August 31, 2001
- Festival Venezia
30 August 2001
"Dust" - Macedonia between the present and the pastVENEZIA (Reuters) - Last evening, the director Milcho Manchevki returned to the Venice Festival with "Dust", a movie about brotherhood, revenge and the capability to tell itself.
He has already won the Golden Lion in 1994, with the movie "Before the Rain". Yesterday, he had the honour of opening the 58th Festival.
Half of the story takes place in modern America, the other half in Macedonia at the beginning of the 20th century. It is the story of two brothers -- played by Joseph Fiennes and David Wenham -- who follow each other to kill each other, in love with the the same woman. It is also a story of hate, revenge and battle.
"But the movie is not about what happens nowadays in Macedonia", explains the director. "It was not my intention to discuss the current political situation. The movie was written several years before".
The producer, Chris Auty, confirms this while explaining that part of the movie was shot in 1999. "It saddens us that the was in Servia hasn't allowed us to start it earlier. We finished it last year, and it's ironic to think that this year we wouldn't have been able to make it. We were in a quiet zone in the middle of a tempest".
For the actors, it was a very touching set.
"The first time I arrived in Skopje", explains Anne Brochet, "I felt something very particular, which helped me to add something instinctive to the movie, as opposed to something researched".
"I spent a wonderful couple of months in Macedonia", says David Wenham. "I felt a big tension among the people, but this hasn't influenced me. What has influenced me the most were the natural facts: the heat and the bees."
According to Manchevski, "Dust" is a "cubist" movie about memory and time, because it is made of several stories which confuse past and present. "I was inspired to make this movie when I realised that the elements of the Revolution in Macedonia about 100 years ago were very similar to the wild West or the Mexican revolution". Today he admitted himself that he grew up watching the westerns on television, although he sees "Dust" as a tribute to Martin Scorsese or Milos Forman rather than to John Wayne or Clint Eastwood.
August 30, 2001
- Violence in Venice as Britons in spotlight
By Hugh Davies in Venice
The TelegraphA VIOLENT, British-financed film, shot on location in Macedonia, is he first non-American feature since the acclaimed Il Postino seven ears ago to have opened the Venice Film Festival.
Dust stars Joseph Fiennes and Adrian Lester and was directed by Milcho Manchevski, who was born in Skopje.
If it repeats the success of Il Postino, it will be a spectacular feat by Manchevski, whose Before the Rain, also about the Balkans, was nominated for an Oscar and won Venice's Golden Lion prize in 1994.
A third of the £8 million budget was provided by British investors. Apart from the stars, British expertise also included the producer, Chris Auty, noted for Stealing Beauty and the car accident film Crash.
Essentially a Cain and Abel story of the Balkan wars of 1912, the film attracted criticism yesterday for its alleged racism against the Turks, who, at times, are portrayed as being ridiculous.
The director coldly thanked a journalist for accusing him at a press conference of anti-Turkish sentiment, but refused to defend himself. Auty said that the claim was silly.
The two-hour film is notable for its graphic killings and outbursts of frenetic fighting, more bloody than the casual violence of Sam Peckinpah movies.
At a Venice screening before last night's world premier, even hardened journalists squirmed in their chairs as men, women and sheep were maimed by gunfire.
Manchevski, an early fan of spaghetti Westerns, insists that the scenes, wild as they are, were necessary to illustrate a time when "people were sliced open and their guts used to strangle them".
His first "Baklava Western" was shown in Venice ahead of somewhat lighter fare that included Woody Allen's The Curse of the Jade Scorpion and the British made Birthday Girl, directed by Jez Butterworth, who made Mo Jo.
- "Dust" withers in heat at Venice
By David RooneyVENICE (Variety) - Heat and "Dust" set the tone as the 58th Venice International Film Festival got under way amid sweltering humidity, an opening ceremony low on star wattage and a downbeat critical response to the world premiere of Milcho Manchevski's blood-drenched Balkan Western.
