The official jury for the New York International Children’s Film Festival (Nyicff) has been unveiled, with “Passages” director Ira Sachs, “Broad City” co-creator Ilana Glazer, “Into the Spider-Verse” producer Peter Ramsey, and actress Uma Thurman among the A-listers presiding over the 2024 festival.
IndieWire exclusively reveals the full jury lineup, as well as the jurors’ personal favorite films from growing up. The 2024 installment of Nyicff boasts Cannes-premiered animated film “Chicken for Linda!” and buzzy Neon release “Robot Dreams” among its program, as well as anime film “The Concierge” and sequel “Dounia – The Great White North.” The Oscar-qualifying festival will take place March 2 through 17. See the full lineup here.
The full jury committee includes Ilana Glazer, Uma Thurman, Sony Pictures Animation head of story Guillermo Martinez, Matthew Modine, “Doc McStuffins” creator Chris Nee, “Migration” director Benjamin Renner, filmmaker Ira Sachs, Phillipa Soo, head of artistic recruiting at Titmouse Animation Ellen Su,...
IndieWire exclusively reveals the full jury lineup, as well as the jurors’ personal favorite films from growing up. The 2024 installment of Nyicff boasts Cannes-premiered animated film “Chicken for Linda!” and buzzy Neon release “Robot Dreams” among its program, as well as anime film “The Concierge” and sequel “Dounia – The Great White North.” The Oscar-qualifying festival will take place March 2 through 17. See the full lineup here.
The full jury committee includes Ilana Glazer, Uma Thurman, Sony Pictures Animation head of story Guillermo Martinez, Matthew Modine, “Doc McStuffins” creator Chris Nee, “Migration” director Benjamin Renner, filmmaker Ira Sachs, Phillipa Soo, head of artistic recruiting at Titmouse Animation Ellen Su,...
- 3/4/2024
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
In the article series Sound and Vision we take a look at music videos from notable directors. This week we look at several music videos by director Garth Jennings. If you ask me who my favorite music video director is, the answer won't be Michel Gondry or Spike Jonze or David Fincher, even though I think all of them are great. No, for me there is one director who really stands above the rest of the crowd and that is Garth Jennings. As a duo with producer Nick Goldsmith, under the moniker Hammer and Tongs, he made not one, not two, but three of my favorite music videos of all time. The...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 3/4/2024
- Screen Anarchy
Courtesy of Kino Lorber
by Chad Kennerk
Set in the 1920s, Has Anybody Seen My Gal? gets its name from the once-popular jazz song recorded by the California Ramblers in 1925. Loosely based upon the Eleanor Porter novel Oh Money! Money! (she was also the author behind Pollyanna), the 1952 jukebox musical comedy was given the full Technicolor treatment – a visual bee’s knees in Kino Lorber’s sterling release.
The Universal Pictures title makes good use of Twenties tunes such as ‘Tiger Rag,’ ‘When the Red, Red Robin Comes Bob, Bob, Bobbin’ Along,’ ‘It Ain’t Gonna Rain No More,’ ‘Gimme a Little Kiss, Will Ya, Huh?’ - and of course, ‘Has Anybody Seen My Gal?’. It was directed by studio regular Douglas Sirk, who would go on to make his name with lush, slyly ironic melodramas such as Magnificent Obsession, All That Heaven Allows, Written on the Wind (all with Rock Hudson), There's Always Tomorrow,...
by Chad Kennerk
Set in the 1920s, Has Anybody Seen My Gal? gets its name from the once-popular jazz song recorded by the California Ramblers in 1925. Loosely based upon the Eleanor Porter novel Oh Money! Money! (she was also the author behind Pollyanna), the 1952 jukebox musical comedy was given the full Technicolor treatment – a visual bee’s knees in Kino Lorber’s sterling release.
The Universal Pictures title makes good use of Twenties tunes such as ‘Tiger Rag,’ ‘When the Red, Red Robin Comes Bob, Bob, Bobbin’ Along,’ ‘It Ain’t Gonna Rain No More,’ ‘Gimme a Little Kiss, Will Ya, Huh?’ - and of course, ‘Has Anybody Seen My Gal?’. It was directed by studio regular Douglas Sirk, who would go on to make his name with lush, slyly ironic melodramas such as Magnificent Obsession, All That Heaven Allows, Written on the Wind (all with Rock Hudson), There's Always Tomorrow,...
- 1/15/2024
- by Chad Kennerk
- Film Review Daily
Following The Film Stage’s collective top 50 films of 2023, as part of our year-end coverage, our contributors are sharing their personal top 10 lists.
In all honesty, the films of 2023 should take a backseat to the images we are seeing every day in Gaza, where journalists and average citizens have been recording and documenting a daily assault on their homes and livelihoods by the Idf. Whatever fakery we watched and enjoyed in the cinema this year should always be kept in perspective in importance with images that are real and actually happening right now. The Palestinians who have documented these important images have been targeted and killed with intent and purpose to silence what their photos and videos are showing and saying.
List of journalists who have been killed.
The below is of lesser note:
Best First Watches:
Angel’s Egg La belle noiseuse Centipede Horror Charley Varrick Coffy Crimson Gold...
In all honesty, the films of 2023 should take a backseat to the images we are seeing every day in Gaza, where journalists and average citizens have been recording and documenting a daily assault on their homes and livelihoods by the Idf. Whatever fakery we watched and enjoyed in the cinema this year should always be kept in perspective in importance with images that are real and actually happening right now. The Palestinians who have documented these important images have been targeted and killed with intent and purpose to silence what their photos and videos are showing and saying.
List of journalists who have been killed.
The below is of lesser note:
Best First Watches:
Angel’s Egg La belle noiseuse Centipede Horror Charley Varrick Coffy Crimson Gold...
- 1/3/2024
- by Soham Gadre
- The Film Stage
The newly restored Egyptian Theatre is welcoming a series of festive double features for cinephiles.
The Los Angeles-based theater is transforming into a holiday wonderland for acclaimed features, ranging from “Eyes Wide Shut” to “The Killer.” IndieWire exclusively announces the programming of curated double features that select “favorite new movies paired with classics ready for another moment in the spotlight,” per the Egyptian. The inaugural holiday series reflects on the best films of the year, pairing features with their creative inspirations.
Stanley Kubrick’s “Eyes Wide Shut” will screen Christmas Day after Netflix’s erotic thriller “Fair Play,” with Bradley Cooper’s Leonard Bernstein ode “Maestro” screening side by side with the 1961 film “West Side Story” in Ib Technicolor 35mm from the Academy Film Archive, featuring Bernstein’s music. Natalie Portman pulls double duty with “Black Swan” and Netflix’s “May December,” both screening December 27.
All double-bills are only $13, with...
The Los Angeles-based theater is transforming into a holiday wonderland for acclaimed features, ranging from “Eyes Wide Shut” to “The Killer.” IndieWire exclusively announces the programming of curated double features that select “favorite new movies paired with classics ready for another moment in the spotlight,” per the Egyptian. The inaugural holiday series reflects on the best films of the year, pairing features with their creative inspirations.
Stanley Kubrick’s “Eyes Wide Shut” will screen Christmas Day after Netflix’s erotic thriller “Fair Play,” with Bradley Cooper’s Leonard Bernstein ode “Maestro” screening side by side with the 1961 film “West Side Story” in Ib Technicolor 35mm from the Academy Film Archive, featuring Bernstein’s music. Natalie Portman pulls double duty with “Black Swan” and Netflix’s “May December,” both screening December 27.
All double-bills are only $13, with...
- 12/15/2023
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
Exclusive: Terence Winter, the master of the gangster genre known for his work on The Sopranos, Boardwalk Empire and more, is teaming with Academy Award-nominated producer Rachel Winter (Dallas Buyers Club) to develop a feature adaptation of A Murder in Hollywood: The Untold Story of Tinseltown’s Most Shocking Crime.
A Murder in Hollywood scribe Casey Sherman
Marking the latest work of non-fiction from New York Times bestselling author Casey Sherman, the book optioned by the Winters chronicles the deadly love affair between screen legend Lana Turner and her gangster boyfriend, Johnny Stompanato. It’ll be published through Sourcebooks early next year. Terence Winter will script the screen adaptation and produce through his Cold Front Pictures banner, alongside Rachel Winter through her Tangerine Pictures shingle.
