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A Self-Made Hero (1996) More at IMDbPro »Un héros très discret (original title)

2 items from 2013

18 April 2013 4:06 PM, PDT | The Guardian - Film News | See recent The Guardian - Film News news »

Mathieu Kassovitz was hailed as the heir to Truffaut after making La Haine in 1995. So why has he renounced French cinema after making his latest film, Rebellion?

Any doubts over Mathieu Kassovitz's feelings towards his national film industry were cleared up last year when he tweeted: "Bugger French cinema. Go fuck yourself with your shitty films." He's done with France. He's moved to Los Angeles. The tweet was in response to the César nominations, France's equivalent of the Oscars. In a field dominated by The Artist and Untouchable, Kassovitz's sober political thriller, Rebellion, received just one nomination, for best adapted screenplay.

"I wasn't hurt because they didn't want to give me a César, I was hurt because they didn't care about that kind of movie any more," says Kassovitz, who has previously won three Césars and never turned up to collect them. "It's a French story. It's craftsmanship. We »

- Steve Rose

10 January 2013 11:29 PM, PST | SoundOnSight | See recent SoundOnSight news »

A soundtrack that has Chinese overtones, interspersed with Satie, and A La Claire Fontaine. Is it a Chinese composer familiar with French culture? Turns out to be a French composer, capable of adapting his music to almost any setting in the world. Whether it be ethereal tunes for golden compasses, mysterious ones for wizards, or spectral ones for writers on the verge of giving up the ghost.

In a TV reality show about composers, Alexandre le Grand would be the winner of his era. Even if composers tend to be discreet, their work lives in a fish bowl. And M. Desplat’s bowl is filling up with scores of many scents and colours very rapidly.

Not just that, he does it consistently well, under lots of pressure, running against the clock on at least two continents, having composed the music for 115 feature films at the age of 51. Not counting the work done for TV, »

- Sultana Raza

2 items from 2013