Movies

For the first time in a long while, audiences were enticed to leave the couch for new movies that didn’t involve superheroes or speedy cars. Over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, Disney’s animated musical fable “Encanto” collected a leading $40.3 million between Wednesday and Sunday and MGM’s star-studded crime drama “House of Gucci” brought in $20

When Denis Villeneuve got the thumbs up from Warner Bros. and Legendary to shoot “Dune,” he knew he was headed back to the Middle East. Specifically, to the deserts of Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, which are inextricably tied to the Canadian director’s passionate vision of the planet Arrakis. These countries have also played

Oklahoma has seen booms before, mostly in the oil business. But right now, the state’s boom has more to do with celluloid. Among several Sundance hits over the past few years, “Minari” and “Stillwater” shot in the state, and now Martin Scorsese is lensing his big-budget “Killer of the Flower Moon,” starring Leonardo DiCaprio, there

Italy, which has always been attractive for international film and TV productions, is now making huge strides as a shooting destination mainly due to its COVID safety measures and smart rebate, on top its stunning locations. The number of high-profile Hollywood shoots that since the pandemic have flocked to Italian sites — from the Alpine

When the coronavirus pandemic arrived in Iceland last year, shutting down production on Netflix’s eight-part supernatural volcano drama “Katla,” veteran filmmaker Baltasar Kormákur was quick to rise to the challenge. With the support of the streaming giant, Kormákur came up with measures that would allow the production to get up and running again, introducing frequent

Starring Pablo Larraín regular Alfredo Castro, Chilean-Spanish writer-director Theo Court’s “White on White” (“Blanco en Blanco”) has been acquired for distribution in North America by Outsider Pictures. The deal follows on the film’s world premiere this September at the Venice Film Festival’s Horizons sidebar, where Court won a Silver Lion for the section’s best director

The Cannes Festival’s greatest industry achievement in the last decade, apart from maintaining the global preeminence of its Riviera-set meet, is Buenos Aires’ Ventana Sur. Launched in 2009 by the Cannes Festival and Market, in partnership with Argentina’s INCAA film-TV agency, it became from its very get-go the biggest film industry event in Latin America.

Bollywood actor Abhishek Bachchan is very busy these days with film “Bob Biswas” ready for release, three more films in the pipeline and management of two popular sports franchises. “Bob Biswas” is a spinoff of Sujoy Ghosh’s 2012 cult classic “Kahaani,” starring Vidya Balan. It featured Saswata Chatterjee as the cold-blooded contract killer Bob Biswas.

Chiledoc has dropped the trailer for “Travesti Odyssey,” which premiered in the Luminous section of documentary festival IDFA. Nicolás Videla’s film is a celebration of the art and the actors of Cabaret Travesía Travesti, which had its last performance as the 2019 Chilean uprising began. The film, an international co-production between Cinespecie and La Madre

SF Studios (“Margrete – Queen of the North”) and Swedish broadcaster SVT are partnering up with Beta Film (“Atlantic Crossing”) on “Raoul,” a drama series about the internationally renowned Swedish diplomate Raoul Wallenberg, who saved thousands of Jewish people during World War II. The six-part series is based on Ingrid Carlberg‘s August Prize-winning biography “Raoul

However much you think you know about modern Lithuanian history, you’re almost certain to leave wiser after digesting all 248 minutes of “Mr. Landsbergis,” an exhaustively detailed but engrossing documentary study of the Baltic republic’s hard-won battle for independence from 1988 to 1991. That the film is both intricately researched and archivally rich comes as

Crime comedy film “Be Somebody” held up strongly at the top of the mainland Chinese box office, in a weekend where the top four places remained unchanged. “Be Somebody” scored $21.9 million on its third weekend of release, just 8% down on its second weekend figure, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. That give

A moment of silent, please, for “This Is Spinal Tap,” as that satire formally abdicates its title as the best and truest movie ever made about what it’s like to be in a rock ‘n’ roll band. There was something wonderful, silly and sad about how, up until now, musicians had to look to the

Marcel van Brakel and Mark Meeuwenoord, winners of IDFA’s Special Jury Award for Creative Technology for their project “Symbiosis,” are already working on an augmented reality (AR) spin-off app, “Future Botanica,” which will allow the audience to co-create new lifeforms and talk about ecosystems. “Virtual reality can be so exclusive, especially with a project like

Reviewing a lavish new Hollywood musical in the Sept. 29, 1968, issue of The New Yorker, Pauline Kael wrote, “Barbra Streisand arrives on the screen, in ‘Funny Girl,’ when the movies are in desperate need of her. The timing is perfect.” I’m tempted to say the same thing about Lady Gaga. Suddenly, she’s ruling the

