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Saule Bliuvaite’s debut feature follows two Lithuanian teens seduced by a ‘modelling school’ promising to take them away from their tough home town

Lithuanian first-time director Saule Bliuvaite makes a real impression with this impressively acted and elegantly composed feature set in the tough suburbs of Kaunas where teen girls dream of escape through an international modelling career. Bliuvaite and her cinematographer Vytautas Katkus contrive striking tableaux and ambient setpieces, creating an emotional context for this drama: a world of alienation and desperate need, but also resilient humour. It’s a disturbing essay in sexuality, poverty and sexual capital which reminded me a little of Ninja Thyberg’s Pleasure and Isabella Eklöf’s Holiday in its candid, affectless evocation of the young female body, and its vulnerability to weight-loss exploitation. Bliuvaite’s style reminded me of the Austrians Ulrich Seidl and Jessica Hausner – the latter was incidentally president of...

Upcoming features by Babak Jalali, Kamila Andini, Martin Koolhoven, Emily Atef, Yann Gonzalez and Diego Lerman are among 67 projects selected for the 12th Venice Gap-Financing Market.

The project incubator which is a component of the Venice Film Festival’s Venice Production Bridge industry program will run from August 29 to 31.

The 67 projects from around the world in the final stages of development and funding have been selected from 330 applications.

They span 40 feature-length fiction and documentary projects, 14 immersive projects, 10 Biennale College Cinema immersive projects and three Biennale College Cinema projects.

Their director-producer teams will participate in one-to-one meetings organized by the Vpb with top industry decision-makers including producers, private and public financiers, banks, distributors, sales agents, TV commissioners, streamers, VoD platforms, institutions and post-production companies.

All meetings will be held at the Venice Production Bridge venues of Hotel Excelsior and Venice Immersive Island.

The full list of feature film projects:

93 – Echo Froma...

Projects from Emily Atef, Babak Jalali, Luis Ortega and Ulrich Seidl are among the 40 films selected for the 12th edition of the Venice Gap-Financing Market (August 29 – 31), taking place during the Venice Film Festivals.

The market is a part of the Venice Production Bridge and provides the 67 projects with the chance to close their intentional financing. This year’s focus is on projects from the UK, Chile and Morocco.

Atef makes her English-language debut with Call Me Queen about a friendship between an Irish journalist in Kenya and a Rwandan woman during the 1990s AIDS crisis. It is produced by Germany...

The projects for the upcoming Venice Gap-Financing Market have been unveiled (32 feature-length fiction) and there’ll be several listed here projects that we’ll discuss at length next year when they start hitting the festival circuit of 2026 and especially, 2027. The 12th edition has some major auteurs from the world of cinema including Austria’s Ulrich Seidl who after his long awaited Rimini (2022) and Sparta (2022) comes to us with Distances. The logline sounds intriguing – Journalist Carl Schwert has always been interested in disaster. He has travelled to dark tourism destinations, meeting people who spend their spare time visiting prisons where captives were tortured, disaster zones, genocide memorial sites and slums.…...

Italian auteur Paolo Sorrentino is this year’s recipient of the Honorary Heart of Sarajevo award to be bestowed upon him during the 31st edition of the Sarajevo Film Festival, which will also feature a retrospective of his films that will be screened as part of the fest’s “tribute to” program.

The honor and tribute will be “in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the art of cinema,” Sarajevo fest organizers said on Tuesday. Sorrentino will also hold a masterclass and “share his thoughts on contemporary art in a conversation with the audience,” they noted.

“I am deeply honored to receive this prestigious recognition and grateful for the attention given to my filmography,” said Sorrentino. “I look forward to being with you in Sarajevo. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

The fest highlighted the effect the Italian director and screenwriter’s oeuvre has had on audiences. “Paolo...

Sovereign has acquired U.K. and Ireland rights to “Kontinental ’25,” the latest film from Romanian auteur Radu Jude that won the Silver Berlin Bear for best screenplay at February’s Berlin International Film Festival.

The comedy-drama, which also earned a Golden Berlin Bear nomination for best film and a Grand Prix nod at the Luxembourg City Film Festival, is targeting a U.K. and Ireland theatrical release in late 2025.

Set in Cluj, the capital of Transylvania, “Kontinental ’25” follows Orsolya (Eszter Tompa), a bailiff who faces a moral crisis after evicting a homeless man from a cellar with disastrous results. The cast includes Gabriel Spahiu, Adonis Tanța, Șerban Pavlu, Oana Mardare, Annamária Biluska, Adrian Sitaru, Marius Damian, Nicodim Ungureanu and Ilinca Manolache.

Reviewing the film for Variety, Guy Lodge praised the film as “extraordinary,” calling it a “searing indictment of crumbling social care in a post-socialist economy” and noting...

Major figures from the Austrian film industry have come together to protest at proposed cuts to the Austria’s production incentive amid fears that this would lead to “destruction of the industry”, “massive increase in unemployment” and “permanent damage to a whole culturalsector”.

