I'm Not Too Bright... / Telluride a Hot Destination? / Cannes Critical Response / A Hint on a Short

 I'M NOT TOO BRIGHT

Well, I'm silly.  If you read last Thursday's post, you know I had a whole chunk about how I was thinking that the Val Kilmer documentary "Val" might be  a Telluride selection.  I even boldly put it into last week's Ten Bets at the # 9 spot. 

It was less than 24 hours later that I found that Val has been dated (by Amazon) for an August release. That clearly puts the kibosh on that notion.  I should have been better on my due diligence.  Mea Culpa!

Anyway, I guess Amazon will have a limited release on July 23rd and Amazon subscribers will be able to see the film on August 6th.

TELLURIDE A HOT DESTINATION?

For the past several weeks, there has been a low level buzz that Telluride and Venice both will benefit from some reluctance on the part of film makers to make plans to debut a film in Toronto due to Canada's approach to Covid-19.  Now, with the Delta variant raising numbers, there is some thought that could further push big name films to either Telluride or Venice or both,

Jeff Wells raises that notion in a post on his website Hollywood Elsewhere writing:

"The word along the Croisette is that certain distributors have either pulled their films out of the 2021 Toronto Film Festival or are seriously thinking about same. Why? Because (a) the Telluride and Venice festivals, unlike Toronto, are not leaning on streaming, and (b) distributors greatly prefer live-audience projection screenings."

We should be getting some serious hard info soon as Toronto is set to announce it's first wave of films on July 20th, a week from tomorrow.  That assumes that TIFF announces films with their premiere status designated but I wonder if that will happen this year.  TIFF has already named 13 films that will play there and did so with no premiere designation.  So, who knows?

CANNES CRITICAL RESPONSE

As the second week of the Cannes Film Festival gets ready to launch, let's check in with how critics' panels are reacting to the Plame d'Or competition films.

Ioncinema's panel has Leos Carax's Annette on top.  Here's the latest chart:

And the link to the Ioncinema article.

Screen Daily has Annette on top as well.

Screen Daily's Critics' Panel is linked here.

Reini Urban has Jauques Audiard's Paris 13th District on top but that's with only a single review.

Reini Urban's compilation.

Check back on Thursday for updated critical response.

A HINT ON A SHORT

I ran across a tweet this weekend that lead me to a news story about a short film called Mark of the Butterfly.  The reason I mention it here is that the film maker Chris Carter seems to imply in the news article from South Carolina television station WLTX that the film could play T-ride.  From the article:

"Carter has submitted Mark of the Butterfly to eight different film festivals. He says those festivals have strict rules about premiering it after submitting it. It will officially be able to be seen after the Telluride Film Festival in September."

So, he doesn't actually say that's it's playing Telluride but he sure implies it.

From the same article, here is the description of the film:

"It's about a high-powered attorney, who is one of the top attorneys in the state," explained Carter. "Now, she's up for a prestigious job as the district attorney, but she is suffering from lupus."

The complete article is linked here.

And, from YouTube, here's a trailer for the film:

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Ten Bets #3 for TFF #48 / Thinking Val is a Possible / Teasers and Trailers from Cannes

 TEN BETS FOR TFF #48

Another week closer and a few alterations to this week's Ten Bets,  Here's where I was last week:

1) The Power of the Dog/Campion

2) Muhammad Ali/Burns. Burns and McMahon

3) The Story of Looking/Cousins

4) Madres Paralelas (Parallel Mothers)/Almodovar

5) The Card Counter/Schrader

6) The Storms of Jeremy Thomas/Cousins

7) Nightmare Alley/Del Toro

8) A Hero/Farhadi

9) The Velvet Underground/Haynes

10) Cow/Arnold

Other Possibles: Dune, Julia, Mothering Sunday, Petite Maman, Where Is Anne Frank?, Paris 13th District and The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Blonde and Bergman Island.

After this last week, here's the look at my latest Ten Bets:

1) The Power of the Dog/Campion

2) Muhammad Ali/Burns. Burns and McMahon

3) Something(s) from Mark Cousins***

4) Madres Paralelas (Parallel Mothers)/Almodovar

5) The Card Counter/Schrader

6) The Velvet Underground/Haynes

7) Nightmare Alley/Del Toro

8) A Hero/Farhadi

9) Val/Poo, Scott

10) Mothering Sunday/Husson

Other Possibles: Dune, Julia,  Petite Maman, Where Is Anne Frank?, Paris 13th District and The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Blonde, Cow, House of Gucci, The Last Duel and Bergman Island.

