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Exclusive: Producer Sara McFarlane (Red White and Blue) and filmmaker Maria McIndoo have acquired the film rights to author Claire Keegan’s short story So Late in the Day.

The duo plan to adapt the work into a film, which will mark the feature debut from writer-director McIndoo. McFarlane will produce under her recently launched Essential Viewing banner. Keegan will serve as executive producer.

This project will mark the second collaboration between McFarlane and McIndoo, following their recent short film A Love Letter to M, starring André Holland and Phoebe Tonkin. A Love Letter to M premiered at the 2025 Indy Shorts International Film Festival.

“I am so excited to be working with Maria in bringing So Late in the Day to life,” McFarlane said. “There are so many things that I love about this short story: the subtlety, the nuance, that every word is written with intent and that it...

"You have any evening plans?" Greenwich Entertainment has unveiled the official trailer for an indie film titled Love, Brooklyn, which first premiered at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival earlier this year to many warm reviews. It's now set for release in theaters at the end of August with more screens during September. A writer in Brooklyn navigates complicated relationships with his ex, an art gallery owner, and his current lover, a newly-single mother,, with the support of his best friend. A modern romance set against the rapidly changing landscape of Brooklyn, New York. It's one of my favorite films from Sundance (here's my glowing review) touching upon many aspects of NYC life - from gentrification to relationships and everything else. Starring André Holland, with Nicole Beharie and DeWanda Wise as his two lovers, plus Roy Wood Jr., Cassandra Freeman, and Cadence Reese. Executive produced / mentored by Steven Soderbergh as director Rachael Holder's feature debut.

Living up to its title, Rachael Abigail Holder’s Love, Brooklyn is a lovely romance that finds André Holland navigating modern relationships. Also starring Nicole Beharie, DeWanda Wise, Roy Wood Jr., Cassandra Freeman, and Cadence Reese, the Sundance premiere was picked up by Greenwich Entertainment. Ahead of a release at NYC’s Angelika beginning August 29, followed by a nationwide release on September 5, the first trailer has now arrived.

Here’s the synopsis: “A writer navigates complicated relationships with his ex, an art gallery owner, and his current lover, a newly-single mother, with the support of his best friend. A modern romance set against the rapidly changing landscape of Brooklyn, New York. A Sundance premiere.”

Jake Kring-Schreifels said in his Sundance review, “You can feel the warm breeze filtering through Love, Brooklyn, a gentle, dream-like summer movie that often teeters on the edge of reality. Rachael Abigail Holder’s debut feature,...

New York City has never looked lovelier in the first trailer for filmmaker Rachael Abigail Holder’s sensual romantic drama “Love, Brooklyn,” which TheWrap can exclusively reveal in the video above.

Written by Paul Zimmerman, the film stars André Holland as a writer navigating his complicated relationships with his gallery owner ex (Nicole Beharie) and his single-mother current lover (DeWanda Wise), all with the support of his best friend (Roy Wood Jr.).

The indie had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year and was scooped up by Greenwich Entertainment, which is releasing “Love, Brooklyn” in New York on Aug. 29 and in theaters nationwide on Sept. 5.

Getting the film made was a challenge, as producer and star Holland told TheWrap at Sundance in January.

“We had this script and were out to all the places that everyone goes to to get financing. People just, I think, didn’t share the vision.

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Tubi might not be as big as some of the other popular streaming services, but it does have some of the best movies and TV shows of recent times, and that too for absolutely free. The Fox-owned streaming service adds a ton of new monthly content to its ever-expanding library. So, we thought of compiling a list of the best movies coming to Tubi in August 2025.

The Prosecutor (August 1) Rt Score: 94% Credit – Mandarin Motion Pictures

The Prosecutor is a Chinese action thriller film directed by Donnie Yen from a screenplay by Edmond Wong. Loosely based on the real-life 2016 drug-trafficking case, the 2024 film follows an ex-prosecutor who investigates the case of a wrongfully charged young man and discovers a sinister conspiracy. The Prosecutor stars Donnie Yen, Julian Cheung, Michael Hui, Francis Ng, and Mc Cheung Tin-fu.

C’mon C’mon (August...

Medical dramas have been a pretty regular television staple for a long time, but people really seem to love the HBO Max series "The Pitt." With each season set over the course of a single 15-hour shift in the emergency room of the fictional Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Hospital, "The Pitt" is a pure shot of adrenaline each and every episode. Moving in as close to real time as you can get, we see the doctors, nurses, and other staff in the emergency room deal with all kinds of trauma cases ranging from simple stitches and wound care to the catastrophic injuries from a mass shooting event at a nearby concert. It's incredibly compelling television that happens to be pretty darn medically accurate as well, with some truly impressive special effects work to sell the blood and guts of it all (including a graphic birth scene).

For fans of "The Pitt...

