“It definitely began with a conversation about what kind of movie we both wanted to make. Because it’s not just about what I want to do as a director, but also what you want to do as an actor,” Sloan said, gesturing to Mastroianni. “What kind of role are you not gonna get cast in unless we make that movie?”

“It started with Ryan sharing with me all of the films that really excited him, and revisiting those films.” Mastroianni added, explaining that they were primarily inspired by classic thrillers like “Blow-Up,” “Blow-Out,” “The Conversation,” “The Third Man,” “Vertigo,” and “Chinatown.”

“We were like ‘What is the through line here?’” Sloan said. “And we found out there’s a structure that many of these films follow called the Spiral Structure, where there’s a character that’s traveling through but every time they hit this spiral, it’s something from their past that they can’t escape.”

That structure gave them the narrative core of “Gazer,” with Mastroianni’s Frankie constantly running into lapses in memory caused by her dyschronometria that make it harder to solve the larger mystery she has become immersed in. And much like their fictional protagonist, Sloan and Mastroianni found themselves working with incomplete information throughout the production process. The self-financed film was sporadically shot between April 2021 and April 2023, with the duo opting to jump into principal photography before they had an entire script written.

“We started writing basically as soon as the lockdown happened. And that went a full year, and then in November I just said to Ariella ‘We’re gonna get into production in April 2021.’ And she was just like ‘Uhh… okay,’” Sloan said. “We weren’t even done with the script yet. We went in with an unfinished script. We knew we had the beginning and the end, so we said we’ll do two weekends in April and we’ll do the beginning and the end of the movie, because we know what we want.”

Before showing off a piece of footage, Cruise asked the room to take a moment and remember his dear friend and Top Gun 2 Ice Man — Val Kilmer, who died two days ago.

The Paramount/Skydance actioner directed by Christopher McQuarrie is billed as the epic finale to a saga that first began nearly two decades ago. It features Cruise as Ethan Hunt following the events of 2023’s Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning which ended on a cliffhanger with the world threatened by a rogue and sentient AI known as The Entity. It grossed over $570M worldwide.

Cruise spent time on stage extoling The Ususal Suspects Oscar scribe winner McQuarrie who came in to doctor on Brad Bird’s installment of Mission: Impossible. “I didn’t tell them that he was there to write the script.” McQuarrie was quick on his feet and fleshed out the blue/red glove scene in Ghost Protocol. “He’s the hero of that film and put Skydance on the map,” said Cruise.

“Because of Christopher McQuarrie we were able to deliver Top Gun: Maverick and two Mission: Impossibles during shutdowns from the pandemic and two strikes,” he praised, “You’re a modern day Thalberg and asset to every studio that you serve.”

“Ladies and gentleman, let me introduce you to Christopher McQuarrie…” said Cruise before the helmer took the stage to receive the Director of the Year Award from CinemaCon.

At a time when no one would hire McQuarrie, he met with Cruise, and “Tom saw the potential for the director who is standing here holding this award.”

“Tom, I’m here because of your vision and trust and to place you in others’ harm way,” McQuarrie half-quipped. He extolled the star for pushing and supporting “beyond anything I was capable of doing.”

Cruise also gave a shout-out while he was on stage to Brad Pitt and Joe Kosinski’s F1 (during Interview with the Vampire, Cruise said he and Pitt would “go drive go-karts” after shooting).

Cruise teed up this trailer like it’s the end — he thanked his former M:I producer Paula Wagner, former Paramount Pictures boss Sherry Lansing who taught him everything about the biz and all the Mission filmmakers including Brian De Palma, Brad Bird, J.J. Abrams and John Woo.

How jaw-dropping is this trailer? Where do we start? How about Henry Czerny’s sinister Kittridge: “If we want to bring the world back to the brink, we have to deal with him,” he says of Cruise’s Ethan Hunt. “Everything you were, everything you’re doing has come to this.” Remember the AI from Dead Reckoning, where it looks like Hunt plugs into it with a big gasmask-like thing on. Cruise’s stunts include crawling around a flying biplane, jumping off an aircraft carrier into the ocean (“you gave him an aircraft carrier?” remarks one official to Kittridge in the trailer). There’s also nuclear missiles launching.

As for the new “Mission: Impossible” preview, which has still not dropped at publication, “The Final Reckoning” is still keeping details close to the vest, less than eight weeks from its global release. The movie seems to tie in moments from all the previous “Mission” movies and the consequences of those actions for our hero, Ethan Hunt. At one point, Hunt holds a knife he used in a pivotal scene in the first Brian De Palma-directed “Mission” movie. Quick shots did show Hunt jumping off an aircraft carrier into the ocean and a massive explosion in either the Arctic or Antarctica. The only real familiar faces in the preview outside of Cruise were Ving Rhames, Henry Czerny, Hannah Waddingham (for a split second), Shea Whigham, and Nick Offerman.

