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Beans Morocco, the comic character actor who showed up in everything from Blazing Saddles, Used Cars and Eating Raoul to episodes of Mork & Mindy, The Bob Newhart Show and Growing Pains, has died. He was 90.

Morocco died May 29 in Bakersfield, California, his friend Ryan Wise told The Hollywood Reporter. For his final film, he starred as an ex-con on his own after decades in the Federal Witness Protection Program in Killing Cookie (2024), a comedy that Wise wrote and directed.

“He was always performing — always entertaining — and he made everyone feel good,” Wise said.

Going by birth name Dan Barrows until he adopted his quirky stage name in the late 1980s, the pint-sized actor also appeared in such other noteworthy films as Clint Eastwood’s Any Which Way You Can (1980), Howard Storm’s Once Bitten (1985), Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994) and Rob Reiner’s The American President (1995).

After he played...

Gene Hackman, the versatile leading man renowned for his smoldering performance as hard-nosed New York City narc Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle in The French Connection, has died. He was 95.

The much-admired two-time Oscar winner and his second wife, Betsy Hackman, 64, were found dead Wednesday at their home in Santa Fe, New Mexico. They had lived in a gated community northeast of the city since the 1980s.

In a statement to the Santa Fe New Mexican newspaper, Santa Fe County Sheriff Adan Mendoza said, “We can confirm that both Gene Hackman and his wife were found deceased Wednesday afternoon at their residence on Sunset Trail.” One of their three dogs also died.

A search warrant ruled that the deaths were “suspicious enough in nature to require a thorough search and investigation.”

His daughters, Elizabeth and Leslie, and granddaughter Annie noted in a statement that Hackman was “loved and admired by millions around...

Gene Hackman, a two-time Oscar winner for “The French Connection” and “Unforgiven,” and his wife, classical pianist Betsy Arakawa, were found dead Wednesday afternoon in their Santa Fe, N.M. home. The office of Santa Fe County Sheriff Adan Mendoza confirmed their deaths to Variety after midnight Thursday. There is no immediate indication of foul play, per authorities, though the Sheriff’s office did not immediately provide a cause of death. Hackman was 95. Arakawa was 63.

On Wednesday, Sheriff’s deputies visited the home of Hackman and Arakawa, who married in 1991. The couple was found dead, alongside their dog.

“All I can say is that we’re in the middle of a preliminary death investigation, waiting on approval of a search warrant,” the sheriff told the Santa Fe New Mexican. The statement came before authorities had positively identified the pair, per the publication. “I want to assure the community and neighborhood...

Quick LinksWhat is The Bad News Bears (1976) About?What Went Wrong With Bad News Bears (2005)?Bad News Bears Was a Critical and Financial Failure

The most common complaint that movie fans direct towards Hollywood is that remakes, reboots, and sequels are far too dominant, and the stats reflect this. 17 of the top 20 highest-grossing films of 2024 were not the first films in their series, with the only exceptions being It Ends With Us, The Wild Robot, and Wicked. While this is a harrowing trend that could bode poorly for Hollywood going forward, the continuous overflow of sequels isn't as bad as some fans may have you believe. Audiences absolutely loved legacy sequels like Gladiator II and Alien: Romulus; children and grown-ups alike flocked to the theater to see Inside Out 2 and Moana 2, and Dune: Part Two is currently nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards. The pure idea...

A handful of famous actors, including Michael J. Fox, turned down the chance to play Sam Wheat in 1990’s Ghost opposite Demi Moore before Patrick Swayze landed his career-changing role. Fox later told Whoopi Goldberg he made a huge mistake by passing on the movie — “I’m a fucking idiot.”

Paramount turned to other actors as well, reports Far Out. Harrison Ford. Tom Hanks. Kevin Bacon. Even Paul Hogan, hot of Crocodile Dundee, was considered. But one guy who never got a shot? The studio’s biggest movie star: Eddie Murphy. The comedian’s films brought in more than $1.3 billion during the 1980s.

“I deserved for them to come to me first,” Murphy says in the book Off the Record, excerpted by Newsweek in 2007. “That’s how you treat your biggest star. You give him the opportunity to say he’s not interested. I would have been interested in doing Ghost.

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Between his big-screen acting debut in Robert Rossen's vastly underrated "Lilith" and his swan song "Welcome to Mooseport," Gene Hackman had a reputation for being a prolific and, at times, nowhere-near-choosy-enough actor given his considerable talents. But when you look over that 40-year career, you don't see an egregious number of turkeys. The Dan Aykroyd buddy-cop comedy "Loose Cannons" or his third go-round as Lex Luthor in "Superman IV: The Quest for Peace" are probably the twin nadirs of his career, but mostly Hackman had a propensity to make many mediocre movies watchable. He was the reason you'd find yourself halfway through Nicholas Meyer's ho-hum spy thriller "Company Business" without any real complaints. Could it be better? Absolutely. But it had Hackman.

The movies -- great, average, or garbage -- haven't had Hackman since 2004, which never ceases to stink.

