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While the Max rebrand back to HBO Max has the streaming world in a tizzy, it’s worth remembering the significance of keeping diverse subscriptions. While “Hacks” and “The Last of Us” wrap up over on that side of your library, the Hulu and Disney bundle is essential for maximizing this summer’s offerings.

Disney+ continues to be the go-to streamer for family friendly viewing options; this month, they’ll add the official “Frozen” Broadway musical to that library, along with Marvel’s “Ironheart,” about Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne) who was introduced in “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.”

Hulu has everything you need for an “Alien” movie marathon, all to gear up for FX’s “Alien: Earth” which premieres in August. You could also do a “Mamma Mia!” marathon or “Bachelor” binge — we’re not here to judge.

Top Pick: “The Bear” Season 4 (Available on Hulu)

Much as we are not...

Levan Akin’s Crossing and Frida Kempff’s The Swedish Torpedo headed the winners at Sweden’s Guldbagge national film awards, presented in Stockholm on Monday, January 13.

Crossing won the best film award, presented to producer Mathilde Dedye – the second time Akin and Dedye have taken the top Guldbagge award, after And Then We Danced in 2020.

Scroll down for the full list of winners

Akin received the best director prize, with the film also winning best cinematography for Lisabi Fridell, and best sound design for Anne Gry Friis Kristensen and Sigrid Dpa Jensen.

Crossing opened the Panorama strand at last...

Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

Crossing (Levan Akin)

There’s no description of Levan Akin’s Crossing that won’t make it sound like the kind of feel-good dramedy which would have taken Sundance by storm in 2006. It has all the key ingredients: an inter-generational friendship forged between a curmudgeonly retired teacher and a young burnout desperate to escape his hometown; an epic road trip where they come to understand each other more; and the older of the two confronting her internal bigotry as they search for her transgender niece. Above all, any description makes this sound like the worst kind of LGBTQ story, which we finally seem to have moved past as a culture––the story of queer people aimed firmly at a straight audience. It...

Forget about “The Magnificent Seven”: It’s time for The Magnificent Six, competing for the Nordic Council Film Prize this year.

The nominees – consisting of four fiction and two documentary feature films and each representing one of the Nordic countries – were announced by Nordisk Film & TV Fond at the Norwegian International Film Festival in Haugesund.

Denmark is represented by “The Son and the Moon,” directed by Roja Pakari and Emilie Adelina Monies. Written by Pakari – documenting her own struggle with cancer – and Denniz Göl Bertelsen, it’s produced by Sara Stockmann for Sonntag Pictures.

“Twice Colonized” by Lin Alluna, hailing from Greenland, was written by Aaju Peter and Alluna. Pic is produced by Emile Hertling Péronard for Ánorâk Film, Red Marrow Media and EyeSteelFilm.

“I’m extremely happy about the nomination and the fact that Greenland is now, for only the second time, represented at the Nordic Council Film Prize.

RankFilm (distributor)Three-day gross (July 26-28)Total gross to dateWeek 1. Deadpool & Wolverine (Disney) £12.6m £17.3m 1 2. Despicable Me 4 (Universal) £3.1m £25.3m 3 3. Twisters (Warner Bros) £1.5m £7.9m 2 4. Inside Out 2 (Disney) £1.1m £50.1m 7 5. Longlegs (Black Bear) £723,000 £5.7m 3

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.28

Deadpool & Wolverine roared into life at the UK-Ireland box office with a £12.6m opening – the biggest of the year, and biggest for a Marvel Cinematic Universe title for over two years.

Playing in over 700 cinemas, the film took a location average around £18,000 for Disney, with final figures still to come. Deadpool & Wolverine has £17.3m in total having opened on Thursday,...

Independents look solid this weekend with Vertical’s Widow Clicquot nice alternative programming amid summer blockbuster season, IFC Film horror Oddity off to a fine start, and Thelma, one of the year’s biggest specialty hits, passing $8 million. New films and holdovers in limited release did business.

Thomas Napper’s Widow Clicquot is looking at an estimated 3-day box-office gross of $190k on about 100 screens. Haley Bennett stars as Barbe-Nicole Ponsardin Clicquot in the true story of a 20-year-old woman who flouts convention by — after her husband dies — taking the reins of their wine business. Clicquot (1777–1866) defied her critics and ultimately revolutionized the champagne industry one of the world’s early, great businesswomen. (‘Veuve’ is French for widow.)

The R-rated drama, screenplay by Erin Dignam, is 88% with critics and audiences on Rotten Tomatoes, a good sign for an extended run. Top five opening markets include LA, NY, San Francisco, Washington D.

Warner Bros’ Twisters is the leading title at this weekend’s UK-Ireland box office, opening in 675 cinemas 28 years after the original film was a hit in the territory.

