Undiscovered Gyrl, a character study of a troubled teen starring Britt Robertson, Robert Patrick, Christian Slater, Justin Long, Martin Sheen, and Kimberly Williams-Paisley, and Grace, a recovery drama featuring Annika Marks and Sharon Lawrence, have been added to the roster of world premieres at the 2014 Nashville Film Festival.
Several participating actors are expected to attend, schedules permitting.
The festival, celebrating its 45th year April 17-26 at Regal's Green Hills megaplex, has released the full slates for several of its programs, including the Tennessee-themed Opening Day Selections, the Special Presentations gala features, the Narrative and New Directors competitions, and the World Vanguard spotlight on international cinema.
More titles will be announced in coming weeks, in addition to those outlined in this week's Scene preview. Below, the titles so far from the NaFF's press releases:
World Premieres
The Identical, Field of Lost Shoes, Grace, Undiscovered Gyrl Southeast Premieres
Lucky Them, Happy ChristmasUS and North American Premieres
Long Way Home, The Enemy WithinThe Nashville Film Festival has become one of the premier showcases for the best new work of American and international filmmakers. The festival screens films that represent the creative risk filmmakers take to tell powerful and important stories in innovative ways.
NaFF has expanded to 10 days and two locations, with competition films, red carpet events, and opening and closing night parties at Regal Green Hills Stadium 16 and free films nightly at the Nissan Multicultural Village at Walk of Fame Park, downtown Nashville.
“I’m excited that we have so many outstanding and diverse films this year,” said Artistic Director, Brian Owens. “We are presenting a broad range of films — not only in voice, but in style. We have traditional narratives that are extremely well done, and experiments in form. Comedy played a stronger role this year than it has in the past."
“Every year the quality of films at NaFF is stellar,” said Ted Crockett, Executive Director. “The competition gets steeper with so many entries from all over the world. Also, as the profile of Nashville continues to rise, so do we.”
The Nashville Film Festival is open to the public. Tickets to any film, panel or party may be purchased online or at the Festival box office. It is Nashville’s best chance to interact with filmmakers, actors and celebrities.
OPENING DAY SELECTIONS
[NaFF artistic director Brian] Owens programmed Opening Day with Nashville in mind. These are films made in or near the city, by a Tennessee filmmaker, or by a filmmaker well-loved by the NaFF festival audience.The Identical | Director: Dustin Marcellino. USA. 88 minutes.
Starring: Blake Rayne, Ashley Judd, Ray Liotta, Seth Green, Joe Pantoliano, Amanda Crew, Brian Geraghty
The Identical is the story of a young couple, who give birth to identical twin boys in the depths of the Great Depression. Unable to care for both, the couple gives one son to be raised and adopted by an evangelist minister and his wife. The film tells the story of the separated twins, Drexel Hemsley and Ryan Wade, and the very different lives they lead—different except for a shared passion for music. WORLD PREMIERE.Chasing Ghosts | Director: Josh Shreve. USA. 93 minutes.
Starring: Toby Nichols, Frances Conroy, Robyn Lively, W. Earl Brown, Tim Meadows.
Lucas, an eleven-year-old boy mourning his brother’s death, seeks answers by filming funerals. When his camera captures something unexpected and extraordinary, he and his family are thrust into the spotlight and he forms an unlikely friendship with an author who survived a near-death experience. TENNESSEE PREMIERE.The Case Against 8 | Directors: Ben Cotner, Ryan White. USA. 112 minutes.
Shot over five years, this behind-the-scenes look at the case against California’s Proposition 8, follows the unlikely team that took the first federal marriage equality lawsuit to the U.S. Supreme Court. TENNESSEE PREMIERE.TN Shorts 1 & 2 — A selection of Tennessee Shorts, to be announced in a later release
SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS
The Special Presentation films are invited to the festival by Owens, as a result of his travels to Sundance and Toronto and daily contact with film-industry insiders. This is his 6th year programming NaFF, after joining the festival in Summer 2008.American Commune | Directors: Rena Mundo Croshere, Nadine Mundo. USA. 90 minutes.
