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James Hunt Oct 9, 2017

Playable DC characters are part of new Moba game Arena Of Valour. We took a look...

Arena Of Valor, which you might also have heard of under its Chinese name King Of Glory, is a 5v5 Moba game developed by Tencent games, makers of the ultra-popular League Of Legends. In many respects, it looks, feels and plays like its stablemate, though with once major difference: this one has playable DC characters in. Is that enough to make you give it a shot? Well, it was for us.

The game’s forthcoming western release means anyone engaging with it will soon be able to take advantage of an absolutely huge userbase. With a reported 80 million daily players worldwide, and 200 million unique players every month, you’re unlikely to be stuck for co-players. At least, we never were.

And indeed, if you, like us, are more of a pick-up-and-play gamer,...

When it comes to the Manhattan Theatre Club’s upcoming production of Lillian Hellman’s The Little Foxes, which will see Laura Linney and Cynthia Nixon playing Regina Hubbard Giddens and Birdie Hubbard in repertory appearing opposite each other during every performance, it’s anybody’s guess at how exactly it’s going to come together. “It’s a big experiment for everybody,” says Linney, who actually suggested that she and Nixon rotate the roles and, admittedly, has no idea if it’s actually going to work. “I love that I have no idea.” For both actors, it’s quite possible the greatest thing about it.

“The bizarre thing is trying to find your own Regina and your own Birdie while the actress across from you is also trying to find it,” Nixon says, while adding that the whole concept is “very liberating.”

“I’m sure Cynthia and I are going to play both parts differently, and who...

The Fire This Time 10 Minute Play Festival 2017 Directed by Cezar Williams Presented by Frigid New York @ Horse Trade at the Kraine Theater, NYC January 19-February 5, 2017

The annual The Fire This Time Festival was begun by artists, for artists, and its purpose is to showcase early-career playwrights of the African diaspora. Traditionally, The Fire This Time has been composed of a variety of events, with the 10 Minute Play Festival serving as the flagship, and this year, its eighth, Tftt has expanded those events beyond the strictly theatrical, including web series and readings by playwrights and sisters Kia and Kara Lee Corthron from their respective debut novels. As an anchor to the festivities (and the only event that isn't free to attend), the The 10 Minute Play Festival has consistently put forth collections of strong, exciting work, and this year's group of seven short plays, performed by a group of seven actors, is no exception.

Joseph Fiennes' controversial debut as Michael Jackson is officially here.

The 46-year-old actor joins Stockard Channing as Elizabeth Taylor and Brian Cox as Marlon Brando in a half-hour episode of Urban Myths, an eight-part series focusing on rumored celebrity experiences. In "Elizabeth, Michael & Marlon," Fiennes portrays Jackson in a retelling of the time the three stars embarked on a road trip after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Watch: Michael Jackson Once Told Oprah Winfrey He Didn't Want a White Actor to Portray Him on Screen

Fiennes' casting in the role understandably made headlines when it was announced last year, after outlets and individuals alike criticized the decision to cast a white man, Fiennes, as the African-American pop icon.

Sky Arts

See the trailer (which also features other scenes from Urban Myths, including Iwan Rheon as Adolf Hitler, Rupert Grint as "Hitler's friend," Ben Chaplin as Cary Grant, Aidan Gillen as Dr. Timothy Leary, Eddie Marsan as [link...

As we head into the holiday season, Wamg brings you our list of the Best Non-Traditional Christmas Movies to watch after the Holiday ham, pretty presents, and multiple viewings of White Christmas, Home Alone and Miracle On 34th Street are a thing of Christmas Past.

Our choices are filled snarky mistletoe carnage and crafty comedy – Geek style. Santa Claus is coming to town in these “More Naughty Than Nice”. films.

We’ve made a list and checked it twice with our lineup of not just the 20 Best holiday films but the Top 21 Non-Traditional Christmas Movies. After the success of Krampus, we just had to add it!

We kick off our list with our Honorable Mention –

Jingle All The Way

Christmas; It’s the most magical time of the year. High powered businessman Howard Langston (Arnold Schwarzenegger), is hard at work taking last-minute orders from customers to whom he just can...

Jeremy Irons is in many respects the quintessential English film actor. That’s not simply because of the honeyed diction and innate elegance, but the versatility that has enabled him to travel with ease between romantic leading man, edgy character actor and sinister villain, towards an Indian summer of ever-dependable supporting player.

Read More: Jeremy Irons Knocks ‘Batman v Superman’: It’s ‘Overstuffed’ & ‘Very Muddled’

Think James Mason. In fact, Irons and Mason even have a role in common – the riskiest of roles, Nabokov’s infamous pedophile Humbert Humbert, Mason most famously in Kubrick’s “Lolita” of 1962, Irons for Adrian Lyne in 1997. It’s difficult to imagine many Americans jumping at a character who came second in Time’s “Top 10 Worst Fictional Fathers,” or possessing the nuance necessary to make us almost like the man.

Again like many Brits, Irons is classically trained (at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School,...

Welcome to the latest episode of The ScreamCast! Each episode sees hosts Sean Duregger and Brad Henderson take a look at another slice of home video horror.

Don’t forget to check out TheScreamCast.com for the show notes and for more news and reviews of Scream Factory releases and make sure to follow them on Twitter too!

Episode 88: Scream For Help On Your Last Shift

Anthony Diblasi’s Last Shift appeared on many “Best Of 2015” horror lists, so Sean, Brad and Bj decide to evaluate it themselves. Does Last Shift deserve the praise it’s received? What do you think? We also dive in to 1984’s Scream For Help and 1988’s Deadly Dreams!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Episode 89: Remembering Bowie, Lemmy, Rickman & More

On this week’s show we say our goodbye’s to some legends that have recently left us, Lemmy Kilmister, David Bowie,...

Little Thing, Big Thing Written by Donal O’Kelly Directed by Jim Culleton Fishamble: The New Play Company 59E59 Theaters, NYC September 2-27, 2015

A thief and a nun duck into a closet under the stairs: this is not the setup for a joke but for Little Thing, Big Thing, the newest work from award-winning playwright and performer Donal O’Kelly, having made its way to the United States as part of New York City’s annual 1st Irish Festival. Ex-con Larry O’Donnell ends up in that closet with Sister Martha McCann, who is returning from Nigeria to oversee the sale of the thematically evocative Lazarus Convent, when their paths cross by chance in the midst of his pulling off one last job. Larry’s final heist, a valuable statue of the Virgin, is interrupted because Martha has a second task in Ireland: to fulfil a death-bed request to hand-deliver a mysterious roll of film,...

From Muppet Treasure Island to Speed, we take a look at the 90s soundtracks that deserve another listen...

Ah, the 1990s. The decade that brought us The Lion King. Titanic. Quentin Tarantino. That wordless bathroom scene in Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet. Angelo Badalamenti's Twin Peaks. Duel of the Fates from Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. In the Mood for Love.

It was a good 10 years for film music, no doubt.

But scratch the surface of 1991 through 1999 and there are tons of good scores ready to spring a surprise on your ears. Some were attached to sorely underrated movies, others were overshadowed by wildly successful ones, and some have simply been forgotten in the passage of time.

Here, in no particular order, are the top 25 underappreciated film soundtracks from the 1990s.

1. Chaplin - John Barry

Okay, let's start with a big one. Richard Attenborough. Robert Downey Jr. John Barry.

Here's the first of our episode-by-episode annotations of Marvel's Daredevil series, released today on Netflix...

With the whole series of Daredevil now available on Netflix, the race is on to reach the ending before someone spoils it for you. But that presents us with a problem. How do we approach reviews? It's not much use speculating about the future of the series when it's available at a moment's notice, but watching the whole thing in one go for a single review is impractical for anyone with a day job and personal relationships to maintain – to say nothing of how difficult it is to critically appraise 12 hours of television if you don't savour the instalments properly.

That's why, instead of traditional reviews, we're trying something new. An episode-by-episode unpicking of the show, looking at its techniques, characters and use of the source material. Call them annotations, call them show notes, call...

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Believe it or not, but it’s been nearly four years since we were blessed with a new Harry Potter film. And it’s been 13 years since Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone hit theaters. Now, the actors who portrayed the beloved child wizards are all grown up. Some are movie stars. Some are television staples. And some are just plain hot.

The most recent Potter alum to hit it big is Alfred Enoch, who played Hogwarts classmate Dean Thomas in the films. Now, Enoch stars alongside Academy Award nominee Viola Davis in the hit ABC show How to Get Away with Murder. Not too shabby for the once-little Gryffindor. But, of course, he’s not the only one. Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter) and Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) are two of the biggest film stars on the planet, and Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley) is set to...

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Believe it or not, but it’s been nearly four years since we were blessed with a new Harry Potter film. And it’s been 13 years since Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone hit theaters. Now, the actors who portrayed the beloved child wizards are all grown up. Some are movie stars. Some are television staples. And some are just plain hot.

The most recent Potter alum to hit it big is Alfred Enoch, who played Hogwarts classmate Dean Thomas in the films. Now, Enoch stars alongside Academy Award nominee Viola Davis in the hit ABC show How to Get Away with Murder. Not too shabby for the once-little Gryffindor. But, of course, he’s not the only one. Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter) and Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) are two of the biggest film stars on the planet, and Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley) is set to...

Last year Wamg brought you our list of the 15 Best Non-Traditional Christmas Movies to watch after the Holiday ham, pretty presents, and multiple viewings of White Christmas, Home Alone and Miracle On 34th Street were a thing of Christmas Past.

