Warner Bros.’ “Dune: Part II” continued its reign at the U.K. and Ireland box office for the second weekend in a row with £5.9 million ($7.5 million), according to numbers released by Comscore.
Denis Villeneuve’s anticipated sequel has an all-star cast including Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Josh Brolin, Stellan Skarsgård, Dave Bautista, Zendaya, Charlotte Rampling and Javier Bardem reprising their roles from the first film, with Austin Butler, Florence Pugh, Christopher Walken and Léa Seydoux joining them. After two weekends, the film’s total stands at £19.4 million in the territory.
In second place, Studiocanal’s “Wicked Little Letters” collected £898,390 in its third weekend for a total of £6 million. In its fourth weekend, Paramount’s “Bob Marley: One Love” earned £830,382 in third position for a total of £15.1 million. In fourth place, Universal’s “Migration” took in £671,666 in its sixth weekend for a total of £18.3 million.
Lionsgate’s “Imaginary” debuted in fifth...
Denis Villeneuve’s anticipated sequel has an all-star cast including Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Josh Brolin, Stellan Skarsgård, Dave Bautista, Zendaya, Charlotte Rampling and Javier Bardem reprising their roles from the first film, with Austin Butler, Florence Pugh, Christopher Walken and Léa Seydoux joining them. After two weekends, the film’s total stands at £19.4 million in the territory.
In second place, Studiocanal’s “Wicked Little Letters” collected £898,390 in its third weekend for a total of £6 million. In its fourth weekend, Paramount’s “Bob Marley: One Love” earned £830,382 in third position for a total of £15.1 million. In fourth place, Universal’s “Migration” took in £671,666 in its sixth weekend for a total of £18.3 million.
Lionsgate’s “Imaginary” debuted in fifth...
- 3/13/2024
- by Naman Ramachandran
- Variety Film + TV
"After a shaky start, he is learning to read and write. He has a passion for Christ." Yes he does. Signature Entertainment in the UK has revealed a new official UK trailer for The New Boy, the latest feature made by acclaimed Australian filmmaker Warwick Thornton. This initially premiered at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival last year, though without much buzz. It opened in Australia last year and we posted the first official trailer back then. The New Boy depicts the mesmeric story of a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy who arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery run by a renegade nun. The boy's presence disturbs the delicately balanced world in this story of spiritual struggle and the cost of survival. Cate Blanchett stars as Sister Eileen, Aswan Reid as the boy, plus Deborah Mailman and Wayne Blair. The reviews in Cannes for this were mixed, some good,...
- 2/21/2024
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
The Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts (Aacta) handed out its 2024 awards on Saturday, and Talk to Me won big, including for best film and best director, while Margot Robbie was honored with the Trailblazer Award.
Barbie, Oppenheimer and The Bear were among the Hollywood honorees, with big Australian winners including the likes of The Newsreader, Deadloch and The New Boy.
“Talk to Me is the biggest winner of the night, adding a further three awards to its collection and taking its total wins to eight, following the Aacta Industry Awards earlier in the week,” the Australian Academy noted. The honors include the one for best direction in film for sibling-YouTubers-turned-directors Danny and Michael Philippou.
Among acting talent earning trophies, rising star Sophie Wilde won the best lead actress in film award for her performance in Talk to Me, while Aswan Reid got the best lead actor in film...
Barbie, Oppenheimer and The Bear were among the Hollywood honorees, with big Australian winners including the likes of The Newsreader, Deadloch and The New Boy.
“Talk to Me is the biggest winner of the night, adding a further three awards to its collection and taking its total wins to eight, following the Aacta Industry Awards earlier in the week,” the Australian Academy noted. The honors include the one for best direction in film for sibling-YouTubers-turned-directors Danny and Michael Philippou.
Among acting talent earning trophies, rising star Sophie Wilde won the best lead actress in film award for her performance in Talk to Me, while Aswan Reid got the best lead actor in film...
- 2/10/2024
- by Georg Szalai
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
“Talk to Me” was the runaway winner at this year’s main awards from the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts.
