Exclusive: The Dtla Film Festival has set the full feature lineup for its 15th edition, taking place at Regal L.A. Live from November 1-5, announcing the Jack Huston starrer Hail Mary as its opening night film.
Also starring Angela Sarafyan, Natalia del Riego, and Benny Emmanuel, the film from Rosemary Rodriguez is described as a genre-bending retelling of the Mary and Joseph story following an undocumented, pregnant migrant’s journey to make it safely across the U.S. border.
Nicki Micheaux’s Summer of Violence will serve as Centerpiece film for the fest, being put on in accordance with SAG-AFTRA strike guidelines, with Deborah Attoinese’s Women in Fire to close it out. Additional feature highlights include the sci-fi rom-com Molli and Max in the Future starring Zosia Mamet, Aristotle Athari, and Okieriete Onaodowan; Maxim Pozdorovkin’s animated doc The Conspiracy featuring voice actors like Mayim Bialik, Liev Schreiber,...
Also starring Angela Sarafyan, Natalia del Riego, and Benny Emmanuel, the film from Rosemary Rodriguez is described as a genre-bending retelling of the Mary and Joseph story following an undocumented, pregnant migrant’s journey to make it safely across the U.S. border.
Nicki Micheaux’s Summer of Violence will serve as Centerpiece film for the fest, being put on in accordance with SAG-AFTRA strike guidelines, with Deborah Attoinese’s Women in Fire to close it out. Additional feature highlights include the sci-fi rom-com Molli and Max in the Future starring Zosia Mamet, Aristotle Athari, and Okieriete Onaodowan; Maxim Pozdorovkin’s animated doc The Conspiracy featuring voice actors like Mayim Bialik, Liev Schreiber,...
- 10/2/2023
- by Matt Grobar
- Deadline Film + TV
After a valiant two-year fight against lung and stomach cancer, entertainment journalist and screenwriter Amy Dawes died at Cedar Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles Friday morning, according to her husband Billy Vasquez, who was by her side.
Over three decades, Dawes wrote insightfully about movies, television, music, popular culture and the city of Los Angeles. She was the consummate Hollywood insider and contributed frequently to Emmy Magazine and the Director’s Guild Quarterly as well as the Los Angeles Times, IndieWire, L.A. Weekly, Buzz magazine, the Hollywood Reporter, Rolling Stone and Santa Fe. After working eight years as a film reporter and senior features editor at Daily Variety, she served as the editor of Creative Screenwriting Magazine. She also held staff positions at The Los Angeles Daily News and the L.A. Herald-Examiner.
She wrote several screenplays, including Deborah Attoinese’s indie drama “Zoe” (2001).
Over the years she has...
Over three decades, Dawes wrote insightfully about movies, television, music, popular culture and the city of Los Angeles. She was the consummate Hollywood insider and contributed frequently to Emmy Magazine and the Director’s Guild Quarterly as well as the Los Angeles Times, IndieWire, L.A. Weekly, Buzz magazine, the Hollywood Reporter, Rolling Stone and Santa Fe. After working eight years as a film reporter and senior features editor at Daily Variety, she served as the editor of Creative Screenwriting Magazine. She also held staff positions at The Los Angeles Daily News and the L.A. Herald-Examiner.
She wrote several screenplays, including Deborah Attoinese’s indie drama “Zoe” (2001).
Over the years she has...
- 2/25/2017
- by Anne Thompson
- Thompson on Hollywood
After a valiant two-year fight against lung and stomach cancer, entertainment journalist and screenwriter Amy Dawes died at Cedar Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles Friday morning, according to her husband Billy Vasquez, who was by her side.
Over three decades, Dawes wrote insightfully about movies, television, music, popular culture and the city of Los Angeles. She was the consummate Hollywood insider and contributed frequently to Emmy Magazine and the Director’s Guild Quarterly as well as the Los Angeles Times, IndieWire, L.A. Weekly, Buzz magazine, the Hollywood Reporter, Rolling Stone and Santa Fe. After working eight years as a film reporter and senior features editor at Daily Variety, she served as the editor of Creative Screenwriting Magazine. She also held staff positions at The Los Angeles Daily News and the L.A. Herald-Examiner.
She wrote several screenplays, including Deborah Attoinese’s indie drama “Zoe” (2001).
Over the years she has...
Over three decades, Dawes wrote insightfully about movies, television, music, popular culture and the city of Los Angeles. She was the consummate Hollywood insider and contributed frequently to Emmy Magazine and the Director’s Guild Quarterly as well as the Los Angeles Times, IndieWire, L.A. Weekly, Buzz magazine, the Hollywood Reporter, Rolling Stone and Santa Fe. After working eight years as a film reporter and senior features editor at Daily Variety, she served as the editor of Creative Screenwriting Magazine. She also held staff positions at The Los Angeles Daily News and the L.A. Herald-Examiner.
She wrote several screenplays, including Deborah Attoinese’s indie drama “Zoe” (2001).
Over the years she has...
- 2/25/2017
- by Anne Thompson
- Indiewire
A teenage girl's journey of passage in the vein of Allison Anders' early works, "Zoe" was hatched at a hotel poolside during the Nortel Palm Springs International Film Festival several years ago -- when first-time filmmaker Deborah Attoinese connected with co-writer Amy Dawes (a former journalist and L.A. film critic, including a short stint at The Hollywood Reporter).
