Cha Cha Real Smooth

Mubi Go, which has helped buoy NYC's arthouse market by offering members a free movie ticket a week at participating theaters, expands to LA today where the ...

Samuel Goldwyn Films presents Danish dad comedy Wild Men by Thomas Daneskov in 15 markets including NY and LA. Armed only with a bow and an ensemble of animal skins, protagonist Martin sets off into the forest in a misguided attempt to overcome his midlife crisis. A chance meeting with a fugitive named Musa leads to a twisted trip through the fjords with police, drug runners, and Martin’s family not far behind. Cruz and Banderas play two egomaniacs, director and actor, commissioned by a millionaire to make a movie. We are seeing rays of hope constantly,” Wells said, noting that 80% of Mubi Go users are 44 and under. Some of them may be better known to audiences and some are hidden gems,” Wells said. Mubi Go, which has helped buoy NYC’s arthouse market by offering members a free movie ticket a week at participating theaters, expands to LA today where the biz could really use a boost.

La segunda película del cineasta Cooper Raiff trata sobre un joven de 22 años que regresa a la casa de su infancia en los suburbios de Nueva Jersey el verano ...

“Ella es el corazón de la película”, dijo. Burghardt dijo que trató de controlar sus expectativas cuando surgió la oportunidad de hacer la prueba para “Cha Cha”. Nunca sentí que debía que cuestionarme y cuestionar mis habilidades para interpretarla”. Cuando vieron su video de la audición, Johnson dijo: “Era obvio... Así que, inspirado por algunos amigos de la escuela de su hermana, decidió que Lola tuviera autismo. “En un principio, escribí la película sobre mi hermana.

El cine indi ha caído en demasiadas autocomplacencias al grado de ya no ser tan distante de los escenarios fantasiosos de los que pretendía rebelarse.

pierde el control ante los conflictos y su insistencia en meterse en la vida de un futuro Pero en el fondo no es más que un niño, exactamente el mismo niño que vimos al inicio de la también productora de la cinta) y para llamar su atención empieza a animar la fiesta bailando,

Raiff's ambition to break free from sentimental formula and forge a path of his own is clear, making him an exciting young filmmaker to watch.

Domino is damaged and she doesn’t always make good choices, but the fact that Raiff’s script doesn’t deify her makes her so much more interesting. Burghardt shows great poise and comic timing in her first film role, and is a joy to watch. The fact that he’s drawn to them and insistent that they have a good time feels like a natural expression of who this guy is: a big-hearted goofball, sweet and upbeat and—above all else—eager to laugh at himself to ensure everyone else is laughing. But rather than swoop in as her savior, Andrew shows genuine interest in her as a pal; Domino asks if he’ll babysit Lola some nights, which he gladly does, but he treats her as an equal and takes an interest in her hobbies. Andrew’s attraction to Domino is obvious, even though she informs him she has a fiancé, a lawyer who happens to be out of town a lot for work. Just the fact that he’s only 25 years old and he’s making movies with this level of stealthy complexity is exciting.

Shithouse writer-director-star Cooper Raiff is back with Cha Cha Real Smooth, which won Sundance's Audience Award for best drama and excited critics at film ...

With Cha Cha Real Smooth, Raiff moves the timeline forward a few years to navigate a familiar type of post-graduate malaise. He becomes a brotherly figure for Lola, and uses the bar and bat mitzvahs as settings to see Domino. Shithouse is a college comedy about a lonely freshman trying to connect with people. The second feature by writer-director-actor Cooper Raiff (after 2020’s Shithouse) is a coming-of-age narrative that doesn’t feature any outward villains and doesn’t judge any of its characters. Its protagonist, Andrew (Raiff), is akin to Benjamin Braddock in The Graduate: He just graduated from college with little idea of what to do with his life. This is a story written and directed by a 23-year-old.

The heart of Cooper Raiff's sophomore feature “Cha Cha Real Smooth," available now on Apple TV+, isn't his post-grad character who is living back at his ...

“I know that she would knock those out of the park.” “She’s the heart of the movie,” he said. “I didn’t feel like I needed to think so much about, like, social nuances and all of those things because she was on the spectrum. Burghardt said she tried to manage her expectations when the opportunity to audition for “Cha Cha” arrived. “I really wanted to do well, but I’ve found that if I get too excited too early, nothing good is going to happen,” Burghardt said. “Originally I was writing the movie about my sister.

Writer-director Cooper Raiff and Dakota Johnson star in the Apple TV+ film.