The native production, which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival last year and was acquired by A24 for North American distribution, scored three of the evening’s top prizes, including wins for best film, best lead actress for Sophie Wilde and best direction for the filmmaking duo of brothers, Danny Philippou and Michael Philoppou.
Other winners from this year’s edition include “The New Boy” stars Aswan Reid and Deborah Mailman in lead actor and supporting actress, respectively, and Hugo Weaving in supporting actor for “The Rooster.”
The Aacta Awards were held Saturday evening at the Home of the Arts, Gold Coast in Queensland. Rebel Wilson served as host, while Australian star Margot Robbie was honored with the group’s trailblazer award.
See the full list of winners below.
The native production, which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival last year and was acquired by A24 for North American distribution, scored three of the evening’s top prizes, including wins for best film, best lead actress for Sophie Wilde and best direction for the filmmaking duo of brothers, Danny Philippou and Michael Philoppou.
Other winners from this year’s edition include “The New Boy” stars Aswan Reid and Deborah Mailman in lead actor and supporting actress, respectively, and Hugo Weaving in supporting actor for “The Rooster.”
The Aacta Awards were held Saturday evening at the Home of the Arts, Gold Coast in Queensland. Rebel Wilson served as host, while Australian star Margot Robbie was honored with the group’s trailblazer award.
See the full list of winners below.
- 2/10/2024
- by J. Kim Murphy
- Variety Film + TV
Talk to Me was named Best Film at the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts Awards, which were handed out today on the Gold Coast. The teen horror pic also won Best Director for Danny and Michael Philippou and Best Lead Actress for Sophie Wilde.
Talk to Me took eight total statuettes, including five from the Aacta Industry Awards earlier in the week. The Newsreader and Deadloch also won five AACTAs each, including the Industry nods.
The group also revealed its winners in TV, online and other categories. See the full list from both Aacta Awards ceremonies below.
Aswan Reid took Best Lead Actor in a Film for The New Boy, and his co-star Deborah Mailman won the Supporting Actress prize. Hugo Weaving scooped Best Supporting Actor for The Rooster and added a Best Lead Actor in a Drama trophy for Love Me.
On the TV side, The Newsreader took Best Drama Series,...
Talk to Me took eight total statuettes, including five from the Aacta Industry Awards earlier in the week. The Newsreader and Deadloch also won five AACTAs each, including the Industry nods.
The group also revealed its winners in TV, online and other categories. See the full list from both Aacta Awards ceremonies below.
Aswan Reid took Best Lead Actor in a Film for The New Boy, and his co-star Deborah Mailman won the Supporting Actress prize. Hugo Weaving scooped Best Supporting Actor for The Rooster and added a Best Lead Actor in a Drama trophy for Love Me.
On the TV side, The Newsreader took Best Drama Series,...
- 2/10/2024
- by Erik Pedersen and Bruce Haring
- Deadline Film + TV
Aswan Reid in The New Boy. Warwick Thornton: 'He's highly intelligent and just used his ‘inner-inner’. He understood the new boy's journey because he's on that journey himself' Photo: Dirty Pictures Warwick Thornton’s The New Boy centres on the arrival of a kid (Aswan Reid) at a monastery, which looks after orphans and runaways. Run by a rebellious nun (Cate Blanchett), who has kept news of the priest’s death a secret, the boy’s natural spirtuality soon runs up against the rigidity of Christianity. In the first part of our interview with Thornton - conducted at Thessaloniki Film Festival - we talked about the evolution of the script and some of the key themes. In this concluding segment, he discusses the practical elements of the film.
They always say never work with children and animals and you don’t just have one kid here but a whole schoolroom of them…...
They always say never work with children and animals and you don’t just have one kid here but a whole schoolroom of them…...
- 1/5/2024
- by Amber Wilkinson
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
The idea of colonialism not just in terms of geography but from a psychological and spiritual viewpoint comes to the fore in Warwick Thornton’s latest historical drama, which transports us back in time to 1940s Australia. The boy of the title has just been unceremoniously dumped in a sack at a remote monastery. There, lads considered troublesome - and, therefore, thanks to racism, who are largely Aboriginal - are sent to be schooled in religion and life before being packed off at the earliest potential moment to work.