Minus the warm and fuzzy, our choices are filled snarky mistletoe carnage and crafty comedy – Geek style.

We made a list and checked it twice with our new lineup of the Top 20 Non-Traditional Christmas Movies. You better believe that Santa Claus is coming to town in these “More Naughty Than Nice”. films.

We kick off our list with our Honorable Mention -

Jingle All The Way

Christmas; It’s the most magical time of the year. High powered businessman Howard Langston (Arnold Schwarzenegger), is hard at work taking last-minute orders from customers to whom he just can’t say no; like his son, Jamie (Jake Lloyd), asking for the hottest...

Continuing from yesterday's amazing interview, Rupert Grint and Alan Rickman sat down with The Huffington Post to talk about "Cbgb" as promotion continues for the film which will hit more theaters this weekend. In this lovely new interview we learn all about how Halloween was for Rupert including how he never got to trick-or-treat as a kid, that he made his own Play-Doh costume, and his favorite Halloween candy. Rupert also talks about reuniting with Alan as well as who else he'd love to reunite with. And he answers whether he likes stage or film better. Are you enjoying the theater work? Are you more of a theater guy or a film guy? Grint: I don’t know, really. This is my first theater experience, and it’s very different. I wanted to just try it; it’s something I’ve always wanted to do. Just the thought of it scares me.

Yes they’re still calling it a pilot, but at least Syfy is issuing press releases about the Dominion project in development. Hopefully now that they have the major casting out of the way, they can get going on this and we’ll be hearing that it’s great and that it’s green-lit for a series run.

Syfy Rounds Out Cast For Dominion Pilot Anthony Stewart Head Is “David Weel,” Roxanne McKee To Play “Claire Rysen,” Luke Allen-gale Is “William Weel,” And Shivani Ghai Guest Stars As “Arika” In Supernatural Series Pilot Produced By Universal Cable Productions

New York – September 24, 2013 – Syfy announces additional casting for its upcoming supernatural drama pilot, Dominion with the signings of Anthony Stewart Head, Roxanne McKee, Luke Allen-Gale and guest star Shivani Ghai. Produced by Universal Cable Productions, the pilot is set to begin shooting this month in Cape Town, South Africa.

Based on characters...

Odd List Simon Brew Ryan Lambie 19 Sep 2013 - 07:20

From dramas to action and everything in between, here's our pick of 20 underrated films from 1990...

Think back to the big films of 1990, and you'll probably immediately come up with things like Ghost, the year's top-grossing film, or maybe Home Alone, which made a star out of the young Macaulay Culkin.

If you're into sci-fi or action, you might pluck Total Recall, Back To The Future Part III or even Die Hard 2 out of your memory banks. But what about all those movies that didn't make it into the year's top 10 ranking films? As ever, there's a huge number of duds and forgettable flops, but there were plenty of films that were wrongly overlooked, too.

That's where this list comes in, which aims to shed a bit of light on 20 films that were either unfairly overlooked by audiences at the time, or...

Odd List Simon Brew Ryan Lambie

From dramas to action and everything in between, here's our pick of 20 underrated films from 1990...

Think back to the big films of 1990, and you'll probably immediately come up with things like Ghost, the year's top-grossing film, or maybe Home Alone, which made a star out of the young Macaulay Culkin.

If you're into sci-fi or action, you might pluck Total Recall, Back To The Future Part III or even Die Hard 2 out of your memory banks. But what about all those movies that didn't make it into the year's top 10 ranking films? As ever, there's a huge number of duds and forgettable flops, but there were plenty of films that were wrongly overlooked, too.

That's where this list comes in, which aims to shed a bit of light on 20 films that were either unfairly overlooked by audiences at the time, or have faded rapidly from general discussions about cinema.

The title of this panel was Financing and Packaging: From Indie to Studio, but in fact, the most studio-like film, Rush , by the major director, Ron Howard, and produced by Brit indie production company Revolution (Andrew Eaton) and Hollywood-based Cross Creek (Brian Oliver), is actually quite independent.

Rush (U.S. Universal, International Sales by Exclusive)

Ron Howard and his producing partner Brian Grazer whose imagine Entertainment have had an overall deal at Universal for 27 years, however, this mid-budget range film of some $50,000,000 was considered not "big enough" for the majors.

To read more about this complex and fascinating film and its international film business background, read the following articles which are quoted throughout this article with thanks and acknowledgement to:

· Variety September 13, 2013 (reprinted at the end of this blog) · Wall Street Journal, September 5, 2013 · The Hollywood Reporter September 28, 2011

Aside from major director Ron Howard himself, the second “major” element of the film is that Universal is the North American distributor of the film. This happens through the three year minimum-6-picture distribution deal Brian Oliver’s Cross Creek has with Universal in which Cross Creek produces and finances either its own films or films chosen from Universal’s development slate. Cross Creek is set up to generate up to four films per year, with Universal to distribute at least two of them with a wide-release commitment.

Isa (International Sales Agent) Exclusive Media is also an independent. This too is the result of Oliver’s deal with Exclusive to jointly finance two projects per year.

Cross Creek, putting its own cash into the project, split the cost of the picture with Exclusive who financed it through a bank loan made against pre-sales generated in 2011 at the Afm. With Howard there to promote the project to buyers, Exclusive secured around $33 million in foreign pre-sales. See Cinando’s list of distributors .

Additionally, Oliver and Eaton structured the project as a U.K.- German co-production, enabling them to secure about $12 million in soft money from Germany (Egoli Tossell) in accordance with U.K.’s co-production treaty. As a result, U.K. rights ended up with Studiocanal.

Brian Oliver is a “one of Hollywood’s biggest and more unusual financiers of risky films, with coin coming mostly from oil and real estate investments in Texas”. This major Hollywood financier/ producer takes chances which prove his astute, if askew, view of what makes a “Hollywood” picture an indie at the same time, as shown by his credits, The Ides of March and Black Swan.

Andrew Eaton is a British producer with deep Hollywood connections through the British community here, e.g., Eric Fellner of Working Title, the British production company currently owned by Universal. (Parenthetically, I bought U.S. rights to Working Title’s first film, My Beautiful Laundrette for Lorimar along with Orion Classics and so I was quite thrilled to have a chance to be in touch with the talented Brits once again).

Working Title had worked with Andrew Easton on Frost/Nixon. Eric Fellner loved the script and offered it to Universal for funding. However, as said, Universal passed on it because it was too small.

“It is going to be easy for people to think this is a Hollywood movie, and it just is not,” quotes Variety from the film’s British screenwriter, Peter Morgan, who penned Frost/Nixon which was also directed by Howard. “It is a British independent film directed by a Hollywood director.”

Eaton and Oliver spoke of how they put this film together.

“We must champion the fact that this is basically 80% a British film in terms of the people who worked on it, the way it was structured and the way we ran it,” says Eaton, who was behind such indie films as 24 Hour Party People and the Red Riding TV series.

Can a Song Save Your Life? (U.S. UTA, Isa: Exclusive)

Exclusive has another film here, Can a Song Save Your Life? which is also repped by Rena Ronson, Co-Head of the Independent Film Group of UTA. Directed by John Carney who came to the public’s attention with his micro-budgeted Once which plays on stage here in Toronto at the moment, in New York and elsewhere regularly. The Weinstein Company picked it up in Toronto, reportedly paying around a $7 million minimum guarantee for U.S. rights with a P&A commitment of at least $20 million.

UTA as an agency also packages both large (studio) and smaller indie films. Rena Ronson, the co-head of UTA Indie explained how her own indie roots -- first at indie distributor Fox-Lorber and continuing into international sales before becoming the “indie agent” at Wma, succeeding the “indie” founder, Bobbi Thompson, have taught her to speak the language of the international as well as the independent film business. She knows the major modes of operating as well as she knows the independent style of business. She further explained that the successes of the larger films permit the “smaller”, i.e., “indie” films to be made.

UTA repped films in Toronto are listed below. For a full report of rights sold, before, during and after Toronto, watch SydneysBuzz.com for the Fall 2013 Rights Roundup.

Can A Song Save Your Life?

Writer/Director: John Carney Starring: Mark Ruffalo, Keira Knightley, Hailee Steinfeld, Adam Levine, Catherine Keener, Mos Def, Cee-Lo Green Publicity: Falco / Shannon Treusch, Monica Delameter U.S. Producer Rep: UTA / CAA . Isa: Exclusive Media Group

U.S. rights were acquired at Tiff 13 by TWC for a record breaking $7 million.

Since first announcing it in Cannes 2012, Exclusive has made other deals as well for Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan (Tanweer), Germany (Studiocanal), Japan (Pony Canyon Inc), Philippines (Solar Entertainment), Russia (A Company), So. Korea ( Pancinema), Switzerland ( Ascot Elite Entertainment Group ), Taiwan ( Serenity Entertainment International ), Turkey (D Productions), the Middle East ( Front Row Filmed Entertainment).

Tiff Special Presentations:

Hateship, Loveship

Director: Liza Johnson Writer: Mark Poirier Writer (Novel): Alice Munro Starring: Kristen Wiig, Guy Pearce, Hailee Steinfeld, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Nick Nolte Publicity: Prodigy PR, Erik Bright

North American Sale: UTA / Cassian Elwes. Isa: The Weinstein Co. Sena has rights for Iceland.