As a guest at a bar mitzvah, he falls “in love” with a party motivator in a striped referee shirt, and is consoled by his mother ( Leslie Mann) after cold reality slaps him in the face — he’s too young. Caught in the middle of her fear and a chance for escape, she’s keen to reach out when Andrew approaches her with compassion and a ready ear. Andrew grew up with his mother’s unwavering love, but maybe an uncertainty of how best to protect her. But it’s not exactly shocking when he allows Domino, his new employer, to blur the boundaries with him. She’s about to marry her fiance, the lawyer Joseph ( Raúl Castillo), but lives with depression and the trauma of Lola’s father leaving. He makes it his mission to get party stragglers on the margins in the mix. He needs, or wants, a push in the right direction. But Andrew is so eager to please, to find validation and love, that it can all be a bit much. Still, Andrew does have something in common with the classic scene of a middle schooler hoping dearly that someone — anyone — will pick them to dance. Domino welcomes his offer, flashing her Dakota Johnson Smile and saying she’ll give him $1,000 — or at least $300 — if he can get Lola to dance. The line dance, a straightforward prompt whose lyrics are instructions, recruits middle schoolers and grandparents alike to get out of their chairs. But after four years of red Solo cups and merrymaking, Andrew can help get a party started just fine.

La película, dirigida, escrita y protagonizada por el cineasta estadounidense Cooper Raiff, sigue a Andrew, un joven en medio de una crisis existencial tras ...

“Fueron como dos años que fuimos amigos y había esa tensión. Y ya que estábamos los dos en otra etapa de nuestras vidas y ya era el tiempo correcto, fue una experiencia muy bonita la de comprometernos”, agregó sobre cómo inició la relación con su novia, con quien lleva ya nueve años. “Mi mamá está encantada de que salgo así con el traje, sin barba y con el pelo corto”. “Como productoras, apoyaron mucho a Cooper como un director realmente joven y que va empezando su carrera. “Nunca decimos que es latino, nunca se menciona en el proyecto. “Cooper es muy colaborativo y me dejó ser creativo”, dijo el actor. El actor de 44 años comenzó a actuar en la adolescencia, cuando era un estudiante tímido y pensó que eso lo ayudaría a atraer a las chicas.

Cooper Raiff's Cha Cha Real Smooth had to play at the Sundance Film Festival virtually because of the pandemic, so he hasn't heard the applause critics are ...

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Filmed in Pittsburgh, this Sundance hit is a funny, touching look at the complications of grown-up relationships.

“Cha Cha Real Smooth” eschews neat endings or pithy explanations of how life is, instead choosing to depict the messiness and compromises of relationships as they are in the real world. That young man is Andrew (Raiff), who is effortlessly charming and outgoing yet still something of a screw-up. “Cha Cha Real Smooth,” a winning comedy from writer/director Cooper Raiff, was made locally — but mostly at the suburban mall, where empty storefronts were converted to shoot several scenes of bar and bat mitzvahs, among other sequences.

Cooper Raiff, the writer, director, and star of Cha Cha Real Smooth, doesn't want you to call his film a "feel-good movie."

I don't even know how to talk about it, but I wanted to make a movie about that feeling, and about this kid who's obsessed with it in a lot of ways, and wants to help out and wants to be a part of it. I was talking to Vanessa about it literally yesterday, and she's like, 'how'd you know it was my mom?' I don't know, you can just tell. And I really love that so much. I don't know what triggered, but when I've talked about it since, I think what it was is I knew right away, she was reading with her mom. I know the story of Domino and Lola was partly inspired by your mom and sister. I remember all of the boys sitting with each other, and the fact that I had a girlfriend but did not talk to her in any way. She's a uniquely alive person—it's so fun just talking to her in her trailer and on Zoom. She's so emotionally available in a way that is alarming; she will start crying talking about the white rice that she's eating. It was nice to feel like I could lean on them and trust them. But, I had made a movie with a camera before, so it was less chaotic this time. It was important to make it as authentic as possible, but always knowing that I am an outsider here and that the movie is not a Jewish story. It sometimes maybe easier to see [as an outsider]. I truly don't have a lot of memories from my childhood that are so clear, but that year of my life was so, so clear. I needed a way for these two characters—a 22-year-old and 33-year-old—to keep coming into contact.

Cooper Raiff's indie charmer, Cha Cha Real Smooth, is an ode to the beauty of being young.

When he spends time with Lola, playing games with her and taking care of her, it’s clear that he actually enjoys it (“easiest thing in the world,” he says, absolutely meaning it). And for a while, Andrew’s really, really sure that he wants to have Domino and Lola in his life in that way. He has too much to do, too much to see, and too many people to love in his own way. Each of them is lost in their own way, stuck, uncertain of which path to take, and it’s partially through the other that each is able to make sense of anything. Raiff’s film acknowledges heartbreak as part of the season of youth, but it doesn’t portray it as being a waste of time. Andrew’s nursing a heartbreak of his own: his girlfriend, abroad in Barcelona, has apparently taken up with a Spanish student, and part of him is convinced he should travel across the world to pursue her. Not only that, but Cha Cha Real Smooth celebrates youth and the possibilities of all its uncertainties, taking a stance that not having everything figured out is simply a glorious part of life. It’s a complicated concept that disassembles traditional conceptions of what romantic love is and should be. It’s true that the two flirt their way around something that undeniably isn’t quite an affair, but more important than that is what each of the characters receives from the other. The movie does have plenty of love and romance, but it makes damn sure to portray a more realistically complicated portrayal of youth and all the uncertainties that come along with it. He can’t be an older brother to her because he’s in love with her mother. He really does enjoy spending time with the girl—he’s kind and understanding, and he treats her with the proper amount of respect. Cooper Raiff’s Cha Cha Real Smooth tells this story, or at least a version of it, but the film manages to pivot around the typical narrative clichés that many others of its ilk fall into.

And sure, one could make an argument for “A Serious Man,” the Coen brothers' 2008 masterpiece about a Jewish physics professor undergoing an existential crisis, ...

When the non-Jewish heroes witness a bar mitzvah boy call his family up to lead the motzi and kiddush, they get emotional: This image of a family coming together to mark a life stage means something grand, even if they don’t have the words for it. In a sign of what’s to come, Andrew is first seen as a teenager hopelessly in love with an adult “motivational dancer” at a friend’s bar mitzvah party, oblivious to their age and maturity gap. Raiff was less interested in the easy jokes one could make about elaborate, expensive parties than in the undercurrent of the ritual itself: what it means to put so much attention and so many expectations on a 13-year-old. He continually seems to be glitching back and forth between maturity (launching his own party-starting business) and debasement (drinking on the job; spinning the adults-only Cardi B hit “WAP” for a roomful of junior high school kids). “Cha Cha” takes the bar mitzvah’s central coming-of-age idea, that a single ritual at the appropriate time marks the true threshold of adulthood, and runs with it in an unexpected manner. Its hero, Andrew (Raiff), isn’t a bar mitzvah boy but rather his hype man: the guy the parents hire to make sure the hormonal honorees (and all their friends) are having a good time at their own party.

Here's how you can watch the critically acclaimed dramedy starring Dakota Johnson, Cooper Raiff, and Leslie Mann.

Cha Cha Real Smooth premiered globally on Apple TV+ on June 17. A heartwarming tale of the highs and lows of college life, Shithouse is a portrait of the existential worries of young adulthood and the emotional vulnerabilities of life away from home. In keeping with Apple's knack for releasing its big movies for short theatrical windows to give them exposure, Apple confirmed it will be making Cha Cha Real Smooth available "in select theaters" globally from June 17. Apple TV released a 3-minute trailer for Cha Cha Real Smooth on May 12, 2022. Cha Cha Real Smooth is served with emotional honesty, charm, and a disarming candor that will leave many optimistic about his future works. She is not just a co-star, she is also one of the film’s producers through her company TeaTime Pictures. You might remember her from her role as Anastasia Steele in the Fifty Shades franchise or her acclaimed role in The Peanut Butter Falcon. She also played Nina in The Lost Daughter and will headline the Spider-Man spin-off film Madam Web. Brad Garrett plays Adams's stepfather, he is popular for his role as Robert Barron on the classic sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond. Leslie Mann plays Andrew's mother, Mann has featured in films such as The 40-Year-Old Virgin, This Is 40, and most recently The Bubble. Cha Cha Real Smooth also stars Evan Assante, Raúl Castillo, Odeya Rush, Erik Feig, Jessica Switch, and Ro Donnelly.

In his second film, whiz-kid Cooper Raiff gives himself another starring role as an adorable bar mitzvah host who meets Dakota Johnson's older woman.

In "Cha Cha Real Smooth," Cooper Raiff creates the world around "Andrew" with so much precision that it shuns all the aspersions.

Domino often used to act very differently when she was with Joseph, and she had made the equation very clear: they would meet when Joseph was not in town. He didn’t force his sensibilities upon them, and maybe that was because of the way he was brought up by his mother. It was not only because of the age gap, that she felt those things. Domino had a miscarriage in one of the parties, and her dress got stained with blood. Looking at Domino, one always felt that there was something more to her, that she was hiding something, that maybe she was depressed or had an unhappy marriage, or maybe she was finding it hard to deal with the challenges and tired of putting in constant effort to raise her autistic daughter. He had developed a bond with Lola too, and she felt secure in her presence. The party was very dull, and even the younger lot was so reserved that they were finding it hard to make their way to the dance floor. Lisa was the biggest supporter and cheerleader of Andrew, and he knows that sometimes his mother exaggerates the situation and boasts about him to just make him happy. They do not predetermine a notion to be right or wrong, and neither do they judge when someone does not adhere to the social norms. Maya was going to Barcelona under the Fulbright Program, and Andrew was hoping that he would find some good non-profit to work at in Barcelona itself. It is the general perception of the filmmaking industry that a protagonist should not be the director of the movie, as most of the time, it leads to the performance becoming exaggerated and the narrative becoming a tad bit excessive. Coming of age doesn’t mean that a momentous event is going to change you completely, so much that you are not the same person again.

NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben speaks with writer, actor and director Cooper Raiff about his new film, "Cha Cha Real Smooth," about a college graduate who ...

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