Ioncinema

Next week we will know the line ups for the 83rd Venice International Film Festival, as well as the 41st International Critics’ Week picks and 23rd Giornate degli Autori selections. Typically landing in the 21-to-23-film range, the Golden Lion competition lineup usually reserves four or five slots for Italian productions, leaving roughly sixteen places for the rest of the international field. Once the inevitable studio-backed red-carpet premieres are accounted for, the competition for the remaining slots becomes especially fierce, with limited opportunities for other national cinemas to break through and command attention. Tomorrow TIFF will offer a look into their Gala and Special Presentations selections which will include (and exclude) some of our guesses below.… Read the rest

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Next week we will know the line ups for the 83rd Venice International Film Festival, as well as the 41st International Critics’ Week picks and 23rd Giornate degli Autori selections. Typically landing in the 21-to-23-film range, the Golden Lion competition lineup usually reserves four or five slots for Italian productions, leaving roughly sixteen places for the rest of the international field. Once the inevitable studio-backed red-carpet premieres are accounted for, the competition for the remaining slots becomes especially fierce, with limited opportunities for other national cinemas to break through and command attention. Tomorrow TIFF will offer a look into their Gala and Special Presentations selections which will include (and exclude) some of our guesses below.… Read the rest

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France-based filmmaker João Paulo Miranda Maria is one of the new emerging voices from Brazil and has already padded a resume of shorts that were showcased at Cannes and Venice to prove it hi savoir-faire. A cinema curious about colonialism, racism, memory, identity and magical realism, he developed his debut feature Memory House through the Cannes Critics’ Week and the Cinéfondation — it was a 2020 Cannes Official Selection — the unfortunately cancelled edition. Last year he shot a short ‘Paysage après la bataille’ featuring Hafsia Herzi. He is now in sophomore feature terrain. Here is everything we know so far for … João Paulo Miranda Maria’s I Don’t Even Know Who I Was.… Read the rest

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Using the road-movie narrative template to explore an unconventional form of companionship, The Kidnapping of Arabella is far from a typical coming-of-age film — in fact, it might be better described as a “coming out-of-age” journey. One of your first reflections might be: who kidnaps whom? This piece of subversive comedy matches the idiosyncratic tone and character-driven quirks found in Carolina Cavalli’s feature debut, Amanda (2022), and her co-penned work Fremont (2023). Centering on themes of loneliness, connection, and co-dependence, this offbeat film delivers a quirky blend of deadpan humor, sharp dialogue, and a generous dose of absurdity.

Among the fresh new wave of Italian female filmmakers on the international film festival circuit, Cavalli returned to the Venice Film Festival’s Orizzonti section for a her second time out with Benedetta Porcaroli winning the Orizzonti award for Best Actress.… Read the rest

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Warner Bros.’ indie label Clockwork lassoed the future cinema offerings from Sean Baker and Park Chan-Wook, and today they announce they’re moving into production on Mary Bronstein’s next film — a sport drama with the main course being a bit of backstabbing. Variety reports that she’ll be directing one of the higher ranked screenplays of 2024’s annual The Black List. Titled Nasty, Bronstein re-team with If I Had Legs I’d Kick You‘s Rose Byrne and they are adding Jenna Ortega to the top of the fold. The original screenplay was written by Isabella Jarosz. Production is set to begin in the fall.… Read the rest

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James Gray’s Paper Tiger has been selected by the New York Film Festival as the Opening Night selection for the 64th edition. This is film counts as number four to be selected by the festival. The film might have left Cannes empty-handed, but NEON are likely looking at different acting categories for awardage. In our Cannes ★★★★ review, our Nicholas Bell stamps this as one of Gray’s career best: “Paper Tiger is partially a film about ‘more money, more problems,’ but also, quite powerfully, a study on how the tantalizing facade of the American Dream is an express elevator to hell for anyone who desires to outstrip the fate of their economic realities.”… Read the rest

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Five Special Presentations programme titles have been added to Toronto, four of them are world premieres and one is heading over to the Lido. The Zellner Bros. will indeed be heading over to Venice with Alpha Gang – the tale about aliens who arrive on Earth seeking to destroy but they soon find themselves compromised with human emotions features the likes of Cate Blanchett, Chris Pine, Dave Bautista, Léa Seydoux, Lily-Rose Depp, Adria Arjona, Doona Bae, and Kelvin Harrison Jr. has to be one of the big acquisition titles available this fall.

Of the five-some we are most excited for the new work from Argentinian filmmaker Benjamín Naishtat who brings Glaxo to the fest.… Read the rest

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Danny Boyle‘s INK will indeed competition for the Golden Lion — with the Venice Film Festival setting the control of free speech thriller as the opening film of the festival with the world premiere set for September 2nd. This is described as an explosive cinematic rollercoaster about a group of visionaries and misfits who had an idea for a new kind of news – one that would give the people what they want and would change the face of the world we live in today. O’Connell stars as THE SUN editor Larry Lamb with Pearce as Rupert Murdoch. Claire Foy is Jules Davies.… Read the rest

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Venice Film Festival just announced their jury, TIFF’s Platform section trio should happen any day now, and we now have Locarno eyeballs on the different comps and le president for the Concorso Internazionale section at the upcoming Locarno Film Festival will be Belgium’s enfant terrible auteur filmmaker Fabrice Du Welz. Du Welz is best known for his Ardennes Trilogy of Calvaire (2004), Alleluia (2014) and Adoration (2019). He most recently directed the crime thriller Maldoror (read review).

Du Welz’s peer jury members will be producer Marco Alessi, actress Lolita Chammah, actress Paulina García and Olivier Père – Executive Director of ARTE France Cinéma.… Read the rest

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Among the final stops on the road to their expected premieres at the major prestige film festivals of 2027 — most notably Cannes — are these half-dozen projects being presented at the Final Cut in Venice work-in-progress lab. Launched in 2013, Final Cut in Venice supports projects from all African countries and six countries of the Middle East: Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria and Yemen. This year we find the new Bassel Ghandour film, the freshly just filmed new oeuvre by Moroccan Alaa Eddine Aljem, and Algerian filmmaker Sofia Djama‘s sophomore project which was filmed this past May.

Jordanian filmmaker Bassel Ghandour saw his feature debut inn 2014’s Theeb premiere at the Venbice Film Festival (he won Best Director in the Orizzonti section).… Read the rest

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