Latest news with #Knobbe
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Reedland' Review: Outstanding Slow-Burn Thriller Announces Potentially Major New Dutch Director Sven Bresser
Johan (Gerrit Knobbe) is a reed-cutter. As 'Reedland' opens, we meet him in his natural habitat, surrounded by hissing, shivering reeds shot in close-up, then in wide shot. It's a sonic and visual maze, the natural world's equivalent of TV static: earth-bound, mud-rooted and subtly threatening in its hypnotic, fluttering illusion of uniformity. Reeds are the perfect hiding place for horrors, as will shortly become abundantly clear, when a girl's body is revealed in the dirt, in all its helplessness. A violent crime fracturing a tight-knit community is hardly a new subject for arthouse cinema, but it is handled here by freshman writer-director Sven Bresser with an original eye and a keen sense of how to generate a persistent atmosphere of foreboding. It was filmed in Weerribben-Wieden in the Netherlands, and the landscape is integral to this finely calibrated mood. 'Whispering' is probably the adjective most associated with reeds, giving the land the stark sense of harboring infinite witnesses who cannot speak of the crimes they have seen — at least, not in any language we can understand. More from Variety Beta Reveals Sales for 'Let It Rain,' 'The Physician II,' 'The Light' 'Case 137' Director Dominik Moll on Exploring the Gilets Jaunes Riots in His Cannes-Premiering Political Drama: 'These Divisions Still Exist' in French Society Breaking Through the Lens Co-Founder Daphne Schmon on What Has to Change for Gender Equity in Film: 'We Need Actions to Speak Louder Than Words' Well-chosen place-name titles are more than just a convenient piece of orientation for an audience. When used judiciously, they plant a flag in that location, forever binding the place and the film together. 'Reedland' is not the name of a town or road, but a terrain that provides the physical and psychological setting for an eerily poetic character study. Knobbe is an extraordinary presence as Johan, a widower who has worked at his job for decades, and is now also an attentive grandfather. As the camera studies Knobbe's weather-beaten face, you watch him, trying to place which Ingmar Bergman film you might know him from. But he isn't an actor, and you've never seen him before. He is an actual reed-cutter, discovered by Brasser during the process of researching and building the film, which makes his tightly controlled performance all the more impressive, and provides persuasive evidence of Brasser's aptitude as both talent-spotter and performance coach. Knobbe's face is shaped by his work in the outdoors, in a way that you simply don't see with actors nowadays, when a high proportion of both men and women seem to be engaged in counterintuitive quests to make their faces, the primary tool of an actor, less capable of expression. Knobbe's, by contrast, gives lived experience — it is its own craggy, fathomless landscape. In addition to Bergman, the lineage of European filmmakers into which this dark, finely judged film slots includes the likes of Michael Haneke and Thomas Vinterberg. But 'Reedland' also recalls Japanese director Kaneto Shindō's 1964 masterpiece 'Onibaba' with its hints of supernatural evil. There, as here, reedland is presented as a breeding ground for more than just mosquitoes: It contains madness and murder. The two films share some visual strategies, with reeds-as-labyrinth shots just as effective a motif now as they were 60 years ago. Not to suggest that DP Sam du Pon's camera only gets landscapes to work with. Numerous vignettes of the small community's existence both in public and private afford Bresser and du Pon the opportunity to explore how people reconcile their public and private selves, on one occasion via the precise framing of a shot where Johan engages with pornography on his laptop, and we glimpse artwork by his granddaughter pinned to a wall in the background. With a tight runtime, magnetic central performance and bleak but compelling subject matter, theatrical prospects could be potentially rewarding for an appropriate arthouse distributor. This is a film designed to be seen on the big screen, and while it should certainly have appeal for high-class streamers, it'd be a pity to see it skip cinemas. For audiences looking to take a step up from standard Scandi-noir murder fare on TV while staying firmly within the realm of accessible narrative cinema, 'Reedland' is an outstanding discovery. Best of Variety The Best Albums of the Decade
Chicago Tribune
29-03-2025
- Health
- Chicago Tribune
Waukegan area residents sharing $48.1 million settlement for EtO emissions from an industrial pant
A group of Waukegan area people impacted by the emission of ethylene oxide (EtO), a known carcinogen, from an industrial plant in Waukegan will be sharing in a $48.15 million settlement with Isomedix Operations, Inc., a one-time owner of the Waukegan facility. Isomedix, a subsidiary of STERIS, plc, a Dublin, Ireland-based company, settled its portion of a multiparty lawsuit with numerous plaintiffs (the ETO plaintiffs) for $48.15 million, according to a March 3 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Coming after a trial with one of the plaintiffs, Pamela Knobbe of Gurnee, ended in a mistrial in Cook County Circuit Court, the case was resolved, according to a news release from STERIS, court filings with the First District Illinois Appellate Court in Chicago, and the SEC filing. Isomedix filed an 8-K Disclosure with the SEC on March 3 in New York, disclosing settlement of its portion of the lawsuits with the ETO Plaintiffs agreeing to pay as much as $48.15 million based on term sheets signed by attorneys for the allegedly injured people. Though there were numerous plaintiffs and defendants in the case, the settlement came after a Feb. 21 decision by the appellate court ending delay tactics by Isomedix, according to the court filings. 'Although Isomedix has an interest in putting all potential (matters) before the jury we cannot overlook its delay in filing its third-party complaint and seeking a continuance,' Justice Celia Gamrath wrote in her opinion. Knobbe sought a prompt trial. At 70, she was twice diagnosed with cancer and is entitled to a prompt resolution of her case, as should be the situation with the 'elderly or seriously ill, according to the court opinion. 'Given Knobbe's age and cancer diagnosis, Knobbe has a right to see her claims to fruition now, without a six-to-12-month continuance advocated by Isomedix,' Gamrath said in her opinion. After the court's opinion was issued Feb. 21, STERIS filed its disclosure with the SEC March 3, indicating Isomedix signed confidential term sheets with the attorneys for the EtO Plaintiffs as well as settlement agreements with 'several plaintiffs currently at trial,' according to the disclosure. Isomedix expects to enter into settlement agreements with additional parties to the lawsuit, according to the disclosure. Should some of the EtO Plaintiffs not sign the agreements or the court declines to accept some of the pacts, Isomedix can continue to defend itself in court. The Waukegan plant which allegedly emitted the EtO was owned by Isomedix from 2005 to 2008 and is currently owned by Medline, according to the court opinion. It was owned by Cosmed from 1993 to 2005. Hundreds of cases were filed in Cook County Court and were consolidated for certain legal procedures. Other defendants have already settled.