Directors Jessica Hausner and Marie Kreutzer (who both participated in the Investors Circle initiative in Cannes with new projects), Barbara Albert, Stefan Ruzowitzky and Ulrich Seidl are among the signatories of an open letter orgainsed by 17 industry associations protesting at the Austrian government’s plan to slash the ÖFI+ incentive’s annual budget from €22m to €15.5m...

Kurdwin Ayub is not wasting time mounting what appears to be celestial bodies from the sky trilogy — as casting has begun on her third feature titled Stars. Ulrich Seidl‘s production co. is once again backing the Kurdish-Austrian filmmaker. After 2022’s Sonne (Berlin International Film Festival – Best First Film Award) and 2024’s Moon (Locarno Film Festival – Special Jury Prize), her latest is inspired by true events. Filming with take place in Jordan this coming autumn.

Star follows a young American reporter trapped in the crossfire as terrorists overrun Iraq. The war film explores the brutal realities of conflict and its profound impact on ordinary lives.…...

If there is a cinematic equivalent of the theatre of cruelty, it must be the reigning spirit of Austrian cinema. Films by Michael Haneke, Ulrich Seidl, Veronika Franz and Jessica Hausner may be very different from each other, but are similarly unflinching as they roam threatening spaces, find the sinister in the everyday and delve into the darkness of human hearts. Johanna Moder’s previous films didn’t share that sensibility, but she shows her Austrian colors in Mother’s Baby, the most viscerally ghastly evocation of new parenthood we’ve seen since Eraserhead.

Not exactly a horror film, Mother’s Baby is nevertheless shot through with horror elements: a weird baby, an isolated woman being gaslit into thinking she’s crazy, a demonic doctor and his horde of witchy nurses working in a strangely unregulated institution straight out of David Cronenberg’s playbook. Over everything hovers the gruesome mystery of birth,...

“The Last Showgirl” director Gia Coppola is set to be honored with the Auteur Award at the 7th annual Kodak Awards.

“Maria” cinematographer Ed Lachman will receive Kodak’s Career Achievement Award for his contributions to film. Lachman has collaborated with directors such as Todd Haynes, Robert Altman, Steven Soderbergh, Ulrich Seidl, Werner Herzog, Wim Wenders, Bernardo Bertolucci, Jean-Luc Godard, and Pablo Larraín. His latest “Maria” earned him his fourth Oscar nomination. Lachman is also nominated at the ASC.

The 7th Annual Kodak Film Awards will take place at the Kodak House in Hollywood on Feb. 27 at an invitation-only event.

Other honorees include Lol Crawley, Greg Kwedar, and Ramez Silyan.

Vanessa Bendetti, head of Motion Picture and Entertainment at Kodak said, “It’s another great awards season for film and independent cinema with twenty-nine Oscar nominations for shot on film productions, including Best Picture consideration for ‘Anora,’ ‘The Brutalist,’ and ‘I’m Still Here.

By most accounts, indie cinema legend Ed Lachman is on track to land his second consecutive Oscar nomination for a collaboration with the great Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larraín. The cinematography legend was nominated last year for the arresting black-and-white photography of Larraín’s satirical gothic fable El Conde; and he is back in contention in the best cinematography category this season with his exquisitely painterly work on Maria, the Angelina Jolie-starring Netflix biographical film about the life and inner world of the great 20th-century opera diva, Maria Callas.

The Hollywood Reporter recently sat down with Lachman for a special session of THR Presents to discuss in detail how Maria was crafted — the complex array of camera, lighting and color choices that went into the film’s arresting but elegant imagery, the nature of Lachman’s collaboration with Jolie and Larraín, and the various principles that have come to inform...

Those who’ve seen his films know Ed Lachman as a key collaborator of (naming just some) Todd Haynes, Sofia Coppola, Steven Sodebergh, Paul Schrader, and Pablo Larraín, with whom his latest collaboration, Maria, is now in theaters and soon on Netflix amidst the studio’s awards blitz. Those who attend EnergaCAMERIMAGE know him as a figurehead, no less essential to the festival than any top brass and treated like royalty at any screening, seminar, or party. It was here nearly a decade ago that I spoke to Lachman on the occasion of Carol, and in 2024 he’s been bestowed a lifetime achievement award––equal-parts earned and obligatory. To paraphrase Leonard Cohen on Bob Dylan’s Nobel Prize, granting Ed Lachman such honors at a cinematography festival is like pinning a medal on Mount Everest for being the highest mountain.

As Far from Heaven, his first of numerous Todd Haynes collaborations,...

In Swedish filmmaker Ernst De Geer’s ”The Hypnosis” (2023), audiences are drawn into a meticulously crafted world that mirrors the internal struggles faced by social introverts. The film delves deep into the intricate dance of human interactions, presenting social gatherings as both a celebration and a minefield of unspoken tensions. Set against a backdrop of elegantly staged environments—from lavish dinner parties to intimate living rooms—the mise en scène plays a crucial role in amplifying the themes of vulnerability and discomfort. Every detail, from the soft yet piercing lighting to the carefully chosen color palettes, serves to heighten the emotional stakes, enveloping viewers in an atmosphere that oscillates between warmth and oppressive awkwardness.

