Category: Movie news

Karmalink’s theatrical and video on demand release in US and Canada

Karmalink will be released in the US in major city theaters and on video on demand in the US and Canada on Friday July 15, 2022. Courtesy photo, used with permission.

Conceived as a way to interrogate processes of neo-colonialism, and highlighting the alienating effects of technological progress, Jake Wachtel’s Karmalink is a mind-bending tale of reincarnation, artificial consciousness, and the search for enlightenment. (Good Deed Entertainment, 2022)

In near-future Phnom Penh, the rich and privileged are augmented with nanotech and new skyscrapers crowd the skyline. In Tralop Bek, a tight-knit community threatened with forced eviction, 13-year-old Leng Heng is having vivid dreams of his past lives. He and his friends are convinced they are meant to find a buried Buddhist statue to save their homes, and they seek out help from a street-smart girl in the neighborhood, Srey Leak. Together they follow clues across town and into the past, uncovering a link with a genius neuroscientist on a quest for digital nirvana. As Leng Heng’s dreams converge on the present, his very sense of identity begins to unravel. When it becomes clear that the stakes are higher than they imagined, the two friends must decide how far they are willing to go to find their treasure and the truth.

American-born filmmaker Jake Wachtel began his career making short documentaries for nonprofits and social impact ventures working in the global south. His work has been featured on NYTimes.com, Wired, NPR, and MSNBC. In 2015, he moved to Cambodia to teach a year-long class in filmmaking to children as a part of the Filmmakers Without Borders initiative. His Phnom Penh-set short film The Foreigner Here premiered at the Cambodian International Film Festival, and he has gone on to collaborate with many of the growing new wave of young Cambodian filmmakers. He also served as on-set editor for Jimmy Henderson’s Cambodian-Chinese coproduction The Prey. Phnom Penh became his home base for several years as he developed his first feature Karmalink—Cambodia’s first sci-fi movie—set in the community where he taught and produced with a majority Cambodian cast and crew, including his former students.

Director: Jake Wachtel Starring: Srey Leak Chhith, Leng Heng Prak, Sahajak Boonthanakit, Cindy Sirinya Bishop, Rous Mony, and Sveng Socheata. 

Cambodia, 2021, 102 minutes, in Khmer with English subtitles

***OFFICIAL SELECTION: VENICE FILM CRITICS’ WEEK (OPENING NIGHT FILM), AUSTIN FILM FESTIVAL, GLASGOW FILM FESTIVAL, and many more.***

Karmalink will be released in the US Theatrically in major cities and on VOD in the US and Canada on Friday, July 15, 2022.

Theaters include:
Lumiere Music Hall – Los Angeles, CA
Rialto Lakeside Elmwood – Berkeley, CA
Rialto Lakeside Sonoma – Sebastopol, CA
SIFF Film Center – Seattle, WA

VOD Platforms include:
US: Apple TV/iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Vudu, XFinity Cable, and more.
Canada: Apple TV/iTunes, Google Play.

Good Deed Entertainment (GDE) is an Ohio based independent studio dedicated to producing, financing, and distributing quality entertainment for under-served audiences. Its distribution slate includes recent releases Summertime, Ma Belle, My Beauty, and Lucky Grandma, in addition to the Academy Award nominated, Loving Vincent, and Spirit Award nominated, To Dust.

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New movie: Final Caller premieres on DVD and digital

Horror movie Final Caller will premiere on DVD and Digital on July 5, 2022 from Wild Eye Releasing. Courtesy photo, used with permission.

Final Caller is the new film from the legendary director of Clownado and Bonehill Road. From legendary indie director Todd Sheets (Bonehill Road, Zombie Bloodbath, Clownado), Final Caller premieres on DVD and Digital July 5 from Wild Eye Releasing. For fans of movies like Saws and Hostel. (Wild Eye Releasing, 2022)

Final Caller – Roland Bennett, an obnoxious late-night radio personality specializing in the supernatural is not having a good night. A visit from his soon-to-be ex-wife brings divorce papers to the station, a boss is listening in due to complaints, and a call from self-proclaimed serial killer “The Outsider”  who threatens to kill a woman live on the air. Being live on the air tonight will spell death for all involved. 

