Kodak, which had a momentous 2023 with more than 60 movies shot on film has gotten off to a promising start in 2024 with Luca Guadignino’s “Challengers” and Jane Shoenbrun’s “I Saw the TV Glow, which A24 released wide May 17. Upcoming releases include Jeff Nichols’ “The Bikeriders” and Robert Eggers’ “Nosferatu.”
Meanwhile, Kodak premiered 29 movies shot on film at Cannes. These include five features competing for the Palme d’Or: Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Kinds of Kindness,” Sean Baker’s “Anora,” Andrea Arnold’s “Bird,” Karim Aïnouz’s “Motel Destino,” and Miguel Gomes’ “Grand Tour.”
Additionally, four movies are featured in Un Certain Regard, and 16 titles across Directors’ Fortnight and Critics’ Week were captured on film. Meanwhile, 16mm film continues to prove its popularity and relevance, with 23 of the on-film titles at the festival choosing it as their capture medium.
This article was first published January 27, 2024. It has been updated.
Cannes 2024 Premieres ‘Kinds...
Meanwhile, Kodak premiered 29 movies shot on film at Cannes. These include five features competing for the Palme d’Or: Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Kinds of Kindness,” Sean Baker’s “Anora,” Andrea Arnold’s “Bird,” Karim Aïnouz’s “Motel Destino,” and Miguel Gomes’ “Grand Tour.”
Additionally, four movies are featured in Un Certain Regard, and 16 titles across Directors’ Fortnight and Critics’ Week were captured on film. Meanwhile, 16mm film continues to prove its popularity and relevance, with 23 of the on-film titles at the festival choosing it as their capture medium.
This article was first published January 27, 2024. It has been updated.
Cannes 2024 Premieres ‘Kinds...
- 5/27/2024
- by Bill Desowitz
- Indiewire
The 2024 Cannes Film Festival is underway with Quentin Dupieux’s The Second Act starring Léa Seydoux and Louis Garrel serving as the opening-night film.
This year’s lineup includes major Hollywood premieres like Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga starring Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth, Kevin Costner’s first film of a planned four-part series Horizon: An American Saga, Francis Coppola’s long-gestating Megalopolis, Yorgos Lanthimos’ Kinds of Kindness in a reteam with Emma Stone, Paul Schrader’s Oh, Canada and Andrea Arnold’s Bird to name a few.
They are joined by new films from stalwart auteurs including David Cronenberg, Jacques Audiard, Ali Abbasi, Jia Zhang-Ke, Christophe Honoré, Paolo Sorrentino, Gilles Lellouche, Mohammad Rasoulof, Michel Hazanavicius, Guy Maddin, Noémie Merlant and Oliver Stone.
Read all of Deadline’s takes below throughout the festival, which runs May 14-25. Click on the title to read the full review and keep checking back as we update the list.
This year’s lineup includes major Hollywood premieres like Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga starring Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth, Kevin Costner’s first film of a planned four-part series Horizon: An American Saga, Francis Coppola’s long-gestating Megalopolis, Yorgos Lanthimos’ Kinds of Kindness in a reteam with Emma Stone, Paul Schrader’s Oh, Canada and Andrea Arnold’s Bird to name a few.
They are joined by new films from stalwart auteurs including David Cronenberg, Jacques Audiard, Ali Abbasi, Jia Zhang-Ke, Christophe Honoré, Paolo Sorrentino, Gilles Lellouche, Mohammad Rasoulof, Michel Hazanavicius, Guy Maddin, Noémie Merlant and Oliver Stone.
Read all of Deadline’s takes below throughout the festival, which runs May 14-25. Click on the title to read the full review and keep checking back as we update the list.
- 5/24/2024
- by Pete Hammond, Joe Utichi, Damon Wise, Stephanie Bunbury and Valerie Complex
- Deadline Film + TV
When Filmmaker featured the startup film collective Omnes Films in our 2021 25 New Faces list, the L.A. outfit’s first two microbudget features — Jonathan Davies’ Topology of Sirens and Tyler Taormina’s Ham on Rye — had both premiered at festivals and received U.S. releases from Factory 25, its members had produced shorts and music videos, and new features were in the works. One of the few companies or collectives to land on our list over its history, Omnes impressed us with not only the quality of the films but the ambition — and optimism — evinced by a group […]
The post “We’re Very Preoccupied with Making Personal Arthouse Features”: With Two Films in Cannes, Carson Lund and Tyler Discuss Production Company, Omnes Films first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post “We’re Very Preoccupied with Making Personal Arthouse Features”: With Two Films in Cannes, Carson Lund and Tyler Discuss Production Company, Omnes Films first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 5/21/2024
- by Scott Macaulay
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
When Filmmaker featured the startup film collective Omnes Films in our 2021 25 New Faces list, the L.A. outfit’s first two microbudget features — Jonathan Davies’ Topology of Sirens and Tyler Taormina’s Ham on Rye — had both premiered at festivals and received U.S. releases from Factory 25, its members had produced shorts and music videos, and new features were in the works. One of the few companies or collectives to land on our list over its history, Omnes impressed us with not only the quality of the films but the ambition — and optimism — evinced by a group […]
The post “We’re Very Preoccupied with Making Personal Arthouse Features”: With Two Films in Cannes, Carson Lund and Tyler Discuss Production Company, Omnes Films first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post “We’re Very Preoccupied with Making Personal Arthouse Features”: With Two Films in Cannes, Carson Lund and Tyler Discuss Production Company, Omnes Films first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 5/21/2024
- by Scott Macaulay
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
Yogi Berra, perhaps the greatest catcher in history, is quoted in Carson Lund’s “Eephus,” a movie about players who, unlike Berra, are never going to trouble the Baseball Hall of Fame’s induction committee. To homage so lofty a legend in so humble a film is a pretty big swing. But one likes to think Berra would be tickled by the shout-out in this lovely little sundowner movie, during which a bunch of middle-aged casual players use the excuse of the last game of their season — and perhaps ever — to valiantly fight the dying of the light. After all, wasn’t he the guy who coined “The future ain’t what it used to be”?
The future sure looks different, suddenly, for the Adler’s Paint and Riverdogs adult-league teams who have played regularly at Soldier’s Field, the public pitch serving their small New England town, for years.
The future sure looks different, suddenly, for the Adler’s Paint and Riverdogs adult-league teams who have played regularly at Soldier’s Field, the public pitch serving their small New England town, for years.
- 5/21/2024
- by Jessica Kiang
- Variety Film + TV
IndieWire has published its Cannes 2024 Cinematography Survey. We analyzed the data to explore (again and again) that the nine-year-old camera, Arri Alexa Mini, is the most popular camera among Cannes filmmakers. Furthermore, interestingly, in its first appearance on the Cannes Cinematography Chart and jumped straight to second place, is the Arri 35.
The main cameras of Cannes 2024 are the Arri Alexa Mini and the 35. Cannes 2024 cinematography
The 77th annual Cannes Film Festival is taking place from 14 to 25 May 2024. IndieWire has reached out to the filmmakers behind 59 films screened in various categories in the festival. The DPs elaborated on the tools they utilized to tell their stories. Read the entire survey here.
Official poster of the 77th Cannes Film Festival featuring a still image from the movie Rhapsody in August by Akira Kurosawa (1991)
As the tradition calls, we took the data and filtered it to the cameras used, to explore tendency. Based on the info,...
The main cameras of Cannes 2024 are the Arri Alexa Mini and the 35. Cannes 2024 cinematography
The 77th annual Cannes Film Festival is taking place from 14 to 25 May 2024. IndieWire has reached out to the filmmakers behind 59 films screened in various categories in the festival. The DPs elaborated on the tools they utilized to tell their stories. Read the entire survey here.
Official poster of the 77th Cannes Film Festival featuring a still image from the movie Rhapsody in August by Akira Kurosawa (1991)
As the tradition calls, we took the data and filtered it to the cameras used, to explore tendency. Based on the info,...
