Right here’s a phrase we’re listening to far much less usually in relation to allegedly filmmaker-friendly and seemingly daring distributors: “scared.” However go away it to rising filmmaker Elliot Tuttle to (fearlessly) invoke it when referring to unnamed distros in relation to his already-controversial characteristic debut, “Blue Movie.”
The movie has now been picked up by fledgling distributor Obscured Releasing, not too long ago launched by RJ Millard and Invoice Guentzler, who Tuttle names as being decidedly not afraid of his artwork. “I’m thrilled to be partnering with Obscured Releasing on our theatrical rollout of ‘Blue Movie.’ Their ardour and dedication to a protracted life for our movie made this a simple alternative,” stated Tuttle in an official assertion. “Lots of people have been scared, however Obscured wasn’t.”
The shingle will launch the movie in theaters this Might. Per its official logline: “The movie follows fetish camboy Aaron Eagle (Kieron Moore), who agrees to spend the night time with an nameless shopper (Reed Birney) and discovers a disturbing tie to his previous.”
However that’s not even the half of it.
In our annual end-of-year record of worthy movies nonetheless in quest of distributionour personal Ryan Lattanzio wrote, “Few modern movies about unresolved childhood abuse — which is at all times unresolved, in the long run, anyway — reduce as narrowly near the bone as Elliot Tuttle’s two-hander masked as provocation, ‘Blue Movie.’ Rejected by mainstream movie festivals earlier than it premiered in Edinburgh this summer time and NewFest in New York in Octoberthis taboo-busting research of a masculine camboy confronted by the pedophile instructor who a few years in the past desired him holds again little and gives even much less that’s palatable to swallow. Its limitations as a stagelike piece apart, the film wrings emotional complexity from a fraught, ever-shifting dialogue between a convicted baby abuser and the scholar, now a late twenties intercourse employee, he spared.
He added, “‘Blue Movie,’ which takes place completely in a rented Hancock Park Airbnb in Los Angeles with solely two actors, dares to go locations I’ve not seen an American film journey to shortly. There was an Israeli film referred to as ‘Princess’ at Sundance in 2014, directed by Tali Shalom Ezer, which freaked lots of people out. It was a couple of 12-year-old lady’s ‘shut relationship’ along with her mom’s boyfriend. There was the 2011 Austrian film ‘Michael,’ directed by Michael Haneke protégé Markus Schleinzer, about an insurance coverage salesman sexually abusing the 10-year-old boy locked up in his basement. These have been stunning. Neither have been American.”
You can even learn his full assessment proper right here.
The movie had its world premiere on the 2025 Edinburgh Worldwide Movie Competition and its North American premiere at Newfest this previous fall. The movie went on to play at OUTShine Movie Competition, Philadelphia Worldwide Movie Competition, Montclair Movie Competition, and extra.
“What Elliot accomplishes in telling the story of how two males’s sexuality and their connection formed their futures is concurrently humane and stunning,” stated Millard and Guentzler in an announcement. “He’s asking questions no American filmmaker has dared to ask in many years and we’re thrilled to be launching ‘Blue Movie’ in theaters.”
The filmmaker-focused Obscured Releasing most not too long ago launched “Cease the Madness: Discovering Susan Powter” and “Countless Cookie.”
The movie was produced by Bijan Kazerooni, Will Youmans, Adam Kersh, and Waylon Sall, with Mark Duplass as consulting producer, and Birney and Eric Kohn as government producers. The deal was negotiated by Matt Burke of Submarine Leisure on behalf of the filmmakers, and O’Brien Kelley of The Kelley Agency on behalf of Obscured Releasing.