While Venice in recent years has kicked off with a Hollywood glow, opening with films such as "Saving Private Ryan," "Eyes Wide Shut" and "Space Cowboys," all accompanied by major thespian appearances, Manchevski's multinational co-production "Dust" provided a more low-key curtain-raiser.
Along with the director and producers, Australian actor David Wenham was on hand to represent the film with female leads Anne Brochet and Nikolina Kujaca, but co-star Joseph Fiennes failed to show.
"Coming to Venice is like coming home for me," said Manchevski of his choice of the Italian fest to premiere his long-awaited sophomore work out of competition.
However, Manchevski's filmic homecoming has failed to elicit the same critical welcome as his first trip to Venice in 1994, when the Macedonian director's debut feature, "Before the Rain," walked away with the Golden Lion.
General reaction to press screenings on the Lido skewed toward the negative, with questioning during the film's official press conference taking a hostile turn. Widespread objections to the tale's extreme violence and brutality indicate a difficult commercial future for the English-language picture.
"Dust" is one of a handful of key titles here available for North American distribution that acquisitions scouts on the Lido will be studying to see how they play with audiences.
Walter Salles' "Behind the Sun," Goran Paskaljevic's "How Harry Became a Tree," Clare Peploe's "The Triumph of Love," Jill Sprecher's "13 Conversations About One Thing" and "Asoka," by Indian director Santosh Sivan, who had a critical breakthrough with "The Terrorist," are other pictures in which buyers have expressed interest and will be tracking closely, hoping to get the jump on their Toronto screenings.
Frontline U.S. arthouse distributors represented in Venice include Miramax, Fine Line, Paramount Classics, USA Films, Universal Focus and IFC. And while the number of prime titles still available for distribution may be down from previous fests, tradester registrations at Venice's industry office are up 50% to 1,500 from 1,000 last year.
Venice officially opened in a lethargic televised ceremony without major stars. President Nanni Moretti presented his colleagues on the official competition jury, while festival chief Alberto Barbera took the stage to outline the event's new twin competition structure.
"There are countless different types of cinema in the world today, from spectacular Hollywood films to experimental work and the digital films currently in a phase of rapid development; from films that look through the eyes of women to work from the young filmmakers of yesterday that have become the masters of today," Barbera said.
"It's to give the attention they deserve to all these faces of cinema that this year we have two competitions with two top awards."
August 29, 2001
- Balkans and Wild West come together in Venice
By Raffaella Malaguti
VENICE, Italy (Reuters) - The Venice Film Festival will offer a bizarre and offbeat opening on Wednesday with "Dust", a quirky Western that swings from America's frontierland to the Balkans.
An "Eastern" would perhaps be a better tag for this early 1900s tale of two brothers from Oklahoma in love with the same woman who end up as head-hunters in Macedonia.
Macedonian director Milcho Manchevski -- who won a Golden Lion in Venice in 1994 with his much-acclaimed Balkan drama "Before the Rain" -- called "Dust" a "cubist" film about memory and time, because it brings together several stories and mixes the past with the present.
Parts of the film, which features "Shakespeare in Love" star Joseph Fiennes, were shot in modern-day New York, while some scenes are set in Oklahoma at the start of the last century.
"I got the inspiration to make this film when I realised there were elements in the iconography of the Macedonian revolution in the early 1900s visually similar to the Wild West or to the Mexican revolution," Manchevski wrote in the Italian daily Corriere della Sera.
He said he read some 160 books to prepare for the film, including "The Confessions of a Macedonian Bandit", written by an American adventurer who fought against the Turks and the Greeks in the mountains of Macedonia in 1905.
CONFLICTS THE SAME EVERYWHERE
While his poignant debut "Before the Rain" made an open attack on the senseless violence of brother-against-brother in the Balkan wars, "Dust" may hold a more subtle message.
