Notizie

Dubai-based sales agency Cercamon has launched Vorteks, a new genre label running the gamut from horror to sci-fi, thriller, fantasy, dark comedy and action movies. Handling 8-10 features a year, Vorteks will be run by David Kwok, the Tribeca Film Festival director of programming for its first 10 editions. A partner at Vorteks, Kwok will spearhead acquisitions and sales.

“With a special focus on emerging talent, the label’s evolving slate will reflect the incredible new voices coming out of the genre community,” Kwok said, noting that Vorteks expands Cercamon’s mission of “searching for the best films and to work with bold filmmakers.”

In one case in point, Vorteks’ first official acquisition is “Ancestral Beasts,” the second feature from Canadian writer-director-producer Riedel (“Jackstones”) and a tale of an Indigenous woman’s battle with trauma which weighs in as one of the buzzy projects at Cannes Frontières Platform’s Proof of...

The 2025 Lighthouse International Film Festival (Liff) has unveiled its program for this summer. The local festival, which takes places on Long Beach Island in New Jersey, will run from June 4 to 8, with special features including the U.S. premiere of Kirill Serebrennikov’s 2024 Cannes hit “Limonov: The Ballad” starring Ben Whishaw. Serebrennikov’s English-language debut was an IndieWire Critic’s Pick from the festival last year.

Liff 2025 has not yet announced its opening night feature, but IndieWire can reveal that Uta Briesewitz’s “American Sweatshop” will close the festival. Highlights also range from the Centerpiece screening of “Omaha” with John Magaro and SXSW Jury Award winner “Slanted.” Jason Alexander will be the keynote speaker for the 25th anniversary of his feature, “Just Looking.” Elegance Bratton is also among the filmmakers who will be in attendance; the director is screening his documentary “Move Ya Body: The Birth of House” at the festival.

Exclusive: Greenwich Entertainment has acquired North American rights to Fantasy Life, the debut feature of actor turned writer-director Matthew Shear, which won multiple prizes, including the Audience Award, at SXSW 2025.

No release date was disclosed. Visit Films is overseeing international sales at Cannes.

Shear (Between the Temples) stars opposite Amanda Peet (Your Friends and Neighbors), the winner of a Special Jury Award at SXSW, as Sam Stein, who after losing his job as a paralegal, suffers a panic attack and stumbles into a job babysitting his psychiatrist’s three granddaughters. The girls’ mother, Dianne (Peet), is an actor whose once-promising career has stalled; she’s in a difficult marriage to David (Alessandro Nivola), a rock bassist. When David goes abroad on tour, Dianne and Sam discover an easy rapport as well as a shared history of mental illness. Sam joins Dianne’s family to babysit for the summer on Martha’s Vineyard,...

Chicago – The 2025 Dallas International Film Festival (Diff) wrapped up on May 1st … and announced its Grand Jury Prizes and Audience Awards this week. The top Narrative Feature is “Omaha,” the Best Texas Feature is “Portrait of a Postman,” the Best Documentary is “The Librarians” and the Audience Award for Narrative Feature is “40 Acres.”

The 19th edition of the annual Dallas International Film Festival (Diff) took place April 25–May 1, 2025. This year marks Diff’s first as an Academy Award® Qualifying Festival, following its designation by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Octobe, and included 120 screenings, filmmaker Q&As, panels, nightly red carpets, and special events. Diff is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit arts and culture organization established as the Dallas Film Society.

2025 Dallas International Film Festival

Photo credit: DIFFDallas.org

“We’re so excited to celebrate this year’s winners,” said James Faust, Diff Artistic Director. “These films really moved us—some made us laugh,...

Michel Franco’s timely drama “Dreams,” starring Oscar winner Jessica Chastain and celebrated ballet dancer Isaac Hernández, has been bought by Greenwich Entertainment for North American rights. The movie world premiered in competition at the Berlin Film Festival where it was warmly received.

