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The Festival Beat N°1110

Rick W 0 48
THE FESTIVAL BEAT MAKER ! SHARING MOTION AND EMOTION SINCE 1995  


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With other 11 000 festivals worldwide which we cover: no wonder we have reached the '1000' mark for our newsletters count. We proudly share our knowledge of the Tallinn Black Nights Festival in focus circuit with our community and really hope our audience ENJOY THE EXPERIENCE. In case you missed any of these 1000+ newsletters ... you ll find them all here.    

Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival in focus  
Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival reveals the selection for the First Feature Competition 2024.
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The strand, dedicated exclusively for the full-length film debutants, includes 7 world premieres and 4 international premieres. All of the authors will be present in Tallinn.  "Even before we received our A-class status in 2014, we've made it a priority to support new talents, especially those making their debut. This is our niche in the global festival stage", said Tiina Lokk, the Festival Director. She elaborated: "We've made our...
 
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  The 11-piece competition strand includes six world premieres and five international premieres.  The new team is led by Estonian documentary director, producer and Associate professor at the Baltic Film, Media and Arts School of Tallinn University, Marianna Kaat (The Last Relic, PÖFF 2023). The other three programmers are: self-shooting producer/director Mike Arnott, long-time PÖFF programm

Is MEGALOPOLIS Coppola’s own Singularity?

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By Quendrith Johnson, Los Angeles Correspondent

 

“Imagine today’s Society as a branch of civilization about to reach a dead end.” You want to defend and explain Francis Ford Coppola’s MEGALOPOLIS just as much as narrator Laurence Fishburne, who tries to make the case during the movie that this oddball gorgeous landscape of mildly psychotic imagery is historic. You want to love Adam Driver and his maniacal urban hive-builder genius as someone amazing and heretofore unseen. “Don’t let the now destroy the forever.” But Ancient Rome intrudes along with a gaudy talent show of predictable human vices. Yet the embodiment of said worn vices is in the amazingly talented forms of wicked Shia LaBeouf, bitchy Aubrey Plaza, witchy Kathryn Hunter, even rejuvenated Dustin Hoffman.

And then you realize what you are looking at, and this is big...

Francis Ford Coppola is the first cinematic director to reach his creative singularity, the point at which artistic growth has become unsustainable with unforeseen effects on future moviegoers.

Coppola’s Artistic Singularity, that’s reason enough to set your Clockwork Orange eye-openers for this lush and unruly fable of the patriarchy’s last glimpse of a familiar universe. The place where Game of Thrones’ Nathalie Emmanuel is still carrying out someone else’s agenda. And even the dailed-up sanpaku eyes of Aubrey Plaza fail to wink out in irony at the audience at any time. “One, two, three yippee-yee.”

MEGALOPOLIS from Lionsgate opened last week, and stars Adam Driver, Giancarlo Esposito, Nathalie Emmanuel, Aubrey Plaza, Shia LaBeouf, Jon Voight, Laurence Fishburne, Kathryn Hunter, and Dustin Hoffman.

Stare at the trailer here.

 

 

# # #

“Megalopolis” Is a Mega Mess

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Megalopolis (Francis Ford Coppola, 2024) 1½ out of 5 stars Francis Ford Coppola, the celebrated auteur who made his name in the 1970s with such Hollywood New Wave classics as The Godfather, The Godfather Part II, The Conversation, and Apocalypse Now, is out with a new movie, Megalopolis, which he wrote as well as directed. […]

The post “Megalopolis” Is a Mega Mess first appeared on Film Festival Today.

72 San Sebastian FIlm Festival´s Perlak/Pearls

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Arnold, Audiard, Baker, Coppola, Courcol, Elliot, Fargeat, Kapadia, Rasoulof, Salles, Sangsoo, Schrader and Sorrentino to compete in San Sebastian Festival’s Perlak section

‘Marco’, by Jon Garaño and Aitor Arregi, will close the section, also to show ‘The Wild Robot’ and ‘Maria Callas: Letters and Memories’ out of competition

https://youtu.be/NV9mhQyiSnc?si=bCACNQaTFlg5RHhl

The Palme d’Or and a wide representation of the award-winners from the last Festival de Cannes, the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize at the Berlinale and the Annecy Cristal Award for Best Feature Film will compete for the City of Donostia / San Sebastian Audience Award alongside other films selected from the Venice Mostra, Toronto and other festivals. Andrea Arnold, Jacques Audiard, Sean Baker, Francis Ford Coppola, Emmanuel Courcol, Adam Elliot, Coralie Fargeat, Payal Kapadia, Mohammad Rasoulof, Walter Salles, Hong Sangsoo, Paul Schrader and Paolo Sorrentino will show their new features in a section to include three films out of competition: Marco, with which Jon Garaño and Aitor Arregi will close Perlak at the Velodrome; the animated feature film The Wild Robot, from Chris Sanders, and the non-fiction Maria Callas: Letters and Memories, from Tom Volf and Yannis Dimolitsas.

