Michael's Telluride Film Blog : July 2022

Thursday, July 28, 2022

BONUS THURSDAY POST: TORONTO ANNOUNCES MANY TITLES- WE DETECT TELLURIDE FILMS

BONUS THURSDAY POST

For the past several years we've been able to get a bead on some Telluride titles based on announcements from the Toronto International Film Festival. That seems to remain true today as TIFF announced a slew of titles and likely there are several more to come. Based on the TIFF premiere status descriptions of their announced films up to today we think the following films will play at The SHOW over Labor Day: weekend:

Broker

Empire of Light

Holy Spider

One Fine Morning

The Wonder

Women Talking

Good Night Oppy

Films I thought might have a shot at TFF #49 that TIFF announced this morning that will NOT be playing Telluride based on their premiere status designation:

The Son

Banshees of Inisherin

Causeway

Decision to Leave

The Eternal Daughter

The Good Nurse

Moonage Daydream

No Bears

Triangle of Sadness

The Whale

Chevalier

Big surprise not at T-ride: The Son

Big surprise in for T-ride: Empire of Light

Also, thanks to shout outs today from Awards Daily and World of Reel.

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Ten Bets #6 / Wild Tuesday-Part One / Wild Tuesday-Part Two / Toronto-An Evolving List / Some Random Thoughts

TEN BETS #6

We've got some shuffling of the players this week following the news from Venice announcing its lineup. First here's your re-cap of last week's Ten Bets:

1) One Fine Morning/Hansen-Love

2) The Son/Zeller

3) Close/Dhont

4) Armageddon Time/Gray

5) Bardo/Inarritu

6) TAR/Fields

7) Women Talking/Polley

8) Aftersun/Wells

9) The Pale Blue Eye/Cooper

10) The Master Gardener/P. Schrader

Others Possibilities: Broker/Kore-eda, Showing Up/Reichardt, Tori and Lokita/Dardennes, Holy Spider/Abbasi, The Forger/Peren, She Said/M. Schrader, Tuesday/Oniunas-Pusic, The Fire Within/Herzog, The U.S. and the Holocaust/Burns, The Wonder/Lelio, Blonde/Dominik

And here's this week's updated Ten Bets:

1) Bardo/Inarritu

2) TAR/Fields

3) Bones and All/Guadagnino

4) Armageddon Time/Gray

5) Close/Dhont

6) Aftersun/Wells

7) One Fine Morning/Hansen-Love

8) The Son/Zeller

9) She Said/M. Schrader

10) The Pale Blue Eye/Cooper

Others Possibilities: Master Gardener/P. Schrader, Women Talking/Polley, Broker/Kore-eda, Showing Up/Reichardt, Tori and Lokita/Dardennes, Holy Spider/Abbasi, The Forger/Peren,Tuesday/Oniunas-Pusic, The Fire Within/Herzog, The U.S. and the Holocaust/Burns, The Wonder/Lelio, Blonde/Dominik, The Whale/Aronofsky, White Noise/Baumbach. Dreamin' Wild/Pohlad, March on Rome/Cousins

WILD TUESDAY-PART ONE

It was a wild Tuesday afternoon earlier this week as separate interviews with Venice Film Festival Artistic Director Alberto Barbera stirred the fall film fest pot by dropping some Telluride news. First the confirmations (it would seem).

In an interview with Variety's Nick Vivarelli, Barbera revealed that Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's Bardo, Todd Field's TAR and Luca Guadagnino's Bones and All will be making the jump from Venice to Telluride (hence those films jumping to the top of this week's Ten Bets above).

Here's the quote from the Varity interview:

"One that is going [to Telluride] is”Tar,” as are the Iñárritu and Guadagnino films."

In the same paragraph, Barbera says that there will not be as large a Venice/Telluride crossover as has been the case in past years:

"My impression is that there will be fewer films going from Venice to Telluride this year — not that there aren’t any... But in past years there were more, which has resulted in Venice being a bit less “top-heavy” this year."

So Barbera isn't saying that there aren't others in addition to Bardo, TAR and Bones but fewer. I did a little digging and discovered that approximately 67 films have made the trek from Venice to Telluride over the past 10 years. Peak years were 2021 and 2018 with nine films moving form Italy to Colorado. Weak years were 2019, 2014 and 2012 with 4. The average, as you can deduce, is 6-7 films each year.

So...likely there will be an addition or two beyond the three Barbera revealed.

Prior to the Venice announcement there had been strong speculation that those films might include Baumbach's White Noise, Aronofsky's The Whale and Zeller's The Son. In my Special Post from Tuesday morning with the Venice lineup, I indicated several other films that might be in line to make the trip from Venice to T-ride:

Argentina 1985

Athena

Blonde

A Couple

No Bears

Dreamin' Wild

Master Gardener

Freedom on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom

Il Viaggio

Best bets to also move from Venice to The SHOW: White Noise, Master Gardener and The Son.

The complete Variety interview is here.

