Movies

December 13, 2019 3:35PM PT Paramount Pictures is in early negotiations with Jonathan Entwistle, who is best known for his Netflix series “The End of the F***ing World”, to develop a new take on “Power Rangers” for the studio. The was a popular ’90s TV series involved a group of kids who become superheroes. The

Sharon Stone got an Oscar nomination for appearing in one Martin Scorsese film, “Casino.” But could her cameo in one of his latest pictures help derail his shot at a nomination for that film this year? The movie in question is not “The Irishman,” the film that’s seen as a leading Oscar contender, but “Rolling

Luc Besson’s EuropaCorp has posted a 50% drop in revenues during the first half of the 2019-20 financial year even as the financially ailing company tries to finalize a rescue deal with its junior lender, Vine Alternative Investments. EuropaCorp’s revenues fell to €40.7 million ($45 million) during the six months ending Sept. 30. The company

Penny Furr was Kathy Scruggs’ roommate when the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter got a major scoop involving the investigation into the Centennial Olympic Park bombing. Scruggs had discovered that Richard Jewell, the security guard who had evacuated the area before the bomb exploded, saving dozens of lives in the process, was a suspect in the attack.

There have been multiple film and TV versions of “Little Women.” But composer Alexandre Desplat and writer-director Greta Gerwig had a non-traditional idea for Sony’s 2019 version: “We wanted the music to be a duet of Mozart and Bowie,” Desplat laughs. There are no rock music touches in the score, but there is a modern

In today’s film news roundup, a Clarence Thomas documentary and “Never, Rarely, Sometimes, Always” are getting theatrical releases, and Lionsgate is developing a Rabbids movie. RELEASE DATES Manifold Productions has slated “Created Equal: Clarence Thomas in His Own Words” to open in theaters nationwide on Jan. 31, Variety has learned exclusively. The documentary about the

Following the news that character actor Danny Aiello died on Thursday night, friends and peers of the “Moonstruck” actor shared their remembrances via social media. Aiello — whose body of work included Spike Lee’s “Do the Right Thing,” “The Purple Rose of Cairo,” “Jacob’s Ladder,” “The Godfather Part II” and Madonna’s “Papa Don’t Preach” music

A four-time Academy Award nominee, Willem Dafoe developed his cinematic charisma — seen in films like “The Florida Project” and “At Eternity’s Gate” — in his early career in theater. After studying drama at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Dafoe moved to New York in 1976 and joined what would eventually become The Wooster Group. His

When Francine Jamison-Tanchuck signed on as the costume designer for “Just Mercy,” the true story of defense attorney Bryan Stevenson (played by Michael B. Jordan) and his fight to overturn the murder conviction of Walter McMillian (Jamie Foxx), she was drawn to the prospect of depicting real-life characters through her work.  “It can sometimes be more

Chris Aronson admits he was being bullish when he told his colleagues at 20th Century Fox that “Avatar” would gross $500 million at the domestic box office. This was back in 2009, before Marvel mania and Disney dominance made half-a-million-dollar earners commonplace at the box office. Up until that point, only “Titanic” and “The Dark

Producer Matt Tolmach wasn’t surprised that Sony Motion Picture Group chairman Tom Rothman wanted a sequel to “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle.” After all, the film didn’t just open big two years ago this month; its box office take actually increased 38.4% in its second weekend of release — a rare feat for a studio

Going from co-president of a major movie studio — otherwise known as the guy who holds the purse strings — to a film producer dependent on that person’s largess could be very discombobulating. But Matt Tolmach has turned his experience as a longtime Columbia Pictures executive into more than a billion dollars of box office

“Jumanji: The Next Level” swung to $4.7 million at 3,778 North American locations on Thursday night. “Black Christmas,” meanwhile, launched with $230,000 in previews from 2,100 theaters. Sony’s comedy sequel is expected to dominate the weekend with a studio forecast of about $35 million at 4,227 venues — nearly equal to the first weekend of

Danny Aiello, a character actor best known for his work in such films as “Do the Right Thing” and “Moonstruck,” died on Thursday night in New Jersey. He was 86. Aiello’s literary agent Jennifer De Chiara confirmed his death to Variety. “It is with profound sorrow to report that Danny Aiello, beloved husband, father, grandfather,

