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The Bloody Disgusting-powered Screambox is home to a variety of unique horror content, from originals and exclusives to cult classics and documentaries. With such a rapidly-growing library, there are many hidden gems waiting to be discovered.

Here are five recommendations you can stream on Screambox right now.

Evil Dead Trap

Mix up your January Giallo viewing with Evil Dead Trap. Although its title invokes Evil Dead – and there’s a bit of Sam Raimi-esque kineticism in the camerawork – the 1988 Japanese film shares more in common with the lurid Italian thrillers: a mysterious killer, elaborate murder set pieces, gruesome violence, stylish cinematography, a dreamlike atmosphere, and an infectious synth score.

Upon receiving a graphic snuff film, a late-night TV host (Miyuki Ono) rallies a small production crew to investigate its origins at an abandoned military base. The story plays out in a manner that could be considered a slasher, but...

Now streaming on Screambox is the festival hit The Wolf Hour, a psychological thriller that takes place during the summer of the Son of Sam murders.

The Ring‘s Naomi Watts stars in the film as June Leigh, “a cultural icon and activist during the 1960s, now fallen from grace and a shell of her former self. An unseen tormentor begins exploiting her weaknesses and she must face her demons at the height of one of the darkest points in New York history: the summer of the Son of Sam murders.”

From writer-director Alistair Banks Griffin, The Wolf Hour actually filmed in New York with the trailer oozing Hitchcock, especially Rear Window, and promises one helluva tense-filled thriller.

Meredith Borders gave the film a positive review out of the Sundance World Premiere, noting that the “Hitchcockian” thriller is “grimy, tense and menacing.”

Check it out on Screambox.

The post ‘The Wolf Hour...

With Alistair Banks Griffin’s recommended second feature, The Wolf Hour, containing one of Naomi Watts’s best performances, in theaters, we’re running again our interview with Griffin following the film’s Sundance premiere. — Editor “I can’t get out but I look out the attic window and watch the world go by. I feel like an outsider. I am on a different wave length then everybody else….” — David Berkowitz In one of the Sundance Film Festival’s real discoveries, Alistair Banks Griffins’s 1977-set The Wolf Hour, Naomi Watts plays June, a novelist and cultural critic existing somewhere in the intellectual shadow of […]...

With Alistair Banks Griffin’s recommended second feature, The Wolf Hour, containing one of Naomi Watts’s best performances, in theaters, we’re running again our interview with Griffin following the film’s Sundance premiere. — Editor “I can’t get out but I look out the attic window and watch the world go by. I feel like an outsider. I am on a different wave length then everybody else….” — David Berkowitz In one of the Sundance Film Festival’s real discoveries, Alistair Banks Griffins’s 1977-set The Wolf Hour, Naomi Watts plays June, a novelist and cultural critic existing somewhere in the intellectual shadow of […]...

For his sophomore feature, Alistair Banks Griffin proposes a phobia friendly transgressive and forbidding drama that makes strange bedfellows out of the process of healing, self preservation, mental mutilation, isolation and guilt. In a fiery fueled backdrop, The Wolf Hour features a Naomi Watts who is into deep psychosis; we first met Alistair back in 2010 at the Cannes Film Festival where he premiered Two Gates of Sleep in the Directors’ Fortnight. We discussed the time in between films, and a lot of the technical aspects in this “buzz” worthy return.

…...

Watts the Matter with Naomi?: Griffin Mines Madness in All-Consuming Character Study

Director Alistair Banks Griffin revisits one helluva hot summer in the city with his highly anticipated sophomore feature The Wolf Hour, arriving nearly a decade after his lauded 2010 debut Two Gates of Sleep. A woman named June seems to be dying a slow death in a dirty hovel during July of 1977 in the South Bronx. A staggering heat wave aggravates a city already ill at ease, violent tendencies birthing the onslaught of serial killer David Berkowitz’s infamous Summer of Sam, and we’re introduced to an unrelentingly grim landscape which seems to be absorbing its protagonist, a troubled woman suffering from agoraphobia while a decade-old trauma continues to haunt her.…...

The apocalyptic anxiety of our present sociopolitical moment is the not-so-hidden undergirding of Alistair Banks Griffin’s psychodrama “The Wolf Hour,” in which Naomi Watts plays June Leigh, a fearful author who’s isolated herself from the outside world by holing up in her fifth-floor South Bronx walk-up.

