SALLYWOOD (USA)
FILMMAKER EXPECTED GUESTS @ Camelot Winner of 38 awards Based on a true-life story, Zack, a 20-something writer who’s been inspired by the movies of actress Sally Kirkland since childhood gets up the courage to make a move from his small town in...
HUNDREDS OF BEAVERS (USA)
In this inventive slapstick comedy a drunken applejack salesman aspires to become the greatest fur trapper in North America. His only obstacle? Hundreds of gigantic beavers. This is now a serious cult film. It is now in its 28th week on the big screen. Last...
AVENUE OF THE GIANTS (U.S.A.)
Stephen Lang (Avatar) and Elsie Fisher (Eighth Grade) star in a heartrending, Northern Californian-set cross-generational odyssey of healing and discovery, an extraordinary friendship blooms between an aging soul and a troubled girl, each bearing unspoken...
HOW TO COME ALIVE WITH NORMAN MAILER
HOW TO COME ALIVE WITH NORMAN MAILER explores the rollercoaster life of Norman Mailer, America’s most controversial and bestselling author of the 20th Century. Propelled by his tremendous ego and contrarian spirit, Mailer’s ceaseless visibility in the public eye...
STARRING JERRY AS HIMSELF (U.S.A.)
A family documents how their immigrant father Jerry, a recently retired Florida man, was recruited by the Chinese police to be an undercover agent, only to discover a darker truth. Genre: Documentary Running Time: 75 min Country: U.S. Language: English Premiere: ...
THE-FILM-MAKER – THE LISA AZUELOS STORY (USA) showing with GANEF (U.K.) and NOWHERE (Armenia)
Lisa Azuelos (L.O.L, Comme t’y es belle, Dalida) is the subject of a new documentary by David Serero. Retrace her journey from her origins to behind the scenes present day. The film features a stellar cast, including François Cluzet, Michèle Laroque, Alexandra Lamy,...
I CAN’T GIVE YOU ANYTHING BUT LOVE: The Jimmy McHugh Story
An aspiring singer is tasked with promoting the music catalogue of his great-grandfather, the famous songwriter Jimmy McHugh, recorded by everyone from Sinatra to Lady Gaga. While licensing these songs for movies, commercials, TV and Broadway shows, the singer...
BONNIE (U.S.)
Legendary casting director Bonnie Timmermann finally goes under the spotlight with an exclusive documentary featuring never-seen audition footage of all of today’s biggest stars and a refreshing take on what a casting director is, and more generally what is the...
RADICAL WOLFE (U.S.) – Documentary
RADICAL WOLFE is an official adaptation of the 2015 Vanity Fair article “How Tom Wolfe Became … Tom Wolfe” by Michael Lewis, best-selling author of MONEYBALL and THE BIG SHORT and a long time personal friend of Wolfe. From a beat reporter at the Washington Post, to an...
PLAYING THROUGH (USA)
Playing Through is a feature-length fictional film honoring the life and legacy of Ann Gregory, a pioneering female athlete and civil rights advocate. Late in her career, Ann Gregory finds the courage to be the first woman of color to enter the USGA Women’s...
DREAM GIRL: THE MAKING OF MARILYN MONROE – France/USA
. How did Marilyn Monroe become one of the greatest sex symbols of all time? What drove a prudish little Californian girl, who was not especially pretty nor exceptionally talented, to become this incredibly striking platinum blonde superstar? How did she become the...
LOVE, CHARLIE: THE RISE & FALL OF CHEF CHARLIE TROTTER
Special Guest: Rebecca Halpern, Director & Writer In the 2000s, chef Charlie Trotter was the toast of Chicago, his eponymous restaurant one of the world’s top fine-dining destinations. A gastronomic revolutionary and a culinary bad-boy, Trotter...
BOULEVARD! A HOLLYWOOD STORY (Filmmaker guests)
When Gloria Swanson, the iconic star of Sunset Boulevard, saw an opportunity to parlay her silent film glory into a new phase of her career, she began to envision a musical stage adaptation of her most famous film. Enter, Dickson Hughes and Richard Stapley, two...
CONFETTI – China/USA
* * * N O T E D A T E C H A N G E * * * How far would a mother go to reverse her child’s fate? Based on writer/director Ann Hu’s story, that’s the question facing Lan, who travels with her 9-year-old severely dyslexic daughter from their small town in China...
OUT OF EXILE (USA)
Many people know the photos of Fred Stein but few know his name. His street scenes of Paris in the 1930s and New York in the 1940s and his portraits of famous personalities are well-known. This film seeks out this forgotten photographer. Who was this man who fled the...
THE AUTOMAT (U.S.)
WEST COAST PREMIERE THE AUTOMAT is about the phenomena of Horn & Hardart, America’s original & most beloved restaurant chain in NYC & Philadelphia showing archival footage of old Philadelphia and NYC, Featuring an original new song written...
