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Hollywood may have pinned its hopes on Tom Cruise, but the gays stopped waiting for him a long time ago. As blockbusters like “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” and the “Fantastic Beasts” franchise earn praise for meager nods to LGBTQ characters, queer audiences have turned elsewhere, finding far better and more diverse representation on TV. Save for a few highbrow exceptions like “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” or “Call Me by Your Name,” queer film has lagged behind television, which moves faster and has more screen time to fill.

That’s about to change this summer, with the premiere of two mainstream gay comedies: Joel Kim Booster and Andrew Ahn’s indie “Pride and Prejudice” riff “Fire Island” and Billy Eichner’s Judd Apatow-produced big-budget rom-com “Bros.” While only one will get a shot at the box office (catch “Fire Island” streaming on Hulu June 3), both...

Amazon has put in development Late Bloomers, a half-hour comedy series from Ben Stiller & Nicky Weinstock’s Red Hour, Deb Spera and Maria Grasso’s One-Two Punch Productions, Survivor’ Remorse executive producer Victor Levin and ITV Studios. Created and written by Donal Lardner Ward (How to Make It in America), Late Bloomers follows a fortysomething couple that's randomly selected for a human trial of an experimental drug therapy that halts aging. In a culture obsessed…...

Taraji P. Henson has come a long way.

The Hidden Figures star, 46, recently reflected on her journey from the rough neighborhoods of Washington D.C. to an award-winning career that has landed her multiple trips to the White House.

“Honey, I’m from the hood,” she told W Magazine after a trip to her hometown in December. “Crack. Murders. Whole neighborhoods going under in a flash.”

Now, with a collection of critically movies, a hit TV show and a growing list of accolades — like the SAG award she just won with the cast of her new film Hidden Figures — Henson is finally living her dream.

The Golden Leopard of Locarno Film Festival’s 68th edition went to Right Now, Wrong Then by South Korea’s Hong Sang-soo.Scroll down for full list of winners

The top award comes two years after Sang-soo picked up the Leopard for Best Direction for his previous feature, Our Sunhi.

A previous winner of Locarno’s top award from South Korea was Bae Yong-kyun for Why Has Bodhi-Dharma Left for the East? (Dalmaga dongjogeuro gan kkadalgeun) in 1989.

Right Now, Wrong Then – which is handled internaitonally by Fine Cut - also received the Best Actor Leopard for Jung Jae-Young and a Special Mention from the Ecumenical Jury.

The International Jury – which included German actor Udo Kier, Israeli filmmaker Nadiv Lapid and veteran Us director Jerry Schatzberg awarded its Special Jury Prize to Avishai Sivan for Tikkun, and the Leopard for Best Direction to the veteran Polish director Andrzej Zulawski for Cosmos, his first film...

Played Out: Dyer’s Sophomore Feature Overly Familiar and Underwhelming

Director Julia Dyer, again teaming with screenwriter sister Gretchen, mount their first project since their successfully received 1996 independent feature, Late Bloomers, with a 1970s sexual revolution period piece, The Playroom. While there are certain sensational and dramatic elements that may put one in mind of a cross between something like Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Flowers in the Attic, the feature, while it certainly avoids camp cliché, also avoids any type of practical engagement with its sordidly unhappy elements. While the adults in the Dyer sisters’ latest feature suffer the children, so do they suffer the patience of an audience desperately searching for a point of interest in the troupe presented to us here.

Opening with a group of four siblings in the Cantwell family, looked after by elder teen Maggie (Olivia Harris), the breaking newspaper headline on...

While he may have missed out on an Academy Award nomination for yet another great performance in "The Sessions," fans of actor John Hawkes don't have to wait long to see him again on the big screen. Once again changing gears, the actor stars alongside the underrated Molly Parker in the indie drama "The Playroom," a film that promises a peek behind the curtain of seemingly stable suburban life. Written by Gretchen Dyer and directed by Julia Dyer (who previously teamed on "Late Bloomers"), the story, set in the 1970s, follows a couple whose hurts and betrayals are brought to the fore during a boozy party, all while their children steal away to the attic, where they conjure up stories of their own. It's the kind of small drama that doesn't get made in the studio system anymore, a fact cited by the actors in this exclusive, seven-minute behind-the-scenes featurette as the reason,...

The ’70s-set family drama The Playroom, starring John Hawkes and the underrated Molly Parker premiered last spring at the Tribeca Fim Festival, but the first clip has newly arrived. Now we have the first theatrical trailer for the film which failed to get much traction.