Twisters stars 2020 Screen Star of Tomorrow Daisy Edgar-Jones and Glen Powell, as a meteorologist and social media tornado chaser who team up with a new team and new technologies. The film has over £1m banked already from previews on Wednesday 17 and Thursday 18.

Jan de Bont’s Twister opened to over £3m in July 1996, ending on an impressive £15m total – equivalent to £29.3m today. This new film is not a direct sequel, although...

There’s no description of Levan Akin’s Crossing that won’t make it sound like the kind of feel-good dramedy which would have taken Sundance by storm in 2006. It has all the key ingredients: an inter-generational friendship forged between a curmudgeonly retired teacher and a young burnout desperate to escape his hometown; an epic road trip where they come to understand each other more; and the older of the two confronting her internal bigotry as they search for her transgender niece. Above all, any description makes this sound like the worst kind of LGBTQ story, which we finally seem to have moved past as a culture––the story of queer people aimed firmly at a straight audience. It’s understandable why anybody would be skeptical of Crossing, or at least consider it outdated if not ill-intentioned, from a distance.

But as with And Then We Danced, his debut that emerged at the 2019 Directors’ Fortnight,...

The Swedish director’s fearless and hopeful takes on LGBTQ+ narratives have made him one of the most exciting gay directors working today. His new film, a border-hopping trans drama about generational tolerance, further cements his ascent

To say that Levan Akin’s experience of making his new film, Crossing, was more tranquil than his previous one, And Then We Danced, is a bit like observing that Manchester’s Canal Street has a more inclusive vibe than Moscow’s Red Square. Both movies are queer-themed: Crossing follows a retired teacher searching for her transgender niece in Istanbul; And Then We Danced concerns a Georgian ballet dancer inching out of the closet.

This time around, however, there were no death threats for Akin to deal with, no bodyguards required on set, no riot police called in to quell protests. Cultural figures have not denounced Crossing, as they did with its predecessor.

Clockwise from top left: Deadpool & Wolverine, Fly Me To The Moon, Twisters, Despicable Me 4, and DIDIPhoto: Focus Features, Melinda Sue Gordon (Universal Pictures; Warner Bros. Pictures & Amblin Entertainment), Apple

Continuing this year’s running theme, July is light on tentpoles and new releases. It’s still a byproduct...

After the critically acclaimed “And Then We Danced” from 2019, Levan Akin comes back with another movie that critiques societal norms in relation to the Lgbtqia+ themes. The film, inspired by a heart-warming story about a senior who was supportive of his trans grandchild, premiered at the 74th Berlin International Film Festival, where it was nominated for the Panorama Audience Award, and won the Teddy Award.

The story, written by Akin himself, follows Lia (Mzia Arabuli), as she tries to find and bring her transgender niece back home. According to her unexpected companion, Achi (Lucas Kankava), she went to Istanbul. These two set off on a journey to the capital of Turkey, where they explore new surroundings, as well as themselves.

“Crossing”, unlike “And Then We Danced”, doesn't have a classic narrative structure – the scenes are not always directly connected, and thus it is not the easiest to follow. The movie...

"Are you sure she wants to be found?" A very good question. Mubi has revealed the official trailer for an indie drama titled Crossing, set for release this summer in select US theaters (and eventually streaming on Mubi for everyone else). This first premiered at the 2024 Berlin Film Festival earlier this year, and stopped by the BFI Flare London Lgbtqia+ Film Festival in March. From acclaimed director Levan Akin (And Then We Danced), this is a moving & tender tale of identity, acceptance and unlikely connection that transcends borders. Lia, a retired teacher, has promised to find her long-lost niece, Tekla – a trans woman she hasn't seen in a long time. Her search takes her to Istanbul where she meets Evrim, a lawyer fighting for trans rights, and Tekla starts to feel closer than ever. This looks especially beautiful & heartwarming, with some positive reviews out of the fests. Starring Mzia Arabuli,...

“And Then We Danced” director Levan Akin returns with another intense and moving queer drama, “Crossing.” Winner of a jury prize at the 2024 Berlinale Film Festival and will next screen next week at Tribeca Festival, “Crossing” opens in arthouses across the country later this summer. IndieWire shares the exclusive trailer for the film below.

Where “And Then We Danced” centered on the romance between two young male dancers, the Swedish director’s latest bridges the gap between generations: Mzia Arabuli stars as Lia, a retired, world-weary schoolteacher on a journey from Batumi in Georgia to Istanbul in Turkey to find her missing trans niece Tekla, and Deniz Dumanli as Evrim, a trans Ngo lawyer who looks like an Anna Magnani, and is someone the movie at first dupes us into thinking is Lia’s niece. Along for the ride with Lia is Lucas Kankava as Achi, a Georgian teenager who...

