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The world premieres of Saudi filmmaker Haifaa Al Mansour’s crime mystery Unidentified,Erupcja starringCharli Xcx,and Canadian DJ Kid Koala’s animation Space Cadet join picks from Cannes, Venice and Berlin in the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) Centrepiece programme.

The selection of world cinema includes 19 world premieres, including Jan Komasa’s kidnap drama Good Boy starring Stephen Graham and Andrea Riseborough; Kirk Jones’s Tourette’s biopic I Swearabout trailblazer John Davidson starring Robert Aramayo and Peter Mullan, which Studiocanal will distribute in theUK and Bankside Films handles for world sales; Jitank Singh Gurjar’s Indian family drama...

Toronto International Film Festival announced the lineup for its Centerpiece program on Tuesday, spotlighting 55 total films from nearly 50 countries. “Blue Moon” from director Richard Linklater, a collaboration between the U.S. and Ireland, will have its North American premiere in the largely international section of the festival.

Of the 55 films screening in the Centerpiece program, 51 represent countries outside of the U.S. Some are collaborations with the U.S., while most are entirely international productions. Likewise, only six films are sole productions of Canada, with one co-production between Canada and Hungary.

18 of the films present in the section will have their world premieres at TIFF. These include “Good Boy,” starring Stephen Graham and Andrea Riseborough; Samara Weaving and Kyle Gallner “Carolina Caroline,” from director Adam Carter Rehmeier, who previously made “Dinner in America” and “Snack Shack”; and “Wasteman,” the debut feature from Cal McMau starring David Jonsson from “Alien: Romulus” and “Industry.

The Toronto Film Festival on Tuesday unveiled 55 new film titles for its global-film focused Centerpiece program, including titles from Richard Linklater, Christian Petzold, Anders Thomas Jensen, Pietro Marcello and Álvaro Olmos Torrico.

There’s world premieres for the “Brat” singer Charli xcx-starrer Erupcja from director Peter Ohs; the Stephen Graham, Andrea Riseborough and Anson Boon starring thriller Good Boy, from director Jan Komasa and co-producer Jeremy Thomas; Adam Carter Rehmeier’s romantic crime thriller Carolina Caroline, starring Samara Weaving; and Kirk Jones’ Tourette Syndrome drama I Swear, which stars Robert Aramayo as John Davidson, the trailblazing campaigner.

The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo. Courtesy of Cannes Film Festival

There’s also first looks for Gail Maurice’s indigenous drama Blood Lines, where the director stars alongside Tamara Podemski, Dana Solomon and Melanie Bray; Nomad Shadow, Eimi Imanishi’s debut feature about a refugee to Europe forced to return to Western Sahara; The Cost of Heaven,...

Lucile Hadzihalilovic’s fractured fairy-tale “The Ice Tower” took top honors at this year’s Neuchatel International Fantastic Film Festival (Nifff), claiming the festival’s H.R. Giger “Narcisse” prize alongside the Imaging the Future prize for best production design.

Toplined by Marion Cotillard alongside colorful character turns from Gaspar Noé and August Diehl, the 1970s-set film follows a young orphan who falls into an hypnotic and soon reciprocated obsession with a film star shooting an adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Snow Queen.”

“All my films are fairy-tales,” Hadzihalilovic told Variety ahead of her film’s world premiere in Berlin. “I don’t care to situate my stories in an everyday reality or a contemporary timeframe; whereas the storybook form comes naturally, allowing for poetry and escape.”

‘U Are the Universe’ Courtesy of ForeFilms

This year’s international jury – made up of graphic novelist Emil Ferris, philosopher Hélène Frappat,...

Honey Bunch Photo: Berlin International Film Festival

A woman with no memory. A mysterious private clinic, based in a remote house with sprawling gardens. A secretive doctor who offers experimental treatment, and a wife (Grace Glowicki) who loves but doesn’t trust her older, academic husband (Ben Petrie). Honey Bunch, which screened at Berlin 2025, has all the ingredients of a classic horror movies, yet it ends up going somewhere quite different. To begin to talk about how it does so would be to give too much away, so when I spoke to directors Dusty Mancinelli and Madeleine Sims-Fewer during that festival, we decided to begin by discussing the tropes the film employs.

“The first one that comes to my mind is the housekeeper, the staunch housekeeper who's keeping their master's secrets,” ventures Dusty.

“And who's often nefarious and fills the role of the villain,” Madeleine points out.

“Yeah. So we've...