De Geer’s narrative meticulously explores the psyche of its characters, exposing their fears and insecurities as they navigate the often treacherous waters of social expectations. The film captures the unguarded moments that underscore the complexities of human connection,...

Albert Serra with his Golden Shell for Afternoons Of Solitude Photo: Courtesy of San Sebastian Film Festival/Alex Abril Albert Serra's bullfighting documentary Afternoons Of Solitude won the Golden Shell as San Sebastian Film Festival's 72nd edition drew to a close last night.

The film considers the life of matador Andrés Roca Rey and Serra received the award from last year’s Golden Shell winner, Spanish filmmaker Jaione Camborda. The jury also included directors Ulrich Seidl, Christos Nikou and Fran Kranz, producer Carole Scotta and journalist Leila Guerriero.

The Silver Shell directing honours were shared ex-aequo by Edinburgh-based Portuguese filmmaker Laura Carreira for On Falling, a carefully crafted character study of a Portuguese migrant working as a warehouse picker and Spaniard Pedro Martín Calero, also making his debut, with ambitious female-centric horror film The Wailing.

Laura Carreira receives her Silver Shell from Carole Scotta for On Falling Photo: Courtesy of...

Sometimes, in a closely contested festival competition, it pays to be the one thing that isn’t like the others. A starkly powerful, observational study of contemporary bullfighting, Spanish auteur Albert Serra’s “Afternoons of Solitude” was the only documentary in the main competition at this year’s San Sebastian Film Festival — and this evening won the Golden Shell for best film of the festival, beating some big-name narrative competition.

The award was presented by last year’s Golden Shell winner, Spanish filmmaker Jaione Camborda, heading a jury that also included directors Ulrich Seidl, Christos Nikou and Fran Kranz, producer Carole Scotta and Argentine journalist Leila Guerriero.

Centred on star Peruvian matador Andrés Rey Roca, “Afternoons of Solitude” is candid in its depiction of the violence of the sport, and has already proven controversial on home turf, with Spain’s animal-rights party Pacma calling for the film to be withdrawn from the festival.

José Luis Rebordinos, director of the San Sebastian Film Festival, has just over a week until opening night when he sits down for an interview with Deadline, and he is still plagued by one niggling organizational issue.

“It’s always so difficult to close the jury,” Rebordinos explains as he rushes out of the room to take a call about his potential jury head.

When he returns, he explains: “A few weeks ago I was speaking with Thierry Fremaux. He said even for him it’s always a problem because jury members have to be at your festival for 10 days, you don’t pay, and it’s complicated because people are often working and when they aren’t, they want to spend time with their families and friends.”

A few days later, the competition jury is finally confirmed, with Spanish filmmaker Jaione Camborda leading alongside Leila Guerriero, Fran Kranz, Christos Nikou,...

The jury for the 2024 San Sebastian Festival will be chaired by director Jaione Camborda, who was the first Spanish female filmmaker to win the Golden Shell last year with The Rye Horn.

She will be joined on the jury by Greek director Christos Nikou who competed at San Sebastian last year Apples And Fingernails, which won the Fipresci Award; Austrian filmmaker Ulrich Seidl, who presented Sparta in the Official Selection in 2022 and is a prize-winner at Berlin and Venice; and French producer Carole Scotta, founder of Haut et Court.

Also on the jury are actor Fran Kranz, whose first film as a director,...

Roland Teichmann, director of the Austrian Film Institute (AFI), has shared more details of the institute’s ambitious new funding programme for first and second features.

The Talent Lab scheme is being launched in collaboration with the Vienna Film Fund under its director Christine Dollhofer.

It aims to “identify interesting young filmmakers from all over the country whether they come from film school or not…this is the strategy to look for new talent from all over the place,” said Teichmann.

The €2.8m scheme offers emerging teams the opportunity to create their first and second feature films within “a structured...

Big World Pictures has acquired U.S. and Canadian distribution rights to Iair Said’s “Most People Die on Sundays” from sales agent Heretic. The existential comedy, Said’s fiction feature debut, was an official selection in the Acid sidebar at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

The film is set for a theatrical release in early 2025, following a fall festival run. Said previously directed the documentary feature “Flora’s Life Is No Picnic.”

“Most People Die on Sundays” follows David, a young middle-class Jewish man described as corpulent, homosexual, and afraid of flying. He returns to Buenos Aires from Europe for his uncle’s funeral, only to learn that his mother has decided to disconnect his father’s respirator. The story explores David’s struggle with existential anguish as he navigates his new reality.

Said explained the film’s genesis: “When my dad died, we had to pay $10,000 to...

Lithuanian cinema, not typically that well represented on the international film festival circuit, was the big story of this year’s Locarno Film Festival awards ceremony, with two films from the Baltic nation taking a number of top prizes between them.

“Toxic,” an auspicious debut from writer-director Saulė Bliuvaitė, won not only the Golden Leopard for Best Film in the fest’s premier International Competition — from a jury chaired by Austrian auteur Jessica Hausner — but also, in an unusual double, the top prize in the separately juried First Feature Competition. Bliuvaitė’s compatriot Laurynas Bareiša, meanwhile, won Best Director in the International Competition for his sophomore feature “Drowning Dry,” while the same film’s ensemble also collectively took one of the jury’s gender-neutral acting prizes.

