One of the films getting the best notes so far at Sundance 2011 is the drama/thriller Martha Marcy May Marlene. It’s the breakout feature for actress Elizabeth Olsen (yes, younger sister of Mary-Kate and Ashley) who has now been cast in her next picture. She’ll appear opposite Sigourney Weaver, Robert De Niro and Cillian Murphy in Red Lights, from Buried director Rodrigo Cortes. Read More »
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Posted on Saturday, January 22nd, 2011 by David Chen
There are few movies that fill me with so much discomfort that I can’t wait to leave the theater, even while I’m watching them. Martha Marcy May Marlene, which premiered yesterday at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, is one of those films, a portrait of cult brainwashing that is so discomfiting, I would have walked out if I wasn’t so transfixed by the tremendous filmmaking on display.
Hit the jump for some more thoughts on the film, including a video blog I recorded with over half a dozen movie writers. Read More »
For their sophomore film, the team that brought us the original Open Water, Chris Kentis and Laura Lau, chose a senior thesis to unveil at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. Silent House, a remake of a Uruguayan film by the same name, sounds simple enough: a girl, her father and uncle are terrorized in their old, creepy house. What makes the film unique though is that it’s told in, mostly, one continuous shot. All the scares happen in real time and with an urgency that would be difficult to duplicate through traditional editing. Starring Elizabeth Olsen, who looks like a mix between the Olsen Twins (probably because she’s their sister) and Maggie Gyllenhaal, the film provides a bunch of legitimate scares and extreme tension despite story cliches and weak acting that’s almost definitely the result of not being able to say “Cut.” Read more about the film after the jump. Read More »
The Sundance Institute announced today that Chris Kentis and Laura Lau, the filmmakers behind the 2004 Sundance sensation Open Water, will return to the Sundance Film Festival with their next feature film — Silent House will have its world premiere in the out-of-competition Park City at Midnight section. The movie, directed by Kentis and Lau based on a screenplay by Lau, is described as “A hauntingly choreographed descent into madness based on the Uruguayan film La Casa Muda.” This “enthralling psychological thriller” is “impressively captured with a continuous camera shot.”
You might recall that I wrote about a film at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival, Gustavo Hernández’s “The Slient House” which was a haunted house horror film which took place all within one 79-minute continous shot (read my review here). This movie is an American remake of that film (note: the iamge above is from the original movie). Read the full press release after the jump.
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