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Tatler Asia
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Tatler Asia
5 Asian films making their debut at Cannes Film Festival 2025
'A Pale View of Hills' (Ishikawa Kei) Above A still from 'A Pale View of Hills' (Photo: IMDB) Kei Ishikawa brings to life the first novel by Nobel Prize-winning author Kazuo Ishiguro; the film is the third of Ishiguro's books to be adapted for the screen, joining The Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go . The story focuses on Japanese widow Etsuko, who is shown as living in England and navigating her experience of loss and war after leaving a shattered post-war Nagasaki. Ishiguro is an executive producer on the film and has publicly praised Ishikawa's poignant screenplay. The piece will premiere in the Un Certain Regard section this week and is set for wider release in the summer, marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. 'Homebound' (Neeraj Ghaywan) Above Bollywood actor Ishaan Khatter plays a lead role in 'Homebound' Ten years after his Cannes debut with the award-winning Masaan, filmmaker Neeraj Ghaywan is returning to the French film festival. Homebound tells the story of childhood friends who pursue a police job that they believe will provide them with an essential sense of dignity and status. The narrative explores themes of friendship and survival, when the pair's bond is threatened as they inevitably clash due to their own desperation. Martin Scorsese joined the movie as an executive producer and went on to say that Ghaywan had crafted a significant contribution to Indian cinema. The piece will premiere in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival. 'Resurrection' (Bi Gan) Above Chinese star Jackson Yee stars in Bi Gan's 'Resurrection' Resurrection marks Gan's first entry into the festival's Official Competition, after his feature Long Day's Journey into Night premiered in the Un Certain Regard section in 2018. The film is set in 2068 and follows the life of a woman who becomes trapped in a surreal state, in which she stumbles upon the remains of an android. After developing a connection with the android through storytelling, she must decide whether to return to the real world or stay with her newfound companion. The piece will premiere in the Official Competition and is set for wider release later this year by early 2026. 'The Exit 8' (Genki Kawamura) Above Kazunari Ninomiya in 'The Exit 8' Renowned Japanese filmmaker Genki Kawamura takes a step further into the world of psychological storytelling in his latest venture. The Exit 8 is a live-action adaptation of the 2023 horror game The Exit 8 by Kotake Create; the game features looping corridors and a series of subtle differences. The movie will continue with this story, in which a trapped man will have to navigate through what appears to be an endless tunnel in order to find 'Exit 8', and must return back to the beginning should he spot any anomalies. The surreal piece is highly anticipated by the game's users looking forward to a new take on the game's intense premise. The piece will premiere in the Midnight Screenings section of the Cannes Film Festival and is set for wider release from August 29, 2025.
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘A Pale View of Hills' Review: The Supple Ambiguities of Kazuo Ishiguro's Novel Stiffen and Seize Up in an Unsatisfying Adaptation
Kazuo Ishiguro's 1982 debut novel 'A Pale View of Hills' is an elegant, slippery examination of lives caught between identities both national and existential: Its tale-within-a-tale of two Japanese women living eerily overlapping lives in post-war Nagasaki, as related to the mixed-race daughter of one of them 30 years later, is rife with deliberate, subtly uncanny inconsistencies that speak of immigrant trauma and disassociation. Such lithe literary conceits turn to heavier twists in Kei Ishikawa's ambitious but ungainly adaptation, which mostly follows the letter of Ishiguro's work, but misses its haunting, haunted spirit. Attractively and accessibly presented, this bilingual Japanese-British production aims squarely for crossover arthouse appeal, and with the Ishiguro imprimatur — the Nobel laureate takes an executive producer credit — should secure broader global distribution than any of Ishikawa's previous work. Viewers unfamiliar with the novel, however, may be left perplexed by key development in this dual-timeline period piece, which strands proceedings somewhere between ghost story and elusive, unreliable