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Robert De Niro won his second Oscar in 1981 for playing a boxing champ in Raging Bull. And now he has been chosen as the acting champ when it comes to Academy Awards.

His performance for the Martin Scorsese film from 1980 has been voted the greatest Oscar Best Actor winner ever, according to a Gold Derby ballot cast by 21 of our film experts, critics, and editors, who ranked all 97 male leading actors.

Anthony Hopkins finished second for The Silence of the Lambs (1991), with Marlon Brando following in third for The Godfather (1972). Daniel Day-Lewis for There Will Be Blood (2007), and Gregory Peck for To Kill a Mockingbird (1961) rounded out the top five.

At the bottom of the list of the Best Actor winners is Warner Baxter for In Old Arizona (1928). George Arliss in Disraeli (1929), Lionel Barrymore for A Free Soul (1930), Paul Lukas for Watch on the Rhine (1942), and Paul Muni for The Story of Louis Pasteur...

Robert De Niro won his second Oscar in 1981 for playing a boxing champ in Raging Bull. And now he has been chosen as the champ of all actors.

His performance for the Martin Scorsese film from 1980 has been voted the greatest Oscar Best Actor winner ever, according to a Gold Derby ballot cast by 21 of our film experts, critics, and editors, who ranked all 97 male leading actors.

Anthony Hopkins ranked second for The Silence of the Lambs (1991), with Marlon Brando following in third for The Godfather (1972). Daniel Day-Lewis for There Will Be Blood (2007), and Gregory Peck for To Kill a Mockingbird (1961) rounded out the top five.

At the bottom of the list of the Best Actor winners is Warner Baxter for In Old Arizona (1928). Just above that film performance in the rankings are George Arliss in Disraeli (1929), Lionel Barrymore for A Free Soul (1930), Paul Lukas for Watch on the Rhine...

In recent years, movies about senility and mortality have taken on a pitilessly bleak, frightening tenor, notably in such awards magnets as “Amour,” “Vortex” and “The Father.” Preferring a less grim approach is the Netherlands’ submission to the Oscar international feature race this year. Jelle de Jonge’s “Memory Lane” is a sometimes boisterous, ultimately affirming seriocomedy about an elderly couple who take a road trip to retrace some of their youthful steps, probably for the last time. A hit on its home turf earlier this year, de Jonge’s film is a well-crafted crowdpleaser that should cross borders with relative ease … unlike its oft-squabbling protagonists.

Jaap (Martin van Waardenberg) and Maartje (Leny Breederveld) have been married close to half a century. But despite their material comfort, the 70-somethings aren’t exactly enjoying a harmonious retirement. He’s an endless grumbler whose doomsaying view that “the world’s on fire...

From Tom Hanks in Forrest Gump to Cillian Murphy in Oppenheimer, some of the best Oscar-winning actors were given plenty of screen time to shine in their Academy-favorite performances. Its always impressive when an actor wins an Oscar with limited screen time, like Anthony Hopkins for The Silence of the Lambs or Beatrice Straight for just five minutes in Network, but theyre much more likely to catch the Academys attention if theyre on-screen for the overwhelming majority of the movie. The more screen time an actor has, the more opportunities they have to wow Oscar voters.

The Academy Awards for Best Actor and Best Actress tend to go to movies that essentially function as a showcase for their lead actor. Joaquin Phoenix is on-screen for all but 19 minutes of Joker (and a few of those minutes are end credits). Even though the opening act of Forrest Gump covers the characters childhood,...

The 1970s is considered a stellar decade for film – the height of the New Hollywood movement – which makes 1974’s “Chinatown” all the more classic. It is arguably one of the most memorable films to come out of that decade, becoming a defining feature for the era and earning 11 Oscar nominations. The mystery neo-noir is often cited as one of the greatest films of all time, particularly for its script, which won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Now on its 50th anniversary, let’s look back at the awards run of “Chinatown” – written by Robert Towne and directed by Roman Polanski – which was released on June 20, 1974.

The psychological mystery stars Jack Nicholson as private detective J.J. “Jake” Gittes. He is hired by a seemingly wealthy socialite to simply investigate her husband’s extramarital affairs, but gets entangled into a whirlpool hidden beneath the surface involving a deeper and deadlier...

“I felt ashamed of myself for watching. No one should have a chance to see so much desire, so much need for a prize. And so much pain when [it] was not given … I felt disgusted with myself. As though I were attending a public hanging.”

Those were the words of the late Glenda Jackson, as she described to The New York Times her recent experience watching the Academy Awards on television in 1979.

Ironically, it was well after she had already been gifted with two Best Actress Oscars herself. She was not present to accept those honors — for 1970’s “Women in Love” and 1973’s “A Touch of Class.” She was also absent when she was Best Actress-nominated for 1971’s “Sunday Bloody Sunday” and 1975’s “Hedda.”

