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Entertainment => Film & TV Talk => Pinoy Entertainment => Topic started by: rse on May 20, 2009 at 01:05 AM

Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: rse on May 20, 2009 at 01:05 AM
[Originally started by JdelaCruz, he requested that his name be removed as author of this thread due to a change in the title of the thread. His request was granted, but the only way to do so was to delete his first post. Here is the original content of that deleted post.]:

Chop-chop here, chop-chop there...

"By contrast, Brillante Mendoza's "Kinatay," from the Phillipines, got hit with an immediate wave of angry boos as soon as the credits rolled." -- Eric Kohn, The Wrap (http://www.thewrap.com/ind-column/finally-cannes-hits-its-stride3124)

"'Kinatay,' a Filipino low-budgeter with a centerpiece scene devoted to the butchery of a woman, may have enthused some of director Brillante Mendoza's hardcore fans but appalled most others" -- Todd McCarthy, Variety (http://www.variety.com/index.asp?layout=festivals&jump=story&id=1061&articleid=VR1118003830&cs=1)

"It’s a singularly grueling experience from which I learned nothing except that I can survive singularly grueling experiences." -- Mike D'Angelo, A.V.Club (http://www.avclub.com/articles/cannes-09-day-four,28099/?utm_source=sidebar_cannes)

"Here is a film that forces me to apologize to Vincent Gallo for calling "The Brown Bunny" the worst film in the history of the Cannes Film Festival." -- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times (http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2009/05/what_were_they_thinking_of.html)

"By contrast, another crime story, the Filipino movie Kinatay, directed by Brillante Mendoza, was both tedious and ugly." -- Jay Stone, National Post (http://www.nationalpost.com/arts/story.html?id=1605332)

"'Kinatay' combines 10-ton metaphoric obviousness (life as a slaughterhouse of corruption) with raggedy visual repetit!ons like you're never seen, followed by raggedy visual repetit!ons like you've never seen, followed by raggedy visual repetit!ons like you've never seen." -- Michael Philips, Chicago Tribune (http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/talking_pictures/2009/05/cannes-may-17-catcalls-and-ultraviolence.html)

***********

[This is the reply of rse]:

http://showbizandstyle.inquirer.net/entertainment/entertainment/view/20090519-205800/Kinatay-draws-raves-rants-in-Cannes
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: gerardhamada on May 20, 2009 at 04:11 AM
pano kaya un napasok sa Cannes if ganun rin pala kapangit. Na Ricky Hatton tayo dun ah
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: X44 on May 20, 2009 at 12:44 PM
lalo ko tuloy gustong panoorin 'to.

minsan bobo din mga puti.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: rse on May 21, 2009 at 12:54 AM
I'm looking forward to this movie.  Loved his Tirador, and Serbis is not bad at all.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Noel_Vera on May 21, 2009 at 10:21 AM
People love Tirador; I like some of Mendoza's films but not that one. Seems to me he's experimenting with noir filmmaking there, and that's a good thing, but not quite getting it.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: keating on May 21, 2009 at 11:17 AM
TIRADOR was the only Mendoza film that I like, given the chance I'll revisit SERBIS soon.

Obviously KINATAY was panned just like SERBIS  where most people walked out during the screening but they keep asking him back!

Cannes 2009: THE UNDERSIDE OF THE PHILIPPINES By: Karin Badt     


 
Filipino director Brilliante Mendoza's new film Kinatay (which means Slaughter) drew me in, I admit, only because of a hallucinatory summer I once spent on Dumaguete Island in the Philippines. Mendoza's film is basically the story of a group of thug policemen who abduct a stripper and torture her in a car, rape her in a basement, and then dismember her. The climax of the story is the challenge of sticking the body parts in a plastic bag.

What was compelling to me -- in this film which was obviously not compelling de tout -- was the fact that after my summer in the Philippines I too wrote a story (transplanted to Thailand) where three thugs are preoccupied with the body of a prostitute, the climax of which is the challenge of sticking her in a bag. What inspired this story were probably the muggy nights I and fellow teachers (we taught streetchildren) and Peace Corp volunteers spent in The Music Box, a disco joint which also doubled as a scuba diving outfit -- and a prostitute ring.

http://kbadt.free.fr/stories/Carnivora.pdf

It was a warm, humid summer, with a strange undercurrent under the surface: a 19 year old Peace Corps volunteer I had a beer with was shot in the head the day after our drink -- pulled out of his car by Muslim guerrillas from Mindinao island. One morning the director of the humanitarian outfit I worked for "invited me" to see the corpse of a little girl found naked and murdered on a beach (I declined).

And a most disconcerting afternoon was in the local prison, where I ran creative workshops. The amiable clients (who slept all in one room on a wicker mat, without beds, chairs or any idea of the court-process) opened up to me about their crimes: one had killed his brother with a pen-knife, another had raped his little 12 year old cousin; a third cut the throat of a boy who stole a Coca Cola can from his shop.

So perhaps that is why I wrote a story where a woman's naked cadaver is manhandled for hours, while the men, bored, smoke cigarettes in the languorous night.

What was it about the Philippines that inspired such similar unconscious workings of the "imagination"? To the point even that the ringleader in my story -- Vic -- has the same name as the ringleader in Mendoza's macabre tale: he too named Vic?

I met Mr. Mendoza on the terrace of the Grand Hotel to find out.