Detailing Lithuania’s attempts to break away from the Soviet Union, from protests in 1989 to Vilnius’ Bloody Sunday in 1991, when Soviet troops attempted to stage a coup, Sergei Loznitsa became interested in the man in the midst of it all: Vytautas Landsbergis, the first Head of Parliament of Lithuania after its independence declaration. “I

Over the course of a celebrated 40-year career, veteran Danish editor Niels Pagh Andersen has worked on critically acclaimed films including Pirjo Honkasalo’s “The 3 Rooms of Melancholia” and Joshua Oppenheimer’s Oscar-nominated “The Act of Killing” and “The Look of Silence.” One of the key takeaways from those collaborations, which he explores in his new

The Biden administration made a statement earlier this month when the Justice Department filed an antitrust lawsuit to block the $2.1 billion sale of Simon & Schuster. Merrick Garland’s body block of the deal that ViacomCBS struck with Bertelsmann’s Penguin Random House sends the message that the White House is paying attention to the pace

Amsterdam’s documentary festival IDFA’s 34th edition wrapped on Sunday as an in-person event, having weathered the partial lockdown in the Netherlands. Variety speaks to artistic director Orwa Nyrabia about this year’s edition. He says of documentary filmmakers: “I prefer to spend my life with this bunch. These people are beautiful, they are kind, accessible and

Disney has reclaimed its rightful place at the top of Thanksgiving box office charts. “Encanto,” the studio’s new animated musical fable, collected $40 million since Wednesday, a robust tally at a time when family audiences haven’t been eager to return to cinemas. It’s become holiday tradition for Disney to release a family friendly movie around

“Dying to Divorce” begins and ends with an onscreen counter, ticking over as rapidly as a zealous taxi meter — if only it were measuring anything so banal. Instead, it’s a representation of Turkey’s appalling rate of femicide over recent years, the screen below the counter filling up with the names of women murdered by

A close-quarters study of the daily trials of living with ALS or Lou Gehrig’s Disease — co-directed by the patient’s son with equal parts adoration and despairing frustration — “Eat Your Catfish” is a documentary every bit as tough-minded as its title is unexpectedly playful. That, as it turns out, is not a disconnect when

A svelte, slinky figure in spotted silvery blond, the snow leopard is one of the great haughty glamazons of the animal kingdom — a status suitably acknowledged in the English-language title of “The Velvet Queen,” French docmaker Marie Amiguet’s lovely, unexpected screen ode to the little-seen feline. (The original French title is the rather more

“The Falls,” Taiwan’s Oscar contender and a timely drama about the trauma of home quarantine, emerged as the unsurprising winner at the Golden Horse Film Awards in Taipei on Saturday. And, in a bold decision that has the potential to enrage Mainland Chinese authorities, the prize for best documentary feature was awarded to “Revolution of

For Christine Baranski and a generation of musical theater stars, Stephen Sondheim, the legendary Broadway composer who died on Friday at 91, was nothing less than a father figure, a musical giant and an inspiration. “Even though he was 91 we are blindsided by the loss. We all feel like orphans,”  Baranski told Variety as

One of three Arabic-language films in the Cairo Film Festival international competition, the feminist dramedy “Daughters of Abdul-Rahman” shows how many Jordanian women put the traditional expectations of their patriarchal society ahead of their own desires and the resulting collateral damage. After world premiering in Egypt, the debut feature of director-writer-producer Zaid Abu Hamdan will

Set in 1973 and named for a beloved SoCal record chain, “Licorice Pizza” brings writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson nearly full circle back to the neighborhoods where he grew up — back to the disco-colored Wonderland where “Boogie Nights” took place and the decade when the indie auteur was born. Fans of Anderson’s filmography shouldn’t be

While the Thanksgiving box office will wind up totaling far less than previous years’ holidays, there were still plenty of viewers to go around between the weekend’s offerings. Disney’s “Encanto” will top the domestic box office for the weekend, while MGM’s “House of Gucci” has become one of the first adult dramas to draw a

Netflix’s latest genre offering from Korea, dark sci-fi thriller “Hellbound,” doesn’t waste any time in getting straight to the action. In the first minutes of the pilot, giant, billowing demons — think The Hulk meets an evil Michelin Man — erupt into the heart of Seoul to torture and scorch to death one of the

As theatrical markets find surer footing after nearly 18 months of stops and starts – with the threat of further lockdowns still present – industry pros now face a set of concerns quite different from those of last year: How best to build on the the recent gains in VOD models while incorporating them into