The option marks just the latest high-profile deal for the prolific Sherman, whose bestseller 12: The Inside Story of Tom Brady’s Fight for Redemption,...
A Murder in Hollywood scribe Casey Sherman
Marking the latest work of non-fiction from New York Times bestselling author Casey Sherman, the book optioned by the Winters chronicles the deadly love affair between screen legend Lana Turner and her gangster boyfriend, Johnny Stompanato. It’ll be published through Sourcebooks early next year. Terence Winter will script the screen adaptation and produce through his Cold Front Pictures banner, alongside Rachel Winter through her Tangerine Pictures shingle.
The option marks just the latest high-profile deal for the prolific Sherman, whose bestseller 12: The Inside Story of Tom Brady’s Fight for Redemption,...
- 10/4/2023
- by Matt Grobar
- Deadline Film + TV
The same season that Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, and Paul Thomas Anderson took it virtually upon themselves to help save Turner Classic Movies following a series of layoffs that was pointing to what could have been its demise, the trio are showing just how hands-on they’ll be. For September, the trio has each compiled a list of recommendations that will air on TCM throughout the month. From melodramas and film noirs to tantalizing tales and giant ants, let’s see what Spielberg, Scorsese and PTA have to recommend.
Steven Spielberg’s September TCM picks are: Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life (1959), the sci-fi monster movie Them! (1954), Alfred Hitchcock’s The Wrong Man (1956), and two Vincente Minnelli films, musical Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) and The Bad and the Beautiful (1952).
Martin Scorsese went a bit more obscure for his TCM picks, selecting British drama Madonna of the Seven Moons (1945), pre-code...
Steven Spielberg’s September TCM picks are: Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life (1959), the sci-fi monster movie Them! (1954), Alfred Hitchcock’s The Wrong Man (1956), and two Vincente Minnelli films, musical Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) and The Bad and the Beautiful (1952).
Martin Scorsese went a bit more obscure for his TCM picks, selecting British drama Madonna of the Seven Moons (1945), pre-code...
- 9/4/2023
- by Mathew Plale
- JoBlo.com
Following David Zaslav’s despicable gutting of Turner Classic Movies earlier this summer––one of many anti-art maneuvers the money-hungry Warner Bros. Discovery CEO and president has commandeered in his embarrassing, hopefully short-lived tenure––he hoped to curry some favor by bringing together the holy trinity of filmmakers to guide the future of the channel. Now, after a few weeks on the job of “network advisors,” Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and Paul Thomas Anderson have shared their picks of what to see on the channel this month.
The first two mentioned filmmakers provided videos of their recommendations, with the Killers of the Flower Moon director recommending the Boris Karloff-led Isle of the Dead, Two Sisters from Boston, Victor Fleming’s melodrama Red Dust, and Joseph Losey’s Accident.
Spielberg recommends a pair of Vincente Minnelli films, Meet Me in St. Louis and The Bad and the Beautiful, Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life,...
The first two mentioned filmmakers provided videos of their recommendations, with the Killers of the Flower Moon director recommending the Boris Karloff-led Isle of the Dead, Two Sisters from Boston, Victor Fleming’s melodrama Red Dust, and Joseph Losey’s Accident.
Spielberg recommends a pair of Vincente Minnelli films, Meet Me in St. Louis and The Bad and the Beautiful, Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life,...
- 9/4/2023
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
To briefly remind readers of the saga:
Back in June of 2023, it was announced that the leadership behind Turner Classic Movies, a long-beloved curator of cinema from Hollywood's Golden Age and beyond, would be laid off. VP of enterprises and strategic partnerships Genevieve McGillicuddy, senior VP of programming and content strategy Charles Tabesh, executive vice president and general manager Pola Changnon, marketing VP Dexter Fedor, and VP of studio production Anne Wilson all lost their jobs. The future of TCM was suddenly up in the air. This not only outraged fans of classic cinema but threw some of Hollywood's most beloved filmmakers into a panic. Was David Zaslav, the CEO of the beleaguered Warner Bros. Discovery nixing the entire TCM brand the same way he did with so much of the films and TV shows on HBO Max? Perhaps Zaslav, having already accrued a horrendous reputation for a long series of consumer-hostile business decisions,...
Back in June of 2023, it was announced that the leadership behind Turner Classic Movies, a long-beloved curator of cinema from Hollywood's Golden Age and beyond, would be laid off. VP of enterprises and strategic partnerships Genevieve McGillicuddy, senior VP of programming and content strategy Charles Tabesh, executive vice president and general manager Pola Changnon, marketing VP Dexter Fedor, and VP of studio production Anne Wilson all lost their jobs. The future of TCM was suddenly up in the air. This not only outraged fans of classic cinema but threw some of Hollywood's most beloved filmmakers into a panic. Was David Zaslav, the CEO of the beleaguered Warner Bros. Discovery nixing the entire TCM brand the same way he did with so much of the films and TV shows on HBO Max? Perhaps Zaslav, having already accrued a horrendous reputation for a long series of consumer-hostile business decisions,...
- 9/1/2023
- by Witney Seibold
- Slash Film
Moviegoers around the world are about to be taken to school by some of the top masters of the field this fall, between new movies by Ridley Scott, Michael Mann, David Fincher, and Martin Scorsese, among others. But as much as cinephiles can spend their entire day arguing about each and every one of these heralded directors online, what can truly compare to getting a little crash course in film history by someone who's commonly considered the greatest filmmaker alive? Many would agree that Steven Spielberg is simply in a class of his own, and thanks to his new role as part of the advisory panel for the esteemed Turner Classic Movies institution, that's exactly what fans are getting.
We previously covered the whole saga surrounding Warner Bros. Discovery's shameful treatment of the hardworking folks over at TCM, necessitating A-list filmmakers like Spielberg, Scorsese, and Paul Thomas Anderson to...
We previously covered the whole saga surrounding Warner Bros. Discovery's shameful treatment of the hardworking folks over at TCM, necessitating A-list filmmakers like Spielberg, Scorsese, and Paul Thomas Anderson to...
- 8/30/2023
- by Jeremy Mathai
- Slash Film
What’s so inspiring and energizing about Steven Spielberg is that he isn’t just one of the greatest filmmakers ever, he’s an eclectic cinephile who talks about his favorite films with the boyish enthusiasm of a fan.
So he was a natural fit, alongside Martin Scorsese and Paul Thomas Anderson, for the advisory panel that came together in June to support Turner Classic Movies. As part of that role, he’s recorded his first “Spielberg’s Picks” video, a recommendations list of his personal faves from the September 2023 TCM lineup. Watch the video above, an IndieWire exclusive, for not just his choices, but his incisive comments.
For his debut picks, he chose Vincente Minnelli’s “Meet Me in St. Louis” (1944), Douglas Sirk’s “Imitation of Life” (1959), Gordon Douglas’s “Them!” (1954), Minnelli’s “The Bad and the Beautiful” (1952), and Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Wrong Man” (1957). Scorsese and Anderson’s own picks are forthcoming,...
So he was a natural fit, alongside Martin Scorsese and Paul Thomas Anderson, for the advisory panel that came together in June to support Turner Classic Movies. As part of that role, he’s recorded his first “Spielberg’s Picks” video, a recommendations list of his personal faves from the September 2023 TCM lineup. Watch the video above, an IndieWire exclusive, for not just his choices, but his incisive comments.
For his debut picks, he chose Vincente Minnelli’s “Meet Me in St. Louis” (1944), Douglas Sirk’s “Imitation of Life” (1959), Gordon Douglas’s “Them!” (1954), Minnelli’s “The Bad and the Beautiful” (1952), and Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Wrong Man” (1957). Scorsese and Anderson’s own picks are forthcoming,...
- 8/30/2023
- by Christian Blauvelt
- Indiewire
The following interview was originally published in the second issue of Outskirts Film Magazine, an independent print magazine on the past and present of cinema. Issue two is now available from the Outskirts e-shop.At 189 pages, Outskirts Nº2 is made up of original essays, interviews, reviews, translations, and a single large dossier dedicated to Japanese filmmaker and actress Tanaka Kinuyo.Forever a Woman.During the last edition of the Locarno Film Festival, a retrospective dedicated to Douglas Sirk took place, organised by Bernard Eisenschitz and Roberto Turigliatto. Among the many incredible guests invited to introduce Sirk’s films, such as Miguel Marías, Jon Halliday, Olaf Möller, Martina Müller, was Laura Mulvey. In speaking to her several months later, what started out initially as a conversation between myself and Mulvey about Sirk, unexpectedly morphed into a broader investigation that included the work of Tanaka Kinuyo, the subject of our dossier.The...
