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Film

Unlike a good blush or incredible lipstick, the best setting powders aren’t made to be noticed—which is why they’re an easy step to skip in your beauty routine when you’re pressed for time or money. Its bad rap for making your face look dry and cakey certainly doesn’t help either. But with the latest face powder formulas, your makeup could last twice as long and stay put without smearing, smudging, or feeling heavy.

Think of setting powder as a tool (and a highly underrated one at that) that can vastly extend the life of even easy makeup looks, like the way a topcoat does for your manicure. And unlike makeup setting spray, a single dusting can lock your makeup in place, keep shine to a minimum, and soak up sweat and oil—qualities that are undeniably useful in the sticky-sweaty dog days of summer.

Makeup powders can be especially helpful if you use a lightweight foundation. “In the heat, your cream or liquid foundation will not set without a setting powder,” explains Natasha Moor, makeup artist and founder of Natasha Moor Cosmetics. “It keeps your foundation locked in throughout the day and ensures that your skin looks smooth with an all-over clean finish—never shiny or oily.”

Is setting powder before or after foundation?

While makeup primer is usually the first setting step to enhance your makeup’s staying power, “powder is typically the final setting step to sealing in foundation and concealer, reduce shine, and hide blemishes,” says celebrity makeup artist and Jamie Makeup founder Jamie Greenberg.

You can also use it in place of foundation, since some tinted face powders can also offer translucent coverage, along with SPF and hydrating and brightening ingredients, such as hyaluronic acid. “Sometimes I just use a tinted SPF with a powder over top of it because I love my freckles and don’t want them to be completely covered,” Kenna Ehman, makeup artist and co-owner of Kenna Kunijo. “It’s a great way to control a shiny face all day without looking super ‘done up.’”

How do you use setting powder without looking cakey?

While nailing down the best setting powder for your skin will help, it really starts with your skin-care routine. “The key to preventing a cakey face is making sure your skin is well hydrated before the application of your products,” says Greenberg.

Should I use setting spray after setting powder?

Absolutely. “While powders typically work better for oily skin and setting sprays for drier skin, I recommend using both a setting powder and a setting spray to ensure long lasting wear,” says Greenberg, who’s a fan of the Herbivore Rose Hibiscus Hydrating Face Mist. “Using a setting spray is the perfect last step in your makeup routine, since it can help your makeup lock into place and melt together.”

Where do you apply setting powder?

While most of your face is fair game, “setting powder is typically applied on the T-zone area, under-eye area, and under your cheekbones to set your makeup into place,” Greenberg says. Also, it’s best applied with a fluffy makeup brush, although some work with makeup sponges (just don’t forget to clean your makeup sponge afterward to swerve a mix-up the next morning).

Do setting powders clog pores?

Not if they’re non-comedogenic. If you’re worried about inadvertently triggering a breakout, consider “powders that aren’t over-drying and don’t cling to dry patches, which are best for acne-prone skin,” Greenberg says. Also key for keeping pores clear: Knowing how to correctly remove makeup at the end of the day.

From vegan makeup brand Cover FX’s talc-free formula—perfect for those with sensitive skin—to others that double as the best bronzer, we compiled a list of the best finishing powder for every preference and concern.

Best Setting Powders for Women 2023:

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Unlike a good blush or incredible lipstick,

TV

Though companies such as HBO Max, AMC Networks and Starz have recently made headlines over removing content from their streaming services, Netflix is the platform now drawing the ire of fans over its recent programming decisions.

Uncoupled, 1899, Warrior Nun and The Midnight Club are just a few of the shows the streamer has axed over the past two months, joining an even longer list of canceled titles in the past year.

These cancellations have prompted outrage, leading dedicated fan bases to start online campaigns demanding Netflix reverse its decision or urging another streamer to rescue a series. Fans of Warrior Nun have taken to social media to do just that over the past month, even leading to the phrase “Netflix, correct your mistake” trending on Twitter on Tuesday.