Greenwich Entertainment will release “Dreams” during the awards season this fall. The film sees Hernandez play a ballet dancer from Mexico who dreams international fame and life in the United States. Believing that his lover (Chastain), a socialite and philanthropist, will support him, he leaves everything behind and narrowly escapes death crossing the border. However, his arrival disrupts her carefully curated world and she will do anything to protect their future together – and the life she has built for herself.

“I’m happy that ‘Dreams’ will be released by Greenwich in North America,” says Franco. “It was a joy to work with Jessica Chastain a second time,...

Dubai-based sales agency Cercamon has snagged international sales rights to family drama “Omaha” following its acclaimed world premiere at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, where it was in the U.S. dramatic competition.

The feature directorial debut from Cole Webley will screen for global buyers at the upcoming Cannes Film Market. Greenwich Entertainment previously secured North American distribution rights in a deal with UTA Independent Film Group, with a theatrical release planned for later this year.

Written by Robert Machoian (“The Killing of Two Lovers”), “Omaha” follows a struggling widower who takes his children on an unexpected cross-country road trip after a family tragedy. As their journey unfolds, his daughter begins to suspect something isn’t right. Newcomers Molly Belle Wright and Wyatt Solis play the children, with veteran actress Talia Balsam rounding out the cast in a supporting role.

“Intimate in its scope, yet emotionally monumental, this debut feature by director Cole Webley,...

Sundance didn’t have the plethora of late night bidding wars we used to see in the good old days of the festival, but a number of buzziest titles are actually closing deals late into the spring and into the early summer. Over 60 films came into this year’s Sundance looking for homes, and slowly but surely a number of those are finding homes. As we previously reported, the hope was that even more distributors could get creative.

Below we’ll update all the acquisitions following the festival as they arrive.

“Folktales”

Section: Premieres

Buyer: Magnolia

Director: Heidi Ewing, Rachel Grady

Buzz: It’s a reunion 20 years in the making after Magnolia also released Ewing and Grady’s Oscar-nominated “Jesus Camp.” “Folktales” is a verité documentary about a traditional folk high school in Arctic Norway and the kids relationships growing with a pack of sled dogs by their side, taking...

Exclusive: Greenwich Entertainment has acquired North American rights to Omaha, the family drama starring Past Lives‘ John Magaro, which premiered to critical acclaim at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. The film, marking the feature directorial debut of Cole Webley, will be released in theaters across the country later this year.

Set against the backdrop of the 2008 economic crisis, Omaha follows a struggling father (Magaro) who embarks on a road trip across the American West with his two children, Ella (Molly Belle Wright) and Charlie (Wyatt Solis), in search of hope and a better life. What begins as a seemingly spontaneous family journey gradually reveals deeper layers of both grief and resilience, as Ella starts to sense that her father’s intentions may be masking a more profound truth.

Written by Robert Machoian (The Killing of Two Lovers), Omaha is a Sanctuary Content production, in association with Kaleidoscope Pictures and Monarch Content.

Chicago – The 2025 Dallas International Film Festival (Diff) kicks off on Friday, April 25th, with a solid line up of features and shorts … including “Omaha” and “The Salamander King” … and capping off the day with an Opening Night Party. For schedule, tickets and info, click DIFF2025.

The 19th edition of the annual Dallas International Film Festival (Diff) will take place April 25–May 1, 2025, at Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas Victory Park. This year marks Diff’s first as an Academy Award® Qualifying Festival, following its designation by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in October. The 2025 festival will include more than 120 screenings, filmmaker Q&As, panels, nightly red carpets, and special events. Cinépolis Luxury Cinemas Victory Park—located at 2365 Victory Park Lane near the American Airlines Center—will serve as the main venue. Additional screenings and events will take place at the AT&T Discovery District, Harwood District, the historic Texas Theatre,...

Maryse Legagneur’s drama The Last Meal (Le Dernier Repas) has earned the top prize at the Miami Film Festival, winning the $15,000 Marimbas Award in international competition. The award, chosen by a jury, goes to a narrative feature film that “best exemplifies richness and resonance for cinema’s future.”

