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Drama

Personal Shopper (2016)

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A personal shopper in Paris refuses to leave the city until she makes contact with her twin brother who previously died there. Her life becomes more complicated when a mysterious person contacts her via text message.

Genre : Mystery/Drama
Country : France/Germany/Belgium

Cast :
Kristen Stewart : Maureen
Sigrid Bouaziz : Lara
Nora von Waldstätten : Kyra

Director :
Olivier Assayas

My opinion on “Personal Shopper”

“For me, Lewis was someone deeply intuitive of others.
He understood things that went unspoken.
Maybe because he knew he was going to die.”

Are you suffering from a sleep disorder lately so you always get up with giant bags under your eyes? Or are you hyperkinetic due to an overdose of cola during a night of “binge watching”? No problem. Simply start the movie “Personal shopper” and these problems have been solved without any doubt. If there would be a Oscar category called “Most boring film of the year“, this film would have won it easily. In short: The whole movie you’ll see Maureen (Kristen Stewart) do some shopping for a high-society model named Kyra (Nora von Waldstätten), driving around in Paris on her moped, meditate while smoking lots of cigarettes and sending a whole series of messages on her iPhone. And she’s also waiting for a sign of life (how ambiguous) of her recently deceased brother Lewis. Apart from some ectoplasm and flickering light phenomena, there’s nothing ghostly to see. A sleep-inducing performance. And even the few scenes in which Stewart walks around half-naked and even masturbates, won’t help. Her cup size is of the same caliber as this film. Meagre.

Personal Shopper

Did she use a different facial expression now? Uh … nope ….

Maybe I’m a bit biased, because I’m immensily annoyed by the person Kristen Stewart. On the other hand. You need a film character who doesn’t feel good about herself and who’s constantly in a melancholic mood, she’s surely the right candidate. If there’s an actress you can admire a whole movie without showing one sincere smile and a face that seems to be dipped in starch, then she’s definitely the one. I still remember this quote : “Kristen Stewart is like my refrigerator, no matter what I put in it (milk, soda, eggs, vegetables, meat), it’s always a refrigerator. And so is she“. I really can’t understand why she’s being praised by everybody. And every time I read about her, superlatives like “authenticity” and “subtle” are being used. Well, you can also say that about the Scarlett Johanssons, Saoirse Ronans, Dakota Fanningsen and even the Jennifer Lawrences in Hollywood. The only difference is that these actresses show some variation in their facial expressions.

Personal Shopper

An arthouse movie about the art of fashion.

Personal Shopper” is once again an arthouse creation. And the artificial world of fashion fits extremely well with it. Both the film and the world of fashion have the same irritating effect on me. They create an artificial product that is reasonably pretentious and targets the group of the happy few. The arthouse film lovers are those happy few who are able to see the abstract meaning and the symbolisme behind such an intellectual film. In the fashion world, the happy few are those who can afford an exclusive sewn together piece of confection. And after a certain time they’ll loudly proclaim that this expensive piece of cloth is out of fashion. By the way. Who can explain to me the usefulness of such a wire-shaped corset that Maureen wears at a certain moment? The connoisseurs will most likely scream bloody murder and call me a retard who doesn’t understand fashion. I hope for myself that that it’ll remain like that.

Personal Shopper

What’s the hidden message?

Which subject this film tries to tackle, is not so easy to interpret. On the one hand there’s the spiritual issue and the connection of the living with wandering souls. On the other hand there is the subject of materialistic thinking and the impersonal world in which we live. The primordial conversation between Maureen and the unknown (the bouncing dots and plopping sounds really started to get on my nerves after a while) is also a reference to the contemporary impersonal conversations among individuals. So how to interprete this movie? I guess you could explain it in many ways. Best you fill in the gaps yourself after watching this movie. Keep in mind that Maureen waits for the unknown person in a hotel room and shortly thereafter you’ll see doors open automatically without seeing anybody. That puts the whole in a completely different perspective. Or not? If not, then I think that the very last bang is a clear statement. But you had need endurance to sit out this long ride and witness this slightly intense moment. Ending with Maureen looking straight at the camera. Emotionless. Trust me. Me and Kirsten Stewart. That’ll never work out.

My rating 3/10
Links : IMDB

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Adventure

‘1883’ Spinoff Series ‘Bass Reeves’ Adds Dennis Quaid to Cast

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Dennis Quaid (Far from Heaven, The Day After Tomorrow) is the latest star to join the cast of Bass Reeves, a new drama series coming from Taylor Sheridan (Yellowstone, Tulsa King) and Paramount+, according to DeadlineBass Reeves was announced as a spinoff to the Yellowstone prequel, 1883 back in May 2022 with David Oyelowo (Selma, A Wrinkle in Time) attached to star as the legendary lawman.

