Friday Releases: The Exorcist: Believer

OCTOBER 6, 2023

The Exorcist: Believer

Directed By: David Gordon Green
Studio: Universal Pictures

Since the death of his pregnant wife in a Haitian earthquake 12 years ago, Victor Fielding (Tony winner and Oscar® nominee Leslie Odom, Jr.; One Night in Miami, Hamilton) has raised their daughter, Angela (Lidya Jewett, Good Girls) on his own. But when Angela and her friend Katherine (newcomer Olivia Marcum), disappear in the woods, only to return three days later with no memory of what happened to them, it unleashes a chain of events that will force Victor to confront the nadir of evil and, in his terror and desperation, seek out the only person alive who has witnessed anything like it before: Chris MacNeil.

Starring: Leslie Odom Jr., Ann Dowd, Jennifer Nettles, Norbert Leo Butz, Lidya Jewett, Olivia Marcum, and Ellen Burstyn
Genre: Horror
Rating: R (for some violent content, disturbing images, language and sexual references)
Country: USA (English, Latin, Haitian, & French)
Runtime: 111 minutes

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Foe

Directed By: Garth Davis
Studio: Amazon Studios

Academy Award nominees Saoirse Ronan and Paul Mescal star in Foe, a haunting exploration of marriage and identity set in an uncertain world. Hen and Junior farm a secluded piece of land that has been in Junior’s family for generations, but their quiet life is thrown into turmoil when an uninvited stranger (Aaron Pierre) shows up at their door with a startling proposal. Based on best-selling author Iain Reid’s novel, directed by Garth Davis, and co-written by Davis and Reid, Foe’s mesmerizing imagery and persistent questions about the nature of humanity (and artificial humanity) bring the not-too-distant future to luminous life.

Starring: Saoirse Ronan, Paul Mescal and Aaron Pierre
Genre: Drama | Sci-Fi | Thriller
Rating: R (for language, some sexual content and nudity)
Country: USA | Australia | UK (English)
Runtime: 110 minutes

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She Came To Me

Directed By: Rebecca Miller
Studio: Vertical

SHE CAME TO ME is a truly modern romantic comedy, a multi-generational love story set against the iconic backdrop of New York: A composer suffering from creative block finds inspiration after a chance encounter with an unusual woman, a couple of bright teenagers fight to prove to their parents that young love can last forever, and for a successful therapist who seemingly has it all, love arrives in the most unexpected of ways.

Starring: Peter Dinklage, Marisa Tomei, Joanna Kulig, Brian d’Arcy James, and Anne Hathaway
Genre: Comedy | Drama | Romance
Rating: R (for some language)
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 102 minutes

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The Royal Hotel

Directed By: Kitty Green
Studio: Neon

Americans Hanna and Liv are best friends backpacking in Australia. After they run out of money, Liv, looking for an adventure, convinces Hanna to take a temporary live-in job behind the bar of a pub called ‘The Royal Hotel’ in a remote Outback mining town. Bar owner Billy and a host of locals give the girls a riotous introduction to Down Under drinking culture but soon Hanna and Liv find themselves trapped in an unnerving situation that grows rapidly out of their control.

Starring: Julia Garner, Jessica Henwick, Toby Wallace, and Hugo Weaving
Genre: International | Thriller
Rating: R (for language throughout and sexual content/nudity)
Country: Australia | UK (English)
Runtime: 91 minutes

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Pet Sematary: Bloodlines

Directed By: Lindsey Anderson Beer
Studio: Paramount+

In 1969, a young Jud Crandall has dreams of leaving his hometown of Ludlow, Maine behind, but soon discovers sinister secrets buried within and is forced to confront a dark family history that will forever keep him connected to Ludlow. Banding together, Jud and his childhood friends must fight an ancient evil that has gripped Ludlow since its founding, and once unearthed has the power to destroy everything in its path. Based on the untold chapter from Pet Sematary, Stephen King’s chilling novel, PET SEMATARY: BLOODLINES is a terrifying prequel and the untold story of why sometimes dead is better….

