US in spotlight at Spanish film festival
The spotlight was on US cinema on Sunday at the San Sebastian film festival, where the latest film by US director-author Paul Auster was shown out of competition and actor Richard Gere received an honorary "Donosti" for his career.
Auster, who is chairing the jury at the 55th edition of the festival in this northern Spanish resort, presented "The Inner Life of Martin Frost".
It is his third film as a director after "Blue in the Face", co-directed with Wayne Wange in 1995, and "Lulu on the Bridge," shown in competition at Cannes in 1998.
The Martin Frost of the title, played by David Thewlis, is a well-known author who has just published a book and decided to retreat to the countryside.
One morning he wakes up to find a woman lying beside him, Claire Martin (Irene Jacob). On the border between reality and imagination, she becomes the muse who inspires him to write his best novel.
The author of "Leviathan" (1993) and "Brooklyn Follies" (2005) admits the inspiration for the film came from one of his own novels, "The Book of Illusions" published in 2002.
"The story is so far fetched that without a certain dose of humour it would have been unbearable. All the action goes on in Martin`s head, that`s why I chose (to set it in) a little house far away from anywhere," he said.
"I wanted to make a story about a man who writes a story about a man who writes a story. It is about the workings of the imagination, how a writer thinks," he added.
Meanwhile, veteran US actor Richard Gere, star of "American Gigolo" and "Pretty Woman", received a "Donosti" -- which means San Sebastian in the Basque language -- lifetime achievement award at the festival Sunday.
"I`m very honoured to be considered in the same stratosphere as the actors who I admired when I was a child," the 58-year-old told a news conference.
The award has been handed out annually since 1986, and previous recipients include Woody Allen, Robert de Niro, Jessica Lange, Isabelle Huppert and Matt Dillon.
Gere`s latest film, "The Hunting Party", about the search for Bosnian Serb war crimes fugitive Radovan Karadzic, will be screened at the festival out of competition.
Norwegian actress Liv Ullman is also being awarded an honorary Donosti, but will accept hers on Friday.
Also screened Sunday was an Austro-German co-production, "Free Rainer" by Hans Weingartner, about a successful reality television producer who begins to question how audience ratings are kept after suffering a car accident.
"I believe that people are not as stupid as TV programs that they watch but the cheapest way to make TV is to make primitive shows," said Weingartner.
"For a long time German films were boring and intellectual, I tried to make an intelligent film and not an intellectual film," he added.
Sixteen movies are competing for the festival`s Golden Shell award for best film, which is to announced on September 29.
A week away, David Cronenberg`s "Eastern Promises" about the Russian mafia and the touching "Buddha Collapsed Out of Shame" on the plight of Afghan children were the critics` favourites for the top prize.
Last year the jury chaired by French veteran actress Jeanne Moreau awarded it jointly to "Half Moon" by Iranian Bahman Ghabadi and "Mon fils a moi" by French director Martial Fougeron, which was booed by journalists.
|