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The Institute is a supernatural horror thriller series created by Benjamin Cavell. Based on Stephen King‘s 2019 novel of the same name, the MGM+ series follows Luke Ellis, a genius teen boy who is kidnapped and wakes up in a mysterious institute where he finds other kids with unusual abilities. Luke’s life takes a turn when his life intertwines with a former police officer haunted by his past, who moves to the nearby town. The Institute stars Ben Barnes, Joe Freeman, Simone Miller, Fionn Laird, Hannah Galway, Julian Richings, Robert Joy, Martin Roach, and Mary-Louise Parker. So, if you loved the thrilling mystery, intense drama, and compelling characters in MGM+’s The Institute, here are some similar shows you should check out next.

The Promised Neverland (Hulu & Crunchyroll) Credit – Crunchyroll

The Promised Neverland is a Japanese anime series directed by Mamoru Kanbe.

The Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival (Mvaaf) has announced the opening lineup for its 23rd annual celebration, providing a platform for Black and brown filmmakers, taking place Aug. 1-9, 2025.

Kicking off the festivities on Aug. 1 will be a screening of the sports documentary Unraveling George. Directed by Mike Tollin and narrated by Marlon Wayans, who portrayed George Raveling in 2023’s Air, the film chronicles the notable journey of the Hall of Fame basketball coach known for guiding the careers of several all-star players, including Michael Jordan. A Color of Conversation will immediately follow the screening.

That evening, The Dutchman — starring André Holland, Kate Mara, Aldis Hodge, Stephen McKinley Henderson and Zazie Beetz — will be presented. The thriller about a successful Black man who finds himself in a psychological game of cat and mouse with a mysterious white woman is based on the 1964 Obie Award-winning play by Amiri Baraka...

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Tubi might not be as big as some of the other popular streaming services, but it does have some of the best movies and TV shows of recent times, and that too for absolutely free. The Fox-owned streaming service adds a ton of new monthly content to its ever-expanding library. So, we thought of compiling a list of the best new movies and TV shows coming to Tubi in July 2025.

Bones And All (July 1) Credit – MGM

Bones and All is a romantic horror film directed by Luca Guadagnino from a screenplay by David Kajganich. Based on the 2015 novel of the same name by Camille DeAngelis, the 2022 film is set in the 1980s and revolves around two young cannibals who fall in love with each other during a cross-country road trip. Bones and All stars Taylor Russell, Timothée Chalamet,...

Check out photos from last night's opening night performance of Duke & Roya. In attendance were producers John Legend and Mike Jackson of Get Lifted Film Co., Naturi-Naughton Lewis and Two Lewis, and special guests Adrienne Warren, André Holland, Quincy Williams, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Angela Yee, Bevy Smith and more. Duke & Roya stars Jay Ellis, Stephanie Nur, Olivier Award winner and Tony® Award nominee Noma Dumezweni and Dariush Kashani. Duke & Roya is written by acclaimed playwright Charles Randolph-Wright (Blue) and directed by Warren Adams. The understudies for Duke & Roya are Ariana Afradi (Pieces), Shirine Babb (A Beautiful Noise), René David Ifrah (“Homeland”), and Jequrey Slaton (“Power Book II: Ghost”). A bold new play about romance, identity, and culture, Duke & Roya tells the resilient love story of when Duke, an American hip-hop superstar, meets a fearless Afghan interpreter, Roya, in the heart of war-torn Kabul. They learn to navigate the stark realities...

Exclusive: Motorsports and basketball. Indianapolis has become a mecca for those activities as the home of the Indy 500 and the Pacers (who came up just short of winning the NBA crown this year). In recent years, Indianapolis has also become an important destination for cinephiles through the work of Heartland Film, the nonprofit that puts on the Heartland International Film Festival in October, and the Oscar-qualifying Indy Shorts International Film Festival in July.

Today, Heartland Film announced the lineup for the 8th edition of Indy Shorts, running from July 22-27 in the Indiana capital. More than 250 short films of virtually every genre will be showcased, among them 41 world premieres, 18 U.S. premieres and 113 Midwest premieres.

“Many of the premiering films have notable names,” the festival comments, including Imelda Staunton (The Most Powerful Human on Earth); André Holland (A Love Letter to M); Lena Headey (Long Pork); Domhnall Gleeson (Retirement Plan...

Exclusive: Greenwich Entertainment has acquired North American rights to Magic Hour, a new indie drama co-written, directed by and starring Katie Aselton, on the heels of its SXSW premiere, slating the film for release in theaters next year.

Starring Aselton, Daveed Diggs, and Brad Garrett, the film follows Erin (Aselton) and Charlie (Diggs) as they escape to the desert to navigate an unexpected and challenging new phase of their relationship. However, the rendezvous shows they couldn’t be further apart, revealing an even more striking turn in their marriage.

Written by Aselton and her husband and frequent collaborator Mark Duplass, the film hails from the latter’s Duplass Brothers Productions. Emily A. Neumann produced, with Mark Duplass, Jay Duplass, and Mel Eslyn exec producing for Duplass Brothers Productions. We were first to report on the project in April 2024.