See Watch our lively chats with dozens of 2024 Emmy contenders

I have to wonder if Miss Jackson ever watched the now-infamous clip of her winning her...

Dianne Crittenden, casting director on the original Star Wars who also worked on Pretty Woman, Spider-Man 2 and dozens of other films during a 40-year career, died March 19 at her home in Pacific Palisades. She was 82.

Her friend and colleague Ilene Starger confirmed her passing to Deadline.

Born on August 6, 1941, in the Jamaica neighborhood of Queens, NY, Crittenden got her start in the entertainment industry working with Howard Zieff, a photographer and director. They worked on advertising campaigns, TV commercials and films.

Her first project as casting director was Terrence Malick’s 1973 drama Badlands, starring Martin Sheen-Sissy Spacek, on which Bruce Springsteen based his song “Nebraska” a decade later. Crittenden worked on a few other films and TV shows, including the Emmy-winning 1976 Sally Field miniseries Sybil, before land the casting-director role of a lifetime — a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

After working with George Lucas on the iconic Star Wars,...

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences doesn't always get it right. Actually, you can count on them to just about never get it right.

This is especially true of the lead acting categories, where voters often become prisoners of the moment and vote for the buzziest and/or showiest performance. This is how Al Pacino's chilling depiction of Michael Corleone's descent into pure, dead-eyed evil in "The Godfather Part II" gets passed over in favor of Art Carney's amiable portrayal of a lonely old man hitting the road with his pet cat in "Harry and Tonto." This results in overdue Oscars, which frequently create new injustices — like Denzel Washington's bravura turn as Malcolm X losing to Al Pacino's ceaseless hoo-hahing in "Scent of a Woman," which led to Washington getting his Best Actor trophy for his (admittedly entertaining) grandstanding work in "Training Day" (which cost...

Mike Nussbaum, one of the oldest working actors in the U.S. industry who appeared in such films as “Men in Black” and “Field of Dreams,” has died. He was 99.

Nussbaum died of natural causes Saturday — six days short of his 100th birthday — at his home in Chicago, his daughter Karen told the Chicago Tribune.

Nussbaum played book publisher Bob Drimmer in “Fatal Attraction” (1987), a school principal in “Field of Dreams” (1989) and alien jeweler Gentle Rosenburg in “Men in Black” (1997). He also appeared in films like “House of Games” (1987), “Things Change” (1988), “Harry and Tonto” (1974), “Losing Josiah” (1995) and “Steal Big Steal Little” (1995).

On the television side, Nussbaum had turns in “The Equalizer,” “The X-Files,” “Brooklyn Bridge,” “Separate but Equal,” “Frasier,” “L.A. Law,” “227,” “The Commish” and “Early Edition.”

Nussbaum was born on Dec. 29, 1923, and raised in the Albany Park neighborhood of Chicago. He went on to have an extensive career in theater,...

Mike Nussbaum, the late-blooming Chicago actor who portrayed the aging salesman George Aaronow in the original Broadway production of Glengarry Glen Ross, just one of his many collaborations with David Mamet, has died. He was 99.

Nussbaum died Saturday — six days shy of his 100th birthday — at his home in Chicago, his daughter, Karen, told the Chicago Sun-Times.

He acted on Windy City stages for more than a half-century and received a lifetime achievement award from the League of Chicago Theaters in 2019.

On the big screen, Nussbaum played the book publisher Bob Drimmer in Fatal Attraction (1987), a school principal in Field of Dreams (1989) and the alien jewelry store owner Gentle Rosenburg in Men in Black (1997).

Nussbaum and Mamet first met in the late 1960s, and the future Pulitzer Prize winner would cast him as Teach in the 1975 premiere of his three-man drama American Buffalo at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. He...

Actor Mike Nussbaum, whose roles include a memorable appearance in the hit movie Men in Black, has passed away.

Per TMZ, Nussbaum died on Saturday morning in his Chicago home with his daughter, Karen, by his side. It was noted that the actor had died of natural causes after spending the past year in hospice, with Karen stating, "It was his time." Nussbaum was 99 years old and just one week shy of his 100th birthday, which would've been on Dec. 29.

A lifelong performer, Nussbaum never formally retired, and he had performed in recent stage plays, with a turn as Albert Einstein in Relativity among them. He was especially popular in the Chicago area's theater scene, though he can also be recognized worldwide from his many roles in popular films and TV shows. One of his most memorable is in the 1997s sci-fi film Men in Black with Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones.

(Welcome to Did They Get It Right?, a series where we look at an Oscars category from yesteryear and examine whether the Academy's winner stands the test of time.)

As someone who frequently peruses the past years of the Academy Awards, more often than not the results just wash over me. Rarely are the winners the most exciting options, but I generally understand how and why a given person or film walked away with a trophy, even if they wouldn't have gotten my vote. People like to grouse about the results of the Oscars, but their whiffing on a massive scale actually doesn't happen as often as people claim it does.

