Freakonomics Documentary Will Close The Tribeca Film Festival

The Tribeca Film Festival gets started in just a few weeks, which means that CB's New York squad has a whooole lot of organizing to do before the end of April. Now three more films have been added to our to-do list, as Tribeca has announced their closing night film, plus a gala premiere and a special presentation.

Most intriguing of the bunch by far is the closing night selection Freakonomics, a documentary adaptation of the bestseller that brings together a serious dream team of documentarians to make it: Alex Gibney (Taxi to the Dark Side), Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me), Rachel Grady and Heidi Ewing (Jesus Camp), Eugene Jarecki (Why We Fight and Seth Gordon (The King of Kong) all put their names to the film.

The gala premiere belongs to Letters to Juliet, the Amanda Seyfried romantic comedy that seems to be occupying the slot held last year by My Life In Ruins: a fluffy movie that's part of a film festival for inexplicable reasons. Finally there's My Own Love Song, the first English-language movie from La Vie En Rose director Olivier Dahan that stars Renee Zellweger and Forest Whitaker as an unlikely pair of roadtrippers.

Now is the time when I must remind you that a choice spot at a film festival does not guarantee a movie's quality, and yet, I'm very excited about Freakonomics. With his upcoming Eliot Spitzer documentary debuting at the festival as well, Alex Gibney ought to be named the grand marshal of this thing.

Katey Rich

Staff Writer at CinemaBlend