Deadline Hollywood - Contenders Film: Los Angeles - 11/15/25
PRESENTATIONS
Saturday, November 15, 2025
AMAZON MGM STUDIOS
SONY PICTURES CLASSICS
CASTING PANEL
BLACK BEAR
HS PICTURES STUDIOS
SONY PICTURES CLASSICS
APPLE ORIGINAL FILMS
AMAZON MGM STUDIOS
After the Hunt Blue Moon Christy Dragon Heart — Adventures Beyond This World Eleanor the Great
Lettering By ALEXIS TAÏEB Cover Illustration By SCOTT ANDERSON
Allan Mandelbaum (Producer)
Malik Hassan Sayeed (Cinematographer)
Jessica Ronane (Casting Director)
Ethan Hawke (Actor)
Panelists to be announced
Sydney Sweeney (Producer/Actor)
Kerry Kohansky-Roberts (Producer)
Isamu Imakake (Director)
June Squibb (Actor) (virtual)
Tory Kamen (Writer/EP)
Panelists to be announced
Nia DaCosta (Writer/Director/Producer)
Tessa Thompson (Producer/Actor)
Cara Brower (Production Designer)
DHARMA PRODUCTIONS
NEON
SONY PICTURES CLASSICS
NEON
Homebound No Other Choice
Nuremberg
Sentimental Value
WARNER BROS. PICTURES
20TH CENTURY STUDIOS
STUNT PANEL
Sinners
Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere
PANELS AND SPEAKERS SUBJECT TO CHANGE
Neeraj Ghaywan (Director)
Ishaan Khatter (Actor)
Vishal Jethwa (Actor)
Park Chan-wook (Writer/Director/Producer)
Lee Byung Hun (Actor)
James Vanderbilt (Writer/Director)
Rami Malek (Actor)
Joachim Trier (Writer/Director)
Renate Reinsve (Actor)
Stellan Skarsgård (Actor)
Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas (Actor)
Elle Fanning (Actor)
Ryan Coogler (Writer/Director/Producer)
Scott Cooper (Writer/Director/Producer)
Ellen Goldsmith-Vein (Producer)
Eric Robinson (Producer)
Panelists to be announced
PRESENTING SPONSOR
SPONSORS
WELCOME TO DEADLINE CONTENDERS FILM: LA
We’re back home for our biggest stateside film showcase
By Antonia Blyth
Hot on the heels of our fabulous London Contenders event, Deadline is back home in LA where it all began— the birthplace of our Contenders event and the original beloved city of Hollywood moviemaking. Here on our stage, we will have some of the most talked-about films of the season, and a level of unstoppable talent that truly stands the test of time—here’s looking at you, June Squibb! While she will be beaming in virtually to our stage to chat with Eleanor the Great screenwriter and executive producer Tory Kamen, the 95-year-old Squibb has a pretty decent excuse for not being here in person: she’s busy preparing to tread the boards on Broadway.
Speaking of the theater, we’ll have a nod to Henrik Ibsen on hand with the team from Hedda, Nia DaCosta’s innovative screen adaptation of the play Hedda Gabler. DaCosta
WE WILL HAVE SOME OF THE MOST TALKEDABOUT FILMS, AND A LEVEL OF UNSTOPPABLE TALENT THAT TRULY STANDS THE TEST OF TIME.
will be joined by lead actress Tessa Thompson and production designer Cara Brower.
In another period story, we’re going back to WWII with Nuremberg—writerdirector James Vanderbilt’s close-up on a psychiatrist, played by Rami Malek, assigned to watch over the Nazis ahead of the Nuremberg trials. Vanderbilt and Malek will be here to talk about the film, which also stars Russell Crowe as Hermann Göring. Going further back still, we’re in 1930s Mississippi for some vampire magic from Sinners, starring Michael B. Jordan, not once, but twice. And writer-director-producer Ryan Coogler will be here to discuss with us.
And it’s back to school with Luca Guadagnino’s After the Hunt—the college-set drama written by firsttime screenwriter Nora Garrett and starring Julia Roberts, Ayo Edebiri and Andrew Garfield.
That’s not all. We return to the ’90s with Christy, a true-life story of a
champion boxer fighting her way to freedom from an oppressive marriage. Sydney Sweeney will be here to talk about taking on this very punchy role as an actor and producer, alongside producer Kerry Kohansky-Roberts.
All the way from South Korea, we have the satirical black comedy No Other Choice from filmmaker Park Chan-wook, who’ll have his lead actor Lee Byung Hun with him to discuss this film that takes unemployment issues to a whole new level.
From Norway, we have Sentimental Value, led by filmmaker Joachim Trier, with his The Worst Person in the World collaborator, lead actress Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsgård, Elle Fanning and newcomer Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas.
