Award
Paramount+ and Tving‘s Korean series “Bargain” has won the critics’ choice award at the Seriencamp Festival in Cologne. In April, “Bargain” became the first-ever Korean series to win best screenplay at the Canneseries Festival in France.
The series stars actors Jun Jong-seo (“Money Heist: Korea”) and Jin Seon-kyu (“Extreme Job”) and is an adaptation of director Lee Chung-hyun’s 2015 short film of the same name. Director Jun Woo-sung, who was part of the production team of the short, picked up the story and developed it into a six-part series. “Bargain” revolves around a group of strangers who gather at a remote motel with ulterior motives – seeking to bargain. Unlike the original film, the series follows the characters after an unexpected earthquake traps them inside the building. With no one to trust, they must find a way to survive.
“Bargain” is developed by Paramount+ and Tving, out of Paramount...
Paramount+ and Tving‘s Korean series “Bargain” has won the critics’ choice award at the Seriencamp Festival in Cologne. In April, “Bargain” became the first-ever Korean series to win best screenplay at the Canneseries Festival in France.
The series stars actors Jun Jong-seo (“Money Heist: Korea”) and Jin Seon-kyu (“Extreme Job”) and is an adaptation of director Lee Chung-hyun’s 2015 short film of the same name. Director Jun Woo-sung, who was part of the production team of the short, picked up the story and developed it into a six-part series. “Bargain” revolves around a group of strangers who gather at a remote motel with ulterior motives – seeking to bargain. Unlike the original film, the series follows the characters after an unexpected earthquake traps them inside the building. With no one to trust, they must find a way to survive.
“Bargain” is developed by Paramount+ and Tving, out of Paramount...
- 6/19/2023
- by Naman Ramachandran
- Variety Film + TV
Stan Refreshes Lionsgate Output Deal
Australian streamer Stan has refreshed its output deal with Lionsgate. The new agreement means Stan lands the local first-run of shows including the upcoming CIA thriller series Gray, starring Patricia Clarkson, Lydia West and Rupert Everett. Also on the menu are Son of a Critch, Welcome to Flatch and Steven K. Knight’s Spartacus sequel series. Theatrical features include White Bird, Alice and Darling. Stan will remain the Aussie home of the Power franchise, The Serpent Queen, Minx, Bmf, Gaslit and Hightown and also picks up Lionsgate catalog titles such as Mad Men, Weeds, The Spanish Princess, Black Sails, La La Land and Twilight.
Indigenous Canadian Stand-Up Show Readied
Exclusive: Canada’s Aboriginal Peoples Television Network and the Canada Media Fund are among the backers of a comedy TV series billed as the first all-Canadian and Indigenous stand-up show. They have signed on to develop...
Australian streamer Stan has refreshed its output deal with Lionsgate. The new agreement means Stan lands the local first-run of shows including the upcoming CIA thriller series Gray, starring Patricia Clarkson, Lydia West and Rupert Everett. Also on the menu are Son of a Critch, Welcome to Flatch and Steven K. Knight’s Spartacus sequel series. Theatrical features include White Bird, Alice and Darling. Stan will remain the Aussie home of the Power franchise, The Serpent Queen, Minx, Bmf, Gaslit and Hightown and also picks up Lionsgate catalog titles such as Mad Men, Weeds, The Spanish Princess, Black Sails, La La Land and Twilight.
Indigenous Canadian Stand-Up Show Readied
Exclusive: Canada’s Aboriginal Peoples Television Network and the Canada Media Fund are among the backers of a comedy TV series billed as the first all-Canadian and Indigenous stand-up show. They have signed on to develop...
- 6/19/2023
- by Jesse Whittock, Max Goldbart and Zac Ntim
- Deadline Film + TV
Japanese filmmaker Koji Fukada is back with another middle-class (melo)drama about common people in uncommon life situations. “Love Life” premiered at Venice and after that went on the tour of festivals.
“Love Life” is screening at the Museum of the Moving Image, as part of the First Look 2023 program
Taeko and her husband Jiro live a peaceful life. At the beginning, their mood could be seen as celebratory, since they are throwing a party for his stern father's 65th birthday, and also celebrating her son Keita's local Othello championship title. However, Jiro's father has a hard time accepting the fact that his son married a divorcee with a child from her previous marriage.
A sudden tragedy resulting in Keita's accidental death starts the spiral of events. Firstly, Keita's biological father Park (Atom Sunada) suddenly appears at the funeral and Taeko has the urge to do her best to...
