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KINO LORBER ACQUIRES KUMARÉ (2011), A DOCUMENTARY BY VIKRAM GANDHI

Posted Thursday, December 22nd, 2011 - Comments Off on KINO LORBER ACQUIRES KUMARÉ (2011), A DOCUMENTARY BY VIKRAM GANDHI
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New York, NY – December 22, 2011 – Kino Lorber, Inc. (www.kinolorber.com) is proud to announce the acquisition of all US rights to the acclaimed and controversial doc Kumaré (2011), by director Vikram Gandhi and producers Brendan Colthurst and Bryan Carmel (all three of  Disposable Television), and executive producer Stephen Feder.

After its world premiere at the 2011 South by Southwest (SXSW), Kumaré received the festival’s coveted Audience Award (Feature Documentary), given by thousands of audience members participating in the selection process.  In the following months, the film played at a select number of US festivals, gathering a sizable and diverse cult-following across the country.

Kumaré also won the Jury Prize for Best Documentary Feature at the Napa Valley Film Festival and played to sold-out audiences (in early November) at DOC NYC, the leading documentary film festival in New York City.

This deal was negotiated between Kino Lorber CEO & President Richard Lorber, Cinetic’s Dana O’Keefe and Vikram Gandhi. Kino Lorber is planning to open Kumaré nationwide in May or June of 2012, before making the film available on major VOD platforms during the summer and early fall.

Bond Strategy and Influence (www.bondinfluence.com), Marc Schiller’s social media and digital marketing company, whose work contributed to the success of Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010), Senna (2010) and currently The Way (2011), will be partnering with Kino Lorber on the theatrical release of this documentary.

For the uninitiated, Kumaré is a wise guru from the East who indoctrinated a group of followers in the West.  Kumaré, however, is not real – he is the alter ego of American filmmaker Vikram Gandhi who inpersonated a spiritual leader for the sake of a social experiment designed to challenge one of the most widely accepted taboos: that only a tiny “1%” can connect the rest of the world to a higher power.

Concealing his true identity from everyone he meets, Kumaré forges profound and spiritual connections with people from all walks of life.  At the same time, in the absurdity of living as an entirely different person, Vikram, the filmmaker, is forced to confront difficult questions about his own identity.

At the height of his popularity, Kumaré unveils his true identity to a core group of disciples who are knee-deep in personal transformation. Will they accept his final teaching? Can this illusion reveal a greater spiritual truth? Kumaré, at once playful and profound, is an insightful look at faith and belief.

About Kino Lorber:

With a library of 700 titles, Kino Lorber Inc. has been a leader in independent distribution for over 30 years and releases over 20 films per year theatrically under its Kino Lorber, Kino Classics and Alive Mind Cinema banners. In addition, the Company brings over 60 titles each year to the home entertainment market with DVD and Blu-ray releases and digital distribution on over 15 internet platforms and VOD services.

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon