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‘Watson’ Screening At Monte Carlo TV Festival

CBS’s Morris Chestnut sleuth series Watson will get its French premiere at the Monte Carlo Television Festival on Friday, June 13, at the Grimaldo Forum Monaco. The “medical series with an investigative spine” is set six months after the death of the titular Dr John Watson’s friend, Sherlock Holmes, at the hands of Moriarty. He resumes life as a head of a clinic dedicated to treating rare disorders, though Moriarty isn’t done with him yet. CBS Studios is making the show, with Paramount Global Content Distribution shopping it globally. Elsewhere at the Monte Carlo TV Festival, American actress Jaz Sinclair will receive the Golden Nymph for Most Promising Talent. Sinclair currently stars in Prime Video superhero drama The Boys and is known for roles in Netflix’s supernatural series The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina and films such as Paper Towns and When the Bough Breaks,...

HBO's "The Last of Us" is back, and the show's second season (read /Film's review) not only brings a time jump but also a whole host of new characters along with it. The best of the bunch so far is undeniably Dina (Isabela Merced), Ellie's (Bella Ramsey) best friend and partner in crime at the Jackson, Wyoming settlement she and Joel (Pedro Pascal) now call home. Other new Jackson residents include the young community leader Jesse (Young Manzino) and the sharp-edged therapist Gail (Catherine O'Hara).

Interestingly, though, season 2 doesn't open with a spotlight on its heroes. Instead, the season premiere focuses heavily on a pack of young people who feel they've been wronged by Joel and are out for blood. Among them? Kaitlyn Dever's Abby, Tati Gabrielle's Nora, Ariela Barer's Mel, Danny Ramirez's Manny, and Owen (more on the actor who plays him momentarily). The latter...

Quick Links The Strange 'Sport' Documented in Tickled A Sudden Confrontation at the LA Screening The Tickling Never Stopped After the Documentary

In April 2014, David Farrier, an off-beat reporter for New Zealands TV3 news channel, was sent a link by one of his friends to a Facebook page containing many strange videos. Deemed as a sport, competitive endurance tickling saw young, fit men become chained and you guessed it go through rounds and rounds of tickling by other young males.

After receiving a shocking and rude denial from Jane OBrien Media for an interview (the alleged producer of these scandalous clips), Farrier requests the help of fellow television producer Dylan Reeve to find out who or what is truly behind this growing phenomenon. Both filmmakers started to learn that the rabbit hole is much deeper than they first thought, and this investigative saga turned into a full-blown and surprisingly hard-hitting...

For me, the best documentaries plunge the audience into a subculture we don't know anything about and immerse us in that world for a couple of hours. For one of the most extreme versions of this, check out David Farrier's "Tickled." But Jeff Zimbalist's newest film, "Skywalkers: A Love Story," debuted at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year and is another great example of a doc that accomplishes that goal, and it's extreme in a totally different way. This film utilizes jaw-dropping footage of two Russian "rooftoppers" named Angela Nikolau and Ivan "Vanya" Beerkus as they illegally break into skyscrapers and other ludicrously tall buildings, find their way onto the roof or towering construction cranes, and pose for photos and videos, racking up tons of social media clout in the process. Along the way, the duo, who were once rivals in the rooftopping scene, strike up a relationship and fall in love,...

We’re delighted to exclusively announce that Grasshopper Film has acquired the digital and non-theatrical North American distribution rights to I’m “George Lucas”: A Connor Ratliff Story, which World Premiered at Slamdance earlier this year and had a successful limited theatrical run nationwide with Alamo Drafthouse Cinemas this past spring. The documentary has its PVOD premiere starting today, available for rental or purchase, followed by a Tvod release on major platforms. The film tracks comedian Connor Ratliff while he performs as renowned filmmaker George Lucas in the New York cult comedy show “The George Lucas Talk Show,” and as he begins to question the need for its continuation and his own drive for success and fulfillment in show business.

The documentary is directed by first-time filmmaker Ryan Jacobi and stars Connor Ratliff, Griffin Newman, and Patrick Cotnoir (The Chris Gethard Show), and is produced by Annamaria Sofillas, Jacobi,...

Picture: Voltage Pictures

It’s been a busy week for new Netflix releases so far, and below, we’ll recap all the new arrivals and highlight a few we think you should be watching right now. We’ll also take a look into what’s currently trending in the Netflix top 10 charts for January 11th, 2024.

Want to see what’s still lined up for the rest of January 2024? We’ve just updated the list of upcoming titles here, and it now includes a bunch more licensed movies scheduled for next week, such as the Kiera Knightley movie: Silent Night.

