UNBANNED: THE LEGEND OF AJ1[/caption]
Unbanned: The Legend of AJ1, the documentary that tells the origin story of the Air Jordan 1 shoe, will premiere as a Special Screening at the 17th annual Tribeca Film Festival. Directed and written by Dexton Deboree, the film follows the iconic shoe from its unlikely beginnings to its role in disrupting long-established rules of the NBA, changing the game of basketball, birthing sneaker culture and influencing a social and cultural revolution.
“We are honored to premiere our film at the Tribeca Film Festival for so many reasons. Los York, many of our film’s cast members and much of the story itself, are rooted in the culture of NYC and we are proud to introduce the true story of AJ1 to one of our hometowns,” Deboree exclaims. “The film captures the raw, rebellious, eclectic and diverse spirit of culture in and around basketball and beyond, something our film has very much in common with New York City. Nothing is more fitting than to premiere with Tribeca at the historic Beacon Theatre especially, this year where the lineup celebrates American diversity,” he adds.
The first feature documentary from Los York Entertainment, Unbanned: The Legend of AJ1 is the true story about the shoe that changed the world. Through interviews with Spike Lee, Chuck D, Anthony Anderson, Michael B. Jordan, Lena Waithe, Kenya Barris, DJ Khaled, Aleali May and many more including Michael Jordan himself, this film explores the power of the AJ1 across social and political spectrums and how it has broken barriers between female and male fashion, self-expression, identity, empowerment and more.
Tribeca Film Festival has been the launching pad for many groundbreaking films including Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: A Bad Boy Story, Nas: Time is Illmatic and most recently, Kobe Bryant’s Oscar®-Winning Animated Short Dear Basketball from acclaimed director Glen Keane.
“At Tribeca we are always looking for documentaries that shift our perspectives to tell us stories in new and exciting ways,” said Cara Cusumano, Director of Programming, Tribeca Film Festival. “The enduring cultural impact of the AJ1 is an entertaining, thrilling, surprising ride, and one that we can’t wait to share with audiences at the Beacon on April 27th.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p79nXVeyj4sDocumentary
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Air Jordan 1 Shoe Documentary ‘Unbanned: The Legend of AJ1’ to Premiere at Tribeca Film Festival | Trailer
[caption id="attachment_27765" align="aligncenter" width="1200"] UNBANNED: THE LEGEND OF AJ1[/caption]
Unbanned: The Legend of AJ1, the documentary that tells the origin story of the Air Jordan 1 shoe, will premiere as a Special Screening at the 17th annual Tribeca Film Festival. Directed and written by Dexton Deboree, the film follows the iconic shoe from its unlikely beginnings to its role in disrupting long-established rules of the NBA, changing the game of basketball, birthing sneaker culture and influencing a social and cultural revolution.
“We are honored to premiere our film at the Tribeca Film Festival for so many reasons. Los York, many of our film’s cast members and much of the story itself, are rooted in the culture of NYC and we are proud to introduce the true story of AJ1 to one of our hometowns,” Deboree exclaims. “The film captures the raw, rebellious, eclectic and diverse spirit of culture in and around basketball and beyond, something our film has very much in common with New York City. Nothing is more fitting than to premiere with Tribeca at the historic Beacon Theatre especially, this year where the lineup celebrates American diversity,” he adds.
The first feature documentary from Los York Entertainment, Unbanned: The Legend of AJ1 is the true story about the shoe that changed the world. Through interviews with Spike Lee, Chuck D, Anthony Anderson, Michael B. Jordan, Lena Waithe, Kenya Barris, DJ Khaled, Aleali May and many more including Michael Jordan himself, this film explores the power of the AJ1 across social and political spectrums and how it has broken barriers between female and male fashion, self-expression, identity, empowerment and more.
Tribeca Film Festival has been the launching pad for many groundbreaking films including Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: A Bad Boy Story, Nas: Time is Illmatic and most recently, Kobe Bryant’s Oscar®-Winning Animated Short Dear Basketball from acclaimed director Glen Keane.
“At Tribeca we are always looking for documentaries that shift our perspectives to tell us stories in new and exciting ways,” said Cara Cusumano, Director of Programming, Tribeca Film Festival. “The enduring cultural impact of the AJ1 is an entertaining, thrilling, surprising ride, and one that we can’t wait to share with audiences at the Beacon on April 27th.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p79nXVeyj4s
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Edward Norton Produced ONE OCTOBER, Chronicling Clay Pigeon’s NY Street Interviews Sets Release Date | Trailer
One October, the documentary chronicling radio host Clay Pigeon as he talks to a diverse cross-section of people throughout New York city, exploring a microcosm of themes and issues including race, religion, economics, politics and culture, will be released nationally starting Friday, May 11.
Filmed entirely in October of 2008, a time when gentrification is rapidly displacing the working and middle classes, Wall Street is plummeting, and then-Senator Barack Obama is making his first presidential bid, One October is a lyrical time capsule that captures the heart and spirit of New York. When seen from our current vantage point, the film foreshadows the roiling political upheaval spreading across the country today in 2018. Directed by Rachel Shuman and executive produced by three-time Academy Award® nominee Edward Norton (“Primal Fear,” “American History X” and “Birdman”), this captivating feature documentary, which had its World Premiere at the 2017 Full Frame Documentary Film Festival, chronicles intrepid radio host Clay Pigeon as he talks to a beautifully diverse cross-section of people throughout the city, exploring a microcosm of themes and issues including race, religion, economics, politics and culture. With today’s news filled with ratings-hungry, sensationalist headlines and political pundits yelling over one another, Pigeon is quite the antithesis with his man-on-the-street style interviews, offering an authentic, warm-hearted and more humanitarian approach to journalism.
Maysles Cinema in Harlem, NYC, where several of the scenes in the documentary were filmed, will host a week-long theatrical release of One October, screening along with the short documentary THE MONOLITH, directed by Angelo J. Guglielmo, Jr., about pioneering NYC artist Gwyneth Leech, starting Friday, May 11. One October will also be released nationally on VOD on May 11 via Passion River Films on iTunes, Amazon Prime, Google Play, Microsoft XBOX and other digital platforms. The film will also screen nationwide in select cities.
One October begins with Pigeon, a radio host from WFMU in Jersey City, NJ, who takes to the streets of New York City to talk to everyday citizens about their lives, their dreams and their relationships in the face of uncertain change in a transforming city. As part of what he calls a “radio experiment,” this transplanted Iowan roams the streets bearing a handheld recorder and a kindly probing nature: “Has he popped the question?” “When is the last time you’ve had a regular roof over your head?” “Do you love America?” These revealing interviews are woven between vivid scenes of New York’s eccentric byways, which together reveal a city—and a nation—at a crossroads.
During his neighborhood rambles, Pigeon meets people like Kristin, an optimistic young woman who has just arrived from the Midwest; Mark, a union construction worker still dusty from his workday and deeply in debt; Nicole, a transgender woman looking for an accepting community; and Stacie, a single mother in Harlem worried about gentrification.
Pigeon’s encounters interweave with observational passages that poignantly reveal urbanist and author Jane Jacobs’s (The Death and Life of Great American Cities) idea of the “ballet of the good city sidewalk”: rollerskaters wind their way through Central Park, city dwellers seek blessings for a motley group of pets on St. Francis Day, observant Jews toss breadcrumbs into the Hudson River on Rosh Hashanah, and Muslims mark the end of their Ramadan fast with Eid al-Fitr prayers and expressions of forgiveness. Amid these celebrations of daily life we see the shifting landscape of the city: big-box stores and mega-chains rapidly replace independent businesses, giant glass buildings are erected where flea markets once stood, and luxury condos loom over small brick tenements.
Nuanced, cinematic and often humorous, One October charts the chasm between one’s desires and one’s means, explores the urgent need to conserve the old amid the glorification of the new, and affirms the notion that a varied streetscape is essential to the health of a dynamic metropolis.
https://vimeo.com/260800683
“I wanted to make a film in response to the homogenization and hypergentrification of neighborhoods in New York City and chose to set it in October 2008, a tumultuous moment when the housing market collapse was becoming a worldwide economic crisis and much of the country was swept up in Obama’s presidential campaign,” said One October director Rachel Shuman. “In retrospect, almost exactly a decade later now, I am releasing the film in another period of change in our country, and I hope that it will present a story of diversity and resiliency that unites people.”
Edward Norton is an environmental, social and civic activist who has substantially contributed to the development of the cultural and civic life of the city. When asked why he wanted to become involved in this film, Norton stated, “Like E.B. White’s classic ‘Here is New York,’ One October captures the complexity of our culture at a moment in time and distills the zeitgeist of optimism and hope surrounding the election of Barack Obama. Viewed today, it’s especially poignant and inspiring.”
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9 Indie Filmmakers with 6 Documentary Films Selected for Film Independent’s 2018 Documentary Lab
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Unapologetic[/caption]
Nine filmmakers and six projects have been selected for Film Independent’s 2018 Documentary Lab, an intensive five-week program designed to help filmmakers who are currently in post-production on their feature-length documentary films.
This year’s projects span the globe – from a film about undocumented youth in the US, to an indigenous family in the Andes standing up to one of the largest gold producers in the world, to an unexpected environmental film about invisible elves, the free market and the surprising power of belief told through an Icelandic grandmother’s quest to save a threatened landscape.
“We’re delighted to welcome this talented group of filmmakers who will be joining us for the eighth year of the Documentary Lab from diverse regions across the US and as far away as Egypt,” said Jennifer Kushner, Director of Artist Development. “Through mentorship, career development and a lively collaborative work environment, the Lab provides support to filmmakers as they work to bring these meaningful nonfiction stories to audiences.”
Through a series of meetings and workshops, the Documentary Lab provides creative feedback and story notes to participating filmmakers, while helping them strategize for the completion, distribution and marketing of their films.
Additionally, the program serves to advance the careers of its Fellows by making introductions to film professionals who can advise on both the craft and business of documentary filmmaking. Lab Fellows attend multiple guest speaker and workshopping sessions with established documentary directors, institutional funders, legal professionals, festival programmers and distributors, and each is paired with an experienced Creative Advisor who provides one-on-one support and insight as the Fellows ready their projects for release.
This year’s Documentary Lab Advisors and Guest Speakers include Ramona S. Diaz (Motherland), Greg Finton (Editor, A River Runs Through It, Dazed and Confused), Amy Halpin of the International Documentary Association, Alexandra Johnes (The Square), Senain Kheshgi of Majority Film, Jeff Malmberg (Spettacolo, Marwencol), Marjan Safinia (But You Speak Such Good English), Chris Shellen (Spettacolo, Marwencol) and Rahdi Taylor of Concordia Films (Blue Note).
Notable past Documentary Lab projects include Tracy Droz Tragos and Andrew Droz Palmero’s Rich Hill; Marah Strauch’s Sunshine Superman; Sarita Khurana and Smriti Mundhra’s A Suitable Girl; Dustin Nakao Haider, Daniel Dewes and Derek Doneen’s Shot in the Dark; and Bing Liu and Diane Quon’s Minding the Gap, winner of the 2018 US Documentary Competition Award for Breakthrough Filmmaking at Sundance.
Film Independent Artist Development promotes unique independent voices by helping filmmakers create and advance new work through its Filmmaker Labs (Directing, Documentary, Episodic, Producing and Screenwriting), Grants Program which awards over $800K annually to filmmakers, the Fast Track finance market, Fiscal Sponsorship and Project Involve, celebrating 25 years of mentoring the next generation of visual storytellers and working toward an inclusive industry.
The 2018 Documentary Lab projects and Fellows are:
Title: I am a Script Girl
Director/Producer: Mina Nabil
Logline: I Am a Script Girl is an up close and personal examination of the life, challenges and career of the unstoppable Sylvette Baudrot who at 89-years old recounts her journey from Egypt to Paris where she became a trusted confidant to the great auteurs of 20th century cinema.
Title: Pathways
Director: Florencia Krochik
Logline: Pathways tells the stories of six “DACA-mented” & undocumented youth and the struggles they face pursuing higher education. The film weaves together their captivating stories and explores the crippled US immigration policies that have led to the hardships they and their families face.
Title: Sage Country
Director: Yuri Chicovsky
Producer: Lauren Blair
Logline: A Colorado sheep rancher who inherits a beloved piece of land and way of life must come to terms with his legacy and his life’s dream.
Title: The Seer and the Unseen
Director/Producer: Sara Dosa
Producer: Shane Boris
Logline: The Seer and the Unseen is an unexpected environmental film about invisible elves, the free market and the surprising power of belief told through an Icelandic grandmother’s quest to save a threatened landscape – and the beloved home her family has lived in for generations.
