Movies

February 1, 2019 4:27PM PT Tony Award winning and Academy Award nominated actress Sophie Okonedo has signed with CAA, Variety has learned. Okonedo is a star of stage and screen, routinely alternating between movies and theater. She most recently played Kanga in Disney’s live-action film “Christopher Robin,” starring alongside Ewan McGregor and Hayley Atwell. She

February 1, 2019 2:52PM PT Netflix is in negotiations to buy the worldwide rights to “American Factory,” which recently premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in the documentary competition. “American Factory,” directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, centers on the aftermath of the 2014 purchase of a General Motors plant in Dayton, Ohio, which

The third frame of M. Night Shyamalan’s “Glass” should lead a typically slow Super Bowl weekend, with about $9 million at 3,665 North American sites, early estimates showed on Friday. Universal’s thriller, a sequel to “Unbreakable” and “Split,” will likely finish the frame with about $88 million and three consecutive box office crowns in its

The opening frames of “Honeyland” are so rustically sumptuous that you wonder, for a second, if they’ve somehow been art-directed. Elegantly dressed in a vivid ochre blouse and emerald headscarf, captured in long shot as she nimbly wends her way through a craggy but spectacular Balkan landscape, careworn middle-aged beekeeper Hatidze Muratova heads to check

February 1, 2019 11:57AM PT Universal Pictures has given a prime summer release date of June 19, 2020, to Pete Davidson’s untitled semi-autobiographical comedy from director Judd Apatow. The studio made the announcement Friday, three days after unveiling the project. The Universal Pictures film is written by Apatow, Davidson, and Dave Sirus. Davidson, who grew up

February 1, 2019 11:29AM PT Javier Bardem is in negotiations to join the A-list ensemble of Legendary’s “Dune” reboot. He boards a cast that already includes Timothee Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Stellan Skarsgard, Dave Bautista, and Charlotte Rampling, with Oscar Isaac and Zendaya also in talks to join. Bardem will play Stilgar, the leader of a

Amid the massive changes in the entertainment industry, Thomas Schlamme has found stability in his role as the 26th president of the Directors Guild of America.“I feel as if I’m more comfortable being the president now than I was when I started,” he says. “I’m able to balance the DGA presidency with my career.” Schlamme

February 1, 2019 10:47AM PT Idris Elba is in talks to star in MGM’s supernatural thriller “Deeper,” sources tell Variety. “Everest” filmmaker Baltasar Kormakur will direct. “Bright” scribe Max Landis penned the script and will also produce with David Goyer, Kevin Turren, and Addictive Pictures. The film follows a former astronaut who was hired to

Mel Gibson and Tye Sheridan are in final negotiations to join the indie “Black Flies,” which is based on the novel by Shannon Burke. The script was penned by Ryan King and was featured on this year’s Black List. Jean-Stephane Sauvaire, who last directed the critically acclaimed A24 film “A Prayer Before Dawn,” will helm

Swedish production company Brain Academy has brought two upcoming features to this year’s Goteborg Film Festival: “The Perfect Patient,” a work in progress currently in post-production, and “The Girlfriend,” which pitched Friday in the projects section. “The Perfect Patient” tells the story of the biggest legal scandal in Sweden’s history. Hannes Råstam was a legal

Twenty years ago, “The Blair Witch Project” debuted at Sundance, creating an impact that’s still felt today. The movie’s “found footage” format inspired multiple imitations and was a reminder to Hollywood of the huge audience potential for micro-budget storytelling. The movie’s biggest impact: It was a triumph of marketing, mixing old media with the newly

February 1, 2019 10:11AM PT “Get Out” star Allison Williams and German actor Alexander Dreymon are set to star in the upcoming survival-thriller “Horizon Line” for STXfilms and Nordic company SF Studios. Principal photography will commence in Mauritius on Feb. 11 before moving to Dublin and then Pinewood in London. STXinternational is handling international distribution

The Göteborg Film Festival’s 6th Nostradamus Report, titled “Relevance in a New Reality,” was presented at a seminar held at the festival on Friday afternoon. The yearly report is designed to forecast what the coming three-to-five years may look like for the screen industries. This year’s Nostradamus is in five chapters in which industry experts

February is here, which means Valentine’s Day is around the corner. Hulu is offering traditional fare (think Kleenex and chocolates) like the Sandra Bullock-led rom-com “While You Were Sleeping,” as well as “Four Weddings and a Funeral,” “Moonstruck,” and “Barefoot.” Why stop at romantic relationships though? Celebrate Galentine’s Day, the Feb. 13 “holiday” popularized by

Prop master Barry Bedig was literally born into the biz. Yet despite being the son of storied special effects man Sass Bedig (“The Godfather,” “Bullitt,” “The French Connection”), Barry’s youth was largely unaffected by Tinseltown’s glare. Infrequent studio visits with Dad produced understated memories. “I got to ride [Roy Rogers’ horse] Trigger once,” he deadpans. Obtaining

