“The 52nd Telluride Film Festival is now in the books. Margot Robbie, Ryan Coogler, Oprah Winfrey, David Oylowo, Rian Johnson, Janet Yang, Kathy Kennedy and Frank Marshall Weng Those Who Camest To Watch Mo. Screenings were introduced with a group meditation (Chloé Zhao), A Song (Jesse Plemons) and A Wave (MAN”, – WRITE: www.hollywoodReporter.com
Below, You Can Read My Biggest Awards-Related Takeays From The Fest.
Four High-Profile Films That Already Have Us Distribution Had Their World Premieres in Telluride: BALLAD OF A SMALL PLAYER (Netflix), Bugonia (Focus), Hamnet (Focus) and Springsteen: Deliver ME FROM NOWHERE (Searchlight). How did they go over?
FOCUS HAS PLENTY OF CAUSE FOR CELEBRATION, AS Both Bugonia an Hamnet Played Like Gangbusters and Look Almost Certain to Land Oscar Noms for Best Picture and Plenty Else.
Zhao’s Hamnetan adaptation of Maggie O’farrell‘S BEST-SELING 2020 Novel of the Same Name, Which Centers on the Shakespeare Family and Its Tragic Loss that Allegedly Inspired the Play HamletGarnered Rave Reviews. Jessie BuckleyWho Plays William’s Wife Agnes. Some are Already Proclaiming It to Be the Best Picture Oscar Frontrunner. I Certainly Think It Will Be A Big Factor in the Season. I would just caness that numeros Academy members quetly expressed to me their peeeling that Film have has beenaled it “trauma porn. Members Will Inevitably Feel Disappointed Whoy Catch Up with It. We’ll See.
As for BugoniaWHICH REUNITES FILMMAKER Yorgos Lanthimos and Actress/Producer Stone in a Dark Comedy About People Who “Do Their Own Research,” Reaction Have Been Nearly As Enthusiastic. It Played, For ME, Like A High-End Black Mirror episode-I mean that as a major compliment-and it also has been to a prior off-the-the-wall lanthang/stone collb, Poor Things. Like that 2023 Film, It Could Land Multiple Acting NOMS (Stone and Plemons Are Great), if Less Recognition for Below-The-Line Work.
Scott Cooper‘s Springsteenmeanwhile, is not what a Lot of People Expectioned It to Be – A Jukebox Musical in the Vein of Bohemian Rhapsody, Rocketman or Elvis – But Rather An Examination of the Cause and Effects of A Deep Depression that Engulfed the boss (The Bear‘s Jeremy Allen White) in the Early 1980s and Resulted in his Iconoclastic 1982 Album Nebraska. It Remains to Be Seen If/How That Will Impact The Film’s Box Office Appeal, But Reviews Have Been Solid, and White and White and Jeremy StrongWho Plays Springsteen’s Manager, Stand a Real Shot at Lead and Supporting Actor Oscar Noms, Respectively.
THEN THERE’S Edward Berger‘s BALLAD OF A SMALL PLAYERWHICH Comes A Year After Conclave and Three Years After All Quiet on the Western FrontBerger Films that Were of A Large Scale and About Matters of Social Import (and Landed a Bunch of Oscar NOMS, INCLUDING BEST Picture). BALLAD is Neither of Those Things-It’s About A Gambling Addite in Present-Day Macao Who Grows IncreASINGly Desperate as His Luck Runs Out-And The No-Holds-Barred Perform Colin Farrellis it is best bet for a nom.
Of Films that Came Directly from World Premiering in Venice to Make their nortth American Debut in the Rockies, Did Anything Pop?
YES, La grazia (Mubi) and Jay kelly (Netflix). And it was strking to me how differly people reacted to thor two films in Telluride Versus in Venice.