Raised on The Farm by a Jewish mother form Beverly Hills and a Puerto Rican father from the Bronx, filmmakers and sisters Rena and Nadine Mundo return to the rural Tennessee commune for the first time since leaving in 1985. Ready to face their past after years of hiding their unique upbringing, they chart the rise and fall of America’s largest utopian experiment. TENNESEE PREMIERE.Dom Hemingway | Director: Richard Shepard. United Kingdom. 93 minutes.
Starring: Jude Law, Emilia Clarke, Kerry Condon, Richard E. Grant, Demian Bichir.
After spending 12 years in prison for keeping his mouth shut, notorious safe-cracker Dom Hemingway is back on the streets of London looking to collect what he's owed. TENNESSEE PREMIERE. A Fox Searchlight Release.Field of Lost Shoes | Director: Sean McNamara. USA. 94 minutes.
Starring: Luke Benward, Lauren Holly, Nolan Gould, Max Lloyd-Jones, Jason Isaacs, David Arquette, Keith David, Gale Harold, Zach Roerig, Tom Skerritt.
Based on a true story of the American Civil War, culminating at the Battle of New Market, May 1864, a group of teenage cadets sheltered from war at the Virginia Military Institute must confront the horrors of an adult world when they are called upon to defend the Shenandoah Valley. Leaving behind their youth, these cadets must decide what they are fighting for. WORLD PREMIERE.Happy Christmas | Director: Joe Swanberg. USA. 78 minutes.
Starring: Anna Kendrick, Lena Dunham, Melanie Lynskey, Joe Swanberg, Mark Webber.
Irresponsible 20-something Jenny arrives in Chicago to live with her older brother Jeff, a young film-maker living a happy existence with his novelist wife Kelly and their two-year-old son. Jenny's arrival shakes up their quiet domesticity as she and her friend Carson instigate an evolution in Kelly's life and career. SOUTHEAST PREMIERE. A Magnolia Pictures Release.Ida | Director: Pawel Pawilkowski. Poland. 80 minutes.
Starring: Agata Trzebuchowska, Agata Kulesza, Dawid Ogrodnik, Jerzy Trela, Adam Szyszkowski.
18-year old Anna, a sheltered orphan raised in a convent, is preparing to become a nun when the Mother Superior insists she first visit her sole living relative, her Aunt Wanda - a worldly and cynical Communist Party insider, who shocks her with the declaration that her real name is Ida and her Jewish parents were murdered during the Nazi occupation. This revelation triggers a heart-wrenching journey into the countryside, to the family house and into the secrets of a repressed past. TENNESSEE PREMIERE. A Music Box Films Release.Locke | Director: Steven Knight. United Kingdom. 85 minutes.
Starring: Tom Hardy.
Ivan Locke has worked diligently to craft the life he has envisioned, dedicating himself to the job that he loves and the family he adores. On the eve of the biggest challenge of his career, Ivan receives a phone call that sets in motion a series of events that will unravel his family, job, and soul. TENNESSEE PREMIERE. An A24 Release.Lucky Them | Director: Megan Griffiths. USA. 97 minutes. CLOSING NIGHT SELECTION.
Starring: Toni Collette, Ryan Eggold, Thomas Haden Church, Ahna O’Reilly, Oliver Platt, Amy Seimetz
More interested in partying and flirting with young musicians than work, veteran rock journalist Ellie Klug has one last chance to prove her value to her magazine’s editor: a no-stone-unturned search to discover what really happened to long lost rock god, Matt Smith, who also happens to be her ex-boyfriend. Teaming up with an eccentric amateur documentary filmmaker, Ellie hits the road in search of answers in this charming dramedy set against the vibrant Seattle indie music scene. SOUTHEAST US PREMIERE. An IFC Films Release.Obvious Child | Director: Gillian Robespierre. USA. 83 minutes.
