Monday, August 29, 2016

Hints and Allegations / Tributes Anyone? / Sully Shots

Good Monday everyone.  The 43rd Telluride Film Festival begins in 4 days!


HINTS AND ALLEGATIONS



I ran across a lot of revealing information over the weekend pointing to confirmations or near confirmations of a number of films that dot the latest Ten (Plus) Bets list from last Friday.

The most telling is the all but certainty now that Clint Eastwood's Sully is part of the fest this week.

Jeff Wells of Hollywood Elsewhere nudged up against declaring it to be a part of the lineup on Friday afternoon in this HE Post .  Then Saturday evening Wells went all in saying that Sully "will premiere at next weekend's Telluride Film Festival."  That post is Here .

So count Sully as an in...and more about some possible ramifications below...

Also buttressing the Sully claim was the latest Screen Talk podcast from Indiewire featuring Anne Thomson and Eric Kohn (both of whom will join in from Telluride this week as part of The Professionals who will rate films that they see for MTFB).  The first part of the podcast deals with Telluride and its influence and though they go to great pains to stress that they "know nothing" they suggest a number of "possibilities".  I suspect that they "know" more than they can admit.

They run out five titles including Sully.  The other four currently are in the last Ten Bets list and they are: Arrival, Manchester by the Sea, La La Land and Bleed for This.  So, though they can't tell us any more than that these titles are speculative, it is my belief that they are all but confirming them for this weekend.

That podcast is here: Indiewire Screen Talk: Telluride

Additionally, Pete Hammond writing for Deadline.com mentions in his review of the just opened Hands of Stone mentions the wave of boxing pics arriving at nearly the same time writing "Bleed for this which debuts next week at the Telluride Film Festival".  That review is here: Deadline.com

And still there is more...

A number of sharp eyed individuals contacted MTFB in the past couple of days to give me a heads up with regard to this year's TFF app.

If you downloaded the app already, then you will have seen the tab to click for the map.  If you do that or look at this screen grab:



You're going to see mention of The Eagle Huntress for the Abel Gance Outdoor Theater (letter B) and The Elsa Dorfman Gallery at The Courthouse (letter D).

These clues tell us that the documentary The Eagle Huntress (From Sony Pictures Classics) will be playing the festival in some capacity and that the Elsa Dorfman Gallery presence confirms that Errol Morris' The B-Side will be playing as well.  A note about The Eagle Huntress: it played Sundance back in January and its presence along with the now-expected Manchester by the Sea will mark the first time that I'm aware that TFF has programmed two Sundance films in a single year.

So, taken altogether, we can add two more films to the "we're pretty sure" will play list: Sully and The Eagle Huntress and we believe that five others are all but confirmed: The B-Side, La La Land, Manchester, Arrival and Bleed for This.

And don't forget, we added Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fischer and Debbie Reynolds last Friday via Anne Thompson.

Remember the final Ten (Plus) Bets will be posted Wednesday morning.


TRIBUTES ANYONE?



I've touched on possible tributes a few times this summer and now, with so few days remaining, it seems like a good time to get really serious about assessing who might get Silver Medallions this weekend.

To start, let's look at the list of possible attendees I posted on Aug. 23:

From Things to Come: Isabelle Huppert
From La La Land: Emma Stone  and Ryan Gosling (JK Simmons would be cool too)
From Arrival: Amy Adams, Forest Whitaker and Jeremy Renner
From Moonlight: Mahershala Ali, Naomie Harris and Janelle Monae
From Bleed for This: Miles Teller, Katey Sagal and Aaron Eckhardt (Ted Levine would be cool too)
From Neruda: Gael Garcia Bernal
From Una: Rooney Mara and Ben Mendelsohn
From Maudie: Sally Hawkins and Ethan Hawke
From: Manchester by the Sea: Casey Affleck and Michelle Williams (producer Matt Damon would be cool too)
From: Norman: The Moderate Rise... Richard Gere (Steve Buscemi and Hank Azaria would be cool too)
From: Wakefield: Bryan Cranston and Jennifer Garner

From other possibles and still outside shots:

From Sully: Tom Hanks, Laura Linney, Aaron Eckhardt and director Clint Eastwood
From: The Accountant: Ben Affleck and Anna Kendrick (JK Simmons, John Lithgow and Jeffrey Tambor would also be cool)
From Live by Night: Ben Affleck, Scott Eastwood, Zoe Saldana and Elle Fanning (Chris Cooper, Chris Medina, Brendan Gleeson would also be cool)
From Eternity: Audrey Tautou, Berenice Bejo and Melanie Laurent
From The Founder: Michael Keaton, Laura Dern (Nick Offerman would be cool)
From The Circle:Tom Hanks and Emma Watson (Patton Oswalt would be cool)
From Gold: Matthew McConnaughey, Bryce Dallas Howard and Edgar Ramirez (Corey Stoll and Bill Camp would be very, very cool)
From Miss Sloane: Jessica Chastain (Mark Strong, Michael Stuhlbarg, John Lithgow and Sam Waterston would be cool)
From The Sense of an Ending: Emily Mortimer (Jim Broadbent would be cool)

From this list we can move Sully from the "other possibles and outside shots" to the "probable" category and see what we can discern.

Let's focus on the films listed here that seem "probable" now for T-ride.

First, we can dispel both Clint Eastwood and Isabelle Huppert from tribute consideration as each have already been feted by TFF (Huppert in 1986 and Eastwood in 1990).  Rooney Mara was tributed last year, so mark her off.  Lauara Linney was also a tributee (2004).

Of the actors in the probable list...I can see the possibility of wither Forest Whitaker or Amy Adams from Arrival getting a tribute.  Whitaker's Best Actor Oscar in 2007 came from Last King of Scotland which made a big splash at the 2006 TFF.

Neruda offers Telluride regular Gael Garcia Bernal who could easily be set for a tribute for his now fairly lengthy career.

Maybe Ethan Hawke or for that matter Sally Hawkins both of whom are in Maudie.

From Manchester by the Sea, I could actually see producer Matt Damon getting a tribute.

Richard Gere would be a terrific tribute candidate and I expect that if Norman: The Rise and Fall plays, he could well be in town.

Wakefield's Bryan Cranston is red hot right now but as most of his experience has been in television up to the last few years, I suspect a tribute for him is farther down the road.

And, of course, if Sully is in play, Tom Hanks seems to scream for a tribute.  But remember, I was all in for a Michael Keaton tribute last year.  Was really certain that would happen and...um...I was wrong.  So even what seems like an obvious choice might not be the actual choice.

Tributes at Telluride are rarely completely actor focused.  Directors are also a big favorite for the honors but finding a director from the "probable" list that isn't relatively early in their career is a bit difficult (Chazelle, Hansen-Love, Villeneuve for examples).  So, maybe TFF looks eleswhere for a tribute.

Or, I'd still like the fest to honor the film Taxi Driver on its 40th anniversary in much the same way that they did Apocalypse Now a couple of years ago.

Nevertheless, the above paragraphs could contain the names of each of the three recipients or none at all.  TFF tributes are notoriously difficult to anticipate.

You have any ideas or guesses?  Shoot me a line.  My contact info is below.


SULLY SHOTS


Tom Hanks in Sully (via The Playlist)


Now that we're thinking that Sully is a probable lock to play the fest, it seems like The Playlist's post from yesterday with a ton of stills from the film might be fun for those of you looking forward to it, here's a link to that post.  Sully Pics from The Playlist


One other note about Sully; I suspect that its inclusion means that we will not see Warners other two possible films that I have been keeping tabs on this summer: Live by Night and The Accountant.


REMINDER...




Don't forget to relay your film ratings for The People's Telluride this weekend.  I'd suggest that you wait until we get through the whole of the fest and then contact me with your complete list of films and your ratings of them on a 1 to 5 scale with 1 being poor and 5 being wonderful!  Use any of the contact methods below:

Contact MTFB at:

mpgort@gmail.com

OR on Twitter @Gort2

OR check out Michael's Telluride Film Blog on Facebook:


Or leave a comment.




3 comments:

Unknown said...
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Mina said...

Hi Mike, when will you let us know what's the "mystery" film and whether it's different from the one you mentioned on Friday? Or was it Sully all along and that's it?
Thanks!

Michael Patterson said...

All signs suggest that Sully is the "mystery" film.