Declare Your Independents — Vol. 41
GITS development assistant Wendy Cohen here, and welcome back to Declare Your Independents, our new series highlighting the latest developments in the world of independent film!
This week…
How Would the Indie Film Community Handle “The Interview” Fiasco?
How to Self-Distribute Your Film
Sundance Institute Announces 2015 January Screenwriters Lab Participants
How the First Two Weeks of December Changed the Oscar Race
Indiewire’s Best Performances Of 2014
Scott and I encourage any of you who go to see an independent movie to post your reactions to the film in these posts. Good, bad, indifferent, whatever. If there’s a film you want to recommend, do it. Use your words to inspire readers to transport themselves into a local cinema.
INDIE SPOTLIGHT: MOVIES TO SEE IN THEATERS THIS WEEK
OPENING FRIDAY (12/19)
Aydin, a former actor, runs a small hotel in central Anatolia with his young wife Nihal with whom he has a stormy relationship and his sister Necla who is suffering from her recent divorce. In winter as the snow begins to fall, the hotel turns into a shelter but also an inescapable place that fuels their animosities.
Watch a Cannes Film Festival Q&A with director and co-writer Nuri Bilge Ceylan here.
This film explores the last quarter century of the great if eccentric British painter J.M.W. Turner (1775–1851). Profoundly affected by the death of his father, loved by a housekeeper he takes for granted and occasionally exploits sexually, he forms a close relationship with a seaside landlady with whom he eventually lives incognito in Chelsea, where he dies. Throughout this, he travels, paints, stays with the country aristocracy, visits brothels, is a popular if anarchic member of the Royal Academy of Arts, has himself strapped to the mast of a ship so that he can paint a snowstorm, and is both celebrated and reviled by the public and by royalty.
Watch an interview with the film’s writer/director Mike Leigh here.
Jim Bennett (Academy Award (R)-nominee Mark Wahlberg) is a risk taker. Both an English professor and a high-stakes gambler, Bennett bets it all when he borrows from a gangster (Michael Kenneth Williams) and offers his own life as collateral. Always one step ahead, Bennett pits his creditor against the operator of a gambling ring (Alvin Ing) and leaves his dysfunctional relationship with his wealthy mother (Academy Award (R)-winner Jessica Lange) in his wake. He plays both sides, immersing himself in an illicit, underground world while garnering the attention of Frank (John Goodman), a loan shark with a paternal interest in Bennett’s future. As his relationship with a student (Brie Larson) deepens, Bennett must take the ultimate risk for a second chance.
Watch an interview with the film’s writer William Monahan here.
Slacker Max (Max Boublil) fell so hard for single mother Alice (Aïssa Maïga) in college that he developed a website aimed at winning her heart. Years later, after his venture has earned him millions of dollars, Max risks his entire fortune performing an ever more complicated series of social contortions to get close to Alice, now a politically motivated factory worker.
The film is based on Leonardo da Vinci’s private journals dating back to the Italian Renaissance which contain more than 6,000 pages of handwritten notes and drawings. From the artist’s birth as a bastard peasant to his thwarted ambitions, hurt, anger, and sexual desire is chronicled with the help of the comprehensive documents.
PK is a comedy of ideas about a stranger in the city, who asks questions that no one has asked before. They are innocent, child-like questions, but they bring about catastrophic answers. People who are set in their ways for generations, are forced to reappraise their world when they see it from PK’s innocent eyes. In the process PK makes loyal friends and powerful foes. Mends broken lives and angers the establishment. P. K.’s childlike curiosity transforms into a spiritual odyssey for him and millions of others. The film is an ambitious and uniquely original exploration of complex philosophies. It is also a simple and humane tale of love, laughter and letting-go. Finally, it is a moving saga about a friendship between strangers from worlds apart.
Paul Schneider (Parks and Recreation) stars as a newly single dad navigating the good, the bad, and the weird of the 30-something singles scene in this whip-smart comedy. When his wife unexpectedly informs him that she wants a divorce, well-meaning but oblivious husband Otto Wall (Schneider) finds himself thrust back into bachelorhood. Cue a hilarious sequence of romantic encounters-from reconnecting with a former crush to online dating-as Otto searches for the real thing amidst a string of one night stands. Directed by the acclaimed writer of Junebug, this sexy farce co-stars Anna Camp, Heather Graham, Amy Sedaris, and Melanie Lynskey.
Watch an interview with the film’s writer/director Angus MacLachlan and cast here.
