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Historian and scholar Carter G. Woodson created Negro History Week in 1926, against the backdrop of Jim Crow America. A half-century later, it would become Black History Month when President Gerald Ford officially recognized it in 1976.

Woodson wanted Negro History Week to help correct a national narrative that barely included African Americans and allowed errors and blatantly racist perspectives to stand uncorrected. It was a time of great change for black people: Just 50 years removed from slavery, racial “uplift” dominated discourse and media and African Americans struggled to find a place in the country.

It was also the early days of cinema, 11 years after the release of D.W. Griffith’s racially incendiary “The Birth of a Nation” (1915), and a year before the first talkie, “The Jazz Singer” (1927), which featured Al Jolson in blackface. Meanwhile, the career of black cinema pioneer Oscar Micheaux was on the rise, as he and other black filmmakers,...

"You do this and you're dead!" "I'm already dead." Briarcliff Entertainment has debuted an official trailer for a historical epic film titled Emperor, yet another outlaw slave who fights back after escaping the chains. Dayo Okeniyi stars in the true story of Shields "Emperor" Green, a descendant of African kings, who escapes to the north and fights back in hopes of freeing his family. The cast includes Naturi Naughton, Kat Graham, Mykelti Williamson, Keean Johnson, Mykelti Williamson, James Cromwell, Paul Scheer, along with Bruce Dern. We've seen these kind of films before, one of the most prominent being The Birth of a Nation, but it's still badass to see these stories brought to the screen. The best part of this trailer is the bell tower explosion at the end. Enjoy. Here's the first official trailer (+ poster) for Mark Amin's Emperor, direct from Briarcliff's YouTube: Emperor is a film inspired...

Esther Scott, whose film, TV and stage career included roles in Nate Parker’s The Birth of a Nation and John Singleton’s Boyz n the Hood, died February 14 in Los Angeles after suffering a heart attack, Deadline has confirmed. She was 66.

Scott appeared in dozens of TV series including playing Delma on CW’s Hart of Dixie as well as roles on CBS’ The Help, Fox’s Melrose Place and ABC’s The Geena Davis Show and Sister, Sister among others. Her first role was voicing a character on the mid-1980s animated Star Wars series Ewoks.

Her film credits include Gangster Squad, Transformers, The Pursuit of Happyness, Dreamgirls, 2005’s Fun with Dick and Jane, Austin Powers in Goldmember, The Craft, Don Juan DeMarco and Common Threads: Stories From the Quilt. She memorably played a grandmother who nearly caught Cuba Gooding Jr’s Tre fooling around with her granddaughter in Boyz n the Hood,...

Esther Scott, whose credits include “Boyz N the Hood,” “Hart of Dixie,” “The Help” and “The Geena Davis Show,” has died, Scott’s publicist confirmed to TheWrap. She was 66.

Scott suffered a heart attack on Feb. 11 at her home in Santa Monica, and remained in the hospital until Friday, where she passed away. TMZ was the first to report her death.

Scott’s roles also includes “Encino Man,” “Austin Powers in Goldmember,” “Dreamgirls,” “Pursuit of Happyness” and “The Craft,” and starred on four seasons of the CW’s “Hart of Dixie” as well as on the short-lived series “The Geena Davis Show.” She also appeared in “Melrose Place,” “Full House,” “Beverly Hills, 90210,” “Ellen” and “Sister, Sister.”

Also Read: 'M*A*S*H' Actress Kellye Nakahara Dies at 72

Most recently, Scott starred as Bridget Turner in “The Birth of a Nation,” which was based on the story of Nat Turner, who...

Esther Scott, who appeared in “Boyz N the Hood,” voiced Shodu in the “Ewoks” series and guest starred on dozens of TV series, died Friday in Los Angeles, her representative confirmed. She had suffered a heart attack Tuesday at her Santa Monica home. She was 66.

Born in Queens, N.Y., Scott appeared in at least 73 films and shows beginning in the 1980s. She had recurring roles in “The Geena Davis Show, ” “The Help” TV show and “Hart of Dixie,” and made guest appearances on “Beverly Hills, 90210,” “Full House,” “Ellen,” “Sister Sister,” “Hart of Dixie” and “The Steve Harvey Show.” In the popular film “Boyz N the Hood,” Scott played the grandmother of Tisha. She voiced the character Shodu in the “Star Wars” animated spin-off “Ewoks.”

Scott was most recently seen as Bridget Turner in “The Birth of a Nation,” based on the story of Nat Turner, who led a...

