Showing posts with label The Founder. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Founder. Show all posts

Thursday, August 11, 2016

Moonlight Shines / Foreign Films Oscar Speculation and Telluride Plays / The Guardian's Oscar Players and Telluride / Time to Start Thinking About Your Inner Critic

Welcome to your Thursday world...


MOONLIGHT SHINES


A24 tweeted this poster/image yesterday for Barry Jenkins Moonlight.  The film is near certainty to screen in Telluride.  The film is getting some notice in awards chatter circles prior to being seen by the public and I've been hearing good buzz from people who have seen it.

Additionally, the word is that a trailer might be expected to drop for the film today as well.  Look for that here tomorrow should it happen and check my Twitter account throughout the day as well (@Gort2).

Moonlight has been announced to screen at the New York Film Fest without a premiere designation which indicates a Telluride play.  Further, Hollywood Elsewhere's Jeffrey Wells implied it strongly in a post from last Tuesday.


FOREIGN FILMS OSCAR SPECULATION AND TELLURIDE PLAYS




Clayton Davis and his crew at Awards Circuit have updates their Oscar predictions as of yesterday including an extensive look at pre-national submission guesses for Best Foreign Language Film.

I took a look at the list in the context of probable/possible films we could see at Telluride and here's what I came up with.

From the AC "Predicted Nominees" are two very probable T-ride players: Toni Erdmann and Graduation.

From the "Also in Contention" list: Julieta

From the "Other Possibilities" list: The Red Turtle.

Take a look at the complete list of predictions here:

http://www.awardscircuit.com/oscar-predictions/best-foreign-language-film/



THE GUARDIAN'S OSCAR PLAYERS AND TELLURIDE



Nigel Smith of Britain's The Guardian posted a list of 25 films that he suspects are Oscar contenders on Wednesday.  Much like the above Foreign Language Film analysis, I've gone through Smith's list and searched out the films that are probable/possible Telluride players.

From his "Front-runners": La La Land, Arrival (and maybe The Founder and The Mercy)

Not included: Arrival, Manchester by the Sea and Moonlight.

The complete post/list is here:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/aug/10/oscars-2017-predictions-movie-reviews-film-festival-favorites


TIME TO START THINKING ABOUT YOUR INNER CRITIC.



It's your annual call to rate the films you see at the Telluride Film Festival.  MTFB is once again asking YOU to participate in The People's Telluride...a gathering of film ratings from the ticket buying public at the fest.

It's simple...rate the films you see on a 1 to 5 scale (1 being awful and 5 being masterpiece) and then send those to me via email: mpgort@gmail.com or michael_speech@hotmail.com OR via the comments section here on the blog or to my twitter account @Gort2.

I'll pull it all together and publish the results a couple of weeks after the fest is in the books.

ALSO...as has become a tradition...I will also be putting together The Professionals Telluride.  I'll have more than a dozen industry pros weighing in with their ratings as well.  People from The Hollywood Reporter, Indiewire, Awards Daily, Awards Circuit, and many more will be participating.

The MTFB Ratings have provided an excellent snapshot of the reactions of the festival-goers to the program since 2012.  Here's what they have looked like in the past:

The Professionals:

2012

1) Central Park Five-4.7
2) Argo-4.5
3) Stories We Tell- 4.3
4) The Sapphires 4.25
5) (Tie) Frances Ha and The Attack- 4.2
7) Rust and Bone- 4.0
8) The Iceman- 3.8
9) At Any Price- 3.7
10) (Tie) Amour and Baraka- 3.5
12) No- 3.4
14) (Tie) Hyde Park on Hudson and The Gatekeepers 3.0
15) Everyday- 2.8

2013

1) 12 Years a Slave (4.7)
2) Blue is the Warmest Color (4.4)
3) Gravity (4.35)
4) Tim's Vermeer (4.3)
5) Nebraska (4.3)
6) All is Lost (4.2)
7) Inside Llewyn Davis (4.1)
8) Starred Up (4.0)
9) The Past (3.9)
10) Labor Day (3.6)
11) Bethlehem (3.6)
12) Prisoners (3.5)
13) The Lunchbox (3.5)
14) Salinger (3.3)
15) The Unknown Known (3.3)
16) Palo Alto (3.2)
17) Tracks (3.2)
18) Under the Skin (3.1)
18) (tie) The Wind Rises (3.1)
20) The Invisible Woman (3.0)

