The fall festival firehose has opened. We’re now inundated with new movie premieres (TIFF, for one, has a staggering 209 features), with Telluride wrapped and Venice heading into its final weekend.
On this episode of IndieWire’s “Screen Talk” podcast, IndieWire Editor-at-Large Anne Thompson and Executive Editor Ryan Lattanzio break down the highs and lows of the fall festival circuit so far, from the standouts to the surprising misfires. Anne was in Telluride, which overlapped with Venice in programming a suite of Netflix titles, including Guillermo del Toro’s lushly mounted “Frankenstein” (we’re somewhat split on that one; Anne’s a perennial del Toro head) and Noah Baumbach’s “Jay Kelly.”
Related Stories
Starring George Clooney as an aging Hollywood star staring down a potential PR crisis after a scuffle with a former acting class peer, it’s Baumbach’s most sentimental movie yet, though Clooney and Adam Sandler as his manager are likely to score Oscar nominations. If you like your Baumbach brittle (Ryan is a self-described “‘Margot at the Wedding’ gay”), then “Jay Kelly” is not for you. The movie Netflix ought to prioritize is Kathryn Bigelow’s nuclear doomsday thriller “A House of Dynamite,” which went off spectacularly at Venice and next plays the New York Film Festival.
Back at Telluride, Anne was high on the Colorado mountains and the world premiere of Chloé Zhao’s “Hamnet,” which earned ecstatic reviews and Oscar predictions across the board. Focus Features strategically brought Zhao’s Shakespeare-era romantic tragedy, starring Jessie Buckley and Paul Mescal, to Telluride knowing it would get the best reviews there, and is the festival Zhao is loyal to.
Focus’ other awards season horse in the race, “Bugonia,” they took to Yorgos Lanthimos’ regular launchpoint in Venice, where it earned more guarded reviews compared to the rapturous Telluride reception. Ryan said that some of its bludgeoning satire — it’s about an alt-right conspiracy nut (Jesse Plemons) who kidnaps a big-pharma CEO (Emma Stone) he thinks is an alien — felt like familiar Lanthimos schtick. Anne reveres the film and spoke to Jesse Plemons.
We both saw “After the Hunt,” which skipped Telluride to debut exclusively out of competition in Venice before opening the New York Film Festival. Luca Guadagnino’s cancel-culture drama set in the world of academia did not play well at his native Italian festival, and on the eve of a rowdy press conference. Anne criticized the length and agreed with Ryan’s review that the script is often muddled and incoherent despite a hefty performance from Julia Roberts as a philosophy professor grappling with her student’s (Ayo Edebiri) against a colleague, played by Andrew Garfield.
Listen to the podcast in full, and hear more of our favorites and also-rans from Venice and Telluride, below.
