted the plaintiffs honor. He was educated at Robert College secondary school in Istanbul and went on to study architecture at the Istanbul Technical University since it was related to his dream career. He left the school after three years, however, to become a full-time writer, and graduated from the Institute of Journalism at the University of Istanbul in 1976. From ages 22 to 30, Pamuk lived with his mother, writing his first novel and he describes himself as a Cultural Muslim who associates the historical and cultural identification with the religion while not believing in a personal connection to God. He started writing regularly in 1974 and his first novel, Karanlık ve Işık was a co-winner of the 1979 Milliyet Press Novel Contest. This novel was published with the title Cevdet Bey ve Oğulları in 1982 and it tells the story of three generations of a wealthy Istanbul family living in Nişantaşı, the district of Istanbul where Pamuk grew up. His historical novel Beyaz Kale, published in Turkish in 1985, won the 1990 Independent Award for Foreign Fiction, the New York Times Book Review stated, A new star has risen in the east—Orhan Pamuk. He started experimenting with techniques in his novels, a change from the strict naturalism of his early works. Popular success took a bit longer to come to Pamuk, but his 1990 novel Kara Kitap became one of the most controversial and popular readings in Turkish literature, due to its complexity and richness. In 1992, he wrote the screenplay for the movie Gizli Yüz, based on Kara Kitap and directed by a prominent Turkish director, Pamuks fifth novel Yeni Hayat caused a sensation in Turkey upon its 1994 publication and became the fastest-selling book in Turkish history. By this time, Pamuk had also become a figure in Turkey
19.
Jia Zhangke
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Jia Zhangke is a Chinese film director and screenwriter. He is generally regarded as a figure of the Sixth Generation movement of Chinese cinema. Jias early films, a trilogy based in his home province of Shanxi, were made outside of Chinas state-run film bureaucracy. Beginning in 2004, Jias status in his own country rose when he was allowed to direct his fourth film, The World. Jias films have received praise and have been recognized internationally, notably winning the Venice Film Festivals top award Golden Lion for Still Life. NPR critic John Powers described him as perhaps the most important filmmaker working in the world today, Jia was born in Fenyang, Shanxi, China. His interest in film began in the early 1990s, as an art student at the Shanxi University in Taiyuan, on a lark, Jia attended a screening of Chen Kaiges masterpiece, Yellow Earth. The film, according to Jia, was changing. Jia would eventually make it to Chinas prestigious Beijing Film Academy in 1993, as a film theory major, while a student at the Beijing Film Academy, Jia would make three short films to hone his skills. The first, a short documentary on tourists in Tiananmen Square entitled One Day in Beijing, was made in 1994 on self-raised funds. Though Jia has referred to his first directorial effort as inconsequential and naive, he described the short day. But it was Jias second directorial effort, the short film Xiao Shan Going Home and it was a film that helped establish Jias style and thematic interests and, in Jias words, was a film that truly marks the beginning of my career as a filmmaker. Xiao Shan would eventually screen abroad where it won a top prize at the 1997 Hong Kong Independent Short Film & Video Awards. creative team, with their support, Jia was able to begin work on Xiao Wu, which would become his first feature film. Before graduating, however, Jia would make one more film, Du Du. The film, little seen and rarely available, was for Jia an exercise of experimentation and technique, for Jia, the film was an important learning experience, even if he was not terribly proud of the end result. Upon graduation, Jia embarked on his first feature-length film, with producer Li Kit Ming, Xiao Wu, a film about a pickpocket in Jias native Fenyang, emerged from Jias desire to capture the massive changes that had happened to his home in the past few years. Additionally, the film was a rejection of what Jia felt was the fifth generations increasing tendency to move away from the reality of modern China and into the realm of historical legend. Shot on a mere 400,000 RMB budget, Xiao Wu would prove to be a success on the international film circuit
20.