We should also note that Netflix re-added its lineup of Nike sports training videos, which departed at the beginning of the month. Our understanding is that they’re on a short-term relicense, but hopefully, we’ll know more soon.

Best New Movies and Series on Netflix for January 11th, 2024 After Everything...

One-half of Barbenheimer has been available on digital platforms for weeks, and now the equation is complete. Releasing the other half on a long holiday weekend is a smart strategy because it restores momentum as a deluge of fall prestige titles premiere in theaters and online.

The contender to watch this week: “Oppenheimer“

At long last, Oppy has come home. Christopher Nolan‘s colossal biopic about atomic-bomb daddy J. Robert Oppenheimer is available on VOD, right in time for an Oscar contest that’s fully aflame. The blockbuster’s likely nominations include Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Cillian Murphy), Best Supporting Actor (Robert Downey Jr.), Best Score (Ludwig Göransson), and Best Sound. Gather the whole family for three hours of thrilling post-turkey physics.

Other contenders:

“Joan Baez: I Am a Noise”: The pop documentaries that flood streaming services today are often undercooked PR exercises without enough critical distance from their subjects,...

In 1944, George Cukor unknowingly coined a popular term in his thriller Gaslight. In the film, audiences watch as Ingrid Bergman’s Paula is made to feel like she’s losing her mind by her beau, Gregory (Charles Boyer), who has sinister intentions. This crazy-making type of mental manipulation has come to be known in the English vernacular as “gaslighting” and has picked up steam over the last 20 years. In David Farrier’s Mister Organ, audiences get a clear look at what a gaslighter is and how they operate. During an interview with Collider’s Maggie Boccella, following a screening at the Overlook Film Festival, Farrier broke down not just his hopes on how the movie will affect others, but how showing it to audiences made him feel less alone.

When a filmmaker dives into a new project, at least a piece of it becomes an all-encompassing force in their lives. This could easily be said double-time for those backing documentaries as many of those directors will fully immerse themselves in the story and lives that they’re following. In his most recent project, Mister Organ, Dark Tourist host and Tickled helmer David Farrier was put into perhaps his most dangerous situation yet as he found himself in a cat-and-mouse game with the subject of his film. In an interview with Collider’s Maggie Boccella, Farrier spoke about his experiences stepping in front of the camera and why he’s ready to solely sit in the director’s chair.

Filmmaker and host David Farrier is no stranger to the long process of editing. The documentarian has had plenty of experience slicing up his work through projects including 2016’s Tickled and his Netflix series Dark Tourist. But, the director’s latest undertaking, Mister Organ, was a horse of a different color. Working on this production wasn’t in any way similar to what he’d done in the past, as it required him to fully engulf himself in the world of a con artist, master manipulator, and gaslighter. Because of this, when the cameras cut and Farrier and his team were happy with what they had, cutting up Mister Organ into a digestible 90-minute documentary was complicated. In an interview with Collider’s Maggie Boccella, Farrier explains the struggles he went through to form the story and how he chose what to keep in.

David Farrier loves a bizarre story. He’s got a knack for digging up the weird and the morbid, things no one’s thought to explore before — or never had the guts to. His directorial debut as a documentarian, Tickled, took a strange dive into the world of competitive tickling, which unearthed a dark secret living just below the surface, and his newest feature, Mister Organ, does just the same, bringing back his unique ability to discover disturbing stories that resonate in all the most unsettling ways.

David Farrier’s been on the cutting edge of bizarre documentaries for years. He’s made a name for himself telling off-beat stories as a journalist, and his directorial debut, Tickled, is what got me seriously interested in documentary filmmaking back in high school, going beyond the kinds of straightforward storytelling I’d seen in educational videos at school and peeling back the most bizarre layers of society. He unearths the strangest parts of our world, honing in on hyper-specific topics to tell tales of greed, narcissism, and the truly bizarre, with a knack for narration and featuring himself in his stories that make things all the more compelling — and in some cases, terrifying.

Tickled director David Farrier started investigating the man clamping cars in his neighborhood, and ended up in a toxic film-maker-subject relationship

It’s been 10 years since David Farrier, a New Zealand journalist and documentarian, first heard about his neighborhood car menace. In 2013, a co-worker tearfully reported that she accidentally parked her car in the lot for a store called Bashford Antiques, in the Auckland neighborhood of Ponsonby (which Farrier describes as “the Beverly Hills of Auckland”), only to return to a tow truck with a pugilistic operator and a steep ransom. After hours of negotiation, she paid $250 for her car.

