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Paris-based sales agent Luxbox has acquired world sales rights to “Dos Estaciones” which will world premiere in World Cinema Dramatic Competition at this month’s Sundance Festival.

Produced by Mexico’s Sin Sitio Cine in co-production with France’s In Vivo Films and the U.S., “Dos Estaciones” marks the feature debut of Juan Pablo González, co-director of the Film Directing program at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) whose shorts have won at Slamdance and New Orleans.

Co-written with Ana Isabel Fernández and Ilana Coleman (“The Inventory”), “Dos Estaciones” pays tribute to Mexico’s artisanal tequila makers, a dying breed as they are bought up by foreign corporations.

In striking parallel and contrast, the feature underscores the meticulous craftsmanship and artistic ambition of art films emerging from Mexico and the rest of Latin America which question received wisdom and cliches, offering an alternative narrative.

They are made, however,...

Fork Films, a New York production company co-founded by Abigail Disney, has announced 11 grantees for its 2021 round of documentary funding. Topics explored in the slate of films include social justice, the impact of the pandemic on historically marginalized communities, climate gentrification and maternal mortality.

The company has funded over 100 projects over 14 years, adding up to over $4.5 million in documentary grants and support. With an aim to elevate justice-driven filmmakers, Fork Films has funded critically acclaimed projects in the past such as “Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen,” “One Child Nation,” “Cameraperson,” “Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution,” “Strong Island,” “The Square” and “The Invisible War.”

This year, along with financial support, Fork Films is offering grantees the opportunity to participate in workshops titled Collective Lens: An Impact Roadmap led by nonprofit organization Peace is Loud. The workshops will cover impact producing strategies, building campaigns and designing distribution plans with impact in mind...

After premiering to great acclaim at Sundance in early 2020, the documentary “Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen” was eventually acquired by Netflix, and it debuted on the streaming service on June 19 right in the middle of Pride Month. As the studio behind two of the last three winners of Best Documentary Feature at the Oscars (2017’s “Icarus” and 2019’s “American Factory”), could Netflix have another contender on its hands with this film?

Directed by Sam Feder, “Disclosure” examines the history of trans representation in film and television dating back to the early days of silent movies. Throughout we are shown the evolution of trans portrayals in everything from Bugs Bunny cartoons, classic television and film to contemporary series such as FX’s “Pose.” There are also looks at award-winning films and television programs that have, with time, been seen as more controversial and potentially problematic, including Oscar winners “The Silence of the Lambs...

IndieWire and International Documentary Association have again partnered for the organization’s annual Screening Series. This year, due to the shifted awards calendar and stay-at-home guidelines, screenings will extend through January and all films will be available on demand for Ida members worldwide. Each screening will conclude with a moderated Q&a available for viewing by the general public. IndieWire and Krcw have returned again as exclusive media sponsors of the Screening Series. IndieWire will be posting written and video coverage of the screenings alongside Kcrw’s community support.

The lineup launches October 8 with Amazon Studios’ “Time,” directed by Garrett Bradley. The documentary, which debuted to raves at the Sundance Film Festival, follows Fox Rich, an entrepreneur, author, and mother of six. She has spent the last 21 years fighting for the release of her husband, Rob, who is serving a 60-year sentence for an offense they both committed.

The films...

Let’s take a first look at the 2021 Oscar race for Best Documentary Feature. While the coronavirus pandemic has muted the buzz that usually builds at fall film festivals, several strong contenders have achieved prominence this year, starting at the Sundance Film Festival, which were held in January before the international shutdowns.

Netflix has four of these Sundance titles, led by “Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution,” about a New York summer camp for disabled teens that opened in 1971 whose attendees became activists for disability rights. The doc, directed by Nicole Newnham and James Lebrecht and executive-produced by Barack Obama and Michelle Obama, was the winner of the fest’s U.S. Documentary Audience Award.

“Miss Americana,” directed by Lana Wilson, is a revealing look at singer-songwriter Taylor Swift‘s career that utilizes studio footage and concert recordings.

Sam Feder‘s “Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen” examines how transgender people are...

Netflix's latest documentary, Disclosure: Trans Lives On Screen, is an in-depth look at how the lives and personalities of transgender people are depicted in films and television. While a tad divisive in its opinions (Is Tootsie offensive? Is there anything wrong with the film Boys Don't Cry? Should Silence of the Lambs be taken so seriously?) the film has its heart in the right place and it is sobering to hear the voices who, for decades, weren't allowed to be heard.