Starring: Jenny Slate, Gaby Hoffmann, Jake Lacy, David Cross, Richard Kind.
For aspiring comedian Donna Stern, everyday life as a female twenty-something provides ample material for her incredibly relatable brand of humor. On stage, Donna is unapologetically herself, joking about topics as intimate as her sex life and as crude as her day-old underwear. But when Donna gets dumped, loses her job, and finds herself pregnant just in time for Valentine’s Day, she has to navigate the murky waters of independent adulthood for the first time. TENNESSEE PREMIERE. An A24 Release.Words and Pictures | Director: Fred Schepisi. USA. 111 minutes.
Starring: Clive Owen, Juliette Binoche, Amy Brenneman, Bruce Davison, Keegan Connor Tracy.
Clive Owen and Juliette Binoche headline this playfully comedic drama about an English teacher who challenges the school’s art teacher to a battle of wits. Jack Marcus is annoyed by his students’ obsessions with good grades over actual learning. Once a thriving novelist, Jack hasn’t published in years and has a tendency to drink his frustrations away. Dina Delsanto is an abstract painter who, like Jack, once was celebrated for her art. Her arthritis has made the act of painting too painful. With teacher reviews impending, Jack decides to inspire the English students by declaring “war” on pictures, believing that the written word gives more meaning to life. Dina accepts Jack’s challenge and the battle begins. TENNESSEE PREMIERE.NARRATIVE COMPETITION
The Animal Project | Director: Ingrid Vininger. Canada. 90 minutes.
Starring: Hannah Cheesman, Kate Corbett, Noah Davis, Aaron Poole, Jessica Greco, Joey Klein.
As a thirty something acting teacher attempts to push a group of eager young performers out of their comfort zones, he struggles with his own ability to live an authentic and fulfilling life with his teenage son. TENNESSEE PREMIEREBuzzard | Director: Joel Potrykus. USA. 97 minutes.
Starring: Joel Potrykus, Joshua Burge, Jason Roth, Lisa Mueller, Alan Longstreet, Michael Saunders.
Paranoia forces small-time scam artist Marty to flee his hometown and hide out in a dangerous Detroit. With nothing but a pocket full of bogus checks, his Power Glove, and a bad temper, the horror metal slacker lashes out. TENNESSEE PREMIEREClub Sandwich | Director: Fernando Eimbcke. Mexico. 82 minutes.
Starring: Lucio Giménez Cacho, María Renée Prudencio, Danae Reynaud.
While vacationing at a beachside resort, a single mother faces inevitable separation anxiety when her 15-year-old son — who is also her best friend — discovers magical chemistry with a girl his own age. TENNESSEE PREMIEREThe Enemy Within | Director: Yorgos Tsemberopoulos. Greece. 107 minutes.
Starring: Manolis Mavromatakis, Maria Zorba, Yiorgos Gallos, Antonis Karistinos, Thanasis Papageorgiou.
Kostas Stasinos, 48, the owner of a garden supply store, lives an ordinary life with his wife Rania, his 17-year-old son Andreas, a high school senior, and his 14-year-old daughter Luisa. When his house is ransacked by a gang of hoodlums, his family's peace and happiness are destroyed, introducing violence into their everyday lives in the shape of an old rifle. SOUTHEAST US PREMIEREThe House That Jack Built | Director: Henry Barrial. USA. 90 minutes.
Starring: E.J. Bonilla, Melissa Fumero, Leo Minaya, Flor De Liz Perez, Saundra Santiago
Jack Maldonado is an ambitious young Latino man who fueled by misguided nostalgia, buys a small apartment building in the Bronx and moves his boisterous family into the apartments to live rent-free. TENNESSEE PREMIEREThe Identical | Director: Dustin Marcellino. USA. 88 minutes.