WILD TUESDAY-PART TWO

And if that wasn't enough...Barbera had an interview with Deadline.com that was posted Tuesday. Matt Neglia of Next Best Picture screen captured the electrifying news and posted it to Twitter:

Making it easier to read:

"There was only one film we couldn't see, which was the Spielberg film [The Fabelmans]. They decided to go domestic with Telluride. It was a film that all the fall festivals wanted to see but no one got to see it internationally other than Toronto."

Needless to say my Twitter feed lit up.

A few minutes later the story was re-posted with the sentence "They decided to go domestic with Telluride" edited out.

I saw both versions with my own eyes.

You can see the current version of the post from Deadline here.

Now, I will admit that I reached out to Deadline to confirm and/or clarify the sentence. It was after that email that the edit occurred that eliminated the Telluride mention.

So, what gives? Seems like these are the possibilities:

Barbera got it wrong.

Deadline got it wrong.

Telluride screened it and decided not to invite it...thus preserving its World Premiere status for Toronto.

Telluride screened and Universal then decided not to go to T-ride after all.

Telluride does have it and TIFF's WP status is flawed.

It was pointed out to me that this could be a repeat of last year when TIFF announced Kenneth Branagh's Belfast as a World Premiere only to have it bow at Telluride first. Could that be the case with The Fabelmans?

The icing on the cake was a Jordan Ruimy/World of Reel post late on Tuesday in which he says no Fabelmans at The SHOW per a TFF source:

"I’m here to tell you, let’s please stop the speculation. A Telluride source has confirmed to me that “The Fabelmans” is not going to that festival."

You can see that complete post here.

TORONTO-AN EVOLVING LIST

TIFF is using a drip-drip-drip method of announcing World Premieres that they haven't used before. As that list grows, I will be posting so we know which films are at TIFF and won't be at TFF#49. Those announced to date are:

Green Onions: A Knives Out Mystery

Brother

Bros

On the Come Up

The Woman King

My Policeman

The Fabelmans (see above)

Catherine Called Birdy

The Swimmers

and Jordan Ruimy at World of Reel says The Greatest Beer Run Ever will also be a TIFF World Premiere.

And there are reports that TIFF will announce some more titles today.

SOME RANDOM THOUGHTS

Teaser for Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio which was released earlier this week via YouTube

A list of films that haven't really been talked about for Telluride but...who knows? Maybe?

The Good Nurse

GDT's Pinocchio

See How They Run

Raymond and Ray

Dreamin' Wild

Tuesday

Moonage Daydream

Spoiler Alert: He Dies at the End

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Tuesday, July 26, 2022

MTFB SPECIAL: VENICE ANNOUNCES

Here are the announced films for the 2022 Venice Film Festival. Films that I think could be in contention for a Telluride play are indicated with ***

COMPETITION

"All The Beauty and The Bloodshed," Laura Poitras (U.S.)

"Argentina, 1985," Santiago Mitre (Argentina, U.S.)***

"Athena," Romain Gavras (France)***

"The Banshees of Inisherin," Martin McDonagh (U.K., U.S.)

"Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths," Alejandro G. Iñárritu (Mexico)***

"Beyond The Wall," Vahid Jalilvand (Iran)

"Blonde," Andrew Dominik (U.S.)***

"Bones and All," Luca Guadagnino (U.S.)

"Chiara," Susanna Nicchiarelli (Italy)

"A Couple," Frederik Wiseman (U.S.)***

"The Eternal Daughter," Joanna Hogg (U.K.)

"Il Signore Delle Formiche," Gianni Amelio (Italy)

"Love Life," Kôji Fukada (Japan, France)

"L’Immensità," Emanuele Crialese (Italy)

"Monica," Andrea Pallaoro (Italy)

"No Bears," Jafar Panahi (Iran)***

”On The Fringe,”

"Other People’s Children," Rebecca Zlotowski (France)

"Our Ties," Roschdy Zem (France)

"Saint Omer,' Alice Diop (France)

"The Son," Florian Zeller (U.K.)***

"TÁR," Todd Field (U.S.)***

"The Whale," Darren Aronofsky (U.S.)***

"White Noise" - Noah Baumbach (U.S.) - OPENING FILM***

OUT OF COMPETITION - FICTION

"The Hanging Sun," Francesco Carrozzini (Italy) - CLOSING FILM

"Call Of God," Kim Ki-duk (Estonia, Kirighistan, Lettonia)

"Dead For a Dollar," Walter Hill (U.S.)

"Don’t Worry Darling," Olivia Wilde (U.S.)

"Dreamin’ Wild," Bill Pohlad (U.S.)***

"Living," Oliver Hermanus (U.K.)

"Master Gardener," Paul Schrader (U.S.)***

"Pearl," Ti West (U.S.)

"Siccitá," Paolo Virzì (Italy)

"When The Waves Are Gone," Lav Diaz (Philippines, France, Portugal, Denmark)

OUT OF COMPETITION - NON-FICTION

"A Compassionate Spy," Steve James (U.S.)