Here's a bit more from Parker's "Renewed Revue #12" -

The comparisons to Blow Out throughout Snake Eyes are numerous and as obvious as the giant American flags that keep appearing throughout some of De Palma’s wide shots and close-ups. But enough time had passed between those projects that what once was old hat for De Palma suddenly seems new again. Working from a script De Palma co-wrote with David Koepp (who’s seeing a career renaissance at the moment thanks to his recent collaborations with Steven Soderbergh), the filmmaker utilizes the same sense of style and pacing for a late nineties sensibility and mindset where all subtlety has been thrown out the window in favour of rampant capitalism. Atlantic City, a place New Jersey native De Palma has gone on record saying he has little love for, is depicted as a gloomy, exploitative cash grab where everyone is on the take.

In addition to a solid assist from Koepp – who knows their way around a twisty narrative where spin and subterfuge are key components – De Palma gets major stylistic support from frequent collaborator Stephen H. Burum’s clever, story focused cinematography that hides clues in plain sight throughout, and legendary composer Ryûichi Sakamoto’s outstanding, perpetually slept on score. All the hallmarks of classic De Palma are on display (split screens, overhead tracking shots, canted angles, a mysterious woman who may hold the key to solving everything, played nicely by Carla Gugino), but Snake Eyes was still dismissed by many at the time for being an old dog showing they weren’t capable of new tricks.

Sure, Snake Eyes is guilty of a couple of cardinal sins. It inarguably gives away its biggest reveal far too early, and the obviously re-shot ending doesn’t send things out with a grand payoff. But everything outside of that is solidly constructed thriller material, anchored by some wonderful work by Cage. Fans who like their Cage erratic and hyperactive will adore the earlier stages of the film, but the actor balances all of this out nicely as Ricky grows wearier and more self aware over the course of the evening. The pairing of this performer with the material is impeccable.

This special limited edition spot gloss, embossed, and silver foil slipcover (designed by Sam Smith) is limited to 2,000 units and is only available on our website and at select indie retailers. Absolutely no major retailers will be stocking them.

Established in 2000 and based in New York City, IFC Films is a leading U.S. distributor of independent film. Its unique distribution model makes independent films available to a national audience by releasing them in theaters as well as on VOD. Partnered with OCN Distribution, IFC will release new titles on home video and revisit past favorites in brand new editions, with many making their HD physical media debuts. 

The final film from director Alain Corneau (SERIE NOIRE, TOUS LES MATINS DU MONDE), LOVE CRIME pits the fiery talents of Ludivine Sagnier (A GIRL CUT IN TWO) and Oscar-nominee Kristin Scott Thomas (THE ENGLISH PATIENT) against each other in a deliciously twisted tale of office politics that turn, literally, cut-throat.

When Christine, a powerful executive (Scott Thomas), brings on a naive young ingénue, Isabelle (Sagnier), as her assistant, she delights in toying with her naïveté and teaching her hard lessons in a ruthless professional philosophy. But when the protege’s ideas become tempting enough for Christine to pass one as her own, she underestimates Isabelle’s ambition and cunning– and the ground is set for all out war. In this devilish, propulsive thriller, Corneau sets up a the scenery expertly and his actors devour it.

directed by: Alain Corneau
starring: Ludivine Sagnier, Kristin Scott Thomas, Patrick Mille, Guillaume Marquet, Gérald Laroche
2010 / 106 min / 1.85:1 / English, French DTS-HD MA 5.1

Additional info:

• Region A Blu-ray
• New commentary by film critic Travis Woods
• New video essay by film historian Alexandra Heller-Nicholas
• Booklet with new writing by film critic Katie Rife
• English subtitles

Legacies of War: Vietnam Across the Divides

On the fiftieth anniversary of the fall of Saigon, filmmaker and program curator Tony Bui presents a multiperspective look at the Vietnam War on film, moving beyond conventional narratives to include voices and viewpoints often overlooked in mainstream cinema. While the most famous Vietnam War films—like the cultural touchstones Platoon and Full Metal Jacket—focus on the experience of American soldiers, this selection paints a broader, more complex picture, exploring Vietnamese perspectives, the war’s impact on civilians, and postwar reckoning. Encompassing powerfully human Vietnamese dramas like The Little Girl of Hanoi and When the Tenth Month Comes, wrenching documentaries like Regret to Inform and Hearts and Minds, and Bui’s own poetic reflection on Vietnam past and present, Three Seasons, these stories of loss, resilience, trauma, and reconciliation offer new ways of understanding a conflict that shattered and shaped countless lives.

FEATURING: On the Same River (1959), Ms. Tư Hậu (1963), Hearts and Minds (1974), The Little Girl of Hanoi (1974), When the Tenth Month Comes (1984), Platoon (1986), Full Metal Jacket (1987), Casualties of War (1989), In Country (1989), Regret to Inform (1998), Three Seasons (1999)*, The Fog of War (2003)*, Journey from the Fall (2006)