A hard-hitting study of alliances and rivalries between teenage girls enrolled at a modeling school in small-town Lithuania, “Toxic” stood out in the Competition...

The European Film Academy has revealed the first tranche of film titles that members can consider for nominations for the European Film Awards, which take place on Dec. 7 in Lucerne, Switzerland.

The academy’s selection of 29 titles covers films that had their first official screening between June 1, 2023, and May 31, 2024. Further titles will be announced in September, which will include films that had their premieres in the summer and early autumn festivals, such as Locarno and Venice.

Among the selection are Jacques Audiard’s “Emilia Pérez,” Cannes’ best actress and jury prize winner, Miguel Gomes’ “Grand Tour,” Cannes’ best director winner, Yorgos Lanthimos’ “Kinds Of Kindness,” best actor winner at Cannes, Mohammad Rasoulof’s “The Seed of the Sacred Fig,” jury special prize winner at Cannes, Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance,” best screenplay winner at Cannes, “Armand” by Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel, the Golden Camera winner at Cannes, Matthias Glasner’s “Dying,...

Cannes Competition titles The Substance, The Seed Of The Sacred Fig, and Emilia Perez are among the first set of titles recommended for nominations at this year’s European Film Awards.

Overall, 29 titles have been selected for the first stage of nominations by the European Film Academy Board. The selection includes films from 26 countries. In the coming weeks, the 5,000 members of the European Film Academy will start to vote on the selected films. The winners will be announced at the European Film Awards ceremony in Lucerne, Switzerland, on December 7.

To be eligible for a European Film Awards, films must be European feature films which, among other criteria, had their first official screening between June 1, 2023 and May 31, 2024 and have a European director. The rule book states that should a film director not be European, exceptions can be made if the filmmaker is “provided they have a European refugee or similar status...

Writer and director Kurdwin Ayub was born in Iraq, but her family came to Austria as refugees when she was still a baby. Now, she is 34 and has been making a name for herself in the film world as an auteur.

Her 2016 feature documentary Paradise! Paradise!, which she wrote, directed, and handled the cinematography for, won the best camera honor at the Diagonale – Festival of Austrian Film. It follows Omar, the father of a family that has lived in Austria since 1991. Now, he plans to buy an apartment in Kurdistan as an investment. THR‘s review called the doc an “engaging intersection of the domestic and the geo-political.”

Her fiction short Boomerang premiered at the Filmfestival Max Ophüls Preis in Saarbrücken, Germany in 2019 and won the jury award for best short. “Adnan is obsessed with going to his ex-wife’s housewarming party,” explains a plot description. “Unfortunately, he isn’t invited.

The teaser (above) has debuted for “Moon” (Mond), which has its world premiere on Aug. 11 in the International Competition section of Locarno Film Festival. Bendita Film Sales has just come on board to handle world sales rights.

The film is written and directed by Kurdwin Ayub, whose first fiction feature film, “Sonne,” premiered at the 2022 Berlinale in the Encounters competition and won the best first feature award.

Ayub, who was born in Iraq and lives in Vienna, was also nominated for the European Discovery Award at the 35th European Film Awards for “Sonne.” It won best Austrian film at Viennale. Her feature documentary “Paradise! Paradise!” won best camera at the Diagonale – Festival of Austrian Film.

In “Moon,” former martial arts fighter Sarah leaves Austria to train three sisters from a wealthy Jordanian family. What sounds initially like a dream job soon becomes unsettling: the young women are cut off from...

Austria has selected Berlinale award-winner The Devil’s Bath as its entry for international feature at the Oscars 2025.

The historical thriller is directed by Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala and won the Silver Bear in cinematography at Berlinale earlier this year.

Set in Austria in 1750, the film stars Anja Plaschg as an oppressed, newly married woman who commits a shocking act of violence. The film topped Screen’s Berlin jury grid along with My Favourite Cake, with both films scoring 3.1.

It is produced by Ulrich Seidl Filmproduktion, co-founded by Ulrich Seidl and Franz, in co-production with Heimatfilm Cologne & Coop99. France’s Playtime handles international sales.

“The Devil’s Bath,” a period psychological thriller which competed at the Berlin Film Festival, has been submitted by Austria as its official Oscar entry for the international feature film race. The film picked up the Silver Bear for best cinematography (for Martin Gschlacht) at the Berlinale.

“The Devil’s Bath” is directed by Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala, the Austrian filmmaking duo behind “Goodnight Mommy” which had bowed at Venice and had also represented Austria in the Oscar race. It went on to be remade into an English-language film released by Amazon under the same title, starring Naomi Watts.

Set in rural Austria in 1750, “The Devil’s Bath” stars Anja Plaschg, the up-and-coming singer and composer known as Soap & Skin. Plaschg plays Agnes, a young married woman who feels oppressed in her husband’s world, which is devoid of emotions and limited to chores and expectations. A pious and highly sensitive woman,...

