42nd Telluride Film Festival Brings Steve Jobs, Beasts of No Nation, Carol, Suffragette

Part of the thrill of the Telluride Film Festival is that the quick, four-day fest only announces its lineup the day before the festival itself starts. Granted, because of Toronto and New York (and Cannes earlier in the year) it sometimes has a ‘been there, done that’ feel to it. This year will see world premieres of heavily anticipated fall and winter films including Lenny Abrahamson’s Room, Sarah Gavron’s Suffragette and Davis Guggenheim’s He Named Me Malala. Black Mass continues to make festival waves before its September 18th bow, Warner Brothers is really pushing the film hard this season.

This year will see tributes to Cannes Best Actress winner Rooney Mara (who brings Carol), Academy Award winning director Danny Boyle (who brings Steve Jobs) and documentarian Adam Curtis (who brings Bitter Lake).

One of the more exciting announcements is the debut film the late Sydney Pollack never finished, his Aretha Franklin documentary Amazing Grace (named after Franklin’s best-selling album). The film documents the making of that album but was mired in sound sync issues that were never resolved, until now.

Two winners from this year’s Berlinale show up; Golden Bear winner Taxi from Jafar Panahi and Silver Bear winners Tom Courtenay and Charlotte Rampling in 45 Years Rampling is a Best Actress Oscar hopeful this season.

Here is the main lineup:

Amazing Grace (d. Sydney Pollack, U.S., 1972/2015)
Anomalisa (d. Charlie Kaufman, Duke Johnson, 2015)
Beasts of No Nation (d. Cary Fukunaga, U.S., 2015)
Bitter Lake (d. Adam Curtis, U.K., 2015)
Black Mass (d. Scott Cooper, U.S., 2015)
Carol (d. Todd Haynes, U.S., 2015)
45 Years (d. Andrew Haigh, England, 2015)
He Named Me Malala (d. Davis Guggenheim, U.S., 2015)
Heart of a Dog (d. Laurie Anderson, U.S., 2014)
Hitchcock/Truffaut (d. Kent Jones, U.S., 2015)
Ixcanul (d. Jayro Bustamante, Guatemala, 2015)
Marguerite (d. Xavier Giannoli, France, 2015)
Mom and Me (d. Ken Wardrop, Ireland, 2015)
Only the Dead See the End of War (d. Michael War, Bill Guttentag, U.S.-Australia, 2015)
Rams (d. Grímur Hákonarson, Iceland, 2015)
Room (d. Lenny Abrahamson, England, 2015)
Siti (d. Eddie Cahyono, Singapore, 2015)
Son of Saul (d. Lázló Nemes, Hungary, 2015)
Spotlight (d. Tom McCarthy, U.S., 2015)
Steve Jobs (d. Danny Boyle, U.S., 2015)
Suffragette (d. Sarah Gavron, U.K., 2015)
Taj Mahal (d. Nicolas Saada, France-India, 2015)
Taxi (d. Jafar Panahi, Iran, 2015)
Tikkun (d. Avishai Sivan, Israel, 2015)
Time to Choose (d. Charles Ferguson, U.S., 2015)
Viva (d. Paddy Breathnach, Ireland, 2015)
Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom (d. Evgeny Afineevsky, Russia-Ukraine, 2015)

[box type=”shadow” align=”aligncenter” class=”” width=””]The 2015 Silver Medallion Awards, given to recognize an artist’s significant contribution to the world of cinema, go to filmmaker Danny Boyle (TRAINSPOTTING, SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE) who will present his latest film, STEVE JOBS; documentary filmmaker Adam Curtis (THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES) who will present his latest work, BITTER LAKE; and actress Rooney Mara (THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO) who will present CAROL. Films will be shown following the on-stage interview and medallion presentation. “We are thrilled to present such an exhilarating, diverse program for the 42nd Telluride Film Festival,” said executive director Julie Huntsinger. “This year was an abundance of riches, particularly within the documentary category, and we feel privileged to celebrate these films and their artists with our audience in one of the most beautiful locations in the world.”[/box]

[box type=”shadow” align=”aligncenter” class=”” width=””]Guest Director Rachel Kushner, who serves as a key collaborator in the Festival’s program, presents the following revival programs: THE MOTHER AND THE WHORE (d. Jean Eustache, France, 1973) MES PETITES AMOUREUSES (d. Jean Eustache, France, 1974) WAKE IN FRIGHT (d. Ted Kotcheff, Australia, 1971) COCKSUCKER BLUES (d. Robert Frank, U.S., 1979) A DAY IN THE COUNTRY (d. Jean Renoir, France, 1936) + UNCLE YANCO (d. Agnès Varda, France, 1967) THE MATTEI AFFAIR (d. Francesco Rosi, Italy, 1972)[/box]

[box type=”shadow” align=”aligncenter” class=”” width=””]Backlot, Telluride’s intimate screening room featuring behind-the-scenes movies and portraits of artists, musicians and filmmakers, will screen the following nine programs: CINEMA: A PUBLIC AFFAIR (d. Tatiana Brandrup, Russia, 2015) THE CENTURY OF THE SELF (d. Adam Curtis, U.K., 2002) INGRID BERGMAN – IN HER OWN WORDS (d. Stig Björkman, Sweden, 2015) IN THE SHADOW OF THE GREAT OAKS (d. George Mourier, France, 2005) PEGGY GUGGENHEIM: ART ADDICT (d. Lisa Immordino Vreeland, U.S., 2015) SEMBENE! (d. Samba Gadjigo, Jason Silverman, U.S.-Senegal, 2015) DREAMING AGAINST THE WORLD (d. Tim Sternberg, Francisco Bello, U.S., 2015) + TYRUS (Pamela Tom, U.S., 2015)[/box]

The 42nd Telluride Film Festival runs September 4-7.

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.

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