WearetheMovies.com Selects
10 Films You Must See
Dubai International Film Festival
(December 9-16, 2009)
Can you see 168 movies in 7 days? You could try and enter the Guinness Book of World Records (and a hospital); or you could read this. Burning with the fever of cinema, we scoured through the very eclectic list of films playing at the 2009 Dubai International Film Festival (DIFF), and chose the finest and most delectable ten films for you. With so many countries and cinematic sensibilities represented at this year’s DIFF, yes, it was terribly complex and insane the process of whittling down the films t0 just 10 films — but at WearetheMovies.com we suffer so you don’t have to!
Broken Embraces (Los Abrazos Rotos)
Pedro Almodóvar | Spain | 2009
128 min
A beguiling mix of melodrama, noir and pop culture nested within Spanish maverick Almodóvar’s trademark complex narrative style and eye-popping visuals. Broken Embraces is the fourth collaboration between Penélope Cruz and Pedro Almodóvar and it simply must not be missed.
City of Life
Ali F. Mostafa | United Arab Emirates | 2009
97 min
What Crash was to Los Angeles, City of Life may be to Dubai. Whatever your personal feelings are towards Crash (okay, personally, we think it’s imbecilic and glib), that film’s influence on writer-director Ali F. Mostafa is clear: cultural melting pot theme and a dramatic exposition of multiple stories taking place within a single city (hey, we even noticed a car crash in the trailer — production value added, Crash-homage paid!). Every UAE resident should be curious to see City of Life, because it seems to be the first real stab at filmmaking by an Emirati.
Milk of Sorrow (La Teta Asustada)
Claudia Llosa | Spain/Peru | 2009
100 min
A politically and emotionally gut-wrenching film that won the 2009 Golden Bear and FIPRESCI awards at the Berlinale. Concerns the abuse of women during the violent Maoist uprising in Peru during the 1980-1992 period. Title refers to the trauma of war passed onto children through breast milk by their mothers.
Mother (Madeo)
Joon-ho Bong | South Korea | 2009
129 min
Joon-ho Bong’s Host is a favorite film here at WearetheMovies.com, and this year the auteur from South Korea returns with Mother, another genre-defying exploration of family and death, caked with Joon-ho’s trademark pitch-black humor.
Mother and Child
Rodrigo Garcia | USA/Spain | 2010
125 min
Garcia’s has a very rich and satisfying resume of independent films that includes Nine Lives and Ten Tiny Love Stories. (He dabbled in studio films with Passengers — an embarrassing bread-and-butter job.) With Mother and Child, Garcia returns to form with top-brass actors such as Naomi Watts and Samuel L. Jackson who took huge pay cuts to participate in his sensitive and intelligent portrayal of life in flux. Mother and Child is a Middle East Premiere at DIFF and also a Gala Screening.
Nymph (Nang Mai)
Pen-Ek Ratanaruang | Thailand/Netherlands | 2009
94 min
The poster boy of the Thai’s New Wave cinema, Pen-Ek brings us another erotically-charged drama about a wife and a husband who travel to a jungle, both allegorical and physical. Reality and fantasy will collide at high speed. If you have seen Pen-Ek’s Last Life in the Universe, then you are ready for Nymph — else the experience may prove to be wild and giddy or crazy and strange. Excellent on both counts if you ask us!
A Prophet (Un Prophète)
Jacques Audiard | France | 2009
150 min
Winner of the Grand Prix at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival and Best Film at the London Film Festival, A Prophet is a swan song to the gritty crime film genre and crafted by director Jacques Audiard to deliver “icons, images for people who don’t have images, the Arabs in France.” With such a pedigree, how can you possibly ignore it?
The Refuge (Le Refuge)
François Ozon | France | 2009
88 min
Often accused as the enfant terrible of contemporary French cinema, François Ozon is known for his frank depiction of human sexuality and wit. The Refuge is a story about an alienated young man and drugs and pregnancy. Being an Ozon film, expect the unexpected and prepare to laugh and wince.
Well Done, Abba
Shyam Benegal | India | 2009
135 min
Often described as the heir apparent to master filmmaker Satyajit Ray, Shyam Benegal is both prolific and daring for breaking the conventions of both mainstream and arthouse cinema in India. In recent years, Benegal has found success on both sides of the fence as Welcome to Sajjanpur proved. Well Done, Abba is another satirical tale of a driver caught up in the complexities of arranging his daughter’s wedding in a small Indian village.
Women Without Men (Zanan-e Bedun-e Mardan)
Shirin Neshat & Shoja Azari | Iran/Germany | 2010
95 min
Co-directed by visual artist Shirin Neshat whose parents belonged to the upper-class generation of the Shah, Women Without Men takes place during the 1953 Iranian coup d’etat and tells the stories of four women who find solace in a magical orchard. Neshat lives in New York has been making films about Iran and women, exploring the tenuous socio-political facets of her heritage. This film won the Silver Loin at 2009 Venice Film Festival.
To buy your tickets, visit www.dubaifilmfest.com or call them at +9714-3913378
