Wednesday, July 29, 2015

Venice Announces / Toronto Musings / Linklater Will Be Later / Foundas on the Future

Welcome to Wednesday...



VENICE ANNOUNCES



The Venice International Film Festival announced its lineup this morning at 11am Venetian time...about 5 AM EDT.  I wasn't awake for it but here's what we discovered:

Tom McCarthy's "Spotlight" (more below) will play Venice.

Suspected Telluride titles "Beasts of No Nation" and "Anomalisa" will also premiere in Venice.

Other Venice titles that could also make the hop between Venice and Telluride are:

"A Bigger Splash"
"Heart of a Dog"
"In Jackson Heights" and
"DePalma"

Of course, others may make the list.

Additionally, remember that "Black Mass" will play out of competition and then come to Telluride (we think).  "Spotlight" is also playing out of competition.


The following links include the complete announced lineup:









TORONTO MUSINGS:



Here's what I posted yesterday in the immediate aftermath of the Toronto Fests first announcement of films:


All Galas except Brain Hegeland's "Legend" and Atom Egoyan's "Remember" are listed as World Premieres.  "Legend" is listed as an International Premiere but opens in Britain the day before TIFF starts, so it's not a Telluride player. "Remember" is listed as a North American Premiere which takes it off the table for Telluride.

World Premiere Galas (and the opening night film) of note that are removed from Telluride consideration are:

"Demolition"
"The Dressmaker"
"Freeheld"
"The Martian"
"The Program"
"Stonewall"

Among Special Presentations:

Those that are listed as Canadian Premieres and thereby likely Telluride material are:

Charlie Kaufman and Duke Johnson's "Anomalisa"
Scott Cooper's "Black Mass"
Lenny Abrahamson's "Room"
Laszlo Nemes' "Son of Saul"


Cary Fukunaga's  "Beasts of No Nation" is also a "Canadian" premiere.  Does this mean it could be a Telluride program?

Surprisingly, Jacques Audiard's "Dheepan" is a North American Premiere, meaning that it won't play at Telluride.  Also off the table for Telluride among TIFF Special Presentations announced this morning are: "Trumbo", "The Club", "The Danish Girl", "The Lobster", "Mountains May Depart", "Sicario" and "Youth" which also surprised me (though I had been cooling on its chances for the last couple of weeks).

Among International Premieres in the Special Presentations category are Tom McCarthy's "Spotlight" and Johnny To's "Office".  That would seem to indicate at least a chance that they play Telluride but I Suspect a Venice play is more likely and then both go directly to TIFF.

And then there are a slew of films that were not announced:

"Suffragette"
"Our Little Sister"
"I Saw the Light"
"Our Brand is Crisis"
"In the Heart of the Sea"
"By the Sea"
"Truth"
"Steve Jobs"
"Manchester-by-the-Sea"
"Secret in Their Eyes"
"Bridge of Spies"
"Queen of the Desert"
"Salt and Fire"
"45 Years"
"13 Minutes"
"Carol"
"Macbeth"
"Adam Jones/Burnt"
"Snowden"
"Joy"
"The Light Between Oceans"
"Crimson Peak"

Today add the following:

My strong belief that Jacques Audiard's "Dheepan" would be playing Telluride is utterly debunked by its TIFF appearance as a North American Premiere.  It's a film that I've had at the #1 or #2 spot on all five of this summer's "Ten Bets" lists.  Color me embarassed.  Similarly, "Youth", which I had been counting on (though a bit cooler on its prospects the last week or two) also will apparently skip The SHOW.  Also shot down this morning, Pablo Larrain's "The Club".

Two "Ten Bets" films that appear to be confirmed: "Black Mass" and "Son of Saul".  "Ten Bets" films on which the jury is still out: "Carol", "Truth", "I Saw the Light", "Suffragette", "45 Years", and "He Named Me Malala".  

Other intriguing turns:  It looks like we may well see Cary Fukunaga's "Beasts of No Nation" as well as Lenny Abrahamson's "Room" and that the possibility of a Danny Boyle return to Telluride with "Steve Jobs" still exists.  And imagine this Charlie Kaufman in Elks Park (Anomalisa)  Looks like that could happen as well.

Then there's the mysterious case of Tom McCarthy's "Spotlight".  It appears that it showed up in some TIFF announcement materials as a Canadian premiere for a bit but is and always was to be listed as an International premiere.  "Wild" was listed the same way last year as it first screened in Telluride before going north to Canada.  I spent a lot of time with a lot of people in the Twitterverse yesterday trying to nail down what "International Premiere" means.  The general consensus was that it references a film's first play outside its nation of origin.  For both "Spotlight" and "Wild" that is/was the U.S.

Both of those factors have had a lot of people speculating that it means that "Spotlight" will be at Telluride.

With the announcement this morning that it plays at Venice (as we suspected from that Italian Vanity Fair article in which Mark Ruffalo reportedly let that cat out of the bag), I believe that it will skip Telluride and move on to Toronto.


Obviously, this week's edition of "Ten Bets" is going to look different.

I have linked some of the coverage of the TIFF announcement here:









LINKLATER WILL BE LATER



Also news late yesterday that Richard Linklater's follow-up to "Boyhood" that has been described as the "spiritual sequel" to "Dazed and Confused" has been pushed to an April 2016 release date.  "Everybody Wants Some" had received some fall fest speculation including Telluride, but this means that's off the table.  Perhaps it shows up at Berlin or Sundance now.

Here's Anne Thompson's story about the move:



FOUNDAS ON THE FUTURE



I reported/reposted last Friday that Variety chief critic (and sometime "Professional film rater" for this Blog for Telluride) Scott Foundas was leaving the venerable publication to join Amazon Films as an acquisitions exec.

Foundas will be working with longtime Indy film guy Bob Berney at Amazon.  Between those two, I think we can expect to see some Amazon product at future Telluride Film Fests.  It'll be really interesting to see what Amazon goes after over the next few months and then factor them into next year's T-ride equation.

Foundas talked to Anne Thompson/Thompson on Hollywood in a post that went up yesterday about his move:

http://blogs.indiewire.com/thompsononhollywood/scott-foundas-explains-why-hes-leaving-film-criticism-again-for-amazon-20150724

More tomorrow...



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