- 5/21/2024
- by Yossy Mendelovich
- YMCinema
Whether the sprawling fantasia that is Tyler Taormina’s Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point proves heartwarmingly reflective or personally destabilizing in its near-ethnographic study of American holiday ritual will depend, largely, on the composition and size of your own Xmas memories. It’s a strength of the film, however, that Taormina’s expansive canvas allows for — and incorporates — the whole range of emotions that the theater of Christmas can produce, from the giddiness of an overstimulated child, stomach groaning from too much pumpkin pie, gazing at all those wrapped presents, to the wearied anxiety of an adult realizing that the holiday […]
The post “I Actually Feel Like the Firefly Was Caught in the Jar”: Tyler Taormina on His Cannes-Premiering Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post “I Actually Feel Like the Firefly Was Caught in the Jar”: Tyler Taormina on His Cannes-Premiering Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 5/20/2024
- by Scott Macaulay
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
Whether the sprawling fantasia that is Tyler Taormina’s Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point proves heartwarmingly reflective or personally destabilizing in its near-ethnographic study of American holiday ritual will depend, largely, on the composition and size of your own Xmas memories. It’s a strength of the film, however, that Taormina’s expansive canvas allows for — and incorporates — the whole range of emotions that the theater of Christmas can produce, from the giddiness of an overstimulated child, stomach groaning from too much pumpkin pie, gazing at all those wrapped presents, to the wearied anxiety of an adult realizing that the holiday […]
The post “I Actually Feel Like the Firefly Was Caught in the Jar”: Tyler Taormina on His Cannes-Premiering Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post “I Actually Feel Like the Firefly Was Caught in the Jar”: Tyler Taormina on His Cannes-Premiering Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 5/20/2024
- by Scott Macaulay
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Diamonds Are Not Forever: Lund Looks Beyond America’s Favorite Pastime
Even with a full count of three balls and two strikes, it may seem like the stakes are low, but the never-mentioned patriarchal foundations are rife with uncertainty in filmmaker Carson Lund’s feature film debut. As a regular contributor to Tyler Taormina’s recent cinema of suburbia and nostalgia, working with the same reflections of the past in a short and very present window — it would be a huge oversight to peg this simply as a pinstripes and leather glove essay. Working within masculinist traits and rural mindsets parameters, Eephus is reminiscent of Richard Linklater’s seminal walk-and-talkathon Slacker.…...
Even with a full count of three balls and two strikes, it may seem like the stakes are low, but the never-mentioned patriarchal foundations are rife with uncertainty in filmmaker Carson Lund’s feature film debut. As a regular contributor to Tyler Taormina’s recent cinema of suburbia and nostalgia, working with the same reflections of the past in a short and very present window — it would be a huge oversight to peg this simply as a pinstripes and leather glove essay. Working within masculinist traits and rural mindsets parameters, Eephus is reminiscent of Richard Linklater’s seminal walk-and-talkathon Slacker.…...
- 5/20/2024
- by Eric Lavallée
- IONCINEMA.com
What kind of Christmas movie do you get when your director’s inspirations are early-90s Nickelodeon live-action shows and 1960s European cinema? In Tyler Taormina’s case, the answer is Christmas Eve In Miller’s Point.
The movie sees four generations of the Balsano family get together for what, it transpires, may be their last annual Christmas party. With celebrations underway, two of the clan’s younger members sneak out in an act of teenage rebellion, which plays out against a backdrop of wintery and suburban Long Island.
The film is Taormina’s follow-up to the well-received indie pic Ham on Rye. He co-wrote the script with Eric Berger. Michael Cera is a producer and part of an ensemble cast that includes Elsie Fisher, Maria Dizzia, Francesca Scorsese, Ben Shenkman, Gregg Turkington, Sawyer Spielberg and newcomer Matilda Fleming.
Taormina and the cast of his new movie dropped by the...
The movie sees four generations of the Balsano family get together for what, it transpires, may be their last annual Christmas party. With celebrations underway, two of the clan’s younger members sneak out in an act of teenage rebellion, which plays out against a backdrop of wintery and suburban Long Island.
The film is Taormina’s follow-up to the well-received indie pic Ham on Rye. He co-wrote the script with Eric Berger. Michael Cera is a producer and part of an ensemble cast that includes Elsie Fisher, Maria Dizzia, Francesca Scorsese, Ben Shenkman, Gregg Turkington, Sawyer Spielberg and newcomer Matilda Fleming.
Taormina and the cast of his new movie dropped by the...
- 5/20/2024
- by Stewart Clarke
- Deadline Film + TV
American filmmaker collective Omnes Films, in Cannes with Tyler Taormina’s Christmas Eve At Miller’s Point and Carson Lund’s Eephus in Directors’ Fortnight, has shared first details about its expanding slate.
Lorena Alvarado’s Venezuela-set Los Capítulos Perdidos tells of a young woman who returns to Venezuela where her grandmother is losing her memory and her father assembles a rare books collection. Alvarado’s family members play fictionalised versions of themselves.
Alexandra Simpson’s feature debut No Sleep Till takes place in a coastal Florida town threatened by an approaching hurricane where the locals insist on staying in their homes.
Lorena Alvarado’s Venezuela-set Los Capítulos Perdidos tells of a young woman who returns to Venezuela where her grandmother is losing her memory and her father assembles a rare books collection. Alvarado’s family members play fictionalised versions of themselves.
Alexandra Simpson’s feature debut No Sleep Till takes place in a coastal Florida town threatened by an approaching hurricane where the locals insist on staying in their homes.
- 5/20/2024
- ScreenDaily
Most baseball movies are not, per se, about baseball. To take some examples: The Natural is about a prodigy overcoming trauma; Eight Men Out is about greed and corruption; Bad News Bears is a foul-mouthed coming-of-age flick; Bull Durham is all about Kevin Costner’s sex appeal; Moneyball carries the sport into the information age; and Field of Dreams (Costner, again) is haunted by the ghosts of baseball past.
First-time director Carson Lund clearly had this in mind when he made his feature debut Eephus, a movie steeped in nostalgia for the game itself, as well as what it represents for a bunch of men past their prime: the long afternoons in the sun, the trash-talking at the plate, the brewskies in the cooler and the kind of camaraderie you can only find in the dugout.
In many ways, this existential and increasingly surreal indie effort, which seems to be...
First-time director Carson Lund clearly had this in mind when he made his feature debut Eephus, a movie steeped in nostalgia for the game itself, as well as what it represents for a bunch of men past their prime: the long afternoons in the sun, the trash-talking at the plate, the brewskies in the cooler and the kind of camaraderie you can only find in the dugout.
In many ways, this existential and increasingly surreal indie effort, which seems to be...
- 5/19/2024
- by Jordan Mintzer
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Writing on Martin Scorsese’s Shutter Island in 2010, Anthony Lane whipped a quote from Umberto Eco: “Two cliches make us laugh but a hundred clichés move us, because we sense dimly that the clichés are talking among themselves, celebrating a reunion.” Eco’s words resonate even stronger in Christmas Eve at Miller’s Point, a fascinating simulacrum of festive movies in which references to annual favorites are thrust together with about as much delicacy as the family it tenderly depicts. The island isn’t Shutter but Long, specifically a small town in Suffolk County where we meet four generations of the Bolsanos, a blue-collar family going through the motions and rituals of their annual get-together, adoring and enduring each other as best they can in what might be their last year in the family home. The filmmaker behind this delicate, strange, reflective bauble is Tyler Taormina, co-founder of the...
- 5/18/2024
- by Rory O'Connor
- The Film Stage
Cannes film festival
There isn’t much plot in Tyler Taormina’s very charming and rich movie about one huge family’s festivities, but it’s engrossing, exalted even
At first glance, there’s some reason to be suspicious of this film, with its possible nepo shenanigans. It’s about an extended blue collar family with a tinge of crime … and it features Francesca Scorsese, daughter of Martin. It’s also about the teeming warmth of a suburban American home, whose inhabitants seem on the verge of something epiphanic … and it features Sawyer Spielberg, son of Steven. But for all the influence-anxiety that anything like this carries with it, this is a very charming and rich movie, teeming with ambient detail, from very original and distinctive film-maker Tyler Taormina, whose previous picture Ham on Rye I very much admired.
Despite or because of the fact that almost nothing really happens in any conventionally dramatic sense,...
There isn’t much plot in Tyler Taormina’s very charming and rich movie about one huge family’s festivities, but it’s engrossing, exalted even
At first glance, there’s some reason to be suspicious of this film, with its possible nepo shenanigans. It’s about an extended blue collar family with a tinge of crime … and it features Francesca Scorsese, daughter of Martin. It’s also about the teeming warmth of a suburban American home, whose inhabitants seem on the verge of something epiphanic … and it features Sawyer Spielberg, son of Steven. But for all the influence-anxiety that anything like this carries with it, this is a very charming and rich movie, teeming with ambient detail, from very original and distinctive film-maker Tyler Taormina, whose previous picture Ham on Rye I very much admired.
Despite or because of the fact that almost nothing really happens in any conventionally dramatic sense,...
- 5/17/2024
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
It’s the holidays, and strings of gaudy rainbow lights twinkle from gables. In cozy living rooms, the elders doze in their chairs while middle-aged siblings bicker and booze it up around the dining table. Little kids squirm in makeshift beds trying to stay awake for Santa, while truculent teenagers sneak out into the suburban night to do secret teenager things. Ok, so there are no chestnuts roasting on an open fire — instead there is a salad bowl full of red and green M&Ms — but in almost every other respect, Tyler Taormina’s delightful stocking-stuffer “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point” is as alive to the domesticated magic of the season as a classic carol. Taormina’s fondly multivalent, Millennial-Norman-Rockwell perspective incorporates a child’s experience of the holiday, overlaid with a teen’s and a parent’s and a grandparent’s and so on. It feels as though...