Starring Levan Gelbakhiani (“And Then We Danced”) and Karidja Touré (“Girlhood”), “Don’t Let the Sun (Catch You Crying),” the fiction feature debut of multi-prized Swiss documentarian Jacqueline Zünd has won the Marché du Film’s first Goes to Cannes Award.

The prize, a €10,000 minimum guarantee for international sales, is sponsored by Sideral, a Spain-based studio dedicated to production, distribution and international sales launched by Elamedia at Berlin last year.

After three introspective doc features, portraying the unspoken thoughts of insomniacs, ageing men and children after their parents’ separation, in “Don’t Let the Sun (Catch You Crying),” Zünd creates an alternative universe where Jonah is employed by an agency that offers human relationships. When he’s hired to work as Nika’s father, he begins to lose control of his tightly disciplined life.

“The film portrays a world that is only a small step away from our reality, not...

Unspooling May 18 as part of an overall Swiss Focus at the Marché du Film, Solothurn Film Festival Goes to Cannes marks the first collaboration between the long-standing Swiss festival and the Cannes market, but also a first for many of the talents and producers carefully picked for the event.

Two of Switzerland’s top documentary filmmakers Jacqueline Zünd, winner of a 2019 Crystal Bear nominated for “Where We Belong,” and Nicholas Steiner, director of “Above & Below”, ranked among Variety reviewer Peter Debruge’s Top 10 films of 2015, are set to attract buyers, sales agents and programmers’ attention with their star-stubbed fiction debuts.

In “Do You Believe in Angels, Mr Drowak,” Steiner has hired Karl Markovics, star of the 2008 Oscar winner “The Counterfeiters”, rising acting talent Lune Wedler, Lars Eidinger and Dominique Pinon.

“After two cinematic documentaries that ran worldwide and an original Netflix series [“Dig Deeper-The Disappearance of Birgit Meier”], I was excited to create this technically demanding,...

The 21st IndieLisboa International Film Festival will take place from 23rd May to 2nd June in Lisbon. The festival aims to address the gap in film distribution created by the dominance of mainstream productions. Each year, it attracts casual viewers and film professionals worldwide, offering them the chance to discover recent works by emerging talents and revisit films made by renowned directors.

IndieLisboa features 7 sections, with 4 of them being competitive. Additionally, it offers events for industry professionals, including workshops, masterclasses, debates, a script-writing lab, a film fund, a pitching forum, and screenings of works in progress. This year, apart from the retrospective of Palestinian artist Kamal Aljafari, the festival will present 12 short and 13 full-length films that are productions or co-productions of Asian countries.

A Traveler's Needs (2024) by Hong Sang-soo (National Premiere)

South Korea, 90'

The newest film of the prolific director had its world premiere at the 74th Berlin International Film Festival,...

Iranian tragicomedy My Favourite Cake continues to sell strongly for Totem Films following its premiere in Berlinale competition last month.

The French sales agent has inked new deals for Australia and New Zealand (Vendetta), Taiwan (Swallow Wings), Indonesia (Falcon), Portugal (Alambique), Brazil (Imovision), Finland (Cinema Mondo), Bulgaria (Betafilm), Greece (Weird Wave), the Baltics (Kino Pavasaris) and former Yugoslavia (Demiurg).

Directed by Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha, the film sold to a slew of territories ahead of its Berlin premiere and during EFM including UK and Ireland (Curzon), Spain (A Contracorriente), Italy (Academy Two), Germany and Austria (Alamode), Norway (Arthaus), France...

In his 2019 breakout feature, And Then We Danced, Swedish writer-director Levan Akin examined gay self-discovery and defiant sexuality against the rigid gender codes of a traditional Georgian dance company. His warmly humanistic new film, Crossing, explores another story of queer identity in an unaccommodating environment, this time using an odd-couple journey to advocate for trans acceptance. Observed with granular detail and imbued with a pulsing sense of place, this novelistic drama takes time to connect its central triangle but does so with a suppleness and restraint that amplify the emotional rewards of its lovely open-ended conclusion.

That sense of place applies to two principal settings as well as the sprawling space in between. It opens in Batumi, on the rocky Black Sea coast of southwest Georgia, and then shifts to the teeming streets and crumbling apartment blocks of Istanbul’s high-density, low-income quarters, where the title expands beyond geographical borders...

Editor’s Note: This review originally published during the 2023 Berlin Film Festival. Mubi will release “Crossing” in select theaters on Friday, July 19 before it streams August 30.

