Jazz Documentary ‘Music for Black Pigeons’ Debuts Trailer Ahead of Venice Premiere (EXCLUSIVE)

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Camerimage, a film festival focused on cinematography, will honor the documentary director Alex Gibney during its 30th edition. The investigative filmmaker will be present at the event in Toruń, Poland, which runs Nov. 12-19, to accept the award for outstanding achievements in documentary filmmaking. Gibney’s films include “Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room,” exposing the greed and corruption of one of the most influential U.S. corporations; Oscar-winning “Taxi to the Dark Side,” with a harrowing tale of inhumane practices during the early years of the war in Afghanistan; and “Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God,” providing a horrifying account of the decades of sexual abuse and pedophilia in the Catholic Church.

Joe Otterson TV Reporter Jeanine Mason has joined the cast of “Upload” Season 3 at Amazon, Variety has learned exclusively. Season 2 of “Upload” debuted on Amazon back in March, with the show earning a Season 3 pick up in May. The series takes place in a world where people can “upload” themselves into a digital afterlife. Mason joins a cast that includes Robbie Amell, Andy Allo, Kevin Bigley, Allegra Edwards, Zainab Johnson, Owen Daniels, Josh Banday, and Andrea Rosen. The official Season 2 synopsis says, “Nathan (Amell) is at a crossroads in his (after) life… his ex-girlfriend Ingrid (Edwards) has unexpectedly arrived to Lakeview hoping to strengthen their relationship, but his heart still secretly yearns for his customer service angel Nora (Allo). Meanwhile Nora is off the grid and involved with the anti-tech rebel group ‘The Ludds.'”

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Following the world premiere of “My Neighbor Adolf” on the Piazza Grande in Locarno, Beta Cinema has sold the dark comedy to Vendetta Films, which will bring the Udo Kier and David Hayman starrer to cinemas across Australia and New Zealand in the first quarter of next year.  Prior to Locarno, Beta Cinema sold the film to Hungary (Cinetel) and Switzerland (Praesens Film), while deals for North America (Cohen Media Group), U.K. and Ireland (Signature Entertainment), Italy (I Wonder), South Korea (Lumix Media) and Japan (Tohokushinsha Film) had been revealed before. The film is set in Colombia in 1960, just a few days after the Nazi criminal Adolf Eichmann was caught by Mossad agents in Argentina. Polsky, played by Hayman, is a lonely and grumpy old man, living in the remote Colombian countryside. He is a survivor of the Holocaust. He spends his days playing chess and tending his beloved rosebushes. One day, a mysterious old German man – played by Kier – moves in next door, and Polsky suspects that his new neighbor is… Adolf Hitler. Since nobody believes him, he embarks on a mission to uncover the evidence. In order to gather it, however, he will need to come closer to his neighbor than he would like – so close that the two could almost become friends.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor The Exchange has acquired the sales rights for North America, Europe, Latin America, Australia, New Zealand and other remaining territories for superhero movie “Shin Ultraman,” a blockbuster hit in Japan when it was released on May 13. The Exchange is introducing the movie to buyers at the Toronto Film Festival. The release of the movie, produced by Tsuburaya Productions, Toho and Khara, marked the 55th anniversary of the original “Ultraman” TV series. It grossed $31.2 million in Japan. The movie was directed by Shinji Higuchi (“The Floating Castle,” “Attack on Titan”) and was written by director and screenwriter Hideaki Anno (“Shin Godzilla,” “Neon Genesis Evangelion”), who also acted as producer alongside Takayuki Tsukagoshi and Minami Ichikawa.

Tessa Thompson rocked a new look at the latest premiere during the 2022 Venice Film Festival.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Alexander Rodnyansky, the producer of Oscar nominated films “Leviathan” and “Loveless,” has boarded the next project from Kazakh director Adilkhan Yerzhanov (pictured), whose film “Goliath” has its world premiere at Venice Film Festival on Thursday in the Horizons Extra section. The new project, “Nosorog,” tells a contemporary story of Tamara, a distraught woman on a desperate search for her missing son in a small town consumed by violent riots. To help get her son back, she hires a shady detective, Brayuk, with unexpected consequences. Rodnyansky joins producers Aliya Mendygozhina and Olga Khlasheva on the project, which is a co-production between the State Center of Support of the National Cinema of Kazakhstan and Kazakh film company Golden Man Media.

Jessica Chastain will soon be seen in “The Good Nurse”, an upcoming Netflix thriller based on a terrifying true story.

Jessica Chastain looks drained from her work in this still from Netflix’s The Good Nurse.