“I’m thrilled to be partnering with Greenwich,” said Aselton in a statement to Deadline.

We will update this article throughout the season, along with all our predictions, so make sure to keep checking IndieWire for the latest news from the 2025 Emmys race. The nomination round of voting takes place from June 12 to June 23, with the official Emmy nominations announced Tuesday, July 15. Afterwards, final voting commences on August 18 and ends the night of August 27. The 77th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards are set to take place on Sunday, September 14, and air live on CBS at 8:00 p.m. Et/ 5:00 p.m. Pt.

The State of the Race

Outside of a couple performances, there is not much consensus on which contenders will be nominated for the Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or Movie. In addition to “The Penguin” being a critical and commercial hit, star Colin Farrell already won several awards for his work on the HBO show this past winter, so...

The Public Theater just presented its annual gala on the lawn outside the newly renovated Delacorte Theater, where guests got an exclusive preview as The Public lit up the reimagined theater for the first time. The gala celebrated The Public's commitment to accessible theater and the return of Free Shakespeare in the Park to a significantly enhanced venue. Completed in partnership with the Central Park Conservancy and NYC Parks, The Delacorte's revitalization ensures a more comfortable and sustainable experience for audiences and cultural workers for decades to come. Gala performers included Leslie Odom Jr. and Renée Elise Goldsberry in celebration of Hamilton’s 10th anniversary. Guests scheduled to attend include Christine Baranski, Billy Crudup, Naomi Watts, André Holland, Mandy Patinkin, André De Shields, Annaleigh Ashford, Donna Murphy, Estelle Parsons, Kenny Leon, original A...

Eternals star Gemma Chan's period drama with a 90% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes is about to make its Hulu debut. The Actor, in which Chan co-stars with Chan co-stars with American Horror Story's André Holland, will start streaming on Monday, June 30.

The Actor combines mystery and thriller elements within its story of a New York actor (played by Holland) who becomes stranded in a 1950s Ohio town with no memory of how he got there or his past life. The movie is based on iconic crime writer Donald E. Westlake's novel Memory, which was written in 1963, but not published until 2010.

Duke Johnsonadapted Memory into The Actor from a screenplay he co-wrote with Stephen Cooney. Speaking to Collider, Chan explained why she signed on for the movie. "I watched and really loved the stop-motion animation film [Johnson] did, Anomalisa. And then I read the script and spoke to him...

Sundance didn’t have the plethora of late night bidding wars we used to see in the good old days of the festival, but a number of buzziest titles are actually closing deals late into the spring and into the early summer. Over 60 films came into this year’s Sundance looking for homes, and slowly but surely a number of those are finding homes. As we previously reported, the hope was that even more distributors could get creative.

Below we’ll update all the acquisitions following the festival as they arrive.

“Hal & Harper”

Section: Indie Episodics

Buyer: Mubi

Director: Cooper Raiff

Buzz: The “Shithouse” and “Cha Cha Real Smooth” writer/director’s serialized debut follows two tight-knit siblings forced to face a past tragedy when their dad decides to sell their childhood home. It’s got a strong cast, including Raiff himself, Mark Ruffalo, Betty Gilpin, and Lili Reinhart,...

June! It’s always such a refreshing chunk of Gregorian real estate, the promise of summer looming in its most ideal form, not yet curdled into the desultory, bedraggled blast-furnace blood factories of late August and September. It’s also when cinema begins to stretch her legs again after an invariably prolonged awards season hangover. And yes, this means a lot of sweaty studio would-be blockbusters. But it also means Don’t-Miss Indies. So! Seek out your local art house and keep those summertime blues at bay.

The Actor

When: Now

Where: Theaters, VOD

Director: Duke Johnson

Cast: André Holland, Gemma Chan, May Calamawy, Asim Chaudhry

Why We’re Excited: Somehow it’s been a full decade since Charlie Kaufman’s melancholic stop-motion feature Anomalisa left audiences both dazzled by its technical brilliance and disconsolate by its gutting existential questioning. Kaufman of course has gone on to direct 2020’s I’m Thinking of Ending Things...

Exclusive: Live Nation Productions has tapped Oscar nominee Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor (Nickel Boys) to pen a feature centered on “Godmother of Rock and Roll” Sister Rosetta Tharpe, with rock legend Mick Jagger producing.

Hailing from Tribeca Studios, Jagged Films, and Inaudible Productions, the project has the participation of Tharpe’s estate, which has granted rights to her music catalogue. In the making of the film, the producers will also draw on Gayle Wald’s definitive biography Shout, Sister, Shout!: The Untold Story of Rock-and-Roll Trailblazer Sister Rosetta Tharpe, to which they’ve secured exclusive rights.

Rising to fame in the ’30s and ’40s, Sister Rosetta Tharpe was a trailblazing gospel guitarist and singer whose fearless transgressions of musical boundaries laid the foundation for rock and roll. An artist who broke barriers as a Black woman in music, she influenced countless legends with her music — among them, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash,...