In “Crossing,” the new film from “And Then We Danced” director Levan Akin, the earthy spirit of Italian icon Anna Magnani is channeled by not one but two actresses who resemble her. There’s Mzia Arabuli as Lia, a retired schoolteacher on a journey from Batumi in Georgia to Istanbul in Turkey to find her missing trans niece, and Deniz Dumanli as Evrim, the trans Ngo lawyer the movie dupes us into thinking is Lia’s niece. The two women are as far apart on the joie de vivre spectrum as any pair could be — Lia has calcified into an emotionless stone who gives away nothing, while Evrim lives freely and sexually liberated in an otherwise LGBTQ-challenged country — yet “Crossing” movingly bridges the space...

Borders, political, social and societal, are being transversed in Crossing, the new film from And Then We Danced director Levan Akin. The drama, which arthouse streamer Mubi has picked up for the U.S. and U.K., stars Mzia Arabuli as Lia, a retired teacher who sets off to find her long-lost niece Telka, a trans woman.

The search takes her, and her neighbor Achi, to Turkey where they meet Evrim, a lawyer fighting for trans rights.

In the first trailer for the film, Achi convinces Lia to let him join her on her search.

‘Crossing’

“The film is based on a true story I was told whilst researching And Then We Danced,” says Akin, “about a grandmother traveling from Georgia to Turkey in search of her trans granddaughter. Just like with my previous film, making Crossing was very challenging. The existence of LGBTQ+ people in Georgia and Turkey is...

Hot Swedish helmer of Georgian descent Levan Akin is due to kickstart Berlin’s Panorama Feb. 15 with his feature drama “Crossing.” Nine years earlier, he walked the Berlinale red carpet with his youth sci-fi “The Circle,” showcased at Generation. Next to him were his Swedish producers of Rmv Film – Abba’s Benny Andersson and his son Ludvig Andersson.

The latter who met Akin over 20 years ago, has stayed by his side since his debut pic “Certain People” in 2011, serving also as executive producer on the 2019 Swedish Oscar entry “And Then We Danced,” and as co-producer this year of “Crossing”.

“Rmv Film spotted Levan from his very first film and has supported him all along,” confirms French Quarter’s Mathilde Dedye, producer of “Crossing” and “And Then We Danced,”, who believes “trust and continuity to be very important for the development of auteurism.”

“I met Ludvig through Levan and he is...

Paris-based sales and production outfit Totem Films has closed a slew of sales ahead of the Berlinale premieres of their Competition title “My Favourite Cake,” and the Panorama opening film “Crossing.”

Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha’s “My Favourite Cake” sold to Cherry Pickers for Benelux, Camera for Denmark, Arizona for France, Triart for Sweden, Cineworx for Switzerland and Bir for Turkey.

Levan Akin’s “Crossing” sold to Imagine for Benelux, New Story for France, Lucky Red for Italy, Avalon for Spain and Cineworx for Switzerland. As announced previously, a multi-territory deal was also signed with Mubi.

Other territories are in discussion and Totem will continue selling the films at the European Film Market in Berlin.

Totem will also be launching sales in Berlin for “Queen Mom,” which is in post-production. The film is directed by Manele Labidi (“Arab Blues”) and stars Camélia Jordana, Sofiane Zermani, Damien Bonnard and Rim Monfort.

Totem Films, the Paris-based sales and production company known for arthouse breakouts such as “Compartment No. 6” and “Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry,” has boarded sales on “My Favourite Cake” by Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha. The Iranian writing-directing duo’s latest feature was just announced in competition at the upcoming Berlinale.

The film stars newcomer Lily Farhadpour as Mahin and renowned Iranian actor Esmail Mehrabi as Faramarz.

Seventy-year-old Mahin lives alone, until she decides to break her solitary routine and revitalize her love life. But as she opens up to romance, an unexpected encounter quickly evolves into an unforgettable evening.

Moghaddam and Sanaeeha said: “’My Favourite Cake’ is based on the reality of the everyday lives of middle-class women in Iran. The realities of women’s lives in Iran have hardly ever been told, yet this is a playful tale about hope and joy in life, as well as the absurdity of death.

Art house streaming platform Mubi has picked up all rights in North America, the U.K., Germany and Latin America for Crossing, the new feature from Swedish director Levan Akin (And Then We Danced).

Mubi snatched up Crossing ahead of this year’s Berlin Film Festival, where it will have its world premiere, opening Berlin’s Panorama sidebar.

The film follows Lia, a retired teacher living in Batumi, Georgia, who sets out to fulfill her recently deceased sister’s last wish: to find Tekla, her long-lost daughter. The road trip takes her to Istanbul where she meets up with Evrim, a trans rights lawyer who might be the key to finding Lia’s niece. Mzia Arabuli, Lucas Kankava and Deniz Dumanli star. The film was produced by Sweden’s French Quarter Film in co-production with Rmv and Svt in Sweden, Adomeit Film of Denmark, France’s Easy Riders Films, Bir...