Why did you make this film?

I want to show in my film what most other filmmakers would not show: I am showing what is really happening in the Philippines, implicating the military, the police. My film was based on a real confession of a police student of criminology: his experience witnessing the killing of a woman, and being part of the gang. What I want to show in my film is the abuse of power; the police are like god. They can butcher people.

Are the Philippines really so dangerous?

You were there. You experienced it. Some places in the world are really dangerous. My film is about the danger and the fear that we experience in Manila; the danger that we encounter every day. The police student did not know he would experience what would happen to. The police are involved in all the corruption that is happening. As for the justice system -- that's a mess. As you say, some people will go to jail for twenty years, with no court process. A lot of times they are not guilty

What do you think about the situation of prostitutes in the Philippines?

Prostitutes are treated like dirt. Because we are a Catholic country, when a woman is working on a bar, one looks down at her. The women are seen as bad. 'You should not be prostituting yourself, You should be working.' I did research into prostitution. A lot of women are working in the bars, and some have boyfriends in the military, so she can do whatever she wants. He protects her. I went to bars that have prostitutes behind it: everyone knows that this exists. It is illegal, but it seems to be legal. At least my film makes people aware that such things exist.

Will film-goers in the Philippines appreciate your message?

I will not show in the commercial theaters to be humiliated again as I was with my last film (Serbis). People in the Philippines see melodramas, Hollywood films, comedy, soap operas. They are only interested in Hollywood -- not serious topics. Serbis did not do well there. Serbis did well in the States, released by Regent.

You have a subtext in the film about Catholic values -- running counter to the corruption: signs saying "Jesus is the Way to Truth" flash on the back of buses, pedicabs, as the men drive off in the night: Can you comment on the meaning of Catholicism for Filipinos?

The Philippines are 90 percent Catholic. You look everywhere and see these images of Catholicism. I myself am a Catholic, brought up in Catholic schools. We are all exposed to religion from an early age. It is a major part of our life. Being exposed to Catholicism, there is still a lot of corruption. I am showing the strange irony of it. Amidst all this faith, we have all this corruption. You have the gangs in the midst of the street; and you see all the signs. On the police shirt is written: "Integrity once lost is lost forever." It is really on the shirt. I only noticed this when I was editing.

Can you comment on the negative reviews your film has received here?

It is a film that you have to slowly absorb. I don't expect people to like it. I want people to think about it after they go to bed.

What did you do before being a filmmaker?

I worked as production designer with other commercial directors in the Philippines. I did that for six years. Before I worked in advertising; for ten years. My clients were coca-cola, soap...

In the Philippines, I could only find "whitening" soap! Did you promote this as well?

Yes, I did. Filipinos want to be white. It's the American influence: the US occupied the Philippines you know, and Filipinos still idolize the US. So the soap makes people feel psychologically better.

Do you feel guilty about having marketed this whitening soap?

Of course. Now I feel good about what I do: a good life is feeling good about yourself.





Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Noel_Vera on May 21, 2009 at 07:16 PM
That's nice--the whitening soap made him feel dirty, now he's trying to come clean with a 'dirty' movie. I'd probably have done the same, myself.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: keating on May 24, 2009 at 06:20 AM
Cannes #4: What were they thinking of?

By
Roger Ebert
 on May 16, 2009 5:13 PM

There are few prospects more alarming than a director seized by an Idea. I don't mean an idea for a film, a story, a theme, a tone, any of those ideas. I'm thinking of a director whose Idea takes control of his film and pounds it into the ground and leaves the audience alienated and resentful. Such a director is Brillante Mendoza of the Philippines, and the victim of his Idea is his Official Selection at Cannes 2009, "Kinatay." Here is a film that forces me to apologize to Vincent Gallo for calling "The Brown Bunny" the worst film in the history of the Cannes Film Festival.

After extensive recutting, the Gallo film was redeemed. I don't think editing is going to do the trick for "Kinatay." If Mendoza wants to please any viewer except for the most tortured theorist (one of those careerists who thinks movies are about arcane academic debates and not people) he's going to have to remake his entire second half.

The sad thing is, the opening scenes in his film give promise of being absorbing and even entertaining. The film opens as the story of Peping, a young man seen taking his girl and their baby to be married in Manila in a jolly group wedding. Mendoza establishes Peping's world as a crowded jumble of street markets, open-air food stands and people who seem to know each other. He picks up cash sometimes by doing odd jobs for local criminals. He will need more funds as a young married man, and is offered a higher-paying job.
It is unlikely you will ever see this film, but if there's a possibility, know that spoilers follow.
Peping joins a group of other professional criminals assigned to teach a lesson to a 30ish prostitute who owes money because of drugs. She is bound, gagged, and thrown into the back of a van. Now commences the Idea. It is Mendoza's conceit that it his Idea will make a statement, or evoke a sensation, or demonstrate something--if only he makes the rest of the film as unpleasant to the eyes, the ears, the mind and the story itself as possible. This he succeeds in doing beyond his wildest dreams.