February 1, 2019 3:50AM PT Demi Moore proves her comedy chops in a wicked satire that’s light on plotting and heavy on the cannibal jokes. When the employees of Incredible Edibles, a comestible silverware start-up, get trapped in a cave during a team-building retreat, it doesn’t take long for these environmentalists to consider cannibalism. Patrick

February 1, 2019 3:10AM PT Anna Marsh has been named Studiocanal’s new managing director in the U.K. Marsh is being upped from executive vice president of international distribution. She will start her new London-based position on March 1. The MD post was initially to be filled by Elizabeth Trotman, Studiocanal’s point person in Australia and New

With “Aurora,” a female-centric romantic comedy with social undertones, Miia Tervo has emerged as one of Finland’s most promising and daring young directors. While attending the Goteborg Film Festival, where “Aurora” is nominated for three awards, Tervo spoke to Variety about being one of Finland’s very few women directors and her desire to address young

GOTEBORG —  The excitement was palpable on Thursday in the Stora Theatern, when Göteborg Film Festival artistic director Jonas Holmberg appeared on stage to present Danish actor right before the screening of the Academy Award-nominated “The Hunt,” which still drew astonished gasps from the crowd. Quickly advertising the actor’s latest film “Arctic” (“It’s all about

Spending on film and high-end TV production in the U.K. topped £3.1 billion ($4.1 billion) in 2018, the second-highest figure on record, but down from 2017’s record-breaking £3.3 billion, according to figures released Friday by the British Film Institute. Spending on high-end TV was up 4% from 2017 at £1.2 billion, the highest since tax

February 1, 2019 1:27AM PT Elisabeth Moss and Susan Sarandon have signed on for “Call Jane,” which follows a 1960s underground abortion movement in the U.S. Sian Heder (“Tallulah”) will helm the picture. Moss will produce along with Robbie Brenner, the Oscar-nominated producer of “Dallas Buyers Club,” under her Unburdened Entertainment shingle. Moss will play Joy,

The title card for Penny Lane’s phenomenal “Hail Satan?” waits a beat before adding the question mark. Are the members of the Satanic Temple for real? No … and yes. In the opening scenes, Lane follows its founders to a Halloween store to buy cheap robes they’ll wear to the Florida Capitol to rally in

Before heading to Göteborg to screen his thriller “Sons Of Denmark” in the Nordic competition, 32-year-old Danish director Ulaa Salim took time to talk to Variety about his provocative debut feature, which made a strong showing in Rotterdam’s Tiger competition. The film is set in 2025, and unfolds in a Denmark where an ultra-nationalist politician,

There’s a sly mood of imminent surprise to music-video director Noble Jones’ narrative feature debut “The Tomorrow Man.” John Lithgow and Blythe Danner play somewhat eccentric older small-town denizens drawn together, though each has a secret life that could be a deal-breaker. Once we suss what those secrets are, it becomes clear that this is

In “David Crosby: Remember My Name,” A.J. Eaton’s moving and elegiac rock-nostalgia documentary, David Crosby appears before us as an older and wiser hippie troubadour, his signature long locks and frontier mustache now white, his spirit chastened but still keyed to the muse of his holy boomer-rock self. In the movie, Crosby speaks with candor

TLA Releasing has snared U.S. and U.K. rights while Optimale has acquired all French rights to Bani Khoshnoudi’s “Fireflies” (“Luciernagas”), from Sandro Fiorin’s sales and distribution company, FiGa Films. “Some of the best Queer cinema right now is undoubtedly coming out of Central and South America, and ‘Fireflies’ is the perfect example of this,” said Adam Silver,

As the aftermath of the Jussie Smollett attack continues to unfold, Ellen Page gave an impassioned speech on “The Late Show” blasting President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence for their anti-LGBTQ policies and emphasizing how those policies affect the experiences of marginalized people. “Connect the dots, this is what happens,” she said, referring to

Hugely popular short video platform, TikTok has teamed with Sony Pictures Entertainment to promote the studio’s psychological thriller “Escape Room.” The film features six strangers who find themselves in circumstances beyond their control. They must use their wits to find and follow the clues, or die. Sony recreated settings from the film, including a shrinking

Nicole Brending’s “Dollhouse: The Eradication of Female Subjectivity in American Popular Culture” has won the Narrative Feature Grand Jury prize and the Spirit of Slamdance award at the 25th Slamdance Film Festival. The film follows rise and fall of fictional child pop star Junie Spoons as her life story unfolds, as told by those who

January 31, 2019 9:00PM PT Ash Mayfair, the Vietnamese director whose first film “The Third Wife” rocked the Toronto, San Sebastian and Chicago festivals last year, will join Myanmar’s The Maw Naing (“The Monk”) in going back to school. They are among five young talents who will take part in the third edition of Southeast