The Boys: So much blood, so little continuity? Think again! We’ve got exploding heads, laser eyes, and… wait, did Ryan the super-powered kid just switch actors? Shhh, don’t tell Homelander, but The Boys pulled off a sneaky recast, and nobody blinked.

Cameron Crovetti as Ryan Butcher in The Boys | Kripke Enterprises

With showrunner Eric Kripke breaking it down, buckle up for a season where the only drama is on screen, not behind the scenes. But hey, with all the gore and super-powered mayhem, who’s keeping track, right?

Big Reveal: The Boys’ Ryan Butcher Was Recast and We Missed It! Cameron Crovetti as Rayn in the series The Boys | Kripke Enterprises

Guess what? The Ryan Butcher you’ve been watching in The Boys isn’t the same kid you met in Season 1. Yeah, turns out Cameron Crovetti, who we all know as Homelander’s moody son, wasn’t...

“Contempt returns to the sender, and that is how it is,” Catherine Breillat wrote in her essay on Ingmar Bergman’s Sawdust And Tinsel.

Frauke Finsterwalder’s razor-sharp and exquisitely stylish Sisi & I (with Tanja Hausner’s eminently tempting and chronology defying costumes), stars the glorious combination of Susanne Wolff (Wolfgang Fischer’s Styx) as Empress Elisabeth of Austria-Hungary, with Sandra Hüller as Irma Countess of Sztáray, her lady-in-waiting. The extraordinary supporting cast includes the two protagonists’ mothers, Sibylle Canonica as Marie Countess of Sztáray and Angela Winkler (Volker Schlöndorff’s Oscar-winning The Tin Drum) as Ludovika of Bavaria, plus Georg Friedrich (Ulrich Seidl’s Rimini) as Sisi’s playful cousin, Archduke Viktor of Austria. Tom Rhys...

The Devil’s Bath directors Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala with Anne-Katrin Titze: “The film takes place in a time when Enlightenment was starting, but still a lot of superstition was going on.”

Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala’s The Devil's Bath, starring Anja Plaschg (who is also the composer as Soap&Skin) with Maria Hofstätter and David Scheid, shot by Martin Gschlacht (Silver Bear winner in the 2024 Berlin Film Festival) with costumes by Tanja Hausner (Jessica Hausner’s sister and longtime collaborator) is executive produced by Ulrich Seidl (Rimini and Sparta) and Bettina Brokemper.

Agnes (Anja Plaschg) being led blindfolded by her husband Wolf (David Scheid) to where they will live

Agnes (Anja Plaschg), wearing a thick brown woolen sweater, braids a fragile wreath for her hair and wraps her precious collection of dried grasses, insects and shells into a kerchief. This is her wedding day and together with her mother,...

The Devils Bath is one of the more somber films to hit the screen in some time, but its also a mesmerizing if not haunting meditation on one of the most ominous and overlooked phenomena in modern history. Written and directed by Severin Fiala and Veronika Franz, the story is set in 1750 Austria, where a deeply religious woman named Agnes begins to feel so lonely and trapped in her confined life that she considers committing a shocking act of violence as the only way out of her misery.

The film recalls Midsommar, but cuts deeper. Culling from research, the filmmakers ultimately illuminate how women throughout Europe during that era attempted to end their lives by committing ritualistic acts of murder. In their eyes, it was a way to overstep the eternal damnation of committing suicide. By confessing their murderous crime, the women would be executed yet cleansed of their sins,...

The Tribeca Film Festival 2024, presented by Okx, is back this week with tons of new genre premieres, retrospectives, and events to get excited about. This year’s Festival, which takes place June 5-16 in New York City showcases the best emerging talent from across the globe alongside established names.

Horror fans can look forward to buzzy titles like The Devil’s Bath, from filmmakers Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala. But the horror extends beyond the Midnight section, including the premiere of Amfad: All My Friends Are Dead. Look for the festival to give special presentations of Alfred Hitchcock and Tod Browning classics, too.

Finally, if you’re a Godzilla fan, don’t miss the epic bash the fest is throwing for the classic film’s 70th anniversary.

Read on for 14 can’t miss events and screenings to catch at Tribeca:

The A-Frame (United States) – World Premiere. A quantum physicist’s machine...

Jessica Hausner on the references to Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining and Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby: “The idea behind Hotel [starring Franziska Weisz] was to use all those classical horror film elements on purpose, to put them together but to not lift the secret.”

In the second instalment with Jessica Hausner on three of her feature films before her latest, the bewitching Club Zero (European Film Award Best Original Score to Markus Binder), we move the conversation to Hotel, starring Franziska Weisz with Birgit Minichmayr (Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon) and Lovely Rita with Barbara Osika as Rita, Wolfgang Kostal and Karina Brandlmayer as her parents, and Peter Fiala as her man of interest. The two films have the costumes, as always, designed by Tanja Hausner, cinematography by Martin Gschlacht, sound design by Erik Mischijew (Maren Ade’s multiple European Film...

