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Nick Cheuk’s debut feature was a small film about a very big topic.

For Time Still Turns the Page, the Hong Kong director trained his focus on the issue of youth suicide, one that directly affected the filmmaker 14 years ago, when a friend at university died by suicide.

It’s a film that comes fraught with emotion, as it follows the story of a school teacher forced to face a tragedy from his past, and it has brought much acclaim for Cheuk, including the best new director award at the 60th Golden Horse Awards in Taiwan last year and a win in the same category at this year’s Asian Film Awards (AFAs), held Sunday in Hong Kong.

What seems more surprising to the 35-year-old director, when he sits down to talk with The Hollywood Reporter on the eve of the AFAs, is that the film found an audience...

Nibbler the Nibblonian first appeared on "Futurama" in the episode "Love's Labours Lost in Space", wherein Leela (Katey Sagal) assumed he was a poor, lost animal that merely needed a home. She put an adorable red cape on him and outfitted him with a diaper. Nibbler had a voracious appetite and could consume many, many, many times his own body weight in pork products in a single day. Nibbler would then poop out perfectly round spheres of solidified dark matter that, quite conveniently, could serve as starship fuel.

It was later revealed that Nibbler was, in fact, Lord Nibbler, an impossibly ancient being -- born around 274 Bce -- who could speak in a clear, deep voice. He belonged to a species that possessed fleets of tiny, adorable warships and who were occasionally kidnapped and farmed for their fuel-pooping abilities. For years, whenever someone saw Nibbler speak, he could activate his...

Martin Scorsese is executive producer on second feature from LA-based French directorial duo Hanna Ladoul and Marco La Via.

TF1 Studio has added French directorial duo Hanna Ladoul and Marco La Via’s English-language comedy-drama Funny Birds to its Cannes market slate.

Catherine Deneuve, Andrea Riseborough and Morgan Saylor are set to star as three generations of women from the same family.

Thrown together under tragic circumstances, the trio are forced to learn to live together on a small rural chicken farm in New Jersey which generates moving and amusing situations.

It is the second feature from LA-based Ladoul and...

Netflix today provided a taste of its slate of original French productions coming up in 2022, which includes 25 new titles for launch this year and 20 projects currently in production. The slate, selected and developed by the Netflix France creative team, reps a total investment of more than 200M euros ($221M) across 2022. The streamer recently signed a deal with the French industry in which it committed to producing at least 10 local films per year, investing about 40M euros ($45M).

Among the projects highlighted during a presentation in Paris today was Romain Gavras’ formerly untitled feature, which is now called Athena. An immersive and modern tragedy, it stars Dali Benssalah, Sami Slimane, Anthony Bajon and is co-written with Oscar nominee Ladj Ly (Les Misérables) and Elias Belkeddar. The logline reads: In the space of a few hours following the tragic death of their younger brother in troubling circumstances, the men’s lives will tip over into chaos.

Exclusive: European film giant Pathé, which owns more than 1,000 cinema screens across the continent, will always be a theatrical-first business. That doesn’t mean it can’t also move with the times.

The French major, whose lifeblood is film exhibition, production and distribution, is riding high off this week’s three Oscar nominations for Coda. But the company is also hiring multiple staff in its fledgling TV division and lining up content collaborations with streamers as it looks to diversify its portfolio in a rapidly shifting media landscape.

Joining Pathé’s TV head Aude Albano in Paris are Development Manager for Series, Gauthier Foll, formerly of WeMake, and Legal Manager Business Affairs for Series, Lise Bouley, formerly of Lagardère and GMT. “We’re structuring the team now”, explains Pathé President Ardavan Safaee.

Also joining the group on the film side in Paris is Executive Vice President of Business Affairs Thibault...

Sales

International media group Fremantle has picked up sales rights outside Asia to Korean format “DNA Singer.” The music gameshow was created by specialty firm FormatEast and Kyung Hwangbo for Sbs and has not yet gone to air. Family members who are genetically linked with celebrities such as singers and actors perform, while the judges must guess which celebrities they are genetically related to. “Fantastic Family – DNA Singer” launches in Korea next week as Lunar New Year specials on Sbs. “It is by no means easy to sell a paper format, before the initial proposal has aired. But recently the preference for Korean content has amplified interest in our shows. We are seeing a trend for major players in the global entertainment industry to acquire our formats in advance to stay ahead of the game,” said Kim Il-Joong, executive director of FormatEast. Fremantle has produced local versions of Korean global...

Animation and CGI are powerful means of expanding the creative possibilities and global audience reach of documentary shows. French producer Program33 has proven this with its two feature-length animation docudramas – “The Last Stand” (2015), about the defeat of the Gauls by the Romans, and “Building Notre Dame” (2019), set in the Middle Ages.