Marco Bellocchio
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Marco Bellocchio is an Italian film director, screenwriter, and actor. Born in Bobbio, near Piacenza, Marco Bellocchio had a strict Catholic upbringing – his father was a lawyer, his mother a schoolteacher. He began studying philosophy in Milan but then decided to film school, making his first film, Fists in the Pocket, funded by family members and shot on family property. In 1991 he won the Silver Bear – Special Jury Prize at the 41st Berlin International Film Festival for his film The Conviction, in 1995 he directed a documentary about the Red Brigades and the kidnapping of Aldo Moro, entitled Broken Dreams. In 2003, he directed a film on the same theme, Good Morning. In 2006 his film The Wedding Director was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival, in 1999 he was awarded with an Honorable Prize for the contribution to cinema at the 21st Moscow International Film Festival. In 2009 he directed Vincere, which was in the competition at the Cannes Film Festival. He finished Sorelle Mai, a film that was shot over ten years with the students of six separate workshops playing themselves. He was awarded with the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 68th Venice International Film Festival in September 2011 and his 2012 film Dormant Beauty was selected to compete for the Golden Lion at the 69th Venice International Film Festival. On 6 September 2012, Bellocchio condemned the Catholic Churchs interference in politics after the premiere of his new film about a high-profile euthanasia case. The film approaches the topic of euthanasia, and the difficulty setting of legislation on end of life in a country, Italy, the subject is inspired by Eluana Englaros case. Following the decision of the jury of the Venice Film Festival, Bellocchio made a big impact on radical Italian cinema in the mid-sixties, and was a friend of Pasolini. In 1968 he joined the Communist Union, and began to make politically militant cinema, however, in a 2002 interview, he remarked, I can talk about my personal ideas but Marxism has little to do with it now. No party is now proposing a change of anything. He was candidate for Italian Parliament in 2006, with Rose in the Fist list, a political cartel made by socialists and Italian Radicals
21.
Maggie Cheung
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Maggie Cheung Man-yuk is a Hong Kong actress. Raised in Britain and Hong Kong, she has over 70 films to her credit since starting her career in 1983, as Emily Wang in Clean, her last starring role to date, she became the first Asian actress to win a prize at the Cannes Film Festival. Maggie Cheung was born in Hong Kong in 1964 to Shanghainese parents and she attended St. Pauls Convent School, where she began at the primary one level. Her family emigrated from Hong Kong to the United Kingdom when she was eight and she spent part of her childhood and adolescence in Bromley, Kent, England. She returned to Hong Kong at the age of 18 in 1982 for a vacation but ended up staying for modeling assignments and she also shortly obtained a sales job at Lane Crawford department store. In 1983, Cheung entered the Miss Hong Kong pageant and won the first runner-up and she was a semi-finalist in the Miss World pageant the same year. Prior to 1988, Cheungs screen appearances were limited to eye candy roles. One of Cheungs notable movie roles then is that of May, Maggie frequently cited her performance in the movie As Tears Go By, her first of many collaborations with film director Wong Kar-wai, as the piece that truly began her serious acting career. Cheung is a polyglot as a result of her upbringing in Hong Kong and England, in Centre Stage, Cheung performed in Cantonese, Mandarin and Shanghainese fluently, switching languages with ease. In Clean, she performed in fluent English, French and Cantonese, audiences outside Asia have become increasingly familiar with Cheungs work, including Irma Vep, Centre Stage, Chinese Box, In the Mood for Love, Hero,2046, and most recently, Clean. Cheung was a member at the 1997 Berlin Film Festival, the 1999 Venice Film Festival, the 2004 Hawaii Intl Film Festival, the 2007 Cannes Film Festival. And for the first time in its history, the 59th Cannes Film Festival used an image of a real actress on its poster — that of Cheung. On 7 February 2007, The New York Times rated Maggie Cheung as one of the 22 Great Performers in 2006 for her Cannes winning role as Emily in Clean. After 25 years of making movies, she decided to retire from acting to pursue a career as a film composer and she had mentioned she would like to compose music and paint after having fulfilled her acting potential. Her most recent film appearance was as Mazu, Chinese goddess of the sea, in the film/video installation Ten Thousand Waves by British filmmaker and installation artist Isaac Julien. As UKs Independent puts it, since her Cannes moment in 2004, Cheung turned her back on film and has shifted her focus to philanthropy, making music, in April 2010, Cheung was appointed as UNICEFs Ambassador to China. In July 2011, she was awarded a honoris causa at the University of Edinburgh. Cheung married French director Olivier Assayas in 1998
22.
