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Listen, I’m not a fan of the MCU nor can I really answer most fan quizzes about this or that scene, but fact of the matter is that go-to MCU filmmakers like The Russos, Waititi, Gunn, and Dericksson are technically brilliant at what they do. That last name, Scott Derrickson, left the MCU after delivering the billion-dollar making “Doctor Strange.” Now he’s made a quasi independent thriller for Blumhouse titled “The Black Phone....

Prince-Bythewood, best known for her finely-aged drama “Love & Basketball,” takes the familiarity of what is essentially a standard action movie and grounds it with likable characters and compulsively watchable action scenes. It also helps to have Theron as her lead, the Oscar-winning actress has proven to be more than just a pretty face over her successful 3-decade movie career. Playing Andy (aka Andromache of Scythia) Theron brings a similar kind of exhaustive wisdom to this role as she did with her Furiosa in “Mad Max: Fury Road....

As brutal as that setup may sound, one cannot prepare you for the hard-to-watch experience that is director Václav Marhoul’s “The Painted Bird.” A movie filled with indelibly bleak moments, many of which involve extremely violent acts being committed, but, unlike the aforementioned classics, Marhoul’s film somehow never transcends its shocks and never quite finds deeper meaning in the drama. Based on Jerzy Kosinski’s 1965 novel of the same name, the film has a young Jewish boy wandering through a dehumanized Eastern Europe during World War II....

Anglo-Saxon critics, that is. The French have no interest. “The Souvenir”, released two years ago, wasn’t even released in French cinemas. Thierry Fremaux balked at choosing them for Cannes. American audiences as well have either ignored or maligned the film. A tepid 6.4 rating on IMDB, an astoundingly bad 36% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes and a horrendous $1.7 million box-office. If the term “critic-proof” ever existed for a film, this would be it....

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A film filled with tense moments that very much feels organic and attuned to the rest of their filmography. “Young Ahmed” will no doubt cause a stir, and it already has if you’ve read some of the reviews that were just published amid its Cannes premiere yesterday, but don’t be fooled by the political biases of some, this is top-notch work from the Dardennes, filled with their usual birds-eye-view camerawork, solid acting from nonprofessionals and a searing screenplay which builds up the tension with every scene....

At 87 years of age, the very-selective Friedkin is now, finally, embarking on his first film in over 10 years. Friedkin will be adapting “The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial,” a 50-year-old script play written by Herman Wouk from his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel. Kiefer Sutherland is set to star. With his three ‘70s classics (“Sorcerer,” “The Exorcist,” “The French Connection”) Friedkin changed Hollywood. In the ‘80s, he also gave us an expertly crafted police procedural (“To Live and Die In L....

Now, much like every movie year, there is news that Le Clint, as they call him, is already set to direct a new film that could potentially be released early next year He is set to direct and star in this new film, titled Cry Macho, for Warner Bros. This would be his 37th film as a director. At 90 years of age, the man is a beast. We’ve also learned today that the filming of “Cry Macho” started on November 5th, with a post-production date set for December 16th....

Jodorowsky is the surrealist Chilean auteur behind, at least, two 1970s masterpieces: “El Topo” and “The Holy Mountain.” He also, unsuccessfully, tried to adapt Herbert’s “Dune” in the mid-‘70s, a scrapped project that has not only become the stuff of legend, but resulted in an incredible 2013 doc titled “Jodorowsky’s Dune.” Contribute Hire me Advertise Donate Team Contact Privacy Policy

The Academy of Motion Pictures and Science had originally said that you didn’t need to be vaccinated to attend this coming March’s ceremony, but now they’re reversing course and saying you need your three jabs to attend. What seems to have occurred is a backlash from invited guests who felt uncomfortable sitting or being in the same room as un unvaxxed individual. The horror! Oh, but wait, it gets better....

