News

The Hollywood Reporter has reported Camila Mendes is attached to be our new Teela in Amazon MGM Studios and Mattel Films’ live-action reboot of Masters of the Universe. She will be joining heartthrob, Nicholas Galitzine, 29, starring in the role opposite He-Man.

Back in May, Galitzine was announced to be cast in the role which is weeks away from Bumblebee and Kubo and the Two Strings director, Travis Knight, signed up to be at the helm of the Masters of the Universe.

Mendes, who is well known for portraying Veronica Lodge for The CW’s Riverdale, made her transition into film mostly taking on supporting roles in films such as The New Romantic, The Perfect Date, and Palm Springs. She has since proved capable of leading in main roles such as the black comedy, Do Revenge.

The synopsis features a 10-year-old Prince Adam, who crashes to Earth in a spaceship. It...

A simple Google search of "the best rom-coms of all time" will take you down a nostalgic hole of '90s and early-'00s movies like "10 Things I Hate About You," "While You Were Sleeping," and "P.S. I Love You." These classics, among many others, have shaped how we view love on screen. But through these films, we've learned what love looks like through white protagonists; many Bipoc communities have failed to see themselves reflected. While we saw Latine actresses like Salma Hayek, Jennifer Lopez, and Christina Milian make their mark early on in romantic comedy movies, for years the entertainment industry has undervalued and underrepresented Latine communities on screen and behind the camera.

Camila Mendes is shifting that narrative. You likely recognize her from rom-coms like "Palm Springs," "The Perfect Date," and "The New Romantic" - and she's starring in and serving as an an executive producer for the new rom-com film "Música,...

“Riverdale” star Camila Mendes appeared on Eileen Kelly’s “Going Mental” Podcast and talked about certain important spheres in her life. Mendes spoke about her upbringing, her past relationships and current romantic life and how she recovered from an eating disorder.

Read More: Camila Mendes Appears To Confirm Romance With ‘Música’ Co-Star Rudy Mancuso: ‘Life Update’

Mendes spoke about her parents’ divorce and how she has become more romantic after her parents’ separation.

“Oddly enough, being a child of divorce makes you more romantic. Even if you tell people you are cynical, it’s because deep down you crave love. I found that in all my relationships. I will fight so hard for something even if it is not working.”

“My parents shouldn’t be together. It is obvious to me why those two people couldn’t work,” Mendes added.

Mendes also spoke about putting her mental health before...

Claws-out high school drama has inspired some pretty memorable movies. Youthful touchstones like Heathers, Cruel Intentions, and Mean Girls take the intensity of hormones and the cruelty of high school students, and mix them with snappy, era-appropriate dialogue and up-and-coming stars. It’s a potent cocktail that when mixed just right yields delicious results. Netflix is looking to follow that template with their new high school revenge comedy Do Revenge, directed by Jennifer Kaytin Robinson, the co-writer of Thor: Love and Thunder who previously helmed Netflix’s Someone Great and created MTV’s Sweet/Vicious.

Will Do Revenge become the 2020s defacto teens-behaving-badly comedy? Only time will tell, but Do Revenge’s cast is enticing enough to suggest that the alchemy may be right for another mean girl magnum opus. Not sure where you’ve seen some of these fresh-faced stars before? Read below to find out.

Camila Mendes

Camila...

Camila Mendes smiling for the camera. Pic credit: ©ImageCollect.com/Birdie Thompson/AdMedia

Camila Mendes shows off her amazing physique in a plunging red carpet dress at the Venice Film Festival.

The Riverdale star was one of the attendees of the famous Venice event.

Her look was one of the ones that caught people’s attention the most, and here is the reason why.

Attending the Bones and All premiere, Mendes wore a gorgeous black sequined dress with a super low neckline that fit her perfectly. This sparkling gown is from Giorgio Armani Privé Spring 2017 collection.

The dress accentuated her amazing and toned body, with revealing cut-outs around her hips.

She accessorized this look with a pair of gold almond-shaped earrings, a soft brown wing, and her hair slicked back into a bun with some baby hairs glued to her forehead.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by camila mendes (@camimendes)

Yes,...

