Jason Solomons 

Trailer Trash witnesses the birth of a cinematic dynasty

Jason Solomons rounds up the week in film
  
  


A bird's eye view of mama Mia

Congratulations to French film-makers Mia Hansen-Løve and Olivier Assayas. Three months ago, Mia (below) gave birth to their first child, Vicki. With impeccable timing, Mia's latest film is called Father of My Children, one of the best I saw at Cannes last year. Hansen-Løve's career began as a young actress, when she landed small parts in two Assayas movies, Late August, Early September and the costume epic Les destinées sentimentales. She then spent time as a critic on Cahiers du cinéma before taking up the camera and meeting Assayas again. Now 29, Mia spent her first nights away from her baby as she came to London last week for the opening of the Birds Eye View film festival. She begins work on her third film this summer, a study of teenagers in the countryside. Meanwhile, Assayas's keenly awaited study of 70s terrorist Carlos the Jackal should be released shortly and I hear he's currently working on a film with Juliette Binoche, reprising her character from his delightful 2008 film Summer Hours. "We couldn't be happier," Mia told me. "For Olivier, it was about time he had a child. He's very excited about her and, yes, it looks like she will spend plenty of time on set during her first years."

Nasty but nice

Who said VHS was dead? Trash is ghoulishly delighted to see a new "video nasty" out there, reviving the spirit of Driller Killer, Cannibal Holocaust, I Spit on Your Grave et al, those contraband cassettes horror geeks passed to each other throughout the 1980s. The new cassette is released to celebrate House of the Devil, a retro-looking horror set in the 1980s, and shot on the 16mm stock characteristic of the lower budget slashers of the era. There are only 50 copies of the VHS available. Hurry before the police raid your video shop.

Smaller is beautiful

Trash applauds New British Cinema Quarterly, an initiative designed to introduce smaller British films to audiences around the UK. Spearheaded by indie distributor Soda Pictures, it's essentially taking the spirit of festivals such as Edinburgh and London and allowing wider audiences to discover talent otherwise sidelined by multiplex domination. I've been a longtime advocate of securing screens for British releases in order to foster audiences for our own film culture. Starting with likable indie band memoir 1234, watch out for the new films playing soon for one night only in your local arthouse complex. See www.nbcq.co.uk

 

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