Film Buzz
The Hurt Locker wins the Best Picture OscarMonday, 08 March 2010
Kathryn Bigelow made Hollywood history last night at the 82nd Academy Awards by becoming the first woman to be named Best Director for The Hurt Locker, which also won for Best Picture. Her brilliant, low-budget Iraq war drama was the big winner at the ceremony, bagging six statuettes as against three Oscars for the co-favourite, Avatar, the sci-fi extravaganza directed by Bigelow's ex-husband James Cameron. The four acting awards were utterly unsurprising and it was a lean... Read more... |
Bafta interviews and reviewsTuesday, 23 February 2010
Read theartsdesk's reviews and interviews for the British Academy of Film and Television Arts award-winners. Read more... |
High-Def Hell in The PacificFriday, 19 February 2010
Take cover! The Pacific is the new 10-part World War Two epic from executive producers Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks, a follow-up to their 2001 series Band of Brothers. It was commissioned by HBO, who will premiere it in the States on March 14, and comes to Sky Movies HD in the UK over Easter. |
Mad Man mystery of A Single ManWednesday, 17 February 2010A tiny incidental pleasure in a movie that could use a few more of them is the Mystery Telephone Voice in Tom Ford’s directorial debut, A Single Man. It’s the moment when college professor George Falconer (Colin Firth) gets some… er… very bad news over the phone. Read more... |
Film has world premieres in Romford, Greenwich, Bethnal Green, Feltham....Thursday, 11 February 2010
The Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, today announced a new initiative, London Film Day. Sunday 21 March will see 15 simultaneous world premieres at suburban cinemas across the capital from Wood Green and Wandsworth to (stretching the definition of London somewhat) Romford and Croydon. The film in question is admittedly one for families more than cinephiles: Nanny McPhee and the Big Bang, the second comedy scripted by Emma Thompson from the Nurse Matilda books. Thompson also... Read more... |
An eruption of pop-up cinemasFriday, 05 February 2010
Pop-up cinemas, like restaurants, shops and galleries, are, well, popping up all over the place these days, but one of the pioneers has been Secret Cinema. This outfit claims, grandly, to have been "revolutionising the traditional cinematic experience" ever since December 2007 and its Facebook page boasts over 26,000 fans. It would seem that the secret is out. Read more... |
Raspberry ripples and Oscar odditiesThursday, 04 February 2010Although the UK Film Council lost no time in firing out the usual self-congratulatory press release, it has been a thin year for British nominees at this year's Oscars. And, as Kim Newman, my colleague from the London... Read more... |
Eric Rohmer 1920-2010Monday, 11 January 2010
Eric Rohmer, who died yesterday in Paris aged 89, was famed for elegant, literate, yet profoundly romantic and erotic dramas such as La Collectionneuse, My Night With Maud and Claire's Knee; and for a style that helped define the French Nouvelle Vague and that he pursued with distinction in some 50 films over the next half century (his last, The Romance of Astrea and Celadon was made two years ago). Read more... |
theartsdesk an essential site of 2009: BBC Radio 5 LiveFriday, 01 January 2010
|
Boxing Day Bloat: theartsdesk recommendsSaturday, 26 December 2009
The morning after the day before has dawned. If you're not inclined to join the shopping queues, theartsdesk is happy to suggest alternatives. Our writers recommend all sorts of cultural things you could get up to in the next week. Read more... |
British Independent Film AwardsSunday, 06 December 2009
Sir Michael Caine and Daniel Day Lewis were the headline honorees at the 12th British Independent Film Awards in London last night, while Moon, an ultra low-budget sci-fi movie directed by Duncan Jones, David Bowie's son, was named Best Film. The full list of nominees and... Read more... |
Jeremy Deller on The Posters Came From The WallsSaturday, 28 November 2009
"Depeche Mode," says Jeremy Deller, "have always been seen as a bit naff in this country, at least in the media. They could never shake off the image of their earliest Top Of The Pops appearances, so no matter how musically exploratory they got, they tended to be seen as this jumped-up rather silly pop band. Read more... |