- 5/17/2024
- by Jessica Kiang
- Variety Film + TV
Three features into his filmmaking career, it’s evident that director Tyler Taormina loves faces — though not in the way of Bergman or Cassavetes. Unlike those art house paragons, he doesn’t isolate his characters in order to peer intently into their souls. He collects faces by the dozen and dreams up crowded tableaus.
His debut film, Ham on Rye, presented a mysterious and unsettling teen ritual in which the faces never connected to conventional stories. Five years later, Taormina is still inspired by group dynamics, and he’s still experimenting with the fusion of aesthetics and storytelling, but this time on more familiar terrain. Veering at times into sensory overload as it reconfigures the holiday-gathering template, Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point can feel like a party that refuses to end, one that could have used some judicious streamlining. But it’s a memorably adventurous party, fueled by intense hopefulness,...
His debut film, Ham on Rye, presented a mysterious and unsettling teen ritual in which the faces never connected to conventional stories. Five years later, Taormina is still inspired by group dynamics, and he’s still experimenting with the fusion of aesthetics and storytelling, but this time on more familiar terrain. Veering at times into sensory overload as it reconfigures the holiday-gathering template, Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point can feel like a party that refuses to end, one that could have used some judicious streamlining. But it’s a memorably adventurous party, fueled by intense hopefulness,...
- 5/17/2024
- by Sheri Linden
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Like any Christmas film worth the time it took to wrap, Tyler Taormina’s wry but melancholy “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point” has a bone-deep understanding of why all the best holidays are so painfully bittersweet: They bring the evanescence of our lives into focus, crystallizing the passage of time, while slowing it down just enough for us to appreciate how much of it has already melted into memory. Unlike the rest of its way too crowded genre, Taormina’s contribution has precious little interest in doing anything else.
And god bless this movie for that, because its tinselly charm depends on conjuring a feeling so pure and hyper-specific that even the slightest flurry of a plot might threaten to dilute the effect. Even more so than Taormina’s previous features, “Christmas in Miller’s Point” is just happy to be an immaculately conceived vibe.
Instead of scenes, there are fleeting glimpses.
And god bless this movie for that, because its tinselly charm depends on conjuring a feeling so pure and hyper-specific that even the slightest flurry of a plot might threaten to dilute the effect. Even more so than Taormina’s previous features, “Christmas in Miller’s Point” is just happy to be an immaculately conceived vibe.
Instead of scenes, there are fleeting glimpses.
- 5/17/2024
- by David Ehrlich
- Indiewire
We’ve only just got Easter out of the way, and here comes the most immersive Christmas movie of the year, an abstract but very much controlled study based in and around a festive party thrown by a very large family from Long Island, New York. Despite the specificity of the setting, however, Tyler Taormina’s third feature film is a surprisingly relatable experience, part anthropological study, part nostalgia kick, lit up (literally) like a Christmas tree in a yuletide riot of red, white and green.
It begins in a car ferrying members of the Balsano family — mother and father, brother and sister — to the home of the family’s matriarch, where four generations of Balsanos have gathered for their annual get-together. This is about as much of a set-up as you’re going to get,...
It begins in a car ferrying members of the Balsano family — mother and father, brother and sister — to the home of the family’s matriarch, where four generations of Balsanos have gathered for their annual get-together. This is about as much of a set-up as you’re going to get,...
- 5/17/2024
- by Damon Wise
- Deadline Film + TV
Michael Cera has two movies he plans to direct in the pipeline.The 35-year-old actor has penned a script with his 'Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point' director Tyler Taormina and his fellow producer on the project, co-writer Eric Berger, for a picture called 'Gummy', but before he can start work on that, there's something else he's hoping to make first.He told Deadline: "[We've written a film] that we’re trying to make that I’ll be directing, that we’ve been pushing along, and are going to hopefully push over the finish line, but we’re kind of in the middle of that. So we just started this team. "I mean, basically I kind of glommed onto their existing team, and we all are just having a really good collaborative feeling.“It’s a movie that I’ve been excited about for a long time, and well, it’s kind of...
- 5/17/2024
- by Viki Waters
- Bang Showbiz
Exclusive: Michael Cera caught Tyler Taormina’s feature directing debut Ham on Rye after a friend suggested he check it out. He was so impressed that he signed himself up as a sort of producing “cheerleader” on the filmmaker’s latest picture Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point, which plays in Directors’ Fortnight on Friday,May 17, at the Cannes Film Festival.
Cera’s quick to point out that Krista Minto, co-writer Eric Berger and others did the heavy-lifting producer duties on the picture that’s almost like a fly-on-the-wall exploration of a sprawling Long Island family’s holiday get-together.
“They’re the ones who actually made the movies,” he stressed.
The film’s Cannes screening comes at a time when Cera, who has made short films, has two films in development, both of which he will direct. One of them is called Gummy, the other is untitled. The untitled one is likely to go first,...
Cera’s quick to point out that Krista Minto, co-writer Eric Berger and others did the heavy-lifting producer duties on the picture that’s almost like a fly-on-the-wall exploration of a sprawling Long Island family’s holiday get-together.
“They’re the ones who actually made the movies,” he stressed.
The film’s Cannes screening comes at a time when Cera, who has made short films, has two films in development, both of which he will direct. One of them is called Gummy, the other is untitled. The untitled one is likely to go first,...
- 5/16/2024
- by Baz Bamigboye
- Deadline Film + TV
Omnes Films has a goal. “Our mission is to fill a void in modern cinema,” says its website. “Our films are passionate, ambitious works made by friends that favor atmosphere over plot and study the many forms of cultural decay in the 21st Century. Whatever the subject or genre, we seek projects that are original in conception and feel like they’ve never been made before.” It sounds wildly ambitious, and maybe it is, but Cannes audiences will be the judge of that when two of its films — Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point by Tyler Taormina and Eephus by Carson Lund — premiere in Directors’ Fortnight.
Taormina and Lund met at college in Boston, where the former was studying screenwriting and the latter film production. Lund, says Taormina, “was always like the crazily prodigious cinematographer. Everyone was very intimidated by this man.” Taormina, meanwhile, wanted to make kids TV. While waiting for a script to sell, Taormina had the idea for a loose indie called Ham on Rye (2019). Lund signed on as DoP, and Omnes was born.
Says Lund, “Omnes is a loose collective that’s becoming tighter. In college I made a short film called Omnes. It’s a sort of a Latin term that’s used often in theater by a director when he needs to get the attention of the cast and crew. And so, we started to tag our films as Omnes Productions. And then we said, ‘You know what? We should make this a real thing.’ So, we rebranded from Omnes Productions to Omnes Films. We wanted to really make it a cinema collective. We’re not an official company, in the sense that we don’t have an LLC or anything. To us, just a symbol of our friendship, our collaboration.”
Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point
First out of the gate was Taormina’s Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point, based on the director’s experience of family gatherings in the early 2000s. “This movie came from many things,” he says, “but I think the genesis was watching my parents’ wedding video on their 30th anniversary. This was some years ago now, and it deeply moved me.”
“I started to revisit some home videos at that time,” he continues, “and I realized pretty quickly that I actually have a total incapability of watching them. I’m too sentimental. It’s too heavy for me to watch my family when we were all so much younger.” That was when the idea of making a Christmas movie came to him. “Once I had that, I knew it would be the way to go. Or, maybe I didn’t know, but I figured that it would be the way that I could reanimate and dwell in the sentimentality that means so much to me.”
Taormina’s film is notable for its striking barrage of kitsch pop classics, which cineastes will recognize from Kenneth Anger’s experimental 1963 film Scorpio Rising. “The option of using Christmas music was just an absolute no. That would’ve been a real cringe-worthy move. But I’m very inspired by Kenneth Anger, very much so, to the point where there’s a central scene in my previous film, Ham on Rye, which was originally conceived and shot to the song he uses in Kustom Kar Kommandos [1965].
“Anger has remained an inciting inspiration for all the work I’ve done so far,” he continues, “and, for this one, Scorpio Rising was there at the beginning. I think we subconsciously realized that this music from the ’60s would make perfect Christmas music, because groups like The Ronettes and so on and so forth went on to make all these famous Christmas songs, so you hear that sound and it immediately feels festive. So, it was kind of a cheat. And on top of that, which ones to choose was very fun for me, because I was actually really interested in how the lyrics of these songs speak so much to the themes of the movie, because the context for a lot of these songs is love and love lost, you know?”