At the time, there was no cap on the amount one could demand for a car parked on private property, and the people at Bashford Antiques were especially enthusiastic exploiters. Clamping – in which someone arrests the wheels of an easily misparked car for a ransom of hundreds of dollars – became...

"He's a very dangerous man." Drafthouse Films has revealed a new US trailer for a wacky weird, strange documentary film titled Mister Organ, the latest from New Zealand journalist / director David Farrier. This premiered at last year's Fantastic Fest in Austin and we featured the original trailer back then. Some will remember Farrier's previous doc film Tickled, another deep dive into a strange and unexplainable world of tickling, which he followed up with the "Dark Tourist" series. In this new doc, Farrier is drawn into a game of cat and mouse with a mysterious individual - a man creating havoc in his own neighborhood, wheel clamping cars at a local antique store. Delving deeper he unearths a trail of court cases, royal bloodlines and ruined lives, in this true story of psychological warfare. Who is this guy?! What a wacko. I am such a huge fan of David Farrier! Reviews...

David Farrier is a filmmaker who has already found himself discovering more than he expected with his breakout hit documentary, “Tickled,” which dove deep into the incredibly strange and shocking world of competitive tickling. However, he seems to have inadvertently stumbled into another twisty story with his upcoming doc, “Mister Organ.”

Read More: ‘Mister Organ’ Review: David Farrier Bites Off More Than He Can Chew In Excellent New Doc [Fantastic Fest]

As seen in the new trailer for the film, “Mister Organ” begins as an investigative documentary about a business in Farrier’s neighborhood with a number of questions.

Continue reading ‘Mister Organ’ Trailer: The Director Of ‘Tickled’ Returns With Another Shocking Doc at The Playlist.

David Farrier's documentary, Mister Organ, opens in theaters on October 6th in NY and LA. It will expand nationwide across the U.S. and Canada from October 13th. The doc's distributor, Drafthouse Films, has released a new trailer for the U.S. release. Check it out down below.    Intrepid journalist and filmmaker David Farrier, whose previous film Tickled became a global sensation for exposing the dark underbelly of competitive endurance tickling, faces off against his greatest foe yet in Mister Organ, an enthralling and bizarre tale that finds Farrier in a dangerous game of cat and mouse with a mysterious con man who is wreaking havoc on his neighborhood.   Our own Kurt caught Mister Organ when the doc played at Calgary Undergound earlier this year....

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

Drafthouse Films has acquired three films that it will release theatrically in U.S. theaters followed by digital releases across major streaming platforms.

They include “Mister Organ,” a documentary from journalist and filmmaker David Farrier, whose 2016 film “Tickled” explored the dark underbelly of “competitive endurance tickling,” will be released in theaters this fall. As he turns his camera on another stranger than fiction story, Farrier finds himself caught in an increasingly dangerous game of cat and mouse with a mysterious character who expertly manipulates the lives of anyone who dares to expose his secrets. The film, Produced by Ant Timpson and Firefly Films’ Emma Slade and Alex Reed, was a critical and audience favorite at Fantastic Fest 2022, and has become a box office hit in Farrier’s native New Zealand.

“I am incredibly happy to be working with Drafthouse Films,” said Farrier “Watching this funny, disturbing, and deeply weird documentary...

David Farrier does not like bullies. He cannot abide liars. And I dare guess that he is not a fan of litigious revenge either. The New Zealand journalist turned filmmaker has a particular knack for sussing out the strange people who embody a combination of all three of these things. He meticulously, and beguilingly, gives shadowy bullies the full investigative treatment. I felt that his previous documentary, Tickled, about the doxxing, exploitive groomer David D'Amato, a man of inherited wealth behind an international "Competitive Tickling League," was a once-in-a-lifetime sinister rabbit hole to fall into. Mister Organ proves that lightning can strike the same place twice. And that place happens to be where David Farrier is sitting. After writing a series of pieces on the...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

Daily Dead is proud to return as one of the sponsors for this year's Overlook Film Festival, taking place March 30th–April 2nd in New Orleans, and following their initial lineup announcement last month, Overlook has now announced their full schedule for their 2023 edition that's brimming with must-see screenings, eerie events, and immersive experiences, including a 40th anniversary screening of David Cronenberg's adaptation of Stephen King's The Dead Zone and a special introduction of William Castle's The Tingler from ​​David Dastmalchian's TV horror host persona, Dr. Bartholomew Fearless!

We have the official press release with additional details below, and be sure to visit Overlook Film Festival's official website for more information!

Press Release: March 14, 2023 | New Orleans, LA – The Overlook Film Festival released today the full schedule for its upcoming 2023 edition, taking place March 30 – April 2 in America’s most haunted city, New Orleans, LA. The festival schedule is now live at overlookfilmfest.

