Author: Alex Billington

"Yes, they're going to need help, but at the same time, it's gonna be their life in their own way." National Geographic has revealed an official trailer for a documentary film titled Blink, following a Canadian family on an adventure of a lifetime. Or specifically – the lifetimes six human beings. After three of their children are diagnosed with an incurable eye condition, one family embarks on an epic journey to show them all of the beauty of the world before it vanishes for good. This is premiering at the 2024 Telluride Film Festival this weekend before it opens in theaters in October. Based in Montreal, Quebecois couple Edith Lemay and Sébastien Pelletier are parents to Mia, Léo, Colin and Laurent. Mia was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa at age 7, as were her younger brothers. While spending this year traveling the world together, they received extensive media attention and were filmed for this doc. Blink of an Eye (the original title) chronicles their journey to experience the world's beauty while preparing for an inevitable future. This is really lovely and ...

Is it time to finally start talking about our sexual kinks without worrying about being shamed by others? This is definitely the vibe this film is putting out. Is this film going to help us normalize this conversation? Maybe not, but at least it's a start... Maybe it is time we all stop hiding our kinks and start letting them into wild? Though that can be dangerous - which is also another vibe this film is putting out. Tread carefully. The first step is actually admitting your kinks and exploring them, understanding them, and not letting shame be the overwhelming emotion. Just watch out, you might get in trouble if you do this in your office at work. Babygirl is the second feature film directed by Dutch actor / filmmaker Halina Reijn after Bodies Bodies Bodies. It's an empowering sexual exploration thriller with some light humor, exploring the dynamics and pitfalls of a relationship between a high power corporate CEO and a young intern at her company. Alas it's rather tame in the sex department but nonetheless I enjoyed it ...

John & Yoko in NYC! Mercury Studios has revealed a first look teaser trailer for a compelling documentary film titled One To One: John & Yoko, which is premiering now at the 2024 Venice Film Festival. The doc is a time capsule that takes us back to the year of 1972, when John Lennon & Yoko Ono appeared in New York City and riled up the culture and politics by getting involved in activism and showing up on TV (also see: Daytime Revolution). Set in 1972 New York, this documentary explores John and Yoko's world amid a turbulent era. Centered on the "One to One" charity concert for special needs children, it features unseen archives, home movies, and restored footage. A unique take on a seminal time in the lives of one of music’s most famous couples, One To One: John & Yoko explores the 18 months that John Lennon and Yoko Ono spent living in Greenwich Village in the early 70s - and how their relationship is changed by their experience in America. This is also the time when ...

"This young man here is working on something very significant." Oscilloscope Labs has revealed an official US trailer for a film titled The Universal Theory, a mysterious sci-fi-tinged thriller set deep in the Swiss mountains. This first premiered at the 2023 Venice Film Festival one year ago under the original title The Theory of Everything, and it earned mostly mixed reviews (mine is here). The noir film is set in 1962. A physics congress in the Alps. An Iranian guest. A mysterious pianist. A bizarre cloud in the sky, a booming mystery under the mountain. It's "a quantum mechanical thriller in black & white." Driven by astonishing twists and improbable coincidences, The Universal Theory unravels a captivatingly complex chronicle with brain-tickling suspense. Cast with a fantastic ensemble and interspersed with a dynamic soundtrack, The Theory of Everything is an intellectual film about the contingency of our world, in which much is possible and hardly anything is necessary. Starring Jan Bülow as Leinert, Olivia Ross as Karin, Hanns Zischler, Gottfried Breitfuss, David Bennent, & Philippe Graber. This is such a radical ...

"Try to write a song about how you feel." GKids has revealed the main official US trailer for an acclaimed Japanese anime film titled The Colors Within, the latest creation from filmmaker Naoko Yamada. She is one of the few female Japanese anime filmmakers and her last two films were A Silent Voice and Liz and the Blue Bird. In this new film, a girl who can see colors in people's hearts joins a band with two other people. The synesthete Totsuko can see others as colors. Honor student Kimi has dropped out of school but still pretends to attend for her grandmother's sake. They reunite and form a small band with Rui, who dreams of composing on analog synthesizers but whose mother expects him to become a doctor. Together, they find freedom, joy, and love. This first premiered at the 2024 Annecy Film Festival to rave reviews and it opens in Japan this month (today, actually!) with a US release later this year. Starring the voices of Akari Takaishi, Sayu Suzukawa, Taisei Kido, and Yui Aragaki. With music by ...