2014

 1)      Birdman (4.72)
 2)      Foxcatcher (4.63)
       3)      ’71 (4.25)
       4)      Wild Tales (4.20)
       5)      Leviathan (4.17)
       6)      Mr. Turner (4.10) 
       7)      The Imitation Game (4.06)
       8)      Mommy (3.92)
       9)      Two Days, One Night (3.90)
       10)    The Homesman (3.80)
       11)    Red Army (3.67)
       12)    Madame Bovary (3.30)
       13)    Wild (3.21)
       14)    Rosewater (3.06)

2015

1) ) Son of Saul (4.44)
2) Anomalisa (4.42)
3) Spotlight (4.41)
4) Steve Jobs (4.31)
5) Beasts of No Nation (4.27)
6) Carol (4.11)
7) 45 Years (4.06)
8) Taxi (4.00)
9) Black Mass (3.85)
10) Time to Choose (3.57)
11) Room (3.50)
12) Suffragette (3.49)
13) He Named Me Malala (2.83)


The People's:

2012

1) Stories We Tell- 4.80
2) Argo- 4.75
3) The Attack- 4.70
4) The Act of Killing-4.41
5) Wadjda-4.2
6) Amour 4.17
7) Barbara- 4.17
8) The Sapphires-4.11
9) Frances Ha-4.07
10) (Tie)The Hunt and Baraka - 4.00
12) Annecy Animation-3.83
13) The Central Park Five 3.75
14) (Tie) A Royal Affair and Corman's World-3.67
16) Rust and Bone-3.65
17) The Iceman- 3.61
18) The Gatekeepers-3.58
19) Superstar-3.50
20) Hyde Park on Hudson-3.33
21) No-3.21
22) Love, Marilyn-3.08
23) Ginger and Rosa-2.54
24) At Any Price-2.13
25) Everyday-2.08
26) Paradise, Love-1.1


2013

1) Tim's Vermeer (4.67)
2) 12 Years a Slave (4.55)
3) Gravity (4.40)
4) The Lunchbox (4.25)
5) Inside Llewyn Davis (4.15)
6) Nebraska (4.08)
7) All is Lost (4.06)
8) The Wind Rises (4.0)
9) Ida (4.0)
10) The Past (3.81)
11) Blue is the Warmest Color (3.75)
12) Tracks (3.64)
13) Prisoners (3.5)
14) Labor Day (3.40)
15) The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden (3.33)
16) Starred Up (3.25)
17) Palo Alto (3.20)
18) The Invisible Woman (3.19)
19) Before the Winter Chill (2.67)
20) The Unknown Known (2.43)
21) Under the Skin (2.0)

2014

1) The Imitation Game (4.73)
2) Birdman (4.46)
3) Wild Tales (4.23)
4) Foxcatcher (4.20)
5) Merchants of Doubt (4.04)
6) '71 (3.90)
7) Red Army (3.63)
8) Wild (Tie 3.50)
8) Escobar: Paradise Lost (Tie 3.50)
8) Mommy (Tie 3.50)
11) 99 Homes (3.47)
12) Rosewater (3.46)
13) Two Days, One Night (3.31)
14) Mr. Turner (3.00)
15) Madame Bovary (2.88)
16) The Homesman (2.58)

2015

1) Room (4.47)
2) Spotlight (4.45)
3) Beasts of No Nation (4.35)
4) Ixcanul (4.31)
5) Son of Saul (4.30)
6) Marguerite (4.23)
7) Black Mass (4.13)
8) Carol (4.02)
9) Rams (3.98)
10) Steve Jobs (3.86)
11) 45 Years (3.78)
12) Suffragette (3.58)
13) He Named Me Malala (3.39)
14) Anomalisa (3.36)


It seems pretty clear that you want your film to finish second in The People's ratings as the Oscar for Best Picture has gone to the film that finished with that rating each of the last four years:

12- Argo
13- 12 Years a Slave
14- Birdman
15- Spotlight

So what film will be #2 for The People this year?


That's all for Thursday.  More tomorrow including an update Ten (Plus) Bets for TFF #43.

Contact MTFB at:

mpgort@gmail.com

OR on Twitter @Gort2

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


Or leave a comment.

Thursday, July 21, 2016

The Guardian Predicts / The Euro Producers; The French-Cinecinema/Cine+ / Fences Swings for the Fences

Good Thursday World!


