The 2015 Virginia Film Festival have added more than 20 new films to the lineup. The
Festival, presented by the University of Virginia and the Office of the Provost and Vice Provost for the Arts, will take place from November 5-8 at venues throughout Charlottesville. The Festival also revealed that Alex Neustaedter, the young star of Ithaca, will join in a post-screening discussion that will include director Meg Ryan, actor Lois Robbins, and producer Janet Brenner. The 16-year-old Neustaedter portrays the lead role of Homer in this coming-of-age story about a small-town telegraph bicycle who delivers messages of love, hope, pain, and even death, to the good people of Ithaca, only to have one of those messages change his life forever.
Brooklyn – The profoundly moving story of Ellis Lacey (Saorise Ronan), a young Irish immigrant woman torn between two countries as she leaves behind the comforts of her mother’s home for the shores of New York City, where the intoxication of new love is challenged by the realities of her past.
Youth – Fred (Michael Caine), a retired orchestra conductor, is on holiday at a resort spa with his daughter and his film-director best friend Mick (Harvey Keitel), who is shooting what may be his final film there. As the two men face, and discuss, the twilight of their careers and lives, Fred receives an invitation from Queen Elizabeth II to perform for Prince Philip’s birthday.
Krisha – Following a prolonged battle with addiction and self-destruction, Krisha returns to the family she abandoned for a holiday celebration, only to see old wounds reopened. Writer/director Trey Edward Shults recreates painful incidents from his past, and casts family members to give the film, expanded from an award-winning 2014 short film of the same name, to achieve a uniquely authentic feel.
Paradise, FL – When his friend’s wife ends up in the hospital, a struggling gulf coast oyster fisherman moves in to care for the couple’s young kids, and finds himself fighting for a family he didn’t know he needed. (pictured above)
Heart of a Dog – Selected for competition in this year’s Venice International Film Festival after its September premiere at the Telluride Film Festival, musician and performance artist Laurie Anderson’s meditation on love and death is playful, lucid, and heartbreaking. Sparked by the death of her beloved terrier Lolabelle, Anderson draws on her childhood experiences and political beliefs, using her own compositions, 8 millimeter films from her family archive, and animation to help guide the journey of Lolabelle’s spirit.
Lucifer – An angel falling from heaven to hell unexpectedly lands in a Mexican village where his presence affects the villagers in surprising ways. Lucifer is a mesmerizing, moving, and unique experiment in form, presented in director t Gust Van Den Berghe’s original format, Tondoscope, which features a lens he created for the film that allows it to be projected in a circular format.
Embrace of the Serpent – This epic story, inspired by the journals of the first explorers of the Colombian Amazon, Theodor Koch-Grunberg and Richard Evans Schultes, encompasses the first contact, encounter, approach, betrayal, and, in the end, life-changing friendship between an Amazonian shaman who is the last survivor of his people and two scientists who spend 40 years in the Amazon in search of a sacred plant to heal them.
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Grounded (Au Sol) is a warm-hearted, tear jerking story about a distraught woman and a sympathetic airline employee who helps her circumvent rigid airport regulations for the sake of her daughter.
Hot Sugar’s Cold World, a fly-on-the-wall look into the life of a modern-day Mozart, Nick Koenig (Hot Sugar) as he creates one-of-a-kind music made entirely out of sounds from the world around him, will open November 6, 2015 in theaters and iTunes with special live performances to follow across the US and Canada.
Nick lives every young musician’s dream, but when his internet- famous girlfriend, (rapper Kitty) goes on tour and they split, he flies to Paris where he grew up, to move on with his life, while hunting for increasingly unique and exotic sounds to sample and turn into beats. Through his journey, Hot Sugar goes on some crazy adventures, meets some fascinating people and learns what it takes to survive as an artist.
With appearances by former members of Das Racist, legendary filmmaker Jim Jarmusch (Broken Flowers, Only Lovers Left Alive), the world’s most renowned Astrophysicist, Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson (“Cosmos” on FOX) and comedian Martin Starr (HBO’s “Silicon Valley”) among a host of other musicians and personalities.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-V5CJaa5zLE
Hot Sugar’s Cold World, an official selections of 2015 SXSW Film Festival and 2015 Hot Docs Film Festival, is directed by Adam Bhala Lough, Executive Produced by David Gordon Green, Danny McBride and Jody Hill, and features Nick Koenig, Martin Starr, Kool AD, Heems, Dapwell, Kitty, Rachel Trachtenburg, Jim Jarmusch, Dr. Neil deGrasse, Tyson, Shelby Fero.
The 2015 Los Cabos International Film Festival announced the films chosen for its fourth edition’s Official Selection, which is composed of Competencia Los Cabos (Mexico, USA and Canada) and México Primero sections. Nine films are in competition for Competencia Los Cabos, where North American films appear side-by-side, films that are from or co-produced with Mexico, USA and/or Canada can participate; and six films are in competition for México Primero, focusing on Mexican films.