Both projects enjoyed a strong international response, in particular “Notre Dame,” with high ratings on PBS in the U.S., and good results in Canada, Germany and Belgium. In France it had 4 million viewers on its first showing and a further 10 million viewers from repeat screenings, with a much broader audience demographic than classic documentaries.

Program33 is now developing its next feature-length animation project “The Joan of Arc Case,” with a similar budget, of around €3.5 million ($4 million).

Joan of Arc has inspired multiple film and TV adaptations, including Luc Besson’s 1999 epic drama. Program33 aims to offer a new...

Jeff Goldblum is standing in a hall of masks in San Dimas, California when he’s taken back. How could he not be? Everywhere he looks, on each shelf and behind every sales rack, there is another row of ghoulish faces staring back at him. Some have rubber fangs, others a latex eyeball, and then there’s that wolf-man get-up over there.

At the time, Goldblum’s filming the opening segment for his latest episode of The World According to Jeff Goldblum, a streaming documentary series courtesy of Nat Geo and Disney+. Yet, simultaneously, he’s also being transported back to childhood and career obsessions. Like everyone else visiting the Immortal Masks shop that day, Goldblum loves monsters. But unlike those other fine folks, he’s actually played one of the most famous monsters ever unleashed on cinemas: the grotesque Brundlefly in David Cronenberg’s 1986 version of The Fly.

So...

With its ethereal music and outstanding animation, Disney’s 1996 version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame is considered, by many, to be a masterpiece and their best animated film. Some also see it as controversial, with more adult themes and religious overtones.

Related: 10 Best Hunchback of Notre Dame Characters, Ranked

With such complexity to what many consider a children’s movie, it shouldn’t be surprising that several theories and urban legends surround the tale of Quasimodo and the Parisian cathedral he dwells in. The real-life Notre Dame is rich with history, as well as some haunting myths. As for the Disney adaptation, some fans think that what is being viewed on the screen is more complicated than most think.

Walt Disney Studios reportedly rejected Michael Jackson’s pitch to provide the soundtrack for the 1996 animated favorite “The Hunchback of Notre Dame.” As a Slash Film oral history of the cartoon classic adaptation of Victor Hugo’s 1831 novel reveals, Jackson attempted to provide songs for the movie in 1995.

But the singer/songwriter’s controversial public profile at the time, which saw child sexual abuse allegations begin to emerge in 1993, turned the studio off, as composer Alan Menken details in the story. (Via NME.) Menken won Oscars prior to the release of “Hunchback” for “The Little Mermaid,” “Beauty and the Beast,” “Aladdin,” and “Pocahontas,” and most recently provided music to the 2019 reboot of “Aladdin.”

“I get a call out of nowhere from Michael’s assistant, when Michael was at the Four Seasons Hotel in New York,” Menken said. “He had to [deal with] allegations about inappropriate behavior with underage kids, and the breakup with Lisa Marie Presley.

Twenty-five years later, Disney’s PG take on Victor Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame remains one of the most radical films in Disney history.

“It is hard to imagine Disney adapting a Gothic novel in which every single major character is morally grey and almost all of them die at the end. Yet, in 1996, Disney released The Hunchback of Notre Dame, a retelling of the very dark Victor Hugo novel. What’s different? Oh gods, it would almost be easier to say what is similar: names, location, and the fact that Quasimodo has physical disabilities. This book is very bleak, guys.”

Read more at The Mary Sue.

We’ve seen many a fashion trend come and go in the twenty years since 2000. Here are twenty of the most notable ones.

“In the new millennium, fashion took a turn toward the maximalist. The early to mid-1990s had down-to-earth...

by Cláudio Alves

Do you know what the first movie you watched in a theater was? While I have no memory of the event, my parents were kind enough to remember my inaugural trip to the movies. When I was just two, they took me to see the latest Disney flick to hit theaters, The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996). Supposedly, I was besotted by the sight and, when the picture was released on VHS, proceeded to re-watch it to my heart's content. I still have that videocassette today, a treasured memento of childhood and a token of a kid's blossoming love for cinema. So today, as The Hunchback of Notre Dame turns 25, I revisited that underrated classic of the Disney Renaissance and see if I still loved it…...

Writers, co-directors and producers for Disney’s 1996 animated The Hunchback of Notre Dame say notes from the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) resulted in several of the film’s sounds being edited to earn the movie’s G-rating, according to a new interview with The New York Times.

That includes lowering the volume of villain Judge Claude Frollo sniffing the hair of the movie’s young Romani female lead, Esmeralda, and increasing the sound of swooshing robes to cover up the character’s voice actor Tony Jay saying the word “sin.”

In a piece published Monday for the 1996 Disney film’s 25th anniversary, writer Tab ...

