Latest news with #TheSpoils
Winnipeg Free Press
02-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Doc paints gripping picture of stolen history
Art is more than just colour on canvas — it is history, identity and, sometimes, a battlefield. The Spoils, directed by Jamie Kastner, ventures into this battlefield, exploring the controversial cancellation of an exhibition honouring Max Stern, a Jewish art dealer whose collection was looted by the Nazis in 1937. At the heart of the film is the gripping struggle for restitution, a battle that continues to this day. A one-time screening of The Spoils will be held on Saturday at the Cineplex McGillivray at 6:30 p.m. Cave 7 Productions Wilhelm von Schadow's Die Kinder des Kunstlers (The Artists' Children) is at the centre of the legal and ethical storm around restitution. Through interviews with stolen-art detectives, historians and museum officials, Kastner exposes the resistance to returning stolen artworks — particularly Wilhelm von Schadow's The Artists' Children (1830), a piece at the centre of this legal and ethical storm. It is a tale of stolen history. The exhibition honouring Max Stern at the Düsseldorf City Museum was originally set to open in 2018. Yet for three years, it remained trapped in bureaucratic limbo as discussions raged over the restitution of Nazi-looted artwork. This delay revealed the deeper tensions surrounding Holocaust-era art restitution — a topic often overshadowed by other aspects of historical justice. Kastner, a Toronto-based filmmaker and writer, has long gravitated toward complex, multi-layered stories. His previous documentary, There Are No Fakes, examined the largest art fraud scam in Canada, involving legendary Indigenous painter Norval Morrisseau. That film caught the attention of journalist and academic Sara Angel, who had covered the Max Stern restitution battle extensively. She saw The Spoils as the perfect project for Kastner's investigative lens. 'When I learned about what Stern's heirs were going through, I was astounded to see how fiercely the fight for Nazi-looted art was still being waged,' Kastner explains via email. 'It wasn't a simple case — it was filled with layers of legal battles, moral dilemmas and contemporary disputes that made it dramatically compelling.' Stern, who died in 1987, was a towering figure in the Canadian art world. Fleeing Nazi Germany penniless, he was interned as an enemy alien during the war, but later rebuilt his life from nothing. His impact on Canadian art was immense — he represented sculptors Rodin and Henry Moore and gave Canadian painter Emily Carr her first major gallery exhibition. 'He was instrumental in creating a market for Canadian art when one hardly existed,' Kastner says. 'There's even a photo of him with Norval Morrisseau — the worlds of my films colliding.' Kastner faced hurdles in telling the story. Cave 7 Productions Jewish art dealer Max Stern fled Nazi Germany but became a towering figure in Canadian art world. 'The biggest challenge was gaining access to key figures in Germany,' Kastner admits. 'Some, like former Düsseldorf mayor Thomas Geisel, granted interviews immediately. Others, like the exhibition's curator, Mr. Vorsteher, dodged me for years.' Eventually, the breakthrough came when a second Max Stern exhibition was held — this time without Canadian or pro-restitution voices. The event forced previously elusive individuals to step into the spotlight, finally allowing Kastner to secure crucial interviews. Beyond access issues, The Spoils faced another challenge: making such a dense, legally complex topic dramatic and engaging. 'I worked with immensely talented collaborators — editor Michael Hannan, composer Tom Third, and my producer, Laura Baron Kastner — to craft a film that was both clear and compelling.' Is The Spoils a call to action? A historical exposé? Kastner resists narrowing the film's purpose to a single message. 'I don't make films with neatly packaged conclusions,' he says. 'I prefer thorny political, historical and moral questions that don't have easy answers.' That said, he acknowledges the film's underlying theme: justice never comes without a fight. 'It's astonishing how much debate surrounds the suffering of German Jews under the Nazis, even when we all know where it led. At the same time, these legal questions can't simply be dismissed. They're real, practical issues.' It took him four years to make the film. Production on The Spoils began in late 2019, with filming wrapping in 2023. The four-year journey was a test of patience, persistence and the ability to adapt to evolving narratives. 