Title: Unapologetic
Director: Ashley O’Shay
Logline: After two Black Chicagoans are murdered by the police, young Black citizens begin challenging the city’s corrupt policies while redefining the meaning of community organizing. Unapologetic goes behind the veil with two Black, queer women, providing an intimate peek into the personal lives that sustain a movement.
Title: Untitled Claudia Sparrow Documentary
Director: Claudia Sparrow
Producer: Ryan Schwartz
Logline: An indigenous family from the Andes stands up to one of the largest gold producers in the world defending their right to live off their land and protect natural resources from devastating corporate greed.
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Faith-Based Documentary “Fragments of Truth” in Theaters One Night Only – April 24 | Trailer
The debate over the reliability of the New Testament changes in “Fragments of Truth,” coming to U.S. movie theaters this April for a special one-night event. Famed evangelical New Testament scholar and author Dr. Craig Evans discusses new evidence concerning Gospel manuscripts that allegedly reinforce the New Testament’s authenticity. The feature content will be followed by an exclusive Q&A with director Reuben Evans and Dr. Craig Evans.
Fathom Events and Faithlife Films partner to present “Fragments of Truth” in nearly 750 U.S. movie theaters on Tuesday, April 24 at 7:00 p.m. local time, through Fathom’s Digital Broadcast Network (DBN). For a complete list of theater locations, visit the Fathom Events website (theaters and participants are subject to change).
Is the Bible trustworthy? In this new documentary from Faithlife Films, narrated by actor John Rhys-Davies (“Indiana Jones,” “Lord of the Rings”), Dr. Craig Evans takes this question head on, traveling the globe to track down the most ancient New Testament manuscripts. Along the way, he highlights groundbreaking new evidence that is changing the debate. Audiences will hear from scholars who have devoted their lives to learning and discovering how the evidence for the reliability of the New Testament manuscripts is stronger than ever.
“Questions regarding the reliability of the Bible have been debated by scholars worldwide for centuries,” Fathom Events CEO Ray Nutt said. “‘Fragments of Truth’ will give audiences of all ages new understanding on the power of the New Testament and ultimately help strengthen their faith.”
“The challenges to the reliability of the Gospels have never been greater,” said director Reuben Evans. “But when we heard about the latest research Dr. Craig Evans published, we knew this was a story that we had to tell.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GZrU7NT210
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“St Pete Unfiltered” Documentary Examines St. Petersburg, Florida Sewage Cover-up | Trailer
The documentary St Pete Unfiltered examines the city of St. Petersburg’s chronic and continued dumping and spilling of raw and partially treated wastewater into Tampa Bay, its surrounding surface waters, and the Florida Aquifer. The film makes its world premiere at the Gasparilla International Film Festival at the AMC Centro Ybor March 24, 2018 at 1p.m.
“Most shocking to me is the city’s negligence and the fact that citizens either aren’t aware of the dumps or they believe that they have been resolved,” says executive producer Caroline Smith. “Not only does the city continue spilling wastewater, our beaches regularly fail routine water tests and this administration focuses its energy and its resources perpetuating a cover up.”
In April 2015 St. Petersburg shuttered one of its four water reclamation facilities, decreasing sewage treatment capacity by 25%. Over the next two years, a series of rain events caused the city to illegally and willfully dump 200-million gallons of raw sewage into Tampa Bay. In addition, the city continued pumping over 800-million gallons of partially treated sewage into the bay, the aquifer, and the area’s surrounding surface waters.
“For a city that claims to be the greenest in the state, St. Petersburg has a problem actually living up to that moniker,” says producer and writer Brandon D. Shuler. “St. Pete has a greenwashing habit where they like to brush over the real issues that they are polluting our environment and threatening our drinking waters with its weak solutions. The current administration is covering up the threats they are exposing their citizens to.”
Under a self-defined consent order with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, St. Petersburg has adopted the use of underground injection wells to pump its partially treated waste water into the Florida Aquifer. Following the idea that all waters are connected through the significant nexus, the use of injection wells merely gets waste pollution out of sight and mind while threating the integrity of the region’s drinking waters.
