VIMooZ

Mariana Rondón’s BAD HAIR, will open in the US beginning Wednesday, November 19. In the film, a nine-year-old boy’s preening obsession with straightening his hair elicits a tidal wave of homophobic panic in his hard-working mother.  BAD HAIR will have a 2-week engagement, November 19 – December 2, in New York City at Film Forum, 209 West Houston Street (West of 6th Avenue), with screenings daily at 12:45, 3:00, 5:10, 7:20, and 9:30. A Cinema Tropical/FiGa Films release.

Mardan

Check out the trailer for Batin Ghobadi’s debut feature Mardan, also Iran’s official entry for Oscar for foreign film for the upcoming Academy Awards. The film, which premiered in September at the Toronto International Film Festival, follows a police officer gripped by a traumatic childhood memory as he searches for a missing man in the rugged mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan.

Volker Schlöndorff’s DIPLOMACY, starring “two of France’s greatest actors,” Niels Arestrup and André Dussollier, will open at the Film Forum in New York on Wednesday, October 15, and at the Laemmle Royal in Los Angeles on November 7. A national release will follow.  

The first trailer has been released for Scottnes Smith’s Hear Me Move which premiered last month at South Africa’s Durban International Film Festival. Described as the first ever dance film from South Africa, Hear Me Move features energetic “sbujwa” and “pantsula” dance sequences, choreographed by the award-winning Paul Modjadji, that play out against the backdrop of a gritty urban Johannesburg seldom seen on the silver screen. Smith says, “We opted to focus on sbujwa and pantsula, our home grown urban street dances, because we wanted South Africans to see themselves and be proud of their contemporary culture.”

Check out the trailer for Mohamed Khan’s FACTORY GIRL which premiered last year at the 2013 Dubai International Film Festival, winning two awards, the Muhr Arab Feature Best Actress Award,  for Yasmine Raess, and the FEPRESCI (International Federation of Film Critics) Best Arab Feature award. Factory Girl was written by the director’s wife Wessam Soliman,  The film tells the story of one year in the life of Hiyam (played by Yasmine Raees), a young woman working in a clothing factory who falls in love with her supervisor.

Shout! Factory,and Cinevox, have entered a picture deal to distribute BRAZILIAN WESTERN (FAROESTE CABOCLO) in both U.S and Canada. Produced and directed by René Sampaio, this crime action-drama premiered with critical praise at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival and recently played at the Miami International Film Festival.

Nabil Ayouch’s HORSES OF GOD, Morocco’s Submission for the 2014 Academy Award Nomination for Best Foreign Language Film, will be released in the U.S. by Kino Lorber, with a planned release in May, 2014.  “HORSES OF GOD” had its World Premiere in’ Un Certain Regard at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival and went on to win multiple awards including Best Director at the Seattle International Film Festival.  The film, inspired by the terrorist attacks of May 16th, 2003 in Casablanca, follows two young men living in the slum of Sidi Moumen in Casablanca, caught up in Islamic fundamentalism and become martyrs.

Zhang Yimou Zhang Yimou’s latest film COMING HOME starring Gong Li, and currently in post-production, has been acquired by Sony Pictures Classics for release in the U.S. Inspired by Yan Geling’s “THE CRIMINAL LU YANSHI, COMING HOME is described as a romance drama chronicling the journey of a Chinese dissident (Chen Daoming) from the 1920′s to the 1990′s. COMING HOME marks the twelfth collaboration between the Sony Pictures Classics team and Zhang Yimou, dating back to the […]

THE NOTEBOOK (Le Grand Cahier), directed by Janos Szasz (Woyzech, The Witman Boys) and the Hungarian entry for Best Foreign Language Film is set for release in the U.S. after having been acquired by Sony Pictures Classics.  Set on the onset of WWII, The Notebook, which stars Ulrich Thomsen (The Celebration) and Ulrich Matthes (Downfall), tells the story of thirteen year old twins abandoned by their parents and forced to live with their cruel grandmother in a village on the Hungarian border. Studying the evil surrounding them, the twins learn to rely on their loyalty to one another, ultimately surviving in the face of challenging circumstances.

The official trailer has been released for Yuval Adler’s BETHLEHEM, winner of six Israeli Academy Awards and Israel’s Official Entry for the Best Foreign Language Film – 86th Academy Awards.  BETHLEHEM tells the story of the unlikely bond between Razi, an Israeli secret service officer, and his Palestinian informant Sanfur. BETHLEHEM is set to be released in the U.S. on February 21, 2014.