The makers of Homebound, the Oscar submission for India, will take to our stage too, with director Neeraj Ghaywan and actors Ishaan Khatter and Vishal Jethwa.
DID YOU CATCH THE 2025
ACADEMY WINNERS ON OUR COVER?
ADRIAN BRODY
The Brutalist
Adrien Brody won the 2025 Oscar and BAFTA for Best Actor for The Brutalist, portraying László Tóth, a HungarianJewish architect and Holocaust survivor rebuilding his life in postwar America.
We’ll also have stunning animation, with Japanese fantasy feature Dragon Heart — Adventures Beyond This World, from director Isamu Imkake.
You’ll want to strap in for the ride with F1, the Joseph Kosinski film that puts us in the hot seat with Brad Pitt and Damson Idris as they race to Formula 1 stardom If you need some soothing music after that, we’ve got not one, but two biopics for you. We’ll have the team from Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere, and Ethan Hawke will be here with Blue Moon, Richard Linklater’s film about songwriter Lorenz Hart.
Finally, we’re giving a shout out to those unsung heroes of the screen: stuntpeople, with their own panel. And those other behind-the-scenes gems: casting directors.
Now, just sit back and enjoy the ride, from time travel to international adventures and music!
MIKEY MADISON
Anora
Mikey Madison won the 2025 Oscar and BAFTA for Best Actress for Anora, portraying Ani, a Brooklyn stripper whose impulsive marriage to a Russian oligarch’s son leads to unexpected consequences.
MODERATORS MEET THE
The Deadline staffers who will guide you through this year’s Contenders
YOUR HOST
ANTONIA BLYTH
Executive Editor, AwardsLine
● A ntonia has contributed to Deadline and AwardsLine’s print magazines since 2014. A native Brit based in LA, prior to joining she covered West Coast entertainment for ELLE.com, and her work has been featured in The Guardian, U.K. Marie Claire and InStyle. She has written a New York Times bestselling non-fiction book and regularly appears on French television network TF1 as an entertainment expert (with subtitles, obviously).
YOUR MODERATORS
MIKE FLEMING
Co-Editor-in-Chief, Film
● Mike joined Deadline in 2010 after working at Variety for
20 years as a reporter, writer and columnist. He was not only nationally recognized as Variety’s premiere film reporter but also for his “Dish” and “The Buzz” columns. Mike is known for his industry relationships and his ability to break news wherever it happens, including on the ground at festivals like Sundance, Cannes and Toronto. He also is an author: Doubleday published his book about The Three Stooges, From Amalgamated Morons to American Icons, which ABC turned into a telepic executive produced by Mel Gibson. One of Mike’s early jobs in journalism was editor of the well-known Media Industry Newsletter (MIN). He then joined New York Newsday as a columnist, reviewer and entertainment writer. During his career,
he has written for numerous magazines including Playboy, Details, TV Guide and Esquire.
ANTHONY D’ALESSANDRO Editorial Director/Box Office Editor
● Anthony covers box office, breaking film news, awardsseason features and festival news. His first job in the film industry was at Savoy Pictures’ headquarters in New York where he worked in film distribution. In the summer of 1999, he was hired by Variety and moved to Los Angeles, and remained in the newsroom covering numerous parts of the industry, including box office, for about a decade. Prior to arriving at Deadline in the fall of 2011, where he co-edited the site’s sister publication AwardsLine, Anthony covered the box office beat for Indiewire’s Thompson on
Hollywood. He also co-produced Matt Walsh’s film
PETE HAMMOND
Awards Columnist/
Chief
Film Critic
● Pete, widely considered to be one of the pre-eminent awards analysts for both film and television, has for the past 14 years been Deadline’s Awards Columnist covering the yearround Oscar and Emmy seasons. He is also Deadline’s Chief Film Critic, having previously reviewed films for MovieLine, Boxoffice magazine, Backstage, Hollywood.com and Maxim, as well as Leonard Maltin’s Movie Guide for which he was a contributing editor. In addition to writing, Pete is also host of the PBS SoCal Cinema Series and the weekly PBS television series “Must See Movies.” He previously held producing positions at “Entertainment Tonight”, “Extra,” “Access Hollywood,” “The Arsenio Hall Show,” “The Martin Short Show” and AMC Networks and is the recipient of five Emmy nominations for writing. Pete is only the second journalist to have received the Publicists Guild of America’s Press Award twice, in 1996 and 2013.
RYAN FLEMING
Crafts Editor, Awards
● Ryan joined Deadline in March 2021 as Assistant Editor for AwardsLine. He received his MFA in Studio Art at The City College of New York in 2019. He contributes to the awards coverage of animation and the craft side of film and television. In his role as Crafts Editor, Ryan also contributes to the editing of Deadline’s AwardsLine magazines and interviews contenders above and below the line.