David Farrier’s documentaries often land somewhere between small-town Louis Theroux, and balls-to-the-wall David Fincher. Disarming, honest, human, but as tense as any straight-up serial killer thriller from the past three decades. They go well beyond the usual Netflix true crime slush pile in just how numbingly straight Farrier plays them too, casting a naive-leaning, charmingly candid version of himself in the lead. An investigative journalist who’s fallen down a rabbit hole so deep and bizarre, the only way out is with a camera. And a prestigious festival tour.

His subjects aren’t exactly baby-eating monsters either. Although his latest, a slightly rambunctious car clamper called either Michael Organ or Count Micheal Organe, depending on what side of the bed he wakes up on on that day, lands as just as threatening.

Farrier’s first feature since his 2016 breakout Tickled, Mister Organ is just about as messy and inconclusive as its subject.

He has made dubious claims to be a lawyer. Sometimes he claims to be a count. He once took extraordinary action in a court of law in an attempt to prove to the judge that he was a prince. International man of mystery, would-be yacht thief and, um, parking attendant, Mister Organ – who goes by many similar names – might not be taken very seriously elsewhere in the world, but in small town New Zealand/Aotearoa, he makes a big impression.

The work of journalist David Farrier, who became intrigued by Organ when he was implicated in a wheel clamping scam, and later fell foul of his litigious nature, this documentary attempts to get to the bottom of just who this man really is. It begins at Bashford Antiques, a quiet little store whose owner, the glamorously attired Jillian Bashford, is getting frustrated by people who keep parking in the private.

Sara Dosa, India’s Shaunak Sen and Canada’s Daniel Roher, directors of three documentaries which recently picked up Academy Award nominations, are set as speakers at the upcoming Australian International Documentary Conference.

The Aidc this week announced the full program for its 2023 event which will place in person in Melbourne March 5-8, with an online only international marketplace March 9 -11.

Dosa is the director of “Fire of Love,” Sen director of “All That Breathes” and Roher director of “Navalny.”

Other notable speakers include New Zealand’s David Farrier (“Dark Tourist”), acclaimed Aboriginal filmmaker Dean Gibson, (“Incarceration Nation”) and Australian filmmaker Emma Sullivan ( “Into The Deep”).

With Agents of Change as its unifying theme, the conference will host over 40 sessions, 120 speakers and more than 100 key decision makers from major broadcasters, streamers, distributors and sales agents.

On the business front, Aidc will see an extensive line-up from global streamers in attendance,...

"This story is as accurate as it is unbelievable." Peacock has revealed the first trailer for a very curious, mysterious, bizarre new series titled Paul T. Goldman. Apparently this has been in the works for 10 years, one of the latest creations from Borat Subsequent Moviefilm director Jason Woliner. "It'll make sense when you watch it," he says. This trailer gives us a hint at what's going on: Goldman seems to have been swindled into marrying a woman who then started taking his money, leading him to get caught in mafia shenanigans. Or maybe none of that is true? It's "a project that mixes fact and fiction to tell a bizarre and incredible tale." Paul T. Goldman seems to be a real person, but he also might be made up, too? This trailer also shows off a bunch of actors who are involved in the recreations, including Dennis Haysbert and Rosanna Arquette.

“Lord of the Rings” star Elijah Wood is to return to New Zealand in the leading role of “Bookworm,” a family adventure-comedy to be directed by Ant Timpson. The project is being launched next week at the American Film Market by sales agent Mister Smith Entertainment.

The film’s story sees 12-year-old Mildred’s life turned upside down when her mother lands in hospital and estranged, American magician father, Strawn Wise (Wood), comes to look after her. Hoping to entertain the bookish tween, Strawn takes Mildred camping in the notoriously rugged New Zealand wilderness. There the pair embark on the ultimate test of family bonding – a quest to find the mythological beast known as the Canterbury Panther.

Considering that Mildred has read every book on camping, but never been into the wilds, and that Strawn is more at home on the Las Vegas strip than in the Southern Alps, the potential for mishap is significant.

Evil Eye is a creepy tale that blends modern horror with classic folktales. When her sister Luna’s (Ivana Sofia Ferro) illness takes a turn for the worse, Nala's (Paula Miguel) parents decide on a last resort strategy and take the family out to the countryside to stay with their estranged grandmother. Nala’s mother Rebecca (Samantha Castillo) has kept her relationship with her mother somewhat mysterious. This is the first time the girls and their father are meeting the woman.

