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3 items from 2012

4 April 2012 7:02 AM, PDT | Moviefone | See recent Moviefone news »

I come to praise Sword & Sandal movies -- not to bury them. But with Wrath of the Titans and the Sword & Sandal/sci-fi mash-up John Carter not exactly setting the world on fire -- along with recent disappointments like Immortals and Conan -- it's getting more difficult by the day to believe that the Sword & Sandal movie can survive the recent fumbling of this otherwise great genre. And that's a shame, because the Sword & Sandal movie -- known for its gladiatorial games, pagan orgies, depraved emperors, and the occasional snarling cyclops -- may represent the most colorful and enduring movie genre of all time. So for the uninitiated, what exactly is a Sword & Sandal movie? Like its cousin the Biblical epic, a Sword & Sandal movie -- or 'peplum,' named after a type of ancient Greek garment -- is typically set in the ancient Mediterranean world, and dramatizes the fight for freedom. »

- Jason Apuzzo

28 January 2012 11:56 PM, PST | SoundOnSight | See recent SoundOnSight news »

I’ve got Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino on my mind these days.  It’s a product of the end-of-year hurrahs for Scorsese’s Hugo.  The film goes into the Academy Award ceremonies with 11 Oscar nominations – the most of any film this year – including a Best Director nod for Scorsese.  Win or lose, Marty’s on a roll having already taken a Golden Globe for his work on the film, and selection as Best Director by the National Board of Review (the Board also named Hugo Best Picture).  And that doesn’t include the film’s placing on any number of critic’s Year’s Best lists. 

What does all this have to do with Tarantino?  It brings to mind a statement the younger filmmaker had made about Scorsese some years ago.

They’ve always been linked, these two.  Tarantino had been anointed by more than a few as “the »

- Bill Mesce

12 January 2012 8:24 AM, PST | MUBI | See recent MUBI news »

Today's announcement from the International Film Festival Rotterdam (January 25 through February 5) concerns a tribute to Peter von Bagh, part of the main Signals section: "With over fifty film titles under his belt, Peter von Bagh may still be the better known in his other persona: as writer of more than twenty books, as television presenter, as artistic director of the Midnight Sun Festival in Sodankyla, which he co-founded in 1986 with the Kaurismäki brothers and as well Il Cinema Ritrovato, Bologna, since 2001. He also is editor-in-chief, since 1971, of the Filmihullu magazine, and a professor of film history in the Helsinki University of Arts."

On to the lineup, with descriptions from the festival, beginning with the features:

Lastuja – Taiteilijasuvun vuosisata (Splinters - A Century of an Artistic Family). Finland, 2011, 74’. A century of development, starting in the era of Finland's nascent nationalism, when the country still belonged to Tsarist Russia, ending in the heydays of post-wwii liberalism, »

3 items from 2012