Toni Collette
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She is a recipient of six AACTA Awards, one Emmy Award and one Golden Globe Award, and has been nominated twice for a BAFTA Award and once for both an Academy Award and a Tony Award. Collettes acting career began in the early 1990s with comedic roles in such as Spotswood and Muriels Wedding. Collette returned to Broadway in Will Enos The Realistic Joneses, for which she earned a Drama Desk Special Award, Toni Collett was born in Blacktown, a suburb in Western Sydney, the daughter of Judith, a customer-service representative, and Bob Collett, a truck driver. She has two brothers, Ben and Christopher. She was born under the surname Collett, but added an e at the end for her stage name and her biological paternal grandfather was an American serviceman whose name Toni does not know. From an early age, Collette showed a talent for acting and she faked an appendicitis when she was eleven, and was so convincing that doctors removed her appendix, although tests showed nothing wrong with it. She attended Blacktown Girls High School until the age of 16 and her first acting role was onstage in the musical Godspell in Sydney in her early teens. Collette made her debut in 1990, in a guest appearance on the Seven Network drama series A Country Practice. In 1992, she made her film debut as part of the ensemble comedy-drama Spotswood, which starred Anthony Hopkins. Collette soon rocketed to international notice with her performance in the role for Muriels Wedding in 1994. She won the Australian award for Best Actress as Muriel, her first of five Australian Film Institute awards, in 1996, she was part of the ensemble cast of the comedy, Così, and had a leading role in Emma as the naïve Harriet Smith. She has also received acclaim on Broadway, starring as Queenie in Michael John LaChiusas musical work. For this role, Collette was nominated for the Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical, Collette turned down the title role in Bridget Joness Diary because she was committed to perform on Broadway at the time. In 1999, she was nominated for an Academy Award for her role as the mother of a boy in the U. S. film The Sixth Sense. In 2000, she was the voice of Meg Bluegum Bunyips mother in The Magic Pudding based on the childrens book by Norman Lindsay. Collette won the Australian Film Institute award for Best Actress for her performance, in 2004, Collette starred with Nia Vardalos and David Duchovny in the musical comedy Connie and Carla, released by Universal Studios. Collettes only film in 2005 was In Her Shoes, a comedy-drama about the relationship between two sisters and their estranged grandmother, co-starring Cameron Diaz and Shirley MacLaine. In 2006, Collette starred in Little Miss Sunshine, a movie about a familys trip to a childrens beauty pageant
23.
Maria de Medeiros
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Maria Esteves de Medeiros Victorino de Almeida, DamSE, known as Maria de Medeiros, is a Portuguese actress, director, and singer who has been involved in both European and American film productions. She is best known internationally for playing Fabienne in Quentin Tarantinos 1994 film Pulp Fiction, Maria de Medeiros was born in Lisbon, Portugal, the daughter of musician and composer António Victorino de Almeida. She played her first part on screen at the age of 15, at the age of 18, she moved to France to pursue her acting studies and was a student at the CNSAD. Medeiros speaks French fluently without an accent and has acted extensively on stage and she also acts in Spanish, German, and Italian productions. Medeiros is the first Portuguese woman to be designated a UNESCO Artist for Peace, among Medeiros most memorable film appearances are three early 1990s roles. Her considerable resemblance to Anaïs Nin landed her the role in Henry & June. In 1990, she played the role of Maria in Ken McMullens film about the rise of the Paris Commune,1871, in 1994, Medeiros appeared in Quentin Tarantinos Pulp Fiction playing Fabienne, the girlfriend of Butch Coolidge. In 2000, Medeiros directed the film April Captains about the 1974 Carnation Revolution in Portugal, the film was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival. In 2003, Medeiros appeared as a hairdresser in the movie My Life Without Me starring Sarah Polley and she has starred in the Canadian movie The Saddest Music in the World directed by Guy Maddin and co-starring Isabella Rossellini and Mark McKinney. In 2007, Medeiros released an album, A Little More Blue, in which she performs songs by Brazilian musicians, including Chico Buarque, Caetano Veloso, Ivan Lins, on the album, she sings in Portuguese, French, and English. On 23 February 2010 her second recording was released, Peninsulas & Continentes, in 2009, she sang These Boots Are Made for Walkin on the Legendary Tigerman album Femina. Sévérine C. De Medeiros sings La pappa col pomodoro Femina, De Medeiros sings These Boots Are Made for Walkin Señora
24.