Netflix is getting ready to officially launch its swanky Paris office on Jan. 17. The streaming giant has planned an afternoon of discussions that gather together Netflix executives, including the company’s co-founder, chairman and CEO Reed Hastings, as well as the filmmakers and producers who have worked with Netflix. As previously announced, the French outpost

As controversy builds around “Richard Jewell” and its depiction of female journalists, it’s nothing new for women music writers on the silver screen. Although “Crazy Heart,” which premiered 10 years ago this month, was basically 2009’s equivalent of Bradley Cooper’s remake of “A Star Is Born,” it hasn’t had quite the staying power of some

Spain’s Secuoya Studios has teamed with publishing giant the Planeta Group to expand Madrid Content City, the audiovisual complex that hosts Netflix first European Production Hub. Madrid Content City will multiply by a factor of seven its current operating area of 22,000 square-meters (236,806 square-feet). In total, Madrid Content City will span 140,000 square-meters (1.5

Though A24’s “Uncut Gems” features retired Celtics player Kevin Garnett in his acting debut, avid basketball fan and star Adam Sandler said he never actually had the chance to shoot hoops with the famed center during filming. “But he taught me two good tips and I’m not going to tell you what they are, but

“Black Christmas” is the second remake of the 1974 slasher classic, which centers on a group of sorority sisters stalked by an unknown murderer. While the original had the female protagonists (SPOILER) offed, in this one, the women fight back. “It’s been called a re-imagining of the original, and I think, in ways that the

“Black Christmas,” a low-budget Canadian horror movie released in 1974, was a slasher thriller with a difference: It was the very first one! Okay, there were more than a few precedents, from “Psycho” (the great-granddaddy of the genre) to “The Last House on the Left” and “The Texas Chain Saw Massacre” to Mario Bava’s “A

December 12, 2019 3:26PM PT Following their exit from the “Star Wars” universe, “Game of Thrones” co-creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have found their replacement pic, signing on to direct an untitled thriller based on the graphic novel “Lovecraft” for Warner Bros. Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi are on board to pen the script

Greta Gerwig wrote and directed Sony’s “Little Women,” a new look at Louisa May Alcott’s much-loved 19th-century classic. Eager to pay tribute to her artisan colleagues, Gerwig says, “It was a joy for me to work with all these people. It’s a movie that’s impossible to create without world-class artists. They killed themselves for me!”

Hollywood has made many terrific films about childhood, and many about filmmaking. Amazon’s “Honey Boy,” which opened Nov. 8, combines the two: A movie with a child’s POV of the industry. That unique angle could be a real benefit during awards season, and the film’s backstory — with Shia LaBeouf as the main attraction — will

In Hollywood, awards season is the season of complaining. There are times when I have to stop and tell myself to just shut up. Why? Because I catch myself kvetching too much. We’re all guilty of it — and we all have to stop.  Here are five things Hollywood loves to whine about and why the

The door has opened wider for gay content in Taiwan since the island became the first in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage in May, and companies like CEO Jay Lin’s Portico Media are hoping to turn LGBTQ stories into good business. The firm is ramping up its development of originals on its GagaOOLala platform, Asia’s

Olivia Wilde has tweeted a string of responses to criticism of the character she plays in Clint Eastwood’s film “Richard Jewell,” which opens Friday. In the series of tweets, she admits that the journalist she plays, Kathy Scruggs, had a relationship with an FBI agent, but Wilde says she was not in control of the

Director Melina Matsoukas didn’t bother to set her alarm for the Golden Globes announcement Monday. When she woke up on Dec. 9 to the news that her movie, “Queen & Slim,” a powerful drama about a young black couple forced to go on the run after a fatal encounter with a racist cop, hadn’t received

FILMS AND PERFORMANCES Infinitely Yours (Director: Miwa Matreyek) ― A live performance at the intersection of cinema and theater exploring what it means to be living in the Anthropocene and the time of climate crisis. A kaleidoscopic meditation that is an emotionally impactful and embodied illustration of news headlines we see everyday. A Machine for

Catherine Deneuve has returned to her Paris home after more than a month in the hospital and at a rest home following a mild stroke, according to French report. The French screen icon was seen out and about by her neighbors in the Saint Germain arrondissement of Paris. Deneuve, 76, had what her family called

When Kees van Oostrum, president of the American Society of Cinematographers, was at the Sundance Film Festival in 2018, he noticed that many documentaries had been shot by women. But he was also aware of the dismal number of female lensers hired for feature films. “I realized we had to do something,” he says. That