The Berlin International Film Festival added nine titles to its 2013 competition lineup, including Steven Soderbergh ‘s latest, Side Effects , starring Jude Law and Channing Tatum , which will have its International Premiere at the February event. [ Related: Matt Damon’s ‘Promised Land’ Among Early Berlin Film Festival Titles ] Also joining the competition is Shia LaBeouf and Evan Rachel Wood starrer The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman about a guy who falls for a woman who’s ‘claimed’ by a violent crime boss. And celebrated Iranian filmmaker whose house arrest was documented in a feature last year titled This Is Not a Film will premiere is latest, Closed Curtain . Added Berlinale Competition films: Camille Claudel 1915 , France By Bruno Dumont (The Life of Jesus, Humanity, Flanders) With Juliette Binoche, Jean-Luc Vincent World Premiere Elle s’en va ( On my Way ), France By Emmanuelle Bercot (Clément, Backstage, Les infidèles) With Catherine Deneuve World Premiere Epizoda u životu berača željeza ( An Episode in the Life of an Iron Picker ), Bosnia and Herzegovina/France/Slovenia By Danis Tanovic (No Man’s Land, Hell, Circus Columbia) With Senada Alimanovic, Nazif Mujic, Sandra Mujic, Semsa Mujic World Premiere Gold , Germany By Thomas Arslan (Dealer, Vacation, In the Shadows) With Nina Hoss, Marko Mandic, Uwe Bohm, Lars Rudolph, Peter Kurth, Rosa Enskat, Wolfgang Packhäuser World Premiere La Religieuse ( The Nun ), France/Germany/Belgium By Guillaume Nicloux (The Flying Children, A Private Affair, That Woman) With Pauline Etienne, Isabelle Huppert, Louise Bourgoin, Martina Gedeck World Premiere Layla Fourie , Germany/South Africa/France/Netherlands By Pia Marais (The Unpolished, At Ellen’s Age) With Rayna Campbell, August Diehl, Rapule Hendricks World Premiere The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman , USA By Fredrik Bond – feature debut With Shia LaBeouf, Evan Rachel Wood, Mads Mikkelsen, Til Schweiger, Rupert Grint, James Buckley International Premiere Parde ( Closed Curtain ), Iran By Jafar Panahi (The Circle, Offside, This Is Not A Film) and Kambozia Partovi (The Fish, Café Transit) With Kambozia Partovi, Maryam Moghadam,Jafar Panahi, Hadi Saeedi, Azadh Torabi, Agha Olia, Zeynab Khanum, Boy World Premiere Side Effects , USA By Steven Soderbergh (sex, lies, and videotape; Erin Brockovich, Haywire) With Jude Law, Rooney Mara, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Channing Tatum International Premiere
Joseph Gordon-Levitt ‘s directorial debut Don Jon’s Addiction will be among the headliners at the Berlin International Film Festival ‘s Panorama program. Starring Gordon-Levitt along with Scarlett Johansson , Julianne Moore and Tony Danza, the feature revolves around a modern-day Don Juan who attempts to change his ways. The film will have its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival next month. The film joins the lineup in Panorama along with fourteen other fiction titles and seven documentaries announced Tuesday. Also in the roster is Noah Baumbach’s acclaimed Frances Ha with Greta Gerwig and Rob Epstein’s Lovelace . Berlinale Panorama titles follow with information provided by the festival: Fictional films in the Main Programme and Panorama Special (15) Baek Ya (White Night) – Republic of Korea By Hee-il LeeSong With Tae-hee Won, Yi-kyung Yi European premiere Chemi Sabnis Naketsi (A Fold in My Blanket) – Georgia By Zaza Rusadze With Tornike Bziava, Tornike Gogrichiani, Zura Kipshidze, Avtandil Makharadze, Giorgi Nakashidze World premiere Dduit-dam-hwa: Gam-dok-i-mi-cheot-eo-yo (Behind the Camera) – Republic of Korea By E J-Yong With Yuh-jung Youn, Hee-soon Park, Hye-jung Gang, Jung-se Oh, Min-hee Kim International premiere Deshora (Belated) – Argentina/Columbia/Norway By Barbara Sarasola-Day With Luis Ziembrowski, Alejandro Buitrago, Maria Ucedo World premiere Don Jon’s Addiction – USA By Joseph Gordon-Levitt With Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Scarlett Johansson, Julianne Moore International premiere Frances Ha – USA By Noah Baumbach With Greta Gerwig, Mickey Sumner, Charlotte D’Ambiose, Adam Driver European premiere Habi, la extranjera (Habi, the Foreigner) – Argentina/Brazil By Maria Florencia Alvarez With Martina Juncadella, Martin Slipak, Maria Luisa Mendonça, Lucia Alfonsin World premiere Inch´Allah – Canada By Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette With Evelyne Brochu, Sabrina Ouazani, Yousef Sweid, Sivan Levy, Carlo Brandt International premiere Kashi-ggot (Fatal) – Republic of Korea By Don-ku Lee With Yeon-woo Nam, Jo-a Yang, Jeong-ho Hong, Ki-doong Kang European premiere La Piscina (The Swimming Pool) – Cuba/Venezuela By Carlos Machado Quintela With Raul Capote, Monica Molinet, Felipe Garcia, Carlos Javier Martinez, Marcos Costa International premiere Lovelace – USA With Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman By Amanda Seyfried, Peter Sarsgaard, Sharon Stone, Robert Patrick, Juno Temple International premiere Meine Schwestern (My Sisters) – Germany By Lars Kraume With Jördis Triebel, Nina Kunzendorf, Lisa Hagmeister, Beatrice Dalle, Angela Winkler World premiere Rock the Casbah – Israel By Yariv Horowitz With Yon Tumarkin, Roy Nik, Yotam Ishay, Rave Iftach, Khawla Alhaj Debsi International premiere Tanta Agua (So Much Water) – Uruguay/Mexico/Netherlands/ Germany By Ana Guevara Pose, Leticia Jorge Romero With Malú Chouza, Néstor Guzzini, Joaquín Castiglioni World premiere The Broken Circle Breakdown – Belgium By Felix van Groeningen With Johan Heldenbergh, Veerle Baetens, Nell Cattrysse International premiere Panorama Dokumente (7) Alam laysa lana (A World Not Ours) – Great Britain/Lebanon/Denmark By Mahdi Fleifel European premiere Gut Renovation – USA By Su Friedrich International premiere Naked Opera – Luxemburg/Germany By Angela Christlieb World premiere Roland Klick – The Heart Is a Hungry Hunter – Germany By Sandra Prechtel With Roland Klick, Otto Sander, Eva Mattes, David Hess, Hark Bohm World premiere Sing Me the Songs That Say I Love You – A Concert for Kate McGarrigle – USA By Lian Lunson With Rufus Wainwright, Martha Wainwright, Emmylou Harris, Norah Jones, Anna McGarrigle European premiere State 194 – USA/Israel By Dan Setton With Yoram Millo, Daniel J. Chalfen, Ariel Setton, Margaret Yen European premiere The Act of Killing – Denmark/Norway/Great Britain By Joshua Oppenheimer With Janus Billekov Jansen, Carlos Mariano Arango de Montis, Mariko Montpetit, Henrik Gugge Garnov, Charlotte Munch Bengtsen European premiere