THE GUARDIAN PREDICTS



Britain's The Guardian posted a "40 Films We Predict Will Premiere at Venice, Toronto or Telluride" story yesterday.  The predix offer some surprises.  Breaking it down: the article bresks the 40 films into three categories-Dead Certs, Quite Likely and If It's Ready.

The piece names Telluride as a specific possibility for two films that we already know will play somewhere before the BFI/London Fest owing to their status their as European premieres: A United Kingdom and The Queen of Katwe.  United Kingdom seems to me to be the more likely T-ride player of the two.  Venice is listed as a specific designated fest probability for Planetarium while Toronto is listed for A United Kingdom, The Queen of Katwe, The Girl on the Train, Free Fire and The Seagull.

Among their "Dead Certs" the best Telluride potentials look like: Denial (from Bleeker Street which partnered with Netflix last year on Beats of No Nation), One or the other of TWC's The Founder or Lion and Arrival.  Outside T-ride shots in this category: The Secret Scripture, The Mercy and the Malick double play of Weightless and The Voyage of Time.

Interestingly, The Guardian lists Warren Beatty's Rules Don;t Apply in the Dead Cert category which is very intriguing,

In the Quite Likely category you'll fins Telluride possibilities such as HHhH and Gold (the other two Weinstein fall films...at least for the moment), 20th Century Women, War Machine (from Netflix), Wilson and How to Talk to Girls at Parties.

Among the "If It's Ready" films I don't find anything that's A) likely to be ready and B) if it is, likely to be a Telluride bound...though I'd really like to put in a word for Miss Sloane.

It's worth noting that The Guardian sponsored TFF #42.

Check the complete article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2016/jul/20/40-films-predict-premiere-venice-toronto-telluride-festivals




THE EURO PRODUCERS: THE FRENCH-CINECINEMA/CINE+



CineCinema changed over to Cine+ within the last few years but it's all the same.  This production company has often been represented at Telluride over the last few years:

2005: Lemming, Live and Become
2006: The Page Turner, Indigenes
2007: The Diving Bell and The Butterfly
2008: With a Little Help from Myself
2009: Farewell, Coco Before Chanel, A Prophet, Inferno
2010: The Illusionist, The Princess of Montpensier, Of Gods and Men
2011: Goodbye First Love, The Kid with a Bike, Le Havre, The Artist
2012: Rust and Bone, Superstar, The Attack, Amour
2013: The Past, Blue is the Warmest Color, Le Maison de la Radio
2014: The Gate. The Price of Fame, Two Days One Night, Diplomacy
2015: Marguerite

The best opportunities for Cine+ to play Telluride this year is Slack Bay.  After that their slate doesn't look, at this point, to offer a lot of other possibilities.


FENCES SWINGS FOR THE FENCES


Fences still from Deadline.com


We missed mentioning this acouple of days ago but Denzel Washington's adaptation of August Wilson's Fences has been dated for an awards season qualifying time frame.  Mutiple reports put the film which Washington both directs and stars in as being released in a limited fashion on Dec. 16 and then going wider on Dec. 25.  Fences is from Paramount which is loaded with titles for this awards season.  In addition to Fences they have Allied, Arrival and Silence.

Admittedly, Fences is an unlikely Telluride film...but you never know...

Coverage of the Fences date announcement:

http://variety.com/2016/film/news/denzel-washington-fences-december-release-1201816381/

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/denzel-washingtons-fences-snags-awards-912004

http://www.ew.com/article/2016/07/18/denzel-washington-fences-release-date

That's it for Thursday.  Come back tomorrow for the latest Telluride Ten Bets.  It's the last one before announcements from Toronto and Venice.


Contact MTFB at:

mpgort@gmail.com

OR on Twitter @Gort2

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


OR leave a comment...

Thursday, July 14, 2016

Finding The Founder / Euro Producers; The French Part One-Canal+ / A Look at La La Land / Trailering A Monster Calls / And Finally, Miss Sloane

Hello on a Thursday everyone...lots to dissect from yesterday...plus French producer Canal+


FINDING THE FOUNDER



I have spent months not concerned about whether or not John Lee Hancock's The Founder starring Michael Keaton as Ray Kroc, the man who made McDonalds into the global behemoth it is today.  Initially the film was supposed to be a November release but that changed this spring when The Weinstein Company moved its release date to August.  That move meant no Telluride, no Toronto...