Honey Bunch Photo: Berlin International Film Festival

A woman with no memory. A mysterious private clinic, based in a remote house with sprawling gardens. A secretive doctor who offers experimental treatment, and a wife (Grace Glowicki) who loves but doesn’t trust her older, academic husband (Ben Petrie). Honey Bunch, which screened at Berlin 2025, has all the ingredients of a classic horror movies, yet it ends up going somewhere quite different. To begin to talk about how it does so would be to give too much away, so when I spoke to directors Dusty Mancinelli and Madeleine Sims-Fewer during that festival, we decided to begin by discussing the tropes the film employs.

“The first one that comes to my mind is the housekeeper, the staunch housekeeper who's keeping their master's secrets,” ventures Dusty.

“And who's often nefarious and fills the role of the villain,” Madeleine points out.

“Yeah. So we've...

Love Like This Before: Sims-Fewer & Mancinelli Examine the Ethics of Love

Canadian filmmaking duo Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli follow up their disturbing 2020 relationship drama Violation (read review) with a more extravagant genre mixture in Honey Bunch, which careens from complex subtexts to full blown B-movie tropes. While not as archly unembellished as their previous venture, a moody intrigue saturates this genre exercise about a young woman suffering from amnesia who undergoes an experimental treatment at an isolated therapeutic facility to recover both her memory of and emotional capacity for her husband. A picture perfect scenario of the doting spouse quickly fades into what appears to be a sinister gaslighting exercise, where a startling ambiguity regarding the complicity of the program’s facilitators also plays a role cementing heteronormative patterns its female clients were subconsciously subverting through their own emotional agency.…...

Romance for indie filmmakers Dusty Mancinelli and Madeleine Sims-Fewer blossomed in the most unexpected of places — as they shot their 2020 debut feature Violation, a relentlessly violent and gory revenge drama set in cottage-country Canada.

“After making our first film, which really dealt with trauma and was very dark, very painful to make and really delved into the dark recesses of our minds, we wanted to make something that was about love,” Sims-Fewer tells The Hollywood Reporter ahead of Honey Bunch, their sophomore feature, having its world premiere in Berlin on Feb. 18.

In their first feature, which bowed at the Toronto Film Festival, Sims-Fewer played a young woman in an unhappy marriage who, with her sister and their husbands, stays at a secluded cottage where unspoken traumas and upsetting sexual violence are gradually revealed.

But on Honey Bunch, the Canadian filmmakers deliberately toned down the dark, bloody material of their first feature.

Feminist body horror is taking over indie cinema.

The female filmmakers behind this new wave of flesh and flash are finding critical and commercial success by combining the viscerally grotesque with progressive themes exploring bodily autonomy, beauty standards, and social expectations for women.

Coralie Fargeat’s indie blockbuster The Substance — which has earned $77 million worldwide and picked up 5 Oscar nominations — is the current queen of female body horror, but gross-out feminist films are everywhere. Sundance’s Midnight screenings this year included Emilie Blichfeldt’s The Ugly Stepsister — a twisted take on the Cinderella story involving bone-crunching cosmetic surgery and bodily mutilation — and Grace Glowicki’s Dead Lover, a horror comedy about a gravedigger (Glowicki) who goes to macabre lengths in an attempt to re-animate her deceased mate.

Berlin’s lineup features Johanna Moder’s Mother’s Baby, a German-language psychological horror movie about a woman unsure if the baby she’s...

The competition line-up for the 2025 Berlin International Film Festival is being announced at a press conference at 11am Cet (10am GMT).

Scroll down for line-up

New festival director Tricia Tuttle is revealing the titles for the Competition and new Perspectives strand alongside co-directors of film programming Jacqueline Lyanga and Michael Stütz.

The announcement is being live-streamed on the festival’s social channels. Watch it live above.

Screen will update this page with the titles as they are announced. Refresh the page for latest updates.

As previously announced, the festival will open with Tom Tykwer’s Special Gala out of competition selection The Light.

Ahead of the Berlinale 2025 taking place February 13-23, they’ve unveiled their lineups for Berlinale Special, Panorama, Generation and Forum sections. Highlights include confirmation of Bong Joon Ho’s Mickey 17 alongside Ira Sachs’ Peter Hujar’s Day, Ancestral Visions of the Future from This Is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection director Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese, a documentary on the making of Shoah, a new Jacob Elordi-led series from Justin Kurzel, and more.

See the lineup below via Deadline and check back for the competition lineup next week.

Berlinale Special

Ancestral Visions of the Future

by Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese | with Siphiwe Nzima, Sobo Bernard, Zaman Mathejane, Mochesane Edwin Kotsoane, Rehauhetsoe Ernest Kotsoane

France / Lesotho / Germany / Saudi Arabia 2025

Berlinale Special | World premiere | Documentary form

A poetic allegory of the filmmaker Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese’s childhood, an ode to cinema and an inner nod to his mother. Through fragmented narratives and mythic imagery,...

