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Fan Tan: A Game of Patience and Precision

Fan Tan might look simple at first glance, but don’t be fooled. This traditional Chinese game, which started centuries ago in gambling houses, combines anticipation with a touch of luck.

Here’s how it works: a dealer places a random number of small beads or buttons on a table, covering them with a metal cup. Players bet on the remainder after the...

Have you always wanted to get into Fairy Tail ? Not sure where to start? Well, look no further! There are a lot of episodes of Fairy Tail . A couple of (extremely) long seasons? Check! Several movies? Check! A brand new series currently airing? Check! And that’s not even counting the manga, video games, OVAs and other related content. But don’t fear! I’m here with a guide to all of Fairy Tail ’s arcs and movies. So without further ado, here’s a comprehensive watch guide to all of Fairy Tail ’s arcs, movies, and a few little bonuses, too! Fairy Tail Season 1 Macao Arc ( Episodes 1-2 ) Our grand adventure starts right at Episode 1. Lucy Heartfilia is a mage, a Celestial Spirit Magic user to be exact. Her goal? Join the magic guild Fairy Tail. She’s not positive if she has fantastic luck or the worst luck...

Some apotheosis of film culture has been reached with Freddy Got Fingered‘s addition to the Criterion Channel. Three years after we interviewed Tom Green about his consummate film maudit, it’s appearing on the service’s Razzie-centered program that also includes the now-admired likes of Cruising, Heaven’s Gate, Querelle, and Ishtar; the still-due likes of Under the Cherry Moon; and the more-contested Gigli, Swept Away, and Nicolas Cage-led Wicker Man. In all cases it’s an opportunity to reconsider one of the lamest, thin-gruel entities in modern culture.

A Jane Russell retro features von Sternberg’s Macao, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, and Raoul Walsh’s The Tall Men and The Revolt of Mamie Stover; streaming premieres will be held for Yuen Woo-ping’s Dreadnaught, Claire Simon’s Our Body, Ellie Foumbi’s Our Father, the Devil, the recently restored Sepa: Our Lord of Miracles, and The Passion of Rememberance.

After the 2020’s online Edition, this yer Udine Far East Film Festival will run a “hybrid” edition from 24th of June to the 2nd of July. Withe a public online press conference the Programme has been unveiled.

Festival’s directress Sabrina Baracetti has opened the press conference with a heartfelt mention to young producer and filmmaker Ma Aeint recently arrested and detained by the military regime in Myanmar. Far East Film Festival wants to add its voice to those of the others protesting and shouting out loudly for Ma Aeint’s freedom.

After a sincere tribute to the sponsors and the local authorities that have helped Feff since its start, Baracetti has revealed the line-up that includes 63 titles from 11 countries, 10 female directors, 6 world premiere, 11 international premiere, 22 European premiere and 21 Italian premieres. Zhang Yimou’s Chinese Spy Thriller “Cliff Walkers” will open the Festival on the 24th of June, while Herman Yau...

The Criterion Channel has unveiled their lineup for next month and it’s another strong slate, featuring retrospectives of Carole Lombard, John Waters, Robert Downey Sr., Luis García Berlanga, Jane Russell, and Rob Epstein & Jeffrey Friedman. Also in the lineup is new additions to their Queersighted series, notably Todd Haynes’ early film Poison (Safe is also premiering in a separate presentation), William Friedkin’s Cruising, and Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Teorama.

The new restorations of Manoel de Oliveira’s stunning Francisca and Francesco Rosi’s Christ Stopped at Eboli will join the channel, alongside Agnieszka Holland’s Spoor, Bong Joon Ho’s early short film Incoherence, and Luc Dardenne & Jean-Pierre Dardenne’s Rosetta.

See the lineup below and explore more on criterionchannel.com.

#Blackmendream, Shikeith, 2014

12 Angry Men, Sidney Lumet, 1957

About Tap, George T. Nierenberg, 1985

The AIDS Show, Peter Adair and Rob Epstein, 1986

The Assignation, Curtis Harrington, 1953

Aya of Yop City,...

