Australian film ‘The Sapphires’ (2012) won the Mercedes-Benz Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature at the 24th Palm Springs International Film Festival.
The international singsong hit held its world premier at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival and its North American premier at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).
The film is about a native Australian all-female soul band that travels to Vietnam during the Vietnam War to uplift the morale of the soldiers fighting there,...
EL LIMPIADOR (The Cleaner) by newcomer director Adrian Saba, Peru 2012, won Best Picture for the New Voices/New Visions Award. The PSIFF 'New Voices/New Visions' section awards newcomer directors for outstanding breakthroughs in filmmaking.
Synopsis: "In the midst of a mysterious, devastating epidemic, Eusebio – a forensic cleaner who sterilizes the apartments of the dead – discovers an eight-year-old boy hiding in an uninhabited house. A grizzled loner all his life, ...
David O Russell
On January 6th during the 24th Palm Springs International Film Festival, Variety held a lunch honoring director David O Russell ('Silver Linings Playbook', 2012) with the Indie Impact Award, presented by Mercedes-Benz. Also in attendance at the lunch were the honored directors from '10 Directors to Watch', which sheds light on exceptionally talented new directors from around the world.
The 'ten directors to watch' are: Haifaa Al-Manso...
SXSW Grand Jury Prize winner for Best Documentary 'Beware of Mr. Baker' (2012) screened at the 24th Palm Springs International Film Festival.
-PALM SPRINGS OFFICIAL PRESS-
Director Jay Bulger traveled to South Africa to make a movie about one of the founding fathers of modern rock, Ginger Baker. Ginger is known for playing drums in the bands Cream and Blind Faith, almost as well known as he is for his bad temper. Jay has chronicled this journey in his Directorial debu...
On January 3rd, 2013 the 24th Palm Springs International Film Festival opened with the screening of Spain's Oscar submission film ‘Blancanieves’ (2012) by Spanish director Pablo Berger.
The festival runs from January 3rd until the 14th and will host 475 screenings of 180 films from 68 countries over 13 days. More than 130,000 filmgoers from all over the world pack the theaters in what is arguably the nation’s most film-lover friendly film festival and this filmgo...
PALM SPRINGS INTERNATIONAL SHORTFEST
RECEIVES $20,000 GRANT FROM
ACADEMY OF MOTION PICTURES AND SCIENCES
The Palm Springs International ShortFest, Short Film Festival & Film Market, celebrated as one of the most acclaimed short film showcases in the world, has been awarded a $20,000 grant from the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences to be applied to the 2012 ShortFest Forums. The 2012 Festival will take place June 19-25.
ShortFest Director Darry...
Saili is a small man with a big heart who lives happily with his beautiful wife Vaaiga and her daughter Litia. Sadly however, the whole family is somewhat of an outcast; Saili because he has been denied his title and Vaaiga because, although her family wants her back, they cast her out years ago. In trying to stay peaceful and to themselves they only aggravate everyone else in the village and their lives as they know it become threatened unless they, namely Saili, speaks up to the pow...
Algerian director Fatma Zohra Zamoum (‘How Big is Your Love’, 2011); speaks.
The film ‘How Big is Your Love’
(Kedach ethabni, 2011) by writer/director/producer Fatma Zohra Zamoum is set in modern Algiers, Algeria. It is a touching tale about a young eight year-old boy, Adel, whose parents are in the midst of an irreconcilable separation, during which time Adel stays with his grandmother. To c...
Interview and Movie Clips with
PETER BART
Thursday, February 9
7:00-8:30 p.m.
Rancho Mirage Public Library
71-100 Hwy. 111, Rancho Mirage, CA 92270
This event is FREE!
In his 2011 book, “Infamous Players: A Tale of Movies, the Mob (and Sex)”, Peter Bart, Vice President and Editorial Director of Variety, provides an insider's, behind-the-scenes look at Paramountduring the "golden age" of the 70's, when the studio produced such classics as “The Godfather”, “...
James Franco and Val Lauren in Palm Springs for 'SAL' (2011) by PSIFF press
James Franco’s feature film SAL (2011) held its world premiere at the 68th La Biennale Venice Film Festival. Most recently the film debuted in Palm Springs during the 23rd Palm Springs International Film Festival. After the screening of the film, Franco appeared with lead actor in SAL, Val Lauren, to attend a Q and A to audiences. Read some of Franco’s answers to questions below.
JAMES...
A SEPARATION (Iran, 2011) by director Asghar Farhadi
Nominated for an Oscar for ‘Best Foreign Language Film’, A SEPARATION has been stunning audiences since its open at the 2011 Berlinale last February. Most recently, it screened at the 23rd Palm Springs International Film Festival (PSIFF 2012).
Bank employee Nader (played by Peyman Moadi) wants to stay in Iran but his wife Simin (Leila Hatami) wants to leave. A traditionalist stuck in the past and unable to leave his be...
Director Joseph Cedar's film HEARAT SHULAYIM (FOOTNOTE, Israel, 2011) joined the list of nine foreign films on the 2012 Oscar 'foreign film' shortlist. The film screened at the 23rd Palm Sptings International Film Festival and now will ride its way all the way to the Oscars.
January 18, 2012
FOOTNOTE held its world premier at Cannes last May. Below is a transcription and photos of the Cannes press conference.
PRESS CONFERENCE at 64th Cannes Film Festival fo...
The Belgian film THE INVADER (2011) screened in the 'New Voices/New Visions' category of at the 23rd Palm Springs International Film Festival 2012, wowing audiences with its stunning visual artistry and the magnetic force of newcomer Issaka Sawadogo's stellar performace as Amadou.
