Venice, 9/4.

In his Venice-so-far piece for today's Guardian, Peter Bradshaw puts Ang Lee's Lust, Caution at the top of his list and highlights two British films that could probably stand a little attention, Penny Woolcock's Exodus, "a dystopian fantasy that parallels the Biblical story of the same name," and Alex Cox's "wacky, scrappy neo-western comedy," Searchers 2.0, "about two ageing film buffs in LA who hear that a famed screenwriter of westerns (in the Eastwood Dollars genre) is in Monument Valley to give a Q&A to fans. This man abused them when they appeared in his films as child actors, so they make the journey to see him - and kick his ass."

Updated.

Emmanuel Burdeau puts down some notes in Cahiers du cinéma's Venice diary on, among other films, Jia Zhangke's Wuyong (Useless), Abdellatif Kechiche's La Graine et le mulet, Todd Haynes's I'm Not There and Hartmut Bitomsky's "superb documentary" Staub (Dust).

For a lighter side of Boyd van Hoeij, keep up with his Venice diary at the Film Experience.

At Twitch, Peter Vanderlugt recommends catching Aoyama Shinji's Sad Vacation if you get the chance.

Update: Mark Salisbury has caught Searchers 2.0, too, and passes along his take at In the Company of Glenn: "The performances are okay, the ending bonkers, but Cox crams in enough humour, warmth, Western references, and pointed comment into his script that both film and cast get by on geeky, goofy charm. The landscape is mighty impressive, too."

---

Covering the coverage: Venice 07. Index.

---

Posted by dwhudson at September 4, 2007 6:27 AM