“Love Life” is screening at the Museum of the Moving Image, as part of the First Look 2023 program
Taeko and her husband Jiro live a peaceful life. At the beginning, their mood could be seen as celebratory, since they are throwing a party for his stern father's 65th birthday, and also celebrating her son Keita's local Othello championship title. However, Jiro's father has a hard time accepting the fact that his son married a divorcee with a child from her previous marriage.
A sudden tragedy resulting in Keita's accidental death starts the spiral of events. Firstly, Keita's biological father Park (Atom Sunada) suddenly appears at the funeral and Taeko has the urge to do her best to...
- 3/13/2023
- by Marko Stojiljković
- AsianMoviePulse
Japanese filmmaker Koji Fukada is back with another middle-class (melo)drama about common people in uncommon life situations. “Love Life” premiered at Venice and after that went on the tour of festivals.
Love Life is screening at Black Movie
Taeko and her husband Jiro live a peaceful life. At the beginning, their mood could be seen as celebratory, since they are throwing a party for his stern father’s 65th birthday, and also celebrating her son Keita’s local Othello championship title. However, Jiro’s father has a hard time accepting the fact that his son married a divorcee with a child from her previous marriage.
A sudden tragedy resulting in Keita’s accidental death starts the spiral of events. Firstly, Keita’s biological father Park (Atom Sunada) suddenly appears at the funeral and Taeko has the urge to do her best to help this troubled deaf homeless Korean man.
Love Life is screening at Black Movie
Taeko and her husband Jiro live a peaceful life. At the beginning, their mood could be seen as celebratory, since they are throwing a party for his stern father’s 65th birthday, and also celebrating her son Keita’s local Othello championship title. However, Jiro’s father has a hard time accepting the fact that his son married a divorcee with a child from her previous marriage.
A sudden tragedy resulting in Keita’s accidental death starts the spiral of events. Firstly, Keita’s biological father Park (Atom Sunada) suddenly appears at the funeral and Taeko has the urge to do her best to help this troubled deaf homeless Korean man.
- 1/22/2023
- by Marko Stojiljković
- AsianMoviePulse
Japanese filmmaker Koji Fukada is back with another middle-class (melo)drama about common people in uncommon life situations. “Love Life” premiered at Venice and after that went on the tour of festivals. We caught it at a special screening at Zagreb Film Festival.
Taeko and her husband Jiro live a peaceful life. At the beginning, their mood could be seen as celebratory, since they are throwing a party for his stern father’s 65th birthday, and also celebrating her son Keita’s local Othello championship title. However, Jiro’s father has a hard time accepting the fact that his son married a divorcee with a child from her previous marriage.
A sudden tragedy resulting in Keita’s accidental death starts the spiral of events. Firstly, Keita’s biological father Park (Atom Sunada) suddenly appears at the funeral and Taeko has the urge to do her best to help this troubled deaf homeless Korean man.
Taeko and her husband Jiro live a peaceful life. At the beginning, their mood could be seen as celebratory, since they are throwing a party for his stern father’s 65th birthday, and also celebrating her son Keita’s local Othello championship title. However, Jiro’s father has a hard time accepting the fact that his son married a divorcee with a child from her previous marriage.
A sudden tragedy resulting in Keita’s accidental death starts the spiral of events. Firstly, Keita’s biological father Park (Atom Sunada) suddenly appears at the funeral and Taeko has the urge to do her best to help this troubled deaf homeless Korean man.
- 11/5/2022
- by Marko Stojiljković
- AsianMoviePulse
The Film Circuit begins with Telluride, a small but perfect film festival in the mountains of Colorado as simultaneously Venice unfurls the films that will soon be released in the wonderful arthouse cinemas of Europe, followed closely by Toronto whose films foretell the coming year’s Oscars nominees. It is a very exciting time to be on the festival circuit.
And simultaneously with these great screenings are sidebars, panel discussions, workshops, master classes and all around great networking for filmmakers around the world.