Of course, there are those "What were they thinking?" moments, like "Crash" winning Best Picture and "That Thing You Do!" losing Best Song. Few make me scratch my head harder than Best Actor at the 1975 Oscars. It's a slate...

There are two types of Al Pacino performances. The first is the kind that announced him as an acting virtuoso in the 1970s. They're fully inhabited, imbued with a coiled intensity, and forever on the verge of crescendoing to rage or, on rare occasions (most movingly in Jerry Schatzberg's "Scarecrow"), joy. This is Pacino at his very best: restless, yet modulated. When he blows his top in "Dog Day Afternoon," screaming "Attica" at the cops posted outside the bank he's attempting to rob, the moment is earned. He's given us keen insight into the mental machinery that drives Sonny, and has us cheering along with the crowd, even though we're still not sure why he's been driven to such dead-end desperation.

The second type is the grotesque self-parody that's been grist for impressionists — none better than Bill Hader — and soundboard prank callers since he stole Denzel Washington's Oscar...

In 1982, the same year Sir Ben Kingsley won his Best Actor Oscar for Gandhi, the year’s other big movie was Steven Spielberg’s E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial. Now, 40 years later, Kingsley has found his own E.T., a sort of combination of that classic with a bit of Cocoon, and perhaps The Father. But Jules, the new dramedy having its world premiere on opening night of the Sonoma Film Festival, marches to its own sweet beat, and represents yet another game attempt to bring that older adult audience back to theaters. A smart distributor should take a close look.

Directed by industry veteran producer and director Marc Turtletaub and written by Gavin Steckler, this slight but engaging, even quirky little film, is a crowd-pleaser that presents Kingsley with a role that fits like a glove, and one we haven’t seen him often do, especially with a full head of hair.

Joachim Trier, writer/director of the multi-Oscar nominated film The Worst Person in the World, discusses his favorite movies with hosts Josh Olson and Joe Dante.

Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode

A History of Violence (2005)

Gremlins (1984) – Glenn Erickson’s Blu-ray review, Tfh’s retrospective links

Innerspace (1987) – Glenn Erickson’s Blu-ray review

The Worst Person In The World (2021)

Back To The Future (1985)

Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959)

Hour of the Wolf (1968)

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) – John Landis’s trailer commentary, Dennis Cozzalio’s review

Mirror (1975)

Stalker (1979) – Glenn Erickson’s Criterion Blu-ray review

Soylent Green (1973)

Dr. Strangelove (1964) – Michael Lehmann’s trailer commentary, Glenn Erickson’s Criterion Blu-ray review

Last Year At Marienbad (1961)

The Hunt (1959)

Remonstrance (1972)

Don’t Look Now (1973) – John Landis’s trailer commentary

Bad Timing (1980) – Bernard Rose’s trailer commentary

Walkabout (1971) – Larry Karaszewski’s trailer commentary

Performance (1970) – Mark Goldblatt’s trailer commentary

Drive My Car (2021)

491 (1964)

The Seventh Seal (1957)

Persona (1966)

The Wild Strawberries...

Goose, “Captain Marvel” (2019)

Okay, Goose is technically not a cat. Carol Danvers’ orange sidekick is actually a flerken (an alien with massive tentacles hidden inside her mouth), but Goose’s fluffy coat and knack for getting into trouble puts her firmly in the cat category.

Binx, “Hocus Pocus” (1993)

Thackery Binx was just a normal teenage boy in 1693 before he was cursed to live forever in the body of a black cat. But hey, everyone goes through weird phases in their teens.

Cat, “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” (1961)

Let’s make this clear: Holly Golightly does not own this cat. He belongs to nobody and nobody belongs to him. But that doesn’t stop him from playing a pivotal role in the movie, including the tear-jerking final scene.

Jonesy, “Alien” (1979)

This orange tabby was the unofficial mascot of the Uscss Nostromo and one of the few crew members to survive a Xenomorph attack.

Chicago – In 1973, director Norman Jewison fashioned a radical film version of the rock opera/Broadway show “Jesus Christ Superstar,” and the cinematic innovations plus stellar cast equaled a timeless movie musical classic. Josh Mostel portrayed King Herod and Barry Dennen was Pontius Pilate in the iconic film.

Jesus Christ Superstar (Jcs) began it’s life as a rock opera, a concept record released in 1969 with Ian Gillan of the rock group Deep Purple singing the part of Jesus. Two key members of the album’s cast went on to do the film … Yvonne Elliman as Mary Magdalene and Barry Dennen as Pontius Pilate. The Broadway show adaptation opened two years later, and the 1973 film followed with Ted Neeley as Jesus.