Viggo Mortensen’s directorial debut “Falling” that premiered at Sundance back in January has finally landed U.S. distribution and will be released by Perceval Pictures and Quiver Distribution in February 2021. It will qualify for 2020 awards consideration.

Mortensen also stars in “Falling” based on his own script, and the film will be released in theaters, on digital and on-demand beginning February 5. You can also check out a new trailer for the film above.

“Falling” stars Laura Linney, Lance Henriksen, Terry Chen, Sverrir Gudnason and Hannah Gross and is the story of a man caring for his father suffering from dementia, relocating the conservative, traditional man to be with his family in the more liberal California. Here’s the full synopsis:

“Falling” follows John (Mortensen) who lives with his partner, Eric (Chen), and their daughter, Mónica (Gabby Velis), in California, far from the traditional rural life he left behind years ago.

Kirill Mikhanovsky’s “Give Me Liberty” and Gu Xiaogang’s “Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains won the best picture prizes in the international and Chinese cinema sections on Tuesday at the International Film Festival and Awards Macau (Iffam).

“This film shouldn’t have existed because there were so many obstacles. Everything was a miracle. Us being here is an utter miracle,” said Mikhanovsky, who took the stage with his producer Alice Austen to describe the frenzy of trying to shoot their film for a quarter of their original budget.

“If someone had asked us a year ago if we’d like to show our film in Macau, we’d have said man, you’re out of your mind,” he laughed, before thanking the festival. “This is such a gathering of minds and intellects and true lovers of cinema, which is very rare. You’ve truly crafted a one-of-a-kind global event.

The relaunched company is headed by former Im Global exec Clement Magar.

Amsterdam and Beijing-based international sales outfit Fortissimo Films, now backed by China’s Hehe Pictures, which is part-owned by Alibaba Pictures, has added a trio of new Chinese projects to its European Film Market (Efm) slate.

It has picked up worldwide rights to Jianyu Gan’s crime thriller Vortex, starring Da Peng, which is about the kidnapping of a young girl, and two directorial debuts a drama called The Return by actress-director Hailu Qin, and magical realist story Emile directed by Zihao Liao, about a young teacher who...

One of the most unusual, and unusually moving swansongs in cinema history, Josef Von Sternberg’s Anatahan (a.k.a. The Saga of Anatahan) returns to American screens this spring in a new restoration which seems destined not to only buff up the movie’s obvious visual splendor but also its standing as an essential and fully engaged work of a master Hollywood stylist rather than simply a curious end post to a remarkable career.

In the early ‘50s Sternberg was coming off two movies made for Howard Hughes—the gorgeously sublimated cold-war adventure Jet Pilot (finished in 1950 but cut extensively by Hughes and held up for release until 1957) and Macao (1952), on which Sternberg and Hughes clashed again, resulting in the director’s replacement by Nicholas Ray. Disillusioned by Hollywood, Sternberg, a long-time devotee of Japanese culture, capitalized on his separation from Hughes and began investigating the possibility, one he...

Bertrand Tavernier with Anne-Katrin Titze: "Josef von Sternberg's Macao. Dubbed in Vietnamese and I have never been able to watch the film again ..." Photo: Sophie Gluck

The day before the opening of the 54th New York Film Festival, I met with Bertrand Tavernier for an in-depth conversation on his documentary My Journey Through French Cinema (Voyage À Travers Le Cinéma Français) that spanned fashion from Mila Parély wearing Coco Chanel's ocelot coat in Jean Renoir's La Règle Du Jeu, the daring of Mireille Balin's deep décolleté in Jean Delannoy's Macao, L'Enfer Du Jeu, to Jean Paul Gaultier's reaction to Jacques Becker's Falbalas.

Bertrand Tavernier: "Also, it's learning about myself. How I discovered those films."

Also, Robert Mitchum in Vietnamese, never having to see Howard Hawks's Rio Bravo again, Yves Montand and the birth of Autumn Leaves, Ernst Lubitsch interactions between Lino Ventura...