Actress Esther Scott died after suffering a heart attack, People confirms. She was 66.

Scott, who starred in Boyz n the Hood, Dreamgirls, Pursuit of Happyness and Transformers, had a heart attack at her Santa Monica home on Feb. 11 and remained in the hospital until she died on Friday surrounded by loved ones. TMZ was the first outlet to report on her death.

Along with movie roles in Encino Man, Austin Powers in Goldmember and The Craft, Scott played next-door neighbor Delma Warner on four seasons of The CW’s Hart of Dixie and Gladys on the short-lived series The Geena Davis Show.

Exclusive: In a development that is a fitting epitaph for a 2020 Sundance Film Festival acquisitions market dominated by streamers, Deadline hears that the fest’s biggest sale title — the WW rights deal for Palm Springs — was actually worth substantially more than what was reported last week by winning bidders Hulu and Neon. Sources familiar with the heated multi-bidder auction said that the value of the deal was actually closer to $22 million, far and away the biggest Sundance deal of all-time. That’s much larger than the $17.5 million and 69 cents Hulu and Neon said they paid to slightly beat the $17.5 million Searchlight Sundance record for The Birth of a Nation. That reported number reflected the acquisition fee, but there is a built in bonus structure that I’m told guarantees the $22 million. Insiders acknowledged that the bonus structure was not fed to the press. Since most of the value of the...

One of this year’s buzziest Toronto International Film Festival breakouts might be about to land a home, and with a record deal to boot. Deadline reports that HBO is nearly at a deal to acquire Cory Finley’s fact-based embezzlement drama “Bad Education” for a price tag “nearing $20 million.” (Variety reports that the number is closer to $17.5 million.) That price point would put the deal in range of Fox Searchlight’s legendary big ticket festival buy, when the studio purchased Nate Parker’s “The Birth of a Nation” for $17.5 million at Sundance in 2016. As has become commonplace, it seems to have boiled down to the ever-raging debate between the merits of theatrical versus streaming.

As Deadline notes, “This one quickly came down to the producers and financiers faced with making a choice that will be more commonplace as fests go forward. Did they want a streaming deal, gamble for...

Nate Parker’s “American Skin” has been added to the Venice Film Festival lineup in the fest’s Sconfini section.

The film, about a black Iraq War veteran who seeks justice for his son killed in a shooting, is the first feature from Parker since his 2016 slavery drama “The Birth of a Nation.”

Parker wrote, directed and stars in the L.A.-set film, which addresses timely subjects like police violence and enduring racism in American society. Co-stars include Omari Hardwick (“Power”), Theo Rossi (“Sons of Anarchy)” and Beau Knapp (“Southpaw”).

Parker plays U.S. Marine veteran Lincoln Jefferson who is working as a janitor at a prestigious California junior high school in California and trying to mend his relationship with his son after his divorce.

Also Read: Venice Festival Juror Jennifer Kent Disappointed by Lack of Female Directors in Competition This Year

When his son is killed during a routine police check,...

By Peter BelsitoThe Talking Pictures and Book to Screen program includes in-depth discussions with directors, writers and actors from the year’s top titles. BlacKkKlansman (USA) with author Ron Stallworth (Book to Screen) will be featured.

Peter Belsito at Cannes 2018: This is the best, most important film I saw at Cannes. It should be — hope so! — massively seen upon its USA release.

If it gets people, especially young ones to view this very important American political work, anything Spike Lee, often too outspoken for many people, does or says is good.

Adam Driver and John David Washington in a scene from the movie “BlacKkKlansman.”

BlacKkKlansman was adapted from a book by Ron Stallworth, Colorado Springs’ first black police officer, who in the early 1970s succeeded in infiltrating the local chapter of the Ku Klux Klan. The sheer absurdity of the circumstances clearly inspired Lee and his three co-writers to play the material,...

Review by Roger Carpenter

Throughout the course of history an occasional film has been singled out as being particularly controversial. As far back as the silent era you had films like The Birth of a Nation, which drew widespread protests for its content. Frankenstein was another early film which had to be cut before being shown at theaters. There are plenty of others as well. Think about The Last Temptation of Christ, Last Tango in Paris, A Clockwork Orange. Then there’s Salo, or 120 Days of Sodom, Cannibal Holocaust, and The Passion of the Christ. The list is endless. In early 1981, when Maniac was released to theaters, it too, was met with huge controversy. News reports ran nightly upon the release of the film in various cities. It was picketed, protested, cut, censored, and outright banned in parts of the world. Most critics roasted the film for its depiction of...