Exclusive: Camila Mendes (Riverdale) and Archie Renaux (Shadow and Bone) will lead the cast of Gulfstream Pictures’ romantic comedy Upgraded, from actor-director Carlson Young (The Blazing World), which has entered production in the UK.

In the film written by Christine Lenig, Justin Matthews & Luke Roberts, aspiring art intern Ana (Mendes) is invited on a last-minute work trip to London by her brilliant but intimidating super boss, meeting the handsome and wealthy William (Renaux) on the plane. Set in both London and New York City, the rom-com chronicles the trials and tribulations of balancing work, romance and following your dreams.

Developed in part by Mendes and Matthews, Upgraded is the third film financed by Gulfstream Pictures this year, following the Josephine Langford-led rom-com The Other Zoey and the motorcycle racing pic One Fast Move, starring Kj Apa, both of which are currently in post-production. Bill Bindley and Mike Karz are producing for Gulfstream,...

Filming has wrapped in Canada on under-the-radar Canadian feature North Of Normal, we can reveal.

Starring in the Carly Stone-directed drama are Sarah Gadon (Alias Grace), newcomer Amanda Fix, Robert Carlyle (Trainspotting), newcomer River Price-Maenpaa, James D’Arcy (Avengers: Endgame) and Benedict Samuel (Gotham).

Based on her memoir, North Of Normal follows author Cea Sunrise Person’s unconventional childhood in the Canadian wilderness, her complicated relationship with her perpetually pot-smoking teen mom, and her path to a version of normalcy on the runways of Paris.

Kyle Mann (Edge Of Winter) and Jonathan Bronfman (Edge Of Winter) are producing from Alexandra Weir’s script. Weir was previously a creature technical director on movies including The Avengers and Rango. Mann, Bronfman and Stone previously teamed up on 2018 SXSW title The New Romantic.

Supervising producers are Jason Jallet and Andrew Bronfman. Executive producers comprise Gadon, Berry Meyerowitz, Jeff Sackman, Noah Segal, Adrian Love,...

Hayley Law and Keith Powers are set to star in actor Avan Jogia’s debut feature, Door Mouse, which just wrapped production in Canada.

Also starring Famke Janssen and Donal Logue, the neo-noir thriller centers on a woman named Mouse (Law) who is stuck in a dead-end job, doing nothing with her life and going nowhere. Mouse works at Mama’s Burlesque Club all night, where her boss Mama (Janssen) encourages her to pursue her real passion of making comics. When a friend from work named Doe-Eyes goes missing and the cops do nothing about it, Mouse and her sidekick Ugly (Powers) take it upon themselves to find out what happened to her. What they discover is that corruption runs deep, monsters are real, and that sometimes, justice is meant...

Exclusive: Camila Mendes has joined STX’s after-market sneakers high-stakes feature drama American Sole, which Deadline first told you about yesterday.

American Sole follows two twenty-somethings (Pete Davidson and O’Shea Jackson) with mountains of college debt who use the fast cash of after-market sneaker reselling to achieve their American dream. But when their startup runs out of cash and a shady investor is their only way out, the dream quickly becomes a nightmare.

The Riverdale Veronica star will play Jess, the girlfriend of Pete Davidson’s character in the movie, which has been billed in the vein of STX hit Hustlers.

The movie will be written and directed by How To Make It In America creator Ian Edelman and produced by Kevin Hart and NBA All-Star Chris Paul. Hart is producing through his Hartbeat banner with Paul producing through his Oh Dipp!!! Productions banner along with Jake Stein, who...

"There's certain things that once you get into, you can never get out of." Cranked Up Films has released an official trailer for an indie crime drama titled Coyote Lake, based on the real life Falcon Lake, a reservoir on the Rio Grande (on the Texas-Mexico border) along a dangerous drug smuggling route that has become synonymous with cartel violence and mysterious disappearances over the years. The film tells the story of a mother and her teenage daughter, who run a boarding house where they drug, rob, and kill drug-runners who stay there - trying to rid the world of bad people one by one. Until they get taken hostage one night by two injured cartel gangsters. Starring Camila Mendes, along with Adriana Barraza, Andrés Veléz, Manny Pérez, Charlie Weber, and Neil Sandilands. This seems like an intense thriller that presents many different compelling moral quandaries to consider. Take a look.

