Winston Duke, Tony Hale star in film festival favorite 'Nine Days'

HOLLYWOOD, LOS ANGELES -- The film festival favorite "Nine Days" is hitting theaters Friday. It's a complicated movie about life, but the director says it can be summed up in a sentence.

"It's a reclusive man who selects souls for the privilege to be born," said director Edson Oda.

"Black Panther" actor Winston Duke plays that man whose name is Will. He is following other people's lives on a menagerie of TV screens. When one of his subjects dies, he has a vacancy for a new life. He's responsible for interviewing the candidates - all unborn souls. Unfortunately, Will's at a place where he doesn't want to feel anything anymore.

"Will is a very interesting character and, as you know, serves as this beautiful reminder of what can happen if you let life, to some degree, defeat you for a while," said Duke.

Zazie Beetz, Arianna Ortiz and Tony Hale are part of the "Nine Days" ensemble cast.

"If you really stay in your moment, there's not too much fear functioning there. You're not worried about the future. You're not concerned about the past. You're just interested in what's happening right now," said Beetz.

"It's a bit of a mystery of like, where are we? What's happening? What's this about because it's so unusual?" said Ortiz.

"We saw the movie pre-COVID where - and I walked away from that going, 'Wow, there's a lot I don't appreciate about life, and I don't take these moments.' Post-COVID you've seen it, you're like, 'Whoa, I got to wake up to a lot of small moments I'm missing. So I'm excited for that wake-up call for a lot of people, including myself," said Hale.

"Nine Days" is in theaters now in limited release.