Indiewire Reveals? / Ten Bets #3 / Oscar Ramblings / The Last Distribs

INDIEWIRE REVEALS?

Indiewire's Anne Thompson posted on Thursday a story called "Film Festivals 2020: Here's What We Do Know".  Within the article she counts down a list of films that she attributes to "sources" that will be on the list of 20 or so films that Telluride has said they will announce as those that would have been selected for TFF #47.

Here's the Thompson rundown:

The Telluride 2020 program, sources say, includes such titles as Francis Lee’s lesbian romance “Ammonite” (also a TIFF selection, as well as Cannes), Gianfranco Rosi’s Middle East documentary “Notturno,” Chloe Zhao’s road movie “Nomadland” (Searchlight) starring Oscar-winner Frances McDormand, Wes Anderson’s “The French Dispatch” (October 16, Searchlight), Steve McQueen’s anthology films “Mangrove” and “Lovers Rock” (BBC, Amazon Prime), and Pixar’s animated “Soul” (November 20, Disney).


The list here looks reasonable and comports pretty well with what I had on last week's Ten Bets. Reviewing Anne's list and the last Ten Bets finds that both lists include:

Ammonite
Notturno
Nomadland
Mangrove
Lover's Rock

 I'd also point out that I've been sniffing around about The French Dispatch being in the possibility column for TFF #47 since the film's premiere date was pushed to October.

The real surprise to me is the inclusion of Pete Docter's Pixar release Soul.  That's a film that I would have never tripped to on my own.  If it shows up on the list of TFF #47 films that Telluride organizers say will be revealed in the next few days, then that is quite the plum for the Telluride that might have been.

The complete article is linked here.


TEN BETS #3

Updating the Ten Bets this Monday with the new information from the Indiewire story referenced above.  But before I do that, here's a look at last week's Ten Bets:


10) Undine
9) Forgotten We'll Be
8) The Secrets We Keep
7) Notturno
6) Small Axe (Mangrove and/or Lover's Rock)
5) John Prine: Hello In There
4) Fireball
3) Nomadland
2) There Is No Evil
1) Ammonite


Before this week's Ten Bets, a quick note:  this could be the last Ten Bets for 2020.  That will be true should TFF announce their list of selected films this week.  I think it's very possible for that announcement to come as early as today.  So, that said, here's the latest Ten Best for MTFB:


10) Fireball
9) John Prine: Hello In There
8) There Is No Evil
7) Soul
6) The French Dispatch
5) Lover's Rock (Small Axe)
4) Mangrove (Small Axe)
3) Notturno
2) Nomadland
1) Ammonite

Other possibilities: Undine, Forgotten We'll Be, Untitled Garbus/Cortes Voting Rights Documentary, The Secrets We Keep, American Utopia and French Exit.

Look for a MTFB SPECIAL POST should the TFF announcement happen this week.


OSCAR RAMBLINGS

I'm kind of wondering if "Oscar Season" is really already locked for this year despite The Academy bumping the eligibility window of the end of February 2021 and the actual Oscar date to the end of April.  Here me out...

What if Tenet gets delayed all the way to Summer 2021?  I think that's a real possibility especially in light of rumors swirling that the last Daniel Craig Bond film-No Time to Die- will be headed to a Summer 2021 date.   I also think that's a real possibility for Spielberg's West Side Story, Villenueve's Dune, Greengrass' News of the World, Caro's Mulan, Jenkins' Wonder Woman 1984 and Scott's The Last Duel.  I can't see any of these films being debuted in anything but a theatrical release of some kind and increasingly I think that's unlikely to happen in any meaningful sense by Feb. 28, 2021.

So posit that the above scenario is true... what films become Oscar players with the films that are already known?

Start with the idea that I'm right about them and eliminating the films listed above:  Clayton Davis at Awards Circuit currently has Tenet at #7, West Side Story at #10, Dune at #4, News of the World at #18, Mulan at #17, Wonder Woman 1984 #26, No Time to Die at #44 and The Last Duel as an "Unranked Contender".

What films then do become players?  Again, I'm including Awards Circuit rankings for each film.

Films that we believe will be on the TFF #47 list when it's announced: Nomadland #1, Ammonite #3, Soul #6, The French Dispatch #8.

Films that I thought could be TFF players but haven't shown up on the Cannes list:  Annette #11 (already off to 2021 and a rumored bow at Cannes next May).  Stillwater #13 (moved off its Nov. 6th date and not yet re-dated.  Waiting to see if a pre-Feb. 28th drop is useful?), C'mon C'mon #14, On the Rocks #16 (I'll bet it holds off until Cannes).

Films that played TFF #46: The Assistant #36, First Cow (UR).

Sundance 2020 films: The Father #15, Minari #20, Never Rarely Sometimes Always #37.

And then there's the load of Netflix titles: Mank #2, The Trial of the Chicago 7 #5, Hillbilly Elegy #9, The White Tiger #12, Da 5 Bloods #19 (already out, of course), Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (UR), Rebecca (UR).

I'm thinking that Netflix may not roll all of these films before Feb. 2021.  Perhaps they also will hold some of these titles back for the possibility of Cannes or the Oscars for 2021.

So, an adjustment of Clayton's predictions that skip the BIG films I've listed above as well as films that appear to be off to post Feb. 2021 but includes the Netflix titles leaves us with the following top 20 (with TFF #47 possibles in Bold.


1) Nomadland
2) Mank
3) Ammonite
4) The Trial of the Chicago 7
5) Soul
6) The French Dispatch
7) Hillbilly Elegy
8) The White Tiger
9) Stillwater (???)
10) The Father
11) Da 5 Bloods
12) Minari
13) Greyhound
14) Palm Springs
15) Untitled Fred Hampton Project
16) The Glorias
17) I'm Thinking of Ending Things
18) Those Who Wish Me Dead
19) Respect
20) Onward

And, of course, if Clayton is close to right... TFF #47 films, such as they are, could still be serious players in this weird Oscar season.


The complete and unaltered list of Clayton's predictions at Awards Circuit predictions are linked here.



THE LAST DISTRIBS: COHEN MEDIA, SUNDANCE SELECTS AND IFC FILMS AND KINO LORBER

I'm closing out the summer's look at distributors that have some Telluride history and films that could be named on TFF"s forthcoming list of films that would have programmed at The 2021 version of The SHOW.

COHEN MEDIA GROUP

Cohen's TFF History:

2019: No Titles
2018: The Great Buster
2017: The Insult, Face Places
2016: Journey Through French Cinema
2015: Hitchcock/Truffaut, Marguerite, Rams
2014: Magician
2013: No Show
2012: The Attack

Possible TFF #47 titles and their chance to play:

Forgotten We'll Be 50%
Operation Mincemeat 20%

KINO LORBER

KL's TFF History:

2019: Beanpole
2018: No Titles
2017: Film Worker
2016: Fire at Sea
2015: Ixcanul, Sembene!, Taxi
2014: The Decent One
2013: Burning Bush, La Maison de la Radio, Manuscripts Don't Burn
2010: La Quattro Volte, Poetry
2007: Blind Mountain

Possible TFF #47 title and its chance to play:

There Is No Evil 50%


SUNDANCE SELECTS AND IFC FILMS

The Sundance/IFC TFF History:

2019: No titles
2018: Non-fiction
2017: Eating Animals

2016: Things to Come, Graduation, Wakefield

2015: 45 Years

2014: Two Days One Night, Seymour: An Introduction

2013: Blue Is the Warmest Color

2012: Frances Ha, The Central Park Five, Everyday

2011: Into the Abyss, Pina, The Forgiveness of Blood, The Kid with a Bike, Goodbye First Love

2010: The Princess of Montpensier, Carlos, Tabloid

2009: Fish Tank, Red Riding, Life During Wartime, Vincere

2008: Hunger, Gomorrah, Flame and Citron, Everlasting Moments, The Good the Bad and The Weird

2007: Secret Sunshine, 4 Months 3 Weeks 2 Days, Jar City

2006: Deep Water, Indigenes, Day Night Day Night

2005: Three Times

Possible TFF #47 selection and its chances:

Undine 45%

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First Ten Bets of 2020 / Some Surprising Tidbits / The Distribs: Amazon

FIRST TEN BETS OF 2020

The last post of June has, over the past few years, become the post in which I lay down my first "Ten Bets" guesses for the Telluride Film Festival.  Most years, when I go back and look at the success rate of first "Tens" I'm feeling pretty good if I land 5 out of 10 that actually play over Labor Day weekend.  Here's the track record since I began the "Ten Bets" model of TFF predicting:

2011: 8/10
2012: 5/10
2013: 6/10
2014: 7/10
2015: 4/10
2016: 3/10
2017: 7/10
2018: 5/10
2019: 4/10

Average: 5.4 per year.

So, I'm rolling up my sleeves and am going to make an attempt at a first Ten Bets for this year...but I'm already pleading a pre-emptive "mea culpa" for getting so much wrong.

10) Ammonite
9) Undine
8) The Secrets We Keep
7) Forgotten We'll Be
6) Untitled Garbus/Cortes Voting Rights Doc
5) Fireball
4) Nomadland
3) John Prine: Hello in There
2) Small Axe (Mangrove and/or Lover's Rock)
1) There Is No Evil


SOME SURPRISING TIDBITS

I ran across a couple of eye-opening news items since my last post.  First, the revelation from member of the TFF Board of Governors Ken Burns in an interview/Awards Chatter podcast with The Hollywood Reporter's Scott Feinberg that he will not be attending TFF #47.  From the article accompanying the podcast:

"However, Burns, whose Beatles-like haircut makes him instantly recognizable wherever he goes, laments that because of the pandemic, he cannot to some places he would like to, such as the Telluride Film Festival, which takes place in Colorado's Rocky Mountains each Labor Day weekend. "I've gone for 30 straight years, 31 overall," he says. "I premiered Huey Long [his 1985 doc] there, and then The Civil War, and I've never not gone [since]. It's incredibly painful not to go there, but I don't want to turn Telluride into Manhattan when it was a hot spot."

That's a lightning bolt.

The Feinberg article as well as the link to the complete interview are here.

Additionally both Indiewire's Anne Thompson and Deadline's Pete Hammond had some thoughts on Saturday about Telluride and the other fall fests in an interview with Gold Derby.

Thompson talks about TFF perhaps being a down-sized event:

"Anne Thompson of Indiewire and Pete Hammond of Deadline — they are both doubtful that an event in the less-populated state of Colorado will welcome outsiders with open arms this year. Thompson has booked a room for the time being, but also adds it is refundable. “I am prepared to go if it is happening.” But, realistically, she can’t see the festival allowing film journalists to attend who live in such large metropolitan areas as New York City and Los Angeles, where the COVID-19 numbers are high. She believes it just might be a local event, given all the restrictions it would have to overcome."

Hammond is even more provocative in a couple of statements.  He suggests that Telluride should announce titles beforehand rather than following their normal practice of announcing the day before the fest starts:

“Telluride is a big question mark for me. I haven’t decided if I am going , and definitely won’t if they don’t announce what movies they have a la TIFF. They normally don’t until the day before the fest, but this year is different and I don’t know if it is worth it."

We had heard (via Thompson in an earlier story at Indiewire) that Telluride would be announcing further plans in mid-July.  Hammond suggests that deadline might carry more weight than a listing of precautions that the festival would take:

"Heard as of two weeks ago for them the movies still aren’t there and they are waiting until mid-July to make a final call on go or no go.”

The complete article from Gold Derby is here.



THE DISTRIBS: AMAZON STUDIOS

Amazon Studios has been a constant player at Telluride since appearing for the first time in 2016.  Last year, however, their TFF entries did not become awards season players.  Here's the rundown of Amazon Studios films that have played TFF in their relatively short history:


2019: The Aeronauts, The Report
2018: Peterloo, Cold War
2017: Wonderstruck
2016: Manchester by the Sea

This year's most likely Amazon players look to be:

Steve McQueen's two Cannes "selected" films that are a part of his Small Axe project.  Both Mangrove and Lover's Rock carry the "Selection of Cannes" label as two of the 56 films named a few weeks back.  McQueen has a significant history with Telluride having screened Hunger, Shame and 12 Years a Slave there.

Will Sharpe's feature directing debut is the biopic of 19th century artist Louis Wain starring Benedict Cumberbatch.  The film also stars Andrea Riseborough and Claire Foy.

The untitled Liz Garbus/Lisa Cortes Voting Rights documentary featuring former Georgia gubernatorial candidate and voting rights activist Stacey Abrams-particularly timely in this election year.

And finally, Julia Hart's woman on the run film starring The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's Rachel Brosnahan.

Chances:

Mangrove and/or Lover's Rock 50%
Garbus/Cortes Doc 40%
Louis Wain 25%
I'm Your Woman 20%

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Views of Cannes' Titles (That We Might See?) / The Distribs: Searchlight

VIEWS OF CANNES' TITLES (THAT WE MIGHT SEE?)

With the announcement on Wednesday of 50+ films that will carry the seal of official selection for the 73rd Cannes Film Festival going forward through the rest of 2020 and into 2021 we began to see the release of tearers, trialers and stills from a njumber of projects.  I'm passing along some of those that I came across over the past few days with an emphasis being on thise titles that feel like they could make their way to Telluride.