Netflix has confirmed that 47 new original series, movies and specials will be debuting on the streaming service in April including: the directorial debut of Oscar-winning actress Brie Larson “Unicorn Store”; the newest rom-com with breakout star Noah Centineo “The Perfect Date”; and the bone-chilling horror movie “The Thriller.”

The latter showcases one-time “Mad Men” star Kiernan Shipka who also headlines the original Netflix series “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.” The second half of season 1 of that reboot of the TV classic also starts to stream in April as does the first season of the interactive adventure series “You Vs Wild,” which is hosted by British action man Bear Grylls. And among a slew of comedy specials are ones featuring Kevin Hart and Anthony Jeselnik.

Below is the full schedule of everything that is coming and leaving Netflix in April 2019.

Sign Up for Gold Derby’s free newsletter with latest predictions

Available...

April releases settle in the lull between award-season prestige films and summer blockbusters, so Netflix is picking up the entertainment slack with a bunch of classics and brand new releases for next month.

“Deliverance” and “All the President’s Men” will be available for streaming alongside new Netflix shows like “No Good Nick” and “You vs. Wild.” Additionally, stoner comedy “Pineapple Express” will hit the streaming service at the beginning of the month and marijuana documentary “Grass Is Greener” will conspicuously be available April 20.

See the full list below.

April 1

Ultraman

Across the Line

All the President’s Men

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

Deliverance

Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

Evolution

Freddy vs. Jason

Friday the 13th (2009)

I Am Legend

Lakeview Terrace

Monster House

Obsessed

Penelope

Pineapple Express

Pokémon the Series: Sun & Moon: S2

P.S. I Love You

Snatch

Spy Kids

Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3D

The Bone Collector

The Fifth Element...

Netflix might be skipping this year’s Cannes Film Festival, but the streaming giant is offering a bit of a mea culpa in its April offerings, which come with some exciting options from bonafide auteurs who also happen to be Cannes regulars, including Lee Chang-Dong, Andrea Arnold, and Quentin Tarantino. Ken Loach’s Palme d’Or winner “I, Daniel Blake” will also join Netflix’s ranks next month, along with classics like “All the President’s Men,” “Bonnie and Clyde,” and “Deliverance.”

In April, Netflix will add Lee’s lauded Cannes competitor “Burning,” which missed out on Oscar love but picked up plenty of other accolades during last year’s awards circuit, including a number of nods for star Steven Yeun. It will be joined by Arnold’s 2016 Palme d’Or entry “American Honey,” along with an extended version of Tarantino’s “The Hateful Eight”.

The streaming service will also...

The real joy of watching Jessica Barden on screen comes from her willingness to get dirty - both metaphorically and literally, in some cases.

The 26-year-old The End of the F***ing World star isn't afraid to explore the messy, gritty aspects of life that young women endure day in and day out, from getting their periods at the worst possible moment to sexual encounters that fall into a slippery gray area of consent. The latter aspect features heavily in Barden's new romantic comedy, The New Romantic, which isn't your average uplifting romance. In fact, its edgier undertones are exactly why Barden signed onto the film in the first place.

Instead of a heroine with a glamorous job in fashion and a sprawling big-city apartment, Barden plays Blake, a near-broke college senior whose sex column at the school's newspaper is so boring that it's on the cusp of cancellation. That...

Camila Mendes didn’t shy away from provocative subject matter in her first film, “The New Romantic,” which focuses on people in a purely transactional relationship — also known as sugar babies.

“The common misconception is people compare sugar babies to prostitutes, [which is] a very ignorant way of looking at sugar babies,” Mendes told TheWrap. “They have a choice, they made that choice, and they are comfortable with that choice. I don’t agree with this habit that people have of judging women for being comfortable with their sexuality or using their sexuality. Sexuality is such a personal matter. If you are comfortable doing something with your body, why should you stop yourself from doing that? Because of what the world thinks? It’s just unfair and I think people should have the freedom to make that choice for themselves.”

