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Director Richard Burgin recently stunned audiences with his debut feature, Fang, with the film earning numerous awards throughout its festival run before arriving on Amazon Prime. His next feature project will be The Slaughter Brothers Dime Circus, which is now raising funds on Indiegogo. The fantasy horror film will focus on a mysterious traveling carnival, with the talented performers hiding dark secrets which will ultimately refuse to remain hidden under the surface.

The Slaughter Brothers Dime Circus will serve as an adaptation of a stage production of the same name, which needed to be closed down due to the pandemic, before it was turned into a radio play. Richard Burgin will direct the film, and the screenplay was primarily written by Sean Sullivan, with contributions from Eris Thomas, Stefne Mercedes, and Burgin himself. Thomas was the director of the original play, and Sullivan was the play’s writer and creator,...

Exclusive: Stand-up comic Greg Fitzsimmons announced today that his new special, Greg Fitzsimmons: You Know Me, will premiere on his YouTube channel on Tuesday, August 27.

Filmed at The Comedy Mothership in Austin, TX in November, the special marks his second hour on the heels of 2013’s Life on Stage, which premiered on Comedy Central before moving to Netflix and is now available to stream on Prime Video.

You Know Me finds Fitzsimmons reflecting on 34 years of sobriety, sex with a 57-year-old woman, convincing your children that you’re cool, and combating loneliness on the road. And he realizes, he’s happy where he is.

Fitzsimmons directed the special and also exec produced alongside Matt Schuler. Producers included 800 Pound Gorilla, Jarad Clement and Valentijn Sloot.

A well-respected veteran comic, Fitzsimmons has been working as a stand-up for 35 years and has also thus far put out two half-hour specials for Comedy Central.

We have sad news to report today. It has been announced that Martin Mull, the hugely talented comedian and actor known for playing Colonel Mustard in Clue, Leon Carp in Roseanne, Gene Parmesan in Arrested Development, and more, has died at the age of 80.

The news was revealed by Martin’s daughter Maggie on Instagram. “I am heartbroken to share that my father passed away at home on June 27th, after a valiant fight against a long illness,” Maggie wrote. “He was known for excelling at every creative discipline imaginable and also for doing Red Roof Inn commercials. He would find that joke funny. He was never not funny. My dad will be deeply missed by his wife and daughter, by his friends and coworkers, by fellow artists and comedians and musicians, and—the sign of a truly exceptional person—by many, many dogs. I loved him tremendously.“

Related Cutting...

The long-awaited fourth season of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” isn’t the only new thing coming to Amazon Prime Video in February. Below we’ve assembled a full list of every new movie and TV show being added to the streaming service this month, including both Prime Video originals and library titles.

The new season of the Emmy-winning “Maisel” arrives on Feb. 18, the same day the first season of the new animated series “The Legend of Vox Machina” drops. But on Feb. 4, Prime Video will debut the brand new original series “Reacher,” based on author Lee Child’s beloved Jack Reacher book series. The new show stars Alan Ritchson in the titular role, putting a new spin on the character who was previously played by Tom Cruise in two feature films.

In terms of library titles, Feb. 25 sees the addition of the action thriller “The Protégé,” which was released in...

February 2022 is a big month for Prime Video. We’re talking “hands the size of dinner plates” big.

Highlighting Amazon Prime Video’s list of new releases for February 2022 is Reacher, the saga of one very large boy. Reacher premieres on Feb. 4 and is based on the Jack Reacher book series by Lee Child. The titular hero (played by Alan Ritchson) is a former major in the U.S. Army Military Police Corps who now travels the country looking for trouble to get into. His hands are very large.

How Big Are Jack Reacher’s Hands?: An Investigation pic.twitter.com/dYasLj7Bey

— Erik Tanouye (@toyns) July 28, 2018

Also coming to Prime Video this month is the return of one of Amazon’s biggest originals. The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel premieres on Feb. 18. Season 4 will find Midge seeking creative freedom in the 1960s. The one big Prime Original Movie of note...