Peping and his victim.
For at least 45 minutes, maybe an hour, maybe an eternity, Mendoza gives us Queasy-Cam shots, filmed at night in very low light, of the interior and exterior of the van as they drive a long distance outside Manila to a remote house. The woman is thrown on a bed, she pleads for her life, she is eventually murdered, her body is hacked into pieces, the pieces are wrapped in plastic, and the body parts are thrown out of the van at intervals during the return journey. No drama is developed. No story purpose is revealed. The woman cannot pay at a later date. She has learned her lesson, but to what avail? There is little dialogue. Peping did not know the woman would be murdered.
On the sound track, there are traffic noises, loud bangings, clashings, hammerings and squealings of tires. They continue on and on and on. They are cranked so high we recall the guitar setting of "11" in "This is Spinal Tap." They are actively hostile. They are illustrated by murk. You can't see the movie and you can't bear to listen to it. Much later, Peping is deposited back in Manila by the van, and hails a taxi. We get incessant sights and sounds of the taxi driving, as the night gives away to pale shades of dawn. The taxi blows a tire. The driver gets out to change it. Peping stands on the curb, trying to find another taxi. Loud, real loud, traffic noises. The tire is changed. The taxi driver asks him to get back in the cab. Peping doesn't want to. Finally he does. Some shots of meat being chopped for food, and of his wife and baby. The movie is over. I should add that the movie is based on current events, that some of the vivisectionists are policemen, and that it cannot be shown in the Phillipines.

This is an Idea. An idée fixe, as the French so usefully put it. As Pierre Henri Castel observes, Au sens banal, idée fixe est l'équivalent d'obsession. Poor Mendoza knows that his strategy is alienating, his scenes unpleasant and painful, his audience recoiling. That is the Idea. You tell me why. Oh, someone will. You mark my words. There will be critics who fancy themselves theoreticians, who will defend this unbearable experience, and lecture those plebians like me who missed the whole Idea. I will remain serene while my ignorance is excoriated. I am a human being with relatively reasonable tastes. And in that role, not in the role of film critic, I declare that there may not be ten people in the world who will buy a ticket to this movie and feel the money was well spent.
But there is no reasoning with a man with a an idée fixe. He knows with a deep certainty that he is right. He will demonstrate that to us. He is an auteur. Surely we will recognize his inspiration, and applaud his bravery. He has filled his own bucket with wet cement, and stepped into it. For a time he could wriggle his toes. But now the cement has set, and he is frozen in place with the results of his decision. He will sink or swim.
I've seen several other films here already, but "Kinatay" seized my attention. I was talking the other day with Thierry Fremaux, the director of the festival, and I mentioned that he has many big names among the directors of this year's Official Selections. "Yes," he said, "but not every great director makes only great films. And we cannot show only great films, although every film is one we believe deserves to be seen." Fremaux knows his films, his festival, his audience. His taste is exceptional. He was not, of course, referring to any particular films or directors. I quote him because some of my film critic colleagues, staggering out into the light after "Kinatay," were banging their palms against their foreheads and crying out, "what got into them when they programed this film?" To them I say, Now, now. They can't only show great films.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Noel_Vera on May 24, 2009 at 02:05 PM
Y'know, Ebert would be more persuasive if it wasn't for his track record as the Great White Middlebrow, absolutely clueless when it comes to Burton and Lynch, and totally blind when it comes to Mel Gibson. Feh.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: rse on May 25, 2009 at 03:42 AM
I just heard that Brillante Mendoza won Best Director at Cannes....
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: allanmandy on May 25, 2009 at 03:43 AM
You heard right!

Mendoza wins best director award at Cannes

CANNES -- Brillante Mendoza of the Philippines on Sunday picked up the best director prize at the Cannes film festival for his dark movie "Kinatay".

"Kinatay" (meaning "massacre") notably features corrupt cops hacking a prostitute to pieces with blunt kitchen knives.

Mendoza, at Cannes for the second year running, again split the critics, drawing both hisses and applause for "Kinatay".

Last year's "Serbis" was set in a Manila porn-theatre with long close-ups of festering boils and overflowing toilets, as well as the poverty and distress on the streets.

Still determined to portray the social reality around him, Mendoza in "Kinatay" traces 24 hours in the day of a trainee policeman, happily beginning with his wedding in the morning to close with the young man's first outing at night with a band of corrupt colleagues.

To his surprise, fear and anguish, they pick up a prostitute accused of betrayal and wind up torturing, raping, killing and hacking her before disposing of the body parts across Manila.

"This is not just entertainment, these kinds of stories are real," Mendoza said at Cannes.

Last year was the first time since 1984 the Philippines had a film competing for the top prize at Cannes, the Palme d'Or.


source (http://showbizandstyle.inquirer.net/breakingnews/breakingnews/view/20090525-206946/Mendoza-wins-best-director-award-at-Cannes)


Woohoo!!!

Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Qoheleth on May 25, 2009 at 07:22 AM
Now, I'm hoping Brillante Mendoza will not allow the Movies and Television Classification and Review Board to chop up his film, Kinatay, like what the board did with his first Cannes Film Festival entry, Serbis.


Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Tampalos on May 25, 2009 at 09:40 AM
yeah, he won the award but got a LOUD BOO for it while the award was presented haha.  take that you maniac!!! bwahahaha.

and why the hell is Inquirer reporting MIXED reviews for Kinatay when it actually got a MAJORITY of NEGATIVE reviews and reactions from the crowd?!

anyway i've only seen Serbis and i thought that was a schoofid fehlm about a whole pile of bullcrap with a nice helping of goat for a garnish.

who knows Kinatay" might actually be good.  i'm just saying that the only film i saw from him was the gimmicky "Serbis" which just left a really bad taste in my mouth.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: X44 on May 25, 2009 at 10:04 AM
Good on Brillante. Represent.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Centurion Obama on May 25, 2009 at 12:40 PM
Brillante "beats"

À L'ORIGINE (IN THE BEGINNING) directed by Xavier GIANNOLI
ANTICHRIST directed by Lars VON TRIER
BAK-JWI (THIRST) directed by PARK Chan-Wook ... Read More
BRIGHT STAR directed by Jane CAMPION
CHUN FENG CHEN ZUI DE YE WAN (Spring Fever) directed by LOU Ye
DAS WEISSE BAND (THE WHITE RIBBON) directed by Michael HANEKE
ENTER THE VOID directed by Gaspar NOÉ
FISH TANK directed by Andrea ARNOLD
INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS directed by Quentin TARANTINO
KINATAY directed by Brillante MENDOZA
LES HERBES FOLLES (WILD GRASS) directed by Alain RESNAIS
LOOKING FOR ERIC directed by Ken LOACH
LOS ABRAZOS ROTOS (BROKEN EMBRACES) directed by Pedro ALMODÓVAR
MAP OF THE SOUNDS OF TOKYO directed by Isabel COIXET
TAKING WOODSTOCK directed by Ang LEE
THE TIME THAT REMAINS directed by Elia SULEIMAN
UN PROPHÈTE (A PROPHET) directed by Jacques AUDIARD
VENGEANCE directed by Johnnie TO
VINCERE directed by Marco BELLOCCHIO
VISAGE (FACE) directed by TSAI Ming-Liang

and is in good company because these are the past Cannes best director winners

Üç maymun (2008) - Nuri Bilge Ceylan
Le scaphandre et le papillon (2007) - Julian Schnabel
Babel (2006) - Alejandro González Iñárritu ... Read More
Caché (2005) - Michael Haneke
Exils (2004) - Tony Gatlif
Elephant (2003) - Gus Van Sant
Chihwaseon (2002) - Kwon-taek Im
Punch-Drunk Love (2002) - Paul Thomas Anderson
Mulholland Dr. (2001) - David Lynch (I)
The Man Who Wasn't There (2001) - Joel Coen
Yi yi (2000) - Edward Yang
Todo sobre mi madre (1999) - Pedro Almodóvar
The General (1998) - John Boorman
Chun gwong cha sit (1997) - Kar Wai Wong
Fargo (1996) - Joel Coen
La haine (1995) - Mathieu Kassovitz
Caro diario (1993) - Nanni Moretti
Naked (1993) - Mike Leigh
The Player (1992) - Robert Altman (I)
Barton Fink (1991) - Joel Coen
Taksi-Blyuz (1990) - Pavel Lungin
Dom za vesanje (1988) - Emir Kusturica
Sur (1988) - Fernando E. Solanas
Der Himmel über Berlin (1987) - Wim Wenders
After Hours (1985) - Martin Scorsese
Rendez-vous (1985) - André Téchiné
Un dimanche à la campagne (1984) - Bertrand Tavernier
L'argent (1983) - Robert Bresson
Nostalghia (1983) - Andrei Tarkovsky ... Read More
Fitzcarraldo (1982) - Werner Herzog

It looks like best director was only first awarded in 1983.

Congratulations to Brillante Mendoza.  He brings honor to Philippines and pushes us further out to the global stage.  I still don't think I'm going to watch the film though, lol.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: dalubhasa1980 on May 25, 2009 at 01:29 PM
Panahon na para magkaroon ng pelikulang Pilipino sa Criterion Collection :)

Unahin na ang "Kinatay."
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: allanmandy on May 25, 2009 at 02:02 PM
No! Dapat "Himala".

Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Noel_Vera on May 25, 2009 at 03:06 PM
He beat Bellochio and Resnais. That IS impressive.

Well if you believe in awards. I don't, but I do believe in the good things an award can bring. Good for him.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: dalubhasa1980 on May 25, 2009 at 06:21 PM
No! Dapat "Himala".



Sang-ayon po ako sa inyo. :)

Sana makakuha sila ng maayos na master ng pelikula.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Klaus Weasley on May 25, 2009 at 10:04 PM
Congrats to Brilliante!  ;D
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: oggsmoggs on May 25, 2009 at 10:53 PM
Hopefully the award sparks a worldwide interest on his filmography, and have programmers start showing Manoro, which is his best yet most neglected work.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: indie boi on May 25, 2009 at 11:23 PM
Mas maganda ba ang Kinatay sa Transformers 2?  ;)
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: blitzkrieg on May 25, 2009 at 11:37 PM
Mas maganda ba ang Kinatay sa Transformers 2?  ;)

Well si Michael Bay wala pang Cannes. Ano laban nya? But I will surely watch Transformers 2 over and above the rest! LOL!

Cannes is Cannes. The most prestigious international and the most celebrity infested filmfest. Brillante's victory spells BIG honor to the country and a big slap to his critics. So screw the critics. So what if the film is rubbish. Brillante is THE man! Brocka or Bernal in their lifetime never achieved this. I'm quite sure dinaldalan yan ng todo ni Quentin after his victory.

