“Romanians are bad at making movies. We have such a beautiful country, but they only show doom and gloom,” whines Pompiliu (Alexandru Papadopol) in the shaggy, summery comedy “Two Lottery Tickets.” Meant as a playful jab toward the Romanian New Wave movement that has put the country on the cinematic map, local audiences might have found a little bit of truth in writer/director Paul Negoescu’s script as they were clearly ready for something different.

Continue reading ‘Two Lottery Tickets’: The Romanian New Wave Gets A Summery, Slacker Comedy [Review] at The Playlist.

If a film such as “The Irishman” or “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” is unnecessarily long, then what will people say about “Malmkrog,” Cristi Puiu’s three-and-a-half-hour period adaptation? Focused almost entirely on the intellectual discussions of five aristocrats gathered at a wintry Transylvanian mansion in the early 1900s, “Malmkrog” belongs to the milieu of cerebral art-films whose arduousness is perhaps exactly the point. Cinephiles with a taste for the hardcore, painful pleasures of slow cinema, are encouraged to read further, but it’s difficult to recommend this feature to the movie-goer unacquainted with or baffled by the sorts of films in which “nothing happens.” Imagine “My Dinner With Andre” without the intimacy and zany charisma.

Continue reading ‘Malmkrog’: Cristi Puiu’s Ambitious Period Film Is Demanding & Beautiful Slow Cinema [NYFF Review] at The Playlist.

With the only major US film festival to happen in 2020 being Sundance, it’s not hyperbolic to say that the New York Film Festival is poised to be one of the biggest events in American film this year. It’s kinda that way by default. That being said, with the announcement of the entire list of films that will screen at the NYC event, it’s clear that the New York Film Festival is doing its best in this uncertain time to provide a quality experience for those willing to show up.

Continue reading NYFF 2020 Full Lineup Revealed: Films From Steve McQueen, Chloe Zhao, Jia Zhangke & More at The Playlist.

When you see the name Cristi Puiu attached to a film, there are a large number of film fans that don’t care what it’s about or who stars in it, the project is an instant must-see. That comes from the fact that Puiu, with only 6 features in the last 20 years, has established himself as one of the best international filmmakers working today. And with that in mind, we’re happy to share the new trailer for “Malmkrog,” the latest Puiu film, which is debuting soon in Berlin.

Continue reading ‘Malmkrog’ Trailer: Acclaimed Filmmaker Cristi Puiu Returns To Berlin With A New Period Drama at The Playlist.

Though Sundance is just around the corner, and SXSW just recently announced its first wave of programming, there’s another big festival with big announcements of its own. The Berlin Film Festival is expected to announce its full lineup later this month, but for the time being we are getting a hint of what’s to come, in the form of a newly announced programming section “Encounters.” 

READ MORE: Jóhann Jóhannsson’s Directorial Debut Film To Premiere At Berlin 2020, Two Years After His Death

Created to support
new voices in cinema and to give more room to diverse narrative and documentary
films in the program, the new section will run alongside the Competition and
Berlinale Shorts sections, which award the Golden and Silver Bears
respectively.

Continue reading New Films By Cristi Puiu And Tim Sutton Among New ‘Encounters’ Competition At Berlin Film Festival at The Playlist.

As though edited through a concertina that inhales great gasps of real life and exhales gusts of drama, Romanian New Wave pioneer Cristi Puiu‘s “Sieranevada” is a wild ride despite being set for the majority of its near-three hour runtime in a tiny, cramped apartment. Unfolding over the course of one afternoon as an extended Romanian family crams into a poky flat bristling with cling-film covered dishes of food and simmering resentments, what seems beforehand like its punishing length is wholly justified by Puiu’s generously overlapping approach.

Continue reading Cannes Review: Cristi Puiu’s Brilliant, Bustling, Bristling ‘Sieranevada’ at The Playlist.