UPDATED, 11 AM: HBO Max has released the official trailer for Season 3 of Pennyworth: The Origin of Batman’s Butler, along with the key art (see below). The third season premieres October 6 on the streaming platform following its first two seasons on Epix. You can watch the original teaser trailer below.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Berlin-based sales outfit M-Appeal has closed distribution deals for Italy and Greece following the film’s world premiere at the Venice Film Festival. The Israeli-Ukrainian co-production plays in Venice’s Horizons Extra section, and will have its North American premiere on Sept. 14 at Toronto Film Festival in the Contemporary World Cinema section. Rome-based P.F.A Films Srl will distribute the film in Italy, with a theatrical release planned for April 2023. The company’s recent titles include “Fabian – Going to the Dogs” by Dominik Graf, “The Audition” by Ina Weisse, and “Border” by Abbasi Ali.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Reservoir Docs has acquired documentary “The Other Fellow,” which is about several men named James Bond, like the movie’s hero. It has debuted the trailer (below). The comedy-thriller premiered and won an award at Doc Edge New Zealand, and gets its European premiere in Dinard at the British Film Festival in France. In Jamaica in 1952, author Ian Fleming needs a name for his suave, sophisticated secret agent, so he steals one from an unaware birdwatcher and creates a pop-culture phenomenon about the ultimate fictional alpha-male. In 2022, the year of 007’s 60th anniversary onscreen, Australian filmmaker Matthew Bauer is on a global mission to discover the lasting, contrasting and very personal impacts of sharing such an identity with James Bond.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent Prominent arthouse sales company The Match Factory has closed multiple sales on Italian auteur Gianni Amelio’s Venice competition title “Lord of the Ants” ahead of its Venice premiere on Tuesday. The Match Factory has sealed deals on Amelio’s latest work – which is a biopic of Italian poet, playwright and director Aldo Braibanti, who was jailed in 1968 due to a Fascist-era anti-gay law – that will ensure the film’s theatrical release in: Australia/New Zealand (Palace Films); Japan (Zazie Films); Spain (Surtsey Films); Sweden (TriArt Film) and Greece (Ama Films). Further deals are in negotiation, the company said. Braibanti was convicted after a complaint from his partner’s father, who later forced his son to be treated with electroconvulsive therapy in an ill-conceived attempt to rid him of his homosexuality. The Fascist-era law that punished Braibanti, which made it a crime to lead innocent or unwary people “morally” astray, was repealed in 1981.

Florence Pugh had the best red carpet date at the Don’t Worry Darling premiere – her grandmother, Pat!

Christopher Vourlias On the eve of the 79th Venice Film Festival, where his powerful Ukraine war documentary “Freedom on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom” will premiere out of competition on Sept. 7, Oscar-nominated filmmaker Evgeny Afineevsky was in a frantic race against time. Footage was still being shot in Ukraine into the second week of August, with Afineevsky only completing the film on Aug. 31 — the same day that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed the A-list celebrities and foreign press at the festival’s opening ceremony, urging the world not to forget the war in Ukraine with the impassioned plea: “Don’t turn your back to us.”

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Variety has been given exclusive access to a first-look clip for “Amanda,” Carolina Cavalli’s quirky Italian-cool film in Venice Horizons, starring Benedetta Porcaroli (star of Netflix series “Baby”), and featuring Italian heavyweight Giovanna Mezzogiorno, and Italian “X-Factor” winner Michele Bravi. The film, which is reminiscent of early Wes Anderson, premieres at Venice on Monday, then goes to Toronto – it’s the only Italian film to play both fests this year. Charades is handling international sales. I Wonder is distributing in Italy. The film centers on Amanda, 24, who lives mostly isolated and has never had any friends, even if it’s the thing she wants the most. When she discovers that as toddlers her and Rebecca used to spend a lot of time together, Amanda chooses her new mission: to convince her that they are still best friends.

When Trace Lysette got to Venice for the premiere of the Andrea Pallaoro-directed drama Monica, she learned that she becomes the first Trans actress to headline a competition film here. Lysette plays the title character, a Trans woman who comes home to care for the mother who rejected her years ago, The young woman has a lot of personal issues she is working through, but among the most frustrating is that the mental faculties of her mother (Patricia Clarkson) are failing along with her health. She doesn’t recognize her child, and Monica tries her best to build a bond as her caretaker. Lysette was a regular in the Amazon series Transparent, and she co-starred with Jennifer Lopez and Constance Wu in Hustlers. But this is her first leading role in a movie. We met at the Excelsior hotel for a Disruptors party thrown by Deadline, Thelios and Guillotine Vodka. It is clear that setting a milestone in Venice is not something Lysette takes lightly.

Giorgio Armani dressed so many stars for the Bones and All premiere at the 2022 Venice Film Festival!

Tessa Thompson is rocking two more looks at the 2022 Venice Film Festival.

Timothee Chalamet is making a fashion statement on the red carpet at the 2022 Venice Film Festival!

Alejandro G Iñárritu‘s three-hour-long opus Bardo (False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths) received a warm reception at its Venice Film Festival world premiere on Thursday night. Six minutes of applause began inside the Sala Grande as the credits rolled, with attendees standing for the Oscar winning filmmaker for about four of those.