The F Word

Director: Michael Dowse Writer: Elan Mastai Writers (Play): Michael Rinaldi & T.J. Dawe Starring: Daniel Radcliffe, Zoe Kazan, Rafe Spall, Adam Driver, Mackenzie Davis, Amanda Crew Publicity: Strategy PR / Cynthia Schwartz, Michael Kupferberg Us Sale: UTA / Lichter, Grossman, Nichols, Adler & Feldman. Isa: eOne

After UTA sold the The F Word to CBS Films for the U.S. for around $3 million in Toronto, Entertainment One Films International completed other international sales. Besides Canada and the U.K., eOne itself will release the film in Australia/New Zealand, Benelux and Spain feeding its own international distribution pipeline. Other sales include Germany to Senator Entertainment, Middle East to Front Row Entertainment, Nigeria toRed Mist, Russia to Carmen Film Group, Turkey to Mars Entertainment Group

Night Moves

Writer/Director: Kelly Reichart Writer: Jonathan Raymond Starring: Dakota Fanning, Jesse Eisenberg, Peter Sarsgaard, Alia Shawkat Publicity: Ginsberg/Libby, Chris Libby North American Sale: UTA Isa: The Match Factory

Tiff Vanguard

The Sacrament

Writer/Director: Ti West Starring: Joe Swanberg, Aj Bowen, Amy Seimetz, Kate Lyn Sheil, Gene Jones Publicity: Dda, Dana Archer, Alice Zhou North American Sale: UTA / CAA Isa: Im Global sold to Pegasus Motion Pictures Distribution Ltd . For China

As of this writing, rather 1 hour ago, Magnolia Pictures, which lost on an earlier bidding war here for Joe, is finalizing a deal for the picture reportedly for seven figures.

Coincidentallywith the beginning of the Toronto Film Festival, the front page of L.A. Times quoted Rena Ronson in an article called "Making history as cameras roll" (print edition) or "Wadjda' director makes her mark in Saudi cinema" (online edition) about Wadjda , (Isa: The Match Factory) last year’s Venice and Telluride film which Rena had spotted at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival, where it won a script award. It was written and directed by a woman which is notable in such a male-dominated part of the world. She met the writer-director, Haifaa Mansour, and that led to working with her for the next two years to finance the film. Its $2.5m budget was backed in part by the Rotana Group, the largest media company in the Middle East, owned primarily by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. The German production company Razor Film owned and operated by Gerhard Meixner and Roman Paul whose first coproduction in 2005, Paradise Now brought them into international prominence and who also picked up last year’s Tiff groundbreaking film from Afghanistan,The Patience Stone, and previously coproduced Waltz With Bashir, came on board and brought German broadcast deals and German film funds as well.

Doha and Film Financing

The fourth panelist was Paul Miller, Head of Film Financing, from the Doha Film Institute , Qatar's first international organization dedicated to film financing, production, education and two film festivals. Doha encourages submission for financing film financing opportunities from anywhere in the world. The Dfi Grants program supports first- and second-time filmmakers in producing and developing their own stories. There are two funding rounds per year. Applications are considered from three regions (basically divided into the Middle East, developing nations and the rest of the world – with some exceptions -- each with different eligibility criteria.

Consideration for funding is open to feature-length films in development, production and post-production, as well as short films in production and post-production. Since 2010, Dfi has provided funding to more than 138 filmmakers.

Beyond the regional grants program, Dfi also invests in a diverse slate of international productions to encourage greater collaboration, mentorship and co‑production opportunities between Gulf countries and the rest of the world. Co-financing applications apply to both Middle Eastern and international feature films, television and web series. Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis throughout the year.

Four films at Tiff that Doha has helped finance:

Mohammed Malas’s Ladder to Damacus, screening in Tiff’s Contemporary World Cinema section; Jasmila Žbanic’s For Those Who Can Tell No Tales in the Special Presentation section. Both films were co-financed by Dfi. Dfi grant recipients Néjib Belkadhi’s Bastardo and Mais Darwazah’s My Love Awaits Me by the Sea screening in the Contemporary World Cinema and Discovery sections, respectively.

The fifth panelist, Ted Hope, Director of the San Francisco Film Society, a non-profit training, festival, and funding operation is known to everyone from his history with Good Machine (which was acquired by Universal and renamed Focus Features), and from his blog Hope for Film/ Truly Free Film . In his always-inimitable fashion, Ted proposed a new sort of financing, called "staged financing", based on a progressive meeting of certain criterion from development through distribution. This way of financing is similar to the venture capital models of financing. His broad ideas on what has to change with the industry's funding and packaging methods brought the panelists and the audience to heel at attention. I reprint his blog after this because this idea goes against the current grain of financing an entire film which may or may not prove to be the final box office bingo winner it always purports to be when securing full financing.

The Sffs provided some funding to Thomas Oliver's 1982 which is in Tiff this year. Aside from winning Us in Progress’ $60,000 in post-production services at this year’s Champs Elysees Film Festival, 1982 also received Sffs’s $85,000 post production grant and participated in the Sffs’s A2E labs. The film is being represented by Kevin Iwashina’s Preferred Content.

The panel became very animated as Ted Hope and Rena Ronson faced off about whether a film is made for a broad audience or whether, if targeted correctly, it could actually make money with niche audiences. As always, the two of them, both equally astute, brought much to bear on both sides of the argument. And, I, as the panel’s moderator, hereby declare, They are both right.

The broader the audience the more potential for making money.

However, as Ted points out, with crowd sourcing, crowd funding and crowd theatrical exhibition, there are many other ways beyond ticket purchases that filmmakers can offer in order to make money with their targeted audience.

This, as well as the great contributions made by Doha’s Paul Miller and Revolution’s Andrew Eaton could have extended the panel into a full day. Paul Oliver of Cross Creek was the quietest, perhaps most reticent, of the speakers, but he amply demonstrated that he is one who puts his money where his mouth is. His acumen and taste make us all grateful for his existence as he is a pivotal point person in creating works of art that create substantial revenues for a sustainable art house film business.

The audience as well was most enthusiastic with their questions and post panel discussions with panelists who stayed to talk.

Articles Reprinted Here:

Truly Free Film

Staged Financing Must Become Film Biz’s Immediate Goal

Posted: 06 Sep 2013 05:15 Am Pdt

Each day I become more and more convinced that staged financing could be a cure to much of the Film Biz’s ills. Staged financing? What? Is the phrase not exactly center of your conversations right now? Why not?!! Whatsamattawidyou? Don’t you know a good solution when you see one?

Although it already exists in many fields, and even in a few small patches of our own yard, I recognize that a staged financing strategy is not yet the force behind Indieland’s own gardening. I am however growing convinced it could yield a far more fruitful harvest than our current methods. A staged-financing ecosystem can’t be built in a one-off manner though. Although it also does not need to the rule of the realm, it needs a permanent eco-system to support it.

Staged financing is part of a much bigger solution that we urgently need to bring to our industry: a sustainable investor class . We need smart money and need to stop seeking, encouraging, and propagating dumb money. Most film investors get out, win or lose, by their third film (I have been told this and don’t have the stats to back it up now, but if you do, please share — otherwise just trust that is what my experience has shown). The value of most independent money in the film biz is the money itself, and that is not good for anyone.

Staged financing is exactly what it says to be. I know in this world such literalness is a strange thing, but there is it. Staged financing is a funding process that is there for each distinct stage. In comparison, it is the opposite of up-front financing — the type that monopolizes the narrative feature world. I am proposing that we institutionalize the staged-financing process and make it easier to finance your film in drips and drabs. Why am I so bullish on what probably sounds like hell to many? Why do I think it will save indie film? Let’s count the ways.