Writers, co-directors and producers for Disney’s 1996 animated The Hunchback of Notre Dame say notes from the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) resulted in several of the film’s sounds being edited to earn the movie’s G-rating, according to a new interview with The New York Times.

That includes lowering the volume of villain Judge Claude Frollo sniffing the hair of the movie’s young Romani female lead, Esmeralda, and increasing the sound of swooshing robes to cover up the character’s voice actor Tony Jay saying the word “sin.”

In a piece published Monday for the 1996 Disney film’s 25th anniversary, writer Tab ...

Beauty and the Beast and Frozen star Josh Gad has now offered a succinct-yet-promising update on the live action remake of Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame. Gad recently responded to a question from a fan on social media, who asked what is going on with the remake, and whether it had been postponed or cancelled as so many projects have been amid the ongoing global situation. Thankfully, that does not appear to be the case.

"Getting. Closer. And. Closer."

While vague, Gad's response at least suggests things are moving in the right direction with The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Josh Gad is slowly becoming synonymous with Disney thanks to several past and upcoming roles in various projects, with the actor and singer already on board to produce a remake of 1996 animated movie, as well as potentially star as the titular hunchback, Quasimodo.

Based on the 1831 novel of the same name by Victor Hugo,...

Despite an interruption for politics, NBC Sports’ coverage of Saturday night’s top-five clash between the No. 1 Clemson Tigers and the No. 4 Notre Dame Fighting Irish averaged a preliminary Total Audience Delivery of 9.44 million viewers across NBC TV and NBC Sports Digital. That makes it the most-watched Notre Dame on NBC game in 15 years, according to Fast National Data released today by Nielsen and digital data from Adobe Analytics.

The totals do not include Out of Home viewership, which is included in official national viewership, and will be available on Tuesday. Viewership also does not include the portion of the game that was interrupted on NBC by coverage of President-elect Joe Biden’s speech.

The Fighting Irish’s thrilling double-overtime victory, 47-40, over the nation’s top-ranked team is the most-watched game since the “Bush Push” game against USC on Oct. 15, 2005, which racked up 10.1 million viewers. That game is the...

A new trailer for Angelina Jolie's next feature, Come Away, has now been released, and shows the Oscar-winning actress raising her two children, who just so happen to be Alice from Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and Peter from J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan. The movie will be centered around the classic literary characters, who in Come Away are depicted as siblings.

As the trailer shows, the plot of Come Away focuses on how the family's life is disrupted after the death of the eldest son. This leads to both Alice and Peter attempting to remedy the tragedy in their own way, and help their parents overcome their grief. As the story progresses, the two children begin to descend into worlds made of their own imagination, with both of them embarking on individual adventures, Alice entering Wonderland and Peter, Neverland.

As the voiceover in the trailer explains, Come Away is about Alice,...

Disney has had enormous success with their live-action adaptations of animated classics. Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin and The Lion King were all monster hits and more recently, Mulan performed extremely well on the Disney+ Premier Access service. If you’re a fan of these, then the future is bright, with The Little Mermaid, Pinocchio, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Bambi and Hercules all at various stages of development (among many other sequels and spinoffs).

Now, it seems that we can add another to this list, as rumors are building of an adaptation of 2001’s Atlantis: The Lost Empire. This adventure movie boasts stunning hand-drawn animation and a beautiful aesthetic, though stumbled at the box office on its original release. While a $186 million worldwide gross on a budget of between $90-$120 million doesn’t exactly make it a bomb, Disney considered it a disappointment and plans for theme park attractions...

Cinephiles and celebrity watchers around the world are feeling nostalgic for the Cannes Film Festival, which won’t take place this year due to coronavirus. The festival has only been cancelled twice before. In 1939, when the very first Cannes ever was about to launch, dozens of stars arrived on MGM’s ocean liner, but after the opening night film, “The Hunchback of Notre Dame,” screened, German troops invaded Poland, and well, the rest is World War II history. The festival started back up again in 1946, and wasn’t interrupted again until 1968, when a group of filmmakers led by Louis Malle took over a screening in solidarity with striking French workers and students.

In recent years, the festival has weathered criticism over its selection policy not highlighting enough women directors and has been forced by French exhibitors to stop screening Netflix films. But it remains the most important place in the world for auteurs,...

Exclusive: What would a workplace comedy look like in the current environment of offices around the world closed and employees working remotely under stay-at-home mandates to slow the spread of the coronavirus? Ben Silverman and Paul Lieberstein, former executive producers of one of the most popular workplace comedies ever, The Office, are taking inspiration from the current situation for a remote workplace comedy series in the works at Big Breakfast, a comedy banner under Silverman and Howard Owens’ Propagate Content.