“After 20 years of silence, a dying Reynold asks his estranged daughter, Vanessa, to share his final meals,” notes a description of The Last Meal. “As she prepares the traditional Haitian dishes of his youth, the familiar flavors unlock painful, buried memories of his life and suffering under the Duvalier dictatorship.

“Set against this backdrop of shared history, The Last Meal is a poignant tale of reconciliation, exploring the power of food, cultural memory, and confronting the past to heal fractured family bonds within the Haitian experience. A beautifully crafted film about legacy, healing, and the stories we carry in our bodies and kitchens.

It’s always interesting to see which films are able to keep up their film festival momentum after buzzy premieres at early-in-the-year fests like Sundance and SXSW. Two to keep an eye on? Cole Webley’s Sundance premiere “Omaha” and Xander Robin’s SXSW crowdpleaser “The Python Hunt,” both of which just notched new wins over the weekend at the 2025 Miami Film Festival.

“The Python Hunt” picked up the Made in Mia Feature Film Award, sponsored by Panavision, which is designed to honor films “of any genre that prominently feature South Florida in their story, setting, and filming location, and best utilize South Florida’s story and theme for universal resonance.” Robin’s film, a documentary about snake-hunters in the Everglades, sure sounds like it fits the bill.

And Webley’s deep-feeling John Magaro-starring family drama, “Omaha,” earned the Jordan Ressler First Feature Award, created by the South Florida...

Gold Derby's top news stories for April 14, 2025.

The Last of Us posts premiere ratings

HBO shared Sunday night premiere ratings for dystopian drama The Last of Us. The Season 2 premiere garnered 5.3 million viewers on HBO and Max, a number that uses a combination of Nielsen’s measurement of linear TV viewers and Wbd's own streaming data. That's up 13 percent from the Season 1 premiere in 2023, which got 4.7 million viewers.

Leslie Odom Jr. is going back to Hamilton

You've been waiting for it, and now it's happening: Leslie Odom Jr. will be returning to Hamilton on Broadway this fall as Aaron Burr, the role he originated and won the Tony for Best Actor in a Musical in 2016 and shared a Grammy for the original cast recording. His run will last from Sept. 9 to Nov. 23 at the Richard Rodgers Theatre. Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda's era-defining historical hip-hop musical, will celebrate its 10th anniversary on Broadway on Aug.

Exclusive: Cole Webley, director of the acclaimed Sundance drama Omaha, starring John Magaro, has signed with Artists First for management.

Marking Webley’s feature directorial debut, Omaha follows a father (Magaro) who after a family tragedy, takes his two young children Ella (Molly Wright) and Charlie (Wyatt Solis) on a journey across the country, experiencing a world they’ve never seen before. As their adventure unfolds, Ella begins to understand that things might not be what they seem. The film garnered rave reviews when it premiered in U.S. Dramatic Competition at Sundance 2025.

A Washington native currently based in Utah, where he shot part of Omaha, Webley frequently explores themes of family and connection despite differences in his work. He spent his formative years running a paper route and attending wrestling tournaments before beginning to direct commercials and short films. In 2021, his commercial “The Epidemic” won the AICP Advertising Excellence...

March Madness is underway, and no streamer has more hoops coverage than Hulu + Live TV.

One of the reasons that the NCAA Tournament is so special is that it brings together schools with rich basketball traditions and Cinderellas who are looking to make their first major mark on the hardwood. One of those games will take place on Thursday, March 20 as the basketball-proud No. 2 St. John's Red Storm will face off in a First Round matchup with the No. 15 Nebraska-Omaha Mavericks. The game will air on CBS, so I recommend watching with a subscription to Hulu + Live TV.

How to watch St. John’s vs. Nebraska-Omaha When: Thursday, March 20, 2025 at 7:10 p.m. Et TV: CBS Stream: Watch with a subscription to Hulu + Live TV. From anywhere: Watch with a subscription to a Vpn. Everything you need to know to stream St. John’s vs. Nebraska-Omaha:

How to watch St.