Staged financing increases the predictability of success. Investors can base their continued commitment on a proof of prinicipal instead of just a pitch. The longer one waits the more they know — of course the longer one waits the lower the chance for their to be the opportunity for investment, so there. The more investors can project or even predict their success, the longer they will stay in the game, and the more that will gather to pay — i.e. more capital at play! Staged financing allows filmmakers and their supporters to pivot based on real world data. The old way had very little it could do when new information hit. Your film (and investment) could be rendered obsolete over night. But that does not have to be a done deal is this new world. This is just one of the many reasons for #1 above of course. Staged financing diversifies the creative class. Wouldn’t it be great if the film biz was actually a meritocracy? Well, if people had to make good movies to complete their financing, wouldn’t that be a bit closer to the case? Staged financing gives all people the opportunity to prove they have a good idea, whether that idea is completed or not. It is not about who you know, but about what you’ve done and can do. Documentary film — compared to the narrative world — already has a great deal of staged financing institutionalized — and benefits from gender proportional representation among directors. Need I say more?Staged financing allows ambitious artistic work to flourish. Instead of just having “commercial elements”, unique and inspiring work can be recognized for the potential it truly has. Instead of being rewarded for being able to earn trust or arrogantly claim to know what one is doing, staged financing allows good work to be rewarded for being good work. Currently, we mistake confidence for capability and those that boast to be able to predict what the end product will be (where there is no way that they will actually know what the 100+ decisions each day will yield), get to play — not the work that delivers something new and wonderful. Staged financing rewards quality over risk mitigation. Staged financing is actually a better form of risk mitigation than the present form that is only based on regurgitating what has already proven successful. When we limit risk by mimicking what has worked in the past, all we are doing is guessing and covering our ass — and this leads to a film culture of movie titles overrun with numerals. We live in an era of abundance, and as comforting as the familiar may be, we have more access to it than ever before. We rarely need the new version of it. We will however need truly original work more and more as time goes on as we will drowning in the repetitive. How will we prove what works? Staged financing, my friend, staged financing. Staged financing creates a better project as it incentivizes the creators every step of the way. Not that you truly need to incentivize those that are in the passion industries for the right reason, but it never hurts to weed out those that are in it for the wrong reason. When your financing is based on your work and not your connections or investors’ fears, you will do all you can to make each stage of financing shine, justify itself, and be truly competitive. Staged financing requires you to walk a series of steps, proving you have earned the right with every advance — and you better do your homework if you don’t want to get left behind. Staged financing requires you choose your initial partners wisely. It’s not just about the terms of the deal that should determine whom your investors are — but that is how we generally act nowadays. Everyone should instead seek value-add investors. You should get more than just money from your investors. You should benefit from their expertise. Filmmakers, agents, lawyers, and managers, often are willing to leap into bed with anyone who offers the most cash — there’s a name for that practice and it should not be film investment. Staged financing means the creators will have “skin in the game”. When it is an up-front finance model, the creators are not working for a payout in success but working just for the upfornt fees (or some semblance thereof); they may have “profit participation” but basically the only anticipated earnings are what is in the budget. It becomes increasingly difficult to motivate the creative team to be engaged in the needed work after the film premieres. Investors have long recognized that this is not the most beneficial arrangement, yet what can they do? The answer my friend, is… yup, you know the song I am singing: everyone loves that staged financing! Staged financing is a time-tested process that has already been adopted by many industries . Staged financing is the modus operandi of Silicon Valley and all the Vc firms. Other industries, from mining onwards, have seen real benefits from the process. Why do we limit our success and not apply proven models to our field? Could it be that somewhere someone is desperately clutching on to what ever paltry power they perceive themselves to possess? Hmmm… If they don’t offer the model you want at the store, build a new model — or maybe even a chain of stores. Staged financing gives producers of quality work more power. The main objection to staged financing is that it gives financiers more power. That is only true if you are making crap. Or mediocre work. If you are making something wonderfully astounding you will never struggle to progress to the next round — and in fact you will be able to improve your terms. And investors won’t complain either, because they now can have to know a good thing when they see one.

So if Staged Financing is this marvelous thing, why have our leaders not yet delivered it to you? Well, they don’t care about you; didn’t you know that?

And if Staged Financing could really save Indie Film, why has the community not constructed this marvelous ecosystem yet? Well, we’ve all been too busy chasing shiny objects and marveling at the reflections fed back of us.

But change is here. We have hope. We can build it better together. And I have already started. The San Francisco Film Society is committed to it. We have others who want to be part of. We are have spots for more to join in. And we are going to help a few select projects really rock this world.

Watch this space. Let’s do it together and truly astonish the world with your awe inspiring work. Just don’t be slack, okay?

Variety, August 21, 2013:

“Rush,” the high-octane car racing film about the public rivalry between legendary Formula One drivers Niki Lauda and James Hunt during the 1970s, has all the markings of tinseltown’s latest flashy biopic, withRon Howard at the wheel, Chris Hemsworth as its star, and Universal Pictures releasing the film Sept. 27. But that assumption couldn’t be further from the truth.

“It is going to be easy for people to think this is a Hollywood movie, and it just is not,” says the upcoming film’s British screenwriter, Peter Morgan, who penned “Frost/Nixon,” also directed by Howard. “It is a British independent film directed by a Hollywood director.” Get Weekly Online News and alerts free to your inbox

As the majors focus more on putting their money behind mega-budgeted projects with built-in brand awareness — sequels, reboots, films based on toys, videogames and comicbooks — filmmakers are finding Hollywood’s studio system rapidly shifting under their feet.

“Because studios are less interested in the midbudget area, there is a massive opportunity for independents to step into that (area) at the moment,” says “Rush” producer Andrew Eaton of London-based Revolution Films.

Indeed, it’s getting harder to set up a midbudget range original project at a studio, even for veteran filmmakers like Howard and his producing partner Brian Grazer, whose Imagine Entertainment has had an overall deal at Universal for 27 years (the longest standing deal U has had in its 100-year history with a production company). That’s forced directors to look elsewhere to tackle the kinds of films now considered too risky to make or the ones that won’t fill retail shelves with merchandise.

Another Hollywood vet, producer Marc Platt, who’s had a production deal at Universal since 1998 after stepping down as its production head, similarly had to find indie financing for his film “2 Guns” after Universal said it would not bankroll the picture but simply distribute it.

With “Rush,” Howard found himself in an entirely new role as the director of a $50 million film that was his first to be independently financed — through a series of bonds, contingencies and pre-sales. He also was a director for hire, replacing Paul Greengrass, who was originally set to bring the showy personalities of Hunt (Hemsworth), a British playboy; and the more serious Austrian champion Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) to the big screen.

“We must champion the fact that this is basically 80% a British film in terms of the people who worked on it, the way it was structured and the way we ran it,” says Eaton. The exec, who was behind such indie films as “24 Hour Party People” and the “Red Riding” series, is modest, and like most Brits politely shies away from the spotlight, tending not to grab credit even when its due.

But he believes “Rush” shows off Blighty’s mettle.

“These are the kinds of films we should be making in the U.K. because we can do it, and we can do it for better value of money,” he says.

Morgan began writing the story of Lauda, a friend of his wife’s, on spec some years ago, intrigued by the driver’s courageous comeback just 40 days after a devastating crash at the 1976 German Grand Prix that severely burned his face and saw him lapse into a coma, and how that might play against Hunt’s notorious womanizing and party lifestyle that gained him rock-star status.

Eager to work with Eaton again after Fernando Meirelles’ “360,” Morgan showed the producer the first draft of “Rush,” and Eaton was hooked.

“Andrew was always going to be a great fit for this project,” Morgan says. “If (the) responsibility was to make this at a price, Andrew could do this. He could make a $50 million film feel like a $150 million film.”

With Greengrass, another Brit, attached to direct, Morgan showed the script to close friend Eric Fellner at his Universal-owned British production outfit Working Title. Fellner, who had worked with him on “Frost/Nixon,” loved the new script and offered it to Universal for funding.

But the studio passed, considering it risky subject matter, given the biopic elements and low profile of F1 racing in the U.S. Universal also didn’t believe the film could be made for the right price. Still Fellner stayed onboard, and his contacts in the F1 arena proved invaluable. His relationships with Ferrari and McLaren thanks to his work on documentary “Senna” enabled “Rush” to enlist the brands in the pic without losing editorial control.

“Ron (Howard) jokes that my major contribution was engine noise,” Fellner says. “Maybe I can take credit for a bit of that.”

Soon after Universal passed, Cross Creek Pictures topper Brian Oliver reached out to Eaton to finance the project — so eager that he offered to put up $2 million before he even signed the deal so that Eaton could order replicas of the 1970s cars to be ready in time for the shoot. He also was instrumental in steering Hemsworth toward the project.

“Typically we don’t spend that kind of money without knowing the movie is going and the budget is done,” Oliver says. “But I was passionate about the script, and I really thought it was a film with a lot of heart, not just a race car movie.”

Cross Creek, also behind “The Ides of March” and “Black Swan,” has quickly become one of Hollywood’s biggest and more unusual financiers of risky films, with coin coming mostly from oil and real estate investments in Texas.

“He’s an unusual maverick in Hollywood because he really fought to get the budget to the highest level he could,” says Eaton of Oliver. “There’s no bullshit with him — he gets stuff done.” Adds Fellner: “Without Brian, the film wouldn’t have gotten off of the ground. He put his money where his mouth is.”

Shortly after funding started coming together, Greengrass dropped off the project due, ironically, to his issues with the budget. Within 24 hours, Morgan and Fellner enticed Howard to come onboard. The financing arrangement intrigued him, but what really attracted Howard was the ability to re-create the world of Formula One in the 1970s “when sex was safe and driving was dangerous,” as he has said in past interviews.

“Ron was incredibly gracious in trusting us to deliver,” Eaton says. “He was very smart about knowing we needed to make this film in a different way. He’d never made a film with a bond before, and never made a film with a contingency before, but he rolled up his sleeves and was ready to learn.” Some of that indie spirit has already rubbed off on Howard, who is now sticking with a mostly British crew on his next project, “In the Heart of the Sea,” including “Rush” cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle and costume designer Julian Day. “Heart” lenses in London.

Exclusive Media came in as the final partner on “Rush,” brought in by Oliver under his deal with Exclusive to jointly finance two projects per year.

Cross Creek split the cost of the pic with Exclusive, with the former putting its own cash in to the pic and the latter financing through a bank loan made against pre-sales generated in 2011 at the Afm, where Howard helped shop the project to buyers. The move proved a success, as Exclusive secured $33 million in foreign pre-sales.

Additionally, Oliver and Eaton structured the project as a U.K.-German co-production, enabling them to secure about $12 million in soft money.

As a result, U.K. rights ended up going to Studiocanal. Universal agreed to distribute “Rush” in the U.S. through its output deal with Cross Creek.

Eaton pressed to put all of the money raised on the screen. “Rush” became the highest-budget film he had ever worked with after 2000’s “The Claim,” which cost $18 million to produce.

“(‘Rush’) was financed in exactly the same way we finance every independent film, and we approached shooting in the same way as we do everything — you try to put as much money as you can onscreen,” Eaton says. “It’s about not wasting money on things you don’t need, like private jets and extravagances.”