DESTINY JACKSON Awards Writer
● Destiny joined Deadline in September 2022 from Netflix’s pop-culture news site Tudum and a freelance writing career that includes bylines at Oscars. org, Marvel, IGN, TV Guide, Script Magazine, Backstage, Filmmaker Magazine and MovieMaker Magazine to name a few. When not stuck behind her laptop, she can be found haunting her local cinema, listening to Coldplay (unironically) or looking for pictures of Spider-Man. She is based in Los Angeles.
JUSTIN KROLL Film Editor
● Justin joined Deadline in July 2020 and covers all aspects of the film industry. Before Deadline, he had been with Variety since early 2008, starting as an intern before being upped to editorial assistant in 2009, and joining the film team in 2010. Before Variety, Kroll worked as a freelancer for Reuters in Los Angeles. He’s a graduate of Michigan State University.
20TH CENTURY STUDIOS
● Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere
Written and directed by Scott Cooper, based on the book of the same name by Warren Zanes, Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere follows the iconic New Jersey musician Bruce Springsteen (Jeremy Allen White) during the making of his stripped-down acoustic 1982 album Nebraska after the success of his Born to Run album. Jeremy Strong, Paul Walter Hauser, Stephen Graham and Odessa Young also star.
AMAZON MGM STUDIOS
● After the Hunt
Luca Guadagnino’s thriller After the Hunt follows a college professor (Julia Roberts) who
FILMS THE
3 2
finds herself in a dilemma of both the personal and the professional kind when an ambitious student (Ayo Edebiri) makes sexual harassment claims against another professor (Andrew Garfield). Michael Stuhlbarg and Chloë Sevigny also star, along with Lío Mehiel, Thaddea Graham, Will Price, Christine Dye and Burgess Byrd.
● Hedda
Based on Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen’s play Hedda Gabler, the film revolves around Hedda (Tessa Thompson), a newlywed constrained by the societal norms of the mid-20th century. Frustrated and wowed by luxury and excitement, she resorts to manipulation and destructive actions to get what she wants. As dark secrets come to light, Hedda must decide if this is truly the life she wants to lead. The film is written and directed by Nia DaCosta. Imogen Poots, Tom Bateman, Nicholas Pinnock, Nina Hoss and Kathryn Hunter also star.
1 Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere
2 After the Hunt
3 Hedda
THE FILMS
APPLE ORIGINAL FILMS
● F1
In Joseph Kosinski’s F1, Brad Pitt plays Sonny Hayes, a renowned Formula 1 driver during the 1990s, who gets into a tragic on-track accident that nearly ends his career. Three decades later, he’s a racer-for-hire when he’s approached by his former teammate Ruben Cervantes (Javier Bardem), owner of a struggling team on the verge of collapse. Cervantes convinces Sonny to take one last shot at saving the team and becoming the best in the world. The only things holding him back are memories of the past and his teammate Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris).
BLACK BEAR
● Christy
In Christy, Sydney Sweeney stars as the titular Christy Martin, a small-town West Virginia native who in the early 1990s became one of the first celebrity female boxers, rising to global star status under the guidance of her trainer-manager and eventual husband, Jim (Ben Foster). The eventual world super welterweight champ and
Boxing Hall of Famer’s toughest fights would come outside the ring, however, over family, identity and a relationship with Jim that turns dangerous and life-threatening. David Michôd directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Mirrah Foulkes. The cast also includes Katy O’Brian, Ethan Embry and Merritt Wever.
DHARMA PRODUCTIONS
● Homebound
Neeraj Ghaywan’s Homebound follows two childhood friends from a small North Indian village as they take an exam
to become police officers and chase a job that promises them the dignity they have long been denied. However, as they draw closer to their dream, mounting desperation threatens to undermine their friendship. The film stars Ishaan Khatter, Vishal Jethwa and Janhvi Kapoor, and is executive produced by Martin Scorsese.
HS PICTURE STUDIOS
● Dragon Heart — Adventures
Beyond This World
Directed by Isamu Imakake, the film follows the spirited journey of two teenagers who seemingly meet a tragic end while having a peaceful outing on a river. Ryusuke (Zach Aguilar), a junior high school student living in Tokyo, visits his rural-dwelling teenage cousin, Tomomi (Ren Holly Liu), for summer vacation. While there, the two have an outing on the Anabuki River, where they are swept away by the rushing current and drown. At the bottom of the river, they find a mysterious old man who informs them of their deaths but says he can bring them back to life if they explore the spirit world and find their mission in life. The cast includes Yûsuke Kobayashi, Chinatsu Hirose, Shigeru Chiba and Tetsuo Komura.
