Movies

October 30, 2018 10:00AM PT Toni Collette is set to join the cast of Rian Johnson’s murder mystery “Knives Out.” The movie stars Daniel Craig, Chris Evans, Lakeith Stanfield, Michael Shannon, Don Johnson, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Ana de Armas. Johnson will write and direct, as well as produce with Ram Bergman. Production is set

October 30, 2018 9:53AM PT Olga Kurylenko will lead a female-led cast in “The Courier,” a London-set action thriller from Zackary Adler (“The Rise of the Krays”). Kurylenko (“Quantum of Solace”) will play the titular courier, whose daily deliveries are interrupted when she discovers that her latest package is a bomb aimed at the witness

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross just got off tour. They also just got out of the recording studio. These are not contradictory statements. In recent months, it’s been Nine Inch Nails by night, film scoring by day — sometimes right up to the moment they walk on stage. They wrapped up work on Jonah Hill’s

“War is a state of mind,” notes Cyprien Clément-Delmas, who, together with Igor Kosenko, directed “Boy of War,” the study of Artiom, a teenage Ukrainian whose dream is to become a soldier and fight for his homeland. Has Artiom really thought this idea through? This was the question on the duo’s minds as they began

Sony Pictures Classics has acquired worldwide rights to the historical drama “All Is True,” starring Kenneth Branagh, Judi Dench, and Ian McKellen. Branagh directed from Ben Elton’s script about the little-known period in the final years of William Shakespeare. Branagh portrays the playwright with Dench as his wife Anne, while McKellen plays the Earl of

This year Lucca Comics & Games, which draws almost 250,000 guests, will really have something for everyone. Michael Pena and Diego Luna of Netflix’s “Narcos,” Marvel Comics’ editor-in-chief C.B. Cebulski, executive producer of videogame “Kingdom Hearts III” Shinji Hashimoto, “The Crow” creator James O’Barr, former Ferrari racer Jean Alesi and manga master Leiji Matsumoto are

How does Heather Parry, president of Live Nation Productions, operate? A telling example comes in answer to a question about how her company became involved with “A Star Is Born,” the Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga vehicle that is already one of the biggest films of the year. “I know Bradley, and as soon as

Christmas is more than a month away, but Netflix is already adding a host of holiday flicks to its November lineup of original movies. Starting Nov. 2, the streaming platform is adding almost ten original films to its fall slate, including “The Holiday Calendar,” a movie about a magic calendar that can predict the future,

The Middle East premiere of U.S. director Peter Farrelly’s “Green Book” will open the revamped Cairo Film Festival where Alfonso Cuaron’s “Roma” is also set to launch in the region and Ralph Fiennes will be feted with a career award. Cairo’s upcoming 40th edition, which will run November 20-29, bears the stamp of a big

It was more or less inevitable that the centenary of Ingmar Bergman (he was born on July 14, 1918) would be commemorated with a reverent film portrait of the legendary Swedish director’s life and work. But here’s where we’ve been lucky: The year has given us not one but two world-class, eye-and-mind-opening Bergman documentaries. The

In today’s film news roundup, Mel Gibson and Charlie Hunnam are starring in “Waldo,” romantic drama “Stay” gets picked up and the Academy is partnering with the African American Film Critics Association. CASTINGS Mel Gibson, Charlie Hunnam and Eiza González are attached to star in Tim Kirkby’s action-thriller “Waldo.” Andrew Lazar, Christina Weiss Lurie and

October 29, 2018 5:44PM PT Jeffrey Dean Morgan, star of AMC’s series “The Walking Dead,” and Connie Nielsen have signed on for the Janusz Kaminski-directed thriller “The Postcard Killings.” The two will co-star in the film adapted from James Patterson and Liza Marklund’s bestseller. The film follows a New York detective (Morgan) whose life is

Despite the Trump administration’s threat to define transgender individuals out of existence, and the recent violence against those of the Jewish faith, Steven Canals and Janet Mock are not afraid of the violence against marginalized people in the United States. “The truth is that our lives as queer people of color, LGBTQ people, as women, our

Hollywood may be reassessing its ties to Saudi Arabia following the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. But at a big international film industry conference underway in the Middle East, there are no signs anyone else is thinking about pulling back from what continues to be considered a global top 10 movie market in

October 29, 2018 3:00PM PT After the record-breaking box office run of “It,” director Andy Muschietti has found his next project. Muschietti will direct a feature film adaptation of “Attack on Titans” for Warner Bros. The studio finalized a deal with Japan-based publishing company Kodansha on Monday. “Attack on Titan,” written and illustrated by Hajime Isayama,