Warner Bros./China Gravity’s co-production The Meg is swimming in with an opening between $44M-$45M at 4,118 theaters — the second widest August release after Suicide Squad (4,255 locations).

This is to be commended. Tracking, the industry nor Warner Bros. ever thought that another shark movie had the potential to open at this level which one studio insider heralded as “the largest live action shark movie opening ever at the box office”.

Meg held fantastically well on Saturday with $16.3M, -1% from Friday’s $16.5M, which remember includes $4M of Thursday previews. Technically, Saturday is really +30% over Friday which means that Meg wasn’t frontloaded like a genre movie.

Heads up: Spike Lee is coming at you with his greatest and most galvanizing movie in years. BlacKkKlansman is right up there with Do the Right Thing and Malcolm X in the Spike’s Joint pantheon of game-changers. For starters, it gets your blood up about the toxic and enduring power of racism. Based on the true story of Ron Stallworth (John David Washington), the first African-American cop on the Colorado Springs police force, the film shows how Ron managed to infiltrate the Ku Klux Klan and righteously screw with it from the inside.

Some people see history as a linear progression, but Hollywood offers plenty of evidence that it’s cyclical. Spike Lee’s “BlacKkKlansman,” which opens Aug. 10, is based on true events in the 1970s, but it reflects the current battles over the rise of white supremacists. Back on Jan. 8, 1958, Variety critic Robert J. Landry wrote about the then-topical firestorm over integration, pointing out parallels to the 1915 D.W. Griffith film “The Birth of a Nation.” Landry said Griffith combined “the twin nightmares of folklore in America: rape and race.” He concluded sadly, “This film is woven inextricably into the tapestry of the American film industry.” Nobody tracked box office receipts then, but Landry estimated its worldwide gross was about $50 million, beating the official all-time champ, “Gone With the Wind” ($33.5 million). In other words, there was a huge audience for a film with the stupefying message that the Ku Klux Klan was...

Convicted felon Dinesh D’Souza presents film critics with two separate but inextricable dilemmas. The first is that any sincere effort to review one of D’Souza’s documentaries — he’s released a new one every other July since 2012 — fundamentally debases both the medium of film, and the act of criticism. The more insidious problem is D’Souza wants writers to pan his work and attack his person.

A right-wing ideologue who has distorted American history since before it was cool, D’Souza knows when “mainstream media” savages his sociopolitical screeds, it only makes him more credible to his core audience of racists and Randians. A single triggered snowflake is worth at least two thumbs up, which probably explains why the fine people at D’Souza Media sent me an unsolicited screener of “Death of a Nation,” even though I awarded both “America: Imagine the World Without Her” and “Hillary’s...

A new lawyer is headed to Riverdale. Penelope Ann Miller has been cast play district attorney Ms. Wright in the upcoming third season of the CW series.

The casting hints to the potential fate of Archie Andrews (K.J. Apa), who was hauled off to jail at the end of Season 2 after being framed by Hiram Lodge (Mark Consuelos) for the murder of a Shadow Lake resident named Cassidy. The savvy, eloquent Ms. Wright is the prosecuting attorney in charge of handling Archie’s case. With a conviction in mind, she will weave together disparate moments of Archie’s young life to portray him as a dangerous, violent sociopath who is capable of committing a heinous crime. And Archie’s freedom will hang in the balance.

Stars Kj Apa, Lili Reinhart, Camila Mendes, Cole Sprouse, Marisol Nichols, Madelaine Petsch, Ashleigh Murray, Mark Consuelos, Casey Cott, Skeet Ulrich, Mädchen Amick, Luke Perry and Vanessa Morgan,...

When LeBron James left the Cavs to sign with the Lakers earlier this month, he left a chunk of change on the table. Under NBA rules, Cleveland could have rained down more than $200 million over five years on the man many consider the best player in the league. Los Angeles was allowed to pony up a mere $154 million over four years.

But there’s a great equalizer on the West Coast: Hollywood, where top current NBA stars aren’t just the face of films; they’re producers and financiers too. It didn’t start with Curry, who just formed his own production company after signing a multiyear development pact with Sony Pictures Entertainment.

This is a different kind of game, but one that’s just as appealing to those who are ultracompetitive. Let’s call them the NBA’s Media All-Stars.

LeBron James

Los Angeles Lakers

He’s King James...

To mark the release of Genesis on 16th July, we’ve been given 3 copies to give away on DVD.