Freedom to Create Prize 2009: Filmmaker winsThursday, 26 November 2009
The second annual Freedom to Create Prize, which was presented in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London last night, has been won by Mohsen Makhmalbaf. The internationally renowned and prolific Iranian filmmaker, 52, downed tools earlier this year to become an official mouthpiece outside Iran for the presidential candidate Mir-Mossein Mousavi. Read more... |
theartsdesk in Colombo: Sri Lankan sports wannabes go globalSunday, 15 November 2009
The Regal Cinema is a charming old place. At 300 rupees for a box seat (£1.50 on a good day for the SLR), you can put your feet up, sip your Fanta in style and, peeping through the plush velour curtains that separate you from both hoi polloi and screen (if not from the nouveaux in box 9), get a disconcertingly exact idea of how the place must have felt when the young Queen Elizabeth II sat in this very seat, shortly after the place was built for her. Read more... |
The Nature Autumn '09 Debate: Science in CinemaMonday, 09 November 2009
It's genuinely sad that last night's proceedings are not higher on the cultural agenda and that the gleaming new Kings Place auditorium was only half full. But as one of the participants pointed out, 50 years on from C P Snow's Two Cultures, there is still an arts establishment for whom sci-fi means Star Trek, and the ludicrous guff of ... Read more... |
Sheffield Doc/Fest: the wrapMonday, 09 November 2009
Upon emerging from Sheffield railway station, one of the first things you clap eyes on is Andrew Motion’s 2007 poem What If? unfurling down the side of one of the university tower blocks and gleaming faintly in the last of the autumn sun. With its exhortation to “greet and understand what lies ahead... The lives which wait as yet unseen, unread,” it’s not a bad incidental epigram for a festival of documentary film-making whose trailer was inspired by the city’s cosmopolitan identity.... Read more... |
theartsdesk received a New Year's gift last night when we were given a significant accolade from BBC Radio 5 Live. In Web 2009 with Helen and Olly, the station's podcasters and self-styled "internet obsessives" Helen Zaltzman and Olly Mann recognised theartsdesk as one of the five "essential sites of 20...
Pages
latest in today
Album: Marina Allen - Eight Pointed Star
While some tracks on Marina Allen’s third album are country accented and a pedal steel is used a few times, it’s impossible to categorise as ...
theartsdesk Q&A: Matthew Modine on 'Hard Miles...
Maybe California-born Matthew Modine caught the movie bug courtesy of his father Mark, who used to manage drive-in theatres, but after bagging his...
Lie Low, Royal Court review - short sharp sliver of pain
Faye is okay. Or, at least she says she’s okay. But is she really? And, if she really is, like really okay, why is she seeking help for her...
The Beast review - AI takes over the job centre
Adaptations of Henry James have often failed to click over the years. The author’s private, introspective works – sightseeing trips around people’...
Judy Chicago Revelations, Serpentine Gallery review - art de...
Being a successful artist is not Judy Chicago’s primary goal. She abandoned that ambition six decades ago when the Los Angeles art world greeted...
Album: Becky Hill - Believe Me Now?
There’s a whole generation of singers who’ve risen to considerable fame on the back of the return of home-grown commercial dance music to the...
Boys from the Blackstuff, National Theatre review - a lyrica...
Prolific playwright James Graham was born in 1982, the year Alan Bleasdale's...
Murrihy, Martineau, Wigmore Hall review - poise, transformat...
Peerless among the constellation of Irish singers making waves around the world, mezzo Paula Murrihy first dazzled London as Ascanio in Terry...
Tokyo Vice, Series 2, BBC iPlayer review - an exciting ride...
It’s entirely fitting that Jake Adelstein should have a poster for All the President’s Men on the wall of his Tokyo apartment, since it...
First Person: LIFT artistic director Kris Nelson on deliveri...
LIFT 2024 is nearly here. It’s a festival that will take you on deep and personal journeys. We’ve got shows that will catch your...