"Bobi Wine Ghetto President," Christopher Sharp, Moses Bwayo (Uganda, U.K., U.S.)

"Freedom on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight For Freedom," Evgeny Afineevsky (Ukraine, U.K., U.S.)***

"Gli Ultimi Giorni Dell’Umanità," Enrico Ghezzi, Alessandro Gagliardo (Italy)

"In Viaggio," Gianfranco Rosi (Italy)***

"The Kiev Trial," Sergei Loznitsa (The Netherlands, Ukraine)

"The Matchmaker," Benedetta Argentieri (Italy)

"Music For Black Pigeons," Jørgen Leth, Andreas Koefoed (Denmark)

"Nuclear," Oliver Stone (U.S.)

OUT OF COMPETITION - SERIES

"Copenhagen Cowboy" (Episodes 1-6), Nicholas Winding Refn (Denmark)

"The Kingdom Exodus" (Episodes 1-5), Lars Von Trier (Denmark)

HORIZONS

"Princess," Roberto De Paolis (Italy) - OPENING FILM

"A Man," Key Ishikawa (Japan)

"Autobiography," Makbul Mubarak (France, Germany, Qatar)

"Blanquita," Fernando Guzzoni (Chile, Mexico)

"Bread and Salt," Damian Kocur (Poland)

"The Bride," Sergio Trefaut (Portugal)

"For My Country," Rachid Hami (France, Taipei)

"The Happiest Man in the World," Teona Strugar Mitevska (Bosnia, Belgium, Denmark)

"Innocence," Guy Davidi (Denmark, Israel, Finland, Iceland) - Documentary

"Luxembourg, Luxembourg," Antonio Lukich (Ukraine)

"On The Fringe" ("En Los Márgenes"), Juan Diego Botto (Spain)

"The Sitting Duck," Jean-Paul Salomé (France)

"Ti Mangio il Cuore," Pippo Mezzapesa (Italy)

"To The North," Mihai Mincan (Romania, France, Greece, Bulgaria, Czech Republic)

"Trenque Lauquen," Laura Citarella (Argentina, Germany)

"Vera," Tizza Covi, Rainer Frimmel (Austria)

"Victim" ("Obet'"), Michal Blasko (Slovakia, Czech Republic, Germany)

"World War III," Houman Seyiedi (Iran)

HORIZONS EXTRA

"Amanda," Carolina Cavalli

"Goliath," Adilkhan Yerzhanov

"Hanging Gardens," Ahmed Yassin Al Daradji

"Nezouh," Soudade Kaadan

"Notte Fantasma," Fulvio Risuleo

"Origin of Evil," Sébastien Marnier

"Red Shoes," Carlos Eichelmann Kaiser

"Valeria Is Getting Married," Michael Vinik

"Without Her," Arian Vazirdaftari

The next clues from Venice will come when they post the screening schedule. Earlier scheduled films have the greatest likelihood of making the Venice/Telluride double play. Although in an Indiewire story from Anne Thompson from a couple of days ago she suggested that some films might screen "simultaneously". I'm not sure what that means.

Monday, July 25, 2022

Venice and Telluride / Toronto Films-An Evolving List / And Babylon?

VENICE AND TELLURIDE

Venice announces its lineup tomorrow. There is a lot of speculation out there that Bardo, Blonde and White Noise will all be in that announcement. I fully expect that Bardo will make the trek to TFF #49 and Jordan Ruimy/World of Reel is reporting that White Noise will screen for TFF in August. All of which leads me to ask Netflix...why not Blonde at Telluride?

Again, Netflix and TFF programmers, hear my plea...Blonde in the San Juans! Ioncinema's Eric Lavallee suggests the possibility:

"We can finally put to rest all the chatter surrounding this one but we wonder if this could be a premiere title that passes on TIFF for a Telluride and then NYFF showing instead."

See the full Ioncinema Venice spec post (part one) here.

And Part Two here.

Other probable Venice inclusions that could double dip at Telluride: TAR, The Master Gardener, Bones and All, Athena, The Whale and No Bears.

TORONTO FILMS - AN EVOLVING LIST

Green Onions: A Knives Out Mystery

Brother

Bros

On the Come Up

The Woman King

My Policeman

The Fablemans

and Jordan Ruimy at World of Reel says The Greatest Beer Run Ever will also be a TIFF World Premiere. Further, big props to Cameron Bailey and TIFF for landing the WP for Steven Spielberg's The Fablemans.

AND BABYLON?

Word is that Damien Chazelle's Babylon is "Picture locked". MTFB friend Jason Osiason passed that along via Twitter this weekend.:

https://twitter.com/jasonosia/status/1551229707210866688

Now, the buzz has been that Babylon was likely off the board re: fall film fests.