The Berlin Film Festival (February 13-23)has unveiled a raft of additions to its programme, including the full Special, Panorama, Generation and Forum line-ups.

Scroll down for full list of titles

Eight works have been added to the Berlinale Special line-up, including confirmation the festival will host the German premiere ofParasitedirector Bong Joon Ho’sMickey 17.The filmstars Robert Pattinson in the story of an “expendable” on a mission to colonise an ice planet who keeps dying and coming back to life. It is likely to world premiere in South Korean ahead of playing at the Berlinale.

The world premiere of...

Aussie filmmaker Justin Kurzel’s series adaptation of Richard Flanagan’s Booker Prize-winning novel The Narrow Road to the Deep North, starring Jacob Elordi, will screen at this year’s Berlin Film Festival.

The Narrow Road to the Deep North was among several titles added to Berlin’s lineup this morning.

The festival describes the series as a “riveting new Australian drama” about a WWII hero haunted by his past. The show will screen as a Berlinale Special Gala. Also in Specials strand is The Thing with Feathers starring Benedict Cumberbatch. The pic screens at Berlin following a debut bow at Sundance and is from filmmaker Dylan Southern. The pic is an adaption of Max Porter’s novel about a grieving father wrestling with the sudden death of his wife while also raising their young children. As previously reported, Bong Joon Ho’s Mickey 17 will also screen. Scroll down...

The Berlin International Film Festival has unveiled the first wave of titles for its 75th edition, including features in its Panorama, Berlinale Special and Generation strands.

An initial 12 titles have been revealed for Panorama, of which eight are world premieres. These include Paul, a documentary by Canadian filmmaker Denis Cote, who has played in competition at Berlin four times with titles including Vic + Flo Saw A Bear and That Kind Of Summer. His latest follows a man struggling with social anxiety who finds refuge in serving women who invite him to clean their homes.

Scroll down for full list of...

The Berlin Film Festival forges a new path next year with the first year under new artistic director Tricia Tuttle, who succeeds Carlo Chatrian and brings a background as a journalist and curator to the annual German showcase. This year’s festival runs February 13-23, and also in new positions this year are Jacqueline Lyanga and Michael Stütz, both serving as co-directors of programming.

With bigger announcements to come, the Berlinale unveiled its first wave of titles across the Panorama and Berlinale Special gala lineups on Tuesday. As previously announced, Tom Tykwer’s “The Light” is opening this coming 75th edition. Filmmakers getting a boost from today’s announcement include Denis Côté, Michel Gondry, and Ira Sachs, all bringing new films to the festival.

In the Berlinale Special lineup, German director Jan-Ole Gerster debuts the neo-noir thriller “Islands,” starring Sam Riley and Stacy Martin. Per the festival synopsis, in the film,...

Michel Gondry and Ira Sachs are among the headline filmmakers set to debut new feature works within the sidebar competitions at next year’s Berlin Film Festival.

The German festival announced the pair this afternoon as part of its first crop of confirmed titles.

Gondry will screen Maya, Give Me a Title in Berlin’s Generation sidebar. The festival’s website describes the film as Gondry’s “stop-motion love letter to his daughter Maya brings to life a poetic and amusing journey that invites you to dream and laugh.”

Also set for the Generation competition is Our Wildest Days (I Agries Meres Mas) by Greek filmmaker Vasilis Kekatos who is best known for his 2019 short film The Distance Between Us and the Sky, which won the Short Film Palme d’Or at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival. He also created the popular Greek series Milky Way.

Related:...

The Belin Film Festival has unveiled its Panorama lineup, including new works by Denis Côté, Ira Sachs, Michel Gondry and Shatara Michelle Ford, among others.

Sachs’ movie, “Peter Hujar’s Day,” stars Ben Wishaw and Rebecca Hall. Set for an international premiere in Berlin, the film portrays a 1974 conversation between photographer Peter Hujar and his friend Linda Rosenkrantz, set against the backdrop of the New York art scene of the time.

Côté’s film, “Paul,” is a documentary about a man struggling with depression and social anxiety who found refuge in serving women who invite him to clean their homes.

Gondry’s “Maya, Give Me a Title” is described by the festival as a “stop-motion love letter to his daughter Maya brings to life a poetic and amusing journey that invites you to dream and laugh.” It features the voice of “The Count of Monte-Cristo” star Pierre Niney.

Ford’s “Dreams in Nightmares,...

John Magaro, Kate Dickie and Jason Isaacs will be heading to the chilly streets of Berlin. The Berlin Film Festival unveiled the first gala screenings for its 2025 edition, which runs Feb. 13-23.

