Archive for the 'Movies' Category

The Sundance Film Festival wrapped up on Sunday, a key step for several new movies — and faces — that will be hitting theaters in the next year. Titles acquired by studios include the Richard Gere-Susan Sarandon finance drama “Arbitrage,” also featuring one of last year’s breakout ingenues, Brit Marling; “Red Lights,” the Sigourney Weaver-Robert De Niro paranormal thriller with past Sundance darling Elizabeth Olsen, and Josh Radnor’s “Liberal Arts,” also co-starring Olsen. Here are four fresh faces whose movies are also stirring up buyer buzz in Park City.

DREAMA WALKER

Starring in a gritty, low-budget Sundance film is one way to break out of a mainstream television mold. The tactic seems to have worked for 25-year-old Dreama Walker, who until now was best known for playing mean girl Hazel Williams on two seasons of “Gossip Girl.” In “Compliance,” directed by Craig Zobel, Walker plays a fast-food employee who falls victim to a prank caller. The film, which polarized audiences at the festival — some called it misogynistic and others praised the tension-filled plot, which was based on true events — has been garnering acquisition buzz.

“I was interested in showing the perspective of a naïve young girl who felt as if she didn’t have a choice,” Walker said. “These people were not idiots. They were put in a horrible situation.” She’ll be switching gears to co-star in ABC’s new comedy, “Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23,” which will follow “Modern Family” in April. “I’m all for proving women can be funny,” said Walker, who plays a small-town girl living in New York City with a manipulative man-eater played by Krysten Ritter.

Since her first role as a drunken teen on “Law & Order,” Walker has appeared in “Gran Torino” and “The Invention of Lying” and has three more films in the pipeline: the family dramedy “The Discoverers,” the teen coming-out tale “Gay Dude” and the comedy “The Kitchen.” “I am still at a place in my career where nobody sees me in a certain way, so I can do different things,” she said.

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Sophia Lin, Lisa Muskat, Tyler Davidson, Theo Sena and Zobel produced the provocative film about the limits of authority. Ann Dowd and Dreama Walker star.

Magnolia svp of acquisitions Dori Begley negotiated the deal with John Sloss and Dana O’Keefe of Cinetic Media. Magnolia said it planned a theatrical release later this year.

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Boomtron have interviewed the Compliance cast at Sundance the day after the film’s world premiere. You can watch it below.

Yesterday Compliance premiered at Sundance and the Q&A afterwards seems to have been very controversial, because the film emitted such strong emotional reactions from the viewers. I’m going to post some review excerpts and reactions to the film later today.

For now I have added pictures of Dreama from the Compliance premiere, two lounges at Park City and two adorable portrait sessions.

Dreama is currently attending Sundance Film Festival in Park City (Utah). Yesterday she was at the first Chefdance night and GenArt’s 7 Fresh Faces In Film event. I have added pictures of both to the gallery. Additionally I have uploaded some screencaps of the Compliance behind the scenes video here.

The world premiere of Compliance has taken place today (just a short while ago) but no pictures have been released so far. There have been some reactions to the film; you can check them out on Twitter.

The Hollywood Reporter has posted a behind the scenes video of Compliance. It features Dreama in a short scene from the film and in a few behind the scenes glimpses.

The world premiere for Compliance will take place “at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival Saturday, Jan. 21, at the Library Center Theatre at 11:30 am as part of the NEXT<=> sidebar”.

Compliance is part of the 2012 Sundance Film Festival NEXT lineup and will be shown a few times during the festival. The website has a few production stills of the film which have now been added to the gallery.
I have decided to post the summary below. For the reaction to the film and the screenings details please visit the Compliance page at the official Sundance Film Festival website.

Becky and Sandra aren’t the best of friends. Sandra is a middle-aged manager at a fast-food restaurant; Becky is a teenaged counter girl who really needs the job. One stressful day (too many customers and too little bacon), a police officer calls, accusing Becky of stealing money from a customer’s purse, which she vehemently denies. Sandra, overwhelmed by her managerial responsibilities, complies with the officer’s orders to detain Becky. This choice begins a nightmare that tragically blurs the lines between expedience and prudence, legality and reason.

According to IndieWire Dreama’s film Compliance will be playing at 2012 Sundance Film Festival’s Park City at NEXT <=>. This means the film will be shown Out of Competition.

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“Compliance,” U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Craig Zobel)
When a prank caller convinces a fast food restaurant manager to interrogate an innocent young employee, no one is left unscathed. Based on true events. Cast: Ann Dowd, Pat Healy, Dreama Walker, Bill Camp, Philip Ettinger.

A poster for the movie Vamperifica has been released online and it looks quite dark and awesome!

DreadCentral has posted their Vamperifica review online. You can find an excerpt below and the full review at the source.

On the surface Vamperifica may seem like all it has going for it is that it’s a quirky little horror comedy, but what I really dug about the story is that there’s a lot more going on simmering below the surface- the movie explores the ideas of bullying (without the preachiness) and acceptance but also managed to be heartfelt and funny while offering some pretty cool kills and good gore to boot. I also appreciated the fact that in Vamperifica the lead vampire is gay (without ever labeling him as such- kudos on the subtlety), making it a somewhat refreshing alternative to all the brooding vampires as of late that have made the vampire subgenre in horror feel a bit redundant these days.

Read the full review at the source

The soul of Raven, the king of all vampires is reborn into the body of a flamboyantly gay college student / aspiring actor named Carmen. Two of Raven’s progeny have been desperately searching for over 200 years to find him, and want to turn him back into a vampire in order to save their dying race. Carmen’s two best friends Tracy and Peter only want to protect him, but are constantly being thwarted by the jealous vampire duo Emily and Campbell. Carmen soon must make a choice, to protect his friends or become the King he was meant to be.

It’s a quirky little comedy to say the least. The jokes were funny, the violence was a tad disturbing and the special effects were decent. It was kind of refreshing that the hero was a flamboyantly gay vampire, instead of the redundantly forlorn, brooding vampires we’re all so used to. The musical number was unexpected, but fitting to the story. The interaction between Carmen and Tracy (Martin Yurkovic and Dreama Walker) was so casual yet animated, and believable as lifelong friends. Peter (Jeff Ward) was not as interesting a character until the end, although by then I wanted to see more of him. At first I didn’t like where the ending was going, but a last minute twist rectified my opinion. I don’t know if I was reading too much into it, but the nasty-natured characters (that weren’t vampires) tended to be overweight; so I don’t know if it was a bias against the plus-sized, or it was just a coincidence.

Vamperifica was surprisingly entertaining. Vampire movies have been on a downward slide and I’m always hesitant with each one I see, but this one was silly and fun.

Total Rating: B

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