Mendes got involved with the project after the film’s director, Carly Stone,...

Following Wednesday night’s “Riverdale” episode, ‘The Midnight Club” — in which fans were transported back to the 1990s for a homage to the 1985 John Hughes flick “The Breakfast Club” — star Camila Mendes says she has another idea for a special episode.

“I would love to do a ’40s episode,” Mendes told TheWrap in an interview on Thursday. “A very comic book original. Archie, Betty, Veronica. [A] slap stick, comic-book-feel episode. That would be fun.”

Seeing as Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa’s CW series is actually based on the comic book series starring Archie Andrews, Jughead Jones, Betty Cooper, Veronica Lodge, Reggie Mantle, the serpents, Josie and the Pussycats (and Sabrina Spellman), that sounds like the perfect idea for the next tribute installment.

Also Read: 'The Midnight Club': 6 Best '80s and '90s Movie References in 'Riverdale's Tribute Episode

Of course the actual Archie Comics characters, which first appeared in print in 1941, led happier,...

With only two months to go until 2018 expires, we recently published our guide on where to stream the best films of 2018. There’s also plenty of worthwhile theatrical options, including a long-awaited film 40 years in the making, darkly comedic period pieces, highly-anticipated Best Picture follow-ups, and much more.

Matinees to See: Boy Erased (11/2), A Private War (11/2), Distant Constellation (11/2), The Front Runner (11/7), Overlord (11/9), Outlaw King (11/9), El Angel (11/9), The New Romantic (11/9), The Long Dumb Road (11/9), Shoah: The Four Sisters (11/14), At Eternity’s Gate (11/16), Jonathan (11/16), The World Before Your Feet (11/21), Anna and the Apocalypse (11/30), and Sicilian Ghost Story (11/30)

15. Searching for Ingmar Bergman (Margarethe von Trotta; Nov. 2)

The celebration of Ingmar Bergman’s immaculate career continues on his birth centenary. Well-timed with the release of The Criterion Collection’s epic new box set, a new documentary on the Swedish master will arrive this month. Margarethe von Trotta’s Searching for Ingmar Bergman take an...

Exclusive: Jane the Virgin fan favorite Brett Dier is joining ABC’s upcoming Goldbergs spinoff series, Schooled, as a new series regular opposite Tim Meadows, Bryan Callen and Aj Michalka. The series, slated for a 2019 launch, comes from The Goldbergs creator/executive producer Adam F. Goldberg, executive producers Marc Firek, Doug Robinson, Sony Pictures TV and ABC TV Studios.

Written by Firek based on a story by him and Goldberg, the spinoff is set in 1990-something and follows the hilarious teachers of William Penn Academy – led by Meadows (Principal Glascott), Callen (Coach Mellor) and Michalka (Lainey Lewis) – who, despite their eccentricities and crazy personal lives, are heroes to their students.

Dier will play C.B.. Based on Goldberg’s favorite teacher and friend, C.B. is a young, energetic teacher who engages students with classroom antics and impressions. C.B. is both a friend and rival to rookie teacher Lainey...

Rom-coms are back in a big way. Crazy Rich Asians, "To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before" and "Set It Up" have all garnered buzz and praise this year. Joining the rom-com revival is The New Romantic, a film that played at SXSW and will finding its way to theaters in November. The film follows a college student who […]...

As the short-lived Starz drama “The Girlfriend Experience” stylishly portrayed the lives of modern-day sex workers, a new romantic comedy hopes to do the same for a similar trend — the sugar baby. (A sugar baby is a younger person who accepts gifts from an older person in exchange for a romantic — and often sexual —relationship.) In “The New Romantic,” which released its first official trailer Friday, this unique relationship gets its very own bubbly teen rom-com treatment.

“The New Romatic” stars a bevy of Ya-focused TV talent, including Camlia Mendes (“Riverdale”), Jessica Barden (“The End of the F***ing World”), and Hayley Law. Barden plays a young journalist who, disillusioned with the romantic options in her peer group, begins dating an older guy in exchange for gifts. Mendes plays the seasoned pro who first introduces Blake to the world of sugar babies, and Law rounds out their friend trio.

“The New Romantic...