Cory Michael Smith has mostly played vulnerable men in dramas like 1985 and May December. So he had plenty of reason to doubt his ability to land the part of the wisecracking and often swaggering Chevy Chase in Jason Reitman’s comedy Saturday Night, which chronicles the first live show of Saturday Night Live in 1975.

“I did not foresee myself being cast in this,” Smith, 37, tells THR. “The [audition] process just kept going, and in my head I’m like, ‘There’s no way that I’m the best person for this.’ ”

Smith eventually would land the part, tasked with inhabiting one of the most colorful members of that kaleidoscopic inaugural class of SNL. It filled him with anxiety.

“I was both elated and horrified that I was going to do this because it’s a big, exciting film that multiple generations care about,” he says. “They care about this institution. They know these actors.

Director Jason Reitman and cinematographer Eric Steelberg have made nine features together since partnering on “Juno” in 2007, but their roots go back even further. They met as teenagers and collaborated on several short films and commercials, establishing a vocabulary that they continue to build and rely on. “To talk about how Eric and I start a conversation about a movie, you have to start with us at 15 years old,” Reitman told IndieWire. “It starts with us taking our baby steps and making all of our mistakes together as kids.”

Reitman and Steelberg’s latest film, “Saturday Night” (now available to download or rent), provided the filmmakers with an opportunity to recapture their youthful energy while applying all that they had learned in the intervening years. The movie tells the story of the cast and crew of “Saturday Night Live” overcoming one obstacle after another on opening night in 1975 to make television history,...

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In 1993, David Mickey Evans' "The Sandlot" hit theaters as the kinder, gentler "The Bad News Bears" for nostalgic Baby Boomers and baseball-loving Millennials. Combining elements of Michael Ritchie's little league classic and Richard Donner's "The Goonies," the film recalls the magical summer when 11-year-old Scott Smalls (Tom Guiry) learned to play America's pastime in order to hang out with the neighborhood kids. The adventure element centers on the boys' attempts to retrieve the Babe Ruth-autographed baseball Scott unwisely "borrowed" from his step-father for use in a game, but the film is largely an anecdotal tale of early adolescents messing around all day long sans parental supervision.

The innocent freedom of "The Sandlot" is apparently forever (/Film called it one of the 20 best sports films of all time). Millennials are now sharing the film with their children, who...

"Saturday Night" is playing in theaters everywhere now, showcasing the chaotic chronicle of the 90 minutes preceding the first episode of the late night sketch comedy series "Saturday Night Live" (or at least the show that would eventually have that title). Jason Reitman directed the film, and he also co-wrote the script with producer Gil Kenan (director of "Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire"), both bringing a long-time love for "SNL" with them. In fact, Reitman was able to live the rare dream of writing at "SNL" for a week. Meanwhile, Kenan's love for "SNL" began in the '90s with the likes of "SNL" legends like Mike Myers, Dana Carvey, and Chris Farley, but it carries through to this day.

Being a die-hard "SNL" fan myself, I was thrilled to speak with both Reitman and Kenan about piecing together the early history of "Saturday Night Live" into this electric film. It's funny,...

Michael Ritchie’s Prime Cut never quite recovers from an early botched opportunity. Up until then, Ritchie effectively primes us for the reveal of the film’s big bad, seemingly eavesdropping on characters in a Chicago bar as they trade exposition pertaining to Mary Ann (Gene Hackman), the owner of a meatpacking plant who uses his business as a front for running drugs and prostitutes.

The trouble is that Mary Ann’s supposed to pay up to some folks in Chi-town, who claim he owes them half a mil, and that’s where enforcer Nick (Lee Marvin) comes in, swinging down to the former’s fortress in Kansas City in a limo fully decked out with guns and expendable goons. Nick and Mary Ann have a history, of course, working for the same bosses, sleeping with the same gold-digging henchwomen. After first stopping at an atmospherically sleazy flophouse, Nick walks...

There are very few events in human history as relentlessly documented and recorded as the Olympic Games. From 1912 onwards, the International Olympics Council produced over 40 documentaries chronicling the pinnacle of sports and athletics, as a way to document and preserve the highlights of the thousands of competitors who compete for the gold every year. While those often straightforward, paint-by-numbers documentaries largely fell out of fashion with the rise of television — and now, there are likely more people keeping up with the games via social media than there are consistent cable watchers tuning in — films made about the games from more independent sources remain key touchstone classics to this day.

It’s no surprise why the Olympics would draw filmmakers and documentarians. As the highest platform of athleticism on the planet, the games features human beings at their absolute peaks, and many of the participants are the types of physical specimens...

My World Of Flops is Nathan Rabin’s survey of books, television shows, musical releases, or other forms of entertainment that were financial flops, critical failures, or lack a substantial cult following.In a 2022 interview with Vulture, Golden Raspberries co-founder Maureen Murphy addressed one of the odious organization’s most...

Directors are lining up left and right each month to share their favorite films from the TCM lineup, and the latest is Jason Reitman. He follows Steven Spielberg going deep on “Meet Me in St. Louis,” Martin Scorsese praising “Madonna of the Seven Moons,” Guillermo del Toro making the case why overlooked “Suspicion” is top-tier Hitchcock, and so many more.