One of my top discoveries from the first half of the 2024 Venice Film Festival is an Argentinian film called Kill the Jockey, originally known as El Jockey in Spanish. It's the latest cinematic creation from artsy, talented Argentinian filmmaker Luis Ortega, already known for his other films Damn Summer, Lulu, and El Angel previously. The film is premiering in the Main Competition at Venice – within the first 15 minutes after the screening began, I knew why they picked this film to play in this prestigious section at the festival. It really is a fantastic film, with complex filmmaking, slick storytelling and vivid pacing, and a very precise, clean style. It's also an impressive 97 minutes (which in Venice is refreshing because almost everything else is 2 to 3 hours long), never overstaying its welcome and moving along at such a swift pace it almost feels like they're leaving out major moments of this story. But that's actually part of what makes it potent - the taut, minimalistic narrative keeps it fascinating, you really have to keep up to ...

"No one can do what you do." Vertical has revealed an official trailer for Bad Genius, an English-language 2024 remake of the hit Thai film of the same name from 2017. This new version is set for a US release in October this fall, despite not showing up at any other festivals or elsewhere. The original Bad Genius from Thailand was a huge hit - we raved about it back in 2017 with this glowing review and it set new box office records in Thailand. It's a twisty, complex thriller about exam cheating and the students caught up in this scheme. Genius scholarship student Lynn Kang starts a cheating operation at her elite private school to fund her college dreams, giving her a unique opportunity to challenge the American education system, and her morals, in the process. This version stars Callina Liang (a breakout actress who also stars in Soderbergh's Presence ghost thriller), Jabari Banks, Taylor Hickson, Sarah-Jane Redmond, Adam Beauchesne, Tina Grant, with Benedict Wong. This remake looks solid, but I'm not so sure it'll top the original flick. Here's ...

"I can't keep hurting just to keep everyone else from hurting." Gravitas has revealed an official trailer for an indie drama titled Little Brother, marking the feature directorial debut of filmmaker Sheridan O'Donnell after many other shorts. After premiering at the 2023 Atlanta Film Festival last year, this film is set for a VOD release in September this year. Little Brother follows Jake, played by Daniel Diemer, as he drives his older brother Pete, played by Philip Ettinger, home for a family intervention after his most recent suicide attempt. The brothers aren't just oil and water; they're fire and gasoline—and they're both crammed inside a busted-up van for 1,400 miles with nowhere to hide. As they cross the American West together, the two struggle to reconcile their past and forge a new bond. Their overbearing father is played by J.K. Simmons (mostly on the phone). The cast includes Polly Draper, Ellen Humphreys, and Fischer Knapp. The filmmaker explains: "I wrote the film to capture their warmth and humor and attempt to understand their mental health journey, all of which I ...

"We were trying as much as possible to recreate a set we're all familiar with." Sony Pictures has debuted a fantastic behind-the-scenes featurette for the upcoming Saturday Night movie, a new film from director Jason Reitman. It was just announced as part of the 2024 Telluride Film Festival line-up screening this weekend, premiering there before heading to TIFF next. At 11:30pm on October 11, 1975, a ferocious troupe of young comedians and writers changed TV forever. Find out what happened in the 90 minutes leading up to the first broadcast of Saturday Night Live. With Gabriel LaBelle as Lorne Michaels, Rachel Sennott as Rosie Shuster, Cory Michael Smith as Chevy Chase, Ella Hunt as Gilda Radner, Dylan O’Brien as Dan Aykroyd, Emily Fairn, Matt Wood, Lamorne Morris, Kim Matula, Finn Wolfhard, Nicholas Braun, Cooper Hoffman, Andrew Barth Feldman, Kaia Gerber, Tommy Dewey, Willem Dafoe, Matthew Rhys, and J.K. Simmons. This is an exciting inside look at what they pulled off, including a live score by Jon Batiste in addition to everything happening in the background on set while filming. ...

"As women - why wouldn't we want to play America's game?" Blue Harbor Entertainment has revealed an official trailer for a documentary film called The Herricanes, a fascinating look back at sports history with an eye on moderns athletes, too. This doc premiered at the 2023 SXSW Film Festival last year and won the Audience Award in the Doc Spotlight section. The Houston Herricanes were a part of the first women's full tackle football league in the 1970s. Their unknown story is one of commitment, courage, and strength. Despite adversity and hardship, they fielded a team purely for the love of the game. What they started is a movement that is still in motion today. These groundbreaking ladies from all different walks of life came to the field with little to no experience but together they made history, even if it hasn't been told yet. Despite this story, and much progress since, there's still setbacks... As the number one sport in America, football is still only visibly played by men, and still remains the final frontier for women in sports. ...