Asked in a recent interview if the film referred to today's conflict-torn Macedonia, Manchevski said that, if there was a reference, it was not at a conscious level. He also slammed the existence of too many prejudices about the Balkans.
"In the historic Balkan wars, many atrocities were committed between neighbouring countries...But the atrocities perpetrated in the Wild West or in more recent wars were as bad.
"What I want to say is that it is often easy to explain what happens in the Balkans by talking about 'ancestral hate' between its populations," he told Italian daily la Repubblica on Saturday.
"Conflicts are the same everywhere, be they about a piece of land, money, or due to the folly of a psychopathic governor."
"Dust" is Manchevski's first feature film since "Before the Rain", which was a candidate for the best foreign film Oscar after winning Venice seven years ago.
Having grown up watching the so-called "Spaghetti Westerns" of Sergio Leone, he said he viewed his film as more of a tribute to directors like Milos Forman or Martin Scorsese than to Western Hollywood stars John Wayne or Clint Eastwood.
Fiennes, who plays one of the two brothers alongside Australian David Wenham, is not expected to attend the premiere. But the world's oldest film festival will not be short of show business glitterati, with stars including Nicole Kidman and Gene Hackman due to attend.
- From today's edition of French newspaper "Le Monde:"
Steven Spielberg is the big absent at the Venice Festival
With a bitter tone in his voice, the director of the Venice Festival, Alberto Barbera, mentioned during a press conference on Wednesday, 8/29 the absence of Steven Spielberg (...) Alberto Barbera also lamented the absence of British actor Joseph Fiennes, star of "Dust" from Macedonian director Milcho Manchevski, presented on Wednesday at the opening of the Festival. "He is used to doing that. He was also absent from the presentation of 'Shakespeare in love' during the Berlin Festival." Reminded the director.
August 28, 2001
- Schedule for "Dust" at the Toronto International Film Festival:
FILM TITLE:Dust
Programme: Contemporary World Cinema
Director: Milcho Manchevski
Country: United Kingdom
Year: 2001
Time: 127 minutes
Film Types: Colour/35mmSCREENING TIMES:
Friday, September 07 09:00 PM UPTOWN 2
Monday, September 10 12:30 PM VARSITY 1Production Company: The Film Consortium
Producer: Chris Auty, Vesna Jovanoska, Domenico Procacci
Screenplay: Milcho Manchevski
Cinematography: Barry Ackroyd
Editor: Nic Gaster
Production Designer: David Munns
Music: Kiril Dzajkovski
Principal Cast: Joseph Fiennes, David Wenham, Anne Brochet, Adrian Lester, Nikolina KujaçaSeven years after his electrifying first film After the Rain turned heads, Macedonian filmmaker Milcho Manchevski emerges with an equally ambitious film about his homeland. Manchevski is an image-maker of considerable power and Dust shares its predecessor’s love of bold, operatic and striking visuals. In many respects it is a much more ambitious work than After the Rain. The film is a Balkan western framed by a narrative structure set in the present and also plays with magic realism in striking ways.
When a doddering old lady interrupts the burglary of her New York apartment by a young hoodlum – surprisingly and humorously outwitting him – she forces him to listen to her story. In an apartment full of faded old black and white photographs from her past, Angela recounts the tale of two brothers, Luke and Elijah, a couple of cowpokes from the American west. When the two of them fight over the same whore one day, their rough-and-tumble friendship turns into bitter rivalry. While Elijah ends up marrying her, Luke turns into “a real bastard,” travelling the world before ending up with a group of cattle raiders in Macedonia. Luke and Elijah’s paths miraculously intersect again, Elijah’s wife Lily gets embroiled in their rivalry and misadventure follows misadventure as the two brothers try to kill each other while the Turks attempt to bring law and order to the region. Throughout, we return to the narrator Angela and her captive, gradually learning of the ramifications this story has on their burgeoning relationship.