Michel Piccoli
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Jacques Daniel Michel Piccoli is a French actor and filmmaker of Italian descent. He has one of the longest careers in cinema, and is regarded worldwide as a symbol of Frances film history, more specifically of the 60s. He was born in Paris to a family, his mother was a pianist. He has appeared in different roles, from seducer to cop to gangster to Pope. He has been married three times, first to Éléonore Hirt, then for eleven years to the singer Juliette Gréco and he has one daughter from his first marriage, Anne-Cordélia. Piccoli is politically active on the left, and is opposed to the Front National. He won the Best Actor Award at the 1980 Cannes Film Festival for A Leap in the Dark, in 1982, he won the Silver Bear for Best Actor at the 32nd Berlin International Film Festival for his role in Strange Affair. In 2001 he was the recipient of the Europe Theatre Prize, Michel Piccoli at the Internet Movie Database
25.
Sarah Polley
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Sarah Ellen Polley OC is a Canadian actress, writer, director and political activist. Polley first garnered attention for her role as Sara Stanley in the Canadian television series Road to Avonlea. She has starred in feature films, including Exotica, The Sweet Hereafter, Guinevere, Go, The Weight of Water, My Life Without Me, Dawn of the Dead, Splice. Polleys second film, Take This Waltz, premiered at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival and her film Stories We Tell is a feature-length documentary. It had its premiere at the 2012 Venice Film Festival. The Toronto Film Critics Association awarded it the $100,000 prize for best Canadian film of the year, Polley was born in Toronto, Ontario. She is the youngest of five born to Diane Elizabeth. Polley was raised by Diane and her husband, Michael Polley. Her siblings are Mark and Joanna, both older, and, from her mothers first marriage, Susy and John Buchan and her mother Diane had Scottish ancestry. During her childhood, Polleys siblings often teased Polley because she bore no resemblance to Michael. Polley discovered as an adult that her father was actually Harry Gulkin. When Polley turned 18, she decided to follow up on suggestions from her mothers friends that her father might be Geoff Bowes—one of three castmates from her mothers play in Montreal. Meeting with Gulkin as just someone who could provide information about Diane in Montreal, bowes and Michael Polley also confirmed, in Stories We Tell, that they had sexual relations with Diane during the run of the Montreal play. Gulkins paternity was later confirmed by a DNA test, Polley attended Subway Academy II, then Earl Haig Secondary School, but dropped out at age 15. Her first cinematic appearance was at the age of four, as Molly in the Disney film One Magic Christmas. She was also in the episode for Friday the 13th – The Series, as well as appearing in a small role in William Fruets sci-fi horror film Blue Monkey. At age eight, she was cast as Ramona Quimby in the television series Ramona and that same year, she played one of the lead characters in Terry Gilliams The Adventures of Baron Munchausen. Polley burst into the eye the following year,1990
26.