Prepare yourself for stellar British sci-fi adventure Genesis, as Man battles Machine in a desperate future.

The year is 2069. Mankind has been devastated by a chemical Armageddon. Forced to live underground where the air is breathable, the civilians, led by the charismatic Paul Brooks (John Hannah) survive in dire conditions, starving and pushed into slave labour.

As the civilian unrest grows, the politicians and scientists, led by Dr. Eve Gabriel (Olivia Grant) dedicate all resources to the construction of Abel, a humanoid life- form, and mankind’s last hope. When the powerful A.I. Machine learns its preprogrammed fate, it is up to Eve and Paul to stop the catastrophic consequences as humanity’s future lies in the balance.

Starring Olivia Grant (Stardust), Chike Okonkwo, (The Birth of a Nation), Ed Stoppard...

Exclusive: Felicity Huffman, Jake Lacy and Jake Hoffman have joined Angela Bassett and Patricia Arquette in the romantic comedy feature Otherhood for Netflix. The project is being produced by Cathy Schulman and Jason Michael Berman (The Birth of a Nation). The movie is currently underway in New York with helmer Cindy Chupack.

Huffman, who most recently appeared in the ABC anthology series American Crime, earning Emmy nominations for each of its three seasons, is coming aboard the comedy about three Moms who leave their suburban life to reconnect with their estranged sons in NYC. The script is from Chupack and Mark Andrus (Oscar nominee for As Good As It Gets with James Brooks) and based on the William Sutcliffe novel Whatever Makes You Happy.

Jake Lacy) and Jake Hoffman also join the Mandalay and Welle Entertainment production.

Huffman, who recently...

Bron Studios has come on as a producer of Oscar® winner John Ridley’s Needle in a Timestack. Zanne Devine, David Thwaites and Bron’S Aaron L. Gilbert are producing. Tony and Grammy Award winner Leslie Odom Jr., BAFTA nominee Freida Pinto, Tony, Emmy and Grammy Award winner Cynthia Erivo, and SAG award winner Orlando Bloom will star. Ridley will direct and is adapting from a short story by Robert Silverberg where a couple work to hold their marriage together in a world where time travel is possible, and the past and present are ever fluctuating.

Matt Kennedy also produces, and Jason Cloth of Creative Wealth Media, Christopher J. Conover, Hope Farley and John Ridley are executive producers.

John Ridley’s critically acclaimed documentary about the Los Angeles uprising, Let It Fall: Los Angeles 1982–1992, premiered in theaters and aired on ABC in 2017 and is currently available on Netflix. He is...

It’s a CineSavant guest reviewer debut for journalist Sergio Alejandro Mims. In its first ever 2-disc set Twilight Time makes a bold statement with a domestic release of an important U.K. restoration. It’s without question extremely influential as filmmaking — techniques used in The Avengers: Infinity War can be traced back to D.W. Griffith’s classic. But this controversial picture is also one of the most vile, racist movies ever made. It has a lot of answer for, yet still makes an impact today. What other film released over a century ago can make that statement?

The Birth of a Nation

Blu-ray

Twilight Time

1915 / Color tinted / 1:33 flat full frame / 191 min. / Street Date May 22, 2018 /Available from the Twilight Time Movies Store /

Starring: Lillian Gish, Mae Marsh, Henry B. Walthall, Ralph Lewis, George Siegman Walter Long, Joseph Henabery Jennie Lee, Mary Alden.

Cinematography: G.W. Bitzer

Film Editors: D.W.

Cannes ’18 Review by Peter BelsitoThis is the best, most important film I saw at Cannes. It should be — hope so! — massively seen upon its USA release.

Let me start by saying — confessing, self criticizing really — that I have dismissed, bad mouthed Spike Lee for the last 25 years. As a filmmaker I considered him subsequently irrelevant after an auspicious beginning with several films. I also disliked his public persona as self important and loud mouthing.

As far as I’m concerned now anything he does (!!) is okay if it gets people, especially young ones to view this very important American political work.

Adam Driver and John David Washington in a scene from the movie “BlacKkKlansman.”

BlacKkKlansman was adapted from a book by Ron Stallworth, Colorado Springs’ first black police officer, who in the early 1970s succeeded in infiltrating the local chapter of the Ku Klux Klan. The sheer absurdity of the...

There are many things of which we may not necessarily need reminding that, nevertheless, must not be forgotten. Trust me when I say it is in no way a spoiler to reveal that anyone who goes to see BlacKkKlansman, the latest Spike Lee joint, will be reminded of the events that took place in Charlottesville last August.