What the authorities don’t know is that the priest in charge has been communing with his maker more directly of late. The head nun Sister Eileen (Cate Blanchett) has decided to preserve the myth of his continued existence, while running the place herself, with some help from a second nun, Sister...
What the authorities don’t know is that the priest in charge has been communing with his maker more directly of late. The head nun Sister Eileen (Cate Blanchett) has decided to preserve the myth of his continued existence, while running the place herself, with some help from a second nun, Sister...
- 1/5/2024
- by Amber Wilkinson
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Cate Blanchett as Sister Eileen in The New Boy. Warwick Thornton: 'Since we gender swapped, suddenly, because nuns we're not allowed to give communion or baptise or all those things, it became exciting, because she was always looking over her shoulder' Photo: The New Boy Productions Warwick Thornton's The New Boy tells the story of a young Aboriginal kid (impressive newcomer Aswan Reid) brought in a sack to a monastery in the Outback, where orphan kids are schooled and looked after. Since the death of the priest - which only the residents know about - nun Sister Eileen (Cate Blanchett) has been running the show with a caring but full-on fervour. Soon the new kid's inate spirituality comes into conflict with that of the organised ideas of the church. The film played in the Un Certain Regard selection of Cannes and, later in the year, we caught up with...
- 12/28/2023
- by Amber Wilkinson
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
The Australian drama premiered at Cannes and stars Cate Blanchett.
Warwick Thornton’s The New Boy leads the nominations for the 2024 Aacta (Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts) Awards with 12 nods, closely followed by horror Talk To Me with 11 nominations.
The New Boy is up for best film, actress for Cate Blanchett and actor for newcomer Aswan Reid while Australian Indigenous filmmaker Thornton is nominated for best director, screenplay and cinematography.
The film is set in 1940s Australia and stars Blanchett (who also serves as a producer) as a nun who takes in a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy. It...
Warwick Thornton’s The New Boy leads the nominations for the 2024 Aacta (Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts) Awards with 12 nods, closely followed by horror Talk To Me with 11 nominations.
The New Boy is up for best film, actress for Cate Blanchett and actor for newcomer Aswan Reid while Australian Indigenous filmmaker Thornton is nominated for best director, screenplay and cinematography.
The film is set in 1940s Australia and stars Blanchett (who also serves as a producer) as a nun who takes in a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy. It...
- 12/11/2023
- by Michael Rosser
- ScreenDaily
With enough passion and grit, powerful, personal stories made one-man-band style can stand up against the best work of top Hollywood talent with far greater budgets.
Warwick Thornton’s “The New Boy,” inspired by his own experiences of being packed off to a Christian boarding school in Australia as a youngster, was in development for 18 years, finally coming together when Cate Blanchett read the script and suggested taking it on through her company Dirty Films. After working with him to adapt the lead role into the character of a nun who fills in for a priest whose death has been kept secret, the project began to come together, with newcomer actor Aswan Reid as the titular boy who begins to work wonders.
It just won the top Camerimage Film Festival prize, the Golden Frog, beating out work by some of Hollywood’s most lauded directors and cinematographers.
Thornton’s background...
Warwick Thornton’s “The New Boy,” inspired by his own experiences of being packed off to a Christian boarding school in Australia as a youngster, was in development for 18 years, finally coming together when Cate Blanchett read the script and suggested taking it on through her company Dirty Films. After working with him to adapt the lead role into the character of a nun who fills in for a priest whose death has been kept secret, the project began to come together, with newcomer actor Aswan Reid as the titular boy who begins to work wonders.
It just won the top Camerimage Film Festival prize, the Golden Frog, beating out work by some of Hollywood’s most lauded directors and cinematographers.
Thornton’s background...
- 11/20/2023
- by Will Tizard
- Variety Film + TV
Yorgos Lanthimos drama ‘Poor Things’ won two prizes.
Warwick Thornton was awarded the Golden Frog at Poland’s Camerimage International Film Festival on Saturday (November 18) for drama The New Boy.
