RECENT PRESS
`Beowulf & Grendel’
Screening: 4 p.m. Nation: Canada/Iceland/United Kingdom Director: Sturla Gunnarsson Synopsis: Director Sturla Gunnarsson ("Such a Long Journey") brings visual panache and psychological depth - as well as touches of humor - to this tale of retribution and revenge,...
Icelanders invade Goteborg
Viking drama 'Beowulf' to open premier Scandi event STOCKHOLM -- Sturla Gunnarsson's Viking drama "Beowulf & Grendel," starring Gerard Butler, will open the Goteborg Film Festival, part of an unusually strong presence by Icelandic directors at the premier showcase...
Ex-postie’s red letter year
A SCOT who gave up his job as a postman to chase his Hollywood dream is being tipped as the movie star of 2006. Tony Curran, 37, is lined up to appear in a series of blockbusters. Last year the Glaswegian, whose film credits include Gladiator and The League Of...
My Favorite Films of 2005
I’ll always remember 2005 as the year I finally got to see The Producers. Being the world’s most avid movie musical fan, I became excited the moment I heard about plans to bring the Tony-winning play to the big screen. And I was not disappointed. How often do viewers...
Critics’ Choice: Top Movies of 2005
What a less-than-memorable year in film it has been! But Crosswalk.com's movie critics have managed to find something good to say about what has hit the silver screen in the past 12 months. Find out which films they thought deserved a ticket in 2005. ... BATMAN BEGINS...
Sandro’s Movie Crackers
Our Hollywood correspondent Sandro Monetti has seen more than a hundred films this year in the service of Sky Showbiz and here he ranks them all in order. So, what gets his vote? Outrageous comedy The 40-Year-Old Virgin comes out on top, ahead of British fatherless...
‘Dear Andrea, your film is one of year’s best’
A GREENOCK writer says she is delighted an American critic has rated her movie his favourite of 2005. Andrea Gibb, who penned the script for Dear Frankie, said she was flattered that David Germain, a writer for the Associated Press agency, had backed the movie....
Monster’s Ball
One more way in which life is like high school, only with money: Eventually, we all will have to contend with "Beowulf." Galumphing out of the Dark Ages toward a cineplex near you is the tale of the Geat prince's bloody intervention in the affairs of the Danish state....
World films link Jakarta to Cannes
Every May, the biggest film festival in the world, Festival de Cannes, opens to offer great films, international stars and glamour. In the past two years, the festival has premiered what have come to be remembered as some of the world's great, if not best,...
US critic names Scots film ‘movie of the year’
It is a low-budget Scottish film about a deaf boy from the west coast of Scotland, shot on a shoestring and given a critical mauling from Britain's top film writers. But a year after it was released in the UK, Dear Frankie has been named as the film of the year by one...
17th ANNUAL PALM SPRINGS INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL ANNOUNCES FILM LINE-UP
Festival to Open with New Line Cinema The New World Palm Springs, CA (December 14, 2005) – The 17th Annual Palm Springs International Film Festival has announced its roster of 232 films, culled from more than 70 countries for the 2006 Festival. The selection of films...
I love karaoke so don’t stop me now
Nothing beats the thrill of singing at the Shanghai Shuffle, writes the actress. When people see me on television or acting on film with Samantha Morton in Morvern Callar, they ask why I still sing karaoke three nights a week at the Shanghai Shuffle on Glasgow's Bath...
AP Film Critics’ Top 10 Lists
As film critics, we had a problem this year. There were too many great movies to choose from and only 10 spots on our best-of lists. After much soul-searching and paring, here's what we came up with - the absolute best of the best. The top 10 films of 2005, according...
Sharp Shooter
Alan Sharp, the man who wrote the scripts for Rob Roy, the recently rereleased The Hired Hand and a new film about Scotland's national bard, Rabbie Burns, calls his work "pastiche". Brian Pendreigh finds that others are not so dismissive. Peter Fonda turned Hollywood...
Movie Q&A: Inspiring mystery singer named
Q: I saw a preview on a rented movie for a film about a mother who tells her son his father is at sea on a certain boat and writes a letter to him from the supposed father. When this boat is supposed to come home she has to come up with a father, so she hires one. I...
Beowulf and Grendel ***
(Sturla Gunnarsson, Canada/Iceland/UK, 2005) Making the most of what was obviously a small budget, this could have been an interesting humanitarian interpretation of the Beowulf legend but for one thing: Sarah Polley. In a movie where we come to accept everyone as...
Beowulf mania: new films, opera, musical breath life into ancient poem
TORONTO (CP) - Move over Troy. Bye-bye Greek heroes. You've had your turn Frodo. Make way for the blood-soaked medieval adventure of Beowulf and Grendel. With at least two major feature films, an opera and an off-Broadway play, the epic poem Beowulf - about a warrior...
Taming the Beowulf giant
Filming the epic in Iceland was a physical challenge. Director Sturla Gunnarsson and actress Sarah Polley talk to Katherine Monk. 'Right now, I've got a big knot in my stomach," says Sturla Gunnarsson, looking just a little ashen around the mouth. "The film just came...
Tragically timeless spirit of war
Copyright 2005 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest Global Communications Corp. All Rights Reserved The Vancouver Sun (British Columbia) Tragically timeless spirit of war: Director Sturla Gunnarsson tackles his biggest project to date 'Right now, I've got a big...
Mini reviews: Brief reviews of festival films
BEOWULF AND GRENDEL Going back to the very beginning of the English literary tradition, Canadian director Sturla Gunnarsson takes on the heavy task of adapting this epic Anglo-Saxon poem to the big screen. Thanks to a modern adaptation from screenwriter Andrew Rai...