Freestyle’s upcoming indie drama directed by Julia Dyer (Late Bloomers) is slated for a day and date release on theatrical and DVD/VOD February 8th, 2013. The film written by Julia’s sister Gretchen Dyer sees a family straining beneath a pleasant facade.

The film also stars Molly Parker, Cody Linley, Lydia MacKay, and Olivia Harris. It seems like one of Hawkes’ forgettable indies, but check it out for yourself and maybe you’ll feel differently.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here’s the official synopsis:

Set in the suburbs during the 1970s, the story unfolds like a dream wrapped around a family drama,...

Here's a reminder, as the Sundance Film Festival gets underway, that not every movie at a festival is going to make it or be remembered. And so it goes for "The Playroom." The film starring John Hawkes and the underrated Molly Parker premiered last spring to not much fanfare at the Tribeca Fim Festival, and even with someone like Hawkes in the cast, it failed to get much traction. And now, just under a year later, it's quite ready to quietly be released and live the rest of its life out in the wild. A new trailer and clip has arrived for "The Playroom," a '70s set drama that sees a family straining beneath a pleasant facade. Written by Gretchen Dyer and directed by her sister Julie Dyer (the sisters’ first film, “Late Bloomers,” premiered at Sundance in 1996), the film is told through the eyes of the children of a married couple,...

The trailer for Freestyle's upcoming indie drama The Playroom is now online and you can check it out in the player below. Directed by Julia Dyer ( Late Bloomers ), The Playroom stars Academy Award-nominee John Hawkes ( Winter's Bone , The Sessions ) and Molly Parker ("Dexter," "The Firm"). The film, which premiered in the gala/spotlight section of this year's Tribeca Film Festival, was produced by Stephen Dyer ( Hysteria ) and Angie Meyer (Wuss), and is slated for a day and date release on theatrical and DVD/VOD February 8, 2013. Set in the suburbs during the 1970s, the story unfolds like a dream wrapped around a family drama, one in which all members of the Cantwell family struggle to find their way in a rapidly changing world. Maggie (newcomer Olivia...

Each year the Tribeca Film Festival offers a flood of new features, from midnight movies, to foreign films, brand-new narratives and debuting documentaries. As such, a critic covering the fest is spoiled for choice, and, thus, frequently forced to fill their screening schedule haphazardly. Last year, as I bounced around Tribeca, chasing down press screenings, I made it a point to see The Playroom, and am very glad I did. Directed by Julia Dyer, the film was her second feature, following 1996's Late Bloomers, both of which were written by her late sister, Gretchen Dryer. But I'd never heard of the Dryer sisters. What drew me to The Playroom was its cast, which included two stars from the HBO western series Deadwood, John Hawkes and Molly Parker. In the drama, set in the 1970s, Hawkes and Parker play a husband and wife who are brewing for a scandalous showdown. Newcomer...

Freestyle Releasing and Freestyle Digital Media have announced that they have acquired theatrical and all DVD and VOD rights to The Playroom , the critically acclaimed drama directed by Julia Dyer ( Late Bloomers ), which stars Academy Award-nominee John Hawkes ( Winter's Bone , The Sessions ) and Molly Parker ("Dexter," "The Firm"). The film, which premiered in the gala/spotlight section of this year's Tribeca Film Festival, was produced by Stephen Dyer ( Hysteria ) and Angie Meyer ( Wuss ), and is slated for a day and date release on theatrical and DVD/VOD February 8, 2013. Set in the suburbs during the 1970s, the story unfolds like a dream wrapped around a family drama, one in which all members of the Cantwell family struggle to find their way in a rapidly...

Freestyle Releasing and Freestyle Digital Media have acquired the theatrical, DVD and VOD rights to "The Playroom," a drama directed by Julia Dyer ("Late Bloomers"), which stars John Hawkes ("Winter's Bone," "The Sessions") and Molly Parker ("Dexter," "The Firm").  The film is slated for a day-and-date theatrical release and on DVD/VOD on Feb. 8, 2013. "The Playroom" premiered in the gala/spotlight section of this year's Tribeca Film Festival. It was produced by Stephen Dyer ("Hysteria") and Angie Meyer ("Wuss"). Set in the suburbs during the1970s, the family drama tells the story of Maggie...