Starring: Jackson White, Forrest Goodluck, Jack Mulhern, Henry Thomas, Natalie Alyn Lind, Isabella Star LaBlanc, Samantha Mathis, Pam Grier and David Duchovny
Genre: Fantasy | Horror
Rating: R (for horror violence, gore and language)
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 87 minutes

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The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial

Directed By: William Friedkin
Studio: Showtime + Paramount+

At the start of a naval court-martial, Barney Greenwald (Jason Clarke), a skeptical naval lawyer, reluctantly agrees to defend Lt. Steve Maryk (Jake Lacy), a first officer of the Navy who took control of the U.S.S. CAINE from its domineering captain Lt. Philip Francis Queeg (Kiefer Sutherland) during a violent sea storm in unfriendly waters. As the trial progresses, Greenwald becomes increasingly concerned and questions if the events aboard the Caine were a true mutiny or simply the courageous acts of a group of sailors who did not trust their unstable leader.

Starring: Kiefer Sutherland, Jason Clarke, Jake Lacy, Monica Raymund and Lance Reddick
Genre: Drama | War
Rating: R
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 108 minutes

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Strange Way of Life

Directed By: Pedro Almodóvar
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics

A man rides a horse across the desert that separates him from Bitter Creek. He comes to visit Sheriff Jake. Twenty-five years earlier, both the sheriff and Silva, the rancher who rides out to meet him, worked together as hired gunmen. Silva visits him with the excuse of reuniting with his friend from his youth, and they do indeed celebrate their meeting, but the next morning Sheriff Jake tells him that the reason for his trip is not to go down the memory lane of their old friendship.

Starring: Ethan Hawke and Pedro Pascal
Genre: Short | Drama | Western
Rating: R (for some sexual content, language and bloody images)
Country: Spain | France (English)
Runtime: 31 minutes

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The Burial

Directed By: Maggie Betts
Studio: Amazon Studios

Inspired by true events, a lawyer helps a funeral home owner save his family business from a corporate behemoth, exposing a complex web of race, power, and injustice.

Starring: Jamie Foxx as Gary, Tommy Lee Jones as O’Keefe, Jurnee Smollett, Mamoudou Athie, and Bill Camp
Genre: Drama
Rating: R (for language)
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 126 minutes

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Desperation Road

Directed By: Nadine Crocker
Studio: Lionsgate

In a small Mississippi town, justice and the law are two very different things. Academy Award Winner Mel Gibson (Braveheart), Garret Hedlund (TRON: Legacy), and Willa Fitzgerald (Scream: The TV Series) star in a modern noir thriller based on the acclaimed novel by Michael Farris Smith about two lost souls tortured by the mistakes of their past and bound by a secret that keeps them running.

Starring: Mel Gibson, Willa Fitzgerald, Ryan Hurst, Garrett Hedlund, and Shiloh Fernandez
Genre: Action | Thriller
Rating: R (for some violence, sexual assault, language throughout, brief sexuality and nudity)
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 112 minutes

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Cat Person

Directed By: Susanna Fogel
Studio: Rialto Pictures

When Margot, a college sophomore (Emilia Jones) goes on a date with the older Robert (Nicholas Braun), she finds that IRL Robert doesn’t live up to the Robert she has been flirting with over texts. Cat Person is a razor-sharp exploration of the gender divide, the quagmire of navigating modern dating and the dangerous projections we make in our minds about the person at the other end of our phones.

Starring: Emilia Jones, Nicholas Braun, Geraldine Viswanathan, Hope Davis, Fred Melamed, and Isabella Rossellini
Genre: Drama | Thriller
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA | France (English)
Runtime: 118 minutes

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Totally Killer

Directed By: Nahnatchka Khan
Studio: Amazon Studios

Thirty-five years after the shocking murder of three teens, the infamous “Sweet Sixteen Killer” returns on Halloween night to claim a fourth victim. Seventeen-year-old Jamie (Kiernan Shipka) ignores her overprotective mom’s (Julie Bowen) warning and comes face-to-face with the masked maniac and, on the run for her life, accidentally time travels back to 1987, the year of the original killings. Forced to navigate the unfamiliar and outrageous culture of the 1980s, Jamie teams up with her teen mom (Olivia Holt) to take down the killer once and for all, before she’s stuck in the past forever.

Starring: Kiernan Shipka, Olivia Holt, Julie Bowen, and Randall Park
Genre: Comedy | Horror
Rating: R (for bloody violence, language, sexual material, and teen drug/alcohol use)
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 106 minutes

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Vindicta

Directed By: Sean McNamara
Studio: Paramount Global

When a city is terrorized by a sadistic serial killer, a seasoned detective and a newly recruited paramedic discover the key to stopping the bloodshed lies in unlocking the truth of their own haunted pasts.

