When Tilda Swinton told Movieline the other day how eager she was to play Conan O'Brien, that was only the tip of the interview iceberg. The Academy Award winner was at Sundance to promote Luca Guadagnino's romantic melodrama I Am Love, where she stars as Emma, a rich housewife who finds carnal excitement and personal fulfillment outside of her marriage to a wealthy Italian industrialist (if you're unfamiliar with her early work, it might shock you that Swinton speaks fluent Italian throughout the movie; then again, the actress has all but made a career out of such stylish surprises).
I sat down with Swinton in Park City for a lengthy talk about the state of melodrama, her opinion of film festivals (she organizes a rather unconventional one herself), her directorial ambitions, and the boggling thing she'd just discovered moments before.
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Less than a week after claiming an editing award at Sundance, the candid documentary Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work landed a theatrical buyer in IFC Films. Directors Ricki Stern and Annie Sundberg followed the tireless comedienne for months, assembling a glimpse at the grueling regimens and routines that built one of this era's great comedy careers. Celebrity roasts, Sacramento morning show appearances... you name it. A release date hasn't yet been set, but trust you'll hear more here once it is. [THR]
In America, we'll get our chance to know Sam Taylor-Wood soon, and she's hoping you'll keep an open mind. In her native Britain, the 42-year-old is different things to different people: a famous visual artist (with headline-grabbing portraits of stars like Robert Downey Jr. and David Beckham), a cancer survivor, a feature film director making her debut with the young John Lennon biopic Nowhere Boy, and a tabloid fixture for dating the movie's 19-year-old-star Aaron Johnson (soon to be seen as the lead in Kick Ass) and becoming pregnant with his child.
Movieline sat down with Taylor-Wood last week in advance of her film's Sundance premiere (Nowhere Boy's U.S. release is thus far undated by the Weinstein Co.) to discuss the scrutiny of Beatles fans, the tyranny of physical resemblance when making a biopic, and the circuitous, fortuitous theft that got her the project in the first place.
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· After a bidding skirmish over the possibly truth-challenged Sundance documentary Catfish, Relativity Media has grabbed rights to the film for a reported $1.5 million. Paramount, whose test screening this week resulted in strong-but-not-strong-enough audience scores, was said to have bowed out after the producers sniffed at a planned viral campaign a la Paranormal Activity. Relativity, meanwhile, will distribute through its Rogue Pictures label; Brett Ratner helped engineer the deal and will receive an executive producer credit. Let the Ratfish gags commence. [Variety]
Fox Searchlight and Hilary Swank try for a do-over, new sequels abound, and more Hollywood Ink after the jump.
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The microbudget dramedy The Freebie was officially the last deal of the 2010 Sundance Film Festival, with Katie Aselton's feature debut closing a deal with Phase 4 Films late Sunday. The movie -- about a married couple who permit each other one-night stands to enliven their relationship -- was the second of five needy Sundance films we've seen offloaded to good homes in the last few days. Have a look at the others and please open your hearts and wallets where you can. [Deadline]
Hesher may have scored one of the biggest distribution deals at Sundance on the weight of names like Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Natalie Portman, but it's Devin Brochu's breakout turn that makes the drama's biggest impression. Playing T.J., the disaffected youth at the film's center, 13-year-old Brochu takes a serious licking -- he endures everything from eating urinal cakes to being threatened with hedge clippers to getting tossed around by heavy machinery. That he manages through it all to render such an astoundingly mature performances is a testament to his talent. We caught up with Devin minutes after taking questions from an enthusiastic Sundance screening, and were relieved to find a sweet, well-adjusted and thoughtful kid on the cusp of something big.
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Last Friday, after a disastrous press and industry screening, Joel Schumacher's Chace Crawford drama Twelve finally had its public premiere as the closing film of the Sundance Film Festival. If things went any better, it's only because they couldn't have gotten much worse.
