Tag Archives: Werner Herzog

Robert Rodriguez Directing Season Two of Disney+’s “The Mandalorian”

Posted on by
Reply

Robert Rodriguezis heading to a galaxy far, far away…

The 51-year-old Mexican American director/producer will serve as the director for Season 2 of Disney+’s The Mandalorian.

Robert Rodriguez

The Sin City and Spy Kidsfilmmaker tweeted a photo of himself with “the biggest star in the universe,” aka Baby Yoda.

“I am truly humbled to say I now have had the very rare privilege of directing the biggest star in the universe,” Rodriguez tweeted.

Production on the sophomore season of the Star Warsspinoff series already has wrapped. 

Among the new faces for Season 2 are Rosario Dawson, Michael Biehnand a recurring Bill Burr. They join returning stars including Pedro Pascalin the title role, Gina Carano, Giancarlo Esposito, Emily Swallow, Carl Weathers, Omid Abtahi, Werner Herzog,Nick Nolte, Julia Jonesand Ming-Na Wen.

The live-action interstellar bounty hunter series premiered on November 12 on Disney+, the day the streaming service launched. Insiders have hinted that several established characters from the Skywalker saga’s feature films mythology will make appearances during the show’s sophomore season.

Season 2 of The Mandalorianwill premiere in the fall, but work already has begunon Season 3.

Soares to Perform at This Year’s Red Bull Music Academy Festival

Posted on by
Reply

Elza Soares will be seeing Red (Bull).

The 79-year-old Brazilian samba queen, known as Tina Turner brasileira, will perform at this year’s ingeniously curated Red Bull Music Academy Festival.

Elza Soares

The New York-based festival boasts a tantalizing array of music, art, film and dance.

In addition to Soares, beloved figures like Solange, Gucci Mane, New Jack Swing mastermind Teddy Riley and iconoclastic filmmaker Werner Herzog are all part of this year’s roster, as well as disco pioneer Patrick Adams and Detroit house legend Moodyman, who will perform a set in tribute to Prince.

Click here for the full lineup and to get more information.

Velasco Selected for Film Independent’s Directing Lab

Posted on by
Reply

The future looks bright for Aldo Velasco…

The Mexican filmmaker and playwright has been selected by Film Independent as one of the participants for  its 12th annual Directing Lab.

Aldo Velasco

The annual program is designed to assist promising directors develop new narrative feature films, improve their craft and advance their filmmaking careers in a nurturing yet challenging environment. The selected filmmakers are provided digital camera and sound packages and a cash stipend to shoot scenes, as well as access to a variety of production resources.

Velasco, born in Guadalajara, Mexico, has seen his short films screened at the Sundance Film Festival, SXSW and Los Angeles Film Festival, among others. In 2009, he received a grant from ITVS (Independent Television Service) to write and direct the short film Tent City for the first season of the online Futurestates series. Aldo is also an editor of feature films. Recently, he edited Chittagong the epic Indian historical drama directed by Bedabrata Pain. He also edited Grace Leeʼs political mock documentary Janeane From Des Moines, which recently premiered at the Toronto Film Festival.

Velasco will work on his project, God Love Stu, true story of Stu Rasmussen, who convinced his conservative hometown in Oregon to elect him as the first transgender mayor in history.

But Velasco isn’t the only Latino selected to the Film Independent’s Directing Lab.

Brazilian-American filmmaker Alex Moratto will take part in the lab. He’s a graduate of the UNC School of the Arts, School of Filmmaking where he was a Kenan Scholar and studied film directing under Peter Bogdanovich. His thesis film The Other Side won the 2010 Jury Award from the Directors Guild of America for Latino filmmaker. Moratto attended Werner Herzogʼs 2010 Rogue Film School Seminar and was the recipient of the 2012 North Carolina Arts Council Artist Fellowship for Screenwriting.

Moratto’s project is the Untitled Amazon Project. When armed loggers threaten to evict their family from their rural home in the Amazon, two brothers smuggle rare lumber in hopes of selling it on the black market for money to save their land.

The lab, which began this week, runs through mid-April.