Guns are displayed in Felix Ashley’s yard, on the Navajo Nation in Dilkon, Ariz., Oct. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)
“The Ballad of Wallis Island,” a Focus Features release in theaters Friday is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association for “some language and smoking.” Running time: 99 minutes. Four stars out of four.CANNES, France (AP) — Before this week, the dissident
hadn’t attended the premiere of one of his films in more than 15 years.Panahi, one of the leading international directors, was banned from traveling out of Iran in 2009 for attending the funeral of a student killed in the Green Movement protests, a judgment later extended to two decades. But even when placed under house arrest, Panahi kept making movies, many of which are among the most lauded of the century. He made 2011’s “This Is Not a Film” on an iPhone in his living room. “Taxi” (2015) was clandestinely shot almost entirely within a car.These and other films of Panahi’s premiered to considerable acclaim at international film festivals where the director’s conspicuous absence was sometimes noted by an empty chair. When his last film, 2022’s “No Bears,” debuted, he was in jail. Only after
was Panahi — who had gone to Tehran’s Evin Prison to inquire about his friend, the then-jailed— released, in early 2023.
Two years later, with his travel ban finally lifted, Panahi arrived at the Cannes Film Festival with a film, “It Was Just an Accident,” riven with the fury and pain of incarceration by the Islamic Republic.
“Being here does matter, of course. But what’s even more important is that the film is here,” Panahi said in an interview on a Palais terrace. “Even when I went to jail, I was happy that the film was done. I didn’t mind being in prison because my job was done.”KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — U.S. President Donald Trump said he plans to speak by phone Monday with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, followed by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and leaders of various NATO countries, about ending
Trump said the call with Putin will be about stopping the “bloodbath” in Ukraine.“Hopefully it will be a productive day, a ceasefire will take place, and this very violent war, a war that should have never happened, will end,” Trump wrote Saturday in a post on his social networking site Truth Social.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed in comments to Russian media that preparations were underway for Monday’s call.Trump’s remarks came a day after the first