'We had other films in production at the same time, but this one demanded a deep level of research and engagement,' Kastner says. Cave 7 Productions Lawyer Ludwig von Pufendorf is interviewed by director Jamie Kastner. Wednesdays A weekly look towards a post-pandemic future. This is a documentary that forces reflection. The Spoils is not just about a single art dealer — it is a microcosm of a greater historical reckoning. 'This isn't just about Max Stern — it's about the lingering ghosts of Nazi-looted art, the obstacles to justice and the uncomfortable questions that come with restitution,' Kastner says. The Spoils forces viewers to grapple with a past that refuses to stay buried. As William Faulkner wrote in his novel Requiem for a Nun: 'The past is never dead. It's not even past.' arts@
Yahoo
18-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Film review: Sinners is a heady mix of sex, garlic and the blues
Sex and garlic and the blues. That's Sinners in a nutshell. It's also about the only thing in this big-budget production from writer/director Ryan Coogler that would fit in one. This movie is loud and proud, big and brash. And original. I mean, yes, it involves vampires, not to mention a character named Annie (played by Wunmi Wosaku) who knows all the ways to kill them or at least keep them at bay. But they don't even show their faces (or fangs) until about half-way through the film. Though it's bloody terrifying when they do. The setting is Clarksdale, Mississippi — birthplace of the blues! — on a sunny Saturday in the fall of 1932. Twin brothers Smoke and Stack, both played by Cooler regular Michael B. Jordan, have just rolled into town after an absence of the better part of a decade. They've amassed some cash, and they aim to purchase an abandoned mill, turn it into a juke joint, and get even richer. But the joint needs its juke, and so they round up their cousin Sammie (musician-turned-actor Miles Caton) and harmonica maestro Delta Slim (Delroy Lindo). Cornbread (Omar Miller), whom they pluck out of a cotton field, will be the bouncer. They also get reacquainted with several women who haven't forgotten them, including Mary (Hailee Steinfeld) and the aforementioned Annie, whom I'm guessing saw the original Nosferatu movie at least twice when it came out 10 years earlier. Lights, camera, elbows up: Movies to stream on Canadian Film Day The Spoils documents the unravelling of an exhibit of Nazi-stolen art Coogler got his feature debut in a big way, with 2013's Fruitvale Station (original titled Fruitvale), which won the Grand Jury prize and the audience award when it debited at the Sundance Film Festival. Despite being snubbed at the Oscars, it led to Coogler directing the Rocky sequel Creed and two Black Panther movies, all of which he also co-wrote. But Sinners is his first non-franchise, sole-writing-credit film since Fruitvale Station, albeit with a budget two orders of magnitude bigger than that film's $900,000. It's a joy to watch, and also to listen to, with a bombastic score by Ludwig Grandson (The Mandalorian, Oppenheimer) that dips in and out of the film, sometimes giving way to performances by one of more of the characters, before picking up the heavy lifting again. It also does some lovely light lifting, as when a character's three strikes on a stubborn match perfectly synchronize with the music's rhythm. Or when a necklace torn from a body signals the end of a song. These little harmonies are wonderful precisely because they're not overdone. I found myself reminded several times of the 1979 song The Devil Went Down to Georgia, given the film's portrayal of the intersection of secular music and something evil in the world. And I was knocked silly and sideways by a raucous scene in Smoke/Stack's establishment, in which Sammie's guitar music conjures up collaborations with phantoms of past and future performers, including a 19th-century Japanese dancer and a 21st-century electric guitarist. If the TARDIS from Dr. Who had a disco, this is what it would look like. That scene was filmed with Imax cameras, and although not every part of the movie uses the full size of the screen, Imax is still the best way to see Sinners if you can. Failing that, go for the biggest screen you can find. Sinners opens April 18 in theatres. 4 stars out of 5