Josh Mostel as King Herod and Barry Dennen as Pontius Pilate in ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’

Photo credit: Universal Studios Home Video

In 2013, Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com got the opportunity...

One of the oddities of this year’s Golden Globes nominees? That Fox’s Freddie Mercury biopic “Bohemian Rhapsody” and Warner’s “A Star Is Born” requested to compete in the drama categories and not as a musical or comedy selection.

After all, the 1976 version of the much-told showbiz saga starring Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson was labeled as a musical and went on to grab Globes for both leads as well as the film itself. But those prizes did not translate into Oscar attention, with only the movie’s signature song, “Evergreen,” earning a statuette.

However, their winning dramatic counterparts that year – Peter Finch and Faye Dunaway in “Network” — would not only make the Oscar ballot cut, but would go on to win Academy Awards as well. Same thing happened to the year’s drama champ, “Rocky,” which won the Best Picture Oscar.

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This article marks Part 1 of the Gold Derby series reflecting on films that contended for the Big Five Oscars – Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Screenplay (Original or Adapted). With “A Star Is Born” this year on the cusp of joining this exclusive group of Oscar favorites, join us as we look back at the 43 extraordinary pictures that earned Academy Awards nominations in each of the Big Five categories beginning with the eight that were shut out of these top races.

At the 31st Academy Awards ceremony, “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” (1958) was well-positioned for Oscar glory. Critically acclaimed and commercially successful, the film adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ play was up in six categories, including the Big Five, plus Best Cinematography.

Instead of emerging victorious, however, the film found itself steamrolled over. It would lose Best Picture and Best Director (Richard Brooks) to the musical “Gigi” and its filmmaker,...

Anthony “Tony” Ray, the actor-producer son of Rebel Without a Cause director Nicholas Ray, died June 29 in Saco, Maine, following a long illness, his family has announced. Ray, who lived in Saco for the last 10 years, was 80.

A graduate of the Neighborhood Playhouse and a member of the Actor’s Studio, Ray was on the producing teams of such 1970s hits as The Rose, An Unmarried Woman, Harry and Tonto, and Freebie and the Bean. He was an assistant director throughout the 1960s and into the ’70s on TV series The Iron Horse and Bewitched, films Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, Cactus Flower, and, according to his family, Stanley Kubrick’s Spartacus and John Huston’s The Misfits, among other credits.

Ray, who often went by the name Tony Ray, also worked as an actor, his credits starting in 1957 with Men In War and an uncredited appearance in...

Some of the most legendary actors in Hollywood history won their Oscars in the 1970s. The Best Actor category of this decade was stacked with some of the biggest stars of the time, many of which have lived on for generations. But which Best Actor Oscar winner of the 1970s is your absolute favorite? Take a trip down memory lane and vote in our poll below.

George C. Scott, “Patton” (1970) — Scott took home the Best Actor prize for “Patton,” which also won Best Picture. In the film he plays the titular George S. Patton, the famous hot-tempered U.S. army general who led troops during World War II. He had previously been nominated for “Anatomy of a Murder” (1959), “The Hustler” (1961), and later for “The Hospital” (1971). Scott notably declined his nomination and win for “Patton.”

SEERobert De Niro (‘Raging Bull’) knocks out all contenders to be your top Best Actor Oscar winner of 1980s [Poll Results]

Gene Hackman,...

Josh Greenfeld, who shared an Oscar nomination with Paul Mazursky for his debut screenplay, Harry and Tonto (1974), has died. He was 90.

Greenfeld died May 11 in Los Angeles from pneumonia, his son Karl Taro Greenfeld, a journalist and novelist, told The Hollywood Reporter.

Greenfeld wrote two further screenplays, the powerful 1978 telemovie Lovey: A Circle of Children, Part II, starring Jane Alexander as real-life Mary MacCracken, a teacher of children with cognitive disabilities; and Oh, God! Book II (1980), with George Burns reprising his comedic title role.

A noted author and playwright, Greenfeld wrote a trilogy of books detailing the ...

Josh Greenfeld, who shared an Oscar nomination with Paul Mazursky for his debut screenplay, Harry and Tonto (1974), has died. He was 90.

Greenfeld died May 11 in Los Angeles from pneumonia, his son Karl Taro Greenfeld, a journalist and novelist, told The Hollywood Reporter.

Greenfeld wrote two further screenplays, the powerful 1978 telemovie Lovey: A Circle of Children, Part II, starring Jane Alexander as real-life Mary MacCracken, a teacher of children with cognitive disabilities; and Oh, God! Book II (1980), with George Burns reprising his comedic title role.

A noted author and playwright, Greenfeld wrote a trilogy of books detailing the ...