Then yesterday, TWC announces that they've decided to move the film back into the thick of Awards season with a new release date of Dec. 16.

So, does that also mean it should be in the conversation for fall festivals?  My head hurts.

Here's the trailer from YouTube:



Here are any number of posts/stories about the new date change for The Founder:











EURO PRODUCERS; THE FRENCH PART ONE-CANAL+




Look at the history of Canal+ as a producer of films that played at Telluride over the last decade:

2003: The Barbarian Invasions, Dogville, Love Me If You Dare, The Tripletts of Belleville
2004: The Weeping Meadow
2005: The Child, Cache, Lemming, Live and Become
2006: Volver, Indigenes, The Page Turner
2007: The Diving Bell and The Butterfly, Terror's Advocate, Jellyfish
2008: With a Little Help From Myself, I've Loved You So Long
2009: Farewell, Coco Before Chanel, A Prophet, The White Ribbon
2010: The Illusionist, Carlos, Of Gods and Men, The Princess of Montpensier
2011: Crazy Horse, Albert Nobbs, Goodbye First Love, The Kid with a Bike, The Artist, Le Havre
2012: Rust and Bone, Superstar, The Attack
2013: Blue is the Warmest Color", Le Maison de la Radio", "The Past"
2014: The Price of Fame, Two Days One Night, Diplomacy
2015: Marguerite


Despite a connection to a single film last year, which, as you can see is anomaly, Canal+ has the chance to be represented by multiple films at Telluride in 2016.  The most likely are:

Things to Come
Elle
Slack Bay
Peshmerga


Check back tomorrow for more on French production companies.


A LOOK AT LA LA LAND



In a big news day yesterday, one of the highlights was the relelase of the first trailer for Damien Chazelle's La La Land.  The film has a lot of heat at the moment and has been announced as the opening night film for the Venice Film Fest.  A good number of people think it has a real shot at making the T-ride lineup.  The trailer intrigues.  Here it is:




And linked here is a ton of coverage that came with the trailer's release:









TRAILERING: A MONSTER CALLS




Another trailer dropping yesterday was for Focus Feature's J.A. Bayona directed A Monster Calls. It's Telluride profile was negligible until recently but has warmed somewhat in the last week or so. Check the trailer here from YouTube:




 Additionally, here's some of the coverage that accompanied the trailer's appearance:

http://www.ew.com/article/2016/07/13/monster-calls-trailer

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2016/07/12/sneak-peek-exclusive-a-monster-calls-movie/86955404/

http://theplaylist.net/theres-another-bfg-coming-new-trailer-j-bayonas-monster-calls-20160713/

http://www.thewrap.com/watch-liam-neeson-come-to-life-in-a-monster-calls-trailer-video/

https://thefilmstage.com/trailer/a-monster-calls-in-full-length-trailer-for-j-a-bayonas-fantasy-adventure/


AND FINALLY...MISS SLOANE?



Late breaking news last night was the upstart distributor EuropaCorpUSA has dated the Jessica Chastain starring John Madden (Shakespeare in Love) directed gun control drama Miss Sloane for Dec. 9.  Awards season?  Yes.  Festival possibility?  It is now.  The cast, in addition to Chastain is quite inpmressive: Mark Strong, John Lithgow, Michael Stuhlbarg, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Sam Waterston.   Note to Telluride...yes please.

Here's the news from Dealine.com and Variety:

http://deadline.com/2016/07/miss-sloane-jessica-chastain-december-release-date-1201786282/

http://variety.com/2016/film/news/jessica-chastain-miss-sloane-december-release-1201814008/


Whew...that'll be all for this Thursday...more tomorrow including a fresh Ten Bets for TFF #43

Contact MTFB at:

mpgort@gmail.com

OR on Twitter @Gort2

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


OR leave a comment...



Monday, January 18, 2016

And Now...On with the Show (The Oscar Show, that is)... / Peering into the Future / Reaching Back to TFF #37...For Some Litigation

Welcome to the new week...Oscar's First Act has concluded with last Thursday's announcement of the nominees.  Now we move to Act Two which culminates on Feb. 28th.  This period of weeks between Oscar nomination announcement and the actual awards is always a sort pf odd limbo-esque time.  The race that has been in some motion, really since the conclusion of Labor Day weekend and Telluride's fest continues but in a much different fashion.

