Michael Winterbottom, one of the most fascinating and idiosyncratic filmmakers of our age, makes so many movies that some of them creep into festivals very quietly and, just as quietly, creep out, never to be seen again. That wasn’t the case with The Trip, for my money one of the most intriguing pictures of 2011, a woolly exploration of middle-aged angst that featured Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon (as themselves) bickering and trading Sean Connery impersonations as they made their way through the English countryside. But two years before that, in 2008, Winterbottom brought a picture called Genova to the Toronto International Film Festival. The picture, a mildly engaging drama in which Colin Firth plays a father who moves his family to Italy after the death of their mother, never got a U.S. release, fading like the worn face of a stone saint on a medieval church. Fortunately, Winterbottom’s latest, Trishna, a retelling of Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles set in contemporary India, hasn’t met the same fate. And though it’s a bit of an oddity, it’s an affecting curio suitable for both Hardy enthusiasts and Winterbottom fans alike.
Freida Pinto is Trishna, the Tess character, who comes from an impoverished family living in a small village. Jay (Riz Ahmed), is her Angel/Alec (Hardy purists should be warned that the two characters have been condensed into one, perhaps a bit clumsily), a man who sweeps her away from her life of poverty, only to end up resenting and degrading her.
Even if Winterbottom has taken what some might consider unforgivable liberties with the story, Trishna works: Winterbottom has a feel for the story’s landscape, including the hardscrabble beauty of the countryside, all yellow dust and scrubby trees. It’s both a place Trishna needs to…
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Michael Winterbottom makes so many movies that some of them creep into festivals very quietly and, just as quietly, creep out, never to be seen again. That wasn’t the case with The Trip, which played here last year, a woolly exploration of middle-aged angst that featured Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon (as themselves) bickering and trading Sean Connery impersonations as they made their way through the English countryside. But two years before that, in 2008, Winterbottom brought a picture called Genova to the festival, a mildly engaging drama in which Colin Firth plays a father who moves his family to Italy after the death of their mother. The picture never got a U.S. release, fading like the worn face of a stone saint on a medieval church.
I hope American audiences get to see Trishna, Winterbottom’s take on Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles set in contemporary India. Freida Pinto is Trishna, the Tess character, who comes from an impoverished family living in a small village. Jay (Riz Ahmed), is her Angel/Alec (Hardy purists should be warned that the two characters have been condensed into one), a man who sweeps her away from her life of poverty, only to end up resenting and degrading her.
Even if Winterbottom has taken what some might consider unforgivable liberties with the story, Trishna works: Winterbottom has a feel for the story’s landscape, including the hardscrabble beauty of the countryside, all yellow dust and scrubby trees. It’s both a place Trishna needs to escape from and it’s home — there’s…
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Big reveals, mildly scandalous controversies, a delicious bit of vampire honeymoon sex and a heaping of good, old fashioned nostalgia dominated the week here at Movieline HQ. Speaking of nostalgia, it’s never too early to look back on our favorite top stories, right? RIGHT! Take a trip down memory lane and relive this week’s biggest moments as if they hit the web only yesterday. Go on, embrace the sentimentality. Consider it Movieline’s way of celebrating the the past, a la J.J. Abrams and his childhood wage labor overlord.
⢠It was a big weekend for The Twilight Saga and even more, uh, stimulating for fans thanks to the arrival of the first Breaking Dawn trailer.
⢠All hail the Alamo Drafthouse’s Tim League, national hero!
⢠With twelve new poor souls to stitch together, is it any wonder Tom Six’s The Human Centipede II was banned in the U.K.? At least it joins good company.
⢠Happy birthday to Johnny Depp and Natalie Portman! And R.I.P., Leonard Stern.
⢠Movieline asked for your help casting Weinergate: The Movie, while vowing to avoid watching that Sarah Palin documentary.
⢠Russell Crowe enjoyed a series of unfortunate anti-circumcision Twitter rants, while Helena Bonham Carter’s series of unfortunate fashion mishaps landed her a Marc Jacobs gig.
⢠Thanks to Movieline Interviewees Full Story »
UK actors, comics and longtime pals Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan (pictured L-R) last week paid a visit to the Tribeca Film Festival, which hosted the American premiere of their new road movie The Trip. But that didn’t mean they weren’t game for a lightning round of summer-movie first impressions.
Charting the duo’s five-day tour of inns, restaurants and nature around the north of England, The Trip reunites Coogan and Brydon with director Michael Winterbottom (A Cock and Bull Story) for a roundly amusing, wildly improvisatory, and often surprisingly poignant glimpse at two friends, two careers and two fathers for whom sharing the same car hardly means sharing the same path.
The Trip itself is a summer film, opening June 10 in limited release and arriving June 22 on VOD. We’ll have more about their movie closer to that time, but meanwhile, Coogan and Brydon spent a few minutes digesting some of the season’s bigger, blockbustery titles with Movieline.
Where do you stand on Thor, directed by Kenneth Branagh?
BRYDON: Oh, Thor. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That looks good.
COOGAN: Oh, that’s interesting.
BRYDON: The word on the street is good!
COOGAN: Rob’s doing a play with [Branagh].
BRYDON: I’m doing a play with him in the autumn. He showed me a little assembly of a trailer a while ago. But I’m so pleased for him, because the advance word is very good, it seems. The reviews are just coming in, aren’t they? And they’re very good.
COOGAN: Really? Well, I’m pleased for him.
BRYDON: He’s a brilliant talent. And what a nice man!
Where do you stand on the Pirates of the Caribbean series?
BRYDON: I’m not very familiar with that. I saw the first…
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