David Henry Gerson’s award-winning documentary The Story Won’t Die

After theatrical releases, The Story Won’t Die will have a worldwide Video on Demand on June 21, 2022. Courtesy photo, used with permission.

The Story Won’t Die, from Award-winning filmmaker David Henry Gerson, is an inspiring, timely look at a young generation of Syrian artists who use their work to protest and process what is currently the world’s largest and longest ongoing displacement of people since World War II. Sundance Award-winning producer Odessa Rae produces the film. (The Story Won’t Die, 2022)

Rapper Abu Hajar, together with other celebrated creative personalities of the Syrian uprising, a post-Rock musician (Anas Maghrebi), members of the first all-female Syrian rock band (Bahila Hijazi and Lynn Mayya), break-dancer (Bboy Shadow), choreographer (Medhat Aldaabal), and visual artists (Tammam Azzam, Omar Imam and Diala Brisly), use their art to rise in revolution and endure in exile in this new documentary reflecting on a battle for peace, justice and freedom of expression. It is an uplifting and humanizing look at what it means to be a refugee in today’s world and offers inspiring and hopeful vantages on a creative response to the chaos of war.

The Story Won’t Die was released theatrically in Los Angeles last Friday and will be released in New York today, June 17, 2022. A worldwide Video On Release on major platforms will follow on June 21, timed to World Refugee Day. Video On Demand platforms include Apple TV, Amazon Prime Video, Google TV, Vimeo, and more.

OFFICIAL SELECTION: Hot Docs, AFI Docs, Watch Docs, and many more.
WINNER! Best Director at Doc LA and Best Feature Doc at FIC Autor Guadalajara.

David Henry Gerson is a filmmaker whose work has won prizes from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Sundance Film Festival, and has been acquired into the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in NY. He is a graduate of Columbia University and the American Film Institute, where he was the recipient of the AFI Richard P. Rodgers Award for Creative Excellence. His film, All These Voices, won the Student Academy Award®. David’s spec screenplay, Above Kings, was nominated to the Tracking Board Hit List and was a semifinalist for the Academy’s Nicholl Fellowship. His documentary film Ultra Violet for Sixteen Minutes, screened at festivals worldwide, the Pompidou Museum in Paris, and was acquired into the permanent collection of the MoMA. The Story Won’t Die is his debut feature.

Feature Documentary/ Not Yet Rated / Running Time: 83 Minutes
Country: USA/GERMANY
Director: David Henry Gerson
Producer: Odessa Rae
Co-Producers: Abdalaziz Alhamza, Colleen Ritzau Leth and Martin Marquet
Featuring: Medhat Aldaabal, Tammam Azzam, Diala Brisly, Abu Hajar, Bahila Hijazi, Omar Imam, Lynn Mayya, Anas Maghrebi, and Mhd Sabboura.

Movie adaptation: The Black Phone by Joe Hill

The Black Phone, from Joe Hill’s ’20th Century Ghosts’ has been adapted into a movie and will be released in theaters on June 24, 2022. Photo: amazon

Joe Hill is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the novels “The Fireman,” “NOS4A2,” “Horns,” and “Heart-Shaped Box;” “Strange Weather,” a collection of novellas; and the acclaimed story collections “Full Throttle” and “20th Century Ghosts.” He is also the Eisner Award–winning writer of a seven-volume comic book series, “Locke & Key.” Much of his work has been adapted for film and TV, including NOS4A2 (AMC), Locke & Key (Netflix), and In the Tall Grass (Netflix). The Black Phone is a short story in his “20th Century Ghosts” collection and has been adapted into a major motion picture from Universal Pictures and Blumhouse Productions. It stars Ethan Hawke and will be released in theaters on Friday June 24, 2022. (amazon, 2022)

The Black Phone – Jack Finney is thirteen, alone, and in desperate trouble. For two years now, someone has been stalking the boys of Galesberg, stealing them away, never to be seen again. And now, Finney finds himself in danger of joining them: locked in a psychopath’s basement, a place stained with the blood of half a dozen murdered children.