At the 68th Venice Film Festival, Belgian director Nicolas Provost held his world premier for his first feature film THE INVADER (2011). I interviewed director Nicolas Provost in Toronto TIF...
VOLCANO (ELDFJALL, Iceland, 2011), Iceland's official Oscar entry for 2012 screened this week at the 23rd Palm Springs International Film Festival.
Few films can boast such raw and gritty realism as VOLCANO (ELDFJALL, Iceland, 2011). While the film is set in its native Iceland, it is a far cry from the expansive Nordic Eden we have been exposed to after Eastwood's FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS (2006) and TOMB RAIDER (2001), with VOLCANO exposing the more tangible truth of everyday life in ...
Generation "П" (GENERATION P, 2011) held its world premier this week at the 23rd Palm Springs International Film Festival, 2012.
Based on the book by Russian writer Victor Pelevin, the film is directed by American/Russian director Victor Ginzburg. The film is about Babylen Tatarsky, a copywriter for a major advertising company in the late 90’s in Post-Soviet Russia. Babylen is put to the test by the advertising firm to find the 'new Russian identity'. Well, what see...
At the 23rd Palm Springs International Film Festival, the FIPRESCI AWARD went to the Hungarian film 'The Turin Horse' (2011), Hungary 's official entry for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, the latest and last film by the legendary auteur director Béla Tarr.
I interviewed Mr. Tarr, Béla in September while in Reykjavik during the 8th annual Reykjavik Film Festival (RIFF) where he was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Golden Puffin Award for greatness in filmmaking from the Ice...
Starbuck Receives Mercedes-Benz Audience Award Best Narrative Feature; The Girls in the Band and Wish Me Away Tie for Audience Award Best Doc Feature; The Turin Horse Receives FIPRESCI Award; The House Receives New Voices/New Visions Award; The Tiniest Place Receives The John Schlesinger Award
The 23rd Annual Palm Springs International Film Festival (PSIFF) announced this year’s award winners at a glamourous luncheon at Spencer’s Restaurant on Sunday, January 15, 20...
23rd ANNUAL PALM SPRINGS INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL ANNOUNCES FESTIVAL WINNERS
The 23rd Annual Palm Springs International Film Festival (PSIFF) announced this year's award winners at a luncheon at Spencer's Restaurant on Sunday, January 15, 2012. The Festival, held from January 5-16, 2012, screened 188 films from 73 countries, including 40 of the 63 foreign language entries for this year's Academy Awards®. Palm Springs' increasingly popular Festival continues to...
Question: What do you get when you mix ‘Planes, Trains and Automobiles’ (USA, 1987) and ‘The Visitor’ (USA, 2007), minus all sex and violence? Answer: Something a little bit like ‘MORGEN’ (2010, Romania) by Romanian director Marian Crisan, but also totally different.
There is almost nil violence in this film; rather, it is paradoxical in its nature using a very tough subject of much heated contention and portraying it in such a gracef...
photo still from 'THE FORGIVENESS OF BLOOD' (2011)
Director Joshua Marston's latest film, THE FORGIVENESS OF BLOOD (2011), screened this week in Palm Springs during the 2012 Palm Springs International Film Festival (PSIFF). Marston once again impresses audiences with his one-of-a-kind filmic verisimilitude. Similar to his international hit MARIA FULL OF GRACE (2004), which was filmed in Col...
Focus on ARAB CINEMA at the 23rd Annual Palm Springs International Film Festival.
At the 23rd Annual Palm Springs International Film Festival this year (January 05-16, 2012), a showcase of Arab cinema from North Africa to the Middle East will be screened. The film lineup entitled: ‘ARABIAN NIGHTS: A Showcase from the Middle East’ will premier 11 films from the new wave of pan-Arabic cinema this past year during one of the region’s most explosive and revolutionary per...
“SALMON FISHING IN TH E YEMEN ” AT 2012 PALM SPRINGS INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
At the open of PSIFF on January 05, 2012, actress Emily Blunt came to present her latest film, Salmon Fishing In Yemen (2011). The film opened in Toronto at the 2011 Toronto International Film Festival and opened the 2012 Palm Springs International Film Festival.
Ewan McGregor, Kristen Scott Thomas and Emily Blunt star in the feature film with based on Paul Torday’s acclaimed nove...
by Marla Lewin
Michael Douglas will receive the icon award tonight at the Palm Springs Film Festival. Then on Sunday he will attend the Golden Globes, where he is nominated for his role as Gordon Grekko, in Wall Street, Money Never Sleeps. Oliver Stone was here on Saturday night to give an award to Carey Mulligan at the Awards Gala, she played Michaels' daughter in the film. Palm Springs is the festival that keeps on giving. Santa Barbara Film Festival gave a Michael a spe...
Nik Xhelilaj, star of "The Albanian"
"The Albanian" by debut German director Johannes Naber is a gripping study, not only of illegal immigration into Germany, but of age-old tribal customs
In the backwood mountains of Albania which still heavily constrict the lives of young people and blood feuds are the norm. Handsome Arben a mountain villager is in love with Etleva, a fetching hay-pitching lass from a neighboring clan, and wants to marry her, but there is a ...
The treasure chest of film choices this year at Palm Springs is so well stocked that the visiting film critic is faced with the dilemma of choice at every turn. Monday, day number five, three important Polish films were stacked up back to back; Jerzy Skolimowski's "Essential Killing", Jan Kidawa-Blonski's "Little Rose" and "All That I love", a debut entry by Jacek Borcuch. Skolimowski and Kidawa-Blonski, both veteran Polish directors, are guests of the fest and we...
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