New York City’s annual Doc NYC festival kicks off this week, including a full-to-bursting slate of some of this year’s most remarkable documentaries. If you’ve been looking to beef up on your documentary consumption, Doc NYC is the perfect chance to check out a wide variety of some of the year’s best fact-based features. Ahead, we pick out 14 of our most anticipated films from the fest, including some awards contenders, a handful of buzzy debuts, and a number of festival favorites. Take a look and start filling up your schedule now.

Doc NYC runs November 9 – 16 in New York City.

“EuroTrump”

Donald Trump may seem like a sui generis figure, a one-of-a-kind monster who was forged in a perfect storm of racism, tweets, and chaos, but history suggests that he’s really just a new breed of an old type. You don’t even have to look...

'Under the Volcano' screening: John Huston's 'quality' comeback featuring daring Albert Finney tour de force As part of its John Huston film series, the UCLA Film & Television Archive will be presenting the 1984 drama Under the Volcano, starring Albert Finney, Jacqueline Bisset, and Anthony Andrews, on July 21 at 7:30 p.m. at the Billy Wilder Theater in the Los Angeles suburb of Westwood. Jacqueline Bisset is expected to be in attendance. Huston was 77, and suffering from emphysema for several years, when he returned to Mexico – the setting of both The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and The Night of the Iguana – to direct 28-year-old newcomer Guy Gallo's adaptation of English poet and novelist Malcolm Lowry's 1947 semi-autobiographical novel Under the Volcano, which until then had reportedly defied the screenwriting abilities of numerous professionals. Appropriately set on the Day of the Dead – 1938 – in the fictitious Mexican town of Quauhnahuac (the fact that it sounds like Cuernavaca...

Just because a movie or a celebrity wins an Oscar, that doesn't mean the win was deserved. While the Academy Awards are seen as the capstone to awards season -- and one of the highest honors in the business -- we all know that stars and movies get snubbed or overlooked all the time.

What's worse is when we look back at what did win, and shake our heads in confusion and disbelief. So, with the 89th Academy Awards just around the corner, let's take a look back over the show's illustrious history at a few times the Academy voters clearly made a mistake.

Watch: 2017 Oscar Awards Nominees: 'La La Land' Leads With 14 Nominations

1. How Green Was My Valley wins Best Picture at the 14th Academy Awards in 1942

20th Century Fox

Beat Out: Citizen Kane, The Maltese Falcon, Blossoms in the Dust, Here Comes Mr. Jordan, Hold Back the Dawn, The Little Foxes, [link...

As Kevin Spacey finds himself stuck inside a cat in this week’s family comedy Nine Lines, how well do you know other movie moggies?

Panic Room

The Gift

Gone Girl

The Glass House

The Third Man

Cat People

Pygmalion

The Black Cat

Let the Right One In

Catwoman

Insidious

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

The Getaway

Willard

The Long Goodbye

Harry and Tonto

Fallen

Pet Semetary

Needful Things

The Thing

An Unmarried Woman

Listen Up Phillip

Hannah and Her Sisters

The Squid and the Whale

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

What Lies Beneath

Taking Lives

Side Effects

Mean Girls

Sixteen Candles

Scream

Drag Me to Hell

Cats and Dogs

Stuart Little

Babe

Charlotte's Web

Hocus Pocus

Jumanji

Death Becomes Her

The Witches

10 and above.

Top cat

9 and above.

Top cat

8 and above.

Top cat

7 and above.

Top cat

6 and above.

A sad tail

5 and above.

A sad tail

4 and above.

Live everyday like it's Caturday: Cinema's top catsLive everyday like it's Caturday: Cinema's top catsRachel West8/8/2016 11:00:00 Am

Today is International Cat Day and we're celebrating our feline friends, turning to our attention to our purrfect pals on the big screen.

Cats are all the rage on cinema, every year it seems. This year, one of our favourite actors, Kevin Spacey, is playing a wealthy business-man and absentee father who gets trapped in the body of his new pet cat in Nine Lives. With this film out in theatres right now, as well as it being a day to celebrate cats, there's no better time to take a look back at some of our favourite felines on film. You can get your tickets to Nine Lives by clicking here!

In honour of National Cat Day and because we strive to live every day like it’s Caturday, here are...

Colombia Pictures

The Academy Awards decision process can often be frustratingly arbitrary. Actors are apparently gifted Oscars for political decisions rather than actual merit, with some seemingly winning either as reparations for prior snubs or just for having played someone with a hard life.

In these instances there is almost always another actor who was overlooked for the great work they did, and as pointless as the Oscars are – it’s a lot of patting on the back, after all – it’s a damn shame they didn’t get the recognition they deserved.

Although admittedly it’s not like the luminaries who comprise the Academy have a What’s App group chat where they all plot and plan who the winners of the awards will be, you can sense the workings of their decision-making. The kind of process that leads to Marlon Brando winning an Oscar for simply having the...

Movie sequels are meant to follow the law of diminishing returns, but the following fought that law - and won.

