Movies

Netflix has announced that a documentary about the K-pop group Blackpink will premiere on Oct. 14. “Blackpink: Light Up the Sky” will follow group members Jennie, Jisoo, Lisa and Rosé’s recording process, their everyday lives as K-pop stars, as well as their history-making performance at last year’s Coachella festival. The film will feature exclusive interviews

SAG-AFTRA has tapped Jonathan Handel, a longtime labor journalist and entertainment/technology attorney, as an outside special counsel. Handel, who covered the labor beat at The Hollywood Reporter for the past decade, will work on special projects and cutting-edge issues. SAG-AFTRA chief operating officer and general counsel Duncan Crabtree-Ireland said, “We are thrilled to have Jonathan

The diversity and inclusion initiative has been a heavy focus for the Oscars the past few years, shown by the expansive membership initiative. Today, as part of the Academy Aperture 2025 initiative, AMPAS announced new representation and inclusion standards in order to be eligible in the best picture category. For the 94th and 95th Oscars

Rachel Lee Goldenberg and Haley Lu Richardson first collaborated together on the 2013 Lifetime movie “Escape From Polygamy,” in which the rising star played a 17-year-old looking to leave a polygamous compound. Their new film, “Unpregnant,” premiering Sept. 10 on HBO Max, is a big departure — it’s a comedy, but not an easy one

The 2020 British Britannia Awards has been delayed until next year due to the coronavirus pandemic. BAFTA LA, which holds the event every year, said in a statement: “BAFTA’s focus in Los Angeles during 2020 will continue to be on its year-round membership programming, educational initiatives, and new talent programs, reaffirming its commitment to keep

“Normal People” star Daisy Edgar-Jones has signed on for the lead role in Legendary’s social thriller “Fresh.” The project is based on Lauryn Kahn’s script with Mimi Cave directing. Legendary, which announced the Edgar-Jones casting on Tuesday, is keeping the film’s storyline under wraps. Hyperobject Industries’ Adam McKay and Kevin Messick will produce. “Normal People,”

Silicon Valley and Orange County have been cleared by the state of California for indoor movie theaters reopening, joining San Diego County as key California markets to reopen. Mark Ghaly, secretary of California Health and Human Services, announced Tuesday that five counties — Amador, Orange, Placer, Santa Clara (home to Silicon Valley) and Santa Cruz

Japanese filmmaker Tomoko Kana is revisiting the legacy of nuclear catastrophe in a new feature film project that brings together survivors of Fukushima and Chernobyl. Kana and producer Mari Mukai are looking for primarily German partners for the project, which they presented at this year’s Venice Gap-Financing Market and which will shoot to a large

Jason Momoa is expressing solidarity with his fellow “Justice League” co-star Ray Fisher amid the Cyborg actor’s ongoing dispute with Warner Bros., the studio behind the superhero franchise. Momoa took to social media on Tuesday, posting a photo of Fisher on his Instagram story with the caption “IStandWithRayFisher.” Fisher shared Momoa’s post on Twitter, writing

Variety is marshaling its global resources to launch digital and print franchises devoted to tracking the restart of content production around the world amid the COVID-19 pandemic. On Sept. 9, Variety will publish its largest-ever special report on international filming locations, “Location Update: The Big Restart,” produced in collaboration with the Association of Film Commissioners

STXfilms has bought the worldwide rights to “Queenpins,” a comedy starring Kristen Bell that was inspired by the true story of the largest coupon counterfeit scam in U.S. history. “Queenpins” will center on the story of a suburban housewife, fed up with being dismissed and overlooked by her husband and society. She decides to take

Switzerland’s Cognito Films has re-teamed with German shingle Elemag Pictures on a human drama about a group of pit workers coming to terms with the closure of Germany’s last coal mine. “Once We Were Pitmen” accompanies five miners on a bittersweet journey against the backdrop of climate change, Germany’s energy transition away from fossil fuels

Joy Jorgensen’s Berlin-based Killjoy Films and Nadia Turincev and Omar El Kadi’s Paris shingle Easy Riders are partnering on “Runner,” a relationship drama set in the American Midwest from director Marian Mathias. “Runner” follows Haas, an 18-year-old girl dealing with the sudden death of her father and whose life takes an unexpected turn when she

Sweden’s Plattform Produktion is teaming up with Dutch production group Lemming Film on director Ena Sendijarević’s colonial drama “Sweet Dreams.” The film, which is set to shoot on location in Southeast Asia next year, follows tumultuous events triggered by the death of a Dutch sugar plantation owner who ends up leaving his Indian Ocean island

Club Fattoush is a real-life bar and arts space in the Israeli port city of Haifa: a kind of bohemian, liberal-minded gathering point for a broad array of residents, be they Israeli or Palestinian, Jewish or Arabic, gay or straight, and so on. Veteran Haifa-born filmmaker Amos Gitai is sufficiently enamored of the venue to

Singer-songwriter-actress-activist Janelle Monáe has released “Turntables,” her first new song since her Grammy nominated 2018 album “Dirty Computer.” The song was written for and featured in the upcoming Amazon Studios documentary, “All In: The Fight for Democracy,” premiering in select theatres nationwide on Wednesday (September 9) and then streaming exclusively via Amazon Prime Video starting Friday, September 18.