As the parents take off to investigate treatment options, they leave the girls in the care of Grandmother Josefa (Ofelia Medina). Luna largely seems fine with it. As a younger child, she is fairly easy to please and there is plenty of nature to explore on the grounds of the large home. Nala, on the other hand, immediately hates it. No wifi, no friends, nothing to do. Added...

When journalist and documentarian David Farrier grows restless, he must wish for the cosmos to deliver him a story in his niche: kooky, off-radar, and with a forbidding underbelly. And when David Farrier makes a wish, a monkey paw on the other side of the world twitches. Farrier took a pivot from entertainment reporting in 2016 with his debut film, “Tickled,” falling through the looking glass into a shadowy world of legal threats and defamation.

Continue reading ‘Mister Organ’ Review: David Farrier Bites Off More Than He Can Chew In Excellent New Doc [Fantastic Fest] at The Playlist.

Who is Michael Organ? He's royalty. He's a lawyer. He's a genius; the smartest guy in any room. At least, that's clearly what he thinks. But those who have run afoul of the New Zealander have a much different impression. According to seemingly everyone, Michael Organ is a pathological liar. We're not talking little white lies here; Organ appears to lie about literally everything, to everyone, at all times. Worse: he allegedly obsessively zeroes in on people he deems to be weak and systematically ruins their lives.

To be clear: Organ isn't physically harming anyone. But his modus operandi seems to be a sick desire to somehow bore people into submission. Organ likes to talk. And talk and talk and talk. He can talk for hours and never let anyone get a word in edgewise. He's like the living embodiment of energy vampire Colin Robinson on "What We Do in the Shadows.

Journalist and filmmaker David Farrier — who, in a nod to the homespun modesty of his documentaries, only refers to himself as the former onscreen — has a certain affinity for sinister weirdos. “Tickled” and the new “Mister Organ” reflect a warm but affectless man who’s compelled by the dark underbellies of seemingly benign people and institutions, and can’t help but get sucked into their shady personal dramas. At this point in his career,

That isn’t to say his movies aren’t enjoyable, or their subjects unworthy of the scrutiny Farrier gives them, only that it keeps getting harder to shake the suspicion that he’s digging the same rabbit holes that he films himself falling down. Farrier’s latest feature — a characteristically first-person exercise that finds him “stumbling into” a story that consumes several years of his life for our amusement — begins with some parking mishegoss at an...

The true crime-style documentary character study “Mister Organ” has been gestating for about five years now. In that time, Michael Organ, an elusive and apparently unhinged con man, insinuated himself into the orbit of David Farrier, a New Zealand–based journalist turned filmmaker.

In “Mister Organ,” Farrier tries to understand Michael Organ, a garrulous chiseler who ran an illegal tire-clamping scam, and who also got caught trying to steal a yacht.

Farrier (“Tickled”) seems to know that there’s a rich story to be told about Organ, who harasses, equivocates and wears down anybody that he feels like messing with. But the run-and-gun style of hand-held photography that Farrier often uses to shoot Organ and various people who’ve met him suggests a deeper mystery that Farrier never meaningfully broaches: Why would you make a movie about an obviously unstable and potentially dangerous creep like Michael Organ?

Also Read:

Fantastic...

If the name David Farrier doesn't ring a bell, well ... I have some homework for you. Seek out his documentary work in "Tickled" and the 2018 Netflix series "Dark Tourist." This Kiwi journalist doesn't seem to have any fear at all. With "Tickled" he investigated an odd tickling competition and as he peeled back the layers things got dark very quickly.

With "Dark Tourist" he traveled the world and specifically went to the most screwed up, dangerous places he could. From the cartel-controlled Medellin to Ouidah, Benin, the birthplace of voodoo in Africa he kept putting himself in dangerous situations for our entertainment.

Farrier has a new project that is debuting at Fantastic Fest this week called "Mister Organ" which once again puts the New Zealand investigative reporter in the sights of an unsavory individual. He doesn't have to travel to the far corners of the world this time, though. "Mister...

"I know there must be more to this car park terrorist." Madman Films in Australia has unveiled the first official trailer for a crazy investigative documentary titled Mister Organ, the latest from Kiwi journalist / director David Farrier. Many of you may remember Farrier's previous doc film Tickled, another deep dive into a strange and unexplainable world of tickling, which he followed up with the "Dark Tourist" series. In this new film, Farrier is drawn into a game of cat and mouse with a mysterious individual - a man creating havoc in his own neighborhood, wheel clamping cars at a local antique store. Delving deeper he unearths a trail of court cases, royal bloodlines and ruined lives, in this true story of psychological warfare. Who is this guy?! What a wacko. I am such a huge fan of David Farrier! He rules. I very much appreciate how brave and bold he...