Jordan Ruimy at World of Reel has had his ear to the ground about Babylon and had reported that director Damien Chazelle and Paramount have been at odds regarding the film fest fate of the much-anticipated film. Ruimy has also reported that TFF folk have been aggressive in seeking to screen the film. Assuming that any of this is true, if Babylon is that far down the trail, one assumes that it could be ready for a TFF #49 bow.

Yes please.

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Thursday, July 21, 2022

Ten Bets #5 / Toronto Films-An Evolving List / Next Best Picture Guesses Telluride / Women Talking Where?

TEN BETS #5

Here's your weekly look at my take on films that I think are the TFF #49 choices. First, a refresher for last week's Ten Bets plus other possibilities:

1) One Fine Morning/Hansen-Love

2) The Son/Zeller

3) Close/Dhont

4) Women Talking/Polley

5) Aftersun/Wells

6) Bardo/Inarritu

7) TAR/Fields

8) Armageddon Time/Gray

9) The Pale Blue Eye/Cooper

10) The Master Gardener/P. Schrader

Others Possibilities: Broker/Kore-eda, Showing Up/Reichardt, Tori and Lokita/Dardennes, Holy Spider/Abbasi, The Forger/Peren, Babylon/Chazelle, She Said/M. Schrader, Tuesday/Oniunas-Pusic, The Fire Within/Herzog, The U.S. and the Holocaust/Burns, The Wonder/Lelio

And here are your latest Ten Bets:

1) One Fine Morning/Hansen-Love

2) The Son/Zeller

3) Close/Dhont

4) Armageddon Time/Gray

5) Bardo/Inarritu

6) TAR/Fields

7) Women Talking/Polley

8) Aftersun/Wells

9) The Pale Blue Eye/Cooper

10) The Master Gardener/P. Schrader

Notes: Armageddon Time moves up as do Bardo and TAR. Women Talking drops a bit based on a World of Reel story you will find below.

I've moved Babylon off the list of possibilities for the time being though it could slide back on. I've put Andrew Dominik's Blonde back on based on persistent buzz that the film will screen at Venice.

TORONTO FILMS - AN EVOLVING LIST

Green Onions: A Knives Out Mystery

Brother

Bros

On the Come Up

The Woman King

My Policeman

and Jordan Ruimy at World of Reel says The Greatest Beer Run Ever will also be a TIFF World Premiere.

NEXT BEST PICTURE GUESSES TELLURIDE (and Venice and Toronto)

Following their weekly podcast that focused on the Big Three fall film fests. Matt Neglia and the Next Best Picture crew posted a written version of their guesses nd predictions for what films are going where. Here that is with films that I have on the Ten Bets list and/or as possibilities indicates with ***

TELLURIDE FILM FESTIVAL

Aftersun (Dir. Charlotte Wells)***

Armageddon Time (Dir. James Gray)***

Bardo (Dir. Alejandro González Iñárritu)***

Broker (Dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda)***

Close (Dir. Lukas Dhont)***

Decision To Leave (Dir. Park Chan-wook)

EO (Dir. Jerzy Skolimowski)

Holy Spider (Dir. Ali Abbasi)***

The Master Gardener (Dir. Paul Schrader)***

One Fine Morning (Dir. Mia Hansen-Løve)***

The Pale Blue Eye (Dir. Scott Cooper) - WORLD PREMIERE***

See How They Run (Dir. Tom George) - WORLD PREMIERE

She Said (Dir. Maria Schrader) - WORLD PREMIERE***

Showing Up (Dir. Kelly Reichardt)***

The Son (Dir. Florian Zeller) - WORLD PREMIERE***

Tár (Dir. Todd Field)***

Tori and Lokita (Dir. The Dardenne Brothers)***

Triangle Of Sadness (Dir. Ruben Östlund)

The Whale (Dir. Darren Aronofsky)

Women Talking (Dir. Sarah Polley) - WORLD PREMIERE***

As you can see, there is extensive overlap between the NBP list and my Ten Bets. NBP has five films listed that I don't and any of the five wouldn't be a real shocker if included: Decision to Leave, EO, See How They Run, Triangle of Sadness or The Whale.

Here's what Matt and the NBP folks have as Venice premieres that would jump the Atlantic to play at TFF a couple of days later:

Bardo, The Master Gardener, TAR and The Whale. Another note...NBP has Andrew Dominik's Blonde playing both Venice and Toronto but not T-ride. So...to anyone with any juice at Netflix or within the programmers at TFF...hear my plea that Blonde makes a stop in Colorado between the two.

Here is the complete NBP post.

WOMEN TALKING WHERE?

Another Jordan Ruimy/World of Reel post of interest this week was the buzz about which fall fest was going to land Sarah Polley's Women Talking as a World Premiere. I have felt relatively confident that it would play Telluride as Polley has made the trip to the San Juans previously but who knows?

Ruimy suggests that Toronto wants it very badly as a WP and should Polley and distributor United Artists/Orion go that way...no TFF #49. If Venice lands it, TFF #49 remains a possibility. Of course Polley's last feature length film, the doc Stories We Tell, did the Venice/Telluride dance in 2012 but the distributor there was Roadside Attractions.

