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Karlovy Vary International Film Festival · 2014

Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 2014

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Programme

31 films · 20 reviews

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'71

Review preview for '71

Burke is interested in people not politics, keeping the focus on the sudden outbreaks of inhumanity and humanity in the madness, expertly crafting his thriller from the swirling fog of war.

Amber Wilkinson · 4 out of 5
A young British soldier is accidentally left behind by his unit on the deadly streets of Belfast in 1971.

(Country: UK; Year: 2014; Director: Yann Demange; Writer: Gregory Burke; Stars: Jack O'Connell, Paul Anderson, Sean Harris, Charlie Murphy, Sam Reid, David Wilmot, Sam Hazeldine, Martin McCann, Killian Scott, Jack Lowden, Valene Kane, Tom Raven, Barry Keoghan, Paul Popplewell, Gerard Jordan)

Full review

Amour Fou

Inspired by the life and death of the poet Heinrich von Kleist and his partner in death, Henriette Vogel.

(Country: Austria; Year: 2014; Director: Jessica Hausner; Writer: Jessica Hausner; Stars: Christian Friedel, Birte Schnoeink, Stephan Grossmann, Katharina Schüttler, Sebastian Hülk, Sandra Hüller, Alissa Wilms, Holger Handtke, Hana Sofia Lopes, Peter Jordan, Eva-Maria Kurz, Barbara Schnitzler, Gustav-Peter Wöhler, Paraschiva Dragus, Marc Bischoff) , Official site

Bird People

An American heads to Paris and deserts his old life.

(Country: US; Year: 2014; Director: Pascale Ferran; Writer: Guillaume Bréaud, Pascale Ferran; Stars: Josh Charles, Radha Mitchell, Mathieu Amalric, Clark Johnson, Anaïs Demoustier, Roschdy Zem, Geoffrey Cantor, Hippolyte Girardot, Genevieve Adams, Philippe Duclos, Erin Elizabeth Burns, Anne Azoulay, Sharon Mann, Akéla Sari, Bertrand Constant)

Black Coal, Thin Ice (Bai ri yan huo)

Review preview for Black Coal, Thin Ice

A painstakingly deliberate neo-noir, heavy on atmosphere and taking its time to build.

Jennie Kermode · 3 out of 5
A detective falls in love with a woman linked to the murder victims of his current investigation.

(Country: China; Year: 2014; Director: Yi'nan Diao; Writer: Yi'nan Diao; Stars: Lun Mei Gwei, Fan Liao, Xuebing Wang)

Full review

Boyhood

Review preview for Boyhood

Intimate and insightful even in its weaker moments, Linklater finds strength and value in normality.

Amber Wilkinson · 4 out of 5
The story of a youngster told over a 12 year period.

(Country: US; Year: 2014; Director: Richard Linklater; Writer: Richard Linklater; Stars: Ellar Coltrane, Patricia Arquette, Ethan Hawke, Lorelei Linklater, Tamara Jolaine, Nick Krause, Jordan Howard, Evie Thompson, Sam Dillon)

Full review See: Ethan Hawke, Patricia Arquette, Joel Grey and Ellar Coltrane at the Boyhood première. , Sundance Episode Three - Boyhood and 52 Tuesdays

Eleanor Rigby (The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby)

Review preview for Eleanor Rigby

How the characters deal with grief is beautifully captured in the nuanced performances of McAvoy and Chastain.

Richard Mowe · 4 out of 5
Two people struggle to stay together after the death of their child.

(Country: US; Year: 2013; Director: Ned Benson; Writer: Ned Benson; Stars: James McAvoy, Jessica Chastain, Ryan Eggold, Marta Milans, Ciarán Hinds, Archie Panjabi, William Hurt, Bill Hader, Viola Davis, Jess Weixler, Isabelle Huppert, Katherine Waterston, Nina Arianda, Jimmy Palumbo, Li Jun Li)

Full review

Fish And Cat (Mahi va gorbeh, Fish & Cat)

Review preview for Fish And Cat

Awe inspiring.

Andrew Robertson · 4.5 out of 5
A menacing pair descend on a campsite where a group of college kids have gathered for a kite-flying festival.

(Country: Iran; Year: 2013; Director: Shahram Mokri; Writer: Shahram Mokri; Stars: Abed Abest, Mona Ahmadi, Ainaz Azarhoush, Nazanin Babaei, Mohammad Berahmani, Siavash Cheraghipoor, Saeed Ebrahimifar, Alireza Esapoor, Neda Jebraeili, Shadi Karamroudi, Babak Karimi, Mohammad Reza Maleki, Faraz Modiri, Milad Rahimi, Arnavaz Safari)

Full review See: Jytte Jensen talks about New Directors/New Films

Hard To Be A God (Trudno Byt Bogom)

A team of scientists is sent out to the planet Arkanar (still stuck in the Middle Ages) in order to set the local population on the right path to future development – but they are not to use violence.