IndieWire simply loves directors sharing their favorite films and paying tribute to the directors and screenwriters behind them. And that enthusiasm comes across loud and clear in “SNL 1975” director Reitman’s picks. First up, Reitman, whose always had an ear for dialogue himself, talks about what’s so great about the patter in Barry Levinson’s “Diner.”

“[‘Diner’] is probably one of the best first movies for a filmmaker of all time,” Reitman said. “And the dialogue is delicious. You can’t look at a Quentin Tarantino movie and...

1985’s Fletch was directed by Michael Ritchie and written by Andrew Bergman. The film is an adaptation of the popular novels written by Gregory McDonald and brings a more comedic and dry approach to its titular character, Fletch, played by Chevy Chase. Fletch is an investigative journalist working the undercover beat as a homeless beach junkie as he tries to uncover the truth behind a kingpin-level drug ring that is looming over greater L.A. While undercover, Fletch is propositioned by a rich man called Alan Stanwick who claims to be dying of bone cancer to kill the man in his upper-class home so that his family can reap the benefits of his life insurance. In exchange, Fletch will receive $50,000 cash and a ticket out of the country.

When this movie was made, Chevy Chase was arguably at the height of his career. While he’d opened the decade with a few horrible flops,...

Although collecting physical media doesn’t have the convenience appeal of streaming films, there is now sort of a stigma with purchasing movies through online platforms. Although its possible to compile a collection of movies through an online library, consumers will ultimately be at the whim of the service should it choose to keep the title available on their server. Additionally, there are a number of titles that don’t happen to find their way to have streaming access and physical media distributors like Shout and Vinegar Syndrome have dedicated their business to some overlooked titles.

Kino Lorber, another great media distributor has just unveiled the technical specs for the Chevy Chase Fletch films via Blu-ray.com, as well as revealing the special features that can be found on the new blu-rays. In 2022, Jon Hamm would take up the mantle in the long-in-development third movie, Confess, Fletch, which is based...

Victor J. Kemper, the former president of the American Society of Cinematographers whose career spanned four decades and included films as diverse as Dog Day Afternoon and Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, has died according to the ASC. He was 96.

Kemper made films with many of the greats of ’70s cinema, including John Cassavetes, Arthur Hiller, Michael Ritchie, Peter Yates, Sidney Lumet, George Roy Hill, Robert Wise, Carl Reiner, Richard Attenborough and Norman Jewison.

His very first film was Cassavetes’ Husbands, and it was an education in itself.

“We shot more than a million-and-a-half feet of film during 10 weeks in New York and 12 weeks in London,” Kemper recalled. “That’s the way Cassavetes worked.”

He went on to make Mikey & Nicky with the director.

Subsequent work included The Candidate, And Justice for All, Audrey Rose, Slap Shot, Oh God!, The Gambler, The Jerk, The Four Seasons, Coma, Mr. Mom, Pee Wee’s Big Adventure,...

Victor J. Kemper, the cinematographer behind “Dog Day Afternoon,” “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure,” “National Lampoon’s Vacation” and other notable films, has died. He was 96.

American Cinematographer, the international publication of the American Society of Cinematographers, confirmed the news of his passing on social media.

One of Kemper’s most prominent films is the biographical crime drama “Dog Day Afternoon” (1975), directed by Sidney Lumet and starring Al Pacino. The film, which tells the true story of a 1972 bank robbery and hostage situation in Brooklyn, was nominated for six Academy Awards and was admitted to the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress.

Kemper also had an ongoing collaborative relationship with director Arthur Hiller, working together on films like “The Tiger Makes Out” (1969) and “See No Evil, Hear No Evil” (1989). Other prominent directors he worked with include John Cassavetes, Anthony Harvey, Michael Ritchie, Elaine May, J. Lee Thompson and Elia Kazan, among many others.

Victor J. Kemper, the veteran cinematographer who shot more than 50 features, including Dog Day Afternoon, Eyes of Laura Mars, The Jerk and Slap Shot, has died. He was 96.

Kemper died Monday of natural causes in Sherman Oaks, his son, Steven Kemper, told The Hollywood Reporter.

Kemper earned his inaugural D.P. credit on Husbands (1970), written and directed by John Cassavetes, then shot Elia Kazan’s final feature, The Last Tycoon (1976) and Tim Burton’s first, Pee-wee’s Big Adventure (1985).

Kemper also did six films for director Arthur Hiller — The Tiger Makes Out (1967), The Hospital (1971), Author! Author! (1982), The Lonely Guy (1984), See No Evil, Hear No Evil (1989) and Married to It (1991) — and three in a row for Carl Reiner: Oh God! (1977), The One and Only (1978) and The Jerk (1979).

The New Jersey native said he had to wear ice skates when he photographed the hockey scenes in George Roy Hill’s Slap Shot (1977) and...

Spoilers for "Wish" follow.