Can't wait to get bored and tormented by Kinatay when it's shown here.  ;D


 

Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Noel_Vera on May 26, 2009 at 12:38 AM
Mas maganda ba ang Kinatay sa Transformers 2?  ;)

What's this? ???
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: rse on May 26, 2009 at 01:03 AM
I'm so happy with this great news!  At least because of this more Pinoy films might stand a change of being selected in Cannes and other major festivals in the coming year(s).  Well maybe another major film festival like Berlin will finally take notice and give our filmmakers some recognition...or maybe it will open for an Oscar Best Foreign Film recognition which will be another great exposure to the Philippine cinema in international market.

I hope that in his next movie he'll lighten up a bit and try to do a comedy in the tradition of Aliwan Paradise or Kakaba kaba....
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: R2 on May 26, 2009 at 01:16 AM
Mendoza's triumph,albeit controversial,is definitely good news for the ailing Filipino film industry. Our country has been a pariah for far too long, we all need the proper attention that our film heritage long deserved. And there should be no room for comparing his achievement with those who came before him; Brocka, Bernal,De Leon, and company doesn't need a Palme D'Or (or an Oscar or whatever) to prove their genius,anyway.
I haven't seen any of his works yet, but his Masahista is fairly available in these parts. I contemplated buying a reasonably-priced copy of it since I learned that Kinatay is in compe***on this year; I finally ordered one upon hearing news of his Cannes victory. I hope watching it can give me an idea of what Mendoza can offer to film lovers everywhere.
Congratulations to Brillante Mendoza! Mabuhay ang pelikulang Pilipino!
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Noel_Vera on May 26, 2009 at 02:36 AM
Berlin's been showing our films--not giving them awards, but it's been showing em.

i haven't seen the last two, but I do think Manoro's his best work.
Title: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Noel_Vera on May 26, 2009 at 05:28 AM


Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director in Cannes; Coraline; Le Plaisir; Rear Window (http://criticafterdark.blogspot.com/2009/05/roger-ebert-kills-brillante-mendozas.html)

Alternative directors for the next Star Trek movie (http://criticafterdark.blogspot.com/2009/05/what-if-someone-else-directed-star-trek.html)
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: gerardhamada on May 26, 2009 at 09:31 PM
wow congrats. Galing naman kala ko na Hatton tayo dun un pala Marquez pala sya
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: keating on May 27, 2009 at 08:21 AM
Haneke's The White Ribbon Wins Cannes Palme d'Or
By Richard Corliss and Mary Corliss Sunday, May. 24, 2009

For 11 of its 12 days, the 62nd Cannes Film Festival was in large part the Cannes Movie Festival. At a hallowed venue where minimalist art films usually dominate, this year sensation often ran rampant. Blood spurted from necks, noses, guts and, in one memorable gross-out moment, a penis. Extreme characters spanned the globe: a vampire-priest in Seoul, a French crime lord in Hong Kong and an American drug-dealer in Tokyo. Sam Raimi brought a horror movie about a gypsy curse, and Quentin Tarantino enlisted in a fantasy World War II. Gay lovers disported in China, and Ang Lee found psychedelic bliss in Woodstock, 1969. Hard-core sex and violence splattered the giant Lumiere screen.


Yet tonight, at the closing ceremony, the Cannes Jury restored order. French star Isabelle Huppert, the jury president, and her majority-female panel bestowed most of their benisons on difficult art films, not movies that strain to entertain. In a festival where 12 of the 20 competition films ran two hours or longer, and five clocked in near two and a half hours, the top honors went to a pair of these epic-length dramas. Austrian and French films received the top two prizes; an Austrian actor and a French actress took the awards for best performances, in English-language films. No American won anything. (See pictures of the red carpet at Cannes.)

Here's the full list of winners.

Palme d'Or (top prize): The White Ribbon, Austria, directed by Michael Haneke



Grand Prix (second place): Un prophéte, France, directed by Jacques Audiard



Best Director: Brillante Mendoza, Philippines, for Kinatay



Jury Prize (third place, tie): Fish Tank, Great Britain, directed by Andrea Arnold, and Thirst, South Korea, directed by Park Chan-wook



Best Performance by an Actor: Christoph Waltz, Austria, for Inglourious Basterds, directed by Quentin Tarantino



Best Performance by an Actress: Charlotte Gainsbourg, France, for Antichrist, directed by Lars von Trier



Best Screenplay: Mei Fang, China, for Spring Fever, directed by Lou Ye



Lifetime Achievement Award for His Work and His Exceptional Contribution to the History of Cinema: Alain Resnais, France

In prizes given by separate juries, the indigenous Australian film Samson and Delilah took the Camera d'Or award for best first feature, and Arena won for best short film.

There was little surprise that the main Palme went to The White Ribbon, an austere and lacerating tale of collective brutality and guilt in a small German village two decades before Hitler took power. This is a pure art film, daunting and demanding, spare and unsparing, making no concession to the prevailing popular taste — except, perhaps, film-festival taste. It was also, as we two Cannes veterans attest, the finest work in the competition. Writer-director Michael Haneke, a personally austere gent who has won prizes here before, with The Piano Teacher (starring Huppert) and Caché, was finally forced to crack a smile as he accepted the award.