Bass Reeves will follow Oyelowo as someone who is known to many as “the greatest frontier hero” in American history in his own series on Paramount+. The streamer already houses so many Sheridan-fronted programs, most recently, Mayor of Kingstown starring Jeremy Renner returned for its second season while CIA drama, Lioness added to its cast with Nicole Kidman and Morgan Freeman. Some believe that Reeves served inspiration to “The Lone Ranger” having worked as a peace officer for Indian territory capturing over 3,000 criminals on that land. Quaid will play Sherrill Lynn, a Deputy U.S. Marshall within the show.

Quaid most recently voiced the character Jaeger Clade in Disney’s animated feature Strange World which is currently available to stream on Disney+. He’ll also star in Steven Soderbergh’s upcoming HBO Max series Full Circle alongside Zazie Beetz, Claire Danes and Emmy-winner Jharrel Jerome. 

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Drama

Amy Winehouse Biopic ‘Back to Black’ Adds to Cast with Jack O’Connell, Eddie Marsan and Lesley Manville

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Let the casting of music biopics commence! As we’ve been hammered with news of superstar musician biopics each and every week, we have more news of one that is filming currently with Back to Black about the late, great Amy Winehouse. While it was reported back in January that Industry star, Marisa Abela will be leading as Winehouse, we now have details courtesy of Deadline on who will be joining the British pop star’s life story on screen. 

The report indicates that Jack O’Connell (Unbroken, ’71), Lesley Manville (Phantom Thread, Another Year) and Eddie Marsan (Ray Donovan, The World’s End) will all appear alongside Abela in Back to Black. O’Connell is set to play Blake Fielder-Civil, the love of Winehouse’s life who she was married to from 2007 until 2009, just a few years prior to her death as their love was unfortunately addled by prescription drug abuse and alcohol as well as multiple stints in rehab for both of them. Marsan will play Winehouse’s father while Manville will play Winehouse’s maternal grandmother in the film.

Back to Black will follow the life of one of the greatest singer-songwriters of all-time in Amy Winehouse. Her sophomore album (which the film is named after) won her 5 Grammy Awards all at the young age of 25 just before her untimely death in 2011 at age 27. The film will focus on Amy’s creativity, genius and upbringing at Camden High School in the UK before she propelled into stardom.

The film will be written by Matt Greenhalgh and directed by Sam Taylor-Johnson reuniting the two of them after their 2009 film Nowhere Boy, which chronicled John Lennon’s formative years and adolescence. Taylor-Johnson is coming off directing episodes of Hunters and Solos for Amazon but is best known for helming Fifty Shades of Grey

O’Connell had a big 2022 starring in Netflix’s Lady Chatterly’s Lover and MGM+’s new original series, SAS Rogue Heroes. He’ll next star as professional race car driver Peter Collins in Ferrari. Manville most recently starred as Princess Margaret in the recent season of The Crown for Netflix and in Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris for which she earned a Golden Globe nomination. Marsan is best known for playing Ray Donovan‘s brother, Terry in the hit Showtime series but will next appear in the film, Fair Play with Alden Ehrenreich and Phoebe Dynevor.

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Action

Anthony Hopkins to Lead Peacock Gladiator Drama ‘Those About to Die’

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Peacock is one of the streamers that has yet to break through in terms of their original content getting recognized for awards contention. One such series that might change that fate for the streaming service is Those About to Die and it’s starting to build out its cast. According to Variety, 2-time Oscar winner Anthony Hopkins (The Silence of the Lambs, The Father) is the first to join the drama series which comes from Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow). Saving Private Ryan screenwriter Robert Rodat will script the series.

Hopkins will play the character known as Emperor Vespasian in the series which is set in the world of gladiatorial battle. It will be an ensemble drama following many different Roman characters that will set forth for violent affairs in the arena among other complexities such as political power and corruption so expect a starry cast for this Peacock drama. Hopkins’ character is described as “despised by the Patricians jockeying for position in the Empire and looking to supplant his heirs to the throne the first chance they get. Vespasian became the Roman emperor after a ten-year civil war. We expect to get more casting news soon as the show will begin filming in Rome in March.

Anthony Hopkins is coming off a terrific performance in James Gray’s Armageddon Time in 2022 after winning his second Academy Award for his role in The Father the year prior. He’ll next voice a character in Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon for Netflix and also will star in British drama One Life alongside Helena Bonham Carter and Jonathan Pryce. Emmerich is coming off directing the sci-fi disaster film, Moonfall in 2022.

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