I did not think much of Sophie Deraspe’s “Antigone” when I saw it back in October at Montreal’s FNC. The only reason I even decided to see it was because it had won the Best Canadian Film award at the Toronto International Film Festival. An adaptation of the famous Greek tragedy of the same name, Deraspe’s film version reimagined the classic story as a modern-day parable about an Arabic refugee family in Montreal. To say Deraspe lays her themes on too thickly would be an understatement, subtlety is not part of this movie’s, albeit limited, strengths.

Speaking to the Los Angeles Times, Ridley Scott reminisced about how Stanley Kubrick called him up after watching the iconic “Alien” chest-bursting scene, desperately wanting to know how Scott managed to pull it off without the use of special effects:

Spike Lee's “Do The Right Thing” celebrated its 30th-anniversary last year and it still packs a wallop. The writer-director’s examination of the racial divide in America is as relevant today as its ever been before.

Here’s a nice little get I found on Reddit, a user by the name of MortSahlfan posted highly entertaining quotes of famous directors hating on other famous directors.

Xavier Dolan has been a polarizing figure for many cinephiles over the last 10 years. After surprising the film world, in his mid-20s to boot, with the critically-acclaimed “Laurence Anyways,” “Mommy,” and "Tom at the Farm," the way Dolan has concocted his movies ever since has been polarizing at best, with critics universally panning them. So, when did the artistic freefall begin? It all started with 2016's "It's Only the End of the World," a film that won the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes. but not without being dubbed one of the worst movies to ever win a prize at that festival. Sure, many French audiences and critics dug it, but the overall consensus stateside was not pleasant. To make things worse, Dolan was about to embark on his first English-language film "The Death and Life of John F. Donovan," which turned out to be a disasterpiece of the highest-order. What do you make of a movie that completely wiped out Jessica Chastain’s performance from its final cut? Stamp a major red flag on it.

The Telluride Film Festival really believes it will be happening in the Rockies of Colorado in the first week of September. Godspeed. Despite growing concerns mounting with the larger-attended Toronto, New York and Venice Film Festivals, this year’s 47th edition of Telluride is expected to kick off on Thursday, September 3, this according to a press release sent by the festival on Friday.

It wasn’t a surprise when Terrence Malick won the Palme d’Or at Cannes 2011 with “The Tree of Life,” it was the most critically-praised movie of the festival’s 64th edition and even ended up #2 in our Best Movies of the 2010s critics poll. However, it turns out that Malick’s masterpiece was not the original choice for the Palme. Speaking to the French publication Liberation (via The Film Stage), Olivier Assayas has confirmed long-standing rumors that Lars von Trier’s “Melancholia” was the film that actually won the jury’s hearts.

In a new interview with the Guardian, Woody Allen acknowledges that the smear campaign concocted against him by the Farrows will probably stick with him for the rest of his career and life:

Netflix might be sponsors on numerous film festivals this fall, including TIFF, Telluride, Venice and NYFF, but it is not planning on sending any of its films or talent to attend them, this according to the always-reliable Anne Thompson. That means David Fincher’s “Mank,” Ron Howard’s “Hillbilly Elegy,” Charlie Kaufman’s “I’m Thinking of Ending Things” George C. Wolfe’s “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” and Ramin Bahrani’s “White Tiger” will most probably premiere at home this coming fall.

The COVID-19 pandemic has shown us that filmmakers are just as hungry to get a stamp of approval from the Cannes Film Festival than even having their films shown at the prestigious film festival. It’s all part of the marketing and an “Official Cannes Selection” stamp of approval could very well mean a prosperous box-office. That’s why the French film festival is unveiling its 2020 selections next week, consisting of 50 titles that would have screened at this year’s now-canceled event.

According to Variety, AppleTV+ and Martin Scorsese have teamed up to distribute the filmmaker’s upcoming movie “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Paramount is still set to distribute the movie and Apple will both finance it and serve as its creative studio.

Because we’re getting a new Jason Reitman-directed “Ghostbusters” in 2021, one that will happily ignore director Paul Feig’s 2016 all-female cast version, there will no doubt be contentious, but unnecessary, debate as to whether or not the 2016 reboot warranted its negative reaction. I won’t delve into the nitty-gritty, but I will mention that Leslie Jones, who starred in Feig’s 2016 film, was none too happy hearing about the Reitman reboot last year, tweeting that it was unfair to ignore the 2016 edition and that it reminded her of something Donald Trump would do. Huh!?

In a new interview with the Daily Mail, Woody Allen, rightfully so, defended himself against what he calls “a false allegation,” but, more intriguingly, said that he’s still looking to make his first “great film” because he doesn’t believe he’s made one yet in his legendary 50-year career as a director.

The Venice Film Festival will go ahead as planned this fall, that’s what the region’s governor, Luca Zaia, stated this past weekend [via Variety] The film festival is set to take place Sept. 2-12.

Edgar Wright’s highly-anticipated “Last Night in Soho” was supposed to come out this fall, but now comes the news it has been delayed until … April 2021. Get used it to it, folks. The dirty little secret in Hollywood right now is that most, if not all, of the movie year is most likely canceled. The news of Wright’s film being delayed by almost a year is just the start of what will be significant release delays from other studio titles.