Chicago – Closing Night for the 2024 Chicago Critics Film Festival (Ccff) is Thursday, May 9th, and the final film centerpiece is “Ghostlight,” directed by Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson. For the full schedule, info and tickets, click Ccff Closing Night. For individual films, click titles below.
Ghostlight
Writer/Co-Director Kelly O’Sullivan (inset) of ‘Ghostlight’
Photo credit: ChicagoCriticsFilmFestival.com
Dan (Keith Kupferer) is a middle-aged construction worker grieving a family tragedy, and has cut himself off from his devoted wife Sharon (Tara Mallen) and talented but troubled daughter Daisy (Katherine Mallen Kupferer). Through an accidental circumstance, Dan finds comfort and community in a misfit company of amateur actors. While performing for the first in a low-rent production for one of Shakespeare’s most famous tragedies, Dan is forced to confront his buried emotions.
Capsule Review: The premise has sitcom-like plot drivers to get the reluctant Dan on stage, but the path...
Ghostlight
Writer/Co-Director Kelly O’Sullivan (inset) of ‘Ghostlight’
Photo credit: ChicagoCriticsFilmFestival.com
Dan (Keith Kupferer) is a middle-aged construction worker grieving a family tragedy, and has cut himself off from his devoted wife Sharon (Tara Mallen) and talented but troubled daughter Daisy (Katherine Mallen Kupferer). Through an accidental circumstance, Dan finds comfort and community in a misfit company of amateur actors. While performing for the first in a low-rent production for one of Shakespeare’s most famous tragedies, Dan is forced to confront his buried emotions.
Capsule Review: The premise has sitcom-like plot drivers to get the reluctant Dan on stage, but the path...
- 5/9/2024
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
"The lines are the easy part. The hard part is the emotional journey." IFC Films has revealed the trailer for Ghostlight, an acclaimed indie drama that first premiered at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival earlier this year. I caught it there and I have to say - this really is a gem, it surprised & moved me in many unexpected ways. Co-directors Alex Thompson & Kelly O'Sullivan's previous film, Saint Frances, received widespread praise on the regional festival circuit & national stage, including noms from the Indie Spirit Awards and The Gotham Awards. This is their latest film creation. When melancholic construction worker Dan finds himself drifting from his wife and daughter, he discovers community and purpose in a local theater's production of Romeo & Juliet. As the drama onstage starts to mirror his own life, he and his family are forced to confront a personal loss. Stars newcomer Keith Kupferer as Dan,...
- 5/6/2024
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
When Chicago-based filmmakers Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson first came across our radar with their charming “Saint Frances,” it was clear we were witnessing the birth of a powerhouse pair of indie filmmakers. Even in that first film, which marked Thompson’s feature directorial debut and that O’Sullivan both wrote and starred in, what would become their signature was obvious: a canny combination of heart and humor that go beyond basic loglines.
“Saint Frances” was eventually nominated for three Gotham Awards and the Indie Spirits’ vaunted John Cassavetes Award, and when chatting with IndieWire about their delightful gem, the pair even admitted that simple plotlines don’t quite do their works justice. “Saint Frances” comes with what seems like a downer of a description: “After an accidental pregnancy turned abortion, a deadbeat nanny finds an unlikely friendship with the 6-year-old she’s charged with protecting.” As the duo told...
“Saint Frances” was eventually nominated for three Gotham Awards and the Indie Spirits’ vaunted John Cassavetes Award, and when chatting with IndieWire about their delightful gem, the pair even admitted that simple plotlines don’t quite do their works justice. “Saint Frances” comes with what seems like a downer of a description: “After an accidental pregnancy turned abortion, a deadbeat nanny finds an unlikely friendship with the 6-year-old she’s charged with protecting.” As the duo told...
- 5/6/2024
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
IFC Films announced that Ghostlight, acquired by the studio out of this year’s Sundance Film Festival where it made its world premiere, will open in New York City and Chicago on Friday, June 14, 2024 before expanding nationwide the following week.