***With what appears now to be three separate projects that could play at Telluride, you have to think Cousins is there with something and maybe all things:

The Story of Looking

The Storms of Jeremy Thomas

The Story of Film: The Next Generation

Will update again next Thursday.

THINKING VAL IS POSSIBLE

A flurry of positive responses out of Cannes and the combo of A24 and Amazon Studios is making me think a TFF bid for the documentary Val-about actor Val Kilmer- could be in the offing.  You can see above how serious I am as I included the film as one of this week's Ten Bets at #9.

The doc reportedly makes use of hundreds of hours of footage shot by Kilmer himself.

Here's the Cannes trailer from YouTube:

TEASERS AND TYRAILERS FROM CANNES

In addition to the Val trailer, here's a sampling of other teasers and trailers out as a result of Cannes' kickoff that could also play Telluride.  All clips via YouTube:

WHERE IS ANNE FRANK

THE VELVET UNDERGROUND

DECEPTION

LAMB

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Indiewire's Cannes Analysis Intrigues / Exploring Amazon / Images from Cannes Films / The Greatest at T-ride?

 INDIEWIRE'S CANNES ANALYSIS INTRIGUES

As I do each year, once the dust had settled from the announcement of the Cannes lineup last Thursday, I began looking at what industry focused websites were saying about the films chosen and not chosen trying to glom onto some nuggets that could point the way to possible Telluride titles.  The most intriguing, to me at any rate, was Eric Kohn's piece for Indiewire.  Here are some nuggets of interest from that article for those of us who are Telluride junkies.

1) The French Dispatch news...If you've been reading here the last couple of years, you've likely picked up on the notion that I'm hot to see this film play T-ride.  Wes Anderson snuck Rushmore into Telluride in 1998 and hasn't been back since.  I have been thinking that there was a chance that Anderson might return to Telluride last year and then again this year with the film and Kohn adds some fuel to that fire as he writes:

"Cannes held the door open for... titles that wanted to wait. “The French Dispatch,” Wes Anderson’s imaginary vision of 20th-century journalists, has been one of Searchlight’s most promising new titles for some time. The movie was set for a Cannes premiere last year and would have later played Telluride"

Yes indeed, Kohn reports that "Dispatch" would have played TFF #47 had it happened.  To me that suggests the possibility that last year's plan could become this year's reality.  Other factors suggesting that it might play: From Searchlight, already announced fall release date post-Telluride (Oct. 22) and no suggestion of its premiere status re: its announced play at the New York Film Fest.

2) Films NOT in Cannes (barring something still to be announced-and there are other films that are still to be announced):

Dune

Soggy Bottom

The Power of the Dog

The Card Counter

Spencer

All or none of which might land a slot at Venice and then???

3) A couple of docs to keep an on: Kohn mentions a few documentaries that we maybe should keep an eye on moving toward Labor Day weekend.

The Val Kilmer doc "Val" is one.  Andrea Arnold's Cow, Todd Haynes The Velvet Underground and Oliver Stone's JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass all seem like possibilities.

The complete Indiewire story is linked here.

EXPLORING AMAZON

My look at film distributors that have had a significant presence at Telluride over the past five years continues today with Amazon Studios.

Here's their complete past at TFF:

2016: Manchester by the Sea

2017: Wonderstruck

2018: Cold War. Peterloo

2019: The Aeronauts, The Report

2020: All In; The Fight for Democracy

Best shots at TFF #48:

The Electrical Life of Louis Wain

Being the Ricardos (if it's done)

Val (see above)

AND...if the MGM deal is done and Amazon has control of the MGM inventory???  In play could be:

The Untitled Paul Thomas Anderson project (Soggy Bottom)

Ridley Scott's House of Gucci

George Miller's Three Thousand Years of Longing

Joe Wright's Cyrano

IMAGES FROM CANNES FILMS

The Film Stage has put together a collection of images from a number of the films that were announced for Cannes last week including some for films that might make the cut for TFF #48.

Examples: The French Dispatch:

And Andrea Arnold's Cow:

Check out some of the other images at The Film Stage linked here.

THE GREATEST AT T-RIDE?

Over the weekend I saw that PBS had dropped a teaser for the latest documentary from Ken Burns; Florentine Films: Muhammad Ali.

The teaser reveals that the doc will land on Sept. 19th which suggests that we could have a shot a seeing it in the San Juans over Labor Day weekend.

Here's the link to the teaser imbedded in a Tweet from PBS:

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