Islands, the new feature from German director Jan-Ole Gerster (Lara, A Coffee in Berlin), is among the gala highlights. The thriller stars British actor Sam Riley (Control, Maleficent) as a once-promising tennis professional now working as a tennis coach for holidaymakers on a resort island, filling his time with alcohol and brief affairs. Stacy Martin, Jack Farthing, and Dylan Torrell co-star.

Köln 75 from director Ido Fluk, follows the true story of Vera Brandes, teenage patron saint of the 1970s Cologne music scene, who risked everything to organize Keith Jarrett’s legendary Köln Concert, considered by many to be the greatest solo concert in music history. German actress Mala Emde play Fluk with John Magaro, Michael Chernus and Alexander Scheer co-starring.

Exclusive: Production has wrapped on under-the-radar sophomore feature Honey Bunch from writer-directors Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli, who made their debut with TIFF, Sundance and SXSW selection Violation. XYZ is handling sales, financing and serving as exec producer.

Rising Canadian actors Grace Glowicki (Tito) and Ben Petrie (BlackBerry) star, while Jason Isaacs (Harry Potter saga), Kate Dickie (The Witch), India Brown (Invasion) and Julian Richings (Beau Is Afraid) round out the cast.

The logline reads: “When Diana (Glowicki) wakes from a coma with fragmented memories, she and her husband (Petrie) seek experimental treatments at a remote facility. As the procedures intensify, their marriage is put to the test and Diana begins to question her husband’s true motives.”

The Canadian production is a part of XYZ’s New Visions slate of films designed to spotlight new talent.

The film is written by Sims-Fewer and Mancinelli and produced by Becky Yeboah,...

Revenge thrillers usually offer us a traumatizing event that sickens us, followed by a gratifying good-for-her twist. The 2020 Shudder original, Violation, however, is bereft of any celebration, gnawing at us with constant dread as it features a horrifying sexual assault followed by a revenge that is rendered bleak. Aglow in dreamy sequences and dizzying cinematography, the film is as stifled as female rage is in real life, merciless yet poignantly hopeless. As such, Violation sheds light on the moral consequences of vengeance, hinting that personal retribution becomes hollow in the grand scheme of male violence. Madeleine Sims-Fewer, who co-wrote and directed the film with Dusty Mancinelli, gives a visceral performance that maintains the female perspective of the thriller, allowing magnified pain and a tortured psyche to overcome any sort of reprieve we seek. While the meteoric concepts of female rage and revenge are at the crux of Violation, the execution is anything but,...

Fly Me to the Moon is a historical romantic comedy-drama film directed by Greg Berlanti from a screenplay by Rose Gilroy. The 2024 film follows a romantic entanglement between a marketing executive and a NASA official, as he prepares for the Apollo 11 moon landing while she is given the task of filming a fake moon landing in case the real mission fails. Fly Me to the Moon stars Scarlett Johansson and Channing Tatum in the lead roles with Woody Harrelson, Anna Garcia, Ray Romano, Jim Rash, Nick Dillenburg, Jessie Mueller, Noah Robbins, and Bill Barrett starring in supporting roles. If you loved the fake moon landing aspect of Fly Me to the Moon, here are some similar movies you can check out next.

Moonwalkers (Starz & Rent on Prime Video) Credit – Alchemy

Moonwalkers is a crime comedy film directed by Antoine Bardou-Jacquet from a screenplay by Dean Craig. Based on the Apollo Moon landing hoax,...

Rooftop Films folks have announced the grant recipients for the large swath of filmmakers’ funds and in the narrative feature categories we have the likes of Carlos López Estrada, Andrew Thomas Huang, Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli grabbing some coin. Estrada who has directed Sundance selected Blindspotting and Summertime has Kill Yr Idols in the works. Tandem of Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli who gave us the TIFF-Sundance preemed Violation will next be working on Honey Bunch. A lab fellow at Sundance, Andrew Thomas Huang continues to piece together his directorial debut in Tiger Girl. Here is the complete list of 2023 Rooftop Filmmakers Fund short and feature film grant recipients:

Water Tower Feature Film Cash Grants (Feature Film)

Carlos López Estrada – “Kill Yr Idols”

Jodie Mack – “Early Mourning, Tarpon Springs/Lindsey’s Color Service”

Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli – “Honey Bunch”

Reid Davenport – “Life After”

Eastern Effects Equipment Grant (Feature Film)

Alex Ross Perry...

Rooftop Films has announced the recipients of their 2023 Filmmakers Fund grants. A total of 21 cash and service grants will be awarded to a variety of independent filmmakers to support the production of their next short or feature film. Four Rooftop Films Water Tower Feature Film cash grants will be exclusively awarded with support from the Laurence W. Levine Foundation.