NOW IN THEATERS
Pulsing with the rhythm of his greatest stand-up, Chris Rock’s TOP FIVE takes things to the next level, reveling in the high and the low, and blending a star-studded comedic romp with an irresistible romance. TOP FIVE digs under the surface of show business, politics, rap, and the exigencies of being black and famous today-holding it all up to the light in the way only Chris Rock can. Mingling echoes of Woody Allen and Dick Gregory with the energy of Kanye West and Jay Z, TOP FIVE is an original and radically new kind of American movie. Written, directed by, and starring Chris Rock, TOP FIVE tells the story of New York City comedian-turned-film star Andre Allen, whose unexpected encounter with a journalist (Rosario Dawson) forces him to confront the comedy career-and the past-that he’s left behind. Starring Chris Rock, Rosario Dawson, Kevin Hart, Tracy Morgan, Cedric The Entertainer, J.B. Smoove, Sherri Shepherd, Anders Holm, Romany Malco, Leslie Jones, Michael Che, and Jay Pharaoh.
Watch the TIFF Q&A with writer/director Chris Rock and the film’s cast here.
“Inherent Vice,” is the seventh feature from Paul Thomas Anderson and the first ever film adaption of a Thomas Pynchon novel. When private eye Doc Sportello’s ex-old lady suddenly out of nowhere shows up with a story about her current billionaire land developer boyfriend whom she just happens to be in love with, and a plot by his wife and her boyfriend to kidnap that billionaire and throw him in a looney bin…well, easy for her to say. It’s the tail end of the psychedelic `60s and paranoia is running the day and Doc knows that “love” is another of those words going around at the moment, like “trip” or “groovy,” that’s being way too overused — except this one usually leads to trouble. With a cast of characters that includes surfers, hustlers, dopers and rockers, a murderous loan shark, LAPD Detectives, a tenor sax player working undercover, and a mysterious entity known as the Golden Fang, which may only be a tax dodge set up by some dentists… Part surf noir, part psychedelic romp — all Thomas Pynchon.
Watch the NYFF Q&A with writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson and the film’s cast here.
We Are The Giant transports viewers to the front lines of the Arab Spring through the courageous stories of six extraordinary people grappling with the dilemma at the heart of all struggles for justice and freedom: whether to take up arms and fight, or to advocate change through peace and non-violence. Filming largely in secret and at great risk over the past two and a half years, award-winning director and former war correspondent Greg Barker (Manhunt) frames intimate portraits of individuals from very different walks of life resolving to stand up for what they believe in and challenge the oppressive regimes determined to crush popular uprisings.
Read Realscreen’s interview with the film’s director, Greg Barker, here.
With the dissolution of her marriage and the death of her mother, Cheryl Strayed has lost all hope. After years of reckless, destructive behavior, she makes a rash decision. With absolutely no experience, driven only by sheer determination, Cheryl hikes more than a thousand miles of the Pacific Crest Trail, alone. WILD powerfully captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddens, strengthens, and ultimately heals her.
Watch an interview with the film’s writer, Nick Hornby, here.
During the winter of 1952, British authorities entered the home of mathematician, cryptanalyst and war hero Alan Turing (Benedict Cumberbatch) to investigate a reported burglary. They instead ended up arresting Turing himself on charges of ‘gross indecency’, an accusation that would lead to his devastating conviction for the criminal offense of homosexuality — little did officials know, they were actually incriminating the pioneer of modern-day computing. Famously leading a motley group of scholars, linguists, chess champions and intelligence officers, he was credited with cracking the so-called unbreakable codes of Germany’s World War II Enigma machine. An intense and haunting portrayal of a brilliant, complicated man, THE IMITATION GAME follows a genius who under nail-biting pressure helped to shorten the war and, in turn, save thousands of lives.
Watch Fresh Fiction’s interview with Graham Moore, writer of the 2011 Black List script, here.
FOXCATCHER is a psychological drama directed by Academy Award nominee Bennett Miller (MONEYBALL) and starring Golden Globe winner Steve Carell, Channing Tatum, Academy Award nominee Mark Ruffalo, Academy Award winner Vanessa Redgrave and Sienna Miller. The film was written by E. Max Frye and Academy Award nominee Dan Futterman. FOXCATCHER tells the story of Olympic Gold Medal-winning wrestler Mark Schultz (Tatum), who sees a way out from the shadow of his more celebrated wrestling brother Dave (Ruffalo) and a life of poverty when he is summoned by eccentric multi-millionaire John du Pont (Carell) to move onto his estate and train for the 1988 Seoul Olympics. Desperate to gain the respect of his disapproving mother, du Pont begins “coaching” a world-class athletic team and, in the process, lures Mark into dangerous habits, breaks his confidence and drives him into a self-destructive spiral. Based on actual events, FOXCATCHER is a gripping and profoundly American story of fragile men who pinned their hopes for love and redemption on a desperate obsession for greatness that was to end in tragedy.
Watch an interview with the film’s screenwriters E. Max Frye & Dan Futterman here.
Many thanks to Wendy for today’s post. Remember to Declare Your Independents by going to a theater or use V.O.D. to watch an indie feature this weekend.