Jordan Peele and Henry Selick’s ‘Wendell & Wild’ to Open Animation Is Film Festival

Manori Ravindran International Editor New York’s South Asian International Film Festival has appointed Chayan Sarkar as its new president. A filmmaker, entrepreneur and festival director, Sarkar is also the founder of the Indian International Film Festival of Queensland in Australia. He takes over from SAIFF founder Shilen Amin, who will step down as president, but will remain a member of the festival’s board of directors. Sarkar joins SAIFF as the festival enters its 19th year as a leading film festival in the U.S. for new cinema from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal, and within the Indian diaspora. In recent years, SAIFF has become increasingly influential as a platform for South Asian cinema, both in the U.S. and internationally. Fourteen of India’s submissions for the international feature film Oscar have had their North American premieres at the festival.

Peter Caranicas Deputy Editor Moving in parallel with the recent upsurge of film production in Greece, the Los Angeles Greek Film Festival (LAGFF), an annual showcase for new works from Greek filmmakers worldwide, plans to expand its activities on an international scale. The fest, now in its 17th year, is launching the Global Greek Film Initiative (GGFI), an umbrella program to advance cultural exchange between Greece, the U.S. and the Greek diaspora, provide opportunities for employment and economic growth within Greece, and serve as the North American hub for Greek film programs and initiatives.  Lia Bozonelis, a Greek-American writer-producer and LAGFF Board Member who conceived the idea of the year-round multifaceted program, said that “Greece is experiencing a hard-won opportunity with the amount of international production pouring in.”

Vanessa Kirby shows off the details on the back of her black velvet mini dress at the premiere of her movie, The Son, in London, England on Monday (October 10).

Italian producer Lorenzo Mieli gave a spirited and often humorous rundown of his career as a producer working with directors such as Luca Guadagnino and Paolo Sorrentino during a keynote talk at the London Film Festival Monday.

“I’m going to keep trying to come up with original stories and meet the expectations the audience has for me,” Jordan Peele said on a recent edition of Variety’s podcast. “I hope to continue to lift original filmmakers up.”And he’s been true to his word.

Clayton Davis Jordan Peele is looking to push boundaries as a writer, director and producer every time he creates something new. “I’m going to keep trying to come up with original stories, and meet the expectations the audience has for me,” Peele says. “I hope to continue to lift original filmmakers up.” On this episode of the award-winning Variety Awards Circuit Podcast, we sit down with Academy Award winner Peele to discuss his two feature film projects in the awards conversation: the sci-fi horror film “Nope,” which he wrote and directed, and the animated feature “Wendell & Wild,” which he voiced, co-wrote and produced. Also on the episode, he talks about his long friendship and collaboration with Keegan-Michael Key, and whether fans might ever see the comedy duo reboot their beloved Comedy Central and Emmy-winning sketch series “Key & Peele.”

Manori Ravindran International Editor Musicals aren’t for everyone, but “Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical” seemed to be right on tune for the BFI London Film Festival. The Netflix movie adaptation of the stage musical, which debuted in the West End in 2012, opened the 66th edition of the festival on Wednesday night, where despite starting 45 minutes late, it found an appreciative audience in the Royal Festival Hall crowd, which included a number of revolting children. The Netflix and TriStar Pictures pic stars Emma Thompson as psychotic headmistress Miss Trunchbull, Lashana Lynch as Miss Honey, Stephen Graham and Andrea Riseborough as Matilda’s parents and Sindhu Vee as confidante Mrs. Phelps.

EXCLUSIVE: Barbara Broccoli, one of the teams of producers behind the powerhouse film Till, about the extraordinary efforts of Maimie Till Mobley to find justice after the lynching of her 14-year-old son Emmett Louis Till, for whistling at Carolyn Bryant, a white woman, by white supremacists in Mississippi in 1955, told Deadline, that audiences must seek out the movie: ”This is not a time for us to look away.”

Antonio Ferme editor Long before “Marriage Story” writer-director Noah Baumbach was attached to Netflix’s “White Noise,” several filmmakers mounted attempts to adapt the notoriously “unfilmable” novel of the same name written by Don DeLillo. Variety reported in 2004 that “The Addams Family” director Barry Sonnenfeld was on board to direct the film, known as his “longtime passion project.” The torch was then handed off to Michael Almereyda, best known for his 2000 film “Hamlet” starring Ethan Hawke, after Uri Singer acquired the rights to DeLillo’s novel. Baumbach’s “White Noise” served as the opening night screening for the 60th annual New York Film Festival on Friday, making its North American debut after a divisive premiere at the Venice Film Festival. The director told Variety on the red carpet that he didn’t give a second thought to the idea that his film’s source material was unadaptable.