Abderrahmane Sissako
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Abderrahmane Sissako is a film director and producer who has often worked in Mali and France. Sissako is, along with Ousmane Sembène, Souleymane Cissé, Idrissa Ouedraogo and Djibril Diop Mambety and his film Waiting for Happiness was screened at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival official selection under Un Certain Regard, winning the FIPRESCI Prize. His 2007 film Bamako received much attention, Sissakos themes include globalisation, exile and the displacement of people. His 2014 film Timbuktu was selected to compete for the Palme dOr in the competition section at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Soon after his birth Sissakos family emigrated to Mali, his fathers country, Sissako returned briefly to Mauritania, his mothers land, in 1980. Then he left for Moscow, where he studied cinema at the VGIK from 1983 to 1989, Sissako settled in France at the beginning of the 1990s. Besides his work as a director, he works as a cultural advisor for Mauritanian head of state Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz. In addition to films and short films, Sissako has served on the jury of the Premiers Plans festival in Angers in January 2007. Pour en finir avec le cinéma du Nord », Le Monde,21 octobre 2006, p.19 Samuel Lelièvre, « Les cinémas africains, Abderrahmane Sissako et les frontières du monde », CinémAction, no
27.
Jasmine Trinca
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Jasmine Trinca is an Italian actress. Trinca was born in Rome, Italy and she began her career in 2001, chosen by Nanni Moretti for his award-winning The Sons Room, receiving the Guglielmo Biraghi prize as best new talent of the year. In 2004, she won a Nastro dArgento for The Best of Youth, Trinca played again with Moretti in the controversial Il caimano. Jasmine Trinca at the Internet Movie Database Jasmine Trincas Profile on www. shooting-stars. eu
28.
Niki Karimi
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Niki Karimi is an Iranian actress, director, and screenwriter. Niki Karimi was born and raised in Tehran, Iran and she has been active in theater since elementary school, and has said that her early interest in film and literature inspired her to become an actress. In 1990, she was cast as a bride in Behrooz Afkhamis hit film The Bride. Niki has won awards nationally and internationally for Sara such as San Sebastian film festival award for best actress. She was assistant of Abbas Kiarostami from 1992 to 2007, expanding on her career as an actor, she wrote and directed the documentary To Have or Not to Have. In 2001, she won her first award as a director in Irans Rain film festival for her work To Have or Not to Have, which was produced by renowned Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami. Nominated at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival for her film directorial debut One Night, she said that acting no longer satisfied her. In addition to film, Karimi has also done some translating work, in 1999 she released her first translation work, Marlon Brandos biography Songs My Mother Taught Me, which she translated from English to Persian. She also translated two books by Hanif Kureishi, Pakistani-English writer and her third film as director, Final whistle, won three awards at the Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema in Vesoul, France. She has been nominated for best actress award in Fajr Film Festival in 2011 for I Am His Wife and she has been awarded recently by the jury of the Iranian Fajr Film ّFestival for her last film as best director, actress and producer. She also got an award for acting in two films, Wednesday, May 9 and Death of Fish
29.
Clotilde Courau
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Clotilde of Savoy, Princess of Venice, is an award-winning French actress. She is the wife of Emanuele Filiberto, Prince of Venice, a member of the House of Savoy and the grandson of Umberto II, professionally, she is known by her maiden name. Clotilde Courau was born on 3 April 1969 in Levallois-Perret, Hauts-de-Seine, France and she has three sisters named Christine, Camille, and Capucine Courau. Clotilde was brought up in the Roman Catholic religion, in 1991, Courau was nominated for a César, for Most Promising Actress, and won a European Film Award for Best Actress, both for the film Le petit criminel. In 1995, she won the Prix Suzanne Bianchetti at the SACD Awards and she was nominated again for a César twice in 1996 for Best Supporting Actress and Most Promising Actress both for the film Élisa. In 1998 she was named as one of European cinemas Shooting Stars by European Film Promotion and she was also created a Dame of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres of France on 7 February 2007. She had a role in Deterrence, an American film about nuclear war that marked the directing debut of Rod Lurie. Clotilde Courau announced her engagement on 10 July, and on 25 September 2003 at the Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli e dei Martiri in Rome, she married Emanuele Filiberto, at the ceremony she wore a wedding gown designed by Valentino. Six months pregnant at the time of the wedding, she was seen as a royal bride because of her left-wing views. The couple have two daughters, Princess Vittoria of Savoy, born on 29 December 2003, Princess Luisa of Savoy, born on 16 August 2006. After her marriage Clotilde became Clotilde of Savoy, Princess of Venice, in 2009, her name was given to a rose created by the rose grower Fabien Ducher to mark the 500000th visitor to the Jardins de lImaginaire, Terrasson
30.