Venezia 79 Competition
Il Signore Delle Formiche
Director Gianni Amelio
Main Cast Luigi Lo Cascio, Elio Germano, Leonardo Maltese, Sara Serraiocco / Italy / 134’
The Whale
Director Darren Aronofsky
Main Cast Brendan Fraser, Sadie Sink, Hong Chau, Samantha Morton, Ty Simpkins / USA / 117’
White Noise
Director Noah Baumbach
Main Cast Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, Don Cheadle, Raffey Cassidy, Sam Nivola, May Nivola, Jodie Turner-Smith, André L. Benjamin and Lars Eidinger / USA / 136’
L’IMMENSITÀ
Director Emanuele Crialese
Main Cast Penélope Cruz, Luana Giuliani, Vincenzo Amato, Patrizio Francioni / Italy, France / 97’
Saint Omer
Director Alice Diop
Main Cast Kayije Kagame, Guslagie Malanda, Valérie Dréville, Aurélia Petit / France / 123’
Blonde
Director Andrew Dominik
Main Cast Ana de Armas, Adrien Brody, Bobby Cannavale, Xavier Samuel, Julianne Nicholson, Lily Fisher / USA / 166’
TÁR
Director Todd Field
Main Cast Cate Blanchett, Noémie Merlant, Nina Hoss, Sophie Kauer, Julian Glover, Allan Corduner, Mark Strong / USA / 158’
Love Life
Director Kôji Fukada
Main Cast Fumino Kimura, Kento Nagayama, Atom Sunada / Japan, France / 123’
Bardo, Falsa CRÓNICA De Unas Cuantas Verdades
Director Alejandro G. Iñárritu
Main Cast Daniel Giménez Cacho, Griselda Siciliani, Ximena Lamadrid, Iker Sanchez Solano, Andrés Almeida, Francisco Rubio / Mexico / 174’
Athena
Director Romain Gavras
Main Cast Dali Benssalah, Sami Slimane, Anthony Bajon, Ouassini Embarek, Alexis Manenti / France / 97’
Bones And All
Director Luca Guadagnino
Main Cast Taylor Russell, Timothée Chalamet, Mark Rylance, André Holland, Chloë Sevigny, Jessica Harper, David Gordon Green, Michael Stuhlbarg, Jake Horowitz / USA / 130’
The Eternal Daughter
Director Joanna Hogg
Main Cast Tilda Swinton, Joseph Mydell, Carly-Sophia Davies / UK, USA / 96’
Shab, Dakheli, Divar (Beyond The Wall)
Director Vahid Jalilvand
Main Cast Navid Mohammadzadeh, Diana Habibi, Amir Aghaee / Iran / 126’
The Banshees Of Inisherin
Director Martin McDonagh
Main Cast Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Kerry Condon, Barry Keoghan / Ireland, UK, USA / 109’
Argentina, 1985
Director Santiago Mitre
Main Cast Ricardo Darín, Peter Lanzani, Alejandra Flechner, Norman Briski / Argentina, USA / 140’
Chiara
Director Susanna Nicchiarelli
Main Cast Margherita Mazzucco, Andrea Carpenzano, Carlotta Natoli, Paola Tiziana Cruciani, Luigi Lo Cascio / Italy, Belgium / 106’
Monica
Director Andrea Pallaoro
Main Cast Trace Lysette, Patricia Clarkson, Adriana Barraza, Emily Browning, Joshua Close / USA, Italy / 113’
Khers Nist (No Bears)
Director Jafar Panahi
Main Cast Jafar Panahi, Naser Hashemi, Vahid Mobaseri, Bakhtiar Panjeei, Mina Kavani, Reza Heydari / Iran / 107’
All The Beauty And The Bloodshed
Director Laura Poitras
USA / 117’
Un Couple
Director Frederick Wiseman
Main Cast Nathalie Boutefeu / France, USA / 64’
The Son
Director Florian Zeller
Main Cast Hugh Jackman, Laura Dern, Vanessa Kirby, Zen McGrath, Anthony Hopkins, Hugh Quarshie / UK / 124’
Les Miens
Director Roschdy Zem
Main Cast Sami Bouajila, Roschdy Zem, Meriem Serbah, Maïwenn, Rachid Bouchareb, Abel Jafrei, Nina Zem / France / 85’
Les Enfants Des Autres
Director Rebecca Zlotowski
Main Cast Virginie Efira, Roschdy Zem, Chiara Mastroianni, Callie Ferreira / France / 104’
Toronto is in spite of itself in a civilized sort of way in competition for the premieres with Venice, though the sequential festivals are serving different constituencies. Still, The Whale, for example is premiering in Venice and then traveling to TIFF.
TIFF Gala Presentations:
The Whale directed by Darren Aronofsky, produced and to be distributed in U.S. and actng as international sales agent A24.
TIFF says: “Brendan Fraser gives a career-defining performance in Darren Aronofsky’s arrestingly intimate drama about a reclusive English professor struggling with personal relationships and self-acceptance, adapted from the stage play by Samuel D. Hunter.”