What has been a very broad affair including many, many films is now truncated to the nominees and  as a couple of the Big Time Oscar Pundits have said since Thursday, the campaigning continues but becomes less obvious and noisy.

At the same time, this space begins to turn, a least a little bit, to its post-Oscar (and primary purpose) which is the attempt to discern some of the films that might be on the program for TFF #43.

Today's post straddles the duality of Oscar and TFF prognostication and that's where we'll be for the next five and a half weeks...

We start with...


AND NOW...ON WITH THE SHOW (THE OSCAR SHOW, THAT IS)...



So here we are 96 hours, give or take, removed from the revealing of Oscar nominations.  Ridley Scott isn't nominated.  No actors of color made it into any of the 20 acting slots.  Lenny Abrahamson IS nominated.  These are among the most discussed topics for Oscar observers these past few days.  But, of course, the other question is...who/what is going to win in a few weeks?

Not surprisingly, there's non shortage of Oscarologists with their early predictions.  I have linked Kristopher Tapley/Variety-InContention, Scott Feinberg/The Hollywood Reporter, Sasha Stone/Awards Daily and (collectively) The Gurus of Gold from Movie City News and their early line on winners below.

Some observations from looking at all of their predictions:

Spotlight remains the favorite to win Best Picture but there is some serious thought that The Big Short, The Revenant and Mad Max:Fury Road are still playing.  Most believe that The Martian, Room, Bridge of Spies and Brooklyn are not likely Best Picture winners.

Prohibitive favorites seem to be (even this far out from the actual awards):

Leonardo DiCaprio/The Revenant for Best Actor
Brie Larson/Room for Best Actress
Sylvester Stallone/Creed for Best Supporting Actor
Tom McCarthy and Josh Singer/Spotlight for Original Screenplay
Adam McKay and Charles Randolph/The Big Short for Best Original Screenplay
Amy for Best Documentary
Son of Saul for Best Foreign Language Film
Inside Out for Best Animated Feature


These eight picks seem pretty solid already.  Some others seem very likely (Mad Max:Fury Road looks good for Film Editing and Production Design for example) but aren't what I would call locks. Of course, some categories seem very, very competitive: Original Score and Song for example.

The FAC will be periodically updating Oscar predictions as we move through these next few weeks. Check back here.  You might remember that, last year, The FAC hit 20 of 24 categories on Oscar night and 22 of 24 in 2014.

Here are your links to The Gurus, Tapley, Feinberg and Stone:

http://moviecitynews.com/2016/01/gurus-o-gold-nomination-day-part-1-of-2/

http://variety.com/2015/film/in-contention/oscar-predictions-oscars-academy-awards-1201600870/

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/awards/predictions/oscars/2015/academy-awards-11416/

http://www.awardsdaily.com/


PEERING INTO THE FUTURE



One of the ways I get the ball rolling in earnestness about Telluride film speculation is to analyze the first of the year "Most Anticipated" film lists from a variety of outlets and look for titles that seem T-ride possible.  Today. I begin that process by looking at The Playlist's list of 100 films they're most excited about.  Among the titles they include are 20 that seem like they might SHOW up on Labor Day weekend.  Here they are with their position on The Playlist list (and an occasional comment):

#96 A United Kingdom
#95 True Crimes
#93 Trespass Against Us
#92 The Zookeeper's Wife
#89 Queen of Katme
#83 The Founder (the story of Ray Kroc and the development of McDonalds starring Michael Keaton)...It's high on my Telluride request list...
#74 Neruda
#62 The Promise
#61 Gold
#60 Comancheria
#51 HHHH
#45 Salt and Fire (Herzog returns to Telluride?)
#38 Personnel Shopper
#28 Passengers (this really isn't all that likely... save for the fact that its Morten Tyldum's directorial follow-up to The Imitation Game).
#23 American Honey
#19 The Unknown Girl
#18 It's Only the End of the World
#9 The Lost City of Z
#5 The Salesman (the latest from Iranian genius Asghar Farhadi.  After both A Separation and The Past playing Telluride, you have to believe that this is very likely.  It might start out at the #1 spot when I actually begin putting together a Telluride #43 list in June).
#3 War Machine (this lands on the list because it's in the hands of Netflix which made its debut at Telluride last year with Beasts of No Nation and Winter on Fire.  I think there's a decent shot that they'll be back).