Between “To All the Boys I Loved Before,” “Set It Up,” and “Love, Simon,” 2018 has had some truly great and fun Ya romcoms. And next on the list looks to be Carly Stone’s debut feature “The New Romantic.” Check out the official synopsis below.

Frustrated with the lack of chivalrous guys her own age, a college senior gives up on dating for love to date an older man in exchange for gifts instead.

Continue reading ‘The New Romantic’ Trailer: Jessica Barden Stars In 2018’s Next Ya Romcom Contender at The Playlist.

"Maybe relationships aren't supposed to be for love...?" The Orchard has revealed the trailer for an indie romantic comedy titled The New Romantic, from first-time Canadian filmmaker Carly Stone. Jessica Barden (from "Penny Dreadful and "The End of the F***ing World") stars as Blake, a young college senior who decides to become a "sugar baby" and date an older man in exchange for gifts, rather than love. "As she documents the adventure in the hopes of winning a journalism award with a generous cash prize, she sets out on a quest to figure out if society is right to judge these woman and if her own self worth comes with a price." I'm sure we all know what lessons she's going to learn. The cast includes Hayley Law, Brett Dier, Timm Sharp, Avan Jogia, and Camila Mendes. This premiered at SXSW, and it looks spunky and cool. Here's the...

The La Film Festival will hold the world premiere of holiday-season comedy “The Oath,” starring Tiffany Haddish and Ike Barinholtz, on Sept. 25 at the ArcLight Hollywood.

“The Oath,” Barinholtz’s directorial debut, centers on a couple whose Thanksgiving takes a turn for the worse when two federal agents wind up being held captive in their living room. Barinholtz also wrote the script. The film also stars John Cho, Carrie Brownstein, Billy Magnussen, Meredith Hagner, Barinholtz’s brother Jon Barinholtz, Nora Dunn, and Chris Ellis.

Roadside Attractions will open “The Oath” on Oct. 12. The movie was one of four gala screenings unveiled Wednesday by the festival, which also announced it will hold the West Coast premiere of Eva Vives’ “All About Nina” on Sept. 23 at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts; the Los Angeles premiere of Rupert Everett’s “The Happy Prince” on Sept. 25 at the Annenberg; and the...

Exclusive: Avan Jogia has been cast as the lead in Now Apocalypse, Starz’s half-hour comedy series from Kaboom’s Gregg Araki and Steven Soderbergh.

Co-written by Araki, who also directs, and Vogue.com sex columnist Karley Sciortino, Now Apocalypse is a 10-episode surreal, coming-of-age comedy series that follows Ulysses (Jogia) and his friends Carly, Ford and Severine, who are on various quests pursing love, sex and fame. Now Apocalypse explores identity, sexuality and artistry, while navigating the strange and oftentimes bewildering city of Los Angeles.

Jogia’s Ulysses, a recent transplant to Los Angeles, is struggling to find his place in the world. Something of a thrill seeker, Ulysses admits that he’s always had an attraction to and fear of the unknown and is plagued by recurring nightmares, which he believes are a portent for a vast, sinister conspiracy.

Araki and Soderbergh executive produce...

Indie distributor The Orchard picked up U.S. distribution rights for another South by Southwest award-winning film on Tuesday, securing rights to “The New Romantic,” written and directed by newcomer Carly Stone.

Stone won the Best First Feature jury award at SXSW for the film. The Orchard also acquired the U.S. rights to “The Dawn Wall,” which won the SXSW audience award in the documentary spotlight category.

“The Orchard is the perfect home for our film,” said Stone in a statement. “They’re passionate, cool and understand how to connect to our target audience.”

“The New Romantic” is positioned as a millennial romantic drama and stars Jessica Barden (“End of the F****ing World”), Hayley Law (“Riverdale”) and Camila Mendes (“Riverdale”).

The film follows Blake Conway, an aspiring journalist and hopeless romantic college senior,...

Exclusive: The Orchard has acquired U.S. rights to Carly Stone’s The New Romantic which won the first time writer-director Best First Feature jury award at this year’s SXSW and will open this fall launching in New York and Los Angeles.