- 8/8/2023
- MUBI
At first glance, Sleeping Beauty seems among the Disney Princess films least likely to live up to the modern era of feminist storytelling. The titular character, Princess Aurora, has so little agency in the film that falling into a cursed sleep seems like a continuation of her early years. Aurora never gets a chance to choose her own destiny. So how could anyone make a case for this as a feminist film?
The answer to that, dear readers, is that the film isn’t about Princess Aurora at all. The film isn’t about supposed hero Prince Philip. It’s about an epic struggle between good fairies and an evil one. The Disney version of Sleeping Beauty is about a political divide in the world of fairies: those that bestow their blessings on humanity, and those who consort with monsters. And all of the major players in this struggle are women.
The answer to that, dear readers, is that the film isn’t about Princess Aurora at all. The film isn’t about supposed hero Prince Philip. It’s about an epic struggle between good fairies and an evil one. The Disney version of Sleeping Beauty is about a political divide in the world of fairies: those that bestow their blessings on humanity, and those who consort with monsters. And all of the major players in this struggle are women.
- 6/27/2023
- by David Crow
- Den of Geek
John Legend is writing the score to a stage adaptation of the 1959 film Imitation of Life.
The musical, which is in development and aiming for Broadway, features a book by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage (Sweat, Ruined) and direction by Liesl Tommy, who directed Danai Gurira’s Eclipsed on Broadway. The production held a private industry reading at the end of April.
Universal Theatrical Group and Get Lifted Film Co, a production company led by Legend, as well as producer Mike Jackson and Friends at Work CEO Ty Stiklorius, are producing the musical.
Imitation of Life, which originated as a 1933 novel written by Fannie Hurst, follows Delilah Johnston, a Black woman and mother living in Atlantic City in the 1920s with her daughter Peola, who passes as white. Johnston forms a friendship and business partnership with Bea Pullman, a white woman who is a widow, and must navigate the...
The musical, which is in development and aiming for Broadway, features a book by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage (Sweat, Ruined) and direction by Liesl Tommy, who directed Danai Gurira’s Eclipsed on Broadway. The production held a private industry reading at the end of April.
Universal Theatrical Group and Get Lifted Film Co, a production company led by Legend, as well as producer Mike Jackson and Friends at Work CEO Ty Stiklorius, are producing the musical.
Imitation of Life, which originated as a 1933 novel written by Fannie Hurst, follows Delilah Johnston, a Black woman and mother living in Atlantic City in the 1920s with her daughter Peola, who passes as white. Johnston forms a friendship and business partnership with Bea Pullman, a white woman who is a widow, and must navigate the...
- 6/26/2023
- by Caitlin Huston
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
A stage musical adaptation of the Fannie Hurst novel Imitation of Life and its film versions is under development at Universal Theatrical Group, with Lynn Nottage writing the book and John Legend handling the music and lyrics. Liesl Tommy is attached to direct.
Following a private industry reading that took place April 24-28 in New York City, Universal Theatrical Group — the live theater division of Universal Pictures — announced the further development of the project today.
Liesl Tommy
Imitation of Life will be produced for the stage by Universal Theatrical Group and Get Lifted Film Co. The musical is being developed for Broadway.
The novel originally was published in 1933, with Universal Pictures producing two film adaptations — the first directed by John Stahl in 1934 and starring Claudette Colbert and Louise Beavers, and the second in 1959, with stars Lana Turner and Juanita Moore directed by Douglas Sirk. The 1934 film was Oscar-nominated, and the...
Following a private industry reading that took place April 24-28 in New York City, Universal Theatrical Group — the live theater division of Universal Pictures — announced the further development of the project today.
Liesl Tommy
Imitation of Life will be produced for the stage by Universal Theatrical Group and Get Lifted Film Co. The musical is being developed for Broadway.
The novel originally was published in 1933, with Universal Pictures producing two film adaptations — the first directed by John Stahl in 1934 and starring Claudette Colbert and Louise Beavers, and the second in 1959, with stars Lana Turner and Juanita Moore directed by Douglas Sirk. The 1934 film was Oscar-nominated, and the...
- 6/26/2023
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
One need only look at the marketing strategy for 1934’s Imitation of Life to see how woefully inept Hollywood was unable to soberingly deal with the racist realities of American culture. The various taglines would have one believe the film is a tawdry tale about a single mother and her daughter falling in love with the same man, completely ignoring the searing backbone of the narrative regarding the toxic yoke of colorism dividing a Black mother and her daughter irrevocably.
Clearly undermining the intention of Fannie Hurst’s novel, from which it was adapted, there’s still no denying the dramatic imbalance between the juxtaposed pair of white and Black characters, a reality also readily apparent in Douglas Sirk’s more famous 1959 remake (and his swan song), which starred Lana Turner and netted Jaunita Moore an Academy Award nomination.…...
Clearly undermining the intention of Fannie Hurst’s novel, from which it was adapted, there’s still no denying the dramatic imbalance between the juxtaposed pair of white and Black characters, a reality also readily apparent in Douglas Sirk’s more famous 1959 remake (and his swan song), which starred Lana Turner and netted Jaunita Moore an Academy Award nomination.…...
- 6/14/2023
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Todd Haynes has a way with female stars. I would even call him the new-age George Cukor in that regard. Whether in Carol with Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, or his HBO limited series Mildred Pierce with Kate Winslet, or his homage to the director of so many so-called “women’s pictures” of the ’50s Douglas Sirk in Far From Heaven with Julianne Moore, he seems to be in his comfort zone with women. That has never been more apparent than his latest, May December, a deliciously entertaining showcase for Natalie Portman and Moore (her and Haynes’ fourth film together), which just had its world premiere Saturday in competition at the Cannes Film Festival.
The title is fine, but watching the film I kept thinking a really great title for it from Hollywood’s past would have been Imitation of Life from the aforementioned Sirk, not that this movie has...
The title is fine, but watching the film I kept thinking a really great title for it from Hollywood’s past would have been Imitation of Life from the aforementioned Sirk, not that this movie has...
- 5/20/2023
- by Pete Hammond
- Deadline Film + TV
Frederick Kohner penned a novel about his young daughter, who was emersed in the growing surfing community as a teen in the 1950s. Her summer experiences inspired the book. Kohner likely never imagined that his book would spawn a cultural phenomenon. It did just that. The book eventually spawned a franchise of films and television projects that brought viewers on Francie ‘Gidget’ Lawrence’s summer adventures. Over the years, several actors have taken on the role of Gidget. Do you remember them all?
Sandra Dee was the first actor to portray the famed character
Sandra Dee was the first actor to take on the role of Gidget. She appeared in the first film adaptation of the bestselling book. By the time Dee landed the role in Gidget, she was a veteran in the entertainment industry. According to The Bad and the Beautiful: Hollywood in the Fifties, Dee earned the equivalent...
Sandra Dee was the first actor to portray the famed character
Sandra Dee was the first actor to take on the role of Gidget. She appeared in the first film adaptation of the bestselling book. By the time Dee landed the role in Gidget, she was a veteran in the entertainment industry. According to The Bad and the Beautiful: Hollywood in the Fifties, Dee earned the equivalent...
- 5/20/2023
- by Andrea Francese
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
For the second consecutive year and 13th time ever, the present Best Picture Oscar lineup consists of an even 10 nominees. As has been the case since 2009, the winner will be decided by a preferential voting system. Over the past 13 years, only twice — at the ceremonies for the films of 2014 and 2018 — has every Best Picture contender won something. An annual average of 2.4 films recognized in the top category during the period wound up with zero trophies, with the biggest shutout having affected five of the nine 2013 nominees. Since several films in this year’s group have reached the point where they’d be lucky to pull off one win apiece, that preferential era record could easily be matched or even broken.
The films competing for the 2022 Best Picture Oscar have a collective total of 65 nominations across 18 categories. According to Gold Derby’s current odds, the most-recognized movie of the year, “Everything Everywhere All at Once,...