So there are 20 films from The Playlist list.  If my past record at extrapolating from The Playlist is any indicator we can expect that five will make the Telluride lineup.  Last year's parsing of The Playlist 100 included these films that I wrote could play T-ride: Beasts of No Nation, Black Mass, Suffragette, Spotlight and Carol.  In 2014, with the same circumstances, I mentioned: Leviathan, Mr. Turner, Two Days One Night, Birdman and Foxcatcher.




Here's the link to The Playlist's complete hot 100 FOR 2016:

http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/the-100-most-anticipated-films-of-2016-20160104


Thursday, I'll take a look at The Film Stage's list of  100 2016 films.


REACHING BACK TO TFF #37...FOR SOME LITIGATION



Remember Tabloid?  Errol Morris' look at one time beauty queen Joyce McKinney?  It was one of my favorite films of TFF #37(2010).

Now, it looks like we may hear about it again some five years later as the subject of the documentary, Ms. McKinney has decided to sue Morris.

Her claim is that she was lied to and disparaged in the film.  Check out the story from The Hollywood Reporter:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/errol-morris-heads-trial-irate-854823


That's a wrap for Monday...more to come on Thursday...


Contact me at:

michael_speech@hotmail.com OR

mpgort@gmail.com OR

via Twitter @Gort2 OR to


Monday, March 2, 2015

More Guesses at Oscar 88/Salt of the Earth Trailer/Acquisitions of Interest

Good Monday World...hope you had a good weekend.


MORE GUESSES AT OSCAR 88



 Anne Thompson/Thompson on Hollywood and Joey Magidson/The Hollywood News came out with their incredibly early crystal ball look at what films might be playing for Oscar glory for 2015.

Find those predictions here:

http://blogs.indiewire.com/thompsononhollywood/oscar_predicts_chart


http://www.hollywoodnews.com/2015/02/27/year-in-advance-oscar-predictions/

Thompson's picks that could have some Telluride play potential include: "45 Years", "Black Mass", "Carol", "The Danish Girl", "Demolition", "Icon", "The Last Face", "Midnight Special", "Our Brand is Crisis", "The Revenant", "Southpaw", "Steve Jobs", "Demolition" "Trumbo", "Macbeth",  "Truth" and "The Hateful Eight".

Magidson's lists each Oscar category and what he views as the most likely nominees with additional possibilities listed.  He lists 10 possible Best Picture nominees plus an additional 15 films that could get a BP nomination.  From that list, these are the films with the highest Telluride potential (Many of which you'll see above on Thompson's list):

"Our Brand is Crisis", "The Hateful Eight", "The Revenant", "Steve Jobs", "Demolition", "Carol", "Black Mass", "Freeheld", "Southpaw",and "Macbeth".


TRAILER FOR "SALT OF THE EARTH"




FirstShowing.net posted a story and the trailer for Wim Wenders TFF #41 Oscar nominated documentary "The Salt of the Earth"  Check the story and the trailer here:


http://www.firstshowing.net/2015/watch-trailer-for-sebastiao-salgados-the-salt-of-the-earth-doc/



ACQUISITIONS OF INTEREST



Two deals went down this week that could conceivably set the stage for films that are in the works to ultimately make their way to the San Juans in the next year or two.  we found out that The Weinstein Company has acquired the distribution for the upcoming McDonald's mogul (Ray Kroc) biopic starring recent Oscar nominee Michael Keaton (PS...saw "Theory of Everything" this weekend...Keaton was robbed).  The film is currently titled "The Founder" and is set to be directed by John Lee Hancock ("The Blind Side").

Here's that story from Variety:

http://variety.com/2015/film/news/weinstein-co-buys-michael-keatons-mcdonalds-movie-the-founder-1201443179/


Also of interest was the news that Kino Lorber had picked up distribution for Berlin film fest winner "Taxi" from Iranian guerrilla film maker Jafar Panahi.  Kino Lorber was last represented at Telluride in 2013 with "Manuscripts Don't Burn".

Here's the announcement from Variety and Ioncinema:

http://variety.com/2015/film/news/berlin-winner-taxi-bought-for-u-s-by-kino-lorber-1201441629/


http://www.ioncinema.com/news/acquisitions-foreign-films/kino-lorber-get-behind-the-wheel-of-panahis-taxi



More on Thursday...