The Sundance Film Festival is known for curating quiet, often stripped-down films that have a famously profound and emotional impact on their audiences.At this fest, “showy” flicks are often few and far between, instead, aiming the spotlight on indie films and their creators. Some of the films on this year’s slate that match this description include the likes of Rebuilding, Ricky, and another title: Omaha. Written by RobertMachoian and directed by ColeWebley, Omaha is a universally necessary watch that is simultaneously not for the faint of heart–one sure to spark a plethora of conversations.

Cole Webley’s “Omaha” (2025) is about fatherhood, loss, and change. However, the script doesn’t explicitly talk about any of it. Instead, it drip-feeds information throughout the film’s duration. It begins with a father (John Magaro) waking up at dawn and getting his kids out of bed to leave home shortly after. He asks them to pack some things but doesn’t share any specific details as to where they are going or why they are leaving home all of a sudden. Still, it seems sudden since the kids are not prepared for any of it.

The father brings the kids to the car as he has a word with a local sheriff. As an audience, we see these events mainly through the daughter, Ella’s (Molly Belle Wright) perspective. Her observant eyes sense her dad’s anxiety but cannot hear any of what he speaks. As they start driving,...

Sundance is a place for discovery, where new stars are minted because of the fresh, invigorating images they bring to the screen. It was where Steven Soderbergh helped kick off the indie film revolution in 1989 with “sex, lies, and videotape” and Quentin Tarantino launched “Reservoir Dogs” in 1992. They showed that, at Sundance, if you have something to say, you can have a seat at the table.

This year, that daring new voice belongs to Eva Victor, whose comedic character study “Sorry, Baby,” about a young professor reeling from a trauma, sold to A24 for $8 million. “Sorry, Baby” also has the distinction of placing first in many of the categories in IndieWire’s 2025 Sundance Critics Survey, including Best Performance (for Victor herself), Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best First Film, and Best Film itself.

Though “Sorry, Baby” was the undeniable favorite across the board at Sundance 2025, our critics survey shared the love...

Every year there are a few horror films that drastically exceed expectations from critics and audiences while also finding tremendous box office success, and one of the candidates to fill that slot in 2025 is The Bride. The upcoming monster horror thriller will be the latest from writer/director Maggie Gyllenhaal. The film has been set for release on September 26 later this year, and now that it's less than eight months away, fans are sitting on pins and needles waiting for the first official trailer. Collider's Perri Nemiroff recently caught up with The Bride star John Magaro to promote his upcoming movie Omaha. During the conversation, she asked about him previously mentioning Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, as well as Young Frankenstein, Frankenstein, Bonnie and Clyde, andBadlands as inspiration for The Bride, to which he said: "That's just a few. There's probably even more stuff I could add in." When...

“Omaha” is not just the favorite audible call of Eli and Peyton Manning or the most populous city in our 37th state of Nebraska, it is also Cole Webley’s feature-film directorial debut.

Webley, previously known for his TV commercials, called Robert Machoian’s “Omaha” script “incredible.” He was specifically struck by the screenplay’s “purity,” Webley said in the IndieWire Studio, presented by Dropbox.

“When I read the script — an incredible script by Robert Machoian — I had been developing several others that I thought would be my first movie,” Webley told our Kate Erbland. “This one hit me so clearly…the purity of this script. When you’re in this business, when a script comes along that everybody knows just needs to be made into a film, the writing’s on the wall.”

“We saw that almost immediately,” he continued, “and we pivoted and said, ‘Why are we trying...

“Omaha” lead John Magaro was 28 when he bombed on his audition for David Chase’s “Not Fade Away,” the actor said during a fireside chat at the IndieWire Studio, presented by Dropbox. Well, actually, his original tryout went very well — it was the callback that was a disaster. Why? Magaro says he failed by doing “the worst thing you can do” as an auditioning actor.

“I was continuing to do the same thing. I was doing what I thought you were supposed to do as an actor — what other people were doing,” Magaro said. “And at the time, there was a thing — and I don’t know if they do this anymore — but I remember getting casting notices, like— you would get an audition from the casting director and [it would read]: ‘Jesse Eisenberg-type.’ ‘Michael Cera-type.’ And I’d be like, well just cast them.” Don’t say that. It...