Alice, Darling by Mary Nighy
Also playing are Alice, Darling (Mary Nighy) in which Anna Kendrick captures the anxious psychology of a woman in an abusive relationship as her friends try to reconnect with her while on a cottage getaway.
Black Ice(Hubert Davis) about Black hockey players facing systemic racism in the sport.
The Greatest Beer Run Ever (Peter Farrelly) about man’s story of leaving New York in 1967 to bring beer to his childhood buddies in the Army while they are fighting in Vietnam. An Apple TV+ production.
Butcher’s Crossing (Gabe Polsky) is a frontier epic about an Ivy League drop-out as he travels to the Colorado wilderness, where he joins a team of buffalo hunters on a journey that puts his life and sanity at risk. Based on the highly acclaimed novel by John Williams. Isa Altitude
The Hummingbird (Francesca Archibugi)Hunt (Jung-jae Lee)A Jazzman’s Blues (Tyler Perry)Kacchey Limbu (Shubham Yogi)Moving On (Paul Weitz)Paris Memories (Alice Winocour)Prisoner’s Daughter (Catherine Hardwicke)Raymond & Ray (Rodrigo García)Roost (Amy Redford)Sidney (Reginald Hudlin)The Son (Florian Zeller)The Swimmers (Sally El Hosaini)What’s Love Got to Do With It? (Shekhar Kapur)The Woman King(Gina Prince-Bythewood)
Special PRESENTATIONSAllelujah (Sir Richard Eyre)All Quiet on the Western Front (Edward Berger)The Banshees Of Inisherin (Martin McDonagh)Blueback (Robert Connolly)The Blue Caftan (Maryam Touzani)Broker (Hirokazu Kore-eda)Brother (Clement Virgo)Bros (Nicholas Stoller)Catherine Called Birdy (Lena Dunham)Causeway (Lila Neugebauer)Chevalier (Stephen Williams)Corsage (Marie Kreutzer)Decision to Leave (Park Chan-wook)Devotion (Jd Dillard)Driving (Madeleine Christian Carion)El Suplente (Diego Lerman)Empire of Light...
And simultaneously with these great screenings are sidebars, panel discussions, workshops, master classes and all around great networking for filmmakers around the world.
Venezia 79 Competition
Il Signore Delle Formiche
Director Gianni Amelio
Main Cast Luigi Lo Cascio, Elio Germano, Leonardo Maltese, Sara Serraiocco / Italy / 134’
The Whale
Director Darren Aronofsky
Main Cast Brendan Fraser, Sadie Sink, Hong Chau, Samantha Morton, Ty Simpkins / USA / 117’
White Noise
Director Noah Baumbach
Main Cast Adam Driver, Greta Gerwig, Don Cheadle, Raffey Cassidy, Sam Nivola, May Nivola, Jodie Turner-Smith, André L. Benjamin and Lars Eidinger / USA / 136’
L’IMMENSITÀ
Director Emanuele Crialese
Main Cast Penélope Cruz, Luana Giuliani, Vincenzo Amato, Patrizio Francioni / Italy, France / 97’
Saint Omer
Director Alice Diop
Main Cast Kayije Kagame, Guslagie Malanda, Valérie Dréville, Aurélia Petit / France / 123’
Blonde
Director Andrew Dominik
Main Cast Ana de Armas, Adrien Brody, Bobby Cannavale, Xavier Samuel, Julianne Nicholson, Lily Fisher / USA / 166’
TÁR
Director Todd Field
Main Cast Cate Blanchett, Noémie Merlant, Nina Hoss, Sophie Kauer, Julian Glover, Allan Corduner, Mark Strong / USA / 158’
Love Life
Director Kôji Fukada
Main Cast Fumino Kimura, Kento Nagayama, Atom Sunada / Japan, France / 123’
Bardo, Falsa CRÓNICA De Unas Cuantas Verdades
Director Alejandro G. Iñárritu
Main Cast Daniel Giménez Cacho, Griselda Siciliani, Ximena Lamadrid, Iker Sanchez Solano, Andrés Almeida, Francisco Rubio / Mexico / 174’
Athena
Director Romain Gavras
Main Cast Dali Benssalah, Sami Slimane, Anthony Bajon, Ouassini Embarek, Alexis Manenti / France / 97’
Bones And All
Director Luca Guadagnino
Main Cast Taylor Russell, Timothée Chalamet, Mark Rylance, André Holland, Chloë Sevigny, Jessica Harper, David Gordon Green, Michael Stuhlbarg, Jake Horowitz / USA / 130’
The Eternal Daughter
Director Joanna Hogg
Main Cast Tilda Swinton, Joseph Mydell, Carly-Sophia Davies / UK, USA / 96’
Shab, Dakheli, Divar (Beyond The Wall)
Director Vahid Jalilvand
Main Cast Navid Mohammadzadeh, Diana Habibi, Amir Aghaee / Iran / 126’
The Banshees Of Inisherin
Director Martin McDonagh
Main Cast Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Kerry Condon, Barry Keoghan / Ireland, UK, USA / 109’
Argentina, 1985
Director Santiago Mitre
Main Cast Ricardo Darín, Peter Lanzani, Alejandra Flechner, Norman Briski / Argentina, USA / 140’
Chiara
Director Susanna Nicchiarelli
Main Cast Margherita Mazzucco, Andrea Carpenzano, Carlotta Natoli, Paola Tiziana Cruciani, Luigi Lo Cascio / Italy, Belgium / 106’
Monica
Director Andrea Pallaoro
Main Cast Trace Lysette, Patricia Clarkson, Adriana Barraza, Emily Browning, Joshua Close / USA, Italy / 113’
Khers Nist (No Bears)
Director Jafar Panahi
Main Cast Jafar Panahi, Naser Hashemi, Vahid Mobaseri, Bakhtiar Panjeei, Mina Kavani, Reza Heydari / Iran / 107’
All The Beauty And The Bloodshed
Director Laura Poitras
USA / 117’
Un Couple
Director Frederick Wiseman
Main Cast Nathalie Boutefeu / France, USA / 64’
The Son
Director Florian Zeller
Main Cast Hugh Jackman, Laura Dern, Vanessa Kirby, Zen McGrath, Anthony Hopkins, Hugh Quarshie / UK / 124’
Les Miens
Director Roschdy Zem
Main Cast Sami Bouajila, Roschdy Zem, Meriem Serbah, Maïwenn, Rachid Bouchareb, Abel Jafrei, Nina Zem / France / 85’
Les Enfants Des Autres
Director Rebecca Zlotowski
Main Cast Virginie Efira, Roschdy Zem, Chiara Mastroianni, Callie Ferreira / France / 104’
Toronto is in spite of itself in a civilized sort of way in competition for the premieres with Venice, though the sequential festivals are serving different constituencies. Still, The Whale, for example is premiering in Venice and then traveling to TIFF.
TIFF Gala Presentations:
The Whale directed by Darren Aronofsky, produced and to be distributed in U.S. and actng as international sales agent A24.
TIFF says: “Brendan Fraser gives a career-defining performance in Darren Aronofsky’s arrestingly intimate drama about a reclusive English professor struggling with personal relationships and self-acceptance, adapted from the stage play by Samuel D. Hunter.”
Alice, Darling by Mary Nighy
Also playing are Alice, Darling (Mary Nighy) in which Anna Kendrick captures the anxious psychology of a woman in an abusive relationship as her friends try to reconnect with her while on a cottage getaway.
Black Ice(Hubert Davis) about Black hockey players facing systemic racism in the sport.
The Greatest Beer Run Ever (Peter Farrelly) about man’s story of leaving New York in 1967 to bring beer to his childhood buddies in the Army while they are fighting in Vietnam. An Apple TV+ production.
Butcher’s Crossing (Gabe Polsky) is a frontier epic about an Ivy League drop-out as he travels to the Colorado wilderness, where he joins a team of buffalo hunters on a journey that puts his life and sanity at risk. Based on the highly acclaimed novel by John Williams. Isa Altitude
The Hummingbird (Francesca Archibugi)Hunt (Jung-jae Lee)A Jazzman’s Blues (Tyler Perry)Kacchey Limbu (Shubham Yogi)Moving On (Paul Weitz)Paris Memories (Alice Winocour)Prisoner’s Daughter (Catherine Hardwicke)Raymond & Ray (Rodrigo García)Roost (Amy Redford)Sidney (Reginald Hudlin)The Son (Florian Zeller)The Swimmers (Sally El Hosaini)What’s Love Got to Do With It? (Shekhar Kapur)The Woman King(Gina Prince-Bythewood)
Special PRESENTATIONSAllelujah (Sir Richard Eyre)All Quiet on the Western Front (Edward Berger)The Banshees Of Inisherin (Martin McDonagh)Blueback (Robert Connolly)The Blue Caftan (Maryam Touzani)Broker (Hirokazu Kore-eda)Brother (Clement Virgo)Bros (Nicholas Stoller)Catherine Called Birdy (Lena Dunham)Causeway (Lila Neugebauer)Chevalier (Stephen Williams)Corsage (Marie Kreutzer)Decision to Leave (Park Chan-wook)Devotion (Jd Dillard)Driving (Madeleine Christian Carion)El Suplente (Diego Lerman)Empire of Light...