Hollywood has tried to bring to life the world of Formula One before.

Sylvester Stallone directed “Driven,” which originally was set in the world of F1, before he changed course and based it on rival Cart racing, instead.

The reason? To gain access to F1, filmmakers must first get the greenlight from the often polarizing Bernie Ecclestone, the 82-year-old billionaire who holds a tight grip on the racing league that has long counted the elite as fans, including Carlos Slim, the world’s richest man, and celebs including Michael Fassbender, Patrick Dempsey, Gordon Ramsey, George Lucas, and Cirque de Soleil founder Guy Laliberte.

Although Stallone tried to gain Ecclestone’s approval, “I apologize to fans of Formula 1, but there is a certain individual there who runs the sport that has his own agenda,” Stallone said in 2000. “F1 is very formal, and it’s very hard to get to know people.”

David Cronenberg also planned to direct a tentpole around F1 for Paramount, in 1986, with the director scouting the project by attending Grand Prix races in Australia and Mexico. The film, “Red Cars,” would have revolved around American driver Phil Hill winning the world championship for Ferrari in 1961. Plans were shelved when Ecclestone decided not to support the project. Instead, Cronenberg published a limited edition art book based on the screenplay in 2005.

One of the few cinematic standouts so far is Asif Kapadia’s documentary “Senna,” about the charismatic Brazilian driver Ayrton Senna, killed in a race in 1994 that’s show in the docu. “Senna” went on to earn $8.2 million, and helped educate viewers of the sport by focusing not on the races but Senna’s iconic presence and his impact on pop culture.

“Rush” is looking to put a spotlight on the personalities behind the wheel and the often riveting rivalries between drivers — what many consider the real draw to the sport. Bruhl has compared them to “modern knights constantly facing death.”

As the film races toward its September release — it will be shown at the Toronto Film Festival out of competition — Howard has screened it for not only racing fans but Formula One, itself.

He recently showed the film to a group of F1 drivers (including Lauda, Lewis Hamilton, Nico Rosberg and Felipe Massa) at Germany’s Grand Prix, calling that audience the toughest test so far, and comparing the experience to screening “Apollo 13” to Nasa’s astronauts and mission controllers in 1995.

In his efforts to promote the film, Howard has called the Hunt-Lauda rivalry one of the greatest in all of sports. “Their story is so remarkable, you (could) only do it if it was true, because people wouldn’t quite believe it. They were willing to risk their lives to attain this elite status. They paid a price for it, but they defined themselves.”

Morgan also has been doing his part to reassure F1 fans that the film is authentic, stressing that it’s about the people in the cars, and not the sport itself.

Any way the wheel’s spun, it’s clear the film’s overall success will largely be driven by how it plays overseas. “Rush” will need to appeal to an international audience that’s more familiar with F1 — a sport second in popularity only to soccer — than to those in the U.S.

But Howard needs to hook moviegoers closer to home — making the American director’s job a much tougher sell.

It’s not really that surprising that there’s nothing all that American about “Rush.”

Formula One is still struggling to find an audience in the U.S. It’s looking to change that through a new $3 million broadcasting deal with NBC Sports that airs 13 races on the cable channel, two on CNBC, and four on NBC. The Monaco Grand Prix was the first of four F1 races to air live on NBC this year, with the final race taking place Nov. 24 from Brazil.

Ratings have averaged a 0.3 rating, although the Monaco race was watched by 1.5 million viewers, making it the most-watched Formula One race on U.S. television in six years, and up 40% over last year’s race when it aired on Speed TV, Nielsen said.

Promos have emphasized the speed of F1’s jetfighter cars, its international appeal and Olympics-like profiles of the drivers.

Formula One also is looking to rev up new fans in the U.S. through the opening of its first permanent track in Austin, Texas, last year, known as the Circuit of the Americas. Howard attended its first race, where Lauda also roamed the track’s garages.

What’s ironic is that Howard isn’t a very good driver. He proved that recently racing around the track of BBC’s hit show “Top Gear” to promote “Rush,” ending up in second to last place on the series’ celebrity leader board — behind Genesis’ Mike Rutherford.

Host Jeremy Clarkson was quick to mock him, saying “We finally found something you can’t do. Good at directing, brilliant in ‘Happy Days,’ a charming human being — but utterly crap at driving.”

Ron Howard's Risky Formula One Movie, 'Rush'

Can this Euro-centric car racing film play in the U.S.?

By Rachel Dodes Conn

Ron Howard's films, like "Apollo 13" and "Frost/Nixon," typically deal with issues very familiar to American audiences. His latest project, Mr. Howard's first independently financed film, is a bit of a departure: "Rush" chronicles the rivalry between Austrian Formula One racer Niki Lauda and his nemesis, the British driver James Hunt, over the course of the historic 1976 season. While competing in Nürburg, Germany during treacherous weather conditions, Mr. Lauda (Daniel Brühl, right) crashed his Ferrari and sustained severe burns to his face and lungs. Yet, fueled by a desire to beat Mr. Hunt (Chris Hemsworth, above), a playboy type whose wife (Olivia Wilde) ran off with Richard Burton, Mr. Lauda was back in his car just six weeks later—still wearing his bandages—to race against him in the Italian Grand Prix.

When Mr. Howard received the script on spec from screenwriter Peter Morgan ("Frost/Nixon," "The Last King of Scotland"), he wasn't a Formula One fan and didn't know who Messrs. Hunt and Lauda were. "I looked them up on Wikipedia," he admits. But as he read about the racers' personalities, he started to see broader themes that would appeal to U.S. moviegoers. "Maybe this is the American in me identifying this," he says, "but both these guys are utterly and entirely individuals—there was no Yoda telling them to seek their higher self."

For Mr. Howard, the process of researching "Rush" was surprisingly similar to learning about space travel for his "Apollo 13," because he found himself having to make arcane automotive engineering terms accessible to viewers. "It was really fun to understand a sport that combines cutting-edge technology with very dangerous competition," he says. "The visceral, cool and sexy element offered a kind of cinematic experience that nowadays exists only with sci-fi."

Formula One isn't nearly as popular in the U.S. as Nascar, and the subject matter is likelier to play well overseas, where the film's financing came from. It premiered Monday, in London, a few weeks before its U.S. opening. The filmmakers say it's more than just a sports picture, and they expect it to appeal to women as well as men.

Saudi Female Filmmaker Succeeds In Making A Movie About A Girl Who Wants A Bicycle

Los Angeles Times

By Rebecca Keegan

Sept. 6, 2013

In a country where women can't freely move around, Haifaa Mansour covertly films the story of a girl's quest for a bicycle.

The production lost two days to sandstorms. The crew faced a last-minute scramble when the nervous owner of a mall changed his mind about allowing filming there. Some days locals chased the cameras away; other days they brought platters of lamb and rice to the set, and asked to be extras.

Meanwhile, the director hid in a van, speaking to her cast via walkie-talkie. In Saudi Arabia, where driving a car is a subversive act for a woman, a 39-year-old mother of two has done something remarkable: written and directed what her distributor believes is the first feature film shot entirely in the ultraconservative kingdom.

Haifaa Mansour is the director of "Wadjda," a drama about a plucky 10-year-old girl who enrolls in a Koran recitation competition in order to win money for a bicycle she's forbidden by law to ride.

Like her young protagonist, Mansour's own story is one of feminine moxie.

In a sly protest of the country's ban on women behind the wheel, she drove herself to her wedding in a golf cart. Because women in Saudi Arabia can't mingle publicly with men outside their families, she shot her movie covertly on the streets of the capital, Riyadh. With movie theaters banned, she screened "Wadjda" in two foreign embassies and a cultural center.

Petite, self-assured, wearing white high-tops and blue nail polish, Mansour is modern in both her fashion and bearing. She speaks English quickly and colloquially, dropping frequent "you knows" into conversation. And she isn't afraid to counter misperceptions about her homeland, as when she gently corrected Bill Maher for calling Mecca the Saudi capital during a recent appearance on his HBO show.

Laced with empathy and humor, "Wadjda" is a quietly provocative portrait of a culture that straddles the centuries, where men wear the ancient white thobe but carry the latest iPads and women hold important jobs as doctors and news anchors but have yet to vote in an election.

"I didn't want to make a movie about women being raped or stoned," Mansour said in an interview in Beverly Hills in June. "For me it is the everyday life, how it's hard. For me, it was hard sometimes to go to work because I cannot find transportation. Things like that build up and break a woman."

The eighth of 12 children of a poet, Mansour grew up in a small town in a home that she describes as nurturing for a little girl.

"My family is very traditional, but my parents are very supportive, very kind," she said. "I never felt I can't do things because I'm a woman."

When Mansour was a teen, her mother removed the light veil she wore while picking her daughter up from school, a gesture that mortified the young woman at the time, but empowers her when she reflects on it now.

Though movie theaters have been shuttered in Saudi Arabia for decades for religious reasons, Mansour said her father, like others, often rented VHS tapes at Blockbuster for the family to watch -- she grew up on Jackie Chan movies, Bollywood productions, Egyptian cinema and Disney animated films. "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" was a particular favorite.

"In small-town Saudi, there is nothing to do. You don't get to exercise your emotions because nothing much is happening, you know?" she said. "So to see people falling in love and fighting, it's so powerful, you see beyond your small town."

After earning her bachelor's degree in comparative literature at the American University in Cairo, she returned to Saudi Arabia but quickly felt stymied.