memory piece; even those more au fait with the material may well query some of Ishikawa's storytelling choices. On more prosaic fronts, too, the film is patchy, with multiple subplots drifting erratically in and out of view, and an uneven quartet of central performances. More from Variety 'Eagles of the Republic' Review: An Egyptian Movie Star Is Forced to Make a Propaganda Film in Tarik Saleh's Catchy but Muddled Age of Autocracy Thriller 'The Disappearance of Josef Mengele' Review: A Post-War Study of the Nazis' 'Angel of Death' Lacks Dimension 'Fuori' Review: Jailtime Revives a Middle-Aged Writer's Mojo in Mario Martone's Uninvolving Literary Biopic Ishiguro's novel was narrated firsthand by the character who bridges both its timelines. The melancholic Etsuko appears in 1952 Nagasaki as a timid, dutiful housewife (played by 'Our Little Sister' star Suzu Hirose) pregnant with her first child, and 30 years later, in Britain's genteel home counties, as a solitary widow (played by Yoh Yoshida) preparing to move from a house filled with pained memories. In between there has been a second marriage, a second pregnancy, a seismic emigration and more than one bereavement. Our access to Etsuko's inner life is limited, however, as her story is filtered through the perspective of her younger daughter Niki (Camilla Aiko), an aspiring journalist who has grown up entirely in Britain. Visiting her mother in 1982 with the intention of writing a family memoir of sorts, Niki struggles to square her westernized upbringing with a Japanese history and heritage that her mother is loath to talk about. Etsuko's reticence is partly rooted in grief: The elephant in the room between them is the recent suicide of Keiko, Etsuko's Japanese-born elder daughter and Niki's half-sister, who never adjusted, culturally or psychologically, to her new environment after emigrating with her mother and British stepfather. Keiko is never directly seen on screen, though there may be an analog of sorts for her childhood self in the film's 1950s-set section, where the young Etsuko — lonely and brusquely neglected by her workaholic husband Jiro (Kouhei Matsushita) — befriends single mother Sachiko (Fumi Nikaido, recently seen in FX's 'Shōgun' series) and her sullen, withdrawn pre-teen daughter Mariko. Sachiko is a glamorous, modern-minded social outcast, marginalized both for her rejection of Japanese patriarchy and the scars of her and Mariko's radiation exposure following the 1945 Nagasaki bombings. (The stigma of the latter is such that Etsuko maintains a lie to Jiro that she was not in Nagasaki at the time.) But she's planning her escape, having attached herself to an American soldier willing to sweep her and Mariko back to the States. As the two women bond, the meek Etsuko begins to wonder if this life of traditional domestic servitude is really what she was made for. Though we are never party to her early years of motherhood, nor the transition between her first and second husbands, the mirroring between these unseen, imminent life changes and Sachiko's situation grows ever clearer — as the women themselves even begin to resemble each other in costume and comportment. Is Sachiko merely a model for Etsuko to emulate, a phantom projection of what her future could be, or the older Etsuko's distanced reflection of her past? DP Piotr Niemyjski's heightened depiction of midcentury Nagasaki — sometimes a postcard vision of serene pastels, sometimes luridly bathed in saturated sunset hues — suggests some embellishment of reality, but Ishikawa never finds a narratively satisfying way to present ambiguities that can shimmer more nebulously on the page, building to a reveal that feels overwrought and rug-pulling. Back in Blighty, shot in drabber tones outside a flash of red maple foliage in Etsuko's lovingly maintained Japanese-style garden, the drama is more straightforward, but stilted and inert nonetheless. The script musters scant interest in Niki's career ambitions and romantic complications, and her halting conversations with her mother keep chasing a climactic point of mutual understanding that never arrives — a poignant impasse, perhaps, but a difficult one to structure a film around. There's more interest in the past, and in Hirose and Nikaido's delicate performances as two women living parallel lives in full view of each other. But 'A Pale View of Hills' commendably resists nostalgia, as it brittly sympathizes with immigrant identities unsettled in any place or any era. Best of Variety The Best Albums of the Decade