Rooftop Filmmakers Fund grants are made accessible to Rooftop Films alumni directors who have had their work screened during the annual Sumer Series in New York City. This years grantees include a demographic of over 60% women, 30% people of color and 10% people a part of the LGBTQ+ community.

“We’re unbelievably excited about the projects we’ve had the privilege of helping to fund this year! Every single one of these filmmakers approach their subjects in ways that are wholly unique to their style and vision, and we can’t wait to see the finished works,...

Alice, the titular protagonist of “Alice, Darling,” cannot think of lying to her boyfriend, Simon, without throwing up. Yet she insists to her friends, who have noticed her gradual withdrawal, that everything is fine. They love each other.

Sure, Simon makes her feel awful about everything: her friends, her eating habits, her job. He regularly guilts her into sex and sexting. He’s winnowed her life down to the essential, arduous project of stroking his ego. But he doesn’t hit her, rarely yells at her. So what does she have to complain about?

“Alice, Darling,” the debut feature from director Mary Nighy, picks at these common ideas — that abuse only looks a certain way, that mental scars cannot be as serious as physical ones — until they unravel. Alanna Francis (“The Rest of Us”) has written a tastefully subtle story of intimate partner violence. As Alice, Anna Kendrick hits her notes well.

It's that frightfully delightful time of year again for Fangoria's highly anticipated Chainsaw Awards, with this year's nominees including Nia DaCosta's Candyman, Don Mancini's Chucky series, Jill Gevargizian's The Stylist, and many more!

You can check out the full list of nominees below, and to cast your votes, visit:

https://www.fangoria.com/original/chainsaw-awards-2022/

In their most recent magazine issue, Fangoria officially announced the nominations for its 2022 Chainsaw Awards, and horror fans everywhere can currently cast their votes at https://www.fangoria.com/original/chainsaw-awards-2022/ for their favorite films, television series, directors, artists, and more that kept us all thrilled, chilled and entertained throughout the course of 2021. Winners will be celebrated later this year during a yet-to-be-revealed Chainsaw Awards event.

The 2022 Chainsaw Awards Nominees include fan favorite films such as James Wan’s Malignant, Candyman from Nia DaCosta, and Edgar Wright’s Last Night in Soho,...

Rlje Films, a business unit of AMC Networks, has picked up select rights to the horror film, Violation fromShudder, AMC Networks’ premium streaming service for horror, thriller and the supernatural. Rlje Films will release Violation on Digital HD and Blu-ray on September 21, 2021.. Check out the trailer:

Now you can win the Win the DVD of Violation. We Are Movie Geeks has two to give away. Just leave a comment below telling us what your favorite horror movie that starts with the letter ‘V’ is (I’d say Vampire Circus. It’s so easy!)

1. You Must Be A US Resident. Prize Will Only Be Shipped To US Addresses. No P.O. Boxes. No Duplicate Addresses.

2. Winner Will Be Chosen From All Qualifying Entries. No Purchase Necessary

The feature screenwriting and directorial debut of Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli, Violation stars Sims-Fewer along with Anna Maguire (Ever After: A Cinderella Story), Jesse Lavercombe...

2021 SXSW Violation Review — Violation (2020) Video Movie Review from the 28th Annual South By Southwest Film Festival, a movie directed by Dusty Mancinelli and Madeleine Sims-Fewer, and stars Madeleine Sims-Fewer, Anna Maguire, Jesse Lavercombe, Obi Abili, Jasmin Geljo, and Cynthia Ashperger. Crew Andrea Boccadoro created the music for the film. Adam Crosby crafted the [...]

Continue reading: Video Movie Review: Violation: A Dark, Self-serious Revenge Film that Benefits from its Heroine & Sequencing [SXSW 2021]...

Deepa Mehta’s Funny Boy earns nine nods including best film.

Jeff Barnaby’s zombie horror Blood Quantum leads the Canadian Screen Awards nominations with 10 nods, the organisation announced on Tuesday (March 30)

The genre title from Prospector Films missed out on a best picture nomination but is in contention for lead actor with Michael Greyeyes, who starred in Sundance breakout Wild Indian, and garnered nods for best effects, best screenplay for Barnaby, and Michel St-Martin’s cinematography, among others.

Deepa Mehta’s Funny Boy earned nine nods including best film alongside Tracey Deer’s Beans, Pascal Plante’s Nadia, Butterfly,...

Violation — written, directed, and produced by ongoing collaborators Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli — is. Among those ostensible norms: the linear path from inciting assault to bloody revenge. It isn’t so much that the rules of rape-revenge haven’t been broken before; we’re currently in a moment for movies in which they’re being broken, troubled, and thrown back on themselves with relative frequency. What’s interesting to track are the ways that these attempts to subvert the genre — to be subversive, even — can often fall into some of the same,...

