Blackmagic Design announced that DaVinci Resolve Studio was used to complete postproduction, including the final DI and online edit, on this year’s French Oscar nominee for Best Foreign Language Film, “Mustang.”
Set in a remote village in northern Turkey, “Mustang” tells a gripping coming of age story about five young sisters fighting a conservative upbringing when some innocent fun in the sea with male classmates has life changing repercussions, including being taken out of school, imprisoned in their own home and prepared for an arranged marriage.
“I was instantly interested in working on a story about women’s issues, especially one told from a female perspective as everything is seen through the eyes of the youngest sister, Lale,” said Yov Moor, the independent colorist on the feature. In addition to using DaVinci Resolve Studio on the final grade with tools including Grouping, the tracker, and masks, Moor also made use of Resolve’s editing capabilities to ensure he completed all his post production work on “Mustang” within just five days.
“A very useful aspect of working with DaVinci Resolve was the fact that we could use both it’s editing and grading toolsets, all from the same application,” Moor explained. “I was able to quickly and easily do things like correct fading on a shot, or even simply test new ideas, all without wasting precious time sending scenes to be reedited and waiting to receive the new results.”
When it came to grading, Moor began not with a traditional brief, but instructions on what sensations director of photography David Chizallet and the director, Deniz Gamze Ergüven were aiming to achieve within each shot.
“The girls in Mustang are always moving, bursting with energy. My grading work was really to enhance this vibrancy and life through color,” Moor added. "Five days to work on any film is challenging, but it’s especially difficult when you’re dealing with a topic as delicate as in ‘Mustang.’ Luckily, the whole creative workflow offered by DaVinci Resolve was completely seamless.”
Review: Writer-Director Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance”
In its first two hours, "The Substance" is a well-made, entertaining movie. Writer-director Coralie Fargeat treats audiences to a heavy dose of biting social commentary on ageism and sexism in Hollywood, with a spoonful of sugar- and sparkle-doused body horror.
But the film's deliciously unhinged, blood-soaked and inevitably polarizing third act is what makes it unforgettable.
What begins as a dread-inducing but still relatively palatable sci-fi flick spirals deeper into absurdism and violence, eventually erupting — quite literally — into a full-blown monster movie. Let the viewer decide who the monster is.
Fargeat — who won best screenplay at this year's Cannes Film Festival — has been vocal about her reverence for "The Fly" director David Cronenberg, and fans of the godfather of body horror will see his unmistakable influence. But "The Substance" is also wholly unique and benefits from Fargeat's perspective, which, according to the French filmmaker, has involved extensive grappling with her own relationship to her body and society's scrutiny.
"The Substance" tells the story of Elisabeth Sparkle, a famed aerobics instructor with a televised show, played by a powerfully vulnerable Demi Moore. Sparkle is fired on her 50th birthday by a ruthless executive — a perfectly cast Dennis Quaid, who nails sleazy and gross.
Feeling rejected by a town that once loved her and despairing over her bygone star power, Sparkle learns from a handsome young nurse about a black-market drug that promises to create a "younger, more beautiful, more perfect" version of its user. Though she initially tosses the phone number in the trash, she soon fishes it out in a desperate panic and places an order.
The one rule to follow is that... Read More