The films competing for the 2022 Best Picture Oscar have a collective total of 65 nominations across 18 categories. According to Gold Derby’s current odds, the most-recognized movie of the year, “Everything Everywhere All at Once,...
- 3/9/2023
- by Matthew Stewart
- Gold Derby
While we’ve known the results of Jeanne Dielman Tops Sight and Sound‘s 2022 Greatest Films of All-Time List”>Sight & Sound’s once-in-a-decade greatest films of all-time poll for a few months now, the recent release of the individual ballots has given data-crunching cinephiles a new opportunity to dive deeper. We have Letterboxd lists detailing all 4,400+ films that received at least one vote and another expanding the directors poll, spreadsheets calculating every entry, and now a list ranking how many votes individual directors received for their films.
Tabulated by Genjuro, the list of 35 directors, with two pairs, puts Alfred Hitchcock back on top, while Chantal Akerman is at number two. Elsewhere in the top ten are David Lynch, Francis Ford Coppola, Jean-Luc Godard, Agnès Varda, Orson Welles, Yasujirō Ozu, and Stanley Kubrick, and tied for the tenth spot is Wong Kar Wai and Ingmar Bergman.
Check out the list below,...
Tabulated by Genjuro, the list of 35 directors, with two pairs, puts Alfred Hitchcock back on top, while Chantal Akerman is at number two. Elsewhere in the top ten are David Lynch, Francis Ford Coppola, Jean-Luc Godard, Agnès Varda, Orson Welles, Yasujirō Ozu, and Stanley Kubrick, and tied for the tenth spot is Wong Kar Wai and Ingmar Bergman.
Check out the list below,...
- 3/5/2023
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
John M. Stahl’s superior melodrama is a focus point for the study of African-Americans in Hollywood. Businesswoman Claudette Colbert a housekeeper Louise Beavers raise their daughters together for a story that expresses the racial divide in simple terms. Determined to pass for white, Beavers’ daughter Fredi Washington rejects her mother outright. The tale of motherly sacrifice is in some ways more honest than later ‘social justice’ films about race, yet it sticks closely to Hollywood’s segregationist rules.
Imitation of Life
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 1167
1934 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 110 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date January 10, 2023 / 39.95
Starring: Claudette Colbert, Warren William, Louise Beavers, Fredi Washington, Rochelle Hudson, Ned Sparks, Juanita Quigley, Alan Hale, Henry Armetta, Hattie McDaniel, Paul Porcasi, Teru Shimada, Madame Sul-Te-Wan, Jane Withers, Dorothy Black.
Cinematography: Merrit Gerstad
Costumes: Travis Banton
Art Director: Charles D. Hall
Film Editor: Philip Cahn, Maurice Wright
Original Music: Heinz Roemheld...
Imitation of Life
Blu-ray
The Criterion Collection 1167
1934 / B&W / 1:37 Academy / 110 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date January 10, 2023 / 39.95
Starring: Claudette Colbert, Warren William, Louise Beavers, Fredi Washington, Rochelle Hudson, Ned Sparks, Juanita Quigley, Alan Hale, Henry Armetta, Hattie McDaniel, Paul Porcasi, Teru Shimada, Madame Sul-Te-Wan, Jane Withers, Dorothy Black.
Cinematography: Merrit Gerstad
Costumes: Travis Banton
Art Director: Charles D. Hall
Film Editor: Philip Cahn, Maurice Wright
Original Music: Heinz Roemheld...
- 1/17/2023
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
German film festival Filmfest Hamburg has scrapped its plan to give the Douglas Sirk Prize to the Austrian director Ulrich Seidl, following allegations of on-set impropriety and child exploitation against him and his film “Sparta.”
However, the festival has decided to continue with its plan to show “Sparta,” a statement released Tuesday by festival director Albert Wiederspiel and program director Kathrin Kohlstedde explained.
The statement read: “The accusations against the production around the working conditions during the making of the film came up after our [festival program] was already in print.
“We included the film in the program because of its outstanding quality. It is a very sensitive film about a particularly difficult and taboo subject. The accusations against Ulrich Seidl are directed against the conditions during the shooting and explicitly not against his film.
“We have therefore decided to leave the film in the program.”
The statement added: “Regarding the Douglas Sirk Prize,...
However, the festival has decided to continue with its plan to show “Sparta,” a statement released Tuesday by festival director Albert Wiederspiel and program director Kathrin Kohlstedde explained.
The statement read: “The accusations against the production around the working conditions during the making of the film came up after our [festival program] was already in print.
“We included the film in the program because of its outstanding quality. It is a very sensitive film about a particularly difficult and taboo subject. The accusations against Ulrich Seidl are directed against the conditions during the shooting and explicitly not against his film.
“We have therefore decided to leave the film in the program.”
The statement added: “Regarding the Douglas Sirk Prize,...
- 9/14/2022
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
Exclusive: One of the hottest acquisition titles at this year’s Toronto Film Festival, which starts in earnest tonight, happens to star a couple of certifiable show business legends, both now in their 80s, both working all the time (much of it together lately) and both proving age is just a number.
Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin wrapped their Netflix comedy series Grace and Frankie after seven seasons — the longest ever for any series in the streamer’s history — and within a week were back before the cameras shooting the indie film appropriately titled Moving On since this pair does just that, even in an industry that doesn’t exactly celebrate seniors as a rule. They are working all the time it seems.
I should note I did this Zoom interview last week, right before Fonda would announce via Instagram that she has been diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma and...
Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin wrapped their Netflix comedy series Grace and Frankie after seven seasons — the longest ever for any series in the streamer’s history — and within a week were back before the cameras shooting the indie film appropriately titled Moving On since this pair does just that, even in an industry that doesn’t exactly celebrate seniors as a rule. They are working all the time it seems.
I should note I did this Zoom interview last week, right before Fonda would announce via Instagram that she has been diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma and...
- 9/8/2022
- by Pete Hammond
- Deadline Film + TV
“These three films, they’re all masterful. They’re extraordinary films, and they’re actually quite different.” It’s mid-July in Switzerland and Todd Haynes is talking melodrama: “The three masterworks for me, and to see them at a festival like Locarno, which is very rare, are Written on The Wind, Imitation of Life, and All That Heaven Allows.” Perhaps more than even the cinema of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Todd Haynes’ films have so often intertwined with those of the late Douglas Sirk, a director whose peerless studio work from the 1940s and 1950s have been a rich source of aesthetic and emotional inspiration, most clearly seen in Haynes’ 2002 masterpiece Far From Heaven.
“Imitation of Life is a film of such remarkable resonance,” Haynes explains on a warm summer morning in the Hotel Belvedere. “I think its themes of race and pretending, of passing, and misperceptions of what you are and who you are,...
“Imitation of Life is a film of such remarkable resonance,” Haynes explains on a warm summer morning in the Hotel Belvedere. “I think its themes of race and pretending, of passing, and misperceptions of what you are and who you are,...
- 8/31/2022
- by Rory O'Connor
- The Film Stage
The latest episode of "Atlanta" is almost good. It has some intriguing and even funny moments, but it ultimately suffers from the same toothlessness and self-sabotage that has plagued the entire season. Shown in literal black and white, "Rich Wigga, Poor Wigga" is an obvious nod to the film "Imitation of Life" that attempts to tackle the concept of "gatekeeping Blackness" and does so with mixed success. Let's just get right into breaking down the episode, and explaining why both this episode and season 3 as a whole have routinely fallen short despite some promising moments.
The...
The post Atlanta Season 3, Episode 9 is a Mixed Bag of Disappointment appeared first on /Film.
The...
The post Atlanta Season 3, Episode 9 is a Mixed Bag of Disappointment appeared first on /Film.
- 5/13/2022
- by Deshawn "DeLa Doll" Thomas
- Slash Film
Watching Written on the Wind was my first introduction to the famous auteur of the melodramatic, Douglas Sirk. The 2K Blu-ray restoration is out now via the Criterion Collection. Sirk was a German filmmaker who fled the country when he was approached by the notorious Joseph Goebbels (Nazi war criminal and the German Minister of Propaganda) to make the films that Leni Riefenstahl ended up working on. There’s more to that story that’s both sad and tawdry; check it out if you have interest in this strange intersection with world history and cinema. Sirk became known for exploring the kind of daily ugly realities that bubbled beneath a bright, polished veneer, a gauntlet later picked up by fellow...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...