Stay tuned.

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Monday, July 18, 2022

Same Headline You've Seen Before / Toronto Weirdness / MTFB Shows Up Other Places / Indiewire's Screen Talk Talks Fall Fests / In Case You Missed It-POSTER! / More Marcel

SAME HEADLINE YOU'VE SEEN BEFORE

I have been refused journalist accreditation for TFF #49. Again. The last time I was accredited was 2018. Regular readers have seen this before and my annual commentary. I'm going to forgo that this year. Suffice to say, I must really be persona non grata vis-a-vis the festival.

TORONTO WEIRDNESS

The Toronto International Film Festival is being a bit cagey and unconventional this summer. TIFF has already announced four World Premiere films that they have scheduled. Meaning they won't be at Telluride:

Green Onions: A Knives Out Mystery-which is the big get of the four announced films

Brother

Bros

On the Come Up

It nearly goes without saying that I haven't had any of these four titles on my watchlist/guess list for TFF #49.

I haven't yet heard when TIFF will drop an announcement with a big chunk of their slate. History suggests that is likely on June 26th. But with this new strategy of easing out a single title every few days...who knows?

MTFB SHOWS UP IN OTHER PLACES

Over the past few days a couple of outlets that you have seen mentioned here in the past have mentioned MTFB on their sites. Both Sasha Stone at her Awards Daily site and Jordan Ruimy at World of Reel refenced and linked to yours truly as they both posted pieces that looked at Telluride and possible films that will play for TFF #49.

Here's the link to the Awards Daily post.

Here's the link to the World of Reel post.

Jordan also reports that Noah Baumbach's White Noise, which I had thought would be slam dunk for TFF #49, seems to be off the table. Jordan had previously reported that the film was shaky for fall fests and it appears that it has become even shakier. Check his story on that here.

INDIEWIRE'S SCREEN TALK TALKS FALL FESTS

Eric Kohn and Anne Thompson in this week's Indiewire's weekly Screen talk podcast spent a good amount of time discussing the looming fall fest landscape. They talk about several films and fests. Of interest to MTFB readers is that the mention Alejandro Inarritu's Bardo and James Gray's Armageddon specifically on the context of TFF #49.

Both films currently sit on the latest incarnation of MTFB's Ten Bets. Bardo at # 6 and Armageddon time at #8.

Check out this edition of Screen Talk here.

Thursday, July 14, 2022

BREAKING: WE HAVE A POSTER

From TFF's Shannon Mitchell, SVP for Publicity

BERKELEY, CA - Telluride Film Festival (September 2-5, 2022) today presents its 2022 Festival poster, designed by Leanne Shapton.

49th Telluride Film Festival posters are available for purchase now on the TFF website at www.telluridefilmfestival.org.

Here's the poster:

Ten Bets #4 / Paul Schrader: Another Honor / A New Film to Contemplate

TEN BETS #4

While we wait for some full-scale announcements from the Toronto International Film Festival which should give us some serious insight about the way the fall film slate is going to shake out...

Here's a re-cap of last week's Ten Bets:

1) One Fine Morning/Hansen-Love

2) The Son/Zeller

3) Close/Dhont

4) Women Talking/Polley

5) Aftersun/Wells

6) Bardo/Inarritu

7) TAR/Fields

8) Showing Up/Reichardt

9) Broker/Kore-eda

10) Armageddon Time/Gray

Others: The Pale Blue Eye/Cooper, The Master Gardener/P. Schrader, Tori and Lokita/Dardennes, Holy Spider/Abbasi, The Forger/Peren, Babylon/Chazelle, She Said/M. Schrader

And here is your fresh Ten Bets:

1) One Fine Morning/Hansen-Love

2) The Son/Zeller

3) Close/Dhont

4) Women Talking/Polley

5) Aftersun/Wells

6) Bardo/Inarritu

7) TAR/Fields

8) Armageddon Time/Gray

9) The Pale Blue Eye/Cooper

10) The Master Gardener/P. Schrader

Others Possibilties: Broker/Kore-eda, Showing Up/Reichardt, Tori and Lokita/Dardennes, Holy Spider/Abbasi, The Forger/Peren, Babylon/Chazelle, She Said/M. Schrader, Tuesday/Oniunas-Pusic, The Fire Within/Herzog, The U.S. and the Holocaust/Burns, The Wonder/Lelio

The top seven remain unchanged as Armageddon Time moves up The Master Gardener returns as a "Bet" and Scott Cooper's Pale Blue Eye moves onto he "Bets" for the first time this summer.

Broker and Showing Up have slipped into the "Other Possibilities" section.

PAUL SCHRADER: ANOTHER HONOR

News from Deadline that Paul Schrader will be honored in August at the Sarajevo Film Festival with the "Heart of Sarajevo". That news comes after it was previously announced that Shrader will be honored for lifetime achievement at the Venice Film Festival.