The villains from Walt Disney Animation's feature films have traditionally been so striking and scary that the company has thought to separate them into their own brand. The brand tends to focus on Maleficent (Eleanor Audley) from 1959's "Sleeping Beauty," Cruella de Vil (Betty Lou Gerson) from 1961's "One Hundred and One Dalmatians," Ursula the Sea Witch (Pat Caroll) from 1989's "The Little Mermaid," the Evil Queen (Lucille La Verne) from 1937's "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," Captain Hook (Hans Conreid) from 1953's "Peter Pan," Hades (James Woods) from 1997's "Hercules," and Dr. Facilier (Keith David) from 2009's "The Princess and the Frog." 

Occasionally, one might find Gaston (Richard White) from 1991's "Beauty and the Beast" in the mix or Chernabog from 1940's "Fantasia." These characters are all memorable for their scary designs, their misguided lust for power or destruction, their resentment, their hatred of the world,...

“Try to Remember,” the most famous song to have come out of the stage musical “The Fantasticks,” was noted for its autumnal feel, sung by someone reflecting back on youthful days. The happy irony is that Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt wrote that song prior to the show’s original 1960 staging when they were both still relatively young men of about 30, fellows who still had about two-thirds of their lives ahead of them. Schmidt, who wrote the music, died in 2018 at age 88, and Jones, who penned the show’s lyrics and book, died Friday at 95.

Here’s to it having been a heck of a long way from September to December.

When the movie version of the show came out in the fall of 2000, I wrote about it for Entertainment Weekly and said that “for my money, ‘The Fantasticks’ is the best pure live–action movie musical since ‘The Rocky Horror Picture Show.’” Now,...

Filmmaker Kevin Smith has a legacy sequel to Bad News Bears that's high atop his wish list. Smith, who rose to fame after his indie comedy Clerks became a big hit in 1994, has directed a variety of films, recently getting back behind the camera for Clerks III. Having gone back to his roots, Smith is working on the horror-comedy film Moose Jaws, a story that the filmmaker describes as "like Jaws but with a moose instead of a shark."

As for what's after Moose Jaws, perhaps that could be a new sequel to The Bad News Bears directed by Smith. While speaking about classic films he'd like to see rebooted on his podcast Fat Man Beyond (per ComicBook.com), Smith mentioned The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension and The Shadow as fun possibilities. But what he wants to see most of all, even hoping to direct such a reboot himself,...

Broadway and film star Joel Grey and John Kander, composer of Cabaret, Chicago and more, will receive the 2023 Special Tony Awards for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre.

Grey was the original Amos Hart in the 1996 Chicago and the original Emcee in Cabaret on Broadway, for which he won a Tony Award. He later received an Academy Award, Golden Globe and BAFTA for his performance in the film adaptation. Kander, who co-wrote those legendary musicals with the late lyricist Fred Ebb, is currently represented on Broadway with the musical New York, New York.

“We are immensely thrilled to honor two legends in their own rights. John Kander has composed the soundtrack to all of our lives – meeting us in every decade – creating unforgettable scores for Cabaret, Chicago, Kiss of the Spider Woman, and his current Broadway hit New York, New York,” said Charlotte St. Martin, president of the Broadway League.

“As a legendary actor and director,...

In 2021, Wesley Snipes used an Esquire "What I've Learned" column to make a fascinating confession: "I've got to learn how to be a movie star."

Snipes was 58 at the time of the article's publication, and enjoying a career renaissance due to his portrayal of actor-director D'Urville Martin in Craig Brewster's uproarious "Dolemite Is My Name." Though he'd officially made his comeback as an aging gang leader in Spike Lee's "Chi-Raq" four years prior, Martin was the perfect vehicle through which Snipes could examine the frustration of an ambitious artist shunted from A-list roles to low-aiming exploitation flicks.

Snipes' Martin is a bitter, alcoholic filmmaker trying, and failing miserably, to make nightclub comic Rudy Ray Moore (Eddie Murphy) look like a Blaxploitation action star on par with Richard Roundtree. Martin is a defeated man, and it's hard not to sense Snipes reckoning with the sun setting on his own action-hero stardom.

We took Gene Hackman for granted, and he's making us pay for it.

Between 1964 and 2004, there wasn't a more reliably excellent film actor in the industry. He'd knock out two or three (or more!) movies a year, and even when they were dire propositions — like the Kryptonite-ridden "Superman IV: The Quest for Peace" or Bob Clark's laugh-free buddy-cop comedy "Loose Cannons" — you knew Hackman would be present and compelling. He also never went too long between watchable films, so the charge that he was phoning it in (which was also leveled at his prolific contemporary Michael Caine) never made sense.

Hackman was — and, oh, how I hate to refer to this still-very-alive master's career in the past tense — a true working actor. He was grateful for the gigs and took them eagerly. He knew what it was to not only struggle but to be told there is no future...

Michael Lerner, the busy Oscar-nominated character actor who had memorable turns as bombastic types in Barton Fink, Harlem Nights, Eight Men Out and so much more, has died. He was 81.

