Steven Wagner

Chinese Portrait
8.3 (84%) 881 votes
Chinese Portrait
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1. Reporter: John Lynn Fernandez
2. Biography: Film critic in West Palm Beach & Greater Miami; contributor for @icsfilm
3. 

&ref(https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BMThjZjY4ZDAtOThkNC00MTZhLTg4MjYtYzJhZDI2ZGEyOGFjXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyODAyNDE3Mw@@._V1_UY113_CR0,0,76,113_AL_.jpg). tomatometer 6,8 of 10 Stars. year 2018. liked It 32 vote. runtime 1hour 19 m. We can see this things on tv right. December 23, 2019 3:15AM PT Sixth Generation director Wang Xiaoshuai's fascinating montage of static shots strikes an elegant balance between auteur cinema and the art world. The original title of Wang Xiaoshuai ’s “ Chinese Portrait ” means “My Lens” in Mandarin, and indeed the director’s unconventional documentary reflects his personal vision of his home country. Inspired by portraiture in still photography and painting, Wang traveled from eastern cities (Beijing and Shanghai) to northwestern areas, such as Qinhai province (populated by Tibetans) and the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region (home of Muslim people of the Hui minority), and carefully composed dozens of images, poignant, mysterious, or ironical. Shot over seven years and deftly assembled by French editor Valérie Loiseleux (who has worked with Manoel de Oliveira, among others), they add up to the mosaic portrait of a post-socialist China in the throes of major upheavals. Nothing is improvised in Wang’s static, precisely framed tableaux. The sitters were obviously asked to pose, stay motionless, and stare forward, creating a tension between stillness and unexpected movement. The compositions are rich with multiple layers; they explore the depth of the cinematic space, and suggest invisible presences at the edge of the frame. In one shot, a woman holds a bleating lamb; behind her, the rest of the herd is gathered by a Mongolian yurt (or tent), while further back stands a wagon trailer, evoking the modernization of nomadic life. In another, two young boys wearing white Muslim kufi hats mind a small food stall; on the right, an unseen man talks to them through an open window; the oldest boy responds with a smile, resumes the pose, then pops his bubble gum. Wang eschews narration and records the rare, muted conversations as another layer of ambient sound. Words are not subtitled, and the shots address the spectators at a sensorial rather than intellectual level. At times, Wang plays with the presence, absence, or invisibility of human bodies. Many shots of urban ruins, crumbling industrial buildings, country roads or polluted waves are devoid of human presence. The operator of a hydraulic destruction hammer attacking a disused factory remains hidden within his cockpit. Often bodies are anonymous (city crowds, workers in huge workshops or immense office spaces) or too far in the cinematic field to be identified. Even so, Wang keeps returning to the portraiture, sometimes humorously planting himself in the center of the space: Wearing an anti-pollution facemask, he stands in front of the iconic Rem Koolhaas CCTV building, barely visible in the smog. The images echo the work of Walker Evans, Andy Warhol’s “Screen Tests, ” or Chantal Akerman’s landscapes. The painterly reference becomes clear when the artist Liu Xiaodong appears in front of a group of seven young women sitting together in the ruined landscape of post-earthquake Sichuan. Internationally famous for his large-scale compositions representing marginalized populations, Liu has long been in dialogue with Sixth Generation directors about the fine line that separates realism from artifice. (Wang cast the artist in his 1993 feature, “The Days, ” and Jia Zhangke’s 2006 “Dong” documents his work. ) A crossover between the film and art worlds, “Chinese Portrait” started as a video installation at the 2010 Shanghai Biennial, and was later featured at the Minsheng Art Museum in 2014, before the shooting continued till 2017. During