Ironically, La graziaThe Italian Film that opened Both Fests, Was Far Better Received in America. The Seventh Collab Between Filmmaker Paelo Sorrentino and Actor Toni ServilloIT Centers on An Italian President Durying the Last Six Months of His Term. . Films, 2013’s The Great Beauty (WHICH Won) and 2022’s The hand of godand also that Servillo Could Make A Run at A Long-Overdue First Oscar Nom.
A similear thing happned with Noah Baumbach‘s Jay kellyA Film About a Movie Star (George Clooney) Who Experiences an existential crisis that forces him and his “to quest their life choices. IT WAS Written Off on the Lido, But Rebounded in A Majoor Way – Along with Its Rotten Tomatoes Score – in Telluride, Whore Baumbach Was Fêted with a Career Tribute, Billy Crudup‘S BIG SCENE RECEIVED MID-MOVIE APPLAUSE AT Each Screening, Adam Sandler Cemented His Status As A Frontrunner for the best Supporting Actor Oscar, and Clooney, Who Was Absent Due to Illness, Was Talked Up By His Collaborator. I Think The Film Is Tailor-Made for the Academy.
The reverse sort of happled with Oscar Winner Guillermo del toro‘s FrankensteinWHICH PLAYED THRUGH The Roof in Venice-IT Got A 14-Minute Standing Oination-and Ten Came to Telluride as A Surprise Late-Night Screening, and Engndered A More Moded Response. I Certainly Well Made, with A Knockout Score by the Great Alexandre Desplat That Academy’s Music Branch Will Surely nominate. But, Even Given Howch Much People Love Del Toro, I Think That Film’s Bloated Story and Runtime (Two-Aand-A-Half Hours, Versus 70 Minutes For The 1931 ORIGinal) Categories.
What about Films from Earlier Fests, Including Sundance, Berlin and Cannes?
In Telluride, As Far As I Could Discern, Only One Film Accumulated As Many Hardcore Fans As Hamnetand that was the Norwegian Dramedy Sentimental Value (Neon), WHICH REunites Oscar Nominee The Worst Person in the World‘s filmmaker Joachim Trier and Actress Renate Reinsveand whoh won cannes’ Grand Prix (Second-Place Award). Festival Atendees Ate It Up, To The Excel That I Think It DesERves to Be Grouped With Coogler’s Sinners (Warner Bros.) and Hamnet in the top tier of best picture contenders.
Like Jay kelly, Sentimental Value is about a philmmaker who neglerated his Family in order to focus on his career – A chacter played by the veteran Swedish therate Stellan SkarsgsetWho Will Probably Duke It Outha Sandler for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar. Unlike Jay kelly, Sentimental Value ALSO DEVOTES A SIGNFICANT AMOUNT OF ATTENTION TO THE FILMMAKER’S CHILDRON, PLAYED by Reinsve (Who and See As Neck and Neck with Buckley for Best Actress) and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas. Elle Fanning Also Stars.
Neon Also Had Two Other Films – Both Political Thrillers – That Were Celebrared at Cannes And Ten Proved Popular in Telluride, As Well.
Iranian Dissident Jafar Panahi‘s It was just an accountWHICH Underscores How The Brutality of Iran’s Current Regimea Haunts The Republic’s Citizens, Won Cannes’ Palme d’or Over Sentimental Valueand was widly admired here as well. (Panahi, visiting the US for the first time in Nearly 20 Years, Enlisted the Audence at One Screening to Join Him in Recorder Mehdi mamoudianwho is currently incarcerated in iran, as Panahi Himself was Until Recently.) Obviously, Iran Will Not Submit It was just an account for the best international feature oscar, But France, from whofchh the Film Drew Much of It Finance, Might. More on that in a moment.
People Also Couldn’t Stop Raving ABOUT Wagner MouraThe Brazilian Best Known for TV’s NarcosWho was Awarded Cannes’ Best Actor Prize for His Tour-De-Force Turn in Kleber mendonça filho‘s The Secret Agent. Moura Should Not Be Undertimated in The Best Actor Oscar Race, and Brazil, Which Won Best International Feature Last Year with I’m still hereMIGHT WELL MAKE ANOTHER RUN FOR IT WITH THIS SMART AND FUNNY EPIC.
