Tartan Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Bad news from European Variety: Hamish McAlpine's 26-year-old Tartan Films is folding. Today, it was announced that Tartan is laying off of its entire 22-member staff, part of "going into administration" as the Hollywood Reporter notes, using the British phrase that more or less means bankruptcy under the administration of auditors.

The London-based distributor might be best known for the scads of J-horror and K-horror it distributed through the Tartan Asia Extreme and Tartan Terror, aka Tartan Grindhouse. The label had a strong fan base, but apparently not enough of a base to survive. The news may not be a surprise, since the closure of Tartan USA had been announced at this year's Cannes Festival, with the sale of domestically-distributed films to Palisades Media.

Tartan films had included such prestige fare as 12:08 East of Bucharest, 2005's best film The Death of Mr. Lazarescu (above) and Johnnie To's Triad Election; the Asia Extreme label got grittier with for Oldboy, the original Ringu and its sequel, and the excellent Korean chiller A Tale of Two Sisters. Here's a list of some of the releases; as eclectic a roster as there is in the current cinema, bearing as it does names from Michael Powell to Park Chan-Wook.

Jackie (Kate Dickie) looks a bit like Chrissie Hynde in a kind of homely/sexy way. She sits gazing into a bank of video monitors. For her job, she watches, godlike, all the people who pass by the myriad of video cameras planted all about Glasgow. If trouble arises, she makes a call and someone (hopefully) shows up on the scene. It seems like the perfect job for her, hovering over other people's lives without the slightest interest in her own. She appears lost, or hollow, and the director Andrea Arnold pulls off the admirable task of making her interesting without immediately giving away her secrets. When those secrets finally come out, they do so in such a way that avoids the obvious "Shyamalan twist." Refreshingly, Red Road is a movie about a person and not a gimmick.

The catalyst comes when Jackie thinks she sees a familiar face in the monitors. We get a flicker of recognition and nothing more. We don't know if the man is a lover, a killer or even whether the man would recognize Jackie if he saw her. After work, Jackie begins to haunt the dingy neighborhood in which the man was sighted. Graffiti sprayed onto crumbling walls is more prevalent than actual intact, livable structures, and the inhabitants seem to be in a perpetual bad mood. After hanging out in a couple of sleazy cafes and bars, she manages to slip into a party at the man's apartment. He notices her and asks her to dance. He begins seducing her and she allows herself to be seduced. Or does she? It would be a disservice to continue any further with the plot, even though only part of the movie's pleasures lies in its discovery.

Ok, so everyone in the US who wanted to see Johnnie To's Election already has a region-free DVD player and the disc from Hong Kong. Me too -- but the thought of it actually getting distribution here remains pretty exciting, if only because it's a sign of respect for the film and maybe, just maybe, a hint that more quality from HK and its sister Asian indistustries will find its way to American screens. No, you're right -- I'm dreaming. Still, though, the news that Tartan has stepped up and acquired US distribution rights to not only Election but also its sequel (which reportedly had a very successful screening at Cannes) is heartening to fans of quality Asian films. I mean, when is it NOT better to see a movie on the big screen?

That said, it's unclear whether Tartan's plans for Election include a theatrical run or only a DVD release. The company does, however, fully intend to get Election 2 into theaters later this year, a run that will be supported (they say) by "a strong publicity campaign."

[via Kaiju Shakedown]

In association with the UK's Tartan Films, the Sundance Channel has picked up exclusive television rights to a nice little pile of films that will air in their Asia Extreme block at midnight on Sundays, starting in April. The films included in the package are 2/3 of Chan-wook Park's Revenge trilogy (Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance and Oldboy), Samaritan Girl, A Tale of Two Sisters, Memento Mori, H, Phone, and A Snake of June.

Yes, seven of the eight films are Korean (A Snake of June is Japanese) - apparently that's what passes for "Asian" these days. China? Hong Kong? Never heard of them. And yes, the whole "Asia Extreme!" marketing gimmick is idiotic and offensive. But the fact is that it's great these movies are going to be on cable, no matter the context. It will be interesting, however, to see if Sundance still cares about airing these films when the current buzz over Korean film expires - that's when such a block will really be appreciated by fans of Asian cinema.

Lady Vengeance (formerly know as Sympathy for Lady Vengeance) is South Korean director Park Chan-wook's final installment in his revenge trilogy. The series started with the little-seen Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, which was followed by the wildly successful Oldboy. Though the characters in the films are unrelated, they go through similar ordeals, and are all determined to get revenge for their experiences. Lady Vengeance will be released in the US by Tartan Films in late April, and they're taking an interactive approach to promoting the film: fans are being asked to choose the advertising poster.

Like the rest of the world, Tartan have a MySpace page, and it's there that you can see the seven options, and vote for your favorite. (Me, I love #6 but since it's totally misleading to casual observers, I'd vote for #5.) The only problem is that it looks like you've got to have a MySpace identity to vote - other than that, though, this is a pretty cool idea. Allowing the public to choose creates publicity and a buzz about the film, and the result will ideally be both a poster with which fans are happy, and an advertising campaign over which they have a sense of ownership. All that remains is to see if they show up to see the movie they helped promoted.

[via JoBlo]