Festival Predictions

2017 Sundance Film Festival Predictions: Tali Shalom-Ezer’s Mercy

Published on November 26, 2016

The chances of seeing Israeli filmmaker Tali Shalom Ezer‘s Mercy premiere at Sundance are next to nil and that’s not because it wouldn’t be a substantial fit within the line-up, but it would have had to have been rushed considerably during the post production phase. Shot in Cincinnati last September, Ezer’s third film features Ellen Page and Kate Mara in a romantic drama. Prior to this, the filmmaker had presented the controversial Princess in the World Dramatic Comp at the 2015 edition.

Gist: Written by Joe Barton, this is about Lucy (Page), the daughter of a man on death row falling in love with Mara’s Mercy character, a woman on the opposing side of her family’s political cause. As a result, Lucy’s value for truth is tested as her world begins to unravel.

Production Co./Producers: Killer Films’ Christine Vachon and David Hinojosa (Lemon), Kate Mara and Ellen Page.

Prediction: U.S. Dramatic Comp or perhaps we’ll only see it ready for a fall fest.

U.S. Distributor: Rights Available. UTA and WME (domestic). TBD (international)

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Eric Lavallée

Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist and critic at IONCINEMA.com (founded in 2000). Eric is a regular at Sundance, Cannes and TIFF. He has a BFA in Film Studies at the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013 he served as a Narrative Competition Jury Member at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson's This Teacher (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). In 2022 he served as a New Flesh Comp for Best First Feature at the 2022 Fantasia Intl. Film Festival. Current top films for 2022 include Tár (Todd Field), All That Breathes (Shaunak Sen), Aftersun (Charlotte Wells).