Brendan Fraser will be honored at this year’s Santa Barbara International Film Festival for his decades’ worth of contributions to American cinema. Going into the 38th annual festival, he is the 2023 recipient of its American Riviera Award. Fraser will attend the event on Feb.

Gearing up for phase two of the Oscar season even before we have even scratched the surfaces of phase one, the Santa Barbara Film Festival said Tuesday that The Whale star Brendan Fraser will be the recipient of its American Riviera Award on Valentine’s Day, February 14, 2023.

Pat Saperstein Deputy Editor The American French Film Festival, formerly known as COLCOA, will kick off Oct. 10 with the North American premiere of docudrama “Notre-Dame on Fire,” from “Quest for Fire” director Jean-Jacques Annaud. The weeklong festival at the DGA Theater Complex in Los Angeles closes with Dominik Moll’s thriller “The Night of the 12th,” about a cold case where the only certainty is the night it occurred. Moll will also be the focus of the festival’s annual “Focus on a Filmmaker.” “Every year, The American French Film Festival presents the very best of French cinema and television, and this year is no exception. I am personally excited about the opening night selection of Jean-Jacques Annaud’s ‘Notre-Dame on Fire’ as I think it perfectly embodies the Franco-American Cultural Fund’s mission,” said Andrea Berloff, writer and board member of the Franco-American Cultural Fund.

The Santa Fe International Film Festival (SFiFF) has announced its first 15 feature titles. These films are part of the Special Presentation section and will be followed by a full schedule of competition films, short films, panels and events. SFiFF starts October 19 and will run through October 23.

The People’s Choice Award from the just wrapped 2022 Toronto International Film Festival has gone to Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans.  First Runner Up is Canada’s own Sarah Polley’s Women Talking. And Second Runner Up was Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. The Documentary Award went to Black Ice, and the Midnight Madness winner was Weird: The Al Yankovich Story             .

EJ Panaligan editor NewFest, a New York-based LGBTQ+ film festival, has announced the full lineup for its 34th iteration. The 2022 edition will run from Oct. 13 to Oct. 25. With world, North American, U.S. and New York premieres for more than 130 films from 23 countries, the festival will be headlined by the world premiere of HBO documentary “Mama’s Boy” from Laurent Bouzereau as the opening night screening. Additionally, the festival will hold an advance screening for the Season 2 premiere of popular HBO series “The White Lotus.” Other high-profile screenings through the festival’s run include Michael Grandage’s love triangle film “My Policeman,” starring Harry Styles and Emma Corrin, and the stop-motion horror comedy “Wendell & Wild,” from writer-director Henry Selick. Jordan Peele co-writes, while also featuring in a lead voice role. Keegan-Michael Key inhabits the film’s other lead voice role, marking a “Key & Peele” reunion on the animated stage between the two longtime collaborators.

Carson Burton The 2022 edition of InFocus: Latinx & Hispanic Cinema Film Festival from NewFilmmakers LA (NFMLA) will be held from Sept. 23-24 in association with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. For the first time since 2019, the festival will be held in-person at the Academy’s Linwood Dunn Theater in Hollywood. The lineup consists of three short film programs showcasing a variety of genres. The festival, which is co-presented by The MBS Group, includes screenings, filmmaker Q&A sessions, industry development programs and educational panels. The festival features independent films from emerging talent hailing from Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Brazil, Cuba, Honduras, Jamaica, Colombia, Venezuela and the United States. Two world premieres will be held at the festival, and one film will see its North American premiere.

Paul Mescal suits up for the premiere of his new movie Aftersun during the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival on Monday (September 12) at the TIFF Bell Lightbox in Toronto, Canada.

Jordan Peele’s third feature, “Nope,” focuses on a group of characters (played by Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer, Steven Yeun, Brandon Perea and Michael Wincott) attempting to track down an unidentified flying object spotted in the air around the Agua Dulce desert. Many of the film’s scenes take place in the dead of night, but as Peele describes it, the majority of them weren’t filmed at night. Instead, cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema shot most of the scenes during the day using some innovative technological approaches “I haven’t wanted to ruin the illusion, but I’ll ruin it for you today,” Peele said at a Toronto International Film Festival Q&A on Sept. 12. “The night shots, for the most part, were shot in the day, which is due to a technological and strategic thing that [Hoytema] brought to the table. ”