che

While Steven Soderbergh was making Che, the stories leaking out about the on-set goings on made it sound like the poor fellow had met his Don Quixote Apocalypse Now Medellin. In an interview with the Guardian, he more or less admits it was a disaster from the first day:

“You know, for a year after we finished shooting I would still wake up in the morning thinking, ‘Thank God I’m not shooting that film.’”

Opening Weekend: Reviews of ‘Che,’ ‘Stone of Destiny’ and ‘The Necessities of Life’

From the items-that-could-become -columns file:

So in the end, how was Cannes? As I’m writing this, at 36,000 ft. somewhere above Greenland, I realize I’ll need a response for that question by the time I get back. The short answer: the weather sucked, and it wasn’t a banner year for films, but there were some good ones. They still need time to settle. As much as critics grumble about the quality of the films when we’re racing around the festival, by the end of the year, they’re usually starting to look pretty good. Some final reflections:

In defending his decision to shoot the four-hour Spanish-language epic Medellin Che, Stephen Soderbergh  says: “I came to him as a sort of agnostic. I’m not from South America. I don’t want to build him up or tear him down. I’m just compelled by the fact that he twice gave up everything and put his ass on the line for someone else’s benefit.” (Potter’s italics)

Slept in for a change. The Cannes programmers gave us a break today, clearing out the schedule to leave our palates fresh for this evening’s premiere of Che, Steven Soderbergh’s four-hour-plus epic about Che Guevara. For once it was sunny. I was tempted to hit the beach, and almost did. But dark rooms exert an addictive pull in this place, along with the fear of missing something unmissable. So this afternoon I caught the final market screening of Hunger, which opened the Un Certain Regard sidebar last week. It’s a much-buzzed feature debut from British visual artist Steve McQueen (you think he’d at least call himself Steven to avoid confusion with the dead actor on IMDB.)