The Australian Indigenous filmmaker received the festival’s top prize at a ceremony in the Polish town of Torun, where the director was recognised for his role as cinematographer on the film. Accepting the award, Thornton paid tribute to his fellow filmmakers and said: “I’ve had tears in my eyes the whole week and it’s not because of the alcohol or the cold weather. It’s the love of cinematography,...
Warwick Thornton was awarded the Golden Frog at Poland’s Camerimage International Film Festival on Saturday (November 18) for drama The New Boy.
The Australian Indigenous filmmaker received the festival’s top prize at a ceremony in the Polish town of Torun, where the director was recognised for his role as cinematographer on the film. Accepting the award, Thornton paid tribute to his fellow filmmakers and said: “I’ve had tears in my eyes the whole week and it’s not because of the alcohol or the cold weather. It’s the love of cinematography,...
- 11/20/2023
- by Michael Rosser
- ScreenDaily
Signature Entertainment has acquired U.K. and Ireland rights to writer-director Warwick Thornton’s Australian drama “The New Boy” from The Veterans.
The film follows a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy who arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery run by a renegade nun, disturbing the delicately balanced world.
Debutant Aswan Reid leads the film in the titular role, alongside Cate Blanchett, Deborah Mailman (“Sapphires”) and Wayne Blair (“Rams”).
“Inspired by Thornton’s own experience of growing up as an Aboriginal boy in a Christian boarding school, this is ambitious, tonally tricky filmmaking, bringing an unexpected dose of whimsy to social interests more austerely explored in Thornton’s excellent previous features “Samson and Delilah” and “Sweet Country,” Variety critic Guy Lodge said in his review of the film.
“The New Boy”
The film is produced by Kath Shelper (“Samson & Delilah”) for Scarlett Pictures, Blanchett and Andrew Upton (“Stateless...
The film follows a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy who arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery run by a renegade nun, disturbing the delicately balanced world.
Debutant Aswan Reid leads the film in the titular role, alongside Cate Blanchett, Deborah Mailman (“Sapphires”) and Wayne Blair (“Rams”).
“Inspired by Thornton’s own experience of growing up as an Aboriginal boy in a Christian boarding school, this is ambitious, tonally tricky filmmaking, bringing an unexpected dose of whimsy to social interests more austerely explored in Thornton’s excellent previous features “Samson and Delilah” and “Sweet Country,” Variety critic Guy Lodge said in his review of the film.
“The New Boy”
The film is produced by Kath Shelper (“Samson & Delilah”) for Scarlett Pictures, Blanchett and Andrew Upton (“Stateless...
- 9/26/2023
- by Naman Ramachandran
- Variety Film + TV
First things first, the reason I pounced on the assignment of reviewing The New Boy without knowing much about it was the presence of Cate Blanchett. Her last role was the brilliant and terrifying Lydia Tár in Todd Field’s “Tár” last year. The legendary actress is known for doing a variety of roles but going from playing the megalomaniac music conductor to playing an Australian nun in the 1940s’ is a huge shift for Blanchett. It is not surprising that the actor excels here as well, delivering yet another brilliant performance. However, the real star of The New Boy is the boy himself, who is played by eleven-year-old Aboriginal actor Aswan Reid.
The New Boy opens with an incredible scene of a little Aboriginal boy overpowering a policeman and running away before getting caught by another policeman. The boy, who is mostly silent and only speaks the aboriginal language,...
The New Boy opens with an incredible scene of a little Aboriginal boy overpowering a policeman and running away before getting caught by another policeman. The boy, who is mostly silent and only speaks the aboriginal language,...
- 9/16/2023
- by Rohitavra Majumdar
- Film Fugitives
Cate Blanchett is about to meet a child who will change her life forever.
Blanchett stars as a nun in Warwick Thornton’s “The New Boy” who takes in a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy (Aswan Reid). IndieWire debuts a new clip from the film, featuring Reid and Blanchett in a lyrical moment.
“The New Boy” premiered at Cannes and will screen at the Toronto International Film Festival on Thursday, September 14. It’s set in 1940s Australia, and follows the Aboriginal orphan boy (Aswan Reid) who arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery, run by a renegade nun (Blanchett). His presence disturbs the delicately balanced world in this story of spiritual struggle and the cost of survival. Deborah Mailman, Wayne Blair, and Kenneth Radley also star, with Nick Cave covering the score.