The Bible, according to Milo Rau, “is a book about a guy losing his fight against state power,” but who ultimately prevails by establishing a movement. It is that struggle that he depicts in his new film, “The New Gospel.” The documentary project is a kind of political Passion Play in which Cameroonian activist Yvan

Celebrated Azerbaijani filmmaker Hilal Baydarov has won international acclaim for a fast-growing body of work that has included seven films in the past two years while also attracting high-profile collaborators. Baydarov is making his Venice debut with the competition title “In Between Dying,” a film he produced with Elshan Abbasov and co-producers Joslyn Barnes of

Lupita Nyong’o shared a moving tribute to her “Black Panther” co-star and friend Chadwick Boseman, who died on Aug. 28 at the age of 43 from colon cancer. Nyong’o posted a photo of her and Boseman laughing, with the caption “For the beloved Chadwick Boseman. #TakeYourTimeButDontWasteYourTime.” It’s the first time she’s spoken publicly about Boseman’s

Gina Rodriguez is set to star alongside Karla Souza in the road trip comedy “Like it Used to Be.” The project, from Broken English Production, is being introduced to buyers this week at the Toronto Film Festival. Based on Bernardo Cubria’s screenplay, “Like it Used to Be” centers on four female best friends going for

Armie Hammer brings Lily James to Manderley in the first trailer for “Rebecca,” a modern take on Daphne du Maurier’s classic gothic thriller novel. The Netflix film, directed by Ben Wheatley, follows a newly married woman (James) as she arrives at the English estate of her wealthy husband Maxim de Winter (Hammer). What begins as

Before she moved to the U.K. to take an M.A. in filmmaking in 2010, Ana Rocha left behind a long and respectable acting career in her native Portugal. This year sees the first fruits of that career change with her directorial debut “Listen,” which premieres Tuesday at the Venice Film Festival, competing in the Horizons

The 64th edition of the British Film Institute London Film Festival (LFF) revealed its full program Tuesday, containing a robust line-up of 58 features from around the world, as well as a range of extended reality (XR) projects and shorts. As previously announced, Steve MacQueen’s “Mangrove” will open the festival and Francis Lee’s “Ammonite” will

Oscar-winning actor Penelope Cruz is set to star in the 1970s-set Italian movie “L’immensita,” to be directed by Emanuele Crialese, the critically acclaimed helmer of “Respiro.” “L’immensita” is represented in international markets by Pathé (“Judy,” “Pain & Glory”) and in the U.S. by CAA. Mario Gianani and Lorenzo Gangarossa at Fremantle-owned Wildside are producing the

“Shorta,” the timely action-packed Danish thriller that had its world premiere in Venice Critics’ Week this weekend, has now been sold by Charades in a number of territories. Directed by up-and-coming Danish filmmakers Frederik Louis Hviid and Anders Ølholm, “Shorta” unfolds in the aftermath of the killing of 19-year-old Talib Ben Hassi while in custody.

As the first major film festival to take place in the pandemic era, there’s a gravity to the 77th Venice Biennale simply by virtue of the show going on under such fraught global conditions. Yet 2020 has also sparked an unprecedented awareness of racial discourse, and as such, it’s essential to note that there hasn’t

The strangest, most up-in-the-air Oscar season has begun with the 77th Venice Film Festival, which features more social distancing and less star power due to COVID-19. But that doesn’t mean that Venice has lost its luster for catapulting a movie into the awards race. The first bonafide major contender for the 2021 Oscars season arrives

“One Night in Miami” is one of those dramas with a hooky, irresistible meeting-of-the-minds premise that places four legends in a single room, all so that we can sit back and watch the verbal-philosophical fireworks fly. The movie takes place on Feb. 25, 1964, the night that Cassius Clay, at 22, won the world heavyweight

As the West Coast suffered through a record-setting holiday weekend heatwave, industry insiders worried that sweltering conditions in Los Angeles may further slow Hollywood’s return to business as usual. The threat of rolling electrical outages and brownouts would be a greater danger to the entertainment industry if it were not already largely shut down due

How do you commemorate a shameful history long suppressed? One way is to render it in black and white images so stark there’s nowhere for the shame to hide, a feat achieved with stunning clarity by Andrei Konchalovsky’s perversely beautiful and coldly furious “Dear Comrades!” (exclamation point ironic). Meticulous and majestic, epic in scope and