Archive for the ‘Bong Joon Ho’ Category

Palm d’Or:  Parasite directed by Bong Joon-Ho

Best Director:  Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardennes for Young Ahmed

Best Actor:   Antonio Banderas – Pain and Glory

Best Actress:  Emily Beecham – Little Joe

Best Screenplay:   Celine Sciamma – Portrait of a Lady on Fire

THE  73rd BAFTA AWARDS /

THE BRITISH ACADEMY FILM AWARDS

Took place on Sunday 2nd February 2020 in London

at the Royal Albert Hall

BAFTA Winners in the Film Category:

Best Film: 1917

Best Director: Sam Mendes

Best Actor: Joaquin Phoenix – Joker

Best Actress: Renee Zellweger – Judy

Best Supporting Actor: Brad Pitt – Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Best Supporting Actress: Laura Dern – Marriage Story

Best British Film: 1917

Best Original Screenplay: Han Jan-Win – Parasite

Best Adapted Screenplay: Taika Waititi – JoJo Rabbit

Best Costume Design: Jacqueline Durran – Little Women

Best Visual Effects: 1917

Best Foreign Language Film: Parasite directed by Bong Joon-Ho   

Rising Star Award: Michael Ward

92^nd Academy Awards took place on Sunday 9^th February 2020 at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California

Best Picture: Parasite

Best Director: Boon Joon Ho – Parasite

Best Actor: Joaquin Phoenix – Joker

Best Actress: Renee Zellweger – Judy

Best Supporting Actor: Brad Pitt – Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Best Supporting Actress: Laura Dern – Marriage Story

Best Original Screenplay: Boon Joon Ho – Parasite

Best Adapted Screenplay: Taika Waititi – Jojo Rabbit

Best Cinematography: Roger Deakins – 1917

Best Costume Design: Jacqueline Durran – Little Women

Best Make up & Hairstyling: Bombshell

Best Visual Effects: 1917

Best Film Editing: Ford v Ferrari

Best Sound Editing: Ford v Ferrari

Best Sound Mixing: 1917

Best Production Design: Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Best Documentary Feature:  American Factory

Best Documentary Short Subject: – Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone (If You are a Girl)

Best Live Action Short Film: The Neighbour’s Window

Best Original Score: Hilda Gudnadotter – Joker

Best Original Song: Elton John – Rocketman

Best Animated Feature Film: Toy Story 4

Best Foreign Language Film: Boon Joon Ho – Parasite

Took Place on Sunday the 5th January 2020 in Los Angeles hosted by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association – Here are the 2020 Winners in the Film Categories

Best Film Drama: 1917

Best Film, Musical or Comedy: Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Best Director: Sam Mendes – 1917

Best Actor Drama: Joaquin Phoenix – Joker

Best Actress Drama: Renee Zellweger – Judy

Best Actor, M/C: Taron Egerton – Rocketman

Best Actress, M/C: Awkwafina – The Farewell

Best Supporting Actor: Brad Pitt – Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Best Supporting Actress: Laura Dern – Marriage Story

Best Foreign Language Film: Parasite directed by Boon Joon Ho (South Korea)

Best Original Screenplay – Quentin Tarantino – Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Best Animated Feature: Missing Link

Snowpiercer

Director: Bong Joon Ho

Cast: Chris Evans, Tilda Swinton, Jamie Bell, Octavia Spencer, John Hurt, Ed Harris, Ewen Bremner, Kang-ho Song, Alison Pill, Luke Pasqualino, Tomas Lemarquis

South Korean director Joon Ho Bong creates an innovative cinematic allegorical thriller Snowpiercer based on the French graphic novel Le Transperceneige featuring a truly international cast headed by Captain America star Chris Evans along with Tilda Swinton, Jamie Bell, Octavia Spencer, Kang-ho Song, John Hurt and Ewen Bremner.

Set in 2031 in a second ice age, a glacial earth has completely frozen over due to an industrial accident in a bid to stop climate change, when industrialists released a chemical CW7 into the planet’s atmosphere. The remaining survivors on earth are bound up and segregated on a fast moving train known as Snowpiercer, a futuristic and brutal version of the Ark, on a circuitous track around frozen waste land.

The train is segregated into first class, economy class and the filthy freeloaders at the tail, squashed into sordid living conditions desperate to survive and are unwittingly fed blocks of protein. Naturally an uprising ensures led by Curtis played by Evans and spurned on by Gilliam to storm the different sections and finally reach the front of the train and confront the enigmatic industrialist Wilford, who built the train prior to the post-apocalyptic freeze.

Snowpiercer is brutal, truly inventive cinema, a chilling allegory on the nature of unrelenting climate change and a horrifying indictment on the nature and savagery inherent in humanity. As Curtis and his gang of misfits storm various sections of the train from a hermetic aquarium to a bizarre brainwashing kindergarten to a debauched drug fueled rave, each section unravels and the perfect order of the passengers is permanently disrupted.

The direction by Joon Ho Bong is flawless if somewhat stylized and the sound editing is fantastic, but what really makes Snowpiercer so innovative is its unique conceptualization ably assisted by a strong cast helped by a host of best supporting actors including Swinton as the Scottish accented Mason, Octavia Spencer (The Help) as Tanya and capped off by Ed Harris (The Hours, Pollock) as the chillingly demented industrialist Wilford, who is a perfect foil to Curtis’s plan of insurrection.

Snowpiercer is unique, violent, bizarre and utterly thought-provoking, a truly original semi apocalyptic thriller with grand Orwellian themes framing the fast speeding narrative. In the tradition of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil or more recently the Denzel Washington thriller The Book of Eli, Snowpiercer fits into that strange subgenre of sci-fiction mixed with apocalyptic fantasy. Chris Evans is superb as the brave leader Curtis along with an energetic Jamie Bell as Edgar last seen as an S & M Master in Lars Von Trier’s Nymphomaniac.

Snowpiercer is riveting, strange and surreal, showing to what bloody depths humans will descend to, when their survival is threatened by a ravaged and inhospitable climate.