Movies

As the pandemic raged and in-person screenings practically disappeared, the Academy’s Screening Room has found an appreciative audience. Many film distributors are able to send links to their films to various guilds, media members and voters; the Academy has stepped in with its screening room, offering voters those films plus other contenders who can’t afford

It’s an eternal middle-aged anxiety: “I feel like I’m turning into my mother.” And it’s given a most literal rendering in Iris K. Shim’s supernatural horror exercise “Umma,” in which Sandra Oh stars as a rural beekeeper inhabited by the vengeful spirit of her estranged mom. But while that premise might sound like the makings

Opposition to the Academy’s plan to award eight Oscars prior to the live telecast continues to grow, with more than 350 new names — including more than a dozen Oscar-winning editors, cinematographers and production designers — added to the petition sent last week to Academy president David Rubin urging a reversal of the plan. Among

Film composers are always looking for novel ways to express ideas and convey character in music. Two of this year’s original-score nominees were especially innovative in finding musical solutions for storytelling challenges. “Dune” demanded a sonic landscape unlike anything composer Hans Zimmer had ever tackled (including such sci-fi projects as “Inception” and “Interstellar,” which brought

This year’s Academy Award nominations are dominated by films from deep-pocketed studios, specialty divisions and streamers. Yet as most 2021 indies were sidelined to the Spirit Awards, a few such as “Drive My Car,” “Flee,” “The Worst Person in the World” and “Writing With Fire” managed to score noms in David vs. Goliath campaign battles.

Andrew Garfield opened up on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” this week about what it was like recreating the iconic “Spider-Man” pointing meme with his “Spider-Man: No Way Home” co-stars Tom Holland and Andrew Garfield. Sony Pictures nearly broke the internet in February when it announced the “No Way Home” digital release date accompanied by a photo

The Danish film “Flee,” with Oscar nominations in animated, documentary and international film categories, tells the tale of Amin, a gay refugee from Afghanistan who is separated from his family. Director Jonas Poher Rasmussen says that when his school friend opened up about his childhood, the helmer had intended to make a short, which grew

Russia-set documentary “Tolyatti Adrift,” which premieres in competition at the Malaga Festival, has debuted its trailer with Variety. The first feature-length work by Spanish director Laura Sisteró is being sold internationally by Prague-based Filmotor (excluding Spain and France). “Tolyatti Adrift” examines life in the Russian city of Tolyatti, once the symbol of socialist pride and

If one daydreams about what film, music, Hollywood, London and all ports in between felt like in the ’60s and ’70s, writer-director Andrew Birkin’s new memoir, “POV: A Life in Pictures,” is a dreamscape of glorious days and nights and legendary personalities. Starring Birkin’s famous model-actress-singer sister, Jane Birkin, along with her famous husbands, plus

In the best visual effects Oscar race, the underdog is Shawn Levy’s “Free Guy.” Despite being set in a virtual world, the film was made for $100 million with an even smaller budget for VFX. But that didn’t prevent the film’s visual effects supervisor Swen Gillberg from delivering some of the best VFX sequences this

“Spider-Man : No Way Home” entangles Peter Parker (Tom Holland) in a “multiverse of madness” that culminates in a climactic battle at night atop the Statue of Liberty where web slingers from past franchises, played by Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, face familiar villainous foes. The friendly neighborhood crime fighters required updated costume designs and

Last year, the 60,000 film and TV union workers of IATSE turned the pressure on studios, de- manding better hours and work- ing conditions, saying that the surge in production over the past decade has led to long shifts and dangerous situations. Last year, cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was killed by a prop gun loaded with

“Steven had said that he wasn’t going to make the film if he couldn’t cast it correctly.” Thus, explains casting director Cindy Tolan, assembling the perfect ensemble was of existential importance to Spielberg’s revisited “West Side Story.” The goal was to capture all the charisma of the beloved 1961 original, while avoiding its much-criticized, inauthentic

A weekend trio of big wins for Netflix at the DGA, BAFTA and Critics Choice awards has given Jane Campion’s “The Power of the Dog” the gas required to make it over the finish line. That’s if it can keep its closest competitors — “Belfast” from Kenneth Branagh and “CODA” from Siân Heder — at

In “The War of the Worlds,” Tom Cruise flees an alien invasion in a Plymouth minivan. The camera swoops around and around, capturing the drama inside the van as it swerves through traffic, and rising from a point below the bumper to look down on the chaos from high above. That shot was made possible