Eephus
Lund, meanwhile, had been cooking up Eephus, a personal story of his own, about a baseball field that is being demolished to build an elementary school. “We shot Eephus five months before Miller’s Point,” he recalls. “Tyler, I believe, had conceived of Miller’s Point maybe a little bit before I started writing Eephus, though I know we were kind of discussing the ideas at a similar time. I wrote Eephus largely during the pandemic, over Zoom, with my two co-writers, Mike Bassa and Nate Fisher. And then eventually when we finally got to work together in a room, we felt like things moved a bit quicker.”
Read the digital edition of Deadline’s Disruptors/Cannes magazine here.
Most of Lund’s career has been as a cinematographer and an editor. “I’d made short films, but I’d never written many screenplays,” he says. “I’m very attracted to location and light — that’s sort of the engine for my creative process — I had stumbled upon an idea where that was sort of the emphasis. Eephus is almost a landscape film, in that respect. I play baseball, and I play in a Sunday League, like the one depicted in the film. I was looking for material that would be personal to me but that also scratched this itch of making a film that would track the process of day turning to night over the course of one afternoon in New England and in fall, which is to me the most beautiful time for baseball.”
The directors were taken aback when both films made it into Cannes. “Honestly,” says Lund, “when one of them got in, we thought, ‘Ok, maybe they won’t program both.’ I mean, we don’t want to look like we’re trying to corner the market! But it happened, and we’re thrilled and a little surprised, for sure. But I think it’s a testament to the Fortnight that they’re keeping their eye on these kind of homegrown, handmade, independent films from America. Films that have a kind of different tone and vision.”...
Taormina and Lund met at college in Boston, where the former was studying screenwriting and the latter film production. Lund, says Taormina, “was always like the crazily prodigious cinematographer. Everyone was very intimidated by this man.” Taormina, meanwhile, wanted to make kids TV. While waiting for a script to sell, Taormina had the idea for a loose indie called Ham on Rye (2019). Lund signed on as DoP, and Omnes was born.
Says Lund, “Omnes is a loose collective that’s becoming tighter. In college I made a short film called Omnes. It’s a sort of a Latin term that’s used often in theater by a director when he needs to get the attention of the cast and crew. And so, we started to tag our films as Omnes Productions. And then we said, ‘You know what? We should make this a real thing.’ So, we rebranded from Omnes Productions to Omnes Films. We wanted to really make it a cinema collective. We’re not an official company, in the sense that we don’t have an LLC or anything. To us, just a symbol of our friendship, our collaboration.”
Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point
First out of the gate was Taormina’s Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point, based on the director’s experience of family gatherings in the early 2000s. “This movie came from many things,” he says, “but I think the genesis was watching my parents’ wedding video on their 30th anniversary. This was some years ago now, and it deeply moved me.”
“I started to revisit some home videos at that time,” he continues, “and I realized pretty quickly that I actually have a total incapability of watching them. I’m too sentimental. It’s too heavy for me to watch my family when we were all so much younger.” That was when the idea of making a Christmas movie came to him. “Once I had that, I knew it would be the way to go. Or, maybe I didn’t know, but I figured that it would be the way that I could reanimate and dwell in the sentimentality that means so much to me.”
Taormina’s film is notable for its striking barrage of kitsch pop classics, which cineastes will recognize from Kenneth Anger’s experimental 1963 film Scorpio Rising. “The option of using Christmas music was just an absolute no. That would’ve been a real cringe-worthy move. But I’m very inspired by Kenneth Anger, very much so, to the point where there’s a central scene in my previous film, Ham on Rye, which was originally conceived and shot to the song he uses in Kustom Kar Kommandos [1965].
“Anger has remained an inciting inspiration for all the work I’ve done so far,” he continues, “and, for this one, Scorpio Rising was there at the beginning. I think we subconsciously realized that this music from the ’60s would make perfect Christmas music, because groups like The Ronettes and so on and so forth went on to make all these famous Christmas songs, so you hear that sound and it immediately feels festive. So, it was kind of a cheat. And on top of that, which ones to choose was very fun for me, because I was actually really interested in how the lyrics of these songs speak so much to the themes of the movie, because the context for a lot of these songs is love and love lost, you know?”
Eephus
Lund, meanwhile, had been cooking up Eephus, a personal story of his own, about a baseball field that is being demolished to build an elementary school. “We shot Eephus five months before Miller’s Point,” he recalls. “Tyler, I believe, had conceived of Miller’s Point maybe a little bit before I started writing Eephus, though I know we were kind of discussing the ideas at a similar time. I wrote Eephus largely during the pandemic, over Zoom, with my two co-writers, Mike Bassa and Nate Fisher. And then eventually when we finally got to work together in a room, we felt like things moved a bit quicker.”
Read the digital edition of Deadline’s Disruptors/Cannes magazine here.
Most of Lund’s career has been as a cinematographer and an editor. “I’d made short films, but I’d never written many screenplays,” he says. “I’m very attracted to location and light — that’s sort of the engine for my creative process — I had stumbled upon an idea where that was sort of the emphasis. Eephus is almost a landscape film, in that respect. I play baseball, and I play in a Sunday League, like the one depicted in the film. I was looking for material that would be personal to me but that also scratched this itch of making a film that would track the process of day turning to night over the course of one afternoon in New England and in fall, which is to me the most beautiful time for baseball.”
The directors were taken aback when both films made it into Cannes. “Honestly,” says Lund, “when one of them got in, we thought, ‘Ok, maybe they won’t program both.’ I mean, we don’t want to look like we’re trying to corner the market! But it happened, and we’re thrilled and a little surprised, for sure. But I think it’s a testament to the Fortnight that they’re keeping their eye on these kind of homegrown, handmade, independent films from America. Films that have a kind of different tone and vision.”...
- 5/15/2024
- by Damon Wise
- Deadline Film + TV
The Christmas movie is a genre unto itself. It includes all types of films, from classics like It’s a Wonderful Life to comedies like Home Alone to actioners like Die Hard. But while any movie can pop a tree and some stockings in the frame, a memorable Christmas movie must do one thing: make the audience feel the spirit of the season, an objective clearly at the heart of Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point, which will see its Cannes world premiere in the Directors’ Fortnight program.
The third feature from director-writer Tyler Taormina (Ham on Rye), Miller’s Point employs a framing story about a multigenerational Italian family coming home for the holidays. But the film is more tone poem than plot-driven narrative, with an atmosphere of holiday nostalgia permeating every scene. A soundtrack of ’60s pop hits plays like a loop of Christmas songs, almost tricking the ear,...
The third feature from director-writer Tyler Taormina (Ham on Rye), Miller’s Point employs a framing story about a multigenerational Italian family coming home for the holidays. But the film is more tone poem than plot-driven narrative, with an atmosphere of holiday nostalgia permeating every scene. A soundtrack of ’60s pop hits plays like a loop of Christmas songs, almost tricking the ear,...
- 5/15/2024
- by Shannon L. Bowen
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Cannes isn’t Sundance. The movies on offer aren’t generally genre horror box office surprises or heartwarming indie dramedies, and sometimes they’re not even sure-fire Oscar hopefuls.
But as several sales agents and distributors told us, Cannes is slowly shifting back to being a home for discovery. With the audience now unbothered by subtitles, distributors aren’t just looking for the next “May December” but the next “Anatomy of a Fall.” And when it comes to the package titles on the Marché du Film, buyers are demanding more than the latest Nicolas Cage shark movie.
The sources IndieWire spoke to believe there’s more quality than quantity among this year’s official competition sales titles and the packages being shopped to distributors. And that’s a good thing, even though there are still plenty of hot packages trickling in by the day and buyers already scooping up competition...
But as several sales agents and distributors told us, Cannes is slowly shifting back to being a home for discovery. With the audience now unbothered by subtitles, distributors aren’t just looking for the next “May December” but the next “Anatomy of a Fall.” And when it comes to the package titles on the Marché du Film, buyers are demanding more than the latest Nicolas Cage shark movie.
The sources IndieWire spoke to believe there’s more quality than quantity among this year’s official competition sales titles and the packages being shopped to distributors. And that’s a good thing, even though there are still plenty of hot packages trickling in by the day and buyers already scooping up competition...
- 5/13/2024
- by Brian Welk
- Indiewire
Magnify has acquired global and U.S. sales rights (excluding Canada and Benelux) to “Wildhood” director Bretten Hannam’s supernatural thriller “Place of Ghosts,” which is set to go into production in August 2024.
Lorna Lee Torres, Magnify’s senior VP of sales, and Austin Kennedy, director of global sales, will be launching the project in Cannes.
In the film, estranged siblings Mise’l and Antle are forced to reunite after being visited by a vengeful spirit. They venture into the “Place of Ghosts,” a primeval forest of the Mi’kmaq people where time and memory blend together. As they journey deeper into the forest, the dark spirit continues to grow, manifesting in terrifying forms that the siblings must confront.