"Going back to Saudi as a young woman, trying to assert yourself in the workplace, you have all those ideas … and all of a sudden you realize because you are a woman you are not heard," she said. "It was such a frustrating moment in my life. It was as if you are screaming in a vacuum."

The idea of women holding jobs still unnerves some Saudi men -- writer Abdullah Mohammed Daoud recently encouraged his more than 97,000 Twitter followers to sexually harass female grocery store clerks to intimidate women from working.

Recalling the freedom she found in movies, Mansour decided to make a short film with her siblings serving as cast and crew, a thriller about a male serial killer who hides under the black abaya worn by Muslim women. Her work -- two more shorts, a documentary and a stint hosting a talk show for a Lebanese network -- focused largely on the untold stories of Saudi women.

In 2005, at a U.S. embassy screening of her documentary, "Women Without Shadows," Mansour met her future husband, American diplomat Bradley Neimann. They now have two children, 2 and 5, and live in Bahrain, where Neimann works for the State Department.

When her husband was posted in Australia, Mansour pursued a master's in film studies at the University of Sydney, and wrote the script that became "Wadjda."

The story was inspired by her now teenage niece, who has tamped down her rambunctious personality to fit into Saudi norms.

"I thought, 'Wow, a woman writer from Saudi Arabia won?'" Rena Ronson said. "I had to meet her. She was so open and tenacious and smart."When Mansour's script for "Wadjda" won an award at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival, it caught the eye of the co-head of the independent film group at United Talent Agency.

Over the next two years Ronson helped Mansour secure financing for her film, which cost a little less than $2.5 million. The primary obstacle, as far as many potential Middle Eastern producers were concerned, was Mansour's desire to shoot in Saudi Arabia, which she felt lent her story authenticity.

The production finally won the tacit approval of the Saudi government -- one of its backers is Rotana Group, an entertainment company primarily owned by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. Another major financier is the German company Razor Film.

Finding actors was another hurdle. Mansour and her producers recruited child performers through small companies that hire folkloric dancers for the Eid holidays. Many of their parents were uncomfortable with a movie about empowering women.

A week before she was scheduled to start shooting, Mansour still hadn't cast her title character when 12-year-old Waad Mohammed entered the room in blue jeans, with headphones clapped over her ears. Singing along to Justin Bieber, she won over Mansour with her sweet singing voice and tomboyish style.

The movie's half-German, half-Saudi crew worked around the rhythms of Saudi life, using cellphone apps that alerted them of the five daily prayer calls. The Germans carried notebooks; the Saudis relied on oral planning.

On the first day of shooting, a start time of 7:20 a.m. came and went. "I don't know what we were thinking," said German producer Roman Paul. "I don't think 7:20 exists in Saudi time. We Germans learned to relax, and the Saudis learned that there is a benefit to doing things at a certain time."

Despite tension on the set -- both from disapproving observers and from the German and Saudi crews learning to work together -- Mansour was buoyant, Paul said.

"She's very fast in overcoming new difficulties, and in an upbeat spirit," Paul said.

Last summer "Wadjda" premiered at the Venice and Telluride film festivals, earning praise for Mansour's subtle direction and a U.S. release from Sony Pictures Classics, which handled the Oscar-winning 2011 Iranian drama "A Separation," about the dissolution of a marriage.

"'A Separation' was such an eye-opener to me in the sense that there were people questioning whether the film went too specific into the Iranian culture," said Michael Barker, co-president and co-founder of the Sony unit. "But if the overall story has a universal appeal, in 'Wadjda' it's about parents and kids and restrictions and freedom, that's something we can all relate to."

Sony Classics has been showing the film to noted feminists -- Gloria Steinem and Queen Noor of Jordan both attended screenings -- and will release it in the U.S. slowly over the fall, starting Sept. 13. (The movie premiered in multiple European countries this summer.)

Mansour said she plans to work in Saudi Arabia again. For her, screening her movie in the kingdom was a high.

"Film is about uplifting, embracing the love of life, it's about moving ahead, it's about victory," she said. "It's not about defeat."

One victory has already been won. This spring, a new law went into effect: With some restrictions, Saudi women are now allowed to ride bicycles.

We first told you back in July about Syfy giving the green light to the pilot Dominion, based on characters in the 2010 film Legion. Back then we had little to go on besides a sketchy paragraph about it being set 25 years in the future after an epic war between an army of angels and humankind.

Now we have more, including not only the casting of three major characters (at least two of whom are likely familiar to you) but a lot more in the way of plot and character detail.

Although I’m completely enthusiastic and encouraging about this pilot, the fact that one of the actors, Christopher Egan, was also cast in the pilot Gothica as Dorian Gray proves that casting a pilot by no means guarantees its pickup to series.

You have been warned; get excited about this, but don’t fall in love just yet:

Syfy Casts Christopher Egan,...

Browse all the sections of the 57th London Film Festival (Oct 9-20) including the galas, competition titles and individual sections.

Alphabetical list of titles by section including feature premiere status

Wp = Wp

Ep = European Premiere

IP = International Premiere

UK = UK Premiere

Gala’s

Opening Night

Captain Phillips, Paul Greengrass (Us) Ep

Closing Night

Saving Mr Banks, John Lee Hancock (Us/UK) Ep

Philomena, Stephen Frears (UK) UK12 Years A Slave, Steve Mcqueen (UK) EPGravity, Alfonso Cuaron (Us) UKInside Llewyn Davis, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen (Us) UKLabor Day, Jason Reitman (Us) EPThe Invisible Woman, Ralph Fiennes (UK), EPThe Epic Of Everest, John Noel (UK) WPBlue Is The Warmest Colour, Abdellatif Kechiche (France) UKNight Moves, Kelly Reichardt (Us) UKStranger By The Lake, Alain Guiraudie (France) UKDon Jon, Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Us) UKMystery Road, Ivan Sen (Australia) UKOnly Lovers Left Alive, Jim Jarmusch (Us) UKNebraska, Alexander Payne (Us) UKWe Are The Best!, Lukas Moodysson (Sweden) EPFoosball 3D, Juan Jose Campanella (Argentina...

The dog days of August are almost over, which means blockbusters are taking a backseat to all those lovely prestige pictures the studios trot out when the leaves change and Meryl Streep gets her thirst for gold like the Oscar vampire she is.

Heavy hitters like Brad Pitt, Jennifer Lawrence, George Clooney, Josh Brolin, Michael Fassbender, Tom Hanks, Kristen Wiig, Chris Hemsworth and the ubiquitous Benedict Cumberbatch all pop up in multiple movies on our annual list of the Fall's best and brightest. Fan favs like Thor (as in "The Mighty"), Ron Burgundy, Katniss Everdeen, Jack Ryan and Machete chop their way back to the big screen with much fanfare, but this time of year is all about the Oscar bait — a Golden Globe simply won't do.

Prepare accordingly for the season below. (And also check out Film.com's Ultimate Fall Movie Preview, plus all kinds of good stuff on MTV's Fall Preview hub.

Blondie, Talking Heads, The Ramones and Patti Smith are one step closer to hitting the big screen. After months of teaser posters and on-set photos, Cbgb, Randall Miller's film chronicling the rise of New York's famed punk rock music venue, is finally letting audiences inside the club with an official trailer. See The Hollywood Reporter's exclusive first look in the player above. Photos: 'Cbgb' Character Posters: 10 A-Listers Play Joey Ramone, Iggy Pop and Blondie Alan Rickman leads an all-star cast as Hilly Kristal, the financially unstable entrepreneur who opened the iconic club in 1973. Cbgb, which

read more...

Tony Award 2013 nominations: Broadway-Hollywood connections include Sigourney Weaver, Tom Hanks, Paul Rudd, Bette Midler (photo: Sigourney Weaver in Vanya and Sonya and Masha and Spike) The 2013 Tony Award nominations will be announced tomorrow, April 30. Among this year’s potential Tony nominees are a number of film-related performers, ranging from Academy Award nominees and winners such as Sigourney Weaver, Tom Hanks, and Jessica Chastain to The Avengers‘ Scarlett Johansson, Our Idiot Brother and Dinner for Schmucks‘ Paul Rudd, and Tom Cruise’s ex-wife Katie Holmes. Two-time Oscar winner Tom Hanks (Philadelphia, Forrest Gump) may be up for a Best Actor in a Play Tony Award for Nora Ephron’s Lucky Guy. Ephron, who died last year, directed Hanks in two of his biggest box-office hits: Sleepless in Seattle (1993) and You’ve Got Mail (1998), both co-starring Meg Ryan. Another potential Best Actor nominee is David Hyde Pierce (Nixon, Down with Love) for...

Audiences today often don't know the name of a play until just before its run starts. But would you book a ticket for a show without a title?

With a new play, audiences never quite know what they're getting, but early ticket-buyers for Anthony Neilson's latest piece at the Royal Court were taking an exceptionally wild shot in the dark. Originally advertised several months ago as "Untitled New Play by Anthony Neilson", it was only revealed to be called Narrative on 15 March, three weeks before opening.

Neilson's play joins a very small sub-set of theatre productions that have been delivered onto the posters unbaptised. The other most recent British example was Mike Leigh's 2011 show at the National theatre, promoted and sold for several months as "New play by Mike Leigh", before, at the last minute, becoming Grief.

In both cases, the delay resulted not from indecision or wilfulness...

