wrestling with angels Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Some days, when you're on week two of the head cold/flu bug/plague from hell and your head feels like it's going to explode from some point directly behind your right eyeball, your ability to come up with a witty blog post title gets diminished. I figure lots of other people out there are sick too -- at least I know they are here in Seattle, because the Safeway keeps running out of and restocking the Theraflu and Triaminic, and they've added a great big display of Kleenex, Gatorade and chicken noodle soup at the front of the store. When you're feeling crummy, the one thing you can do to pass the time is sit your ass on the couch, wrap up in your favorite warm and fuzzy blankie, zone out on cold medicine and internet-surf. And we, dear Cinematical readers, are here to serve you in your hour of need. You don't have to think too hard about which other film sites to check out. Just read on, we've rounded up some of the coolest film stuff out there for you right here. And there's nothing like a big group hug to make you feel better, right? So read on ...

Did tax refund checks just go out, or something? For some reason, small distributors have been in a spending mood for the past few days, and a bunch of independent films have reaped the rewards, scoring themselves US distribution. Details are as follows:

• Milan Records has picked up North American rights to Brasileirinho, a documentary that "[pays] tribute to choro, the musical style that forms the foundation of all Brazilian composition, including samba and bossa nova." Milan also distributed director Mika Kaurismäki's earlier music doc, Sound of Brazil.
• Boy Culture, the only fiction film on the list, is the story of a gay male escort. The movie had its world premiere at this year's Tribeca Film Festival, and focuses on "X, an escort who becomes romantically entangled with his two [male] roommates," as well as an older customer. Distribution rights were purchased by TLA, which has not announced its plans for the film.
• Wrestling With Angels, Freida Lee Mock's documentary about playwright Tony Kushner (Angels in America, Homebody/Kabul, Caroline, or Change), was picked up by Balcony Releasing. Balcony plans to have the film, which "follows the rise of Kushner ... to socially active artist from his roots in the deep South", in theaters in early October.

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The Outfest Queer Brunch is one of the hottest parties for actual filmmakers at Sundance. You won't find Paris Hilton getting jiggy in her fur boots there, but you will find a good percentage of the folks actually involved making movies - and lest we forget, that's really what Sundance is all about. Most of the filmmakers at Sundance must have been there yesterday morning, because the Grub Steakhouse was packed wall-to-wall with people schmoozing, networking, and trying to work their way to the buffet lines and the open bar. Our own C.K. Sample came with me to act as photographer, and he must have a vibe about him or something, because he was come onto twice - one guy grabbed C.K.'s rear in the buffet line and told him, "It's so crowded here, you have to just push your way through and be....aggressive". I'm sure C.K. was flattered.

I ran into lots of directors at the brunch, including Quinceañeara director Richard Glatzer, All Aboard! Rosie's Family Cruise director  Shari Cookson, small town gay bar director Malcolm Ingram, and Oscar-award winning director Freida Lee Mock, who is here with her film Wrestling With Angels: Playwright Tony Kushner. Queer film historian Jenni Olson was on hand, as was novelist Armistead Maupin (scoring at the brunch buffet, left), whose novel The Night Listener was made into a film starring Robin Williams and Sandra Oh, which is premiering here at Sundance.

The biggest draw at the brunch was legendary director John Waters, who is so cool and amazing in his natural state, he doesn't even have to put on any pretense.  Waters is practically the messiah of Outfest and of queer film - he was unabashedly taking Hollywood by storm as an openly gay man long before it was cool to do so,  and paving the way for every gay person working in film today. It was fascinating watching people's reaction to Waters - waiting patiently to get a picture taking with him, to shake his hand, to touch his sleeve. C.K. bravely got right up there to introduce himself and give Waters a Cinematical tshirt - Waters was a little startled by C.K. at first, but warmed right up when offered a pumpkin-colored Cine shirt.

Director Maurice Jamal and his crew (pictured, right) had the best tshirts at the Outfest Brunch. Well, except for ours, of course.

 More photos of the Outfest Brunch below the fold.