The Berlin Film Festival is staying true to its political roots.

The 74th Berlinale on Wednesday unveiled its Panorama, Generation and Forum sidebars, and the selection is packed with features and documentaries with a strong political bent, as is to be expected from a fest that prides itself on the social relevance of its official lineup.

Gender roles and gender politics are in focus in several of the Panorama titles, including the section’s opening film Crossing from director Levan Akin (And Then We Danced), in which an unlikely duo travels to Istanbul in search of a young trans woman; the Norwegian feature Sex from Dag Johan Haugerud, about two chimney sweeps living in monogamous, heterosexual marriages whose experiences change their views on sexuality; Bruce Labruce’s The Visitor, a provocative remake of Pier Paolo Pasolini’s 1968 classic Teorema; and Anthony Schatteman’s debut feature Young Hearts, a Generation Kplus title,...

The Berlinale has completed the lineup for its Panorama, Generation, Forum and Forum expanded sections, with new films from Levan Akin and Andre Techine, plus the debut feature of US playwright Annie Baker.

Swedish filmmaker Akin, who scored an international hit in 2019 with And Then We Danced, will open the Panorama strand with Crossing, about two people travelling from Georgia to Istanbul in search of a young transgender woman.

Scroll down for the full list of Panorama, Generation and Forum features

Also among the 31 films in Panorama are My New Friends from French filmmaker Techine, starring Isabelle Hupert, Hafsia Herzi...

Actors Ewan McGregor, Sidse Babett Knudsen, Renate Reinsve, Anders Danielsen Lie, directors Ruben Östlund, Ernst de Geer, Ramata-Toulaye Sy and Cannes Film Festival honcho Thierry Frémaux are some of the stellar guests set to walk the red carpet at the 47th edition of Sweden’s Göteborg Film Festival.

This year’s Göteborg Fest unspools from Jan. 26 to Feb. 4.

For his last run as artistic director of Scandinavia’s biggest film festival, Jonas Holmberg has selected 240 films from 82 countries, and what he calls “one of the strongest lineups ever” for Göteborg’s main Nordic competition strand. Among the highly anticipated titles vying for the coveted Best Nordic Film Dragon Award worth Sek 400,000, is Norway’s “Handling the Undead” by Thea Hvistendahl, set to kickstart the festival on the heels of its Sundance world premiere.

“This will be the first time we open with a zombie horror,” notes Holmberg, who looks forward...

Georgian cinema continues to show thriving signs of life in Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry, a film about a contently independent woman who is faced with the thrills and spills of companionship for the first time. A breakout at Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes earlier this year and a deserved winner, last week, of both best film and actress at the Sarajevo Film Festival, Blackbird is the latest from Elene Naveriani, a 38-year-old director who co-wrote the script with the writer and feminist activist Tamta Melashvili. From that collaboration springs an unlikely tale about the shock of attraction, about how bodies appear depending on how we see them and who’s looking, and about the joys of touch and solitude and whether or not they need be mutually exclusive.

Naveriani’s third feature opens with swagger and a literal cliffhanger: Eto, our immediately likable champion of self-sufficiency, is out picking berries when she...

Production arm Totem Atelier is moving full speed ahead on several international co-productions.

Paris-based international sales and production house Totem Films is heading into Cannes with two new senior hires and a trio of recently-boarded co-productions.

Margot Hervee will head up sales and acquisitions after spending six years at global platform Mubi. Pablo Carrizosa has come on to handle business affairs for the company’s sales and production branches as well as the new point contact for Spain, Portugal and Latin America in sales and acquisitions. The duo joins Nuria Palenzuela Camon, head of festivals at Totem since the end...

Paris-based sales outfit Totem Films has boarded the new, as-yet-untitled project from “And Then We Danced” director Levan Akin, which has just wrapped shooting in Istanbul. Totem will present the film to buyers at next month’s European Film Market in Berlin.

The story is “about finding your family, not your blood relatives, but those that accept and love you unconditionally, without prejudice, for who you are,” the production company, French Quarter Film, said.

Akin said of the project: “My whole life, Istanbul and its inhabitants have held a special place in my heart, and I’m very excited to soon be able to share this world and its unique spaces with an audience.”

Totem Films said: “Levan perfectly knows how to capture genuine atmospheres and characters. We launched Totem in Cannes 2019 with ‘And Then We Danced.’ What a joy to continue our collaboration with this tribe!”

Akin’s Georgia-set...

Pluto Film has boarded Giovanni Bucchieri’s debut feature “100 Seasons,” set to world premiere in Intl. Film Festival Rotterdam’s coveted Tiger Competition later this month.