The Shed has revealed the full cast for The Brothers Size, written and co-directed by Academy Award winner and Geffen Playhouse Artistic Director Tarell Alvin McCraney and co-directed by Olivier Award-nominated Bijan Sheibani. The cast features André Holland as Ogun Size, with Alani iLongwe as Oshoosi Size, and Malcom Mays as Elegba. Previews for The Brothers Size begin August 30 in The Shed’s Griffin Theater. This co-production with Los Angeles’s Geffen Playhouse marks the 20th anniversary of this groundbreaking work, which explores themes of brotherhood, resilience, and the complexities of the Black male experience. Directed by Sheibani...

Exclusive: Greenwich Entertainment has acquired North American rights to Love, Brooklyn, an acclaimed indie drama produced by and starring André Holland (Exhibiting Forgiveness), which premiered in U.S. Dramatic Competition at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Executive produced by Steven Soderbergh, the film is the second Sundance acquisition for Greenwich in as many weeks, on the heels of Cole Webley’s Omaha starring John Magaro. It’ll be released in theaters nationwide later this year.

Marking the directorial debut of Rachael Abigail Holder, Love, Brooklyn follows three longtime Brooklynites as they navigate careers, love, loss and friendship against the rapidly shifting landscape of their beloved city. Roger (Holland) is a writer fighting to maintain his creative integrity in the commercially driven publishing industry. Behind on a deadline, Roger distracts himself by hanging with his old flame Casey (Nicole Beharie), an art gallery owner wrestling with the fate of her...

Exclusive: The Revisionist, the drama starring Oscar winner Dustin Hoffman (Rain Man), Alison Brie (Glow), André Holland (Moonlight), and Tom Sturridge (The Sandman), is heading to the Cannes market with Palisades Park Pictures handling international sales.

We first told you about writer-director Alex Vlack’s feature film debut late last year and the movie is now in post. WME Independent will handle North America rights.

In The Revisionist, “Elise, a successful novelist, does what so many writers do: she manipulates and transforms the people in her life into the characters she needs for her story. As she blurs the line between fiction and reality, her world descends into secrets, lies, and outright betrayal. The project is an exploration of the psychological lengths to which a writer will go to achieve their art.”

Pic is produced by Arielle Elwes, Veronica Radaelli, Fiona Robert, Sophia Robert, Zachary Spicer and Alex Vlack. Executive producers are Cassian Elwes,...

Exclusive: Ryan Kampe’s Visit Films heads to Cannes with a sales slate of completed titles including upcoming Tribeca Festival world premiere Our Hero, Balthazar, and SXSW selections The Dutchman, Fantasy Life, Baby Doe, and Brother Verses Brother.

Oscar Boyson’s satire Our Hero, Balthazar will screen privately for buyers ahead of its Tribeca slot and follows a wealthy New York teenager who posts on social media calling for stricter gun control in the hopes that his activist-minded crush will notice. When an online troll comments on his video and messages Balthazar, he becomes convinced that he is communicating with...

Succession star Alan Ruck has officially joined the cast of a new horror-thriller from director Aaron Fisher.

Per Variety, Ruck joins Rosanna Arquette (Pulp Fiction) and Ashton Sanders (The Equalizer 2) in the new horror flick, Corporate Retreat. Written by Fisher and Kerri Lee Romeo, the horror-thriller follows "a group of corporate employees at a tech company whose team-bonding retreat devolves into a bloody fight to survive the tests of a vengeful executive." Corporate Retreat will serve as Fisher's second feature directorial effort following his 2019 film, Inside the Rain. The film is produced by Uri Singer, who is best known for films such as White Noise and Tesla.

In an official statement, Singer praised Ruck's ability to perform comedy and drama, which he believes makes him a perfect fit for Corporate Retreat. "We’re thrilled to welcome Alan to the team," Singer said. "His unique ability to seamlessly blend comedy and drama is truly exceptional.

Exclusive: Qasim Basir’s Sundance Film Festival feature To Live and Die and Live is getting a theatrical release on May 16 in AMC multiplexes from AuthentiQ Films & CinemaStreet Pictures.

Samuel Goldwyn Films picked up digital rights to the movie, which will land in the home later this year.

Basir’s feature, and ode to Detroit, was lauded by top critics at its Sundance Film Festival debut in 2023 with 89% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes. Hollywood filmmaker Muhammad returns to his home city (Amin Joseph) to bury his stepfather and settle his accounts. But as he is thrust into old and new relationships his struggles with addiction and loss may finish him before he finishes the task.

The pic also stars Skye P. Marshall, Omari Hardwick, Cory Hardrict, Maryam Basir and Dana Gourrier. To Live and Die and Live is a AuthentiQ Films, Significant Productions, CinemaStreet Pictures and Confluential Films production. Producers are Nina Yang Bongiovi,...