Oscar winner Blanchett produced the film through her Dirty Films banner, with Roadshow Films distributing for Australia and New Zealand,...
Blanchett stars as a nun in Warwick Thornton’s “The New Boy” who takes in a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy (Aswan Reid). IndieWire debuts a new clip from the film, featuring Reid and Blanchett in a lyrical moment.
“The New Boy” premiered at Cannes and will screen at the Toronto International Film Festival on Thursday, September 14. It’s set in 1940s Australia, and follows the Aboriginal orphan boy (Aswan Reid) who arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery, run by a renegade nun (Blanchett). His presence disturbs the delicately balanced world in this story of spiritual struggle and the cost of survival. Deborah Mailman, Wayne Blair, and Kenneth Radley also star, with Nick Cave covering the score.
Oscar winner Blanchett produced the film through her Dirty Films banner, with Roadshow Films distributing for Australia and New Zealand,...
- 9/14/2023
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
Exclusive: The Veterans is launching international sales on upcoming UK period comedy Fackham Hall at Toronto and has unveiled first members of the ensemble cast.
In the first significant deal announced during TIFF, Bleecker Street has acquired U.S. rights for the film.
First signings include Hero Fiennes Tiffin (The Woman King), Thomasin McKenzie (Last Night in Soho), Emma Laird (A Haunting In Venice) and Katherine Waterston, who appears in this year’s TIFF title The End We Start From alongside Jodie Comer and Benedict Cumberbatch.
Written by comedian Jimmy Carr in his screenwriting feature debut with Patrick Carr and the Dawson Brothers (The Bubble), Fackham Hall pokes fun at traditional period dramas like Downton Abbey and Gosford Park. The production is described as being “in the tradition of classic joke-a-minute spoof comedies like The Naked Gun series and Airplane!”.
Fiennes Tiffin will play a new porter who embarks on...
In the first significant deal announced during TIFF, Bleecker Street has acquired U.S. rights for the film.
First signings include Hero Fiennes Tiffin (The Woman King), Thomasin McKenzie (Last Night in Soho), Emma Laird (A Haunting In Venice) and Katherine Waterston, who appears in this year’s TIFF title The End We Start From alongside Jodie Comer and Benedict Cumberbatch.
Written by comedian Jimmy Carr in his screenwriting feature debut with Patrick Carr and the Dawson Brothers (The Bubble), Fackham Hall pokes fun at traditional period dramas like Downton Abbey and Gosford Park. The production is described as being “in the tradition of classic joke-a-minute spoof comedies like The Naked Gun series and Airplane!”.
Fiennes Tiffin will play a new porter who embarks on...
- 9/7/2023
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
Aswan Reid delivers Australian cinema’s most impressive child performance for some time, as the titular youngster taken to an outback orphanage
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Warwick Thornton’s latest film sure is a strange one. In sheer stylistic bravado The New Boy matches, and in some ways exceeds, the great auteur’s previous works, which include Samson and Delilah and Sweet Country. But driven by a desire for symbolic heft, The New Boy becomes a cryptic and borderline impenetrable noodle-scratcher stuffed full of heavy religious imagery. Reportedly inspired by Thornton’s own upbringing as an Aboriginal child attending a Christian boarding school, the film revolves around a young Aboriginal boy (Aswan Reid), known only by the titular description, who is seized by police in the 1940s and taken to an orphanage located in the back of beyond.
The boy’s supernatural powers – including the ability to...
Get our weekend culture and lifestyle email
Warwick Thornton’s latest film sure is a strange one. In sheer stylistic bravado The New Boy matches, and in some ways exceeds, the great auteur’s previous works, which include Samson and Delilah and Sweet Country. But driven by a desire for symbolic heft, The New Boy becomes a cryptic and borderline impenetrable noodle-scratcher stuffed full of heavy religious imagery. Reportedly inspired by Thornton’s own upbringing as an Aboriginal child attending a Christian boarding school, the film revolves around a young Aboriginal boy (Aswan Reid), known only by the titular description, who is seized by police in the 1940s and taken to an orphanage located in the back of beyond.