Violation, the first feature by Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli, is one of the recent efforts that best subverts genre cinema, specifically the rape-revenge film. When I had the opportunity to interview the writers/directors, I asked them about the different elements that make Violation such a unique and fascinating experience. It all starts with its style and mood, closer to auteur cinema. Then we have the construction of the act of sexual abuse that will lead us to revenge. Violation reflects the reality of many cases that occurred in an environment of supposed safety and trust. The film also portrays what usually happens when women report sexual assault: they end up being questioned and their cases minimized. The revenge itself is brutal, there are several...

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

Crime & Punishment: Sims-Fewer & Mancinelli Serve a Cold Dish

Neither redemption nor revenge are at the complete behest of the individual, at least not in Violation, the rousing debut from Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli. Skewering a horde of exploitation tropes in our cultural constellation of sexual assault cinema, it’s a dish served bold, and calibrated effectively in its ability to leave its audience in doubt about sympathies and alliances.

Beautifully shot in its menacing juxtaposition of nature’s predatory hierarchy and the perverted complications of human interactions, the scenario, and its troubled heroine (played with chilly gusto by Sims-Fewer) will remain lodged uncomfortably in your throat as it dares to transgress the boundaries of victim and victimizer, predator and prey.…...

Well now. Winter has been a thing, hasn't it? Everything was fine until this past week. What the hell, February? We look to March with fear and trepedation, but also hope because here is the lineup for Shudder next Month and there is a bunch of goodness that will at least warm our horror hearts while staving off frostbite in our toes.    Shudder has some great horror flicks from the ladies next month. The Shudder Original lineup includes Lucky from Natasha Kermani, Violation from Madeleine Sims-Fewer (and her co-director Dusty Mancinelli) and Slaxx from Elza Kephart. They join Stay Out of the Attic, Koko-Di Koko-Da and the popular series A Discovery of Witches next month.    Check out March 16th! Four horror classics -...

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

Last week we announced the digital-cinema dates for Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli's drama/horror Violation here at home through TIFF and Viff's online platforms. The rollout begins on March 19th through TIFF then the week following on the 26th through Viff.    Violation recently played at Sundance and will also play at SXSW next month. It might have been a rocky start for the Canadian production, premiering during the health crisis, but it's still finding a way to get out to the masses.    Well now, we finally have a Canadian trailer for this critically lauded film, released by Pnp Films. Finally a trailer, period, as this would appear to be the first one out there. Check it out below. It's hard not to ignore...

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

A selection at TIFF, Sundance, and the forthcoming SXSW, Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli’s rape revenge thriller Violation is now arriving on Shudder next month. Starring Madeleine Sims-Fewer, Anna Maguire, Jesse Lavercombe, and Obi Abili, the film weaves through multiple timelines to tell the story of fierce and deserved retribution after an unthinkable act. Ahead of the release, the first trailer has now arrived.

Jared Mobarak said in his TIFF review, “We’re often told growing up that every story has two sides so that we can learn how to put ourselves into another’s shoes and see whether actions we thought were harmless actually did cause harm. That doesn’t mean you can’t project the sentiments onto adult situations too, though. Especially when they deal with memory. Take Miriam (Madeleine Sims-Fewer) and Greta (Anna Maguire) for example—two sisters who used to do everything together in their youth.

"It haunts your waking dreams..." Shudder has unveiled the first official trailer for a brutally dark thriller titled Violation, one of the big breakout's from last year's Toronto Film Festival in the Midnight Madness category. "The bold and unflinching thriller world premiered to critical and audience acclaim ​at the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival, where Sims-Fewer was a recipient of the TIFF Rising Star Award, and was also an official selection for both the 2021 Sundance and SXSW Film Festivals." It just hit Sundance and is streaming on Shudder in March. A troubled woman on the edge of divorce returns home to her younger sister after years apart. But when her sister and brother-in-law betray her trust, she embarks on a vicious crusade of revenge. This stars Madeleine Sims-Fewer, Anna Maguire, Jesse Lavercombe, and Obi Abili. If you haven't heard about this, critics have been raving about it for a while. Looks like it gets intense.

Following the recent screening of Violation at Sundance and ahead of its release on Shudder on March 25th, the official trailer for the film has been released.

Written, produced, and directed by Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli, Violation stars Madeleine Sims-Fewer, Anna Maguire, Jesse Lavercombe, and Obi Abili.

You can watch the new trailer below, and in case you missed it, read Heather Wixson's Sundance review of the film.

