#2018 sundance film festival

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📸 Fabrice Dall‘Anese

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Deadline Studio Portraits at Sundance, Day 4, Park City, USA

📷 Michael Buckner (01.22.2018)

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NEW PROJECT announced for Alexander Skarsgård to star and executive produce "Pillion"

via Variety (5.8.24):

Alexander Skarsgard (“The Northman,” “Succession”) and Harry Melling (“The Pale Blue Eye,” “The Queen’s Gambit”) are set to lead the cast of “Pillion,” described as a “fun and filthy romance with heart” and being produced by multi-Oscar-winning powerhouse Element Pictures.

The film — to be launched in Cannes by Cornerstone, which is handling worldwide sales — marks the feature debut of Harry Lighton, whose short “Wren Boys” was nominated for best British short at the 2018 BAFTAs, was nominated for a BIFA and had its U.S. premiere at the Sundance Film Festival.

“Pillion” follows Colin (Melling), a weedy wallflower letting life pass him by. That is until Ray (Skarsgård), the impossibly handsome leader of a motorbike club, takes him on as his submissive. Ray uproots Colin from his dreary suburban life, introducing him to a community of kinky, queer bikers and taking all sorts of virginities along the way. But as Colin steps deeper into Ray’s world of rules and mysteries, he begins to question whether the life of a 24/7 submissive is for him. Has he found his calling, or simply swapped one form of suffocation for another? 

The film — set to shoot in the U.K. this summer — is an Element Pictures production financed by BBC Film, Picturehouse Entertainment and September Films, who will handle distribution in the U.K. and Benelux respectively. The BFI is also supporting the film. The screenplay was developed with BBC Film and is based on Adam Mars-Jones’ “Box Hill” which was the 2019 Fitzcarraldo Editions Novel Prize winner. Element Pictures’ Emma Norton, Ed Guiney and Andrew Lowe will produce together with Lee Groombridge. BBC Film’s Eva Yates, Claire Binns for Picturehouse, September Films’ Pim Hermeling and Skarsgård are executive producers. Louise Ortega is the BFI’s executive for the project. Heads of department include cinematographer Nick Morris (“Wren Boys”), production designer Francesca Massariol (“The Strays”), BIFA Award winning costume designer Grace Snell (“The Souvenir”), BIFA Award nominated composer Oliver Coates (“Aftersun”) and casting director Kahleen Crawford (“Lost Daughter”).

“Everyone at Element is so excited to help Harry Lighton bring ‘Pillion’ to life,” said Norton. “Harry is a filmmaker who is drawn to risk and fascinated by the  potential to find surprising complexity in everyday life. We love this about him and believe that ‘Pillion’ is the perfect expression of his talent, bravery and ambition.”

Added Cornerstone’s Alison Thompson and Mark Gooder; “Harry’s script is equally compelling and shocking as it is funny and entertaining – and one of the best we’ve read in years. The casting is inspired and we are thrilled to unleash this brilliant project in the Cannes market.”

[nerdygaymormon]

LDS LGBTQ Anniversaries for 2023

For 8 years I’ve been in charge of creating my stake’s calendar. In addition to stake meetings & activities, I include holidays and significant LDS anniversaries like when it was the 175th anniversary of the founding of Sunday School or 40 years ago priesthood and temple blessings were restored to members of African descent. 

This year there's only 1 significant anniversary I put on the calendar: Sept 21st will be 200 years since the angel Moroni first appeared to Joseph Smith.

For readers of this blog, here’s a few anniversaries this year that may be of interest:

75 years ago

April 1948 - Gay BYU students Kent Goodridge and Richard Snow met with church president George Albert Smith. They were in love and wanted to get a clarification of their ‘status.’ President Smith treated them with great kindness and told them to "live their lives as best they could" in their companionship. They had gambled making this appointment and worried they could be excommunicated on the spot, instead they left feeling loved and valued. 

Unfortunately, this live-and-let-live attitude didn’t last long as President Smith's successor, David O. McKay, felt homosexuals "should be excommunicated without any doubt, that the homosexual has no right to membership in the Church."