Michael Haneke’s Amour and Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master lead London critics’ nominations. Also in Tuesday’s news round-up, Toronto critics name their picks for 2012; Richard Gere is among more honorees at the upcoming Palm Springs International Film Festival; Bully is set for Producers Guild honors; and Ricky Gervais is eyeing the Muppets sequel. Amour , The Master Lead London Critics’ Circle Noms Michael Haneke’s Amour and Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master each received seven nominations from the London Film Critics’ Circle. Both were nominated for best film, director and screenwriter. The U.K.’s own Skyfall received five nominations including two for Judi Dench, Deadline reports . Toronto Film Critics Name The Master Best Picture Paul Thomas Anderson’s cult-drama was honored Best Film by the Toronto Film Critics Association, while runners-up included Michael Haneke’s Amour and Kathryn Bigelow’s Zero Dark Thirty . Anderson also received Best Director and Best Screenplay, while Philip Seymour Hoffman was named Best Supporting Actor by the group, THR reports . Richard Gere, Tom Hooper and Mychael Danna to Receive Palm Springs Honors Gere will receive the festivals Chairman’s Award for his role in Arbitrage , while Les Misérables director Tom Hooper will be feted with the PSIFF’s “Sony Bono Visionary” award and Life of Pi composer Mychael Danna will receive the Frederick Loewe award for film composing, Variety reports . Bully Wins Stanley Kramer Award The Producers Guild of America gave the doc directed by Lee Hirsch its 2013 Stanley Kramer Award, which honors a a production or producer “whose achievement or contribution illuminates and raises public awareness of important issues.” The film which vividly captures the crisis of school bullying is short-listed for Oscar consideration, Deadline reports . Ricky Gervais Eyes Muppets Sequel The comedian is in talks to star in The Muppets sequel as the Disney movie’s human lead character. The follow-up to the 2011 pic is described as a “European-centric adventure,” THR reports .
The Sundance Film Festival continued its roll out of films playing its 2013 event in January, unveiling its out-of-competition Spotlight, Park City at Midnight and New Frontier sections as well as installations and performances headed to the festival’s New Frontier venue. Jeff Nichols’ Mud , starring Matthew McConaughey and Reese Witherspoon , festival favorite No with Gael García Bernal and the U.S. premiere of Ben Wheatley’s Sightseers are among the films set for Sundance’s Spotlight section, which includes North American and U.S. debuts. [ Related: Check out Sundance’s 2013 U.S. and World Competition lineup as well as films in its NEXT program ] “I couldn’t be more pleased to announce the films selected for these sections because they illustrate the tremendous creativity and vibrancy of the independent film community,” said Sundance’s Director of Programming Trevor Groth in a statement. “Spotlight features our favorite films that have premiered at other festivals and the Park City at Midnight and New Frontier sections are comprised of films that are bound to shock, intoxicate, derange or dazzle. Expect the unexpected when you venture down the path of these cinematic sensations.” The Sundance Film Festival takes place January 17 – 27 in Park City, Salt Lake City, Ogden and Sundance, Utah. Sundance’s Spotlight, Park City at Midnight and New Frontier lineups (with descriptions provided by the festival): SPOTLIGHT Regardless of where these films have played throughout the world, the Spotlight program is a tribute to the cinema we love. Fill the Void / Israel (Director and screenwriter: Rama Burshtein) — A devout 18-year-old Israeli is pressured to marry the husband of her late sister. Declaring her independence is not an option in Tel Aviv’s ultra-Orthodox Hasidic community, where religious law, tradition and the rabbi’s word are absolute. Cast: Hadas Yaron, Yiftach Klein, Irit Sheleg, Chaim Sharir, Razia Israeli, Hila Feldman. Gangs of Wasseypur / India (Director: Anurag Kashyap, Screenwriters: Anurag Kashyap, Zeishan Quadri) — Exiled and outcast for robbing British trains, Shahid Khan spurs a battle for revenge that passes down generations. Shahid’s son vows to get his father’s honor back, becoming the most feared man in the Indian town of Wasseypur. Cast: Manoj Bajpai, Nawazuddin Siddique, Richa Chadda, Huma Qureshi, Tigmanshu Dhulia. U.S. Premiere The Gatekeepers (documentary) / Israel, Germany, Belgium, France (Director: Dror Moreh) — Since its stunning military victory in 1967, Israel has hoped to achieve a long-lasting peace. Forty-five years later, this has yet to happen. Six former heads of Israel’s Secret Service reflect on the successes and failures of the “peace process.” Mud / U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Jeff Nichols) — Two teenage boys encounter a fugitive and form a pact to help him evade the bounty hunters on his trail and reunite him with his true love. Cast: Matthew McConaughey, Tye Sheridan, Jacob Lofland, Reese Witherspoon. North American Premiere No / Chile, U.S.A. (Director: Pablo Larraín, Screenwriter: Pedro Peirano) — When Chilean military dictator Augusto Pinochet calls for a referendum to decide his permanence in power, the opposition persuades a young advertising executive to head its campaign. With limited resources and under scrutiny, he conceives a plan to win the election. Cast: Gael García Bernal, Alfredo Castro, Antonia Zegers, Luis Gnecco, Marcial Tagle, Néstor Cantillana. Sightseers / United Kingdom (Director: Ben Wheatley, Screenwriters: Alice Lowe, Steve Oram) — Chris wants to show girlfriend Tina his world, but when events conspire against the couple, their dream caravan holiday takes a very wrong turn. Cast: Alice Lowe, Steve Oram. U.S. Premiere Stories We Tell (documentary) / Canada (Director: Sarah Polley) — Sarah Polley is both filmmaker and detective as she investigates the secrets kept by a family of storytellers. She unravels the paradoxes to reveal the essence of family: always complicated, warmly messy and fiercely loving. PARK CITY AT MIDNIGHT From horror flicks to comedies to works that defy any genre, these unruly films will keep you edge-seated and wide awake. Each is a world premiere. Ass Backwards / U.S.A. (Director: Chris Nelson, Screenwriters: June Diane Raphael, Casey Wilson) — Loveable losers Kate and Chloe take a road trip back to their hometown to claim the beauty pageant crown that eluded them as children, only to discover what really counts: friendship. Cast: June Diane Raphael, Casey Wilson, Vincent D’Onofrio, Alicia Silverstone, Jon Cryer, Brian Geraghty. Hell Baby / U.S.A. (Directors and screenwriters: Robert Ben Garant, Thomas Lennon) — An expectant couple moves into the most haunted fixer-upper in New Orleans – a house with a demonic curse. Things spiral out of control and soon only the Vatican’s elite exorcism team can save the pair – or can it? Cast: Rob Corddry, Leslie Bibb, Keegan Michael Key, Riki Lindhome, Paul Scheer, Rob Huebel. In Fear / United Kingdom (Directed and story by: Jeremy Lovering) — Trapped in a maze of country roads with only their vehicle for protection, Tom and Lucy are terrorized by an unseen tormentor exploiting their worst fears. Eventually they realize they’ve let the evil in – it’s sitting in their car. Cast: Alice Englert, Iain