St Pete Unfiltered exposes the city’s perpetration of the worst sewage spill in Florida’s history. The documentary premieres March 24, 2018 at 1p.m. at the AMC Centro Ybor.
https://vimeo.com/254616947
https://vimeo.com/259796484
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Music Documentary “Elvis Presley: The Searcher” Debuts April 14 on HBO | Trailer
“Elvis Presley: The Searcher,” the two-part music documentary chronicling his creative journey from childhood through the final 1976 Jungle Room recording sessions, will debut Saturday, April 14 (8:00-11:30 p.m. ET/PT) on HBO.
The documentary includes stunning atmospheric shots taken inside Graceland, Elvis’ iconic home, and features more than 20 new, primary source interviews with session players, producers, engineers, directors and other artists who knew him or who were profoundly influenced by him. It also features never-before-seen photos and footage from private collections worldwide, and an original score by Pearl Jam lead guitarist Mike McCready.
Among those offering insights into Elvis are: Priscilla Presley, Elvis’ ex-wife; his guitarist, Scotty Moore; childhood friend Red West; historians Bill Ferris, Bill Malone and Portia Maultsby; writers Alan Light, Preston Lauterbach, Nik Cohn and Warren Zanes; music executives John Jackson, David Porter, Ernst Jorgensen and Bones Howe; and musicians Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen, Emmylou Harris and Robbie Robertson.
The first part details: Elvis’ early life in Tupelo, Miss., where he soaked up both black and white gospel music, and Memphis, where he sought out rhythm and blues and country music; his initial encounter with Sun Records producer Sam Phillips, who teamed him with Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black to record the seminal hit “That’s All Right”; his early years of touring, mostly in the South, which burnished his reputation as a rising star; and his decision to sign with a national label, RCA Records, after his manager, Col. Tom Parker, bought out his Sun contract.
Also featured in part one: his unprecedented rise to fame over a single year, 1956, with a string of hit records and memorable TV performances, beginning with his electrifying performances on the Dorsey Brothers and Milton Berle shows, and capped by “The Ed Sullivan Show”; his long-held desire to break into movies, and success in early films like “Love Me Tender” and “Jailhouse Rock”; the death of his beloved mother, Gladys, just after he had purchased Graceland, a Memphis estate; and his two-year Army stint in Germany (1958-1960), during which he met his future wife, Priscilla Beaulieu.
The second part includes: Elvis’ return home after his Army discharge, when he was still a huge star and making hit records like “It’s Now or Never,” but facing a rapidly changing pop-music scene; Col. Parker’s efforts to pair Elvis with the likes of Frank Sinatra on TV to ensure a long and lucrative mainstream career; a seven-year period making an endless string of lightweight, music-infused movies, which stunted his musical growth and alienated many fans; and his triumphant TV comeback in 1968, a tumultuous year marked by social unrest and the deaths of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, which troubled Elvis deeply.
Also featured in part two: his commitment, orchestrated by Col. Parker, to an extended Las Vegas residency punctuated by over-the-top concerts featuring dozens of musicians and singers (The Sweet Inspirations, The Jordanaires); the Aloha from Hawaii concert, which reached billions via satellite, and was Parker’s response to Elvis’ repeated pleas to tour internationally, which he never did; his declining health in the 1970s, brought on by a grueling schedule of more than 100 concerts annually and an increased reliance on prescription drugs; his emotional recording of “Separate Ways,” which preceded his 1973 divorce from Priscilla; and his decision in 1976 to stage a marathon recording session in Graceland’s Jungle Room, where he cut dozens of songs, including the memorable “Hurt.” After the Jungle Room sessions, Elvis went back on tour, a shell of his former self. He died at Graceland on Aug. 16, 1977.
RCA/Legacy Recordings, a division of Sony Music Entertainment, will release “Elvis Presley: The Searcher”, the musical companion to the documentary, on Friday, April 6. It will be available in digital and physical configurations.
Director Thom Zimny’s previous HBO credits include the Bruce Springsteen documentaries “The Ties That Bind,” “Bruce Springsteen’s High Hopes” and “The Promise: The Making of ‘Darkness on the Edge of Town’.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qULBo4iPV8M
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MOUNTAIN Narrated by Willem Dafoe Opens May 18th | Trailer
Mountain directed by Jennifer Peedom, and narrated by Willem Dafoe is a unique documentary that explores our fascination with mountains, and accompanied by a classical score from the Australian Chamber Orchestra. The film will open theatrically on May 18th, 2018.