“So many of us are jumping on daily Zoom meetings — for work and beyond,” Silverman said. “We are in a new normal and are personally navigating ways to remain connected and productive at work and in our home lives. With the brilliant Paul Lieberstein at the helm, we think we have a series that not only brings humor and comfort during this troubling time but will also be an inventive...

France’s National Cinema Centre was granted powers in March to soften windows.

The French branches of Universal Pictures International (Upi) and Warner Bros are among a dozen distributors operating in France to have been granted permission by the country’s National Cinema Centre (Cnc) to break the theatrical window due to the shutdown of cinemas amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

They are joined by local studios Gaumont and Pathé as well as independent distributors Le Pacte, Diaphana, Memento Films Distribution and Ad Vitam, Rezo and Apollo, all of which are strong supporters of France’s media windows.

France’s notoriously...

With Aladdin behind them and The Lion King arriving next week, Disney are pressing ahead with their endless stream of live-action (or CGI) remakes of their classic animated movies. We’ve previously brought you the news that the studio is working on a new Hercules, possibly with Alexander Skarsgard in the lead, and now we’ve got some info on their upcoming revamp of The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Deadline reported at the beginning of the year that Disney was developing the remake, to be titled simply Hunchback, with Josh Gad attached as producer. This led many to theorize that the Beauty and the Beast actor may also play the lead. Well, We Got This Covered has been told that this is indeed the likely scenario.

On the other hand, we’ve also heard who Disney is eyeing for another key role: Game of Thrones star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau is being...

From the ecstatic Zulu chant that opens the film — “Nants ingonyama bagithi baba!” — to the thundering drumbeat that ends it, director Jon Favreau’s exhilarating live-action take on “The Lion King” hews closer to the Walt Disney animated masterpiece than any of the studio’s recent remakes. Technically, “live action” is the wrong way to describe the movie — it’s more a cover version, really — which is every bit as animated as the 1994 original, and leagues beyond Favreau’s 2016 “The Jungle Book” update in terms of how breathtakingly photo-realistic the visual effects work looks.

At times, the movie mimics the earlier Disney toon practically shot for shot — as in the presentation of baby Simba on Pride Rock and the spectacular wildebeest stampede that endangers him as a cub — so much so that Favreau didn’t need to change a note when scoring these sequences. That raises the inevitable question, “Why bother?...

For Westerners making movies in Asia, logistics can be problematic. And, for Asian filmmakers able to navigate local conditions, screenwriting for international audiences and access to markets can still be stumbling blocks.

Veteran producer and executive Guy Louthan is now developing a business that straddles East and West, deploys American production standards and techniques, and maximizes Asian cultural impact. It also comes at a time when global interest in Indian and Southeast Asian content is growing thanks to the aggressive local production strategies of Amazon, Netflix and HBO.

The Palanquin company that Louthan formed with British director Roland Joffe aims to bridge the gap with a slate of its own movies, close connections to local production services firms and a possible film fund once the business model has proved itself. He aims to provide full financial transparency and Asian creative involvement while delivering films that are likely to combine local and foreign locations,...

Reel-Important People is a monthly column that highlights those individuals in or related to the movies that have left us in recent weeks. Below you'll find names big and small and from all areas of the industry, though each was significant to the movies in his or her own way. Kathryn Adams (1920-2016) - Actress. She starred in Bury Me Not on the Lone Prarie and Blonde for a Day and also appears in Hitchcock's Saboteur, the 1939 version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Fifth Avenue Girl, Spring Parade, The Invisible Woman and Hellzapoppin'. She died on October 14. (THR) Jane Alderman (c.1929-2016) - Casting Director. She was instrumental in the acting careers of John Cusack, Jeremy Piven, Jennifer Beals, Gary Cole...

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Kathryn Adams, an actress who appeared in such notable films as Alfred Hitchcock’s Saboteur and the Charles Laughton-starring The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and who retired from Hollywood upon her marriage to Leave It To Beaver‘s Hugh Beaumont, died October 14 at 96. Other film credits include 1939’s Fifth Avenue Girl, 1940’s The Invisible Woman and 1946’s Blonde For a Day. In 1942, she played Mrs. Brown, a young mother, in Hitchcock’s Saboteur. In 1942, Adams married…...

It's the final Hollywood film by the legendary Ziegfeld star Marilyn Miller, and it's also a terrific talkie feature debut for W.C. Fields -- with one of his dazzling juggling bits. But the real star is director William Dieterle, whose moving camera and creative edits rescue the talkie musical from dreary operetta staging. Her Majesty, Love DVD-r The Warner Archive Collection 1931 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 75 min. / Street Date January 19, 2016 / available through the WBshop / 21.99 Starring Marilyn Miller, Ben Lyon, W.C. Fields, Leon Errol, Ford Sterling, Chester Conklin, Clarence Wilson, Ruth Hall, Virginia Sale, Oscar Apfel. Cinematography Robert Kurrie Film Editor Ralph Dawson Songs Walter Jurmann, Al Dubin Written by Robert Lord, Arthur Caesar from story by Rudolph Bernauer, Rudolf Österreicher Directed by William Dieterle

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

The Warner Archive Collection has been kind to fans of early talkies. We've been able to discover dramatic actresses like Jeanne Eagels...

or, Savant picks The Most Impressive Discs of 2015

This is the actual view from Savant Central, looking due North.

