Month: February 2020

Paramount’s “Sonic the Hedgehog” dominated global box office charts after debuting to $100 million worldwide. “Sonic,” based on the popular Sega video game, pulled in $43 million when it launched in 43 international territories, representing 60% of its foreign footprint. Among overseas markets, Mexico saw the biggest start with $6.7 million, followed by the United

February 16, 2020 9:51AM PT Nikita Pearl Waligwa, an actor who appeared in Disney’s biographical drama “Queen of Katwe,” has died, according to BBC and the Ugandan newspaper Daily Monitor. She was 15. Waligwa had been diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2016 and seemed to recover a year later. However, in 2019, another tumor

Paramount’s family film “Sonic the Hedgehog” ignited over Presidents Day weekend with $57 million in North America and $100 million globally, the biggest showing ever for a video game adaptation. “Sonic” is expected to earn $68 million to $70 million through Monday, one of the best results for the holiday weekend. The better-than-expected start is

Issa Rae co-stars in two romantic movies with leading men of color this year: “The Photograph,” a drama with Lakeith Stanfield, and the upcoming rom-com “The Lovebirds” with Kumail Nanjiani. Rae said the former — written and directed by Stella Meghie — echoes the nostalgia of one of her favorite films centered on black love,

Shaun, everyone’s favorite sheep, is back, and this time he’s facing aliens and robots in “A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon.” Directors Will Becher and Richard Phelan teamed together on this film for their first full-length collaboration. While the two have been working at Aardman Studios, Phelan’s background was as a story artist and Becher’s

Lynn Cohen, a veteran stage and screen actor who played Magda on “Sex and the City,” died Friday. She was 86. Magda was Miranda Hobbe’s (Cynthia Nixon) housekeeper and eventually her nanny, and Cohen also appeared in both film adaptations of the show. She talked to Cosmopolitan about her role in 2018. “It showed a

The Independent Film & Television Alliance has filed a complaint to the U.S. Trade Representative, calling for the U.S. government to keep China on its Priority Watch List and to monitor China under Section 306 of the Trade Act. The IFTA lobby group, which represents American and international independent film companies, argues that China is

February 15, 2020 6:29AM PT FilmNation will launch international sales on “The Good Nurse,” a thriller set to star Jessica Chastain and Eddie Redmayne, at the European Film Market (EFM), Variety has learned. The film marks Tobias Lindholm’s English-language feature directing debut. The Danish filmmaker previously oversaw “A Hijacking” and “A War.” The film centers

There’s much talk these days of microaggressions: words and gestures of disrespect toward others, particularly those of other social groups, that betray prejudice even when everyday or unintentional. It’s a term that sounds almost scientific, though as a unit of measurement, it’s frustratingly inexact: how many microaggressions add up to plain, violent, not-so-small oppression? How

In today’s film news roundup, Noomi Rapace gets a starring role, ArcLight Cinemas hires Ted Mundorff and a “Karn Evil 9” movie is in the works. CASTING  Noomi Rapace will star in the thriller “O2,” which will launch sales next week at the European Film Market in Berlin through Wild Bunch International. Franck Khalfoun is

When disconsolate lovers light up a post-coital cigarette amid tousled bedclothes in a French New Wave film, the source of their angsty ennui is often, in some way or other, l’amour. But if it’s Hangzhou, China, in the late 2010s, as opposed to 1960s Paris, the source of the disaffection, and therefore the poetry, is

For any Lin-Manuel Miranda fans whose hearts sank almost as quickly as they rose upon hearing that, yes, there’s a “Hamilton” movie, and no, it won’t be out for another 20 months, succor may be on the way in the form of a probably faster-arriving movie that features Miranda in almost as big a role,

As panic roils mainland China and fear escalates throughout globe over the spread of coronavirus, Hollywood studios and content production companies are ramping up their efforts to respond to the human and economic impact of a potential pandemic. This past Tuesday, as Sony Pictures Entertainment shook off its Oscar hangover from wins for “Once Upon