Emilia Pérez, which earned Jacques Audiard (Paris, 1952) the Jury Prize at the last Festival de Cannes, will open the Perlak competition. The female protagonists featuring Zoe Saldaña, Karla Sofía Gascón, Selena Gomez and Adriana Paz also jointly landed the Best Actress Award for this film in which a Mexican cartel leader decides to change sex in a cast also starring Edgar Ramírez. Audiard already landed the Grand Jury Prize in Cannes thanks to Un Prophète / A Prophet (2009) and the Palme d’or with Dheepan (2015), while he carried off Best Director at the Venice Mostra with Les frères Sisters / The Sisters Brothers (Perlak, 2018). In 2009 his film De battre mon coeur s'est arrêté / The Beat That My Heart Skipped (2004) participated in the themed retrospective Backwash: Cutting Edge of French cinema.

Having shown Cow (2021) as a Cannes Premiere, Andrea Arnold (Dartford, 1961) will present Bird in Perlak, a movie included in the Official Selection at Cannes, where she has won the Jury Prize on three occasions thanks to Red Road (2006), Fish Tank (2009) and American Honey (2016). The latest work from the British filmmaker tells the tale of a 12-year-old teen who lives with her father and brother in a squat in North Kent.

Anora, winning film of the last Palme d’or at Cannes, is also included in the Perlak selection, Its author, Sean Baker (Summit, 1971), follows the odyssey of a young sex worker in Brooklyn who marries a Russian oligarch. This will be the North American director’s third participation in the section after The Florida Project (Perlak, 2017), premiered in the Quinzaine des Cinéastes at Cannes and Red Rocket (Perlak, 2021), a competitor in the official selection at the Festival de Cannes.

Francis Ford Coppola (Detroit, 1939) also competed at the last edition of the French event with Megalopolis, an epic Roman fable set in an imaginary Amer

Ten (Plus) Bets #9 for TFF #51 / NYFF Spotlight Announcement / Some Other Possible Guests / New Poster for Saturday Night / The People's Telluride-12th Edition

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 TEN (PLUS) BETS #9 FOR TFF #51



Well, with what purports to be the last set of announced films for Toronto on Tuesday and the release of the Venice screening schedule on Monday, we have some shifting occurring in this week's Ten (Plus) Bets for TFF #51.

Here was last week's Ten (Plus) Bets:

1) Anora/Baker
2) Conclave/Berger
3) Emilia Perez/Audiard
4) The End/Oppenheimer
5) All We Imagine as Light/Kapadia
6) The Piano Lesson/Washington
7) Nickel Boys/Ross
8) Misrecordia/Guiraudie
9) Better Man/Gracey
10) Piece by Piece/Neville

And a Bonus Ten Bets:

11) Dahomey/Diop
12) Grand Tour/Gomes
13) No Other Land/Adra, Ballal, Abraham and Szor
14) The Seed of the Sacred Fig/Rasoulof
15) The Friend/Siegel and McGeehee
16) Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight/Davitz
17) The Apprentice/Abassi
18) A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things/Cousins
19) Maria/Larrain
20) Saturday Night/Reitman

Other possibilities:

Separated/Morris
Oh, Canada/Schrader
Flow/Zibalodis
Santosh/Suri
Megalopolis/Coppola
Allegorie Citadine/ Rohrwacher and JR
The Actor/Johnson
Parthenope/Sorrentino
Hand of Dante/Schnabel
Napoleon (new restoration)/Gance
Leonardo DaVinci/Burns
Memoir of a Snail/Elliot
One on One: John and Yoko/ Macdonald and Rice-Edwards
The Outrun/Fingscheidt and/or Blitz/McQueen


This week's Ten (Plus) Bets:

1) Anora/Baker
2) Conclave/Berger
3) Emilia Perez/Audiard
4) The End/Oppenheimer
5) All We Imagine as Light/Kapadia
6) The Piano Lesson/Washington
7) Nickel Boys/Ross
8) Saturday Night/Reitman
9) Misrecordia/Guiraudie
10) Piece by Piece/Neville

And a Bonus Ten Bets:

11) Separated/Morris
12) Better Man/Gracey
13) No Other Land/Adra, Ballal, Abraham and Szor
14) The Seed of the Sacred Fig/Rasoulof
15) The Friend/Siegel and M

Clarity from New York and Toronto / Ten (Plus) Bets #8 for TFF #51 / Vanity Fair Looks at Saturday Night

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CLARITY FROM NEW YORK AND TORONTO




Announcements on Tuesday from both the New York Film Festival and the Toronto International Film Festival helped to sharpen the focus on what films are likely to be screening as a part of the 51st edition of the Telluride Film Festival.

