First-time writer-director Ana Asensio’s Most Beautiful Island is a movie you won’t easily forget. The psychological thriller follows a day in the life of an undocumented immigrant woman trying to make ends meet in New York. She decides to take an odd job to get herself out of financial straits, but when she shows up, she’s forced into a dangerous underground world in which her life hangs by a delicate thread. Shot in gritty Super-16, the film intimately captures the desperation and ignominy facing many American immigrants. – Emily Buder

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Trailer and poster now available.

From Rue-Morgue:

 Exec producer Larry Fessenden’s DIG TWO GRAVES unearths supernatural thrills this month

New York horror mogul Larry Fessenden was among the executive producers of DIG TWO GRAVES, a supernatural film starring THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS’ Ted Levine. It’s coming later this month; keep reading for the info, trailer and poster.

 Area 23a Movievents releases DIG TWO GRAVES to select theaters and VOD March 24. Directed by Hunter Adams from a script he wrote with Jeremy Phillips, the film also stars Samantha Isler, Troy Ruplash, Danny Goldring and Ann Sonneville. The synopsis: After 13-year-old Jacqueline Mather [Isler] loses her brother in a mysterious drowning accident, she is soon visited by three moonshiners who offer to bring her brother back to life—but at a grim cost. As the dark history of her grandfather, Sheriff Waterhouse [Levine] is unearthed, the true intentions of the moonshiners come to light.”

From Entertainment Weekly: 

Glass Eye Pix and Hood River Entertainment are teaming up to produce horror-thriller The Ranger. The film follows a group of teen punks who get in trouble with the cops and escape to the woods. There, they come up against an unhinged park ranger with an axe to grind, hell-bent on preserving the serenity of his forest.

The Ranger will be the directorial debut of Jenn Wexler, who cowrote the script with Giaco Furino. Wexler is best known as a producer whose credits include director Robert Mockler’s Like Me and Ana Asensio’s Most Beautiful Island, both of which are screening at this year’s SXSW Film Festival. Wexler also produced director Mickey Keating’s Must List-approved 2016 haunted house tale Darling and the same filmmaker’s Psychopaths, which will receive its world premiere at the upcoming Tribeca Film Festival. Andrew van den Houten and Ashleigh Snead will produce for Hood River Entertainment and Larry Fessenden and Heather Buckley will produce for Glass Eye Pix, along with Wexler. The title was showcased at the 2016 Frontieres International Co-Production Market at the Fantasia Film Festival. It was at the market that the two companies decided to join forces and produce the film.

“I have a long history with Andrew, ever since he cast me in his feature debut Headspace, and later in Jug Face, but this will be our first time partnering as producers,” said Fessenden in a statement. “It is a thrill to team up to support Jenn Wexler’s first outing as a feature director after her many outings producing for others.”

“I’ve been a fan of Jenn’s work since I selected her short film to be the winner at Viscera Film Festival years ago,” van den Houten. “Now I’m honored to be helping finance and produce her first feature. Larry, GEP, and I have been waiting to collaborate for years so may this be a fruitful start with many more projects to come.”

The Playlist has the scoop

As immigration continues to dominate the national conversation, things couldn’t be more timely for Ana Asensio‘s “Most Beautiful Island,” which is getting ready to premiere at this month’s SXSW Film Festival.

In addition to directing, Asensio wrote and leads the film, which also stars Natasha Romanova, David Little, Nicholas Tucci, Larry Fessenden, and Caprice Benedetti, and tells the story of a single day in the life of a young, undocumented immigrant in New York City. 

“Most Beautiful Island” launches this weekend. Poster created by Mondo artist Jay Shaw.

Fessenden will appear in 4 movies at this year’s SXSW Film Festival, including two Glass Eye Pix productions, LIKE ME and MOST BEAUTIFUL ISLAND. He also shows up in THE TRANSFIGURATION by Michael O’Shea, the much anticipated new vampire flick that was a hit at Cannes last year, as well as CHEAP THRILLS director E L Katz’s next flick SMALL CRIMES, starring Game of Thrones’ Nikolaj Coster-Waldau. 

Meanwhile, you can catch Fessenden streaming live in recent releases STRAY BULLETS, STAKE LAND 2, and GIRLFRIEND’S DAY, and look for him at the Tribeca Film Festival premiere of Mickey Keating’s PSYCHOPATHS in April.

The question it seems, is not “what role does Fessenden play?”, but “how does his character die and how quickly?” Inquiring minds would like to know.

Recent portrait of the thespian by longtime pal Robin Holland

LIVE AT HOWL! 6 East 1st St. & Bowery, NYC. Saturday March 4th, 7pm.

GEP pal Robert O. Leaver (co-writer, The Last Winter) AKA Birdthrower, will perform LIVE Saturday.
Birdthrower has been making noise on Ben Harper’s Instagram page this last month
with videos by Glass Eye Pix. Check them here and here

A Glass Eye Pix Production directed and written by Mickey Keating. (USA)

World Premiere, Narrative. Over the course of one excessively blood-soaked night, multiple serial killers’ paths cross, leaving a trail of bodies and begging the question: Which psychopath will live to see morning? One of the most exciting and unclassifiable new voices in indie horror, Mickey Keating delivers his wildest ride yet with this ultra-stylish and uber-violent descent into madness. With Ashley Bell, James Landry Hébert, Mark Kassen, Angela Trimbur, Larry Fessenden, Jeremy Gardner, Sam Zimmerman.

From Bloody-Disgusting