So what is behind the streamer’s recent cancelation spree?

As of late, the streaming boom has fizzled out after years of strong growth as platforms in search of subscribers propelled the volume of new TV series to all-time highs. In response to underwhelming growth, streaming services are cutting costs and pulling back, something that has been compounded by the possibility of a recession.

To that point, Netflix had a difficult time in 2022.

Though the company added 7.66 million subscribers in the fourth quarter, it had a rocky start to the year, losing more than 1 million subs at the beginning of 2022.

Since the loss of subscribers, the company has laid off over 400 workers, announced plans to crack down on password sharing and created an ad-supported tier.

The company also plans to keep its investment in new film and television programs steady. In 2022 and 2021, Netflix spent $17 billion on programming, and it expects to spend at least that amount in 2023.

This translates into Netflix becoming more conscientious about which projects it spends money on.

“What we have to do is be better and better at getting more impact per billion dollar spent than anyone else,” said co-CEO Ted Sarandos during a prerecorded earnings report. “And that’s how we’re focusing on it… As we reaccelerate revenue, we’ll revisit that number, of course. But we’re a pretty disciplined bunch about that.”

Therefore, it makes sense that shows that underperform will get the axe.

“It’s not something that we take lightly,” Netflix’s head of U.S. and Canada scripted series Peter Friedlander told Variety of the streamer’s content decisions.

“It’s just a frustrating part of the job that’s been a part of our business forever, so this isn’t a new experience to have cancellations, and hopefully, we can continue to bring in shows that continue,” he added.

Various metrics go into the cancellation decisions besides financials.

From a data perspective, shows with a lower completion rate–the percentage of viewers who finish a show–have a harder time getting renewed, according to Forbes, which looked at third-party data on series completions. Many canceled series, including the recently killed First Kill, had a completion rate below 50%.

Additionally, Netflix’s Top 10 list is a metric for measuring a series’ success.

Despite its numerous cancellations, Netflix’s methodology seems to be working.

In 2022, Netflix had five of the Top 10 most-watched English-language TV seasons ever, led by Stranger Things 4 and Wednesday, both of which had more than one billion hours of viewing.

“This business is really completely about engagement, profit and revenue,” said new Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters in the company’s prerecorded fourth-quarter earnings call. “We’ve got to grow all of those things and all those things are tied to executing content. When the content’s working, the business is working. We grow engagement; we grow revenue; we grow profit.”

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Though companies such as HBO Max, AMC

What to Watch

We have been graced with many autobiographical movies from major filmmakers throughout the course of cinema history. Just last year, for instance, we saw Empire of Light from Sam Mendes and Steven Spielberg’s The Fabelmans. While the former fizzled with critics and audiences, the latter has become a force to be reckoned with this awards season. Whether good or bad, there’s nonetheless something immediately interesting whenever a director decides to turn the camera towards themselves. This is precisely what Italian filmmaker Emanuele Crialese has done with L’Immensità.


Part of the Spotlight program at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, L’Immensità stars Penélope Cruz as Clara, a woman living an unfulfilled life in 1970s Rome. She is trapped in a loveless marriage to a man who abuses and cheats on her, and her only saving grace — or graces, more correctly — are her three children: Adriana (or “Adri”), Gino, and Diana. Indeed, Clara throws herself fully into being the best mother for her kids, which often involves tapping into her own inner child, much to the chagrin of her authoritative husband and their judgmental friends. Clara’s profound relationship with her oldest, 13-year-old Adri, enters new waters as Adri traverses feelings of gender dysphoria, beginning to identify as a boy and going by the name of Andrea. More than that, Andrea fosters a connection with Sara, one of the children in their neighborhood, their relationship gradually moving from friendship to something more.

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Crialese, who is trans, based L’Immensità on his own childhood experiences of navigating gender identity, particularly during a time when the understanding and vocabulary — and access to both — related to transgender expression wasn’t as expansive as it is today. In this way, his film sits firmly at the intersection of the pain of adolescence, the sliding scale of strength and fragility that is family, and the epiphanic moment of self-actualization, effectively offering a poignant love story between a mother and her child.