David Farrier has made his mark in the past several years with documentaries with off-beat subjects like 2016’s “Tickled” and his 2018 Netflix series “Dark Tourist.” Now, he’s back with his latest feature, “Mister Organ,” about perhaps his most weirdest subject yet.

Read More: Fantastic Fest 2022 Lineup: New Films From Luca Guadagnino, Park Chan-wook, Martin McDonagh, & More Added To The Event

The upcoming doc follows Farrier as he becomes interested in the titular Michael Organ, a wheel clamper in New Zealand.

Continue reading ‘Mister Organ’ Trailer: David Farrier’s Goes Down The Rabbit Hole Again With New Doc Premiering At Fantastic Fest at The Playlist.

“Who doesn’t want to be a pirate?”

Rhys Darby certainly does, but not just any pirate. In the new HBO Max series Our Flag Means Death, the comedian immediately recognizable from Jumanji: The Next Level, What We Do in the Shadows, Flight of the Conchords, and so many more roles, assumes the mantle of real-life “gentleman pirate” Stede Bonnet.

Premiering March 3 with three episodes, Our Flag Means Death was created by David Jenkins (People of Earth), and co-created by Taika Waititi, who also co-stars as the dread pirate Blackbeard. More Muppets Treasure Island than Black Sails, the 10-episode first season is about a pirate out of his depth — something Darby says is like some of his other characters, such as Murray from Conchords.

And although the New Zealand actor says he isn’t fancy like the 18th-Century Stede was, he does think there is a relatability to the gentleman pirate.

Nine Inch Nails and the noise-rock group Health have teamed up for a new song, “Isn’t Everyone.”

Members of Health attempted to explain what the song was about in an interview with Webworm With David Farrier; it originated “in the middle of the lockdown,” according to the group’s Jake Duzik.

“I think at the time it was written — part of the reason we wanted it to come out so quickly, is that being an American in America, we were in the middle of Trumpocolypse and George Floyd and...

Global distributor, producer and streamer Mubi has snapped up major European markets for hot Sundance title “Pleasure,” which delves into the world of the porn industry in Los Angeles.

The service has acquired all rights to the provocative film in the U.K., Ireland, Italy and Turkey. Directed by Ninja Thyberg, the film recently received its world premiere as part of Sundance’s World Cinema Dramatic Competition.

Starring newcomer Sofia Kappel, “Pleasure” tells the story of a young woman (Bella Cherry) who moves from a small town in Sweden to Los Angeles in pursuit of stardom, and lands squarely in the porn industry. Variety’s chief film critic Owen Gleiberman praised “Pleasure” in his review, calling it an “intentionally stark” and “disturbingly authentic” look at what the porn industry has become.

“A movie like ‘Pleasure’ jerks the skeevy, compulsive porn world out of the closet in a way that few movies have,...

Arthouse streaming service Mubi has snapped up rights to Toronto International Film Festival title “Shiva Baby” for the U.K., Ireland, Germany, Austria, India, Turkey and Latin America.

Written and directed by Canadian filmmaker Emma Seligman, “Shiva Baby” follows a young bisexual Jewish woman at a shiva — a mourning tradition in the Jewish community — at which she must confront her over-achieving ex-girlfriend as well as her sugar daddy, his girlfriend and their baby.

Utopia Media boarded the film ahead of its Toronto premiere.

“Shiva Baby” — which began life as a short written and directed by Seligman while studying film at New York University — screened in the narrative feature competition at SXSW, and received its public premiere at last month’s TIFF. Variety critic Tomris Laffly said of the movie, “Think of this late-coming-of-age farce as a funny ‘Krisha’ or the indoor apocalypse that takes place in ‘Mother!’ — but with broken glass objects,...

Sundance winner and upcoming BFI London Film Festival title “Farewell Amor” will bow in December on curated streaming service Mubi.

Mubi has acquired worldwide VOD rights, excluding North America, Africa, China and Israel, on the film. IFC has acquired the North America rights.

Producer Huriyyah Muhammad won the Sundance Institute/Amazon Studios Producers Award for narrative features at the Sundance Film Festival, where the film received its world premiere in the U.S. dramatic competition section in January. It will play at the BFI London Film Festival’s ‘Love’ strand in October.

Written and directed by feature debutant and Sundance Institute fellow Ekwa Msangi, the film follows an Angolan immigrant reunited with his family in New York City after 17 years. Now strangers sharing a one-bedroom apartment, they discover a shared love of dance that may help them overcome the distance between them.