The Sarajevo announcement reveals that Schrader will be screening The Card Counter and doing a Masterclass as part of the Sarajevo program. No mention of a screening of The Master Gardener which almost certainly will screen at Venice.

The Deadline story is linked here.

A NEW FILM TO CONTEMPLATE

News this week that Cannes' Jury prize-winner The Eight Mountains had been jointly acquired for distribution by Janus Films and Sideshow. That bumps the film co-directed by Felix van Groeningen (Beautiful Boy and Broken Circle Breakdown) and Charlotte Vadermeersch squarely into the Telluride conversation.

Janus' past Telluride appearances have included:

The Eyes of Orson Welles

Cameraperson

Le Havre

Janus also has distribution for a couple of other TFF #49 possibilities: Tori and Lokita and EO. A TFF selection would be a first for Sideshow.

Details from Indiewire are here.

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Monday, July 11, 2022

The Usual Suspects / Babylon Still Up in the Air / Armageddon Arrives in October / She Said Trailer Coming

THE USUAL SUSPECTS

Each summer around this time I take some time to check out what Telluride's "Usual Suspects" have in the pipeline that could end up on the list films named to the TFF lineup. The process is not always predictive but there have been many times when it has.

The striking thing this year is that there seem to be fewer "Usual Suspects" projects that could be in the pipeline. That said...

Werner Herzog-The Fire Within which world premiered at the Sheffield Doc Fest last month. The film focuses on Katia and Maurice Krafft who were featured in Herzog's 2016 Into the Inferno. The couple were also the subject of a documentary that premiered at Sundance earlier this year: Fire of Love.

Ken Burns- The U.S. and the Holocaust. The three part series is set to begin screening on PBS stations on Sept. 18th which suggests to me that a Telluride showing of some and perhaps all of the episodes are screened at TFF #49.

Paul Schrader-The Master Gardener. Schrader has been represented at Telluride many times over the years: The Card Counter, First Reformed, Adam Resurrected. I'd normally think that Master Gardener would be a Telluride lock BUT- Schrader has been announced as the recipient of this year's Venice Film Fest's Golden Lion award for Lifetime achievement. How Venice schedules that presentation and where in their schedule they program The Master Gardener likely will determine whether Schrader's film plays Telluride.

Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu-Bardo. There was some back and forth occurring last week as to whether the film would be playing any fall fests. At the end of the week the notion seemed to land on "probably". My guess is a Venice early slot followed by a jump across the Atlantic to T-ride. Inarritu has presented Babel, Biutiful and Birdman at Telluride. He's also been in town for Cuaron's Roma and Del Toro's The Shape of Water. I am expecting, if Bardo is ready for it to be at TFF #49.

Jean Pierre and Luc Dardennes- Tori and Lokita- The film premiered at Cannes, which, if anything, bolsters the probability that it makes its way to The SHOW. The Dardennes have made a number of appearances at TFF: The Child, The Kid with a Bike and Two Days One Night-their last TFF film in 2014.

Sebastian Lelio-The Wonder. Lelio has made a splash at Telluride in recent years: Gloria in 2013 and A Fantastic Woman in 2017. The wonder is also a Netflix title, which doesn't hurt.

Bill Pohlad-Dreamin' Wild. Pohlad has been a supporter of Telluride as well as a producer of films that play there for a good long while: A Hidden Life, Wild, 12 Years a Slave, Into the Wild, Fur, Brokaback Mountain. Pohlad has a couple of directing credits including Love & Mercy which did not play Telluride but did screen at the Toronto Fest. The film is also in the Focus Features bin.

Producers that could be represented at TFF #49 that are "Usual" as well.

Martin Scorsese-The Eternal Daughter. Scorsese's Killers of the Flower Moon will not be ready for fall fests and likely wouldn't play them even if it was. However, Scorsese is often represented at Telluride in his capacity as a producer: The Card Counter, Uncut Gems, Bleed for This. Eternal Daughter is also being distributed by A24.

Barry Jenkins-Aftersun. Aftersun played well at Cannes winning the French Touch Prize of the Critics' Week Jury and was produced, in part, by Barry Jenkins PASTEL. It's also distributed by A24 which doesn't hurt either. I'm bullish on its chances to screen at TFF.

Alfonso Cuaron-Raymond and Ray. Cuaron producing a Rodrigo Garcia directed film here (Garcia was at Telluride in 2011 with the Glenn Close starrer Albert Nobbs. The film's distributor is AppleTV+ which was at Telluride last year with The Velvet Underground.

And a special note here. Sort of a "Usual Suspect" Daina Oniunas-Pusic who had shorts at TFF in 2015-The Beast and 2016-Rhonna and Donna and is now directing Tuesday starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus. And it's from A24. (shout out to Jason Osiason who tipped me to this).