THE FILMS
NEON
● No Other Choice
In No Other Choice, after celebrating 25 years as a health and safety officer at a paper mill in South Korea, Man-soo (Lee Byung Hun) is brought down to earth when he is made redundant by the company’s new American owners. After several months of unemployment, Man-soo decides to take a radical new approach to job-seeking: killing the competition. Based on Donald Westlake’s 1997 American novel The Ax, the film is directed and co-written by Park Chan-wook, and also stars Son Ye-jin, Park Hee-soon, Lee Sung-min and Yoo Yeon-seok.
● Sentimental Value
In the Norwegian drama Sentimental Value, sisters Nora (Renate Reinsve) and Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) reunite with their estranged father (Stellan Skarsgård), a once-renowned director who offers Nora, a stage actress, a role in what he hopes will be his comeback film. When Nora turns it down, she discovers he has given her part to an
eager young Hollywood star (Elle Fanning). Suddenly, the two sisters must navigate their complicated relationship with their father and deal with an American star dropped into the middle of their complex family dynamic. Joachim Trier directs and co-writes alongside Eskil Vogt. Anders Danielsen Lie, Cory Michael Smith and Catherine Cohen also star.
SONY PICTURES
CLASSICS
● Blue Moon
Richard Linklater’s Blue Moon, written by Robert Kaplow, centers on the final days of Lorenz Hart (Ethan Hawke), a popular songwriter alongside his writing partner
Richard Rodgers. The setting is Sardi’s restaurant in New York, on March 31, 1943, the opening night of Oklahoma! the musical, which marked Rodgers’ first collaboration with Oscar Hammerstein II as Hart’s replacement after their falling out. The film also stars Margaret Qualley, Bobby Cannavale and Andrew Scott.
● Eleanor the Great Scarlett Johansson’s directorial debut, Eleanor the Great, stars June Squibb as Eleanor, a woman grieving the loss of Bessie (Rita Zohar), her best friend and roommate. When she moves to Manhattan to live with her daughter and grandson, Eleanor finds herself in search of connection in the strangest of places. When she inadvertently joins a Holocaust survivors’ group, Eleanor is reminded of her late friend Bessie’s harrowing experience growing up in Nazioccupied Poland. But when Nina (Erin Kellyman), a journalism student, takes a vested interest in Eleanor, the truth suddenly becomes a slippery subject.
● Nuremberg
Set post-World War II, James Vanderbilt’s Nuremberg chronicles the true story of the famous trials held by the
1 Sentimental Value
2 Eleanor the Great
3 Blue Moon
4 No Other Choice
THE FILMS
Allies against the defeated Nazi regime. The film is primarily told through the eyes of American psychiatrist Douglas Kelley (Rami Malek), who is tasked with determining whether Nazi prisoners are fit to stand trial. He finds himself in a complex battle of wits with Hermann Göring (Russell Crowe), Hitler’s right-hand man. The cast also includes Richard E. Grant, Leo Woodall, Colin Hanks and Michael Shannon.
WARNER BROS. PICTURES
● Sinners Ryan Coogler’s Southern vampire horror film Sinners stars Michel B. Jordan in dual roles as criminal twin brothers who return to their hometown of New Orleans for a fresh start after making names for themselves as gamblers and bootleggers working for the Chicago Outfit. However, upon their return, they are faced with a supernatural evil that aims to threaten everything they know and everyone they care about. The film is produced, written and directed by Coogler and also stars Hailee Steinfield, Miles Caton, Jack O’Connell, Wunmi Mosaku and Delroy Lindo.
Special offers & information from Contenders sponsors & partners
Presenting Sponsor
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CONTENDERS WORD SEARCH #2
After the Hunt Blue Moon Casting panel Christy Dragon Heart Eleanor the Great Formula One Hedda Homebound No Other Choice Nuremberg Sentimental Value Sinners Springsteen Stunt panel Stuck?
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INTERNATIONAL
SATURDAY DECEMBER 6
Deadline has searched the globe for the year’s top international films and they will be at Contenders Film: International. This virtual event highlights all the globally diverse and rich storytelling from the year.
FOR MORE INFORMATION AND TO RSVP VISIT DEADLINE.SWOOGO.COM/ CONTENDERSFILMINTERNATIONAL2025
DOCUMENTARY
SUNDAY DECEMBER 7
Tune in for a day dedicated to the documentary films of the year. Deadline talks to the filmmakers and subjects behind the gripping stories that have left their mark and are potential award nominees.
FOR MORE INFORMATION AND TO RSVP VISIT DEADLINE.SWOOGO.COM/ CONTENDERSFILMDOCUMENTARY2025