The boy’s supernatural powers – including the ability to...
- 7/5/2023
- by Luke Buckmaster
- The Guardian - Film News
"He has a passion for Christ. And I feel he may even follow in my footsteps..." Roadside Films in Australia has unveiled an official trailer for The New Boy, the latest feature from acclaimed Australian filmmaker Warwick Thornton. This recently premiered at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival playing in the Un Certain Regard section, but didn't end up with any awards or much buzz. The New Boy depicts the mesmeric story of a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy who arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery run by a renegade nun. The boy's presence disturbs the delicately balanced world in this story of spiritual struggle and the cost of survival. Cate Blanchett stars as Sister Eileen, Aswan Reid as the boy, plus Deborah Mailman and Wayne Blair. The reviews in Cannes for this were mixed, some good, some bad, saying it's "ultimately unmoving" and "turgid." Though it certainly looks gorgeous,...
- 6/7/2023
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Warwick Thornton’s latest feature, the 1940s-set The New Boy, sees Cate Blanchett star as a renegade nun, Sister Eileen (Cate Blanchett), who runs a mission for Aboriginal children. A new charge (newcomer Aswan Reid) is delivered in the dead of night – a boy who appears to have special powers. When the monastery takes possession of a precious relic, a large carving of Christ on the cross, the new boy encounters Jesus for the first time and is transfixed. However, the...
The post ‘The New Boy’ (Trailer) appeared first on If Magazine.
The post ‘The New Boy’ (Trailer) appeared first on If Magazine.
- 6/7/2023
- by jkeast
- IF.com.au
The spark of life that gave Warwick Thornton what is now “The New Boy” took 18 years to flicker, and then fully glow. The Australian filmmaker looked to his own childhood, raised by monks, to find the spiritual fairy tale that now manifests via the film’s eponymous Aboriginal child in a sweeping and poetic portrait of stifled faith and the threat of monopoly on religion.
Thornton’s cinema is one of enormous, orchestral music and vast landscapes that envelop and invite us in, even if you feel like you don’t know where you’re going or shouldn’t be allowed to look around. It’s the kind of culturally specific filmmaking that somehow immediately gains universality in that ambition to connect, to understand the empathy and sensitivity to listen in to these conflicts and this bright spark of a boy who speaks to struggles of faith however you were raised.
Thornton’s cinema is one of enormous, orchestral music and vast landscapes that envelop and invite us in, even if you feel like you don’t know where you’re going or shouldn’t be allowed to look around. It’s the kind of culturally specific filmmaking that somehow immediately gains universality in that ambition to connect, to understand the empathy and sensitivity to listen in to these conflicts and this bright spark of a boy who speaks to struggles of faith however you were raised.
- 5/20/2023
- by Ella Kemp
- Indiewire
For about half an hour or so, Warwick Thornton’s “The New Boy” could almost fool you into thinking that it’ll be a gentle, evocative and beautifully atmospheric movie about a small group of people who mean well. But then things change, and an understated film that might have quietly dealt with Australia’s original sin – the decades-long removal of indigenous children from their parents – turns complex, spiritual and surpassingly unsettling, a mixture of religion and magic that doesn’t really trust in either.
It’s still beautifully composed, but it cuts that beauty with some thorny ideas and puzzling turns; it starts out beguiling, but it may end up getting under your skin.
Best known for “Samson and Delilah,” which was nominated for an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2009, Warwick has largely been working in television since then, with the notable exception of 2017’s “Sweet Country,...
It’s still beautifully composed, but it cuts that beauty with some thorny ideas and puzzling turns; it starts out beguiling, but it may end up getting under your skin.
Best known for “Samson and Delilah,” which was nominated for an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2009, Warwick has largely been working in television since then, with the notable exception of 2017’s “Sweet Country,...
