THR’s Rebecca Keegan and Scott Feinberg are reporting that the Academy “is developing a streaming service of its own that would enable distributors to stream their own Best Picture Oscar hopefuls to voters,” this would cost them $10,000-15,000 per film, cheap-ish for their all-too-consuming bottom-line.
Read moreWhy Cannes is Still the Best Film Festival in the World
There will, no doubt, be a lot of heated discussions in regards to the Cannes Film Festival, which officially begins on May 14th. These write-ups will come mostly from American media hounds in the film industry, most of which seem to have a very narrow-minded way of looking at cinema.
Read more‘Hail Satan’ Plays Devil’s Advocate [Review]
“Hail Satan” is, first and foremost, about resistance; resistance against sectors of Christianity which have heavily deviated into their own toxic kind of militant evangelism. In fact, it’s this problematic nature of religion that kick-started the creation of The Satanic Temple. In Penny Lane’s documentary, The temple is rendered as nothing short of a troll-punking organization. It’s also an atheist-minded religion which keeps the positives that would come with religion — such as the camaraderie, organization but intersects these positives with progressive liberal values. You might ask, where does Satan fit into all of this? Oh, he’s mostly used as a direct conduit to infuriate Christian extremists, most of which actually believe The Satanic Temple abides by Lucifer’s throne. They don’t. In fact, The Satanic Temple does not worship Satan as a literal god at all. It’s all about the symbolism, baby. After all, the lord of darkness was the ultimate rebel by which the earliest biblical stories were told. These post-modernist Satanic followers mostly just want to place his statues all around red-state public spaces, including a Baphomet smack-dab in the middle of the Arkansas State Capitol. The fight to take the statue down, not to mention the idea of replacing it with a replica of the ten commandment plates, thanks to one Arkansas lawymaker, form the absurdist drama of the doc. Lane uses talking-heads footage from high-ranking TST members to forward her narrative, including the inner dilemmas such as the ethical rivalry between spokesman Lucien Greaves and Jex Blackmore, the founder of TST’s Detroit chapter who caused controversy within the organization, and ensuingly got booted out of it, after deciding to incite violence towards the temple’s enemies. Blackmore believes the separation of church and state isn’t enough, and that anarchy is needed to further promote the Staanic Temple’s goals.The rest of the movie is surprisingly infused in light and satirical manner by Lane, to further establish Satan’s rebelliously playful demeanor. If anything, Lane tries to make the case for America, in all its divisiveness, to take the moral examples presented by these lord-of-darkness-worshiping jokesters and change its mindset for the greater good. [B/B+]
Trailer: Fast & Furious Presents Hobbs & Shaw
Notes: Cannes 2019 Lineup Includes Malick, Almodovar, Dardennes and Dolan
Yes, 1999 Was Probably the Best Decade at the Movies of the Last 20 Years
Brian Raftery‘s “Best. Movie. Year. Ever: How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen” is making the rounds at bookstores, it came out two days ago. The film media have been hyping it up, including Vulture, which ran an entire chapter from the book on “Eyes Wide Shut.”
And so, the inevitable question one must ask is this: Are we heavily overhyping 1999?
Being John Malkovich, Election, The Matrix, Fight Club, American Beauty, The Limey, The Sixth Sense, Magnolia, The Straight Story, Eyes Wide Shut, Three Kings, The Insider, The Blair Witch Project, Bringing Out the Dead, Boy’s Don’t Cry, Go, The Iron Giant, Toy Story 2, South Park, Office Space, The Talented Mr. Ripley, American Pie, Bowfinger, Dick, 10 Things I Hate About You, Arlington Road, Man on the Moon, The Dreamlife of Angels, Romance, Payback.
So, no, we are not overhyping 1999. It truly is the bees knees. Best movie year ever? Probably not. But best movie year of the last two decades, no doubt about it. Is there any other year that comes remotely close? Maybe 2007 or 2011.