Pic follows aspiring journalist, hopeless romantic and college senior Blake Conway (Jessica Barden) who is terrified of graduating. In order to escape her looming post-graduation fate that includes student debt and zero romantic prospects, she becomes a sugar baby. As she documents the adventure in the hopes of winning a journalism award with a generous cash prize, she sets out on a quest to figure out if society is right to judge these women and if her own self worth comes with a price. Riverdale‘s Hayley Law and Camila Mendes also star. Kyle Mann and Michael Risley of Drive Films produced as well as financed the film.

 While portraying Morgan in The New Romantic, Camila Mendes said she thought back to her college days to young women she knew who were “sugar babbies,” people who accept gifts in return for dating older men. “I knew plenty of girls in college who were sugar babies, and everyone kind of had their own […]

Source: uInterview

The post Jessica Barden & Camila Mendes On Sugar Babies, ‘The New Romantic’ [Video Exclusive] appeared first on uInterview.

Where to draw the line between friends with major benefits and something, say, slightly illegal? For college student and aspiring professional journalist Blake (Jessica Barden), the question seems more academic than practical, even when she’s the sugar baby dating a wealthy older man in return for some attractive perks.

Writer-director Carly Stone’s interest in the topic is only slightly more considered, since she’s really more interested in crafting an incisive millennial rom-com, but The New Romantic comes off as too forced and calculated. Setting the bar for the film impossibly high with repetitious references to Nora Ephron classics like Sleepless...

Exclusive: Writer-director Carly Stone, whose feature directorial debut The New Romantic just premiered in competition at SXSW and won her the Best First Feature jury award, has signed with ICM Partners and Good Fear Management. ICM is also handling sales on the coming-of-age pic. Stone, who graduated from AFI, also writes for the CBC sitcom Kim’s Convenience, which earlier this month won Best Comedy Series at the Canadian Screen Awards. The New Romantic stars The End of t…...

Exclusive: Writer-director Carly Stone, whose feature directorial debut The New Romantic just premiered in competition at SXSW and won her the Best First Feature jury award, has signed with ICM Partners and Good Fear Management. ICM is also handling sales on the coming-of-age pic. Stone, who graduated from AFI, also writes for the CBC sitcom Kim’s Convenience, which earlier this month won Best Comedy Series at the Canadian Screen Awards. The New Romantic stars The End of t…...

An indictment of modern hook-up culture, The New Romantic offers an often surprisingly funny look at one aspiring journalist’s experimentation with a sugar daddy relationship. Jessica Barden stars as Blake, an undergraduate who’s trying to win the $50,000 Hunter S. Thompson prize for Gonzo journalism that will help her pay off her student loans. Set on a small-town Ontario campus, The New Romantic offers an accurate look at college life as Blake finds her community and attempts to discover herself. The film echoes Blake in that just as she lacks some of the answers, so too does the narrative, as we see her naïveté perspective in scenes like Blake turning to YouTube tutorials to understand what a “sugar baby” relationship exactly entails.

As the film opens, Blake writes a hopeless romantic column aspiring for something more than just casual intimacy from Tinder, inspiring her roommate Nikki (Hayley Law) to...

Juried prizes were presented tonight at the 25th annual Swsw Film Festival. Jim Gaffigan, in Austin to represent the Miranda Bailey-directed ensemble comedy “You Can Choose Your Family,” presided as host. The venue was the Paramount Theatre, a 103-year-old landmark just blocks from the Texas Capitol.

SXSW will continue screening films through Saturday, when most of the festival’s audience awards recipients will be announced. The exception is for the headlining films, such as “A Quiet Place,” “Blockers,” and “Ready Player One” — those verdicts follows on March 19.

This year’s line-up comprised 256 total features and shorts, culled from 8,183 submissions. Best narrative feature “Thunder Road” was adapted from the namesake, one-take short that won a Grand Jury award at Sundance in 2016.

Lena Dunham’s “Tiny Furniture” (2010) and Destin Daniel Cretton’s “Short Term 12” (2013) are among the best-known past jury victors at SXSW. IndieWire’s Dana Harris helped choose the Louis Black “Lone Star” honoree,...