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Hulu has been offering entertainment for the masses since it joined the streaming wars in March 2008. Like many streaming services, the platform aims to be a one-stop shop for people looking for nostalgic favorites and new content that they can watch on demand. It even offered the Academy Awards streamed live in 2025, which unfortunately turned into an embarrassing failure. 

However, Hulu still continues to strive in its mission of offering the best content possible, and that includes several Hulu Original series that stand out in the very crowded streaming landscape. This catalog contains a wide range of genres offering something for everyone, and there also plenty of genre mashups that create fresh, intriguing content that stand out from the rest. 

But choosing what to watch is never easy when you have such a large library to browse. That's why we've...

Welcome to the Gold Ticket, your VIP guide to the best of award-worthy pop culture for the weekend ahead, curated by the Gold Derby team of experts. (April 4 - April 6)

The main stream

Michelle Williams is Dying for Sex.

The Academy Award nominee and Emmy winner for Best Limited/TV Movie Actress for her work in Fosse/Verdon stars in the new FX limited series, which is adapted from the Wondery podcast of the same name. The eight-episode series (now streaming on Hulu) is inspired by the true story of Molly Kochan, who, after discovering that her cancer returned and is incurable, leaves her husband (portrayed on the show by Jay Duplass) to explore her sexuality with the time she has left. Deftly balancing comedy with frequently grim subject matter, the surprisingly raunchy series — which also stars Jenny Slate as Molly's best friend with whom she embarks on her new...

“The Actor” (2025) feels like a Charlie Kaufman script directed by Damien Chazelle. It is bittersweet, charming, and immersive like a Chazelle film that lingers in your mind long after, but it follows a dreamlike logic and revels in its inherent absurdity like a Kaufman script. Somehow, their distinct styles coalesce in Duke Johnson’s surrealistic mystery film to offer a captivating confusion. It constantly puts its protagonist, Paul Cole (André Holland), at odds with himself. After waking up from an accident, he learns that he was beaten up for sleeping with a married woman. He loses most of his memories.

The husband shows no mercy to this man and throws him out. Suddenly, he finds himself stranded in a small town with no one to call his own. He enters with no recollection of the life he had led till then. He only vaguely recalls someone calling him ‘an actor’ in the hospital.

For the last five years, a cinematic adaptation of Andy Weir’s novel Project Hail Mary has been in the works. The production has hit several roadbumps on its way from page to screen, but tonight, audiences at CinemaCon were the lucky ones to be the first to feast their eyes on footage of the Ryan Gosling (Barbie)-led film. It’s been a long road, but the dynamite team led by co-directors and producers, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, have seemingly nailed the project, which was adapted for the screen by Buffy the Vampire Slayer writer and High Potentialcreator, Drew Goddard.

Here’s what we saw.

Ryan Gosling is a brainy elementary teacher who has the answers that the professionals need in the trailer for Project Hail Mary. The government recruits the teacher to help with Project Hail Mary, as the sun — and many other stars — are beginning to die.

In the surreal and Kafka-esque drama, “The Actor,” starring André Holland (“Moonlight”)and Gemma Chan (“Crazy Rich Asians”), New York-based theater actor Paul Cole (Holland) is wrapping up an out-of-town engagement when a casual adultery has a disastrous consequence. Helmed by filmmaker Duke Johnson, known for co-directing “Anomalisa” with Charlie Kaufman (“Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind”), in the film, Cole can’t remember who he was, where he lives, or even, for a time, what he does.

Continue reading ‘The Actor’: André Holland & Gemma Chan Talk The Joys Of Working On Duke Johnson’s Surreal Identity Drama at The Playlist.

Anna Wintour announced today that the fourth annual Vogue World will take place in Hollywood on October 26 at the Paramount Pictures Studio Lot. Celebrating the “conversation between film and fashion,” 100% of the ticket proceeds will go to the Entertainment Community fund, with a focus on supporting costuming professionals impacted by the Los Angeles wildfires.

“Vogue World: Hollywood will be a one-night-only show with a huge cast of models and actors, dancers, musicians and surprises, and it will set great film costumes next to brilliant fashion collections,” said Wintour. “By mixing fashion with the arts and culture in the center of a city, and by raising funds for a cause, Vogue World has become a runway show-as-rallying cry, a way to fix the attention of a huge global audience, to bring awareness, and sound an unmistakable note of positivity, creativity, and hope.”

This year’s event will feature contributions from costume...

The 2025 Sffilm Festival lineup is finally here!

The Sffilm Festival will take place April 17 to 27 in theaters across San Franciscoʼs Marina and Presidio neighborhoods, the Mission, and in Berkeley. The festival lineup includes over 150 films from more than 50 countries including 11 World Premieres, 10 International Premieres, 10 North American Premieres, and six US Premieres. All feature films in competition, special events, and Marquee sections are California premieres. There are also 11 Sffilm Supported titles which are projects that received support from the organizationʼs youth education and artist development programs as grants, residencies, or funding, reflecting the year round mission of Sffilm. This is the largest-ever showcase of Sffilm Supported projects ever in the festival.