Co-directors João Pedro Rodrigues & João Rui Guerra da Mata are first and foremost cinephiles, and make no bones about invoking the classic Josef von Sternberg and Nicholas Ray directed, Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell starred Rko feature, Macao, throughout their own shapeshifting exploration of the post-Portuguese protean city. But The Last Time I Saw Macao is much more than just an homage to beloved cinema greats. Like it’s cinematic ancestor, the film delves into the darkness of film noir, but it also passes like a shadow from underground thriller to personal documentary, city symphony to action shoot-out at any given moment, all while acting as a cinematic travelogue for Guerra da Mata, who grew up in Macao, but hasn’t been back in thirty years.

In the last three decades the city has changed quite a bit, and in the film’s parallel universe, it’s fallen into shadow...

Presenting the Return of Stinky Lulu's Supporting Actress Smackdown now in its new home at The Film Experience. The Year is... 1952 and our panelists are allowed 52 words per actress!

The Nominees

Gloria Grahame, Jean Hagen, Colette Marchand, Terry Moore, and the perennial Thelma Ritter!

The Panelists

Matt Mazur (Pop Matters) is a New York-based publicist who works on campaigns for independent, foreign language, and documentary films. His vast archive of actress interviews (including Sissy Spacek and Courtney Love) can be found here. Follow him @Matt_Mazur

Nathaniel R (The Film Experience) is the founder of The Film Experience, a Gurus of Gold and CNN International Oscar pundit, and the internet's actressexual ringleader. Also loves cats. Follow him @NathanielR

Nick Davis (Nicks Flick Picks) tweets, blogs, and writes reviews and is a professor of film, literature, and gender studies at Northwestern University. His first book "The Desiring Image" was recently published.

After stops in Locarno, Tiff and Nyff, The Cinema Guild have The Last Time I Saw Macao , João Pedro Rodrigues was born in Lisbon. His feature films are and “The Last Time I Saw Macao” (2012). João Rui Guerra da Mata has co-written with João Pedro Rodrigues the feature film “To Die Like a Man” (2009). “The Last Time I Saw Macao” (2012) is his first feature film as director.

Gist:

Worth Noting: Rodrigues’ previous films are available for viewing: “O Fantasma” (2000), Two Drifters aka “Odette” (2005), “To Die Like a Man” (2009)

Do We Care?: Although our Blake Williams does have some reservations about the film (Tiff ’12 Daily recap), he thinks that “the disappearance of history and culture (Macao was a Portuguese colony for 4 centuries, ending in 1999, so the filmmakers are playing with their own genuine and personal nostalgia from its past), these little bursts of light infused a visual poeticism that made the overall viewing rewarding.

There is no such thing as “pure documentary.” While classified as “non-fiction,” documentaries ultimately form narratives depending on how the director chooses to cut the footage together. In The Last Time I Saw Macao, co-directors Joao Pedro Rodrigues and Joao Rui Guerra da Mata, conversely, draw attention to a fictional framework, a man searching for his troubled friend in Macao. However, this framework opens up to an honest documentary portrait of a city. Last Time I Saw Macao does indeed find a clever fashion in which to photograph its eponymous city, but sometimes lacks a certain ability to entertain. The film begins with a rather compelling opening sequence. Transgendered woman Candy (Cindy Scrash, star of Rodrigues’ To Die Like A Man) lip-synchs to Jane Russell’s “You Kill Me” from Josef Von Sternbergh’s film Macao (1952) in a direct homage to both the film and the city (many references are made to Von Sternbergh’s film throughout...

The New York Film Festival is celebrating its 50th birthday this year while at the same time saying goodbye to Richard Peña, who served as Program Director for the last 25 years. This year’s festival is packed with films from all over the world, bringing the best of the best from Cannes, Berlin, and other renowned festivals to a New York audience. Peña, who also teaches in the Film Department at Columbia University, has long championed Latin American cinema, in particular. After traveling in the region as a young undergrad he decided to focus his academic research on Latin America. Peña has gone on to not only spotlight Latino films in the classroom but also carved out a space, year after year, for Latino films to shine at the New York Film Festival. This year is no exception. Now in its second week, the fest has some exciting Latino premieres that will close out its 50th edition.