At the close of his latest movie, an amiable if somewhat broad black comedy, the Brooklyn filmmaker switches from the narrative to footage of torch-baring white supremacists, erupting violence, and, most disturbing of all, the horrific murder of Heather Heyer, who was killed when James Alex Fields Jr. drove his Dodge Challenger into a crowd of counter-protesters on a downtown Charlottesville street. Lee intercuts this with clips of the President’s press conference that followed, during which Donald Trump failed to condemn the actions of the far-right group.

Chilling, frightening, enraging stuff: the...

If D.W. Griffith’s “The Birth of a Nation” was “like writing history with lightning,” as Woodrow Wilson described it way back in 1915, then Spike Lee’s “BlacKkKlansman” is the roll of thunder that was eventually sure to follow. The astonishing true story of one of the riskiest undercover investigations in American history — an improbable early-’70s case in which black police detective Ron Stallworth (John David Washington) applied for and was ultimately granted membership in the Ku Klux Klan — Lee’s latest is as much a compelling black empowerment story as it is an electrifying commentary on the problems of African-American representation across more than a century of cinema.

Backed by Blumhouse and “Get Out” auteur Jordan Peele, “BlacKkKlansman” is also the best thing the director has made in a dozen years (since HBO miniseries “When the Levees Broke”) and a welcome throwback to the days when Lee’s...

So, being a bit of a history and geography buff, I had somewhere, heard a story about Jones County, Mississippi succession from the Confederacy, but I mostly recalled it as a curious little blip on the history of our country, and frankly, I wasn’t completely sure how real the story was. But, yes, the Free State of Jones, succeeded from the Confederacy, led by Newton Knight (Matthew McConaughey) a deserted Confederate soldier who with a group of other Confederates as well as some runaway slaves, lead a rebellion against some of the Confederates soldiers, who were basically raping the poor civilians of both their men and their property, seizing ten percent of food, and everything else they had. This was upsetting to Knight, for several reasons, not the least of which that, the rich in the South actually didn’t send their men to war.

The film was directed by Gary Ross,...

Purists want to enjoy the Emily Blunt film in silence – but it’s not the only part of cinema etiquette that could do with a 21st-century update

Motion pictures regularly strike a nerve, causing audiences to rethink their views about politics, sex, religion and drugs. This is true of films as varied as the spectacularly racist silent movie The Birth of a Nation, the deeply disturbing and uncompromisingly antisemitic The Passion of the Christ and the futuristic, immensely thought-provoking 2001: A Space Odyssey.

But it is also true of Jaws, Psycho and Deliverance, all of which traumatised filmgoers to such a degree that they afterwards avoided going into the ocean, the shower, the basement, or the rural American south. These are films that generate passion or controversy by virtue of their troubling subject matter and their powerful images. For better or worse, they change the way we think and the...

Bustling Atlanta may be the third-largest production center in the U.S. (after L.A. and New York), but the coastal Georgia city of Savannah offers far more charming allures for producers looking to shoot amidst cobblestone streets, green parks and historic buildings – not to mention in the haunting Bonaventure Cemetery, made famous by the novel and film “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.” Plus, the city provides a 10% rebate on qualified film and TV spend on top of Georgia’s already generous 20-30% transferable tax credit.

To qualify, films must be budgeted at $1.75 million or higher. Qualifying TV series must include a minimum of five episodes.

The minimum spend must be $500,000 per film; $500,000 is also required of TV, per season. There’s a project cap of $150,000 for film and $250,000 for TV, per calendar year. In addition, at least 60% of the filming days must take place in Chatham County,...

The director, whose debut suffered after his acquittal from a 1999 rape charge was publicised, returns with a film about an Lapd homicide detective

Nate Parker, the film-maker whose award-winning directorial debut The Birth of a Nation was engulfed in controversy after it emerged Parker had been acquitted of rape charges, is to return with a new film about an Lapd detective.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, Parker has been hired to direct Black and Blue, based on the memoirs of Ralph Waddy, an African-American former Los Angeles detective who worked on a series of high-profile cases, including the assassination of Robert Kennedy, the Manson murders and serial killer Vaughn Greenwood, and conducting undercover work against the Black Panthers.