- 9/10/2022
- by Sydney
- Sydney's Buzz
Venice film festival: Japanese director Kôji Fukada has crafted a richly painful and quietly comic human drama
Might the title be an instruction? If so, it’s not so easy to obey, judging from this movie from Japanese director Kôji Fukada who made such an impression with his sweet, Rohmeresque feature Goodbye Summer in 2013. Love Life is an inexpressibly tragic and painful human drama about complicated lives, a movie that interleaves the utter desolation with a dry understated comedy and a sense of emotional tangle and chaos, a film that moreover blindsides its leading female character – and us, the audience – with an entirely unexpected coda section away from Japan in South Korea. In Shakespearean terms, this could be a filmic “problem play”.
A married young couple are living together in a small flat: Taeko (Fumino Kimura) and her husband Jiro (Kento Nagayama) and their lively eight-year-old son Keita (Tetsuda Shimada...
Might the title be an instruction? If so, it’s not so easy to obey, judging from this movie from Japanese director Kôji Fukada who made such an impression with his sweet, Rohmeresque feature Goodbye Summer in 2013. Love Life is an inexpressibly tragic and painful human drama about complicated lives, a movie that interleaves the utter desolation with a dry understated comedy and a sense of emotional tangle and chaos, a film that moreover blindsides its leading female character – and us, the audience – with an entirely unexpected coda section away from Japan in South Korea. In Shakespearean terms, this could be a filmic “problem play”.
A married young couple are living together in a small flat: Taeko (Fumino Kimura) and her husband Jiro (Kento Nagayama) and their lively eight-year-old son Keita (Tetsuda Shimada...
- 9/7/2022
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Love Life is one of those films that really wears its screenplay. The plot follows a mother’s attempts to come to terms with the death of a child, but it’s more about unusual paths the journey takes for her to get there. The director is Kôji Fukada, a filmmaker who studied under Kiyoshi Kurosawa and cites Rohmer as a key influence. The first of Fukada’s films to complete for one of the grand festival awards, it premiered this week in what has been if not the best, then at least the glitziest Venice lineup in recent memory. Amongst the stars, Love Life (named for an Akiko Yano song of the same name) is jarringly everyday in color palette and setting, but has just the right amount of scope, filmmaking nous, and unusual choices to hold its own and even stand out.
A neat film of knotty ideas,...
A neat film of knotty ideas,...
- 9/6/2022
- by Rory O'Connor
- The Film Stage
‘Love Life’ Review: Koji Fukada’s Life-After-Loss Drama is Full of Tragedy But Strangely Lightweight
Even the most solidly founded of marriages can be strained and shattered by the death of a child. For handsome, wholesome Japanese couple Taeko and Jiro, however, that tragedy shows up all the fault lines that were already in their young relationship, and that’s before living ghosts of the past show up for both partners. Koji Fukada’s “Love Life” unabashedly embraces melodramatic contrivance in its examination of modern middle-class love tested as much by social prejudices as by personal demons; it just does so with such pallid, polite reserve that its sentimentality never becomes transcendently moving. As such, this agreeable but overlong pic finds the Japanese writer-director still struggling to regain the form of his jolting 2016 Cannes prizewinner “Harmonium.”
That film was an exercise in disorienting tonal contrast and conflict, with a vein of blood-dark comedy running through severely tragic events. “Love Life,” on the other hand, is an earnest,...
That film was an exercise in disorienting tonal contrast and conflict, with a vein of blood-dark comedy running through severely tragic events. “Love Life,” on the other hand, is an earnest,...
- 9/6/2022
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
Grief and guilt are the twin quiet rivers running beneath Koji Fukada’s ambiguously titled Venice competition entry Love Life, a delicately tangled story of generational conflict and the silences that, without being overtly aggressive, can drive people apart. Anyone familiar with the work of Japan’s greatest cinema maestro, Yasuhiro Ozu, will recognize the general territory. It is a space within which tectonic social shifts are disguised under layers of traditional social observance, often involving large meals, and where profound emotions may be — and often must be — contained within a glance.