30 years ago

May 18, 1993 - Apostle Boyd K. Packer gave an address to the First Presidency, the Quorum of the Twelve, and the Presiding Bishopric, in which he stated there are three great threats to the LDS Church: the gay/lesbian challenge, the feminist movement, and scholars 

September - The September Six are excommunicated for publishing scholarly work against or criticizing church doctrine or leadership. This was widely reported in national press and resulted in a chilling effect on academics challenging approved church narratives

25 years ago

October - Mormon-raised Russell Henderson and his friend Aaron McKinney tortured Matthew Shepard and left him for dead in Wyoming. The shocking crime made international news. The outrage over this crime eventually lead to the Matthew Shepard Act in 2009 which expanded the federal law’s definition of “hate crime” to include sexual orientation and gender identity. In 2018, Matthew's ashes were moved to the Washington National Cathedral

15 years ago

Chieko Okazaki, the first person of color to serve in an LDS Church general organization presidency, was first counselor in the General Relief Society President when she published a book in which she wrote “A family with a gay child is not a failed family. It's a family with a member who needs special love and understanding and who has love and understanding to give back.”

California’s Prop 8 - Church leadership heavily encouraged members donate time and money to pass Prop 8 which would ban same-sex marriage in California. About 1/2 of the money raised for its passage came from Mormons. The proposition passed and immediately there were protests at temples in Los Angeles and Salt Lake City, and the church received a lot of negative exposure. Since then the church has preferred behind-the-scenes roles in its efforts to combat queer rights

10 years ago

Dec 20, 2013 - Same-sex marriages became legally recognized in Utah. Seth Anderson & Michael Ferguson, both former Mormons, are the first gay couple to get married in Utah 

5 years ago 

January 2018 - The documentary "Believer" featuring Imagine Dragon's lead singer Dan Reynolds premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Reynolds discussed the intersection of LGBTQ people in the Mormon community. Later in the year he appeared on The Ellen Degeneres Show and The Daily Show with Trevor Noah and spoke of LGBTQ Mormons and suicides

January 2018 - Josh Weed, the most famous LDS gay man in a mixed-orientation marriage, announces that he & his wife will get a divorce. They apologize to everyone who ever had their story held up as an example that gay people can get married and stay in the Church.

February 2018 - Church-run Family Services states it no longer provides reparative therapy or sexual orientation change efforts

February 2018 - Richard Ostler starts a podcast called “Listen, Learn, and Love,” which has LGBTQ members/former members share their stories

March 2018 -  BYU sponsors its first LGBT campus event, a panel of four students--Kaitlynn Wright, Ben Schilaty, Sarah Langford and Gabriel Cano–answer student-submitted questions

As president of the LGBTQAI+ and Allies Club, Jill Stevenson worked with administration at Southern Virginia University, a predominantly-LDS liberal arts college, to get the university to officially recognize the club, and to allow same-gender dancing on campus

June 2018 - The Church’s Family Search website starts allowing same-sex marriages to be recorded

July 2018 - The Provo Freedom Festival allows LGBTQ groups to participate in the parade due to a contract it had signed with the city of Provo which included a non-discrimination clause.

Dec 2018 - Stacey Harkey, a cast member on BYUTV’s popular show Studio C, comes out as gay

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Bill Skarsgård and Valter Skarsgård // Sundance Film Festival, 2018. 

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RAFAEL CASAL - SAGINDIE ACTORS ONLY BRUNCH (2018)

PARK CITY, UT - JANUARY 21: Rafael Casal attends the SAGindie Actors Only Brunch during the 2018 Sundance Film Festival on January 21, 2018 in Park City, Utah.

Pics by: Fred Hayes

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Bill Skarsgård portraits by Michael Buckner for Deadline Studio during Sundance Film Festival (January, 20 2018).

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A secretly made documentary expanding on allegations of sexual assault against supreme court justice Brett Kavanaugh has premiered at this year’s Sundance film festival.

Justice, a last-minute addition to the schedule, aims to shine a light not only on the women who have accused Kavanaugh, a Donald Trump nominee, but also the failed FBI investigation into the allegations.

“I do hope this triggers outrage,” said producer Amy Herdy in a Q&A after the premiere in Park City, Utah. “I do hope that this triggers action, I do hope that this triggers additional investigation with real subpoena powers.”