Alexander Sokurov
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Alexander Nikolayevich Sokurov, PAR is a Russian filmmaker. Sokurov was born in Podorvikha, Irkutsk Oblast, in Siberia and he graduated from the History Department of the Nizhny Novgorod University in 1974 and entered one of the VGIK studios the following year. There he became friends with Tarkovsky and was influenced by his film Mirror. Most of Sokurovs early features were banned by Soviet authorities, during his early period, he produced numerous documentaries, including The Dialogues with Solzhenitsyn and a reportage about Grigori Kozintsevs flat in St Petersburg. His film Mournful Unconcern was nominated for the Golden Bear at the 37th Berlin International Film Festival in 1987, mother and Son was his first internationally acclaimed feature film. It was entered into the 20th Moscow International Film Festival where it won the Special Silver St. George and it was mirrored by Father and Son, which baffled the critics with its implicit homoeroticism. Susan Sontag included two Sokurov features among her ten films of the 1990s, saying, There’s no director active today whose films I admire as much. In 2006, he received the Master of Cinema Award of the International Filmfestival Mannheim-Heidelberg, Sokurov is a Cannes Film Festival regular, with four of his movies having debuted there. However, until 2011, Sokurov didnt win top awards at international festivals. For a long time, his most commercially and critically successful film was the semi-documentary Russian Ark, acclaimed primarily for its visually hypnotic images, Sokurov has filmed a tetralogy exploring the corrupting effects of power. The first three installments were dedicated to prominent 20th-century rulers, Moloch, about Hitler, Taurus, about Lenin, in 2011, Sokurov shot the last part of the series, Faust, a retelling of Goethes tragedy. The film, depicting instincts and schemes of Faust in his lust for power, the film won the Golden Lion, the highest award of the Venice Festival. Three of his works, Spiritual Voices, From the Diaries of a War, Confession, From the Commander’s Diary, Confession has been screened at several independent film festivals, while the other two are virtually unknown. In 1994 Sokurov accompanied Russian troops to a post on the Tajikistan-Afghanistan border, the result was Spiritual Voices, From the Diaries of a War, a 327-minute cinematic meditation on the war and the spirit of the Russian army. Landscape photography is featured in the film, but the music, soldiers jargon and the combination of animal sounds, sighs and other location sounds in the fog and other visual effects give the film a phantasmagorical feel. On the journey from Russia to the border post, in the film, Sokurov captures their physical toil and their mental desolation, as well as daily rituals such as meals, sharing tobacco, writing letters and cleaning duties. There is no start or end to the dialogues, Sokurov negates conventional narrative structure, the final part of the film celebrates the arrival of the New Year,1995, but the happiness is fleeting. The following day, everything remains the same, the endless waiting at a border post, the fear, in Confession, From the Commander’s Diary, Sokurov films officers from the Russian Navy, showing the monotony and lack of freedom of their everyday lives
31.