Stars include Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine (“Blood Diamond...

Joe Exotic, Tiger King and the mullet that launched a thousand memes has become an instant megastar thanks to the Netflix documentary Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness which arrived on the streaming service at the end of March and has become the internet’s new obsession.

It’s a very weird doc that seems to have captured people’s imaginations and left them wanting more. The great news is that there are loads of totally off the wall documentaries out there to stream. We’ve rounded up some of the craziest to be your next-watch post Tiger King.

Finders Keepers

This 2015 documentary is so bonkers and also such an obvious companion piece to Tiger King we dedicated a whole article to it. It’s about two men engaged in a long feud about the ownership of a mummified human leg. One guy inadvertently bought the leg which was hidden...

The two most prevalent topics for (virtual) water-cooler conversations these days? Coronavirus, of course, and Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness, Netflix’s roaringly popular docuseries about the battle between rival exotic cat businesses, culminating in a mind-boggling alleged murder-for-hire plot.

If you’re isolated at home and have already made your way through Tiger King‘s seven episodes, here are equally captivating offerings.

We should have all learned by now that keeping a tiger as a pet is … a bad idea. But this one-hour documentary, available with Amazon Prime Video, shares the science of how your regular house cat is connected to wild felines.

New Indie

Filmmakers have made the case that, instead of going to film school, young would-be directors might be better off just listening to director commentaries. And if that’s the educational route you’ve chosen, two of today’s most interesting directors are telling all on new Blu-ray releases. Want to know more about how Barry Jenkins brought James Baldwin’s powerful novel “If Beale Street Could Talk” (20th Century Fox Home Entertainment) to the big screen, or how Karyn Kusama crafted the bleak neo-noir “Destroyer” (20th Century Fox Home Entertainment)? They tell all on these essential new releases.

Also available: S. Craig Zahler is at it again with “Dragged Across Concrete” (Lionsgate), a cops-gone-rogue heist saga starring Vince Vaughn and Mel Gibson.

See Photo: See Nicole Kidman's Extreme Transformation for Karyn Kusama's Cop Thriller 'Destroyer'

New Foreign

Few directors in the history of cinema have...

The latest Aladdin trailer unveiled Will Smith's Genie in all of his blue glory. When some first-look photos from the movie were released late last year, many Disney fans were upset to see that Smith's Genie was not blue. The actor explained on social media that he was pictured in his human form and assured that he'd be CGI for most of the movie. Now, fans have what they were asking for and a lot of them are freaking out at what they see.

Disney's decision to make live-action versions of some of their classic movies has met some resistance, and Aladdin is no different. The animated movie is beloved by Disney fans and Robin Williams' take on the Genie is iconic. However, after the success of the live-action Beauty and the Beast, there was no stopping the studio and they are continuing on with the remakes, hoping...

Will Smith told Entertainment Weekly last December his version of the Genie in Guy Ritchie’s upcoming live-action “Aladdin” would “stand out as unique even in the Disney world,” and the 50-year-old actor certainly wasn’t lying. Disney finally unveiled Smith’s CGI-infused blue genie in a special trailer that aired during the 2019 Grammy Awards (see photo above) and it didn’t take long for shock and disbelief to erupt on social media in reaction to the footage.

The look of Smith’s Genie was widely mocked by film reporters and general “Aladdin fans,” with comparisons ranging from Tobias in “Arrested Development” to the thumb people in “Spy Kids” and the invisible “Bird Box” monster that makes people kill themselves when they look at it. Smith told EW he was going to bring a previously unseen “hip-hop flavor” to the character, who was famously voiced by Robin Williams in Disney’s 1992 animated movie.

Japan's Reconstruction Agency and Fukushima Prefectural Government are considering legal action over the episode of Netflix's Dark Tourist, which visited places still dealing with the aftermath of the March 2011 triple nuclear meltdown.

The episode, the second in the series released on the streaming giant July 20, sees New Zealand journalist David Farrier visit Japan, with just more than half of the program following him on an organized bus tour through areas near the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant.

Farrier and the other tourists become concerned as the readings on their Geiger counters showed radiation higher than they were ...

Whether a feature or a bug, one of the central aspects of the Netflix documentary series “Somebody Feed Phil” is that host Phil Rosenthal is an unabashed outsider. Going to places he doesn’t understand with an open mind and an open palate, it’s a celebration of global cuisine from the point of view of somebody who is experiencing everything for the first time. It’s an approach that works for that show, but it’s strange to see that same humor and surface-level fascination in service of something with far more dramatic weight than a snack from a street vendor.