With him in his subterranean cell is an antique phone, long since disconnected . . . but it rings at night anyway, with calls from the killer’s previous victims. And they are dead set on making sure that what happened to them doesn’t happen to Finney.

“The Black Phone” is one of fifteen stories in Joe Hill’s first story collection, originally published as 20th Century Ghosts—the inventive and chilling compendium that established this award-winning, critically acclaimed, and bestselling author as “a major player in 21st-century fantastic fiction” (Washington Post).

 

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New movie release: A Town Full of Ghosts

A Town Full of Ghosts’ digital release date is June 17, 2022. Photo: google

For fans of ‘found footage’ horror movies: Some towns should stay forgotten. This June, travel to Blackwood Falls. From filmmaker Isaac Rodriguez, A Town Full of Ghosts premieres on digital platforms June 17. (A Town Full of Ghosts, 2022)

A Town Full of Ghosts – Mark and his wife Jenna sell everything they have to purchase a western ghost town in the middle of nowhere called Blackwood Falls. They plan to turn the ghost town into a tourist attraction with hotels, restaurants, and attractions. They hire a small film crew to document their journey and upload the videos to their video channel. When funding falls through, they find themselves stuck in the middle of nowhere. Things take a twist when Mark discovers the town has a horrible history of death. He secretly digs deeper into the past and stumbles upon something evil.

Tensions start to rise when one of the film crew goes missing, and everyone finds themselves trapped in the town. Jenna comes up with a plan to escape, but Mark begins to lose his mind and takes matters into his own hands. Jenna makes one last attempt to escape the town. She gets lost in the wooden maze while something evil goes after her. She must escape or become an eternal resident in Blackwood Falls.

Andrew C. Fisher, Mandy Lee Rubio, Lauren Lox, Sarah Froelich, Isaac Rodriguez, Keekee Suki, and Vania Vasquez star in an Isaac Rodriguez film,

“After visiting the J. Lorraine, TX, ghost Town in Austin, TX, I was immediately inspired to make my next film there. The town was actually all built by the current owner. Some of the buildings were very small and looked fake, but I knew I could incorporate that into the story. A few months back, I saw a YouTuber who sold everything and moved into a real ghost town in California. I wanted to use that basic idea with a married couple and add a The Shining vibe to it.” – writer/director Isaac Rodriguez

New movie release: Guidance

Francesco Chen and Yu Chieh Chiu in Neysan Sobhani’s GUIDANCE. Photo, Good Deed Entertainment, used with permission.

The movie Guidance, directed by Neysan Sobhani and starring Sun Jia (Han Miao), Harry Song (Mai Zi Xuan) and Francesco Chen (Su Jie) will be released in the US on Video On Demand June 17 on all major platforms including Apple TV/iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Vudu, XFinity Cable, and more. (Good Deed Entertainment, 2022)

Guidance – In the not-too-distant future, humanity slowly rebuilds itself a decade after The Great War. Believing that the ability to lie is the root cause of the devastating conflict, a tech entrepreneur creates a pill containing a nanotechnology app known as “Guidance” that allegedly will make everyone more enlightened. Once swallowed, an A.I. “installs” in the person’s nervous system and aids their ability to detect deception in other people among other enhancements. A young couple goes on a weekend retreat to the countryside and they begin to use Guidance. However, recent events have potentially compromised their trust in one another. With the tech in their bodies, the couple tries to subvert Guidance in the hopes of saving their relationship before it’s too late.

China, 2021, 93 minutes, In Mandarin Chinese with English subtitles

Writer/Director Neysan Sobhani is an award-winning writer and director making short films and now his feature debut, Guidance, in Asia. Raised in Asia and North America and at times officially stateless, his identity was shaped by the diverse places he lived, having fled war and conflict twice while young.

As a diaspora filmmaker, Sobhani’s films have flavors of Asian and Western cinema, with his short films appearing in over 40 international film festivals around the world. Reframing audience perceptions of Chinese films through a blended genre approach, his feature film, Guidance (2021), was released in cinemas across China in late 2021.