Stars: Virginia Madsen, Sherilyn Fenn, Richard Cox, Kay E. Kuter, James Wilder, Paul Feig, Scott Coffey, Walter Addison, Dan Garrity, John Cook | Written by Tim Doyle, Aziz Ghazal, Elizabeth Passarelli | Directed by Ron Link

When I was a growing up, a teenager who lived at the local video store renting anything and everything that caught my eye (thanks to my mother giving the shop permission to rent me 18-rated titles), there was one film whose trailer seemed to be appear on nearly all the films I rented… Zombie High. Now, at the time, Zombie High was the One film I wanted to see that my local video shop never had available to rent. But all was not lost, thanks to the local Co-op bizarrely getting in a spinner rack of horror films for Halloween (and the following Christmas) I finally tracked down a copy all of my own!

Skip forward to 2021 and,...

Simon Brew Jun 20, 2017

Steve Guttenberg headlines what's supposed to be a reunion of the Police Academy cast. Life doesn't always work out as promised, though...

To the nearest $1m, the final Police Academy movie – Police Academy: Mission To Moscow – took a tidy $1m at the box office. It brought to a tragic end a movie franchise that had delighted surely a few people in its latter years, and certain given the office photocopiers a workout, as jokes were religiously recycled en masse. The Hangover series would put a better gloss on the recycling jokes schtick, and repeat the trick across its sequels many years later, to better commercial return.

See related Dunkirk: where you can see the IMAX preview in the UK Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk: filming started, cast confirmed Dunkirk: set video shows scale of Christopher Nolan’s new film

See also: What went wrong with Police Academy: Mission To Moscow.

Police Academy producer Paul Maslansky – who also tried to turn Ski Patrol into a series, foiled by the fact that barely anyone went to see the first and only one – has talked about rebooting Police Academy since. Most of the original cast are still with us, too, save for the brilliant David Graf (Tackleberry), Bubba Smith (Hightower), and George Gaynes (Commandant Lassard). Basically, a chunk of the core ensemble are available, and have been waiting for the call to return for a fresh Police Academy adventure. But the call, unfortunately, never came.

Hence, Lavalantula.

This is a film that centres on Steve Guttenberg, a washed-up movie star of the 90s who’s taken on a bug movie for $10,000. Going by the name of Colton West, we learn that he’s been the star of such movie franchises as Crazy Cops and Red Robot, and I know even typing this that nobody really cares. Instead, you’ve been drawn to this film for the same reason I was: it’s the cast of the Police Academy movies, just in a sort-of-horror film. Asda – and other supermarkets selling DVDs are available – had this next to Star Wars: Rogue One in my local store. One coin toss later, and Rogue One could wait.

It turns out, of course, that it’s a dose of trash that’s been doing the rounds for a little while. Spun out of the Sharknado series, Lavalantula was first shown on Syfy in the Us back in 2015, and I’ve barely found mention of it since. That notwithstanding, I armed myself with some of those new strawberry and vanilla Calippos (6/10 from me for them), and settled in.

Purveyors of The Asylum and Syfy attempts to recreate the feel of B-movies will know what they’re getting here. A perfunctory bit of plot, to get to some special effects that have been produced with second hand computers bought off Ilm. That’s less snooty than it sounds, mind. Lavalantula, a word that only seven of the 49 human beings who have ever tried managed to pronounce correctly the first time, is a solid audit as to what $20,000 or so’s worth of effects can buy you. Some lava and half-decent spiders is the answer. Given that London Has Fallen, for one, cost $105m to make and had effects that looked like Call Of Duty a generation back, Lavathingy does offer a decent recent in that sense. Don’t get carried away and start giving it awards or anything, though.

Thing is, it’s easy to look down on micro budget stuff like this. Yet who knows where the next big filmmaker is going to come from? Jennifer Yuh Nelson cut her teeth on the basic animated movies that used to go straight to bargain stores, and now she’s one of the highest grossing female directors of all time, courtesy of the Kung Fu Panda series. The late Jonathan Demme was one of many schooled by the low budget ways of Roger Corman – a model that Jason Blum has expanded on for his Blumhouse outfit, offering filmmakers low budgets in exchange for final cut – and whilst The Asylum has lower ambitions, everyone needs a break, right?

In this case, it’s director Mike Mendez, who worked on the likes of NCIS and CSI before giving the world Big Ass Spider! Here, he knows the trade off is he has to shoot lots of explanatory conversation scenes to stretch the budget (he does throw in a Raiders Of The Lost Ark boulder-rip-off at one moment, though, as well as a just on the right side of legal Pirates Of The Caribbean homage), reckoning he has but 10 minutes out of 80 that he can spend on effects. At one stage, he decides to have a man dressed as a spider fight a spider. Sadly, it’s less fun that it sounds.

The other concession to budget is you don’t actually get the cast of Police Academy for very long. This is less forgivable. Sure, you get shirtless Guttenberg stealing a bus, and in his own way giving us his own spin on Last Action Hero. His character also needs to reconnect with his son for reasons that are of no human interest. But everyone else? They’re shuttled in for quick cameos. You get them at the start, and then Winslow and Ramsey finally return an hour later. But by then, they’re plotting how to beat the big spiders, and – presumably fearing legal interest – the references to glories old are all but gone.

I can’t be the only person who put the DVD in to hear Michael Winslow recreate his collection of noises. But we get, what, five minutes with him in all? It’s like a Police Academy reunion where everyone but Steve Guttenberg got given the wrong time. There’s the odd concession and acknowledgement of the series elsewhere in the film - “they took out the Blue Oyster. I loved that place,” says pretend Captain Jack Sparrow (really) at one stage – but for Ramsey, Leslie Easterbrook and Winslow, the DVD packaging may as well provide you with a spotter book, so you can at least tick ‘em off once you see them.

Still, Ralph Garman is good fun here as the aforementioned Jack Sparrow knock-off, and 24 fans who wonder just what happened to that fella who played Tony Almeida Isn’t Dead Really will get their answer, as Carlos Bernard duly picks up his cheque. 24: Legacy couldn’t come along quickly enough, though.

On the plus side too, there’s little question that everyone’s in on the gag.

But when you yearn for the film to at least have an equitable number of laughs as a Police Academy sequel, it’d be fair to say a little alarm has long been going off. By the time the film is directly mirroring and quoting a moment from Jurassic Park, that old adage of invoke the memory of other, better films at your peril has long been proved.

The cheapest moment, incidentally, and this is a competitive contest, is the Basil Exposition-type Doctor/Professor/scientist character, clambering into a helicopter with the full chopper sound effect going. Only for the camera to leave the fact that the rotors aren’t turning fully in shot.

Yet I think I still want that horror movie with the Police Academy cast that I was sold. In fact, what I think what I’d like to see now is a big screen version of the PlayStation 4 game Until Dawn, but with Police Academy characters, to bring a bit of a choose your own adventure element to the fun. Plus, then you get to replay it, changing just a few plot elements next time you play, accurately reflecting one of the core components of the Police Academy business plan.

Guttenberg has since followed this up with a sequel, 2 Lava 2 Tarantula, where only two Police Academy alumni joined him. Another film is coming. But Lavalantula: Tokyo Drift is surely just a meeting and a beermat’s worth of plot away, where all of his co-stars will have deserted him, ready to rejoin him for the fourth film in the series. That’s how this stuff work, right? And then Statham will turn up two films later? Right?

Right?...

Ski patrol rescued a boy dangling from a chairlift on Monday in the second incident of this kind at the Sundance Ski Resort in Provo, Utah, in less than two weeks.

The boy, who was reported to be between 10-12 years old, got caught on the lift by his backpack, according to 12 News,

Ski patrol put a padded mat underneath the boy and then used a ladder to lift the boy, who was not injured in the incident, back into the chair.

A similar incident occurred on December 22 when the backpack belonging to an 11-year-old boy became caught on a chairlift at the same resort.