The film is co-directed by Chicagoans Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan and written by O’Sullivan, and stars real-life family Keith Kupferer, Tara Mallen, and Katherine Mallen Kupferer, as well as Dolly De Leon (Triangle of Sadness).
The film follows Dan, a melancholic construction worker who finds himself drifting from his wife and daughter, he discovers community and purpose in a local theater’s production of Romeo and Juliet. As the drama onstage starts to mirror his own life, he and his family are forced to confront a personal loss.
“We are beyond excited to be bringing this project that is so near and dear to our hearts to the big screen this summer,...
The film is co-directed by Chicagoans Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan and written by O’Sullivan, and stars real-life family Keith Kupferer, Tara Mallen, and Katherine Mallen Kupferer, as well as Dolly De Leon (Triangle of Sadness).
The film follows Dan, a melancholic construction worker who finds himself drifting from his wife and daughter, he discovers community and purpose in a local theater’s production of Romeo and Juliet. As the drama onstage starts to mirror his own life, he and his family are forced to confront a personal loss.
“We are beyond excited to be bringing this project that is so near and dear to our hearts to the big screen this summer,...
- 4/18/2024
- by Valerie Complex
- Deadline Film + TV
A masterfully crafted work with nearly no false notes, Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson’s Ghostlight is a tender drama bearing profound moments of humor and small triumphs. The smartly constructed script by O’Sullivan buries the lede, revealing new narrative information with each layer as we watch a nuclear family slowly come apart and, later, find solace in the wake of their son’s suicide. Anchored by a real-life family, the film feels as if it’s been meticulously workshopped with the same intimate collaboration that gave O’Sullivan and Thompson’s last feature, Saint Frances, its authentic nuances.
Dan Muller (Keith Kupferer) is first presented to us as a small-town construction worker with a short temper and family drama. He has a rebellious 15-year-old daughter Daisy (Katherine Mallen Kupferer) and his marriage to Sharon (Tara Mallen) is on the rocks. Love holds the family together, and following an...
Dan Muller (Keith Kupferer) is first presented to us as a small-town construction worker with a short temper and family drama. He has a rebellious 15-year-old daughter Daisy (Katherine Mallen Kupferer) and his marriage to Sharon (Tara Mallen) is on the rocks. Love holds the family together, and following an...
- 3/13/2024
- by John Fink
- The Film Stage
El éxito del terror indie en Sundance: “Talk to Me” pasa el testigo a “I Saw the TV Glow” en su 40ª edición.
El Festival de Cine de Sundance ha terminado y por ello os traemos nuestro análisis del festival. Un festival en el que anteriormente se estrenaron mundialmente películas muy aclamadas como “Brooklyn”, “Hereditary”, “Manchester By The Sea”, “Little Miss Sunshine”, “Get Out” o “Whiplash”. Y es que, esta temporada de premios aún no ha terminado y ya estamos con los ojos puestos en las películas de Sundance para ver cuál ha destacado y si alguna de ellas podría unirse a esta lista de películas aclamadas que tuvieron su estreno en el festival. Así que, pasemos al análisis.
Como siempre, para obtener una visión más clara acerca de las reacciones del festival, hemos optado por realizar un análisis utilizando como fuente los datos de Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic y Letterboxd.
El Festival de Cine de Sundance ha terminado y por ello os traemos nuestro análisis del festival. Un festival en el que anteriormente se estrenaron mundialmente películas muy aclamadas como “Brooklyn”, “Hereditary”, “Manchester By The Sea”, “Little Miss Sunshine”, “Get Out” o “Whiplash”. Y es que, esta temporada de premios aún no ha terminado y ya estamos con los ojos puestos en las películas de Sundance para ver cuál ha destacado y si alguna de ellas podría unirse a esta lista de películas aclamadas que tuvieron su estreno en el festival. Así que, pasemos al análisis.
