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The Guardian
13-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
First Shift review – like Training Day with the good bits removed
The most interesting thing about this crushingly mediocre cop movie is that it's directed by the notorious Uwe Boll (Postal, Alone in the Dark), who is a character more bizarre than any drafted for the screen – at one point he invited his severest critics to fight him in the boxing ring. While the poor quality of his work, especially his computer game adaptations, is perhaps overhyped – are they that bad? – there's less dispute that his films are largely not financially successful, and his output has slowed after a now-abandoned retirement. (Like Steven Soderbergh, it seems Boll just can't quit.) One of his weirder re-emergences recently was playing himself in Radu Jude's acclaimed Romanian art film Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World from 2023 – after which he made this lukewarm mess. As the title might suggest, the idea is that this follows the first shift worked by two detectives on their first day together in New York City; not unlike, say, Training Day, except without the sharp script (by David Ayer), the fluent direction (by Antoine Fuqua) or a knockout cast (Training Day's killer combo of Ethan Hawke and Denzel Washington). Instead, First Shift supplies us with C-lister Gino Anthony Pesi in the lead as Deo, a gruff loner whose isolation is underscored by an unfeasibly long opening sequence showing him getting up in the morning and doing the most mundane of activities for long minutes of empty screen time. Clearly, Boll's ineptitude for pacing has not waned. Eventually, Deo gets to the station where he finds he's to work with a new partner, sunny Angela (Kristen Renton, serviceable) who's only just moved to the Big Apple from Florida. Of course, the two very different personalities clash, with Deo sneering at Angela's chirpy disposition while she bridles mildly at his sexist digs. Boll's self-penned script and the machete-like editing throw some almost avant garde shapes as it contrives to abruptly intercut between the lead cops' banter in their car and some gangsters bopping around town sadistically killing people – though these plotlines barely intersect at all in the course of the film. Presumably things are being set up for a future shift in which the duo – bonded at the end by mutual appreciation of a cute dog and a murder-suicide crime scene, storylines given roughly equal emotional weight here – bring the gangsters to heel. The clumsiness of the storytelling, presumably unintentional, is almost entertaining in itself but only if basically inept film-making is your idea of fun. First Shift is on digital platforms from 19 May.
Korea Herald
30-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Korea Herald
Jeonju Intl. Film Fest kicks off 26th edition with 224 films
The Jeonju International Film Festival, South Korea's premier platform for indie and art house cinema, kicks off Wednesday featuring 224 films from 57 countries. The 26th edition of the annual festival will begin its 10-day run with an opening ceremony at 6:30 p.m. at the Sori Arts Center in Jeonju, located about 190 kilometers south of Seoul. Following the ceremony, the Romanian film "Kontinental '25," directed and written by Radu Jude, will open the festival, JIFF said. The comedy-drama film depicts the moral crisis a bailiff suffers after a homeless man she tries to evict commits suicide. It won the Silver Bear for Best Screenplay at the 75th Berlin International Film Festival in February. JIFF will conclude with the Korean documentary film "In the Land of Machines," directed by Kim Ok-young. The film follows the lives of three migrant workers from Nepal employed in South Korea. Throughout the festival, 224 movies will be screened across Jeonju. Among them, 80 films will have their global premieres at the festival. A special section focusing on democracy will feature six films that examine political upheaval around the world, offering reflections on South Korea's recent political crisis following impeached former President Yoon Suk Yeol's brief imposition of martial law. The "J Special: Programmer of the Year" section, now in its fifth year, features actress Lee Jung-hyun. She has selected three films to present: Park Chan-wook's "Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance," Hirokazu Koreeda's "Nobody Knows" and the Dardenne brothers' "L'Enfant." JIFF will also screen works featuring the actress, including her debut movie, "A Petal" (1996). (Yonhap)
Reuters
19-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Reuters
Romania's Jude aims for second Berlinale win with comedy drama 'Kontinental '25'
BERLIN, Feb 19 (Reuters) - Radu Jude returned to the Berlin Film Festival on Wednesday with "Kontinental '25," a comedy drama about a bailiff's misplaced moral crisis that marks the Romanian director's bid for a second Golden Bear after winning the top prize four years ago. "Kontinental '25" is based on a news article Jude read about a female bailiff feeling guilt after evicting someone who later kills himself, the director told journalists. The bailiff's reaction "struck me at the same time as being extremely moving and extremely questionable", because feeling that way after the fact could be seen as hypocritical, he said. The film centres on the moral crisis felt by the bailiff, played by Romanian actor Eszter Tompa, over the incident. "Actually, I hate films about moral crises. I'm more interested in the material aspect of cinema, but here it is interesting because it's misplaced," the director said. Jude won the festival's top prize in 2021 with the sexually explicit dark comedy "Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn." Only Taiwan-born Oscar-winning director Ang Lee has so far won two Golden Bear awards, for "The Wedding Banquet" in 1993 and with "Sense and Sensibility" in 1996. "Kontinental '25" is one of 19 films competing for the top prize at the festival this year, with other entrants including "Blue Moon" from U.S. director Richard Linklater, and South Korean auteur Hong Sangsoo's "What Does that Nature Say to You."
