Thu. Mar 28th, 2024


Cannes 2022: Armageddon Time, Eo, Rodeo by Ben Kenigsberg

“In ‘Armageddon Time,’ James Gray brings together all the ideas about class, opportunity, the immigrant experience, and life in New York that have run through his films since ‘Little Odessa.’ It’s his best movie since ‘The Immigrant,’ at least, and maybe his best movie, period—a forthrightly autobiographical coming-of-age picture that might look generic at first but steadily reveals an attention to detail that is rare. The specificity of character, of place, of advice given by a grandfather—they’re all the sorts of things that you could see haunting a 12-year-old for years, in ways that he would feel compelled to exorcise as an adult.”

One Fine Morning

Cannes 2022: One Fine Morning, Brother and Sister, Mariupolis 2 by Ben Kenigsberg

“Léa Seydoux plays Sandra, a translator and single mother whose father, Georg (Pascal Greggory), was a philosophy professor. But he has Benson’s syndrome, which has caused his mental acuity and vision to slip and led to the point where he can no longer live alone. Over the course of the film, Sandra and her mother (Nicole Garcia), who is divorced from Georg, keep moving him from one care facility to another, in the sort of ordinary but wrenching hassle that anyone who has watched a relative decline will recognize.”

Photo by Jason Gorber at Cannes 2022.

Cannes 2022: Fest Launches with Zombies, Art Movies, and Maverick by Jason Gorber

“The next morning, after what felt like a lifetime of waiting, I got to see ‘Top Gun: Maverick‘. It screened, delightfully, in the newly renamed Agnes Varda Theatre. I’d love to think that Varda herself was there in spirit, wryly smiling at the beautiful men and women on screen, the erotic machines, and the boisterous soundtrack. From the opening note and ‘Simpson/Bruckheimer’ logo you know the nostalgia is going to be blasted up to full afterburner, but I was genuinely thrilled that they expanded the storyline to near mythic levels, borrowing from everything from ‘The Dam Busters’ to (more overtly) ‘Star Wars’ to provide its structure.”

By Dave Jenks

Dave Jenks is an American novelist and Veteran of the United States Marine Corps. Between those careers, he’s worked as a deckhand, commercial fisherman, divemaster, taxi driver, construction manager, and over the road truck driver, among many other things. He now lives on a sea island, in the South Carolina Lowcountry, with his wife and youngest daughter. They also have three grown children, five grand children, three dogs and a whole flock of parakeets. Stinnett grew up in Melbourne, Florida and has also lived in the Florida Keys, the Bahamas, and Cozumel, Mexico. His next dream is to one day visit and dive Cuba.