All episodes of The Agency Season 1 are now streaming on Paramount+, but the studio had so much faith in the show that it was renewed long before the recently aired finale. The show earned solid scores of 68% from critics and 76% from general audiences on Rotten Tomatoes, but it also scored strong viewership for Paramount+ and features a load of star power. The Agency set up plenty of threads to pull on in Season 2 and potentially beyond, and during a recent interview at Sundance with Collider's Perri Nemiroff for his upcoming movie Omaha, The Agency star John Magaro, who plays Owen in the hit spy thriller series, spoke about this being one of his first chances to come back and play the same character in a second season:...

It’s only fitting that a road trip movie like “Omaha” would begin with a series of domestic still lifes depicting clutter. Screenwriter Robert Machoian’s unique entry into the subgenre is neither a transformational journey nor the ultimate destination for a struggling Nevadan family of three. Instead, it’s about sitting with what already exists in whatever makeshift format is taken as the world passes by a rusty, rickety car.

Continue reading ‘Omaha’ Review: A Sturdy, Stoic John Magaro Anchors Moving Family Road Trip Drama [Sundance] at The Playlist.

There are many longstanding traditions in this entertainment industry of ours, and one of them — not necessarily the greatest, but certainly one of them — is the Sundance Road Trip Movie. Independent films about families and/or mismatched associates on a lengthy trek around the country or the world, in which a series of adventures and/or misadventures usually prove that the journey was just as important as the destination. Sometimes it’s funny, sometimes it’s sad, but always it screams “Sundance.”

Not every Sundance has a Sundance Road Trip Movie, but the festival just wouldn’t be the same without films like “Little Miss Sunshine,” “Paris, Texas,” “Y tu mamá también,” “Smoke Signals,” “Tumbleweeds,” “The Motorcycle Diaries,” “A Real Pain,” “The Puffy Chair,” “Wristcutters: A Love Story,” “The End of the Tour,” “Will & Harper” or “The Brave Little Toaster.” And now, joining that legacy is Cole Webley’s “Omaha,...

In the moving Sundance drama “Omaha,” the bedsheets are still warm when the life of a family is thrown into disarray on the morning they are mandated to vacate their home. The mother’s passing and the 2008 financial collapse contributed to the precariousness that’s put them in this predicament. Few belongings will accompany them on their road trip to an uncertain future.

In the driver seat of a barely functional car, a remarkably subdued John Magaro plays a widower and single father who, for most of the running time, is referred to simply as Dad. His perceptive 9-year-old daughter Ella (Molly Belle Wright) helps him push the moribund vehicle on the passenger side so it can start. From the look of it, they’ve done this plenty of times before, as the routine of a shared burden communicates the kids’ unconditional support for a parent desperately doing his best.

Kicking off the Sundance Film Festival Dramatic Competition this year is Omaha, an increasingly bleak road trip with a recently widowed father, his two kids and their dog. Set against the 2008 financial crisis, Omaha begins with a dad (John Magaro) facing foreclosure on his house after losing what appears to be everything professionally as well as the tragic death of his wife and mother to their two kids, Ella (Molly Belle Wright) and Charlie (Wyatt Solis).

As the film begins, he faces this latest crisis and gathers up the kids and their pet dog to jump into the increasingly unreliable family car, which usually only starts and gets going as Ella runs alongside and helps push it forward. And so they are off on an unspecified journey across the American Southwest with stops along the way that begin to explain — however subtly — this dad’s deep money problems. There’s...

Cole Webley, a Salt Lake City-based director, spent decades dreaming of premiering one of his films in Park City. The Utah native has attended the Sundance Film Festival for nearly 20 years, waiting in long lines as the snow fell around him, shivering in the cold in hopes of catching a hot new movie. He’d also tried and failed to get five of his short films into competition.

“To say that I had an affinity towards the festival would be an understatement,” Webley says. “It’s been the pinnacle of what I had hoped to achieve.”

This year, Webley finally gets his wish. “Omaha,” a drama about a struggling father embarking on a cross-country trip with his two daughters, will debut on the first day of Sundance. The inclusion of “Omaha” is meaningful to him in other ways. The film was largely shot around Utah with a local crew, so...

Featured on IndieWire’s Most Anticipated Films of 2025, Maggie Gyllenhaal’s upcoming sophomore directorial entry “The Bride!” is shaping up to be one wild ride. With Christian Bale and Jessie Buckley leading as Frankenstein’s monster and his eponymous Bride, the film is a family affair with Gyllenhaal’s husband, Peter Sarsgaard, her brother Jake Gyllenhaal also featured, as well as Penélope Cruz, Annette Bening, and Julianne Hough. Sarsgaard also brought his “September 5” co-star, John Magaro onto the project. In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Magaro discussed getting to work on the film, which he described as a mash-up of dance films and movies about bandits in love.

“It’s a wild movie. It’s very different than ‘The Lost Daughter,’ Maggie’s previous film that she directed,” said Magaro. “It’s like a mix of a Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers movie, ‘Young Frankenstein,’ ‘Frankenstein,’ ‘Bonnie and Clyde,...

Saul worked at Cinnabon in Better Call Saul to lay low and avoid drawing unwanted attention. Gene's life as a Cinnabon manager was boring yet perfect for staying under the radar. Cinnabon was featured in Better Call Saul with no monetary exchange between the brand and the show.

The Better Call Saul Cinnabon scenes were flashforwards showing Jimmy McGill working minimum wage as Gene, and when fully explained, these black and white sequences reveal an incredible amount of thematic depth. Introduced in season 2 of Breaking Bad, Walt and Jesse's "criminal lawyer" Saul Goodman (Bob Odenkirk) would become one of the most important characters in the series. He was also one of the few major figures to end the show alive, making the smart move to get the hell out of dodge — or in this case, Albuquerque — before things really hit the fan.

In Better Call Saul, viewers got to witness...

Warning: Spoilers for The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live episode 2

A key plot development in The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live episode 2 opens the door for a community once thought to be lost forever to make a comeback. Over the years, The Walking Dead franchise has been host to a long list of tragedies, some of which pertaining to the eradication of entire settlements. Communities have been wiped off the map through various means, with the most common cause being The Walking Dead's Civic Republic Military.

The evils of the Crm were on full display in both Fear the Walking Dead and The Walking Dead: The World Beyond. Rick and Michonne's spinoff has since provided a reminder of their destructive potential. In The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live episode 2, Michonne and her new group of survivors crossed paths with a Crm helicopter, which immediately bombarded them with chlorine gas.

The following contains descriptions of intense and graphic scenes.

While it may not appear so on the surface, war movies and horror films share many similar elements. The essence of a horror film is to elicit fear within its audience. Cinema's most haunting war movies tend to accomplish this same feat as they horrify audiences with images of humanity's bleakest moments. One can argue war movies can be more terrifying than horror films because, in many cases, war movies depict events that have occurred in reality.

The scariest war movie scenes in film history linger in the minds of audiences long after the final credits roll. One simply does not ever forget Saving Private Ryan's Omaha Beach sequence or Come and See's barn church scene. The most horrifying war movie scenes are among the most powerful in the history of cinema.

Private Pyle Snaps In Full Metal Jacket...

Another major sports docuseries is in the works, and this one has some major star power behind it.

Lakers star LeBron James and his SpringHill Company is in talks with Peyton Manning’s Omaha Productions and Barack and Michelle Obama’s Higher Ground for a series that would follow professional basketball players, a source familiar with the discussions confirms to The Hollywood Reporter. The format would bring the same approach to the NBA that Omaha’s Quarterback brought to the NFL.

The NBA is also expected to be involved in the show, much as NFL Films is a partner on Quarterback. The Wall Street Journal, which first reported the news, says that the show will likely end on Netflix, where Higher Ground has a first-look deal, and where Quarterback emerged as a successful addition to the genre earlier this year.

It’s not immediately clear which players the series would follow,...