Lerner died Saturday night, according to an Instagram post from his nephew, Sam Lerner, who is also an actor (ABC’s The Goldbergs). The cause of death was not immediately known.

“It’s hard to put into words how brilliant my uncle Michael was, and how influential he was to me,” Sam wrote. “His stories always inspired me and made me fall in love with acting. He was the coolest, most confident, talented guy, and the fact that he was my blood will always make me feel special. Everyone that knows him knows how insane he was — in the best way.”

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Raised in a Brooklyn housing project as...

The "Fletch" movies have always been the product of turmoil. I.M. Fletcher, a hybrid private eye and journalist, made his first appearance in Gregory McDonald's 1974 novel "Fletch," following the investigator as he looks into a shady but tempting offer from a fat cat billionaire. His big-screen debut came in Michael Ritchie's ("Bad News Bears") 1985 feature of the same name, starring Chevy Chase in the lead role of the loose adaptation; it was a box-office smash. Four years later, the sequel "Fletch Lives" saw Chase and Ritchie reprising their respective roles in a follow-up Roger Ebert once described as a "dispirited slog through the rummage sale of movie cliches."

Since then, Fletch has undergone more iterations than his numerous implausible identities. The most talked about version is Kevin Smith's unproduced "Fletch Won," which he envisioned as a Miramax vehicle for "Mallrats" star and frequent Smith collaborator Jason Lee.

My earliest memory is of going to see "Star Wars" in the summer of 1977 with my mom and my older brother. I was three years old, so it's mostly a vaguely sensed recollection, but one moment stands out with startling clarity: when the lights went down, I screamed.

This was back when movie theaters actually went dark. No dimmed house lights lining the walls, no light strips to guide you up and down the aisle (save possibly for faded glow tape that hadn't been replaced in years). It was pitch black in that theater for a second or two until the tattered bumper preceding the coming attractions flickered across the screen. I remember that, too. I remember feeling saved.

I've been chasing that sensation ever since, often to the annoyance of my moviegoing companions. For me, the ritual of going to the movies was as important as watching the movie itself.

Exclusive: A beloved title from Paramount’s movie library is eying a TV comeback. CBS is developing The Bad News Bears, a single-camera comedy based on the 1976 movie which starred Walter Matthau as an alcoholic ex-baseball pitcher who becomes a coach for a youth baseball team of misfit players.

Written by Corey Nickerson (black-ish), the new TV take, from Aaron Kaplan’s Kapital Entertainment and Wendi Trilling’s TrillTV, is rebooting the original premise. In the CBS version, a down-on-her-luck divorced mom coaches a team of misfits in a cutthroat Little League.

The project will weave in personal experiences from Nickerson who coached her son’s baseball team. She executive produces with Kaplan and Melanie Frankel from Kapital and Trilling via TrillTV. Kevin Marco oversees for Kapital.

CBS Studios, where Nickerson has been under an overall deal, is the studio. This marks the latest collaboration between units from the two...

Stand-up comedians are some of the neediest people on the planet. Their livelihood hinges on their laugh-provoking expertise, and every single performance can feel like a make-or-break referendum on their funniness. Even the greats feel this pressure. In the 2002 documentary "Comedian," Jerry Seinfeld observes that an established, widely beloved comic only gets a slim grace period between taking the stage and delivering the goods. People are paying a two-drink minimum — they expect to laugh.

Every comedian has an off-night, but I have a hard time envisioning what that looked like for Robin Williams. Ditto, Eddie Murphy. With Williams, you knew he was going to remove the restraining bolt from his brain and access that deep reservoir of jokes and references and spot-on impersonations with dizzying speed. Murphy was different. He exuded confidence, deftly gliding from bit to bit, secure in the knowledge that he could only kill. Maybe that's why...

Jon Hamm finally got the leading man role he deserved after Mad Men. It’s a shame it took seven years. Regardless, Confess, Fletch is an absolute treat. Directed by Greg Mottola and working from Gregory McDonald’s novel of the same name, Hamm plays Irwin M. Fletcher, who “used to be an investigative reporter of some repute.” Within the first few minutes, Fletch finds a dead body in the Boston townhouse he’s crashing at and is immediately considered the prime suspect by Sergeant Inspector “Slow-Mo” Monroe (Roy Wood Jr.). We learn the townhouse’s owner Owen Tasserly (John Behlmann) is somewhere in Europe and has an interest in fine art. Meanwhile, Fletch has been tasked with locating nine stolen paintings that belong to a kidnapped rich guy. He’s also dating the rich guy’s daughter (Lorenza Izzo) while being seduced by the rich guy’s wife (Marcia Gay Harden...

The problem with Michael Ritchie’s 1985 film “Fletch” is that it’s a perfectly good ’80s Chevy Chase action-comedy and a very bad adaptation of Gregory McDonald’s Edgar-award-winning mystery novel. It’s a dichotomy that becomes clear if you’re one of the many, many ’80s kids (hello) who watched “Fletch” on video and HBO so many times we memorized it and then went to read the book – and its ten (ten!) follow-ups – and discovered they were something different altogether.

