WAITING FOR THE BARBARIANS--Updates, Reviews and Discussion

[Ruby Begonia]

Thanks to Nebraska and Fireflydances for their interesting input! The book opening with the focus on Joll's sunglasses reminds me of the opening to OUATIM, which I loved. Kind of sad it's not going to be how this film begins, but I'm sure it will be good. I'll definitely read the novel but not until after I see the film story with fresh, unspoiled eyes. And then I'm sure I'll see the film again taking into consideration the novel and the ONBC insights. I want to be surprised the first time.

I hope Coetzee has written a good part for JD. I think it will be very different from the jail captain JD played in Before Night Falls.

[nebraska]

Isn't it interesting (and wonderful) what a different approach we take. As my uncle once told me, if we are both alike one of us isn't necessary.

[meeps]

I love your uncle's saying May I use that in the future ?

[nebraska]

I love your uncle's saying May I use that in the future ?

Yes absolutely!

[meeps]

Thanks a billion for that

[fireflydances]

I found three reviews -- Variety, Hollywood Reporter and The Guardian:

Variety:

Hollywood Reporter:

The Guardian:

The first two are the most thoughtful and both writers give good reviews. I was not impressed by the reviewer at The Guardian who found it necessary to make a cutting personal remark about JD. Nothing to do with his performance. The guy just thinks he's too skinny. (what an industry!)

I figure you might want to move these elsewhere. And I will probably have a question about the reviews in ONBC.

[nebraska]

Overall positive comments for Johnny and for Rylance. Can't hurt!

[fireflydances]

Another review, IndieWire. Gives the film a "C"

[Joni]

I found three reviews -- Variety, Hollywood Reporter and The Guardian:

Variety:

Hollywood Reporter:

The Guardian:

The first two are the most thoughtful and both writers give good reviews. I was not impressed by the reviewer at The Guardian who found it necessary to make a cutting personal remark about JD. Nothing to do with his performance. The guy just thinks he's too skinny. (what an industry!)

I figure you might want to move these elsewhere. And I will probably have a question about the reviews in ONBC.

Thanks firefly! I merged your Review topic with the existing Updates topic, and threw in Discussion as well, as it's pretty hard to separate the three once the discussions begin.

People trying to avoid Spoilers should maybe watch out for them now in this thread.

[meeps]

This is not so much about the movie, but among other things about Johnny being a very sweet daddy:

[AdeleAgain]

As Reuters has put it to its 20+ million twitter followers - it was Depp-mania in Venice yesterday.

https://twitter.com/Reuters/status/1170123262296113152

PS why does Robin Baum always look so worried and serious? You only see her back here but in other clips yesterday she always looks worried bless her.

[fireflydances]

Yet another review. As Stephen Deuters tweeted, "they know. a cracking good review"

BFI

[fireflydances]

Another really good review. This reviewer -- Luke Hicks -- knows the book well and that makes a tremendous difference in what he sees.

The Playlist:

[Ruby Begonia]

Ciro Guerra • Director of Waiting for the Barbarians
“Some people have called this novel unfilmable, but I could see it very clearly”
by Jan Lumholdt

Interesting interview with Ciro Guerra linked above. Excerpt of his great comments about Johnny:

Johnny Depp liked both the novel and my previous work, and was very positive. He’s a sweet man, Johnny, with a lovely disposition, and he was very happy to work with actors again – when you do special-effects films, it can be lonely with all the green screens. So he jumped at the opportunity from page one. For me, it was new to work with actors who are really at the top of their game, and it was very rewarding. They became good friends along the way.

[fireflydances]

I found this little hopeful sliver over at The Playlist which also contains the first (and very short and limited) clip of Johnny and Marc.

But first the sliver I mentioned: Currently, ‘Barbarians’ has no U.S. release date or distribution, but it smells like one of those artful indies that come out in Spring, so hopefully, someone acquires it for 2020. There’s no trailer out there, but Venice has released the first clip from the film that will tide us over until then.

Here is link to the article and the tiny clip: