Obsessing about the Telluride Film Festival and the film awards season since 2008!
"The best blog out there for predicting what will be going to Telluride."-Matt Neglia, Next Best Picture
"The Nostradamus of Telluride"
-Tim Appelo, Movies for Grownups
On this Boxing Day, I take a look at my latest assessment at the Oscar nomination chances for the categories of Visual Effects as well as Sound Editing and Sound Mixing. I last assessed these categories on Nov. 25th. As always, TFF #46 films are indicated with Bold.
VISUAL EFFECTS
1) Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2)
2) The Irishman (4)
3) The Lion King (1)
4) Avengers: Endgame (3)
5) 1917 (-)
6) Alita: Battle Angel (-)
Other possibles: Gemini Man, Cats, Captain Marvel
SOUND EDITING
1) 1917 (1)
2) Ford v Ferrari (2)
3) Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (3)
4) Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood (6)
5) Avengers: Endgame (5)
6) Joker (-)
Other possibles: Ad Astra, The Irishman, Toy Story 4
SOUND MIXING
1) 1917 (1)
2) Ford v Ferrari (3)
3) Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2)
4) Once Upon a Time... (5)
5) Rocketman (6)
6) Ad Astra (4)
Other possibles: The Irishman, Avengers: Endgame, Toy Story 4
PRESENT FOR IN THE ABSENCE
If you read the previous post, you know that I crowed about getting my first Oscar film screener. That came last week from the producers of the Oscar short-listed Documentary Short Subject film In the Absence.
The 29 minute film explores the sinking of a South Korean ferry boat in 2014 that cost the lives of nearly 300 people and seeks to reveal the choices among bureaucrats that contributed to the loss of life.
I found it harrowing and moving, and of course will now keep my fingers crossed that it moves from the short list to the list of nominated doc shorts that are announced on Jan. 13th.
Here's a link to Anne Thompson's (Indiewire) video interview with the two lead actors from Terrence Malick's A Hidden Life: August Diehl and Valerie Pachner.
Best Actress Oscar winner Emma Stone (La La Land TFF #43)
Picking up where I left off Tuesday, I'm continuing an eight part series of articles tracing the connection between films that have played Telluride's Film Fest and the eight "major" Oscar categories.
Tuesday I looked at T-ride and the Best Director nominees from the past 14 years. Today it's Best Actress. Here are the actresses that played films at TFF since 2005 who were Oscar nominated as leading actresses. Additionally, if that actress won it is indicated with ***.
2005: Reese Witherspoon/Walk the Line***
2006: Kate Winslet/Little Children, Penelope Cruz/Volver
2007: Ellen Page/Juno, Laura Linney/The Savages
2008: No nominees
2009: Carey Mulligan/An Education, Helen Mirren/The Last Station
2010: Natalie Portman/Black Swan***
2011: Glenn Close/Albert Nobbs
2012: Emanuelle Riva/Amour
2013: Sandra Bullock/Gravity
2014: Marion Cotillard/Two Days One Night, Reese Witherspoon/Wild
2015: Brie Larson/Room***, Charlotte Rampling/45 Years, Cate Blanchett/Carol
2016: Emma Stone/La La Land***
2017: Sally Hawkins/The Shape of Water, Saoirse Ronan/Lady Bird
2018: Olivia Colman/The Favourite***, Melissa McCarthy/Can You Ever Forgive Me?, Yalitza Aparicio/Roma
Notes: For Best Actress 22 nominations over these 14 years (to the best of my ability, I believe Jane Alexander was the first Best Actress nominee from a TFF film. That came in 1983 for Testament). Over the 14 years, five women of Telluride have won the trophy.
It does feel like the festival has gained some traction as a Best Actress launchpad over the last five fests (2014-18) with half the nominees and three of the five wins coming during that span.
2015 and 2018 were the strongest Best Actress years with three nominees coming from TFF films in both of those years.
Next Tuesday: time to look at Best Actor.
A DATE FOR A HIDDEN LIFE
Although I have continued to soft pedal its chances to play at Telluride, a recently announced released date for Terrence Malick's A Hidden Life continues to make it a possibility.
Multiple sources including Deadline and World of Reel reported last weekend that the Malick film will be released in the U.S. on Dec. 13th. smack in the middle of awards season. That's consistent with what had been reported earlier that Fox Searchlight would be proceeding with a strong awards push for the film.
The Dec. 13th date would allow Malick to play Telluride, Toronto, New York, London and/or AFI. It's Cannes premiere means that no Venice play is in its future.
A Hidden Life tells the true story of an Austrian conscientious objector during WWII.
BACURAU IS ACQUIRED
Specialty distributor Kino Lorber added Cannes award winner Bacurau from Brazilian film makers Kleber Mendonca Filho and Juliano Dornelles to their stable of films.
I took a brief look at Kino Lorber's Telluride chances in my post on June 28th and concluded that, at that time, KL had another Cannes film, Synonyms, that had a 50/50 chance of making the TFF #45 lineup.
Bacurau's acquisition by Kino Lorber definitely raises its profile for Telluride with the asterisk that Variety reports that the film is currently set for 2020...which isn't a complete disqualifier.
Give Bacurau a 30% chance of making this year's program.
Hope that your week has been going well. It's Thursday!
THE NEW MALICK AT TFF #46?
Like a lot of the film community, I've been keeping an eye on the latest film, A Hidden Life, from auteur Terrence Malick for...well...a long time. News appeared this week that might nudge its chances of playing at Telluride a bit closer to a reality.
Fox Searchlight acquired the film for U.S. distribution after its play in Cannes. The film was reportedly acquired for somewhere between $12-14 million.
The anticipation at this point is that Searchlight will likely position the film for a fall release, plays at a fall fest or fests and campaign it as an awards contender.
Malick is notoriously reclusive and his previous Telluride brief, as best as I can sniff it out, came in 1998 as a producer for the film Endurance (IMDb link here).
Fox Searchlight's participation certainly doesn't hurt the films chances of playing at TFF #46 as the distributor has become a frequent presence in the San Juans over Labor Day weekend. Last year Searchlight was at the fest with Can You Ever Forgive Me, The Favourite and The Old Man and the Gun. In 2017, FS screened The Shape of Water at TFF #44 which, of course, went on to capture the Oscar for Best Picture. Searchlight has also has Best Picture wins in the last decade with 12 Years a Slave and Birdman both of which also played the Telluride fest.
So...this week's acquisition activity probably bumps up the chances that A Hidden Life makes its way to southwest Colorado in about thee months.
THE CRITICS AT CANNES
Checking in with Reini Urban's collection of critical responses to the films that have been screening this last week-plus at the 72nd Cannes Film Festival.
With just a few days left before awards are handed out Bong Joon-Ho's Parasite sits atop the overall critical reception. The film boasts a cumulative 8.57 rating on a scale of 10 (with over 200 critics counted) making it not only the highest rated film of the Palme competitors but the top rated film when all categories are considered.
Parasite has U.S. distribution from a relative newcomer on the scene: Neon. Despite its youth, Neon has been well represented at Telluride the past few years with The B Side: Elsa Dorfman's Portrait Photography (2016), Border (2018) and The Biggest Little Farm (2018) all making the TFF lineup so Parasite becomes a serious potential TFF #46 film.
Other notes from the critical compilation: 3 other Palme competing films are in the critics top ten at the moment. That includes Almodovar's Pain and Glory (8.43 at #3) , Sciamma's Portrait of a Lady on Fire (7.76 at #6) and Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in...Hollywood (7.57 at #9).
Robert Eggers The Lighthouse is at #2 with a 8.48 rating. The Lighthouse is being distributed domestically by A24. Aside from the Tarantino film which with be released in the U.S. on July 26th, the other four films have a shot at Telluride.
Other Cannes films that I've taken note of as potential TFF choices and their critical response at this point include:
Young Ahmed/Dardennes- 5.47
A Hidden Life/Malick- 6.93
Matthias and Maxime/Dolan 5.84
Frankie/Sachs 5.53
Joan of Arc/Dumont 6.30
Port Authority/Lessovitz 5.56
Diego Maradona/Kapadia 7.11
Family Romance/Herzog 5.95
The Climb/Covino 6.76
A rating above 6.0 is generally regarded as good to great but hasn't necessarily been a determinative factor regarding whether TFF programs a Cannes film.
The Palme and other awards will be announced tomorrow and Saturday.
Still of Sarah Paulson in The Goldfinch (from IMDb)
Anton Volkov's Trailer Track website says we're about to get the first trailer for John Crowley's The Goldfinch. Based on the Pulitzer Prize winning novel, the film stars Nicole Kidman, Sarah Paulson and Ansel Engort.
The film is set for U.S. release on Sept. 13th and is distributed by Warner Bros with Amazon Studios distributing worldwide and also acting as a production company for the film.
All of this means that it's a TFF #46 possibility.
Stay tuned for the trailer.
That's it for today. Come back Monday for a look at Cannes awards results and if that menas anything for Labor Day weekend.
EMAIL: mpgort@gmail.com OR michael_speech@hotmail.com
We got our first video image of Terrence Malick's latest film this week. A Hidden Life is set to compete for the coveted Palme d"or at Cannes' 72nd Film Festival with its premiere screening scheduled for Sunday night.
A Hidden Life (previously called Radegund) tells the story of a young Austrian who is punished by the Nazi regime in World War II for claiming to be a conscientious objector.
The Film Stage linked the teaser, and it is only a teaser as it runs a meager 15 seconds. Here it is via YouTube:
You have to hand it Ken Burns and his production company, Florentine Films. They have been very busy promoting his upcoming multi-part documentary called Country Music for a while now.
That has extended to a recent interview with Melissa Newman for Billboard that was up this week.
Burns discusses a wide range of topics concerning the 16+ hour, eight episode mini-series that will run in its entirety over two weeks in September (following TFF #46) on PBS.
The dating of the initial PBS screening works well to anticipate Burns' return to Telluride and also that there is a reasonable chance that at least some of the documentary will screen as a part of the film fest.
80 year old American film master Francis Ford Coppola continues work on his latest passion project. Megalopolis has been on Coppola's mind for decades and was derailed, at least in part, by the events of Sept. 11, 2001.
The latest news this week was that Coppola has actively moved into the casting phase for the project and the two names being dangled in a number of outlets were Jude Law and Shia LaBeouf..
Welcome back from the weekend and Mother's Day...hope all the mothers had a swell day.
SO MANY TRAILERS AND TEASERS
With the 72nd Cannes Film Fest opening tomorrow a number of films that will be screening dropped video over the weekend some of which are potential Telluride entrants. Also appearing was a trailer for the non-Cannes film Judy starring Renee Zellweger as Judy Garland. So today's post is largely devoted to connecting TFF fans with some of those trailers all of which are linked here via YouTube.
JUDY
Judy is set to be released Sept 27th from Roadside Attractions which was last at Telluride in 2017 with the Oscar winning (Best Actor and Original Screenplay) Manchester by the Sea.
Along with the trailer, linked here's a story about its release from: Indiewire.
FRANKIE
Ira Sachs' family drama is set to play Cannes a week from today as a part of the Palme d'Or competitive slate. The film stars Isabelle Huppert, Brendan Gleeson, Greg Kinnear and Marisa Tomei. Huppert was a TFF tribute recipient in 1986.
The film currently has no U.S. distributor or release date.
Family Romance from Werner Herzog is also playing Cannes out of competition and is scheduled to screen Saturday night. The film is set in Japan and IMDb says it is about " A man is hired to impersonate the father of a young girl".
And finally a trailer for the documentary Diego Maradona about the life of the world renowned soccer player from director Asif Kapadia. The film comes from HBO and is set for release in the U.S. on Sept. 24th putting it in a sweet spot to screen at either Telluride, Toronto or both.
While we don't have a trailer release for Terrence Malick's A Hidden Life, we do have a peek at new stills from the film that is scheduled to screen at Cannes in Palme competition on the 19th.
Here's a look a some of those images from The Film Stage:
A Hidden Life tells the true story of an Austrian World War II conscientious objector who refused to serve for the Nazis. The film is seeking U.S. distribution and a subsequent domestic release date.
The death of film making pioneer Agnes Varda has continued to send reverberations through the film community and the honorifics and reminiscences continue to appear online and in major publications. As I did on Monday, I have linked a few more of those here:
Jude Dry for Indiewire with comments from female film makers including: Greta Gerwig, Ava Duvernay, Lena Dunham and a dozen others.
REPORT FROM CINEMACON: THE GOLDFINCH
Part of the cast of The Goldfinch at CinemaCon (via Indiewire)
CinemaCon attendees got the first look at a trailer for John Crowley's adaptation of Donna Tartt's Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Goldfinch earlier this week.
The film is certainly on my watch list as a potential choice by TFF programmers for this year's fest. The film is scheduled for U.S. release on Sept. 13th and is from the combination of Warner Bros. and Amazon Studios. The combination of factors means that it could play any or all of the combination of Telluride, Venice and Toronto.
Amid fevered speculation that Terrence Malick's new film will be announced as a competition film for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival on April 18th came news this week that its title has officially been changed.
The film has been discussed for months with the working title Radegund. However, Indiewire's Zack Sharf reported on Tuesday that the film will now be titled A Hidden Life.
The film follows the true story of World War II Austrian Conscientious Objector Franz Jagerstatter who was executed by the Nazis in 1943.
I got a nice invite from Jordan Ruimy of the World of Reel website to participate in a project he is currently working on. I don't want to give away what it is until Jordan is ready to unveil it but I did want to publicly give him a thank you and a shout out and tell you that something is in the works.
After a ten day hiatus MTFB is back today after having spent Spring Break doing this and that. Spent some of the break in NYC. Saw Aaron Sorkin's adaptation of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird with Jeff Daniels. It's nearly perfect. Saw Bryan Cranston in Network...Cranston is phenomenal. Did some other stuff.
It was good to step away for a few days, but I'm back now as we head our way to the announcement of the films that will play at Cannes which really does begin the Telluride speculation season on some earnest. Here we go...
NETFLIX AND CANNES: THE BREAKUP CONTINUES
While I was away we found out that Netflix will again have zero films playing at the Cannes Film Fest in May. The impasse that created that situation last year has not been resolved and as such, Netflix apparently will not be bringing any films to France in any of the programs.
That was reported in a number pf places this past week including this from Variety.
In addition, as it turns out, the big fish in Netflix's barrel this season, Martin Scorsese's The Irishman reportedly wouldn't be ready anyway. It seems that there is still far too much effects work to be done. That according to Zack Sharf writing at Indiewire.
Sharf writes that a Venice premiere at this point seems the safest bet. That would still seem to leave the door open for a screening at Telluride much in the way Netflix played Cuaron's Roma last year (and Searchlight did Shape of Water the year before).
My take is still some serious wariness. Scorsese hasn't been at Telluride in decades. I wouldn't be surprised if it played Venice and Venice alone or skipped fests all together.
Still, Collider's Adam Chitwood suggests a run for the film through the Venice, Telluride, Toronto (maybe New York) gauntlet.
MALICK AT CANNES AND THEN...
And speaking of Cannes...there's a growing consensus that Terrence Malick will return to Cannes in May with his latest film Radegund. It's a film I have been stalking for quite some time mostly because it's Malick doing a film with a reportedly more traditionally narrative structure that tells the true story of an Austrian conscientious objector during World War II.
I'm hoping, that after a spate of films that haven't exactly been embraced (since Tree of Life) that this will be the path back to critical success for the auteur.
Charles Barfield writing for The Playlist suggests that Cannes will screen the new film. That story is linked here.
Should that come to pass, the questions would be: does it play any other fests and which distributor picks it up?
I'll keep an eye on it.
SCHILLER TALKS TELLURIDE, FILM AND MORE?
Friend of the blog and multi-hyphenate Christopher Schiller was featured this week on The Weekend Take podcast with Shawn Schaffer. Schiller runs down a number of topics including a love letter to the Telluride Film Festival.
You can find Schiller's guest stint and The Weekend Take podcast at iTunes at this link.
The Asheville, NC Citizen Times reports that Ken Burns is going to screen some moments of his new documentary on country music in Asheville next week (on April 2 on the UNC-Asheville campus). It's yet another sign that, although the entire 16 hour doc may not be ready in its entirety, there's plenty of it to show to an audience.
This roll out in various parts in various places continues to make me think that a presentation of some of it over Labor Day weekend in T-ride is a realistic possibility.
And to celebrate what would have been Fred Rogers 91st birthday, TriStar released a new photo from the set of A Beautiful Day in the neighborhood starring Tom Hanks as Rogers.
Here's the new photo:
The film is directed by Marielle Heller (Can You Ever Forgive Me?) and is set for U.S. release on Nov. 22nd.
That's your "Spring Break Is Over Return Issue" of MTFB. I'll have more on Thursday.
EMAIL: mpgort@gmail.com OR michael_speech@hotmail.com
Good Thursday friends...Yesterday was a busy day for film news...and that's an understatement!
ROMA ANNOUNCED FOR NY...VENICE NAMES FIRST MAN AS OPENER...READING THE SIGNS
The New York Film Fest announced yesterday that its centerpiece film will be Alfonso Cuaron's much anticipated Roma.
The film was listed in announcements, however , as its "New York premiere" which tells you a few things...
It won't be the film's world premiere...that could be at Venice. It also means, because it isn't the film's North American premiere, that the film will have played prior to its NY October date somewhere in North America and likely, because its named a New York preem, that it will have played somewhere in the U.S. That probably means Telluride or Los Angeles. Telluride is the more likely due to Cuaron's presentation of Gravity there in 2013 and also, probably because his buddies Alejandro Inarritu and Guillermo Del Toro have had great success there.
Does it guarantee a T-ride play...No. But it does make it much more likely.
I had Roma listed last week on the Ten Bets listed in the #9 spot. Don't be surprised if it's higher on the new Ten Bets coming tomorrow.
Linked coverage of the NYFF announcement is here from:
Both The Playlist and Entertainment Weekly specifically mention Telluride as a destination for the film.
Roma is being handled by Netflix...Who just hired Awards Consultant Lisa Taback yesterday. Those who follow Oscar season will recognize Taback's name. The hire means that Netflix is planning to play hard this awards season.
Meanwhile...in Venice news...
Venice has announced that its opening night film will be Damien Chazelle's First Man starring Ryan Gosling as Neil Armstrong.
The designation that First Man will open Venice absolutely does not preclude a shot at TFF #45. As matter of fact, Chazelle's La La Land opened Venice in 2016 and followed that with a Telluride presentation. Alexander Payne's Downsizing did the same thing last year and Guillermo Del Toro's The Shape of Water also played both places. Past Telluride films that also opened Venice include Birdman, Gravity and Black Swan.
The Playlist suggests that a Telluride play is likely.
Meanwhile, tweets from Toronto Star critic Peter Howell and Awards Daily's Sasha Stone also suggest Telluride is a good possibility for First Man:
Howell:
Stone:
Here's additional linked coverage of the Venice announcement from:
Venice will announce the bulk of its lineup on July 25th.
MALICK'S RADEGUND AT FESTS
An interview with actor Matthias Schoenaerts appears to confirm that the latest film from auteur Terrence Malick is likely to appear at fall festivals and have a fall release date. In an interview with The Independent, Schoenaerts says that Radegund, a film based on actual incidents from World War II in which a German conscientious objector is persecuted for his beliefs, is going to premiere at a fall festival or festivals. Most speculation about which focuses on Venice and Toronto but a Telluride play is not completely outside the realm of possibility.
I have to tell you that this is the first Malick film that I have been excited about since The Tree of Life.
Radegund currently has no distribution or release date set.
The last couple of days were very busy in terms of new trailers appearing. Of note, in as far as Telluride observers might be concerned were the first for Joel Edgerton's gay conversion therapy drama Boy Erased starring Lucas Hedges, Nicole Kidman, Russell Crowe and Edgerton.
Here it is from YouTube:
Boy Erased is distributed by Focus Features and is scheduled for release on Nov. 2nd.
Linked coverage is here for the trailer's release from:
Meanwhile, Universal has released a new trailer for Robert Zemeckis' Welcome to Marwen was released yesterday by Universal. The film's first trailer apparently did not strike the chord that Uni wanted when it was released a month ago. To that end, another has dropped. Again for YouTube:
Linked coverage is here for the Marwen trailer release from The Playlist and SlashFilm.
ANNOUNCEMENTS COMING SOON
New York kicked it off yesterday with its announcement about Roma as its Centerpiece. Venice added to the fun by announcing its opening night film. Now, prepare for an onslaught of film fest announcements to come next week from Toronto and Venice and all of the clues that will result.
By Friday of next week, we should know a lot more about what films are playing which fests and by inference, many films that will play at TFF #45.
It will be one of the more exciting weeks of the year for Telluride watchers and you can get all of the best guess analysis about what it all means right here at Michael's Telluride Film Blog.
That's all for today...come back tomorrow for more including the 4th edition of MTFB's Ten Best for TFF 2018.
EMAIL: mpgort@gmail.com OR michael_speech@hotmail.com
Sony Pictures Classics has announced that its Hank Williams biopic starring Tom Hiddleston and Elizabeth Olsen will be released on Nov. 27th smack in the middle of awards season. The conventional wisdom is that SPC will push for Hiddleston for Best Actor at a minimum. The film could also make a play in a number of other categories.
"I Saw the Light" was at #5 on last week's first "Ten Bets" list. The selection of a late November release date doesn't harm its Telluride chances in the least and actually stokes the T-rode flames just a little bit.
Writer/director Justin Kurzel spoke recently to the British version of Yahoo Television about his upcoming "Macbeth" starring Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard. The film is being distributed by The Weinstein Company and played the Cannes Film Festival. It is not yet scheduled for a U.S. release but is set for an October 2nd release in the U.K.
"Macbeth" was listed on last week's "Ten Best" as being "on the outside" but close.
Speaking of release dates and their effect on their Telluride potential...
The already tenuous possibility that we could see Terrence Malick's latest "Knight of Cups" took a hit with the announcement over the weekend that the film will not be released until 2016.
The Playlist and Thompson on Hollywood provide the details:
Terrence Malick remains the auteuriest of auteurs. His next feature: "Knight of Cups" has been gestating for a good long while and from reports seems to be ready to launch. Malick has never played Telluride, though you'd think that his best stuff would do very well there. And a reminder, purportedly "Tree of Life" was screened in Telluride in 2011 for Fox Searchlight which led to them acquiring and distributing the film.
To the end that "Knight" could make the T-ride 2015 lineup, here's this note that a bunch of new stills can be found in this post from The Playlist:
Michel Gondry's latest film "Microbe and Gasoline" dropped an International trailer yesterday (it's in French) and that's what you can view here:
"Microbe and Gasoline" trailer via YouTube
The film currently lacks distribution but Gondry was feted by Telluride in 2004, not as a tribute recipient, however. Nevertheless, Gondry's latest has to be at least a consideration for T-ride inclusion.
PREDICTING VENICE
Nicholas Bell writing for Ioncinema posted a set of predictions for possible selections for the Venice Film Fest. Regular readers of MTFB know that, on average, Venice and Telluride will share about three titles (last year it was five: "Birdman", "Ida", "The Look of Silence" "99 Homes" and "The Price of Fame").
If Bell's prognostications are close, one wonders, what might double as a Venice/Telluride play?Among the films he lists as possible Venice fare, the films that seem most likely to make the quick turnaround to Telluride are:
Jeff Nichols' "Midnight Special"
Todd Solondz's "Wiener Dog"
Werner Herzog's "Salt and Fire"
Frederick Wiseman's "In Jackson Heights"
Luca Guadaginino's " A Bigger Splash"
There's more. Take a look at the following link from Ioncinema:
Welcome back from the weekend to a Monday in July...
SEARCHING FOR THE FOX IN 2014
I am continuing my series of looking at distributors and their connection to Telluride over the past few years as a way of examining the potential film choices for TFF #41, Today it's Fox Searchlight. Here's what we have seen from them art Telluride over the past decade:
2004: Kinsey
2005: Bee Season
2006: The Last King of Scotland, The Namesake
2007: Juno, The Savages
2008: Slumdog Millionaire
2009: ZIP
2010: Never Let Me Go, 127 Hours, Black Swan, Millions
2011: Shame, The Descendants
2012: ZIP
2013: 12 Years a Slave
14 films in ten years. The highwater mark coming in 2010 with 4 films on the SHOW list but '09 and '12 with no films at all. But when Fox Search plays, they usually light it up including two Best Picture winners that they had play T-ride including last year's "12 Years a Slave". Looking at their current lineup of films purportedly ready as per IMDb.com you'll find that they have three films that could show at the SHOW:
Inarritu's "Birdman", Vallee's "Wild" and Vinterberg's "Far from the Madding Crowd"...though it is still unlikely to be ready in time for Labor Day weekend. Meanwhile, if you read this space with much regularity, you know that I think the "Birdman" is very, very likely to make a Telluride play. That leaves "Wild" as a question mark. Currently, I'm not feeling it as a Telluride play (although star Reese Witherspoon won her Oscar for "Walk the Line" which played T-ride in 2005.
