12 Films To See In May: ‘Guardians Vol 3,’ The ‘Starling Girl,’ ‘Master Gardener’ & More

Naman Ramachandran Global distributor, streamer and production company MUBI has acquired Felipe Gálvez’ “The Settlers,” which bowed on Tuesday at the Cannes Film Festival’s Un Certain Regard section. MUBI has acquired the film for North America, U.K., Latin America, Turkey, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Benelux and India. MUBI will release the film theatrically in the U.S., U.K., and additional territories with release plans to be revealed soon. “The Settlers” is set in Chile at the beginning of the 20th century. A wealthy landowner hires three horsemen to mark out the perimeter of his extensive property and open a route to the Atlantic Ocean across vast Patagonia. The expedition, composed of a young Chilean mestizo, an American mercenary, and led by a reckless British lieutenant, soon turns into a ‘civilizing’ raid.

Mubi has picked The Settlers, the latest pic from Chilean filmmaker Felipe Gálvez for North America, the UK, Latin America, Turkey, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Benelux, and India.

Anna Marie de la Fuente With the writers’ strike dragging on, unscripted content is expected to dominate programming grids. A panel organized by C21 Media at the L.A. Screenings Independents on the format’s outlook in Latin America could not have been more timely. Rising costs, shifting consumer tastes, the advent of streaming platforms and the sway of social media have indeed posed new challenges, even to such mainstays as Banijay’s “Big Brother.” One of Banijay’s biggest reality shows, it first broadcast in 1999 in the Netherlands and was syndicated to more than 60 countries worldwide. “It was a gigantic challenge when we decided to produce ‘Big Brother’ again after 10 years had passed since the last edition,” said Guillermo Pendino, VP content and programming, FTA Brands, Latam Sur, Paramount (Argentina-Chile). “It was no longer the same world, there were the platforms, the social networks and you had to speak to a new audience, an audience that didn’t even know what ‘Big Brother’ was because they were still very young the last time it was broadcast,” he noted. “From Paramount we see the unscripted format as a great opportunity, especially at Telefe Argentina and Chilevisión,” he said.

Marta Balaga Debuting Chilean director Felipe Gálvez doesn’t shy away from controversy. On the contrary: he actually welcomes it. “I love to be controversial,” he tells Variety in Cannes, where he is introducing blood-soaked Western “The Settlers,” posing some uncomfortable questions about his country’s colonial past.   “If something is controversial, it’s a good sign. It means it’s interesting. I am trying to provoke with my film, because this conversation is far from over.” Set in 1901, “The Settlers” sees three men (Benjamin Westfall, Mark Stanley and Camilo Arancibia) hired by a rich Spanish landowner (Alfredo Castro) to mark out his immense property. One is American, one Scottish, one of Indigenous descent. But what is really expected of them is to get rid of the Indigenous tribes.

EXCLUSIVE: Avatar Entertainment is in Cannes launching The House on Tifton Lake, a Mexican horror starring Vadhir Derbez (Sense8, The Seventh Day).

Christopher Vourlias A host of emerging talents gathered at Cannes’ Plage des Palmes on May 22 for the latest edition of Focus COPRO’, an event launched in 2018 by the Cannes Court Métrage Rendez-vous Industry program to give a boost to first-time feature directors. Seven up-and-coming filmmakers whose previous shorts have bowed at the Cannes Film Festival and other prestigious fests including Berlin, New Directors New Films and Clermont-Ferrand, gathered under sunny skies on the French Riviera for an informal lunch with a host of industry decision-makers. The event offered a casual setting for the directors to chat about their upcoming feature debuts, seated alongside veteran producers and sales agents, as well as reps from leading co-production markets, labs, residencies, workshops and institutions focused on identifying and nurturing emerging talent.