New York Fest reveals seemed to confirm earlier extrapolations that the following will play TFF #51:

All We Imagine as Light
Anora
Misrecordia
Nickel Boys 
The Seed of the Sacred Fig

In addition NYFF premiere designations signal that the following are also likely for TFF #51:

Dahomey
Grand Tour
No Other Land

Meanwhile, Toronto Centerpiece announcements tend to confirm The Seed of the Sacred Fig in addition to the inclusion of  Flow and Santosh as TFF #51 films.

Additionally, the fate of Paul Schrader's Oh, Canada is once again, up in the air, as NYFF lists it with no premiere designation as opposed to a U.S. Premiere designation which would normally signal a Telluride play. Meanwhile Toronto's lineup lists it as a North American Premiere.  Both things can't be true.  I'm thinking Oh, Canada might be in TFF #51 after all.

With three weeks left we expect to hear more from both of these fests as well as nod or two from London.




TEN (PLUS) BETS #8 FOR TFF #51




Woooo...we ARE getting down to it for 2024!

Here's your now weekly prediction about what will be screening at the 51st Telluride Film Festival.  First a look at last week's predicted field:


1) Anora/Baker
2) Conclave/Berger
3) Emilia Perez/Audiard
4) The End/Oppenheimer
5) All We Imagine as Light/Kapadia
6) The Piano Lesson/Washington
7) Nickel Boys/Ross
8) Misrecordia/Guiraudie

Hints and Allegations / Who Could Be at TFF #51? / Looks at Possible Double Plays

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HINTS AND ALLEGATIONS




I had a couple of readers send me information about possible confirmations/inclusions about films and/or attendees this past week.  

Back on July 23rd I posted an MTFB special about announcements from Toronto, Venice and New York.  One of the films I especially noted was Andrea Arnold's Bird as it was labeled as a North American Premiere on the TIFF official website but had been posted here on X as a Canadian Premiere.  However, MTFB reader Bobby Harris contacted me to reveal that TIFF's entry for Bird on the website has been changed to Canadian:



So, for me, that's going to mean that I'm putting Bird back on the Ten Bets/Possible list when it gets updated on Thursday.

Additionally, I had another reader reach out to convey intell about three possible attendees for TFF.  I'm going to be a little cagey here as to who/where the info came from as well as explicitly naming names-at least for now.  I will say that a couple of the names would confirm that Anora and Emilia Perez will play Telluride.  The third person's presence would indicate one or possibly two films neither of which are currently among the "Bets" or "Possibles".


WHO COULD BE AT TFF#51?





For fun, let's assume I'm right about almost everything playing at TFF #51; what star wattage could we see in town, on panels, doing Q&A's?

Anora: Sean Baker, Mikey Madison
Conclave: Edward Berger, Ralph Fiennes, John Lithgow, Stanley Tucci, Isabella Rossellini
Emilia Perez: Jacques Audiard, Zoe Saldana, Sele na Gomez, Karla Sofia Gascon, Adriana Paz
The End: Joshua Oppenheimer, Tilda Swinton, Michael Shannon, Geo

Ten (Plus) Bets #7 for TFF #51 / A New Name and a Date / TFF #51 Has a Poster

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TEN BETS (PLUS) #7 FOR TFF #51 



Waiting on announcements from New York, Venice (they just added Kevin Costner's Horizon: An American saga Part 2 to their lineup yesterday) as well as Fantastic Fest

Here's last week's Ten (Plus) Bets:

1) Anora/Baker
2) Conclave/Berger
3) Emilia Perez/Audiard
4) The End/Oppenheimer
5) All We Imagine as Light/Kapadia
6) The Piano Lesson/Washington
7) Misrecordia/Guiraudie
8) Nickel Boys/Ross
9) Better Man/Gracey
10) Piece by Piece/Neville

And a Bonus Five Bets:

11) The Seed of the Sacred Fig/Rasoulof
12) A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things/Cousins
13) The Apprentice/Abassi
14) The Friend/Siegel and McGeehee
15) Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight/Davitz

Other possibilities:

Maria/Larrain
Parthenope/Sorrentino
In the Hand of Dante/Schnabel
Untitled Noah Baumbach
Megalopolis/Coppola
Napoleon (new restoration)/Gance
Leonardo DaVinci/Burns
The Actor/Johnson
SNL 1975/Reitman
Memoir of a Snail/Elliot
Babygirl/Reijn
Separated/Morris
One on One: John and Yoko/ Macdonald and Rice-Edwards
Harvest/Tsangari
Allegorie Citadine/ Rohrwacher and JR


And here's this week's:

1) Anora/Baker
2) Conclave/Berger
3) Emilia Perez/Audiard
4) The End/Oppenheimer
5) All We Imagine as Light/Kapadia
6) The Piano Lesson/Washington
7) Nickel Boys/Ross
8) Misrecordia/Guiraudie
9) Better Man/Gracey
10) Piece by Piece/Neville

And a Bonus Five Bets:

11) The Apprentice/Abassi
12) A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things/Cousins
13) The Seed of the Sacred Fig/Rasoulof
14) The Friend/Siegel and McGeehee
15) Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight/Davitz

Other possibilities:

Maria/Larrain
Megalopolis/Coppola
Separated/Morris
Saturday Night/Reitman
Parthenope/Sorrentino
In the Hand of Dante/Schnabel
Napoleon (new restoration)/Gance
Leonardo DaVinci/Burns
The Actor/Johnson
Memoir of a Snail/Elliot
One on One: John and Yoko/ Macdonald and R

Venice Schedule Leak / Davis Details Telluride

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VENICE SCHEDULE LEAK




World of Reel reports that at least part of the Venice Film fest has leaked.  As frequent readers of MTFB know, there is often a fairly substantial crossover between films that screen early at Venice (the first three days) and the TFF lineup.

If the partially leaked titles and dates are correct it looks like Pablo Larrain's Maria is positioned to make the leap from Italy to Colorado as WOR says it bows in Venice on Aug. 29th.  The other film that is suggested as a possible Venice-Telluride double play is Halina Reijn's Babygirl (however, see below)  starring Nicole Kidman which is said to screen on Aug. 30th.

The reporting also indicates that, as previously reported, both Queer and The Room Next Door will be scheduled far too late to make an appearance at TFF #52.

I suspect that there will be other films that make the trip but as yet no other films screening schedule seems to have been revealed.



DAVIS DETAILS TELLURIDE




Variety's Clayton Davis writing on Tuesday detailed a ton of Telluride lineup info.

Here's what Davis says will be playing:

Conclave
Piece by Piece
Nickel Boys
The End 
Anora
Better Man
The Piano Lesson
Emilia Perez
Maria
The Friend
All We Imagine as Light
Misrecordia


Maybes for Telluride:

The Seed of the Sacred Fig
The Apprentice
Megalopolis



Will NOT play Telluride:

Babygirl
A Complete Unknown
Nightbitch
The Room Next Door
Pedron Paramo
Gladiator II
Here
We Live in Time
The Brutalist
Wolfs
Queer
Joker: Folie a Deux

Ten Bets #6 for TFF #51 / Two Go Away / Two (Maybe) Get Added / Is it Possible?

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TEN BETS #6 FOR TFF #51


Well, the hints hit hard this week with the Toronto and Venice Fests announcing the bulk of their 2024 lineups.  New York also got into the act by announcing their opening night film: RaMell Ross' Nickel Boys-with its conspicuous absence of a premiere designation in the media release.  Needless to say...we know more now than we did a week ago.

Here's what the "Ten Bets" and other possibilities looked like last week:

1) Anora/Baker
2) Conclave/Berger
3) Emilia Perez/Jacques Audiard
4) The Room Next Door/Pedro Almodovar
5) The Seed of the Scared Fig/Mohammad Rasoulof
6) A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things/Cousins
7) Nickel Boys/Ross
8) Maria/Pablo Larrain
9) Queer/Luca Guadagnino
10) Bird/Arnold

Other possibilities:

The End/Oppenheimer
I'm Still Here/Salles
Parthenope/Sorrentino
In the Hand of Dante/Schnabel
Hard Truths/Leigh
The Piano Lesson/Washington
Untitled Noah Baumbach
Megalopolis/Coppola
Napoleon (new restoration)/Gance
Leonardo DaVinci/Burns
Oh, Canada/Schrader
The Actor/Johnson
SNL 1975
All We Imagine as Light
Memoir of a Snail

Now, here's the update:

1) Anora/Baker
2) Conclave/Berger
3) Emilia Perez/Audiard
4) The End/Oppenheimer
5) All We Imagine as Light/Kapadia
6) The Piano Lesson/Washington
7) Misrecordia/Guiraudie
8) Nickel Boys/Ross
9) Better Man/Gracey
10) Piece by Piece/Neville

And a Bonus Five Bets:

11) The Seed of the Sacred Fig/Rasoulof
12) A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things/Cousins
13) The Apprentice/Abassi
14) The Friend/Siegel and McGeehee
15) Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight/Davitz

Other possibilities:

Maria/Larrain
Parthenope/Sorrentino
In the Hand of Dante/Schnabel
Untitled Noah Baumbach
Megalopolis/Coppola
Napoleon (new restoration)/Gance
Leonardo DaVinci/Burns
The Actor/Johnson
SNL 1975/Reitman
Memoir
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