The trailer for Destin Cretton SXSW-winning Short Term 12 dropped today, and it does a fine job of reminding me that this is one of the films I really must catch up with. For all New Yorkers, you can see the film this month at BAMcinemaFest, and next month at Rooftop, prior to its August theatrical release through Cinedigm. Here’s what Scott wrote on the film in his SXSW wrap: Winning SXSW’s Narrative Grand Jury Prize was Destin Cretton’s Short Term 12, the feature expansion of his excellent 2008 short about counselors and youth at a residential facility for at-risk …

One of the most brilliantly out-there shorts of recent years, Jillian Mayer and Lucas Leyva’s Life and Freaky Times of Uncle Luke has finally made it online, and you’d be a fool not to check it out. It’s the film that put the pair on the map when it played at the festival circuit in 2012, and then later justified their inclusion our “25 New Faces” list last year. Calling the film “both very smart and gleefully nuts,” this is what Scott wrote on Life and Freaky Times of Uncle Luke in his profile of Mayer and Leyva for the …

“When a group of people get together and decide to do something, strange and mysterious things can happen,” said writer and actress Brit Marling as she delivered the 2013 Georgetown University Senior Convocation speech. The Georgetown alum reflected on her years at Georgetown and the friends and future directors she met there — Mike Cahill and Zal Batmanglij. She describes moving to L.A. with them and not becoming successful until the three decided to stop trying to “break in” and just make work. “If I can tell you anything of value, it’s that the most important thing you do from …

Debuting today is the first trailer for David Lowery’s Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, which premiered at Sundance, is currently in Cannes, and will be out through IFC on August 16. Though I’ve already seen the film twice, this trailer beautifully captures the gorgeous lyricism of Lowery’s 1970s-set tale of outlaw lovers and makes me right away want to revisit it once more.

Earlier today Scott wrote about Jodorowsky’s Dune, the Cannes doc about the legendary mystical auteur’s famous failed attempt to adapt Frank Herbert’s sci-fi novel for the big screen, so now is a perfect time to post the trailer for the director’s new film, which is also having its world premiere on the French Riviera. The Dance of Reality is Jodorowsky’s first film since 1990, but the 23-year layoff does not seem to have dulled the director’s visual flair, sense of the bizarre or, well, general weirdness. This trailer has French rather than English subtitles, but the images more than speak for …

Another day, another bunch of clips from U.S. indies playing at Cannes. Above there is a quick snippet, featuring Marion Cotillard and Jeremy Renner, from James Gray’s period drama The Immigrant (previously called Lowlife). The Weinstein Company will be putting out the film (also starring Gray regular Joaquin Phoenix) later this year and, barring terrible reviews from Cannes critics, it should be a 2013 awards contender. Below are a teaser trailer and a clip from Jeremy Saulnier’s second feature, Blue Ruin, which looks incredibly compelling and has the potential to establish the director (who mostly plies his trade as a …