After the Hunt star Julia Roberts has won an Oscar and opened movies that have made billions at the box office.
Yet Friday night’s premiere of the film on opening night of the New York Film Festival, she said, was a top-shelf highlight of her life and career.
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“I moved to New York when I was 17 years old, and I’m 57, and this is Top 3 great achievements of my New York life,” she told the crowd at Alice Tully Hall.
Director Luca Guadagnino raved about the filmgoers at NYFF, calling them “the best audience at festivals in the world.” He recalled being an up-and-comer and meeting filmmakers “that I shall not name” who were telling the younger Guadagnino that “cinema is dead. And I was like, ‘Why?’” The New York fest, he continued, “celebrates cinema in a way that makes us know that cinema is actually alive.”
While the 60-second ovation that followed the screening fell short of the 6-minute standing O it received at its world premiere in Venice, the Tully reception was warm and almost all of the audience lingered for a 15-minute Q&A. NYFF Artistic Director Dennis Lim moderated the discussion with Guadagnino, Roberts, cast members Andrew Garfield, Ayo Edebiri and Michael Stuhlbarg as well as screenwriter Nora Garrett. (Perhaps the most memorable moment was Garfield wincing at the memory of having to act in a sexually aggressive manner toward “National Treasure Julia Roberts” in one scene, which “thank God” was captured in a single take. “It was not, in any way shape or form, pleasant,” he dryly added.)
Amazon MGM Studios will release After the Hunt theatrically in select theaters on October 10, with a wide break the following week.
The 63rd edition of NYFF featured some new personalities delivering introductory remarks. Daniel H. Stern, Chair of the FLC Board of Directors, welcomed the audience. In recent years, the leadoff slot on opening night had been occupied by Lesli Klainberg, president of Lincoln Center, but she departed the organization after last year’s festival.
Stern brought Mariko Stern, who became CEO of Lincoln Center last fall, onstage. Addressing the film community, she thanked “all of you who enthrall us, all of you who lift us, all of you who teach us. It is such a true, deep joy to be here with you.”
In addition to “opening our eyes” to experience new films, she said she would “invite you to also open your ears” because Friday night’s screening was the first at Alice Tully Hall to use Dolby Atmos sound. The new system features 120 speakers spread all over the auditorium. (Guadagnino’s well-tuned ear for his soundtracks, plus a score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross helped influence the installation.)
Next, Stern introduced Daniel Battsek, who succeeded Klainberg last April, following executive stints at Miramax Films, Film4 and Buena Vista International. In a field of 100 candidates for the job, from all over the world, “what impressed us was his genuine enthusiasm for our mission and for the future of Film at Lincoln Center, so I think there are great things to come under his leadership,” Stern said.
Battsek kept his portion brief and straightforward, joking that when he has sat in the audience for NYFF premieres as audience member, producer and executive, he has often thought, “When are these damn speeches going to be finished?” Turning more serious, he said this year’s slate of 107 features and shorts from 41 countries “will offer the chance to step into a new world and, I hope, to walk out of the theater inspired, challenged and moved.”
Along with setting the stage for the fest, which runs through October 13, Battsek offered a salute to Robert Redford, who died earlier this month, remembering him as a “fearless champion of independent voices.” Lim also noted that the fest’s printed program features a back page saluting filmmaker David Lynch, who died last January.
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