Jessica Hausner with Anne-Katrin Titze on Sylvie Testud’s Christine, Léa Seydoux’s Maria, Bruno Todeschini’s Kuno, and Gilette Barbier’s Frau Hartl in Lourdes: “I was thinking about the story of Heidi [by Johanna Spyri].”

In the first installment with Jessica Hausner on three of her feature films before her latest, the bewitching Club Zero (European Film Award Best Original Score to Markus Binder), we start the conversation with Lourdes, costumes, as always, designed by Tanja Hausner, cinematography by Martin Gschlacht, sound design by Erik Mischijew, and production design by Katharina Wöppermann (Shirin Neshat and Shoja Azari’s Women Without Men).

Kuno (Bruno Todeschini) with Christine (Sylvie Testud), Frau Hartl (Gilette Barbier) and Cécile (Elina Löwensohn)

Maria (Léa Seydoux), a newcomer to the...

The Tribeca Film Festival 2024, presented by Okx, today announced its full lineup of feature narrative, documentary, and animated films. This year’s Festival, which takes place June 5-16 in New York City showcases the best emerging talent from across the globe alongside established names.

Of particular note to horror fans, Tribeca Midnight is the “surprising, shocking, frightening, and thrilling” destination for the best in horror and more for late night audiences. Look for buzzy titles like The Devil’s Bath, from filmmakers Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala. But the horror extends beyond the Midnight section, including the premiere of Amfad: All My Friends Are Dead.

Read on for the genre titles scheduled to premiere at Tribeca:

Spotlight Narrative

A launching pad for the most buzzworthy new films, Tribeca’s Spotlight section brings audiences anticipated premieres from acclaimed filmmakers and star performers.

The Damned, – World Premiere. When a ship sinks near her isolated fishing post,...

Ms Novak’s (Mia Wasikowska) students Fred (Luke Barker), Ragna (Florence Baker), Helen (Gwen Currant), Elsa (Ksenia Devriendt), and Ben (Samuel D Anderson) in Jessica Hausner’s bewitching Club Zero

In the second installment with Jessica Hausner on Club Zero (co-written with Geraldine Bajard) and scored by Markus Binder (European Film Award winner), starring Mia Wasikowska (as Conscious Eating instructor Ms Novak), we discussed her longtime collaborators, costume designer Tanja Hausner and cinematographer Martin Gschlacht plus Sidse Babett Knudsen and Peter & The Wolf.

Jessica Hausner on using Peter & The Wolf in Club Zero: “It’s a very common fairytale and we found out that it’s really very well known …” Photo: Anne Katrin Titze

The parents of the students are played by Elsa Zylberstein (Simone Veil in Olivier Dahan’s all-embracing portrait Simone: Woman Of The Century) Mathieu Demy, Camilla Rutherford...

Club Zero director Jessica Hausner with Anne-Katrin Titze (in Batsheva): “I do see the film in connection to a fairy tale. I think in all my films there is a connection to one fairy tale or the other.”

Jessica Hausner’s bewitching Club Zero (co-written with Geraldine Bajard), shot by Martin Gschlacht, scored by Markus Binder (European Film Award winner) with costumes by the ever surprising Tanja Hausner, starts off with students Fred (Luke Barker), Elsa (Ksenia Devriendt), Ragna (Florence Baker), Ben (Samuel D Anderson), Helen (Gwen Currant), Joan (Sade McNichols-Thomas), and Corbinian (Andrei Hozoc), all dressed in gender-neutral pale yellow polo shirts, beige skorts, and purple knee socks, gathering insect-like chairs for a Conscious Eating class, led by recently hired instructor Ms Novak (Mia Wasikowska). Ms Dorset (Sidse Babett Knudsen), the head mistress of this elite and very expensive international boarding school, is well-meaning and oblivious of...

Early Modern times were messy: Europe was finding its footing in rationalism, seeking independence from the centuries-long spiritual yoke of Catholicism and Protestantism. Shedding the skin of the past seems, at least from our standpoint today, the best thing that could have happened to modern man. Preempting industrialization and a desire-fulfilling capitalist society, the journey towards Enlightenment positioned its preceding times as “The Dark Ages.” But the freedom to live or die was certainly a luxury for many––especially women caught in the patriarchal webs of rural life. Ewa Lizlfellner was one such woman who didn’t want to live, but to die.

In the 18th-century common beliefs, “the devil’s bath” figured as a metaphor for depression and suicidal ideation. Judging from the phrase alone––replete with pejoratives and a particularly spatialized horror––one can gather exactly how unfitting it was to be of “ill” mental health. While the...

American Cinematographer Ed Lachman will be the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award at this year’s Camerimage Film Festival.

Lachman was born on March 31, 1946. His grandfather owned several vaudeville theatres in the 1920s, which were later converted into movie houses, co-managed with Lachman’s father, a film theatre distributor who later acquired a small cinema in Boonton, New Jersey.

Lachman’s extensive filmography includes numerous collaborations with directors such as Todd Haynes, Ulrich Seidl (Import/Export), Steven Soderbergh (The Limey and Erin Brockovich), Gregory Nava and Paul Schrader. He served as the cinematographer on Sofia Coppola’s debut feature, The Virgin Suicides, and lensed A Prairie Home Companion, Robert Altman’s last film.