Only three centuries ago, setting out to climb a mountain would have been considered close to lunacy. Mountains were places of peril, not beauty, an upper world to be shunned, not sought out. Why do mountains now hold us spellbound, drawing us into their dominion, often at the cost of our lives?
From Tibet to Australia, Alaska to Norway armed with drones, Go-Pros and helicopters, director Jennifer Peedom has fashioned an astonishing symphony of mountaineers, ice climbers, free soloists, heliskiers, snowboarders, wingsuiters and parachuting mountain bikers. Willem Dafoe provides a narration sampled from British mountaineer Robert Macfarlane’s acclaimed memoir Mountains of the Mind , and a classical score from the Australian Chamber Orchestra accompanies this majestic cinematic experience.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxtWMOAHoiI
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Watch Trailer for Wim Wenders’ Documentary “Pope Francis – A Man of His Word”
Pope Francis – A Man of His Word (Focus Features / screenshot) Focus Features has released the official trailer for Wim Wenders’ Pope Francis – A Man of His Word, the new documentary feature with Pope Francis.
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SFFILM Launch Program to Feature World Premiere of 5 Documentaries on 2018 San Francisco International Film Festival Lineup
[caption id="attachment_27553" align="aligncenter" width="1200"]
The Rescue List[/caption]
SFFILM’s Launch program returns to the San Francisco International Film Festival to provide a platform for a select group of exceptional films just beginning their distribution journey.
In Launch’s second year, five documentary features within the official lineup of the 2018 San Francisco International Film Festival have been selected to have their world premieres.
LAUNCH TITLES AT 2018 SFFILM FESTIVAL
The Human Element (Matthew Testa, USA, 80 min) – World Premiere American photographer James Balog has been tracking human-caused changes to our planet for over 35 years. Disturbed and motivated by what he has seen, The Human Element documents how the earth’s four elements–water, air, fire, and earth–have all been impacted by a fifth element, homo sapiens. With breathtakingly rich and innovative photography, he illustrates issues ranging from rising sea levels to pollution’s impact on asthma cases to focus us on a call for change. The Rescue List (Alyssa Fedele and Zachary Fink, USA/Ghana, 80 min) – World Premiere Lake Volta in Ghana is the largest man-made lake in the world; it is also notorious as a locale for forced child labor. Bay Area filmmakers Alyssa Fedele and Zachary Fink’s beautifully shot documentary charts the courageous efforts of a local safe house to rescue the kids, give them schooling and therapy, and prepare them for reintegration into their families. Though it contains many intimate and moving moments with the children, the star of the film is real life hero Kwame, who initiates several dramatic rescues. Tre Maison Dasan (Denali Tiller, USA, 94 min) – World Premiere Tre, Maison, and Dasan are three boys who all share something in common–one of their parents is in jail. Following their separate lives through boyhood and weaving their stories together, first-time documentary filmmaker Denali Tiller tenderly observes each youngster’s life, as the kids come to understand more about the world around them. Capturing loving, frustrating, and heart wrenching moments between parent and child, Tre Maison Dasan approaches the issue of mass-incarceration by exposing the effects of the criminal justice system on young men. Ulam: Main Dish (Alexandra Cuerdo, USA, 80 min) – World Premiere For lovers of food documentaries like Jiro Dreams of Sushi (2011) and the Chef’s Table series, Ulam: Main Dish will come as a welcome and fresh addition. The film centers on the honest struggle for authenticity and respect for a cuisine often marginalized by the food world. Deploying rousing interviews with owners, restaurateurs, top chefs, as well as mouth-watering dishes placed front and center, filmmaker Alexandra Cuerdo follows the heartaches and triumphs of contemporary chefs that seek a place for their culture at the dinner table, one dish at a time. Wrestle (Suzannah Herbert, USA, 96 min) – World Premiere Jamario, Jaquon, Jailen, and Teague are teammates on the J.O. Johnson High School wrestling team in Huntsville, Alabama. Led by their passionate coach, they are trying to qualify for the State Championships but the pressures outside of the ring–emotional breakdowns, racial profiling by the police, teenage pregnancy–are mounting for each of the young men. Over the course of the season, director Suzannah Herbert gracefully follow each of them, showing that the sport is what keeps them focused and in control of their lives.