What a year! I was able to take one very nice trip back East too see Washington D.C. for the first time, or at least as much as two days' walking in the hot sun and then cool rain would allow. Back home in Los Angeles, we've had a year of extreme drought -- my lawn is looking patriotically ratty -- and we're expecting something called El Niño, that's supposed to be just shy of Old-Testament build-me-an-ark intensity. We withstood heat waves like those in Day the Earth Caught Fire, and now we'll get the storms part. This has been a wild year for DVD Savant, which is still a little unsettled. DVDtalk has been very patient and generous, and so have Stuart Galbraith & Joe Dante; so far everything...

Maureen O'Hara: Queen of Technicolor. Maureen O'Hara movies: TCM tribute Veteran actress and Honorary Oscar recipient Maureen O'Hara, who died at age 95 on Oct. 24, '15, in Boise, Idaho, will be remembered by Turner Classic Movies with a 24-hour film tribute on Friday, Nov. 20. At one point known as “The Queen of Technicolor” – alongside “Eastern” star Maria Montez – the red-headed O'Hara (born Maureen FitzSimons on Aug. 17, 1920, in Ranelagh, County Dublin) was featured in more than 50 movies from 1938 to 1971 – in addition to one brief 1991 comeback (Chris Columbus' Only the Lonely). Maureen O'Hara and John Wayne Setting any hint of modesty aside, Maureen O'Hara wrote in her 2004 autobiography (with John Nicoletti), 'Tis Herself, that “I was the only leading lady big enough and tough enough for John Wayne.” Wayne, for his part, once said (as quoted in 'Tis Herself): There's only one woman who has been my friend over the...

Maureen O’Hara, an actress whose career stretched beyond film and television to the world of business, has died at the age of 95.O’Hara, born Maureen FitzSimons to Charles and Marguerite in Dublin in 1920, showed an aptitude for acting from a young age. She began training in drama, music and dance at the age of six, learning stage craft at the Abbey Theatre from 14. Her experience led to a screen test with a film studio in London, but despite a failure there, she was spotted by actor Charles Laughton, who saw star quality in her.Laughton, along with business partner Erich Pommer, offered her a contract with their company Mayflower Pictures, resulting in her film debut in 1938 in two films, The Playboy and Little Miss Molly. But she scored her first big role (and a surname) change with Jamaica Inn, directed by Alfred Hitchcock. Delighted with her performance in the film,...

From the AP:

Maureen O’Hara, the flame-haired Irish movie star who appeared in classics ranging from the grim “How Green Was My Valley” to the uplifting “Miracle on 34th Street” and bantered unforgettably with John Wayne in several films. She was 95.

O’Hara died in her sleep at her home in Boise, Idaho, said Johnny Nicoletti, her longtime manager.

O’Hara received an Honorary Award at the 2014 Governors Awards.

“She passed peacefully surrounded by her loving family as they celebrated her life listening to music from her favorite movie, ‘The Quiet Man,'” said a statement from her family.

“As an actress, Maureen O’Hara brought unyielding strength and sudden sensitivity to every role she played. Her characters were feisty and fearless, just as she was in real life. She was also proudly Irish and spent her entire lifetime sharing her heritage and the wonderful culture of the Emerald Isle with the world,...

Get ready, campers! It’s a big week for all you Angela Baker fans out there as this Tuesday the good folks at Scream Factory are releasing Collector’s Edition Blu-ray/DVDs for the first two Sleepaway Camp sequels: Unhappy Campers and Teenage Wasteland.

June 9th will also be the day that two great cult classics—Society and Spider Baby—are being celebrated with their very own Special Edition releases from Arrow Video. The folks at Turner Classic Movies are giving The Hunchback of Notre Dame a high-def upgrade as well. And as if all that wasn’t enough, TV lovers have The Strain Season 1 Collector's Edition Blu-ray Box Set (available exclusively on Amazon ahead of a July 14th wide home media release) and Teen Wolf Season 4 to look forward to, and we also have a ton of indie horror titles coming to DVD and Blu-ray, including Debug,...