De Caestecker, Allen Leech. kink (documentary) / U.S.A. (Director: Christina Voros) — A story of sex, submission and big business is told through the eyes of the unlikely pornographers whose 9:00-to-5:00 work days are spent within the confines of the San Francisco Armory building, home to the sprawling porn production facilities of Kink.com. The Rambler / U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Calvin Lee Reeder) — After being released from prison, a man known as “The Rambler” stumbles upon a strange mystery as he attempts the treacherous journey through back roads and small towns en route to reconnecting with his long-lost brother. Cast: Dermot Mulroney, Lindsay Pulsipher, Natasha Lyonne, James Cady, Scott Sharot. S-VHS / U.S.A., Canada (Directors: Simon Barrett, Adam Wingard, Edúardo Sanchez, Gregg Hale, Timo Tjahjanto, Gareth Huw Evans, Jason Eisener, Screenwriters: Simon Barrett, Jamie Nash, Timo Tjahjanto & Gareth Huw Evans, John Davies) — Searching for a missing student, two private investigators break into his abandoned house and find another collection of mysterious VHS tapes. In viewing the horrific contents of each cassette, they realize there may be terrifying motives behind the student’s disappearance. Cast: Adam Wingard, Lawrence Levine, L.C Holt, Kelsy Abbott, Hannah Hughes. Virtually Heroes / U.S.A. (Director: GJ Echternkamp, Screenwriter: Matt Yamashita) — Two self-aware characters in a Call of Duty-style video game struggle with their screwy, frustrating existence. To find answers, one abandons his partner and mission, seeking to unravel the cheat codes of life. Cast: Robert Baker, Brent Chase, Katie Savoy, Mark Hamill, Ben Messmer. We Are What We Are / U.S.A. (Director: Jim Mickle, Screenwriters: Nick Damici, Jim Mickle) — A devastating storm washes up clues that lead authorities closer and closer to the cannibalistic Parker family. Cast: Bill Sage, Ambyr Childers, Julia Garner, Michael Parks, Wyatt Russell, Kelly McGillis. NEW FRONTIER With media installations, multimedia performances, transmedia experiences, panels, films and more, New Frontier highlights work that celebrates experimentation and the expansion of cinema culture through the convergence of film, art, and new media technology. Films Charlie Victor Romeo / U.S.A. (Directors: Robert Berger, Karlyn Michelson, Screenwriters: Robert Berger, Patrick Daniels, Irving Gregory) — An award-winning theatrical documentary derived entirely from ‘Black Box’ transcripts of six real-life major airline emergencies brought to the screen with cutting-edge stereoscopic 3D technology. Cast: Patrick Daniels, Irving Gregory, Noel Dinneen, Sam Zuckerman, Debbie Troche, Nora Woolley. Fat Shaker / Iran (Director and screenwriter: M Shirvani) — An obese father and his handsome, deaf son share extraordinary experiences in Tehran. Then a beautiful young woman upsets the balance of their relationship, forcing them to renegotiate their position with each other and the world around them. Cast: Levon Haftvan, Maryam Palizban, Hassan Rostami, Navid Mohammadzadeh. Interior. Leather Bar. / U.S.A. (Directors: Travis Mathews, James Franco, Screenwriter: Travis Mathews) — To avoid an X rating, it was rumored that 40 minutes of gay S&M footage was cut from the controversial 1980 film, Cruising. Filmmakers James Franco and Travis Mathews re-imagine what was in the lost footage. Cast: Val Lauren, James Franco, Travis Mathews, Christian Patrick, Brenden Gregory. Halley / Mexico (Director: Sebastian Hofmann, Screenwriters: Sebastian Hofmann, Julio Chavezmontes) — Alberto is dead and can no longer hide it. Before surrendering to his living death, he forms an unusual friendship with Luly, the manager of the 24-hour gym where he works as a night guard. Cast: Alberto Trujillo, Lourdes Trueba, Hugo Albores. The Meteor / Canada (Director: François Delisle, Screenwriter: François Delisle) — Forty-something Pierre, his mother and his wife are linked by crime, guilt and loneliness. Like casualties of love and desire, they are dying to stick their heads above water and breathe the air of life. Cast: Noémie Godin Vigneau, François Delisle, Laurent Lucas, Brigitte Pogonat, François Papineau, Andrée Lachapelle. INSTALLATIONS Cityscape 2095 Artists: Yannick Jacquet, Mandril, Thomas Vaquié [AntiVJ] AntiVJ artists Yannick Jacquet and Marc Ferrario blend painting with light projection to transform the walls of New Frontier into a luminous, three-dimensional cityscape that feels strangely familiar yet impossible to locate. With its disorienting sense of time and space, Cityscape 2095 places spectators on the observatory deck of a skyscraper, where they take in a sprawling, imaginary city as it glitters over the course of one day. Coral: Rekindling Venus Artist: Lynette Wallworth Inspired by the first collaboration among the international science community to witness the celestial transit of Venus in 1761, Lynette Wallworth’s visually stunning Coral: Rekindling Venus is an augmented-reality and full-dome planetarium presentation designed to nurture an emotional connection between a global audience and the planet’s endangered coral reefs. This epic project features original deep-sea photography, augmented-reality artwork and music by Antony and the Johnsons. Presented at the New Frontier venue in Park City, Salt Lake City’s Clark Planetarium and other locations nationally. Details to be announced. E.M-bed.de/d, Datamosh, Augmented Real Artist: Yung Jake Rap artist Yung Jake is Net art incarnate, flowing lyrics about tweet culture, data-moshing, hashtags, and memes as he blows up on Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, and Instagram in his HTML5 music video, E.M-bed.de/d. This MC drops unexpectedly into your browser sessions, streams into Festival screenings, Skype-bombs live DJ performances, and pops out of floors and magazines in augmented-reality music videos. Eyjafjallalokull Artist: Joanie Lemercier [AntiVJ] Inspired by the 2010 Icelandic volcanic eruption that wreaked travel havoc across Europe, Eyjafjallalokull is a stunning, three-dimensional, audiovisual mapping installation that challenges audiences’ perception of space by creating an optical illusion that transforms the walls of New Frontier into a sweeping digital vista that artistically recreates the seismic event. North of South, West of East Artist: Meredith Danluck North of South, West of East enhances narrative storytelling by wrapping the film around the entire room. Presented to an audience in swivel chairs, Meredith Danluck’s remarkable four-channel narrative feature deftly unspools a darkly humorous tale of small-town folks as they try to make sense of a posthope America. Shot on location in Detroit, Michigan, and Marfa, Texas, this unique film features fantastic performances by Ben Foster, Stella Schnabel, and Sue Galloway, and a soundtrack by Marfa local punk band Solid Waste. Pulse Index Artist: Rafael Lozano-Hemmer Rafael Lozano-Hemmer’s beautifully resonant, interactive