PAUL NEWMAN, BEHIND BLUE EYES! (France) + 2 shorts
His beauty, masculinity and intelligence, and of course the color of his eyes, have followed Paul Newman throughout his life. Annoyed by the incessant references to his apparent sex appeal, the actor did everything he could to change the perception of him as a...
IRMI (USA)
Irmi Selver had a long and fascinating life, one touched by love and tragedy, challenges and resilience. This documentary portrait, based on her memoirs and co-directed by her daughter Veronica Selver and Susan Fanshel, traces Irmi’s personal story across the...
THE PICTURE OF HIS LIFE (Israel, U.S., Canada)
Environmentalist, explorer, “soldier of Mother Nature” and one of the greatest underwater photographers of all time, Amos Nachoum’s work has been featured in National Geographic, Time and The New York Times, among other media. His unique approach has put him...
RECORDER: THE MARION STOKES PROJECT (U.S.A.)
RECORDER: THE MARION STOKES PROJECT Coachella Valley Premiere For over 30 years, Marion Stokes obsessively and privately recorded American television news twenty-four hours a day. A civil rights-era Communist radical who became fabulously wealthy and reclusive later...
AMIA – ARCHIVAL SCREENING NIGHT
On SA, June 13 Desert Film Society members will receive a link to view this film orig scheduled for May 2. A video introduction will feature Melissa Dollman and Devin Orgeron. The Association of Moving Image Archivists presents videos from archives and...
PETER FALK VS COLUMBO (France)
WEST COAST PREMIERE For many, he is above all the fluffy and at the same time ingenious investigator who transfers the powerful to their luxury villas in a crumpled trench coat. But Peter Falk not only embodied Inspector Columbo, but also worked as an actor with...
SUBLET – U.S. / Israel
Note this film will be sent on SUNDAY because of Rosh Hashanah. A New York Times travel writer comes to Tel Aviv after suffering a tragedy. The energy of the city & his relationship with a younger man brings him back to life. Director/Writer: Eytan Fox –...
BE NATURAL: THE UNTOLD STORY OF ALICE GUY-BLACHE (USA)
Guest – Dr. Drake Stutesman* Narrated by Jodie Foster, Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché is a documentary about the first female filmmaker, exploring the heights of fame and financial success she achieved before she was shut out from the very...
POINT DEFIANCE (USA) Filmmaker Guests
Filmmaker Guests: Justin Foia, Director/Writer and Timothy Foia, Writer “A bachelor’s beautiful, isolated home becomes a hostile prison when his troubled brother returns from military duty in Afghanistan, forcing them to unearth their violent past before another dark...
EVERY ACT OF LIFE (USA)
PLEASE NOTE: The starting time for this film ONLY is 9:30 AM. Doors will unlock at 9:00. Few if any living playwrights have been as successful for as long as Terrence McNally. Nearing his ninth decade his body of work includes: Master Class, Kiss of the...
SLIPAWAY (USA) GUESTS
COACHELLA VALLEY PREMIERE Filmmaker Guests: Julia Butler, Writer/Director Elaine Partnow, Lead Actress SLIPAWAY is a touching and thought-provoking film, shot on a vintage sailboat in the middle of the ocean. A spiritual journey of compassion, redemption and...
THE SAMUEL PROJECT (USA) GUESTS
Guests: Ryan Ochoa, Marc Fusco and Steve Weinberger Eli, an outcast teen, played by Ochoa, who dreams of becoming an artist, connects with his isolated grandfather Samuel, a dry cleaner portrayed by Linden, for the first time. Eli uncovers his...
HUMOR ME (USA)
COACHELLA VALLEY PREMIERE A heartfelt father-son comedy about a struggling playwright who is forced to move in with his joke-telling dad in a New Jersey retirement community and learns, as his father often says, “life’s going to happen, whether you...
BIG SONIA (USA)
For years, Sonia Warshawski (91) has been an inspirational public speaker at schools and prisons, where her stories of surviving the Holocaust as a teenager have inspired countless people. When Sonia is served an eviction notice for her iconic tailor shop, she’s...
MIDNIGHT RETURN: STORY OF BILLY HAYES & TURKEY – with guests
Join us for an EXCLUSIVE Q&A screening of Midnight Return: The Story of Billy Hayes and Turkey at Camelot Theaters! After his ingenious escape from a Turkish prison in 1975, Billy Hayes arrived home to a hero’s welcome, instant celebrity and within a week...
HAROLD AND LILLIAN: A HOLLYWOOD LOVE STORY (USA)
“Movie fans know the work of Harold and Lillian Michelson, even if they don’t recognize the names. Working largely uncredited in the Hollywood system, storyboard artist Harold and film researcher Lillian left an indelible mark on classics by Alfred Hitchcock, Steven...
EMPTY SPACE (USA) showing with: THE MANY SAD FATES OF MR. TOLEDANO
EMPTY SPACE Southern California Premiere “Tom, an overweight young man, takes refuge at his grandmother’s cabin in rural Protection, IL, in an attempt to bury the years of being bullied and feeling rejected. While in town, he meets a precocious blind...