BABYLON STILL UP IN THE AIR

Jordan Ruimy's World of Reel is keeping tight tabs on the status of Damien Chazelle's Babylon. The latest word there is that its festival fate is still up in the air and it appears to be a tussle between Chazelle and Paramount. Ruimy writes in his July 8th post:

"At the time of this article, Paramount and Chazelle are still in disagreement over whether they should bring “Babylon” to the fall festivals."

Ruimy also reveals a ton of details about the film including its current runtime of nearly three hours and that there is buzz that the film could be rated NC-17. The link to Jordan's story is here BUT HERE IS YOUR SPOILER ALERT! The post is rather detailed.

ARMAGEDDON ARRIVES IN OCTOBER

The Playlist reports that Focus Features has dated James Gray's Armageddon Time for limited release on Oct. 18th. That dating allows for it to be a part of Telluride, Toronto and/or New York. The film premiered at the Cannes Fest back in May.

I have felt an upturn in its chances to be a Telluride selection in the last 2-3 weeks.

The film's IMDb description is as follows:

"A deeply personal coming-of-age story about the strength of family and the generational pursuit of the American Dream."

Armageddon Time stars Jessica Chastain, Anne Hathaway, Jeremy Strong and Anthony Hopkins.

The story from The Playlist is here.

SHE SAID TRAILER COMING

Again, looking at World of Reel reporting that Maria Schrader's She Said will likely have a trailer drop in the next couple of weeks. The film features Carey Mulligan and Zoe Kazan starring as the true life reporters who were instrumental in revealing Harvey Weinstein's abuse.

She Said is set for a Nov. 18th release.

WOR suggests that "The Oscar campaign for Maria Schrader’s “She Said” will kickstart with the trailer being released either next week or the week after that. Then, possibly a Telluride world premiere."

The complete WOR post is linked here.

The single fly in the ointment in the film's TFF-ishness is that it's from Universal which has a sketchy TFF track record having, by my count, screened only three films there over the past 15 years:

2008-Flash of Genius

2015-Steve Jobs

2018- First Man

Still I have had it in the Ten Bets or on the list of additional possibilities since the first Bets almost three weeks ago.

Stay tuned as I will share the trailer as soon as it becomes available.

EMAIL: mpgort@gmail.com

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Thursday, July 7, 2022

Ten Bets #3-The Jostling Begins / Bouncing Around / Much More Marcel / She Is Done

TEN BETS #3-THE JOSTLING BEGINS

After last week's largely unchanged Bets, this week is a different story. Largely hinging on excellent reporting by Jordan Ruimy/World of Reel-that reporting is detailed below in the following summation of hos collection of posts dating back to Independence Day.

That said, here's a repeat of last week's Ten Bets and other possibilities

1) Bardo/Inarritu

2) One Fine Morning/Hansen-Love

3) The Son/Zeller

4) Close/Dhont

5) Women Talking/Polley

6) Aftersun/Wells

7) Showing Up/Reichardt

8) Broker/Kore-eda

9) White Noise/Baumbach

10) The Master Gardener/P. Schrader

Others: Tori and Lokita/Dardennes, Holy Spider/Abbasi, Blonde/Dominik, Next Goal Wins/Waititi, The Forger/Peren, Babylon/Chazelle, TAR/Fields, She Said/M. Schrader.

And here are the latest Ten Bets:

1) One Fine Morning/Hansen-Love

2) The Son/Zeller

3) Close/Dhont

4) Women Talking/Polley

5) Aftersun/Wells

6) Bardo/Inarritu

7) TAR/Fields

8) Showing Up/Reichardt

9) Broker/Kore-eda

10) Armageddon Time/Gray

Others: The Pale Blue Eye/Cooper, The Master Gardener/P. Schrader, Tori and Lokita/Dardennes, Holy Spider/Abbasi, The Forger/Peren, Babylon/Chazelle, She Said/M. Schrader.

BOUNCING AROUND

As mentioned above, there is some jumbling of the Ten Bets for this week owing to reporting from Jordan Ruimy. If you compare last week's Ten Bets with this week's you'll see that some films have disappeared, some jumped on and Bardo is still on the list, but moved from the top spot down to #6.

All of that comes as a result of Jordan's reporting at World of Reel.

Specifically two posts from the last week. Ruimy posted a piece on July 4th indicating that sources had told him that Bardo would NOT being playing fall fests and that Blonde and White Noise would NOT be at Telluride. Including for T-ride, according to his reporting, will be: Armageddon Time (Gray), Women Talking (Polley), The Pale Blue Eye (Cooper) and TAR (Fields).

I was devastated as my personal hope for list included Bardo and Blonde (in addition to Babylon-which is hanging onto the "maybe: list by the slimmest of threads.

Then on Wednesday, Ruimy was back with a different spin on Bardo. Ruimy indicated that a new source was telling him that Bardo would be ready for screening at fall fests. Ruimy writes:

"I had it confirmed this late afternoon that Inarittu and Netflix are hopeful “Bardo” will be done on time for the fall fests."

