NEON
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“Let’s Talk about Glitch Feminism, and What is a Cyber Doula?”: Jazmin Jones on Her Expansive Sundance-Premiering Doc, Seeking Mavis Beacon
Originally published January 20, 2024, timed to the film’s premiere at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival, this interview with Seeking Mavis Beacon director Jazmin Jones is now reposted in conjunction with the film’s theatrical release from NEON. — Editor Exuberantly maximalist in approach, Jazmin Jones’s blast of a debut feature, Seeking Mavis Beacon, is a rapid-fire blend of neo-noir road movie, desktop essay film and meta critique of the “searching for” documentary subgenre. The picture follows Jones and cyber doula friend Olivia McKayla Ross — self-described “e-girl detectives” — on their years-long journey to locate Renee L’Espérance, the Haitian-born model […]
by Scott Macaulay on Aug 31, 2024 -
“Polaroids Were Certainly a Key Touchstone Into This World”: Osgood Perkins on Longlegs
It’s somewhat apt to say that Osgood Perkins owes much of his cinematic success to Satan. His 2015 debut as a writer-director, The Blackcoat’s Daughter, explores the sinister presence of the occult at a Catholic boarding school in Upstate New York. He leaned into a gothic ghost story for his 2016 follow-up, I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House, eschewing devil worship for a clear nod to novelist Shirley Jackson. Longlegs, his third effort as sole writer and director, veers staunchly back toward Satanism, this time revolving around a series of murders committed by the eponymous killer. […]
by Natalia Keogan on Jun 19, 2024 -
“That’s What’s Thrilling about Acting—Recreating Private Moments”: John Early, Back To One, Episode 296
John Early is an actor, comedian, writer, and wearer of many hats. His latest as a comedian and writer is the HBO special Now More Than Ever. His latest as an actor is the independent film Stress Positions. On this episode he talks about how these two projects came about, the differences between the John Early character and himself, the pleasure of working on the series Search Party, why he relishes straight-up acting, the comedy breakthrough he made in his new special, and much more. Back To One can be found wherever you get your podcasts, including Apple Podcasts, Google […]
by Peter Rinaldi on Jun 18, 2024 -
Trailer Watch: Michael Mann’s Ferrari
A teaser has landed for Michael Mann’s Ferrari ahead of its Venice world premiere tomorrow. Mann’s long-awaited return will then screen at the New York Film Festival before it hits theaters just in time for the holidays. Based on Brock Yates’s book Enzo Ferrari: The Man, The Cars, The Races, The Machine, the film stars Adam Driver as the eponymous race car driver and entrepreneur, Penélope Cruz as his wife Laura and Shailene Woodley as his mistress Lina Lardi. Sarah Gadon, Gabriel Leone, Jack O’Connell and Patrick Dempsey also star. Per an official synopsis: It is the summer of 1957. […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Aug 30, 2023 -
Trailer Watch: Justine Triet’s Palme d’Or-Winning Anatomy of a Fall
A trailer arrives today for Justine Triet’s latest film Anatomy of a Fall, which was awarded the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. The film will screen at TIFF and NYFF before hitting theaters later this fall. Per an official synopsis: For the past year, Sandra (Sandra Hüller), her husband Samuel (Samuel Theis), and their eleven-year-old son Daniel (Milo Machado Graner) have lived a secluded life in a remote town in the French Alps. When Samuel is found dead in the snow below their chalet, the police question whether he was murdered or committed suicide. Samuel’s suspicious death is […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Aug 17, 2023 -
“Music Will be a Prism That You Can See the Whole Movie Through”: Director Zachary Wigon on Story Beats, Miles Davis and His BDSM-Themed Thriller Sanctuary
The poster for Sanctuary features a blonde Margaret Qualley whispering to a mysterious Christopher Abbott. Its imagery — a seeming femme fatale, an unknowing male prey and all the imagined chaos in between — evokes the height of the cinematic erotic thriller era. But the strength, elegance and wit of Micah Bloomberg’s (TV series Homecoming) script and Zachary Wigon’s (The Heart Machine) direction is their interest in subverting your (and the characters’s) expectations at every step. In Sanctuary, Abbott plays Hal, a hotel mogul’s son and heir. He has ordered a fancy meal to a decadently opulent hotel suite where […]
by Meredith Alloway on May 31, 2023 -
Trailer Watch: Zachary Wigon’s Sanctuary
The trailer arrives today for Sanctuary, which had its world premiere at TIFF in September and is now slated for theatrical release this spring. The film was directed by Zachary Wigon from a screenplay by Micah Bloomberg. Wigon has written for Filmmaker in the past, and has additionally interviewed filmmakers like Claire Denis, Lars von Trier, Abbas Kiarostami and Steve McQueen for the site. Sanctuary‘s official synopsis reads: A wickedly dark comedy follows dominatrix, Rebecca (Margaret Qualley), and her wealthy client, Hal (Christopher Abbott), as they engage in a high stakes role playing game for power and control. In the […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Apr 12, 2023 -
Watch: The Making of Enys Men (Exclusive Premiere)
Today, NEON exclusively premieres a nearly 14-minute featurette with Filmmaker on the making of Cornish writer-director Mark Jenkin’s experimental folk horror film Enys Men. Jenkin and the film’s star, Mary Woodvine, take viewers behind the scenes of the shoot and detail their individual processes while making the film. In his review out of Cannes, Blake Williams summarized the film’s loose plot and stylistic leanings: Set in 1973, Enys Men (Cornish for “Stone Island” and is pronounced—if I recall correctly—AYN-is Mayn) is an image-forward movie drenched in the kind of dense, thick film grain you can find in e.g. the work of Ben Rivers or […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Mar 30, 2023 -
Trailer Watch: Daniel Goldhaber’s How to Blow Up a Pipeline
NEON has released the trailer for How to Blow Up a Pipeline, director Daniel Goldhaber’s loose adaptation of Andreas Malm’s non-fiction text of the same name. Goldhaber previously appeared on our 25 New Faces of Independent Film list back in 2018 with collaborator Isa Mazzei on the strength of their debut feature Cam, which Goldhaber directed and Mazzei wrote. Mazzei returns as a producer on this film, with Goldhaber co-writing the script with Jordan Sjol and star Ariela Barer. Pipeline, which was shot on 16mm by DP Tehillah de Castro, is Goldhaber’s sophomore feature-length directorial effort. Vadim Rizov interviewed Goldhaber […]
by Filmmaker Staff on Mar 2, 2023 -
“I Wanted the Story to Start in a Downpour and End With Waves”: Hirokazu Kore-eda on Broker
What could be more heartless than selling abandoned babies? Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Broker asks just that, and against all odds, finds a way to understand how people could behave that way. It’s the Japanese writer-director’s first feature shot in South Korea, having most recently worked in France for his previous film La Vérité. Broker stars Song Kang-ho as Sang-hyeon, a tailor in debt to the mob, and Gang Dong-won as his younger business partner Dong-soo, an orphan. Using Dong-soo’s professional connection to a local church, the two begin covertly snatching babies from the building’s baby box, which people use to anonymously […]
by Daniel Eagan on Dec 30, 2022