Synopsis: "With her marriage about to implode, Miriam returns to her hometown to seek solace in the comfort of her younger sister and brother-in-law. But one evening a tiny slip in judgement leads to a catastrophic betrayal, leaving Miriam shocked, reeling, and furious. Believing her only recourse is to exact revenge, Miriam takes extreme action, but the price of retribution is high, and she is not prepared for the toll it takes as she begins to emotionally and psychologically unravel."



The...

Shudder has released the first official trailer for “Violation,” a disturbing revenge thriller that premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, recently screened at Sundance, and will play SXSW next month ahead of its March 25 streaming release. The film is a haunting psychological drama about a country retreat gone awry when two sisters and their partners hunker down for the weekend. It’s the feature filmmaking debut of Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli, with Sims-Fewer delivering a wallop of a performance as the unraveling protagonist.

Here’s the official synopsis, lest we don’t give too much away: “With her marriage about to implode, Miriam returns to her hometown to seek solace in the comfort of her younger sister and brother-in-law. But one evening a tiny slip in judgement leads to a catastrophic betrayal, leaving Miriam shocked, reeling, and furious. Believing her only recourse is to exact revenge, Miriam takes extreme action,...

Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli’s domestic horror debut Violation follows Miriam (played by Sims-Fewer), a fraught woman on the verge of divorce, returns home to visit her sister and her husband at their lake home. The trip takes a dark turn when Dylan assaults Miriam, sending her on a violent arc of revenge. Dp Adam Crosby tells us how he captured the film’s lurid takes and how they fostered an environment to explore sensitive topics. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired […]

The post "The Overall Emotional Responsibility of the Film Was a Daunting Task at Times": Dp Adam Crosby on Violation first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli’s domestic horror debut Violation follows Miriam (played by Sims-Fewer), a fraught woman on the verge of divorce, returns home to visit her sister and her husband at their lake home. The trip takes a dark turn when Dylan assaults Miriam, sending her on a violent arc of revenge. Dp Adam Crosby tells us how he captured the film’s lurid takes and how they fostered an environment to explore sensitive topics. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired […]

The post "The Overall Emotional Responsibility of the Film Was a Daunting Task at Times": Dp Adam Crosby on Violation first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

For the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, IndieWire is again partnering with Canada Goose for a series of events to celebrate the female filmmakers showing new films at this year’s fest, including a private virtual version of our annual sit-down dinner honoring filmmakers. While this year’s mixer will look a little bit different than years past, the Zoom-based event promises to bring together some of indie film’s best and brightest, albeit through virtual means.

At this year’s Sundance, female filmmakers aren’t in short supply: 50 percent were directed by one or more women. Their projects include some of the hottest at the festival, including Rebecca Hall’s “Passing,” Robin Wright’s “Land,” Sian Heder’s “Coda,” Nanfu Wang’s “In the Same Breath,” and Mona Fastvold’s “The World to Come.”

And that’s just one piece of Sundance’s offerings, as some of the best films of...

Shudder, AMC’s horror and thriller-focused streaming platform, announced a lineup of 11 films set to premiere over the next 11 weeks.

The selection of Shudder Originals coming to Shudder include Sundance Film Festival selections, as well as Tribeca Film Festival selections and a host of new content, as well. The first project to join the streaming site will be “Hunted,” a take on the Little Red Riding Hood story that is set to premiere Jan. 14.

Other movies joining Shudder hail from the genres of psychological horror to thriller, with themes exploring technology, nature, gender and betrayal. “Lucky,” coming on March 4, will detail the difficulties one woman faces after discovering that she has a stalker. And “A Nightmare Wakes” will give life to Mary Shelley in a period piece about the famous author.

The final film in the 11-week lineup is “Violation,” which both ran at Sundance and the Toronto International Film Festival.

We don't talk a lot about Canadian entertainment company Pacific Northwest Pictures but they have been quietly picking up some really good flicks recently. In their current roster is Darius Marder's Sound of Metal with Riz Ahmed and Olivia Cooke, and Black Bear starring Aubrey Plaza, Christopher Abbott and Sarah Gadon. Seems Pnp know a thing or two about getting good titles, eh?    Now you can add Canadian drama/horror Violation from filmmakers Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli. Pnp have picked up the Canadian rights for Violation and are planning a March release. Violation had its world premiere at TIFF back in September and played at a handful of other festivals here in Canada. It plays at Sundance later this month.    Our own Josh caught...

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Ahead of its screening at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli's feature film debut, Violation, has been acquired by Shudder, with a streaming release slated for next year:

Press Release: New York, NY - Shudder, AMC Networks’ premiere streaming service for horror, thriller and the supernatural, has announced the acquisition of Violation, the debut feature written, produced and directed by Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli, which will be released exclusively on the streaming platform. The bold and unflinching thriller world premiered to critical and audience acclaim at the 2020 Toronto International Film Festival, where Sims-Fewer was a recipient of the TIFF Rising Star Award, and is also an official selection of the 2021 Sundance Film Festival where it will make its international premiere. Shudder has acquired all rights for the U.S., UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand to premiere on its service in those territories later next year.

