Last year's festival was superb BUT I saw far less films and was literally obsessed and in awe of 'Call Me By Your Name', which was my favourite film of last year. This year, I was immersed in the festival as I was in a position to attend as many screenings as possible which meant I got to see films I wouldn't have considered and films I didn't buy tickets to as I knew I could see them at press screenings. Last year, I had a clear cut top five films and even top ten at a push, but having seen 26 films I am finding it harder to pick my favourites. However, I wouldn't be writing up this post if I hadn't made an effort.
Not all the films I've seen have posts yet, still got a few to catch up on, particularly Buster Scruggs, which I intend to go on about.
Capernaum is definitely the best film I've seen at the festival. I had been very excited to see Nadine Labaki's third feature, waiting years to see what she'd so and she delivered a truly amazing film, no exaggerations. She and the film got a standing ovation at Cannes and it was the same at the opening night of the film in London. The audience were in tears, it was and is an inspiring film, with two of the most amazing central performances, two young children, one barely a toddler. In all honesty, I've held off writing about the film because I want to get it right. Labaki was present at the screening and stayed to do a Q&A as I think everyone knew it was needed. She is a brilliant filmmaker and deserves all the credit and applause.
The surprises in this line up for me are definitely 'Assassination Nation' which switches genres, includes a massive warning at the start and turns into a witch hunt of four girls, but this was also a revenge film that I enjoyed very much, it also had core friendship which wasn't shattered or torn apart, they are loyal, which in some ways, is refreshing to me. 'Vox Lux' also unexpectedly got into my top picks. A familiar story with narrative taken from or inspired by real events used as context to portrait story, featuring music written by Sia (I like some of her pop tunes) would seem like a hard sell BUT I actually found it fascinating. I found it hard to read the room after this one so I'm guessing it will have a divided opinion.
I was always going to love 'The Breaker Upperers' from the moment I saw the trailer back in New Zealand in April. Loved the trailer, the humour, Madeleine Sami and Jackie van Beek, it was just great. I actually loved it so much, I saw it twice. Same goes for the Coen Brothers anthology film, I was always going to love it, 6 Coen films in one? Who's complaining? But more on this in a later post. Having fallen in love with Yorgos Lanthimos's 'The Lobster' a few years back, I had a feeling I was going to enjoy this historical odd ball comedy about Sarah Churchill and her cousin Abigail Masham fighting for the attention of Queen Anne. Three fantastic central female characters, played perfectly by three great actresses, particularly Rachel Weisz and Olivia Colman.
There are some notable mentions, again, not all posts are up; Girl, The Fight, Sorry to Bother You and Girls of the Sun.
This year was intense and at times stressful, but I had an amazing time, here's to next year!