Beanpole Back In? / Motherless Blitz Is On / Varda Has a Date / IMDb Reveals ? / Current Bets

Tuesday...One Week...3 Days...

BEANPOLE BACK IN?

If you've been reading this space closely the last few days, you know that there has been some confusion concerning whether either Beanpole or The Truth might play Telluride after both films were listed as North American premieres last week in an announcement of films for the Toronto International Film Fest.

I'd had Beanpole as fairly certain for TFF #46 as a result of its status as "New York" premieres in the NYFF announcement of their lineup back on Aug. 8th.

Now Jeff Wells at Hollywood Elsewhere says Beanpole is in for Telluride after all.  Here's a screenshot from his site that he posted last night:

So...Beanpole goes back on the Bonus Bets list on Friday and I am still thinking The Truth has a real shot to be at TFF #46 after it opens the Venice Fest next week.

Well's complete post is linked here.

MOTHERLESS BLITZ IS ON

I'm morally certain that Edward Norton's Motherless Brooklyn will screen in Telluride next week.  The film is known to be set to screen at Toronto (where it is listed as an International Premiere) and New York.  Clearly as a run up to what will be its first public screening at TFF #46, the film was all over the P.R. trail yesterday.

Katey rich writing for Vanity Fair talked to director/screen writer and star of the film Edward Norton.  That article was posted yesterday by VF and you can find it linked here.  Included in that article are the first looks of the period set film that IMDb lists as a Crime/Drama.

The IMDb logline tells us that the film focuses on a private detective who has Tourette's Syndrome and is striving to solve the murder of his partner.  Also starring in the film are Willem Dafoe, Alec Baldwin, Bruce Willis and Leslie Mann.

Both The Playlist and Indiewire piggy-backed on the Vanity Fair story (as I'm doing).  You can find their added reportage linked here:

Indiewire

The Playlist

In addition to the photo above, VF also included these stills from the film:

Motherless Brooklyn is set to be released on Nov. 1st.

VARDA HAS A DATE

Janus Pictures has acquired the U.S. rights to distribute the final film of Agnes Varda's career-Varda by Agnes- and have announced that the film...which will be playing Telluride (he says authoritatively-based on its status for the New York Film Fest as a "New York" premiere)...will open in the U.S. on Nov. 22nd in New York.  The film will then expand nationally in the following weeks.

Janus also announced that a massive retrospective of Varda's career will be launched at Lincoln Center in NYC on Dec. 20th.

Coverage of the date announcement was provided yesterday from The Hollywood Reporter and The Playlist.

IMDB REVEALS...

Yesterday an eagle eyed follower of MTFB pointed out to me that some films have a Telluride date included in there IMDb release date profile.  The initial discovery was on IMDb Pro but after some skulking about, I found that it was also discernible on the more easily accessed IMDb website.  

The specific film that the reader was pointing to was Ford v. Ferrari.  I was able to find the same TFF conformation for Marriage Story, The Two Popes and Uncut Gems.  

I also ran through every film that I have currently in the latest Ten Bets and Bonus Bets but only these four came up with Telluride listed in their release plans.

Suffice it to say that I'll keep going back to this source over the next few days to find out if it will reveal any more TFF #46 information.

Check date info for yourself as follows:

Ford v. Ferrari

Uncut Gems

Marriage Story

The Two Popes

CURRENT TEN BETS AND BONUS BETS

10) The Aeronauts
9) Ford v. Ferrari
8) The Two Popes
7) Judy
6) Pain and Glory
5) Uncut Gems
4) Portrait of a Lady on Fire
3) Motherless Brooklyn
2) Marriage Story
1) Parasite


Bonus Bets:

Bonus 1) Varda by Agnes
Bonus 2) First Cow
Bonus 3) A Hidden Life
Bonus 4) The Report
Bonus 5) The Kingmaker
Bonus 6) The Climb
Bonus 7) Waves
Bonus 8) Lyrebird
Bonus 9) Verdict


THE PEOPLE'S TELLURIDE

For the eighth consecutive year MTFB is soliciting your input for The People's Telluride.  All you have to do is watch films during the fest and then, when it's all over, report to me your assessment of each film on a 1-5 scale with 1 being "UGH!" and 5 being "GREAT".


Report your ratings with any of the following contact methods:


EMAIL:  mpgort@gmail.com OR michael_speech@hotmail.com

TWITTER @Gort2 (and follow me there as well)

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News from New York and Toronto / World of Reel and Hollywood Elsewhere Add to the Stack / And One More Thing...

Thursday...Three weeks and a day...



