Movies

There are movies made during the pandemic, and movies made because the pandemic, and though debuting director Jake Johnson had been kicking around the idea for “Self Reliance” for years, it took COVID to motivate him to make it. Why? Because the “New Girl” actor’s absurdist concept — about a sad-sack bored enough with his

Martial arts veteran Sammo Hung will be presented with a lifetime achievement honor at the Asian Film Awards. The ceremony is back as an in-person event after a two-year absence and has shifted back to Hong Kong after previously being held in Hong Kong, Macau and Busan. Hung will accept the award on Sunday at the Hong Kong Palace Museum. Hung’s

Siva Ananth, one of the producers of Mani Ratnam’s magnum opus “Ponniyin Selvan: 1,” is ecstatic about the film’s rich haul of nominations at the Asian Film Awards. The film has received a total of six nominations, including for best picture. It is an adaptation of Kalki Krishnamurthy’s classic Tamil-language novel. The story is set

Hooray! A romantic comedy that revives the screwball formula where two people talk themselves silly — and we only had to go to the end of the solar system to make it happen. Adam (Anthony Mackie) and Jane (Zoë Chao) are the sole surviving astronauts on a ship with no navigation and no communication system

Eva Longoria’s feature directorial debut, “Flamin’ Hot,” had audiences on fire at its world premiere at the SXSW Film Festival on March 11 — while deftly navigating the controversy surrounding the film’s subject without ever addressing it by name. The movie is based on the life of former Frito-Lay executive Richard Montañez, played by Jesse Garcia

Filmmaker Billy Luther makes his narrative feature debut at SXSW on Saturday with “Frybead Face and Me,” executive produced by Taika Waititi. Inspired by his childhood, the film follows a young boy, Benny (Keir Tallman), who has to spend the summer with his grandma on the reservation. Luther, whose past work includes the documentary “Miss

Americans can’t get enough of processed corn. They eat it for breakfast, in cereal form, and all throughout the day, snacking on cookies and crackers and chips, often washing it down with soda (sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup, naturally). Premiering at the SXSW Film Festival, “Flamin’ Hot” tells the backstory of Frito-Lay’s insanely popular, ultra-spicy

It’s striking how often the word “removal” comes up in various governments’ official policies regarding refugees and asylum seekers — a pointedly chosen term that conjures images of inanimate refuse or clutter awaiting collection, rather than human lives in desperate limbo. Fail to make your case to officials and you’ll be “removed,” a near-literally humanizing

A neighborhood-wide power outage impacted a stretch of Hollywood Boulevard’s robust tourism area, including Ovation Hollywood, the complex set to host the Academy Awards Sunday evening. Reports of the outage first emerged Saturday afternoon at approximately 1 p.m. Located across the street from the Dolby, the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel — where many A-list stars get

Leading documentary sales agent Philippa Kowarsky – who handled Oscar nominees “The Act of Killing,” “Collective” and “Flee” – gave a masterclass at the Thessaloniki Intl. Documentary Festival this week. Kowarsky recently returned to Cinephil, the documentary sales company she founded, as executive chair, after a brief stint at BBC’s doc strand Storyville. Cinephil’s current

Production designers from the Oscar-nominated films “All Quiet on the Western Front,” “Avatar: The Way of Water,” “Babylon,” “The Fabelmans” and “Elvis” are joining the Art Directors Guild (ADG) and Set Decorators Society of America (SDSA) for an in-person panel on Saturday at 3 p.m. PT, which will also be available to stream. Sponsored by

The “evil twin” school of psychological metaphor has been a frequent device in horror fiction, and its familiarity does not much benefit the very literal-minded “Appendage.” Writer-director Anna Zlokovic’s first feature centers on a young Manhattanite whose insecurities manifest themselves in the form of a mini-me who becomes a serious usurping threat. This SXSW-launched Hulu

Cinephil has sold Valerie Kontakos’ documentary “Queen of the Deuce,” which charts the rise of Chelly Wilson, the queen of the porn industry in 1970s New York, to several key territories. The film premiered at Doc NYC and is now playing in the International Competition at the Thessaloniki Intl. Documentary Festival. Greece’s ERT, Canada’s Doc

Pornography, as a visual medium, has long followed the lead of technology. First it was drawn by hand. Then it was photographed. Then it was shown in back rooms on 8mm one-reelers. Then it was shown in movie theaters. Then it moved to video cassettes and DVD. Then it arrived on the Internet. Then, in

SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from “Scream VI,” now playing in theaters. The casual horror fan probably noticed a few iconic masks and monsters in the “Scream VI” subway scene: There’s Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, Pinhead and even modern staples like Florence Pugh’s flower dress from “Midsommar” and a group of tethered people from Jordan

When he began working on his latest documentary, “The Last Seagull,” acclaimed Bulgarian filmmaker Tonislav Hristov (“The Good Postman”) set himself a seemingly simple task: to follow the last of the dying breed of male escorts who, since the communist era, have spent their summers seducing foreign women in resort towns along the Black Sea.