“The film immediately caught us with its honesty, originality, and sensitivity. It offers a colorful mix of passion, tenderness and romance,” Daniela Cölle, CEO and acquisitions head, says.

Produced by Sweden’s French Quarter Film – also behind Anna Odell’s “The Reunion” and Levan Akin’s “And Then We Danced” – and co-produced by Rmv Film, it sees Bucchieri playing with reality and fiction, as well as his own 30-year-old video recordings, in a tale dedicated to his first love, Louise Peterhoff.

Peterhoff, now an established actor seen in such shows as “Peacemaker” and “The Truth Will Out,” as well as Ari Aster’s “Midsommar,” is more than just a memory. Credited as a co-creator, she comes back into Giovanni’s life – as an entirely new character.

Mubi’s U.S. lineup for next month has been unveiled, including some essential recent releases, notably James Vaughan’s Friends and Strangers, Radu Muntean’s Întregalde, Alice Diop’s We (Nous), the Isabel Sandoval-led short The Actress, Ougie Pak’s Clytaemnestra, and the new restoration of Hong Sangsoo’s Virgin Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors.

As part of Pride month and fitting as his latest film arrives, Andrew Ahn’s Spa Night is among the selections, alongside And Then We Danced, Being 17, and Lilting. Lee Chang-dong’s Burning, a pair of films by Hirokazu Kore-eda, and Kim Bora’s House of Hummingbird are also in the lineup.

Check out the lineup below and get 30 days free here.

June 1 – Wet Sand, directed by Elene Naveriani | Viewfinder | Pride

June 2 – And Then We Danced, directed by Levan Akin | Pride Unprejudiced: LGBTQ+ Cinema

June 3 – Friends and Strangers, directed by James Vaughan | Mubi Spotlight

June 4 – Final Set,...

Greenwich Entertainment has taken North American rights to dark comedy-drama “Concerned Citizen,” which had its world premiere in the Panorama section of the Berlinale. Salzgeber has taken the rights for Germany and Austria. Berlin-based sales outfit M-Appeal is selling the film.

Idan Haguel’s film, a satirical parable on the insidious ways in which privilege can unleash the prejudice within, centers on Ben, who thinks of himself as a liberal and enlightened gay man, living in the perfect apartment with his boyfriend Raz. All that’s missing to complete the picture is a baby, which the couple are trying to make a reality.

Meanwhile, Ben decides to improve his up-and-coming neighborhood in gritty south Tel Aviv by planting a new tree on his street. But his good deed soon triggers a sequence of events that leads to the brutal police arrest of an Eritrean immigrant. The guilt trip that ensues...

‘Sex Education’ creator Laurie Nunn and ‘Babyteeth’ director Shannon Murphy are also mentors.

Anne Mensah, the vice president of original series at Netflix, and See-Saw’s head of development, film and limited series, Katherine Bridle are among the senior executives taking part in the 2021 BFI Network x Bafta Crew mentoring programme.

This is the third edition of the mentoring scheme, which aims to provide support to 20 filmmakers from across the UK who are from regions and communities underrepresented in the screen industries and are currently working towards debut projects in film and television.

As well as being paired a mentor,...

Kamil Krawczycki’s feature debut ’Elephant’ to begin shoot in September.

Poland’s only dedicated LGBTQ+ distributor Tongariro Releasing is making its first foray into production this autumn with Kamil Krawczycki’s feature debut Elephant which is described as “a family drama plus a beautiful gay romance set in the Polish countryside.”

Speaking to Screen at this week’s Polish Days in Wroclaw, Tongariro Releasing co-founder Jakub Mroz said that the project had received 700,000 Zloty from the Polish Film Institute’s ‘First Film’ micro-budget funding scheme for 90% of the film’s budget, with the distributor contributing the remaining 10% from own funds.

Berlin-based distributor Salzgeber has bought Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Benelux rights to Adam Kalderon’s Israeli titleThe Swimmer from M-Appeal. The completed film is screening in the Cannes market.

Set in a summer training camp where young athletes compete to qualify for the Olympics, The Swimmer follows a sportsman as he learns how to accept and love himself despite the discriminative tendencies of the high-performance sports environment against LGBTQ sportspeoople.

Salzgeber has a traditional focus on queer and documentary cinema and has handled titles such as And Then We Danced by Levan Akin and No Hard Feelings by Faraz Shariat.

Pride Month is observed every June in the U.S. to honor the 1969 Stonewall Uprising in Manhattan, a flashpoint for the Gay Liberation Movement. Here’s a sampling of programming from TV networks and other media platforms, organizations and communities. We’ll update the list when new Pride Month programming is announced.