The nine films in competition for 
Film Director Kathy Roselli will hold a benefit screening of OLD?!, a 55 minute documentary that explores the process of aging through personal, humorous, inspiring, and deeply touching stories from area residents in all stages of their lives. Seeking to pull audiences into a conversation about the process of aging, OLD?! encourages viewers to explore and experience their own journeys of growing old.
Roselli, an Ashland, Oregon resident, drew on personal testimonials and insights from more than 70 Ashland area residents ages 10 days to 101 years, to make her film. The documentary has been featured at the Portland Film Festival; the SAFilm Fest (San Antonio, TX) ; the Real to Reel Film Festival (Kings Mountain, N.C), where it was recognized as Best Of Fest; and at IndieFEST (La Jolla, CA.) where it received an Award of Merit, Special Mention, Documentary Feature.
Roselli, who discovered her passion for filmmaking later in life, began her journey as a director with the short documentary, Portrait of Isabelle, about a young girl suffering from Rhett Syndrome. Roselli met her subject while working as a pediatric physical therapist. Since her first film, Roselli has produced two other short documentaries, Free Voice ~ Free Spirit and Breath In Three Verses (AIFF13), which have also done well at film festivals. OLD?!, is Roselli’s first feature length documentary. She drew inspiration from her own desire to hear about aging from real people rather than experts. “Aging is something we all do,” she said. “Making this film helped me embrace the third stage of my life.”
Roselli brings her film to the Varsity Theatre as a way to share the work with the many locals she interviewed, and also to support the non-profit 
15 films will compete in the feature-length documentary competition of the upcoming 
FLOWERS (Loreak), Spain’s 
The 2015 Hamptons International Film Festival announced their award winners, and RAMS, directed by Grimur Hákonarson won The HIFF Award for Best Narrative Feature. RAMS is Iceland’s official selection for the Academy Awards. MISSING PEOPLE, directed by David Shapiro, received the HIFF Award for Best Documentary Feature. OVER, directed by Jörn Threlfall, and LAST DAY OF FREEDOM, directed by Dee Hibbert-Jones, Nomi Talisman, received the HIFF Awards for Best Narrative Short Film and for Best Documentary Short Film, respectively.
EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT, directed by Ciro Guerra, received the Honorable Mention for Narrative Feature and PATRIOT, directed by Eva Riley, received Honorable Mention for Narrative Short Film. CHUCK NORRIS VS. COMMUNISM, directed by Ilinca Calugareanu, received the Honorable Mention for Documentary Feature.
Check out some video clips and images from CLASSROOM 6, a found-footage horror film directed by Jonas Odenheimer, available on VOD and iTunes today, Friday, October 9, 2015.
In CLASSROOM 6, a local reporter and her assembled TV crew explore a school haunted by a horrific past. The team soon realizes that the location is home to an evil and ancient force that wants them dead.
https://vimeo.com/141674449
https://vimeo.com/141674451
https://vimeo.com/141674450
Academy-Award Nominee Toni Collette (pictured above) (The Sixth Sense, Little Miss Sunshine, United States of Tara), Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winner Tracy Letts (Homeland) and Sam Trammell (True Blood) join Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter franchise, Horns) in director/co-writer Daniel Ragussis ‘s upcoming feature film IMPERIUM, to be distributed by Lionsgate Premiere, the Company’s newly-launched specialty film label utilizing a mix of traditional and multiplatform release strategies.
Daniel Radcliffe stars as the title character, Nate Foster, a special agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, where he specializes in domestic terrorism and covert operations. Toni Collette joins as a veteran battle-hardened colleague FBI Agent Angela Zampino, with Tracy Letts joining as Dallas Wolf, a modern-day leader of the white supremacy movement and Sam Trammell plays Jerry Conrad a seemingly normal suburban Dad who is also the local Ayran youth recruiter.
Based on true events, IMPERIUM focuses on the FBI agent as he goes undercover and joins a white supremacist group in order to expose a sizable terrorist plot to create a dirty bomb. The bright up-and-coming analyst must confront the challenge of sticking to a new identity while maintaining his real principles as he navigates the dangerous underworld of white supremacy.
The script was co-written by former FBI agent Mike German whose counterterrorism activities during his 16-year tenure inspire the plot of the film.
IMPERIUM commences production this month in Hopewell, Virginia and is executive produced by Andrew Mann, Jeff Elliott, Chad Moore, Barry Brooker and Stan Wertlieb in addition to Eric Gold and Warren Goz of Sculptor Media. The film is produced by Atomic Features and Tycor International Film Company producers, TY Walker, Dennis Lee and Simon Taufique. Green-Light International is handling foreign sales and brokered the domestic Lionsgate deal. IMPERIUM will be released by Lionsgate Premiere.