To pay tribute to this head-scratching Sundance selection, Movieline's assembled a list of items that the film's titular number might be referring to. Sure, Twelve is supposed to be the name of a new designer drug all the characters are talking about, but we like our explanations better:
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The big jury prize winners of this year's Sundance Film Festival were announced at a ceremony last night emceed by David Hyde Pierce. U.S. Dramatic Competition honors went to Debra Granik's Winter's Bone, an adaptation of the Daniel Woodrell novel about a girl forced to care for her poverty-stricken family in the Ozark mountains after her meth-making father disappears. (Good news: it was picked up yesterday by Roadside Attractions, who plan a summer release.)
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It's that time again, dear reader: Time to break out the mic, scan the headlines and join together in another rousing chorus of Say Whaaaa? We found several of this week's most notable pop-culture boners, missteps, bafflements and ridicule magnets at the Sundance Film Festival, but not even Park City could contain the scope of the absurdity catalogged after the jump. Back once more to lead the charge are the beloved Say Whaaaa? Singers -- take it away, fellas!
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Tomorrow night, Sundance will host the official Closing Night Awards Ceremony -- but if utterly subjective hardware-distribution is what you seek, your wait is over! The First Annual Movieline Sundancies Awards are about to get underway, its twenty gleaming trophies -- each painstakingly hand-cast in the shape of a pair of golden Ugg boots -- lined up and ready to be presented to this year's list of illustrious winners. Click on for the results!
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Now that Sundance is winding down, your Movieline crew is preparing to depart Park City, but we couldn't let you go without some more overheard shenanigans. Au revoir, innocent bystanders!
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Sold! Blue Valentine, the intimate portrait of a disintegrating marriage starring Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams (and despised by some around Movieline Sundance HQ) has been snatched up by marshmallow-at-heart Harvey Weinstein for The Weinstein Co. The deal was closed after all-night negotiation that squeezed IFC Films and Sony Pictures Classics, both also interested, out of the running. Rumor has it TWC is also hungry for The Tillman Story, a deal which Deadline says will close today. [THR]
From its lengthy introductory shot of the nude protagonist fussily mixing feminism, art and vanity to a cryptic, haunting closing shot I shouldn't spoil, a number of factors make Zeina Durra's feature debut The Imperialists Are Still Alive! among Sundance 2010's most fascinating films. None, however, make it more intriguing than the way it compels one to describe the indescribable -- starting with Durra herself, a London-bred, New York-trained filmmaker of Jordanian/Lebanese/Bosnian/Palestinean heritage. Imperialists! presents her alter-ego Asya (Elodie Bouchez), a successful artist in Manhattan with links to both the Palestinean resistance and upper-crust Western hegemony. Negotiating between the two with her tight circle of comrades, Asya falls in love with a Mexican lawyer/Ph.D candidate (Jose Maria de Tavira) and avoids the prying eyes and ears of spy agencies including the CIA, Mossad and Mi6. Oh, and it's a comedy. See where I'm going with this?
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At the end of yesterday's well-received screening of Catfish -- easily the most buzzed-about documentary at this year's Sundance Film Festival -- one man raised his hand for the Q&A.
"This may be a minority opinion," he said. "I think you guys did a great job, but I don't think it's a documentary."
A murmur went through the crowd and the filmmakers became angry and defensive, but more on that later. In the meantime: Brother, I'm right there with you. There's something fishy about Catfish, and I'm not just talking about the title.
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After the premiere of Louis C.K.: Hilarious on Tuesday night, the comedian mentioned he was working on the most offensive joke he's ever written. "I like to take audiences to a bad place, then make them happy they went there," he explained. "I just haven't figured out the second part of the equation yet. The 'happy they went there' part." Still, the audience demanded to hear it, so Louis ended the evening with the (very offensive!) bit-in-development. WARNING: It contains profanity and disturbing, violent subject matter! Please don't click 'continued'! It is very offensive!
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