Taeko (Fumino Kimura) and Jiro (Kento Nagayama) have been married for around a year, having met several years earlier in the social welfare office where they now both work. Taeko already had a child, Keita (Tetta Shimada), from a previous marriage to a man who abandoned them when Keita was a baby, perhaps because he was barely able...
Taeko (Fumino Kimura) and Jiro (Kento Nagayama) have been married for around a year, having met several years earlier in the social welfare office where they now both work. Taeko already had a child, Keita (Tetta Shimada), from a previous marriage to a man who abandoned them when Keita was a baby, perhaps because he was barely able...
- 9/6/2022
- by Stephanie Bunbury
- Deadline Film + TV
Enormous personal events unfold throughout Kôji Fukada’s soulful Japanese drama “Love Life,” premiering at the Venice Film Festival: a marriage, a reunion, an affair and, most notably, a death. And yet the scale in which Fukada works — as both writer and director — is so deliberately intimate that immense experiences feel microcosmic, while tiny moments make a huge impact.
His heroine, Taeko (Fumino Kimura), is so self-effacing that it often feels as though she would erase herself if she could. Most of the time, she is able to look to others for meaning and definition; in her small, generic flat within a block of large, generic apartment buildings, she serves her in-laws, her husband, her son Keita (Tetta Shimada). At work, from a cubicle or a sidewalk, she serves as a social advocate, helping unhoused and otherwise disadvantaged strangers.
When she can’t find something to do, she lingers in near-immobility,...
His heroine, Taeko (Fumino Kimura), is so self-effacing that it often feels as though she would erase herself if she could. Most of the time, she is able to look to others for meaning and definition; in her small, generic flat within a block of large, generic apartment buildings, she serves her in-laws, her husband, her son Keita (Tetta Shimada). At work, from a cubicle or a sidewalk, she serves as a social advocate, helping unhoused and otherwise disadvantaged strangers.
When she can’t find something to do, she lingers in near-immobility,...
- 9/5/2022
- by Elizabeth Weitzman
- The Wrap
Click here to read the full article.
The apartment at the center of Love Life, Koji Fukada’s mellow study of grief and dislocation, is, like the film, compact and practical. A long table, surrounded by a narrow bench and various chairs, occupies the center of the living room. The kitchen is tucked in a corner. Near the entrance: a bathroom with a short tub, a sink, a toilet. Toward the rear: sliding doors leading to a balcony overlooking a hideous concrete lot; a bedroom on the right. Evidence of family life is everywhere: height marks etched into a wall, trophies, diplomas, a child’s drawings, books, clothes on hooks, shoes in corner.
Taeko (Fumino Kimura), Jiro (Kento Nagayama) and their 6-year-old son, Keita (Tetta Shimada), live in this unfussy space, and how they interact with it is one of the most edifying aspects of Fukada’s latest feature. With Love Life,...
The apartment at the center of Love Life, Koji Fukada’s mellow study of grief and dislocation, is, like the film, compact and practical. A long table, surrounded by a narrow bench and various chairs, occupies the center of the living room. The kitchen is tucked in a corner. Near the entrance: a bathroom with a short tub, a sink, a toilet. Toward the rear: sliding doors leading to a balcony overlooking a hideous concrete lot; a bedroom on the right. Evidence of family life is everywhere: height marks etched into a wall, trophies, diplomas, a child’s drawings, books, clothes on hooks, shoes in corner.
Taeko (Fumino Kimura), Jiro (Kento Nagayama) and their 6-year-old son, Keita (Tetta Shimada), live in this unfussy space, and how they interact with it is one of the most edifying aspects of Fukada’s latest feature. With Love Life,...
- 9/5/2022
- by Lovia Gyarkye
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Click here to read the full article.
Six years after his 2016 film Harmonium won Cannes’ jury prize in the Un Certain Regard section, Japanese director Koji Fukada is taking the big step up into Venice’s main competition with the emotionally intense family drama Love Life.
Fukada’s rise to the top tier of the international festival circuit has been telegraphed for some time. His breakthrough family comedy Hospitalité won best picture in the Japanese cinema category of the 2010 Tokyo International Film Festival, and in 2020 that same event featured him as its director in focus with a mini-retrospective. Effectively, the Tokyo festival’s organizers were arguing that Fukada was worthy of the type of top-level industry attention that Venice has now bestowed upon him.
