Apparently determined to prove herself francophone cinema’s most inexhaustible precious resource, Virginie Efira once again lights up the screen prior to burning it down in a role that, after Justine Triet’s “Sibyl,” Paul Verhoeven’s “Benedetta” and Rebecca Zlotowski’s “Other People’s Children,” is of a type she has come to define: the strong-willed, smart fortysomething woman
Movies
In bumper Cannes dealing, Paris-based European film-TV powerhouse Studiocanal has nearly sold out worldwide on Andrew Garfield-Florence Pugh romantic drama “We Live in Time,” executive produced by Benedict Cumberbatch. Owned by Vivendi’s Canal Plus Group, Studiocanal has also closed half the world on both James McAvoy’s “Control” and Thomas Cailley’s Un Certain Regard opening film
Oscar-winning director Gabriele Salvatores (“Mediterraneo”) is back behind the camera on “Napoli – New York,” a period immigration drama based on a story written for the screen by Federico Fellini. Fellini co-wrote the tale of two Neapolitan kids who embark on a ship to New York to escape Italy’s early postwar poverty with his frequent
WINNING WAYS “Women Talking,” which won Sarah Polley an Oscar for best adapted screenplay, was this weekend named best narrative feature at the Bali International Film Festival (aka the Balinale). Ashen Nadeem’s “Crows Are White” won the feature documentary prize and “The Tone Wheels,” by Yuda Kurniawan, was named winner of the Gary L Hayes
Indonesia’s largest cinema chain Cinema XXI could be heading to the stock market through an IPO by early next year. Early details were reported by the Nikkei newspaper citing its finance industry partner publication Dealstreet Asia. They said that the company may seek to raise $300 million of fresh capital. Last year, financial news service
Studio Ghibli, the iconic Japanese animation studio, will maintain a cloud of secrecy for as long as possible around “How Do You Live,” the final film from maestro Miyazaki Hayao (“Spirited Away,” “Howl’s Moving Castle,” “Princess Mononoke”). Studio Ghibli Sets New Film, ‘How Do You Live,’ From Hayao Miyazaki Twitter.com/@JP_GHIBLI The new movie is scheduled
Bollywood star Bhumi Pednekar, celebrated for her films that advocate social change, has revealed ambitious goals for World Environment Day. Pednekar founded non-profit advocacy platform Climate Warrior – funded from her acting remunerations – through which she strives to neutralizing her and her family’s carbon footprint and making her own home sustainable and the organization
“Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” grabbed top place at the mainland China box office over the weekend with an opening $17.2 million (RMB122 million) score. Giant screen company, Imax reports that $2.7 million, or more than 16% of the film’s China total, came from its Middle Kingdom venues. Chinese online ticketing agency Maoyan forecasts that “Spider-Man:
Crime action film “The Roundup: No Way Out” dominated the South Korean box office on its official opening weekend with a thumping $21.9 million performance. The film, the third in a franchise that pits a heavy-fisted cop, portrayed by Ma Dong-seok (aka Don Lee), against colorfully devious rogues, crushed all competing titles by taking an
Barry Newman, the Emmy-nominated actor who starred in the 1971 cult action thriller “Vanishing Point” and as the eponymous lawyer in the NBC series “Petrocelli,” died on May 11. He was 92. No further details are currently available on his death. In “Vanishing Point,” Newman played former race car driver Kowalski, a speedster that darts
A third “Hocus Pocus” film is officially in development, Walt Disney Pictures president Sean Bailey has confirmed. In a profile with The New York Times, Bailey stated that “Yes, ‘Hocus Pocus 3’ is happening” when discussing additional upcoming live-action projects in development at the company. “Hocus Pocus 3” comes after the success of the 2022
With a tentative Directors Guild of America deal in hand and the Writers Guild of America on strike, SAG-AFTRA has been thrust into a bigger role than the performer’s union has played in years in the industry’s triennial labor contract negotiations. SAG-AFTRA gets its turn at the bargaining table this week, with an agenda that
If you’ve ever wondered when it was that Michel Gondry, the gifted French director of “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” became the world’s most annoying filmmaker, you might say the answer is, “He always was.” Yet no one, including me, quite thinks of him that way. That’s because the few works of his that
Disney’s perennial hit “Frozen” is saying “let it go” to its spot as the second-biggest animated film in history. Over the weekend, Universal’s “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” hit $1.3 billion at the worldwide box office, enough to bump the original adventures of royal sisters Anna and Elsa ($1.28 billion) to the No. 3 spot.
