Month: November 2020

German filmmaker Ulrike Ottinger has been making films for nearly 50 years now, creating experimental and often transgressive work that frequently walks the line between documentary reality and artistic truth. Nothing has fazed her in this time, even working in the bohemian heyday of the late Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Berlin, but her latest film, in
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Following 2017’s “Las Cinéphilas,” about retired women who go to the cinema every day, and this year’s “Le Temps Perdu,” which just had its world premiere in IDFA’s feature-length documentary competition, Argentinian director Maria Alvarez is already developing the third part of her trilogy focusing on elderly people. In “Close” (“Las Cercanas”), which will see
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Feature debutant Rezwan Shahriar Sumit’s “The Salt in Our Waters,” bows Nov. 29 at the Singapore International Film Festival’s Asian Visions strand after successful festival screenings at London, Busan and Torino. The project was supported by the Spike Lee Fellowship, which offered the film’s preliminary writing grants, France’s CNC aide aux cinemas du monde, the
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It hasn’t yet come to pass, but there may come a year when Record Store Day gets the official dual title of National Bill Evans Day. While there are plenty of rock artists whose archives have been regularly mined for exclusive vinyl releases tied to the semiannual event, like David Bowie and the Grateful Dead,
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Since his 2001 debut, everything about vocalist and actor Josh Groban has been an evolution. The high lyric baritone with the big voice and four multi-platinum albums moved from covering songwriters’ operatic pop and lofty theater songs to penning his own more intimate, urbane material. These songs show up alongside those of such writers as
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Turns out “Utopia” wasn’t a perfect fit at Amazon. The streamer has canceled the sci-fi drama after only a single season, Variety has confirmed. News of the axe coming down on “Utopia” comes just over two months after it launched. Inspired by the British series of the same name, “Utopia” hailed from “Gone Girl” and “Sharp Objects”
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All products and services featured by Variety are independently selected by Variety editors. However, Variety may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes. In HBO’s “The Undoing,” Grace Fraser’s collection of coats is worthy of its own storyline. Her mossy-green textured
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More than two years after filming wrapped, “Superintelligence,” the latest joint effort of Melissa McCarthy and her director husband Ben Falcone, has finally popped up on a streaming platform — specifically, HBO Max — which arguably is the natural habitat for a lightweight, undemandingly engaging comedy that can be enjoyed either entirely in one sitting,
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HBO and HBO Max are rounding out the universally despised year with the long-awaited premieres of popular shows and movies. “Wonder Woman 1984,” the hotly anticipated sequel to 2017’s “Wonder Woman,” will be debuting simultaneously on HBO Max and in theaters on Christmas Day. Gal Gadot faces off against a new enemy with superhuman strength
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The great, late drag queen Mertzy Jones had an expression: “Miss Too-Many Things is a mess in a dress.” For better and worse, that describes Miley Cyrus, an artist whose restless, genre-jumping eclecticism often sounds more like a kiddish cluttered mind with a dabbler’s sensibilities, rather than an ambitious experimental aesthetic. Luckily, that’s not such
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Netflix series “Fabulous Lives of Bollywood Wives” delivers exactly what it promises: a glossy window into the lives of four wealthy, glamorous women celebrating their enduring friendships on screen. Bravo may have gotten there first with its “Real Housewives” franchise, but the streaming giant’s take is the first of its kind out of India. The
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Growing up in a part of Texas he calls “Selena country,” Jaime Dávila inevitably became a lifelong fan of the singer-songwriter. Thus, the Campanario Entertainment president’s role as exec producer of a new series about Selena’s life, family and career has been a long time coming. But Selena’s life is not a story untold. Indeed,
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(SPOILER ALERT: Do not read on if you have not watched the fifth episode of season 2 of Disney Plus’ “The Mandalorian.”)   “The Mandalorian” teed up the arrival of Ahsoka Tano two episodes ago and judging from the speed and cameo size of the show thus far, viewers would have been forgiven for thinking we
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In the 24 days since Election Day, Twitter has added warnings labels to 200 of President Trump’s tweets or posts he has retweeted (and counting) indicating that they contain false, disputed or misleading info. Overall since polls closed Nov. 3, about 30% of Trump’s posts on Twitter have been flagged by Twitter as containing or
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Record Store Day’s little-sis adjunct, the Black Friday edition, typically only includes about a third the amount of titles as the main event in April. But since the said big kahuna got put off and split between three “RSD Drops” weekends in August, September and October, this weekend’s Black Friday spinoff doesn’t feel so minimal
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Paris-based company Alba Films has acquired French distribution rights to Sabrina Van Tassel’s timely social justice documentary “The State of Texas vs. Melissa.” The documentary premiered at the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival and recently made its U.K. debut at the Raindance Film Festival where it won the best documentary award. FilmRise holds theatrical and digital
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Hit variety TV show “China’s Got Talent” has been renewed for a seventh season and will be produced by Shanghai Canxing Culture and Media for Star China Media. The “Got Talent” property was created by Simon Cowell’s Syco Entertainment, with the international rights represented by Fremantle. The two companies are the format’s co-owners. “ ‘China’s
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In today’s Global Bulletin, streamers face potential content quotas in Australia, Leonine hires former Red Arrow exec Nina Etspueler, Channel 4 commissions a second Diana doc and Tallinn’s industry section announces its winners. QUOTA Global platforms facing imminent local production quotas across Europe could be looking at a similar situation in Australia, where new proposed
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