The film Dirty God by Dutch filmmaker Sacha Polak (Hemel, Zurich) will open the 48th edition of International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR). Dirty God is a compelling portrait of a young mother named Jade (a powerful debut role for actress Vicky Knight), and deals with themes of courage, self-acceptance and motherhood in contemporary London.
A Star is Born leads the nominees for the 25th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards® for outstanding individual, cast and ensemble performances in film with four nominations, followed by BlacKkKlansman and The Favourite with three nominations each. The cast of BlacKkKlansman and A Star is Born were also nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture along with Black Panther, Bohemian Rhapsody and Crazy Rich Asians.
Lucrecia Martel’s Zama, Lee Chang-dong’s Burning, and Paul Schrader’s First Reformed took the top spots among films released in 2018 on Film Comment’s annual end-of-year survey. Of the films that screened at festivals worldwide but have not announced stateside distribution, Roberto Minervini’s What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire?, Mariano Llinás’s La Flor, and Khalik Allah’s Black Mother received the top rankings.
The Santa Barbara International Film Festival has selected Yalitza Aparicio (Roma) Sam Elliott (A Star is Born), Elsie Fisher (Eighth Grade) Claire Foy (First Man), Richard E. Grant (Can You Ever Forgive Me?), Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie (Leave No Trace), John David Washington (BlacKkKlansman) and Steven Yeun (Burning) to receive the 2019 Virtuosos Award at the upcoming 34th edition of the festival.
Six premieres of digitally restored films will be presented in the Berlinale Classics section of the 69th Berlin International Film Festival. The first three of those classics have already been chosen and include Dominik Graf’s Die Sieger (The Invincibles, GER 1994), the Danish film Ordet (The Word, DEN 1955) directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer, and Örökbefogadás (Adoption, HUN 1975) by director Márta Mészáros, which won the 1975 Golden Bear for Best Film. All three will be celebrating a world premiere at the festival with Berlinale Classics screenings of brand-new digital restorations.
The African American Film Critics Association (AAFCA) named Ryan Coogler’s “Black Panther” the Best Film of 2018 along with Best Director (Ryan Coogler) and Best Song (“All the Stars” performed by Kendrick Lamar and SZA with music and lyrics by Kendrick Lamar, Anthony Tiffith, Mark Spears, Solana Rowe and Al Shuckburgh) making it AAFCA’s top award-winner of 2018.
Netflix released the trailer for the Leonardo DiCaprio-produced documentary “Struggle: The Life and Lost Art of Szukalski,” which looks at the life and career of Polish painter and sculptor Stanislav Szukalski. The documentary film launches Friday, December 21 on the Netflix.
The world premiere of the documentary Ski Bum: The Warren Miller Story directed by award-winning filmmaker Patrick Creadon (Wordplay) will open the 2019 Slamdance Film Festival. The documentary chronicles the life and times of legendary filmmaker Warren Miller, who served as a driving force in the development and promotion of skiing in America and throughout the world. Miller, who died earlier this year at the age of 93 while the documentary was still in production, sat with the filmmakers months before his passing in what would prove to be his final interview.
Sight & Sound, the BFI’s international film magazine, today named Alfonso Cuarón’s Roma as the Best Film of 2018 in one of the most anticipated and respected critics’ opinion poll: Sight & Sound’s Films of the Year. Paul Thomas Anderson’s Oscar®-winning Phantom Thread is in second place, followed by Lee Chang-dong’s Burning in third.
“Fyre”, Chris Smith’s highly anticipated documentary film is an exclusive behind the scenes look at the infamous unraveling of the Fyre music festival. The documentary will be released globally on Netflix on January 18, 2019.
French actress and Academy Award winner Juliette Binoche will serve as president of the International Jury at the 69th Berlin International Film Festival.
The San Francisco Film Critics Circle named Roma the Best Picture of 2018 along with Best Foreign Language Picture but gave the award for Best Director to Spike Lee for BlacKkKlansman. BlacKkKlansman also won the awards for Best Original Score and Best Screenplay, Adapted.