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Film Festival Announces Some Early Highlights for 2018

Fri, 05/24/2019 - 13:07
A scene from "The Happy Prince," Rupert Everett's film about Oscar Wilde's last years.

Those anxious for a sneak peek into the 2018 Hamptons International Film Festival lineup need wait no longer. The festival has announced a few of the highlights coming Oct. 4 to East Hampton.

For opening night, the festival has chosen Sara Colangelo’s “The Kindergarten Teacher,” with Maggie Gyllenhaal and Gael Garcia Bernal. Ms. Colangelo, who is a veteran of HIFF’s Screenwriters Lab, will attend the opening along with Ms. Gyllenhaal.

Another film sure to attract interest is “The Happy Prince,” by Rupert Everett about Oscar Wilde in his later years, starring Mr. Everett, Colin Firth, and Emily Watson.

Nadine Labaki’s “Capernum” was a jury prize winner at Cannes. It concerns a 12-year-old boy in Beirut who sues his parents for negligence.

Eva Trobisch’s “All Good” will have its United States premiere at the festival. It stars Aenne Schwarz as a silent victim whose refusal to address a nonconsensual encounter becomes destructive.

“Border,” directed by Ali Abbasi, is about a customs officer with a unique gift and the mystery of its origins.

Two more films from Screenwriters Lab participants will be shown this year. They are “And Breathe Normally,” directed by Ísold Uggadóttir and about an airport worker and refugee in Iceland, and “Dead Pigs” by Cathy Yan, which uses a real event in Shanghai, a mysterious influx of dead pigs in the Yangtze River, as the inspiration for a story of people who find themselves connected through it.

The Views From Long Island section will include “The Last Race,” Michael Dweck’s documentary about the Riverhead Raceway, a stock car racetrack trying to continue the tradition of the sport as land values skyrocket.

“Grit,” a HIFF Air, Land, and Sea section pick, is a documentary by Sasha Friedlander and Cynthia Wade about an Indonesian village buried under a toxic mudflow.

The festival runs from Oct. 4 to Oct. 8. Individual tickets will go on sale on Sept. 24, with passes and packages available from Sept. 5 onward through the festival’s website.


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