ArcLight Presents Slamdance Cinema Club, the recently minted collaboration between Arclight Cinemas and the Slamdance Film Festival, today announced their upcoming summer film screenings for June, July and August, in a series that began this March.
One of Slamdance’s ever-widening slate of extra-festival ventures, Slamdance Cinema Club brings features from the recent festival (January 23-29, 2015 in Park City, Utah) to the Arclight Theater in Hollywood, California for a one-night theatrical special screening. Screenings of two films per month include filmmaker Q&As with high-profile guest moderators (past moderators include actors Joe Manganiello and Matthew Lillard). Tickets will be available at the ArcLight’s Cinema Club website.
The first three months of the initiative has brought a diverse line-up of features to L.A. audiences: wrestling documentary The Resurrection of Jake The Snake by Steve Yu (March 8); horror comedy Bloodsucking Bastards by Brian James O’Connell (March 9); Turkish drama (and 2015 Audience Award for Narrative Feature winner) Across the Sea by Nisan Dağ and Esra Saydam (April 12); uproarious doc Dennis Rodman’s Big Bang in Pyongyang by Colin Offland (April 13); eco-documentary Trees that Walk by Italian filmmaker Mattia Colombo (May 17); and coming-of-age tale I Believe in Unicorns by Leah Meyerhoff (May 18).
A still from the inaugural Slamdance Cinema Club title, The Resurrection of Jake the Snake
The eclectic programming continues with the new titles, including Perry Blackshear’s comedy They Look Like People, which took home the festival’s Jury Honorable Mention for Narrative Feature; Jeremy Royce’s doc 20 Years of Madness (see “Addictive Personalities,” a MovieMaker interview with Royce and film subject Jerry White Jr., here); and Gabrielle Demeestere’s Yosemite, produced by Rabbit Bandini and starring James Franco (see Demeestere in a clip from the festival here).
The full June, July and August line-up is as follows:
June 14, 2015
Huntington’s Dance
Rating: NYR
Running Time: 89 min
Genre: Documentary
Directors: Chris Furbee
Synopsis: The story of one man’s reckoning with his family’s brutal, hereditary disease: Huntington’s Disease. This first person account brings the viewer intimately into their lives. We see his denial, his mother’s death, his grappling with being tested and his eventual diagnosis. His path from caretaker, to victim to activist is tracked in a unique diary fashion over the course of 18 years.
June 15, 2015
Diamond Tongues
Rating: NYR
Running Time: 100 min
Genre: Comedy
Directors: Brian Robertson, Pavan Moondi
Cast: Leah Goldstein, Nick Flanagan, Leah Wildman, Adam Gurfinkel, Noah R. Taylor
Synopsis: Edith Weiland dreams of being a successful actress but just can’t seem to make it happen. Things get worse when her ex-boyfriend she broke up with to focus on her career takes up acting on a whim and immediately books a leading role. When Edith can’t figure out what she’s doing wrong, she begins to do everything wrong.
July 12, 2015
Yosemite
Rating: NYR
Running Time: 80 min
Genre: Drama
Director: Gabrielle Demeestere
Cast: James Franco, Henry Hopper, Calum John, Alec Mansky, Everett Meckler
Synopsis: In the fall of 1985, the intertwining tales of three fifth-grade friends, Chris, Joe, and Ted, unfold in the suburban paradise of Palo Alto. Chris drives up to Yosemite for the weekend with his dad and discovers a corpse in the woods. Joe, left to his own devices by his babysitter, befriends a lonely drifter who shares his love of comic books. Meanwhile, a mountain lion is spotted in Palo Alto in broad daylight and Ted searches for his cat, who has gone missing.
July 13, 2015
On Her Own
Rating: NYR
Running Time: 80 min
Genre: Documentary
Director: Morgan Schmidt-Feng
Synopsis: The story of Nancy Prebilich and her family as they struggle to save their fifth generation farm during the Great Recession. Yet this story is about more than just one family’s struggle to keep their land out of foreclosure. It explores the roles history and ancestry play out in our present-day lives. What happens when the cost of preserving family heritage is the family itself?
August 9, 2015
They Look Like People
Rating: NYR
Running Time: 80 min
Genre: Horror
Director: Perry Blackshear
Cast: MacLeod Andrews, Evan Dumouchel, Margaret Drake, Mick Casale, Elena Greenlee
Synopsis: Suspecting that people are transforming into malevolent shape-shifters, Wyatt flees to New York City to seek out his estranged childhood friend Christian. As the mysterious horrors close in on Wyatt, he questions whether to protect his only friend from an impending war, or from himself. A genre-bending story about love, loyalty, and living nightmares.
August 10, 2015
20 Years Of Madness
Rating: NYR
Running Time: 90 min
Genre: Documentary
Director: Jeremy Royce
Synopsis: When the founder of a mid-’90s Public Access TV show in Detroit reunites the eccentric cast after 20 years to make a new episode, he discovers that most of his childhood friends are struggling with issues ranging from mental illness to drug addiction. They are forced to take a hard look at their relationships and reconcile their teenage dreams with the realities of adulthood.
Slamdance Cinema Club is the latest venture in Slamdance‘s expanding roster of programs. Others include VOD distributor Slamdance Studios, ongoing roadshow Slamdance On the Road, and the Slamdance Hulu channel. In January, we commended the festival as one of 2015’s 50 Worth the Entry Fee for adding value to filmmakers’ experiences. As Slamdance co-founder Peter Baxter said, the aim with these programs is “to assist [artists] in sustaining their careers and get their films out to much larger audiences.” MM
Ticket Giveaway
Missed these films in Park City, and want to check them out in Los Angeles—free? MovieMaker has two pairs of tickets to give away for any of the above June – August screenings, courtesy of Slamdance Cinema Club. To be in the running, simply email [email protected] with the subject line “Slamdance Cinema Club Tickets.” Include your name and the screening (film title, date) that you would like to attend. Winners will be drawn and contacted at 5 p.m. PST on Friday, May 22, 2015.
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