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Bulova Documentary Puts a Spotlight on Brand's Backing of Veterans, Women's Rights and Other Social Initiatives
As New York watch company Bulova celebrates its 150th anniversary, managing director Michael Benavente can point to many milestones and achievements the brand can be proud of, but there is one that stands out. Speaking following Variety and Golden Globes' screening of Michael Culyba's documentary 'America Telling Time: 150 Years of Bulova' presented by Bulova, Benavente told an audience on Sunday at the Cannes Film Festival that the sequence that made the most emotional impact on him and other audience members he'd chatted with was the one featuring the work done with the Veterans Watchmaker Initiative, which the company supports. More from Variety 'A Pale View of Hills' Review: The Supple Ambiguities of Kazuo Ishiguro's Novel Stiffen and Seize Up in an Unsatisfying Adaptation 'Eagles of the Republic' Review: An Egyptian Movie Star Is Forced to Make a Propaganda Film in Tarik Saleh's Catchy but Muddled Age of Autocracy Thriller 'The Disappearance of Josef Mengele' Review: A Post-War Study of the Nazis' 'Angel of Death' Lacks Dimension The non-profit runs a tuition-free school that allows disabled veterans to learn watchmaking skills and offers them a dedicated job placement. In the film, veterans, some of whom had been homeless, explained how it had restored their sense of self-worth, as well as giving them a means to earn a living, despite their physical or mental challenges. For some it had literally been a life saver, as they had been contemplating suicide. Benavente explained that the Veterans Watchmaker Initiative was set up by Sam Cannan, who was a sniper for a SWAT team in Baltimore. 'He got shot off a three-story building while there was an active shooter, and he fell, and by the grace of God, there was an awning that broke his fall. But immediately he was disabled from the Baltimore Police Department,' Benavente explained. After attending the Joseph Bulova School of Watchmaking, Cannan went on to 'have a very illustrious career as a watchmaker. He goes to live in Switzerland for many years, and this project that you saw today is really a work of love for him to give back, because he was in the same place as these guys. So you can see he's very emotional and he's super passionate about it and he's a great guy, and so we're just happy to be able to be with him and support,' Benavente said. Among other not-for-profit initiatives the company supports that are covered in the film are the Latin Grammys; the Maestro Cares Foundation, co-founded by singer Marc Anthony; and the We Are Family Foundation, which was co-founded by singer-songwriter Nile Rodgers. Both Anthony and Rodgers are brand ambassadors for Bulova, have designed watches for the company, and feature prominently in the film. Anthony's wife Nadia Ferreira, the Paraguayan model and social influencer, also attended the Cannes screening. The film is broken into themed chapters, rather than following a series of milestones chronologically, and the one that stood out for Culyba was Bulova's impact on women's rights. In the 1970s, for example, the company ran a series of groundbreaking ads in support of equal pay for women. 'I would say that was another exciting part of discovery while I was making the film,' Culyba said. 'I wasn't necessarily aware of their advertising campaign for the Equal Rights Amendment, and that ad is so brave and bold of a company at that time to really take a social and political stand. 'At the time, Bulava really embraced women's rights, and it's a message that I think a lot of people, a lot of women, obviously, and men, can feel still today, through the brand it, it's still there.' Best of Variety New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week Emmy Predictions: Talk/Scripted Variety Series - The Variety Categories Are Still a Mess; Netflix, Dropout, and 'Hot Ones' Stir Up Buzz Oscars Predictions 2026: 'Sinners' Becomes Early Contender Ahead of Cannes Film Festival
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Karan Johar and Neeraj Ghaywan on Star Kids, Martin Scorsese and Their Cannes Selection ‘Homebound': ‘Living a Cinematic Dream'