Jamaica Inn

Written by Sidney Gilliat and Joan Harrison

Directed by Alfred Hitchcock

UK, 1939

With 23 feature films to his credit, by 1939, Alfred Hitchcock was the most famous director in England. And with his celebrity and his reputation for quality motion pictures, he had attained a degree of creative control unmatched in the British film industry at the time. When it comes to Jamaica Inn, for more than three decades the last film he would fully shoot in his native land, this reputation and this independence would be thoroughly tested. Available now on a stunning new Blu-ray from Cohen Film Collection, which greatly improves the murky visuals and distorted sound marring all previous home video versions, Jamaica Inn had the renowned Charles Laughton as supervising star and producer. Predictably, he and Hitchcock did not always see eye to eye as they jockeyed for authority on set. The result is a contentious...

Over the course of film history, we've seen plenty of long-time actors step behind the camera to take up their directorial ambitions. Clint Eastwood did it. Mel Gibson did it. George Clooney did it. What do these three have in commonc Well, for starters, they are all men, so there's that. Further, they are all white, but more on that later. More to the point of the article, these men all eased into their directorial careers by starring in their respective debuts, using their presence on screen to help market their talents off it. And with his feature directorial effort The Water Diviner, which hits limited theaters this week, Russell Crowe is just the most recent addition to a growing list of actors who have decided to try their hand behind the camera. Like Eastwood, Gibson, and Clooney before him, the Best Actor winner stars in his first feature as director,...

Above: Us three-sheet poster for The Private Life of Henry VIII (Alexander Korda, UK, 1933).

The great Charles Laughton may not have been the prettiest of movie stars, but he had a presence that many matinee idols would have killed for (as the current retrospective running at Film Forum will attest). In an era in which glamor was everything, studio marketers may have struggled with how to present Laughton’s unconventional looks and his larger-than-life portrayals of larger-than-life characters (so many monsters, murderers, tyrants, or simply overbearing fathers) to the public. In most of the posters for his most famous film, The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939), he is all but a silhouette, a spoiler alert to his monstrous transformation as Quasimodo. And in some posters for The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933), the film for which he won his first Oscar, Henry is made to look more like the Hans Holbein...

Hollywood will come alive with The Sound of Music (1965) this spring as the beloved, Oscar®-winning classic returns to the big screen to celebrate its 50th anniversary with a gala opening-night screening on Thursday, March 26 at the 2015 TCM Classic Film Festival. Legendary stars Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer will join Turner Classic Movies host Robert Osborne at the world-famous Tcl Chinese Theater IMAX to introduce the beautifully restored film and kick off the sixth annual festival, which will run March 26-29, 2015, in Hollywood.

The film is being presented in collaboration with Twentieth Century Fox, in celebration of their Golden 50th Anniversary Blu-ray release arriving on March 10, 2015.

The Sound of Music is the story of the Von Trapp family, whose lives are forever changed by the arrival of Maria, the warmhearted young governess who brings joy and music to the Captain (Plummer) and his children. The film earned Andrews her second...

Paul, Nathaniel & Anne MarieAs you know I just spent a week in Los Angeles for the 2014 AFI festival which kicked off with A Most Violent Year soiree and included a tribute to legendary Sophia Loren. I can't tell you how fun Anne Marie and our newest team member Margaret are in person - Margaret introduced Anne Marie to The Film Experience in college for which we must thank her or we wouldn't have "A Year With Kate" (nearing the home stretch now). Because they are young and live in Hollywood I assigned them the "Young Hollywood Panel" as well. We wrapped things up with Gala Premieres and a Podcast.

It was great to meet a handful of Tfe readers at screenings! Hi Jordan. Hi Keir. Hi other people who didn't tell me your names! Paul Outlaw, pictured left who you know well from the comments, is the only person I've...

Maureen O'Hara movies: 2014 Honorary Oscar for Hollywood legend (photo: Maureen O'Hara at the 2014 Governors Awards) In the photo above, the movies' Maureen O'Hara, 2014 Honorary Oscar recipient for her body of work, arrives with a couple of guests at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' 2014 Governors Awards. This year's ceremony is being held this Saturday evening, November 8, in the Ray Dolby Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland Center in Hollywood. For the last couple of years, Maureen O'Hara has been a Boise, Idaho, resident. Before that, the 94-year-old movie veteran -- born Maureen FitzSimons, on August, 17, 1920, in Dublin -- had been living in Ireland. Below is a brief recap of her movies. Maureen O'Hara movies: From Charles Laughton to John Wayne Following her leading-lady role in Alfred Hitchcock's British-made Jamaica Inn, starring Charles Laughton, Maureen O'Hara arrived in Hollywood in 1939 to play the gypsy Esmeralda opposite Laughton in William Dieterle...