The Nate Parker comeback train is in motion. The formerly embattled writer-director-star, who captivated Hollywood in 2016 with his film “The Birth of a Nation,” then went radio silent following a scandal over an acquitted rape case, has booked a new project. Parker will direct the indie film “Black & Blue,” about unsung African American detective Ralph Waddy. The incredible life story follows an Lapd sleuth with a hand in iconic American events like the Watts riots, the Robert Kennedy assassination and the Manson Murders. Also Read: Why Black Audiences Are Conflicted Over Nate Parker's 'Birth of a Nation' Singer-actor Macy Gray is...

Nate Parker, the filmmaker whose Sundance sensation The Birth of a Nation was derailed by resurfaced news of a college rape trial, has another feature to direct.

Parker will helm Black & Blue, a drama about Los Angeles Police Department hero Ralph Waddy, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed. The pic is his first feature since Birth of a Nation, which was a critical hit during its debut at Sundance, only to garner negative attention due to Parker's involvement in a 1999 rape case and the suicide of the woman who alleged Parker and Birth of a Nation co-writer Jean Celestin...

It’s been a while since we’ve heard from actor/writer/director Nate Parker. After exploding on the scene after the 2016 Sundance premiere of his film, “Birth of a Nation,” the filmmaker was positioned to have a huge awards season push, with Oscar nominations in his future. Unfortunately, before that could even happen, Parker become the subject of some controversy. However, now it seems like the filmmaker is back with a new project.

Nate Parker is attached to direct the Los Angeles Police Department drama “Black & Blue,” Deadline reports. The filmmaker will rewrite the original script penned by Jim McGrath. The project is the first feature film Parker has been attached to since “The Birth of a Nation.”

“Black & Blue” tells the true story of Ralph Waddy, a heroic detective who led the Lapd through some of the most significant events of the 1960s, including Robert Kennedy’s assassination, the Watts riots, and the Manson Murders. The script reportedly focuses on Waddy’s detective career and his rocky relationship with his father.

Per Deadline, ForM.B Entertainment’s Steven Jensen is set to produce along with Darren Enenstein, Shondrella Avery, Adam R. Sanders, and Lenny Rosenberg. Avery will also star in the movie in an unspecified role.

Parker has remained largely out of the spotlight since fall 2016, when rape allegations from his college...

“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.” That Abraham Lincoln quote sums up the quiet, thoughtful dignity that actors have tried to portray on film for several generations now. And on screen, he’s done everything from meeting Shirley Temple to fighting vampires. In honor of his birthday today, here are some of the actors who have played Honest Abe over the years. Joseph Henabery – “The Birth of a Nation” (1915) The controversy and racism of “The Birth of a Nation” aside, D.W. Griffith stages the assassination of Abraham Lincoln as...

Fifteen years ago this month, the Best Picture race at the Oscars pitted Rob Marshall’s razzle-dazzle musical “Chicago” against Roman Polanski’s wrenching Holocaust drama “The Pianist”: a bipolar set of Academy Awards contenders that caused many critics and filmmakers to get both their knickers and their boxers in a twist.

Yes, “The Pianist” may have been the more important work, but was it so important that movie folks could forgive Polanski for the 1977 rape of a 13-year-old child that caused him to become a permanent fugitive from American justice?

Sympathetic Patrick Goldstein, writing in the influential Los Angeles Times, compared Polanski’s case to that of “Les Miserable’s” Jean Valjean, “an ex-con trying to turn his life around who is being obsessively tracked and hunted down by the Parisian police inspector Javert.” Well, of course, drugging and raping a pubescent girl for your perverse pleasure is...

Sharing her own story of sexual abuse was both healing and painful for Gabrielle Union.

The Being Mary Jane star previously spoke out in 2016 — amid controversy surrounding former assault accusations against The Birth of a Nation director, Nate Parker — about being raped at gunpoint while working at a Payless shoe store 25 years ago.

During her recent book tour for her best-selling memoir We’re Going to Need More Wine, the 45-year-old actress listened to countless stories from fans who shared their own sexual assault stories, which “triggered” Ptsd from her own sexual assault more than two decades ago.

“On my book tour,...

Pick any random song by the Coup – we suggest "Fat Cats, Bigga Fish" from their 1994 album Genocide & Juice, or "My Favorite Mutiny" from 2006's Pick a Bigger Weapon – and you'll get complex anti-corporate screeds and much dropping of Chomsky-esque political science against layered, funky-as-fuck beats. An extended middle finger against the powers that hold people back is this Bay Area hip-hop collective's raison d'etre; not for nothing did they name a song "5 Million Ways to Kill a C.E.O." (We also highly recommend blasting that cut off 2001's incendiary Party Music as well.