The runner-up Grand Jury Prize went to Un prophéte (A Prophet), a complex, absorbing, fairly conventional prison drama directed by Jacques Audiard. In the manner of last year's Palme d'Or winner The Class, set in a Paris junior high school, this is a documentary-style study of French minorities in an enclosed environment that sets its own rules. The main tension — and there's plenty in the schemings of rival ethnic gangs — comes from the relationship of a young Arab (Tahar Rahim) and his aged Corsican mentor (Niels Arestrup). When asked at the post-show press conference if he was disappointed at getting second place, Audiard replied, "What's the problem? Isn't this a good prize?" It is, and honorably merited. Both of the big winners will be distributed in the U.S. by Sony Classic Pictures, which is likely to make its the lion's share of its loot from Un prophéte.

In Antichrist, Gainsbourg, daughter of Brit actress Jane Birkin and the late French singer-provocateur Serge Gainsbourg, played a woman so traumatized by her child's death that she goes slowly, deeply, mutilatingly mad. Accepting her award, she called the experience "intense, sad and exciting." If not the best performance of the festival, Gainsbourg's was surely of the self-punishing kind that could be appreciated by jury members Huppert, Asia Argento and Shu Qi, all of whom have played similarly extreme roles. Waltz, the suave German on Brad Pitt's tail in Inglourious Basterds, thanked the film's "unique and inimitable creator," Tarantino, because, he said, after 30 years in the business, "You have given me my vocation back." Later, the press asked both actors what they'd think if some of their scenes were cut for international release by their respective directors. Said Waltz, impishly, "I think they are planning to cut them together."

The shared Jury Prize had to be a disappointment for its two recipients. Arnold had taken the same award three years ago for her first feature, Red Road, and Park snagged the Grand Jury prize in 2003 for Oldboy. But the really startling awards were in the supporting categories. Kinatay, which depicts the torture, beheading and dismemberment of a prostitute, was almost universally reviled. In the critics' poll for Film Francais magazine, this grotty little melodrama from Brillante Mendoza, the forlorn hope of Filipino cinema, was given the lowest rating of any official selection. But somebody must think that Mendoza really is brilliant. "It's not a dating film," one jury member, playwright and screenwriter Hanif Kureishi, acknowledged at the press conference. "It's not a film I would see again." But he and other members said they were proud to have honored it.

The jury that made room for Mendoza managed to ignore two men who are surely among the most daring, original and accomplished filmmakers in the competition, or anywhere else: Spain's Pedro Almodóvar, with his Penélope Cruz romantic drama Broken Embraces, and Palestine's Elia Suleiman, whose endearing, deadpan The Time That Remains tells, in sour or poignant vignettes, the history of his family and his sundered country. Resnais, whose Wild Grass shows the legendary 86-year-old director at the top of his puckishly anarchic form, won a Life Achievement Award — which is Palme-speak for Thanks for Not Dying Quite Yet. After 60 history-making years in film, he deserved better, as did Suleiman and Almodóvar. Guys, we love ya, you're great, but you're no Brillante Mendoza.

But every new year at Cannes has its triumphs and disappointments; each critic is his or her own jury. Even the bad films are fun to think, argue and write about. We have been pleased to escort you through the 2009 fortnight, and wrap up all the words we've written with the most hopeful we know: A l'année prochaine! Same time, next year.

Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Tampalos on May 27, 2009 at 09:51 AM
Mas maganda ba ang Kinatay sa Transformers 2?  ;)
the first Transformers was just an awful robot porn.  awful, because what's the point in porn when you can barely see the details of the robots.  awful, awpOOL i say.

Kinatay... haven't seen it but judging from the synopsis i've read and Mendoza's spit-worthy work in Serbis, magkalevel lang sila sa Transformers so pweh, pweh, pweh.

if Kinatay turns out to be a garbage like Serbis then it's laughable that some of us here are proud of such an ugly, useless, tasteless, pointless piece of fecal matter.  art daw?  bwahahha.  pweh, pweh, pweh na lang.

it's funny and ironic that Philippine indie cinema praised by our naive and pretentious critics are just as formulaic in their themes and stories like our typical rubbish love themed mainstream movies.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: JdelaCruz on May 27, 2009 at 01:09 PM
I hope Brillante Mendoza can use this Cannes cachet to have Kinatay shown here uncut.

Maybe a brilliant promoter or organization would stage a Mendoza film festival of sorts.  Introduce the Pinoy public to a world-famous Pinoy not named Manny and give them a chance to see what's got the international film world all agog.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: X44 on May 27, 2009 at 01:17 PM
Maybe a brilliant promoter or organization would stage a Mendoza film festival of sorts. 


At last year's Cinemanila, Brillante was the subject of a retrospective. I missed it, much to my shame. Only saw Tirador - - -which I liked. Wanted to see at least Manoro, too. Hopefully another one crops up.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: halvert on May 27, 2009 at 03:43 PM
or at least someone get his works out on dvd...so we can judge for ourselves.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: X44 on May 27, 2009 at 04:40 PM
Some of them are , I think, the older stuff, and on sale at Astro as I type,  but nothing beats the cinema for me - - -least when it comes to local stuff.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: allanmandy on May 27, 2009 at 11:47 PM
Too bad:

Brillante "Dante" Mendoza, the first Filipino to win as "Best Director" at the Cannes Film Festival, has no plans to show his controversial short film "Kinatay" in commercial theaters.... Read more (https://abs-cbnnews.com/entertainment/05/27/09/pinoy-cannes-winners-film-wont-hit-theaters)

Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: keating on May 28, 2009 at 07:40 AM
Mendoza is right......MTRCB will just censor his film. Walang ng mapapanood. I doubt also if U.P. Film Center will screen it soon, Nonoy Lauzon said mainit pa ang mata sa amin ng MTRCB.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: allanmandy on May 28, 2009 at 12:03 PM
It's partly UP-FC's fault, in my opinion. It's been too accommodating of several (I'm not saying all) gay-themed indie films that masquerade themselves as art, when clearly they're just senseless skin flicks. There was a time early this year when I find it embarrassing as a UP alum/employee/student to see huge banners of men in different states of undress, hanging boldly and proudly in front of the FC building, as if it were some rundown smut cinema in Recto. The UP Film Institute should know better than that.

Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Noel_Vera on May 29, 2009 at 07:49 AM
" two men who are surely among the most daring, original and accomplished filmmakers in the compe***on, or anywhere else: Spain's Pedro Almodóvar, with his Penélope Cruz romantic drama Broken Embraces"

Y'know, I haven't seen Broken Embraces, but if it's anything like Talk to Her or All About My Mother, well it's well made and affecting enough, but hardly orignal. The filmmaker of Matador, Dark Habits, he was original; this is just Douglas Sirk with the melodrama and performances and color palette but without the mis en scene.

And even then I prefer Joey Gosiengfiao.

Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: allanmandy on Jun 05, 2009 at 12:06 AM
There's a possibility that Kinatay will be among those recent Philippine Cannes entries that will be screened in the 14th French Film Festival in Shangri-La on June 12:

link (http://www.clickthecity.com/movies/?p=5075)

Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: rse on Jun 05, 2009 at 01:25 AM
More Brillante things, I just stumbled into these:

Serbis DVD
http://www.amazon.fr/Serbis-Gina-Pareno/dp/B001UKY4SS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1244059850&sr=1-1 (http://www.amazon.fr/Serbis-Gina-Pareno/dp/B001UKY4SS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1244059850&sr=1-1)

Foster Child DVD
http://www.amazon.fr/John-john-Eugène-Domingo/dp/B001BBSEFK/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1244136556&sr=1-2 (http://www.amazon.fr/John-john-Eugène-Domingo/dp/B001BBSEFK/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1244136556&sr=1-2)

I don't know if they've released these films locally yet.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: keating on Jun 05, 2009 at 07:46 AM
There's a possibility that Kinatay will be among those recent Philippine Cannes entries that will be screened in the 14th French Film Festival in Shangri-La on June 12:

link (http://www.clickthecity.com/movies/?p=5075)



Its impossible if the film will not go to the hands of MTRCB.

Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: allanmandy on Jun 05, 2009 at 08:50 AM
Darn those MTRCB folk. Why, they're even  reprimanding TV stations that allegedly air that LBC spelling bee ad.

Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: gearhead000 on Aug 25, 2009 at 01:29 PM
CNN zooms in on Brillante Mendoza’s world
 (http://showbizandstyle.inquirer.net/entertainment/entertainment/view/20090825-221869/CNN-zooms-in-on-Brillante-Mendozas-world)

Quote
Apart from “Talk Asia,” he will also be featured on CNN’s “Scene by Scene” in October. He has been interviewed by Time and featured in Newsweek, too.

xxxx

“CNN Talk Asia” will have repeat screenings Tuesday.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: blitzkrieg on Sep 26, 2009 at 12:30 AM
 ;D Hey last Wednesday I saw this being shown in Robinson Pioneer and I guess other Robinson's Malls. Read the MTRCB certification and no cuts were listed.. But I doubt it..

Has anyone seen this already? Feedback please..thanks!
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Klaus Weasley on Sep 26, 2009 at 01:04 AM
;D Hey last Wednesday I saw this being shown in Robinson Pioneer and I guess other Robinson's Malls. Read the MTRCB certification and no cuts were listed.. But I doubt it..

Has anyone seen this already? Feedback please..thanks!

I haven't (I'm going today, Saturday). But I hear Brillante Mendoza won't allowed this to be shown with cuts. I think the fact that he won the award would be reason enough for the MTRCB (and his distributors) to bow to his demands.

It would be so embarrassing and stupid of the MTRCB to cut this film. I mean, if FOREIGNERS from other countries saw this uncut and unedited, why should we, his countrymen, couldn't see it uncut?
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: dorian_gray on Sep 26, 2009 at 05:21 AM
this film is being shown again at the bangkok international film festival. In fact, a good number of pinoy films are shown.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: jas on Sep 26, 2009 at 09:06 AM
According to clickthecity.com, this is currently being shown at Robinson's Manila & Galleria only. The reviewer, Philbert Dy, confirms that this is uncut. Planning to watch it this afternoon.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: oggsmoggs on Sep 26, 2009 at 10:16 AM
Do watch. It's very good.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Klaus Weasley on Sep 26, 2009 at 11:17 AM
Damn this rain.

I'll have to postpone watching this at least until tomorrow.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: blitzkrieg on Sep 27, 2009 at 11:36 PM
 ;D Saw this today...liked it! I can understand why some foreigners hated the film maybe because it was really ambitious, edgy, scary or simply because they are totally clueless that things like that truly happen.  Brillante Mendoza really deserves that recognition from the Cannes judges and to think they were mostly women. Kudos also to the cast like Coco Martin, John Regala and the brazen Ma. Isabel Lopez who still has the chops (no pun intended) when it comes to sexiness.