Como siempre, para obtener una visión más clara acerca de las reacciones del festival, hemos optado por realizar un análisis utilizando como fuente los datos de Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic y Letterboxd.
- 1/31/2024
- by Marta Medina
- mundoCine
The Sundance Film Festival has wrapped in snowy Park City, and Deadline was on the ground to watch all of the key films. Here is a compilation of our reviews from the fest, which include festival award winners like Daughters, the documentary that took the Festival Favorite Award, and A Real Pain, which won the Waldo Salt Screenwriter Award for its writer-director-star Jesse Eisenberg.
Other pics include several that were scooped up by distributors, led by Steven Soderbergh’s ghost story Presence selling to Neon, A Real Pain going to Searchlight, Ghostlight to IFC Films, and Netflix’s smash $17 million deal for It’s What’s Inside.
Check out the reviews below, click on the titles to read them in full, and keep checking back as we add more.
The American Society of Magical Negroes (L-r) Justice Smith and David Alan Grier in ‘The American Society of Magical Negroes’
Section: Premieres
Director-screenwriter: Kobi Libii
Cast: Justice Smith,...
Other pics include several that were scooped up by distributors, led by Steven Soderbergh’s ghost story Presence selling to Neon, A Real Pain going to Searchlight, Ghostlight to IFC Films, and Netflix’s smash $17 million deal for It’s What’s Inside.
Check out the reviews below, click on the titles to read them in full, and keep checking back as we add more.
The American Society of Magical Negroes (L-r) Justice Smith and David Alan Grier in ‘The American Society of Magical Negroes’
Section: Premieres
Director-screenwriter: Kobi Libii
Cast: Justice Smith,...
- 1/29/2024
- by Damon Wise, Valerie Complex and Pete Hammond
- Deadline Film + TV
IFC Films and Sapan Studio have acquired the North American rights to “Ghostlight,” the second film from “Saint Frances” directors Alex Thompson & Kelly O’Sullivan which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.
The film stars Keith Kupferer as Dan, a melancholic construction worker who unexpectedly joins a local theater’s production of ‘Romeo and Juliet.’ When the drama onstage starts to mirror his own life, he and his family are forced to address a recent tragedy.
Kupfarer stars alongside his wife, Tara Mallen, and their daughter Katherine Mallen Kupferer, who recently starred in the film adaptation of “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” “Triangle of Sadness” star Dolly De Leon rounds out the main cast.
“Alex and I have long admired IFC Films’ fierce championing of independent cinema and are thrilled to be partnering with a leader in the space along with Sapan Studio to release ‘Ghostlight,” O’Sullivan said in a statement.
The film stars Keith Kupferer as Dan, a melancholic construction worker who unexpectedly joins a local theater’s production of ‘Romeo and Juliet.’ When the drama onstage starts to mirror his own life, he and his family are forced to address a recent tragedy.
Kupfarer stars alongside his wife, Tara Mallen, and their daughter Katherine Mallen Kupferer, who recently starred in the film adaptation of “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” “Triangle of Sadness” star Dolly De Leon rounds out the main cast.
“Alex and I have long admired IFC Films’ fierce championing of independent cinema and are thrilled to be partnering with a leader in the space along with Sapan Studio to release ‘Ghostlight,” O’Sullivan said in a statement.
- 1/25/2024
- by Jeremy Fuster
- The Wrap
IFC Films and Sapan Studio have acquired North American rights to Sundance dramedy Ghostlight as the Sundance deals continnue to trickle in heading into the closing weekend.
Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan directed the story of a melancholic construction worker who joins a local production of Romeo And Juliet and addresses a recent tragedy when the play mirrors his own life.
Ghostlight debuted in Premieres on opening day and screens again on Friday and throughout the weekend. The real-life acting family of Keith Kupferer, Tara Mallen and their daughter Katherine Mallen Kupferer star alongside Dolly De Leon.
IFC Films plans...
Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan directed the story of a melancholic construction worker who joins a local production of Romeo And Juliet and addresses a recent tragedy when the play mirrors his own life.