Here and There

Aquí y Allá | Antonio Méndez Esparza (2012)

Mexico/Spain/USA | Spanish with English subtitles | Format: Dcp | 110 minutes

Having won the top prize at the Critic’s Week sidebar at Cannes, this debut feature from Antonio Méndez Esparza looks at immigration from a different point of view--what happens when you go back? Pedro returns home to his family in Mexico after a stint working in New York. When he arrives he is surprised to see how different things look, how things have changed. He has little to say to his daughters and has to get to know his wife all over again. He feels detached, lonely, alienated. He feels distant from his family--and in parallel, the camera stays far away from the characters. In a series of long takes, conversations amongst family and friends are seen from a distance and the camera remains stationary. People walk in and out of scenes, have their backs turned to the camera, or are just too far away to see clearly. We rarely get a glimpse of those who talk and without close-ups of their faces--miss out on facial expressions and the nuances of the nonverbal. Just like Pedro--the audience, as a result of the camera work--has trouble emotionally connecting with the people on the screen.

No

Pablo Larraín (2012)

Chile/USA | Spanish with English subtitles | Format: Dcp | 110 minutes

Pablo Larraín and Gael García Bernal in person at both screenings and at the SoHo Apple Store on Thursday, October 11 as part of NyffLive.

“In 1988, in an effort to extend and legitimize its rule, the Chilean military junta announced it would hold a plebiscite to get the people’s permission to stay in power. Despite being given 15 minutes a day to plead its case on television, the anti-Pinochet opposition was divided and without a clear message. Enter Rene Saavedra, an ad man who, after a career pushing soft drinks and soap, sets out to sell Chileans on democracy and freedom.” Gael García Bernal (Y Tu Mama Tambien, Motorcycle Diaries) stars as Rene Saavedra. His performance is said to be the major reason behind the standing ovation it received at the Cannes Film Festival, its world premiere. It also was just announced as Chile’s entry for the Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award.

The Dead Man and Being Happy

El muerto y ser feliz | Javier Rebollo (2012)

Spain/Argentina/France | Spanish with English subtitles | Format: Dcp | 94 minutes

“For his third feature, the gifted Spanish director Javier Rebollo (Woman Without Piano) has decamped to Argentina and created a literate, screwball road movie that Borges surely would have loved. The “dead man” of the title is Santos (veteran Spanish screen star José Sacristán), a cancer-stricken hired killer who flees his Buenos Aires hospital bed and sets off on one last assignment. It is a journey that takes him through an interior Argentina rarely glimpsed in movies, from the Cordoba resort town of La Cumbrecita (with its disproportionate—and disconcerting—population of elderly Germans) to the northern province of Santiago del Estero. Along the way, Santos finds himself joined by Alejandra (the wonderful Roxana Blanco), an attractive middle-aged woman who impulsively jumps into his vintage Ford Falcon at a gas station and soon thwarts him from his intended path.”

Films from Portugal are often excluded from a discussion of Latin American or Latino films. But, in the same way that we include Brazilian films even though they are in Portuguese and Spanish films because of the country’s colonial ties to the Americas--i personally think that films from Portugal should also qualify as Latin American or Latino. Maybe, I’ll just start calling them Ibero-American films.

Tabu

Miguel Gomes (2012)

Portugal | Portuguese with English Subtitles | Format: 35mm | 118 minutes

“Shot in ephemeral black-and-white celluloid, Tabu is movie-as-dream—an evocation of irrational desires, extravagant coincidences, and cheesy nostalgia that nevertheless is grounded in serious feeling and beliefs, even anti-colonialist politics. There is a story, which is delightful to follow and in which the cart comes before the horse: the first half is set in contemporary Lisbon, the second, involving two of the same characters, in a Portuguese colony in the early 1960s. “Be My Baby” belted in Portuguese, a wandering crocodile, and a passionate, ill-advised coupling seen through gently moving mosquito netting make for addled movie magic.”

