To help sift through the increasing number of new releases (independent or otherwise), the Weekly Film Guide is here! Below you’ll find basic plot, personnel and cinema information for all of this week’s fresh offerings.
Starting this month, we’ve also put together a list for the entire month. We’ve included this week’s list below, complete with information on screening locations for films in limited release.
See More: Here Are All the Upcoming Movies in Theaters for July 2016
Here are the films opening theatrically in the U.S. the week of Friday, July 1. All synopses provided by distributor unless listed otherwise.
Wide
The Bfg
Director: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Bill Hader, Jemaine Clement, Mark Rylance, Penelope Wilton, Rebecca Hall, Ruby Barnhill
Synopsis: The Bfg is no ordinary bone-crunching giant. He is far too nice and jumbly. It’s lucky for Sophie that he is. Had she been...
Starting this month, we’ve also put together a list for the entire month. We’ve included this week’s list below, complete with information on screening locations for films in limited release.
See More: Here Are All the Upcoming Movies in Theaters for July 2016
Here are the films opening theatrically in the U.S. the week of Friday, July 1. All synopses provided by distributor unless listed otherwise.
Wide
The Bfg
Director: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Bill Hader, Jemaine Clement, Mark Rylance, Penelope Wilton, Rebecca Hall, Ruby Barnhill
Synopsis: The Bfg is no ordinary bone-crunching giant. He is far too nice and jumbly. It’s lucky for Sophie that he is. Had she been...
- 7/1/2016
- by Steve Greene
- Indiewire
Film review: 'Western'
For a film headed south, Competition entry "Western" is misleadingly titled. A road movie with nowhere to go, it tests the viewer's endurance for a two-hour trek with two losers from Brittany, France. To be sure, there are a few laughs along the way, but they are spaced too far apart across the cinematic terrain to be worth the trip.
Directed and co-written by Manuel Poirier, the film stars Sergi Lopez as the womanizing Paco, an erstwhile shoe salesman who has to hit the pavement when the hobo Nino (Sacha Bourdo) steals Paco's car. Love-starved Nino steals the car to impress a woman to no avail, while Paco succeeds in picking up a woman when he loses his car. The woman dumps Paco when she discovers his predilection for prevarication. Such comedic twists and ironies come close to popping the clutch on this film, but "Western" never really picks up any speed.
Take, for example, the hilarious sequence in which woman-chaser Paco concocts a plan to find a woman for Nino, from whom most women run. Together, they create a questionnaire exclusively for women for the ostensible purpose of identifying the ideal man. It is all a ruse, of course, to identify the one woman in the village who would find the repulsive Nino attractive.
The door-to-door polling that follows is full of comic potential, as is the "climax" of the sequence when Nino is abandoned in bed by the woman who concludes that he is too good for her. Like an engine turning over, this montage suggests that the cinematic vehicle has much horsepower, but ultimately Poirer cannot jump- start this movie.
The signs of sexism that appear throughout "Western"'s landscape contribute to the lessening of the film's comic potential. In an awkward and unsuccessful scene, Nino accuses all women of superficiality for falling for the allegedly handsome Paco.
Lopez, however, is no leading man, and the tendency for virtually all attractive women in the film to fall for his charlatan charms does not simply defy credulity but suggests that all women are stupid, lovesick or both.
Besides its pace, "Western" is a trip with a few highlights. Poirier and co-writer Jean-Fran‚ois Goyet deserve some credit for a couple of moments of levity. Lopez and Bourdo deliver acceptable performances, as do the host of women they conquer along the way. Elisabeth Vitali and Marie Matheron are especially iridescent as the only two women who see the light when it comes to Paco.
Speaking of the light, "Western"'s lighting looks as if the sun failed to set during the shoot as every image seems overexposed. Perhaps this look is intentional or merely the psychological projection of a viewer who could not wait for the sun to set on this film.
WESTERN
In competition
Director Manuel Poirier
Producer Maurice Bernart
Screenwriters Manuel Poirier,
Jean-Fran‚ois Goyet
Exececutive producer Michel St. Jean
Director of photography Nara Keo Kosal
Production manager Malek Hamzaoui
Editor Yann Dedet
Sound Jean-Paul Bernard
Original music Bernardo Sandoval
Cast:
Paco Sergi Lopez
Nino Sacha Bourdo
Marinette Elisabeth Vitali
Natalie Marie Matheron
Baptiste Basile Siekoua
Running time -- 136 minutes
No MPAA rating...
Directed and co-written by Manuel Poirier, the film stars Sergi Lopez as the womanizing Paco, an erstwhile shoe salesman who has to hit the pavement when the hobo Nino (Sacha Bourdo) steals Paco's car. Love-starved Nino steals the car to impress a woman to no avail, while Paco succeeds in picking up a woman when he loses his car. The woman dumps Paco when she discovers his predilection for prevarication. Such comedic twists and ironies come close to popping the clutch on this film, but "Western" never really picks up any speed.
Take, for example, the hilarious sequence in which woman-chaser Paco concocts a plan to find a woman for Nino, from whom most women run. Together, they create a questionnaire exclusively for women for the ostensible purpose of identifying the ideal man. It is all a ruse, of course, to identify the one woman in the village who would find the repulsive Nino attractive.
The door-to-door polling that follows is full of comic potential, as is the "climax" of the sequence when Nino is abandoned in bed by the woman who concludes that he is too good for her. Like an engine turning over, this montage suggests that the cinematic vehicle has much horsepower, but ultimately Poirer cannot jump- start this movie.
The signs of sexism that appear throughout "Western"'s landscape contribute to the lessening of the film's comic potential. In an awkward and unsuccessful scene, Nino accuses all women of superficiality for falling for the allegedly handsome Paco.
Lopez, however, is no leading man, and the tendency for virtually all attractive women in the film to fall for his charlatan charms does not simply defy credulity but suggests that all women are stupid, lovesick or both.
Besides its pace, "Western" is a trip with a few highlights. Poirier and co-writer Jean-Fran‚ois Goyet deserve some credit for a couple of moments of levity. Lopez and Bourdo deliver acceptable performances, as do the host of women they conquer along the way. Elisabeth Vitali and Marie Matheron are especially iridescent as the only two women who see the light when it comes to Paco.
Speaking of the light, "Western"'s lighting looks as if the sun failed to set during the shoot as every image seems overexposed. Perhaps this look is intentional or merely the psychological projection of a viewer who could not wait for the sun to set on this film.
WESTERN
In competition
Director Manuel Poirier
Producer Maurice Bernart
Screenwriters Manuel Poirier,
Jean-Fran‚ois Goyet
Exececutive producer Michel St. Jean
Director of photography Nara Keo Kosal
Production manager Malek Hamzaoui
Editor Yann Dedet
Sound Jean-Paul Bernard
Original music Bernardo Sandoval
Cast:
Paco Sergi Lopez
Nino Sacha Bourdo
Marinette Elisabeth Vitali
Natalie Marie Matheron
Baptiste Basile Siekoua
Running time -- 136 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 5/12/1997
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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