The film provides a timeline of the allegations, initially that Kavanaugh was accused by Christine Blasey Ford of sexual assault when she was 15 and he 17. She alleged that he held her down on a bed and groped her, and tried to rip her clothes off before she got away. Kavanaugh was also accused of sexual misconduct by Deborah Ramirez, who alleged that he exposed himself and thrust his penis at her face without her consent at a college party.

Kavanaugh denies the allegations. He turned down requests to take part in the documentary.

The first scene features Ford, half off-camera, interviewed by the film’s director Doug Liman, whose credits include Mr and Mrs Smith and The Bourne Identity. Justice features a number of interviews with journalists, lawyers, psychologists and those who knew Ford and Ramirez.

“This was the kind of movie where people are terrified,” Liman said. “The people that chose to participate in the movie are heroes.”

In the film, Ramirez, who previously told her story to Ronan Farrow in the New Yorker, also shares her story on-camera. Ramirez is referred to as someone “they worked hard for people not to know”, her story never given the space it deserved until long after Kavanaugh was confirmed to the court in October 2018.

Ramirez details a Catholic upbringing, before explaining that her high grades got her into Yale when the university was slowly diversifying its student body in the mid-80s. As well as being admitted only 15 years after women were allowed in, Ramirez was also biracial and working class. “My mum was concerned,” she recounts, emotionally, in the documentary.

Friends at the time refer to her as “sweet and Bambi-like” and “innocent to a fault”, but Ramirez tried to fit in by becoming a cheerleader and by drinking with her peers. This, she says, brought her into the orbit of Kavanaugh, who came from a privileged family and was known as a heavy drinker at the time (he is referred to in the film as someone who was usually “more drunk than everyone else”). Ramirez recounts the alleged event, when she was intoxicated and, she says, made, without her consent, to touch Kavanaugh’s penis, which he had placed near her face.

The film then details how the circles around Ramirez and Kavanaugh responded, showing text messages of a discussion when Ramirez’s allegations were about to go public, of a mutual friend being asked by Kavanaugh to go on record to defend him. Another friend refers to it as “a cover-up”.

The New Yorker included a statement from a group of students at the time in support of Kavanaugh. A year later, the film shows that two of them emailed the New Yorker to remove their names from the statement.

Ramirez’s lawyers claim they contacted Republican senator Jeff Flake, who was involved in Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings, to explain what happened to her. The next day Flake called to delay the confirmation and insist on a week-long FBI investigation.

But the film details how the FBI failed to call on the many witnesses recommended by Ramirez’s lawyers. Footage is shown of the film-makers meeting with a confidential source who plays tape of Kavanaugh’s classmate Max Stier, now a prominent figure in Washington running a non-profit, who allegedly witnessed Kavanaugh involved in a similar act of alleged drunken exposure with a female student at a dorm party at Yale. The woman has chosen to remain anonymous and this is the first time this recording has been heard.

It was made during the week the FBI investigated Kavanaugh, and despite Stier notifying them, they failed to speak to him. “You don’t talk to that guy, you’re not talking to anybody,” Liman said during the Q&A.

The FBI tip line that was set up is referred to as “a graveyard”, with 4,500 tips sent straight to the White House rather than being investigated. It’s referred to as another “cover-up”.

The film-makers also spoke to other accuser who alleged misconduct but could not be included in the film. “We did speak to people who had other allegations, and we were very careful and thorough, and it’s not for disbelieving them – but the stories you see here are the ones you are able to corroborate,” Herdy said to the audience.

Justice was made in secrecy over the last year, with NDAs signed by everyone involved. The project was self-funded by Liman, making his documentary debut. He told the Hollywood Reporter that the supreme court holds “special meaning” to him, his father having been a lawyer and activist and his brother a federal judge. He was frustrated by the FBI investigation into Kavanaugh that “never happened”, and sought the help of renowned documentary producers Liz Garbus and Herdy, both with specialised experience of films about sexual assault allegations, to do the work that he saw as unfinished, if barely started at all.

At the Q&A, he expressed the importance of secrecy, speaking about “the machinery that’s put into place against anyone who dared to speak up” and an awareness that this machinery would be turned on the film if it was made public.

“There would have been some kind of injunction,” he said. “This film wouldn’t have been showing here.”

It was only screened to Sundance high-ups on Wednesday before being officially announced on Thursday. It premiered to a sold-out cinema on Friday.

