Academy Award®-nominated filmmaker Todd Haynes will attend HIFF31 to screen his latest narrative feature MAY DECEMBER, and will receive the festival’s Achievement in Directing Award. Haynes will also take part in our A Conversation With… series, sponsored by The Macallan.
Samir Hussein – Wire Image
Todd Haynes is an Academy Award-nominated screenwriter, director, and producer whose work has spanned more than four decades. Haynes’ critically lauded films include POISON (1991; Sundance Film Festival Grand Jury Prize recipient), SAFE (1995), VELVET GOLDMINE (1998; Cannes Film Festival Special Jury Prize recipient), FAR FROM HEAVEN (2002; Academy Award nominee for Best Original Screenplay), I’M NOT THERE (2007), CAROL (2015), DARK WATERS (2019), and THE VELVET UNDERGROUND (2021), his first feature length documentary.
Haynes will receive the award in person at HIFF31 during his A Conversation With… discussion on Monday, October 9. Haynes is also attending on behalf of his latest narrative feature MAY DECEMBER, which will screen as a Spotlight selection. (See below.)
Sponsored by
Francois Duhamel / courtesy of Netflix
MAY DECEMBER
Dir: Todd Haynes
USA | 2023
Sponsored by
Twenty years after their notorious tabloid romance gripped the nation, Gracie Atherton-Yoo (Julianne Moore) and her husband Joe (twenty-three years her junior) brace themselves for their twins to graduate from high school. When Hollywood actress Elizabeth Berry (Natalie Portman) comes to spend time with the family to better understand Gracie—whom she will be playing in a film—family dynamics unravel under the pressure of the outside gaze.
Joe (Charles Melton), never having processed what happened in his youth, starts to confront the reality of life as an empty-nester at thirty-six. And as Elizabeth and Gracie study each other, the similarities and differences between the two women begin to ebb and flow. Set in picturesque and comfortable Camden, Maine, MAY DECEMBER is an exploration of truth, storytelling, and the difficulties (or impossibility) of fully understanding another person.
MAY DECEMBER premiered in competition at the 76th Cannes Film Festival. A Netflix release.
Passes and packages for HIFF31 go on sale September 5. A HamptonsFilm Members pre-sale for individual tickets begins September 23, with individual tickets to the general public on sale September 25. Join today for early ticket access.
The 31st annual Hamptons International Film Festival will take place October 5-12, 2023. HIFF thanks the supporters for this year’s festival, including returning Premiere Sponsor Audi; Signature Sponsors The Macallan and Variety; Supporting Sponsors Naturopathica, Dragon Hemp, Netflix, Silvercup, and Regal Cinemas; as well as official Media Sponsors WNBC, The East Hampton Star, The Purist, and new Signature Sponsor The Atlantic; and long term support from New York State Council on the Arts, and Suffolk County Film Commission.