Recent rumours have pointed towards the sudden move having to do with Dominik and the streaming giant fighting over final cut. A prominent film journalist, and a few others in European circles, have more or less confirmed this to me. And so, I’ll elaborate a little further. As it currently stands, “Blonde” is a sexually graphic NC-17 depiction of Monroe. Netflix was absolutely horrified by the cut Dominik submitted to them, which included a rape scene and “bloody menstrual cunnilingus”....

Aubrey Plaza has just been added to the cast. Joy! She’ll be joined by Adam Driver, Nathalie Emmanuel, Forest Whitaker, Laurence Fishburne and Jon Voight. I’m a big admirer of Plaza’s acting. Some of her marquee roles include “The To-Do List,” “Ingrid Goes West,” and “Emily the Criminal.” The legendary Oscar-winning Coppola is self-funding “Megalopolis,” a passion project more than three decades in the making. The cost is said to be around $120 million for the epic....

That’s why we’re looking forward to this year’s edition, if they’re able to go through with it safely. Variety’s Elsa Keslassy has written that she expects these French titles in the line-up:Claire Denis’ “Fire” Francois Ozon’s “Peter von Kant” Mikhaël Hers’ “Les passagers de la nuit”Alain Guiraudie’s “Nobody’s Hero” We had already broken the news about Denis being at Berlin months before anyone knew. Ditto Guiraudie. I had no clue about Ozon, but it would make sense considering he likes to premiere some of his films at Berlin....

Nope (Jordan Peele)As much as I’d love to see Peele crack the high-brow official competition, consider this one more of a fit for an OOC spot. Cahiers du Cinema love his films, and the general French press has has been very favourable towards Peele’s socially conscious horror output, but I long to live to see the day when mainstream genre fare makes it into competition. Alas, I don’t think we’re there yet with Fremaux’s crew....

The only reason we know Affleck is in Nolan’s film is due to leaked set photos which show the actor donning a brown shirt and matching tie, typical of military personnel. Whether this is a cameo or an actual supporting role is a mystery. Consider me pleased to see Casey back at it. After winning the Oscar for his phenomenal performance in 2016’s “Manchester by the Sea,” the 46-year-old actor got #MeToo’ed and blacklisted by the industry, although he did appear, albeit briefly, in a few small-scaled indies....

Shock. If you didn’t know, that’s a major no-no in that part of the world. You can’t call for an independent Taiwan in communist and government-controlled China. Does Fu Yue want to live to be a year older? Is she nuts? There has been tension between China and Taiwan for decades now. Even though Taiwan has been self-ruled since 1949, Beijing wants to hear none of that and still considers Taiwan to be a wayward province and has gone to great lengths to limit its independence....

Nolan, speaking to the Los Angeles Times, admits that he was “thrilled” by ticket sales for “Tenet.” “Warner Bros. released ‘Tenet,’ and I’m thrilled that it has made almost $350 million,” Nolan said. “I am worried that the studios are drawing the wrong conclusions from our release — that rather than looking at where the film has worked well and how that can provide them with much needed revenue, they’re looking at where it hasn’t lived up to pre-COVID expectations and will start using that as an excuse to make exhibition take all the losses from the pandemic instead of getting in the game and adapting — or rebuilding our business, in other words,” Nolan said....

The trailer for the film features the line “Always be courageous in everything you do, but never be afraid to cry." Yikes. This is the true story of Dana Canedy’s fiancé, First Sergeant Charles Monroe King, who began to write what would become a two-hundred-page journal for his son in case he did not make it home from the war in Iraq. He was killed by a roadside bomb on October 14, 2006....

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Of course, Morricone will best be remembered for shaping the sound of the Spaghetti Western genre thanks to the legendary sounds he instilled in in Sergio Leone’s “Dollars Trilogy,” which include “A Fistful of Dollars,” “For a Few Dollars More,” and “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,”. Maybe the single greatest piece of music he ever wrote was for Leone’s 1968 masterpiece “Once Upon a Time in the West,” Throughout his career, Morricone collaborated with the likes of Terrence Malick, John Carpenter, Quentin Tarantino, Roman Polanski, William Friedkin, Brian De Palma, and Mike Nichols, among others....