The
Sundance Festival 2004
1/20/04 - Ray Price -Movie City News -- Sketches
from Sundance: "Me, at least, I haven’t
seen a movie in my three-and-a-half-days at Slamdance or Sundance with
a
line or moment of such overflowing emotional weight. But I am fascinated
by Mike Hodges’ I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead, a steely
masterpiece of mood and madness, but that’s a whole other cup
of hemlock. Clive Owen holds the screen like Sean Connery and
Cary Grant combined. And Hodges’ work has a brutal sentimentality,
man as beast: cross my family, cross my friends, I cross you out. Cross
my enemies? Give me a ring and I’ll help. An early morning interview
with Hodges found him bringing up the great French film directors before
I had a chance: Godard, for his invention; Bresson, for the savor of
sound; and Jean-Pierre Melville, for his marvelous use of interiors
to indicate psychological displacement, and for the parakeet from Le
Samourai that hops through I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead"
1/20 - Stella's
report on the ISWID (BBC) [not flattering]
1/19
- BBC - Sundance - Stella's
Top Ten picks to see: "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead Mike Hodges
directs the (still) up-and-coming Clive Owen in a story of a London
gangster who comes out of hiding to investigate the death of his
brother. Get Carter 2?"
From BBC Films - Special
section on Sundance -- "..Over the coming days, Stella's
going to be interviewing the likes of Trauma director Marc Evans
and the film's star, Mena Suvari; I'll Sleep When I'm Dead director
Mike Hodges; and That Touch Of Pink star Jimi Mistry. Got a question
for any of them? Why not email
Stella here, and she'll ask it on your behalf.
I'll Sleep When I'm Dead
United Kingdom, 2003, 102 Minutes,
Director: Mike Hodges
Screenwriter - Trevor Preston
Executive Producer - Roger Marino
Producers - Mike Kaplan, Michael Corrente
Cinematographer - Mike Garfath
Editor - Paul Carlin
Production Designer - Jon Bunker
Music - Simon Fisher Turner
Cast - Clive Owen, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Charlotte Rampling, Malcolm McDowell
Screening Times
Saturday, Jan 17 9:00 AM Holiday Village Cinema III
Sunday, Jan 18 5:30 PM Holiday Village Cinema II
Monday, Jan 19 6:00 PM Egyptian Theatre
Saturday, Jan 24 6:30 PM Tower Theatre
Sunday, Jan 25 10:00 AM Sundance Village
Mike Hodges has a well-deserved reputation as one of the master innovators
of genre cinema. With I'll Sleep When I'm Dead, he adds to his acclaim by showcasing
a vision and expertise that illustrate his complete command of the material,
beginning with Get Carter and, most recently, Croupier. What a marvelous ride
through the side alleys and underworld of contemporary London this film gives
us! I'll Sleep When I'm Dead is a film that both fascinates and repels, that
is both cerebral and muscular, that unearths tensions in a wholly unexpected
fashion and explores dimensions of the fictional universe that literally take
us to another realm.
As is his custom, Hodges shares the "made by" film
credit with his screenwriter, Trevor Preston, with whom he has constructed
characters who are
immediately recognizable but also fatally and fascinatingly human. Blessed
with an exceptional cast that includes Clive Owen, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Charlotte
Rampling, and Malcolm McDowell, the filmmakers still manage to subordinate
their high-profile presence to telling this circuitous tale of vengeance and
revelation. I'll Sleep When I'm Dead displays the complete range of film arts.
A consuming and stimulating work and a theoretical thriller, it is a film which
could only be created by a remarkably skillful filmmaker.
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