media installation swaths the central lounge of New Frontier with images of the warm, breathing flesh of its visitors. Pulse Index records the heart rates and fingerprints of participants and exhibits them in a beautiful Fibonacci pattern. Place your finger into the custom-made sensor, and your fingerprint appears on the largest cell of the display, pulsating to your heartbeat. Your print then travels down the sequence to join those of all the others who have visited the room, immersing the community space with the radiant glow of the human touch. What’s He Building in There? Artists: Klip Collective Ricardo Rivera and the Klip Collective transform the entire front of the New Frontier venue into an interactive, 3-D projection-mapped parable, inspired by the Tom Waits song. Sip a hot beverage in the outdoor lounge and watch the walls and windowpanes dissolve into a story about a man on a mysterious mission inside the building. Use the X-ray flashlight to peek at what he is up to. RELATED: Sundance Film Festival Reveals 2013 U.S. & World Competition Slate Follow Brian Brooks on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
The scene outside East Hampton’s usually civilized Guild Hall was almost as frenzied as a mosh pit on Saturday night when an overflow crowd turned up to watch Alec Baldwin interview fellow leading man Richard Gere . The spirited conversation, which focused mostly on Gere’s pre- Pretty Woman career, was a precursor to the Arbitrage actor receiving the Hamptons International Film Festival’s 2012 Golden Starfish Award for Lifetime Achievement in Acting. Over the course of the discussion, Gere talked about some of his more unusual moments working with such storied directors at Terrence Malick, Richard Brooks, Francis Ford Coppola and Paul Schrader. For instance, he recalled his frustration working with Malick on Days of Heaven because of the lack of guidance that the filmmaker gave to his actors. Malick “is a really interesting guy,” Gere said, “but one of his quirks is that he doesn’t always know what he wants.” Indeed, during one frustrating scene, Gere said he found himself asking that very question of the director who then pointed to “linen curtains blowing” in the breeze of an open window. “I meant like that,” Gere said Malick told him, and in that case, the actor told Baldwin, “I knew exactly what he meant.” The silver-haired Gere also talked about Brooks’ secrecy regarding scripts. He recalled that when he asked the director if he could see the screenplay to Looking for Mr. Goodbar , Brooks invited him to his Los Angeles home, where the filmmaker’s wife, actress Jean Simmons greeted Gere and led the actor to a “romantically lit room.” There, Brooks gave him a half hour to read the script, which Gere implied, was not enough time, until he discovered that Brooks had “blacked out everything that was not my part.” The discussion took an amusing turn when Baldwin brought up the subject of American Gigolo and asked Gere if he was uncomfortable about his emergence as a sex symbol. The actor replied that it was an “interesting dilemma” and eventually invited his WME agent Andrew Finkelstein, who was sitting in the audience, to join the conversation. (Finkelstein was an assistant to the late ICM agent Ed Limato, who worked with Gere at the time of that 1980 movie.) Finkelstein replied that Limato “didn’t like” that the media was focusing on Gere’s “hunkishness,” adding: “You were a better actor than a hunk.” The line drew a big laugh from the audience, and Gere, wearing a wry smile on his face said: “I’m a better actor than a hunk. Thank you, Andrew.” Finkelstein recovered nicely by yelling out: “Richard is now looking for an agent.” Shortly before Gere was presented with his Golden Starfish award, Baldwin asked the actor if any of his leading ladies had ever fallen for him. “Someone told me that one of them had, and I said, ‘I wish they had told me!'” Gere replied. “But I’m not going to answer that question.” Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
All decked out, Nicole Kidman received a gala tribute at the New York Film Festival Wednesday night ahead of the U.S. premiere of her latest starrer, The Paperboy , directed by Lee Daniels . Appearing like audiences have never seen her before, Kidman said she pushed her boundaries in the role in which she plays a sultry vixen who is carrying on with a convicted murderer in prison (played by John Cusack ). Kidman opened up about the role and why she decided to take on the part which required her to — among other things — spread her legs and even pee on fellow co-star Zac Efron ; she also shared why she never spoke to John Cusack on the set outside of their characters. But despite pushing herself into admittedly uncomfortable territory, there was one thing she would not do. Initially, Kidman did not think she could pull off the part. Daniels had her meet with five women who have had relationships with men in prison. Unsure of herself, she said the experience allowed her to find he way to the character with some encouragement from one of the women. “I was kind of freaking out and didn’t think I could be authentic in this role. And then, one of them said to me, ‘No, I think you can do this.’ And she kind of gave me that confidence. And after that, it sort of just flowed out of me. I didn’t want a sense of myself in any way, so I went straight into the character and never stepped out of it.” Based on a novel by Pete Dexter, The Paperboy is set in late ’60s/early ’70s Florida. Kidman plays Charlotte Bless, who sashays with a period-fabulous wardrobe, fake eye-lashes and pillowy lips. She’s the object of young Jack’s (Efron) affections. He’s a young guy who’s aimless and living with his dad and soon-to-be stepmother. His older brother (Matthew McConaughey) is a journalist who comes to town to investigate death-row inmate Hillary Van Wetter’s (Cusack) conviction, who he believes is actually innocent. Meanwhile, love-struck Charlotte is in a tither trying to get her man out of jail — and then things grow very strange… “I never got to know John Cusack through the shoot,” said Kidman. “I never knew John [at all, in fact] and that’s when I [decided] I’m not going to get to know John. I wanted to deal with him as the character and have him deal with me as the character. I never, never spoke to him through the shoot as John, and that was a great way [to do this]. At the very end of the shoot he came to my trailer and he said, ‘Hi, I’m John’ (laughs). It was great!” While playing Charlotte, Kidman was very careful not to judge her. Because of the production’s very tight budget, Kidman — an A-lister who is one of the world’s most photographed actresses — said she went to second-hand stores and picked up $5 frocks and shoes ahead of the shoot in New Orleans and physically and figuratively assembled Charlotte’s persona. After picking her accent and look, she stayed with the character even after the day’s shoot ended. And