NEWS FROM NEW YORK AND TORONTO

New York announced its Main Slate lineup on Tuesday and I had the ramifications up on Twitter fairly quickly and a Late Breaking post here on the blog by late Tuesday afternoon.  By way of reminder, here's what I had Tuesday afternoon from NYFF:

New York Film Fest announcement seems to confirm or point to these films as Telluride players:

Marriage Story
Motherless Brooklyn
Beanpole
First Cow
Pain and Glory
Parasite
Portrait of a Woman on Fire
Varda by Agnes


Via Matt Neglia of Next Best Picture:

Not going to Telluride...

Atlantics
Bacurau
Fire Will Come
A Girl Missing
I Was at Home, But
Liberté
Martin Eden
Moneychanger
Oh Mercy!
Saturday Fiction
Sibyl
Synonyms
To the Ends of the Earth
The Traitor
Vitalina Varela
Wasp Network
Wild Goose Lake
Young Ahmed
Zombi Child

And it seems the only NYFF World Premiere is The Irishman.

Full disclosure...my tweet on Tuesday regarding Telluride films suggested or confirmed included The Whistlers.  On Twitter it was pointed out to me by @BobertHarris that The Whistlers will U.S. Premiere will be at Fantastic Fest.  That would explain the lack of premiere designation in the NYFF announcement.  My apologies.

The above list reflects that realization.

The biggest info regarding films that now appear likely for Telluride were the inclusion of  Varda by Agnes, First Cow and Beanpole.

Films that had been seriously on my TFF #46 radar that now seem certain to not be at Telluride are: Atlantics, Synonyms, Bacurau, The Traitor, Wasp Network and Young Ahmed.  So...three up and six down.

Meanwhile, Toronto announced its ten film platform lineup with nine of the ten films listed as World Premieres thus ruling them all out.  Martin Eden, the only film listed as an International Premiere underlines the NYFF announcement which had ruled it out for Telluride.

Honestly, the only Platform film that TIFF announced that I had thought might show at The SHOW was Sarah Gavron's Rocks.


So, that's what we learned on Tuesday from other fest announcements.

Here's the official lineup announcement from the Film Society of New York.

Additionally, from Indiewire, this is the Toronto Platform section news.



WORLD OF REEL AND HOLLYWOOD ELSEWHERE ADD TO THE STACK

Between Jordan Ruimy's latest Telluride spec post (yesterday) and Jeff Welles posting about it yesterday as well, it looks like we can probably add Terrence Malick's latest film, A Hidden Life to our list of Telluride probables.  Wells says that he "was in fact told that it will screen at Telluride".  That's a big get as far as I'm concerned. 

Additionally, both Ruimy and Wells suggest that Scott Burns The Report is a real possibility.  I'm thinking it's likely. 

I can reveal that The Report was the film I was referencing in my post last Tuesday under the heading "Trafficking in Rumor".

I recall suggesting this Sundance title as my preferred film form that fest for T-ride to make an exception for in as far as its previous play in Utah.  You can find that suggestion from me in my post from Jan. 31st.


Honestly, between the New York, Toronto announcements and Wells and Ruimy...the last couple of days have been a gold mine of useful information.  Seems like the next thing we should hear is the actual schedule from Venice which I expect any day now.

Here's the link to the Hollywood Elsewhere post.

And to the World of Reel post, which graciously shouts out MTFB...thanks Jordan!



AND ONE MORE THING...

In addition to the detective work the last couple of days it has been a hell of a good time having responses from people guessing what the "Trafficking in Rumor" film might be. 

Several readers dropped me a note in a variety of ways...Twitter, email note to Facebook with questions and guesses.  Far and away the leading guess was Little Women.

Noop.

The clues that actually pointed to The Report were that it's "curiously related" to a film that we're "very sure" is playing the fest...which is, ironically Noah Baumbach's Marriage Story...as Adam Driver stars in both films.  The other clue was that I had mentioned the film earlier...see the note above about my Sundance suggestion back on Jan. 31st.

Again, the buzz is that Little Women is not likely to play any fest prior to its Dec. 25th premiere date.  That said, if you'd like to re-visit my fantasy scenario for the Greta Gerwig film, that was in my post from last Monday.


Here's the current Ten Bets with Bonus Bets:


10) The Aeronauts
9) Ford v. Ferrari
8) The Two Popes
7) Pain and Glory
6) Uncut Gems
5) Judy
4) Motherless Brooklyn
3) Marriage Story
2) Portrait of a Lady on Fire
1) Parasite

"Bonus Bets":

Bonus 1) The Truth
Bonus 2) Varda by Agnes
Bonus 3) First Cow
Bonus 4) Family Romance LLC
Bonus 5) Country Music


Got a new Ten Bets plus Bonus Bets coming tomorrow!