DOLORES (Germany) showing with JOE’S VIOLIN (USA)
DOLORES California Premiere Georg Letterer is an introvert modeler, who builds detail-obsessed prototypes. He receives an order from famous Hollywood actress Dolores Moor to make a model of her extravagant villa. This is the opportunity for Georg to escape from...
HIGH STRUNG – Special DFS Fundraiser Screening – GUESTS
Tickets ($8 students, $15 adults) available now at Camelot’s Box Office or on-line at http://highstrung.eventbrite.com MEET THE FILMMAKERS! One Time Screening in the Coachella Valley Director/Writer – MICHAEL DAMIAN Writer/Producer – JANEEN DAMIAN...
THE FRONTIER (USA)
THE FRONTIER WEST COAST PREMIERE Laine, (Jocelin Donahue), a young woman on the run from the law, turns up at The Frontier, a dust-caked motel on the outskirts of Phoenix. With deep bruises on her neck and blood on her hands she’s looking for a place to clean up and...
2 NIGHTS TILL MORNING (Lithuania/Finland) and THE OPPOSITE OF A FAIRY TALE (USA short)
THE OPPOSITE OF A FAIRY TALE West Coast Preview A Film Lab and AAFL TV Production By Jennifer Betit Yen Guests: Timothy Yang, Bruce Yang, Collin Heald and Ryan Heald Benefit to combat Elder Abuse ($15.00 at the door) When Celeste, a kind social worker, meets...
JERRY LEWIS: THE MAN BEHIND THE CLOWN – CALIFORNIA PREMIERE + 2 shorts
JERRY LEWIS: THE MAN BEHIND THE CLOWN CALIFORNIA PREMIERE Since the early days, Jerry Lewis – in the line of Chaplin, Keaton and Laurel – had the masses laughing with his visual gags, pantomime sketches and signature slapstick humor. Yet Lewis was far more than just...
MORGENTHAU (USA)
WEST COAST PREMIERE Good Fortune: Three Men, Three Generations, One Fight MORGENTHAU tells the story of one American family whose careers reveal new perspectives on the social and political shifts in the twentieth century. From fighting for international action...
BEREAVE (USA) – Guest: Writer/Director George Giovanis
SPECIAL GUEST WRITER/DIRECTOR, GEORGE GIOVANIS Coachella Valley Premiere Fatally ill Garvey thinks he has figured out how to die alone. But when his beloved wife Evelyn goes missing on their anniversary he must live to save her. Jane Seymour, Malcolm McDowell, and...
LAYOVER (USA) – in French
COACHELLA VALLEY PREMIERE FILMMAKER GUESTS JOSHUA CALDWELL, (WRITER/DIRECTOR) TRAVIS OBERLANDER, (PRODUCER) Simone, a young Parisian on her way to Singapore to get engaged, is forced to spend the night in Los Angeles when her connecting flight is canceled. After...
WELCOME TO KUTSHER’S: THE LAST CATSKILLS RESORT (USA)
One of the legendary Borscht Belt hotels during its heyday, Kutsher’s was family-owned and operated for over 100 years. Exploring the full Dirty Dancing-era Catskills experience— and how it changed American pop culture in the comedy, sports and vacation...
A PERFECT MAN (USA)
Coachella Valley Premiere – One Time Screening Set in Amsterdam, the film centers around James, a successful architect and troubled man who finds the answers to his questions about women in an over-the-phone relationship with Nina. When the pair finally meet,...
CHASING BEAUTY (USA)
Coachella Valley Premiere – One Time Screening Special Guests – Director, Brent Huff & Model, Hoyt Richards CHASING BEAUTY provides a rare glimpse into the intriguing and complex world of modeling. Behind the glossy covers of Vogue and Glamour lie the...
ZAYTOUN (Feature – Israel, UK) & LUCY (Short)
Coachella Valley Premiere – Sneak Preview ZAYTOUN Showing with short “LUCY” – Guest, Libby Blood, Director/Writer In 1982, amid the Lebanese Civil War, Israeli pilot Yoni (Stephen Dorff) is shot down over Beirut and is taken prisoner by...
SPINNING PLATES (USA)
Coachella Valley Premiere – One Time Screening Special Guest: Joseph Levy – Director / Writer / Producer / Editor SPINNING PLATES is a documentary about three extraordinary restaurants and the incredible people who make them what they are. A cutting-edge restaurant...
THE STURGEON QUEENS (USA), GUS (USA) and IN BED AT 10 PM (Israel)
COACHELLA VALLEY PREMIERES STURGEON QUEENS: 100-year-old Hattie Russ Gold and her sister, 92-year-old Anne Russ Federman, have life stories that hit all the key notes of the New York Jewish immigrant experience: hardwork, humor, romance, and a little tsuris. Hattie...
SOME VELVET MORNING (USA)
West Coast Premiere Stanley Tucci stars as a man who surprises his former mistress (Alice Eve), claiming to have left his wife. Before too long, a dark history between the two has come into focus. “This film is an emotional see-saw… I am in awe of...Donate Today!
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