Irish Co-Production 'The Lobster' Receives Rave Reviews from Critics at the Cannes Film Festival
Irish co-production The Lobster, the eagerly-awaited English language debut from director Yorgos Lanthimos, has made its debut at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, with strong reviews flooding in across the board.
The Lobster is a blackly funny love story set in a near future where finding love is a matter of life or death. The film was produced by Element Pictures, funded by Bord Scannán na hÉireann/the Irish Film Board and filmed in Co. Kerry in 2014.
The Irish Times, Donald Clarke, 4/5 - "a poisonously effective work from an utterly singular director. You walk out feeling ever so slightly changed by it. There are few higher compliments."
The Hollywood Reporter, Leslie Felperin - "The stakes are high, but the director and key collaborators raise their game and the movie is boosted by the sort of eclectic acting line-up not often found outside the confines of a Woody Allen or Wes Anderson film. The result is a richly rewarding but often very disturbing, even harrowing work... it might just be recognized as a classic example of a genre only now just beginning to form."
Variety, Guy Lodge - "A wickedly funny protest against societal preference for nuclear coupledom that escalates, by its own sly logic, into a love story of profound tenderness and originality, this ingenious lo-fi fantasy will delight those who already thrilled to Lanthimos's vision in "Alps" and the Oscar-nominated "Dogtooth," while a starry international cast should draw as-yet-unconverted arthouse auds into his wondrously warped world."
Indiewire, Oliver Lyttelton - "In the end, all the strangeness adds up towards something genuinely significant, an atypically rich and substantial comedy that's stuffed with great scenes and performances even before you start to chew on its bigger questions. It's Lanthimos' most accessible and purely enjoyable film yet, and the first great relationship movie of the Tinder and match.com age."
London Evening Standard, David Sexton - "The Lobster is both totally off the wall and flatly prosaic, often very funny but also bloody and brutal, like life. It's fantasy cinema of the kind that a festival like Cannes lives to nurture: terrific."
Cine Vue, John Bleasdale 4/5 - "From the oddness of its initial high concept, the Greek director and his cast never blink... a marvellously bleak, bizarre comedy."
About THE LOBSTER
THE LOBSTER is a feature film co-production involving Ireland, the UK, Greece, France and the Netherlands. It was written by Yorgos Lanthimos and Efthimis Filippou and produced by Ed Guiney, Lee Magiday, Ceci Dempsey and Yorgos Lanthimos. Executive Producers are Andrew Lowe, Tessa Ross and Sam Lavender. The film was developed by Element and Irish finance for the film came from the IFB.
Film4, Bord Scannán na hÉireann/ the Irish Film Board, Eurimages, the Netherlands Film Fund, Greek Film Centre and BFI present in association with Protagonist Pictures, with the participation of CANAL+, CINE+ and Aide aux Cinémas du Monde, Centre National du Cinéma et de l'Image Animée, Ministère des Affaires Étrangères et du Développement International, Institut Français an Element Pictures, Scarlet Films, Faliro House, Haut et Court, Lemming Film co-production in association with Limp and with the support of the MEDIA Programme of the European Union.