In today’s film news roundup, Kristen Stewart’s “Seberg” is getting a prime release date from Amazon and John Simmons, Debra Kaufman and Joe Alves have been selected for guild honors.
RELEASE DATE
Amazon Studios has given Kristen Stewart’s independent political thriller “Seberg” an awards-season release date of Dec. 13.
Amazon bought the film at the Berlin Film Festival. Jack O’Connell, Anthony Mackie, Margaret Qualley, Colm Meaney, Zazie Beetz, Vince Vaughn, Stephen Root, and Yvan Attal are also starring. Benedict Andrews directed from a script by Joe Shrapnel and Anna Waterhouse.
Stewart stars as actress Jean Seberg who clashes with the FBI as it attempts to discredit her through its Cointelpro program in retaliation for her support of the Black Panther Party. Those efforts included creating a false story in 1970 that the child Seberg was carrying was not fathered by her husband, but by a member of the Black Panther Party.
Mackie portrays a civil rights activist and O’Connell plays an FBI agent assigned to surveil the actress. Seberg acted in dozens of films including “Saint Joan,” “Bonjour Tristesse,” “Breathless,” and “The Mouse That Roared.” She died in 1979 in France, with authorities ruling her death a suicide.
“Serberg” premiered at the Venice Film Festival, where it received a seven-minute standing ovation. Stewart was recently honored at the Deauville American Film Festival where director Olivier Assayas presented her with the Talent Award. Deadline first reported the dating news.
HONORS
The International Cinematographers Guild will honor cinematographer John Simmons with American Society of Cinematographers Mentor Award.
The guild will present freelance journalist Debra Kaufman with the William A. Fraker Award at the Emerging Cinematographers Awards Luncheon in the ASC Clubhouse in Hollywood on Oct. 4.
Simmons won the Best Cinematography Emmy for the Nickelodeon multi-camera series “Nicky, Ricky, Dicky and Dawn” and has three additional Emmy nominations. His first multi-camera primetime show was “The Hughleys.” He was an adjunct professor in the Television/Film and Theater Department at UCLA for 25 years and is presently filming shows for Netflix.
Kaufman is being honored for her journalistic contributions in covering the film and television industry from the perspective of cinematography. She currently writes for USC’s Entertainment Technology Center newsletter, ETCentric and contributes to American Cinematographer, ICG Magazine and the Editors Guild’s CineMontage.
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Oscar-nominated production designer Joe Alves will receive the Art Directors Guild’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
The award will be presented at the 24th Annual ADG “Excellence in Production Design” Awards on Feb. 1 at the InterContinental Los Angeles Downtown. Alves received an Oscar nomination for his work on “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and is known for his work on the three “Jaws” films.
Alves’ credits include Alfred Hitchcock’s “Torn Curtain,” Rod Serling’s “Night Gallery,” “Free Jack” and “Geronimo.” He made his directing debut with “Jaws 3D” and created a derelict Gotham City for John Carpenter’s science-fiction adventure “Escape From New York” and served as visual consultant on Carpenter’s “Starman.”