In the months leading up to Friday’s release of “Halloween,” it’s become clear that the film is meant as more than just another installment in the legendary horror franchise. At Wednesday’s L.A. premiere of the reboot, Jamie Lee Curtis hammered that point home. “The movie was written in January 2017 and it was a movie
Movies
October 17, 2018 8:43PM PT An American teenager goes on a trip to Nigeria, only to learn that he’s trapped in a scavenger nation where life is a matter of who scams who. We’ve all seen movies — like “Beirut,” with Jon Hamm — in which a trouble-shooting agent or foreign correspondent has to make
October 17, 2018 8:23PM PT Jason Blum took the opportunity at Wednesday’s L.A. premiere of “Halloween” to clarify his comments about the availability of female directors that made headlines earlier in the day. “I totally misspoke,” Blum told Variety on the red carpet. “I made a mistake about it. Our audience is 55% women; the executives
Family is an important theme for Japanese animation director Mamoru Hosoda, and his new film, “Mirai,” is no exception. The film, one of his most intimate, is about a young boy who comes to terms with becoming a big brother when his parents bring home his new baby sister, something Hosoda’s family experienced not too
The notion of David Arquette starring in a horror movie about a “possessed” rock band promises so much trashy fun, a certain amount of disappointment seems almost inevitable. Yet “High Voltage” confounds expectations by being very little fun at all. Short on thrills and energy despite its title, this slick yet sluggish feature often seems
October 17, 2018 6:02PM PT The restoration of a venerable Los Angeles synagogue prompts an inquiry into its vital communal value in Aaron Wolf’s moving documentary. Aaron Wolf grew up attending Los Angeles’ historic Wilshire Boulevard Temple, which was founded during Abraham Lincoln’s presidency and has served as a vital place of worship and cultural
October 17, 2018 4:03PM PT Anna Brewster, Michael Pitt, and Sharlto Copley have rounded out the cast of the Netflix pic “The Last Days of American Crime” starring Edgar Ramirez. “Taken 2” director Olivier Megaton is helming with Karl Gajdusek adapting the script. Based on the Radical Publishing graphic novel “The Last Days of American
In today’s film news roundup, Diana Silvers joins Jessica Chastain’s “Eve,” “Halloween” outpaces “The Nun’s” Fandango pre-sales, and RLJE Films nabs the horror-thriller “Monster Party.” CASTING Newcomer Diana Silvers has been cast in Tate Taylor’s action movie “Eve” opposite Jessica Chastain, John Malkovich, and Colin Farrell, Variety has learned exclusively. Taylor replaced Matthew Newton as director of “Eve” after
Bob Dylan’s album “Blood on the Tracks” is headed to the big screen, thanks to “Call Me by Your Name” director Luca Guadagnino. The Oscar nominee is retreaming with RT Features on a movie inspired by Dylan’s seminal 1975 album. Richard LaGravenese will pen the script of the drama, which is based on an idea by
Corporate synergy, meet J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World. AT&T and Warner Bros. are hoping some magic transpires with their first large-scale marketing campaign together — for next month’s “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald” — since the telecom giant closed the Time Warner acquisition in June. The multi-pronged push will include AT&T retail stores being decked
Kirsten Schaffer, executive director of Women In Film, Los Angeles, heads to Rome’s MIA Market this week to join key representatives of the Italian media as they push for systemic changes in the local entertainment industry. On Oct. 21, Schaffer will be joined at MIA by Paul Feig and prominent Italian bizzers on a panel,
October 17, 2018 11:03AM PT Michael B. Jordan will star in and produce Lionsgate’s film adaptation of assassin story “The Silver Bear.” A director has not yet been attached to the project, announced Wednesday. “The Silver Bear” is based on the book series by Derek Haas, the screenwriter for “Wanted” and “3:10 to Yuma.” The
October 17, 2018 10:50AM PT [embedded content] Nicole Kidman is almost unrecognizable as a damaged Los Angeles Police Department detective in the first trailer for Annapurna’s “Destroyer.” The footage, released Wednesday, shows Kidman’s character, Erin Bell, haunted by the memory of an undercover operation with a gang in the California desert that ended with tragic
For Sony’s “The Front Runner,” which opens wide Nov. 21, director-co-writer Jason Reitman dealt with a very large main cast. The opening shot sets the tone for the movie as it takes in multiple groups of people with different points of view and overlapping conversations. In Robert Altman-esque fashion, various dialogues fade in and out
Each year Variety’s New Leaders feature profiles the most prominent up-and-comers in the entertainment business. To determine this year’s worthies, Variety looked across disciplines, from television, digital, music and film, to law and finance, as well as content creators. They were proposed by their bosses and peers who have worked with them and seen their rise.
