Sundance London 2017 - Dina by Dan Sickles & Antonio Santini

It’s a credit to Dogwoof and their impressive output that they have yet to release a single film this year that could be considered below par. The latest offering from this tireless outfit is every bit as exhilarating as the rest of their releases.

Presented as part of Sundance London Film Festival, Dina is a fantastic piece of filmmaking. This fascinating documentary is not only touching, funny and genuinely engaging, but it also deals with themes that not many filmmakers would dare approach.

Sundance London 2017 - A Ghost Story by David Lowery

David Lowery has become a Sundance little darling. His latest feature, A Ghost Story, was a festival sensation last January in Park City. In fact, the queue for the press screening was immense, despite the heavy snow outside the tent. The organisers soon realised they had to open a second room for the screening as they didn’t want to let the critics down. This week, A Ghost Story has its UK premiere and the filmmaker is coming to London for a talk. You can check the festival schedule here. But before you make any plans, let’s investigate this fever. Is A Ghost Story really extraordinary?

Cannes 2017 - Awards & Comments

The jury has just handed over the awards at the Cannes Film Festivals. This year more than ever, there has been a real split between the French and the international press. The former favoured 120 Battements Par Minute and The Day After, the latter Loveless, The Square and (to a lesser extent), The Killing of a Sacred Deer, and the jury was more in tune with them. The real surprise came not so much from the films that featured in the list of awards, more in the order they were given awards for.

As for last year, I did not predict a single award correctly, although I had one nearly right as I knew Nicole Kidman would not leave empty-handed, she was just rewarded in an unexpected and rather brilliant way. I did have most of the winning films in my list of predictions, but had the actual awards they received the wrong way round.

Cannes 2017 - Awards Predictions

This edition has been a solid year, with few real clunkers (even Le Redoutable did not end up being the disaster we had all somehow predicted), but not quite on par with 2016, which had been exceptional, and it would have been foolish to expect 2017 to match it. Since the awards are decided by a small jury (this year made up of such wildly different artists as Pedro Almodovar, Will Smith, Maren Ade, Paolo Sorrentino etc...), it is fiendishly difficult, and somehow pointless, to try to second guess what their tastes in films might be based on their own work and personality. After all, who expected 2013 President of the Jury Steven Spielberg to fall in love with Blue Is The Warmest Colour? Yet this is precisely what I am going to do, based on the films I saw and the general "vibe", despite my near total failure at predicting any of the awards last year.

Cannes 2017 - Based On A True Story by Roman Polanski

There are usually two reasons why a film by an illustrious director might find itself out of competition. It can be at the request of its director (Woody Allen has patently refused to be in competition all the times his films have been in Cannes), or it can be than it is not felt to be strong enough for the competition, but still deserves a spot for its star studded cast, and it is probably the case here, not strong enough being an understatement.

Cannes 2017 - L'Amant Double by François Ozon

Prolific director François Ozon did not have much luck with his last Cannes outing in 2013, with Jeune & Jolie receiving a frosty reception from critics, as well as a certain controversy (and not the right kind) for the way he handled his subject. After the thrilling The New Girl Friend (2014), and the rather serious Frantz (2016), he is back on the Croisette, on competition, with L'Amant Double.

In L'Amant Double, former model Chloe (Marine Vacth) visits handsome psychatrist Paul (Jérémie Renier) after some unexplained physical symptoms. The visits quickly takes a more personal turn as the pair begins an affair. Chloe is surprised to spot Paul in parts of town he has no business being, until she realises he has a twin brother, Louis (also played by Jérémie Renier), a psychiatrist with a radically different personality, whom she begins seeing professionally and romantically.

Cannes 2017 - Twin Peaks Season 3 Episode 1 & 2

More than ten years after his latest film, Inland Empire (aka the best film of all times, which is not open for discussion), who could ever have imagined that David Lynch would make a film again. Even more surprising was that he chose to make a third season to the much beloved Twin Peaks, bringing back collaborator and co-writer Mark Frost, as well as most of the original cast, not to mention scores of famous names, as well directing the entire 18 hours!

It is hard to convey how much watching the first two episodes of Twin Peaks Season 3 in Cannes meant for me. I was lucky enough to watch Twin Peaks Fire Walk With Me in Cannes in 1992, at my very first festival, having skipped school and being expelled for a week as a result. (Totally worth it...) So as a Lynch/Twin Peaks/Cannes nut, being able to watch this at the festival all these years later was beyond my most imaginable dreams. It is all the more remarkable considering this is a TV series (although Cannes has made another exception with Top of the Lake season 2, also present this year).