Manchevski daringly shuttles between two stories and time periods, jumping fearlessly between cultures and continents, alternating violent drama with tender confession. At times it feels as though Dust combines the bloody choreography of Sam Peckinpah with the magic realism of Gabriel García M&aagrave;rquez. That this is a subjective and moving response to recent events in the region goes without saying; more to the point, Manchevski reaffirms that he is a filmmaker unafraid of taking chances, as he attempts to make us feel what it must be like to experience the tragic aspects of his culture.
– Piers Handling
Milcho Manchevski was born in Skopje, Macedonia in 1959. He graduated from the Department of Cinema and Photography at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale. He directed short films and music videos for ten years before making his debut feature After the Rain (94), which won numerous awards at international film festivals. Dust (01) is his second film.
Associated with European Film Promotion, an initiative supported by the European Union's MEDIA Programme
The direct URL is here
August 26, 2001
- Joe might not attend the Venice Film Festival, accordig to "Secolo XIX" from August 25:
"Venice - At a few days from the beginning, the Festival of Venice looses some announced stars. Painful defections have arrived from Jude Law, Steven Spielberg and from Joseph Fiennes, star of "Dust" the film of Milcho Manchevski which will open the Festival. For the younger of the Fiennes' brothers officialy nothing is lost and the producer Domenico Procacci continues to work for the arrival at the Lido of the shakespearean actor".
August 24, 2001
NOJ received hit # 100,000 today! Thank you very much for visiting us so often! :)
August 22, 2001
- Dust will be shown at the Toronto Film Festival in September!
Indie Wire DAILY NEWS, August 22, 2001
By Anthony KaufmanWith 326 films in 10 days, amounting to 27,091 minutes of celluloid, one very passionate cinephile, taking no time off to sleep or eat, could only manage to see about 53% of the film showings at the 26th Toronto International Film Festival. That's just how big it is. During a press conference at Toronto's Windsor Arms hotel yesterday (Tuesday), Festival Director Piers Handling announced the complete lineup for North America's biggest international industry event -- and boy, must he have been out of breath. [A complete list of all festival films is available now at indieWIRE.com.]
Opening on September 6 with the world premiere of Canadian director Bruce Sweeney's "Last Wedding" and closing on September 15 with Ray Lawrence's recent Australian fest hit "Lantana," Toronto's vast selection is divided amongst several main categories: Galas, Special Presentations, Contemporary World Cinema, Masters, and Discovery, among others.
[snip]
But English is not the dominant language of Toronto's 2001 line-up. A solid 58% of the films are in a foreign tongue. Contemporary World Cinema will also feature the world premiere of Sunji Iwai's "All About Lily Chou-Chou," Venice opener "Dust", Zhang Yang's latest "Quitting," Darezhan Omirbaev's "The Road," and several French-language and Spanish-language entries, including "Bad Company" director Jean-Pierre Ameris' "C'est la Vie," Laurent Cantet's "Time Out," Alfonso Cuaron's "Y Tu Mama Tambien," and "Lovers of the Arctic Circle" director Julio Medem's "Sex and Lucia," among many others.
August 21, 2001
- Mag alert!
In the September issue of InStyle Magazine (US edition), available at the stands from August 24, Joe is featured as "Man of Style" on page 265 (that's the page with the full-page color photo) plus there is a 3-page interview and three half-page additional color photos. In the half-page color photos, Joe is playing with a soccer ball. The interview is not the usual thing as Joe discusses his tastes in fashion, doing nude scenes, and what he likes women to wear: ...."Heels? I love heels. It's not a fetish, but there is something very sexy about them."
- The Blood Ties programme will once again be shown on US TV (and why they only mention Ralph each time is beyond me):
Profiles - The Family Fiennes
Duration: 1 hr
Description: Actor Ralph Fiennes uncovers the painful truth about his mother, novelist Jennifer Lash.
Airing: Sat 9/1/01 5:00am CST BRAVO Channel
- Listen to an interview from SiL times on Kicking it with Byron Allen. If the Joe interview doesn't come up right away, put his name in the search box.