“Bretten Hannam has crafted an ambitious and thematically rich indigenous horror/fantasy that engages with political and social history and adds to the expanding world of original genre film,” Torres said.
Lorna Lee Torres, Magnify’s senior VP of sales, and Austin Kennedy, director of global sales, will be launching the project in Cannes.
In the film, estranged siblings Mise’l and Antle are forced to reunite after being visited by a vengeful spirit. They venture into the “Place of Ghosts,” a primeval forest of the Mi’kmaq people where time and memory blend together. As they journey deeper into the forest, the dark spirit continues to grow, manifesting in terrifying forms that the siblings must confront.
“Bretten Hannam has crafted an ambitious and thematically rich indigenous horror/fantasy that engages with political and social history and adds to the expanding world of original genre film,” Torres said.
- 5/13/2024
- by Leo Barraclough and Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
It’s the most exciting time of the year for a cinephile: the Cannes Film Festival is set to kick off next week, running May 14-25. Ahead of festivities we’ve rounded up what we’re most looking forward to, and while we’re sure many surprises await, per every year, one will find 20 films that should be on your radar. Check out our picks below and be sure to subscribe to our daily newsletter for the latest updates from the festival.
All We Imagine as Light (Payal Kapadia)
After one film, Payal Kapadia is a name you should know––a fresh, intrepid voice in cinema. And in the wake of student protests turning the world upside-down, she’s an essential up-and-comer. Her lone feature to date, 2021’s A Night of Knowing Nothing, is an experimental immersion into India’s own student revolutions––a brutal awakening into the shockingly violent...
All We Imagine as Light (Payal Kapadia)
After one film, Payal Kapadia is a name you should know––a fresh, intrepid voice in cinema. And in the wake of student protests turning the world upside-down, she’s an essential up-and-comer. Her lone feature to date, 2021’s A Night of Knowing Nothing, is an experimental immersion into India’s own student revolutions––a brutal awakening into the shockingly violent...
- 5/9/2024
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
This holiday season is one where the offspring of iconic Hollywood families come together, apparently.
“Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point,” which is set to debut in the Director’s Fortnight at Cannes, stars Francesca Scorsese and Sawyer Spielberg, two film stars in their own rite who hail from respective auteurs Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg.
Decade-plus indie staple Michael Cera leads the latest feature directed by Tyler Taormina; Cera also produces the ensemble family dramedy that marks Taormina’s follow-up to his 2019 coming-of-age comedy “Ham on Rye.”
Set during one Christmas Eve, a family gathers for what could be the last holiday in their ancestral home. As the night wears on and generational tensions arise, one of the teenagers sneaks out with her friends to claim the wintry suburb for her own, per the official synopsis. Cera is seen donning a cop uniform in one of the first look images,...
“Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point,” which is set to debut in the Director’s Fortnight at Cannes, stars Francesca Scorsese and Sawyer Spielberg, two film stars in their own rite who hail from respective auteurs Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg.
Decade-plus indie staple Michael Cera leads the latest feature directed by Tyler Taormina; Cera also produces the ensemble family dramedy that marks Taormina’s follow-up to his 2019 coming-of-age comedy “Ham on Rye.”
Set during one Christmas Eve, a family gathers for what could be the last holiday in their ancestral home. As the night wears on and generational tensions arise, one of the teenagers sneaks out with her friends to claim the wintry suburb for her own, per the official synopsis. Cera is seen donning a cop uniform in one of the first look images,...
- 5/6/2024
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
Variety held their annual Power of Women event Thursday, May 2 at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, in New York City. Honorees included Anitta, Mariska Hargitay, Shonda Rhimes, and Amy Schumer, along with presenters that included Glenn Close, Bela Bajaria, Bruna Marquezine, and Sascha Seinfeld.
IndieWire caught up with Francesca Scorsese, who’s featured as an “Up Next” talent in Variety’s issue, on the event’s red carpet, where she reflected on working with Luca Guadagnino in HBO’s 2020 limited series “We Are Who We Are.” “He’s the most amazing, sweetest guy. Very eccentric, but that’s the best part about him,” Scorsese said. “It was really cool because I got to experience another filmmaker. You know what I mean? I grew up being on my dad’s film sets and seeing his directing style and just like literally just like living in that world.”
“I saw similarities but...
IndieWire caught up with Francesca Scorsese, who’s featured as an “Up Next” talent in Variety’s issue, on the event’s red carpet, where she reflected on working with Luca Guadagnino in HBO’s 2020 limited series “We Are Who We Are.” “He’s the most amazing, sweetest guy. Very eccentric, but that’s the best part about him,” Scorsese said. “It was really cool because I got to experience another filmmaker. You know what I mean? I grew up being on my dad’s film sets and seeing his directing style and just like literally just like living in that world.”
“I saw similarities but...
- 5/3/2024
- by Vincent Perella
- Indiewire
Magnify, the International sales arm of Magnolia Pictures, has acquired global and U.S. sales rights to Taiwanese thriller “Pierce” from first-time feature filmmaker Nelicia Low. An official teaser has now been released for the title ahead of its sales launch at the upcoming Marche du Film in Cannes.
“Pierce” follows Jie, a young fencer reconnecting with his estranged older brother Han, who mysteriously returns after seven years in juvenile prison for killing an opponent during a fencing competition. Jie believes Han’s insistence that he is innocent and decides to help him, defying his mother’s efforts to erase Han from their lives. Han grows close to Jie in training him for the national championships, but his hostile past is triggered after an argument, leaving Jie to begin to question whether his beloved brother might be a violent sociopath after all.
The film stars Ding Ning (who won a...
“Pierce” follows Jie, a young fencer reconnecting with his estranged older brother Han, who mysteriously returns after seven years in juvenile prison for killing an opponent during a fencing competition. Jie believes Han’s insistence that he is innocent and decides to help him, defying his mother’s efforts to erase Han from their lives. Han grows close to Jie in training him for the national championships, but his hostile past is triggered after an argument, leaving Jie to begin to question whether his beloved brother might be a violent sociopath after all.
The film stars Ding Ning (who won a...
- 5/1/2024
- by Alex Ritman
- Variety Film + TV
Magnify, the rebranded international sales arm of Magnolia Pictures, has acquired global and U.S. sales rights to “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point” in the run up to its world premiere at Cannes Directors’ Fortnight.
Directed and co-writer by Tyler Taormina (“Ham on Rye”), the film stars Michael Cera (“Barbie”), Francesca Scorsese, Maria Dizzia (“Martha Marcy May Marlene”), Ben Shenkman (“Billions”), Elsie Fisher (“Eighth Grade”), Gregg Turkington (“Entertainment”), Sawyer Spielberg (“Masters of the Air”) breakout actor Matilda Fleming, among others.
Written by Taormina and Eric Berger, the film revolves around a rambunctious extended family descending upon their small Long Island hometown for the holidays where hijinks, generational squabbles, and family traditions ensue.
“Taormina takes a singular approach to the classic holiday family movie, bringing his absurdist humor and dynamic filmmaking to life with a charming and perfectly cast ensemble,” said Lorna Lee Torres, Magnify SVP of Global Sales. “We...
Directed and co-writer by Tyler Taormina (“Ham on Rye”), the film stars Michael Cera (“Barbie”), Francesca Scorsese, Maria Dizzia (“Martha Marcy May Marlene”), Ben Shenkman (“Billions”), Elsie Fisher (“Eighth Grade”), Gregg Turkington (“Entertainment”), Sawyer Spielberg (“Masters of the Air”) breakout actor Matilda Fleming, among others.
Written by Taormina and Eric Berger, the film revolves around a rambunctious extended family descending upon their small Long Island hometown for the holidays where hijinks, generational squabbles, and family traditions ensue.
“Taormina takes a singular approach to the classic holiday family movie, bringing his absurdist humor and dynamic filmmaking to life with a charming and perfectly cast ensemble,” said Lorna Lee Torres, Magnify SVP of Global Sales. “We...
- 4/25/2024
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
Sales and production house Film Constellation is launching world sales rights on U.S. comedy drama “Eephus,” directed by Carson Lund, set to world premiere in the Directors’ Fortnight section in Cannes in May.
In the film, as an imminent construction project looms over a beloved small-town baseball field, a pair of New England Sunday league teams face off for the last time over the course of a day. Tensions flare up and ceremonial laughs are shared as an era of camaraderie and escapism fades into an uncertain future.
“Eephus” is the feature directorial debut of American filmmaker Lund, who also has a cinematography credit on another Directors’ Fortnight title, “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point.”
“Eephus” is produced by Lund, Tyler Taormina, Michael Basta, David Entin and Gabe Klinger for U.S.-based Omnes Films, in collaboration with executive producers Michael Tonelli, Ashish Shetty, Brian Clark and Jim Christman of Magmys.
In the film, as an imminent construction project looms over a beloved small-town baseball field, a pair of New England Sunday league teams face off for the last time over the course of a day. Tensions flare up and ceremonial laughs are shared as an era of camaraderie and escapism fades into an uncertain future.
“Eephus” is the feature directorial debut of American filmmaker Lund, who also has a cinematography credit on another Directors’ Fortnight title, “Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point.”
“Eephus” is produced by Lund, Tyler Taormina, Michael Basta, David Entin and Gabe Klinger for U.S.-based Omnes Films, in collaboration with executive producers Michael Tonelli, Ashish Shetty, Brian Clark and Jim Christman of Magmys.
- 4/18/2024
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
Following the main lineups for the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, a handful of sidebar slates have been unveiled, featuring Directors Fortnight, Critics Week, and Acid. Notable highlights include the Sundance favorite Good One (read our review here), Tyler Taormina’s Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point starring Michael Cera, the first film in over a decade from James White director Josh Mond, the Christopher Abbott-led It Doesn’t Matter, Eat the Night from Jessica Forever duo Caroline Poggi & Jonathan Vinel, Carson Lund’s Eephus, Patricia Mazuy’s Visting Hours, The Hyperboreans, a new film from The Wolf House directors Cristobal Leo & Joaquin Cocina, Matthew Rankin’s The Twentieth Century follow-up Universal Language, and more.
Check out the lineups below.
Cannes Directors Fortnight
Feature films:
“Ma Vie Ma Gueule,” Sophie Fillieres (France) – opening film
“A Son Image,” Thierry de Peretti (France)
“Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point,” Tyler Taormina (USA)
“Desert of Namibia,...
Check out the lineups below.
Cannes Directors Fortnight
Feature films:
“Ma Vie Ma Gueule,” Sophie Fillieres (France) – opening film
“A Son Image,” Thierry de Peretti (France)
“Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point,” Tyler Taormina (USA)
“Desert of Namibia,...
- 4/16/2024
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
The Cannes Directors’ Fortnight section has unveiled its lineup for the 2024 festival, which will open with This Life of Mine, the final feature from the late French director Sophie Fillières. The drama features Agnès Jaoui as a woman whose identity starts to unravel when she turns 55. Fillières died shortly after wrapping principal photography on the film and her children finished post-production.
There are four U.S. titles in the feature section of the non-competitive sidebar: Tyler Taormina’s Christmas Eve In Miller’s Point, Carson Lund’s Eephus, India Donaldson’s Good One and Gazer from Ryan J. Sloan.
Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point, starring Michael Cera, Elsie Fisher, Francesca Scorsese. Ben Shenkman, Gregg Turkington, Sawyer Spielberg, Maria Dizzia and newcomer Matilda Fleming, follows four generations as they gather for what might be their last Christmas in the family home. Lund, who lensed Christmas Eve, makes his feature debut with Eephus,...
There are four U.S. titles in the feature section of the non-competitive sidebar: Tyler Taormina’s Christmas Eve In Miller’s Point, Carson Lund’s Eephus, India Donaldson’s Good One and Gazer from Ryan J. Sloan.
Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point, starring Michael Cera, Elsie Fisher, Francesca Scorsese. Ben Shenkman, Gregg Turkington, Sawyer Spielberg, Maria Dizzia and newcomer Matilda Fleming, follows four generations as they gather for what might be their last Christmas in the family home. Lund, who lensed Christmas Eve, makes his feature debut with Eephus,...
- 4/16/2024
- by Scott Roxborough
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The 77th edition of Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight will kick off with “This Life of Mine,” a dramedy directed by Sophie Fillières, a renowned French filmmaker who died last year. Presented posthumously, the film is headlined by French stars including Agnès Jaoui, Philippe Katerine and Valérie Donzelli. The independent selection, which has recently gone through a rebranding and is now spearheaded by artistic director Julien Rejl, will close with another French film, Jean-Christophe Meurisse’s “Plastic Guns,” an offbeat crime comedy headlined by popular actor Jonathan Cohen.
The lineup includes as many as four U.S. features, three of which are feature debuts, including India Donaldson’s coming-of-age film”Good One” which premiered at Sundance and garnered solid reviews. Set in upstate New York, “Good One” follows 17-year-old Sam as she joins her father and his oldest friend, Matt, on their annual backpacking trip in the Catskill Mountains. “Good One” has...
The lineup includes as many as four U.S. features, three of which are feature debuts, including India Donaldson’s coming-of-age film”Good One” which premiered at Sundance and garnered solid reviews. Set in upstate New York, “Good One” follows 17-year-old Sam as she joins her father and his oldest friend, Matt, on their annual backpacking trip in the Catskill Mountains. “Good One” has...
- 4/16/2024
- by Elsa Keslassy
- Variety Film + TV
Directors’ Fortnight has unveiled the selection for its 56th edition heavy on films from first-time US filmmakers, South American titles, and talent including Isabelle Huppert, Michael Cera and Agnès Jaoui.
Artistic director Julien Rejl revealed the line-up at a press conference in Paris on Tuesday (April 16) for the Cannes parallel section run by French directors guild the Srf.
Scroll down for the full selection
After undergoing a complete rebranding for last year’s edition complete with new artistic director Rejl and a new more inclusive female-forward name in French to La Quinzaine des Cinéastes, this year’s selection includes eight...
Artistic director Julien Rejl revealed the line-up at a press conference in Paris on Tuesday (April 16) for the Cannes parallel section run by French directors guild the Srf.
Scroll down for the full selection
After undergoing a complete rebranding for last year’s edition complete with new artistic director Rejl and a new more inclusive female-forward name in French to La Quinzaine des Cinéastes, this year’s selection includes eight...
- 4/16/2024
- ScreenDaily
Cannes parallel section Directors’ Fortnight has unveiled the line-up for its 56th edition running from May 15 to 23, at a press conference in Paris’ Forum des Images cultural center.
The section, launched in 1969 and overseen by the French Directors Guild, will present 21 feature films and 10 short films.
It is the second line-up overseen by Delegate General Julien Rejl, who took up the role last year.
Discoveries of his inaugural edition included Georgian director Elene Naveriani’s late coming-of-age drama Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry; U.S. indie film Riddle Of Fire by Weston Razooli, as well as Vietnamese filmmaker Phạm Thiên Ân’s 2023 Cannes Caméra d’Or winner Inside The Yellow Cocoon Shell.
The 2024 edition will open with late director Sophie Fillières’ final feature This Life of Mine, starring Agnès Jaoui as a woman whose sense of self starts to unravel as she turns 55.
Fillières died shortly after completing the shoot and her...
The section, launched in 1969 and overseen by the French Directors Guild, will present 21 feature films and 10 short films.
It is the second line-up overseen by Delegate General Julien Rejl, who took up the role last year.
Discoveries of his inaugural edition included Georgian director Elene Naveriani’s late coming-of-age drama Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry; U.S. indie film Riddle Of Fire by Weston Razooli, as well as Vietnamese filmmaker Phạm Thiên Ân’s 2023 Cannes Caméra d’Or winner Inside The Yellow Cocoon Shell.
The 2024 edition will open with late director Sophie Fillières’ final feature This Life of Mine, starring Agnès Jaoui as a woman whose sense of self starts to unravel as she turns 55.
Fillières died shortly after completing the shoot and her...
- 4/16/2024
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
Following The Film Stage’s collective top 50 films of 2023, as part of our year-end coverage, our contributors are sharing their personal top 10 lists.
From an industry standpoint, 2023 was eventful. We witnessed concurrent strikes, widespread film festival upheaval, Universal besting Disney at the box office, and much more. (I recommend Matt Belloni’s The Town podcast to keep up with this side of town.) On the indie biz side, this was a year in which I saw two small films succeed utilizing a method I long thought dead (or at least on life support): that being good old-fashioned four-walling. Al Warren’s Dogleg and Case Esparros’ The Absence of Milk in the Mouths of the Lost both captured the momentum of cross-country film touring with in-person Q&As. Distributor Utopia has mounted a similar touring strategy for Sean Price Williams’ directorial debut The Sweet East.
When it comes to the films themselves,...
From an industry standpoint, 2023 was eventful. We witnessed concurrent strikes, widespread film festival upheaval, Universal besting Disney at the box office, and much more. (I recommend Matt Belloni’s The Town podcast to keep up with this side of town.) On the indie biz side, this was a year in which I saw two small films succeed utilizing a method I long thought dead (or at least on life support): that being good old-fashioned four-walling. Al Warren’s Dogleg and Case Esparros’ The Absence of Milk in the Mouths of the Lost both captured the momentum of cross-country film touring with in-person Q&As. Distributor Utopia has mounted a similar touring strategy for Sean Price Williams’ directorial debut The Sweet East.
When it comes to the films themselves,...