Starring: Blake Rayne, Ashley Judd, Ray Liotta, Seth Green, Joe Pantoliano
The Identical is the story of a young couple, who give birth to identical twin boys in the depths of the Great Depression. Unable to care for both, the couple gives one son to be raised and adopted by an evangelist minister and his wife. The film tells the story of the separated twins, Drexel Hemsley and Ryan Wade, and the very different lives they lead—different except for a shared passion for music. WORLD PREMIERELittle Brother | Director: Seric Aprymov. Kazakhstan. 97 minutes.
Starring: Alisher Aprymov, Almat Galym.
A small remote village, lost in the mountains and having little but nothing of a connection with an outer civilized world. We face the monotony of life that devours the living in the souls of people. The protagonist is a nine-year-old kid Yerken who resembles an ill nestling forced to live without any support and help whatsoever. SOUTHEAST US PREMIERELove Me | Directors: Maryna Gorbach, Mehmet Bahadir Er. Turkey | Ukraine. 90 minutes.
Starring: Ushan Çakir, Viktoria Spesivtseva, Güven Kiraç, Olena Stefanska, Mehmet Bahadir Er.
Sprinkled with hilarious notes of cultural clashes and an endearing display of the kindness of strangers, this idiosyncratic "comedy drama" will warm hearts in the most unexpected way. SOUTHEAST US PREMIEREMaryan | Director: Ganapathy Bharat. India | Namibia. 150 minutes.
Starring: Dhanush, Parvathi Menon, Salim Kumar, Appukutty, Jagan.
Maryan is the journey of a fisherman from South of India and his fight for survival. This film is a gritty adventure drama about the undying human will to survive and the power of love. SOUTHEAST US PREMIERENoble | Director: Stephen Bradley. Vietnam | United Kingdom. 101 minutes.
Starring: Brendan Coyle, Deirdre O'Kane, Liam Cunningham, Mark Huberman, Nhu Quynh Nguyen.
NOBLE is the true story of a funny, feisty and courageous woman called Christina Noble who overcomes the difficulties of her childhood in Ireland to discover her destiny on the streets of Saigon in 1989, fourteen years after the end of the war. SOUTHEAST US PREMIEREPeace After Marriage | Director: Ghazi Albuliwi. USA. 86 minutes.
Starring: Ghazi Albuliwi, Assaf Cohen, Einat Tubi, Hany Kamal, Hiam Abbass, Omer Barnea.
Desperate for companionship, a lonely, young Palestinian-American man agrees to marry an Israeli woman in need of a Green Card, forcing them to re-examine their respective cultural and familial traditions. TENNESSEE PREMIERESomething Necessary | Director: Judy Kibinge. Germany | Kenya. 85 minutes.
Starring: Kipng'eno Kirui Duncan, Hilda Jepkoech, Carolyne Chebiwott Kibet, Anne Kimani.
A woman struggling to rebuild her life after the civil unrest that swept Kenya after the 2007 elections claiming the life of her husband, the health of her son and leaving her home on an isolated farm in the Kenyan countryside in ruins, she now has nothing but her resolve to rebuild her life left. SOUTHEAST US PREMIERETest | Director: Chris Mason Johnson. USA. 89 minutes.
Starring: Kevin Clarke, Kristoffer Cusick. Chris Mason Johnson. Scott Marlowe. Matthew Risch.
San Francisco, 1985. Two opposites attract at a modern dance company. Together, their courage and resilience are tested as they navigate a world full of risks and promise, against the backdrop of a disease no one seems to know anything about. TENNESSEE PREMIEREThou Wast Mild and Lovely | Director: Josephine Decker. USA. 94 minutes.
Starring: Joe Swanberg, Sophie Traub, Robert Longstreet, Kristin Slaysman, Matt Orme.
There are places you go, where the things you do will matter to a lot of people. Then there are places you will go, where the things you will do matter only to a very few. But to those few, they will matter - a lot. TENNESSEE PREMIEREUndiscovered Gyrl | Director: Allison Burnett. USA. 100 minutes.