TRALER FOR THE FRENCH DISPATCH/WES ANDERSON (YouTube)

TRAILER FOR ANOTHER ROUND/THOMAS VINTERBERG (YouYube)

TEASER FOR ETE '85 (SUMMER '85)/FRANCOIS OZON (YouTube)

TEASER FOR TRUE MOTHERS/NAOMI KAWASE (YouTube)

STILLS FROM MANGROVE AND LOVER'S ROCK/STEVE MC QUEEN (The Film Stage)

THE DISTRIBS: SEARCHLIGHT

The annual summer look at film distribution outfits that have had a significant relationship with the Telluride Film Festival over the years begins today.

We'll begin our analysis with TFF stalwart Searchlight (used to be Fox Searchlight but underwent the name alteration after Disney bought them).

Searchlight's recent history with TFF:

2019: A Hidden Life (1)
2018: The Favourite, Can You Ever Forgive Ne?, The Old Man and the Gun (3)
2017: The Shape of Water (Best Picture Oscar), Battle of the Sexes (2)
2016: No Show
2015: He Named Me Malala (1)
2014: Birdman (Best Picture Oscar), Wild (2)
2013: 12 Years a Slave (Best Picture Oscar) (1)
2012: No Show
2011: Shame, The Descendants (2)
2010: Never Let Me Go, 127 Hours, Black Swan (3)
2009: No Show
2008: Slumdog Millionaire (Best Picture) (1)
2007: Juno, The Savages (2)
2006: The Last King of Scotland, The Namesake (2)
2005: Bee Season (1)
2004: Kinsey (1)

That means Searchlight averages just under 1 1/2 films at TFF each year over the last 16 years.  This year their cupboard is full of films that could make an appearance at TFF.  As we'll be saying all summer...so much is going to depend on the perception of film makers, talent, distributors and pass holders as to what films actually end up in The SHOW.

That said, Searchlight has four contenders.

The first to mention is Wes Anderson's The French Dispatch.  It's a film that would not have been on the Telluride radar at all if things were "normal" but the Covid-19 pandemic resulted in it being moved off its original release date to a current announced date of Oct. 16th.  That signals that the film could conceiveably play any or all of the fall fests TFF, TIFF, Venice and/or New York.  It was believed that it would be the opening night film for Cannes original May dates, you know that it must be ready to screen for audiences.

Next up is Chloe Zhao's Nomadland starring Frances McDormand.  This film was on my lookout list last year! However, I was surprised that we didn't see it show up on the Cannes list last week.  That could be a warning sign.  It could also mean that Searchlight decided not to go after a Cannes slot ofr the film...maybe Venice?

The other two Searchlight properties may have trouble being ready for a TFF date.  Michael Showalter's The Eyes of Tammy Faye went into post-production in December and Taika Waititi's Next Goal Wins went into post in January.  With the shutdown of the industry in March due to the pandemic, both films are question marks at this time.

Also, a quick word about a fifth film, Guillermo Del Toro's Nightmare Alley.  Prior to the pandemic I might have thought that this film had an outside shot at making Telluride but it looked like Del Toro would have to really work quickly to get it done in time.  Now, however, with IMDb describing the film as "filming" (as of Jan. 20th) I have to think that it's going to be a 2021 release.

Chances for TFF #47:

The French Dispatch 40%
Nomadland 40%
Tammy Faye and Next Goal Wins 25%

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Cannes Titles Revealed / Fremaux Interview Sheds Light / Analysis of the Cannes Selections

CANNES TITLES REVEALED

The 73rd Cannes Film Fest list ofn 50ish films that would have been chosen was announced yesterday.  FIlms gthat seemed to me to have some overt Telluride possibilities included:

Wes Anderson's The French Dispatch
Francois Ozon's Summer '85
Francis Lee's Ammonite
Steve McQueen's duo of Mangrove and Lover's Rock from what was supposed to have been a T.V. series but is now billed as six small films-Small Axe was the title of the anthology.
Thomas Vinterberg's Another Round


Here's the complete list of films announced:

“The French Dispatch,” Wes Anderson
“Summer of 85,” François Ozon
“True Mothers,” Naomi Kawase
“Lover’s Rock,” Steve McQueen
“Mangrove,” Steve McQueen
“Druk (Another Round),” Thomas Vinterberg
“Peninsula,” Sang-ho Yeon
“ADN,” Maïwenn
“Soul,” Pete Docter
“Ammonite,” Francis Lee
“Falling,” Viggo Mortensen
“Broken Keys,” Jimmy Keyrouz
“Truffle Hunters,” Gregory Kershaw and Michael Dweck
“Aya and the Witch,” Goro Miyazaki
“Limbo,” Ben Sharrock
“Heaven,” Im Sang-soo
“Last Words,” Jonathan Nossiter
“Des Hommes,” Lucas Belvaux
“Passion Simple,” Danielle Arbid
“Good Man,” Marie-Castille Mention Schaar
“The Things We Say, the Things We Do,” Emmanuel Mouret
“John and the Hole,” Pascual Sisto
“Limbo,” Ben Sharrock
“Here We Are,” Nir Bergman
“Rouge,” Farid Bentoumi
“Sweat,” Magnus von Horn
“Teddy,” Ludovic and Zoran Boukherma
“Un médecin de nuit,” Elie Wajeman
“Enfant Terrible,” Oskar Roehler
“Nadia, Butterfly,” Pascal Plante
“Pleasure,” Ninja Thyberg
“Slalom,” Charlène Favier
“Casa de Antiguidades,” João Paulo Miranda Maria
“Ibrahim,” Samuel Gueismi
“Gagarine,” Fanny Liatard, Jérémy Trouilh
“16 Printemps,” Suzanne Lindon
“Vaurien,” Peter Dourountzis
“Garçon chiffon,” Nicolas Maury
“Si Le Vent Tombe,” Nora Martirosyan
“On the Way to the Billion,” Dieudo Hamadi
“9 Days at Raqqa,” Xavier de Lauzanne
“Cévennes,” Caroline Vignal
“French Tench,” Bruno Podalydès
“Un Triomphe,” Emmanuel Courcol
“Le Discours,” Laurent Tirard
“L’Origine du Monde,” Laurent Lafitte
“Flee,” Jonas Poher Rasmussen
“Eight and a Half,” Ann Hui, Sammo Kam-Bo Hung, Ringo Lam, Patrick Tam, Johnnie To, Hark Tsui, John Woo, Woo-Ping Yuen

I have linked coverage of the announcement from:

Indiewire

Variety

Deadline



FREMAUX INTERVIEW SHEDS LIGHT

Cannes Artistic Director Thierry Fremuax (via Indiewire)

Tuesday, the day before the Cannes lineup announcement, Variety's Elsa Keslassy reported that Cannes artistic Director Thierry Fremaux had written a letter highlighting some of the facts of the selections and the process for this most unusual year.

Among the items of interest in the article that Keslassy penned from that letter is this paragraph:

"Fremaux also said Cannes’ official selection has been invited, as per tradition, to festivals that succeed it, such as Locarno, Telluride, Toronto, Deauville, San Sebastian, Pusan, Angoulême (for French cinema), Morelia, New York, Lyon, Rome, Rio, Tokyo, Mumbai or Mar del Plata and even Sundance."

As best as I can tell, it's the first acknowledgement from one of the players that Telluride will be in the mix for some of these Cannes #73 films,  Up until this point I have been assuming that the traditionally strong connection between Cannes and Telluride would continue to exist but the news stories that I have seen have never explicitly mentioned T-ride.  They had explicitly mentioned a whole slew of other fests but I hadn't seen Telluride by name until Tuesday.

Keslassy followed the Tuesday article with another yesterday after the Cannes lineup was announced and it also included a nod to Telluride programming Cannes' titles:

"The other fests that are expected to play Cannes-labeled films include Telluride, Deauville, Busan, Morelia, New York, Sundance and Fremaux’s own Lumiere festival in Lyon."

Now our next best move is to start paying attention to how Venice, Toronto and New York structure themselves and announce the films that will play at each of those stops.  We may still be able to figure out some of what will be a part of TFF #47.

Here's the link to the Fremaux letter article.

Today's follow-up is linked above.


ANALYSIS OF THE CANNES SELECTIONS

Indiwire's Eric Kohn and Anne Thompson in separate posts yesterday took some time to parse the list of 50+ films that Cannes has now said would have played as a part of Cannes #73.

Kohn's article looks at a number of topics including films that were not named.  That list included some films that are presumed to be eyeing Cannes for 2021 like Paul Verhoeven's Bendetta.  Among the other films not named, which I have thought might be part of a normal year's Telluride conversation, were Sofia Coppola's On the Rocks and Mia Hansen-Love's Bergman Island.

Kohn's article is linked here.

Thompson's story focuses on the Oscar chances of the films that were named.  Her conclusion-Oscar fare is not in abundance in this lineup. 

Her assessment is that the best Oscar candidates here are Anderson's The French Dispatch, Lee's Ammonite and Docter's Soul.

Incidentally, Thompson also makes the claim in print that we can expect to see some Cannes titles at TFF #47:

"The Cannes 2020 selection will eventually get that extra push from critics, media and audiences at Venice, Telluride, Toronto and New York, in whatever hybrid form they take"

The Thompson article is linked here.

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