- 2/28/2022
- Screen Anarchy
Singers Beyonce and Zendaya are said to be in talks to star in a remake of the movie ‘Imitation of Life’. The drama film was first released in 1934, based on Fannie Hurst’s 1933 novel of the same name, and then remade in 1959, starring Lana Turner, Juanita Moore, John Gavin and Sandra Dee, reports […]...
- 2/20/2022
- by Glamsham Bureau
- GlamSham
Forget the hearts and flowers, forget the mushy cards, forget Valentine’s Day — instead, grab your gal pals and celebrate “Galentine’s Day” on February 13! Not sure what this great day is?
In 2010, Amy Poehler gifted us with this “non-holiday” as Leslie Knopes on “Parks and Recreation,” declaring, “Every February 13, my lady friends and I leave our husbands and our boyfriends at home and we just come and kick it, breakfast style. Ladies celebrating ladies.” So, we’ve come up with the best movies that celebrate those female friendships.
It’s only fitting that we include Poehler’s collaboration with her real-life best friend Tina Fey, with their “Baby Mama” making the list. And if you’re looking for more laughs, grab your girlfriends, a bottle of wine and enjoy “Girls Trip” or “Bad Moms” or “Bridesmaids.”
SEEMost Romantic Movies Ever: 25 greatest films ranked from worst to best
In the mood for a good cry?...
In 2010, Amy Poehler gifted us with this “non-holiday” as Leslie Knopes on “Parks and Recreation,” declaring, “Every February 13, my lady friends and I leave our husbands and our boyfriends at home and we just come and kick it, breakfast style. Ladies celebrating ladies.” So, we’ve come up with the best movies that celebrate those female friendships.
It’s only fitting that we include Poehler’s collaboration with her real-life best friend Tina Fey, with their “Baby Mama” making the list. And if you’re looking for more laughs, grab your girlfriends, a bottle of wine and enjoy “Girls Trip” or “Bad Moms” or “Bridesmaids.”
SEEMost Romantic Movies Ever: 25 greatest films ranked from worst to best
In the mood for a good cry?...
- 2/12/2022
- by Susan Pennington and Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
Cate Blanchett failed to land among this year’s nominees in the Best Supporting Actress race, but the two-time Oscar winner made history anyway with the 94th Academy Awards nominations. By starring in two Best Picture nominees, “Don’t Look Up” and “Nightmare Alley,” Blanchett has been credited in nine movies nominated for the Oscars’ top picture prize. That makes her the only actress ever credited in that many Best Picture nominees, surpassing a record previously held by Olivia de Havilland.
Blanchett’s first role in a Best Picture nominee came for “Elizabeth,” the 1998 film that also gave Blanchett her first Best Actress nomination. Her other Best Picture nominees before this year included all three films in the “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, “The Aviator”, “Babel,” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” The twosome of “Don’t Look Up” and “Nightmare Alley” marks the first time Blanchett has appeared in...
Blanchett’s first role in a Best Picture nominee came for “Elizabeth,” the 1998 film that also gave Blanchett her first Best Actress nomination. Her other Best Picture nominees before this year included all three films in the “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, “The Aviator”, “Babel,” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” The twosome of “Don’t Look Up” and “Nightmare Alley” marks the first time Blanchett has appeared in...
- 2/10/2022
- by Christopher Rosen
- Gold Derby
Forget the hearts and flowers, forget the mushy cards, forget Valentine’s Day — instead, grab your gal pals and celebrate “Galentine’s Day” on February 13! Not sure what this great day is?
In 2010, Amy Poehler gifted us with this “non-holiday” as Leslie Knopes on “Parks and Recreation,” declaring, “Every February 13, my lady friends and I leave our husbands and our boyfriends at home and we just come and kick it, breakfast style. Ladies celebrating ladies.” So, we’ve come up with the best movies that celebrate those female friendships.
It’s only fitting that we include Poehler’s collaboration with her real-life best friend Tina Fey, with their “Baby Mama” making the list. And if you’re looking for more laughs, grab your girlfriends, a bottle of wine and enjoy “Girls Trip” or “Bad Moms” or “Bridesmaids.”
In the mood for a good cry? It’s a toss-up between “Beaches...
In 2010, Amy Poehler gifted us with this “non-holiday” as Leslie Knopes on “Parks and Recreation,” declaring, “Every February 13, my lady friends and I leave our husbands and our boyfriends at home and we just come and kick it, breakfast style. Ladies celebrating ladies.” So, we’ve come up with the best movies that celebrate those female friendships.
It’s only fitting that we include Poehler’s collaboration with her real-life best friend Tina Fey, with their “Baby Mama” making the list. And if you’re looking for more laughs, grab your girlfriends, a bottle of wine and enjoy “Girls Trip” or “Bad Moms” or “Bridesmaids.”
In the mood for a good cry? It’s a toss-up between “Beaches...
- 2/10/2022
- by Susan Pennington, Chris Beachum and Misty Holland
- Gold Derby
After a hiatus as theaters in New York City and beyond closed their doors during the pandemic, we’re delighted to announce the return of NYC Weekend Watch, our weekly round-up of repertory offerings. While many theaters are still focused on a selection of new releases, there’s a handful of worthwhile repertory screenings taking place.
IFC Center
Solaris screens for its 50th anniversary.
Metrograph
As a retro of melodrama master John M. Stahl gets underway, the six-film retrospective of Miklós Jancsó has its final weekend.
Museum of the Moving Image
Films by Paul Thomas Anderson, Sergei Eisenstein, and Ulrike Ottinger screen for “See It Big: Extravaganzas!“
Museum of Modern Art
“To Save and Project,” one of the most eye-opening series in any given year, has its final weekend as a pre-code series kicks off.
Film Forum
As a new 35mm print of The Conversation continues its run, a collection...
IFC Center
Solaris screens for its 50th anniversary.
Metrograph
As a retro of melodrama master John M. Stahl gets underway, the six-film retrospective of Miklós Jancsó has its final weekend.
Museum of the Moving Image
Films by Paul Thomas Anderson, Sergei Eisenstein, and Ulrike Ottinger screen for “See It Big: Extravaganzas!“
Museum of Modern Art
“To Save and Project,” one of the most eye-opening series in any given year, has its final weekend as a pre-code series kicks off.
Film Forum
As a new 35mm print of The Conversation continues its run, a collection...
- 2/3/2022
- by Nick Newman
- The Film Stage
The Criterion Channel’s February Lineup Includes Melvin Van Peebles, Douglas Sirk, Laura Dern & More
Another month, another Criterion Channel lineup. In accordance with Black History Month their selections are especially refreshing: seven by Melvin Van Peebles, five from Kevin Jerome Everson, and Criterion editions of The Harder They Come and The Learning Tree.
Regarding individual features I’m quite happy to see Abderrahmane Sissako’s fantastic Bamako, last year’s big Sundance winner (and Kosovo’s Oscar entry) Hive, and the remarkably beautiful Portuguese feature The Metamorphosis of Birds. Add a three-film Laura Dern collection (including the recently canonized Smooth Talk) and Pasolini’s rarely shown documentary Love Meetings to make this a fine smorgasboard.
See the full list of February titles below and more on the Criterion Channel.
Alan & Naomi, Sterling Van Wagenen, 1992
All That Heaven Allows, Douglas Sirk, 1955
The Angel Levine, Ján Kadár, 1970
Babylon, Franco Rosso, 1980
Babymother, Julian Henriques, 1998
Bamako, Abderrahmane Sissako, 2006
Beat Street, Stan Lathan, 1984
Blacks Britannica, David Koff, 1978
The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution,...
Regarding individual features I’m quite happy to see Abderrahmane Sissako’s fantastic Bamako, last year’s big Sundance winner (and Kosovo’s Oscar entry) Hive, and the remarkably beautiful Portuguese feature The Metamorphosis of Birds. Add a three-film Laura Dern collection (including the recently canonized Smooth Talk) and Pasolini’s rarely shown documentary Love Meetings to make this a fine smorgasboard.
See the full list of February titles below and more on the Criterion Channel.
Alan & Naomi, Sterling Van Wagenen, 1992
All That Heaven Allows, Douglas Sirk, 1955
The Angel Levine, Ján Kadár, 1970
Babylon, Franco Rosso, 1980
Babymother, Julian Henriques, 1998
Bamako, Abderrahmane Sissako, 2006
Beat Street, Stan Lathan, 1984
Blacks Britannica, David Koff, 1978
The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution,...