A Magnetic Performance from Penélope Cruz

Warner Bros. Pictures

To great effect, L’Immensità is told through the eyes of Clara’s children, specifically Andrea’s. There’s a certain playfulness to Gergely Pohárnok’s cinematography here, the camera moving through Andrea’s world, zipping across the space like a child unbridled and excited about the freedom of play. Combined with vibrant costume design from Massimo Cantini Parrini, popping out among the more muted earth tones of the sets, there’s an overall feeling of joy. Indeed, at the beginning of the film, Clara and her children lip sync and dance along to the radio as they set the table for dinner in a meticulous choreographed sequence that is thrilling to watch because of how undeniable Clara’s happiness is at this moment (and, by extension, how that happiness spreads to the children). Here, the camera never stops orbiting around the family — this is their world, and we are just guests.

Related: Sundance 2023: Movies in the NEXT, Spotlight, and Midnight Programs

That said, what’s most interesting about Crialese’s positioning of the narrative in Andrea’s view is that, in addition to the joy we bear witness to whenever they’re with or around Clara, there’s an inherent unreliability to it as well. After all, they are only 13 years old. Of course, this ultimately makes for a riveting watch where Clara is concerned. Through Andrea’s eyes, we can see that the darker shades of their mother’s character are forcefully kept just beneath the surface, even if, at times, we don’t fully understand why. It helps that Cruz is magnetic as ever, deftly weaving through the different roles Clara occupies — the ever-present mother, the unhappy wife, the outsider, the woman desperately seeking something else — and presenting to us someone who is both familiar and a mystery. Just as Andrea wants to know more about their mother, we, too, find her irresistible.

Luana Giuliani Is a Breakout Star

l'immensita
Warner Bros. Pictures

As perfect as Cruz is, however, L’Immensità truly belongs to Luana Giuliani, who plays Andrea. She turns in one of the most exciting performances by a young actor in recent years, commanding every scene with just a glance. Giuliani’s ability to convey a lot while doing very little defies her years, and is essentially the perfect vessel for Andrea’s emotional metamorphosis. At the end of the film, Andrea imagines themself onstage performing “Love Story” as their true self in a televised broadcast, slicked-back hair, tailor tux and all. On the one hand, it’s a poetic callback to a similar sequence they imagine earlier in the film, except it was Clara onstage. But on the other, and more importantly, this is a hard-earned moment for Andrea, signifying their choice to finally live their truth.

Throughout the entirety of the film, everyone chastises, ridicules, and stifles Andrea’s true gender identity. Although Clara is accepting of how Andrea identifies (to a degree), she also still sees them as Adriana, especially when around other people. There’s a suggestion, here, that she wants to protect Andrea from derision from others, as any mother would. However, seeing how unhappy their mother ultimately became from playing by traditional rules, Andrea makes the decision of self-love, which is radical for a queer person who exists in a world that seeks to hide them. And as the camera closes in on them at the end, it’s like the sun breaking through the clouds.

L’Immensità‘s Sundance screening schedule is now available on the festival’s website.

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We have been graced with many autobiographical

Awards

The Art Directors Guild will present Oscar-winning filmmaker Guillermo del Toro with the William Cameron Menzies Award, to honor his visually striking and emotionally rich body of work. Del Toro will receive the award at the 27th ADG’s Excellence in Production Design Awards on Saturday, February 18 at the InterContinental Los Angeles Downtown.

Del Toro first gained recognition for writing and directing Cronos, which premiered at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival, where it won the Mercedes Benz Award, and went on to earn more than 20 international awards. Del Toro’s most noted films include Pan’s Labyrinth, which garnered Academy Awards for Art Direction, Cinematography, and Makeup and The Shape of Water, which won the Venice International Film Festival’s Golden Lion as well as Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Production Design and Best Score. His latest project, Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, continues his lifelong love of animation and stop-motion filmmaking. Additional credits include The Devil’s Backbone, Hellboy, Pacific Rim, Crimson Peak, and Nightmare Alley.
 