When Bollywood titan Karan Johar's Dharma Productions backs a film exploring caste and religious discrimination in rural India with Martin Scorsese as executive producer, cinema history gets rewritten. 'Homebound,' Neeraj Ghaywan's long-awaited sophomore feature, produced by Johar along with Adar Poonawalla, Apoorva Mehta, Somen Mishra, co-produced by Marijke deSouza and Melita Toscan Du Plantier and executive produced by Scorsese and Pravin Khairnar, isn't just heading to Cannes' Un Certain Regard section — it's smashing industry conventions about who gets to tell which stories and how far they can travel. More from Variety Bulova Documentary Puts a Spotlight on Brand's Backing of Veterans, Women's Rights and Other Social Initiatives 'A Pale View of Hills' Review: The Supple Ambiguities of Kazuo Ishiguro's Novel Stiffen and Seize Up in an Unsatisfying Adaptation 'Eagles of the Republic' Review: An Egyptian Movie Star Is Forced to Make a Propaganda Film in Tarik Saleh's Catchy but Muddled Age of Autocracy Thriller The unlikely creative alliance between Bollywood's glossiest producer, an indie filmmaker with uncompromising social vision, and cinema's most revered living director has yielded an anticipated festival appearance. Ghaywan's 2015 debut 'Masaan' had its world premiere at Cannes' Un Certain Regard strand where it won both the Fipresci Prize and Promising Future Award. The path to securing cinema royalty as their champion came through co-producer du Plantier, who produced 'Masaan' and has a longstanding relationship with Scorsese. 'Martin had seen 'Masaan' and was very interested in what Neeraj's next would be,' Johar tells Variety. 'Just the fact that I heard his notes – that Martin Scorsese has notes on a film that I have a credit on – I'm not sure I'm being able to recover from this out-of-body feeling.' In 'Homebound,' desperate to break free from the weight of their marginalized identities, two childhood friends from a North Indian village – Shoaib Ali (Ishaan Khatter) and Chandan Kumar (Vishal Jethwa) – push against a world stacked against them. Convinced that a police constable's job will bring them the dignity they've long been denied, they chase it with urgency and hope. Chandan meets Sudha Bharti (Janhvi Kapoor), who urges him to pursue education instead. Meanwhile Shoaib struggles with his financial burdens worsened by his father's ailment. Bound by brotherhood, they confront the disillusionment of a system that failed them. Scorsese's creative influence began early. 'He started from the scripting stage,' Ghaywan reveals. 'He gave copious amounts of notes, not just in the scripting but also on the editing stage. He saw three cuts. It's insane, him saying your character names and talking with such length.' For Johar, whose Dharma Productions built its empire on glossy, star-studded blockbusters, 'Homebound' represents the continuation of a less-recognized aspect of his company's work – one that has included festival favorites and critically acclaimed titles that push boundaries. 'I don't know why we get slotted,' Johar says with a hint of frustration. 'I've been saying this a lot because from actually producing even parts of anthologies – Neeraj himself has directed 'Geeli Pucchi' for us in [Netflix's] 'Ajeeb Daastaans' – to trying to move the bar of cinema with films like 'Kapoor & Sons' right up to 'Kill,' which was at Toronto in 2023… we've been trying to always do that one film once in a while that breaks barriers and creates a great profile for us as a production house that is not just swimming in the mainstream, but also wants to come to the beautiful, cinematic shore.' On what drew him to 'Homebound' specifically, Johar's answer is disarmingly simple: 'There are only two things I can say. One is Neeraj. The other is Ghaywan,' he says. 'I was like, he always had me at hello.' The film stars next-gen talents Ishaan Khatter (Netflix's 'The Perfect Couple'), Janhvi Kapoor ('Devara Part 1') – both from film families – alongside Vishal Jethwa ('Tiger 3'). For a film exploring marginalization and social inequity, casting 'star kids' might seem counterintuitive, but both filmmakers insist the actors' commitment transcended their privileged backgrounds. 'I genuinely went with the feeling of collaborating with people who have kindness,' Ghaywan emphasizes. 'People who believed in me, who were inspired by the script.' The search for Chandan was particularly extensive. 'We casted for like, a really long time,' Ghaywan reveals. 'We tried casting for many people for Vishal's part. But I was somehow navigating towards Vishal because, apart from being a good actor, he also had a sense of innocence. You know, that really brought something to the film, because you would want it to be something tender, and that's how Vishal came on board.' Johar, a connoisseur of star quality, says of Khatter: 'He's a chameleon. You can put him in [Netflix's] 'The Royals,' and he'll deliver that kind of sexy boy look which is like thirst trap and everyone's national crush these days, and you put him in 'Homebound,' and he'll rip your gut out emotionally.' For Kapoor, daughter of late Indian cinema icon Sridevi and producer Boney Kapoor, the film represented a transformation both onscreen and off. Ghaywan is particularly protective of the actor who has faced intense public scrutiny. 'She's been maligned publicly and heavily trolled, but when people see this film and her true potential, they'll wake up to see she's really made of something else,' he insists. The director describes how Kapoor 'started questioning her own privilege' during preparation. 'I gave her [Bhimrao Ramji] Ambedkar's 'Annihilation of Caste' to read, and she went into a rabbit hole of trying to understand the glaring differences that we live with together.' Ambedkar, the architect of India's Constitution and a fierce crusader against caste discrimination, redefined the nation's legal and social framework. Johar adds that for Kapoor, the experience was more therapeutic than professional: 'She felt she was in 10 days of therapy with Neeraj, and she felt healed as a result. Even now, she says those seven or eight days spent on the sets of 'Homebound' will be her best days spent on a film set. She felt she wasn't really acting but going through some sort of personal catharsis.' Ghaywan's preparation was immersive and transformative. 'I took the boys for a long immersion exercise. We stayed in villages,' he explains. 'No matter what we do, we can't replicate the lived experience of somebody. We can only empathize. We can only do as much justice as we can.' One moment during this process crystallized the film's purpose for the director: 'In a sitting inside a very poor man's house in a village, we were eating, and I just felt so banal. I felt like, what is the point of all of this? Because this moment is so special that me making a film is so insignificant compared to this amazing life unfolding in front of me.' That authenticity is why Johar gave Ghaywan complete creative control: 'I told him the one thing you should not listen to is me. You should actually just do whatever your heart desires, because you know the world of this film. It's coming from a very solid place in your heart, and just follow your gut. I'm there to just back you like a silent supporter, but on the sidelines.' The film tackles sensitive topics of caste and religion in India, and despite tackling divisive issues, both men reject the notion their film takes sides. 'At its heart, it's a friendship story,' Johar says. 'There's a humanitarian perspective to it. There is no villain in this film. Most of us know that we live in the gray, and rarely are we addressing the gray. What Neeraj does so beautifully is that all characters operate from the gray. They combat the grayness within their ecosystem and within their DNA, and then they emerge from there with a slight light at the end of the tunnel.' Ghaywan, who hails from a marginalized community himself, adds: 'My intent with this film is not to villainize but to speak to the other side with empathy as well. I want to hold their hand, make them sit next to me and say, 'Hey, look at this. This is what happened in this person's life. Do you want to rethink about what's going on?'' For Johar, having an officially selected film at Cannes represents a culmination. 'To me, it's the holy grail of world cinema, literally the temple of world cinema,' he says with characteristic passion. 'I was there in a film that was an anthology with 'Bombay Talkies' [2013]… with Anurag Kashyap, Dibakar Banerjee, and Zoya Akhtar,' Johar says. The film was a special screening at Cannes to commemorate 100 years of Indian cinema. 'Now, many years later, properly with an officially selected film with the beautiful golden leaf settled on our poster with Mr. Scorsese being the executive producer… I feel like it's living a cinematic dream,' Johar adds. Ghaywan, returning to Cannes after a decade, reflects on his journey from cinephile to celebrated filmmaker: 'Every year in those early days of cinephilia, you would make a list of all the Cannes films. Anurag [Kashyap] and I used to compete about who's seen which film. I was so jealous if he'd seen one before me.' He pauses, the gravity of his return apparent. 'Not in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine having a film in a competition section. In a way, it is like me 'homebound' to Cannes.' Ghaywan is represented by Tulsea. Paradise City Sales is handling international sales for 'Homebound,' with WME Independent representing North American rights. Best of Variety New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week Emmy Predictions: Talk/Scripted Variety Series - The Variety Categories Are Still a Mess; Netflix, Dropout, and 'Hot Ones' Stir Up Buzz Oscars Predictions 2026: 'Sinners' Becomes Early Contender Ahead of Cannes Film Festival