The Last Time I Saw Macao

A Última Vez Que Vi Macau | João Pedro Rodrigues, João Rui Guerra da Mata (2012)

Portugal/France | Portuguese with English Subtitles | 85 minutes

“This stunning amalgam of playful film noir and Chris Marker–like cine-essay from João Pedro Rodrigues (To Die Like a Man, Nyff 2009) and João Rui Guerra da Mata explores the psychic pull of the titular former Portuguese colony. After a spectacular opening scene, in which actress Cindy Scrash lip-synchs, as tigers pace behind her, to Jane Russell’s “You Kill Me”—from Josef von Sternberg’s Macao (1952), a key reference here—the film shifts to da Mata’s off-screen recollections of growing up in this gambling haven in the South China Sea.”

The New York Film Festival, presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center, runs through October 14.

Written by Juan Caceres and Vanessa Erazo, LatinoBuzz is a weekly feature onSydneysBuzzthat highlights emerging and established Latino indie talent and upcoming trends in Latino film with the specific objective of presenting a broad range of Latino voices. Follow@LatinoBuzzon twitter.

As I mentioned in the preface to the first part of my Wavelengths preview (the one focusing on the short films), there are significant changes afoot in 2012. Until last year, the festival had a section known as Visions, which was the primary home for formally challenging cinema that nevertheless conformed to the basic tenets of arthouse and/or “festival” cinema (actors, scripting, 70+minute running time, and, once upon a time, 35mm presentation). This year, Wavelengths is both its former self, and it also contains the sort of work that Visions most likely would have housed. While in some respects this can seem to result in a kind of split personality for the section, it also means that Wavelengths, which has often been described as a sort of “festival within the festival,” has moved front and center. Films that would’ve occupied single slots in the older avant-Wavelengths model, like the...

This week's announcement that Olivier Père, former programmer of Cannes's Directors' Fortnight, will be stepping down from his post at the helm of the Festival del Film Locarno marks the end of brief but important era for this film festival, one of the longest-running in the world. In just three years, Père has helped to put the annual event back on the festival map, drawing an annual influx of celebrities and industry-types for red-carpet world premieres, jury prizes, and lifetime achievement awards. Perhaps more than ever in its sixty-six-year history, Locarno is an important station on the fall festival circuit, forecasting the slates of Toronto and New York and providing useful international gateway for cinema from all over the world.

This year's festival featured a characteristically dizzying mix of international festival ephemera, an Otto Preminger retrospective, and much-heralded appearances by the likes of Kylie Minogue, Alain Delon, and Harry Belafonte on the festival's main stage,...

Voluptuous star of The Outlaw and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

The actor Jane Russell, who has died aged 89, was among the most desired women of the 20th century. She had great erotic force and great likability. Russell made just over 20 films, but only a handful of those are remembered: her first film, The Outlaw (1943); the comedy western The Paleface (1948), with Bob Hope; and the musical Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), co-starring Marilyn Monroe.

The Outlaw, produced by Howard Hughes, was famously promoted with a series of publicity stills showing Russell lying in the hay, and bending down to pick up bales. The experience made her savvy about the vulgarity of the film industry. Her breasts were less covered and more fetishised, lit, photographed, designed and dreamed about than any woman's in the cinema had been until that time. Hughes even designed a special bra for her to wear in the film (although she...

Hollywood heartthrob Jane Russell died at an age of 89 on Monday at her California residence, media reports said. According to reports, the Hollywood sex symbol of 1940's and 1950's died due to respiratory-related illness.Russell was launched by billionaire Howard Hughes in the 1943 film The Outlaw. She acted in blockbusters like Young Widow, MacAo, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Gentlemen Marry Brunettes, The Paleface and The Tall Men.

Jane Russell, the Hollywood silver-screen siren who ignited a tinder box with Howard Hughes’ bosom-heaving 1943 western The Outlaw, died on Monday at age 89. But the legacy she leaves behind will always be more than just the sum of her ample parts. The raven-haired beauty was only 19 and working as a receptionist in a doctor’s office when the notorious ladies’ man Hughes spotted her and cast her as Rio MacDonald, the smoldering girlfriend of Sheriff Pat Garrett, in The Outlaw. Overnight, she was catapulted from obscurity to infamy, thanks to the movie’s poster, which featured Russell reclining suggestively on a haystack,...

Not many actresses had enough raw charisma to share the screen with Marilyn Monroe without getting upstaged, but Jane Russell could. Russell, who died Monday at the age of 89 of respiratory-related illness, was a rare Hollywood commodity: an actress who combined raw sexual magnetism with a razor-sharp wit. She was beautiful and sexy and smart and funny, the total package. And man, what a package.

Russell gave the world two gifts for which we will be forever grateful: the musical comedy "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" with Monroe, and a figure so voluptuous it inspired filmmaker, aviator, and voluptuousness hobbyist Howard Hughes to invent one of the first underwire brassieres. As the legend goes, Russell served as Hughes' bra muse during production of his film "The Outlaw" in 1941. The 19-year-old actress had been plucked from obscurity working in a doctor's office when Hughes cast her for her curvaceous body and smoldering onscreen presence.

We look back at Jane Russell's movie career, from The Outlaw through Gentlemen Prefer Blondes to her late-60s cameos

As a 20-year-old and the object of Howard Hughes's attentions, Jane Russell was force-fed into a series of low-cut dresses for The Outlaw (1943).

She plays Doc Holliday's girl Rio, who falls in love with a wounded Billy the Kid when he hides out with her, on the run from Pat Garrett. Not remotely historically accurate, this blood-heat western is best remembered for the censorship squabbles over exactly how far Russell was allowed to lean over while tenderly ministering to the Kid. Hughes's legendary underwired cantilevered brassiere was designed during the shooting of the film, but Russell denied she ever wore it.

The Paleface (1948) was a real change of pace: a comedy western with Bob Hope as the useless dentist Peter Potter, who plays husband to Russell's deep-cover Calamity Jane.

Jane Russell, the star of classic movies Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and The Outlaw, has died aged 89. The actress rose to fame in the early 1940s with Howard Hughes’ Western The Outlaw, and went on to appear in critically acclaimed movies The Paleface, His Kind Of Woman and Macao. But she quit acting at the end of the '60s and only made a handful of appearances after that. “Why did I quit movies?” mused Russell in 1999. “Because I was getting too old! You couldn’t go on acting in those years if you were an...

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Actress Jane Russell, best known for her films during the 1940s and 1950s, passed away from respiratory problems in her Santa Maria home Monday. She was 89 years old. Russell began her career as a celebrity sex symbol, first appearing in Howard Hughes' "The Outlaw." The 1943 release was famously the subject of a legal battle over exactly how much of Russell's cleavage could be displayed and not violate production code. From there, Russell's career blossomed with her turning in her most famous performance in Howard Hawk's "Gentleman Prefer Blondes" in 1953. Other notable roles of Russell's include "Double Dynamite" (with Groucho Marx and Frank Sinatra) and "His Kind of Woman" and "Macao" (both opposite Robert Mitchumm).

Actress Jane Russell, best known for her films during the 1940s and 1950s, passed away in her Santa Maria home Monday at the age of 89. Russell's daughter-in-law Etta Waterfield says the actress died of a respiratory-related illness.

Russell was discovered by eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes who cast her in his sexy and controversial 1941 western The Outlaw. The 1943 release was famously the subject of a legal battle over exactly how much of the actress' cleavage could be displayed and not violate production code. Nevertheless, the film turned Russell into a star.

She went on to appear opposite such leading men as Frank Sinatra and Bob Hope, but perhaps her most famous role was opposite Marilyn Monroe in 1953's Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.

Other notable roles included Double Dynamite (with Groucho Marx and Frank Sinatra), His Kind of Woman and Macao (both opposite Robert Mitchum).

Russell was also the number one pin-up girl...

Actress Jane Russell died earlier today of respiratory failure in her Santa Maria home at the age of 89.  As the legend goes, film mogul Howard Hughes was taken aback by Russell's 38-inch bust and promptly cast her in The Outlaw.  The film was shot in 1941 and never missed an opportunity to spotlight Ms. Russell's voluptuous figure, a stylistic choice that troubled the censors and kept the film from a wide release until 1946.  (At which point The Outlaw was a smash hit.) But Russell was more than the sum of her breasts.  Her relatively brief career is noted for commanding performances in The Paleface, His Kind of Woman, Macao, and most notably Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.  It is best to present Ms. Russell in motion, in Technicolor; so hit the jump for musical highlights from her career. "Ain't There Anyone Here for Love" - Gentlemen Prefer Blondes "Buttons and Bows" - Son of Paleface...

Los Angeles — She was the voluptuous pin-up girl who set a million male hearts to pounding during World War II, the favorite movie star of a generation of young men long before she'd made a movie more than a handful of them had ever seen.

Such was the stunning beauty of Jane Russell, and the marketing skills of the man who discovered her, the eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes.

Russell, surrounded by family members, died Monday at her home in the central coast city of Santa Maria. Her death from respiratory failure came 70 years after Hughes had put her on the path to stardom with his controversial Western "The Outlaw." She was 89.

Although she had all but abandoned Hollywood after the 1960s for a quieter life, her daughter-in-law Etta Waterfield said Russell remained active until just a few weeks ago when her health began to fail. Until then she was active with her church,...

Jane Russell, the voluptuous actress known for her roles in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and The Outlaw along with her lifelong work as an advocate for adoption, passed away today in Santa Maria, CA. She was 89.

She was born Ernestine Jane Geraldine Russell on June 21, 1921 in Bemidji, Minnesota, the eldest of five children and the only daughter of Roy, an Army lieutenant and Geraldine, an actress. After her father's retirement from the Army and acceptance of a job in California, the family relocated to California's San Fernando Valley and eventually Burbank. She spent her teen years taking piano lessons (at her mother's insistence) and grew interested in theater, joining the drama club at Van Nuys High School and taking part in productions there. Her plan to become a designer after graduation was dashed after the death of her father, when she instead found a job as a secretary and receptionist in order to help support her family. At her mother's urging, she continued to hone her skills with training at stage director Max Reinhart's School of the Theatre, and made additional money working as model.

Her dramatic studies, combined with good fortune -- she was reportedly discovered while working at her receptionist job -- brought Jane to the attention of Howard Hughes, who signed her to a seven-year contract in 1940 after a protracted search for a woman to star in his next project, The Outlaw. The movie, which completed filming in February of 1941, was denied release because it violated the Hayes Office production codes for decency (they were unhappy with the display of Russell's cleavage). While Hughes and the Hayes Office negotiated cuts to the film, Russell was sent on an extensive tour to promote the unreleased picture; her tour, combined with provocative ads and photos promoting the film, put her on the national radar, and a limited release of the trimmed down film in 1943 (along with a wider release in 1946) made her a star. Also in 1943, Jane married Bob Waterfield, her high school sweetheart, who was the UCLA quarterback at the time and who would go on to become a Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback for the Cleveland Rams/Los Angeles Rams.

Jane's next film appearance was five years later, in 1946 with RKO's The Young Widow, which was the first time that she would be seen by most filmgoers, since The Outlaw was still tied up in Hayes Code violations. Her following films found her cast with some of the most popular leading men of the time -- Bob Hope in 1948's The Paleface; two incendiary pairings with Robert Mitchum (His Kind of Woman, Macao); co-starring with Victor Mature and Vincent Price in The Las Vegas Story, with Frank Sinatra and Groucho Marx in 1951's Double Dynamite, and with Clark Gable and Robert Ryan in The Tall Men (1955).

