"Mountains May Depart" Acquired/Views of the "Queen"/Future Telluride: Wither J.C. Chandor?

Good Wednesday to All,


"MOUNTAINS MAY DEPART" ACQUIRED

It was announced yesterday that Cannes competition film "Mountains May Depart" from director Jia Zhangke has been acquired for U.S. distribution by Kino Lorber.  Here's the story via Variety:


http://variety.com/2015/film/asia/us-deal-on-jia-zhangke-mountains-1201501457/

"Mountains May Depart" was very well respected critically at Cannes as you may recall from my round-up of various critical groups posted on May 8: http://michaelstelluridefilm.blogspot.com/2015/05/cannes-and-oscar-analysiscannes-and.html )

"MMD" ended up as a top three film from three of the four critical compilations that I was keeping track of.

Kino Lorber has had a noticeable presence at Telluride over the last couple of years so it's acquisition of "MMD" could easily presage a TFF #42 play for the film.  Here's Kino Lorber's T-ride play the last two years:

2014- "The Decent One" ("Der Anstandige")
2013- "Burning Bush", "Manuscripts Don't Burn" and "La Maison de la Radio"

In addition, Kino Lorber will distribute Berlin's Golden Bear winner "Taxi" which is also a very real Telluride candidate.


"Mountains May Depart" IMDb page: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3740778/


NEW VIEWS OF THE "QUEEN"

Werner Herzog's "Queen of the Desert" suffered middling reviews from its play at the Berlin Film Fest but still has to be considered a very realistic possibility for inclusion in this year's Telluride lineup.

The Playlist dropped a ton of new images from the true life story that stars Nicole Kidman.  I have included a couple and you can take a look at the rest here:

http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/new-images-of-nicole-kidman-and-james-franco-in-werner-herzogs-queen-of-the-desert-20150609



FUTURE TELLURIDE: WITHER J.C. CHANDOR?

I was really expecting that J.C. Chandor's "A Most Violent Year" would play T-ride last year, and, of course, I was wrong.  Really wrong.  Reportedly the film wasn't ready for Labor Day...so no J.C. and no Oscar Isaac and no Jessica Chastain and no "Most Violent Year".

Now, looks like we might have another opportunity next year as Chandor's newest project came to light in multiple reports yesterday.

Chandor looks set to direct "Liar's Ball" which puts him in a general sense back in some of the territory he dealt with in  his first feature "Margin Call".  "Liar's Ball" us set in the middle of the NYC real estate scene and is based on a true story.

A24 is producing and distributing.  They have appeared at Telluride with "Ginger and Rosa" in 2012 and "Under the Skin" in 2013.  So a future Telluride play is a possibility.

Here's the story from a number of sources:

http://variety.com/2015/film/news/jc-chandor-liars-ball-real-estate-movie-1201515363/

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/a24-jc-chandor-adapting-liar-801254

http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/jc-chandor-goes-to-the-liars-ball-with-a24-20150609

http://www.thewrap.com/j-c-chandor-zachary-quinto-producing-the-liars-ball-adaptation/


More on Thursday...


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