Helen Mirren, James McAvoy, Rupert Everett and Kristin Scott Thomas are among the big names vying for Olivier Awards. Nominees for the 2013 edition of the U.K. theater prizes were announced Tuesday morning. "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time," an adaptation of Mark Haddon's bestselling novel, picked up a leading eight nominations. The show focuses on a boy with Asperger's Syndrome and his efforts to track down the killer of his neighbor's dog. It scored nominations for Best Play, Best Actor for Luke Treadaway and Best Director for...

Nominations for the 37th annual edition of the Olivier Awards, Britain's top theater prize were announced on Tuesday. Winners will be revealed on April 28. (Read full report here.) Best Play Constellations The Audience The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time This House -Insertgroups:12- Best Play Revival Long Day’s Journey Into Night Macbeth Old Times Twelfth Night (Apollo Theatre) Best Actor (Play) Rupert Everett – The Judas Kiss James McAvoy – Macbeth Mark Rylance – Twelfth Night Rafe Spall – Constellations Luke Treadaway – The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time Best Actress (Play) Helen Mirren – The Audience Hattie Morahan – A Doll’s House Billie Piper – The Effect Kristin Scott Thomas – Old Times Best Supporting Actor (Play) Paul Chahidi – Twelfth Night Richard McCabe – The Audience Adrian Scarboro...

Review James Hunt 11 Mar 2013 - 10:15

It's the first SimCity game in a decade, but how does it compare to its predecessors? James finds out...

Call it SimCity 5, call it SimCity 2013, call it anything you like. It's the original city simulation game, and it's back for its first major instalment in ten years. But what's it actually like?

It's impossible to talk about SimCity right now without addressing the elephant in the room. "Nelly," I say, "how do you feel about the fact that inadequate server support has left thousands of paying customers unable to properly access SimCity for days following the launch?"

Unfortunately, I don't speak elephant, but it's clear from all the stamping and trumpeting that no one, person or pachyderm, considers this an acceptable situation. And while EA has been sufficiently humble regarding their failures, they've only addressed the botched implementation of the mandatory online component – the...

Now that you’ve had your fill of peppermint, presents, and multiple viewings of AMC’s White Christmas and Miracle On 34th Street, how about a little snark to go along with that special Holiday movie – sans the warm and fuzzy. It’s time for some mistletoe carnage and crafty comedy Geek style. In our gift to you, Wamg presents our list of the 15 best non-traditional films. Lovers of It’S A Wonderful Life can consider yourselves excused cuz Santa Claus is coming to town in these “More Naughty Than Nice”. movies.

Black Christmas

Black Christmas (the 1974 version of course), generally acknowledged as the forerunner of the ‘slasher’. genre, is so graphic in its imagination that you don’t even need to see any gore or murder. Black Christmas, which holds up spectacularly well after almost 40 years, tells the tale of a group of sorority sisters that are hounded and...

Alain Corneau passed away in August 2010, two days after his final film, Love Crime (Crime d'amour), opened in France and just before it premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. I didn't get a chance to see it in Toronto that year, but finally had a chance to watch it last night, knowing I wanted to watch it before seeing Brian De Palma's remake, titled Passion, which will be playing the Venice Film Festival at the end of August. Starring Kristin Scott Thomas and Ludivine Sagnier, the story begins as the age-old tale of a mentor (Thomas) using the ingenue (Sagnier) for professional gain. While Thomas, as Christine, uses the accomplished work of Isabelle to rise to the top. Isabelle, upset with Christine's two-faced approach to their relationship, is struggling between the idea of remaining a loyal employee and the voice of her co-worker (Guillaume Marquet) in her ear,...

Robin Williams as Ike? Frankly, we're not seeing the resemblance, but apparently Lee Daniels thinks otherwise.   "Mrs. Doubtfire" star Robin Williams has been cast as former president Dwight D. Eisenhower in Daniels' upcoming film "The Butler," joining a cast that already includes Forest Whitaker, Oprah Winfrey, Vanessa Redgrave, Terrence Howard, John Cusack, Alan Rickman, Jane Fonda and Colman Domingo. Also read: Robin Williams' Pay-or-Play Lawsuit Tossed "The Butler," based on the life of White House servant Eugene Allen -- who worked for eight First Families over three decades -- begins shooting in New...

Last week brought Ralph Fiennes’ directorial debut to the shelves in Coriolanus, in which he starred as the eponymous lead alongside Gerard Butler, as well as the likes of Michael Dowse’s Goon, and Madonna’s W.E.

This week has, as ever, a fantastic new selection of films and TV programmes available for purchase from today, including three of my all-time favourite TV programmes. On top of that, there’s an Oscar winner, an Oscar nominee, and one film that everyone was talking about in the run-up to the awards season but was noticeably absent when the Academy Award nominees were announced in January.

My personal picks of the week:

With so much choice, I was forced to divide into two categories of film and TV this week:

James Bobbins’ The Muppets & Clint Eastwood’s J. Edgar

Entourage Season 8, Curb Your Enthusiasm Season 8 & One Tree Hill Season 9

The Muppets Iframe...

Ashley Greene, who plays Alice Cullen in the blockbuster Twilight Saga has signed on to play late New York club boss Hilly Kristal’s daughter Lisa in the star-studded Cbgb biopic. The actress joins Alan Rickman, who will play her father; Malin Akerman set to co-star as Blondie singer Debbie Harry, while the rest of the [...]

Continue reading Twilight Star Ashley Greene Rocks Cbgb Lead on FilmoFilia.

Related posts: Malin Akerman Set to Play Blondie’s Deborah Harry in Cbgb Christopher Walken, Ashley Greene, Shirley MacLaine, Adam Beach to Star in The Boom Boom Room Harry Potter’s Rupert Grint Has Landed Two Movies...

Rock of Ages thesp Malin Akerman is set to play Debbie Harry, the lead singer of the pop-punk band Blondie singer in Randall Miller‘s indie Cbgb, which chronicles the iconic New York nightclub. Brit thesp Alan Rickman stars as Hilly Kristal, the owner of Cbgb for over 30 years, while Harry Potter’s Rupert Grint will [...]

Continue reading Malin Akerman Set to Play Blondie’s Deborah Harry in Cbgb on FilmoFilia.

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Darren Criss may have only been on Broadway for three weeks, but he’s already solidified his place in the Broadway community and earned an enviable résumé credit: host of Broadway.com’s 13th-annual Audience Choice Awards.

EW attended the theatrical get-together last night at the Time-Warner Center in New York, where the festivities were merry and the presenters (including Adam Pascal, Brian D’Arcy James, Judith Light and Tammy Blanchard) were even more so. While other theater awards ceremonies can be stuffy affairs, Criss’s self-referential shtick got things off to a lively start. Armed with a guitar and a piano,...

Please cry for Ricky Martin and Elena Roger in the Broadway revival of Evita. The truth is, the Tony nominators didn’t love you. Those stars were two of the biggest snubs at this morning’s announcement of the 66th annual Tony Awards.

One of the biggest shockers? It seems that Angela Lansbury will have to wait for her chance to win a record-breaking sixth Tony Award. Despite critical acclaim for her role as a Southern political doyenne in Gore Vidal’s The Best Man, Lansbury was passed over for Featured Actress in a Play. The surprise nominee in that...

The Tony Awards season is heating up. The Tony administration committee met today to decide eligibility for various categories: One Man, Two Guvnors will compete for best (new) play despite a push from its producers to be considered in the less-competitive revival category (the comedy is loosely based on Carlo Goldoni’s 1743 play Servant of Two Masters). James Earl Jones will be up for Lead Actor in a Play for Gore Vidal’s The Best Man. Ricky Martin will contend as Featured Actor in a Musical even though his name is above the title of Evita. And in a real head-scratcher,...

Newlywed Carey Mulligan has been given a belated wedding gift following her nuptials at the weekend - the British actress has been named among the New York Drama League's Distinguished Performance nominees.

The An Education star joins other big Hollywood names, like Kevin Spacey, Jesse Eisenberg, Alan Rickman and Matthew Broderick among this year's hopefuls, while Ricky Martin has been recognised for his role as Che Guevara in Evita.

And there were double nominations for Martin Luther King, Jr. play The Mountaintop (Samuel L. Jackson and Angela Bassett) and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman (Andrew Garfield and Philip Seymour Hoffman).

The 2012 Drama League nominees for Distinguished Production of a Play, Distinguished Production of a Musical, Distinguished Revival of a Play, Distinguished Revival of a Musical, and the much coveted Distinguished Performance Award were announced on Tuesday.

Clybourne Park, The Columnist, The Intelligent Homosexual's Guide to Capitalism and Socialism with a Key to the Scriptures, The Lyons, One Man, Two Guvnors, Other Desert Cities, Peter and The Starcatcher, Tribes, Seminar, Septimus and Clarissa and Venus in Fur will compete for the Distinguished Production of a Play trophy, while the Distinguished Production of a Musical award will be a battle between Ghost, Leap of Faith, Mission Drift, Newsies, Nice Work If You Can Get It, Once and Queen of The Mist.

The nominated revivals include And God Created Great Whales, Death of a Salesman, Look Back in Anger, Wit, Carrie, Follies, Evita and Jesus Christ Superstar.

The 78th annual Drama League Awards will be held at the Marriott Marquis Times Square on 18 May.

And Alan Menken and Rosie O'Donnell are already winners - they've been named the respective recipients of the Distinguished Achievement in Musical Theatre and Unique Contribution to the Theatre prizes.