Starring: Elena Kampouris, Jeremy Piven, Sean Astin, Travis Nelson, and Bradley Stryker
Genre: Horror
Rating: R (for violence and gore, language and brief drug material)
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 93 minutes

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Dicks: The Musical

Directed By: Larry Charles
Studio: A24

Two self-obsessed businessmen discover they’re long-lost identical twins and come together to plot the reunion of their eccentric divorced parents.

Starring: Megan Mullally, Nathan Lane, Megan Thee Stallion, Bowen Yang, and Aaron Jackson
Genre: Comedy | Musical
Rating: R (for strong crude sexual content, graphic nudity, pervasive language and brief drug use)
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 86 minutes

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V/H/S/85

Directed By: David Bruckner, Scott Derrickson, Gigi Saul Guerrero, Natasha Kermani & Mike P. Nelson
Studio: Shudder

Unveiled through a made-for-TV documentary, five tales of found footage horror emerge to take viewers on a terrifying journey into the grim underbelly of the 1980s.

Starring: Jordan Belfi. Freddy Rodríguez, James Ransone, Dani Deette, Rolando Davila-Beltran, and Justen Jones
Genre: Horror | Thriller
Rating: Not Rated
Country: Hong Kong | China (Cantonese, Japanese, & Chinese)
Runtime: 110 minutes

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When Evil Lurks

Directed By: Demián Rugna
Studio: IFC Films

When brothers Pedro (Ezequiel Rodríguez) and Jimmy (Demián Salomón) discover that a demonic infection has been festering in a nearby farmhouse — its very proximity poisoning the local livestock — they attempt to evict the victim from their land. Failing to adhere to the proper rites of exorcism, their reckless actions inadvertently trigger an epidemic of possessions across their rural community. Now they must outrun an encroaching evil as it corrupts and mutilates everyone it is exposed to, and enlist the aid of a wizened “cleaner,” who holds the only tools that can stop this supernatural plague.

Starring: Ezequiel Rodriguez, Demián Salomon, Luis Ziembrowski, Silvia Sabater and Marcelo Michinaux
Genre: Horror | International;
Rating: Not Rated
Country: Argentina | USA (Spanish)
Runtime: 99 minutes

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Appendage

Directed By: Anna Zlokovic
Studio: Hulu

Hannah (Hadley Robinson), a young fashion designer, seems fine on the surface, but secretly struggles with debilitating self-doubt. Soon these buried feelings begin to make Hannah physically sick and sprout into a ferocious growth on her body: The Appendage. As Hannah’s health declines, The Appendage begins to fuel her anxieties — her perceived lack of talent at work, her deteriorating relationships with her boyfriend and best friend, and her parents’ lack of love and understanding. At her breaking point, Hannah makes a shocking discovery–there are others out there like her.

Starring: Emily Hampshire, Hadley Robinson, Deborah Rennard, Brandon Mychal Smith, and Desmin Borges
Genre: Comedy | Drama | Horror
Rating: TV-MA
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 94 minutes

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Mercy Road

Directed By: John Curran
Studio: Well Go USA Entertainment

After committing an impulsive, vicious crime while searching for his missing daughter, a frantic father (Luke Bracey) goes on the run from law enforcement and soon begins receiving chilling calls from an unknown entity claiming to know her whereabouts. As he faithfully follows the caller’s increasingly unhinged instructions, he is driven perilously close to the edge of sanity while discovering exactly how far he is willing to go to save his child.

Starring: Luke Bracey, Huw Higginson, Toby Jones, Alex Malone, Martha Kate Morgan, and Susie Porter
Genre: International | Thriller
Rating: R (for language throughout)
Country: Australia (English)
Runtime: 86 minutes

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Aberrance

Directed By: Baatar Batsukh
Studio: Freestyle Releasing

When city dwellers Erkhmee and Selenge arrive at an old cabin deep in the Mongolian wilds, a foreboding settles over the couple. Erkhmee’s seemingly keen desire to provide a safe and nurturing space for his artistic wife is at odds with the violent actions and mannerisms their quizzical neighbor observes. As the neighbor digs deeper for the reason behind this aberrant behavior, only more questions and trouble arise.

Starring: Sukhee Ariunbyamba, Bayarsanaa Batchuluun, Badamtsetseg Batmunkhm, and Selenge Chadraabal
Genre: Crime | Drama | Horror | Mystery | Thriller
Rating: Not Rated
Country: Mongolia (Mongolian)
Runtime: 75 minutes

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Last Stop Larrimah

Directed By: Thomas Tancred
Studio: HBO

Nestled deep in the Australian Outback is the remote town of Larrimah and its 11 eccentric residents. When Paddy Moriarty and his dog Kellie left the local pub and vanished in December of 2017, a long history of infighting is unveiled as the remaining residents become suspects in an unfolding investigation that leads to Paddy being declared dead. The documentary, told in five chapters, shines a light on Larrimah’s quirky history and how the town’s once close-knit and jubilant residents brought about their own fate.