Related: 10 Underseen LGBTQ Movies

And there are indeed films that show the transgender community in a positive light. Here are 10 choices where filmmakers got it right.

Watching “Soapdish” as a child in the 90s was the first time I saw what life could be like for a transgender actress. Montana Moorehood, an actress on a soap opera played beautifully by Cathy Moriarty, is forcibly outed as a transgender woman to her co-stars. They react with shock and disgust, with her producer saying “She’s a boy” and the man who’s been intimate with her nearly pukes in his hand. Seeing that was not a positive experience for me.

I fell in love hard with Hollywood at a very young age. Watching TV and film was how I learned to speak English and discovered that I wanted to act, but life changed shortly after “Soapdish.” I was no longer allowed to be as feminine in my presentation. I was forced to cut my hair short and my parents bought boy-presenting clothes to protect me because they feared for my life.

Halle Berry will not be portraying a transgender man in an upcoming film. The actress apologized in a Monday tweet for her recent remarks about potentially portraying a transgender character in an upcoming film, which drew criticism on social media.

Berry was criticized for her comments in a Friday Instagram live interview where she discussed her preparations for an upcoming film role. She misgendered her character several times during the interview, which drew criticism on social media, including a handful of Hollywood talents, such as the team behind Netflix’s “Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen” documentary. Berry apologized for her remarks on Monday.

“Over the weekend I had the opportunity to discuss my consideration of an upcoming role as a transgender man, and I’d like to apologize for those remarks. As a cisgender woman, I now understand that I should not have considered this role, and that the transgender...

In a statement posted to Twitter on Monday evening, Halle Berry said she is backing out of plans to play a transgender man in an upcoming film after criticism from LGBT groups.

“As a cisgender woman, I now understand that I should not have considered this role, and that the transgender community should undeniably have the opportunity to tell their own stories,” she said.

pic.twitter.com/qpE8Tw1Xmu

— Halle Berry (@halleberry) July 7, 2020

On Friday, Berry spoke about preparing for the role in an Instagram Live interview, though she noted she had yet to be officially cast. She described the role as “a character where the woman is a trans character, so she’s a woman that transitioned into a man.”

“Who this woman was is so interesting to me, and that will probably be my next project,” she said.

The interview sparked a backlash from the trans community,...

During an interview with hairstylist Christin Brown on Instagram Live, Halle Berry talked about a lot of things including her hair journey throughout her career and her upcoming directorial debut with Bruised. Then she spoke about a role that was pitched to her: a transgender man. She then said, “I want to experience that world, I want to understand that world.”

This wasn’t exactly a good idea.

Berry is an LGBTQ advocate, but her decision to consider taking the role of a transgender man during an era when authenticity and representation on screen are paramount was subject to concern and some backlash on Twitter.

Sam Feder, director of the recently released Netflix documentary Disclosure, which chronicles the portrayal of trans people in media, tweeted at the actress: “Often people don’t know what they don’t know. And that’s ok! @halleberry please consider watching @Disclosure_Doc before performing transness.

Halle Berry has pulled out of a role in an upcoming film in which she’d play a transgender character after facing backlash online.

In an Instagram live interview on Friday, the actor said she had been preparing for the role, but had not been officially cast.

“[It’s] a character where the woman is a trans character, so she’s a woman that transitioned into a man. She’s a character in a project I love that I might be doing,” Berry had said. She added that she wanted to take a “deep dive” into “that world,” likely referring to the trans community.

However, Berry faced backlash online after misgendering the character multiple times during the interview.

“Who this woman was is so interesting to me, and that will probably be my next project,” she said.

On Monday night, she issued an apology and pulled out of the role, saying “the...

Versatile film, avant-garde classical, jazz and pop composer Ennio Morricone died in a Rome hospital after falling and breaking his leg, his lawyer Giorgio Assumma announced, according to Variety. He was 91.

Known as “the Maestro,” Morricone is best known as the composer of the scores and themes of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, Once Upon a Time in the West, and his Academy Award winning soundtrack for Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight. He also toured frequently, and expanded his sonic visions to reflect contemporary sounds. Besides his collaborations on the spaghetti Western films of Sergio Leone, Morricone composed for Bernardo Bertolucci, Dario Argento, Don Siegel, Brian De Palma, and John Carpenter. He composed for such diverse artists as Andrea Bocelli, Sting, k.d. lang, and Pet Shop Boys. Morricone never became fluent in English. When he won his 2007 honorary Oscar, his speech was translated by Clint Eastwood.