It might have been a few decades since you left school. You might imagine the modern classroom — especially one in a decently funded, mid-sized German high school — to be as alien to your own educational background as to be unrecognizable. And yet one of the remarkable aspects of İlker Çatak’s highly effective, slow-cooker

The Razzies acknowledged the elephant in the room at the 2023 awards – the organization gave itself a dishonor after nominating a 12-year-old for worst actress, sparking internet controversy. Ahead of Sunday’s Academy Awards celebrating the year’s greatest achievements in film, the 43rd annual Razzies celebrated the “worst” actors and movies. This year’s Razzie nominations

Introducing “Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves,” the lavish hyperkinetic popcorn fairy tale that kicked off SXSW this evening, the film’s co-directors, John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein, told the audience that they had designed the movie to appeal to hardcore D&D players — and also to those who know absolutely nothing about the game.

“Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves” stole the hearts of the audience at its world premiere at the SXSW Film Festival on March 10, no matter whether or not they’d played the 50-year old role playing game that shares its title. The action comedy stars Chris Pine as a rakish bard named Edgin and Michelle

Has a cigarette ever saved the the world, stopped a zombie apocalypse, made the best-dressed list, or helped the hero and heroine live happily ever after? No … not ever. That is why it is cause for concern for Project Truth Initiative and other public health organizations to see tobacco continuing to play a supporting

Cate Blanchett wore gold sequins and “Elvis” filmmaker Baz Luhrmann directed a group photo shoot at the Australian Oscars Nominees Reception held Thursday night in Hollywood at the Chateau Marmont penthouse. The guest list also included Oscar nominees from “Elvis,” including Luhrmann, DP Mandy Walker, costume designer Catherine Martin and producers Gail Berman, Schuyler Weiss

How long does a documentary need to be? Frederick Wiseman frequently goes long, and Oscar-winning “OJ: Made in America” ran nearly eight hours. Lately, with “Bill Russell: Legend” and “Boom! Boom! The World vs. Boris Becker,” streamers have embraced the “two-part documentary” — a fancy term for what used to be called a miniseries. So,

The US-Ireland Alliance’s 17th annual Oscar Wilde Awards, held at the Bad Robot studios on March 9 in Santa Monica, celebrated some of the best Irish talent of 2022. The Oscar Wilde Awards celebrate the creative endeavors in entertainment of those of Irish descent. This year’s honorees were Irish actors Kerry Condon, Jessie Buckley, and

This article first appeared as part of Jenelle Riley’s Acting Up newsletter – to subscribe for early content and weekly updates on all things acting, visit the Acting Up signup page. The Academy Awards are this Sunday and it’s actually been a great year for film and particularly actors. So many of them have been recognized with nominations

Matthew Von Der Ahe stars in “Champions,” Bobby Farrelly’s refreshingly unsentimental, hilarious and rather gritty remake of the 2018 Spanish hit “Campeones.” The story follows a disgraced minor league basketball coach (Woody Harrelson) who, after a DUI, is sentenced by a judge to coach a local Special Olympics basketball team, the Friends. Von Der Ahe,

Chloé Zhao has known “Everything Everywhere All at Once” directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert — aka, the Daniels — for about a decade. They met when they were fellows at the Sundance Directors Lab. “They were making ‘Swiss Army Man,’” Zhao recalls. “To be able to reunite with them and see that they have

Early on in “What’s Love Got to Do With It?,” enterprising London-based filmmaker Zoe (Lily James) pitches a proposed documentary about Muslim arranged marriages to a pair of white male commissioners. They’re bored and disengaged until they realize how the topic can be dressed up in the tropes and lingo of Western romantic comedy to

“Down Low,” an outrageous new comedy that premieres this week at SXSW, starts with a failed attempt at a happy ending. And things go sharply downhill from there. The raunchy film is the brainchild of Lukas Gage, best known for being on the receiving end of Murray Bartlett’s, um, affections in “The White Lotus.” He

One year after the slap that shook the industry, Will Smith is getting ready to return to acting. While the “Men in Black” star has kept a mostly low profile in the 12 months since slapping presenter Chris Rock at last year’s Oscars ceremony, he is now prepping for his first acting gig since the