Starring: Paddy Moriarty
Genre: Documentary | Crime | Mystery
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 118 minutes

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Miranda’s Victim

Directed By: Michelle Danner
Studio: Vertical

Based on true events, this drama follows eighteen-year-old Trish Weir (Abigail Breslin) who in 1963 was kidnapped and sexually assaulted. After a voluntary confession, her assailant, Ernesto Miranda (Sebastian Quinn), is convicted but the verdict is later overturned by the US Supreme Court since his confession was made without an attorney present. In the resulting retrial, a determined prosecutor (Luke Wilson) seeks to hold Miranda fully accountable notwithstanding defense attorney’s (Ryan Phillippe) rigorous defense. What follows is a legal proceeding that will forever change the nation’s justice system.

Starring: Abigail Breslin, Luke Wilson, Kyle MacLachlan, Ryan Phillippe, Mireille Enos, Emily VanCamp, Andy Garcia, and Donald Sutherland
Genre: Biography | Crime | Drama
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 127 minutes

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Joan Baez I Am A Noise

Directed By: Miri Navasky, Karen O’Connor, & Maeve O’Boyle
Studio: Magnolia Pictures

Neither a conventional biopic nor a traditional concert film, JOAN BAEZ I AM A NOISE is a raw and intimate portrait of the legendary folk singer and activist that shifts back and forth through time as it follows Joan on her final tour and delves into her extraordinary archive, including newly discovered home movies, diaries, artwork, therapy tapes, and audio recordings. Baez is remarkably revealing about her life on and off stage — from her lifelong emotional struggles to her civil rights work with MLK and a heartbreaking romance with a young Bob Dylan. A searingly honest look at a living legend, this film is a compelling and deeply personal exploration of an iconic artist who has never told the full truth of her life, as she experienced it, until now.

Starring: Joan Baez, Mimi Fariña, Bob Dylan, and David Harris
Genre: Documentary | Biography | Music
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 113 minutes

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Monsters of California

Directed By: Tom DeLonge
Studio: Screen Media

After discovering research left behind by a missing government agent, Dallas Edwards and his misfit high school friends embark on a righteous and dangerous adventure to uncover a paranormal conspiracy in Southern California that brings them face-to-face with some of the government’s most guarded mysteries.

Starring: Jack Samson, Casper Van Dien, Camille Kostek, Richard Kind, Arianne Zucker, Jack Lancaster, Jared Scott, and Gabrielle Haugh
Genre: Adventure | Sci-Fi
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 110 minutes

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Your Friend, Memphis

Directed By: David P. Zucker
Studio: Greenwich Entertainment

Memphis, a young man with cerebral palsy, is caught between the world’s expectations and his own ambitions. His story is an odyssey of dogged determination: a search for work, love, and freedom – no matter what.

Starring: Memphis
Genre: Documentary | Biography | Drama
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA | Italy (English)
Runtime: 88 minutes

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Dr. Cheon and the Lost Talisman

Directed By: Kim Seong-sik
Studio: Well Go USA Entertainment

Despite being the grandson of a famed village shaman, Dr. Cheon doesn’t actually believe in ghosts, yet makes a living performing fake exorcisms on camera. But when a mysterious client arrives at his door, Dr. Cheon is drawn into a series of strange and unexplainable events that will challenge everything he has ever believed–and resurface childhood horrors he’s tried to forget.

Starring: Gang Dong-won, Joon-ho Huh, Esom, Lee Dong-hwi, and Yi-Hyun Cho
Genre: Crime | Fantasy | Horror | Mystery
Rating: Not Rated
Country: South Korea (Korean)
Runtime: 98 minutes

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My Love Affair with Marriage

Directed By: Signe Baumane
Studio: 8 Above

From an early age, songs and fairytales convinced Zelma that Love would solve all her problems as long as she abided by societal expectations of how a girl should act. But as she grew older something didn’t seem right with the concept of love: the more she tried to conform, the more her body resisted. A story about the acceptance of the inner female rebellion.