People latch on to certain filmmakers and hold them up to an incredibly high standard. Martin Scorsese, Stanley Kubrick, Alfred Hitchcock and many others are given the pedestal treatment. However, there are so many directors out there who never get their due diligence. For example, who talks about how great Victor Fleming isc Not many people, despite directing Gone with the Wind and The Wizard of Oz... in the same year. One such filmmaker who I think has made some pretty fantastic films but is often overlooked in the film community is Robert Wise, who is the subject of a forty-five minute documentary you can watch below. The man started off as an editor, editing films like Citizen Kane and The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Moving into the director's chair, he made films like The Day the Earth Stood Still, West Side Story, The Sound of Music, Star Trek: The Motion Picture,...

Jaws from James Bond

One movie character who scared me as a child was Jaws, the shiny-toothed James Bond villain. Those silver teeth freaked me out, big time – I remember the early sequence from The Spy Who Loved Me was particularly chilling: Jaws lures a defenceless older man into a trap, and proceeds to bite into his neck, killing him. While we're shown no violence, the whole scene terrified me: the way Jaws walked slowly towards the man in a knowing, menacing way, and the idea of him simply biting the man to death (though at least he had the courtesy to stun the victim first).

Being bitten by Jaws isn't like being bitten by a vampire – he drinks no blood. Instead, he just seems to sink those artificial teeth into flesh and tear a hole big enough to cause fatal bleeding. Whenever I'd watch that scene, it made me deeply uncomfortable,...

The Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences voted Tuesday night (August 26) to present Honorary Awards to Jean-Claude Carrière, Hayao Miyazaki and Maureen O’Hara, and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award to Harry Belafonte.

All four awards will be presented at the Academy’s 6th Annual Governors Awards on Saturday, November 8, at the Ray Dolby Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland Center.

“The Governors Awards allow us to reflect upon not the year in film, but the achievements of a lifetime,” said Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs. “We’re absolutely thrilled to honor these outstanding members of our global filmmaking community and look forward to celebrating with them in November.”

Carrière, who began his career as a novelist, was introduced to screenwriting by French comedian and filmmaker Pierre Étaix, with whom he shared an Oscar for the live action short subject “Heureux Anniversaire (Happy Anniversary)” in 1962. He...

Harry Belafonte will receive the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award and Jean-Claude Carrière, Hayao Miyazaki and Maureen O’Hara will receive Honorary Awards at the Academy’s 6th Annual Governors Awards November 8 at the Ray Dolby Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland. The Academy’s Board of Governors did not award the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, which is given out periodically. The last recipient was Francis Ford Coppola in 2010. Deadline’s Pete Hammond will give his take later today. The full release follows:

Los Angeles, CA —The Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences voted Tuesday night (August 26) to present Honorary Awards to Jean-Claude Carrière, Hayao Miyazaki and Maureen O’Hara, and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award to Harry Belafonte. All four awards will be presented at the Academy’s 6th Annual Governors Awards on Saturday, November 8, at the Ray Dolby Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland Center®.

“The...

Wally Pfister recently made the move from Dp to Director, with his sci-fi film Transcendence. As Cinematographer, he has notched up an impressive body of work, shooting Christopher Nolan’s entire output (apart from Following) as well as the rightly admired Moneyball and Transcendence is beautifully shot, if nothing else.

But directorial debuts can be a tricky business, even where the director in question has plenty of background in film-making. Take David Goyer for example – fantastic writer, but steps into the director’s chair for Blade Trinity and kills the franchise stone dead. Jan De Bont, by comparison, shot Die Hard, The Hunt for Red October and Black Rain, before directing Speed to pretty much universal acclaim. Sure, his follow up efforts have tanked, but his debut was a corker.

Here are six of the best directorial debuts.

1. Charles Laughton – Night of the Hunter

It is an enduring mystery and...

Our new contributor Diana D Drumm reporting on the TCM Festival which recently concluded

Maureen O'Hara introducing "How Green Was My Valley" at TCM 2014

Even at 93, Maureen O’Hara is still sublime, crossing the threshold of everyday stunning into moment-stopping magnificence. Peering at you, you can’t help but feel wonder. Whether she’s speaking on the beauty of a life well-lived or correcting someone’s Spanglish pronunciation of “Rio Grande” (the actress is fluent in Spanish), she transcends her surroundings, even on the red carpet in front of Grauman’s or in front of a brimmingly packed house at El Capitan Theatre. She may not be as full-bodied as her Wayne-pairing prime (that was over 60 years ago, people), but she continues to exemplify a certain Old Hollywood quality unmatched by any contemporary equivalents and envied by her compatriots at the time (including close friend and fellow famous redhead Lucille Ball...