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FILMWORKER -Documentary on Stanley Kubrick’s Long-Time Assistant Leon Vitali, Sets Release Date
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Filmworker[/caption]
Filmworker, a documentary film directed by Tony Zierra about Stanley Kubrick’s long-time assistant Leon Vitali, will open at the Metrograph in New York on May 11th, and at the Nuart in Los Angeles on May 18th, followed by a national rollout. The film world premiered at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival and went on to screen at numerous international film festivals including Telluride, the New York Film Festival and the AFI Fest.
It’s a rare person who would give up fame and fortune to dedicated himself to someone else’s creative vision. Yet, that’s exactly what Leon Vitali did after his acclaimed performance as ‘Lord Bullingdon” in Stanley Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon. After appearing in Barry Lyndon, prestigious job offers poured in from film, television and stage, but Leon turned them all down to take on the role of assistant to the master filmmaker. It would prove to be an extraordinary, intense, often arduous journey that would push Leon to his limit and beyond. The young actor surrendered his thriving career to become Kubrick’s loyal right-hand man.
For more than two decades, Leon played a crucial role behind-the-scenes helping Kubrick make and maintain his legendary body of work. In Filmworker, Leon’s candid and often funny experiences in the company of the notoriously private Kubrick are woven together with rich and varied elements including previously unseen photos, videos, letters, notebooks, and memos from Leon’s private collection of Kubrick artifacts. Insightful, emotionally charged anecdotes from actors, family, crew members, and key film industry professionals who worked with Kubrick and Leon add an important layer of detail and impact to the story.
On what would turn out to be Kubrick’s final film, Eyes Wide Shut, Leon was stretched to the limit carrying out double duties. Not only did he attend to countless production tasks, he also gave a stellar performance as the imperious ‘Red Cloak’. Kubrick’s sudden death in the midst of putting the final touches on Eyes Wide Shut left chaos in its wake. Without Kubrick’s unassailable leadership, confusion reigned. Exhausted, ill, and grief-stricken over the loss of the man whose dynamic presence had been his driving force for decades, Leon threw himself into a tough and constant battle to keep Kubrick’s uncompromising standards alive.
Filmworker enters the world of Leon Vitali and Stanley Kubrick from a unique perspective that highlights the nitty-gritty of the creative process. By experiencing Leon’s journey we come to understand how the mundane gives rise to the magnificent as timeless filmmaking is brought to life at its most practical and profound level. Leon’s story is uniquely his own, but this chronicle of one artist who chose to serve another stands as a testament to the legions of unsung heroes whose names shine for a brief moment as the credits roll.
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5 Scientists Explore Some of the Most Spectacular Places on Earth in Trailer for “The Serengeti Rules”
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“Bob Paine (played by Matthieson McCrae) explores the Pacific Northwest in search of a natural laboratory.” From THE SERENGETI RULES. Photo credit: Nicolas Brown.[/caption]
Check out the beautiful and breath-taking trailer for The Serengeti Rules, a film that follows five pioneering scientists exploring some of the most remote and spectacular places on Earth.
Directed by Emmy and BAFTA award-winning filmmaker Nicolas Brown, The Serengeti Rules, will world premiere at the 2018 Tribeca Film Festival.
Beginning in the 1960s, a small band of young scientists headed out into the wilderness, driven by an insatiable curiosity about how nature works. Immersed in some of the most remote and spectacular places on Earth—from the majestic Serengeti to the Amazon jungle; from the Arctic Ocean to Pacific tide pools—they discovered a single set of rules that govern all life. Now in the twilight of their eminent careers, these five unsung heroes of modern ecology—Bob Paine, Jim Estes, Mary Power, Tony Sinclair, and John Terborgh—share the stories of their adventures, and how their pioneering work flipped our view of nature on its head. Across the globe, they discovered that among the millions of species on our planet, some are far more important than others. They called these species “keystones,” because they hold the natural world together. The role of keystones is both revelatory and surprising: sea otters help kelp forests flourish, supporting everything from salmon to eagles; wolves enable rivers to run clear and help forests thrive; and the humble wildebeest controls the numbers of trees, butterflies, elephants, and even giraffes on the savanna.