(Country: Russia; Year: 2013; Director: Alexey German)

Human Capital (Il Capitale Umano)

Review preview for Human Capital

Paolo Virzì's study of capitalism in crisis gives the audience all it covets.

Anne-Katrin Titze · 5 out of 5
The lives of two generations overlap as they tumble toward an ill-fated event that inextricably links them.

(Country: Italy, France; Year: 2013; Director: Paolo Virzì; Writer: Stephen Amidon, Paolo Virzì, Francesco Bruni, Francesco Piccolo; Stars: Fabrizio Bentivoglio, Valeria Golino, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Fabrizio Gifuni, Luigi Lo Cascio, Bebo Storti, Gigio Alberti, Giovanni Anzaldo, Matilde Gioli, Guglielmo Pinelli, Pia Engleberth, Nicola Centonze, Silvia Cohen, Vincent Nemeth, Paolo Pierobon)

Full review See: New York interview with Paolo Virzi about Human Capital , New York interview with Paolo Virzi about Human Capital , Interview with Valeria Bruni Tedeschi and Valeria Golino about Human Capital , Interview with Paolo Virzì about Human Capital

History Of Fear (Historia del Miedo)

A hot summer. A private district with an enormous park. An abandoned plot of land in the suburbs and an uncontrollable wave of smoke spark uncertainty and chaos.

(Country: Argentina, France, Germany, Uruguay; Year: 2014; Director: Benjamín Naishtat; Writer: Benjamín Naishtat; Stars: Jonathan Da Rosa, Tatiana Giménez, Mirella Pascual, Claudia Cantero, Francisco Lumerman, César Bordón, Valeria Lois, Elsa Bois, Edgardo Castro, Mara Bestelli, Daniel Leguizamón)

The Hope Factory (Kombinat Nadezhda)

A young woman is determined to get away from Norilsk, one of the world's most polluted cities.

(Country: Russia; Year: 2014; Director: Natalia Meschaninova)

Ida

Review preview for Ida

A still, painterly vision in silvery monochrome - capturing the quiet contemplation of the two women and simultaneously encouraging the same on the part of the viewer.

Rebecca Naughten · 4.5 out of 5
A novice nun comes face-to-face with her family’s past in 1960s Poland.

(Country: Poland, Denmark; Year: 2013; Director: Pawel Pawlikowski; Writer: Rebecca Lenkiewicz, Pawel Pawlikowski; Stars: Agata Kulesza, Joanna Kulig, Dawid Ogrodnik, Adam Szyszkowski, Agata Trzebuchowska)

Full review See: Pawel Pawlikowski in conversation on Ida

Leviathan (Leviafan)

Review preview for Leviathan

The performances are powerful, unforgettable, like ice in the wind

Angus Wolfe Murray · 4 out of 5
A car mechanic tries to defend his property with tragic consequences.

(Country: Russia; Year: 2014; Director: Andrey Zvyagintsev; Writer: Oleg Negin, Andrey Zvyagintsev; Stars: Aleksey Serebryakov, Elena Lyadova, Vladimir Vdovichenkov, Roman Madyanov, Anna Ukolova, Kristina Pakarina, Sergey Pokhodaev, Aleksey Rozin, Lesya Kudryashova, Aleksey Pavlov, Alim Bidnenko)

Full review

Life Of Riley (Aimer, boire et chanter)

Review preview for Life Of Riley

If the characters are focused on how and if, for us the question why lingers in the air.

Amber Wilkinson · 2.5 out of 5
A group of close friends discover that one of them only has a few months to live.

(Country: France; Year: 2014; Director: Alain Resnais; Writer: Alan Ayckbourn, Jean-Marie Besset, Laurent Herbiet, Alain Resnais, Caroline Silhol; Stars: Sandrine Kiberlain, André Dussollier, Sabine Azéma, Hippolyte Girardot, Alba Gaïa Kraghede Bellugi, Michel Vuillermoz, Caroline Sihol, Travis Kerschen)

Full review

Li'l Quinquin (P'tit Quinquin)

Review preview for Li'l Quinquin

Dumont - for all the outlandishness of the film in other aspects - prioritises a messy realism over straightforward likeability in relation to his protagonists.

Rebecca Naughten · 4 out of 5
A blackly comic murder mystery develops in a small town in northern France.

