SXSW Sydney 2024: Nightbitch and Saturday Night premieres to lead film program
SXSW Sydney has unveiled the headliners of its film program.
The line-up is led by Nightbitch, the Marielle Heller (Can You Ever Forgive Me?) movie that is already generating Oscar buzz for its star, Amy Adams, after its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival earlier this month.
Nightbitch tells the story of a frustrated suburban stay-at-home mother who sometimes transforms into a dog. It also features Scoot McNairy and Zoe Chao.
Sign up to The Nightly's newsletters.
Get the first look at the digital newspaper, curated daily stories and breaking headlines delivered to your inbox.
By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.The festival will also host the Australian premiere of Saturday Night, filmmaker Jason Reitman’s (Away We Go, Juno) movie based on the behind-the-scenes drama of the first episode of Saturday Night Live.
The cast features Gabriel LaBelle as SNL’s formidable boss Lorne Michaels, Cory Michael Smith as Chevy Chase, Dylan O’Brien as Dan Aykroyd, Nicholas Braun as Andy Kaufman, Rachel Sennott as Rosie Shuster and Ella Hunt as Gilda Radner.
If you’re more of a horror fan, Smile 2, starring Naomi Scott, will premiere at SXSW Sydney, as will The Front Room, a return to the big screen for Brandy.
The headliner’s program is rounded out by Pavements, an experimental concert film/biopic from Alex Ross Perry, who had previously made Her Smell. It’s been described as a hybrid of “narrative, scripted, documentary, musical and metatextual”.
The festival had previously announced highlights from its screen line-up including Sing Sing, the drama about a wrongly imprisoned man starring Colman Domingo (also generating Oscar buzz), and Didi, a coming-of-age story from Taiwanese-American filmmaker Sean Wang.
There is also Never Look Away, New Zealand Lucy Lawless’s directorial debut, a documentary about war photojournalist Margaret Moth, and Azrael, which stars Samara Weaving as a woman making her escape from a cult in a post-apocalyptic world.
The speakers program will include Australian filmmaker Warwick Thornton, composer Jed Kurzel and producer Josey McNamara, who is a partner in Margot Robbie’s production company LuckyChap.
SXSW Sydney will run from October 14th to the 20th.