Del Toro is also a prolific producer of animated films and television. Among his EP credits are Kung Fu Panda 2 and 3, Puss in Boots 1 and 2, and Rise of the Guardians; his producing credits include The Book of Life.

Past recipients of the Menzies award include Robert Osborne, John Musker and Ron Clements, Syd Mead, and Denis Villeneuve.

“Guillermo del Toro has stunningly brought humanity to non-human characters and full-fledged existence to environments which could be seen as devoid of life by integrating strong narrative imagery into his collaborations with production designers,” said Coates. “The Art Directors Guild is thrilled to celebrate his captivating work, which has indelibly pushed the bounds of production design to new heights.”
 

 

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The Art Directors Guild will present Oscar-winning

Music

While a jukebox musical may not be a rock concert, bringing well-known songs to a musical setting comes with an expectation. In the case of Tina, The Tina Turner Musical, the journey of an icon is more than just well-placed songs recalling the highs and lows of her life. The real takeaway from this musical is that women can, and should, get loud because they deserve to be heard.

Chronicling her journey from Anna Mae Bullock to Grammy-winning Tina Turner, this musical never loses sight of the person behind the iconic songs. Even if those hits from the 80s might have been the soundtrack to some people’s childhood or the Ike and Tina review influenced R&B, it is more than just the melodies that make an impact on the audience. It is a reminder that even in the most difficult moments, following a dream has value.

When Tina opens, a young Anna Mae is scolded for being too loud with her singing. That reprimand might seem harsh, but it serves as a sentiment that plays throughout the superstar’s story. Whether taking the abuse from Ike Turner or trying to regain her position in music relevancy, Tina needed to put aside the quietness and embrace, or celebrate, her loudness. A woman without a voice will never be powerful.

Tina, The Tina Turner Musical, Touring Production, photo provided by Dr. Phillips Center

Presence and power are clearly shown by the talented National Tour cast. During a recent performance at Dr. Phillips Center, Zurin Villanueva, who is one of the tour’s leading ladies as Tina, owned the stage. While she captured the slight ruggedness that Turner’s voice employed, it is the big belting numbers that have everyone enraptured. Balancing the fear, desire, and brashness that is part of a celebrity, Villanueva kept all eyes on her. Even as “Young Anna Mae” might tug at the heartstrings during the finale, this show is a vehicle for Villanueva’s talents.

Although there are many harsh moments where the audience gasps and recoils due to the violent relationships, the sadness and even heartbreak in many of Tina’s iconic songs will never overshadow the joy that music can and will offer. To refer back to the words of one of her most famous songs, the river is deep and the mountain high, but the view that is filled with harmony and fulfillment is worth the journey.

Even though everyone knows the story and songs, there is a want to enjoy the musical experience for what it is. Some songs and moments might be a little clunky in the plot, but everyone is waiting for that big moment. In this case, it comes in the finale and encore. It is time to clap, dance, forget about the negativity and let the music take hold. The Tina Turner Musical finale and encore definitely leave the audience wanting more.

Tina Turner Musical

Tina, The Tina Turner Musical, Touring Production, photo provided by Dr. Phillips Center

Although musical theater has seen its transformation or modernization from idyllic characters bursting into song to queens who rock and founding fathers who rap, the truth is that musicals, especially jukebox musicals, can serve as a retrospective of music and culture. The past is not dated, rather it is the melody that plays in the mind like an old friend.

Whether or not the audience had seen Tina Turner strut her way across a stage or watched or read her biographic story previously, the Tina Turner Musical is an entertaining night of theater. Part warning, part inspiration, and a whole lot of great music are a reason to purchase a ticket.

Tina, the Tina Turner Musical is on a National Tour with a recent stop at Dr. Phillips Center in Orlando, Florida. Additional tour dates across the U.S. are available.