Christmas may be more than a month away, but that isn’t stopping streaming platforms from adding some holiday cheer to their November lineups. Beginning with the animated film “Angela’s Christmas” on Nov. 1, Netflix is adding several holiday movies to its streaming slate, including “The Holiday Calendar,” “The Princess Switch,” and “A Christmas Prince: The

The producers of “Crazy Rich Asians,” which doesn’t release in China till the end of next month, are already warming up plans to shoot the film’s sequel in the Middle Kingdom. Producer John Penotti, president of SK Global, said that “China Rich Girlfriend” is targeting a shoot in Shanghai. He made the revelation Monday in

October 29, 2018 11:24AM PT Not even a star-studded cast could save “London Fields” from pushing daisies at the box office. The long-delayed mystery drama — starring Amber Heard, Billy Bob Thornton, Jim Sturgess, Johnny Depp, and Cara Delevingne — brought in a dismal $116,470 when it opened in 613 North American theaters. That means each

Liam Neeson and Micheal Richardson (“Vox Lux”) will star in James D’Arcy’s directorial debut, “Made in Italy.” Neeson will play a bohemian London artist who returns to Italy with his estranged son, portrayed by Richardson, to sell the house they inherited from his late wife. The movie, also written by D’Arcy, will commence production in April

October 29, 2018 9:00AM PT Dev Patel will make his directorial debut with “Monkey Man.” The “Slumdog Millionaire” star will also act in the revenge thriller, which is being presented to buyers at this year’s American Film Market. “Monkey Man” centers on the Kid (Patel), who emerges from prison to grapple with a world marred

October 29, 2018 8:51AM PT Lena Dunham will write the harrowing survival tale of a Syrian refugee stranded at sea for the big screen. Dunham has been tapped by co-producers Steven Spielberg and J.J. Abrams to adapt “A Hope More Powerful Than the Sea: One Refugee’s Incredible Story of Love, Loss, and Survival.” The nonfiction

Though James Cromwell was honored at the fourth annual Carney Awards for his work as a character actor, the industry veteran has worked as a political activist his entire career. On the red carpet at the Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica, Calif., he candidly shared his thoughts about the current political climate. “This is

An aspiring singer, an astronaut, and a magical nanny walk into a movie theater — and with that, Oscar season is officially underway. History proves that festival raves don’t necessarily translate into box office success, and massive ticket sales don’t always correlate with awards love. Still, Variety has started to take a look at this year’s

MEXICO CITY  — Morbido Festival, Mexico’s most important event for genre cinema, has announced that Spain’s Paco Plaza, “Veronica” director and co-creator of the 2007-14 “Rec,” the breakout hit found-footage horror movie series, will be attending the festival and writing a script for one of its newest initiatives. This year, Morbido Group renovated the haunted

A “Talking Tom and Friends” movie may be heading to the multiplex as developer Outfit7 teams with “Assassin’s Creed” producer Jean-Julien Baronnet to adapt the mobile app into a feature film. “Talking Tom,” a wisecracking cat that responds to gestures made on smartphone or tablet screens, was first introduced eight years ago. The family friendly

In Anna Odell’s much-anticipated ”X&Y,” which world premieres as the opening film at the Stockholm Film Festival, the director also plays the leading role alongside Mikael Persbrandt, one of Sweden’s most renowned actors. Odell spoke to Variety about the film. Odell is one of Sweden’s best-known contemporary artists and, since her directorial feature debut –

October 29, 2018 4:03AM PT For the fourth year, the Stockholm Impact Award, which comes with a prize of SEK1 million ($110,000) and a trophy designed by Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, will be handed to a film playing at the Stockholm Intl. Film Festival that “reflect our times.” This year the organizers are expanding the

MADRID — Vicente Canales’ Film Factory Entertainment has acquired world sales rights to “The Consequences” (“Las consecuencias”), writer-director Claudia Pinto Emperador’s follow-up to her 2013 feature debut, “The Longest Distance,” which marked out the Spanish-Venezuelan writer-director as a talent to track. A Spain-Netherlands-Belgium co-production, “The Consequences” won a €330,000 ($376,000) conditionally repayable non-interest loan for

Before Yorgos Lanthimos’ “The Favourite” – the acclaimed period-piece centering on the rivalry of two female courtiers, vying for the attention of England’s queen – closes the Stockholm Intl. Film Festival on Nov. 18, the event will have offered its audience 150 films, 39% of which are directed by women, a higher percentage than most international

Feature documentaries about Chaka Khan and Prince are on Kew Media Distribution’s slate for the AFM. Kew is building a profile in music documentaries, launching “Chuck Berry” at Mipcom and recently sealing deals with Showtime and Sky for “Teddy Pendergrass – If You Don’t Know Me.” In Michael J. Kirk’s “Mr Nelson: On the North Side,”