- 1/24/2022
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
Celebration of German Hollywood legend promises a fresh perspective on his life and work.
Switzerland’s Locarno Film Festival is set to explore the life and work of legendary German Hollywood director Douglas Sirk for the retrospective of its 75th edition, running August 3-13 this year.
The celebration of his work will coincide with the 35th anniversary of the death of the filmmaker whose classic melodramas include Magnificent Obsession, All That Heaven Allows, There’s Always A Tomorrow, Written On The Wind, A Time To Love And Die and Imitation Of Life.
Born in Hamburg in 1897 as Hans Detlef Sierck,...
Switzerland’s Locarno Film Festival is set to explore the life and work of legendary German Hollywood director Douglas Sirk for the retrospective of its 75th edition, running August 3-13 this year.
The celebration of his work will coincide with the 35th anniversary of the death of the filmmaker whose classic melodramas include Magnificent Obsession, All That Heaven Allows, There’s Always A Tomorrow, Written On The Wind, A Time To Love And Die and Imitation Of Life.
Born in Hamburg in 1897 as Hans Detlef Sierck,...
- 1/20/2022
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- ScreenDaily
Racial passing occurs when a member of one racial group is either believed to be or accepted as a member of another. In the U.S., it generally means someone who is Black or of multi-racial heritage, “passing” as a White person. It’s the subject of Rebecca Hall’s well-received directorial debut “Passing,” currently streaming on Netflix. Hall, who is the daughter of the late director Peter Hall and opera singer Maria Ewing is of Dutch, Native American, African American and Scottish heritage. She adapted Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel about two African American friends: one (Tessa Thompson) is married to a prominent doctor and the other (Ruth Negga) has passed for white for years and is married to a wealthy racist (Alexander Skarsgard). Hall was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize dramatic at Sundance; “Passing” currently is nominated for five Gotham Awards including Best Picture and Breakthrough Director.
Racial...
Racial...
- 11/24/2021
- by Susan King
- Gold Derby
Back in 2018, Michael Stuhlbarg joined an exclusive club of actors who co-starred in three Best Picture nominees during the same Oscars ceremony. The often-hirsute actor played a key role in Best Picture winner “The Shape of Water” and also co-starred in nominees “Call Me By Your Name” and “The Post.”
The trifecta put Stuhlbarg in some select company as only five other performers had pulled off the same feat: John C. Reilly, who was in three of the five Best Picture nominees at the 2003 Oscars — Best Picture winner “Chicago,” “The Hours,” and “Gangs of New York”; Claudette Colbert in 1935 for Best Picture winner “It Happened One Night,” “Cleopatra,” and “Imitation of Life”; Charles Laughton in 1936 for Best Picture winner “Mutiny on the Bounty,” “Les Miserables” and “Ruggles of Red Gap”; Adolphe Menjou in 1938 for “One Hundred Men and a Girl,” “Stage Door” and “A Star Is Born”; and Thomas Mitchell...
The trifecta put Stuhlbarg in some select company as only five other performers had pulled off the same feat: John C. Reilly, who was in three of the five Best Picture nominees at the 2003 Oscars — Best Picture winner “Chicago,” “The Hours,” and “Gangs of New York”; Claudette Colbert in 1935 for Best Picture winner “It Happened One Night,” “Cleopatra,” and “Imitation of Life”; Charles Laughton in 1936 for Best Picture winner “Mutiny on the Bounty,” “Les Miserables” and “Ruggles of Red Gap”; Adolphe Menjou in 1938 for “One Hundred Men and a Girl,” “Stage Door” and “A Star Is Born”; and Thomas Mitchell...
- 9/9/2021
- by Christopher Rosen
- Gold Derby
by Brent Calderwood
Juanita Moore lived to be 99 but she's immortal via her Oscar-nominated classic
In case you were wondering, today marks the 2021 due date to submit nominations for the Hollywood Walk of Fame. More importantly, it also marks the third year in a row that Juanita Moore has been nominated. Each year the selection committee chooses about 20 winners from among 200 or so nominees, and for the past two years, Moore has been passed over, despite her Oscar-nominated performance in 1959’s Imitation of Life, and despite the annual efforts of her nephew Arnett Moore. Here’s hoping that this will finally be Juanita Moore’s year.
In 1959, Juanita Moore earned nearly unanimous praise for her star turn in Imitation of Life. Moore plays Annie Johnson, the Black mother of a light-skinned daughter, Sarah Jane, who is assumed by her classmates to be white...
Juanita Moore lived to be 99 but she's immortal via her Oscar-nominated classic
In case you were wondering, today marks the 2021 due date to submit nominations for the Hollywood Walk of Fame. More importantly, it also marks the third year in a row that Juanita Moore has been nominated. Each year the selection committee chooses about 20 winners from among 200 or so nominees, and for the past two years, Moore has been passed over, despite her Oscar-nominated performance in 1959’s Imitation of Life, and despite the annual efforts of her nephew Arnett Moore. Here’s hoping that this will finally be Juanita Moore’s year.
In 1959, Juanita Moore earned nearly unanimous praise for her star turn in Imitation of Life. Moore plays Annie Johnson, the Black mother of a light-skinned daughter, Sarah Jane, who is assumed by her classmates to be white...
- 5/29/2021
- by Brent Calderwood
- FilmExperience
Writer, director and actress Rebecca Miller discusses a few of her favorite films with hosts Josh Olson and Joe Dante.
Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode
Personal Velocity: Three Portraits (2002)
The Ballad Of Jack And Rose (2005)
The Private Lives Of Pippa Lee (2009)
Maggie’s Plan (2015)
Explorers (1985)
The Way We Were (1973)
Battleship Potemkin (1925)
Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday (1953)
Annie Hall (1977)
Repulsion (1965)
Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
Knife In The Water (1962)
The Tenant (1976)
Cries and Whispers (1972)
Persona (1966)
The Magician (1958)
Hour Of The Wolf (1968)
The Virgin Spring (1960)
The Seventh Seal (1957)
Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948)
The Exorcist (1973)
The Shining (1980)
La Dolce Vita (1960)
Regarding Henry (1991)
Angela (1995)
Badlands (1973)
Casino (1995)
On The Waterfront (1954)
My Dinner with Andre (1981)
Jules and Jim (1962)
The Bitter Tears Of Petra von Kant (1972)
Wings Of Desire (1987)
The Killer Inside Me (1976)
The Killer Inside Me (2010)
Married To The Mob (1988)
Blue Velvet (1986)
Dune (1984)
Imitation Of Life (1934)
Imitation Of Life (1959)
Written On The Wind (1956)
Magnificent Obsession (1954)
All That Heaven Allows...
Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode
Personal Velocity: Three Portraits (2002)
The Ballad Of Jack And Rose (2005)
The Private Lives Of Pippa Lee (2009)
Maggie’s Plan (2015)
Explorers (1985)
The Way We Were (1973)
Battleship Potemkin (1925)
Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday (1953)
Annie Hall (1977)
Repulsion (1965)
Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
Knife In The Water (1962)
The Tenant (1976)
Cries and Whispers (1972)
Persona (1966)
The Magician (1958)
Hour Of The Wolf (1968)
The Virgin Spring (1960)
The Seventh Seal (1957)
Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948)
The Exorcist (1973)
The Shining (1980)
La Dolce Vita (1960)
Regarding Henry (1991)
Angela (1995)
Badlands (1973)
Casino (1995)
On The Waterfront (1954)
My Dinner with Andre (1981)
Jules and Jim (1962)
The Bitter Tears Of Petra von Kant (1972)
Wings Of Desire (1987)
The Killer Inside Me (1976)
The Killer Inside Me (2010)
Married To The Mob (1988)
Blue Velvet (1986)
Dune (1984)
Imitation Of Life (1934)
Imitation Of Life (1959)
Written On The Wind (1956)
Magnificent Obsession (1954)
All That Heaven Allows...
- 5/11/2021
- by Kris Millsap
- Trailers from Hell
The Film Experience will visit a few Lana Turner films this week. Here's Nick Taylor...