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

When I saw the picture of Pure Noise Records my mind immediately went to their artists Handguns and The Story So Far, both of which of which I’m pretty huge fans of. I’ll be blunt about not being familiar past name recognition of the majority of the bands on their label but with my only experience being the aforementioned bands I went into My Iron Lung with the idea of Pop-Punk in mind. I was pleasantly surprised to be wrong.

Grief, the debut 7” from San Diego 4-piece My Iron Lung, comes across more as a blast from the past channeling the emotive hardcore sound of bands like I Hate Myself while maintaining a certain crispness that cements them in the now. The music falls a little more on the softer side with the instrumentals being less distorted than one would expect from a genre...

It’s hard to write about Julia Dyer’s The Playroom without writing about the passage of time. It’s been sixteen-years since Dyer’s previous (and first) film, the Sundance hit Late Bloomers, and Dyer has finally crafted a proper follow-up. But beyond that, the film itself is quite concerned with the changes in attitude and perspective that time renders. Set in 1970s suburbia, The Playroom tells the story of a dysfunctional, alcohol-fueled dinner party, while also showing the same night through the eyes of a group of kids upstairs in the house’s attic. Premiering this week in Tribeca’s Spotlight section, the film features an especially strong ensemble that includes John Hawkes, Molly Parker, and Olivia Harris.

Filmmaker: Obviously it’s been a long time since Late Bloomers. In your eyes, how has the independent film landscape changed since that movie was released?

Dyer: In many ways,...

Rob Sitch comedy Any Questions For Ben? has slipped 50 per cent in its second weekend at the box office.

Working Dog.s latest project . following the incredibly popular past hits The Castle and The Dish . grossed a disappointing $302,421 from 235 screens over the weekend, earning it a screen average of just $1287. Last weekend it opened with $608,731.

Distributor Roadshow kept Any Questions for Ben? on 235 screens . the same as opening weekend . however, the film failed to generate positive word-of-mouth while negative reviews also did not help its cause.

The film, also starring Rachael Taylor and Daniel Henshall, follows Ben (Lawson) who suffers a quarter-life crisis after being asked to speak at his school.s career night. Sitch directed the comedy and co-wrote along with Tom Gleisner (The Hollowmen, Russell Coight.s All Aussie Adventures) and Santo Cilauro (Frontline, Thank God You.re Here).

Stephan Elliott.s comedy A Few Best Men also...

#49. The Playroom - Julia Dyer Having John Hawkes cast in your film doesn't assure a playdate in Park City, but Hawkes plus having shown your first film (Late Bloomers) at the film festival way back in 1996 might help in spades to receive a sophomore showing showcase which would be the case for Julia Dyer's The Playroom. If included, this would surely be included in the U.S Dramatic Comp. Gist: Four children in their attic hideaway make up a fantastic story, while downstairs their parents weave a drunken intrigue of their own. In a lyrical but gripping dual narrative, the story of the children’s life intertwines with the story they make up about their life–until the two stories collide and the delicate family structure collapses. Producers: Stephen Dyer and Angie Meyer(Ioncinema.com Preview Page // IMDb Link)...

Late Bloomers: Five Shows That Are Funnier Now Than When They Started We never thought we'd like Cougar Town either. By Rachel Friedman Fall is here — goodbye endless re-runs and crappy reality shows, and hello TV premieres. Some sitcoms click from the start (see: Modern Family), but others take a while to get good. Here's a look at four returning comedies and one dramedy that you might have written off after the no-laughs pilot or uneven first episodes but which now deserve a second (or third) chance. 1. Parks and Recreation (NBC, entering fourth season) The American version of The Office initially suffered by sticking too closely to the show's original British incarnation. Likewise, Parks and Recreation initially suffered by sticking too closely to The Office during season one. But with mid-level bureaucrat Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler) revamped as a significantly more intelligent version of Michael Scott, [...]...

Informant Media and Forthcoming Films released the trailer for the upcoming comedy “Hysteria.” The film stars Felicity Jones (“The Tempest,” “Like Crazy”), Maggie Gyllenhaal (“The Dark Knight,” “Donnie Darko”), Hugh Dancy (“Black Hawk Down,” “King Arthur”), Rupert Everett (“Shrek 2,” “My Best Friend’s Wedding”) and Jonathan Pryce (“Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl,” “Brazil”). The comedy film is about men using technology and innovation to create a product to excite women—the vibrator. The film is directed by Tanya Wexler (“Ball in the House,” “Finding North”) from the story written by Jonah Lisa Dyer, Stephen Dyer (“Late Bloomers,” “Finding North”) and Howard Gensler. “Hysteria” will be released in the United Kingdom later this year. Check out the trailer below and let us know what you think: Source: YouTube...