that time Wang (a 2005 Jury Prize winner at Cannes) worked on two ambitious films, “Red Amnesia” and “So Long My Son” (which won two acting prizes at the most recent Berlinale) that explore the traces left by history on the multifarious Chinese landscape. An image of “Chinese Portrait, ” filmed in a small southern fishing town, echoes a moment of “So Long My Son. ” In the penultimate shot, a group of men and women are standing on a parched, cracked land, their empty pails posed at their feet. They are dressed simply, yet somewhat formally, and, with quiet dignity, stare back at us. In the foreground, a woman and a little boy are crouching. The boy is having a hard time keeping the pose. He looks around, then down, moves his body, and eventually yawns. The shot foregrounds the ethical pitfalls of documentary portraiture. When the drought victims return the gaze of the camera, does it alleviate the imbalance of power? Should a little boy have to crouch for the duration of a long photo shoot? In this haunting, precisely choreographed tableau, Wang reaches an apex in the tension between stillness and unplanned movement. The sitters’ dignity and the boy’s implicit resistance are now woven into the texture of the film. While this can be read as a metaphor for the relationship between citizens and government in China today, it confirms Wang’s stature as one of the country’s most significant filmmakers, one with the courage to pose disturbing questions. The Chinese box office is gearing up for a starkly unsexy Valentine’s Day, with “Jojo Rabbit” and a local title formally pulling out of the mid-February line-up, while unconfirmed reports suggest that others ? including “Little Women” ? will soon pull the plug, amidst strict measures to prevent the spread of deadly coronavirus. Cinemas are [... ] Jessica Mann, a key witness in the trial of Harvey Weinstein, faced a second day of cross-examination on Monday about the complex nature of her relationship with the disgraced producer. Mann, a hairdresser and aspiring actor, gave explosive testimony on Friday in which she accused Weinstein of violent sexual assault and rape, and claimed the [... ] The shortest Oscar season ever has been especially brutal for strategists trying to gain traction with smaller-scale offerings later in the season: Early birds and conventional choices scooped up the lion’s share of Oscar nominations. And yet, as final voting comes to a close on Feb. 4 with certain categories seemingly locked up, it bears [... ] Veteran U. S. film and TV executive Michael Garin has been appointed CEO of Abu Dhabi’s twofour54, the outfit that provides infrastructure and incentives to more than 500 entertainment companies and drives media and entertainment industry growth in the United Arab Emirates. Set up in 2008 and named after Abu Dhabi’s geographical coordinates, this so-called media [... ] China has officially ordered an indefinite halt to all film production in the country as it seeks to stop the spread of the deadly coronavirus that has swept the nation. The death toll in China stands at 361 ??higher now than that of SARS, which killed 349. China has confirmed 17, 205 cases as of Sunday, [... ] Movie theaters aren’t throwing away their shot to have “Hamilton” on the big screen. Disney is bringing a film of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical sensation with the original Broadway cast to cinemas in North America on Oct. 15, 2021. The movie version isn’t an adaptation in the vein of Miranda’s upcoming “In the Heights, ” but rather [... ] The Miami Film Festival will open on March 6 with “The Burnt Orange Heresy, ” starring Mick Jagger, Donald Sutherland, Elizabeth Debicki and Claes Bang. Miami Dade College’s festival, now in its 37th edition and running March 6-15, will screen more than 125 narrative features, documentaries and shorts from 30 countries. “Charles Willeford’s classic 1971 art [... ].
Ito ang pmahalaang Duterte. Walang problema sa ncov. Ang problema talaga droga. Ingat po sa ating lahat. Walang kkyahan at pasilidad ang gobyerno. .