So, bottom line: Fox Searchlight plays "Birdman" as its solo entry for TFF #41.
MALICK'S KNIGHT MIGHT HAVE A DATE
Malcik and Christian Bale on the set of "Knight of Cups" via thefocuspull.com
Does Terrence Malick's "Knight of Cups" have a U.S. release date? Well, there's buzz that it could be but it's not exactly from publicists. thefilmstage.com reports that the film could get released in the U.S. in October. The story also suggests that Venice or Toronto might be the fest for the film. Venice seems right to me. Remember, though. that "Tree of Life" made a small appearance to select distributors at Telluride back in 2011.
A couple of weeks back, I reported that Gary Meyer's responsibilities ofr the Telluride Film festival had changed from that of co-director to what is described as Senior Curator. Meyer was said to be moving to put more focus on his Eat, Drink, Film website. We've seen that happen now as Meyer has a big post up over the weekend about Roger Ebert. Take a look at that here:
So, yesterday, I was doing my research thing; trying to suss put clues here and there to what might be playing at this year's fest. I stumbled over a reference online and dug into it. At one point I was about 90% certain that I had a backdoor confirmation that a film that I have mentioned and that has been on the Ten Bets list was a go for TFF. Very exciting...and I'm thinking I'm a film research genius. Then I get a response to a feeler I had sent to a source....mmm...nope...no confirmation. Actually, more confusion...
So..."not so smart"...but I'll keep trying!
VIEW OF HYDE PARK
The Playlist has a post up this morning that shows us posters for John Hillcoat's "Lawless" which we won't see in Telluride (it opens nationally that weekend) and Roger Michell's "Hyde Park on Hudson" which I feel strongly that we WILL see in Telluride. Here's the poster:
Wes Anderson is enjoying some of his best reviews for his current "Moonrise Kingdom". Meanwhile, Johnny Depp may be the biggest movie star on the planet ("Dark Shadows" notwithstanding). Neither film maker has made an appearance at Telluride, but that could change. The interweb was lousy yesterday with the story that the two will apparently work together on Anderson's "The Grand Budapest Hotel" (rhetorically, does that sound a lot like John Madden's "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel"?)
For hoots, here's the trailer for "Moonrise Kingdom":
KNIGHT WITHOUT DAMSEL
We have gotten used to seeing set photos of Christian Bale with various beautiful women from Terrence Malick's currently filming "Knight of Cups". Finally, photos emerged yesterday of Bale and someone male. Oakenfold, who I gather is something of a well known DJ are featured. Here's a pic:
The word has been around for some time now that Paul Thomas Anderson had shown Tom Cruise (reportedly they have remained friends after Cruise' performance in Anderson's "Magnolia in 1999). Consequently, there have been a number of reports that Cruise, and by extension, Scientology, wasn't pleased.
Does this alter chances that "The Master" might be a Telluride film...well...who knows. Cruise has been a supporter of TFF in the past, though I can't find him listed in a TFF program since 2008. Interesting to ponder...
OZ
OK...this won't be at Telluride, but it does feature Telluride guest James Franco (127 Hours) and it looks kind of cool. Above is the trailer for "Oz, the Great and Powerful" scheduled for release in Spring 2013. Also, here's an accompanying story from Get The Big Picture:
I don't know if you've seen this or not, but it's kind of entertaining and I swear I have seen this scene play out (after a fashion) at the Telluride Film Festival...won't give anymore away...(thanks to Kris Tapley and Dave Poland)
And Jeffrey Well at Hollywood Elsewhere tweeted and posted about Terrence Malick shooting on location in L.A. for "Knight of Cups". The post also includes a brief summary of what the film is supposed to be about: http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2012/07/sasquatch_on_lu.php