there was one physical trait filmmaker Lee Daniels wanted from Kidman. “Lee was obsessed with the butt,” said Kidman. “He wanted my butt to be bigger. I said, ‘I can do that…'” Continuing about her character she added, “I don’t see her as crazy because I see very few people as crazy. For me, she’s a woman who’s obviously very damaged. And she’s scared of intimacy, which is the common thread for people who [form] relationships with people in prison. But once they get out, it’s often very different, which was something interesting for me.” Lee Daniels, the Oscar-nominated director of Precious (2009), who is African-American, said he felt racial tension while filming Paperboy in Louisiana’s bayous. The tension prompted him to ask Nicole Kidman to use the n-word in one scene, but she drew the line there. “I didn’t think it was right for the character honestly,” she said. “And I have a son who’s African-American. But the other stuff, I think the whole thing I try to do as an actor is fulfill a director’s vision. I have opinions and I’m there to stimulate and ignite things in the director, hopefully, but I’ve never tried to pull a director off his vision. So, the spreading the legs and all that were fine because I wanted to please Lee.” The Paperboy begins its theatrical run this Friday. Follow Brian Brooks on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
The new Universal Soldier picture, the latest in the series about genetically-modified supermen raging against their government creators, is a curious exercise in cognitive dissonance; here you have an action flick high on gory, bone-crunching slicing and dicing and kicking and punching — everything star and Ben Affleck doppelganger Scott Adkins ( Undisputed II and III ) can possibly do to evoke oohs and aahs in 3-D in the serious-faced, beefy fashion of his ’80s and ’90s predecessors — and yet director John Hyams didn’t sound completely delusional this week at Fantastic Fest when he said his UniSol fourquel was influenced by David Cronenberg, Michael Haneke, and (yes, I see it, kinda!) even art house provocateur Gaspar Noe. Stylistically these references are obvious, even if they add little to the overarching point of Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning 3D . Hyams opens with a neat, tricksy sequence that sets up the plot (and makes the best use of 3-D) through the first-person POV of family man John (Adkins); forced to watch as masked intruders murder his wife and child, we see through John’s eyes as he’s beaten to near-death, the only lasting clue left in his brain being the stone-faced mug of Jean-Claude Van Damme (reprising his role as veteran UniSol Luc Deveraux). When John comes to in a hospital recovery bed with nothing but the lingering memory of that night, he sets out to put the missing puzzle pieces together, which leads him to a strip club and a dancer (Mariah Bonner) who seems to know him. Meanwhile, an agent nicknamed The Plumber (Belarusian MMA fighter Andrei Arlovsky) is activated to wipe out his own kind but is re-educated by a swaggering, confident ex-UniSol ( Dolph Lundren ) bent on spreading the gospel of his boss — Van Damme as cult figure, not a crazy stretch — who seeks to build an army of disgruntled Unisols into raging against The Man. Few elements of the Universal Soldier: Day Of Reckoning script make much sense (John’s line of vengeance-logic; The Plumber’s proclivity for wearing his plumber uniform everywhere he goes ), and the film meanders through some interminably long, wannabe noir-ish plot stretches to set up reasons for its stars to brawl and, y’know, grow back severed body parts. But Hyams satisfies where it matters — in his slashing, limb-severing, body-pounding action, and the physically impressive Adkins, a stunt performer turned leading man. Saddled with the tough job of playing a vacant-eyed man-machine with no memories and a vague sense of self, Adkins at least comes alive when he’s in his element. (A seemingly seamless single-shot sequence — beautifully and brutally choreographed, though stitched together via subtle CG movie magic — is one for the highlight reel.) Notably, Adkins, Van Damme, and Lundgren turn in far more compelling work than they did in their last film together, Expendables 2 , though maybe that’s not saying much. Van Damme, gloriously off-kilter in that picture, is a study of coiled restraint in Oreo cookie Apocalypse Now face paint; Lundgren might be at his career best – again, perhaps not saying much. In the least, and most significantly, Day of Reckoning should propel British martial artist/stunt veteran Adkins out of the niche genre world — action cinema’s Adkins diet? Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning hits VOD October 25, followed by a theatrical run November 30. Read more from Fantastic Fest . Follow Jen Yamato on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Hitman Joe ( Joseph Gordon-Levitt ) is confronted with his future self — in the form of a time-traveling Bruce Willis — in Rian Johnson’s Looper , the writer-director’s third feature and one of the freshest original science fiction tales in years. Before debuting the September 28 release at Fantastic Fest over the weekend, Johnson spoke with Movieline about the pre- Brick short script that gestated into Looper , the film’s dark streak and the 1970 soul ballad that serves as “the heart of the movie.” Take me back to the beginning – the idea for Looper began as a short story in your notebook around the time of Brick , right? Before I made Brick . It was a script for a short film, and it was a few years before we made Brick , during a time when we were spending all of our time looking for money to make Brick – Steve [Yedlin], my cinematographer, and I. We realized we were just driving ourselves crazy and to alleviate the pressure we decided to start making some shorts, and we made a few but this was one that I wrote but we never ended up shooting. What was the original seed of the idea that started it? It’s funny, at some point after the release I’m going to put the three-page script up on the internet but it started with the same voice over that the feature starts with. It explains the guy and his job, and when his older self shows up, it was a foot chase between the two of them across the city, then it ended when they caught up with each other. It has a similar ending to the feature which is why I don’t want to put it out too soon. I had been reading a ton of Philip K. Dick and was in a period when I had just discovered his books, so I think my brain was full of sci-fi ideas. Were you feeling super existential? I must have been going through one of those existential phases we all go through, continuously. The honest answer is it was ten years ago and I don’t exactly remember. Ten years ago I was 28. The quarter-life years or so. It’s true, my God. Now I’m going through an existential crisis, thanks a bunch! I’m sorry! One thing I like about the concept is that it’s so