“I am over the moon that we are back with 11 days of screenings, special Tributes, Awards, free talks, our annual Industry Days Conference, parties, city tours, and much more. It has been a delight to curate over 150 films for this...

When Duke Johnson was making the Oscar-nominated animated feature “Anomalisa” with Charlie Kaufman, Kaufman suggested Johnson read “Memory,” a lost Donald Westlake novel that had recently been published. (Kaufman had heard about its resurrection on NPR.) The novel, about a man named Paul Cole, who finds himself stranded in a small town with a head injury after being attacked by the jealous husband of Paul’s lover, had been completed in 1963 and shopped around by Westlake, with no takers. An attempt was made in the 1970s to shop it around again but Westlake, one of the great American crime fiction writers, declined. After his death in 2008, it was finally published by Hard Case Crime two years later.

“[Kaufman] was telling me that he really liked it, because what was interesting about it is that it’s by this famous crime novelist and that it was in the guise of a noir thriller,...

Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

Anora (Sean Baker)

Sean Baker’s Anora expands his filmmaking vision, pushing the writer-director-editor’s fifth consecutive story on sex workers into a higher plane of awards and commercial success. It’s a romantic comedy, a madcap dash around New York City, a movie ruminating on loss, love, and class disparity. Baker aims to put audiences through a ringer of emotional swings, ending with a desolation that’s been building in the background, easier to spot once the tinsel’s shimmer fades. With a true star-making performance from Mikey Madison and a deep bench of supporting actors, Anora whirls until suddenly it doesn’t, and all that’s left is earned, resonant silence from both its characters and audience. – Michael F.

Where...

Director Duke Johnson‘s new film “The Actor” creates a unique bond between its lead character and the audience, using a variety of subjective techniques to convey the title character’s perspective to the viewer. From repurposing sets and actors playing multiple roles to various aural and visual motifs that all contribute to a sense of disorientation and déjà vu, the movie is filled with moments that allow the audience to intimately share the protagonist’s experience.

As an actor struggling to figure out who he is and where he belongs after an accident leaves him with amnesia, André Holland is so perfect for the part that it’s difficult to imagine the movie without him. But Johnson initially spent a lot of time working with another actor — one whose discussions with the director ended up dramatically influencing the shape of the script.

“The original script found its way to Ryan Gosling,...

The Dutchman Photo: South by Southwest

In his narrative feature directorial début, Andre Gaines adapts playwright Amiri Baraka's 1964 one-act play, The Dutchman. Set on the New York City subway, the psychological thriller revolves around Clay (André Holland), a troubled Black businessman who has a chance encounter with the mysterious white stranger Lula (Kate Mara). Meanwhile, Clay and his wife, Kaya's (Zazie Beatz) therapist, Dr Amiri (Stephen Mckinley Henderson), inexplicably appears to him outside of their counselling sessions.

Clay's chance encounter with Lula appears to be a dangerous omen that threatens to unravel his life completely. To escape this encounter, he must answer deeper questions that have led him to this moment.

Gaines' previous credits include his 2021 feature documentary début, The One And Only Dick Gregory, and 2022's, After Jackie. From looking back to the famous American comedian, Gaines's focus shifted to the struggle for racial equality in Major League Baseball,...

For cinematographer Joe Passarelli, it was a smooth transition going from the stop-motion “Anomalisa” (2015) to the live-action “The Actor” with director Duke Johnson. That’s because both films are formally bold, mind-bending tales about the search for identity.

“Anomalisa” explores Fregoli syndrome, where people appear as the same person in disguise, by marrying distinctive stop-motion designs with stylized action; “The Actor,” by contrast, tackles a variation of amnesia, where people appear as a troupe of actors playing multiple roles, with more dream-like theatricality.

Based on Donald E. Westlake’s surreal novel, “Memory,” Johnson’s newest film focuses on André Holland as a man who suffers from both long-term and short-term memory loss; he’s trying to get back to New York from a ’50s Midwestern town, but his only anchor in a shifting reality is the woman he befriends played by Gemma Chan. Holland’s continually refreshing blank slate is...

When director Duke Johnson sat down and watched Federico Fellini’s 1954 classic “La Strada,” he was immediately drawn to the iconic clown costume worn by Giulietta Masina. Now in his newest film, “The Actor,” a similar outfit is adorned by Edna (Gemma Chan) while out on an intimate date with Paul (André Holland).

“It’s these two people that feel like maybe they don’t fit into the world,” Johnson tells Variety. “With these two oddballs finding each other, the possibility of connection was the driving force. They’ve really hit it off.”

The moment takes place on Halloween night when Paul, still trying to piece together who he is after waking up with amnesia, goes out with Edna after the two meet at the cinema. Despite it being Halloween, you’d hardly be able to tell by looking at the men’s synonymous coats, making Edna’s hand-stitched blue clown costume immediately stand out.