Morricone...

Oscar winner Ennio Morricone, composer of “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” and “The Mission” and among the most prolific and admired composers in film history, has died. He was 91.

Morricone died early Monday in a Rome clinic, where he was taken shortly after suffering a fall that caused a hip fracture, his lawyer Giorgio Asumma told Italian news agency Ansa.

Shortly after Morricone’s death was confirmed, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte tweeted: “We will always remember, with infinite gratitude, the artistic genius of the Maestro #EnnioMorricone. It made us dream, feel excited, reflect, writing memorable notes that will remain indelible in the history of music and cinema.”

The Italian maestro’s estimated 500 scores for films and television, composed over more than 50 years, are believed to constitute a record in Western cinema for sheer quantity of music.

At least a dozen of them became film-score classics, from the...

Discovering Sy Rogers was a big deal for me. As a gay kid in Pensacola, Fl, I learned early on that my “same-sex attraction”––as it’s often called in conservative Christian churches––was not acceptable in my community. Rogers previously identified as trans and led international ministries based on the idea that if God can change Rogers from being transgender, he can also change one’s homosexuality. This assumes it’s wrong to be gay and that being transgender is even worse. But I didn’t want to be gay, so I walked in Rogers’ footsteps. For the first half of the 2010s, I believed ex-gay theology and it took the second half of the decade in therapy to unravel it. Telling my story is not easy, but the truth is more powerful than pretending my past never happened.

While watching Sam Feder’s new documentary Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen,...

Exclusive: Netflix has acquired the worldwide rights to the Sam Feder-directed documentary Disclosure. The feature-length docu is set to debut on the streaming platform on June 19 — a perfect release date considering June is Pride Month.

Disclosure made its premiere at Sundance earlier this year and puts a spotlight on transgender representation in TV and film while showing how it has impacted how Americans feel about members of the trans community and how it has taught trans people to feel about themselves.

Feder not only puts members of the trans community front and center but he also made sure that they were represented behind the camera as well. This way, it was a film about trans people made by trans people, marking a genuine effort of authenticity.

“Disclosure came to life so beautifully because trans people were at the center of production — over 150 trans people were involved, from early research through distribution,...

Inside Out, one of the world’s leading Lgbtq film festivals and Canada’s largest distributor of Lgbtq content, has given Variety exclusive access to the lineup of 10 feature film projects that will participate in the festival’s fourth annual Finance Forum during its 30th anniversary year. Executives taking part will include reps from Netflix, Bleecker Street, IFC Films, Gamechanger Films, Killer Films, MK2, Bankside Films, Powderkeg Studios and GLAAD. Inside Out executive director Andria Wilson and director of programming Andrew Murphy spoke to Variety about the program, and the commercial and creative health of Lgbtq cinema.

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, this year’s finance forum will proceed entirely online during the festival’s original May dates. As previously announced, the full festival will now take place from Oct. 1-11.

Inside Out’s Lgbtq Finance Forum, taking place May 26-29, provides Lgbtq-identified producers and/or producers creating Lgbtq content...

Tribeca Film Festival announced its 2020 lineup, a slate of 115 movies that includes offerings from Hugh Jackman, Pete Davidson and Chrissy Teigen.

The 2020 festival — which runs in Manhattan from April 15 through April 26 — has selections from 124 filmmakers representing 33 countries.

High-profile screenings include the U.S. premiere of “Bad Education” starring Jackman; the New York premiere of Judd Apatow’s comedy “The King of Staten Island” with Davidson; Elisabeth Moss in “Shirley;” and “Call Your Mother” featuring Bridget Everett, Tig Notaro and Awkwafina. “Fries,” a documentary from Teigen and Malcolm Gladwell, will have its world premiere at the festival.

Other non-fiction films debuting include “Citizen Penn,” a look at Sean Penn’s relief work in Haiti, and “Don’t Try to Understand: A Year in the Life of Earl ‘Dmx’ Simmons,” featuring inside access to the life of the famous rapper. Laverne Cox-produced film “Disclosure,” an exploration of transgender representation in the media will also premiere,...

