Mary Ford of New York-based Mary Ford & Co. has been named East Coast sales rep for HUM Music+Sound Design, Santa MonicaA.Montoya Reps, Dallas, has been signed to handle Southwest and Southeast representation for Porter Film Company, Hollywood, and Chicago-based Steve Ford Music… Julie Dey has been appointed regional marketing director for Broadcast Video Inc. (BVI), Miami, Coconut Grove and Miami Beach, and its sister companies, including convergent media production firm Visual Fire, visual effects division Deep Blue Sea and music/sound design shop Rockin’ Chair, all based in Miami. Dey will be located in Orlando, FlaA.Director Scott McCullough, who was previously handled via The Directors Network, Studio City, Calif., is lining up representation in different areas of the country, his latest link being with Paradox Films, Charlotte, N.C., for sales in the Carolinas, Virginia, Florida, Kentucky and Washington, D.C. Studio Productions, Nashville, continues to rep him in Tennessee, Mississippi, Arkansas and Louisiana….
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