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Bulova Documentary Puts a Spotlight on Brand's Backing of Veterans, Women's Rights and Other Social Initiatives
As New York watch company Bulova celebrates its 150th anniversary, managing director Michael Benavente can point to many milestones and achievements the brand can be proud of, but there is one that stands out. Speaking following Variety and Golden Globes' screening of Michael Culyba's documentary 'America Telling Time: 150 Years of Bulova' presented by Bulova, Benavente told an audience on Sunday at the Cannes Film Festival that the sequence that made the most emotional impact on him and other audience members he'd chatted with was the one featuring the work done with the Veterans Watchmaker Initiative, which the company supports. More from Variety 'A Pale View of Hills' Review: The Supple Ambiguities of Kazuo Ishiguro's Novel Stiffen and Seize Up in an Unsatisfying Adaptation 'Eagles of the Republic' Review: An Egyptian Movie Star Is Forced to Make a Propaganda Film in Tarik Saleh's Catchy but Muddled Age of Autocracy Thriller 'The Disappearance of Josef Mengele' Review: A Post-War Study of the Nazis' 'Angel of Death' Lacks Dimension The non-profit runs a tuition-free school that allows disabled veterans to learn watchmaking skills and offers them a dedicated job placement. In the film, veterans, some of whom had been homeless, explained how it had restored their sense of self-worth, as well as giving them a means to earn a living, despite their physical or mental challenges. For some it had literally been a life saver, as they had been contemplating suicide. Benavente explained that the Veterans Watchmaker Initiative was set up by Sam Cannan, who was a sniper for a SWAT team in Baltimore. 'He got shot off a three-story building while there was an active shooter, and he fell, and by the grace of God, there was an awning that broke his fall. But immediately he was disabled from the Baltimore Police Department,' Benavente explained. After attending the Joseph Bulova School of Watchmaking, Cannan went on to 'have a very illustrious career as a watchmaker. He goes to live in Switzerland for many years, and this project that you saw today is really a work of love for him to give back, because he was in the same place as these guys. So you can see he's very emotional and he's super passionate about it and he's a great guy, and so we're just happy to be able to be with him and support,' Benavente said. Among other not-for-profit initiatives the company supports that are covered in the film are the Latin Grammys; the Maestro Cares Foundation, co-founded by singer Marc Anthony; and the We Are Family Foundation, which was co-founded by singer-songwriter Nile Rodgers. Both Anthony and Rodgers are brand ambassadors for Bulova, have designed watches for the company, and feature prominently in the film. Anthony's wife Nadia Ferreira, the Paraguayan model and social influencer, also attended the Cannes screening. The film is broken into themed chapters, rather than following a series of milestones chronologically, and the one that stood out for Culyba was Bulova's impact on women's rights. In the 1970s, for example, the company ran a series of groundbreaking ads in support of equal pay for women. 'I would say that was another exciting part of discovery while I was making the film,' Culyba said. 'I wasn't necessarily aware of their advertising campaign for the Equal Rights Amendment, and that ad is so brave and bold of a company at that time to really take a social and political stand. 'At the time, Bulava really embraced women's rights, and it's a message that I think a lot of people, a lot of women, obviously, and men, can feel still today, through the brand it, it's still there.' Best of Variety New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week Emmy Predictions: Talk/Scripted Variety Series - The Variety Categories Are Still a Mess; Netflix, Dropout, and 'Hot Ones' Stir Up Buzz Oscars Predictions 2026: 'Sinners' Becomes Early Contender Ahead of Cannes Film Festival