Sooo...Bardo stays on the Ten Bets but takes a 5 position demotion. Shaky! My belief had been that Bardo would play Venice and then make the trans-Atlantic jump to southwestern Colorado. We'll see...

As you can see, I have linked both of Ruimy's posts.

MUCH MORE MARCEL

As Marcel the Shell with Shoes On continues its rollout nationwide, there continue to be stories that pop up highlighting the film about the plucky mollusk. I have some of those here from this week"

From Variety

ScriptMag.com

MovieWeb

SHE SAID IS DONE -IT TESTED

Again reporting from Jordan Ruimy tells us that Maria Schrader's She Said (the film about the Harvey Weinstein affair) has screen tested and seems to have done well.

I think there some possibility that it screens in the San Juans on Labor Day weekend.

The WOR story is here.

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Monday, July 4, 2022

Focus on Focus / 40 Possible Oscar Films For 2022 and Telluride / From World of Real / Marcel Behind the Scenes / Trailer for Ticket to Paradise

FOCUS ON FOCUS

My review of distributors with a recent significant Telluride history and what they may have to offer for TFF #49 continues today with Focus Features. Focus has had a more-or-less consistent presence at the fest over the past few years:

2021 Belfast, The Card Counter, Red Rocket

2020- The Way I See It

2019 Waves

2018- Boy Erased
2017- Darkest Hour
2015- Suffragette
2012- Hyde Park on Hudson
2006- Catch a Fire

As you can see, Focus has been a solid entrant at T-ride particularly from 2015 forward and had large presence last year with three films that were featured as a part of The SHOW.

For 2022, Focus has three films that seem like they might be under consideration:

Todd Fields TAR with Cate Blanchett (a Blanchett tribute please?)

James Gray's Armageddon Time with Jessica Chastain (a Chastain tribute please?), Anne Hathaway and Anthony Hopkins (maybe Hopkins could get the Tribute that probably would have happened in 2020 with The Father)

Michael Showalter's Spoiler Alert: The Hero Dies with Sally Field and Jim Parson (a Field tribute please?)

Bill Pohlad's Dreamin' Wild. Pohad has an extensive history with TFF.

I have these films listed in the order from top to bottom that I feel like are most likely to make the TFF #49 list.

TAR 40% chance

Armageddon Time 35%

Spoiler Alert 25%

Dreamin' Wild 20%

40 POSSIBLE OSCAR FILMS FOR 2022 AND TELLURIDE

Tim Gray writing for Variety posted an Oscar speculation piece for Variety. Gray breaks the categorization down into early fest contenders (Berlin, Sundance and Cannes) and from those the films that I could see as Telluride potentials would be:

Armageddon Time

One Fine Morning

Triangle of Sadness

Then Gray switches to organizing by the month that the film will be released...so looking at September onward, other potentials would be:

Blonde

See How They Run ( a Searchlight film that I didn't include on my assessment of their slate a few days ago-but-you never know. Sam Rockwell and Saoirse Ronan star and that's an attention-getting duo)

The Banshees of Inisherin

Till

Amsterdam

Bones and All

The Menu

Golda

My Policeman

She Said

Babylon

Women Talking

And finally, Gray has a category of undated films from which possible TFF players include:

Bardo

Empire of Light

The Good Nurse

Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio

The Lost King

The Pale Blue Eye

Shirley

The Son

White Noise

The Whale

The Wonder

The complete listing is here.

FROM WORLD OF REEL

Jordan Ruimy's World of Reel continues to be a go to place for Telluride and Telluride-adjacent news. Since my last post on Thursday Jordan has added a couple of items of interest. First, there's a new list from him of "Not Going to TFF/film fests". Included on the list is Damien Chazelle's Babylon which Ruimy reports has been pursued fervently by The SHOW. Jordan writes:

"I know for a fact that Telluride is trying VERY HARD to get Chazelle’s film. Paramount hasn’t budged just yet, it’s still set to skip the fall festivals"

Earlier in the piece Jordan characterizes Babylon's status as "possibly" skipping the fall fests so it seems unlikely but not entirely 100% off the table.

See the story and complete list of films skipping fests at this link to WOR.

The other note from Jordan is a semi-report about She Said. That's the Maria Schrader film about the takedown of Harvey Weinstein. The film has been test screened and Ruimy writes:

“She Said” test-screened in the east coast last week. I’m not allowed to post the reaction I got from it, but it’s a very positive one."

The film has been flirting with my Ten Bets list during June.

Ruimy's complete post on She Said is here.

MARCEL BEHIND THE SCENES

A24 debuted a behind the scenes video concerning the animation of TFF #48 breakout hot (in select theaters now!) Marcel the Shell with Shoes On. I'm a fan.

Here's the video from YouTube:

TRAILER FOR TICKET TO PARADISE

Do I think Ticket to Paradise will play TFF #49...nope. Could it? Maybe. Does it have a trailer? It does now. From YouTube:

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