Starring: Britt Robertson, Robert Patrick, Christian Slater, Justin Long, Martin Sheen, Kimberly Williams-Paisley.
Undiscovered Gyrl follows the life of Katie Kampenfelt, a beautiful, imaginative teen who, after graduating from high school, decides to take a year off before college. Almost immediately Katie’s life begins to veer off course. Through the prism of a blog she writes, the audience is given a rare, voyeuristic glimpse into the imagination, sexual yearnings, and haunted psyche of a soul in progress. WORLD PREMIERENEW DIRECTORS COMPETITION
1982| Director: Tommy Oliver. USA. 80 minutes.
Starring: Wayne Brady, Hill Harper, Sharon Leal, Ruby Dee, Bokeem Woodbine, Troi Zee, La La Anthony.
From the earliest days of the crack cocaine epidemic that plagued America comes this story of Tim, a devoted husband and proud father trying to protect his ten-year-old daughter from the ravages of his mother’s addiction. TENNESSEE PREMIERE9 Full Moons | Director: Tomer Almagor. USA. 103 minutes.
Starring: Amy Seimetz, Bret Roberts, Donal Logue, Dale Dickey, Harry Dean Stanton, James Duval.
A wildly enigmatic, hard-partying young woman compensates for her loneliness with different men, until she falls for Lev, a solitary musician with a radically different personality. TENNESSEE PREMIEREAs It Is in Heaven | Director: Joshua Overbay. USA. 86 minutes.
Starring: Sylvia Boykin, Todd Bagley, Meredith Cave, Chris Nelson, Kassandra Botts, Abi Van Andel.
After the death of the Prophet, a young man is called upon to lead his small religious sect as they anxiously await the end of the world. TENNESSEE PREMIEREBefore I Disappear | Director: Shawn Christensen. USA. 94 minutes.
Starring: Shawn Christensen, Emmy Rossum, Paul Wesley, Ron Perlman, Richard Schiff, Fatima Ptacek
At the lowest point in his life, Richie gets a call from his estranged sister, asking him to take care of his eleven-year-old neice for a few hours. Based on the Academy Award-winning short film Curfew. TENNESSEE PREMIEREChasing Ghosts | Director: Josh Shreve. USA. 93 minutes.
Starring: Toby Nichols, Frances Conroy, Robyn Lively, W. Earl Brown, Tim Meadows.
Lucas, an eleven-year-old boy mourning his brother’s death, seeks answers by filming funerals. When his camera captures something unexpected and extraordinary, he and his family are thrust into the spotlight and he forms an unlikely friendship with an author who survived a near-death experience. SOUTHEAST US PREMIERECongratulations! | Director: Mike Brune. USA. 90 minutes.
Starring: John Curran, Rhoda Griffis, Robert Longstreet, Jack McGee, Adam Fristoe.
Veteran Detective Dan Skok of the Missing Persons Bureau lands the case of his career - a six-year old boy who disappears inside his own house. What should be a traditional investigation becomes an absurd and comic exploration of a man who's profession is a perpetual search. TENNESSEE PREMIEREDrunktown’s Finest | Director: Sydney Freeland. USA. 95 minutes.
Starring: Jeremiah Bitsui, Carmen Moore, Morningstar Angeline, Kiowa Gordon, Shauna Baker.
Three young Native Americans — an adopted Christian girl, a rebellious soon-to-be father, and a transsexual model wannabe — strive to escape the hardships of the reservation and find a place for themselves in an evolving world. TENNESSEE PREMIEREForty Years from Yesterday | Director: Robert Machoian, Rodrigo Ojeda-Beck. USA. 76 minutes.
Starring: Bruce Graham, Matt Valdez, Suzette Graham, Rebekah Mott.
Bruce awakens one morning to find that his loving wife of forty years has unexpectedly passed away. What follows is an intimate portrait of the process that follows: how to deal with the body, the legalities; how to manage one’s relationship with God; how to move on. TENNESSEE PREMIEREGrace | Director: Heath Jones. USA. 95 minutes.