He is a three-time Oscar nominee for Far from Heaven, Carol, and Pablo Larrain’s El Conde.

Magnify, formerly Magnolia Pictures International, has announced multiple territories out of EFM on Veni Vidi Vici, the provocative Sundance premiere from Austrian filmmakers Daniel Hoesl And Julia Niemann.

Deals have closed in France (L’atelier d’Images), Central and Eastern Europe (HBO Europe), Poland (Aurora), Czech Republic and Slovakia (Pilot), former Yugoslavia (Five Star Distribution), Middle East (Gulf), Taiwan (Joinstar), Ukraine (Arthouse Traffic), Hungary (Cinefil), and airlines (Spafax).

Magnify’s SVP of global sales, Lorna Lee Torres and director of global sales Austin Kennedy negotiated the deals and are considering offers on Germany, Japan and other territories.

Satire Veni Vidi Vici premiered...

Austrian filmmaking duo Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala seemingly never met a remote woodland setting that didn’t feel like the right place to strand a traumatized woman. Following Goodnight Mommy (the chilling 2014 original, not the limp American remake) and their English language debut The Lodge, they inch away from horror without relinquishing the unsettling atmosphere or taste for the macabre in their intense character study, The Devil’s Bath (Des Teufels Bad). While it’s punishingly grim and has some pacing issues, this is a gripping psychological study by directors operating with formidable command.

Early on, Franz and Fiala’s new film recalls Robert Eggers’ The Witch, despite being set more than a century later, in 1750. It has a comparable emphasis on ambience and authentic historical detail, which is possibly even more granular here. But vague suggestions of witchcraft quickly turn out to be misleading, with the story instead fueled by converging forces of religion,...

One of my favorite categories of Reddit posts (don’t judge) are those where people who have worked for or near the super-rich share stories that people “wouldn’t believe.” From ordering private jets like they were pizza to hosting children’s parties where A-list performers sing to indifferent toddlers, these stories make it quite clear that the 1% lives on a planet most of us will never visit. “Pharaoh-level shit,” as one of my favorite Reddit reactions of all time said.

The craziest thing about Veni Vidi Vici, Daniel Hoesl and Julia Niemann’s pitch-black satire about a wealthy family with a predilection for human-hunting, is that it doesn’t seem that crazy.

The Ulrich Seidl-produced film opens with a quote from The Fountainhead, which can never mean a good thing unless we’re in store for a comedy. “The point is who will stop me”––a quote part...

Playtime has boarded “The Devil’s Bath,” a period psychological thriller directed by Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala, the Austrian filmmaking duo behind the critical and commercial hit “Goodnight Mommy.”

The movie reteams Franz and Fiala with Ulrich Seidl, who also produced “Goodnight Mommy.”

Set in rural Austria in 1750, “The Devil’s Bath” stars Anja Plaschg, the up-and-coming singer and composer known as Soap & Skin. Plaschg plays Agnes, a young married woman who feels oppressed in her husband’s world which is devoid of emotions and limited to chores and expectations. A pious and highly sensitive woman, Agnes falls into a deep depression, before committing a shocking act of violence that she sees as the only way out of her inner prison.

Along with starring in “The Devil’s Bath,” Plaschg also composed the music for the film. Based on historical records, the movie is inspired by the true stories...

Destroy Everything You Touch: Hoesl & Riemann Come to Conquer with Dark Satire

As Abba once succinctly stated, “Money, money money/Must be funny/In a rich man’s world,” which is certainly the case in the latest film by Austrian director Daniel Hoesl, co-directing with Julia Niemann. The pair previously co-directed the doc Davos (2020), featuring the locals in a rural Swiss town visited by wealthy elitists once a year, which sounds an awful lot like Park City, Utah, where the Sundance Film Festival hosted the premiere of this title (along with Hoesl’s similarly articulated 2013 debut Soldier Jane). Once the assistant director to the venerable Austrian provocateur Ulrich Seidl (who produced this film), Hoesl shares a certain streak of misanthropy with his mentor, introducing us to a family of impossibly callous elitists who feel something like the self-absorbed clan of White Noise (2022) who have developed a taste for playing the...

Hailing from the country that gave us such grim social critics as Michael Haneke and Ulrich Seidl, Vantablack Austrian satire “Veni Vidi Vici” opens with a senseless homicide. It’s a startling scene, no less upsetting than the Scorpio killing that kick-starts “Dirty Harry” — except that in this case, the incident is calibrated as the darkest sort of comedy. Rather than picking off an unsuspecting rooftop swimmer, the serial killer does his hunting out in the open, without shame or any pretense of covering his tracks.

The movie makes no mystery of the sniper’s identity, revealing it right from the jump, the way a “Columbo” episode might. And yet the authorities show zero interest in arresting the guilty party, even going so far as to toss an eyewitness out of the police station (that man winds up offing himself in exasperation). That’s because the person responsible, Amon Maynard (Laurence Rupp), is a millionaire,...

