“Santa Sangre” (1989)
Call this a re-breakout for beloved cult director and legendary counterculturalist Alejandro Jodorowsky. Notable for delivering the majestically trippy “El Topo” and “The Holy Mountain” in the early ’70s, Jodorowsky retreated to the shadows, attempting to bring his vision of “Dune” to life (a.k.a. The Greatest Film That Never Was). Jodorowsky didn’t really direct anything worth noting for almost 20 years (tepidly received “Tusk” included), which made “Santa Sangre” a bona-fide comeback for the revered absurdist. Split between a flashback and a flash forward, ‘Sangre’ is concerned with Felix (played by Jodorowsky’s sons, Axel and Adan, at different stages of his life), a boy who grew up in the circus as a child magician and encounters loads of surreal, scary, and sinister characters as he comes of age. Jodorowsky’s signature embellishments and socio-political criticisms are all on creative display here as he targets Catholicism, takes the side of the occult and inventively plays with stale genre conventions, churning out something unique and visually captivating. The Midnight King returneth.
“The Scent Of Green Papaya” (1993)
Winner of the Camera d’Or (best first feature film from, crucially, all of the festival’s programs), Tran Anh Hung‘s gorgeous and placid debut spans decades between 1940 and 1960 in Vietnam and, like every unforgettable viewing experience, transports us to another world with distinguished grace. The story is told through the eyes of Mui (Tran Nu Yên-Khê, Hung’s wife), a lowly servant who moves from one household to another, and by doing so divides the narrative in two. The first part, when Mui is still a child, sees her observing the disconnected lives of a cheating husband and a mentally fragile wife, while the other sees her grown-up and growing closer to a pianist, who reciprocates the feeling even while being engaged to someone else. On paper, it almost sounds like the melodramatic ingredients of a soap opera, but “The Scent Of Green Papaya” is so superbly crafted, so sumptuously photographed by Benoît Delhomme, and so harmoniously immersive through its mise-en-scène (incredibly, the whole film was shot on a soundstage in Paris — the magic trick that is cinema) that it becomes something much more beguiling, and successfully rode the wave of praise from UCR to eventually pick up an Academy Award nomination.
“Sonatine” (1993)
This breakout story is unlike any of the others. Legendary Japanese actor-turned-director Takeshi Kitano was mostly known as a comedian back home, so when he directed, edited and starred in “Sonatine,” a serious, gritty and pensive yakuza picture, the Japanese public couldn’t take him seriously and the film bombed. But when it screened at UCR in Cannes, Kitano’s reputation internationally grew. Yakuza films have a reputation for being overtly aggressive and bombastic, riddled bullets and screams drowning any sense out of plots and character actions, but “Sonatine” shines through its sensitive construction and nature. Kitano plays mob enforcer Murakawa, who is sent to mediate a dispute between two rival clans only to learn that not all is as his boss told him. The plot unravels slowly through dreams, deceit, playfulness, and lots of gunfire, but its existential vibe often gets it compared to Jean-Pierre Melville’s “Le Samourai.” Kitano treats the yakuza genre with simultaneous respect and revulsion, accentuating his thoughts on the lifestyle with an unforgettable final act.
“Tokyo Sonata” (2008)
In a similar vein to someone like Zvyagintsev, it’s hard to call “Tokyo Sonata” a breakout film for Kiyoshi Kurosawa without some explanation. It’s a breakout film in the sense that the world saw the more sensitive, less genre-anchored side of the prolific director. 1997’s “Cure” was Kurosawa’s major international breakthrough, cementing his status as one of his countries’ formidable horror directors, but “Tokyo Sonata” — which follows the Sasaki family as each member slowly comes to terms with his or her own place within the household — shows a more sophisticated side to the director, even though existential themes of dislocation and uprooted values can be just as frightening. Indeed, “Tokyo Sonata” showed a different, less predictable and more devious kind of horror film from Kurosawa as it used only bits of genre flair to glue together a story of broken individuals learning to cope with themselves and each other, with dark humor thrown in for good measure. It came after a string of duds for the filmmaker, putting him back in the international conversation and is in many ways the most universal and balanced film he’s ever directed.
“White God” (2014)
Flying under international radars for over a decade after his first feature, it wasn’t until the premiere of “White God” that the world first truly perked up their ears at the name of Kornél Mundruczó. The Hungarian art-houser worked with his biggest budget yet to create an entry for the doggie-movie canon that won’t be forgotten any time soon. Following the parallel lives of adorable street mutt Hagen and his teen owner, who’s learning about life and love through her rollercoaster experience with her adopted pet, “White God” blends a variety of genres to highlight the socio-political divide of contemporary Hungary. Truth be told, not every genre switch is smooth and perhaps not every metaphor resonates as deeply as others, but for its audaciously allegorical approach and uncanny ability to direct packs of dogs like they’re consciously evoking emotions, “White God” is an uninhibited triumph. It ended up stealing the hearts of the UCR’s jury and nabbing the Prix, and now Mr. Mundruczó is preparing his English-language debut with Bradley Cooper. A dog with an international bite, at long last.
As a program that’s been running for close to four decades now, there are of course plenty of UCR films that were just about to make the cut only to be relegated to the Honorable Mention sidebar of this article. Among them were Jane Campion’s “Two Friends,” Lars von Trier’s “Epidemic” and Sven Nykvist’s “The Ox.”
Jan Svankmajer’s “Faust” is a great example of a solid UCR film that cannot be molded into a breakout thanks to the far superior “Alice” before it; and though it was a something of an unpredicted success for the Weinsteins when it was released, time hasn’t been the kindest to old “Mrs. Brown.” Ditto “The Apostle” from Robert Duvall. Something genuinely excellent, like Hong Sang-soo’s “The Power of Kangwon Province,” is hard to call a breakout thanks to how hard it is to single out from the director’s overall body of work.
Of course, there’s more we failed to mention, but we’ll leave it to you to tell us all about it. It would be also fun to know what movies you think, from this year’s Un Certain Regard lineup, have the potential of appearing in a future list like this.
You know where to leave your thoughts! And be sure to bookmark us as we bask in the sun from silver screens in dark rooms and send our reports from the French Riviera.
Click here to catch up on our complete coverage of the 2016 Cannes Film Festival.