The Playlist

Review: 'Michael H. Profession: Director' Is An Interesting But Never Essential Portrait Of Michael Haneke

By Rodrigo Perez
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May 3, 2013 1:50 PM
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1 Comment

Reviews

Described memorably as the Minister of Fear by the New York Times some years ago, Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke has been terrorizing audiences and holding them emotionally and psychologically hostage ever since his career began. Fond of rigorous, excruciatingly brutal portraits of human suffering, misery and seemingly sadomasochistic torture, Haneke's vision of such painful aims is always unflinching, coldly dispassionate and cruelly voyeuristic. With the absence of joy, hope and relief in his movies, and a stringent, rap-on-the-knuckles approach that sometimes verges on being scolding, many have assumed Haneke to be a soulless misanthrope, humorlessly putting audiences through the paces because he can.

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IFC Films Snaps Up Oliver Assayas' ‘Sils Maria’ with Juliette Binoche & Mia Wasikowska

By Tess Hofmann
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April 23, 2013 2:46 PM
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0 Comments

News

In a confident gesture, IFC has picked up the distribution rights to the as-yet-unproduced “Sils Maria” (aka "Since Maria") the Switzerland-set project from French auteur Oliver Assayas to star Juliette Binoche and Mia Wasikowska. IFC acted as a distributor on Assayas’ “Summer Hours,” and will bring his latest “Something in the Air” to theaters this year. It appears that they have as much hope for this forthcoming contemplative tale as we do, particularly given the pedigree of his cast.

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Mia Wasikowska Joins Juliette Binoche In Olivier Assayas' 'Sils Maria'

By India Ross
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March 25, 2013 10:41 AM
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News

That Mia Wasikowska is everywhere. The elfin darling of the indie elite (who has been known to slum it for the odd blockbuster, like breakthrough "Alice in Wonderland"), she has sustained the critical momentum of the pajama-clad daughter in “The Kids Are All Right” to dominate the Sundance acting conversation with “Stoker." This summer, according to Ion Cinema, she will be trekking into “Sound of Music” country to film an Alpine meditation with Euro-stalwart Juliette Binoche.

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Ken Watanabe Joins 'Godzilla' As Production Starts, Juliette Binoche Confirmed

By Kevin Jagernauth
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March 18, 2013 2:29 PM
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5 Comments

News

...and just like that, Warner Bros. has announced that production has started today on "Godzilla," with the studio, filmmakers and everyone else keeping a tight lock and seal over details or anything else concerning the production. But the press release did offer up a couple more eyebrow raising bits of casting for a monster movie that seems to be following the "Pacific Rim" playbook to a certain degree.

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The Essentials: Krzysztof Kieslowski

By Rodrigo Perez
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March 13, 2013 5:34 PM
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8 Comments

Features

It’s perhaps comical to describe a filmmaker revered in some circles as underrated when they’ve been nominated for some of the biggest prizes in cinema -- the Palme d'Or, Venice’s Golden Lion, the Academy Awards, Berlin’s Golden Bear. But perhaps because Polish filmmaker Krzysztof Kieslowski never really took many of these major prizes home, and never gained global status until later in his career, we find that the filmmaker is not as revered as we’d like (though he tied for a Golden Lion in 1993). Perhaps this observation is very relative. Perhaps it’s because he didn’t enter the Criterion canon until 2006, perhaps because his career ended too abruptly just as it was truly ascending, or perhaps simply because he’s one of our most adored filmmakers: we routinely never give up an opportunity to celebrate Kieslowski’s work when we can.

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Juliette Binoche, Jodie Foster & More Reportedly Eyed For Abel Ferrara's Dominique Strauss-Kahn Pic As Isabelle Adjani Drops Out

By Kevin Jagernauth
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March 7, 2013 11:57 AM
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2 Comments

News

So remember about a year ago when Abel Ferrara was talking up his next movie, one that would be inspired/based on disgraced French politician Dominique Strauss-Kahn? While producers were cagier, Ferrara was talking up a shoot last summer with Gerard Depardieu in the lead role, with Isabelle Adjani to co-star? Well, that didn't happen and now it looks like he's going to have to find a new leading lady.

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What? Juliette Binoche Grappling 'Godzilla'

By Kevin Jagernauth
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February 26, 2013 4:17 PM
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8 Comments

News

When we spoke with Juliette Binoche at the Berlin International Film Festival, our conversation touched on directors she's worked with like Michael Haneke, Anthony Minghella, Leos Carax, Abbas Kiarostami and Bruno Dumont (she stars in that director's latest "Camille Claudel 1915"). But we suppose arthouse movies only pay so much, or perhaps she just wants a complete change of pace and a brand new experience, because the actress is now stepping into her first bonafide studio blockbuster.

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Berlin Interview: Juliette Binoche On 'Camille Claudel' & Working With Haneke, Minghella, Carax & Kiarostami

By Jessica Kiang
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February 20, 2013 4:47 PM
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1 Comment

Interviews

Like most of director Bruno Dumont’s films, “Camille Claudel 1915” has proven divisive (you can read our take here), but one thing that critics on both sides of the fence are in unanimous agreement about is the quality of the central performance from Juliette Binoche. Economically contained and internalised, even when her Claudel is displaying some rare histrionics, Binoche invests the role with oceanic depths and undercurrents of conflicting emotion in a turn that in some ways can almost be seen as the stripped-away template for the kind of melancholic, tragic, tortured heroine with which she has made her name.

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Berlin Review: The Trials Of 'Camille Claudel 1915' Make For Trying Watching, Even With Juliette Binoche In Peerless Form

By Jessica Kiang
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February 16, 2013 12:02 PM
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1 Comment

Festivals

Director Bruno Dumont ("The Life of Jesus," "Outside Satan") has made a name for himself with challenging, sometimes controversial films that often feature non-professional actors and considered, not to say glacial, pacing interrupted with scenes of violence. But with "Camille Claudel 1915" he abandons some aspects of that approach while ever more fully indulging others. So for the first time he has a name star in Juliette Binoche, who turns in a reliably committed and remarkably naked performance as the titular Claudel, but here Dumont slows the pace of the action to almost nil, and punctuates it only with long talky tracts until the film becomes either a masterpiece of the "slow and boring" school of cinema, or an occasionally excruciating form of Chinese water torture, depending on your point of view.

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Juliette Binoche & Clive Owen Will Romance Each Other With 'Words And Pictures'

By Kevin Jagernauth
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November 7, 2012 6:13 PM
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3 Comments

News

Man, talk about a movie title that is going to be a pain to Google. Fred Schepisi ("Roxanne," "Mr. Baseball," "The Eye Of The Storm") is lining up his next movie, the blandly titled "Word And Pictures," but luckily his two leads are much livelier.

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