Ghostlight debuted in Premieres on opening day and screens again on Friday and throughout the weekend. The real-life acting family of Keith Kupferer, Tara Mallen and their daughter Katherine Mallen Kupferer star alongside Dolly De Leon.
IFC Films plans...
- 1/25/2024
- ScreenDaily
IFC Films and Sapan Studio announced today that they have acquired the North American rights to Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan’s Ghostlight out of the Sundance premiere section.
The movie stars a real-life family of actors Keith Kupferer, Tara Mallen, and their daughter Katherine Mallen Kupferer (Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret) alongside Golden Globe nominee Dolly De Leon (Triangle of Sadness). A theatrical release is planned for this year.
Ghostlight centers on Keith Kupferer, in a star-making performance, as Dan, a melancholic construction worker who unexpectedly joins a local theater’s production of Romeo and Juliet. When the drama onstage starts to mirror his own life, he and his family are forced to address a recent tragedy. The pic is currently 100% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.
Movie was produced by Thompson, Pierce Craven, Chelsea Krant, Ian Keiser, Eddie Linker and Alex Wilson. Variety had the break on Ghostlight.
The movie stars a real-life family of actors Keith Kupferer, Tara Mallen, and their daughter Katherine Mallen Kupferer (Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret) alongside Golden Globe nominee Dolly De Leon (Triangle of Sadness). A theatrical release is planned for this year.
Ghostlight centers on Keith Kupferer, in a star-making performance, as Dan, a melancholic construction worker who unexpectedly joins a local theater’s production of Romeo and Juliet. When the drama onstage starts to mirror his own life, he and his family are forced to address a recent tragedy. The pic is currently 100% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.
Movie was produced by Thompson, Pierce Craven, Chelsea Krant, Ian Keiser, Eddie Linker and Alex Wilson. Variety had the break on Ghostlight.
- 1/25/2024
- by Anthony D'Alessandro
- Deadline Film + TV
IFC Films and Sapan Studio have acquired the North American rights to “Ghostlight” following its world premiere at Sundance Film Festival, where the tender-hearted drama drew strong reviews.
The film is the sophomore feature from Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan and follows their critically acclaimed 2019 debut “Saint Frances.” It stars a real-life family of actors — Keith Kupferer, Tara Mallen and their daughter Katherine Mallen Kupferer — as well as Golden Globe nominee Dolly De Leon, a breakout for her turn in “Triangle of Sadness.” IFC Films plans to release the film in theaters later this year.
“Ghostlight” centers around Dan, a melancholic construction worker who unexpectedly joins a local theater’s production of Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet.” But as the onstage drama mirrors his own life, Dan and his family are forced to grapple with a recent tragedy. In his Variety review, Peter Debruge wrote that the story was “beautifully told,...
The film is the sophomore feature from Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan and follows their critically acclaimed 2019 debut “Saint Frances.” It stars a real-life family of actors — Keith Kupferer, Tara Mallen and their daughter Katherine Mallen Kupferer — as well as Golden Globe nominee Dolly De Leon, a breakout for her turn in “Triangle of Sadness.” IFC Films plans to release the film in theaters later this year.
“Ghostlight” centers around Dan, a melancholic construction worker who unexpectedly joins a local theater’s production of Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet.” But as the onstage drama mirrors his own life, Dan and his family are forced to grapple with a recent tragedy. In his Variety review, Peter Debruge wrote that the story was “beautifully told,...
- 1/25/2024
- by Brent Lang
- Variety Film + TV
Live theater serves a therapeutic role for the actors involved in “Ghostlight,” an emotional “let’s put on a show”-style indie that, fittingly enough, came together during last year’s actors strike. The sensitive — but also considerably more conservative — follow-up project for “Saint Frances” screenwriter Kelly O’Sullivan and co-director (and partner) Alex Thompson celebrates the healing power of art, as a family shaken by its eldest son’s suicide uses a community theater production of “Romeo and Juliet” to work through emotions they haven’t been able to discuss openly at home.
