August 2005

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Features

#Edinburgh Cringe

Festival is a freewheeling Altmanesque comedy about the Edinburgh Fringe festival. So how come it's funny and tragic and romantic all at once? Director Annie Griffin, creator of television's The Book Club, knows how. All comedians "are like babies", she tells Jonathan Romney.

#The Big Stealer

Robert Mitchum's persona is built on true and tall tales, an 'immoral' face, an often exposed body and a naturally minimalist talent in front of the camera. This made him the perfect representative of the doomed male victim-hero of film noir, argues Nick James.

French Cinema the Anti-Hollywood

'No compromise' could be actress Béatrice Dalle's motto as Process director C.S. Leigh tells it. The same can be said for director Bruno Dumont, who talks to Demetrios Matheou about his new road movie Twentynine Palms in this round-up of recent French film. PLUS Charlotte Garson on the state of the French industry.

An Improper Charlie

Tim Burton may have produced James and the Giant Peach but he's not the obvious choice to direct Roald Dahl's attack on the modern child Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Fortunately Burton, with his best collaborator Johnny Depp on top weird form as choc-making genius Willy Wonka, has succinctly updated the story. Roger Clarke is delighted with its insouciant charm.

Spirit Levels

Ever since the success of The Ring Japanese horror movies have been routinely remade by Hollywood. But what gets lost in translation? Walter Salles' remake of Hideo Nakata's Dark Water provides an apt vehicle for cultural comparison, says Mark Kermode.

Selected reviews

#Film of the Month: The Last Mitterrand

Robert Guédiguian turns a book about the scandals of the Mitterrand era into a meditation on memory, power and death. By Ginette Vincendeau.

#Dear Wendy

#Yes

Reviews in this issue:

  • 3-iron
  • Beautiful Boxer
  • The Car Keys
  • Crash
  • Dark Water
  • Dear Wendy
  • The Devil's Rejects
  • Errance
  • Festival
  • Imaginary Heroes
  • James' Journey to Jerusalem
  • Kicking & Screaming
  • Los debutantes
  • Mr. & Mrs. Smith
  • Novo
  • Process
  • Shallow Ground
  • Film of the Month: The Last Mitterrand
  • The Perfect Catch
  • The Skeleton Key
  • Tiresia
  • Twentynine Palms
  • The United States of Leland
  • Unleashed
  • Walk on Water
  • Wedding Crashers
  • Whisky
  • Yes
Last Updated: 20 Dec 2011