Continue reading ‘Confess, Fletch’ Review: A High-Spirited Sequel Returns the Character to His Literary Roots at The Playlist.

The first of author Gregory McDonald's "Fletch" novels was published in 1974. The title character of the McDonald's nine books was Irwin Maurice Fletcher, an ex-Marine investigative journalist with a penchant for disguises. Fletch is a bit of a slovenly cad, and he is constantly outrunning attorneys who seek alimony payments from various ex-wives. The first novel involves Fletch investigating drug traffic on the Los Angeles beaches as well as the mysterious, well-paid request from a dying millionaire that Fletch euthanize him.

"Fletch" was very loosely adapted to film in 1985 with Chevy Chase in the title role and with Michael Ritchie directing. The film was less a rundown detective story than a light comedy, and a lot of "Fletch" focuses on Chase's disguises and the comedian's ability to improvise. The story -- the investigation of a millionaire asking to be euthanized -- was kept intact. The film was a...

Fletch lives!

After years (perhaps decades) of potential reinvention, a new iteration of Fletch, the private investigator that originated in a series of novels by mystery writer Gregory Mcdonald and immortalized in Michael Ritchie’s terrific movie starring Chevy Chase (and one so-so sequel), is finally here.

Jon Hamm is now playing Irwin “Fletch” Fletcher, this time for “Adventureland” director Greg Mottola. The new trailer definitely keeps the spirit of the original film alive while noticeably lessening the wackiness of the Chase iteration (we imagine there will be fewer half-assed disguises this time around).

The new movie, based on the second Fletch novel by Mcdonald, sees Fletch investigating the theft of a valuable painting. Hamm’s old “Mad Men” costar John Slattery co-stars as Fletch’s boss at the paper, while Marcia Gay Harden, Kyle McLaughlan and Lorenza Izzo also co-star.

Also Read:

Jon Hamm Joins ‘The Morning Show’ Season...

The words offbeat, personal and edgy used to be a draw for movie fare — we’d check out a new relationship picture based only on an actor or two that we liked. Bobby Roth’s semi-autobiographical buddy story has a good stab at the early ’80s art + singles scene in Los Angeles, with a dash of macho clichés — pals Peter Coyote and Nick Mancuso fight in public and somehow suffer while bedding fantastic women. But the overall vibe is one of honest sensitivity, aided by fine performances from Carole Laure, Kathryn Harrold and Carol Wayne. Plus music by Tangerine Dream.

Heartbreakers

Blu-ray

Fun City Editions

1984 / Color / 1:85 / 99 min. / Street Date August 30, 2022 / Available from Amazon, Available from Vinegar Syndrome

Starring: Peter Coyote, Nick Mancuso, Carole Laure, Max Gail, James Laurenson, Carol Wayne, Jamie Rose, Kathryn Harrold, George Morfogen, Jerry Hardin, Henry Sanders, Walter Olkewicz.

Cinematography: Michael Ballhaus

Production Designer: David Nichols...

Ivan Passer’s first American film and his first in the English language is a core life-with-a-junkie tale in a cold Manhattan winter. George Segal is the ‘habituated, not addicted’ (he says) user whose married life has already been destroyed. Can he escape with the help of his new girlfriend? Hector Elizondo’s pimp/pusher has no intention of letting that happen. What’s weird is Passer’s frequently light tone — Segal’s criminal antics verge on the absurd. It’s a great film to see Karen Black, a young Robert De Niro and even Paula Prentiss in action, and yet another snapshot of Times Square in its most degraded decade.

Born to Win

Blu-ray

Fun City Editions

1971 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 89 min. / Scraping Bottom / Street Date May 31, 2022 / Available from Vinegar Syndrome / 27.99, from Amazon / 34.99

Starring: George Segal, Karen Black, Paula Prentiss, Hector Elizondo, Jay Fletcher, Robert De Niro, Ed Madsen, Marcia Jean Kurtz,...

One of the most bizarre and original crime movies of its era is director Michael Ritchie's "Prime Cut", released in 1972. Gene Hackman plays a magnate who presides over a mid-western beef manufacturing empire that serves as a cover for his real purpose: kidnapping and trafficking teenage girls into the sex trade. Things heat up when Chicago gangster Lee Marvin and his team are sent by the mob to collect an overdue debt from Hackman. In the process, he encounters a young victim of Hackman's sex slave business, played by Sissy Spacek. The mayhem that follows is violent and brutal and Ritchie places it all in the sun-drenched cornfields that look like the benign setting of an Andrew Wyeth painting. People are beaten, gored, shot, stabbed and occasionally ground into sausages. It's pretty rough going but it's also quite witty and humorous and Marvin and Hackman make terrific antagonists. If you haven't seen it,...

To cite Monica Vitti as an icon, following her death in Rome this week at 90, is somehow unsatisfying. She could never be summed up as something so inert — she was far too vividly alive. If her sensuality has been called “chilly,” it nonetheless animated every frame she stood in or fast-tapped through in high heels. If the landscapes her greatest creative partner Michelangelo Antonioni directed her across were at times sprawling or forbidding, she always held the eye, whether with a look or a highly kinetic outburst.

