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Hong Kong's Johnnie To springs 'surprise' on Venice film fest
2007-09-06
Leading Hong Kong director Johnnie To on Thursday was to reveal the "surprise" of this year's Venice film festival -- "Mad Detective," his latest police thriller. Starring Andy On and Lau Ching Wan, the film co-directed by Wai Ka Fai sneaks up on you from a standard plotline of a rookie cop teaming up with a former officer to hunt down a serial killer. As the plot thickens, it turns into a psychological teaser that blurs the line between truth and lies, reality and delusion. "The film challenges story conventions and audience expectations," To said in programme notes. The identity of this year's surprise entry among the 23 films vying for the Golden Lion had been kept secret until Wednesday. The top prize last year was clinched by the surprise candidate, "Still Life" by Chinese director Jia Zhangke. Also Thursday, Welsh director Peter Greenaway applies his brush to the cinematic canvas to reveal the many secrets of the Rembrandt masterpiece "The Nightwatch," a work that led to the Dutch master's financial and social ruin. The voluptuous work explores the three women in Rembrandt's life and the influence of his home life on his work. "How could so seriously rich and respected a painter in mid-life, end his life in penury?" asks Greenaway in programme notes. Meanwhile French actress Fanny Ardant, star of Italian director Vincenzo Marra's "L'Ora di Punta" (The Rush Hour), arrives amid controversy after causing a furore by praising Red Brigades leader Renato Curcio as a "hero" in a magazine interview. A demonstration is planned against Ardant, despite an apology, while festival director Marco Mueller said last week that she was welcome at the event even if he disagreed with her remarks. The Marxist-Leninist group active in Italy in the 1970s kidnapped and murdered Italy's former Christian Democrat prime minister Aldo Moro in 1978. Ardant co-stars with Michele Lastella in Marra's film about the obsession for money, power and greed in Italian society. "How many thieves, murderers, con men are among us?" the director asks. On Wednesday, US director Tim Burton, the master of the macabre, became the youngest recipient of the Golden Lion for career achievement at age 49. Burton's frequent collaborator Johnny Depp bestowed the award ahead of a screening of a 3-D version, created by Henry Selick, of the 1993 runaway hit "The Nightmare Before Christmas," in which the Pumpkin King of Halloween tries to take over Christmas by kidnapping Santa Claus. Viewers also were treated to the first eight minutes of Burton's next creation, a film version of the Stephen Sondheim musical "Sweeney Todd," a Broadway hit in 1979 that enjoyed a revival in Britain in 2004. Depp stars with Helena Bonham Carter in the story of the legendary London barber who murdered his customers by slitting their throats. Also Wednesday, Japanese director Takashi Miike presented his raucous take on the spaghetti western, "Sukiyaki Western Django," alongside a retrospective on the genre at this year's festival. With two days left until Venice's all-director jury returns its verdict, the French film "La Graine et le Mulet" (Grain of Life) by Tunisian-born director Abdellatif Kechiche enjoys the lead among Italian film critics. The unique Bob Dylan biopic by Tom Haynes, "I'm Not There" was also well received, as well as the US film "Redacted" by Brian De Palma about the rape and murder of an Iraqi girl by US soldiers. Dylan is conspicuously absent but omnipresent in the kaleidoscopic "I'm Not Here," but Cate Blanchett, who most closely resembles Dylan at the height of his stardom, seems set to triumph here as best actress.
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