Star Wars Dialogue is a 5-part dialog between Mike Thorn, Isiah Medina, Chelsea Phillips-Carr, Isaac Goes, and Neil Bahadur about George Lucas's first six films in the Star Wars franchise.Mike Thorn: Considering the influence of silent cinema on the Star Wars films, how might we read Lucas’s series as it relates to D.W. Griffith’s work? I’m thinking very broadly here about some of the formal echoes between the climatic finale of The Birth of a Nation (1915) and that of A New Hope. Isiah Medina: In principle, there is nothing that cannot be reversed, there is no cinematic tactic or strategy that cannot be re-appropriated. Or, as Lucas would have it, there’s nothing that cannot be revised for and with future technological breaks. Okay, let’s say we have a Birth of a Nation ending mixed in with a Triumph of the Will (1935) award ceremony in A New Hope.

Unlike the fall film festivals, Sundance is pretty much unpredictable. Few saw Beasts of the Southern Wild or Fruitvale Station coming, but they managed to create massive buzz at the festival. That being said, some movies can generate tons of buzz at the festival and then disappear when they’re released into theaters like The Birth of a Nation or Me and Earl and the Dying Girl. Some promising-looking films disappoint, and movies that sounded corny end up winning over audiences. You never know what to expect, and obviously the programmers want every movie to sound worthwhile. But looking …...

Meryl Streep is being targeted by street artists in Los Angeles for allegedly knowing about Harvey Weinstein’s history of harassment and abuse. A series of posters have begun appearing in the Los Angeles area depicting the actress standing next to Weinstein with a red bar over her eyes that reads, “She knew.” The artist or artists behind the posters are remaining anonymous.

Read More:Meryl Streep Says It Hurt to Be Attacked By Rose McGowan: ‘I Am Truly Sorry She Sees Me As An Adversary’

The “She Knew” posters started appearing December 19, just a day after Streep issued a statement denying ever being aware of Weinstein’s behavior. The Oscar winner was responding to a tweet from Rose McGowan which criticized her and other actresses for planning to wear black at the Golden Globes in protest of Hollywood sexual harassment and abuse. McGowan said the women should wear Marchesa instead,...

Joseph Baxter Kirsten Howard Mar 4, 2018

That Bad Boys spin-off series will star Jessica Alba, too...

While the Bad Boys buddy cop film franchise – starring Will Smith and Martin Lawrence – has been dormant since the 2003 sequel, behind-the-scenes plans have been sporadically surging ever since for a cash cow continuation, with the TV spin-off now off to quite the flying start.

See related Jessica Jones’ Kilgrave: Marvel’s creepiest villain yet Iron Fist season 2: Alice Eve joins the cast Luke Cage season 2 wraps Jessica Jones is the most popular Marvel show on Netflix Daredevil season 3: Vincent D’Onofrio teases Fisk's evolution

It's been announced this month that Jessica Alba will be returning to serialised television for the first time since she starred in James Cameron’s Dark Angel. Alba will join Gabrielle Union in NBC's upcoming, as-yet-untitled Bad Boys television spin-off, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Alba will also executive produce the project.

Last year was certainly an anomaly with The Birth of a Nation selling for $17.5 million at the festival. Though history won’t likely repeat itself this year, there will still be plenty of action on the buyer front and bidding wars afoot. New players are lining up from Megan Ellison’s Annapurna Pictures to Tom Quinn and Tim League’s recently launched Neon, which bought the Anne Hathaway starrer Colossal out of Toronto and is ready to build a slate. And tech giants like Facebook and even Apple — whose pocketbooks rival the twin festival forces of Amazon and Netflix — are...

Damien Chazelle, Barry Jenkins, Kenneth Lonergan, Denis Villeneuve and Garth Davis have been nominated by the Directors Guild of America as the best film directors of 2016, the DGA announced on Thursday. Chazelle was nominated for “La La Land,” Jenkins for “Moonlight,” Lonergan for “Manchester by the Sea,” Villeneuve for “Arrival” and Davis for “Lion.” Davis also received a second nomination in the DGA category of best first-time director, along with the directors of “The Edge of Seventeen,” “Deadpool,” “The Birth of a Nation” and “10 Cloverfield Lane.” That nomination marked the first mainstream awards attention for “Birth of a Nation” director.

Nate Parker's Birth of a Nation finally earned some major recognition this awards season, scooping up six NAACP Image Award nominations. The one-time Oscar hopeful was greeted enthusiastically at its Sundance debut earlier this year but over the summer a resurfaced rape case against writer-director-star Nate Parker shrouded the film in controversy. The movie has so far failed to receive much recognition from critics groups and awards organizations so far this Oscar season.  

