The Last Face Puts White Romance Over African Suffering

The Last Face

Director - Sean Penn

Writer - Erin Dignam

Starring - Javier Bardem, Charlize Theron, Adele Exarchopoulos

I'm going to just spare you the suspense on this one. This is a fucking terrible movie. Stop. Don't get excited. This isn't The Book of Henry or even The Snowman. No, this isn't even similar to another Cannes failure about White people existing in foreign lands, The Sea of Trees. This is a travesty of a film that doesn't even have the dignity to let the audience laugh at it (except for sexy tooth brushing). I'm going to do the best that I can to prevent you from ever seeing this film. You'll read things here and imagine them being hilariously terrible but don't bother. Sean Penn doesn't play by normal rules. He imagines this as a grand epic romance that also showcases the plight of Africans and inspires us to action. Well, Sean Penn is a fucking moron.

Mister Viewer, You Could Have Saved Yourself. I Gave You All the Clues.

Opening Act: The Snowman

The Snowman resembles a good movie for all of about 10 seconds. That's how long the beautiful shots of the frozen, desolate Norwegian wilderness look firmly establishing the isolation of a house. Once the film enters the house though, it immediately begins to fall apart in a completely dumbfounding manner. To put yourself in the proper headspace for what this movie is you only need to know one thing. It is about a police detective played by Michael Fassbender named Harry Hole tracking a serial killer who makes snowmen at crime scenes. It is not a comedy. This opening scene is a piece of backstory that I'm pretty sure has nothing to do with Mr. Hole (Disclaimer: I have basically no idea what happens in this movie. It's a complete mess and I stopped caring about trying to put the pieces together especially once I realized that about half the pieces were missing because they didn't film the entire script. This is a bad movie.) but exists to establish the world. Take a look for yourself.

Schurmy Classics - 1957 Part III: The Big Ones

Schurmy Classics

Part III: The Big Ones

The Cranes Are Flying

Here it is, what you've patiently waited for. You may have even read the other parts of this edition of Schurmy Classics while you were waiting. I applaud you for doing so. Every award in this section will have honourable mentions because 1957 was too good to limit myself to just the nominees. You've already read too much to have to sit through more preamble so let's just move onto the awards.

Part I: Technical Awards
Part II: Genre Awards