The Banishment
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The Banishment is a 2007 Russian film directed by Andrey Zvyagintsev. The film is a adaptation of The Laughing Matter, a 1953 novel by Armenian-American writer William Saroyan. It stars Konstantin Lavronenko and Maria Bonnevie, the film premiered at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for the Palme dOr. Lavronenko won the Best Actor award at the festival and it was released in Russian cinemas on 2 October 2007. The film received mixed reviews from critics, Alex brings his wife Vera and two children for a trip to his childhood home in the countryside. The tranquillity of the countryside is broken when Vera tells Alex that she is pregnant and he believes that this baby is not his. The rift between the couple grows but the two try to keep up appearances in the presence of their children and the old friends that visit them, Alex is unsure about what to do and turns to his brother Mark for advice. On the way to meet Mark at the station, Alexs son Kir reveals that Alexs friend Robert was at their house one day while Alex was away for work. Alex concludes that Robert is the babys father, Vera feels estranged from her husband, and fears that Kir will follow in Alex and Marks criminal footsteps. In the films opening scene, Mark comes to Alexs house for help removing a bullet from his arm. In the end, Alex forces Vera to have an abortion hoping they will be able to re-build their relationship, while their children are at a friends house, he gets Mark to find a doctor to perform the procedure. After the abortion Vera commits suicide by overdosing on pain relieving medication, Alex and Mark rush the funeral formalities as gossip spreads quickly in the countryside. After returning home from the parlour, Mark has a serious heart attack. Against the advice of the doctor, he attends Veras funeral but dies before he, Alex returns to the city alone and goes to Roberts house with the intention of killing him. Alex falls asleep in his car outside the house and is awoken by Robert who invites him in, as he retrieves the gun from the glove box, he discovers an envelope containing the results of Veras pregnancy test and a letter written by Vera on the back. The film cuts to a flashback of the time Robert came to Alexs home while he was away and it is revealed that the day before, Vera attempted to commit suicide by overdosing on pills but is saved by Robert. She expressed concerns about having another baby in this relationship that was lacking communication, the films screenplay was presented to Zvyagintsev by Artyom Melkumian, an Armenian friend of his who worked as a television cameraman. Melkumian loved William Saroyans The Laughing Matter and spent ten years adapting the novel, originally, the script had a lot of dialogue but Zvyagintsev said that when he started testing it with actors it was a disaster and had to remorselessly cut the dialogue
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Andrey Zvyagintsev
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Andrey Petrovich Zvyagintsev is a Russian film director and actor. He is mostly known for his 2003 film The Return, which won him a Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, following The Return, Zvyagintsev directed The Banishment and Elena. His most recent film Leviathan was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film in 2014, Zvyagintsev was born in Novosibirsk, Siberia. At the age of 20 in 1984 he graduated from the school in Novosibirsk as an actor. Since 1986 he has lived in Moscow where he continued his studies at the Russian Academy of Theatre Arts until 1990, from 1992 to 2000 he worked as an actor for film and theater. In 2000 he began to work for the TV station REN TV, in 2003, he directed his first feature film The Return, which received several awards, including a Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival. His second feature film The Banishment premiered at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival and was nominated for a Palme dOr, in 2008, he directed Apocrypha, a short segment for the film New York, I Love You. The segment was cut from the films theatrical release but is included on the DVD. His 2011 film, Elena, premiered at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival, in the Un Certain Regard section and his 2014 film Leviathan was selected to compete for the Palme dOr in the main competition section at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. Zvyagintsev won the award for Best Screenplay. for Leviathan, Leviathan received a Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film in 2015. As of January 2015, Leviathan has been nominated for the Academy Award for best Foreign Language Film, in 2015 he was a jury president of the 18th Shanghai International Film Festival
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Breath (2007 film)
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Breath is the fourteenth feature film by South Korean director Kim Ki-duk. A loner housewife, Yeon, deals with her depression and anger by beginning an affair with a convicted man on death row. After discovering her husband’s infidelity, Yeon visits the prison where a condemned criminal. She has been following the reports of his numerous suicide attempts. Despite knowing Jins crimes, Yeon treats him like an old lover and puts all her efforts into his happiness, even though she doesnt know him. Breath was nominated for the Palme dOr award at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, the film grossed a total of $624,947 internationally. Breath at the Internet Movie Database Breath at the Korean Movie Database Breath at HanCinema Breath at Festival de Cannes
