Never a good sign when a film that technically opened the Sundance Film Festival and subsequently played at Berlin is picked up a full four months after the fact. I haven't seen Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman's film but from what I heard, the film poses as a challenge to the patrons who'll end up seeing the film in theaters and might be a puzzle for the marketing department at Oscilloscope Laboratories who picked up the picture. The distributor plans a September 24th launch accompanied by a VOD release.
There's definitely an air of familiarity with the best actor predictions you'll find below - I get buzzing on future film performances based on the already established filmography, but if I use this year's Oscar winner for Best Actor, then I should expect the unexpected.
On the world cinema front, we have a new film from Aki Kaurismäki (filming in the North of France), we have Lou Ye joining forces with Tahar Rahim, and another auteur in Phillippe Garrel who will be directing Monica Bellucci.
What do Central Station (1998), The Thin Red Line (1999) and Paul Thomas Anderson's Magnolia (2000) all have in common? They were awarded the top honor at the Berlin Film Festival and you can add Honey, the final leg in Semih Kaplanoglu's trilogy which commenced with Egg and last year's Milk, to that grouping.
We're only a little past the one week point the apres portion of the Sundance Film Festival so I'm expecting some keys deals to still come trickling in, however there are fivesome of high profile, critically well-received titles that have yet to find a U.S. distribution deal that I thought are worth mentioning.