David Farrier’s new series “Dark Tourist” takes a broad categorization of unconventional global tourist destinations and approaches them with the same voyeuristic tone and format, treating a whole host of global oddities as a set of minor curiosities. The result is a slippery documentary exercise that never...

We should have known that the bizarre story behind “Tickled” wouldn’t stop with either the film’s release or its subject’s death. Months after David D’Amato — the man behind the Competitive Endurance Tickling empire that David Farrier and Dylan Reeve delve into in their compelling documentary — died, some continue to wonder: Did he really?

Read More: ‘Tickled’ Directors React to David D’Amato’s Death: It ‘Has Hit Us Pretty Hard’

The two filmmakers put that conspiracy theory to rest in a new article for the Spinoff, writing unequivocally that “D’Amato has indeed died” and even going so far as to provide a copy of his death certificate. With that cleared up, however, they’re left to question how his company Jane O’Brien Media persists now that its founder has departed this mortal coil.

As with everything else related to this endlessly strange saga, the...

David D’Amato, the subject of the documentary “Tickled,” “died suddenly” on March 13. On March 18, the “Tickled” filmmakers, David Farrier and Dylan Reeve, released a statement on their website which includes a poignant message about the complicated antagonist of their film.

Read More: ‘Tickled’ Doc Creator Involved In Heated Confrontation With Film’s Subjects At L.A. Premiere — Watch

The directors show compassion for D’Amato, and recount their tumultuous relationship with him. Read Farrier & Reeve’s statement in full below:

Statement on Death of David D’Amato

We are incredibly sad to learn that David P D’Amato, the subject of Tickled, has passed away.

We don’t know any specific details about his death at this time.

David D’Amato has been a part of our lives for around three years now – a very unusual three years – and despite the various lawsuits he brought against us, this news...

David D’Amato, the antagonist in David Farrier and Dylan Reeve’s documentary “Tickled,” has passed away. An obituary published in The New York Times reveals the 55-year-old “died suddenly” on March 13. No other details of his passing are provided.

D’Amato gained notoriety as the elusive subject of Farrier and Reeve’s investigation into and the subsequent documentary on Jane O’Brien Media, a company that produces “competitive tickling” fetish videos featuring young, athletic male participants. The duo alleges that D’Amato ran and funded the company, which allegedly intimidated the subjects of the videos if they did not comply with specific demands. D’Amato denied that he was affiliated with the company, but a slew of documents revealed during the investigations appear to tie him directly to the business.

Read More: ‘Tickled’ Directors React to David D’Amato’s Death: It ‘Has Hit Us Pretty Hard’

At the Los Angeles premiere of ‘Tickled,...

Joey Moser talks to Tickled director David Farrier about his infamous documentary and its follow-up The Tickle King, now showing on HBO. This post originally appeared on AwardsDaily TV by Joey Moser.

With “The Wire,” “Treme” and “Show Me a Hero” all in the books, David Simon is ready to drop “The Deuce” on eager audiences. His latest HBO series takes a look at the porn industry circa the 1970s, with James Franco (in dual roles) and Maggie Gyllenhaal leading the way. Entertainment Weekly has the first two images from the show, one of which you can see below.

Read More: HBO Orders David Simon’s Porn-World Drama ‘The Deuce’ Starring James Franco & Maggie Gyllenhaal To Series

Franco plays two brothers: Vincent and Frankie Martino, who played a role in the rise of adult entertainment in New York; he also directed two episodes. Gyllenhaal, meanwhile, plays a prostitute named Candy. “The stereotypes and ideas we have about prostitutes and people who work in porn are too vague,” the actress tells EW. “I hope that this show, in a way, shines a bright...

“Animals” is back, baby!

When HBO’s subversive animated comedy returns March 17, rats Phil and Mike (series creators Phil Matarese and Mike Luciano) are back for more adventures that appear to include… well, using a human baby with wrestler Sting’s signature face painting, which of course he had lifted from “The Crow.”

Read More: The Most Significant TV Animals of 2016

The series will also delve into the worlds of squirrels, gorillas, earthworms and what looks like green algae. As usual, a huge cast of guest stars will voice the critters, including “Game of Thrones” khaleesi Emilia Clarke, Fred Armisen, Ice-t, Dan Harmon, RuPaul, Kim Gordon, Mark Duplass, Judy Greer and strangely, cook Rachael Ray. Take a look at the official trailer for Season 2

Produced by Mark and Jay Duplass, “Animals” premiered at the 2015 Sundance film festival before HBO picked up the comedy for two full seasons. Season 1 debuted February 5 on HBO,...