CLUB KID (Jordan Firstman) — North American Premiere

Jordan Firstman draws from a deep well of empathy and whipsmart humor to spin a fairy tale of New York about how quickly a gold star gay can grow-up when a unicorn of a long-lost son with great music taste and teflon trauma shielding drops into your rent-controlled apartment. Immersing the audience into the the stroboscopic 2010s queer scene with a bevy of actors and performers who were (and remain) a part of it, artfully arranged platters of cocaine (and other party favors), hazy darkroom encounters, rolling on until the first light of morning. In his debut feature as writer/director, Firstman displays a deft command of tone and visual appeal, balancing the hard-partying appeal of a club promoter and the ensuing wake-up call of impending real life. As a performer, he’s a magnetic center whose wearily pivots when a ten year old kid (a delightful Reggie Absolom) is unexpectedly dropped into his life. Their dynamic is so magical that the harsher realities are temporarily held at bay. Funny and tender, it’s a heart thumping knockout.

The Debut (Jesse Eisenberg) — World Premiere

If I had a nickel for every time Telluride world premiered a movie about a stage actor destroying their life for a role … well, I’d have myself another nickel today.
As a suburban housewife on the sudden precipice of irrelevance who auditions for a community theater role on a lark, Julianne Moore truly drags herself through the shit and comes through on the other side in this truly batty musical comedy. Paul Giamatti plays a familiar curmudgeon as the rigoeously demanding director who puts a cast of real world off-broadway regulars in a very silly original production (written with obvious love for the genre by Eisenberg). Moore’s introduction to the arts scene feels instantly uncanny and gets stranger and stranger with each passing day of her grueling education as an actor. It’s a gonzo performance for the ages so violently alive that it pierces the mask.

Rose (Markus Schleinzer) — North American Premiere

Supremely austere black and white filmmaking opens with the bone-littered earth ablaze and village folk inheritance customs. The quietly gripping pastoral procedural of a 17th century German woman living as a man — complete with bear killing and marital consummations — in the aftermath of the thirty-years war eventually erupts into a provocative performance from Sandra Hüller that challenges the boundaries of self-determination.

As the unsuspecting wife, Caro Braun impressively holds her own. A thought-proviking and sobering piece of cinema.