To a young film buff crammed into a swaybacked seat at a Manhattan arthouse, beholding her for the first time was to risk a schoolboy crush. She’s been called “Impossibly lovely” on this site, and that’s true enough — impossible, and yet there she is onscreen. The sturdy lips forming a blossom of a mouth, the eyes that seem focused just a...

If 2021 has been a calvacade of bad decisions, dashed hopes, and warning signs for cinema’s strength, the Criterion Channel’s monthly programming has at least buttressed our hopes for something like a better tomorrow. Anyway. The Channel will let us ride out distended (holi)days in the family home with an extensive Alfred Hitchcock series to bring the family together—from the established Rear Window and Vertigo to the (let’s just guess) lesser-seen Downhill and Young and Innocent—Johnnie To’s Throw Down and Orson Welles’ The Magnificent Ambersons in their Criterion editions, and some streaming premieres: Ste. Anne, Lydia Lunch: The War is Never Over, and The Incredibly True Adventure of Two Girls in Love.

Special notice to Yvonne Rainer’s brain-expanding Film About a Woman Who . . .—debuting in “Female Gaze: Women Directors + Women Cinematographers,” a series that does as it says on the tin—and a Joseph Cotten retro boasting Ambersons,...

This first remake of the 1956 sci-fi classic retains many of the original’s story points, clears up the bio minutiae for literal-minded viewers and adds a fascinating social commentary about ’70s lifestyles that’s almost as depressing as the idea of being ‘replaced’ by an alien simulacrum. Philip Kaufman’s first big hit is a worthy picture that’s maintained its high reputation … and it’s even scarier in today’s socio-political climate.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers

4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray

Kl Studio Classics

1978 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 115 min. / Street Date November 23, 2021 / available through Kino Lorber / 39.95

Starring: Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Jeff Goldblum, Veronica Cartwright, Leonard Nimoy, Art Hindle, Lelia Goldoni, Kevin McCarthy, Don Siegel, Tom Luddy, Stan Ritchie, David Fisher, Tom Dahlgren, Garry Goodrow, Michael Chapman, Robert Duvall.

Cinematography: Michael Chapman

Production Designer: Charles Rosen

Film Editor: Douglas Stewart

Original Music: Denny Zeitlin

Written by W.D. Richter from a...

Updated with Ctg response: Playwright Jeremy O. Harris said Tuesday that he intends to pull his Tony-nominated Slave Play from the upcoming lineup at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles due to the theater company’s dearth of scheduled productions by female playwrights – a scarcity acknowledged by the management of Center Theatre Group, which operates the Taper.

In a tweet that reproduced an email sent to executives of L.A.’s Center Theatre Group, Harris wrote, “As a playwright who holds dear the principles of both inclusion it was a shock to realize that this season was programmed with only 1 woman across all theatres. As an Angeleno and a lover of theatre I think Los Angeles audiences deserve an equitable showing of the playwrights working in the US right now.

“I’ve spoken to my team,” he continues, “and would like to begin the process of removing slave play...

Another unexpected comic treasure from the mid ’70s! Jeff Bridges and Sam Waterston make an irresistible pair of would-be outlaws in a tale of the modern West — high-country Montana, actually — where a gentleman rancher from New Jersey owns all the land and making an honest living is just too boring. Thomas McGuane’s hilariously laid-back dialogue pits our slacker cattle rustlers against society — but only in the pursuit of having a good time. Frank Perry’s beautifully directed show gives choice roles to a fistful of actors: Clifton James, Elizabeth Ashley, Harry Dean Stanton, Slim Pickens, Charlene Dallas, Richard Bright, Joe Spinell, Patti D’Arbanville. Call it ‘literate’ country comedy, with musical accompaniment by Jimmy Buffett. The extras include a great new interview with star Jeff Bridges.

Rancho Deluxe

Blu-ray

Fun City Editions

1975 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 93 min. / Street Date July 19, 2021 / Available from Vinegar Syndrome /

Starring: Jeff Bridges, Sam Waterston, Elizabeth Ashley,...

Near the pinnacle of director-driven ’70s cinema is this marvelous comedy about a ‘American Miss’ contest, and the swirl of personalities that come to support, promote and ogle the teen beauties just learning the ropes of the good old U.S. hype machine. Bruce Dern, Barbara Feldon and Michael Kidd are just wonderful as the adults in charge of the pageantry; Annette O’Toole, Joan Prather and Melanie Griffifth are among the hopefuls, learning an early lesson in a time honored, entirely bogus Americana ritual: as Michael Kidd says, he teaches these sweet kids to dance and behave like Vegas showgirls. It’s deceptively, distractingly funny — and as true as the day is long.