An English lieutenant, an American cowboy, and a mixed-race Chilean sheepherder venture into the inhospitable limits of the Tierra de Fuego region at the southernmost tip of the South American continent—the ends of the Earth, some might call it. Under the orders of their employer, landowner José Menéndez (the always masterful Alfredo Castro), the trio’s mission is to savagely murder as many Indigenous people as they encounter in their path.  READ MORE: 2023 Cannes Film Festival: 21 Must-See Movies To Watch Set in 1901, “The Settlers” (Los Colonos), a scorching Western on Chile’s blood-soaked national myth, takes aspects from the official text-book history and probes at their conveniently sanitized interpretations of how they shaped the country’s future.

Emiliano De Pablos Santiago-based Clara Films and Colombian sound post house-producer Centauro-Productora LAP are joining forces to co-produce Chilean Ricardo Valenzuela Pinilla’s debut “What Was Left Unsaid,” a social drama with hints of dark comedy.   Produced by Camila Bascuñán at Chilean company Delavida Films, “What Was Left Unsaid” is currently at post-production stage.  The deal completes funding for the film and marks a significant milestone in the journey of bringing Valenzuela Pinilla’s first feature to audiences worldwide.     The story of “What Was Left Unsaid” is set in rural Chile, in the early 2000s, when communications’ modernization started. Margarita, a 43 year-old field sales executive, stands out for her undeniable connection with people in contrast with her 40 year-old sales colleague Cucho.

aespa have announced the Europe, US and Latin America legs of their 2023 ‘SYNK: Hyper Line’ world tour.Today (May 19), aespa revealed that they will be going on a tour of Europe, US and Latin America later this year, as part of their 2023 ‘SYNK: Hyper Line’ world tour. The US leg will kick off in Los Angeles on August 13.Following which, the girl group will plays shows in Dallas, Miami, Chicago and more over the next month, before wrapping things up in New York City on September 5.

Manuel Betancourt Hundreds of fish lie dead on a riverbed. A lone (lonely?) cow ambles around late at night in a forest. A flock of birds fly in discordant unison up above. The arresting images of nature gone awry in Francisca Alegría’s “The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future” are but the first clues that this rural-set Chilean feature has a distinct ecological interest. This hypnotic tale about how hard it can be to heal earthly and familial wounds marks a singular feature debut from the director of 2016 short “And the Whole Sky Fit in the Dead Cow’s Eye.” Aptly matching its dizzying and obfuscating title, the film opens with a premise that owes much to Latin America’s most treasured literary genre: magical realism. A young woman, with a motorcycle helmet in tow, emerges from the river where she presumably committed suicide decades ago. She washes ashore only slightly disoriented, caring little for the muddied state she’s in. Audiences, who have been offered an extended view of the verdant landscape around this mystery woman, including of the many fish who will soon be found dead in her wake, have heard a choral song that elucidates (though doesn’t quite clarify) what’s happened: “We’ve lived in agony since she passed away,” the voices sing, “but a drowned woman will come back soaked with life. And like her, we will return one day.” Alegría puts us immediately in a world where spirituality and ecology co-exist, where haunting presences have tangible connections with the physical realm.

EXCLUSIVE: Here at the Cannes Film Festival, Mubi has taken rights in North America, UK, Italy, Latin America, Turkey, India and Benelux to Un Certain Regard movie The Delinquents (Los Delincuentes).

Emiliano De Pablos Top Chilean fiction house Parox, producer of “Invisible Heroes,” has kick-started principal photography on international co-production “Los mil días de Allende” (“Allende, the Thousand Days”), a historical drama mini-series about the last three years in the life of Chilean President Salvador Allende. Alfredo Castro – one of Latin America’s most respected actors and a Pablo Larraín regular, star of films such as “Karnawal” and “El Club” – leads the mini-series cast as Allende; Benjamín Vicuña (“Besieged,” “Locked Up”) plays Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. The four-episode, 55-minute fiction drama shoot is taking place entirely in Chile, lensing from May 15 for two months, under “Besieged” and “Inés of My Soul” director Nicolás Acuña.

John Hopewell Chief International Correspondent Few European arthouse-crossover film sales agents have better weathered the ebb and flow of international market dynamics than Madrid’s Latido Films, which turns 20 in 2023. Proof of that came at April’s Platino Awards, where Latido scored six statuettes, split between an acting double for Alauda Ruiz de Azúa’s “Lullaby” and four for Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “The Beasts,” which has already swept Spain’s Goya Awards and scored a French Cesar for foreign film. Scoring €6.8 million ($7.5 million) in Spain, and 327,000 admissions in France, “The Beasts” also rates as one of the top-performing recent Spanish-language movies.

Callum McLennan Belgium’s Panique! (“Adoration,”), and Chile’s Pájaro have joined Oscar-nominated Vivemant Lundi! (“Flee,” “Mémorable,”) and Spanish collective Terremoto AIE to round out the co-production force behind the animated feature, “Olivia and the Invisible Earthquake.”  Filmax will handle distribution in Spain. KMBO will handle its domestic release in France. The Gallic distributor is on a roll with strong animation box office performances in France for “Amazing Maurice” and current Ukrainian hit “Mavka: The Forest Song,” Spearheading the production is Terremoto AIE, which includes Citoplasmas Stop Motion studio, Cornelius Films, and Bígaro Films, all contributing to the feature. 

“I always imagined this moment.” Amidst the bodies of dead fish succumbing to pollution caused by deadly chemicals from a nearby factory rises Magdalena. Magdalena (Mía Maestro), long-deceased, brings with her not only the shock of resurrection, but old wounds and a litany of family secrets, setting the stage for “The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future,” the feature-length debut from young Chilean director Francisca Alegría.

At just 23 years old, Eliza Scanlen has already amassed one of the most formidable filmographies of her Zoomer peers. “The Starling Girl” is just the latest addition to a sterling résumé packed with commercial success and indie darlings alike.

Christian Nodal and Cazzu are in the middle of an exciting journey, as they are expecting their first child together. Yesterday was Mother's Day in Mexico, and the Mexican singer made special gesture for his girlfriend. While Cazzu revealed that they live together in Argentina, they are spending time apart while he is on tour.

“I always imagined this moment.” Amidst the bodies of dead fish succumbing to pollution caused by deadly chemicals from a nearby factory rises Magdalena. Magdalena (Mía Maestro), long-deceased, brings with her not only the shock of resurrection, but old wounds and a litany of family secrets, setting the stage for “The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future,” the feature-length debut from young Chilean director Francisca Alegría.

Peter Debruge Chief Film Critic From “Saved!” to “The Miseducation of Cameron Post,” Sundance movies tend to paint fundamentalist Christians as severe, cult-like zealots, hellbent on brainwashing the next generation. While such portrayals can certainly be cathartic for those scarred by conservative upbringings, it’s a refreshing change to see this milieu treated with the level of nuance that Laurel Parmet brings to “The Starling Girl.” Set in a small Kentucky town where morality is strictly enforced, Parmet’s promising, evenhanded debut focuses on a religious teen (“Little Women” star Eliza Scanlen) who’s never had reason to question her faith, until a crush on her handsome youth pastor (Lewis Pullman) awakens her sexuality and scandalizes the community. For the adults in this repressive rural enclave, organized religion seems to provide the discipline and structure they seek. But for 17-year-old Jem Starling, their values are starting feel like a straitjacket.

Charna Flam International Federation of Film Producers Associations (FIAPF) and Women in Animation (WIA) have announced the selection of the five delegates of the second edition of the Stories x Women program. Stories x Women’s works to support and provide opportunities for African, Asia-Pacific Islander and Latin American women animators who want to tell their authentic stories. The program is sponsored by the Walt Disney Company, with additional support from Sony Pictures Entertainment. The five are “Superpunk” (Brazil) led by Mirtes Santana and Guilherme Petreca, “Negocio de Brujas” (Chile) led by Paulina Sanhueza Meléndez and Alejandra Jaramillo Fanta, “Nerea” (Dominican Republic) led by Fabiola Contreras Rosso and Arima Léon, “The Golden Pig” (Malaysia) led by Hwei Ling Ow and Kate Goodwin and “Papo Hapo” (Türkiye/Kenya) led by Irmak Atabek Ndungu and Mbithi Masya.