Good Deed Entertainment (GDE) is an Ohio based independent studio dedicated to producing, financing, and distributing quality entertainment for under-served audiences. Its distribution slate includes recent releases Summertime, Ma Belle, My Beauty, and Lucky Grandma, in addition to the Academy Award nominated Loving Vincent and Spirit Award nominated To Dust.

Photo: Good Deed Entertainment, used with permission.
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New movie release: Isolated

Isolated, starring KateLynn E. Newberry, will be available for digital/DVD release starting June 14, 2022. Photo: Uncork’d Entertainment, used with permission.

Uncork’d Entertainment has picked up Isolated, starring KateLynn E. Newberry (Widow’s Point, Devil’s Junction: Handy Dandy’s Revenge) and is set for a digital/DVD release date of June 14, 2022. (Uncork’d Entertainment, 2022)

Isolated – The self-contained mystery/action thriller, similar in concept to Red Eye and Devil, tells of a woman who wakes up trapped inside of a room with no memory of who she is or how she got there. As she fights to find a way to escape, she ends up talking to a man in a room next to hers, who claims he, too, is trapped. As she questions whether or not to trust this man, she starts to remember things from her past that lead her to question not only where she might be, but also what she might be.

Directed by Tyler Lee Allen, the film also stars Lanny Joon and David Solomon.

“Newberry commands the screen in this captivating mystery” said Keith Leopard, President Uncork’d Entertainment. “We look forward to audiences discovering the masterful work Allen has done on Isolated this June.”

Uncork’d Entertainment was founded in July, 2012 by Keith Leopard, a Home Entertainment industry veteran with more than 23 years of experience in purchasing, acquisitions, merchandising, marketing and analysis of major studio and independent supplier to the home entertainment market. The Company focuses on distribution in six areas: Digital Media, Physical Home Entertainment, Aggregation, Theatrical and Television, Foreign Sales, and has secured relationships across all platforms to ensure your film reaches the widest audience possible.

New movie release: The Fall of the Queens

The Fall of the Queens will have a digital release starting June 9, 2022. Photo: Uncork’d Entertainment, used with permission.

Uncork’d Entertainment has picked up Aleph Cine-directed Spanish thriller The Fall of the Queens, which will have a June 7 digital release. (Uncork’d Entertainment, 2022)

The Fall of the Queens – Two teenage sisters, Juana and Mara, live in an isolated beekeeping country house with their aunt. When their cousin Lucio bursts into their lives, the perfect symbiosis that is their relationship is endangered: seduction, jealousy, rivalry, and the need to destroy whatever gets in the way begins to grow. The hive is preparing for the arrival of a new queen bee.

Malena Filmus, Lola Abraldes, Franco Rizzaro, Umbra Colombo, and Giovanni Ciccia star in the Wicker Man-style spooker.

“A sibling of The Wicker Man and Dare Me, THE FALL OF THE QUEENS has one heck of a killer concept and it’s been executed magnificently,” said Keith Leopard, President Uncork’d Entertainment. “The direction, cast and, most importantly, scares are superb.” 

 

An Act of Worship to premiere at Tribeca Film Festival 2022

Khadega in Nausheen Dadabhoy’s An Act of Worship. Photo: Capital K Pictures, used with permission.

In other film festival news, ‘An Act of Worship’ will have its WORLD PREMIERE in Documentary Competition at the forthcoming Tribeca Film Festival 2022. The festival will take place in New York City from June 8 through June 19, 2022. (An Act of Worship, 2022)

‘An Act of Worship’ is a polyphonic portrait of the last 30 years of Muslim life in America. Told through the lens of Muslims living in the United States, the film offers a counter-narrative of pivotal moments in U.S. history and explores the impact of anti-Muslim rhetoric and policy on young Muslims who came of age after 9/11. Due to their first-hand knowledge and intimate access to the Muslim community, the filmmaking team is able to take charge of the account, which has previously been shaped by outsiders. ABER’s father was deported when she was 16. Now, she is a community organizer leading a sanctuary city initiative in New York. KHADEGA is an 18-year-old Sudanese immigrant living in Michigan. While she feels compelled to advocate for her community, she struggles to overcome society’s expectations of her and find her own way. AMEENA is a civil rights lawyer in California, but as a mother, she is conflicted between caring for her three young children or sacrificing her time with them to fight for change. Weaving together observational footage of these three women with community home videos, and evocative recollections from individuals impacted by incidents of Islamophobia,’ An Act of Worship’ opens a window into the world of Muslim Americans through collective memory.

