"Evening" falls on Koltai (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - Lajos Koltai is in final negotiations to direct the screen adaptation of Susan Minot's best-selling novel "Evening" for Focus Features and Hart Sharp Entertainment.
Crime meets absurdist slapstick in "Invisible Waves" (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - If Jacques Tati, the French comic absurdist, had ever made a gangster thriller, it probably would have looked like Pen-Ek Ratanaruang's "Invisible Waves.
"Eight Below" delivers above-average adventure (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - Disney may have written the book on live-action animal adventure stories, but it has been quite a while since there has been a chapter as terrific as "Eight Below."
Jason Vorhees Lives! (E! Online)
February 14, 2006
E! Online - Hollywood
testosterone king Michael Bay has been charged with breathing new life
into Jason Vorhees and resurrecting the Friday the 13th franchise
with a prequel.
Paramount to release Gore's global warming film (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - The producers of a global warming documentary starring former Vice President Al Gore have landed a worldwide distribution deal with Paramount Pictures' specialty label, the Viacom Inc.-owned studio said on Tuesday.
Bleak Iran film puts social pain before politics (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - As Iran occupies the world stage over its nuclear ambitions, a bleak new film deliberately turns the spotlight on the mundane reality of everyday relationships, unemployment and failure in the country.
Opus Dei Holds Out for 'Da Vinci' Changes (AP)
February 14, 2006
AP - The conservative Roman Catholic group Opus Dei said Tuesday it had no intention of calling for a boycott of the upcoming film "The Da Vinci Code," but said it hopes the much-awaited film could still be changed so that "there aren't references that would hurt Catholics."
Shannen Doherty Involved in Car Crash (AP)
February 14, 2006
AP - Former "Charmed" actress Shannen Doherty was bruised and cut on her thigh during a Pacific Coast Highway crash that sent another motorist to the hospital, authorities and the Doherty's publicist said Tuesday.
Oscar organizers deny pressure on Palestinian film (Reuters)
February 14, 2006
Reuters - Oscar organizers said on Tuesday
they have not yet decided how to designate a film about suicide
bombers in the West Bank but denied they were being pressed by
Israel to say the movie came from the Palestinian Authority
rather than Palestine.
Uncle Owen, R.I.P. (E! Online)
February 14, 2006
E! Online - To Phil Brown, it seemed "a very unimportant role." But in Star
Wars lore, it was anything but.
Berlin fest warms up after another cold start (Reuters)
February 14, 2006
Reuters - It took a moving story of Bosnia's
lingering war trauma and a feel-good musical from Hollywood
veteran Robert Altman to enliven an otherwise slow start to the
Berlin Film Festival this year.
Former Guantanamo Prisoners Promote Film (AP)
February 14, 2006
AP - Two former Guantanamo Bay captives joined British director Michael Winterbottom on Tuesday to promote his semi-documentary film about their experience and call for closure of the U.S. detention center.
S.Korea film director in Berlin protests quota cut (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - South Korean director Park Chan-wook staged a one-man demonstration in front of the Berlin Film Festival's entrance for an hour on Tuesday to protest against moves to cut the Korean film quota in his country.
Random House unveils first films under new tie-up (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - Two politically charged stories, one a novel set in Israel and the other a non-fiction investigation about the war in Iraq, are set to be the first movie adaptations from an unprecedented joint venture between a book publisher and a film company.
Turin's Film Museum a Bizarre Experience (AP)
February 14, 2006
AP - Inside the Mole Antonelliana, the city's biggest landmark, the Museo Nazionale del Cinema offers one bizarre experience after another.
Film uses true story to tell of Guantanamo ordeal (Reuters)
February 14, 2006
Reuters - The true story of three friends who set
off from Britain for a wedding overseas and ended up as
terrorist suspects in Guantanamo Bay is the theme of a
provocative and disturbing new film by Michael Winterbottom.
Health Concerns Keeps Parks From Award (AP)
February 14, 2006
AP - Health concerns kept photojournalist and filmmaker Gordon Parks from accepting the William Allen White Foundation National Citation in the state where he grew up. But in a videotaped presentation at the University of Kansas, the 93-year-old Parks said Kansas remains his home.
