Park Pictures Features’ latest narrative feature film offerings, the John Slattery-directed drama God’s Pocket and the dramatic comedy Infinitely Polar Bear (written and directed by Maya Forbes) have been chosen for the 2014 Sundance Film Festival’s prestigious Dramatic Competition. With Park Pictures Features’ debut film Robot & Frank a Sundance award winner in 2012, this marks the Manhattan studio’s second and third film at the festival.
God’s Pocket, with screenplay by John Slattery and Alex Metcalf, stars Philip Seymour Hoffman, Richard Jenkins, Christina Hendricks and John Turturro. The film follows Mickey (Hoffman), whose stepson Leon is killed in a construction “accident.” Mickey tries to bury the bad news with the body, but when the boy’s mother demands the truth, Mickey finds himself stuck between a body he can’t bury, a wife he can’t please, and a debt he can’t pay.
The film was produced by Park Pictures Features in association with Hoffman’s Cooper’s Town and Slattery’s Shoestring Pictures. Producers are Sam Bisbee, Jackie Kelman Bisbee, Lance Acord, John Slattery, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Emily Ziff.
Infinitely Polar Bear marks Forbes' directing debut . The film stars Mark Ruffalo and Zoe Saldana. Set in the ‘70s, the story follows a manic-depressive mess of a father who tries to win back his wife by attempting to take full responsibility of their two spirited daughters. Paper Street Films co-produced the film with Park Pictures Features in association with Bad Robot. The film was produced by Wally Wolodarsky, Benji Kohn, Bingo Gubelmann, Sam Bisbee and Galt Niederhoffer and its executive producers include JJ Abrams, Bryan Burk, Austin Stark and Park’s Jackie Kelman Bisbee.
Park Pictures, the commercial production house founded in 1998 by director and cinematographer Acord and executive producer Jackie Kelman Bisbee, formed narrative feature company Park Pictures Features with film producer Sam Bisbee in 2011. Park Pictures Features first film, Robot & Frank, won the Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize (shared with the feature Valley of Saints) at Sundance in 2012. The Alfred P. Sloan honor is bestowed on films that “explore science and technology themes or that depict scientists, engineers and mathematicians in engaging and innovative ways.” Robot & Frank also marked the feature directorial debut of Jake Schrier, who is on Park Pictures’ directors roster for commercials and branded content. Christopher Ford was nominated for a 2013 Film Independent Spirit Award in the Best First Screenplay category on the basis of Robot & Frank.
