CINEPHILE SPOTLIGHT: MAMMOTH FILM FESTIVAL™ 2023
MAMMOTH FILM FESTIVAL™ 2023 Notable Selections Highlights include the exclusive World Premieres of “Bonded” starring Golden Globe Nominee Diego Calva, “Bad Hombres” starring Luke Hemsworth, Tyrese Gibson, Thomas Jane and Nick Cassavetes, “Some Other Woman” directed by Avatar’s Joel David Moore starring Amanda Crew, Ashley Greene-Khoury and Tom Felton, International Feature Film “The Engineer” starring Emile Hirsch, and Robert Davi directed by Danny A. Abeckaser, “Rise” from Maritte Lee Go starring Joy Sunday, Peter Mensah and Chike Okonkwo. Documentary “American Badass” starring Michael Madsen from director Dominique Milano featuring Quentin Tarantino, John Travolta, Daryl Hannah, Virginia Madsen. World Premiere of Action Feature “On Fire” directed by Peter Facinelli and Nick Lyon, starring Facinelli along with Lance Henriksen, Ross McCall and Asher Angel, Feature Thriller “Dyad” with an extensive cast such as Lou Ferrigno Jr, Nick Cassavetes, Christian Combs, and Yellowstone's Rob Kirkland, “The Duel'' starring Dylan Sprouse, Hart Denton and Patrick Warburton, among many others, with more to be announced in coming weeks. Expanded information on the above films, and additional films, listed below.
The highly anticipated Mammoth Film Festival™ 2023 taking place March 2-6th, 2023 will feature over 80 films selected from an overwhelming response of submissions via FilmFreeway, inclusive of U.S and International World Premieres across the Feature, Documentary, Short, Music Video and Episodic categories, with a highlighted Action Sports category. The festival strives to showcase world premieres from incredible young and seasoned filmmakers, layered with both talented up-and-comers and established renowned actors, across diverse backgrounds.
The 2023 Mammoth Film Festival™ lineup will kick off in the features category with the world premieres of “Bonded” starring Golden Globe nominee Diego Calva (“Babylon”), Jason Patric, Paulina Gaitan, Alfredo Castro, Renata Vaca and Ari Lopez, Inspired by a true story from the Golden Globe winning producers of “Argentina 1985,” and executive producer Yalitza Aparicio; “Bad Hombres” starring Luke Hemsworth, Tyrese Gibson, Thomas Jane, Nick Cassavetes, Hemky Madera, Paul Johansson, Diego Tinoco and directed by John Stalberg. “Some Other Woman” will be headlining Friday Fright Night, a staple of the fest and is directed by Joel David Moore (“Avatar”) starring Amanda Crew, Ashley Greene-Khoury, Tom Felton, Rick Fox, and Brooke Lyons; the International Feature “The Engineer” directed by Danny A. Abeckaser, starring Emile Hirsch along with Abeckaser, Robert Davi, Kyle Stefanski and Israeli stars Angel Bonanni, Tsahi Halevi, Oshri Cohen, Dan Mor, Yarden Toussia-Cohen, Adam Elon and Omer Hazan, based on the story of Hamas Bombmaker and militant Yahya Ayyash; Action Feature film “On Fire” directed by Peter Facinelli and Nick Lyon, also starring Peter Facinelli, Asher Angel, Lance Henriksen, Ross McCall and Fiona Dourif; and Feature film “Dyad” with Nick Cassavetes, Paul Johannson, Rob Kirkland (Mayor of Kingstown,Yellowstone), Lou Ferrigno Jr, Christian Combs, Melanie Rains, Denny Love, Miraj Grbic and Mark Hapka.
World premiere features are also set to include the feature “Rise” from Maritte Lee Go and producer Maurice Fadida starring Jimmy Akingbola, Joy Sunday (Wednesday), Peter Mensah, Sasha Morfaw, Sufe Bradshaw and Chike Okonkwo; MammothFF’s First Time Filmmaker Spotlight is set to highlight actors turned directors Luke Roberts and Justin Matthews who will premiere “The Duel'' starring Dylan Sprouse, Hart Denton and Patrick Warburton.
The documentary category is highlighted by the world premiere of Michael Madsen’s “American Badass: A Michael Madsen Retrospective” from director Dominique Milano, featuring Quentin Tarantino, John Travolta, Ron Perlman, Paul Sorvino, Mario Kassar, Angie Everhart, Donald Gladstein, William Baldwin, Chuck Zito, Mike Starr, Robert Forster, Daryl Hannah, Virginia Madsen, Charlie Sheen, and“Citizen Athlete,” leads with anticipation in the Actions Sports category, of documentaries, written by Ryan March, directed by Brandt Wille, and starring Olympians and pro athletes Elana Meyers, Hunter Church and Kaillie Humphries of the U.S. Olympic Women's Bobsled Competition. Logline: An intimate and inside look to the Women's US Bobsled team leading up to the 2022 Beijing Olympics.
Other stand out films across Features, Documentaries, Episodics, and Shorts categories will continue to be announced leading up to the festival. The shorts category, inclusive of domestic and international shorts, is known to showcase directorial debuts year after year from established actors looking to expand their filmmaking careers, this year highlighting a variety of female directors. The Episodic block has become a signature focal point of the festival, allowing talent to also showcase work in the television space, and has led to numerous project sales and development deals as a result.
Episodic World Premieres, Episodic Previews and Shorts take center stage include “The Many Worlds of George Goodman,” starring and produced by Blair Redford, written and directed by Gregg Bishop, “A Girl. A Guy. A Ford. A Love Story” starring Melissa Kirkendall, Alexandra Chando and Blair Redford, the Lucas Grabeel-directed short “Lucas Needs an Agent” starring Corbin Bleu and Katie Leclerc, and “Hysterical” directed by April Mureau with an all-female cast starring Christine Lahti, Emily Hanley, Helen Hong and Kimia Behpoornia, and "Better Daze" by Jon Carlo and Kyle Stefanski, to name a few.
The Action Sports category which ranges from shorts to documentaries to features, is important to the festival to represent its roots, being that it centers around a sporting destination for skiing, snowboarding, golf and more, drawing notable athletes and Olympians all year round. This year to note, Jeremy McGrath, one of the most popular American Motocross/Supercross champions in the history of the sport genre, is not only being honored at the festival but also will showcase a never before seen mini documentary layered with an intimate Q&A session.
The judges panel this year is thrilled to announce thus far the participation of Rob Weiss (Writer/Producer, Entourage, Ballers), Ashley Benson (Actress), Jamie Chung (Actress), Geoff Stults (Actor), Luke Watson (Writer/Producer), Curt Morgan (Producer/Art of Flight, Dark Matter), Carly Margulies (USA Olympic Team) and Daysha Broadway (Emmy Winner/Editor)
With the 2023 schedule introducing expanded programming, including a larger footprint across the town of Mammoth Lakes, the festival marks the return of their Celebrity Charity Bowling Tournament, an attendee favorite, on Sunday March 5th to benefit Mammoth Media Institute, and also announces a shift in their closing awards, which will now consist of a luncheon ceremony on Monday, March 6th emceed by Jonathan Kite and Chris Reinacher. The festival will kick off on March 2nd at Minaret Cinemas with its opening night world premiere feature screening and red carpet, led in by a selected short presentation, followed by their opening night gala reception at Canyon Lodge. New venues will be integrated throughout the town of Mammoth, with a schedule highlighted by signature elements such as their Friday Midnight Feature and Saturday Night Special Spotlight, amongst others.
“Mammoth Film Festival looks ahead with great anticipation for its future as it breaks barriers to elevate the standard for film festivals by embracing our film competition, understanding the value of our coveted screenings and world premieres and establishing our marketplace to elevate our official selections. We are proud to celebrate each and every film that is selected, and proud to be California’s favorite winter film festival.” – Festival co-founders Tanner Beard and Tomik Mansoori
As Mammoth Film Festival™ continues to emerge as a budding festival, continuously gaining global attention and recognition year after year, its circuit furthermore proves its effectiveness when it comes to filmmakers getting business done. With countless success stories, MammothFF has been gaining a reputation as a place where filmmakers want to world premiere, first timers want to debut, and where producers are getting their films in the hands of key distribution companies, resulting in numerous sales to date. In addition to the successful sales and premieres to press acclaim, there have been many young talents that have landed representation as a result of being recognized as a festival award winner at Mammoth Film Festival™
Showcasing diversity but also holding true that everyone stands shoulder to shoulder at Mammoth Film Festival™ as simply “filmmakers” celebrating the completion of their work throughout the selections is extremely important to the festival founders.