Starring: Annika Marks, Sharon Lawrence, Michele Feren, Erin Beute, Brian Patrick Clarke.
After a weekend of binge drinking in a small Florida town, Gracie ends up in the county jail with two options; six months in prison or ninety Alcoholics Anonymous meetings in ninety days. She chooses the meetings and embarks on a new life path and begins to put the pieces of her shattered life back together. WORLD PREMIEREI Believe in Unicorns | Director: Leah Meyerhoff. USA. 80 minutes.
Starring: Natalia Dyer, Pater Vack, Julia Garner, Amy Seimetz, Toni Meyerhoff.
An imaginative teenage girl who is the sole caretaker of her disabled mother escapes into a fantasy world as her first relationship with an older boy begins to turn violent. TENNESSEE PREMIEREMedeas | Director: Andrea Pallaoro. Italy, Mexico, USA. 97 minutes.
Starring: Catalina Sandino Moreno, Brían F. O'Byrne, Mary Mouser, Ian Nelson.
Ennis, a stern and hard-working dairy farmer, struggles to maintain control of his life and his family, while his wife, Christina, retreats inward, slowly disconnecting from him and their five children in this intimate portrait of a rural family’s struggles in a harsh and shifting landscape. SOUTHEAST US PREMIEREOJ: The Musical | Director: Jeff Rosenberg. USA. 90 minutes.
Starring: Jordan Kenneth Kamp, Malcolm Barret, Larisa Oleynik, Owiso Odera, Bianca DeGroat, Sarah Hagan.
Eugene Olivier is an eccentric theater artist who leaves New York to take on Los Angeles. With his two best friends from high school, he begins his quest to stage the next great American musical — a retelling of the OJ Simpson story, adapted from Shakespeare’s Othello. TENNESSEE PREMIEREThe Resurrection of a Bastard | Director: Guido van Driel. Netherlands. 89 minutes.
Starring: Yorick van Wabeningen, Goua Robert Grovogui, Juda Goslinga, Jeroen Willems.
Three men — an old Frisian farmer bent on revenge, a gangster who has just barely survived “liquidation,” and an illegal immigrant with an uncertain future — all meet under an ancient oak tree, beyond the last town. SOUTHEAST US PREMIERETrap Street | Director: Vivian Qu. China. 93 minutes.
Starring: Yulai Lu, Wenchao He, Young Hou, Ziaofei Zhao.
Li Qiuming works for a digital mapping company surveying the streets of the quickly changing city. To make ends meet, he moonlights by installing surveillance cameras. One day, he has a brief encounter with a woman who disappears down an unmappable street and becomes infatuated with her. SOUTHEAST US PREMIEREWhite Shadow | Director: Noaz Deshe. Tanzania / Germany. 117 minutes.
Starring: Hamisi Bazili, Salum Abdallah, Riziki Ally, James Gayo.
Alias is a young albino boy growing up in the Central African bush. His condition makes him the subject of taunting; but he faces an even graver danger: witch doctors and many people of the region believe the body parts of albinos have mystical powers. To save him from a ghastly fate, his mother sends him to Dar es Salaam to live with his uncle, where he faces a new sort of danger. SOUTHEAST US PREMIEREWORLD VANGUARD
The Amazing Catfish | Director: Claudia Sainte-Luce. Mexico. 89 minutes.
Starring: Lisa Owen, Ximena Ayala, Sonia Franco, Wendy Guillen.
Lonely young twenty-something Claudia, meets ailing matriarch Martha in a hospital room after Claudia is admitted with appendicitis. The women bond over a shared bag of potato chips. Martha has four kids from three different fathers. Claudia has been alone all her life. When Martha spots Claudia walking home after her surgery, she offers her a ride in her over-crowded Beetle — and their lives will never be the same. TENNESSEE PREMIERE.Butter on the Latch | Director: Josephine Baker. USA. 63 minutes.