But it’s not 2019, when even the most dedicated of hermits can feel connected to others through the Internet. Griffin’s analog setting is the summer of 1977, when New York’s then-notorious version of urban decay had segments of the city ready to ignite, while a steady stream of news about “The .44 Caliber Killer” — a female-targeting serial murderer soon to be known as “Son of Sam” — had single women on edge, especially those with long, dark hair, like June’s.

But despite a typically committed performance by Watts, once again showing her special affinity for hard-edged sufferers grinding out a way to survive,...

The Death of Dick Long, Give Me Liberty, Selah and the Spades and Alistair Banks Griffin’s The Wolf Hour (which is receiving its theatrical release this Friday) are just some of the items that we found in last year’s Next section. This year’s crop includes we find the highly anticipated Omniboat: A Fast Boat Fantasia by several American indie darling filmmakers (and what will likely be Robert Redford’s last role), Danny Madden‘s directorial debut Beast Beast, Lawrence Michael Levine‘s third feature film Black Bear and Heidi Ewing‘s first foray into narrative territory in I Carry You With Me (see pic below).…...

"It's like a war zone..." "Something much more sinister than that." Brainstorm Media has unveiled a trailer for the indie thriller The Wolf Hour, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year. This is the second film made by filmmaker Alistair Banks Griffin and it premiered to quite a bit of buzz during Sundance. With Hitchcockian tautness, the film "flawlessly captures the style and texture of the 1970s and the interior unraveling of a woman who, like her city, is teetering on a knife-edge." Naomi Watts stars as a woman seeking refuge inside her grandmother's apartment in the Bronx in the late 1970s, with a heat wave hitting the city and paranoia kicking in as guests arrive one by one. "In this eerily resonant allegory for our times, she is, like all of us, weighing her actions in a world on the brink of collapse." Also starring Jennifer Ehle,...

I’ve got a trailer here for an interesting paranoia thriller called The Wolf Hour. The movie is set in 1977 and stars Naomi Watts as a woman named June who refuses to leave her apartment as New York City finds itself in complete chaos.

New York City is “awash with escalating violence. A citywide blackout is triggering fires, looting, and countless arrests, and the Son of Sam murders are riddling the city with panic. June, once a celebrated counterculture figure, attempts to retreat from the chaos by shutting herself inside the yellowed walls of her grandmother’s South Bronx apartment. But her doorbell is ringing incessantly, the heat is unbearable, and creeping paranoia and fear are taking hold. Visitors, some invited, some unsolicited, arrive one by one, and June must determine whom she can trust and whether she can find a path back to her former self.”

This movie premiered at the Sundance Film Festival,...

One of two films to premiere at Sundance Film Festival this year that starred both Naomi Watts and Kelvin Harrison Jr. (along with Luce), The Wolf Hour finds the stars in a different kind of psychological thriller mode. Directed and written by Alistair Banks Griffin (Two Gates of Sleep), the film is set during the 1977 blackout in NYC as we’re trapped in the apartment of Watts’ character, who must face her own demons while also fearing the outside world. Ahead of a release later this year, the first trailer and poster have now arrived for the film also starring Jennifer Ehle and Emory Cohen.

Nick Allen said in his review for RogerEbert.com, “Naomi Watts further proves that she’s one of the best with “The Wolf Hour,” a largely one-woman show directed by Alistair Banks Griffin that takes place in a sweaty, anxious New York City during the Summer of Sam.

Festival celebrating Us cinema unveils full line-up of 45th edition.

The Deauville American Festival has unveiled a female-focused programme spotlighting women behind and in front of the camera for its 45th edition.

The festival, unfolding in the luxury northern French resort of Deauville Sept 6-15, courted controversy earlier in the week when it announced it was opening with Woody Allen’s A Rainy Day in New York.

It will be the feature’s biggest festival screening after backers Amazon cancelled its release after its 2017 shoot when molestation allegations by the director’s adopted daughter Dylan Farrow resurfaced amid the rise...

Andrew Lincoln in ‘The Walking Dead.’

The Walking Dead‘s Andrew Lincoln will star opposite Naomi Watts in Penguin Bloom, the adaptation of Bradley Trevor Greive and Cameron Bloom’s novel to be directed by Glendyn Ivin.

Lincoln will portray Cameron Bloom, the husband of Watt’s Sam Bloom in the drama based on the true story of a young Sydney family who struggle to come to terms with a near-fatal accident that left their mother paralyzed.

An unlikely ally enters their lives in the form of an injured Magpie chick, which the family dubbed ‘Penguin’ due to her black and white plumage.