NAUSHEEN DADABHOY is a director and cinematographer whose work spans fiction and documentary. She lensed an Oscar nominated film, an Emmy winning documentary, and films that have played at Sundance, TIFF, Locarno and on Al Jazeera, HBO and PBS. Her directorial debut THE GROUND BENEATH THEIR FEET premiered at IDFA.

Running Time: 83 Minutes
Language: English, Arabic Country: USA

TRIBECA FILM FESTIVAL 2022
An Act of Worship (Section: Documentary Competition)
WORLD PREMIERE
Directors: Nausheen Dadabhoy
Producer: Sofian Khan, Kristi Jacobson, Heba Elorbany

Public screening schedule:
Thursday, June 9 at 5p.m. at Village East – WORLD PREMIERE
Friday, June 10 at 6p.m. at Cinepolis – 2nd Public Screening
Sunday, June 12 at 8:15p.m. at Tribeca Film Center – 3rd Public Screening

Dances with Films premiere date of animated documentary ‘Eternal Spring’

Film participant and illustrator Daxiong. “Eternal Spring (長春)” will make its West coast premiere on June 15 at the TCL Chinese 6 Theaters. Photo: Lofty Sky Pictures, used with permission.

Lofty Sky Pictures groundbreaking filmmaker Jason Loftus’ (“Ask No Questions”) latest film, the powerful animated documentary “Eternal Spring (長春)”  will make its West coast premiere at this year’s Dances With Films (June 9 – 19, 2022), on Wednesday, June 15 with a 7p.m. premiere at the TCL Chinese 6 Theaters (in the Hollywood & Highland complex in Los Angeles). “Eternal Spring (長春)” is a multiple award winner, most recently having won the Hot Docs Audience Award for best film and the Rogers Audience Award for best Canadian film, and both the audience and jury awards for International Documentary Feature Film at Mammoth Lakes Film Festival. (Loft Sky Pictures, 2022)

This extraordinary harmony of animation and documentary has been awarded and acclaimed across Europe in its Film Festival run thus far for its groundbreaking animation – and of particular note, has been its incredible comic-book-style animation that transports the viewer into the brave and heroic world of a group of Falun Gong practitioners. “Eternal Spring ( 長春)” with its story of survival at all costs & battle for human rights continues to draw powerful comparisons to beloved Oscar nominee “Flee.”

This Canadian film was made for theatrical (it is in 2.39 Cinema 4K and audiences are loving it on the big screen thus far from its international film festival run), most recently to sold out audiences at the New York Human Rights Film Festival on May 23 at Lincoln Center & May 24 at IFC Center (one of 10 official selections and the US premiere), and again on May 31 and June 2 at Krakow Film Festival (Oscar qualifying International Documentary Competition, Polish Premiere). 

“Eternal Spring (長春)” – Confronted with government denunciations and human rights violations against their spiritual practice, a group of Chinese activists executes a bold and perilous plan to hack into state television.

“Eternal Spring (長春)” – In March 2002, a state TV signal in China is hijacked by members of banned spiritual group Falun Gong. Their goal is to counter the government narrative about their practice. In the aftermath, police raids sweep Changchun City and comic book illustrator Daxiong (Justice League, Star Wars), a Falun Gong practitioner, is forced to flee. He arrives in North America, blaming the hijacking for worsening a violent repression. His views are challenged when he meets the lone surviving participant to have escaped China, now living in Seoul, South Korea.

Combining present-day footage with 3D animation inspired by Daxiong’s art, Eternal Spring retraces the event on its 20th anniversary, and brings to life an unprecedented story of defiance, harrowing eyewitness accounts of persecution, and an exhilarating tale of determination to speak up for political and religious freedoms, no matter the cost.