Being a fan of the filmmaker, the principle actor and several key indie filmmaking members behind the scenes, we’re proud to have your first look at the festival one sheet poster for For Ellen – the U.S. Dramatic Competition feature film from So Yong Kim. In the one sheet designed by Gregory Homs (who designed one-sheets for A Room with a View, Home Of The Brave), the spatial dimensions in the shot expound on the central characters’ solace (Paul Dano’s character of Joby appears to be torn by his past, but his forthcoming future as well) and the carrot mahogany orange drowns out any frigidness of the wintery backdrop in favor of a warmer palette — I’m thinking after featuring a pair of tiny siblings wrestling with pre-abandonment issues in Treeless Mountain, that we might be in store for a loving portrait about not giving up control. You can read the synopsis below, or let So Yong Kim describe it in her own words.
When Joby (Dano), an aspiring young rock star, finally agrees to sign divorce papers with his estranged wife (Malone), he discovers that he is about to forfeit all custody of his six-year-old daughter, Ellen (Shaylena Mandigo). Never having been in Ellen’s life before, Joby suddenly realizes that he’s not ready to lose that part of himself. Hoping to make up for lost time, he tries to win her heart.
