Super LTD presents Best International Feature Oscar nominee The Quiet Girl and, as the Academy Awards approach, RRR ramps up again and Navalny returns to theaters for one-week run.
Also opening, Aaron Eckhart in Ambush, Charlotte Rampling in Juniper and comedian Jim Gaffigan as the host of a failing children’s science TV show in Linoleum. Roadside Attractions presents My Happy Ending, IFC debuts God’s Time and Netflix premieres Idris Elba in film spinoff Luther: The Fallen Son.
Bunker, produced by Blue Fox Entertainment founder James Huntsman and written by his son Michael Huntsman opens on 225+ screens, Montana-based indie The Year Of The Dog, whose director sold his condo to finance the production, debuts on over 100.
Oscar noms: Drama The Quiet Girl, written and directed by Colm Bairéad and starring Catherine Clinch, Carrie Crowley and Andrew Bennett, opens in six locations in NY, LA, San Francisco and Chicago. In rural Ireland in 1981, nine-year-old Cait is sent away from her overcrowded, dysfunctional family to live with foster parents for the summer. While quietly struggling at school and at home, she had learned to hide in plain sight from those around her. She blossoms in her new situation but, in a house where there are meant to be no secrets, discovers a painful truth. Deadline review here. The film, with a 97% and 91% ranking, respectively, with critics and audiences, premiered in Berlin last year.
S S Rajamouli’s RRR, with a best original song Oscar nom for “Naatu Naatu”, is planning its biggest ever screening of the three-hour Telugu epic in LA March 1 with the director, songwriter M.M. Keeravaani and star Ram Charan. The “Fan CelebRRRation Live” unspools at The Theatre at Ace Hotel ahead of a new push to 200 screens nationwide Friday, March 3 by Variance Films and Sarigama Cinemas. RRR was initially released last March. Its June re-release has been going for 37 weeks.
Best documentary nominee Navalny by Daniel Roher about the imprisoned Russian dissident is back in theaters in LA, NY, San Francisco, Chicago, Boston Atlanta and Washington, D.C. for one week through March 2. Alexei Navalny, Russia’s leading opposition figure, was poisoned with a nerve agent and almost died. Navalny unfolds in real-time as Vladimir Putin’s fiercest critic teams with investigative journalists to ID the would-be killers. Presented by Warner Brothers/CNN Films/HBO Max.
New openings: Greenwich Entertainment presents Matthew Saville’s dark comedy from New Zealand Juniper on 75 screens in 50 markets including NY and LA. Ruth (Charlotte Rampling) is a worldly former war correspondent now bored in retirement with a drinking problem and a newly fractured leg. Sam (George Ferrier) is her unruly grandson, recently kicked out of boarding school and grieving the death of his mother. When the two are brought together under the same roof, they form an unexpected bond.
Roadside Attractions presents My Happy Ending by Tal Granit and Sharon Maymon on 125 screens. Andie MacDowell stars as a famous actor who goes incognito to seek treatment for a medical issue. While at the hospital, she meets three unique and remarkable women — an aging rocker, a young mother, and a forever single retired schoolteacher.
Saban Films presents Mark Burman’s Vietnam War epic Ambush on 70 screens. Starring Aaron Eckhart, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Connor Paolo. When a small outpost is ambushed, a U.S. Army squad must take the battle below ground on a high-stakes mission in a new type of warfare.
Shout! Studios presents Linoleum by Colin West with Jim Gaffigan, Katelyn Nacon and Rhea Seehorn on 13 screens, expanding next week. Cameron Edwin (Gaffigan), the host of a failing children’s science TV show Above & Beyond has always had aspirations of being an astronaut. After a mysterious space-race era satellite lands in his backyard, his midlife crisis manifests in a plan to rebuild the machine into his dream rocket.
IFC Films presents God’s Time by Daniel Antebi on 17 screens. Best friends and recovering addicts Dev (Ben Groh) and Luca (Dion Costelloe) are secretly in love with fellow addict Regina (Liz Caribel). At every meeting they hear her share her wild fantasy to kill her evil ex-boyfriend. But one day she sounds serious.
Netflix opens Luther: The Fallen Sun starring Idris Elba, Cynthia Erivo and Andy Serkis, directed by Jamie Payne in theaters ahead of its March 10 debut on the streamer.
Amid a dearth of kids fare, Warner Bros. opens animated Mummies on 225 screens domestically. Directed by Juan Jesús García Galocha, the PG pic follows the adventures of three ancient Egyptian mummies — a princess, a former charioteer and his younger brother, along with their pet baby crocodile — who live in an underground secret city, hidden in ancient Egypt wind up in present-day London.
Blue Fox Entertainment presents World War I genre thriller Bunker by Adrian Langley at 225+ locations in over 50 markets. BFE founder James Huntsman produced, his son Michael Huntsman penned the screenplay. Starring Luke Baines, Eddie Ramos, Roger Clark, Sean Cullen, Julian Feder, Kevin Tanski and Patrick Moltane. Trapped in a bunker during World War I, a group of soldiers face an ungodly presence that slowly turns them against each other.
Nova Vento Entertainment presents The Year Of The Dog by Rob Grabow, starring Michael Spears and Grabow, at 100+ locations. Matt, a loner alcoholic at rock bottom, struggles to maintain sobriety for 30 days so he can honor his mother’s dying wish, to visit her in hospice, sober. His book-thumping AA sponsor, Fred, offers him refuge at his farm, where Matt befriends Yup’ik, a stray Husky. Bozeman-based Grabow sold his condo to finance the $150k-budget project.
Expansion: Emily, from Bleecker Street, moves to 500 screens in week two. The period drama about Emily Brontë is directed by Frances O’Connor and stars Emma Mackey, who just won the BAFTA Rising Star Award.