Editor’s Note: This article is presented by Adobe. Adobe is committed to celebrating creativity for all and empowering everyone to bring their stories to life. That’s why Adobe is thrilled to spotlight “Disclosure,” an in-depth exploration of trans representation featuring interviews with leading trans thinkers. By creating greater opportunity for all voices, we can empower change in our communities and move the world forward.

When assembling the footage for “Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen,” director Sam Feder and editor Stacy Goldate knew they were dealing with something big. The film, which played in the Documentary Premieres section of this year’s Sundance Film Festival, represents the first major chronicle of transgender narratives in film and television, weaving archival clips — some from the earliest days of cinema — with personal reflections from luminaries like Laverne Cox, Yance Ford, and Jen Richards. With careful research and insightful editing, Feder and Goldate...

Director Sam Feder’s documentary “Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen” shows that through 100 years of cinema and popular culture, trans people and ideas about what it means to be trans have actually been very visible on screen, but many of those images have been “violent and dehumanizing.”

Feder’s film argues that we’ve been programmed to think a certain way about trans people based on this long history of seeing trans people as villains or jokes, and he hopes “Disclosure” forces cis gendered folks to what these stories have said for the past 100 years.

“Start to think about how the images of the past 100 years inform how non trans people understand trans people and how we’ve learned to understand ourselves.,” Feder told TheWrap’s Steve Pond at Sundance. “I want people to have the model by watching this movie to then interrogate their own ideas of who trans...

Frameline increases total awards sum from $25,000 to $30,000.

Frameline is supporting an Australian film and three Sundance selections through the Lgbtq+ non-profit’s Frameline Completion Fund.

Lesbian coming-of-age rom-com Ellie & Abbie (& Ellie’s Dead Aunt) joins six others including recent Park City world premieres La Leyenda Negra, Buck, and Disclosure: Trans Lives On Screen.

The selections will share a $30,000 pool, which Frameline increased from $25,000 this year to mark its 30th anniversary.

Monica Zanetti directed Ellie & Abbie (& Ellie’s Dead Aunt), about a teenage school captain who falls for a girl in her class and receives advice from her deceased lesbian...

Here's Ren Jender filing her final report from Sundance 2020...

Tabitha Jackson and Kirsten JohnsonSundance didn't have a big queer film this year, as they have in many previous years but with this year's awards came the news that a black, queer woman, Tabitha Jackson, would take over from outgoing, longtime Sundance Film Festival Director John Cooper. Jackson also made news on the first day of the festival when she married documentary director Kirsten Johnson, and they jointly announced that Johnson would no longer be submitting her films to the festival during her spouse's tenure.

Sam Feder's Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen premiered on Monday. The film is a documentary in the tradition of The Celluloid Closet, which included clips of queer characters in films and commentary on those characters by writers, actors and filmmakers...

The New Hollywood Podcast has returned from hiatus and is back with a live Sundance episode from the winter wonderland of Park City with director Sam Feder and subjects Emmy-nominated Jen Richards, Marquise Vilson and Tre’vell Anderson from the documentary Disclosure: Trans Lives On Screen.

The documentary, which made its premiere at Sundance, puts the spotlight on the depiction and portrayal of the transgender community in film and television, revealing that Hollywood hasn’t exactly put its best lens on the marginalized community. The docu paints a picture of how the industry reflects and manufactures our deepest anxieties about gender. With prominent members from the Hollywood trans community including Laverne Cox, Lilly Wachowski, Yance Ford, Mj Rodriguez, Jamie Clayton, and Chaz Bono, the film gives them the opportunity for them to share...

During an interview at the Variety Studio at the Sundance Film Festival, a panel of transgender activists — who appear in director Sam Feder’s documentary “Disclosure: Trans Lives on Screen,” which premiered at the festival — scoffed at the idea of voting for Pete Buttigieg.

When asked whom they’ll vote for as the primaries approach, Jen Richards — a writer, actor and advocate, who appeared on the Caitlyn Jenner reality series, “I Am Cait” — said she’s voting for Elizabeth Warren. “This is the person so wonky, and who really wants to do things right,” Richards said. “Whether it’s realistic or not, I don’t know. But I support her.”

Zeke Smith, who in 2017 was outed as trans as a contestant on “Survivor,” and was another “Disclosure” panelist, agreed with Richards. “As a high school debater from Oklahoma City who also ended up at Harvard, I feel like I have...