Brad Pitt, Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Lulu Wang are among 900 new members inducted into the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) since 2020. The global intake also includes Akua Gyamfi, Anna Dick, Bobby Krlic, Caroline O’Neill, Fiona Shaw, Isobel Waller-Bridge, Jennifer Hampson, Kate Herron, Mark Bridges, Micheal Ward, Roger Clark, Ṣọpẹ Dìrísù, Vanessa

“The Flash” star Greg Finley is set to join Emile Hirsch (“Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood”) in indie crime thriller “Gemini Lounge,” Variety can confirm exclusively. The film, the first from “Rush Hour” producer Arthur Sarkissian’s new media and entertainment company Global Ascension Studios, is directed by Danny A. Abeckaser (“Mob Town”). “Gemini Lounge”

As well as causing a humanitarian and geopolitical crisis, the seismic fall-out of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24 has reverberated across the film industry locally and globally. The effects, insiders tell Variety, will be felt for decades. In terms of distribution, they may even be permanent. Russia’s designation as a pariah state has

Jordanian director Rama Ayasra’s “Harvest Moon,” a documentary that tells the story of two activists on a mission to bring back the cultivation of wheat and its lost heritage to its original homeland of Jordan, took the top prize in the Pitching Forum of the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival’s Agora Docs industry program, which wrapped March

Let’s not mince words: “Jazz Fest: A New Orleans Story” is a high-stepping, hand-waving, spirit-lifting gas. Co-directors Frank Marshall and Ryan Suffern, with the invaluable assistance of editor Martin Singer, have fashioned an infectiously exuberant overview of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, the Big Easy’s unique and enormous celebration of its music, cuisine

Despite a period of temporary closures from January to April/May 2021 due to COVID-19 restrictions and limited film slate, business rallied in the fourth quarter for the Cineworld Group cinema chain to post revenues of $1.8 billion for 2021. The company, which owns Regal cinemas in the U.S., recorded a $708.3 million loss before tax

“The Prank” is no big whoop, but for a good stretch it’s a tartly written, engagingly nasty little comedy of high-school vengeance. It’s set during the senior year of Ben (Connor Kalopsis), the kind of eager, obsessive-compulsive overachiever who prints out several backup copies of his homework assignments, and Tanner (Ramona Young), a hacker, high

Gabrielle Union has levied criticism towards the Walt Disney Company over its widely derided decision to take a soft stance regarding new anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation in Florida. The actress, who stars alongside Zach Braff in the studio’s upcoming Disney Plus reimagining of “Cheaper by the Dozen,” voiced her dismay regarding the situation on the red carpet

Colleen Kwok’s “The Stars The Sun The Moon” won the top prize for a Hong Kong-produced in-development project at the Hong Kong-Asia Film Financing Forum. Mainland Chinese title “Not Found” by Huang Ningwei won the equivalent prize for the best non-Hong Kong project. A total of 14 prizes were announced at a virtual ceremony on Wednesday,

“The Return of Tanya Tucker, Featuring Brandi Carlile,” a documentary that premiered Sunday at the South by Southwest Film Festival, has had its world rights acquired by Sony Pictures Classics, the company announced Wednesday. “I’m over the moon that this special documentary has found such a perfect home with Sony Pictures Classics,” said Carlile, who

The strong debut of Sony Pictures’ “Uncharted” at the box office last month came a happy sign that moviegoing is back to normal-ish levels as families returned to multiplexes for the Tom Holland-starrer based on the PlayStation video game franchise. Behind the scenes, “Uncharted” is also a textbook case of a movie that needed seasoned

The upcoming Los Angeles-Italia Film Fashion and Art Festival will be honoring Italian directors Paolo Sorrentino (“The Hand of God”) and Enrico Casarosa (“Luca”) as well as costume-designer Massimo Cantini Parrini (“Cyrano”) all of whom have scored nominations for the upcoming Academy Awards.  The 17th edition of the pre-Oscars event will be held March 20-26

Zoe Saldaña has a message for moviegoers ahead of the release of “Avatar 2” this December: “It’s definitely a leap from the first ‘Avatar,’ so you have to brace yourself for it. It’s going to be an adventure you wont forget.” James Cameron has spent well over a decade developing the sequel to his record-breaking

HBO Max is putting together an all-star cast for the upcoming original film “The Parenting.” On Wednesday, the streamer announced that Brian Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Edie Falco and Dean Norris had been cast to star in the horror-comedy, which focuses on a young queer couple who rent a countryside cottage to host a weekend getaway

With Oscar voting set to begin on March 17, four new actors will be entering the history books with “Academy Award winner” next to their name. The honor of an Oscar nomination is one of the highest a person can receive in Hollywood. Still, many talented actors haven’t received the distinction yet, despite a plethora