A charming little nugget of a romantic-comedy that tentatively explores the existence of love stories in a world that seems to have outgrown them, Carly Stone’s “The New Romantic” is a movie for a generation that finds themselves uncomfortably wedged between “Sleepless in Seattle” and boning via Bumble — a generation that was raised on “Sex and the City,” but never got to live in Carrie Bradshaw’s New York. Blitzing through her feature debut in a quick 82 minutes, Stone doesn’t waste any time swirling all of those touchstones together and distilling them into the form of a girl named Blake (engagingly played by “The End of the F***ing World” star Jessica Barden).

The sex columnist for the newspaper at her sleepy Canadian college, Blake is introduced — in true Bradshaw fashion — via a voiceover reading of her latest article. Mentioning how she binged Nora Ephron movies when she had mono in high school,...

Making her first feature with the atypical romantic comedy The New Romantic, writer/director Carly Stone brought the film to this year’s SXSW Film Festival, joining stars Jessica Barden (a breakout talent of recent vintage with Netflix series The End of the F***ing World), Hayley Law and Brett Dier at Deadline’s Studio to discuss the film. Pic centers on Blake (Barden), a young woman who, frustrated with a lack of chivalry among guys her own age, turns to life as a sugar…...

Girl Talk is a weekly look at women in film — past, present, and future.

While Hollywood continues to struggle towards parity in the director’s chair, the film festival world is playing major catch-up. At this year’s SXSW Film Festival, the push towards parity is becoming more of a reality than ever before, as 33% of all feature films at the fest are directed by women, while the shorts section boasts 59% female directorship across its slate. It’s a stark difference to the studio side of the industry.

The USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative’s latest study, “Inclusion in the Director’s Chair? Gender, Race & Age of Directors across 1,000 films from 2007-2017,” found that, of the 109 film directors associated with the 100 top movies of 2017, 92.7 percent were male; 7.3 percent were female. Days later, the San Diego State University’s Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film followed with the “Celluloid Ceiling” study,...

Exclusive: Graduating from college can be an exciting moment in one’s life. It also can be scary as hell. Director-writer Carly Stone brings the fear of post-college life in this clip from The New Romantic starring The End of the F***ing World standout Jessica Barden. The clip features aspiring journalist and college senior Blake Conway (Barden) talking to her editor (Avan Jogia) about going on a questionable date for her column. The New Romantic marks Stone’s feature…...

Jordan Peele’s The Last O.G to screen in Independent Episodic; Timur Bekmambetov’s Profile among SXSW line-up.

Source: Paramount Pictures

SXSW top brass on Wednesday (January 31) said the world premiere of John Krasinski’s A Quiet Place will open the 25th edition of the festival, which runs in Austin, Texas, from March 9-18.

Krasinski directed and stars in horror-thriller A Quiet Place alongside his wife Emily Blunt in the tale of an isolated family living in silence for fear of attack by an unknown force than tracks sound. Platinum Dunes produced the feature, which opens in the Us through on April 6 through Paramount.

SXSW launches the inaugural Independent Episodic section this year, an expansion on the Episodic section launched in 2014. Overall, the festival will screen 132 features, with additional titles to be announced.

The full line-up will include 44 films from first-time filmmakers, 86 world premieres, 11 North American premieres and five Us premieres. The films were culled...

The SXSW Conference and Festivals has announced its features lineup and opening night film, plus a selection of episodic titles for the 25th edition of the Film Festival, running this March in Austin, Texas. This year’s festival will open with John Krasinski’s Paramount-produced “A Quiet Place,” playing as part of the festival’s Headliners section. Elsewhere, the film lineup is stacked with a number of offerings from female filmmakers, including its Narrative Feature Competition, which includes eight films (out of ten) directed or co-directed by women, from Megan Griffiths’ “Sadie” to Stacy Cochran’s “Write When You Get Work.”

Other sections of the festival also include a heavily female bent, including three films in the Headliners section (which currently includes five titles), and the Narrative Spotlight section, which includes new films from Lynn Shelton, Miranda Bailey, Julia Hart, and Suzi Yoonessi. Those titles are joined by a slew of other SXSW regulars,...