LA Film Festival Unveils 2016 Competition Lineup; 42 World Premieres Chosen Across All Categories

Details

Category: Entertainment News

Published on Friday, 29 April 2016 11:43

US Fiction Competition

11:55 – USA (DIRECTORS Ari Issler, Ben Snyder WRITERS Ari Issler, Ben Snyder, Victor Almanzar PRODUCERS Danny Mendoza, Joshua Blum, Gia Walsh, Kara Baker, Matthew Thurm CAST Victor Almanzar, Shirley Rumierk, Elizabeth Rodriguez, David Zayas, Julia Stiles, John Leguizamo) – Upon his return home, a U.S. Marine must face up to the consequences of a shameful tragedy that has defined his past before he runs out of time. World Premiere

72 Hours: A Brooklyn Love Story? – USA (DIRECTOR Raafi Rivero WRITERS Raafi Rivero, Bilal N'Dongo PRODUCERS Vincent Harris, Stephanie Williams CAST Melvin Mogoli, Andrea Rachel Parker, Erinn Westbrook, Bilal N'Dongo, David Shaw, Enrique Miller, Khadim Diop) – A charismatic teen is thrown into a crisis of life and love when he must decide whether to leave his rapidly gentrifying Brooklyn community to pursue a prestigious academic scholarship. World Premiere

Blood Stripe – USA (DIRECTOR Remy Auberjonois WRITERS Kate Nowlin, Remy Auberjonois PRODUCERS Schuyler Weiss, Julie Christeas, Remy Auberjonois, Kate Nowlin CAST Kate Nowlin, Tom Lipinski, Chris Sullivan, Rusty Schwimmer, Rene Auberjonois) – After a third tour of duty in Afghanistan, a Marine sergeant returns home to find herself hemorrhaging anxiety and paranoia from unseen wounds. World Premiere

Chee and T – USA (DIRECTOR Tanuj Chopra WRITERS Tanuj Chopra, Chee Malabar PRODUCER Sohini Sengupta CAST Sunkrish Bala, Dominic Rains, Asif Ali, Noureen DeWulf, Rebecca Hazlewood, Bernard White, Karan Soni, Scott Rogers, Himanshu Suri) – A delirious ride with two hot henchmen, who are tasked with getting their South Asian boss's out-of-control nephew presentable for his engagement party by day's end. World Premiere

Destined – USA (DIRECTOR/WRITER Qasim Basir PRODUCERS Tommy Oliver, Rick Rosenthal, Matt Ratner CAST Cory Hardrict, Jesse Metcalfe, Margot Bingham, Robert Christopher Riley, Jason Dohring, Zulay Henao, Hill Harper, Lala Anthony, Mo McCrae) – A man navigates parallel realities: one as a hardened criminal who has spent years building his drug empire; the other as an ambitious architect who has been working his way up the corporate ladder. World Premiere

Dreamstates – USA/France/Rwanda (DIRECTOR/ WRITER Anisia Uzeyman PRODUCERS Maripol, Dave Guenette, Anisia Uzeyman, Saul Williams, Annie Maurette, Neptune Frost, Mai Lucas CAST Saul Williams, Anisia Uzeyman, Beau Sia, William Nadylam, CX KIDTRONIK, Guillermo Brown, Julien Chirol, Zach Prewitt, Mervin Sealy Sr.) – Created in collaboration with Saul Williams, this non-linear tale is about two wayward souls discovering their love for one another, as reality and fiction blur on a tour across the United States with pivotal figures of the Afro-Punk movement. World Premiere

GREEN / is / GOLD – USA (DIRECTOR/ WRITER Ryon Baxter PRODUCERS Anthony Burns, Ryon Baxter CAST Jimmy Baxter, Ryon Baxter, David Fine, Liz Clare, Shelley Mitchell) – After his father goes to prison, a wayward tween has nowhere to live except with his high school dropout brother, who is building—at all costs—a marijuana business. World Premiere

My First Kiss and the People Involved – USA (DIRECTOR/ WRITER Luigi Campi PRODUCERS Mayuran Tiruchelvam, Andy Nguyen, Ko-Rely Pi CAST India Salvor Menuez, Robert Beitzel, Josh Caras, Liza Thorn, Carmen M. Herlihy) – Sam doesn't speak; she hums with the trees and the cracks in the walls. When her caregiver mysteriously disappears from the group home, Sam steps into the world to find her. World Premiere

Paint it Black – USA (DIRECTOR Amber Tamblyn WRITERS Amber Tamblyn, Ed Dougherty PRODUCERS Wren Arthur, Anne Hubble, Amy Hobby, Amber Tamblyn CAST Janet Mcteer, Alia Shawkat, Alfred Molina, Emily Rios, Rys Wakefield) – Barely able to process the death of her true love, Josie is drawn into a twisted relationship with the deceased's mother as irrational grief explodes in beautiful and terrifying ways. World Premiere

Tracktown – USA (DIRECTORS/ WRITERS Jeremy Teicher, Alexi Pappas PRODUCERS Laura Wagner, Alexi Pappas, Jeremy Teicher, Jay Smith CAST Alexi Pappas, Chase Offerle, Rachel Dratch, Andy Buckley) – A bright, talented and lonely long-distance runner twists her ankle as she prepares for the Olympic Trials and must do something she's never done before: take a day off. World Premiere

The View from Tall – USA (DIRECTORS Erica Weiss, Caitlin Parrish WRITER Caitlin Parrish PRODUCER Amanda Pflieger CAST Amanda Drinkall, Michael Patrick Thornton, Carolyn Braver) – A precocious high school senior finds an unlikely lifeline in her court-mandated therapist after she is ostracized from school after a sexual transgression with her English teacher goes viral. World Premiere

Woven – USA (DIRECTORS Salome Mulugeta, Nagwa Ibrahim WRITERS Salome Mulugeta, Ryan Spahn, Kristin Hanggi PRODUCERS Salome Mulugeta, Nagwa Ibrahim, Ryan Spahn CAST Salome Mulugeta, Ryan O'Nan, Alemtsehay Wodajo, Larisa Polonsky, Ryan Spahn, Vincent Agnello, Mickey Macras, Tibebe Solomon Borga, Mona Ibrahim) – When a mysterious crime takes the life of her only brother, an Ethiopian-American woman searches for the truth behind his death, while struggling to reconcile cultural expectations with her own pursuit of self-identity and love. World Premiere

Documentary Competition

Company Town – USA (DIRECTORS Natalie Kottke, Erica Sardarian PRODUCERS Natalie Kottke, Erica Sardarian, Edgar Sardarian, Adam Paul Smith, David Johnson) – Almost every resident of Crossett, Arkansas, has worked for (or is currently employed by) Georgia-Pacific, a company privately-owned by the Koch brothers. Now, one by one, former employees are getting sick and dying of cancer. World Premiere

Denial – USA (DIRECTOR Derek Hallquist WRITERS Derek Hallquist, Aaron Woolf, Anoosh Tertzakian PRODUCER Aaron Woolf) – Filmmaker Derek Hallquist was in the midst of filming an environmental documentary about his father's innovative quest for alternative energy sources when he uncovered a shocking aspect of his father's life that transformed a global crisis into a personal one. World Premiere

Dr. Feelgood – USA (DIRECTOR Eve Marson WRITERS Eve Marson, Mark Monroe, Sara Goldblatt, David Boodell PRODUCERS Eve Marson, Sara Goldblatt) – An examination of the ethics behind a medical practice of prescribing pain-relieving drugs, featuring Dr. William Hurwitz, who prescribed thousands of opioid prescriptions before being sentenced to 25 years in prison for drug trafficking. World Premiere

Dying Laughing – UK (DIRECTORS/PRODUCERS Lloyd Stanton, Paul Toogood) – Riveting interviews lend insight into the creative craft of comedy and the psychology behind some of the world's greatest stand-ups, including Chris Rock, Kevin Hart, Jerry Seinfeld, Sarah Silverman, Jamie Foxx, Steve Coogan, Billy Connolly and Amy Schumer. World Premiere

The House on Coco Road – Grenada/USA (DIRECTOR/PRODUCER Damani Baker WRITERS Damani Baker, Jon Fine, Eisa Davis, Cameron Russell) – An activist and teacher abandons the racial violence permeating Oakland in the 1960's in pursuit of the utopic possibilities of Grenada's revolution—only to put her family in harm's way during a brutal invasion by the U.S. military. World Premiere

Jackson – USA (DIRECTOR Maisie Crow PRODUCERS Maisie Crow, Jamie Boyle) – A single mother, an abortion clinic director and fervent pro-lifer lay bare their stakes in the fight of one of the last remaining abortion clinics to stay open against the pro-life movement's efforts to make abortions illegal in the Deep South. World Premiere

The Last Gold – USA/Germany (DIRECTOR Brian T. Brown WRITERS Brian T. Brown, Casey Barrett PRODUCERS Chuck Wielgus, Mike Unger, Dan Klein) – One of the strongest U.S. women's swimming teams in history is met at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal by a team from East Germany who got big overnight following the most extensive steroid doping program in sports history. World Premiere

Looking at the Stars – Brazil/Nicaragua/USA (DIRECTOR Alexandre Peralta WRITERS Alexandre Peralta, Melisa Rebelo Kerezi PRODUCERS Alejandro Ernesto Martinez B., Alexandre Peralta, Melisa Rebelo Kerezi, Corina Maritescu, Chao Thao, Thais Peralta) – At the world's only ballet school for the blind, located in São Paulo, Brazil, a prima ballerina and her teen protégé boldly take on the unique challenges of their visual impairments to develop new forms of self-expression through dance. World Premiere

Olympic Pride, American Prejudice – USA (DIRECTOR/ WRITER Deborah Riley Draper, PRODUCERS Deborah Riley Draper, Blair Underwood, Amy Tiemann, Michael A. Draper) – Follow the historic story of 18 African-American athletes who competed in the 1936 Berlin Olympics, undermining the fallacy of Aryan supremacy and exposing the hypocrisy of life under Jim Crow laws in the U.S. World Premiere

Out of Iraq – USA/Canada/Lebanon/Iraq (DIRECTORS Eva Orner, Chris McKim PRODUCERS Fenton Bailey, Randy Barbato, Eva Orner, Chris McKim) – Two Iraqi men meet in the middle of war-torn Ramadi in 2004; one is a soldier for the Iraqi Army, the other is a translator for the U.S. military. They fall in love. World Premiere

Political Animals – USA (DIRECTORS Jonah Markowitz, Tracy Wares WRITER Jonah Markowitz PRODUCER Anne Clements) – The first openly gay California State Representatives, Sheila Kuehl, Jackie Goldberg, Christine Kehoe, and Carole Migden, had to utilize cunning, strategy and endurance when authoring and introducing the legislation that fundamentally changed the landscape of LGBT rights. World Premiere

They Call us Monsters – USA (DIRECTOR Ben Lear PRODUCERS Sasha Alpert, Gabriel Cowan) – Behind the walls of The Compound, L.A.'s most violent juvenile offenders await their trials. To their advocates, they're kids. To the system, they're adults. To their victims, they're monsters. Who are they to you? World Premiere