O’Sullivan has a natural storytelling gift, coupled with a knack for comedy. Here, she takes elements that feature regularly in Sundance Film Festival dramas — grieving families, difficult teens, small-town communities — and rearranges them into a surprising and moving narrative. (Small wonder that the film was invited to premiere in Park City.) Some might reject that approach as being manipulative,...
O’Sullivan has a natural storytelling gift, coupled with a knack for comedy. Here, she takes elements that feature regularly in Sundance Film Festival dramas — grieving families, difficult teens, small-town communities — and rearranges them into a surprising and moving narrative. (Small wonder that the film was invited to premiere in Park City.) Some might reject that approach as being manipulative,...
- 1/19/2024
- by Peter Debruge
- Variety Film + TV
Getting impatient for Kenneth Lonergan to get his act together and make another great movie? Ghostlight should scratch that itch and more besides, being a funny, intelligent and yet at times almost unbearably sad movie that takes a searing family tragedy and spins it into a riveting redemption story that, while a little predictable in the more familiar second half, somehow never hits a false note. Although technically an ensemble piece, with a lovely cast of supporting players whose thespian antics will ring a bell with actors of all generations, it rests squarely on a powerhouse performance from Chicago stage veteran Keith Kupferer, whose career must surely about to enter a whole new phase, perhaps to the fill the void left by the late, great Brian Dennehy.
Directed by Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson, who caused a splash at SXSW in 2019 with Saint Frances, Ghostlight opens with a curtain-up, as...
Directed by Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson, who caused a splash at SXSW in 2019 with Saint Frances, Ghostlight opens with a curtain-up, as...
- 1/19/2024
- by Damon Wise
- Deadline Film + TV
Sundance film festival: Triangle of Sadness star Dolly De Leon steals scenes in an endearing story of a real family wrapped up in a lo-fi staging of Romeo and Juliet
The film-makers Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson know their way around the peaks and valleys of the everyday. Their breakout 2019 feature Saint Frances, written and starring O’Sullivan, sublimated what could be big strokes of drama – abortion, postpartum depression, getting older, lost time – into the unremarkable (on the outside) relationship between an aimless 34-year-old and her six-year-old nannying charge. The daily humors and challenges in one woman’s life were not particularly dramatic or arresting, but rendered with such curiosity and acceptance as to feel radical.
Ghostlight, the duo’s new feature premiering at the Sundance film festival, traffics in a similar leveling of mundanity and insight. (It’s also written by O’Sullivan.) There’s an appealing naturalness to the project,...
The film-makers Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson know their way around the peaks and valleys of the everyday. Their breakout 2019 feature Saint Frances, written and starring O’Sullivan, sublimated what could be big strokes of drama – abortion, postpartum depression, getting older, lost time – into the unremarkable (on the outside) relationship between an aimless 34-year-old and her six-year-old nannying charge. The daily humors and challenges in one woman’s life were not particularly dramatic or arresting, but rendered with such curiosity and acceptance as to feel radical.
Ghostlight, the duo’s new feature premiering at the Sundance film festival, traffics in a similar leveling of mundanity and insight. (It’s also written by O’Sullivan.) There’s an appealing naturalness to the project,...
- 1/19/2024
- by Adrian Horton in Park City, Utah
- The Guardian - Film News
Is there a more exhaustively, and exhaustingly, tackled theme in American independent film than grief?
Festival lineups and arthouses are littered with stories — some somber, some quirk-laden — of loss and trauma, mourning and memory, learning to live and love again after the passing of a child, a spouse, a sibling, a parent. Despite sublime exceptions like Manchester by the Sea and Rachel Getting Married, a dispiriting majority are basically cinematic white noise; there’s a numbing, rinse-and-repeat sameness to all the emotional repression, breakthroughs and release. Trying to take a shortcut to our most painful feelings, these films have the contrary effect of activating our defenses or, worse, our indifference.