André Holland is a busy man. His recent TV series The Big Cigar and Terminator Zero were great, and his new film The Actor is a personal favorite, a film noir masterpiece. He is also starring in this year's The Dutchman, Once Again... (Statues Never Die), and Love, Brooklyn, along with the film The Revisionist, which stars Holland alongside Dustin Hoffman, Alison Brie, and Tom Sturridge. Like The Actor, The Revisionist deals with the blurring of lines between art and life, truth and fiction, identity and performance; Holland plays the titular actor in The Actor and a writer in The Revisionist. Though, as Holland told MovieWeb in a recent interview, the two films are different in many ways.

"It's completely different, and it's still very much [happening]," said Holland (who is also currently attending Harvard Divinity School). "We just finished maybe six weeks ago, something like that, or maybe two months.

Gemma Chan and Channing Tatum are starring in a new movie called Josephine, and it seems like a doozy. Chan, who recently spoke with MovieWeb about her hypnotic noir mystery The Actor, opened up about the filmmaking experience behind Josephine. "I'm not actually sure what I'm allowed to say about it. We have finished filming it. We filmed it in San Francisco. It was such an incredible experience," said Chan, who added:

"Beth de Araújo, the director, this is loosely based off something that happened in her childhood, so we were all aware of our responsibility to doing justice to something that was a story that's very personal to her and her family. Channing was incredible. We had an amazing young girl called Mason who plays Josephine. I'm really excited. I haven't seen the film yet, I think they're still just finishing up the edit. So I'm excited to hopefully get to see it soon,...

The 2025 SXSW Film & TV Festival kicked off Friday, March 7 in Austin with world and North American premieres of movies in 11 sections, TV shows in three sections and several short film and virtual reality programs.

This year’s festival launched with opening-night film Another Simple Favor reteaming Paul Feig, Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick, with other notable world premiere titles including Chad Hartigan’s The Threesome, Kate Mara‘s two entries The Astronaut and The Dutchman (the latter also starring André Holland), the Ben Affleck-Jon Bernthal sequel The Accountant 2, the Nicole Kidman-starring Holland and Death of a Unicorn starring Paul Rudd and Jenna Ortega.

Check out Deadline’s reviews recaps below as films premiere at the fest, which runs through March 15, and click on the titles for the full reviews.

The Accountant 2 ‘The Accountant 2’

Section: Headliner

Director: Gavin O’Connor

Cast: Ben Affleck, Jon Bernthal, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Daniella Pineda,...

André Holland continues his streak as one of the sharpest dramatic actors working today — and I’m not just talking about “Moonlight,” have you seen TV’s “The Knick”? — as a New York businessman in marital freefall in Andre Gaines’ “The Dutchman.” Gaines and co-writer Qasim Basir lift Amiri Baraka’s classic 1964 play out of its midcentury Civil Rights Movement context and transplant the text to present-day Manhattan, where Clay (Holland) is going mad over his wife Kaya’s (Zazie Beetz) recent admission of an infidelity.

So launches a dark night of the soul through the city that echoes “Eyes Wide Shut” — in which mysterious women also tempt a spiraling Tom Cruise over an evening after Nicole Kidman confesses to extramarital thoughts — and even “After Hours” with its magical realism and deus-ex-machina moments of utter (and intentional) absurdity. But Clay’s psychosexual and personal freefall does not land him at...

André Holland is on a roll with three new films, ‘The Last Supper’ tests the faith-based market, hot Vietnamese director Tran Thanh is back, and documentary October 8 examines the explosion of antisemitism after the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

A handful of big indies are out with wide releases from Focus Features (Black Bag) to A24 (Opus) to Falling Forward Films and Ketchup Entertainment (Looney Tunes: The Day The Earth Blew Up).

Neon, the indie distributor of the moment, is out with mystery-thriller The Actor, André Holland’s third leading role this year after Sundance-premiering Love, Brooklyn by Rachael Abigail Holder, which Holland also produced, and The Dutchman, by Andre Gaines, which just debuted at SXSW. The Actor opens in NYC at the Angelika, Holland doing Q&As, at The Grove in LA and top 10 markets – 20+ screens in all.

Based on the novel Memory by Donald E. Westlake, the film,...

The Actor is a true film experience — artistically and intellectually gripping, or confusing and boring, depending on the audience. Its superb lead performance, production design, and poetically philosophical approach will be eagerly imbibed by some viewers who will be quick to call The Actor a masterpiece, while most mainstream audiences will be left restless by its odd pacing and lack of romantic chemistry. Your reaction to the film utterly depends upon your cinematic proclivities. The arthouse crowd will surely gush while the Average Joe may want to steer clear. If you're somewhere in between the two, summon an adventurous spirit and rush to see the film before it disappears from theaters all-too-soon.

Initially set in 1950s Ohio, an actor (André Holland) wakes up in a small town's hospital after being attacked for a dalliance with a married woman. He has no memory of the violent incident or his life before.

