Buzzy TIFF-premiering EPiC: Elvis Presley In Concert from Neon shimmies onto 350 Imax screens for one week ahead of a national expansion. Abramorama documentary Billy Preston: That’s The Way God Planned It starts a limited run. Roadside Attractions is launching this season’s Oscar Nominated Shorts with 354 runs.
Billed as an Elvis Presley “cinematic experience,” EPiC – 96% Rotten Tomatoes Certified Fresh with critics and 99% with audiences — features long-lost footage from the King’s legendary Las Vegas residency in the 1970s woven together with rare 16mm footage from him on tour and 8mm from the Graceland archive, plus Presley recordings rediscovered during Luhrmann’s research for his 2022 film Elvis. Starring Austin Butler, that film earned eight Academy Award nominations including Best Picture, won multiple BAFTAs and Golden Globes and grossed nearly $300 million worldwide.
EPiC expands to 1,000 screens next week. See Deadline’s Q&A with Luhrmann.
“There’s ben a lot written and a lot said, but never from my side of the story,” says Elvis in the trailer, below.
Abramorama doc Billy Preston: That’s The Way God Planned It by Paris Barclay, which premiered at SXSW 2025 and went on to play DOC NYC and Palm Springs, takes a theatrical bow at the Film Forum in NYC ahead of a series of mostly one-off engagements around the country, including Laemmle theaters in Los Anegele in March.
Billy Preston was 5 years old when he backed gospel legend Mahalia Jackson. Over the following six-decade career, he contributed his signature sound to the greatest artists of his time, including The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Barbra Streisand, Sly Stone, Ray Charles, Eric Clapton, Rufus and others, while establishing himself as a Grammy-winning solo artist. Despite success, he struggled to reconcile his relationship with the Black church with his sexuality, setting off a lifelong quest to find love and acceptance.
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His hits include “Will It Go Round in Circles,” “Nothing from Nothing” — both of which topped the Billboard Hot 100 — “Outa-Space” and “Space Race.” He also played on The Beatles’ global smash “Get Back.” The doc is named for Preston’s first UK hit “That’s the Way God Planned It,” recorded in 1969 for The Beatles’ Apple Records and produced by his lifelong friend, George Harrison. Fifteen years after his death in 2006, Preston was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as part of the class of 2021.
Roadside Attractions has taken the Oscar Nominated Shorts, long distributed by UK outfit ShortsTV, for the first time. The three feature-length compilations of Best Animated Short Films, Best Live Action Shorts and Best Documentary Shorts have been a reliable draw for audiences. Filmmaker, writer and actor Taika Waititi – Oscar-nominated for 2024 Live Action Short Film Two Cars, One Night — has affiliated with the presentation and been actively promoting it on social media.
He said in Roadside’s announcement: “Short films occupy a singular space in the filmmaking community, –inviting artists to experiment, challenge conventions, and tell stories with unparalleled creative freedom.”
Theaters can show any or all of the three programs, which will expand to about 600 runs by Academy Awards time on March 15
Nominated Live Action Shorts: Butcher’s Stain by Meyer Levinson-Blount and Oron Caspi, A Friend of Dorothy by Lee Knight and James Dean, Jane Austen’s Period Drama by Julia Aks and Steve Pinder; The Singers by Sam A. Davis and Jack Piatt and Two People Exchanging Saliva by Alexandre Singh and Natalie Musteata.
Animated Shorts: Butterfly by Florence Miailhe and Ron Dyens, Forevergreen by Nathan Engelhardt and Jeremy Spears, The Girl Who Cried Pearls by Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski, Retirement Plan by John Kelly and Andrew Freedman and The Three Sisters by Konstantin Bronzit.
Documentary Shorts: The longest program, it includes All the Empty Rooms by Joshua Seftel and Conall Jones, Armed Only with a Camera: The Life and Death of Brent Renaud by Craig Renaud and Juan Arredondo, Children No More: “Were and Are Gone” by Hilla Medalia and Sheila Nevins, The Devil Is Busy by Christalyn Hampton and Geeta Gandbhir and Perfectly a Strangeness by Alison McAlpin.
Other new indie openings: A24’s How to Make a Killing by John Patton Ford (Emily the Criminal) debuts on 1,600 screens. Disowned at birth by his obscenely wealthy family, blue-collar Becket Redfellow (Glen Powell) will stop at nothing to reclaim his inheritance, no matter how many relatives stand in his way. With Margaret Qualley.
Focus Features is out with marriage drama Midwinter Break at 802 locations. The feature directorial debut of theater veteran Polly Findlay is based on the novel by Bernard MacLaverty, who co-wrote the screenplay with Nick Payne. Stars Lesley Manville and Ciarán Hinds as a retired couple whose trip to Amsterdam resurfaces long-buried secrets.
Independent Film Company opens Adam MacDonald’s zombie thriller This Is Not a Test on 450 screens. A small group of her classmates take cover in their high school to escape their suddenly apocalyptic hometown.