Apple Studios has finally released the official CODA trailer for director Sian Heder’s coming-of-age family drama pic, starring Emilia Jones and Oscar winner Marlee Matlin. The video features a teenage girl as she gets torn between choosing to go after her dreams of going to a music school for college or staying behind with her deaf family who needs her. The film previously won multiple major awards earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival.
The film is still slated to debut on August 13 in select theaters and on Apple TV+. Its current release date sees CODA going up against three high-profile competitors in the form of Ryan Reynolds’ long-delayed action-comedy Free Guy, Jennifer Hudson’s Aretha Franklin biopic Respect, and Stephen Lang’s Don’t Breathe 2.
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Based on the award-winning French film titled La Famille Belier, CODA will be led by Emilia Jones (Locke & Key) as Ruby, Eugenio Derbez (Dora and the Lost City of Gold) as Bernardo Villalobos, Oscar winner Marlee Matlin (Children of a Lesser God) as Jackie, Daniel Durant (You) as Leo, and Troy Kotsur. It will also star Ferdia Walsh-Peelo, Amy Forsyth, and Kevin Chapman.
Gifted with a voice that her parents can’t hear, seventeen-year-old Ruby, is the sole hearing member of a deaf family—a CODA, Child of Deaf Adults. Her life revolves around acting as an interpreter for her parents and working on the family’s struggling fishing boat every day before school with her father and older brother. But when Ruby joins her high school’s choir club, she discovers a gift for singing and finds herself drawn to her duet partner Miles. Encouraged by her enthusiastic, tough-love choirmaster to apply to a prestigious music school, Ruby finds herself torn between the obligations she feels to her family and the pursuit of her own dreams.
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CODA is written and directed by Sian Heder. It is produced by Philippe Rousselet, Fabrice Gianfermi, Patrick Wachsberger, and Jérôme Seydoux with Ardavan Safaee and Sarah Borch-Jacobsen set as producers. The film was a co-production by Vendome Pictures and Pathe Films.
The film had its world premiere at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival where it went on to win the festival’s top prizes, including the Special Jury Award for Ensemble Cast, the Directing Award, the Audience Award, and the Grand Jury Prize.