Veni, vidi, vici: “I came, I saw, I conquered,” reportedly said Julius Caesar after an especially swift victory. Now, his words echo in Daniel Hoesl and Julia Niemann’s satire about a family so powerful it can get away with murder. Literally.

“Imagine you are above the law. You can do anything. It’s frustrating, because sometimes you want the world to wake up and yet nothing happens. It’s really funny and really sad,” Hoesl tells Variety.

“These people want to be stopped. They leave all these traces, so why does no one speak up? There is more than one Jeffrey Epstein out there.”

Premiering at Sundance and Rotterdam – and produced by Ulrich Seidl for Ulrich Seidl Film Produktion, with Magnify handling sales – “Veni Vidi Vici” takes a closer look at the Maynard clan where “family is everything,” but human life means nothing.

“Our main character always wins. It...

For those missing the billionaire voyeurism of “Succession,” Sundance film “Veni Vidi Vici” is poised to be a more sinister remedy.

Directed by Julia Niemann and Daniel Hoesl (and written by Hoesl), the film centers on the Maynard family, who live an “almost perfect” billionaire lifestyle, per the official synopsis. Patriarch Amon is a passionate hunter, but doesn’t shoot animals, as the family’s wealth allows them to live totally free from consequences, as the logline for the social satire dark comedy teases.

“Destructive strength is creative strength,” a character says in the trailer. “But don’t predatory cats belong in the wild?”

The hunt for whomever the dangerous hunter with no regard for human life is takes over a community, as all fingers seem to point to the elite family at the center of the drama. Yet the whodunit takes on another social issue: When the presumed wealthy “madman” killer is revealed,...

Sales talks to commence in Park City and continue in Berlin.

Magnify, the company formerly known as Magnolia Pictures International, has made its first acquisition since the rebrand, taking global sales rights to upcoming Sundance premiere Veni Vidi Vici.

Daniel Hoesl and Julia Niemann (Davos) directed the Austrian social satire about a billionaire family and their children’s almost perfect life without consequences.

Laurence Rupp (Barbarians), Ursina Lardi (Lore), Dominik Warta (L’Animale), and newcomer Olivia Goschler star. Ulrich Seidl (Goodnight Mommy) of Ulrich Seidl Filmproduktion served as producer.

“Daniel and Julia have crafted an exquisite, sophisticated and timely satire...

Magnify, which was formally known as Magnolia Pictures International, has acquired global and U.S. sales rights to “Veni Vedi Vici,” an Australian social satire from directors’ Daniel Hoesl and Julia Niemann. Written by Hoesl, the film will debut in the World Dramatic Competition section of the 2024 Sundance Film Festival. It marks the first title acquired for sales under the newly rebranded Magnify label.

In “Veni Vedi Vici,” the Maynards and their children lead an almost perfect billionaire family life. Amon is a passionate hunter, but doesn’t shoot animals, as the family’s wealth allows them to live totally free from consequences.

“Daniel and Julia have crafted an exquisite, sophisticated and timely satire that delves into the dynamics of privilege. Fuelled with dark humor, psychotic absurdity, and hyper-realistic violence, ‘Veni Vedi Vici’ promises a captivating watch in Park City, that we are thrilled to launch under the freshly rebranded Magnify label,...

Girls Will Be Girls To Premiere At Sundance Film Festival 2024: Here’s Everything You Should Know About Chadha & Ali Fazal’s Debut Production! ( Photo Credit – Instagram )

Ali Fazal and Richa Chadha’s debut production, ‘Girls Will Be Girls,’ a female-led drama written and directed by debutante Shuchi Talati, is set to premiere at the prestigious Sundance Film Festival 2024. The film will be screened in the World Dramatic Feature category, marking an extraordinary achievement for producers as well as the director. ‘Girls Will Be Girls’ is one of 16 films chosen to participate in the competitive category of the renowned Film Festival.

The 40th edition of the Sundance Film Festival, which aims to provide a space to gather, celebrate, and engage with risk-taking artists who are committed to bringing their independent visions to audiences through independent storytelling, will take place from January 18–28, 2024, in Park City, Utah.

Speaking about the film, producer Richa Chadha earlier said,...

One of our favorite traditions in best-of-the-year festivities is a lineup that tends to find a more interesting path than any guilds or critics groups. The wonderfully eccentric John Waters, whose tastes always includes a mix of the unexpected and underseen, hasn’t let us down with his top 10 films of 2023.

Published at Vulture, where one should click over to read thoughts on each, his top 10 is capped by Ari Aster’s Beau Is Afraid. Other selections include Paul Schrader’s Master Gardener, Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, plus the latest from Pedro Almodóvar, Aki Kaurismäki, Radu Jude, and Catherine Breillat, as well as the overlooked Full Time.

Check out the list below, along with our reviews where available.

1. Beau Is Afraid (Ari Aster)

2. A Prince (Pierre Creton)

3. Master Gardener (Paul Schrader)

4. Full Time (Éric Gravel)

5. Last Summer (Catherine Breillat)

6. Sparta (Ulrich Seidl)

7. Fallen Leaves (Aki Kaurismäki)

8. Strange Way of Life...