‘The Cat and the Canary’ 1939: Paulette Goddard / Bob Hope haunted house comedy among Halloween 2013 movies at Packard Theater There’s much to recommend among the Library of Congress’ Packard Campus and State Theater screenings in Culpeper, Virginia, in October 2013, including the until recently super-rare Bob Hope / Paulette Goddard haunted house comedy The Cat and the Canary (1939). And that’s one more reason to hope that the Republican Party’s foaming-at-the-mouth extremists (and their voters and supporters), ever bent on destroying the economic and sociopolitical fabric of the United States (and of the rest of the world), will not succeed in shutting down the federal government and thus potentially wreak havoc throughout the U.S. and beyond. (Photo: Bob Hope and Paulette Goddard in The Cat and the Canary.) Screening on Thursday, October 31, at the Packard Theater, Elliott Nugent’s The Cat and the Canary is a remake of Paul Leni...

In celebration of the October 2nd Blu-ray release of the Universal Classic Monsters: The Essential Collection from Universal Studios Home Entertainment, veteran horror historian Scott Essman has prepared a truly monstrous trip back through time for you classic horror fans!

It’s a quiet dusty morning in the summer of 1916 and all but a small eastern region of the San Fernando Valley is largely undeveloped, to say nothing of unpopulated. For the past year, inside of an unassuming front gate just over the hill from Los Angeles proper, two men are trying to forge their path in the fledgling motion picture business: Lon Chaney and Jack Pierce. Nascent actors Chaney, 33, and Pierce, 27, were completely unknown, but each had an angle; they could both work magic out of a simple makeup case, fully transforming their faces and even parts of their bodies to put themselves into a better position to be cast in a role.

(Erle C Kenton, 1932/Leo McCarey, 1935; Eureka! PG)

With one foot in the theatre and another in the cinema throughout his career, Charles Laughton (1899-1962) was one the greatest actors of his time, whose only movie as director, The Night of the Hunter, is a stand-alone masterpiece. A protean figure despite his bulk, his roles ranged from the sadly sympathetic (The Hunchback of Notre Dame) to the unforgettably sadistic (Mutiny on the Bounty). His success in Hollywood was immediate, and these two films in Eureka!'s Masters of Cinema series (each containing both DVD and Blu-ray formats) demonstrate his versatility.

In Erle C Kenton's sophisticated horror movie Island of Lost Souls (1932), long refused a BBFC certificate for its repugnance and alleged blasphemy, he is Dr Moreau, Hg Wells's mad scientist, ruling a Pacific island populated by increasingly rebellious mutants of his own overweening creation. One of the pathetic creatures is played by Bela Lugosi.

The great movie pioneer D.W. Griffiths once said “we do not want now and we shall never want the human voice with our films.” Shame he failed to realise that film-making is a technical medium that will always develop. In the last 100 years we have had the introduction of colour, trick photography, 3D and CGI, among other numerous innovations such as CinemaScope - and even Smellovision. But none of these compare to the most revolutionary of cinematic changes: sound.

The silent era of the twenties holds little more than curiosity-value for many modern film fans. Other than a few notable exceptions such as Nosferatu (1922) and The Phantom of the Opera (1925), it’s become a long-forgotten part of cinema history. But back then we had the Brad Pitts and Angelina Jolies of their day! Big stars and talented actors who sadly failed to survive the test of time.

The coming of sound was controversial,...

Peter Kimpton tops up our writers' favourite film series with an ode to Charles Laughton's 1955 thriller, a tale as dark and disquieting as a half-forgotten dream

Want to write your own review of the film? Do so here – or brave the cut-throat comments section below

Motionless for 90 minutes, I could not even remove my coat. I sweated and shivered. I felt in shock. Was the film recreating scenes from my sleep? I had never seen, as far as I can recall, The Night of the Hunter. That is until a cold, wintry night in the 1990s when, working in Glasgow, I went to the city's Gft cinema to catch a new 35mm print of Charles Laughton's 1955 masterpiece. It was his only film as a director. Critics panned it on its release, consequently killing off the actor's career behind the camera, and perhaps robbing history of further works of greatness.

Orson Welles, Rita Hayworth, The Lady from Shanghai Orson Welles' career as an actor was both fruitful and frustrating. From Citizen Kane (1941) to Someone to Love (1987), Welles appeared — mostly in supporting roles — in about 70 features made in various parts of the world. There was one brilliant performance in one brilliant film, Charles Foster Kane in Citizen Kane, but the rest of what I've seen has been either forgettable or memorable for the wrong reasons. Subtlety is a quality with which Welles the Actor was totally unfamiliar. Whether or not you admire Orson Welles' work in front of the camera, Welles fans are being treated to 13 films featuring Welles as both leading man and supporting player, all day Monday, August 8, on Turner Classic Movies. The only TCM premiere in this "Summer Under the Stars" Orson Welles Day is the 1952 British-made crime drama Trent's Last Case, directed by veteran Herbert Wilcox,...