by Murtada
Mudbound is having a moment this week. On the eve of its TIFF premiere, the trailer drops and Dee Rees, Carey Mulligan and Mary J Blige get the cover at Variety. Rees talks about how difficult it was to find a distributor at Sundance in the year after The Birth of a Nation debacle:
I feel like we were in the shadow of other films. This film is certainly on the level of — if not better than — that. To burden our film with that was unfair. That’s the hard thing about Hollywood; you realize it’s not fair. It’s not a meritocracy. It’s like, Come on.
More from Rees plus the movie's trailer after the jump..
Rees also talks about being a black female out filmmaker and how that affects financing of her films:
If I were a white guy who had done ‘Pariah,’ my next film would have been huge. I do think there’s a different trajectory. Films are talked about differently. It’s like a film by an independent black director gets talked about for who made it, not for what the film is.
Netflix seems to be pushing hard for Mudbound to make a dent at the Oscars. Post TIFF, the film will also play the New York Film Festival before being released on November 17. The jury is still out on whether their day and date streaming strategy will be embraced.
The trailer though hints at a strong sweeping story with multiple points of view. In addition to Mulligan and Blige, Jason Mitchell and Garrett Hedlund seem to have meaty parts. The reception at Sundance - as the critical quotes tell us in the trailer - was good. We’ll see if Mudbound can build on that at the fall festivals. No matter though we are excited to see a new movie from the filmmaker we fell in love with because of Pariah (2011).
What are your thoughts on the trailer?