October 17, 2018 10:00AM PT Ken Jeong, Parisa Fitz-Henley, and Chloe Coleman have joined Dave Bautista’s action-comedy “My Spy” for STXFilms. Peter Segal is directing the script penned by the writing team of brothers Jon and Erich Hoeber. Bautista plays a hardened CIA operative who finds himself at the mercy of a precocious 9-year-old girl,
Each year Variety’s New Leaders feature profiles the most prominent up-and-comers in the entertainment business. To determine this year’s worthies, Variety looked across disciplines, from television, digital, music and film, to law and finance, as well as content creators. They were proposed by their bosses and peers who have worked with them and seen their rise.
Each year Variety’s New Leaders feature profiles the most prominent up-and-comers in the entertainment business. To determine this year’s worthies, Variety looked across disciplines, from television, digital, music and film, to law and finance, as well as content creators. They were proposed by their bosses and peers who have worked with them and seen their rise.
October 17, 2018 7:27AM PT Kobe Bryant has been dropped from the jury of the Animation Is Film Festival, following an online protest over his 2003 rape allegation. Bryant won an Academy Award this year for his animated short film, “Dear Basketball.” He was scheduled to serve on the jury for the animation festival, which
The planned theatrical release of big-budget Chinese war movie “Unbreakable Spirit,” has been scrapped following allegations of money laundering. The film had earlier been at the center of the tax avoidance allegations involving actress Fan Bingbing. The film, previously known as “The Bombing,” was originally set for an August release. That was rescheduled to Oct.
Indian film “Soni,” directed by Ivan Iyer, was named as the best film at the second edition of the Pingyao International Film Festival. It wins a prize of $20,000, with half going to development of the director’s next project, and half provided to the film’s distributor in China. Other Roberto Rossellini prizes went to Ognjen
LYON, France – Alfonso Cuarón’s inspiration for his award-winning drama “Roma” was none other than Cannes topper Thierry Frémaux, the Mexican director revealed during a masterclass at the 10th Lumière Film Festival in Lyon on Tuesday. In a wide-ranging conversation with Frémaux, who serves as director of the Institut Lumière, Cuarón recalled how he had
LYON, France – Javier Bardem charmed his audience at a masterclass during the Lumière Film Festival on Monday, eliciting laughter with stories of his youth, learning English by way of AC/DC, his famous family and expounding on the talent, compassion and genius of the filmmakers with whom he has worked, among them Bigas Luna, Julian
LYON, France – While Liv Ullmann looks back on an illustrious career as an icon of international film and theater, indelibly shaped by her professional and personal relationship with Ingmar Bergman, it is her work with refugees that she describes as one of the most important parts of her life. Speaking on Sunday at the
LYON, France — The Lumière Festival’s International Classic Film Market(MIFC) kicked off in Lyon on Tuesday with a keynote address by Sandra Den Hamer, director of the Netherlands’ EYE Filmmuseum in Amsterdam. Den Hamer offered a detailed presentation of EYE’s role in film restoration, preservation and digitization. The film museum also focuses on research and
Keira Knightley is set to star in Miss World pageant comedy drama “Misbehaviour” for Pathé. Pathé will present the film, which is directed by BAFTA-winner Philippa Lowthorpe, to buyers at the upcoming American Film Market. “Misbehaviour” is based on the true events of the 1970 Miss World pageant in London, when a global audience witnessed
In the ranks of international arthouse auteurs, the status of Claire Denis is curiously ambiguous: depending on which lens you look through, she’s either among the most venerated or the most undervalued filmmakers working today. Ask the critical community, and you’ll leave very much with the former impression. Many writers, this one included, will heap
A girl’s mysterious disappearance sends her bereaved mother on a search for answers. But the unsettling truths she discovers will force her to rethink her ideas of God and faith, in a potentially haunting series that probes at eternal questions about life after death. “The Cloud” is partly set on earth and partly in an
CPB Films’ Marco Cherqui is joining forces with Pascal Caucheteux’s Why Not Productions to produce a TV series adaptation of Jacques Audiard’s “A Prophet.” Cherqui and Caucheteux had together produced Audiard’s film, which world premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, won the Grand Jury Prize and garnered nominations for a foreign-language Oscar and a Golden
A nation divided. Panic in the streets. Mounting fears that the troubled republic wouldn’t survive. Though Jonathan Putnam’s Lincoln and Speed novels are set in the tumultuous years that would ultimately lead to the American Civil War, the creator of a forthcoming TV adaptation of the series, “These Honored Dead,” admits that the historical narrative