Scripted by Shaun Grant and Harry Cripps and produced by Watts, Emma Cooper and Made Up Stories’ Bruna Papandrea, Jodi Matterson and Steve Hutensky, the production will start shooting in early August.

The producers said: “We were all captivated by this heart-warming story of resilience, the power of family and hope.

“The Wolf Hour,” a psychological thriller starring Naomi Watts and Jennifer Ehle, has been picked up for North America by Brainstorm Media. HanWay Films has also closed sales for a host of European and Asian territories.

Directed by Alistair Banks Griffin, “The Wolf Hour” features Oscar-nominated Watts as June, a former countercultural celebrity who lives as a recluse in New York’s South Bronx in the late 1970s. Outside, the city is on edge, with the Son of Sam killer on the loose and the July 13, 1977, riot over an electricity blackout about to erupt. June’s world starts to unravel when an invisible tormentor begins to crack her defenses.

Other cast members are Ehle (“Pride and Prejudice”), Kelvin Harrison Jr., Emory Cohen, Brennan Brown, and Jeremy Bobb.

Banks Griffin’s debut feature film, “Two Gates of Sleep,” played in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight in 2010. “The Wolf Hour” is produced by Brian Kavanaugh-Jones...

Brainstorm Media has acquired North American rights to Alistair Banks Griffin’s thriller The Wolf Hour, which has also sold around the world for HanWay Films.

The Sundance debut stars Naomi Watts together with Jennifer Ehle, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Emory Cohen, Brennan Brown, and Jeremy Bobb. Watts also executive produced.

Set against the ‘Summer of Sam’, the film charts the story of a once well-known, now reclusive writer caught up in the tension of late 1970s New York. The deal was negotiated between Brainstorm and CAA Media Finance on behalf of the filmmakers together with HanWay. Brainstorm will release theatrically in fall 2019.

HanWay has also closed deals with Odeon (Greece), Nos Lusomundo (Portugal), Fabula (Turkey), Discovery (Former Yugoslavia), DDDream (China), Klockworx (Japan), Shaw (Singapore), Cinesky (airlines / ships) and Uphe Content Group.

The film is produced by Brian Kavanaugh-Jones and Bailey Conway Anglewicz from Automatik along with Bradley Pilz under Bradley Pilz productions. Felipe Dieppa and Taryn Nagle are exec producers for The Big Picture Company with Linda Moran of Belladonna Productions and Fred Berger of Automatik.

“Naomi Watts gives a riveting performance in this tense thriller. We are very excited to bring this movie to U.S. theaters nationwide,” said Michelle Shwarzstein, VP of Marketing and Acquisitions for Brainstorm Media.

Banks Griffin’s first feature Two Gates Of Sleep screened in Director’s Fortnight at Cannes 2010 and competed for the Camera d’Or.

The Naomi Watts thriller The Wolf Hour has been acquired by Brainstorm Media, which nabbed the North American rights.

A fall 2019 theatrical release is planned for Alistair Banks Griffin's psychological thriller, which also stars Jennifer Ehle, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Emory Cohen, Jeremy Bobb and Brennan Brown.

Set in July 1977 in New York during a citywide blackout that is triggering fires, looting and countless arrests, and the Son of Sam murders that are riddling the city with panic. June (Watts), once a celebrated counterculture figure, attempts to retreat from the chaos by shutting herself inside the yellowed walls of ...

The Naomi Watts thriller The Wolf Hour has been acquired by Brainstorm Media, which nabbed the North American rights.

A fall 2019 theatrical release is planned for Alistair Banks Griffin's psychological thriller, which also stars Jennifer Ehle, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Emory Cohen, Jeremy Bobb and Brennan Brown.

Set in July 1977 in New York during a citywide blackout that is triggering fires, looting and countless arrests, and the Son of Sam murders that are riddling the city with panic. June (Watts), once a celebrated counterculture figure, attempts to retreat from the chaos by shutting herself inside the yellowed walls of ...

Run a finger along any of the surfaces in Alistair Banks Griffin’s sophomore feature “The Wolf Hour,” and it will come up slicked with sweat, grime and the residual soot of the city. It is the summer of 1977, and it’s hotter than hell. June Leigh (Naomi Watts) perches on the window sill of the squalid Bronx apartment she dares not leave, facing right into a lethargic fan that scarcely even stirs the wavy brown hair off her sticky shoulders. Outside, little blisters of violence and intimidation erupt on the tinder-box streets, and somewhere nearby, Son of Sam is murdering women with wavy brown hair. “Hello from the gutters of New York City,” the serial killer writes in letters to the papers, and though Griffin’s heavy-on-atmosphere, light-on-plot film takes place almost exclusively five floors up from ground level, those gutters feel palpably, oppressively close.

“The Wolf Hour” is a peculiar film,...

Once again placing his player(s) through the ringer, Alistair Banks Griffin moves from outdoorsy existentialism and moral quicksand in (2011’s Two Gates of Sleep) to a writer’s block so severe (agoraphobia and quasi pathological transgressions) that only a burning building catharsis will save the soul sophomore film in The Wolf Hour. We were at the world premiere at Sundance, where Dylan managed to speak to Griffin and supporting player Kelvin Harrison Jr. (who was brought onboard because he had worked with Naomi Watts on Luce).

…...

The Wolf Hour

The highest ranked Sundance Film Festival selected item on our list belongs to Alistair Banks Griffin and his long awaited second feature film. Filming took place in November of 2017 with Naomi Watts in the driver’s seat. A 2016 January Screenwriters Lab project, Griffin would reteam with composers Danny Bensi & Saunder Jurriaans – they first worked together on Griffin’s 2011 debut film, Two Gates of Sleep.

Gist: June (Watts) was once a celebrated counter-culture figure, but that was a decade ago. She now lives alone in her fifth floor South Bronx apartment, having all but cut herself off from the outside world.…...

For his moody thriller set during the famous New York City blackouts in the summer of 1977, “The Wolf Hour” director Alistair Banks Griffin had one goal at the top of his list: “We had to capture the humidity, that was my first note.” The director and his two illustrious lead actresses, Naomi Watts and Jennifer Ehle, paid a visit to the IndieWire Sundance Studio, presented by Dropbox, during the 2019 festival. Watts, who plays an agoraphobic writer named June in the film, shared the secret to nailing the sweaty blackout look: “We were covered in Vaseline. Every day.”

“Color palette was the second part of that equation. Really just feeling this heavy, layers of paint and dented plaster,” said Griffin. “Every inch of the set was worked over to make it feel like that moment. I go back and look at a lot of great ’70s cinema, too, and kind of putting it in that canon.

In Alistair Banks Griffin’s psychodrama “The Wolf Hour,” Naomi Watts plays June Leigh, a fearful author who’s isolated herself from the outside world by holing up in her fifth-floor South Bronx walk-up during the 1977 New York blackout riots. Watts and Griffin dropped by TheWrap Studios at Sundance to talk about the film with TheWrap’s Sharon Waxman, and Watts made the case for her character being locked up in the movie.

“She has made a great case for staying locked up inside, things don’t work for her out there in the world anymore, she hurts people, she hurts herself,” said Watts. “She’s orchestrated her life to work in a comfort zone, or somewhat, and just rely on people when she absolutely has to.”

Also Read: Kelvin Harrison Jr on How Privilege Plays a Huge Part in 'Luce' (Video)

In the film, June (Watts) was once a celebrated counter-culture figure,...

“The Wolf Hour” begins with a big, tight close-up of Naomi Watts’ face, and proceeds with the same sense of scrutiny. She’s in every scene of this character study— in nearly every shot, in fact—and delivers a performance of such raw nerve, you understand how writer/director Alistair Banks Griffin figured he could hang the entire picture on it. That’s a big risk, and he almost pulls it off.

Continue reading ‘The Wolf Hour’: Naomi Watts Gives A Striking Raw Nerve Performance [Sundance Review] at The Playlist.

A deglammed Naomi Watts puts herself through the wringer as a paranoid agoraphobic, holed up in the South Bronx apartment of her late grandmother on a diet of cigarettes and booze while New York shudders, sweats and burns in The Wolf Hour. It's 1977, the Summer of Sam, and the escalating murder count is spreading panic through the city. But the condition of Watts' character June Leigh, a counterculture novelist whose first book was a sensation, is of her own making. Or is it? Those are the basics of writer-director Alistair Banks Griffin's claustrophobic psychological thriller, a showy acting ...

A deglammed Naomi Watts puts herself through the wringer as a paranoid agoraphobic, holed up in the South Bronx apartment of her late grandmother on a diet of cigarettes and booze while New York shudders, sweats and burns in The Wolf Hour. It's 1977, the Summer of Sam, and the escalating murder count is spreading panic through the city. But the condition of Watts' character June Leigh, a counterculture novelist whose first book was a sensation, is of her own making. Or is it? Those are the basics of writer-director Alistair Banks Griffin's claustrophobic psychological thriller, a showy acting ...

Filmmaker Alistair Banks Griffin from The Wolf Hour is among the voices, faces and creative folks that are a part of the ten films selected for our favourite section at the Sundance Film Festival. Added to the fest at the beginning of the decade, over time, the Next section (formerly referred to as “<=>”) has unearthed some of the best voices in micro American indie film projects with the likes of Sebastian Silva, Josh Mond, Rick Alverson, Anna Rose Holmer, Andrew Dosunmu, Craig Zobel, David Lowery and Janicza Bravo. We return with Sundance Trading Card Series focusing on the 2019 Next Section selected films.…...

Production Designer Kaet McAnneny from Alistair Banks Griffin’s The Wolf Hour is among the voices, faces and creative folks that are a part of the ten films selected for our favourite section at the Sundance Film Festival. Added to the fest at the beginning of the decade, over time, the Next section (formerly referred to as “<=>”) has unearthed some of the best voices in micro American indie film projects with the likes of Sebastian Silva, Josh Mond, Rick Alverson, Anna Rose Holmer, Andrew Dosunmu, Craig Zobel, David Lowery and Janicza Bravo. We return with Sundance Trading Card Series focusing on the 2019 Next section selected films and personalities.…...

The Sundance Film Festival is all about independent film — but is it really?

In between screenings and late into the night, Park City is actually Party City. From intimate cocktail soirées to musical performances, this year’s film festival has something for everyone.

Here is Variety’s ultimate party guide for Sundance 2019…

Thursday, Jan. 24

Lyft & Neon Kick Off Party

Celebrating “The Biggest Little Farm” and “Apollo 11”

Lyft Lounge, 5:30-7:30pm

Friday, Jan. 25

30th Annual GLAAD Media Awards Nominations Announcement

Mj Rodriguez and Nico Santos

At&T Hello Lounge, 8 a.m.

Danny Clinch Pop-Up Gallery Opening Party

Salesforce Music Lodge, 4-6 p.m.

GLAAD Media Awards Nominees Cocktail Party

At&T Lounge, 4:30-6 p.m.

SundanceTV’s Sundance Film Festival Kickoff Party

Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jenna Elfman, Rhea Seehorn, Kirby Howell-Baptiste and Sarah Wayne Callies

SundanceTV HQ, 5-8 p.m.

“Honey Boy” Party

Shia Labeouf, Fka Twigs, Maika Monroe,...

Exclusive: The Sundance Institute Screenwriters Lab has accepted 15 writers from countries including the U.S., Lebanon, South Africa, Turkey and the UK who will bring 12 projects to the Sundance Mountain Resort in Utah from January 18-23.

The January Screenwriters Lab was created and organized under the leadership of Sundance Institute’s Feature Film Program Founding Director Michelle Satter and Labs Director Ilyse McKimmie. The team of Creative Advisors includes Artistic Director Dana Stevens, Michael Arndt, Thomas Bidegain, Todd Graff, Phil Hay, Erik Jendresen, Richard Lagravenese, Jenny Lumet, Malia Scotch Marmo, Walter Mosley, Nicole Perlman, Susan Shilliday, Zach Sklar, Elena Soarez, Veena Sud, Robin Swicord, Joan Tewkesbury and Tyger Williams. This year’s Lab is dedicated to the memory of two cherished Creative Advisors: Tom Rickman and Audrey Wells. The Lab provides one-on-one story sessions for Fellows with the Creative Advisors. The Lab is the first step in a year-round continuum...

Last year’s Next section offerings gave us Madeline’s Madeline, Night Comes On, Search and We the Animals. This year we have Rashaad Ernesto Green’s Premature (see pic above), Tayarisha Poe’s Selah and the Spades and Alistair Banks Griffin’s The Wolf Hour. Easily our favorite section at the fest, here are the ten titles:

Adam / U.S.A. — Awkward teenager Adam arrives to spend his final high school summer with his older sister, who has thrown herself into New York City’s lesbian and trans activist scene. Over the summer, Adam and those around him experience love, friendship, and attendant hard truths in this coming-of-age comedy.…...

Shooting took place in November of 2017 on Alistair Banks Griffin‘s sophomore feature and a cast of Naomi Watts, Jennifer Ehle, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Emory Cohen, Brennan Brown and Jeremy Bobb to boot. The Wolf Hour was at Sundance’s 2016 January Screenwriters Lab. Griffin reteams with composers Danny Bensi & Saunder Jurriaans – who got their first ever composing gig in film via Griffin’s Cannes preemed directorial debut, Two Gates of Sleep.

Gist: Naomi Watts plays a former 60’s activist, a celebrated counter-culture figure who now lives alone in her Bronx apartment and who has barely left her six-story walk up in years, becomes unraveled when an unseen tormentor begins harassing her as the events of the 1977 New York blackout riots unfold outside her window.…...

When esteemed actor Joel Edgerton set out to make his second feature, Boy Erased, he understood the world he was portraying—the way it looked, and the way it felt. Starring Lucas Hedges, the film would loosely adapt Garrard Conley’s memoir, drawing on his experiences at Live in Action, a church-supported gay conversion program in Memphis. On screen, Edgerton would depict a therapy center striking a very specific mood. “It’s a very dry, depressing, cold place,” composer Saunder Jurriaans explains—a space cast in pale blue light.

While a certain aesthetic seemed to emerge seamlessly with Boy Erased, its score was another matter. First teaming with Jurriaans and Danny Bensi on his previous film, psychological thriller The Gift, Edgerton brought the pair back for his second outing with no preconceptions, giving them free rein over the film’s sound. “From the material in the script, we were able...

The Wolf Hour

The interminable wait for Alistair Banks Griffin‘s second feature film is officially over. The Borderline Films’ backed Two Gates of Sleep debuted at the Cannes Film Fest’s Directors’ Fortnight section back in 2010, and after a handful of projects in development, it is psychological thriller The Wolf Hour (workshopped at Sundance’s 2016 January Screenwriters Lab) that pulled ahead of the pack and was cemented this past November.

Continue reading...

Production on Alistair Banks Griffin‘s sophomore film began this week, and the supporting cast in the sweltering The Wolf Hour have been identified.

Continue reading...

Exclusive: Jennifer Ehle (Zero Dark Thirty), Kelvin Harrison Jr. (Mudbound), Emory Cohen (War Machine) Brennan Brown (Focus), and Jeremy Bobb (Going in Style) round out the cast of the Alistair Banks Griffin-directed psychological thriller, The Wolf Hour, starring Naomi Watts as June Leigh (Watts), a cultural icon and activist during the 1960s, now fallen from grace and a shell of her former self. It's the notorious "Summer of Sam" and June only has to look out of her…...

Variety has just announced that Naomi Watts will star in and executive produce the upcoming Summer of Sam-based psychological thriller The Wolf Hour. The film will be directed by Alistair Banks Griffin with Brian Kavanaugh-Jones and Bailey Conway Anglewicz producing… Continue Reading →

The post Summer of Sam Thriller The Wolf Hour Scores Naomi Watts appeared first on Dread Central.

Alistair Banks Griffin is currently in pre-production and finally gearing up for his long-awaited sophomore feature with Naomi Watts confirmed as the lead in the not to be confused with the Haneke film, The Wolf Hour.

Continue reading...

Naomi Watts has been set to star in The Wolf Hour, a psychological thriller from writer-director Alistair Banks Griffin. HanWay Films has acquired sales rights, with CAA aboard to handle domestic rights beginning at the American Film Market. The film is set go into production this fall in New York. The pic centers on June Leigh (Watts), a cultural icon and activist during the 1960s, now fallen from grace and a shell of her former self. An unseen tormentor begins…...

Naomi Watts is set to take the lead in The Wolf Hour, a psychological thriller from up-and-coming writer and director Alistair Banks.

Set during the 1977 New York blackout riots, the film will see the Oscar-nominated actress play June Leigh, a cultural icon and activist during the '60s who has since fallen from grace and is a shell of her former self, now facing her demons at the height of one of the darkest points in the city's history. Watts will also executive produce.

Alistair Banks Griffin’s first feature film, Two Gates of Sleep, screened in Director’s Fortnight at the 2010 Cannes Film...

Naomi Watts is set to take the lead in The Wolf Hour, a psychological thriller from up-and-coming writer and director Alistair Banks.

Set during the 1977 New York blackout riots, the film will see the Oscar-nominated actress play June Leigh, a cultural icon and activist during the '60s who has since fallen from grace and is a shell of her former self, now facing her demons at the height of one of the darkest points in the city's history. Watts will also executive produce.

Alistair Banks Griffin’s first feature film, Two Gates of Sleep, screened ...

Top row: Andrew Ahn, Shaz Bennett, Bernado Britto, Steve Caple Jr, Jonas Carpignano, Marta Cunningham, Alistair Banks Griffin. Bottom row: Siân Heder, Marielle Heller, Anna Rose Holmer, Crystal Moselle, Felix Thompson, Yared Zeleke Photo: Courtesy of Sundance Institute Sundance Institute has announced a new FilmTwo Inititative, which aims to help second-time feature filmmakers, in a bid to address what it describes in its press release as "a growing need in the field of independent storytelling, especially for women and filmmakers of colour".

Second films have long been known as tricky territory and the initiative, with support from founding Partner NBCUniversal, will offer a lucky 13 directors specialist creative and tactical guidance in navigating the unique challenges of making their sophomore movies, such as identifying and/or writing their second project, defining their voice and scaling up and creating more ambitious projects in terms of budget and scope. Through the initiative, four...

The Sundance Institute is including a touch of Cannes this week as the likes of Pippa Bianco (her short Share was the 2015 winner of Cannes Cinefondation), Alistair Banks Griffin (Two Gates of Sleep premiered in Directors’ Fortnight in 2010), and the Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza tandem (from Critics’ Week Grand Prize in 2013 for Salvo) are among the dozen selected projects for the 2016 January Screenwriters Lab. The immersive, five-day writers’ workshop takes place just prior to the festival at the Sundance Resort in Utah, January 15-20. Look for several of these projects to one day break into not only Sundance, but other major film fests. Here are the selected people & projects:

The projects and fellows selected for the 2016 January Screenwriters Lab are:

Bull (U.S.A.) / Annie Silverstein (Co-writer/Director) and Johnny McAllister (Co-writer)

In a near-abandoned subdivision west of Houston, a wayward teen runs headlong into her equally willful and unforgiving neighbor,...

The San Francisco Film Society, otherwise known as the Sffs, has picked the winners for its 2015 Hearst Screenwriting Grant Award. Brent Green and Thyra Heder, who are developing a stop-motion animated feature length film entitled, "Over the Eaves," will receive $15,000 to carry out their tale about a young boy whose inventions change the course of human history forever.

"We were immediately struck by the impressive ambitiousness of this project,” said Sffs director of Film 360 Michele Turnure-Salleo.

Read More: San Francisco Film Society Announces New Science in Cinema Initiative

The Sffs Hearst Screenwriting Grant is awarded in the fall of each year to writers residing in the United States who have been practicing for at least five years and who have previously written a minimum of one feature screenplay. Previous grant winners include A. Sayeeda Moreno and Micah Shaffer for "White" (2014), Alistair Banks Griffin for "Snow the Jones" (2013), Maryam Keshavarz and...

The San Francisco Film Society, otherwise known as the Sffs, has picked the winners for its 2015 Hearst Screenwriting Grant Award. Brent Green and Thyra Heder, who are developing a stop-motion animated feature length film entitled, "Over the Eaves," will receive $15,000 to carry out their tale about a young boy whose inventions change the course of human history forever. "We were immediately struck by the impressive ambitiousness of this project,” said Sffs director of Film 360 Michele Turnure-Salleo. Read More: San Francisco Film Society Announces New Science in Cinema Initiative The Sffs Hearst Screenwriting Grant is awarded in the fall of each year to writers residing in the United States who have been practicing for at least five years and who have previously written a minimum of one feature screenplay. Previous grant winners include A. Sayeeda Moreno and Micah Shaffer for "White" (2014), Alistair Banks Griffin for "Snow the...

On the heels of the 39th edition of the Toronto Int. Film Festival (Sept 4-14), Ifp’s Independent Film Week is where a plethora of fiction, non-fiction and new this year, web-based series from the likes of Desiree Akhavan and Calvin Reeder find future coin. Sectioned off as projects at the very beginning of financing to those that are nearing completion, there happens to be tons of Sundance alumni in the names below. Among those that caught our attention we have Medicine for Melancholy‘s Barry Jenkins’ sophomore feature, produced by Bad Milo!‘s Adele Romanski, Moonlight is about “two Miami boys navigate the temptations of the drug trade and their burgeoning sexuality in this triptych drama about black queer youth”. Concussion‘s Stacie Passon digs into the thriller genre with Strange Things Started Happening. Produced by vet Mary Jane Skalski (Mysterious Skin), this is about “a woman who has...

Last month, we unveiled our all-encompassing, most anticipated films for the current year in film. Now we peer into a future that is a little past the limits of 2014 thus we find ourselves with a quickie overview of the Top 100 Most Anticipated Films for 2015. Curated by our Nicholas Bell, with a little luck, we might see less than a finger count on one hand sum of films break this year, but for the most part, a good deal of these projects have planned 2014/15 production start dates. Here are 100 projects/filmmakers worth keeping tabs on (picks 100 to 11)

100. The Double Hour – Dir. Joshua Marston

99. Lila & Eve – Dir. Charles Stone III

98. Legacy of Secrecy – Dir. David O. Russell

97. The Theory of Everything – James Marsh

96. Elvis and Nixon – Dir. Liza Johnson

95. Hier – Dir. Balint Kenyeres

94. Timeless – Dir. Vadim Perelman

93. Wonderful Tonight – Dir. Christine Jeffs

92. Rocketman – Dir. Dagur Kari

91. Passengers – Dir. Brian Kirk

90. Sweet Cheeks – Dir.

Franny

Director: Andrew Renzi

Writer: Andrew Renzi

Producers: Treehouse Pictures’ Justin Nappi and Kevin Turen, TideRock Media’s Thomas B Fore and Jason Michael Berman, Big Shoes Media’s Jay Schuminsky

U.S. Distributor: Rights Available

Cast: Richard Gere, Dakota Fanning, Theo James

Padding his directing resume with a stellar pair of dramatic shorts in the Sundance preemed The Fort (2012) and Karaoke! (2013), Andrew Renzi’s feature debut Franny (a Sundance Writers’ Lab project) happens to have plenty of added value with Richard Gere in the lead, Simon Killer dp Joe Anderson and Martha Marcy May Marlene‘s composers Danny Bensi and Saunder Jurriaans on the technical side.

Gist: Gere will play a fun-loving, hedonistic philanthropist who works his way into the lives of a newlywed couple (Dakota Fanning, Theo James) to recapture the life he once had.

Release Date: Filming began around October, so this could technically be ready for Cannes,...

New films from Peter Webber, Pernille Fischer Christensen, Oliver Schmitz, Eran Kolirin.

A total of 39 features have been selected for Berlin’s co-production market (Feb 9-11).

Directors with work in the market include Peter Webber, Pernille Fischer Christensen, Oliver Schmitz, Eran Kolirin, Christos Georgiou, Erik Skjoldbjaerg and Nir Bergman.

All projects have 30% of their financing in place while budgets range from €700,000 to €6.5m.

This year’s Residency participants comprise Emir Baigazin, Alistair Banks Griffin, Bence Fliegauf, Sebastián Lelio, Elina Psykou and José Luis Valle. The participants will present new projects to potential partners at the co-production market.

The Talent Project Market will see ten new producers and directors primed for the international market. Ritesh Batra’s The Lunchbox featured last year, while Italian filmmaker Fabio Mollo’s Il Sud e Niente plays in this year’s Generation programme.

Five companies have been selected for the Company Matching programme and three more projects have been picked for the...

He made his splash on the Croisette (2010′s Directors’ Fortnight) with the exquisite, almost dialogue-less Two Gates of Sleep (Brady Corbet and David Call pairing) and now comes word/confirmation that filmmaker Alistair Banks Griffin has two projects in the works. His Therese was part of the 2013 Berlinale Residency (names such as Sebastián Lelio and the talented Elina Psykou also had projects) and Snow The Jones just received coin (which takes care of rent and filling up the fridge for a good year) in the shape of the 2013 San Francisco Film Society/Hearst Screenwriting Grant which was voted on by Tom Grievson (Sffs director of communications), filmmakers Ian Hendrie and Maryam Keshavarz (Circumstance) and Michele Turnure-Salleo (Sffs director of Filmmaker360).

Gist: Snow The Jones is about a teenage vagabond who joins a door-to-door sales crew and discovers. It is described as “an experiential trip into a dark side of the...

Snow The Jones looks at a girl who discovers the dark world of door-to-door sales crews.

Two Gates of Sleep director Alistair Banks Griffin has won the 2013 San Francisco Film Society/Hearst Screenwriting Grant.

The $15,000 prize goes to develop his script Snow The Jones.

The grant, supported by a donation from William R. Hearst III, is awarded each autumn to a writer living in the Us who has been working for at least five years.

The panelists who reviewed the finalists’ submissions were Tom Grievson, Sffs director of communications; filmmakers Ian Hendrie and Maryam Keshavarz; and Michele Turnure-Salleo, Sffs director of Filmmaker360.

Snow The Jones is about a teenage vagabond who joins a door-to-door sales crew and discovers. It is described as “an experiential trip into a dark side of the American dream and a lost young girl looking for a place to belong.”

The jury said in a statement: “It was a very competitive round with very...