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Not an Official Journalist but Still a Guru / Trafficking in Rumor / TFF Is in Men's Journal's Top Ten / Quick Notes

Tuesday.

NOT AN OFFICIAL JOURNALIST BUT STILL A GURU

As many of you know, I was denied "journalist" status for this year's festival.  That happened over three weeks ago.

But, I have been asked back by Movie City News to participate again this year as one their Gurus of Gold.  I'll be tasked with making "educated" predictions for this year's Oscar season.  MCN Guru guru Ray Pride emailed me, as well as other past Gurus, last Thursday.

As you might expect, I accepted the invitation.

I'm not sure yet when the Guru-ing will commence but you can be sure I'll be letting you know here when I do know.

Incidentally, it's also likely that I'll be writing an occasional Oscar-centric article or two for another film-centric web outfit but I'm going to keep that under cover until that's more assured.

TRAFFICKING IN RUMOR

Sooo...I'm relatively certain that I have a line on another film that will be playing the 46th iteration of the Telluride Film Festival.  This is one of those "All the President's Men" things.  I have two independent sources telling me that a film that is currently NOT an expected title, is currently NOT on my latest Ten Bets or Bonus Bets list but IS a film that I mentioned before.

I can also tell you that this mystery film is curiously related to a film that we are very sure will play the fest.

I'm hesitant to name the film without one more piece of corroboration and I'm spooking around for that.

Should the film pan out, it could well be an Oscar player (at least a couple of Oscar prediction sites have the film in their early predictions list).

More as it develops...if it develops.

TFF IS IN MEN'S JOURNAL'S TOP TEN

Men's Journal recently published an article entitled "The 10 Best Summer Festivals in America" and making the list is the one and only Telluride Film Festival.

The article names TFF as "one of the most prestigious" film festivals.

The article also includes the following fests:

Summerfest-Milwaukee, WI.

Taste of Chicago-Chicago, IL.

Vermont Brewers Festival, Burlington, VT.

The Great Taste of the Midwest, Madison, WI.

Made in America Music Festival, Philadelphia, PA.

Feast Portland, Portland, OR.

Wanderlust Festival, Chicago, IL.

Beer, Bourbon and BBQ-Multiple Locations

Newport Folk Festival, Newport, VA.

The complete article with links to all of the festivals is linked here.

QUICK NOTES

***The New York Film Fest is supposed to announce the rest of their main slate films today at noon eastern time.  I'll likely post an update here with the ramifications of that announcement as soon as possible.

***Jordan Ruimy wrote at World of Reel yesterday that Agnes Varda's swan song-Varda by Agnes-will play Telluride as well as Toronto and New York.  The NYFF announcement later today may provide a confirmation.  We'll see.

***Deadline reports that Gavin O'Connor's The Way Back (formerly Torrance) starring Ben Affleck has been moved by Warners to March, 2020.  That likely means we can take it off the list of possible films for TFF consideration.


Here's the current Ten Bets with Bonus Bets:


10) The Aeronauts
9) Ford v. Ferrari
8) The Two Popes
7) Pain and Glory
6) Uncut Gems
5) Judy
4) Motherless Brooklyn
3) Marriage Story
2) Portrait of a Lady on Fire
1) Parasite

"Bonus Bets":

Bonus 1) The Truth
Bonus 2) Varda by Agnes
Bonus 3) First Cow
Bonus 4) Family Romance LLC
Bonus 5) Country Music


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75 Films That Could Make the TFF #46 Lineup / Venetian Choices / Varda By Agnes English Trailer / Beautiful Day News / New Stills for Ada Astra /

Hope you had a good weekend... and also a big thank you to all of you that reached out in some fashion to offer condolences regarding the denial of my request for media accreditation for this year's Telluride Film Festival.