Parker himself received three nominations, for outstanding directing in a motion picture (film), outstanding writing in a motion picture (film) and best actor...

When it comes to his wife, Armie Hammer is one smitten kitten.

At the Nocturnal Animals premiere in Los Angeles on Friday, Hammer proudly hit up the red carpet with his wife, actress Elizabeth Chambers, who is pregnant with their second child.

"How could you not look at her? She looks gorgeous!" Hammer gushed to ET's Lauren Zima.

The 30-year-old Birth of a Nation star added that any nerves about their expanding family are quickly subsiding.

"I'm a little less nervous. You have a little more faith in the human mechanism," he said. "The only reason you're here and I'm here is because it works. We got through with one good baby, I think we can do it again."

The couple already have a daughter, Harper, who will turn two in December, and Hammer is equally excited to have a baby boy on the way.

"It's one of...

Signaling a quick rise and fall in theaters, Nate Parker's The Birth of a Nation plummeted 60 percent at the box office in its second weekend, a sharp decline for a film expected to play throughout awards season. The question now is how much Fox Searchlight will lose after paying a record $17.5 million for worldwide rights to the slave-rebellion drama at the Sundance Film Festival and an estimated $18 million more on marketing. Birth had earned just $12.3 million as of Oct. 17. Some box-office observers believe the loss will be at least $10 million,

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The weekend turned out almost exactly as expected with Universal and DreamWorks's The Girl on the Train finishing at #1 and the weekend top twelve coming in ~8.7% behind the same weekend last year, grossing a combined $96.4 million. The weekend's two other new wide releases*The Birth of a Nation and Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life*are in a fight for sixth place as holdovers mostly ruled the top five. This weekend also saw Disney's Finding Dory become the 27th film to ever cross $1 billion worldwide, making it the third Disney release of 2016 to cross that mark. Finishing at #1, the adaptation of Paula Hawkins' bestselling novel, The Girl on the Train, came up just a bit shy of expectations with an estimated $24.7 million from 3,144 theaters. It's no stretch to assume the film experienced diminishing buzz as the weekend wore on, due mostly to the largely negative reviews (44% on RottenTomatoes) and lackluster,...

For a second week in a row, North American multiplexes welcome three new wide releases into theaters. This weekend that includes Universal and DreamWorks's The Girl on the Train along with Fox Searchlight's Sundance pickup and Oscar hopeful The Birth of a Nation. Meanwhile, Lionsgate and CBS will be targeting family audiences with the adaptation of Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life. Overall, the weekend is, once again, looking to be down compared to the same weekend last year with the top twelve hovering right around $97 million altogether, but there is one additional factor to take note of. Estimates have suggested a -5% effect could be had on the weekend box office due to Hurricane Matthew which has intensified to a Category 4 with winds of at least 140 miles per hour. Yesterday governors of Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina declared a state of emergency and today Florida...

Nate Parker held back tears during an interview on 60 Minutes on Sunday, in which he said he didn't feel guilty about events that prompted allegations that he raped a female classmate in 1999 - allegations that have cast a shadow on an acclaimed passion project that many had once hailed as a formidable Oscar contender. "You know, I was falsely accused. You know, I went to court. And I sat in trial. You know, I was vindicated. I was proven innocent," the Birth of a Nation filmmaker said as he struggled to keep his emotions in check during a sit-down with Anderson Cooper.

Actress Gabrielle Union, who plays a silent woman who was raped in Nate Parker's The Birth of a Nation, has written an op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, revealing her "stomach-churning confusion" as she learned that Parker was accused and acquitted of rape. The actress was herself raped at gunpoint at age 19, in the backroom of the Payless shoe store where she was working, leading her to become an advocate for sexual-assault victims. She says this experience, "a stain that is finely etched into [her] own history," continues to affect her on a core level.

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A raft of films have been added to the schedule for the upcoming BFI London Film Festival, which revealed its full lineup Thursday. Fresh from their world premieres in Venice, La La Land, Snowden and Arrival will be given special gala screenings, as will Sundance hits The Birth of a Nation and Manchester By the Sea. Nate Parker, whose planned Q&A at the AFI was recently canceled over a growing controversy over a 1999 rape allegation, is expected to be among the directors attending the event. Other headline titles include Nocturnal Animals, A Monster Calls and Their Finest, alongside previously

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