much about identity, our past selves, our future selves, how we see ourselves and the potential to change the future. And our relationship with this kind of character, our future self, our notion of what we’re going to turn into and our ideas of how our lives are going to go. That’s usually personified in your relationship with a mentor or parent, someone who’s indicative of a path you could take in life and whether you want to or not, that’s kind of the interesting question. I found the film to be quite romantic. Nice! And that was not something I was really expecting. That song you use, Chuck and Mac’s “Powerful Love,” is so beautiful and perfect. Isn’t it incredible? It’s such a beautiful song. I literally picked up blind, I think on vinyl on the Twinights [album]. Listening to that song just sticks, then the lyrics somehow attach themselves to the meaning of the whole thing and it ends up jamming in your head and it becomes a really obvious choice, you know? Actually, in pre-production I sent an mp3 of that song to Bruce [Willis] right when he signed on and told him this song is the heart of the movie, and he got really excited about it. I was listening to that song over and over while we were shooting it. That and a lot of Sam Cooke. A soul connection. I’m really happy that you felt that from the movie. There is a real deep heart of romance in the movie, and not just boy-girl romance but romance with a capital R. Love. Yeah – love in the sense that love can somehow fix things. I hope that that’s baked into it. As dark and as bleak as the movie can get at times, the reason I feel comfortable having it go there is I hope that it gets to a really hopeful and redemptive place at the end. Do you see Looper as dark and bleak? I think it goes to some pretty dark, bleak places and shows these characters, even the ones who are supposed to be good guys, doing some terrible things. I think it shows the dark side of everybody and gets to some spots where you wonder if it’s all going to be okay, but I hope it shows you that people can change and people can make decisions for the right reasons. I was really surprised to be crying as the credits rolled. Yes! I was trying to make you cry. That makes me really happy. My little sister cried! That’s what we were going for, that kind of rush of emotion at the end. Your films have been quite different, playing in different genres. When you decided Looper would be your next feature did you have any trepidation about tackling the time travel aspect knowing the geekosphere would scrutinize it? Well, yes – especially because I’m part of the geekosphere and I’m one of those guys. The thing is, I’ve never had time travel inconsistencies in a movie deny me the pleasure of enjoying a movie. For me those are two separate things. And that’s something I can’t understand. I can’t understand someone who says “I didn’t like that movie because that, that, and that…” For me it’s like, wow, that’s a cool movie with a well-told story that was awesome, and this didn’t make sense and that’s fun to dive into and pick apart. But every time travel movie that’s ever been made, if you really dig into it you’re going to hit bedrock where paradoxes kind of hit each other and it doesn’t make sense. The important thing is that the storytelling works and that it has a consistent set of rules that it plays fair by. But I was mostly terrified just because time travel is a tough thing to work into the fabric of a story. It’s a tough thing to put into a story and still have the whole thing tick – it can be like pouring grape jelly into a clockwork watch. It’s a messy ingredient that’s hard to tame. As your films have gotten bigger and your career has gone from indie to increasingly more mainstream audiences, how do you feel your trajectory has evolved? I guess the movies have gotten bigger, one by one – I still haven’t worked with a studio. Sony’s putting this out and have been awesome and I would love to work with a studio someday, but so far we’re doing each of these independently. I guess I’ve crept up in scale with each one, but at the end of the day they’re all motivated by the same thing; they all start with a story that I care about that I want to tell. It is fun to see how broad a canvas we can accomplish; even with the next step I think it would be really fun to do something bigger, working on a broader canvas and reaching a bigger audience. But it can never come from that place. It’s so much work to make a movie, and for me it has to get me off my butt. To get me actually writing you have to strike something inside, you have to hit a power main to get the energy. You have to strike something you care about. Have studios approached you a lot more in recent years with projects? Not so much after Brick – I got anything that was dark and had to do with high school. Not so much after Brothers Bloom . In the lead up to Looper there have been more people calling… but the thing that’s interesting to me is if this group, this little family that we have that we’ve made these movies with, can tell one of our stories on that scale – and that doesn’t just mean doing something, I think you have to be conscious of the size of the canvas that you’re working on, the amount of money you’re spending, and the audience you’re trying to reach and you have to adjust your storytelling. I think that’s part of your job as a storyteller. You mention this “family” of filmmakers and collaborators, from using Joseph Gordon-Levitt again to working with Nathan Johnson on the music. You named Noah Segan’s character after his own nickname. Even Joe’s character is named Joe. I was really lazy with these names! [Laughs] When it comes to working with this group of people again and again, how do you synthesize all this? Did you write these characters with their personalities or capabilities in mind? Their capabilities more than their personalities, their strengths. This is a unique case with Noah and Joe, but usually I don’t have any idea who’s going to play [my characters]. It’s not like when I’m writing these characters I’m picturing my friends. You’re creating a completely new character and hiring somebody to play to that and against it and shatter your expectations of what that character could be in some ways. With Joe for instance, the way that Joe loves transforming himself on film and the way that he loves disappearing into his role I knew was specifically suited to something where he was going to have to sell himself as a younger version of an older actor. And there’s just something about Noah that’s inherently likeable and I knew that’s a trait I wanted to shine through with this weird little pathetic villain character – I wanted there to be something where you could see the little boy in him who’s trying to be a cowboy. That’s the sort of thing you know from your friends that you can hopefully use to your advantage. How much do you think our world will be like the world of Looper by the year 2044? I think that our world will be much nicer. I’m an optimist, actually. I think everything’s going to get better. I think we’re evolving. Looper is in theaters Friday. Read more from Fantastic Fest! Follow Jen Yamato on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