Of course, this is all a matter of opinion, and if you personally think Babe: Pig in the City is better than the original - hint: it's not - do let us know in the comment box below.

1. The Dark Knight (2008)

The best of Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy? Undoubtedly. Quite why it's so great is hard to put a finger on, because there are so many reasons, from Heath Ledger's stunning turn as The Joker to that truck flip.

Endlessly rewatchable, this is a dark and complex crime film that brings the very best out of the superhero genre. Just don't talk about The Dark Knight Rises, okay?

2. Toy Story 2 (1999)

Toy Story 2 is a miracle. Originally envisioned as a straight-to-video cheapie, John Lasseter and the rest...

Lenny Bruce: Dustin Hoffman in the 1974 Bob Fosse movie. Lenny Bruce movie review: Polemical stand-up comedian merited less timid biopic (Oscar Movie Series) Bob Fosse's 1974 biopic Lenny has two chief assets: the ever relevant free speech issues it raises and the riveting presence of Valerie Perrine. The film itself, however, is only sporadically thought-provoking or emotionally gripping; in fact, Lenny is a major artistic letdown, considering all the talent involved and the fertile material at hand. After all, much more should have come out of a joint effort between director Fosse, fresh off his Academy Award win for Cabaret; playwright-screenwriter Julian Barry, whose stage version of Lenny earned Cliff Gorman a Tony Award; two-time Best Actor Oscar nominee Dustin Hoffman (The Graduate, Midnight Cowboy); and cinematographer Bruce Surtees (Play Misty for Me, Blume in Love). Their larger-than-life subject? Lenny Bruce, the stand-up comedian who became one of the...

Chicago – The showcase and respect given to filmmakers at the recently completed 2015 Chicago Critics Film Festival (Ccff) meant that the top directors made appearances on behalf of their featured films. James Ponsoldt of “The End of the Tour” and Patrick Brice of “The Overnight” are two prime artists at the top of their game.

HollywoodChicago.com also got a chance to talk to Ponsoldt and Brice after their screenings at the Ccff, and the insights provided context to their art.

James Ponsoldt, Director of “The End of the Tour”

James Ponsoldt is a great friend to the festival, having screened his film “The Spectacular Now” at the first Ccff in 2013. He returned with “The End of of the Tour,” a superior and poignant understanding of author David Foster Wallace (a career-defining role for Jason Segel), as he takes his last book tour promoting his famous novel, “Infinite Jest.”

James Ponsoldt...

All week long our writers will debate: Which was the greatest film year of the past half century. Click here for a complete list of our essays. How to decide in the grand scheme of things which film year stands above all others? History gives us no clear methodology to unravel this thorny but extremely important question. Is it the year with the highest average score of movies? So a year that averages out to a B + might be the winner over a field strewn with B’s, despite a few A +’s. Or do a few masterpieces lift up a year so far that whatever else happened beyond those three or four films is of no consequence? Both measures are worthy, and the winner by either of those would certainly be a year not to be sneezed at. But I contend the only true measure of a year’s...

By Anjelica Oswald

Managing Editor

With Michael Keaton winning the Golden Globe for best actor in a musical or comedy and Eddie Redmayne winning for best actor in a drama, both men continue establishing themselves as the frontrunners in this year’s lead actor race at the Oscars.

Though not new to films, Redmayne starred in Oscar-nominated films such as Elizabeth: The Golden Age (2008) and Les Miserables (2012). His performance as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything, however, propelled him to widespread acclaim and put him on the radar. He is one of four best actor nominees — along with Keaton, Benedict Cumberbatch and Steve Carell — to receive their first nomination this year.

For most of his career, Keaton was known for his comedic roles, such as Mr. Mom (1983) and Beetlejuice (1988), and for his turn as Batman in Tim Burton’s Batman (1989) and Batman Returns (1992). These roles earned Keaton praise and...

One of the major movie star clichés, right along with “What I really want to do is direct” is the wail of the comedy star, “I want to show that I’m a serious actor”. Through the years many actors first known for generating laughs have attempted to stretch, to show another facet, by taking dramatic roles, often with mixed results. For every Jerry Lewis in The King Of Comedy, there’s an Adam Sandler in Reign Over Me. But sometimes the gamble really pays off with gold…Oscar gold. One of the biggest surprises in Academy history was the Best Actor win by Art Carney (then best known as one of the greatest sidekicks in sitcom history as Ed Norton in “The Honeymooners”) way back in 1974 for Harry And Tonto which may have paved the way for the Best Supporting Actor win by Robin Williams for 1997′s Good Will Hunting.

It can be such a beautiful happening when the natural forces of humanity and the wild kingdom can get together and establish a sense of harmony in motion pictures. Also, it can be a compelling yet regrettable conflict as well when man and beast decide to collide in the interest of big screen entertainment. Whatever the case may be certainly does not matter because the concept of beasts of all species (rather it be of the four-legged or two-legged variety) collectively clashing or cooperating sends a special message about triumph, tragedy and just plain tenderness.