- Daily Express, July 27, 2001:
Article called "Collared by your tie: As Nicole Kidman shows men how to do it, we discover what your top-knot says about you", featuring (among other celebs) a pic of Joe from the SiL Premiere with his blue tie and this text:
"This suggest a man who is supremely confident. It gives off a seductive air and there's something very sensual and indolent about the whole package. It's cool yet understated."
August 18, 2001
- The Sydney Morning Herald has an interview with David Wenham on October 28,2000, listing among his features for the last year
* Dust, shot in Macedonia and co-starring Joseph Fiennes. "I guess you'd call it a Balkan Western - I think this will be the first," he laughs. "And I got to play a cowboy. It's from the director of Before the Rain, and it'll be very hard to pull off, but if he does, it'll be very interesting."Read the full article here.
August 9, 2001
Premiere mag Sept 2001 has the following KMS blurb:
Killing Me Softly
Starring Heather Graham and Joseph Fiennes; directed by Chen Kaige (MGM, October)Alice (Graham), an American banker in London, bumps into mountaineer Adam (Fiennes) on the way to work. With scarcely a word spoken, they head off for a shag - and so begins an obsessive love affair, with Alice dumping her boyfriend and friends to be with Adam. But when she learns that several of his ex-girlfriends are missing or dead, Alice wonders whether she might be next. With their characters' relationship based on passionate, spontaneous sex, expect to see plenty of action from the 2 leads. "Both are completely naked," says Chinese director Chen (Farewell My Concubine), who is making his English-language debut. "I am very fair; I don't think it's right if you only ask the femal to take off the clothes." Says Fiennes, "One scene involves something most people wouldn't partake in, but it's rather beautiful, and I think [Chen] has negotiated it really well."
Working for Scale: Fiennes learned to climb for the role and quickly became hooked; just prior to filming, he tackled a 2,000-foot Scottish peak. "The producer was very nervous," Chen says, "[but] he came back without any damage." Only just. "It was a very difficult climb that turned into severe," Fiennes recalls. "The weather comes in, and suddenly everything's out of your control."
August 3, 2001
- Rancid Aluminium will be shown twice next week on UK TV:
Monday 6 August on Sky Moviemax at 10 pm and
Friday 10 August on Sky Moviemax 5 at midnight.
- Vote for Joe:
There's an Ultimate Movie Poll on Empire Online: Vote for the star (dead or alive) you rate as the all-time No 1, and everything from your Favourite Director to Best Special Effects Movie, and the Best Ensemble Cast to The Best Poster. They'll be posting the results in the magazine and on the site from 1 October 2001. You can win a DVD player and 10 DVDs.
August 2, 2001
- Forever Mine has been released on VHS and DVD in Canada today
August 1, 2001
- Dust preview from Italian magazine:
"Ciak", August 2001
Id., Italy/G.B./USA, 2001
Direction: Milcho Manchewski
Actors: Joseph Fiennes, Anne Brochet, Adrian Lester, David
Wenham, Nicolina Kujaka, Rosemary Murphy.
Distribution: Medusa
Expected released: 26th October.Six years after the multiawarded (Leone d'oro - Gold Lion - in Venice) "Before the rain", now another reflection on the time and on the narration of the clever director Milcho Manchewski. This time the stories, that cross each other in a elaborate mix of temporal bounds, are two. The first story is set in New York of today, and tells about an old Macedonian woman that, to the man who has just tried to rob her, tells a story: (the second) the story of two cowboy brothers (Fiennes and Wenham), mercenaries and in love with the same woman, in the Macedonian Far East. Chinese boxes, and temporal ellipses, filled as the film goes on, form the fascination and the main material of the second work of the director who has crushed market's logics and Hollywood, and according whom "make cinema is not really make art. It's tell stories, treat the myth".
The magazine defines "Dust": labyrinthic.
Abbreviations