I am kinda intrigued thought what Joel Lamangan and Tony Mabesa thought about the film. We were in the same screening..
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Klaus Weasley on Sep 29, 2009 at 07:33 PM
I was gonna sneak off work and watch this today but I saw (on-line at least) that it's no longer playing!  :o

Any word if/when it's going to come back?
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: X44 on Sep 29, 2009 at 11:29 PM
I missed it,too,no thanks to Ondoy.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: jas on Sep 30, 2009 at 11:04 AM
It was still showing at Robinson's Galleria as of yesterday. Caught the 9:00 PM last full show.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: technosprite on Sep 30, 2009 at 08:36 PM
told doc bing that i found "kinatay" superior to "serbis." the film's original was "chop-chop lady", the concept of which was done in 2007. but bing wrote the screenplay in early january in "record" time.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Klaus Weasley on Sep 30, 2009 at 08:45 PM
It was still showing at Robinson's Galleria as of yesterday. Caught the 9:00 PM last full show.

Really? According to the website and ClicktheCity, it's no longer screening. I sent a message to Robinson's.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: R2 on Oct 08, 2009 at 03:08 PM
"Kinatay" is featured in this year's edition of The Times BFI London Film Festival. There'll be 2 screenings on Friday, 16th of October.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: Klaus Weasley on Oct 08, 2009 at 08:54 PM
"Kinatay" is featured in this year's edition of The Times BFI London Film Festival. There'll be 2 screenings on Friday, 16th of October.

Great! All we have to do is get a ticket to London!  ;D

I hope Kinatay gets screened at CineManila.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: X44 on Oct 12, 2009 at 12:38 AM
Just saw Kinatay. Loved it. For such a spare storyline, it had so much meat. The van scene was terrifying, reminds me of that long highway shot in Solaris only terrifying. Also, the flat tire scene with the cab,

Its screening at UP until the 15th. And nope, no cuts. And there were one or two scenes that would have been.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: rse on Oct 30, 2009 at 01:35 AM
"Kinatay" is featured in this year's edition of The Times BFI London Film Festival. There'll be 2 screenings on Friday, 16th of October.

This was actually annoying because I was in London that week on a business trip and didn't know that the festival was on.  I found out that there was a screening on that Friday but my flight back was on Thursday (a day earlier).
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: jas on Aug 03, 2010 at 01:48 PM
from Twitch Film:

Brillante Mendoza Casts Isabelle Huppert In Kidnap Thriller CAPTURED
August 2, 2010, 11:45 AM

Filipino director Brillante Mendoza is going international. The acclaimed director of Serbis and Kinatay has announced plans for his next feature, one based on the real life kidnapping of foreigners in the Mindanao region. Title Captured, production is slated to begin next year with French actress Isabelle Huppert joining locals Coco Martin, Ronnie Lazaro, Jhong Hilario, Ketchup Eusebio, and Ping Medina.
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: dorian_gray on Aug 04, 2010 at 07:45 PM
OMFG! J'adore Isabelle Huppert!

How true is this?
Title: Re: Brillante Mendoza wins Best Director at Cannes for "Kinatay"
Post by: jas on Dec 23, 2011 at 08:13 AM
Brillante Mendoza flick entered in Berlin film festival
Philippine Daily Inquirer | ANN – Wed, Dec 21, 2011

After nearly three decades, a Filipino film, Brillante Ma. Mendoza's "Captive," will compete in the main section of the Berlin International Film Festival, which will be held in the German capital on February 9-19 next year.

Mendoza, who is in Mindanao doing research for another project, told the Philippine Daily Inquirer in a phone interview Tuesday he was happy to have his work included among the first five films selected for the festival-along with such high-profile Oscar contenders as Zhang Yimou's "The Flowers of War" (Out of Competition) and Stephen Daldry's "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" (Out of Competition).

Mendoza said it was important to join a festival that was one of the biggest film markets in the world-second only to Cannes. "The Philippines will gain the attention not only of festival-goers, but of film distributors and producers from all over the world."

Mendoza's "Captive," which top-bills French actress Isabelle Huppert with Filipino actors Ronnie Lazaro, Raymond Bagatsing, Angel Aquino and Sid Lucero, among others, will have its world premiere at the Berlin festival, alongside Antonio Chavarrias' "Dictado" from Spain and Edwin's "Postcards From the Zoo" from Indonesia. (Other entries in the main competition will be announced later.)

Mendoza said Huppert, an icon of world cinema, was pleased on hearing the good news. "We had a private screening of the film in Paris on December 12 and she said she was happy with the final cut."

"Captive," formerly titled "Prey," tells the story of a foreign aid worker (Huppert) who gets kidnapped, along with Filipinos, by bandit groups in Mindanao.

"If I'm not mistaken, the last time the country competed in the main section of Berlin was 29 years ago, with Ishmael Bernal's 'Himala,'" Mendoza recalled.

Mendoza himself won the Caligari Prize in Berlin's Forum section for "Tirador" in 2008. In 2009, he won best director at the Cannes International Film Festival for "Kinatay."

"Being included in the main competition of a major festival will help boost awareness of Filipino cinema. It will make global audiences regard Filipino films more seriously. It will open doors for other Filipino filmmakers as well," he said.

Mendoza said another Filipino film, Rommel Tolentino's "Nono," was included in the Generation section of Berlin 2012.