In Beast of Burden: Top 10 Human-Animal Combinations in the Movies we will look at some of the best selections where man and animal co-exist whether it be in calmness or chaos. There is no doubt that one can come up with numerous top ten lists detailing their ideal man-animal themes in cinema. The struggle for...

If you’re looking for some good movies to watch this three-day holiday weekend, I’d like to suggest a double shot of Paul Mazursky, the under-appreciated filmmaker who died Monday. A whole marathon of his work is in order, really, especially if you’ve never seen Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice or Harry and Tonto or Next Stop, Greenwich Village (come at least for Bill Murray’s first film appearance and a great early Christopher Walken) or An Unmarried Woman (a terrific feminist classic) or the crazy Alex in Wonderland (come at least for the Fellini scene). But two of my favorites are his big releases in the mid-80s, Moscow on the Hudson and Down and Out in Beverly Hills, and I think they make a perfect double feature for Independence Day. First up is Moscow on the Hudson, which in early 1984 led the wave of comedies involving immigration and migration to New York City (see...

Mazursky and Jill Clayburgh on the set of An Unmarried Woman (1978)

Paul Mazursky, one of the most acclaimed and prolific filmmakers to come of age in the 1960s, has died from cardiac arrest. He was 84 years old. Mazursky originally worked as an actor in films, appearing in such movies as "The Blackboard Jungle". However, with the revolutionary freedoms that came into movie-making in the mid-1960s, Mazursky turned to screenwriting and directing. His first screenplay was for the Peter Sellers hippie comedy "I Love You, Alice B. Toklas!". He made his directorial debut with "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice" in 1969. The film starred Natalie Wood and Robert Culp as a hip, privileged couple who contemplate wife swapping with their best friends, played by Elliott Gould and Dyan Cannon, both of whom rose to stardom because of the film. Like most of Mazursky's films, the movie viewed social significant issues- in this case,...

He was a visionary in terms of independent filmmaking with a series of pioneering works beginning in the late ’60s. Sometimes referred to as the ‘Woody Allen of the West Coast’, Paul Mazursky was nominated for five Oscars, mostly for his writing. Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, Harry And Tonto (which won an Oscar for star Art Carny in 1974), Moscow On The Hudson, An Unmarried Woman, Down And Out In Beverly Hills were among his many accomplishments. His last significant work was Enemies A Love Story in 1989, the story of a Holocaust survivor who finds himself involved with three women – his current wife, a passionate married woman, and his long-vanished wife whom he thought was killed during the war. Mazursky has spent the last couple of decades acting in small roles, but there was a time when he was considered one of the most important filmmakers working, and for good reason.

Paul Mazursky, the innovative and versatile director who showed the absurdity of modern life in such movies as Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice and An Unmarried Woman, has died. He was 84. The filmmaker died of pulmonary cardiac arrest Monday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, said Mazursky's spokeswoman Nancy Willen. As a talented writer, actor, producer and director, Mazursky racked up five Oscar nominations, mostly for writing such films as Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice and Enemies, A Love Story. He also created memorable roles for the likes of Art Carney, Jill Clayburgh and Natalie Wood. Later in life, Mazursky acted...

Paul Mazursky, the innovative and versatile director who showed the absurdity of modern life in such movies as Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice and An Unmarried Woman, has died. He was 84. The filmmaker died of pulmonary cardiac arrest Monday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, said Mazursky's spokeswoman Nancy Willen. As a talented writer, actor, producer and director, Mazursky racked up five Oscar nominations, mostly for writing such films as Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice and Enemies, A Love Story. He also created memorable roles for the likes of Art Carney, Jill Clayburgh and Natalie Wood. Later in life, Mazursky acted...

In just four short years, Jennifer Lawrence has earned an Oscar win among three nominations, and she is now declared as the most powerful actress in the world. Beyond that victory for "Silver Linings Playbook" and nods for "Winter's Bone" and "American Hustle," her ranking is mostly based on the success of "The Hunger Games" film franchise. She is the 12th overall person on the new Forbes Celebrity 100 list. The top five are singer Beyonce, basketball star LeBron James, producer Dr. Dre, entrepreneur Oprah Winfrey, comedian/talk show host Ellen DeGeneres. Thompson on Hollywood. -Break- Oscar-nominated writer and director Paul Mazursky dies in Los Angeles at age 84. Though he was never nodded as a director, he competed four times as a writer for "Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice," "Harry and Tonto," "Enemies: A Love Story," and "An Unmarried Woman" (for which he also earned a producing bid). H.

Paul Mazursky has died, aged 84.