- 1/9/2024
- by Caleb Hammond
- The Film Stage
Ham on Rye (2019) and Happer’s Comet (2022) filmmaker Tyler Taormina went into festive mode for his third feature in less than four years. Christmas Eve in Miller’s Point moved into production during the summer on Long Island with Michael Cera, Elsie Fisher, Maria Dizzia, Francesca Scorsese, Ben Shenkman, Gregg Turkington, Sawyer Spielberg, and newcomer Matilda Fleming. Written by Taormina and Eric Berger, the project will be featured at the American Film Festival’s U.S. in Progress in Wroclaw.
Gist: On Christmas Eve, Balsanos gather for what could be the last holiday in their ancestral home. As the night wears on and generational tensions arise, cousins Emily and Michelle sneak away to a winter wonderland, where suburban teenagers find their rebellious paradise.…...
Gist: On Christmas Eve, Balsanos gather for what could be the last holiday in their ancestral home. As the night wears on and generational tensions arise, cousins Emily and Michelle sneak away to a winter wonderland, where suburban teenagers find their rebellious paradise.…...
- 11/8/2023
- by Eric Lavallée
- IONCINEMA.com
Not long ago, an award-winning Polish composer who’d scored dozens of films approached Ula Śniegowska about U.S. in Progress, an industry event conceived as a bridge between the Polish and American markets that runs parallel to the American Film Festival in Wrocław, Poland.
“He approached me saying, ‘I’ve done enough in the Polish market. I need an introduction to the international market. Can you, as U.S. in Progress, help me?’” Śniegowska recalls. “It seems we are a perfect matchmaker for those types of companies to have their work exposed in the U.S.”
Celebrating its 13th edition, U.S. in Progress was launched as a showcase for emerging independent American filmmakers. Each year, the event presents a curated selection of American indie titles in the final stages of production to European sales agents, distributors and festival programmers. This year’s edition takes place Nov. 8 – 10.
Since its inception,...
“He approached me saying, ‘I’ve done enough in the Polish market. I need an introduction to the international market. Can you, as U.S. in Progress, help me?’” Śniegowska recalls. “It seems we are a perfect matchmaker for those types of companies to have their work exposed in the U.S.”
Celebrating its 13th edition, U.S. in Progress was launched as a showcase for emerging independent American filmmakers. Each year, the event presents a curated selection of American indie titles in the final stages of production to European sales agents, distributors and festival programmers. This year’s edition takes place Nov. 8 – 10.
Since its inception,...
- 10/24/2023
- by Christopher Vourlias
- Variety Film + TV
Today we’re sharing the Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign for No Sleep Till, the feature debut from French-American filmmaker Alexandra Simpson. So far, $3,735 has been raised by 21 backers toward a flexible $25,000 goal, with 29 days remaining to secure funds through the campaign. Producing the film is Ham on Rye and Happer’s Comet director Tyler Taormina, a member of the filmmaking collective Omnes Films, which appeared on our 25 New Faces of Film list in 2021. Also on board in Zurich-based producer Michael Graf, who produced the Sundance ’23 short White Ant. Here’s a general synopsis and pitch of No […]
The post Crowdfunding Campaign Launched for Alexandra Simpson’s Feature Debut No Sleep Till, Produced by Tyler Taormina first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post Crowdfunding Campaign Launched for Alexandra Simpson’s Feature Debut No Sleep Till, Produced by Tyler Taormina first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 8/4/2023
- by Natalia Keogan
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Today we’re sharing the Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign for No Sleep Till, the feature debut from French-American filmmaker Alexandra Simpson. So far, $3,735 has been raised by 21 backers toward a flexible $25,000 goal, with 29 days remaining to secure funds through the campaign. Producing the film is Ham on Rye and Happer’s Comet director Tyler Taormina, a member of the filmmaking collective Omnes Films, which appeared on our 25 New Faces of Film list in 2021. Also on board in Zurich-based producer Michael Graf, who produced the Sundance ’23 short White Ant. Here’s a general synopsis and pitch of No […]
The post Crowdfunding Campaign Launched for Alexandra Simpson’s Feature Debut No Sleep Till, Produced by Tyler Taormina first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
The post Crowdfunding Campaign Launched for Alexandra Simpson’s Feature Debut No Sleep Till, Produced by Tyler Taormina first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.
- 8/4/2023
- by Natalia Keogan
- Filmmaker Magazine-Director Interviews
Mubi has announced its lineup of streaming offerings for next month, including the exclusive streaming premiere of Lars von Trier’s The Idiots in a new 4K restoration, Céline Devaux’s anti-romcom Everybody Loves Jeanne, and Tyler Taormina’s Happer’s Comet.
Additional selections include three films by Wong Kar Wai, a Robert Altman double feature, four works by Jacques Rivette, plus shorts by Mia Hansen-Løve and Yorgos Lanthimos.
Check out the lineup below and get 30 days free here.
July 1 – Synecdoche, New York, directed by Charlie Kaufman
July 2 – 2046, directed by Wong Kar Wai | As Time Goes By: Three by Wong Kar Wai
July 3 – The Exiles, directed by Kent MacKenzie
July 4 – Ivansxtc, directed by Bernard Rose
July 5 – Un Pur Esprit, directed by Mia Hansen-Løve | Short Films Big Names
July 6 – Contemporary Color, directed by Bill Ross IV, Turner Ross | Turn It Up: Music on Film
July 7 – The Idiots, directed by Lars von Trier...
Additional selections include three films by Wong Kar Wai, a Robert Altman double feature, four works by Jacques Rivette, plus shorts by Mia Hansen-Løve and Yorgos Lanthimos.
Check out the lineup below and get 30 days free here.
July 1 – Synecdoche, New York, directed by Charlie Kaufman
July 2 – 2046, directed by Wong Kar Wai | As Time Goes By: Three by Wong Kar Wai
July 3 – The Exiles, directed by Kent MacKenzie
July 4 – Ivansxtc, directed by Bernard Rose
July 5 – Un Pur Esprit, directed by Mia Hansen-Løve | Short Films Big Names
July 6 – Contemporary Color, directed by Bill Ross IV, Turner Ross | Turn It Up: Music on Film
July 7 – The Idiots, directed by Lars von Trier...
- 6/26/2023
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSHam on Rye.Tyler Taormina, director of the idiosyncratic Ham on Rye (2019) and Happer's Comet (2022), has wrapped production on his next feature. Filmed on Long Island, Christmas Eve In Miller’s Point is a Christmas comedy that stars Michael Cera, Elsie Fisher, and Gregg Turkington, plus the progeny of two prominent filmmakers in Francesca Scorsese and Sawyer Spielberg.The Guardian reports that filmmaker Brian Rose is attempting to “recreate” the lost version of Orson Welles’s The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), which was altered significantly by Rko prior to its release. Using “the latest technology to reconstruct lost material and animate charcoal sketches,” Rose has reportedly spent four years recreating “around 30,000 frames” of Welles’s original rough cut in order that viewers can visualize what Welles intended in lieu of seeing the director’s original cut,...
- 6/21/2023
- MUBI
We’ll be getting some American indie holiday cheer via Ham on Rye / and the just released Happer’s Comet helmer Tyler Taormina sometime next year. Deadline reports that production is now complete on a comedy titled Long Island on Christmas Eve In Miller’s Point – a project that stars Michael Cera, Elsie Fisher, Maria Dizzia, Francesca Scorsese, Ben Shenkman, Gregg Turkington, Sawyer Spielberg, and newcomer Matilda Fleming. Producers included Cera, Krista Minto, Taormina, David Croley Broyles and Duncan Sullivan. The executive producers are Jeremy Gardner, Joseph Lipsey IV, Brock Pierce and Jason Stone.
Written by Taormina, Eric Berger and Kevin Anton, the film watches as four generations of the Balsano family gather for what may be the last Christmas in the family home.…...
Written by Taormina, Eric Berger and Kevin Anton, the film watches as four generations of the Balsano family gather for what may be the last Christmas in the family home.…...
- 6/16/2023
- by Eric Lavallée
- IONCINEMA.com
Exclusive: Filmmaker Tyler Taormina (Ham on Rye) has wrapped production on Long Island on Christmas Eve In Miller’s Point, a Christmas comedy to star Michael Cera (Life & Beth), Elsie Fisher (Barry), Maria Dizzia (The Good Nurse), Francesca Scorsese (We Are Who We Are), Ben Shenkman (Billions), Gregg Turkington (Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania), Sawyer Spielberg (Masters of the Air) and newcomer Matilda Fleming.
Written by Taormina, Eric Berger and Kevin Anton, the film watches as four generations of the Balsano family gather for what may be the last Christmas in the family home. As they lose themselves in rowdy celebration, cousins Emily and Michelle sneak away to a winter wonderland, where suburban teenagers find their rebellious paradise.