Wow I hop it's nice upcoming movie ?. Naming the top films of 2019 is preposterously hard; nearly every week, a new film worth seeing arrived in theaters or debuted on a streaming service, which means there’s an embarrassment of riches to choose from. But any top movies list is, after all, partial to the taste of the person who constructs it, and looking over this year’s films, I found myself favoring movies with a spark of risk and creativity that stood apart from the safer studio fare on offer at the multiplex most weekends. And there were plenty of those more daring options to choose from in 2019. Here are my top 21 films of 2019 and how to watch them, with a lengthy list of runners-up near the end. Every single one is worth your notice. 21) The Competition In The Competition, French documentarian Claire Simon turns her camera on the highly selective admissions process at Paris’s famous La Fémis film school, which boasts alumni like Alain Resnais ( Last Year at Marienbad), Arnaud Desplechin ( My Golden Days), and Claire Denis ( High Life). As hundreds of applicants gather to write an essay, participate in acting and directing exercises, and talk to a panel of judges drawn from France’s elite cinema institutions (including museums, theaters, and libraries), Simon’s camera rests in the room, observing the hopeful students and the judges as they talk to one another. Only a small number of applicants will ultimately be invited to enroll, and Simon continues filming even while the judges convene, after the applicants have left the room. Simon taught in the directing department at La Fémis for 10 years, so she knew the place inside and out when she arrived. The Competition is very much about that specific French school, but it’s also about the kinds of “performances” that people put on when they’re trying to impress strangers ? whether it’s students trying to charm admissions officers who will determine their future, or interview subjects trying to look accomplished for a documentarian’s camera. How to watch it: After a limited theatrical release in the spring of 2019, The Competition is awaiting home release. 20) Midsommar Ari Aster’s Midsommar, a confidently directed and operatic follow-up to 2018’s Hereditary, situates its tale of grief, breakups, and rites in northern Sweden at the height of the country’s sun season. It’s a smart choice for the story Aster wants to tell, in which four American graduate students accompany their Swedish friend home for midsummer celebrations, then find themselves entangled in pagan rituals that rock them to their core. Midsommar is obsessed with the passage of time and the cycle of seasons, and the ways humans scramble to make sense of monumental but still ordinary life change: breakups, aging, death, and more. The film takes a quietly balanced approach to this theme; neither the modern approach of treating changes like tragedies to be mourned nor the more ancient ? even pagan instinct to memorialize them with rituals and acceptance is more “civilized. ” Human life is violent, nasty, and explosive. And Midsommar is, after all, a horror film ? one that reminds us there’s nothing on Earth more terrifying than existence itself. How to watch it: Midsommar is available to digitally rent or purchase on Amazon, YouTube, Google Play, Vudu, and iTunes. Apple TV subscribers can also watch the director’s cut. 19) Portrait of a Lady on Fire French director Céline Sciamma has often made coming-of-age films about young women, frequently exploring the ways that gender expression and sexual desire morph, shift, and evolve during youth. In Portrait of a Lady on Fire, she trains her gaze on the past, telling the story of a young painter (Noémie Merlant) near the end of the 18th century. The painter has been commissioned to make a portrait of a woman named Marianne (Adèle Haenel), who’s being pressured by her mother to get married. The artist and her subject become close, and when Marianne’s mother leaves home for a while, desire flames to life. Portrait of a Lady on Fire is a restrained film until it isn’t, and exquisite in its rendering of both the women’s relationship and the period it’s set in. It’s not just a romance ruled by the female gaze; it’s centered in a world where men rarely intrude, and thus the full gamut of female emotion and desire is on display. How to watch it: Portrait of a Lady on Fire will receive a one-week limited theatrical run in New York and Los Angeles beginning December 6. It will open nationwide on Valentine’s Day 2020. 