Fukada’s ninth feature, Love Life tells a taut domestic drama about a newly married Japanese couple (Fumino Kimura and Kento Nagayama) enjoying a peaceful existence...
Six years after his 2016 film Harmonium won Cannes’ jury prize in the Un Certain Regard section, Japanese director Koji Fukada is taking the big step up into Venice’s main competition with the emotionally intense family drama Love Life.
Fukada’s rise to the top tier of the international festival circuit has been telegraphed for some time. His breakthrough family comedy Hospitalité won best picture in the Japanese cinema category of the 2010 Tokyo International Film Festival, and in 2020 that same event featured him as its director in focus with a mini-retrospective. Effectively, the Tokyo festival’s organizers were arguing that Fukada was worthy of the type of top-level industry attention that Venice has now bestowed upon him.
Fukada’s ninth feature, Love Life tells a taut domestic drama about a newly married Japanese couple (Fumino Kimura and Kento Nagayama) enjoying a peaceful existence...
- 9/1/2022
- by Patrick Brzeski
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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For the 79th Venice Film Festival, artistic director Alberto Barbera has put together one of the most well-curated lineups of his career. Both studios and streamers are well represented.
Netflix scored an opening-night coup with Noah Baumbach’s White Noise, with buzz promising that it’ll wow the Lido, alongside Andrew Dominik’s Marilyn Monroe biopic, Blonde, with Ana de Armas; Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s Mexican epic Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths; and Romain Gavras’ French action thriller Athena.
Studio fare is well represented by Warner Bros.’ Don’t Worry Darling from director Olivia Wilde; Focus has Todd Field’s Tár with Cate Blanchett and Mark Strong; MGM will debut Luca Guadagnino’s Timothée Chalamet-Taylor Russell starrer Bones and All; Searchlight presents The Banshees of Inisherin from Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri director Martin McDonagh; and Sony Pictures Classics will be...
For the 79th Venice Film Festival, artistic director Alberto Barbera has put together one of the most well-curated lineups of his career. Both studios and streamers are well represented.
Netflix scored an opening-night coup with Noah Baumbach’s White Noise, with buzz promising that it’ll wow the Lido, alongside Andrew Dominik’s Marilyn Monroe biopic, Blonde, with Ana de Armas; Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s Mexican epic Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths; and Romain Gavras’ French action thriller Athena.
Studio fare is well represented by Warner Bros.’ Don’t Worry Darling from director Olivia Wilde; Focus has Todd Field’s Tár with Cate Blanchett and Mark Strong; MGM will debut Luca Guadagnino’s Timothée Chalamet-Taylor Russell starrer Bones and All; Searchlight presents The Banshees of Inisherin from Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri director Martin McDonagh; and Sony Pictures Classics will be...
- 8/30/2022
- by Scott Roxborough
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The 79th Venice International Film Festival has just announced the line-up for the next edition. The 79th Venice International Film Festival is organised by La Biennale di Venezia and directed by Alberto Barbera. It will take place at Venice Lido from 31 August to 10 September 2022. The Festival is officially recognised by the Fiapf (International Federation of Film Producers Association).
The aim of the Festival is to raise awareness and promote international cinema in all its forms as art, entertainment and as an industry, in a spirit of freedom and dialogue. The Festival also organises retrospectives and tributes to major figures as a contribution towards a better understanding of the history of cinema.
Here are all the Asian Titles on the Programme:
Competition:
Love Life
Director Koji Fukada
Main Cast Fumino Kimura, Kento Nagayama, Atom Sunada / Japan, France / 123’
Shab, Dakheli, Divar (Beyond The Wall)
Director Vahid Jalilvand
Main Cast Navid Mohammadzadeh, Diana Habibi,...
The aim of the Festival is to raise awareness and promote international cinema in all its forms as art, entertainment and as an industry, in a spirit of freedom and dialogue. The Festival also organises retrospectives and tributes to major figures as a contribution towards a better understanding of the history of cinema.
Here are all the Asian Titles on the Programme:
Competition:
Love Life
Director Koji Fukada
Main Cast Fumino Kimura, Kento Nagayama, Atom Sunada / Japan, France / 123’
Shab, Dakheli, Divar (Beyond The Wall)
Director Vahid Jalilvand
Main Cast Navid Mohammadzadeh, Diana Habibi,...
- 7/26/2022
- by Adriana Rosati
- AsianMoviePulse
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