The Telluride Film Festival offers a bright spotlight, showcasing a small selection of films over Labor Day weekend just as summer movies give way to a more serious season of cinema. Later this year, moviegoers will be talking about Bill Murray as Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Marion Cotillard as a woman who loses her legs to a killer whale and even a small town story starring Zac Efron as an aspiring NASCAR racer and Dennis Quaid as his father, an Iowa farmer. Those three films – Roger Michell’s Hyde Park on Hudson , Jacques Audiard ‘s Rust and Bone and Ramin Bahrani’s At Any Price – lead a roster of acclaimed and anticipated new movies that will screen at this weekend’s tony Telluride Film Festival. Telluride’s annual lineup is famously revealed just as attendees arrive in the Colorado mountain town for the four-day event. Even so Gary Meyer, one of the heads of the festival, privately previewed the lineup for a few journalists earlier this week and then swore them to secrecy. Telluride attendees consider movies sacred. Spoilers are frowned upon. “So, what do you think?” Meyer asked as he detailed the lineup for the 39th annual festival. “It was pretty much down to the wire,” he added about this year’s roster. He also teased that he and festival directors Tom Luddy and Julie Huntsinger have a surprise screening up their sleeves. It will screen in a still to be named slot some time between tomorrow and Labor Day. So now it can be revealed that even as it screens in the Venice Fest this weekend the anticipated American indie At Any Price will be unveiled in Telluride before heading to the Toronto International Film Festival next week. Filmmaker Ramin Bahrani has created a family drama that also explores globalization and Big Agriculture. In addition to Quaid and Efron, the film stars Heather Graham and Kim Dickens. Bahrani is expected to fly in from Venice in time for this weekend’s showings of the film here in Colorado. Also making the trek from Italy to Telluride will be French filmmaker Xavier Giannoli. His latest is described by the Telluride festival as a Kafkaesque tale. In Gianoli’s latest, Superstar , top name French actor Kad Merad plays the everyman. One day he wakes and heads to work only to discover that he’s famous. He has no idea why people are asking for his autograph and snapping his photo with their mobile phones while he rides to work on the Paris Metro. The comedy also stars Cecile de France who gained domestic attention for her turn in last year’s Dardenne Brothers drama, The Kid With A Bike . Roger Michell’s Hyde Park on Hudson was a safe bet for Telluride lineup prognosticators. It stars local Laura Linney, a festival fixture. In the film she stars alongside Bill Murray, appearing as FDR’s younger, distant cousin, Margaret Suckley. Linney’s character guides guests – in this case the King and Queen of England in 1939 – at Roosevelt’s residence in rural New York State and also falls for FDR. The new film will next head to the Toronto Film Festival. Sally Potter’s Ginger and Rosa will make the same journey. It stars Elle Fanning and Alice Englert as best friends in the 60s growing up and experiencing the anxieties and excitement of the era. The cast is rounded out by Timothy Spall, Oliver Platt, Annette Bening, Alessandro Nivola and Christina Hendricks. Also on tap are Noah Baumbach’s Frances Ha starring Greta Gerwig and Michael Winterbottom’s Everyday with Shirley Henderson. Both will also go from Telluride to the Toronto fest next week. Telluride will pay tribute to a pair of European actors this weekend. Marion Cotillard will be honored and appear here alongside her latest, Jacques Audiard’s Rust and Bone from this year’s Cannes Film Festival. Also acclaimed at the French fest this year was Mads Mikkelsen. He turned heads for his starring role in Thomas Vinterberg’s The Hunt and has also been on the fest circuit in Nikolaj Arcel’s A Royal Affair . Both films will screen in Telluride this weekend as festival salutes the Danish leading man. About three dozen new feature films will screen at the Telluride Film Festival this weekend, complemented by classic and retrospective entries, as well as short films, film oddities and even some Looney Tunes cartoons in honor of the 100th anniversary of director Chuck Jones’ birth. The 39th Telluride Film Festival Premieres Lineup : The Act of Killing (Joshua Oppenheimer, Denmark, 2012) Amour (Michael Haneke, Austria, 2012) At Any Price (Ramin Bahrani, US, 2012) The Attack (Ziad Doueiri, Lebanon/France, 2012) Barbara (Christian Petzold, Germany, 2012) Breaking the Frame (Marielle Nitoslawska, Canada, 2012) Carriere 250 Meters (Juan Carlos Rulfo, Mexico, 2012) Celluloid Man: A Film on P.K. Nair (Shivendra Singh Dungarpur, India, 2012) Cinema Jenin (Marcus Vetter, Germany/Israel/Occupied Palestinian Territory, 2012) Doueiri , Lebanon/France, 2012) The Central Park Five (Ken Burns, Sarah Burns, David McMahon, US, 2012) Everyday (Michael Winterbottom, UK, 2012) Frances Ha (Baumbach, US, 2012) Final Cut: Ladies and Gentlemen (Gyorgy Palfi, Hungary, 2012) The Gatekeepers (Dror Moreh, Israel, 2012) Ginger and Rosa (d. Sally Potter, England., 2012) The Hunt (Thomas Vinterberg, Denmark, 2012) Hyde Park on Hudson (Roger Mitchell, US, 2012) In Search of Emak Bakia (Oskar Alegria, Spain, 2012) Jonathan Miller (David Thompson, UK, 2012) Journal de France (Raymond Depardon and Claudine Nougaret, France, 2012) The Iceman (Ariel Vroman, US, 2012) Love, Marilyn (Liz Garbus, US, 2012) Me and Me Dad (Katrine Boorman, UK, 2012) Midnight’s Children (Deepa Mehta, Canada/Sri-Lanka, 2012) Mikis Theodorakis, Composer (Klaus Salge and Asteris Kutulas, Germany, 2012) No (Pablo Larrain, Chile, 2012) On Borrowed Time (David Bradbury, Australia, 2012) Paradise: Love (Ulrich Seidl, Austria, 2012) Piazza Fontana (Marco Tullio Giordana, Italy, 2012) Pilgrim Hill (Gerard Barrett, Ireland, 2012) A Royal Affair (Nikolaj Arcel, Denmark, 2012) Rust and Bone (Jacques Audiard, France, 2012) The Sapphires (Wayne Blair, Australia, 2012) Stories We Tell (Sarah Polley, Canada, 2012) Superstar (Xavier Giannoli, France, 2012) Wadjda (Haifaa Al Mansour, Saudi Arabia, 2012) What is this Film Called Love? (Mark Cousins, Ireland/Mexico, 2012) The Telluride Film Festival takes place August 31-September 3. Follow Eugene Hernandez on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Robert Zemeckis’ Flight starring Denzel Washington will screen as the Centerpiece of the Austin Film Festival & Conference . The 2012 event, taking place October 18 – 25 revealed some details of its upcoming event Tuesday including 10 films that will join this year’s lineup. AFF annually hosts over 180 film screenings and