Two Bollywood Stars May Have Wedding Plans (AP)
February 14, 2006
AP - Two of Bollywood's brightest stars may be getting ready to wed and, according to a report in the Times of India, an astrologer says they're a perfect match.
Oscar Pics Sinking
February 14, 2006Normally, the good thing about an Oscar nomination is that it breathes second life into faltering movies. Not so this year. Collectively, the 2006 Best Picture nominees dropped an average of 43 percent last weekend, with the best performer, Brokeback Mountain, losing 33 percent of its audience. Brokeback, with $66.5 million in earnings so far, is also the only Best Picture contender still active in the top 10 — while Steven Spielberg's Munich dropped a whopping 53 percent, Capote fell off 45 percent and George Clooney's Good Night, and Good Luck went down 43 percent. A spin-off concern: If people aren't motivated to see the flicks, who the heck is gonna be tuning into the telecast?
High-Def Flicks on Your TV
February 14, 2006HBO and Showtime better get cracking on more of those original series. MovieBeam — the first movie-rental service to feature online HDTV movies — launches today in more than two dozen cities. Owned by Disney, the service requires the purchase of a $200 set-top box and a $29 activation fee but allows users to download rentals, via PBS signals, of up to 100 movies at launch, with six of the seven major studios signed up. The initial line-up includes new home-video releases like Wedding Crashers and Proof, recent favorites like March of the Penguins and The 40-Year-Old Virgin and more, um, classic, ahem, fare, like Dude, Where's My Car? and Pop Star.
Sony pretty in "Pink" at top; "Destination" speeds to 2nd (Reuters)
February 14, 2006
Reuters - Four new wide releases
finished pretty much where they were expected to this past
weekend, grabbing the top four slots at the boxoffice and
leading the frame to better last year's comparable session by a
whisker. Record snowstorms in the northeast had a bigger impact
than anticipated as early projections were trimmed yet again
when the actual grosses trickled in.
France's "Amis" signals comeback of local films (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - The weak performance of local-language films has been cited as one of the reasons for last year's downslide at the overseas boxoffice. But if early signs are any indication, there'll be a drastic change this year, especially with the phenomenal take-off of France's "Les Bronzes 3: Amis Pour La Vie," which earned $43.7 million from 950 prints in two weekends in its home market alone.
Universal readies mission to 'Red Star' (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - Universal Pictures has picked up the rights to Christian Gossett's award-winning comic book "The Red Star," setting "Night Watch" filmmaker Timur Bekmambetov to develop and possibly direct the fantasy sci-fi epic.
Danish film examines tensions with Muslim immigrants (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - For the director of a new film exploring the tensions between Danes and Muslim immigrants, the row over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad first published in Denmark should not have come as a complete surprise.
Oldman on 5th "Potter" Black list (Reuters)
February 14, 2006
Reuters - Gary Oldman is in
negotiations to reprise his role as Sirius Black for Warner
Bros. Pictures' fifth Harry Potter installment, "Harry Potter
and the Order of the Phoenix."
MovieBeam offers first HDTV online movie rentals (Reuters)
February 14, 2006
Reuters - A video on demand movie
service spun out of Walt Disney Co. is introducing on Tuesday
the first U.S. home delivery service for high-definition films,
backed by top Hollywood and Silicon Valley partners.
Wiesenthal docu in works (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - Nicole Kidman will narrate a feature-length documentary examining the life of Holocaust survivor and Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal, who died in September at 96.
"Guantanamo," "Winter" put politics center stage (Reuters)
February 14, 2006
Reuters - Organizers at the Berlin
International Film Festival were bracing themselves Monday for
the most politically charged day of the event so far, with
Michael Winterbottom's "The Road to Guantanamo" and Iranian
director Rafi Pitts' "It's Winter" set to unspool in
competition Tuesday.
Sci-fi actors come to life for "Noise 2" (Reuters)
February 14, 2006
Reuters - "White Noise 2: The
Light" has attracted two space stars into its orbit.
Bay revives "Friday" for New Line (Reuters)
February 14, 2006Reuters - Jason is coming back.