everlasting moments Tagged Articles at Cinematical

By Kim Voynar (Original publication date: 9/3/2008 -- Telluride Film Festival)

For the cinephile, discovering a new film by famed Swedish director Jan Troell (one of this year's Telluride tributees) is a lot like eating a perfectly made truffle after a lifetime of mass-produced candy bars. His latest effort, Everlasting Moments, was like that for me; it's that rare cinematic experience that you settle back, bite into, and then savor as the subtle richness of the film cleanses the palate and fills the soul.

Based on the real-life story of Troell's wife's grandmother, the film takes us through the life of Maria Larsson (Maria Heiskanen, in a remarkable performance), a belabored mother of a large brood in the early days of the 20th century who finds renewed passion and intellectual independence through a Contessa camera she wins in a lottery. The camera sits for many years unused until one day, Maria takes it into the shop of the local photographer, Sebastien Pederson (Jesper Christensen), to sell it to help pay the rent.

The kindly Pederson shows Maria how to use the camera, and once she starts using it, she begins to see the world through a whole new lens. Finding herself unable to resist continuing to learn and improve her eye as a photographer, Maria becomes obsessed with capturing the little moments of life around her through the miraculous ability to capture living moments in still images.

The arrival of Watchmen this weekend has caused the other studios to flee in terror, but not the indies! There are several smaller films opening in limited release today, and the Indie Spotlight is here to round 'em up for you. Make a note of the ones that sound good and watch for when they come to your city (or to cable, or to DVD, etc.).

• Everlasting Moments (pictured) is a Swedish drama, based on a true story, about a young female photographer in the early 1900s. It was on the shortlist for the foreign-language category at the Oscars this year, but was not nominated. Cinematical's Kim Voynar lurved it at Telluride last September, calling it "that rare cinematic experience that you settle back, bite into, and then savor as the subtle richness of the film cleanses the palate and fills the soul." Mmm... Swedish palate cleanser.... At Rotten Tomatoes, 85% of the reviews agree with Kim.

• Phoebe in Wonderland delighted many of us at Sundance last year (including Cinematical's Kim Voynar) with its imaginative, funny depiction of a smart little girl who has trouble conforming to society's rules. I'm a little surprised by the mixed reviews (about half and half) at Rotten Tomatoes; I thought the general consensus was a lot more positive. Oh well. Don't listen to them, listen to Kim and me. It's a sweet movie. Look for it on about a dozen screens around the country.

• 12, from Russia, was nominated for an Oscar last year. That makes sense, considering it's a remake of 12 Angry Men, which was nominated for three Oscars itself back in 1957. Rotten Tomatoes has it at 89%, with critics using words like "riveting," "aggressively entertaining," and "intense." It's playing in L.A. and New York now, and it will tour the country in the coming weeks.

OK, I think this is the last narrowing-down-the-list that will occur before the actual Oscar nominations are announced a week from Thursday. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has whittled the candidates in the Best Foreign-Language category to these nine semi-finalists. It is from these that the five nominees will be chosen:

Revanche, Austria; The Necessities of Life, Canada; The Class, France; The Baader Meinhof Complex, Germany; Waltz with Bashir, Israel; Departures, Japan; Tear This Heart Out, Mexico; Everlasting Moments, Sweden; Three Monkeys, Turkey.

If the Turkish film is nominated, it will be a first for that country, which has submitted a film every year since 1992 but has never made the Big 5. The other countries have all been nominated before, though Mexico and Israel have never won.

These nine shortlist contenders were culled from 67 entries. After embarrassing situations in previous years where the Academy's stodgy old foreign-language nominating committee neglected films that should have at least made the shortlist, a new rule was implemented this year that allowed that group to choose only six of the nine semi-finalists. The other three were chosen by the Academy's "foreign-film executive committee," which skews younger and less boring. The Academy didn't say which films on the shortlist came from which group, though.

As you probably know, each country is permitted to submit only one film per year. If you want to see what everyone submitted this year -- and rail against the Academy for not shortlisting, say, Italy's Gomorra or Jordan's Captain Abu Raed -- the complete list is here.

The Telluride Film Festival has wrapped up and we're gearing up for our non-stop coverage of the Toronto International Film Festival, which starts tomorrow. Just in case you missed any of our coverage from the Telluride Film Festival, here's a roundup of what we saw there. Most of these films will also be playing at Toronto as well; if you attended Telluride or are going to TIFF, be sure to let us know which films you love or hate -- we always enjoy hearing what our smart Cinematical cinephiles think about the films they catch at fests.

Slumdog Millionaire (dir. Danny Boyle): Fans of director Danny Boyle's work will find much to appreciate in his latest film, Slumdog Millionaire, a sweeping, hopeful story about a boy in the slums of India who becomes an instant celebrity after he wins millions on India's version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire? ... read more

For the cinephile, discovering a new film by famed Swedish director Jan Troell (one of this year's Telluride tributees) is a lot like eating a perfectly made truffle after a lifetime of mass-produced candy bars. His latest effort, Everlasting Moments, was like that for me; it's that rare cinematic experience that you settle back, bite into, and then savor as the subtle richness of the film cleanses the palate and fills the soul.

Based on the real-life story of Troell's wife's grandmother, the film takes us through the life of Maria Larsson (Maria Heiskanen, in a remarkable performance), a belabored mother of a large brood in the early days of the 20th century who finds renewed passion and intellectual independence through a Contessa camera she wins in a lottery. The camera sits for many years unused until one day, Maria takes it into the shop of the local photographer, Sebastien Pederson (Jesper Christensen), to sell it to help pay the rent.

The kindly Pederson shows Maria how to use the camera, and once she starts using it, she begins to see the world through a whole new lens. Finding herself unable to resist continuing to learn and improve her eye as a photographer, Maria becomes obsessed with capturing the little moments of life around her through the miraculous ability to capture living moments in still images.