Happy 100th birthday, Lana Turner! Here we are on her centennial to talk about her role as Lora Meredith in Douglas Sirk’s 1959 remake of Imitation of Life, one of her most famous films and easily among the most enduring American melodramas ever made. Imitation’s themes of race and womanhood in America, its sumptuous design, and Oscar-nominated turns from Juanita Moore and Susan Kohner have all rightly received their fair share of attention, yet I have to ask... do most folks like Turner in this?
Maybe my perception that she’s disliked comes from a class in undergrad where my professor didn’t like anything about Turner, from her acting style to the era of beauty she represents. Sirk’s own comments on directing her certainly don’t help...
Happy 100th birthday, Lana Turner! Here we are on her centennial to talk about her role as Lora Meredith in Douglas Sirk’s 1959 remake of Imitation of Life, one of her most famous films and easily among the most enduring American melodramas ever made. Imitation’s themes of race and womanhood in America, its sumptuous design, and Oscar-nominated turns from Juanita Moore and Susan Kohner have all rightly received their fair share of attention, yet I have to ask... do most folks like Turner in this?
Maybe my perception that she’s disliked comes from a class in undergrad where my professor didn’t like anything about Turner, from her acting style to the era of beauty she represents. Sirk’s own comments on directing her certainly don’t help...
- 2/8/2021
- by Nick Taylor
- FilmExperience
The presumed dead-and-buried practice of racial passing by light-skinned blacks in the United States decades ago is returned to center-stage in Passing, a delicate, sensitive, intentionally claustrophobic and not entirely limber directorial debut from the protean British stage performer Rebecca Hall. Based on the recently resurrected 1929 novel by Nella Larsen, which was a modest success in its time, the film is indisputably intriguing for its look at a very particular convention about which younger generations know very little. But the adaptation is also rather arch and aridly decorous, with a well-rehearsed rather than spontaneous feel that sometimes weighs things down. Still, this is something very different from the usual fare both in cinemas and on the tube and, given the subject matter, it will attract the intellectually curious and culturally informed.
The phenomenon of passing was familiar to the wide public during the last century due to a handful of popular entertainments,...
The phenomenon of passing was familiar to the wide public during the last century due to a handful of popular entertainments,...
- 1/31/2021
- by Todd McCarthy
- Deadline Film + TV
As her new film My Zoe opens, the actor-director recalls being enchanted by Jarmusch, Godard and Chéreau – and dancing rock’n’roll at the Paris Boum Boum
When I was a teenager I was very much into films – a little bit of music maybe, but mostly films. I went to the cinema a lot. I really liked older stuff like Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life, and my dad was a big admirer of John Cassavetes, so I was a fan of A Woman Under the Influence. But I really remember being blown away by [Francis Ford Coppola’s] Rumble Fish. It’s funny: I’ve seen it since and I like it, but I wouldn’t say it was my favourite any more. But back then, I thought it was just really great: the music, the way they use black-and-white and colour. I used to listen to the soundtrack all the time,...
When I was a teenager I was very much into films – a little bit of music maybe, but mostly films. I went to the cinema a lot. I really liked older stuff like Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life, and my dad was a big admirer of John Cassavetes, so I was a fan of A Woman Under the Influence. But I really remember being blown away by [Francis Ford Coppola’s] Rumble Fish. It’s funny: I’ve seen it since and I like it, but I wouldn’t say it was my favourite any more. But back then, I thought it was just really great: the music, the way they use black-and-white and colour. I used to listen to the soundtrack all the time,...
- 10/22/2020
- by Interview by Andrew Pulver
- The Guardian - Film News
“Limitation of Life tells the struggles of assimilation and identity conflicts within a first generation Chinese-American family in 1950s New York. A riff on Douglas Sirk’s Imitation of Life, Limitation of Life is both a homage to the lush 1950s melodramas and a subversion on the genre by front-and-centering a family of Poc immigrants, whom 1950s Hollywood rendered voiceless.” (Official)
“Limitation of Life” review is part of the Submit Your Film Initiative
Leading on a strong and aesthetically pleasing note, “Limitation of Life” wonderfully homages the genre of the 1950’s melodrama with a color pallet and screen 4:3 ratio. Additionally, the sound design, score, wardrobes and set designs also are favorable in capturing the era. While the visual approach gives the short film a defining presentation, the greater feat lies within balancing homage with criticism of under-representation of Asian culture in Hollywood.
While Asian cultures are still among the most poorly represented in Hollywood,...
“Limitation of Life” review is part of the Submit Your Film Initiative
Leading on a strong and aesthetically pleasing note, “Limitation of Life” wonderfully homages the genre of the 1950’s melodrama with a color pallet and screen 4:3 ratio. Additionally, the sound design, score, wardrobes and set designs also are favorable in capturing the era. While the visual approach gives the short film a defining presentation, the greater feat lies within balancing homage with criticism of under-representation of Asian culture in Hollywood.
While Asian cultures are still among the most poorly represented in Hollywood,...
- 9/25/2020
- by Adam Symchuk
- AsianMoviePulse
When one ponders the filmography of Douglas Sirk, one languishes in his successful meditation on stifled American lives in his 1950s soapy melodramas, the period with which he would eventually be most celebrated. It’s now unavoidable to speak of Sirk without mentioning the influence of his films from this decade on Todd Haynes or Rainer Werner Fassbinder. But it’s a select number of titles, some of them remakes of earlier Hollywood melodramas themselves, which take up the bulk of the conversation. But for all the hyperbolic anguish of a Magnificent Obsession or the detrimental social issues of All That Heaven Allows and Imitation of Life, Sirk also completed a handful of highly insightful, more psychologically attuned portraits, one of the best being 1955’s There’s Always Tomorrow (released the same year as Heaven and the little seen Rock Hudson period piece Captain Lightfoot).…...
- 8/25/2020
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Kino Lorber unleashes their second volume of forgotten film noir classics with Film Noir: The Dark Side of Cinema II which includes three distinctly different titles from the 1950s, including Thunder on the Hill (1951), The Price of Fear (1956) and The Female Animal (1958), each containing their own notable nuggets among their cast members and directors.
The gem of the collection is Thunder on the Hill, a 1951 melodrama from Douglas Sirk, which by comparison’s standards is noir-light. The German émigré is of course most noted for a string of 1950s melodramas which would set the inspirational standards for a host of future international auteurs, with items such as Magnificent Obsession (1954), All That Heaven Allows (1955), Written on the Wind (1956), and his 1959 swan song Imitation of Life (the first and last of those being remakes of John M.…...
The gem of the collection is Thunder on the Hill, a 1951 melodrama from Douglas Sirk, which by comparison’s standards is noir-light. The German émigré is of course most noted for a string of 1950s melodramas which would set the inspirational standards for a host of future international auteurs, with items such as Magnificent Obsession (1954), All That Heaven Allows (1955), Written on the Wind (1956), and his 1959 swan song Imitation of Life (the first and last of those being remakes of John M.…...
- 6/2/2020
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Though his actual first name was Howard, and he signed his books “James Harvey,” in the 20-plus years of our friendship I always knew him as Jim. In our household, my wife, daughter and I also had a nickname for him, “The Owl,” because of the night hours he kept. I am a morning person, and sometimes the difference created tension between us, if, say, we were having dinner after a film and it was going on 10:30 and I could barely keep my eyes open. I would stand up to signal I was done and ready to leave while he was still nursing his espresso, just getting started, and he would get a wounded look in his eyes and let me know he thought I was being rude. It’s true, I can be abrupt, and he was the opposite, apt to make a more gradual, mannerly leave-taking. We were both great walkers,...
- 5/29/2020
- by Phillip Lopate
- Indiewire
The writer/director of The Love Witch talks about her favorite classic women’s pictures.
Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode
The Love Witch (2016)
Baby Face (1933)
Stromboli (1950)
Europa ’51 (1951)
Fear (1951)
Duel In The Sun (1946)
The Scarlet Empress (1934)
Blonde Venus (1932)
Nora Prentiss (1947)
Woman On The Run (1950)
Wait Until Dark (1967)
Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
Imitation of Life (1969)
Little Women (2019)
Emma (2020)
My Cousin Rachel (2017)
Sex and the City (2008)
Mamma Mia! (2008)
Mildred Pierce (1945)
The Reckless Moment (1949)
Sudden Fear (1952)
Torch Song (1953)
Captain Marvel (2019)
Other Notable Items
The Captain Trips virus in Stephen King’s novel The Stand (1978)
Marlene Dietrich
Mae West
Jennifer Jones
Joan Crawford
Joan Bennett
Gene Tierney
Barbara Stanwyck
The Hays Code
Cary Grant
Marilyn Monroe
Ingrid Bergman
Roberto Rossellini
The Academy Awards
Bette Davis
Jennifer Jones
Gregory Peck
Joseph Cotten
Travis Banton
Josef von Sternberg
Catherine the Great
The Criterion Collection
Kent Smith
Dan Duryea
Douglas Sirk
Jane Austen
Mildred Pierce TV miniseries...
Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode
The Love Witch (2016)
Baby Face (1933)
Stromboli (1950)
Europa ’51 (1951)
Fear (1951)
Duel In The Sun (1946)
The Scarlet Empress (1934)
Blonde Venus (1932)
Nora Prentiss (1947)
Woman On The Run (1950)
Wait Until Dark (1967)
Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
Imitation of Life (1969)
Little Women (2019)
Emma (2020)
My Cousin Rachel (2017)
Sex and the City (2008)
Mamma Mia! (2008)
Mildred Pierce (1945)
The Reckless Moment (1949)
Sudden Fear (1952)
Torch Song (1953)
Captain Marvel (2019)
Other Notable Items
The Captain Trips virus in Stephen King’s novel The Stand (1978)
Marlene Dietrich
Mae West
Jennifer Jones
Joan Crawford
Joan Bennett
Gene Tierney
Barbara Stanwyck
The Hays Code
Cary Grant
Marilyn Monroe
Ingrid Bergman
Roberto Rossellini
The Academy Awards
Bette Davis
Jennifer Jones
Gregory Peck
Joseph Cotten
Travis Banton
Josef von Sternberg
Catherine the Great
The Criterion Collection
Kent Smith
Dan Duryea
Douglas Sirk
Jane Austen
Mildred Pierce TV miniseries...
- 5/19/2020
- by Kris Millsap
- Trailers from Hell
Great 3-D thrills — Hollywood was working to perfect 3-D movies just as the craze died out. An impeccable Blu-ray 3-D restoration, the glory of young Rock Hudson and some of the best Utah scenery in depth makes this a very enjoyable disc. Director Douglas Sirk was itching to do a western, and the swiftly rising star Rock Hudson wanted to work for him again, even though it meant playing another Indian role. Were these men that desperate to get out of Hollywood for a month? At least they avoided filming in nuclear test sites…
Taza, Son of Cochise
3-D Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1954 / Color / 2.00:1 widescreen / 79 min. / Street Date May 26, 2020 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95
Starring: Rock Hudson, Barbara Rush, Gregg Palmer, Rex Reason, Morris Ankrum, Eugene Iglesias, Richard H. Cutting, Ian MacDonald, Robert Burton, Joe Sawyer, Lance Fuller, Charles Horvath, Jeff Chandler, William Leslie, Barbara Burck, most of Utah.
Cinematography:...
Taza, Son of Cochise
3-D Blu-ray
Kl Studio Classics
1954 / Color / 2.00:1 widescreen / 79 min. / Street Date May 26, 2020 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95
Starring: Rock Hudson, Barbara Rush, Gregg Palmer, Rex Reason, Morris Ankrum, Eugene Iglesias, Richard H. Cutting, Ian MacDonald, Robert Burton, Joe Sawyer, Lance Fuller, Charles Horvath, Jeff Chandler, William Leslie, Barbara Burck, most of Utah.
Cinematography:...
- 5/12/2020
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
“I’ll never let you go,” Gene Tierney’s Ellen Berent coos to her husband/victim in the 1945 melodrama film-noir Leave Her to Heaven. It’s a sentiment first uttered at an intimate juncture where such words still seem somewhat innocent from her increasingly toxic personality. Indeed, at least in cinematic terms, she’s a character who hasn’t let go, an exotically charged Technicolor femme fatale whose deadly beauty is merely one part of a dangerous trifecta, as equally bad as her bark and her bite.
Directed by John M. Stahl, who would pass away only five years later at the age of 63, with several of his previous titles (such as ‘women’s pictures’ Magnificent Obsession and Imitation of Life) remade in the 1950s by Douglas Sirk, it remains both Stahl and Tierney’s vibrant stranglehold on iconicity, the power of which can never be usurped.…
Continue reading.
Directed by John M. Stahl, who would pass away only five years later at the age of 63, with several of his previous titles (such as ‘women’s pictures’ Magnificent Obsession and Imitation of Life) remade in the 1950s by Douglas Sirk, it remains both Stahl and Tierney’s vibrant stranglehold on iconicity, the power of which can never be usurped.…
Continue reading.
- 4/7/2020
- by Nicholas Bell
- IONCINEMA.com
Coming to Film Forum in New York City is “Black Women,” a 70-film screening series that spotlights 81 years – 1920 to 2001 – of trailblazing African American actresses in American movies.
Scheduled to run from January 17 to February 13, the series is curated by film historian and professor Donald Bogle, author of six books concerning blacks in film and television, including the groundbreaking “Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films” (1973).
“Last year, Bruce Goldstein, the repertory programmer at Film Forum, asked me if there was something I was interested in doing, and this was a topic that I had been thinking about, because I recently updated my book on the subject, ‘Brown Sugar,’ which dealt with African American women in entertainment from the early years of the late 19th century to the present,” said Bogle. “That’s really the way it came about, and it just developed from there.
Scheduled to run from January 17 to February 13, the series is curated by film historian and professor Donald Bogle, author of six books concerning blacks in film and television, including the groundbreaking “Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films” (1973).
“Last year, Bruce Goldstein, the repertory programmer at Film Forum, asked me if there was something I was interested in doing, and this was a topic that I had been thinking about, because I recently updated my book on the subject, ‘Brown Sugar,’ which dealt with African American women in entertainment from the early years of the late 19th century to the present,” said Bogle. “That’s really the way it came about, and it just developed from there.
- 1/17/2020
- by Tambay Obenson
- Indiewire
Kelvin Harrison Jr. is the ultimate breakout story. The 25-year-old New Orleans native is nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for his wrenching performance in “Luce,” where plays an adopted teen contending with his heritage, while acclaim for his other performance as a troubled teen in Trey Shults’ fall festival sensation “Waves” further cemented 2019 as his big year.
All of that comes on the heels of a dense five-year period in which the actor was plucked from obscurity, scoring bit parts in everything from “Ender’s Game” to “12 Years a Slave” before finding his footing as a young lead in the past year. Nevertheless, he said in a recent interview that he still feels like an outsider.
The charismatic star, whose recent credits also include Epix’s “Godfather of Harlem,” has received nothing but reverence from his veteran co-stars — but the actor said his entire life has been a fish-out-water...
All of that comes on the heels of a dense five-year period in which the actor was plucked from obscurity, scoring bit parts in everything from “Ender’s Game” to “12 Years a Slave” before finding his footing as a young lead in the past year. Nevertheless, he said in a recent interview that he still feels like an outsider.
The charismatic star, whose recent credits also include Epix’s “Godfather of Harlem,” has received nothing but reverence from his veteran co-stars — but the actor said his entire life has been a fish-out-water...
- 1/3/2020
- by Tambay Obenson
- Indiewire
zWhen filmmaker Karim Aïnouz read Martha Batalha’s book “The Invisible Life of Euridice Gusmao,” he wished it was a novel he could’ve written. The book was not only a well known story in his home country of Brazil, but he picked up on numerous similarities between the book’s characters and his own grandmother and mother.
The book was so iconic that he even felt conflicted about being a man directing a movie based on a quintessentially female story. But with his film “Invisible Life,” Brazil’s official submission to the International Feature race at the Oscars, he felt it was time to do a portrait of his mother’s generation.
“I thought it was an important portrait to do of women of a certain generation who I thought had been not really represented, neither in literature, history or cinema,” Aïnouz told TheWrap’s Steve Pond following a...
The book was so iconic that he even felt conflicted about being a man directing a movie based on a quintessentially female story. But with his film “Invisible Life,” Brazil’s official submission to the International Feature race at the Oscars, he felt it was time to do a portrait of his mother’s generation.
“I thought it was an important portrait to do of women of a certain generation who I thought had been not really represented, neither in literature, history or cinema,” Aïnouz told TheWrap’s Steve Pond following a...
- 12/4/2019
- by Brian Welk
- The Wrap
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