Luckily, there are portraits of grief that bulldoze past our resistance, and their own shortcomings, thanks to the sheer force of their sincerity. Ghostlight, from Chicago-based writing-directing team Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson, is one of them. A dramedy about...
Festival lineups and arthouses are littered with stories — some somber, some quirk-laden — of loss and trauma, mourning and memory, learning to live and love again after the passing of a child, a spouse, a sibling, a parent. Despite sublime exceptions like Manchester by the Sea and Rachel Getting Married, a dispiriting majority are basically cinematic white noise; there’s a numbing, rinse-and-repeat sameness to all the emotional repression, breakthroughs and release. Trying to take a shortcut to our most painful feelings, these films have the contrary effect of activating our defenses or, worse, our indifference.
Luckily, there are portraits of grief that bulldoze past our resistance, and their own shortcomings, thanks to the sheer force of their sincerity. Ghostlight, from Chicago-based writing-directing team Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson, is one of them. A dramedy about...
- 1/19/2024
- by Jon Frosch
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Most reviews of Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson’s tender dramedy “Ghostlight” are likely to start with a definition of the title, but we’ll try to subvert that expectation a bit here.
Instead, we’ll open with a quote from this publication (and this very writer) on the pair’s uncanny knack for making gems that have loglines that don’t (that can’t) do justice to the tales they spin. The pair’s first feature, the similarly winning “Saint Frances,” packed what seemed like a downer of a description: “After an accidental pregnancy turned abortion, a deadbeat nanny finds an unlikely friendship with the 6-year-old she’s charged with protecting.” As the duo told IndieWire in 2021, “We struggled with that line too. It’s so funny, every time we describe the movie, we just want to say like, ‘We know, but—’” (that’s O’Sullivan), with Thompson cutting in,...
Instead, we’ll open with a quote from this publication (and this very writer) on the pair’s uncanny knack for making gems that have loglines that don’t (that can’t) do justice to the tales they spin. The pair’s first feature, the similarly winning “Saint Frances,” packed what seemed like a downer of a description: “After an accidental pregnancy turned abortion, a deadbeat nanny finds an unlikely friendship with the 6-year-old she’s charged with protecting.” As the duo told IndieWire in 2021, “We struggled with that line too. It’s so funny, every time we describe the movie, we just want to say like, ‘We know, but—’” (that’s O’Sullivan), with Thompson cutting in,...
- 1/19/2024
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
Fusion Entertainment has signed Keith Kupferer, the veteran stage and screen actor whose new film “Ghostlight” premieres this week at the Sundance Film Festival. Kupferer has also recently been cast in a recurring role in the new MGM+ series “Emperor of Ocean Park” from John Wells, which is currently in production in Chicago. The thriller series is based on the best selling novel by Stephen L. Carter.
“Ghostlight” centers on Dan (Kupferer), a melancholic middle-aged construction worker, who is grieving a family tragedy. Cut off from his devoted wife, Sharon (Tara Mallen), and talented but troubled daughter, Daisy (Katherine Mallen Kupferer), Dan finds comfort a local theater production of “Romeo & Juliet” featuring a company of amateur actors. “Ghostlight” is directed by Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson, who are also clients of Fusion Entertainment.)
Kupferer will also continue to be repped by the Grey Talent Group.
A seasoned stage performer,...
“Ghostlight” centers on Dan (Kupferer), a melancholic middle-aged construction worker, who is grieving a family tragedy. Cut off from his devoted wife, Sharon (Tara Mallen), and talented but troubled daughter, Daisy (Katherine Mallen Kupferer), Dan finds comfort a local theater production of “Romeo & Juliet” featuring a company of amateur actors. “Ghostlight” is directed by Kelly O’Sullivan and Alex Thompson, who are also clients of Fusion Entertainment.)
Kupferer will also continue to be repped by the Grey Talent Group.
A seasoned stage performer,...
- 1/18/2024
- by Brent Lang
- Variety Film + TV
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.