U.S. and France-based live action production company Cadence Films has added executive producer Jenn Johnson to its team. Working closely alongside co-founder/EP Lorenzo Ragionieri, Johnson brings a keen creative eye and extensive background in sales and talent representation which will further Cadence’s mission: to bring ambitious, moving ideas to life. Johnson’s career includes a variety of prominent, high-impact positions, including president/lead sales at her own talent representation company, Open Season; executive producer and head of sales at the New York-based music production company Music and Strategy; and most recently, as a partner at talent representation firm Hustle. There she had the opportunity to work with leading directors including Michel Gondry, Martin Krejci, Antoine Bardou-Jacquet, Hannah Lux Davis, Drew Kirsch, and The Bobbsey Twins. Alongside her experience in bringing compelling stories to life on-screen, Johnson’s considerable background in sales, including tenures repping for RadicalMedia and B-Reel Films, gives her the tools to nurture rewarding relationships with creative stakeholders. It’s a winning combination that sets her up to approach this next chapter as an EP and to expand the reach and impact of Cadence’s groundbreaking and stylistically diverse work. “I’m looking forward to cultivating fresh opportunities for our filmmakers to make highly creative work,” said Johnson. “Repping certainly taught me how to turn over every rock, follow every lead, and dream big for my client. The chance to do this with a laser-focus on one specific roster is such a rewarding experience and one that I’ve been craving to take on”….
Integrated post house Lockt Editorial has secured L.A.-based indie firm Content Chemics–headed by Ezra Burke and Shane Harris–to handle representation on the West Coast. Lockt joins Content Chemics’ client roster alongside production companies Neighborhood Watch, Love Song and Stept Studios. In addition to its lineup of editor talent, Lockt houses a full VFX/CGI team, and a sound department….
Dalet, a technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, has expanded its DACH (Germany, Austria, and Switzerland) team leadership with the appointment of Massimo Dolce as regional sales manager. In collaboration with the Dalet Germany-based team, Massimo will spearhead new customer, partner, and industry engagements that feature the full Dalet product lineup. This includes the Dalet media logistics platform and the Dalet end-to-end news workflow solution; both augmented with the Dalet ecosystem of tools and services. Dolce joins recently hired presales solution architect and technical specialist for the DACH region, Tobias Stoessel, and the wider Dalet EMEA team including Enrique Lafuente, VP EMEA enterprise sales, Fabien Donato, director of presales, and Ewan Johnston, strategic alliances and channel partner director. Dolce comes to Dalet from duties with professional industry vendors over the years such as EditShare, Imagine Communications, NewTek, Sony and Vizrt….
Jennifer Kent On Why Her Feature Directing Debut, “The Babadook,” Continues To Haunt Us
"The Babadook," when it was released 10 years ago, didn't seem to portend a cultural sensation.
It was the first film by a little-known Australian filmmaker, Jennifer Kent. It had that strange name. On opening weekend, it played in two theaters.
But with time, the long shadows of "The Babadook" continued to envelop moviegoers. Its rerelease this weekend in theaters, a decade later, is less of a reminder of a sleeper 2014 indie hit than it is a chance to revisit a horror milestone that continues to cast a dark spell.
Not many small-budget, first-feature films can be fairly said to have shifted cinema but Kent's directorial debut may be one of them. It was at the nexus of that much-debated term "elevated horror." But regardless of that label, it helped kicked off a wave of challenging, filmmaker-driven genre movies like "It Follows," "Get Out" and "Hereditary."
Kent, 55, has watched all of this — and those many "Babadook" memes — unfold over the years with a mix of elation and confusion. Her film was inspired in part by the death of her father, and its horror elements likewise arise out of the suppression of emotions. A single mother (Essie Davis) is struggling with raising her young son (Noah Wiseman) years after the tragic death of her husband. A figure from a pop-up children's book begins to appear. As things grow more intense, his name is drawn out in three chilling syllables — "Bah-Bah-Doooook" — an incantation of unprocessed grief.
Kent recently spoke from her native Australia to reflect on the origins and continuing life of "The Babadook."
Q: Given that you didn't set out to in any way "change" horror, how have you regarded the unique afterlife of "The... Read More