75 FILMS THAT COULD MAKE THE TFF #46 LINEUP

From the "Throw Everything Against the Wall and See What Sticks" Dept.: here, in alphabetical order, are 75 titles that could be named to the lineup for The SHOW:

1917
Ad Astra
The Aeronauts
Ahmed
Atlantics 
Bacurau
Bad Education
A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood
Bergman Island
Blackbird
By the Grace of God
The Climb
Country Music/Ryman Concert
Dry Run (Todd Haynes film)
Ema
Fair and Balanced
Falling
Family LLC
First Cow
Ford vs. Ferrari
Forman vs. Forman
Frankie
The Goldfinch
The Good Liar
Harriet
A Hidden Life
John Prine: Hello in There
Jojo Rabbit
Joker
Judy
Just Mercy
Kajillionaire
The Kindness of Strangers
The King
The Last Thing He Wanted
The Laundromat
Les Miserables
Light of My Life
The Lighthouse
Little Women
Long Time Coming
Lucy in the Sky
Mainstream
Marriage Story
Matthias and Maxime
Mr. Jones
Molly
Motherless Brooklyn
The Nest
Never, Rarely, Sometimes, Always
Nomadland
Pain and Glory
Parasite
The Personal History of David Copperfield 
The Pope
Port Authority
Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Queen + Slim
Radioactive
The Report
Sebring
Sorry We Missed You
Synonyms
Torrance
The True History of the Kelly Gang
The Truth
The Two Glorias: Life on the Road
Uncut Gems
Untitled Miranda July Film
Varda by Agnes
Wasp Network
Wendy
Where Is Anne Frank?
The Whistlers
Who You Think I Am


And bonus...New Looney Tunes Cartoons...


VENETIAN CHOICES?

World of Reel's Jordan Ruimy thinks he's got the bead on Venetian titles due to what seemed like an errant Tweet yesterday from what Ruimy deems a very credible source.

Among titles he rattles off that also could make the Venice/Telluride connection are:

Soderbergh's The Laundromat, Reichardt's First Cow, Gray's Ad Astra, Waititi's Jojo Rabbit, Larrian's Ema and Baumbach's Marriage Story.

Jordan's full story is linked here.



VARDA BY AGNES HAS AN ENGLISH TRAILER


Ahead of announcements this week that I suspect will reveal where this final film from Agnes Varda lands comes an English dubbed trailer.


Here that is from YouTube:

And a poster as well:

Here's coverage of the trailer release from:

FirstShowing.net

The Playlist

The Film Stage

BEAUTIFUL DAY NEWS

Over the weekend I ran across a couple of articles about Marielle Heller's upcoming A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood starring Tom Hanks as Fred Rogers.  Also, coming later today we should see the first trailer for the film.  That, to me, pre-sages the likelihood that some festival is going to announce the film in the next few days.  Toronto announces its first wave tomorrow and Venice announces on Thursday.

Here's the articles from the weekend from Entertainment Weekly  and The Wrap.

I am anticipating that I'll be able to tweet the trailer later today and also expect to include it in tomorrow's post.

NEW STILLS FOR AD ASTRA

On the Red Carpet tweeted new photos from James Gray's Ad Astra-again, another film that we should know more about by the time we get to the end of the week in terms of where it lands or if it lands fest-wise.

Here's a sample of a couple of the new looks:

That's your Monday...more tomorrow including news from Toronto.

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Agnes Varda 1928-2019 / Garrone's Big Weekend

I hope it is a good day for you today...


AGNES VARDA 1928-2019

Hard news over the weekend as cinephiles the world over learned of and mourned the passing of  revered filmmaker Agnes Varda.

Varda was a giant of European cinema as one of the prominent voices that emerged with the French New Wave.

Varda was an Oscar nominee for Best Documentary for her 2017 collaboration with artist JR: Faces Places which played at TFF #43.  Varda also was a recipient of an Honorary Oscar.  She was among TFF's first tribute recipients being recognized at the 4th Telluride Film Festival.  Here's a snap of the entry for her tribute from the official TFF #4 program:

Tributes and reminiscences poured in from the film community from around the world over the weekend and I have linked several of those below:

Peter DeBruge/Variety

Mekado Murphy/The New York Times

Melanie Goodfellow/Screen Daily

Zack Sharf/Indiewire

Rhett Bartlett/The Hollywood Reporter

Jordan Raup/The Film Stage

Peter White/Deadline

MOMA Curator Laurence Kardish writing for Indiewire

Multiple sources from The Guardian

And here is Varda's IMDb page with video tribute

It wouldn't surprise me that Varda could have the TFF #46 program dedicated to her in five months much like Pierre Rissient last year.  I had already thought that some version of her latest and last film, Varda by Agnes (listed by IMDb as a television series),  which screened at the Berlin Fest in February, might show up as a part of the TFF #46 program and with her death, I suspect that becomes even more likely.  That is unless the producers/distributors choose to release it in the U.S. before Labor Day weekend.