The Drama League Awards may not be quite as prestigious as the Tonys, but they have a few years on them. Established in 1922 and made official in 1935 (the Tonys began in '47), the awards honor the best in theater both on and off Broadway. The League announced their nominations today, and the list includes many of the names we expect to be seeing from the Tonys when they announced their nominations next Tuesday. Raven-Symone (currently starring in "Sister Act" on Broadway), Megan Hilty and Justin Long announced the nominees for the awards' five categories -- Distinguished Production of a Play, Distinguished Production of a Musical, Distinguished Revival of a Play, Distinguished Revival of a Musical and the Distinguished Performance Award, for which more than 50 actors -- male and female -- were nominated. The winner can only receive the award once during his or her career, according to Broadway World, which...

They may not be household names like their A-list colleagues, but the actors on this list have appeared in some of our all-time favourite geek movies...

Some actors dabble in sci-fi; others dip their toe into fantasy; some may even make an appearance in the odd horror film - all before returning to the safety of the genres in which they feel more comfortable - perhaps a nice, award-chasing period drama, or a well-paid romantic comedy.

A-listers may see the geeky films that we on this site enjoy and celebrate as fun little side-projects, but there are actors out there who commit full-time to these types of movies. It is high time, therefore, that we credited these individuals with the recognition they deserve.

Besides the stipulation that, in order to be included, an actor had to still be alive and working today, there were no strict criteria that had to...

London - There's a Hollywood cast for Britain's Whatsonstage theater awards, with James Earl Jones, Jude Law and Kevin Spacey competing for best actor in a play.

Jones is nominated for "Driving Miss Daisy," Law for "Anna Christie" and Spacey for "Richard III," alongside Benedict Cumberbatch for "Frankenstein," James Corden for "One Man, Two Guvnors" and David Tennant for "Much Ado About Nothing."

The prizes, run by theater website whatonstage.com, are decided by public vote.

Best actress contenders announced Friday include Vanessa Redgrave for "Driving Miss Daisy" and Kristin Scott Thomas for "Betrayal."

In the musical categories, there are multiple nominations for the movie-inspired romance "Ghost" and Roald Dahl-based "Matilda."

Winners will be announced Feb. 19. See below for the full list of nominees.

Watch previews of some of the nominated plays:

The Full List Of 2011/12 Nominations

Best Actress in a Play

Eve Best – Much Ado About Nothing at...

Do you constantly look at news headlines and swear to Baby Jesus they're fake? Here's one just from today: Wahlberg Brother Opening Burger Joint Called Wahlburgers. (Come on!)

If so, you're probably a loyal reader of The Onion, the satirical gem that's grown from a University of Wisconsin rag to a widely celebrated cultural mainstay on the strength of its laugh-out-loud headlines (let's face it, sometimes you don't even need the text).

What's nice about The Onion is that as astute and pointed as its headlines can be in commenting on the zeitgeist's most absurd, at least we know the stories aren't real.

For as long as the paper's been in print, its editors have been whipping up hilarious quips on Hollywood and its stars. Here are our 30 faves.

30. New Pixar Employees Required To Watch Adorable Sexual Harassment Video

[Link]

29. Vince Vaughn Appears On 'Tonight Show' To Deceive Country About Latest...

Getty Steve Williams offers advice to Adam Scott at the PGA Championship in Akron, Ohio

And so the romance ends. One thought they were “taking a break.” The other thought that meant he could, well, “see” someone else. Someone new. Younger.

Ok, maybe it’s not worthy of the soap opera it’s become, but most of the golf world is talking about the Big Breakup. A month ago, Tiger Woods fired his caddie of 12 years, Stevie Williams. Tiger has...

‘To The Death’

‘No. To the pain.’

‘I… don’t think I’m familiar with that phrase’.

Are any cinema-goers really familiar with that phrase either? While Westley’s bluff and stamina defeats and humiliates Prince Humperdinck in The Princess Bride, the far more memorable (and much more quoted) conflict has to be Inigo Montoya’s promise of ‘You killed my father. Prepare to die’. It’s a fun family film, but Inigo makes Count Rugen beg for his life. Then kills him anyway. In stories of revenge, right and wrong and life and death, does someone always actually have to die in order for us to feel that the story is done?

But, with more and more films belonging to franchises, are their stories ever really done?

Is the bad guy allowed to die if there’s a chance he or she might be needed in the sequel?

Maybe...

Will Daniel Radcliffe show up? Shall the heavens open on Rupert Grint? And can Emma Watson's hair cope with the wind? Watch a live video stream of the final Harry Potter premiere with us from 16:00-19:00 BST. Plus our correspondents will be reporting direct from Trafalgar Square

.

4.00pm: It all ends. Finally. After what feels like just 500 short years, the Harry Potter film franchise tonight comes to a finish. Or at least starts the beginning of that finish - the world premiere in London being only the first of many before the actual opening date (next week). And then there's the DVD and Blu-ray etc, so actually it'll be 2013-ish before we can stop hearing about the boy wizard.

But anyway, for the next three hours join us as we watch a live video stream of the festivities in Trafalgar Square, where the cast and crew will...

Award-winning actor with a fastidious intelligence and a hint of inner steel

Anna Massey, who has died of cancer aged 73, made her name on the stage as a teenager in French-window froth. She then graduated, with effortless and extraordinary ease, to the classics and to the work of Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter and David Hare. In later years, she became best known for her award-winning work in television and film. What constantly impressed was her fastidious intelligence and capacity for stillness: always the mark of a first-rate actor.

Born in Thakeham, West Sussex, she was bred into show business although, in personal terms, that proved something of a mixed blessing. Her father was Raymond Massey, a Canadian actor who achieved success in Hollywood; her mother was Adrianne Allen who had appeared in the original production of Noël Coward's Private Lives. Anna's godfather was the film director John Ford.

Since...

DVD Playhouse—April 2011

By

Allen Gardner

Hereafter (Warner Bros.) Clint Eastwood’s spiritual thriller follows a trio of characters whose seemingly disparate paths converge: Matt Damon as a blue collar Joe who tries to fight against his psychic powers that see “the other side,” Cecile de France as a journalist who somehow survives the tsunami that crushed Indonesia, and a London schoolboy (Frankie and George McLaren) who seeks answers after losing his twin brother. Like all of Eastwood’s films, the narrative construction is tight as a drum, with solid work by all involved. That said, “solid” would have to be the operative word to describe the proceedings here, as well as “unremarkable” and “uninvolving” on an emotional level. Perhaps we expect too much when we see Clint’s name on a film these days, but that’s the flip side of being one of the best. Blu-ray/DVD combo pack.

DVD Playhouse—April 2011

By

Allen Gardner

Hereafter (Warner Bros.) Clint Eastwood’s spiritual thriller follows a trio of characters whose seemingly disparate paths converge: Matt Damon as a blue collar Joe who tries to fight against his psychic powers that see “the other side,” Cecile de France as a journalist who somehow survives the tsunami that crushed Indonesia, and a London schoolboy (Frankie and George McLaren) who seeks answers after losing his twin brother. Like all of Eastwood’s films, the narrative construction is tight as a drum, with solid work by all involved. That said, “solid” would have to be the operative word to describe the proceedings here, as well as “unremarkable” and “uninvolving” on an emotional level. Perhaps we expect too much when we see Clint’s name on a film these days, but that’s the flip side of being one of the best. Blu-ray/DVD combo pack.

By far, the question we get most to our IFC News Podcast e-mail account and to our Twitter accounts is "How can I listen to older episodes of the podcasts?" Well good news podcasts fans; Christmas came a couple days late this year. While we're still working to make all our podcasts available on iTunes, we're pleased to present this complete archive page containing links to every single IFC News Podcast. That's right: every single one. Even the early ones that are embarrassingly terrible that you should never listen to. (Seriously. Don't do it.)

Still, if you've got 200+ hours at your disposal and you want to listen to the evolution of our podcast, now you can. And it has evolved. On our very first episode (a review of "Borat" from October 2006), we were barely capable of introducing ourselves (we also were pretty blatantly ripping off Filmspotting's review format). By episode...

Warner Bros. announces new Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows video games Today the EA Play Label of Electronic Arts Inc. and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment announced that two Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows video games are in development to coincide with the much-anticipated final adventure in the Harry Potter film series from Warner Bros. Pictures which will be told in two full-length parts. The Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I video game will be released this fall on all major gaming platforms.

With all the action taking place outside of Hogwarts for the first time, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I represents a shift in tone for the Harry Potter games. On the run with a horde of merciless enemies on their tail, players will find themselves in unknown territory, far from the safety of the school grounds, fighting for survival at every turn.

Chicago – History will be kind to “Nine”. Due to wildly extreme expectations caused by the pedigree of the film’s cast, many critics and audiences dismissed Rob Marshall’s musical on its release in late 2009. “Nine” falls short of perfection but the Blu-ray release proves that it gets a lot closer than most people thought the first time they saw it.

Blu-Ray Rating: 4.0/5.0

It may be my affinity for musicals, Italian cinema, and most of the cast members of “Nine,” but this film is immensely rewatchable, which will always be one of the first questions one should ask when considering buying a Blu-ray: Will I watch it more than once? I know I will watch “Nine” more than once, if just for the spectacular supporting performances by Marion Cotillard and Penelope Cruz, the latter of which was nominated for an Oscar and the former of which should have been.

Nine...