"everything u ever wanted to know about the foreign film category
*...but were afraid to ask"
Pt 1 All 81 Trailers | Pt 2 Women Directors & Debut Filmmakers | Pt 3 Zoology
Actors You Know & Possibly Love
Successful actors really rack up the frequent flyer miles. The savvy ones cultivate relationships wherever they go. The very smartest of them pick up a second or third or fourth language and actually use those languages in their careers. Viggo Mortensen doesn't have quite the Hollywood career he deserves but notice that he doesn't settle - he's truly in love with his craft and uses his Spanish, English, Danish, and French in films all over the world. When the Danish Connie Nielsen was starting to look basic after lots of unsatisfying American films, she reminded everyone that she was actually gifted by going international with France's demonlover and returning home for Brothers. Actors who are bilingual and never use that onscreen are a mystery. It would be fun to see Sandra Bullock in a German movie or Hugh Jackman or Bradley Cooper in a French flick... even if it was only cameos since we know none of them are hurting for work. Why did Mira Sorvino not really capitalize on her Mandarin during her long dry spell? It's no accident that Charlotte Rampling and Carmen Maura never stopped working or that Kristin Scott Thomas only quit working when she wanted to; they speak multiple languages and make films outside their home countries often.
Let's look at the actors with a strong international presence that pop up in this year's Oscar submitted foreign-language films after the jump...
Geraldine ChaplinGeraldine Chaplin will forever be most famous as Charlie Chaplin's daughter but at 71 she has built quite a filmography with classics under her own belt like her Golden Globe nominated performances in Doctor Zhivago, Nashville, and Chaplin. Plus there's her perfect cameo in Almodóvar's masterpiece Talk to Her to consider. She works all over the place since she speaks Spanish, French and English fluently. This year she headlines Sand Dollars, a lesbian drama submitted from the Dominican Republic (reviewed) which opens in the US in November.
Tim Roth of Tarantino Troupe fame (plus, you know... Rob Roy, Incredible Hulk, Selma, Planet of the Apes), is the lead in the Mexican submission 600 Miles as a kidnapped ATF Agent. So he's in two Oscar hopefuls this year since Hateful Eight hits theaters at Christmas
Song Kang-ho is the king who struggles with his heir in South Korea's historical drama submission The Throne (in South Korea it's called Sado which is the name of the Crown Prince in question). You may not know Kang-ho's name but you know his face as the muse of Park Chan-Wook (Snowpiercer) since Chan-wook's movies have lives outside of Korea. Though he only had a supporting role in Snowpiercer, he's usually the lead or one of them at least. Previous imported hits include: The Host, Sympathy for Mr Vengeance and the great vampire picture Thirst.
Daniel Wu, in addition to being one of the world's most beautiful men, is the male lead of China's surprise submission, the romantic comedy Go Away Mr Tumor. He's appeared in many high profile Asian films including Bishonen, The Banquet and recently The Man With the Iron Fists and Tai Chi Hero and he models and likes to show off his body so there are lots of photos of him to drool on all over the web. He surely deserves his own Beauty Break but we'll have ample opportunity for that next month surely. Why? If you're like 'he looks soooo familiar' but you don't watch that many Asian films or drool on beefcake photos, it's possible that you've been watching AMC where they've been constantly promoting his first American TV series Into the Badlands which debuts in November.
Rhys Ifans (Notting Hill, Greenberg, Harry Potter) headlines the UK's submission, a Welsh adaptation of the play Under Milk Wood (yes, the same one that became this Elizabeth Taylor movie)
Pilou Asbaek leads Denmark's A War about a soldier whose actions in Afghanistan haunt him and his family back home. Asbaek recently starred in the Danish hit A Hijacking (similar story as Captain Phillips), but if you didn't see that his face is probably familiar from his supporting role in Scarjo's very recent sci-fi blockbuster Lucy. His profile gets even bigger next year when he plays Euron Greyjoy in the ever expanding cast of Game of Thrones on TV and Pontius Pilate in the remake of Ben-Hur on the big screen.
Shu Qi and Chang Chen attending Cannes for the premiere of "Three Times" years ago
Shu Qi & Chang Chen are the stars of Taiwan's The Assassin reuniting them with their Three Times director Hou Hsiao-Hsien. If they look familar it's because they're in a ton of movies. Chen was, most famously, Zhang Ziyi's lover in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon but he's also co-starred in high profile Asian films like The Grandmaster, Red Cliff, and 2046. You may have seen Shu Qi in the original Transporter with Jason Statham or in the action film So Close or in Hsiao-Hsien's Millenium Mambo.
Deneuve & Gorilla in "The Brand New Testament"
Catherine Deneuve France's all time most iconic actress (and that's saying a lot!) co-stars in Belgium's comedy The Brand New Testament. If you're a younger reader who is like "why is everyone so obsessed with Catherine Deneuve pick any of three of these for a mini festival at home: Belle de Jour, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Pola X, The Hunger, Repulsion, 8 Women, Tristana, A Christmas Tale, Indochine... and really that's just scratching the surface. She's been a brilliant and vital cinematic force for over 50 years and is still working all the time and in daring films at 71 years of age!