Picturesque origins aside, the film is an upbeat affair about three rebellious high schoolers who run away from unhappy homes somewhere in the hinterlands and head for Hollywood. They don't get very far, and not much bad happens to them. And the movie is not so bad either, but neither is it distinguished enough to hitch its way into many theaters. The presence of Jenny Seagrove ("Local Hero") and lead Vanessa Zima ("Ulee's Gold") might help in ancillary excursions.
An affair appealing mostly to women from start to finish, "Zoe" is a meandering saga that at times awkwardly loses focus but never strays too far from its path. The subjects of spousal abuse, delinquency and Native American spiritualism are handled believably, but the central plot of Zoe's quest for roots and guidance is conveniently shouldered by a stranger whom the lead and her friends Sarah (Stephi Lineburg) and Ally (Victoria Davis) hijack at gunpoint.
This unbelievable, quickly forgotten development occurs early on when the three runaways can't quite get out of a diner without a policeman giving them a fright. The stranger in question is English shrink Cecilia (Seagrove), on a mission to scatter the ashes of her deceased mother, who lived out her life in a shack near "sacred Indian grounds." Proud of being one-eighth Native American, Zoe longs to find her roots and healthy mothering, but Cecilia keeps her at arm's distance.
With an easygoing episodic structure that works in character-driven comedy and nary a swear word or unpleasant moment, "Zoe" climaxes when the lead and Cecilia -- leaving behind Sarah and Ally -- find those sacred grounds and the nurturing friend of Cecilia's mother, Red Shirt (Gordon Tootoosis). While Cecilia comes to know what her mother was like -- and approves -- Zoe almost gets roasted in the desert when she takes a spontaneous step toward enlightenment.
The character as written and Zima's performance as Zoe are distractingly one-note after the early scenes of her bad home life. Perhaps female viewers will feel differently, but there's not enough tension or doubt about the outcome. Unfortunately, when it does conclude, there are one or two leaps meant to be taken on faith that don't make the whole scenario go down any smoother.
ZOE
Curb Entertainment
and Bill Kenwright Films
Director: Deborah Attoinese
Screenwriters: Deborah Attoinese, Amy Dawes
Producers: Bill Kenwright, Carole Curb Nemoy, Mike Curb, Ram Bergman, Dana Lustig
Director of photography: Samuel Ameen
Production designer: Charles M. Lippross
Editors: Lawrence Maddox, Richard Weis
Costume designer: Clara Ronk
Music: Dan Pinnella
Casting: Mary Margiotta, Karen Margiotta
Color/stereo
Cast:
Cecilia: Jenny Seagrove
Zoe: Vanessa Zima
Sarah: Stephi Lineburg
Ally: Victoria Davis
Red Shirt: Gordon Tootoosis
Mrs. Callahan: Kim Greist
Julian: Oliver Parker
Running time -- 90 minutes
No MPAA rating...
Picturesque origins aside, the film is an upbeat affair about three rebellious high schoolers who run away from unhappy homes somewhere in the hinterlands and head for Hollywood. They don't get very far, and not much bad happens to them. And the movie is not so bad either, but neither is it distinguished enough to hitch its way into many theaters. The presence of Jenny Seagrove ("Local Hero") and lead Vanessa Zima ("Ulee's Gold") might help in ancillary excursions.
An affair appealing mostly to women from start to finish, "Zoe" is a meandering saga that at times awkwardly loses focus but never strays too far from its path. The subjects of spousal abuse, delinquency and Native American spiritualism are handled believably, but the central plot of Zoe's quest for roots and guidance is conveniently shouldered by a stranger whom the lead and her friends Sarah (Stephi Lineburg) and Ally (Victoria Davis) hijack at gunpoint.
This unbelievable, quickly forgotten development occurs early on when the three runaways can't quite get out of a diner without a policeman giving them a fright. The stranger in question is English shrink Cecilia (Seagrove), on a mission to scatter the ashes of her deceased mother, who lived out her life in a shack near "sacred Indian grounds." Proud of being one-eighth Native American, Zoe longs to find her roots and healthy mothering, but Cecilia keeps her at arm's distance.
With an easygoing episodic structure that works in character-driven comedy and nary a swear word or unpleasant moment, "Zoe" climaxes when the lead and Cecilia -- leaving behind Sarah and Ally -- find those sacred grounds and the nurturing friend of Cecilia's mother, Red Shirt (Gordon Tootoosis). While Cecilia comes to know what her mother was like -- and approves -- Zoe almost gets roasted in the desert when she takes a spontaneous step toward enlightenment.
The character as written and Zima's performance as Zoe are distractingly one-note after the early scenes of her bad home life. Perhaps female viewers will feel differently, but there's not enough tension or doubt about the outcome. Unfortunately, when it does conclude, there are one or two leaps meant to be taken on faith that don't make the whole scenario go down any smoother.
ZOE
Curb Entertainment
and Bill Kenwright Films
Director: Deborah Attoinese
Screenwriters: Deborah Attoinese, Amy Dawes
Producers: Bill Kenwright, Carole Curb Nemoy, Mike Curb, Ram Bergman, Dana Lustig
Director of photography: Samuel Ameen
Production designer: Charles M. Lippross
Editors: Lawrence Maddox, Richard Weis
Costume designer: Clara Ronk
Music: Dan Pinnella
Casting: Mary Margiotta, Karen Margiotta
Color/stereo
Cast:
Cecilia: Jenny Seagrove
Zoe: Vanessa Zima
Sarah: Stephi Lineburg
Ally: Victoria Davis
Red Shirt: Gordon Tootoosis
Mrs. Callahan: Kim Greist
Julian: Oliver Parker
Running time -- 90 minutes
No MPAA rating...
- 1/26/2001
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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