The project hails from Omnes Films and was produced in association with Crypto Castle Productions and Puente Films. Producers included Cera, Krista Minto, Taormina, David Croley Broyles and Duncan Sullivan. The executive producers are Jeremy Gardner,...
Written by Taormina, Eric Berger and Kevin Anton, the film watches as four generations of the Balsano family gather for what may be the last Christmas in the family home. As they lose themselves in rowdy celebration, cousins Emily and Michelle sneak away to a winter wonderland, where suburban teenagers find their rebellious paradise.
The project hails from Omnes Films and was produced in association with Crypto Castle Productions and Puente Films. Producers included Cera, Krista Minto, Taormina, David Croley Broyles and Duncan Sullivan. The executive producers are Jeremy Gardner,...
- 6/15/2023
- by Matt Grobar
- Deadline Film + TV
Shot entirely in writer-director Tyler Taormina’s suburban Long Island hometown during the eerie hours between midnight and predawn, Happer’s Comet surveys an array of empty spaces and sleepless figures. What lighting there is comes from one of two ambient sources—electricity or the moon—and yet to call the film a noir would be misleading. Rather than menacing or oppressive, its sense of obscurity is almost soothing.
The film’s camera is drawn to anything that gleams and shimmers: the speaks of dust floating in a swimming pool, the blinking of electronic gizmos, the galaxy of water droplets across a windshield. Taormina’s unique sensibility makes the film, more than anything, a cinematic tone poem, expressing a reconciliation with sleeplessness as time yawns into strange infinitudes.
Happer’s Comet has no real plot or characters. As pure montage, the film derives its coherency from the time of day and,...
The film’s camera is drawn to anything that gleams and shimmers: the speaks of dust floating in a swimming pool, the blinking of electronic gizmos, the galaxy of water droplets across a windshield. Taormina’s unique sensibility makes the film, more than anything, a cinematic tone poem, expressing a reconciliation with sleeplessness as time yawns into strange infinitudes.
Happer’s Comet has no real plot or characters. As pure montage, the film derives its coherency from the time of day and,...
- 6/12/2023
- by William Repass
- Slant Magazine
Following a number of disappointing blockbusters in May, there are a few promising ones this month (as glimpsed in our honorable mentions below), but it feels like we’ll have to wait until July for a trio of heavy hitters. In the meantime, June brings an eclectic mix of sturdy debuts, auteur-driven offerings, and accomplished documentaries.
15. Shadow Kingdom (Alma Har’el; June 6)
Technically released in limited capacity a couple years ago, the Bob Dylan concert film Shadow Kingdom is now getting proper distribution. As Nick Newman said in our summer movie preview, “Your local Bob Dylan obsessive has surely mentioned Shadow Kingdom, the 2021 concert film that saw him rework an assortment of earlier songs––some established, some deeper in the back catalogue. One case (‘To Be Alone with You’) marked an almost-total rewrite, and courtesy the end credits (which we now know is called ‘Sierra’s Theme’) an entirely new track.
15. Shadow Kingdom (Alma Har’el; June 6)
Technically released in limited capacity a couple years ago, the Bob Dylan concert film Shadow Kingdom is now getting proper distribution. As Nick Newman said in our summer movie preview, “Your local Bob Dylan obsessive has surely mentioned Shadow Kingdom, the 2021 concert film that saw him rework an assortment of earlier songs––some established, some deeper in the back catalogue. One case (‘To Be Alone with You’) marked an almost-total rewrite, and courtesy the end credits (which we now know is called ‘Sierra’s Theme’) an entirely new track.
- 6/2/2023
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI, and sign up for our weekly email newsletter by clicking here.NEWSGush.The lineup for the 2023 Sundance Film Festival has been announced. Before the festival begins in Park City on January 19, peruse the selection on Notebook—including new films from Ira Sachs, Deborah Stratman (The Illinois Parables), Mary Helena Clark (Figure Minus Fact), and Fox Maxy (F1ght1ng Looks Different 2 Me Now).Victor Erice has just wrapped production on a new film, Cerrar los Ojos, in Granada, Spain, ahead of a 2023 release. This will be his fourth feature, arriving 31 years after 1992’s Dream of Light.The legendary composer Angelo Badalamenti—one of David Lynch’s most important collaborators, and the architect of all of his atmospheres—has died at age 85. In addition to his music with Lynch, Badalamenti worked with artists like Nina Simone,...
- 12/14/2022
- MUBI
Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.
This week’s New to Streaming column is sponsored by Sara Dosa’s Fire of Love, now streaming on Disney+, courtesy of National Geographic Documentary Films.
Fire of Love (Sara Dosa)
In a bond forged over mutual fascination (or obsession) with the mysteries of volcanoes, Katia and Maurice Krafft dedicated their lives to discovering everything they could about these natural phenomena. Forces of both awe-inspiring wonder and tragic disaster, Sara Dosa’s archival documentary Fire of Love gracefully captures this extreme dichotomy while also getting to the heart of what drove this couple to abandon a routine, domesticated lifestyle and literally sacrifice their lives in the mission to save others. In telling their devotion to one of the natural world’s most dangerous forces,...
This week’s New to Streaming column is sponsored by Sara Dosa’s Fire of Love, now streaming on Disney+, courtesy of National Geographic Documentary Films.
Fire of Love (Sara Dosa)
In a bond forged over mutual fascination (or obsession) with the mysteries of volcanoes, Katia and Maurice Krafft dedicated their lives to discovering everything they could about these natural phenomena. Forces of both awe-inspiring wonder and tragic disaster, Sara Dosa’s archival documentary Fire of Love gracefully captures this extreme dichotomy while also getting to the heart of what drove this couple to abandon a routine, domesticated lifestyle and literally sacrifice their lives in the mission to save others. In telling their devotion to one of the natural world’s most dangerous forces,...
- 11/11/2022
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
After its debut at Sundance in January, where it earned the World Cinema Dramatic Competition award for directing, Ukrainian wartime drama “Klondike” nabbed top honors for best international film at the Chile’s 18th Santiago International Film Festival (Sanfic).
“Klondike,” written, directed and edited by Ukrainian filmmaker Marina Er Gorbach (“Omar and Us”), tells the story of expectant couple Irina and Anatoly who live in the village of Grabove, near the Russia-Ukraine border during the high conflict that coincides with downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. The couple faces devastation up-close as Irina refuses to relocate, even as troops close in.
Best director went to Chile’s Roberto Baeza for his documentary effort “Punto de Encuentro,” a gripping portrait of filmmakers striving to recreate the story of their fathers, tortured and imprisoned under the dictatorship.
Tyler Taormina (“Ham On Rye”) feature “Happer’s Comet,” which examines alienation by focusing on characters from his Long Island hometown,...
“Klondike,” written, directed and edited by Ukrainian filmmaker Marina Er Gorbach (“Omar and Us”), tells the story of expectant couple Irina and Anatoly who live in the village of Grabove, near the Russia-Ukraine border during the high conflict that coincides with downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. The couple faces devastation up-close as Irina refuses to relocate, even as troops close in.
Best director went to Chile’s Roberto Baeza for his documentary effort “Punto de Encuentro,” a gripping portrait of filmmakers striving to recreate the story of their fathers, tortured and imprisoned under the dictatorship.
Tyler Taormina (“Ham On Rye”) feature “Happer’s Comet,” which examines alienation by focusing on characters from his Long Island hometown,...
- 8/21/2022
- by Holly Jones
- Variety Film + TV
Easy to overlook in the looming shadow of the Venice, Telluride, Toronto, and New York Film Festivals (and all of the awards season hoopla they portend), Switzerland’s historic Locarno Film Festival has remained so distinct and essential precisely because of its refusal to concede to industry pressures or chase attention over artistry.
While the magical Piazza Grande has been home to its fair share of glitzy outdoor screenings over the years — the next few days will see the 8,000-seat town square transform into an impromptu “Bullet Train” station, for example — Locarno has always prided itself on providing a more curious and less hostile platform for elite auteurs whose work may not conform to the commercial demands of the international marketplace; recent winners of the festival’s prestigious Golden Leopard award include Pedro Costa (“Vitalina Varela”), Lav Diaz (“From What Is Before”), and the great Chinese documentarian Wang Bing (“Mrs.
While the magical Piazza Grande has been home to its fair share of glitzy outdoor screenings over the years — the next few days will see the 8,000-seat town square transform into an impromptu “Bullet Train” station, for example — Locarno has always prided itself on providing a more curious and less hostile platform for elite auteurs whose work may not conform to the commercial demands of the international marketplace; recent winners of the festival’s prestigious Golden Leopard award include Pedro Costa (“Vitalina Varela”), Lav Diaz (“From What Is Before”), and the great Chinese documentarian Wang Bing (“Mrs.
- 8/2/2022
- by David Ehrlich and Sophie Monks Kaufman
- Indiewire
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