In the past few years, the festival has become a regular home to a number of investigative documentaries about alleged sexual predators in the public eye. Figures such as Michael Jackson, Bill Cosby, Russell Simmons and former Sundance mainstay Harvey Weinstein have all been spotlighted.

Since the announcement of Justice, Herdy confirmed they have been “getting more tips”, which started arriving just 30 minutes after the press release went out. Liman added that the film, which is seeking a distributor, will now possibly need to be extended and re-edited.

Herdy added: “It’s not over.”

[courseyoulovemeyoudontknowme]

Call Me By Your Name (2017, Luca Guadagnino)

24/12/2023

Call Me By Your Name is a 2017 sentimental film directed by Luca Guadagnino.

The screenplay is written by James Ivory and is a film adaptation of the novel Call Me By Your Name by André Aciman. It is the third and final film of Guadagnino's "desire trilogy", after I Am Love (2009) and A Bigger Splash (2015). Set in northern Italy in 1983, the film tells the love story between Elio (Timothée Chalamet), a seventeen-year-old living in Italy, and the American student Oliver (Armie Hammer). Also part of the cast are Michael Stuhlbarg, Amira Casar, Esther Garrel and Victoire Du Bois. The film's editor Walter Fasano also has a cameo in the film: he is the DJ of the famous party scene, as stated by Fasano himself in an interview.

Principal photography took place in Crema, Italy, between May and June 2016.

The film had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on January 22, 2017, and was subsequently released theatrically in the United Kingdom on October 27, 2017 and in the United States on November 24, 2017. The film received unanimous acclaim, with particular appreciation for the direction, screenplay, soundtrack and performers, and was chosen by the National Board of Review and the American Film Institute as one of the 10 best films of the year. It received three nominations for the 2018 Golden Globe, for best film, best actor (Chalamet) and best supporting actor (Hammer) and four nominations for the 2018 Oscar awards for best film, best actor (Chalamet), best non-original screenplay, best song (Mystery of Love). The Oscar was won by Ivory for best adapted screenplay.

Summer 1983. Elio Perlman, a seventeen-year-old French-American Jew, spends his summer holidays in a villa immersed in the Cremasco countryside, in Moscazzano, where his father, an archeology professor, usually hosts a foreign student every year who is busy writing his thesis doctoral degree.

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Janina Gavankar at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival 

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“A futile and stupid gesture”: the IMDB Studio at Sundance 2018 🧡

Photo Tommaso Boddi

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The red carpet premiere for 'A Futile And Stupid Gesture' at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival

📷 Jason Merritt (24.01.2018)

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Afterparty of the Sundance Film Festival from Grey Goose, January 19, 2018

Photographer: Michael Kovac

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PETER MULLAN IS RED JACOB MACKENZIE

Peter Mullan is a Scottish actor and filmmaker, he was born in Peterhead, a town in Aberdeenshire, Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 UK. He was interested in directing films at the age of 19 and he made several shorts. He decided to dedicate himself to acting and made his debut in the theatre in 1988 before moving to cinema and television.

His feature film work over the last several decades stretches across every genre, including roles in Riff-Raff (1991), Braveheart (1995), Trainspotting (1996), Miss Julie (1999), Young Adam (2003), Children of Men (2006), The Red Riding Trilogy (2009), War Horse (2011) The Vanishing, the Harry Potter film series (2010–11) and The Vanishing (2018).

Although his part in Braveheart was a small recurring role as one of the Scottish army foot soldiers, Mullan was to go on to enjoy a breakthrough shortly after Gibson’s classic film hit cinemas.

He followed Braveheart with his part as the drug dealer Mother Superior in Trainspotting, then found himself being fêted by Martin Scorsese when he won the best actor award at Cannes for Ken Loach’s film, ‘My Name Is Joe’ (1998), filmed in Argyll and Glasgow.

Trainspotting 1996 ‧ Crime/Thriller

Mullan has a vast body of work but is probably best known for his portrayal of Joe in the 1988 Ken Loach film ‘My Name is Joe’. For this work, he won the highly prized Best Actor Award at the Cannes Film Festival.

Mullan in My Name is Joe, directed by Ken Loach. Photograph: Allstar Picture Library

A few years later, in 2011, the Sundance Film Festival awarded Mullan a World Dramatic Special Jury Prize for Breakout Performances for his role as Joseph in Paddy Considine’s Thriller/Drama ‧ ‘Tyrannosaur’ (2011) with Olivia Colman.

Since then, Mullan has gone on to work with directors like Steven Spielberg (War Horse 2011 ‧ War/Adventure ) alongside Jeremy Irvine and with Alfonso Cuarón popped up as a totalitarian crank in Alfonso Cuarón’s Children of Men, goading the dispossessed into parading their “refugee face”. On Mullan suggestion, Cuarón swapped his character’s weapon of choice for something less obvious, but more threatening, and has become one of the most respected modern film and TV actors.

War Horse 2011 ‧ War/Adventure ‧ Film of the Year 2012

He has also made his name as a director, with acclaimed movies such as Neds, Orphans and The Magdalene Sisters.

His other film credits include ‘Hercules’ 2014 ‧ Action/Fantasy alongside Dwayne Johnson as General Sitalces, Commander of the Thracian army. Lord Cotys's second-in-command right-hand man portrayed by the late John Hurt.

Sunset Song, 2015 ‧ Romance/Drama Terence Davies’s adaptation of Lewis Grassic Gibbons’s novel, stars Agyness Deyn as Chris, a Scottish farm worker who sees family trauma merge into global catastrophe as the First World War devastates her village.

Starring Peter Mullan, as Chris’s abusive dad. was filmed at various locations across Scotland in Aberdeenshire, including Fettercairn and the Glenmuick, Glen Tanar, Invercauld and Ballogie estates. Sunset Song is certainly a masterpiece of Scottish/ British literature and was voted Scotland's favourite book.

Scots Quair is actually three books, Sunset Song, Cloud Howe and Grey Granite, that tell the story of Chris Guthrie, a young woman in the North East of Scotland, moving from the hard, rural life of her adolescence to adulthood and marriage. A Scots Quair is one of the most important works of Scottish literature.

Tommy's Honour 2016 ‧ Sport/Romance is based on the powerfully moving true story (and novel of the same name by Kevin Cook) of the challenging relationship between “Old” Tom and “Young” Tommy Morris, the dynamic father-son team who ushered in the modern game of golf.

Tommy's Honour 2016

Peter Mullan stared as Tom with Jack Lowden playing his son. The film was filmed in the Edinburgh city region including Peebles and Musselburgh golf course.

He also played Yaxley in ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows’, parts 1 and 2. In TV, he’s played characters in ‘Westworld’, ‘Top Of The Lake’ and Netflix’s ‘Ozark’ as Jacob Snell. [Netflix]

In 2020 He was great in #Ozark portraying local crime lord Jacob Snell, The crime boss of Osage Beach until he died in season two of the Netflix hit.

Ozark 2017 ‧ Drama ‧ 4 seasons

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (TV Series 2022– ) - Peter Mullan played Durin III king of the dwarves and builder of the great halls of Moria.

Moria is introduced in Tolkien's novel The Hobbit and is a major scene of action in The Lord of the Rings. In the fictional world of J. R. R. Tolkien, Moria, also named Khazad-dûm, is an ancient subterranean complex in Middle-earth.

On the big and small screen, from sci-fi to action and comedy, there are plenty of Scots actors who have made a huge impact on the world of acting. Just take a look at the right place where you will find them in Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

#PeterMullan #Scotland #actor #filmmaker #Peterhead #RedJacobMackenzie #BOMB #Braveheart #Trainspotting #MartinScorsese #bestactor #CannesFilmFestival #KenLoach #MyNameIsJoe #Tyrannosaur #OliviaColman SundanceFilmFestival #ChildrenofMen #WorldDramaticSpecialJuryPriz #Hercules #DwayneJohnson #GeneralSitalces #book #SunsetSong #Scottishliterature #TerenceDavies #LewisGrassicGibbons #Tommy'sHonour #novel #Kevin Cook #TommyMorris #Musselburghgolf #Netflix #Ozark #JacobSnell #DurinIIIking #Moria #RingsofPower #Tolkien'snovel

Posted 5th April 2024

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New // Old Robert Pattinson at Sundance Film Festival 2018

📸 by John Parra