Essie Davis in ‘Babyteeth’.
US distributor IFC Films and sibling IFC Midnight have set multi-platform launch dates for Shannon Murphy’s Babyteeth and Natalie Erika James’ Relic, but release plans for Australia are yet to be settled.
A bittersweet comedy starring Ben Mendelsohn, Essie Davis, Eliza Scanlen and Toby Wallace, Babyteeth will premiere in cinemas and on demand on June 19.
A psychological horror movie co-scripted by James and Christian White, featuring Emily Mortimer, Robyn Nevin and Bella Heathcote, Relic will open on July 10.
Produced by Alex White and based on Rita Kalnejais’ play, Murphy’s film had its world premiere in Venice. Mendelsohn and Davis play a couple who discover their seriously ill teenage daughter Milla (Scanlen) has fallen in love with drug dealer Moses (Wallace).
It’s her protective parents’ worst nightmare but Milla teaches those in her orbit how to live like there is nothing to lose.
While cinemas here remained closed Universal Pictures hasn’t yet locked in a release plan for Babyteeth.
‘Relic.’
Carver Films’ Anna McLeish and Sarah Shaw produced Relic, which premiered at Sundance, with Nine Stories Productions’ Jake Gyllenhaal and Riva Marker.
The plot follows Nevin as Edna, an elderly, widowed matriarch who goes missing. Her daughter Kay (Mortimer) and granddaughter Sam (Heathcote) travel to their remote family home to find her. Soon after she returns, they start to discover a sinister presence haunting the house and taking control of Edna.
Umbrella Entertainment head of acquisitions Ari Harrison tells IF no specific dates have been set for its theatrical titles including Relic.
Both films are among IndieWire’s 18 must-see US summer releases, alongside such titles as Kenneth Branagh’s Artemis Fowl, Judd Apatow’s The King of Staten Island, Michael Winterbottom’s The Trip to Greece and Michael Showalter’s The Lovebirds.
IndieWire declared Murphy’s “primal and surefooted debut never falls into either mawkishness or sadism…a coming-of-age cancer drama that bursts with life, breaks your heart and moves to its own spirited beat.”
The website lauded James’ film as an “ambitious, thrilling debut and one that seems poised to stick with audiences long after its last chilling surprise.”