Starring: Isolde Chae-Lawrence, Stephan Goldbach, Charlie Hewson, Sarah Small.
Sarah reunites with her old friend Isolde at a Balkan folk song and dance camp in the woods outside Mendocino, California. They sing a song she learned years before about dragons who entwine themselves in women’s hair, carrying them off through the forest, burning it as they go. When Sarah pursues fellow camper Steph, her nights of secrets and singing with Isolde come to an abrupt end. TENNESSEE PREMIERE.The Enemy Within | Director: Yorgos Tsemperopoulos. Greece. 107 minutes.
Starring: Manolis Mavromatakis, Maria Zorba, Ilias Moulas, Thanasis Papageorgiou.
Kostas is a progressive ideologist living a good life with his wife, son and daughter and running a successful flower shop despite the turmoil of the Greek economy. When their home is invaded by a gang of thieves, the violence shatters his family’s peace. Morally demolished, Kostas struggles to get his family back to normal. US PREMIERE.Long Way Home | Director: Gergory Hadden. Sweden / USA. 87 minutes.
Starring: Elizabeth Cook, Viktor Åkerblom, Jason Alexander, Phil “The Mangler” Kaufman, Rhondi Reed.
When Nashville star Molly Rhodes meets Swedish music producer Vincent Deuce, their plan is to create a new genre from scratch — Super-Country. Their new single, “This Is Not Your Country,” becomes a hit, but Molly isn’t convinced that this blend of country and Swedish House music is the best direction for her career. NORTH AMERICAN PREMIERE.Manakamana | Director: Stephanie Spray, Pacho Velez. Nepal / USA. 117 minutes.
Documentary.
From the makers of Leviathan, comes this sensorial documentary that takes us on a cable-car ride up and down the vast landscapes of Nepal’s Trisuli valley, where the world-famous Manakamana Temple attracts Buddhist pilgrims from around the world. TENNESSEE PREMIERE. A Cinema Guild Release.Metro Manila | Director: Sean Ellis. United Kingdom / Philippines. 115 minutes.
Starring: Jake Macapagal, Althea Vega, John Arcilla.
Seeking a brighter future in megacity Manila, Oscar and his family flee their life in the rice fields of the northern Philippines. But the capital's intensity quickly overwhelms them, and they fall prey to the rampant manipulations of the locals. Oscar catches a break when he's offered steady work for an armored truck company. Soon, the reality of his job’s danger sets in and Oscar must confront the perils he faces in his new life. TENNESSEE PREMIERE. An Oscilloscope Release.A Story of Children and Film | Director: Mark Cousins. United Kingdom / France. 101 minutes.
Documentary.
Following up his epic documentary The Story of Film: An Odyssey, Mark Cousins presents a globe-spanning rumination on the way the lives of children are presented in cinema, surveying such classics as E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, The 400 Blows, Fanny and Alexander, Los Olvidados, and The White Balloon. TENNESSEE PREMIERE.Vic + Flo Saw a Bear | Director: Denis Côté. Canada. 95 minutes.
Starring: Pierrette Robitaille, Romane Bohringer, Marc-André Grondin.
Victoria and Florence are two ex-cons trying to make a new life for themselves in the backwoods of northern Quebec. Seeking peace and quiet, the couple slowly begin to feel under siege as Vic’s parole officer keeps unexpectedly popping up and a strange neighborhood woman turns out to be a menacing presence from Flo’s past. TENNESSEE PREMIERE.A Kimstim release.When the World’s On Fire | Director: James Clauer. USA. 70 minutes.
Starring: James Cooke, Joshua Elrod, Leo Kling, Travis Nicholson.
Javier, a Guatamalan immigrant, finds himself homeless and living on the fringes of society in a hardscrabble Southern city. With his loyal dog as his companion, Javier encounters a revolving cast of charcaters, each more colorful than the last — rugged souls trying to break free from their suffocating predicaments and hoping to catch some glimmer of their American Dream. TENNESSEE PREMIERE.