(Country: France; Year: 2014; Director: Bruno Dumont; Writer: Bruno Dumont; Stars: Alane Delhaye, Lucy Caron, Bernard Pruvost, Philippe Jore, Philippe Peuvion, Lisa Hartmann, Jason Cirot, Julien Bodard, Corentin Carpentier, Pascal Fresch, Baptiste Anquez, Stéphane Boutillier, Frédéric Castagno, Andrée Peuvion, Lucien Chaussoy, Cindy Louguet, Céline Sauvage, Bruno Darras, Sébastien Liss, Yacine Kellal, Didier Hennuyer, Cédric Lemaire, Stéphane Gallais, Raphaël Mourgues)

Full review

Love Is Strange

Review preview for Love Is Strange

Courageous and uncompromising

Angus Wolfe Murray · 4 out of 5
The consequences of a gay marriage on family and friends.

(Country: US, France; Year: 2014; Director: Ira Sachs; Writer: Ira Sachs, Mauricio Zacharias; Stars: John Lithgow, Alfred Molina, Marisa Tomei, Darren E. Burrows, Charlie Tahan, Eric Tabach, John Cullum)

Full review

Memories On Stone

Documentary about Kurdish identity.

(Country: Iraq, Germany; Year: 2014; Director: Shawkat Amin Korki)

Misunderstood (Incompresa)

Drama based loosely on the director's childhood.

(Country: Italy, France; Year: 2014; Director: Asia Argento; Writer: Barbara Alberti, Asia Argento; Stars: Charlotte Gainsbourg, Gabriel Garko, Gianmarco Tognazzi, Giulia Salerno, Anna Lou Castoldi, Max Gazzè, Carolina Poccioni, Alice Pea)

Mommy

Review preview for Mommy

The energy and sheer visual bravura carry it along.

Richard Mowe · 3 out of 5
A widowed single mother, raising her violent son alone, finds new hope when a mysterious neighbor insinuates herself into their household.

(Country: France, Canada; Year: 2014; Director: Xavier Dolan; Writer: Xavier Dolan; Stars: Anne Dorval, Antoine-Olivier Pilon, Suzanne Clément)

Full review

The Normal Heart

The story of gay activist and writer Ned Weeks who, at the beginning of the 1980s, was one of the first to vociferously criticize the marginalization of the then unknown HIV virus.

(Country: US; Year: 2014; Director: Ryan Murphy; Writer: Larry Kramer, Larry Kramer, Ryan Murphy; Stars: Mark Ruffalo, Jonathan Groff, Frank De Julio, William DeMeritt, Taylor Kitsch, Joe Mantello, Sean Meehan, Stephen Spinella, Jill Melanie Wirth, BD Wong, Julia Roberts, Jim Parsons, Adam B. Shapiro, John Mainieri, Matt Bomer)

The Rover

Review preview for The Rover

Only the gun speaks

Angus Wolfe Murray · 2 out of 5
In the near future, a man tracks the gang who stole his car across the outback, forcing the injured man they left behind to help him.

(Country: Australia, US; Year: 2014; Director: David Michôd; Writer: David Michôd; Stars: Guy Pearce, Robert Pattinson, Scoot McNairy, David Field, Tawanda Manyimo)

Full review

Snowpiercer (Snow Piercer)

Review preview for Snowpiercer

The mix of action and satire also turns it into an absorbing hell of a ride.

Sophie Charlotte Rieger · 4.5 out of 5
In a future where a failed global-warming experiment kills off most life on the planet, a class system evolves aboard the Snowpiercer, a train that travels around the globe via a perpetual-motion engine.

(Country: South Korea, US, France; Year: 2013; Director: Bong Joon Ho; Writer: Bong Joon Ho, Kelly Masterson, based on the story by Jacques Lob, Benjamin Legrand, Jean-Marc Rochette; Stars: Tilda Swinton, Chris Evans, Luke Pasqualino, John Hurt, Jamie Bell, Octavia Spencer, Alison Pill, Ed Harris, Ewen Bremner, Song Kang-ho, Kenny Doughty, Steve Park, Adnan Haskovic, Clark Middleton, Tómas Lemarquis)

Full review See: Interview with Bong Joon-ho about Snowpiercer , Interview with John Hurt about Snowpiercer

Starred Up

Review preview for Starred Up

Mackenzie shows everyone, inmates and guards alike, to be trapped in a corrupted, corrupting system that resists all change.

Anton Bitel · 4 out of 5
A young offender is relocated to the adult prison where his father is locked up.