Unfortunately, these deep connections also work in reverse. When keystones are removed, ecosystems unravel and collapse—a phenomenon no one had imagined—or understood until their revolutionary discoveries. But with new knowledge also comes new hope, and these same visionaries reveal the remarkable resilience of nature—and how the rules they discovered can be used to upgrade and restore the natural world. They give us the chance to reimagine the world as it could and should be.
Based on the book by Sean B. Carroll, The Serengeti Rules will forever change the way we see nature. The film will be accompanied by a media and impact campaign to shine a light on restoration projects across the world.
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Kevin Macdonald’s Authorized Whitney Houston Documentary Gets a Summer Theatrical Release Date
Whitney, Academy Award®-winning director Kevin Macdonald’s highly anticipated documentary about the life and career of legendary superstar Whitney Houston will be released this summer in the United States on July 6th by Roadside Attractions and Miramax, and also on July 6th in the UK and Ireland by Altitude Film Entertainment.
Whitney is the intimate, definitive account of the superstar’s life and career, authored by renowned Oscar®-winning filmmaker Kevin Macdonald. The only film officially supported by the late singer’s estate, it includes previously unreleased recordings, rare never-before-seen footage and live performances recorded by Houston at various stages her life, as well as original studio recordings and acapellas of some of the late singer’s greatest hits. Because the filmmakers had access to vast archives of the Houston estate, the film also contains personal home movie footage that has never been seen publicly before, offering a rare glimpse of Whitney’s life behind-the-scenes as known only to her closest relatives, friends and collaborators.
Director Macdonald says, “I approached Whitney’s life like a mystery story; why did someone with so much raw talent and beauty self-destruct so publicly and painfully? I was lucky enough to have the support of Pat Houston and the Whitney Houston estate in this quest. They entrusted me with the ‘keys to the vault’ while giving me complete freedom to follow the story wherever it went. At heart, Whitney is an intimate family story that reveals a new side to a woman that even her most die-hard fans never knew.”
“To tell Whitney’s story, you have to know her story,” says Patricia Houston, the late singer’s manager, sister-in-law and the executor of Houston’s estate. “We could not be more excited that Whitney’s fans will have this authoritative and definitive documentary chronicling the full arc or her career and the scope of Whitney’s entire life. This is an amazing retrospective that celebrates Whitney with never-before-seen footage and Kevin approaches her life with no blinders on. He captures all of Whitney’s magic, and he does not ignore the hard times. This is a film that will truly thrill all who knew and loved her as a musician, actress, model and so much more.”
Academy Award®-winner Kevin Macdonald (Marley, Touching The Void, One Day in September, The Last King of Scotland), Academy Award®-winning producer Simon Chinn (Man on Wire, Searching For Sugarman), and his Lightbox co-founder Emmy® Award-winning producer Jonathan Chinn (LA 92, Fantastic Lies) and multi-Emmy® Award nominated and Happy Street Entertainment co-founder Lisa Erspamer (“Running From Crazy”) tell the unvarnished and authentic story of the late icon’s life in a film that examines both the meteoric highs and devastating lows of her remarkable and unforgettable career. Patricia Houston, Nicole David, Zanne Devine, Rosanne Korenberg, Joe Patrick, and Altitude Film Entertainment’s Will Clarke, Andy Mayson, and Mike Runagall executive produced.
Often referred to simply as ‘The Voice’, Whitney Houston was a singular talent, blessed with an extraordinary vocal range and incredible technical skill. As one of music’s biggest selling artists ever, she broke more records than any other female singer in the history of pop music. With over 200 million album sales worldwide, and remaining the only artist to chart seven consecutive US No. 1’s, Whitney Houston became the voice of a generation and is the most awarded female singer in history. Coming from an esteemed lineage of singers, Whitney was destined to be plucked from her gospel-singing roots to rule the world stage. She inspired a generation of singers from Mariah Carey and Lady Gaga to Beyoncé and her unforgettable performance of ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ moved the nation.
But all these achievements became overshadowed by a story of deep internal turmoil, addiction and self-destruction. With unprecedented access to friends, family and collaborators – some of whom have never told their story before, Kevin Macdonald offers the first comprehensive look at Whitney Houston’s life, work and creative process. The film reveals a woman who was both blessed and cursed with perhaps the greatest natural ability of any pop star in history.