- 5/20/2023
- by Steve Pond
- The Wrap
Warwick Thornton is a master maker of images. The first frames of The New Boy – a sweep of dusty ground; a flash of a small boy on a policeman’s back, strangling him; a pre-war telegraph pole, all drenched in the searing white midday light of the desert – create a collage of inland Australia, a world of open spaces. The boy is duly pulled off of the policeman, put in a sack and delivered in the dark to a mission; a nun opens the door to receive the delivery. At that point, the gallery of Thornton’s frame becomes a series of golden brown interiors that could have come from Rembrandt, except that they are peopled with Indigenous boys – Lost Boys, as Sister Eileen (Cate Blanchett) describes them to God – and the trio of adults who look after them.
Out in the world, their compatriots are embroiled in the Second World War.
Out in the world, their compatriots are embroiled in the Second World War.
- 5/19/2023
- by Stephanie Bunbury
- Deadline Film + TV
The new boy doesn’t get a name, and he doesn’t give one. Arriving at an isolated orphanage in rural South Australia in the early 1940s, he’s taken in with brisk kindness by the two nuns who oversee the place, but privileges like names are for children a little further along in their understanding and acceptance of this establishment’s firm Christian principles: Until he’s ready for baptism, the shirtless, mostly wordless Aboriginal newcomer will be acknowledged but not identified. It’s a limbo state that evocatively represents the tension between Australia’s Indigenous population and even the most notionally inclusive of their colonizers; in Warwick Thornton’s thoughtful magical-realist fable “The New Boy,” spiritual differences aren’t treated with violence, but echo bloody territorial conflict just the same.
Inspired by Thornton’s own experience of growing up as an Aboriginal boy in a Christian boarding school,...
Inspired by Thornton’s own experience of growing up as an Aboriginal boy in a Christian boarding school,...
- 5/19/2023
- by Guy Lodge
- Variety Film + TV
Back in 2017, Warwick Thornton landed in Venice with a western that offered some corrective to the white-savior narratives of countless others in the genre. Sweet Country, his third feature, chronicled the real-life story of an Aboriginal stockman arrested and tried for the death of a white ranch owner in 1920s Australia. Hardly the first to foreground racial tensions within a period setting, the film stood as a refreshing departure from others that only ostensibly acknowledged Indigenous peoples’ experience under colonialism, but wound up prioritizing the redemptive arcs of their white heroes. Six years later, along comes The New Boy, a film that shares the same ethos of its predecessor. Here, too, Thornton digs up a chapter of his country’s past to subvert and ultimately reappropriate the white man’s iconography: where Sweet Country took on the western, The New Boy tackles colonialism through the prism of the Church. But...
- 5/19/2023
- by Leonardo Goi
- The Film Stage
Warwick Thornton has been doubling as cinematographer on his projects since back before his debut, Samson & Delilah, won the Camera d’Or at Cannes in 2009. But the Indigenous Australian director’s command of visual storytelling has possibly never been as striking as it is in the rural setting of his third narrative feature, The New Boy. Frequently, the rolling hills and wheat fields, the harvest scenes, shots of a fire tearing through crops or even a steam train chugging across the landscape seem a direct tip of the hat to the descriptive beauty of Néstor Almendros’ influential work on Days of Heaven.
If Thornton’s screenplay at times smudges the focus in charting the uneasy intersection between Christian dogma and Indigenous spirituality, the core of personal experience, of learning to straddle those two worlds in the director’s own childhood, gives the film sincerity and heart.
Its flaws, strangely enough,...
If Thornton’s screenplay at times smudges the focus in charting the uneasy intersection between Christian dogma and Indigenous spirituality, the core of personal experience, of learning to straddle those two worlds in the director’s own childhood, gives the film sincerity and heart.
Its flaws, strangely enough,...
- 5/19/2023
- by David Rooney
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The genesis of Warwick Thornton’s seventh narrative feature The New Boy stretches back to the beginning of the Australian’s fictional filmmaking career. Thornton drafted the first script of The New Boy — a story about innocence and survival, following a lone Indigenous boy who finds himself in a Christian monastery in 1940s Australia — 18 years ago, well before he won Cannes’ Camera d’Or prize in 2009 for his feature debut, Samson & Delilah. The New Boy has always been a deeply personal project for Thornton, who as a young boy was sent by his mother to a remote boarding school run by Spanish monks.