‘Rafiki' is the first Pro-LGBTQ Movie Made in Kenya [Review]
You will read people raving about the importance of a movie like “Rafiki“ even existing and I can understand and agree with that. This is an openly pro-LGBTQ movie financed in a country that is a vehemently homophobic and, for that, a movie such as this one should no doubt exist. However, the meandering plot and contrived romance at the heart of this film does the film’s outer importance a major disservice.
Read moreM. Night Shyamalan Admits Negative Reviews of ‘Glass’ Made Him Cry
M. Night Shyamalan’s “Glass” brought the director back to earth after he received positive reviews for his last two movies (“The Visit,” and “Split”) which had some in the industry proclaiming “comeback!” However, that “comeback” was indeed short-lived with “Glass” nabbing a 37% rotten rating and 42 Metascore. Too bad. I was pulling for Shyamalan who has made two great movies in his career (“The Sixth Sense” and “Unbreakable”).
Read moreSummer Movie Preview: 14 Big-Studio Movies That Could Astonish
As I researched the films that will be splattered on-screen nationwide between late April and August, I found major hope, a real grab-bag of potential big-studio treats. Surprising? Yes, especially considering that I have been critical of the summer movie season the last few years, at least ever since superhero movies changed the way studios greenlit their films. However, this year, there’s actually hope for artistic breakthroughs.
Read moreJ-Law Trying to Mount A Comeback With New A24 Project
There’s an an upcoming, untitled Jennifer Lawrence film in the works, involving producer extraordinaire Scott Rudin, and Lila Neugebauer (“The Waverly Gallery”) directing via a script by first-timer Elizabeth Sanders.
Read moreFinal Cannes 2019 Predictions
The Cannes Film Festival will be unveiling their lineup tomorrow morning (EST). It feels like Christmas eve for us down here at WoR. The boxes of gifts will be unwrapped tomorrow and we will, hopefully, be very excited by what will be selected. I do not expect the likes of Aster, Zhao, Reichardt, Eggers and Schultz making it into official competition but I would love to see these directors appear in the sidebars like Un Certain Regard.
Read moreBi Gan’s ‘Long Day’s Journey Into Night’ Is A Technically Masterful 3D Experiment [Review]
It’s remarkable and perplexing that a landmark work such as director Bi Gan‘s latest film, “Long Day’s Journey into Night,” is not part of this year’s official competition at the Cannes Film Festival. The mezmerizing, mysterious film, an indisputably great one, is coming off the heels of the equally otherworldly 2014 film “Kaili Blues,” but this sophomore effort is a game-changer of the highest order.
Read moreMilla Jovovich Stands Defiant Against ‘Hellboy’ Critical Beating
The critical and commercial thud that “Hellboy” received from critics and audiences alike isn’t anything new for Milla Jovovich, she’s the queen of duds; Off the top of my head I can think of “Joan of Arc,” “Ultraviolent” and all of those “Resident Evil” movies as prime examples of past, and quite infamous, Jovovich bombs.
Read moreGreta Gerwig's ‘Little Women' Might Replace Tarantino's ‘Once Upon A Time' At Cannes
Variety is reporting that Greta Gerwig’s “Little Women” is Sony’s back-up plan if Quentin Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” can’t make it to Cannes. The report says rumors place both “Little Women” and ‘Once Upon a Time’ in post-production at this very moment, but that the QT is seriously being considered to skip the festival due to late-in-the-game editing which might not be done in time for the May festivities.
John Travolta's Upcoming Stalker-Thriller Film Retitled to ’The Fanatic' - Directed by Fred Durst of Limp Bizkit
John Travolta's career looks like it desperately needs a second comeback. We thought it might happen with his excellent turn as OJ Simpson's lawyer, Robert Shapiro, in 2016’s “The People V. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story.” Ever since then? Nada. Zilch. Zero.
His next project does sound fascinating. TMZ asked Travolta about “The Fanatic,” a film directed by Fred Durst, yes of Limp Bizkit fame, and the actor had nothing but raves for his filmmaker, “Maybe my favorite experience I’ve had. He’s so generous and he’s such an artist. And he allowed me to create a character that no one else would allow.”
