Based on Frank Herbert’s book and directed by Denis Villeneuve, Dune follows Paul Atreides, played by Timothee Chalamet, who goes on a mythical and emotionally charged journey. Paul is a brilliant young man born into a destiny beyond his comprehension.
He travels to the most dangerous planet in the universe to ensure his family and people’s future. Malevolent forces explode into conflict over the pant’s exclusive supply of the most precious resource in existence, a commodity capable of unlocking humanity’s most significant potential. But it is those who can conquer their fear that will survive.
Villeneuve co-wrote the screenplay with Jon Spaihts and Eric Roth. Hans Zimmer composes the music for the science fiction film. The rest of the cast includes Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Stellan Skarsgard, Javier Bardem, Jason Momoa and Dave Bautista.
Based on the acclaimed Jerzy Kosiński novel, The Painted Bird is a fastidious 35mm black and white summoning of wild, primitive Eastern Europe at the bloody close of World War II. The film follows the boy’s journey, entrusted by his persecuted parents to an elderly foster mother. The older woman soon dies, and the boy is on his own, wandering through the countryside, from village to village, farmhouse to farmhouse. As he struggles for survival, he suffers through extraordinary brutality meted out by the ignorant, superstitious peasants. He witnesses the terrifying violence of the efficient, ruthless soldiers, both Russian and German.
In a defining scene, one of the peasants shows him the flight of a captive bird, whom the man has painted and then released back into its flock. Immediately, the bird gets attached and ripped apart because it is different from its fellows. That lesson reinforces all he already knows and will soon know better: the difference is fatal.
But there are rare moments of compassion: a German soldier spares him, a priest intervenes on his behalf, and finally, he becomes the protégé of a Russian sniper, who is kind to the child, but ruthless with the enemy. And there are signs of love. He is seduced by an older girl, finally rediscovering the comfort of intimacy, only to realize that he has been used. When he is miraculously reunited with his weakened father at the end of the war, the boy is cold and impenetrable, hardened by his ordeal. Yet we can still glimpse something of the old, sensitive boy behind the eyes of the new. Perhaps there is hope.
The cast includes Petr Kotlár, Udo Kier, Lech Dyblik, Jitka Čvančarová, Stellan Skarsgård, Harvey Keitel, Julian Sands, Aleksey Kravchenko, and Barry Pepper.