Last night's episode of The Late Show with James Corden featured a roster of celebrities known for their dancing in movies: Zoe Saldana, Julia Stiles, and ... Paul Feig? Host James Corden chatted with Saldana and Stiles about their dance sequences (notably: Center Stage and Save The Last Dance) before showing a clip of Feig dancing in Ski Patrol. In the 1990 movie, Feig shows off some surprising dancing skills and, when on Tuesday night, even recreated the scene — splits and all! — as Saldana, Stiles, and Corden all watched in awe.

I never would've thought I might encounter a ski movie comedy at Cannes, and that it would be something I could call brilliant, yet every year I'm surprised by discoveries and this is another that will go down as one of my favorites of this festival. From Sweden comes a film titled Force Majeure, or also known as Turist (in French) at the festival, a dark comedy set in the French Alps following a family on a ski vacation. Directed by Ruben Östlund, who made two Free Radicals ski movies back in the 90s, the film plays with human dynamics and our responses to situations, but is enlivened by hilarious dark comedy. I really loved this one. In the very minor subgenre of skiing comedies, there are a few classics like Hot Dog The Movie, Hot Tub Time Machine and the zany Ski Patrol, that will likely never be topped.

"Parenthood's" mid-season finale airs Tuesday, Dec. 11 at 10 p.m. Est on NBC, and I've been meant to write about it for a while. (I'm in a perpetual state of meaning to write about "Parenthood" and not doing it.)

I'll start things off with a personal anecdote that I think illustrates what's best about the show, and I'll try to get through this part without crying. Ha. That's like trying to get through an episode of "Parenthood" -- especially this season -- with dry eyes. It just won't happen.

Last March, on a ski vacation in Colorado, I was on a very large mountain, heading downhill and toward a restaurant where my husband and I planned to meet friends for lunch. I'm not a great skier, but I was doing pretty well that day ... though I was in the process of realizing I kind of just wanted to quit -- not just for the day,...

This week, take an Anatomy class with the makers of CSI, discover what Judy Greer classifies as the high point of her workout life, and find how how super dense milk can help you levitate.

Reluctantly Healthy | Get schooled on the benefits of interval training while Judy Greer’s elbows swing wildly as she picks up the pace on the treadmill. Let’s just hope her elbows weren’t flailing when she ran into Heidi Klum and Seal at a local gym.

Failure Club | Want to know what’s endlessly fascinating (and relatable!)? People stumbling on their journey towards achieving a lifelong dream.

In honor of snow falling in NY for the first time this year, the cult movie of the week is Ski Patrol, from 1990.

Roger Rose (better known now for voice over work) plays Jerry, the senior member of The Snowy Peaks ski patrol. He lives to ski and is in love with fellow instructor Ellen (Yvette Nipar – who is hot but has only really done guest stars on tv). They are joined by T.K. Carter as Iceman – fans of The Thing will recognize him as Nauls. Also on the team are a demolitions expert (George Lopez!), a misfit who can’t make the patrol team and a foreign exchange patroller… It all adds up to mayhem on the slopes. The plot is pretty standard fare amped up with typical late 80′s/early 90′s comedy flare – the troop is trying to save the lodge from greedy land developer Sam Maris… played by Martin Mull.

Those dancing feet are promising to tap out dollar signs for RDF Rights at MIPCOM.

Included in the RDF Media Group arm's diverse slate of 250 new hours of U.K. and international programming is the hit dance format "So You Think You Can Dance," which Rdf expects will help it capitalize on the worldwide ballroom dancing phenom.

Before MIPCOM, RDF Rights secured nine presales of Season 4 of "Dance" including TVA in Canada, MBC Middle East, Channel 4 Nelonen Finland, Fox International Channels Italy, Kanal 11 Estonia and Fox Life Channel Poland. Other territories include Asia, South Africa and Turkey.

In addition to sales of the original U.S. series, three new local versions have also just launched -- with impressive ratings. Sabc in South Africa achieved an average share of 43% for the first two episodes of its new series; Stb in Ukraine won 21.4% share with its first episode, beating the Friday average...