(Country: UK; Year: 2013; Director: David Mackenzie; Writer: Jonathan Asser; Stars: Jack O'Connell, Ben Mendelsohn, Rupert Friend, Anthony Welsh, David Ajala, Ian Beattie, Sam Spruell, Tommy McDonnell, Darren Hart, Peter Ferdinando, Gershwyn Eustache Jr)

Full review See: David Mackenzie in conversation on Starred Up

Stations Of The Cross (Kreuzweg)

Review preview for Stations Of The Cross

Almost perfectly constructed... a stunning piece of filmmaking.

Andrew Robertson · 5 out of 5
The story of a teenager whose family are Catholic fundamentalists.

(Country: Germany; Year: 2014; Director: Dietrich Brüggemann; Writer: Anna Brüggemann, Dietrich Brüggemann; Stars: Hanns Zischler, Franziska Weisz, Florian Stetter, Birge Schade, Ramin Yazdani, Lucie Aron, Lea van Acken, Moritz Knapp, Klaus Michael Kamp, Georg Wesch)

Full review

Still The Water (Futatsume No Mado)

A teenage couple investigate after a corpse is found floating in the sea during an island festival.

(Country: Japan; Year: 2014; Director: Naomi Kawase; Writer: Naomi Kawase; Stars: Makiko Watanabe, Hideo Sakaki, Jun Murakami, Miyuki Matsuda, Tetta Sugimoto)

Stratos (Mikro psari)

Story of a contract killer who moonlights in a bakery.

(Country: Greece, Germany, Cyprus; Year: 2014; Director: Yannis Economides; Writer: Yannis Economides, Christos V. Konstantakopoulos, Harry Lagoussis, Vangelis Mourikis, Xiros Thanos; Stars: Vangelis Mourikis, Vicky Papadopoulou, Petros Zervos, Yannis Tsortekis, Giorgos Giannopoulos, Yannis Anastasakis, Veronica Naujoks, Polina Dellatola, Maria Kallimani, Yannis Voulgarakis, Omiros Poulakis, Stathis Stamoulakatos, Giorgos Biniaris, Alekos Pangalos, Sonja Theodoridou)

Stray Dogs

Story of a family living on the margins of Taipei.

(Country: France, Taiwan; Year: 2013; Director: Ming-liang Tsai; Writer: Peng Fei Song, Ming-liang Tsai, Chen Yu Tung; Stars: Shiang-chyi Chen, Kang-sheng Lee, Yi Cheng Lee, Yi Chieh Lee, Yi Ching Lu)

Timbuktu (Le chagrin des oiseaux)

Review preview for Timbuktu

The way Sissako exposes the double standard makes the Jihadists' behavior no less threatening, on the contrary.

Anne-Katrin Titze · 4.5 out of 5
After a herdsman accidentally kills someone, he finds himself a victim of Sharia law fundamentalists.

(Country: France, Mauritania; Year: 2014; Director: Abderrahmane Sissako; Writer: Abderrahmane Sissako, Kessen Tall; Stars: Pino Desperado, Abel Jafri, Toulou Kiki, Kettly Noël, Hichem Yacoubi)

Full review

Tom At The Farm

Review preview for Tom At The Farm

A complex portrait of grief, Tom At The Farm is Dolan's strongest work to date, not least because of the performance he gives in the lead.

Jennie Kermode · 4 out of 5
A young man finds himself embroiled in a dangerous game of deception.

(Country: Canada, France; Year: 2013; Director: Xavier Dolan; Writer: Michel Marc Bouchard, Xavier Dolan; Stars: Xavier Dolan, Pierre-Yves Cardinal, Lise Roy, Evelyne Brochu, Manuel Tadros, Jacques Lavallée, Anne Caron, Caleb Landry Jones, Mélodie Simard)

Full review

The Two Faces Of January

Review preview for The Two Faces Of January

Patricia Highsmith on a low flame

Angus Wolfe Murray · 2.5 out of 5
Death in Greece involves a fraudulent investment banker, a tour guide and a young wife. There are no certainties and nowhere to run.

(Country: UK, US, France; Year: 2014; Director: Hossein Amini; Writer: Hossein Amini, based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith; Stars: Viggo Mortensen, Kirsten Dunst, Oscar Isaac, Yigit Özsener, Daisy Bevan)

Full review See: Article about The Two Faces Of January New York première

The Wonders (Le meraviglie)

Review preview for The Wonders

Wisdom is quiet and the future a mystery

Angus Wolfe Murray · 4.5 out of 5
Nothing will be the same at the end of this summer for Gelsomina and her three younger sisters.

(Country: Italy, Switzerland, Germany; Year: 2014; Director: Alice Rohrwacher; Writer: Alice Rohrwacher; Stars: Maria Alexandra Lungu, Sam Louwyck, Alba Rohrwacher, Sabine Timoteo, Agnese Graziani, Monica Bellucci, )

Full review