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Colette and Justin

Directed By: Alain Kassanda
Studio: Icarus Films

Born in Kinshasa and living in Paris, filmmaker Alain Kassanda embodies the classic immigrant dual identity: in the Democratic Republic of Congo he is seen as French, while in France he is seen as Congolese. Determined to understand the colonial legacy from which he comes, Kassanda convinces his grandparents–Colette and Justin–to sit for a series of interviews. Together, they watch old news footage, remember a visit from the Belgian king, and recall what life was like as part of the nascent Black bourgeoisie who served the colonial administration. But COLETTE AND JUSTIN is more than a film about family reminiscences. Kassanda uses a wealth of black-and-white archival footage to tell the story, superimposing his own thoughts and his grandparents’ voices over the visuals–in effect, using the colonizers’ images against them. Beginning as one man’s search to understand himself and his roots, COLETTE AND JUSTIN is ultimately an evocative and thoughtful meditation on the intersection of political and family history, and the multi-generational destructive reach of colonialism.

Starring: Colette and Justin
Genre: Documentary | International
Rating: Not Rated
Country: France | Belgium (French & Lingala)
Runtime: 89 minutes

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Reality Winner

Directed By: Sonia Kennebeck
Studio: Codebreaker Films

A state of secrets and a ruthless hunt for whistleblowers — this is the story of 25-year-old NSA contractor Reality Winner, who disclosed a document about Russian election interference to the media and became the number one leak target of the Trump administration.

Starring: Heidi Montag, Vernon Davis, Denise Boutte, Asia’h Epperson, Natalia Dominguez, and Benjamin A. Onyango
Genre: Documentary
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 93 minutes

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They Shot the Piano Player

Directed By: Fernando Trueba & Javier Mariscal
Studio: Submarine

A New York music journalist goes on a quest to uncover the truth behind the mysterious disappearance of young Brazilian piano virtuoso Tenorio Jr. A celebratory origin story of the world-renowned Latino musical movement Bossa Nova, They Shot The Piano Player captures a fleeting time bursting with creative freedom at a turning point in Latin American history in the 60s and 70s, just before the continent was engulfed by totalitarian regimes.

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A Very Good Girl

Directed By: Petersen Vargas
Studio: Star Cinema

After a heartless firing triggers a chain of unfortunate events, Philo (Kathryn Bernardo) plots a meticulous revenge against retail mogul Mother Molly (Dolly de Leon), aiming to dismantle her empire and seize the ultimate payback. This time, there is no mercy.

Starring: Kathryn Bernardo, Dolly De Leon, Donna Cariaga, Chienna Filomeno, and Jake Ejercito
Genre: Comedy | Drama | International | Mystery | Thriller
Rating: Not Rated
Country: Philippines (Tagalog & Filipino)
Runtime: 121 minutes

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Plan C

Directed By: Tracy Droz Tragos
Studio: Level 33 Entertainment

A determined group of blue state advocates, midwives and doctors have been networking to increase access to abortion pills in the United States outside of a clinic setting, regardless of where you live. In 2014, Francine, a social scientist based in Los Angeles, and her partners launched Plan C for the purpose of spreading the word about how and where to buy abortion pills online. This is the story of that work between 2020 and the overturning of Roe in 2022: the pipelines they built, the access they expanded, the criticism they faced, and the hope they have for the future.

Starring: Francine Coeytaux, Elisa Wells, Robin Marty, Julie Amaon, and Frances Morales
Genre: Documentary
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 99 minutes

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Shelter in Solitude

Directed By: Vibeke Muasya
Studio: Emerald Caz Productions

With only days left until his execution, a prisoner on death row develops a bond with a country singer and a tough warden.

Starring: Siobhan Fallon Hogan, Peter Macon, Robert Patrick, Dan Castellaneta, Pete Hogan, and Michael Oberholtzer
Genre: Comedy | Crime | Drama
Rating: Not Rated
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 93 minutes

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SOMM: Cup of Salvation

Directed By: Jason Wise
Studio: Forgotten Man Films

A father and daughter set out to revive the ancient grapes of their homeland in Armenia. They must breathe life into the post-Soviet infrastructure of their country, harvest grapes during war and market their wine globally, from the battle-scarred Caucus Mountains to the clandestine vineyards hidden deep within the forbidden Iranian countryside.

Starring: Dlynn Proctor, Aimee Keushguerian, Dustin Wilson, and Steven Spurrier
Genre: Documentary
Rating: PG-13 (for thematic material)
Country: USA (English)
Runtime: 90 minutes

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