Smile

Blu-ray

Fun City Editions

1975 / Color /1:85 widescreen / 113 min. / Street Date May 25, 2021 / Available from Vinegar Syndrome / 34.99

Starring: Bruce Dern, Barbara Feldon, Michael Kidd, Eric Shea, Geoffrey Lewis, Nicholas Pryor, Titos Vandis, Paul Benedict, William Traylor, Dick McGarvin,...

I’ve written here before about my fondness for director Michael Ritchie, particularly his streak in the 1970s when he made one great movie after another about the dark side of the American competitive spirit. Most of his best films – Downhill Racer (1969), The Candidate (1972), The Bad News Bears (1976) – are wry meditations on what it really means to win (and lose) in a culture where winning is valued above all else; one of the most memorable moments in all of his work comes at the conclusion of The Candidate, when Robert Redford’s senatorial candidate wins his election […]

The post Smile, Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Carole Lombard: Jim Hemphill’s Home Video Recommendations first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

I’ve written here before about my fondness for director Michael Ritchie, particularly his streak in the 1970s when he made one great movie after another about the dark side of the American competitive spirit. Most of his best films – Downhill Racer (1969), The Candidate (1972), The Bad News Bears (1976) – are wry meditations on what it really means to win (and lose) in a culture where winning is valued above all else; one of the most memorable moments in all of his work comes at the conclusion of The Candidate, when Robert Redford’s senatorial candidate wins his election […]

The post Smile, Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Carole Lombard: Jim Hemphill’s Home Video Recommendations first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

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By Tim McGlynn

The Paramount Presents Series recently released The Golden Child on Blu-ray and it is a beautiful disc to behold even though the movie has a few flaws.

It’s 1986 and Eddie Murphy is riding high on the success of Beverly Hills Cop, 48 Hours and Trading Places and it is time to create another blockbuster for this talented star. What do you do? Well, let’s keep the same formula and feature Murphy as a hip, wisecracking hero who this time finds lost children. Then, throw in a bit of martial arts in the style of John Carpenter’s Big Trouble in Little China and add some Asian mysticism that reminds viewers of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Make sure your lead character displays an anti-authority attitude and even include a humorous scene where he pretends to be a...

The lights will soon be back on inside the Ahmanson Theatre.

Center Theatre Group artistic director Michael Ritchie announced this week that the 54th season at the Ahmanson will kick off Nov. 30 — three months later than originally scheduled and 20 months after shuttering due to Covid-19 — with director Matthew Warchus’ A Christmas Carol.

The season includes productions of The Lehman Trilogy, The Prom, Hadestown, Dear Evan Hansen, Come From Away and Everybody’s Talking About Jamie. The Tony Award-winning best revival Rogers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! that was previously set to open the season in August 2020 will now close the season in 2022....

The lights will soon be back on inside the Ahmanson Theatre.

Center Theatre Group artistic director Michael Ritchie announced this week that the 54th season at the Ahmanson will kick off Nov. 30 — three months later than originally scheduled and 20 months after shuttering due to Covid-19 — with director Matthew Warchus’ A Christmas Carol.

The season includes productions of The Lehman Trilogy, The Prom, Hadestown, Dear Evan Hansen, Come From Away and Everybody’s Talking About Jamie. The Tony Award-winning best revival Rogers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! that was previously set to open the season in August 2020 will now close the season in 2022....

The Bad News Bears

Blu ray

Imprint

1976 / 1.78:1 / 102 min.

Starring Walter Matthau, Tatum O’Neal, Vic Morrow

Cinematography by John Alonzo

Directed by Michael Ritchie

W.C. Fields’ final screen appearance was a brief walk-on in Sensations of 1945, an overloaded variety show that barely found time for the great man. As usual Fields had the last laugh—thanks to his life-long aversion to authority, the comedian enjoyed a brief renaissance in the 70’s when his films were showcased at revival houses alongside those other counterculture champions, the Marx Brothers. Morris Buttermaker, the obstinate antihero of Michael Ritchie’s The Bad News Bears, is a W.C. Fields for The Me Decade. Like Fields, Buttermaker is a hard-drinking vagabond (he roams the San Fernando Valley cleaning swimming pools), boasts a tomato-shaped proboscis, and has little use for the world or its inhabitants—who else but Walter Matthau to play this slouching, grouching deadbeat.

Oscar-nominated screenwriter and producer Walter Bernstein, who survived the blacklist era by writing pseudonymous scripts for television and later wrote films including “Fail-Safe,” “The Front” and “Semi-Tough,” died on Jan. 22. He was 101.

Bernstein’s longtime friend and former WGA West president Howard Rodman shared the news of his death on Twitter Saturday. “Truly saddened to hear that Walter Bernstein – legendary screenwriter, and one of the great humans – died last night. He was 101. I feel so damn fortunate that three generations of our family got to know him.”

Truly saddened to hear that Walter Bernstein — legendary screenwriter, and one of the great humans — died last night. He was 101. I feel so damn fortunate that three generations of our family got to know him.

Here's Walter from 10 years ago, when he was a young man of 91. pic.twitter.com/yLGvTb3mJY

— Howard A. Rodman (@howardrodman) January 23, 2021

Bernstein’s promising writing career was...