Synopsis: Every day, twelve-year-old Simon takes the cable car up to the mountains where the slopes bristle with the hustle and bustle of winter season tourists. He pokes about in hotel wardrobes and changing rooms looking for something to eat in rucksacks, but what he’s really after are skis that he can turn into cash. Whenever he talks to holidaymakers or hotel staff, he tells them that his parents died in a car accident and that he lives alone with his sister. Louis, the young woman who lives in the apartment in the valley has no idea what Simon gets up to all day long. Their odd relationship alternates between quarrels and tenderness. Ursula Meier sets her second feature-length drama against the backdrop of a popular tourist destination in the Alps. From the broad, anonymous mass of people, she has distilled the story of one child who believes he has found a way to offset his breadline existence. This portrait of a boy on the brink of puberty, poised between deceit and an unquenchable need for love and tenderness, is at the same time an exploration of the contradictions and hidden depths of an ostensibly prosperous world. [Synopsis courtesy of Berlin International Film Festival]
Anne Thompson and TOH! writers Sophia Savage, Beth Hanna, Matt Mueller, Matt Brennan and more share their Top Ten Films of 2012. While there are such shared likes as "Beasts of the Southern Wild," "Silver Linings Playbook," "Moonrise Kingdom," "Argo," "Zero Dark Thirty," "Amour," "Lincoln" and "Flig...
Read More »Ursula Meier's "Sister" has been chosen as Switzerland's entry into the Foreign Oscar race. The film opens October 5. Check out our story and interview below, originally published during the Los Angeles Film Festival.
Read More »Adopt Films has announced its acquisition of all U.S. rights to Ursula Meier’s ”Sister,” which world premiered in competition at the Berlin International Film Festival earlier this week to warm notices.
Read More »Ursula Meier’s “Sister,” Switzerland’s shortlisted Oscar entry, centers on a young woman and boy struggling to live in a drab, unnamed Swiss valley town, while a glittering mountain resort presides above them. The original title of the film, “L’enfant d’en haut” (roughly translating to “The Child fr...
Read More »“Kauwboy,” the Netherlands’ official Oscar entry and recent winner of the European Film Awards Fipresci prize, finds similarity in another 2012 Foreign-Language submission, Ursula Meier’s “Sister,” and last year’s enigmatic Cannes Grand Jury winner from the Dardenne brothers, “Kid with a Bike.” Each...
Read More »A strong selection of films arrive in theaters this weekend. Not only are "Frankenweenie," "Taken 2" and "V/H/S" fighting for audience attention, there's also Switzerland's powerful Foreign Language Oscar entry from Ursula Meier, "Sister," and Andrea A...
Read More »This weekly column is intended to provide reviews of nearly every new indie release (and, in certain cases, studio films). Specific release dates and locations follow each review.
Read More »Eugene Jarecki's look at America's drug war tops a full and varied list of critical successes finally making their way to theaters.
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