“I had been getting in trouble back home in Alice Springs [a small city in Australia’s Northern Territory] and it was what she thought I needed to sort me out,” says Thornton. “I had never been inside a church before. I walked into the church building for the first time and saw this guy...
“I had been getting in trouble back home in Alice Springs [a small city in Australia’s Northern Territory] and it was what she thought I needed to sort me out,” says Thornton. “I had never been inside a church before. I walked into the church building for the first time and saw this guy...
- 5/17/2023
- by Patrick Brzeski
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Warwick Thornton’s “The New Boy” has been set as the opening title of next month’s Sydney Film Festival, which will celebrate its 70th edition, June 7-18. The film, a tale of sprituality and survival in 1940s Australia, starring Cate Blanchett, Deborah Mailman, Wayne Blair and Aswan Reid, will also play in the festival’s competition section.
Other titles in competition include: the world premiere of Australian documentary feature “The Dark Emu Story,” directed by Allan Clarke; Christian Petzold’s previously announced “Afire”; Charlotte Regan’s Sundance Grand Jury Prize winner “Scrapper”; Kore-eda Hirokazu’s “Monster”; Aki Kaurismäki’s compassionate comedy “Fallen Leaves”; Kim Jee-woon’s “Cobweb”; Asmae El Moudir’s “The Mother of All Lies”; Alice Englert’s directorial debut “Bad Behaviour”; Celine Song’s Sundance and Berlinale 2023 selected romance “Past Lives”; Liu Jian’s 2023 Berlinale-selected animation “Art College 1994”; Devashish Makhija’s “Joram,” a thriller about an...
Other titles in competition include: the world premiere of Australian documentary feature “The Dark Emu Story,” directed by Allan Clarke; Christian Petzold’s previously announced “Afire”; Charlotte Regan’s Sundance Grand Jury Prize winner “Scrapper”; Kore-eda Hirokazu’s “Monster”; Aki Kaurismäki’s compassionate comedy “Fallen Leaves”; Kim Jee-woon’s “Cobweb”; Asmae El Moudir’s “The Mother of All Lies”; Alice Englert’s directorial debut “Bad Behaviour”; Celine Song’s Sundance and Berlinale 2023 selected romance “Past Lives”; Liu Jian’s 2023 Berlinale-selected animation “Art College 1994”; Devashish Makhija’s “Joram,” a thriller about an...
- 5/10/2023
- by Patrick Frater
- Variety Film + TV
Cate Blanchett is donning a habit in her next role post-“TÁR.”
The Academy Award-winning actress leads Warwick Thornton’s latest film “The New Boy,” which is set to debut at 2023 Cannes in the Un Certain Regard section.
Per the official synopsis, set in 1940s Australia, “The New Boy” is the story of a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy (Aswan Reid) who arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery, run by a renegade nun (Blanchett), where his presence disturbs the delicately balanced world in this story of spiritual struggle and the cost of survival.
Mezi Atwood, Deborah Mailman, Wayne Blair, and Kenneth Radley also star.
Blanchett’s Dirty Films and Scarlett Pictures partnered to co-produce “The New Boy,” with Roadshow Films distributing for Australia and New Zealand, and CAA Media Finance and UTA handling sales for North America. The Veterans on board to manage the rest of international sales.
The Academy Award-winning actress leads Warwick Thornton’s latest film “The New Boy,” which is set to debut at 2023 Cannes in the Un Certain Regard section.
Per the official synopsis, set in 1940s Australia, “The New Boy” is the story of a nine-year-old Aboriginal orphan boy (Aswan Reid) who arrives in the dead of night at a remote monastery, run by a renegade nun (Blanchett), where his presence disturbs the delicately balanced world in this story of spiritual struggle and the cost of survival.
Mezi Atwood, Deborah Mailman, Wayne Blair, and Kenneth Radley also star.
Blanchett’s Dirty Films and Scarlett Pictures partnered to co-produce “The New Boy,” with Roadshow Films distributing for Australia and New Zealand, and CAA Media Finance and UTA handling sales for North America. The Veterans on board to manage the rest of international sales.
- 4/14/2023
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
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