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Istanbul Film Festival · 2018

Istanbul Film Festival 2018

Mined Zone

Programme

9 films · 3 reviews

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9 Fingers

A man on the run falls in with a gang - becoming their hostage and accomplice.

(Country: France, Portugal; Year: 2017; Director: FJ Ossang; Writer: FJ Ossang; Stars: Damien Bonnard, Diogo Dória, Elvire, Pascal Greggory, Paul Hamy, Lisa Hartmann, Susana Afonso Lopes, Alexis Manenti, Lionel Tua, Gaspard Ulliel)

Caniba

Review preview for Caniba

The directors' intentions remain obscure; as always, one feels that by watching their work one is becoming a part of the experiment.

Jennie Kermode · 2 out of 5
A film that reflects on the discomfiting significance of cannibalistic desire in human history and culture through the prism of one Japanese man, Issei Sagawa, and his unsettling relationship with his brother.

(Country: France; Year: 2017; Director: Lucien Castaing-Taylor, Verena Paravel; Stars: Issei Sagawa, Jun Sagawa)

Full review

Dhogs

The intimacy of a hotel room. The immensity of a desert. A desolate gas station. In these picturesque settings, hideous crimes occur under the cold stare of unexpected protagonists that show the dark, twisted and perverse sides of human existence.

(Country: Spain; Year: 2017; Director: Andrés Goteira; Stars: Carlos Blanco, Alejandro Carro, María Costas, Melania Cruz, Antonio Duran Morris)

Holiday

Review preview for Holiday

Sonne, seemingly named for her role, moves through it with languorous ease.

Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
The sugar baby of a mob boss flirts with a stranger on the Turkish Riviera.

(Country: Denmark, Netherlands, Sweden; Year: 2018; Director: Isabella Eklöf; Writer: Isabella Eklöf, Johanne Algren; Stars: Victoria Carmen Sonne, Lai Yde, Thijs Römer)

Full review

Love Me Not

A couple hire a migrant to be a surrogate mother and she moves in with them. But trouble brews when the wife goes missing.

(Country: Greece; Year: 2017; Director: Alexandros Avranas; Writer: Alexandros Avranas, Kostas Peroulis; Stars: Eleni Roussinou, Christos Loulis)

Lowlife

When a simple organ-harvesting caper goes awry, a twist of fate unites three of society’s forgotten and ignored to unite in an attempt to save a pregnant woman from a gruesome fate.

(Country: US; Year: 2017; Director: Ryan Prows; Stars: Nicki Micheaux, Ricardo Adam Zarate, Jon Oswald, Shaye Ogbonna, Santana Dempsey)

Piercing

Review preview for Piercing

Without a doubt, Pesce is one of the most exciting young directors to emerge in recent years.

Jennie Kermode · 4.5 out of 5
A man seeks out an unsuspecting stranger to help him purge the dark torments of his past. His plan goes awry when he encounters a woman with plans of her own. A playful psycho-thriller game of cat-and-mouse.

(Country: US; Year: 2018; Director: Nicolas Pesce; Writer: Nicolas Pesce, based on the novel by Ryû Murakami; Stars: Christopher Abbott, Mia Wasikowska, Laia Costa, Wendell Pierce, Marin Ireland, Maria Dizzia, Dakota Lustick, Olivia Bond)

Full review See: Interview with Nicolas Pesce about Piercing, Mia Wasikowska, Christopher Abbott, Alfred Hitchcock and David Lynch

The San San Trilogy

Trilogy of films.

(Country: US; Year: 2016; Director: Jonah Freeman, Justin Lowe; Writer: Jonah Freeman; Stars: Imogen Poots, India Menuez, Hamilton Morris, Jennifer Sky, Elizabeth Hart, Tres Warren, Thea McCartan, Theodore Bouloukos, Imogen Poots, India Menuez, Hamilton Morris, Jennifer Sky, Elizabeth Hart, Tres Warren, Thea McCartan)

Silent Mist

Sexual violence breaks out in small-town China.

(Country: China, France; Year: 2017; Director: Miaoyan Zhang; Writer: Wang Lianggui, Roelof Jan Minneboo, Quge, Miaoyan Zhang, Rice Zhang; Stars: Wang Gufu, Chulan Hu, Yang Xiaojiang, Zhao Zuojun, Wang Gufu, Chulan Hu, Yang Xiaojiang, Zhao Zuojun)