The best experience that Travolta ever had? In a film directed by Limp Bizkit's frontman?
“The Fanatic” is based on a real-life experience that Durst had. The film is about an obsessed fan, played by Travolta, who begins stalking his favorite action-film star, played by Devon Sawa (Remember him? From “Idle Hands” and “SLC Punk?”).
Previously titled “Moose,” Bloody Disgusting is reporting that principal photography took place in Alabama.
Joker's smiles from the teaser trailer in chronological order
‘Under the Silver Lake' Isn't As Bad As You Think It Is [Review]
The Initial release for David Robert Mitchell's "Under the Silver Lake" was supposed to be last summer, but, after negative reviews greeted it at Cannes, A24 cut the chord and changed its release for December 7th, then that date was bumped again to, supposedly, this coming Friday. I presume Mitchell’s film is indeed coming out in 4 days hence, so it’s time to give my two cents on this polarizing film, which I happened to catch almost a year ago at Cannes.
"Under the Silver Lake" actually works decently well, up until its lazy and infuriating payoff, which feels flat and uninspired. David Robert Mitchell (“It Follows”) is a filmmaker that wants to break rules, his work here with DP Mike Gioulakis is commendable. The problem is that there just is no there there, an L.A. odyssey about Sam (Andrew Garfield), a Peeping Tom-turned-amateur-detective who tries to crack the conspiracy case of a missing person which he believes may be hidden in pop-culture artifacts. That missing person is Sarah, and who wouldn’t have a thing for this stoner chick, especially since she’s played by Riley Keough. The evidence he uncovers leads him to vanish into the L.A. underworld, where nothing is as it seems; girl gangs, tween vandalists, a dog killer, a missing millionaire among other distractions Mitchell lays out for us.
The goal here is to build up a cult following, and, make no mistake about it, there will be people that'll respond to Mitchell's film in that very way. Clocking in at 139 minutes, this shapeless L.A. noir wants to be like "The Big Lebowski" and "The Long Goodbye," but tries too hard to attain the level of those classics. Mitchell's intention with this film was for it to be a purposeful and confusing California-flavored mental haze. However, the whole notion of a story revolving around a surreal dive into L.A's hipster community is nothing new at the movies. We’ve seen it all before. [B-]
George Lucas Confirms Jar Jar Binks Is His Favorite Star Wars Character, ‘Phantom Menace' One of His Favorite Movies
Jar Jar Binks became the laughingstock of not just many "Star Wars" fans, but the cinematic world as well in the summer of 1999. Binks is considered to be the most hated character in "Star Wars" history. Not even those damn Ewoks can dethrone the Gungan from "The Phantom Menace". In fact, the hatred directed at the character had such a negative effect on its portrayer, actor Ahmed Best, that he contemplated suicide, “I faced a media backlash that really made me feel like my life was over” the actor said in a recently released video interview, adding, “There was just so much hate and anger and venom directed at me, and I took it personally…I put a lot of me into that work, and if you talk to any artist who really cares about their work, you’re talking about them,” Best says.
Read moreWes Anderson Says ‘The French Dispatch' Could Be Released by End of Year
Speaking to the French outlet Charente Libre, Wes Anderson mention his upcoming movie “The French Dispatch'“ may be released before the end of the year. The director said that no release date has been decided but he thinks an end of 2019 deadline is doable. So, maybe there’s going to be a Wes Anderson movie this holiday season.
Terry Gilliam says PC Killing Comedy: ‘We Can’t Laugh at Anybody Because it Causes Offense’
A new interview with Terry Gilliam [via the WSJ} basically expounds upon something we’ve been tackling here at WoR: Political correctness is killing comedy. I wrote an article last year, "The 2010s: A Decade When Comedy Lost Its Mojo, which laid the ground for a potential comedic doomsday, which we're quite clearly headed at, if the "era of outrage" continues:.
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