Exclusive: Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli, whose feature film debut Violation premiered in the Midnight Madness section at this year’s Toronto Film Festival, have signed with WME. The duo co-directed, co-wrote and co-produced the revenge thriller, which also earned Sims-Fewer a TIFF Rising Star award for her starring role.

Canada-born pair Sims-Fewer and Mancinelli had been making short films since meeting at the 2015 TIFF Talent Lab. The pair’s latest, Chubby, had its world premiere at the Telluride Film Festival. Their previous shorts include their first, 2017’s Slap Happy, and Woman in Stall.

In Violation, Sims-Fewer plays a woman in an unhappy marriage on a weekend trip with her sister and their husbands at lakeside estate, where unspoken fractures, bottled-up resentments and a violent act are revealed.

The pic, which co-stars Anna Maguire, Obi Abili and Jesse Lavercombe, won awards at both the Calgary and Vancouver film festivals.

Sims-Fewer...

An act of sexual violence leads an awful retribution in Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli’s Violation, which premiered this past week at the Toronto International Film Festival. But were the film’s execution as simple, as blunt, as this brief synopsis might suggest, there’d be little to distinguish Violation from so many other works in the rape-revenge genre. Instead, in their debut feature Sims-Fewer and Mancinelli have radically scrambled the dramatization of cause and effect, sliding backwards and forwards in their storytelling to place a sexual assault that happens on a couple’s weekend getaway within the broader psychology of the survivor’s family […]...

An act of sexual violence leads an awful retribution in Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli’s Violation, which premiered this past week at the Toronto International Film Festival. But were the film’s execution as simple, as blunt, as this brief synopsis might suggest, there’d be little to distinguish Violation from so many other works in the rape-revenge genre. Instead, in their debut feature Sims-Fewer and Mancinelli have radically scrambled the dramatization of cause and effect, sliding backwards and forwards in their storytelling to place a sexual assault that happens on a couple’s weekend getaway within the broader psychology of the survivor’s family […]...

Rage, betrayal, confusion, and bloodshed are the driving factors of Violation, an unflinchingly brutal, often quite gruesome story of a woman who goes to extreme lengths following a terrible incident. Writer-directors Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli do not shy away from the violence, employing meticulously crafted practical effects to portray a jaw-dropping series of events. But while […]

The post ‘Violation’ Review: An Unflinchingly Brutal, Needlessly Muddled Story of Trauma and Revenge [TIFF 2020] appeared first on /Film.

Editor’s note: The following review contains spoilers for the ending of “Violation.”

In their Master Class during 2016 Toronto International Film Festival, “Transparent” creator Joey Soloway posits that the female gaze, a term originated by film theorist Laura Mulvey, should not strive to be the direct inverse of the male gaze. While women, trans, and non-binary filmmakers are well within their rights to subvert conventional norms around nudity, sexuality, and the framing of bodies, a truly “other gaze” (Soloway’s inclusive amendment of the term) should aim to create new imagery outside of established cinematic tropes. That brings us to Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli’s unflinchingly grotesque “Violation,” which hammers the bluntest of female gazes into the rape-revenge thriller. Rich in sumptuous visuals that portend its nasty undercurrent,

A resolutely disturbing genre thriller, it opens with the ominous image of a pitch black wolf feasting on a rabbit carcass...

True to its name, “Violation” is about an unforgivable transgression. Written, produced, and directed by Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli, their feature debut follows Miriam (Sims-Fewer) on at least two (maybe more) trips to the woods. In one, she ends up venting about her marital problems to her sister’s husband, Dylan (Jesse Lavercombe) and after a drunk kiss the night before, she wakes up to find him raping her by the smoldering campfire in the early morning hours.

Continue reading ‘Violation’ Is A Smart & Visceral Take On The Rape-Revenge Narrative [TIFF Review] at The Playlist.

Rape revenge films are a fraught bunch, while some seem to seek only to exploit an inappropriate titillation stirred in more lascivious audiences, others take a more nuanced look into the psychology of this very specific kind of trauma. The most successful are able to both tap into the pain and the catharsis of acting out violent revenge, while still maintaining a perspective with which people can relate, if not necessarily empathize with. Madeleine Sims-Fewer and Dusty Mancinelli have plumbed the depths of sexual violence in a number of shorts over the last few years, but never with such meticulous acuity as in their debut feature, Violation. A pair of sisters and their husbands strike out into the woods for a restorative holiday in this...

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