Showtime

The premium cable network will feature more than 50 hours of LGBTQ+ programming including Xy Chelsea, Same Sex America, Beyond Opposite Sex, L Word Mississippi: Hate the Sin and Semper Fi; select episodes of Desus & Mero; and the first seasons of The L Word, The L Word: Generation Q, Queer as Folk, Work in Progress and Couples Therapy.

HBO Max

WarnerMedia’s streamer is launching its Shine On spotlight page, which honors and recognizes its library of Lgbtqia+ stories, characters and creators. A list of curations that will be included on the page is here.

Paramount+

Discovery...

When Ketie Danelia was approached a few years ago with the script for “And Then We Danced,” Levan Akin’s gay romantic drama about a young man’s sexual awakening in the masculine world of Georgian dance, the producer knew the risks. “Everyone was telling me not to take this project, because it’s very dangerous. Which turned out to be true,” she tells Variety.

In a conservative, patriarchal country where the powerful Orthodox Church holds tremendous sway, filming was a challenge. Locations would balk at the last minute, concerned about the potential backlash; far-right groups threatened the cast and crew. When the movie finally premiered in Tbilisi in 2019, after bowing in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight to rave reviews, police units had to escort moviegoers into the cinema. Yet through it all, Danelia remained undaunted. “I knew why I was doing it,” she says.

“And Then We Danced” is among a...

by Nathaniel Rogers

Rooting for Love And Monsters to get a visual fx Oscar nomination. Such a pleasantly fun surprise as mainstream movies go! It would have been a big sleeper hit in a normal theatrical year

Oscar balloting begins in 11 days so we'd like to finish our own Film Bitch Awards by then. Or at least the Oscar parallel portion. So in an effort to speed that up here are four categories. My take on the best in film editing, makeup & hairstyling, visual effects, and production design. Within these four categories there are surprisingly no repeat nominees. 

Fascinating read --The Root on Ma Rainey's Hair and Makeup20 slots = 20 different films with honors for And Then We Danced, Borat Subsequent Moviefilm, Emma, The Father, First Cow, Hillbilly Elegy, I Carry You With Me, Love and Monsters, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Mank, The Midnight Sky, Mulan, News of the World, Nomadland,...

GLAAD has announced the full list of nominees for the 32nd Annual GLAAD Media Awards. The organization announced 198 nominees in 28 categories, including two new categories: Outstanding Children’s Programming and Outstanding Breakthrough Music Artist.

“During an unprecedented year of crises and isolation, the nominees for the 32nd Annual GLAAD Media Awards reached LGBTQ people with powerful stories and inspired countless others around the world with bold looks at LGBTQ people and issues,” GLAAD President & CEO Sarah Kate Ellis said. “As GLAAD continues to lead the fight for LGBTQ acceptance, this...

Netflix continues to be a force to be reckoned with when it comes to the awards front.

GLAAD unveiled its nominations for 2021, and the streamer came out on top with 26 total nominations.

HBO Max garnered nine nominations, followed by HBO, Amazon and Hulu (which nabbed four each). Among broadcast networks, only ABC and NBC earned nods, with two each.

Harley Quinn, The Umbrella Academy, and Saved by the Bell were among this year’s first-time contenders.

Outstanding Comedy Series

Big Mouth (Netflix)

Dead to Me (Netflix)

Everything’s Gonna Be Okay (Freeform)

Harley Quinn (HBO Max)

Love, Victor (Hulu)

Saved by the Bell (Peacock)

Schitt’s Creek (Pop TV)

Sex Education (Netflix)

Superstore (NBC)

Twenties (BET)

Outstanding Drama Series

9-1-1: Lone Star (Fox)

Killing Eve (BBC America)

P-Valley (Starz)

Ratched (Netflix)

Star Trek: Discovery (CBS All Access)

Supergirl (The CW)

The Umbrella Academy (Netflix)

Vida (Starz)

The Wilds (Amazon Prime...

Nominees have been announced for this year’s GLAAD Media Awards, which acknowledge the fairness, accuracy, inclusiveness, boldness, originality, impact and overall quality of LGBTQ representations in the media.

Josie Totah (of Peacock’s Saved by the Bell), D.J. “Shangela” Pierce (HBO’s We’re Here), and Jonathan Bennett (Hallmark Channel’s The Christmas House) announced the nominees on GLAAD’s TikTok page. This year’s award ceremony will be held (virtually) in April.

More from TVLineShonda Rhimes: Being the Only Straight EP Singled Out by GLAAD 'Is Not Ok,' Points to Diversity ProblemGLAAD: TV's LGBTQ Representation Dipped Amid Pandemic,...