The Directors Guild of America announced a tentative deal with the studios on Saturday night, providing pay hikes and an improved residual for international streaming. But a summary provided by the DGA makes no mention of pegging the streaming residual to viewership. That indicates that residuals will be continue to be the same on streaming
“Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” webbed up a stellar $120.5 million in its domestic box office debut. In beating expectations, it landed the second-biggest opening weekend of the year, behind only “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” with $146 million, as well as the third-biggest opening weekend for any “Spider-Man” film. Sony’s animated sequel is benefitting from
With a few mystifying teasers and less than two months until the premiere of the live-action “Barbie” film, audiences still don’t know exactly how the film will unfold. But the production team has started to reveal insight into the film — including how they caused an international pink paint shortage. In a recent Architectural Digest
“The Flash” is almost here, and the rollout has been anything but typical. With just 13 days to go before the film’s June 16 release, titular star Ezra Miller has done no press and will make a low-profile appearance at the Los Angeles premiere on June 12, only posing for photos rather than doing interviews. The
They want pictures of Spider-Man. Columbia Pictures and Sony Pictures Animation’s “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” earned $51.75 million on Friday from 4,313 locations, a figure that includes some $17.35 million in Thursday previews. The animated superhero adventure is already outpacing projections headed its projections of an $80 million-or-so opening heading into the weekend, with the
By the brazenly esoteric standards of Argentine director Lisandro Alonso, his last feature “Jauja” was virtually a concession to the mainstream. A lushly shot 19th-century historical drama led by Viggo Mortensen, it was — until a typically disorienting coda — close to linear in its colonialist-quest narrative, even as it moved in slow, ever-widening circles,
Tom Holland’s favorite movie starring the Marvel superhero Spider-Man is actually not one of his own. Holland, who has donned the Spidey suit for three standalone movies as well as “Captain America: Civil War,” “Avengers: Infinity War” and “Avengers: Endgame,” told the Associated Press on Thursday night that 2018’s animated “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” is
SPOILER ALERT: This article contains major spoilers for “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” now playing in theaters. Just like the infinite Spider-Verse itself, there are so many different versions of Spider-Man and other spider-themed heroes that pop up in “Across the Spider-Verse” that it’s almost impossible to keep track of everything. In the new movie, Miles
Disney, after removing dozens of shows and movies from Disney+ and Hulu last week, said it will incur a $1.5 billion impairment charge for the June quarter. In an SEC filing Friday, the company said that on May 26, 2023, it removed “certain produced content” from its direct-to-consumer streaming services. As a result, Disney will
You might think Shia LaBeouf portraying a 20th-century Italian saint under the direction of perpetual bad-boy expat Abel Ferrara is a pretty strange prospect. But that’s just the iceberg tip of the oddities in “Padre Pio,” which, despite the American star’s casting in the title role, often appears uninterested in its own venerated ostensible subject.
The summer movie season is heating up in theaters this June with the releases of Sony’s “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” Warner Bros.’ “The Flash” and Disney’s “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” but streamers are also set to make some noise with the arrival of big tentpoles. From Netflix unveiling the sequel to one
In his upcoming memoir “Pageboy,” Oscar-nominated actor Elliot Page reveals he was once confronted by a homophobic actor at a birthday party in Los Angeles (via People magazine). The year was 2014, shortly after Page publicly came out as gay during a speech made at a Human Rights Campaign conference (“I’m here today because I
Aside from its Palme d’Or for Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall,” the French cinema world is also celebrating the near-complete recovery of French box office after the pandemic. Ticket sales are still 11.6 % down on the average levels of 2017 to 2019, but the good news is that the B.O. jumped by 33% with
SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for “Sanctuary,” in theaters now. At first glance, Zachary Wigon’s new film “Sanctuary” might seem simple — it was shot in 18 days in a 1,200 square foot room with a two-person cast, after all. But within those four walls lies a complex and wildly entertaining tale full of sex,
While Hollywood was on pause during the worst of the pandemic, Rob Savage’s quick thinking and creativity inspired him to make two movies on the fly. The British writer-director shot his independent film “Host” at the beginning of COVID-19 restrictions, with cast and crew using Zoom and self-taping to tell the spine-chilling tale of a
Don’t tell me “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” is merely a “cartoon.” It’s a visionary work that redefines what the animation medium can achieve, sitting alongside the handful of sequels such as “The Dark Knight” and “The Empire Strikes Back” that elevate their franchises by pushing them in surprising new directions. On a personal level, this