After co-directing 2015’s Anomalisa with Charlie Kaufman, Duke Johnson’s solo follow-up is an adaptation of the Donald E. Westlake’s novel Memory. Paul Cole (André Holland) is the eponymous actor––or so people tell him is his occupation after he wakes up in small-town Ohio with a mysterious head injury and zero memories. There’s a beautiful woman, Edna (Gemma Chan), and a small cast of characters who may or may not have Paul’s best interests at heart. It’s a classic noir setup, but Johnson is less interested in doling out narrative breadcrumbs that build into a perfectly interlocking narrative so that audiences can solve a central mystery––instead he centers us firmly within the headspace of Paul, prioritizing larger philosophical questions about identity along with a budding romance between Paul and Edna. Johnson was transfixed watching Chan deliver a monologue about lost love in Steven Soderbergh...

Duke Johnson ('Anomalisa') discusses his mysterious, moody masterpiece with André Holland and Gemma Chan, the book it's based on, and how Ryan Gosling is involved. 'The Actor' is in theaters March 14 from Neon.

When New York actor Paul Cole is beaten and left for dead in 1950s Ohio, he loses his memory and finds himself stranded in a mysterious small town where he struggles to get back home and reclaim what he's lost.

André Holland & Gemma Chan discuss their remarkably unique new film 'The Actor,' written and directed by Duke Johnson ('Anomalisa'). The pair discuss the liberation and challenge of filming in such a surreal, allegorical world, discuss their theories of the mysterious film, and touch on future projects such as 'Josephine' with Channing Tatum and 'The Revisionist' with Dustin Hoffman. See 'The Actor' in theaters starting March 14, 2025, from Neon.

Based on the novel 'Memory' by Donald E. Westlake, 'The Actor' finds Paul Cole (André Holland) stranded in a mysterious small town with no memory of who he is or how he got here. Without a sense of identity or purpose, he starts from scratch and begins courting a local costume designer Edna (Chan). As bits and pieces of his past slowly emerge, he attempts to find his way home, but time is slippery,...

One of the great pleasures of director Duke Johnson‘s haunting and beautiful new film “The Actor” is, appropriately enough given the film’s title, the abundance of terrific performances. André Holland anchors the movie as the title character, an actor struggling to figure out who he is and where he belongs after an accident leaves him with amnesia. He’s surrounded by a gallery of equally fascinating supporting players — most of whom play multiple characters, with the actors often unrecognizable under layers of elaborate hair and makeup.

For Johnson, the decision to create a troupe of actors who would play different characters throughout was both practical and philosophical. “There are the limitations of shooting in Europe and getting your actors,” Johnson told IndieWire on an upcoming episode of the Filmmaker Toolkit podcast, noting that getting a huge cast to Budapest for production would have been prohibitively expensive — once he...

For as much light as The Actor is bathed in, it’s equally shrouded in darkness. Duke Johnson’s solo directorial debut is a film of bleary sun and swallowing night and almost nothing in-between. It wouldn’t make sense to depict the in-between. That would be realistic, and The Actor is anything but real.

Jubilant strings swell over vintage opening credits as we peer at the peaks of skyscrapers in a still, top-of-the-cityscape shot not too dissimilar from the angle we get on Saffron City in the original Super Smash Bros. The twinkling black-and-white image has a glowy 1950s TV-hour charm, the text surrounded by mid-century atomic sparkle logos (see: poster). It transitions neatly into the doomy film noir scene we open on––the inciting incident.

In a motel room, mid-womanizing, our pitiable protagonist (a terrific André Holland) gets his comeuppance: a chair to the face. As it so happens,...

Based on the novel “Memory” by Donald E. Westlake, “The Actor,” a Kafka-esque crime-noir fantasy about identity and memory, is the latest directorial effort by filmmaker Duke Johnson, known for his work in animation and co-directing “Anomalisa” with screenwriter/director Charlie Kaufman (“Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind”).

But as Johnson reminds you, you’re more than just your IMDb page, and while “The Actor” is his feature-length live-action directorial debut, the filmmaker went to film school, directed his fair share of shorts, and learned his live-action chops in college.

Continue reading Director Duke Johnson Talks ‘The Actor,’ Learning From Charlie Kaufman & André Holland As Collaborator For Life [Exclusive] at The Playlist.

Of all the things we forget in life, dreams may be the most frequent. No matter how much you journal or try to find ways to cling to these subconscious fragments, they always seem to slip away as we re-enter the waking world. It’s then interesting that, for all the ways it populates the films we conjure up, only rarely does cinema truly capture a sense of this half-remembered dreaming. Too often, it’s made overly literal and less hazy even as this is what defines so much of our lives. However, this makes the works that successfully tap into this all the more special to dream with.

“The Actor” is one such film. A captivating portrait of a man who can’t seem to remember who he is and may not ever be able to, Duke Johnson’s live-action feature debut is an enrapturing film that speaks in...