events, while the Conference welcomes over 100 speakers in its panels and roundtables. Among the films screened during the festival are numerous world and US premieres in a wide range of genres, from comedy to documentary, horror to drama. Also on tap for this year, X-Files creator Chris Carter will receive the event’s Outstanding Television Writer Award at AFF’s annual Awards Luncheon on Saturday, October 22nd. Carter will join Paul Feig and Brian Helgeland as part of AFF’s new “Guest Programmer” section of the festival, giving “highly regarded filmmakers” the chance to screen and discuss films they found influential. Carter will also participate in – fittingly – “A Conversation with Chris Carter,” where he will share stories from his long career in television and film. Carter will also present special retrospective screenings of The X-Files and Millennium episodes. There are also plans to screen an X-Files marathon at the Alamo Drafthouse. AFF will release the rest of its lineup in September. Details of AFF’s early 10 films follow with details provided by the festival : Flight – Centerpiece Film Writer: John Gatins Director: Robert Zemeckis In this action-packed mystery thriller, Academy Award winner Denzel Washington stars as Whip Whitaker, a seasoned airline pilot who miraculously crash-lands his plane after a mid-air catastrophe, saving nearly every soul on board. After the crash, Whip is hailed as a hero, but as more is learned, more questions than answers arise as to who or what was really at fault, and what really happened on that plane? Directed by Robert Zemeckis, the highly anticipated new film also stars John Goodman, Don Cheadle, and Melissa Leo. Free Samples Writer: Jim Beggarly Director: Jay Gammill A Stanford law school dropout named Jillian escapes to the anonymity of Los Angeles to figure out what she wants to do with her life, and on the day of her college boyfriend’s birthday, she finds herself stuck running an ice cream truck fending off locals and oddball friends alike. This one day spent in a truck on the streets of LA will wake Jillian from her aimless daze and make her see that life doesn’t stop just because you want it to. Starring Jess Weixler, Jesse Eisenberg, Halley Feiffer, Jason Ritter, this great new comedy is directed by Baylor University film school grad Jay Gammill. It’s A Disaster Writer/Director: Todd Berger Four couples meet for Sunday brunch only to discover they are stuck in a house together as the world may be about to end. StarringJulia Stiles, America Ferrera and David Cross. Julia Stiles and America Ferrera will present the screening at AFF. Last Will & Testament Directors: Laura Wilson, Lisa Wilson US Premiere This documentary explores the ongoing debate about the authorship of the works attributed to Shakespeare. Writers and critics, actors and scholars, including Mark Twain, Sigmund Freud, Charlie Chaplin, and many others have struggled to reconcile England’s “Star of Poets” with the grain dealer from Stratford. Why? – Featuring interviews with Vanessa Redgrave, Derek Jacobi, Mark Rylance, and other highly regarded Shakespearean actors. Pictures of Superheroes World Premiere Writer/Director: Don Swaynos A young maid is asked by her employer to pretend to be his wife as part of a highly questionable business scheme. Meanwhile, she meets the comic book superhero artist living in her employer’s home (seemingly without the employer’s knowledge or permission), and she begins to wonder if there is something more to life than fake marriages and carpet cleaners. Produced by Kelly Williams, and starring Kerri Lendo, John Merriman, Byron Brown and Chris Doubek. Rising From Ashes Director: T.C. Johnstone Two worlds collide when cycling legend Jock Boyer (first American to compete in the Tour de France) moves to Rwanda and teams with Tom Ritchey (inventor of the mountain bike) to help a group of struggling genocide survivors pursue their dream of a national team. As they set out against impossible odds, both Jock and the team find new purpose as they rise from the ashes of their past. Narrated by Forest Whitaker and directed by Austin native T.C. Johnstone, this remarkable story culminated at the 2012 Olympics in London when one of the subjects of the film, Adrien Niyonshuti, competed in the Games and became Rwanda’s first Olympic cyclist. Shadow Dancer Writer: Tom Bradby Director: James March Single mother Collette McVeigh is a Republican living in Belfast with her mother and hardliner IRA brothers. When she is arrested for her part in an aborted IRA bomb plot in London, an MI5 officer (Mac, played by Clive Owen) offers her a choice: lose everything and go to prison for 25 years or return to Belfast to spy on her own family. With her son’s life in her hands, Collette chooses to place her trust in Mac and return home, but when her brothers’ secret operation is ambushed, suspicions of an informant are raised and Collette finds both herself and her family in grave danger. Starring Clive Owen, Andrea Riseborough, and Gillian Anderson. Spinning Plates World Premiere Writer/Director: Joseph Levy Spinning Plates is a feature documentary film about three restaurants, extraordinary for what they are today as well as the challenges they have overcome. A cutting-edge restaurant named the seventh best in the world whose chef must battle a life-threatening obstacle to pursue his passion… a 150-year-old family restaurant still standing only because of the unbreakable bond with its community… a fledgling Mexican restaurant whose owners are putting everything they have on the line just to make enough to survive and provide for their young daughter. Features Chef Grant Achatz of Chicago’s Alinea and Chef Thomas Keller of California’s The French Laundry. To Kill A Memory World Premiere Writers: Dustin Rikert, William Shockley, Philip Tiboni Director: Dustin Rikert A respected US Marshal is imprisoned after being suspiciously involved in a bank robbery gone wrong. When he learns that the other bank robbers may be going after his wife, the Marshal must escape prison and catch them before it’s too late. This low budget indie Western features an astonishing lead performance from country western singer Kix Brooks of Brooks and Dunn. Kix Brooks will present the screening at AFF. Paul Feig Presents: The Human Tornado and Bringing Up Baby This year, AFF is excited to introduce an all new Guest Programmer section, which invites some of our highly regarded panelists and guest filmmakers to program and present films that inspired them. Paul Feig (director of Bridesmaids , creator of “Freaks and Geeks,” also directed episodes of “Arrested Development,” “The Office,” “Mad Men,” “30 Rock” and more) has chosen two very different films: the blaxsploitation Dolemite adventure The Human Tornado and Howard Hawks’ immortal screwball comedy Bringing Up Baby . Don’t miss an opportunity to hear how these two wildly diverse films influenced one of the most in-demand directors in Hollywood today.