However, it would be her co-starring role with another popular leading lady of time for which she would be most commonly remembered: as Dorothy Shaw in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, with rising star Marilyn Monroe. The pair, cast as two showgirl best friends sailing to Paris to find husbands, redefined the musical with their comedic, overtly sensual stylings and became real-life friends in the process.

As Jane continued to expand her film resume through the mid 1950s, she and her husband Bob continued to build their life together. Unable to have children of their own, they chose to adopt, bringing Tracy and Thomas in 1952, and Robert in 1956, into their family. The adoption struggles the couple faced inspired Jane to found the World Adoption International Fund, which assisted in simplifying the adoption process for over 50,000 families as well as lobbying for the passage of 1953's Federal Orphan Adoption Bill and 1980's Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act.

Jane's already-busy offscreen life included time spent building her musical career; beside her albums 'Let's Put Out the Lights' and 'Jane Russell' and singles recorded with the likes of Frank Sinatra, she would also appear in her own solo nightclub act that toured around the world, and later formed a gospel group with Connie Haines and Beryl Davis that released a single that reached number 27 on the Billboard chart.

As her film roles became less notable - her last being in 1970's Darker Than Amber - Jane returned to the stage, where she appeared in both Broadway and regional productions, and also appeared in TV series The Yellow Rose and Hunter. Her marriage to Bob Waterfield ended in divorce in 1968; she was married twice more, to Roger Barrett (August-November 1968) and to John Calvin Peoples (from 1974 until his death in 1999).

She is survived by her children Tracy, Thomas and Robert.

Jane Russell has passed away at age 89, Ksby is, sadly, reporting today. Russell, a major Hollywood star of the 1940's and 50's, began her career as a celebrity sex symbol, first appearing in Howard Hughes' The Outlaw . The 1943 release was famously the subject of a legal battle over exactly how much of Russell's cleavage could be displayed and not violate production code. From there, Russell's career blossomed with her turning in her most famous performance in Howard Hawk's Gentleman Prefer Blondes in 1953. Other notable roles of Russell's include Double Dynamite (with Groucho Marx and Frank Sinatra) and His Kind of Woman and Macao (both opposite Robert Mitchumm). Russell is survived by three children, six grandchildren and ten great-grandchildren.

Marlene Dietrich, Gary Cooper, Morocco Turner Classic Movies is dedicating this evening to filmmaker Josef von Sternberg, best known for his elaborate pageants starring Marlene Dietrich. One of those, Shanghai Express (1932) was shown earlier this evening; another, the creaky melodrama Morocco (1930), which earned Dietrich her sole Academy Award nomination, is on right now. Gary Cooper and Adolphe Menjou co-star. Next, TCM will present Crime and Punishment (1935) an atmospheric but melodramatic adaptation of Dostoevsky's novel. I've yet to sit through the last three: The Shanghai Gesture (1941), Macao (1952), and The King Steps Out (1937). Schedule and synopses from the TCM website: 5:00pm [Romance] Shanghai Express (1932) A beautiful temptress re-kindles an old romance while trying to escape her past during a tension-packed train journey. Cast: Marlene Dietrich, Clive Brook, Anna May Wong, Warner Oland Dir: Josef von Sternberg Bw-82 mins 6:30pm [Romance] Morocco (1930) A sultry cabaret singer falls [...]...

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Cinema Retro has received the following press release from the British Film Institute regarding their program of events for the month of December at the Southbank theatre facility in London. For full info and tickets visit the web site by clicking here.

Blonde Venus, one of the films screened as part of the Von Sternberg tribute.

Josef Von Sternberg

This month we will celebrate the career of Josef von Sternberg – one of Hollywood’s most visionary directors – with a complete retrospective of his films. He was the man Marlene Dietrich called her master, and is perhaps best known for Underworld (1927), The Blue Angel (1930) and Macao (1952)

Sally Potter

Sally Potter is one of the UK’s most innovative and original filmmakers, and we look forward to launching our comprehensive study of her career with a screening of Orlando (1993) followed by a Q&A...