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Dark Comedy Heaven: Fox Searchlight Unites Dan Clowes and Alexander Payne on ‘Wilson’
Lifelong cynics will most certainly love the plan that Fox Searchlight just hatched. Call this a marriage made in dark comedy heaven, names Alexander Payne and Dan Clowes are being mentioned in the same sentence as Searchlight appears to be giving Payne a vote of confidence once again by looking to move him from The Descendants to Wilson -- the Dan Clowes graphic novel. Payne's Ad Hominem will produce with Josh Donen, on behalf of Sam Raimi's Stars Road.
2011 Sundance Bonus Predictions: Mark Pellington’s I Melt With You
The last time Mark Pellington was at Sundance, he showcased not one, but a pair of pics in the world preem of Henry Poole Is Here and he got to show the Cannes preemed U23D. This year, the filmmaker might be poised to bring his highly personal, "micro" budget film, I Melt With You which will definitely not play in the NEXT section, but should find a place in the U.S. Dramatic Comp
Oscar Doc Race: Inside Job, Banksy, Waste Land, Tillman Story, and Waiting for Superman Among 15 Short List
Not entirely sure why much lauded docs films that stuck out this year in Janus Metz's Armadilllo, Lixin Fan's Last Train Home, Michelangelo Frammartino's le quattro volte and Jeff Malmberg's Marwencol failed to make the grade (I'm not entirely sure how this works with the cut-off dates), but there are plenty on the list of 15 that have earned the right to be deemed among the best docs of the year, almost shockingly they included Exit through the Gift Shop and thankfully didn't bother with Catfish. Not surprisingly, a major launch-pad for the documentary form with at least eight examples below (if my count is good) is the Sundance Film Festival. The preliminary round of voting will determine five noms (announced live on Tuesday, January 25, 2011, at 5:30 a.m. PT) and the only one I can honestly say is a shoe-in for a top 5 nom spot is Charles Ferguson's Inside Job.
2011 Sundance Bonus Predictions: Andrew Meieran’s Highland Park
She's a Sundance staple and it would be logical to see Park Posey in a film that would help launch a filmmaker's career at a fest that does just that. The film works with a very "current" theme and if the tone is just right, I could see Andrew Meieran's dramedy, which has had a long time to prep for the festival (read this article on the shot in RED production). Look for Highland Park to be one of possibly a pair (the other being Detachment) of high school set pics that deal not with the students, but the staff.
2011 Sundance Bonus Predictions: Maryam Keshavarz’s Circumstance
I could have sworn that Maryam Keshavarz's Circumstance had had a world preem at Locarno, but no - it'll be ready for the 2011 film festival season. Look for the Sundance Institute’s 2007 Screenwriters Lab participant to showcase her feature debut in Park City - specifically in the World Dramatic Comp. Then it could easily go to Rotterdam, where it received the Hubert Bals Fund or Berlin where the film/filmmaker was part of the Talent Campus.