One other note...among my favorite things to stumble across as I was preparing this story was the IMDb entry for Varda's 1967 documentary short Uncle Yanco which featured none other than Tom Luddy.  Yes.  There's a picture and a credit and the description mentions that the two were friends.  Here's the pictorial evidence:

               

GARRONE'S BIG WEEKEND

Word this weekend that Matteo Garrone's Dogman, which played TFF #45 fared very well at the David di Doantello Awards picking up nine trophies out of a total of 15 nominations including Best Picture, Direction and Screenplay.  The David di Donatello Awards are described by Varitey as Italy's equivalent of the Oscars.

Variety's coverage of those awards is linked here.

Meanwhile, almost simultaneously, we got our first glimpse of Garrone's next project...a live action version of Pinocchio starring Oscar winner Roberto Begnini.

Here's a pic of Begnini as Pinocchio's creator Geppeto:

Still via Greta De Lazzaris via The Hollywood Reporter

THR reports that Garrone plans to wrap principal photography by May... which could mean that with a quick turnaround...maybe people might see it as early as Labor Day...just saying...

Coverage is linked here from:

The Hollywood Reporter

The Playlist

That's a wrap for this sad Monday.  I'll have more on Thursday...


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Updated Oscar Predictions for Seven Categories / New Gurus of Gold / You Can't Rule It Out / First Look at Berlin's First Film

Good Thursday to all you TFF fans...


UPDATED OSCAR PREDICTIONS FOR SEVEN CATEGORIES

ANIMATED FEATURE FILM

1) Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse
2) Incredibles 2
3) Isle of Dogs
4) Mirai
5) Ralph Breaks the Internet

ORIGINAL SCORE

1) If Beale Street Could Talk
2) Mary Poppins Returns
3) Isle of Dogs
4) Black Panther
5) BlacKkKlansman

ORIGINAL SONG

1) Shallow/A Star Is Born
2) All the Stars/Black Panther
3) I'll Fight/RBG
4) The Place Where Lost Things Go/Mary Poppins Returns
5) When a Cowboy Trades His Spurs for Wings/The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

CINEMATOGRAPHY

1) Roma
2) Cold War
3) A Star Is Born
4) The Favourite
5) Never Look Away

COSTUMES

1) The Favourite
2) Mary Poppins Returns
3) Black Panther
4) Bohemian Rhapsody
5) The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

PRODUCTION DESIGN

1) The Favourite
2) Black Panther
3) Mary Poppins Returns
4) First Man
5) Roma

FILM EDITING

1) Vice
2) BlacKkKlansman
3) The Favourite
4) Bohemian Rhapsody
5) Green Book

NEW GURUS OF GOLD

Here's the link to the latest Oscar predictions from The Gurus of Gold at Movie City News.  They're linked here.  I'm in relatively good shape in as far as the collective predictions are concerned except in Film Editing where I'm way, way in a different place than the rest of the Gurus.

YOU CAN'T RULE IT OUT

I started seeing hints on Twitter the last couple of days that Martin Scorsese's The Irishman will likely have a theatrical release in September (perhaps late September) before its streaming release on Netflix, which is the money behind the film.  Jordan Ruimy of World of Reel tweeted this on Tuesday night:

Additionally, Ruimy posted a short story on his site which you can see here.

Of course, should this prove out, then the film, which is probably the most anticipated film of the year, has a window to screen at Telluride as well as Venice (if it doesn't screen in Cannes and my money says it screens at Cannes...assuming that fest and Netflix can come to some sort of mutually acceptable set of conditions-see my last post from Feb. 4th) and Toronto.

Making this all the more possible is the success this season of the Netflix produces Roma and should Roma ultimately win the Best Picture Oscar in two and a half weeks the chances of a T-ride play probably increase.

Stay tuned...

FIRST LOOK AT BERLIN'S FIRST FILM

Lone Scherfig's The Kindness of Strangers will open the Berlin Film Fest today.  The film is one of the Berlin titles that seems to me to have potential to be selected for The SHOW's 2019 lineup.

Deadline reported Tuesday that the film's producers have released a trailer for the film.  You can find that story and the embedded trailer here.

The Kindness of Strangers stars Zoe Kazan, Caleb Landry Jones, Andrea Riseborough and Bill Nighy and, in addition to opening the fest, will be one of the film's in competition for the Golden Bear.

Meanwhile, here is more coverage of the Berlinale from Indiewire with a story from David Ehrlich, Kate Erbland and Jude Dry looking at what they say are the ten most anticipated titles of the fest including several that are on my TFF #46 watch list including Mr. Jones, By the Grace of God, The Golden Glove and Varda by Agnes.


That's your MTFB update for this Thursday.  I'll have more on Monday.


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