AFI Fest: Guillermo Del Toro dazzles with his take on “Pinocchio”

by Eurocheese

One of the most exciting debuts of the festival was Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio. The first thing that stands out about his adaptation, unsurprisingly, is the stunning visuals. Imagine a puppet show with a lush background where frames are so beautiful, singled out shots could easily serve as postcards. Well known characters such as the cricket (given the name Sebastian here) and the Blue Fairy mix deep blues with the monsters that always seem to lurk in Del Toro’s imagination. Think of it this way: If you crossed the animals from Isle of Dogs with the radiance of a stained-glass window, you’d get images like this. 

Del Toro came to present the film and spoke to having total control over the project, not allowing studio notes to mess with his vision (he used stronger language than "mess with")...

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Chart Updates: Best Animated & Documentary Features

by Nathaniel R

"All the Beauty and the Bloodshed" won Venice, but nothing is ever locked for the Documentary nominations as they pass over many frontrunners.

Happy weekend, Oscar fantastics. Figured it was time to finally put up the Documentary Feature chart now that we know several of the potential biggies. How do we suddenly know them given that documentaries arrive each and every week with little indication of whether they'll be Emmy or Oscar fodder? The answer is three key buzz-boosting factors...

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"Holy Spider" and other interesting updates to Best International Feature Film

by Nathaniel R

"Holy Spider" will be released in the US, dates TBA

Lots to tell you about today in the Best International Feature Film race. We are just six days away from the deadline for countries to submit their representative film for consideration at the upcoming Oscars but we know one country that won't be submitting and that's Russia since they're boycotting us given which side we fall on in their war on Ukraine.

We generally know most of the list before that deadline due to press releases from all around the world. But not all. There are usually about 90ish entries and we have 70 announced thus far. You might remember that last year the Academy chucked their (very good and transparent) tradition of releasing the full official list of submissions in early October. If they continue that this year we won't have exact counts for awhile which is quite sad since those films need all the attention they can get and they only have a short window to get that since the all but 10 of them will be culled on December 21st when the shortlist is announced. What's more we thrive on statistics and factoids when getting obsessed with this niche window into global cinema and you cant do that without the exact list. ANYWAY, sorry about all the minutae. There are quite a few interesting new submissions / factoids to share with you after the jump...

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Review: "Inu-Oh", a punk riot and true spectacle

by Nathaniel R

Last week we had the pleasure of an invitation to the East Coast premiere of the anime rock opera Inu-Oh, which opens in theaters today. It's distributed by GKids, a company which has long championed non-Hollywood animation for US audiences who we all know can be stubbornly myopic about animation, viewing it as a genre rather than a medium capable of all kinds of genres and visual experiences. The screening was at Japan Society here in Manhattan. I bring this up primarily because I had somehow never been there and must highly recommend the venue which has monthly screenings of both anime films and acclaimed live action Japanese films, too (recent films included everything from Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke to the kaiju film Mothra, to Akira Kurosawa's Kagemusha).  Seeing specialty films, which generally play to tiny arthouse crowds, in a beautiful respectful context to a large packed crowd is always a thrill (one of the reasons film festivals, never lose their thrill).

And Inu-Oh deserves a big screen so don't wait until streaming if it hits a theater near you...

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Yes No Maybe So: "Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio"

by Nathaniel R

This morning Netflix released the poster and teaser to Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio so it's really happening. Del Toro always has so many projects in development that it's something of a surprise when any of the long gestating projects emerges, complete. They're being somewhat cagey about actual dates beyond "November in theaters / December on Netflix" but a month is good enough for now. The trailer poster and quick Yes No Maybe So thoughts are after the jump...

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