The Film that is Probably an Even Bet with It was just an account to be the french entry is Nouvelle vague (Netflix), Richard Linklater‘s Black-and-Homage to the French New Wave. Cineastes Loved It in Cannes – I Was Shocked that It Wasn’t Awarded a Single Prize there – And Again in Telluride, Ahead of Wich I Discussed It Will Linklater.
Other Titles that Came to Telluride and Held their Own, Even if they didn’t the World on Fire, Were, Via Cannes, The History of Sound (A24), The Mastermind (Mubi), A Private Life (Sony classics), Pillion (A24) and Uurchin (1-2 special); Via Berlin, Blue Moon (Sony Classics); and via sundance, If i have legs i’d kick you (A24).
What about the sales titles?
Thr Exclusivly Broke the News of the Two Deals That Have Come Out of the Fest of Thus Far: Netflix Boughht Oscar Nominee Joshua seftel‘s All The Empty RoomsA Powerful Doc Short About An Effort to Memorialize Children Kilda in School Shootings; and Amazon/Mgm Nabbed Oscar Winner Morgan Neville‘s Energizing doc ferature about Paul McCartney‘s post-beatles life, Man on the run.
Of the Films that are still on the table, i’ve heard a lot of enthusiasm for TunerThe Narrative Directorial Debut of Navalny Oscar Winner Daniel Roherwhoh stars Leo Woodall an Dustin Hoffman; One Academy Member Even Likened It To WHIPLASH. Hamlet, Aneil Karia‘s reimaging of the shakespeare play in a present-day London, is all about Riz ahmed‘s compelling performance as the Title Character, and Will Probably Find a Buyer. An Philippa Lowhorpe‘s H is for hawk Features A Committed Turn by the Great Claire Foy as a Falconer, But Is Way Too Long at 130 Minutes; I Suspect That Any Potential Partner Will Insist On Tightling It Up.
Among the Distributorless Documentaries That Played At The Fest, The MOST TALKED About Was Surely Ivy Meeropol‘s Ask E. JeanA Portrait of the Former Advice Columnist E. Jean CarrollWho Acused President Donald Trump of Sexual Assault and Twice Won Legal Judgments Against HIM – But Is Any Potential Distributor Willing to Risk The Wrath of Trump? I HOPE AND SUSPECT SO.
Mark Obenhaus an Citizenfour Oscar Winner Laura Poitras‘ Cover-Up Profiles Another Muckraker, Seymour Hershand won a Lot of Admirers Both in Venice, Whore It Debuted, and in Telluride. I Heard A Lot of Chatter About The White Helmets Oscar Winner Orlando von einsiedel‘S Tearjerker The Cycle of Love. And if the turnout of doc branch academy members at screenings of Robb moss‘ The bend in the river Is Any Indication, It, Too, Will Soon Find A Home.
The Bottom Line
Much of the Awards-Industrial Complex, Including Yours Truley, Has Just Returned Home from Telluride, and Is Laying Low Toiday and Tomorrow Before Decaming to Chanada Forn. Thursday. There, Many Titles That Played In Telluride Will Resurface. A FEW THAT DEBUTED IN VENICE BUT THEN SKIPPED TELLURIDE WILL HAVE THEIR North American Premieres, Including The smashing machine (A24) and The testament of Ann Lee (Still Secking Us Distribution). And MOST EXCITINGly, The Canadians Will Host The World Premieres of A Bunch of Potential Awards Contends, Including Rental Family (Searchlight), The Lost Bus (Apple), Hedda (Amazon/Mgm), Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery (Netflix), Roofman (Paramount) and Christy (Still Secking Us Distribution).
There are 194 days, or Six montths and 13 days, Between now and the 98th Academy Awards on Sunday, March 15, 2026. A Lot Can Still Happen. Stay tuned.