The director and screenwriter passed away of pulmonary cardiac arrest on Monday, June 30, according to family spokeswoman Nancy Willen.

Mazursky was well known for his sometimes controversial movie topics in the '60s and '70s, and penned and directed films such as Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, Harry and Tonto and An Unmarried Woman.

Over his long career, Mazursky directed six actors in Oscar-nominated performances, including Anjelica Huston in Enemies: A Love Story and Art Carney in Harry and Tonto.

He once told the Chicago Tribune: "I seem to have a natural bent toward humour and I seem to make people laugh, but I think there is in me a duality.

"I like to make people cry also… I like to deal with relationships. The perfect picture for me does all that."

The filmmaker also received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in...

Paul Mazursky died yesterday of pulmonary cardiac arrest. Born Irwin Mazursky in 1930, he'd go on to be nominated for five Oscars. After getting his start as an actor, Mazursky eventually became known best for writing and directing films that deftly captured contemporary life at the end of the 1960s and 1970s, with movies like Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, Blume in Love, Harry and Tonto, Next Stop, Greenwich Village, and An Unmarried Woman. His work was hugely influential, especially on those making similarly honest dramedies. 2006's Yippee, an autobiographical documentary about his trip to a Ukrainian Hasidic Jew festival, was his last feature. Most recently, he appeared as Norm on Curb Your Enthusiasm and has served as a film critic for Vanity Fair. He was 84.

Paul Mazursky, a five-time Oscar-nominee who wrote and directed admired movies from Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice to Down and Out in Beverly Hills, died Monday of pulmonary cardiac arrest, according to a family spokesperson. He was 84.

Mazursky was a successful actor in the 1950s, starring in many television series, as well as Blackboard Jungle and Stanley Kubrick’s first film, Fear and Desire. He segued into writing, scripting episodes of The Danny Kaye Show and The Monkees. He also wrote the 1968 Peter Sellers film, I Love You, Alice B. Toklas, and then made his directorial debut on Bob & Carol, which...

Filmmaker Paul Mazursky, the five-time Oscar nominee most famous for films such as "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice," "Down and Out in Beverly Hills" and "An Unmarried Woman," has passed away. According to a family spokesperson, he died of pulmonary cardiac arrest Monday in Los Angeles. He was 84. Mazursky's last theatrical release came nearly 20 years ago with the Chazz Palminteri adaptation "Faithful" but he has maintained a guest actor presence in film and television ever since. (And before -- in fact, a young Mazursky can be seen all the way back in Stanley Kubrick's 1953 film "Fear and Desire.") Younger audiences may know him as Norm from HBO's "Curb Your Enthusiasm" or his appearances on ABC's "Once and Again," but he established a long and distinguished career writing and directing relationship dramas and comedies and had been a singular voice throughout. Four of Mazursky's five Oscar nominations came for his work on the page.

Paul Mazursky, the colorful writer-director who masterfully mingled the funny and the forlorn in such modern classics as Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, An Unmarried Woman and Down and Out in Beverly Hills, has died. He was 84. A five-time Oscar nominee whose influential oeuvre also includes the touchstone films Harry and Tonto (1974), Next Stop, Greenwich Village (1976) and Enemies: A Love Story (1989), Mazursky died Monday in Los Angeles of pulmonary cardiac arrest. List The Hollywood Reporter Reveals Hollywood's 100 Favorite Films "A true raconteur, Paul brought humor and spirit to the many Guild meetings he

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The prolific Oscar-nominated screenwriter and director whose films include Harry And Tonto, Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice and Down And Out In Beverly Hills, died yesterday in Los Angeles of pulmonary cardiac arrest. Paul Mazursky was 84. Born 1930 in Brooklyn as Irwin Mazursky, he was a graduate of Brooklyn College and made his cinema debut in Stanley Kubrick’s feature Fear And Desire. When he wasn’t acting, Mazursky was a stand-up comic in New York and at the Gate of Horn in Chicago. After befriending Pauls Sills and Barbara Harris, Marzursky appeared in the west coast company of Second City. Writing […]...

Watch this great interview with Paul Mazursky by David Poland over at Movie City news. Mazursky was nominated for writing Enemies: A Love Story, Harry and Tonto, Bob, Ted, Carol and Alice,...

Paul Mazursky, the iconoclastic director and screenwriter whose films included “Harry and Tonto,” “An Unmarried Woman” and “Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice,” died Monday in Los Angeles. He was 84. Mazursky, born Irwin Mazursky in Brooklyn in 1930, died from pulmonary cardiac arrest, according to a spokesperson. A graduate of Brooklyn College, Mazursky made his debut as an actor in the Stanley Kubrick film “Fear and Desire,” and launched an acting career, later moving on to writing for “The Danny Kaye Show” and creating the television series “The Monkees.” See photos: Hollywood's Notable Deaths of 2014 Mazursky made his screenwriting debut...