1. Five Days of War: Grade F

Well, we’re off to a running stop on this week’s Round-Up. I’m not going to even bother explaining why this poster is terrible, let’s just move on.

2. Late Bloomers: Grade C-

I love the symmetry of the image, however it feels a little naked (yes, I went there) against the rest of the poster. It looks very flat.

3. Space Battleship Yamato: Grade C

If I didn’t find this poster on a respectable site I wouldn’t believe it was a real film. That being said, the Sci-Fi geek in me absolutely loves the very concept of the art, but it is a little sloppy.

4. The Violin: Grade B

I love how this poster is soaked in that moody green. It is a great setting and feel.

5. Final Destination 5: Grade C-

They’re still making these movies,...

"Deadwood" co-stars Molly Parker and John Hawkes ("Winter's Bone") have signed on to star in the indie drama "The Playroom" for Ten96 Films reports Variety.

Set in 1975, the pair will play suburban parents of four. Their volatile teenage daughter (Olivia Harris) acts as a kind of surrogate mother to the younger children, who themselves "have created a make-believe world in their attic hideaway while the parents act out a sordid story below".

Cody Linley also stars as the daughter's boyfriend. Julia Dyer ("Late Bloomers") directs from a script by her sister Gretchen Dyer, while Stephen Dyer ("Hysteria") and Angie Meyer producing. Shooting is currently under way in Dallas.

Shooting has already begun in Dallas, Texas, on “The Playroom,” an independent drama about a dysfunctional family. Veteran Canadian actress Molly Parker and "Winter's Bone" star John Hawkes--who also appeared together in “Deadwood”--will star as the parents of four children in the ’70s including their volatile teenage daughter (Olivia Harris) who "acts as a surrogate mother to the younger children, who have created a make-believe world in their attic hideaway while the parents act out a sordid story below." The film is written by Gretchen Dyer and directed by her sister Julie Dyer. The sisters’ first film, “Late Bloomers,” premiered…...

Hollywood may be obsessed with youth and speed, but just occasionally age and wisdom win out. Joe Queenan on the late bloomers who make a good case for biding one's time

Early next year, Annette Bening will garner an Oscar nomination for her tart, intense performance as Julianne Moore's control-freak lover in The Kids Are All Right. She could just as easily be nominated for her tart, intense performance as a neurotic middle-aged healthcare professional in the underrated film Mother and Child, another engaging arthouse release that surfaced a few months ago. In effect, after more than a decade of working infrequently, and even then mostly appearing in duds (Being Julia, The Women, Running with Scissors ) Annette Bening is making a serious comeback at the age of 52, 20 years after most leading ladies have arrived at the expiration date for their careers.

What makes this return to centre stage even...

As I stumble through American Idol withdrawal and recover from the fact that vanilla is still the flavor of choice in the U.S. whether we're talking ice cream or singers, I've been increasingly thankful for Susan Boyle, the angel on Britain's Got Talent. Whether she wins or loses the chance to sing for the Queen, she is the inspirational poster child for late bloomers everywhere. Besides looking like that crazy spinster aunt in Wal-Mart clothes that your mother always invites to dinner because she lives alone with her cat, Boyle is a creaking forty-eight years old. That's right: she's more than twice the age of Kris Allen, our newly crowned American Idol. Yet, Boyle's age, church lady looks and lousy luck in love didn't deter our feisty lass from climbing up on stage and belting out "I...

• “Late Bloomers,” a film about daring to live out personal passions in the autumn of life, focuses on women resisting the role of subservience thrust upon them in Swiss society. The film has foreshadowed this European country’s political turn-around in a charming social comedy. The term “late bloomers” has become a popular catch-phrase in Switzerland, referring to women in their later years who have the courage to follow their dreams, even where those dreams conflict with traditional societal constraints. With a well-cast and gorgeous setting in the the idyllic world famous Emmental, the Swiss entry for the Academy Awards Foreign Film consideration is a crowd pleaser with a winning formula à la Chocolat or television's The Golden Girls. Late Bloomers is about a widowed woman who fulfills her lifelong dream of opening a Lingerie shop in her conservative village where her son is the priest and everybody knows each other.

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