Carpet Burn: Kulumbegashvili Unnerves with Exacting Debut of Violence and Veneration

For decades, the international presence of Georgian cinema was thanks (mostly) to the output of Otar Iosseliani, and over the past decade or so, a variety of arthouse offerings from the country resulted in late period reverence for directors such as Zaza Urushadze and Zaza Khalvashi. And following on the formidable wave of Levan Akin (whose sophomore feature And Then We Danced bowed at Cannes) is another Cannes alum, Dea Kulumbegashvili, making her directorial debut with a breathtaking scourge of a film, Beginning.…...

Paris-based sales company Totem Films has boarded Lovisa Siren’s new film “Sagres,” a dynamic European road movie.

“Sagres,” which has just gone into production, follows two sisters and a teenage daughter who travel from Stockholm, Sweden, to the picturesque cliffs of Sagres, Portugal — located in the southwestern most part of Europe, known as “The End of the World.”

Maya, the younger sister, is a free-spirited, half-failing musician who has left her son in Portugal with her mother, while older sibling Nilo is a control freak in a sexless marriage. When the sisters’ mother phones up to say she’s sick, the pair — joined by Nilo’s rambunctious teenage daughter Laura — embarks on a road trip through Europe to reunite in Sagres, culminating in a tragicomic reunion no one expected.

“Sagres” marks Siren’s feature debut. Her 2014 film “Pussy Have the Power” picked up the Best Short Award at the Goteberg Film Festival.

Project will be partially shot in Turkey, with production to start in September 2021.

Levan Akin, the writer/director of Cannes 2019 hit And Then We Danced, is planning his next film, Passage, to be partially shot in Turkey.

Passage is now in development with production to start in September 2021. It will shoot in Istanbul and also in Georgia, which was the setting for And Then We Danced.

Akin is writing the script now and will spend more research time in Turkey. The Swedish Film Institute is supporting development.

Passage is described as “a story about love and longing for a place to belong.

By Glenn Dunks

Did you see Letterboxd’s highest-rated film list for the first half of 2020? The film database site used by cinephile types to log and rate everything they see noted that this time last year the comparative 2019 list was topped by Avengers: End Game, none other than the highest-grossing movie of all time. This year’s top title on a newly lockdown affected list? Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles’ Bacurau! Quite a change of pace to intergalactic superheroes, you have to admit. And followed by titles like And Then We Danced, Corpus Christi, First Cow and Vitalina Varela? As the kids say, you love to see it.

As audiences cannot rely on a regular stream of American content to plug into their necessary expanded viewing schedules, it is encouraging to consider that some people’s eyes may have been newly opened. I thought of this when watching...

Mubi also reveals ’Portrait Of A Lady On Fire’ has become its most-viewed film in the UK to date.

Corneliu Porumboiu’s The Whistlers topped UK streaming platform Curzon Home Cinema’s (Chc) most-watched films over the weekend, after bypassing a theatrical release due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

The Romanian crime thriller, which debuted in competition at Cannes last year, was originally due to receive a UK day-and-date release on June 26 via Curzon. But ongoing cinema closures meant the film launched exclusively on Chc on May 8, seven weeks early, and performed strongly as audiences look to streaming platforms for new titles during lockdown.

Harvey Weinstein-inspired drama received an early digital release in the UK due to cinema closures.

UK streaming platform Curzon Home Cinema (Chc) has recorded its biggest weekend to date following the early digital release of Harvey Weinstein-inspired drama The Assistant.

The film, starring Julia Garner (Ozark), helped the platform generate a 7.4% revenue boost on its previous best weekend and was 340% up on Chc’s equivalent weekend in 2019.

It marks an ongoing success story for the streaming platform, which has seen a consistent rise in figures following the closure of all cinemas in mid-March as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Nordic exhibitors can offer examples to others looking to bounce back from the pandemic.

With Sweden’s anti-lockdown approach and other Nordic territories set to re-open venues earlier than other parts of the world, the international film industry can look to the Nordics for examples of how to bounce back from the Covid-19 pandemic.

Peter Fornstam, founder and managing director of Sweden’s second-largest cinema chain, Svenska Bio, kept all of his 35 cinemas open until Easter. After the public holiday, Svenska Bio’s two Stockholm sites – the Grand and Victoria (with a total of 12 screens) – remained open and showing recent...

As a die-hard genre film fan who is also an unabashed couch potato, I am incredibly uninformed about the art of dance. Still, Levan Akin's drama And Then We Danced strikes a match in the kindling of my imagination. First, the setting. The film unfolds in modern-day Tbilisi, Georgia, where "Merab (Levan Gelbakhiani), a devoted dancer who has been training for years with his partner Mary (Ana Javakishvili) for a spot in the National Georgian Ensemble. The arrival of another male dancer, Irakli (Bachi Valishivili) -- gifted with perfect form and equipped with a rebellious streak -- throws Merab off balance, sparking both an intense rivalry and romantic desire that may cause him to risk his future in dance as well...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...