18) 3 Faces At the 2018 Cannes Film Festival premiere of Jafar Panahi’s 3 Faces, a chair was reserved for the director, with his name printed on a piece of paper taped to the back. That chair remained empty: Panahi, his wife, his daughter, and 15 of his friends had been arrested in 2010 and charged with creating propaganda against the Iranian government. The filmmaker ? one of the most celebrated in Iran, if not the world ? was sentenced to a six-year jail sentence and barred for 20 years from making films, writing screenplays, giving interviews to any media, or leaving the country. But Panahi didn’t stop making films. His 2011 work This Is Not a Film (it was) was smuggled out of Iran inside a cake and had its premiere at Cannes. Two more of his films have since premiered at the Berlin Film Festival and won major awards, and 3 Faces opened in the US earlier this year. Panahi appears as himself in 3 Faces, and so does everyone else in the film ? it’s a fictional story, but populated with real people. Behnaz Jafari, a famous actress in Iran, receives a video from a young woman named Marziyeh ( Marziyeh Rezaei). Marziyeh explains in the video that she has sent Jafari many messages, begging the actress to convince Marziyeh’s family to let her attend the acting conservatory in Tehran ? and it appears that Marzieyeh may have since hanged herself in a cave out of despair from not being able to follow her lifelong dream. Disturbed and confused, Jafari and Panahi travel to Marziyeh’s village to investigate. 3 Faces is Panahi’s exposition of and rebuke to traditionalist ideas about women’s value and dignity in Iranian culture. A lot of what’s happening in the film is metaphorical, in conversations that seem to slyly revolve around twisted notions of masculinity, whether in a discussion of a “stud bull” that’s blocking the road, or a comically pathetic story about a son’s long-ago circumcision. 3 Faces isn’t an obvious political statement, but its sideswipe at ideologies that prevent people from reaching their full potential is present all the same. How to watch it: 3 Faces is available to digitally rent or purchase on Amazon, YouTube, Google Play, Vudu, and iTunes. 17) Honey Boy Honey Boy has the kind of premise that could very rapidly devour its own tail or become unconscionably sentimental. Shia LaBeouf wrote the screenplay based on his own life, and he plays his own father in the film, which runs along two parallel story tracks. In one, a 22-year-old hotshot actor named Otis ? LaBeouf’s own stand-in, played by Lucas Hedges ? lands in rehab after his third drunken altercation with the police, and his therapist tells him he’s suffering from PTSD. As part of his recovery, he needs to recall his relationship with his father. In the other, 12-year-old Otis (Noah Jupe) is a successful child actor with a steady income, some of which is used to pay his father, James, who works as his chaperone (a requirement on set for child actors). LaBeouf dons a potbelly and balding mullet to play James, a felon and an addict who’s been sober for four years, and a volatile and sometimes abusive parent, though he clearly cares for, and about, his son. If Honey Boy was strictly fictional, it probably wouldn’t work at all, because it would feel strenuously contrived to garner sympathy. But all of it is based in fact, starting from LaBeouf’s successful career as a child actor, during which he played lead roles on the 2000-2003 ABC show Even Stevens and in the 2003 movie Holes. The screenplay was written mostly while LaBeouf was in rehab following a 2017 arrest, much like we see in the film. And in the hands of director Alma Har’el (whose previous directorial work has largely been in documentary filmmaking), the film is far too knowing and lived-in to fall into the sentimentality trap. How to watch it: Honey Boy is currently playing in limited theaters. 16) Chinese Portrait Chinese Portrait is a stunning trip through modern China, a vast country with a diverse population and landscapes. Independent director Wang Xiaoshuai decided to create a portrait of the Chinese citizenry and their country by making literal portraits, on film. He began traveling around China, filming long, static shots of what he saw and often asking one or two people in the frame to look directly into his camera, as if they were in a painting. Because Wang’s camera does not move, and he provides no narration to explain where he’s filming, Chinese Portrait invites the audience to become intimately engaged with its images. To viewers, seeing the movement around the static figure looking straight at us feels like looking at a living photograph. So whether we’re watching workers at a factory, strangers on a train, or young people at a bar, what we’re seeing is a whole world, action and emotion swirling around individual people. How to watch it: Chinese Portrait opens in limited theaters on December 13 in New York, and December 20 in Los Angeles. 15) For Sama There have been many documentaries in recent years about the bombings and humanitarian crisis in Aleppo, and many of them have been excellent. But For Sama is a new take on the subject, and it’s truly outstanding. Waad Al-Kateab and her husband, Hamza Al-Kateab are native Syrians who were living in Aleppo when Syrians began to protest against their government and President Bashar al-Assa
Love, your work lady! Amazing as always...

Est ce que tu vas bientôt faire un room tour ? Gros bisous je t'adore ????.

Great pics! great song! great clip.