Mammoth Film Festival™ has been quickly growing in status and attention since 2018, making it a sought after film festival that continues to gain traction and is supported by talented filmmakers from around the world, especially North America. With past festivals featuring films and television episodic screened, sold and showcased by icons and established industry players such as Quentin Tarantino, Emile Hirsch, Joel David Moore, Jeff Kalligheri, Tony Hawk, Kate Bosworth, Zac Efron, Luke Hemsworth, Dante Spinotti, Chike Okonkwo, Barbara Palvin, Hana Mae Lee, Richard Kind, Michael Madsen, Tara Wood, Lesley-Ann Brandt, Alyssa Milano, Katie Cassidy, James Lafferty, Josh Duhamel, Peter Facinelli, Anne Heche, Ashley Greene, Lukas Haas, Xzibit, Brendan Murphy of FLUXX and many more. There is no doubt that the 2023 festival lineup and programming, with more announcements to follow, will continue to be equally impressive to this year’s attendees and supporters.
A large part of the Mammoth Film Summit Interactive Panels, a key component to the annual festival, is the annual Her Voice roundtable discussion of female filmmakers which has hosted everyone in the past from Jennifer Morrison (Actor/Director), Ngoc Nguyen (Times Up), Laura Lewis (Rebelle Media), Kat Graham (Actor/Producer), Shannon McIntosh (Producer), and many more, hosted by “Her Voice” podcast creator and Festival Manager, Alexandra Chando.
Another groundbreaking panel being introduced from Mammoth Film Summit’s Interactives,“The Importance of Indie Projects and Breaking it Down,” will focus on the premiere screening of “Radio Telescope,” a project created by members of the Mammoth Media Institute.
Festival co-founders Tanner Beard and Tomik Mansoori are extremely passionate and dedicated to the festival filmmakers and attending film enthusiasts, as well as supporting the town of Mammoth Lakes, therefore committed to ensuring a responsible film festival experience that incorporates and supports local businesses, and encourages town tourism.
The festival, led by Tanner Beard, Tomik Mansoori, Theo Dumont, Alexandra Chando, Nicole Castro, Alexandra Lasky and Evan Weissman. Partners for this year include Wild7Films, El Cristiano Tequila, Sierra Nevada Resort, Saldo Wines, Path Water, and many more.
About Mammoth Film Festival™
March 2-6th, 2023 in Mammoth Lakes, CA
Mammoth Film Festival™ aims to lead the charge for an ever-changing landscape of film and media. Founded by seasoned filmmakers Tanner Beard and Tomik Mansoori, the international festival first premiered in 2018 and is specialized as an all-media platform, celebrating varieties of filmmakers, actors, directors, writers, producers and their respective work. Mammoth Film Festival™ is a 501c-3 nonprofit festival benefiting the Mammoth Media Institute and Mammoth Film Summit programs. Regal with the wonderful town of Mammoth Lakes, CA as its beautiful backdrop, MammothFF is held annually each February at the Minaret Cinemas along with a variety of establishments throughout town, with The Village serving as the festival hub. The festival includes Red Carpet World Premieres and Special Screenings, an annual Celebrity Bowling Tournament, a slate of Educational and Interactive Panel Discussions with Top Film Industry Leaders, Q&A’s, Press Conferences, and a large array of experiential elements, closing out with an Awards Ceremony to acknowledge the excellence of its participating filmmakers and a vastly growing marketplace.
For festival information, the full 2023 lineup and continued festival updates please visit: mammothfilmfestival.org and Download their IOS App to follow along for
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