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While a jukebox musical may not

Docs

“Five Years North” profiles two figures on the opposite sides of immigration struggles in New York City: an undocumented Guatemalan teenager and an ICE agent. Filmmakers Chris Temple and Zach Ingrasci deepen our understanding of the human effects of America’s policies. The documentary opens theatrically this weekend at New York’s Film Forum.

 

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"Five Years North" profiles two figures on

Global

No record of electronic communication between Premier Danielle Smith’s office and the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service (ACPS) has been found after allegations reported last week were probed, according to Alberta Justice.

In a news release issued Monday, the government department said the Alberta Public Service had undertaken a “comprehensive review of emails” regarding the matter, searching for “any emails sent to or received by the relevant prosecutors and staff in the premier’s office over a four-month period.”

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READ MORE: Internal review of emails between province, crown prosecutors not enough: NDP, experts

Concerns were raised last week after the CBC reported that a source told them they had seen emails they alleged were sent from a staffer in Smith’s office to the ACPS, challenging prosecutors on their judgment regarding cases relating to a blockade by the Canada-U.S. border near Coutts, Alta., last year.

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“No further review will be conducted unless additional evidence is brought forward,” Alberta Justice said on Monday.

More to come…

&copy 2023 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

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No record of electronic communication between Premier

Trending




View gallery

THE BACHELOR - ABC’s “The Bachelor” stars Lekha. (ABC/Ricky Middlesworth)


THE BACHELOR - ABC’s “The Bachelor” stars Greer. (ABC/Ricky Middlesworth)


THE BACHELOR - ABC’s “The Bachelor” stars Madison. (ABC/Ricky Middlesworth)

Image Credit: ABC

  • Madison Johnson is a contestant on season 27 of ‘The Bachelor, hoping to find love with Zach Shallcross.
  • She owns a marketing business for medical aesthetic companies.
  • Madison has two younger sisters who she is extremely close with, one of whom she filed for custody of in 2018.

Zach Shallcross will meet 30 women on night one of The Bachelor, including 26-year-old Madison Johnson. “Madison hopes to meet an honest, empathetic, loyal man with a caring family,” her ABC bio reads. “Madison has worked extremely hard to get to such a great place in life and says she is more than ready to find someone to share it with. She is serious about finding love on this journey.”

Zach has also been open about how serious he is about finding a wife on the show. His season has been teased as one of the most “emotional” in the show’s history. Learn more about Madison below:

madison johnson
Madison on ‘The Bachelor.’ (ABC)

1. Madison Johnson owns her own business

Madison is the founder and CEO of MJM Consulting Inc. The company is a marketing agency for companies in the medical aesthetic space. Before owning her own company, Madison worked as the marketing manager for the Rejuv Medical Aesthetic Clinic in Fargo, North Dakota, according to LinkedIn. She used the experience to start consulting on her own, according to the MJM Consulting website. She founded her company in March 2020. “I realized just how bad the aesthetic industry needed qualified digital marketing individuals who knew all things marketing and cared about the value of each dollar spent on marketing,” Madison explained.

2. Where did Madison go to college?

Madison received her Bachelors degree in Communication from Western Michigan University in 2017. She then went onto the Communications Masters program at Western Michigan University, but left after one year and transferred to North Dakota State University. Madison received her Masters Degree in Digital Communication and Media/Multimedia from NDSU in 2019. During Madison’s time at Western Michigan, she worked as a Marketing Specialist and a research and teaching assistant. She was also a presidential scholar .

3. Madison has full custody of her teenage sister

Madison has two younger sisters, Meaghan Johnson and Myah Johnson. She has been open on Instagram about how close she is with both of her sisters. In 2018, after completing one year of her Masters program at Western Michigan, Madison moved back home to North Dakota to care for her youngest sister, Myah, who was still a minor. She did not publicly reveal what led to her decision to become Myah’s caretaker, but did open up about the process.

“I will be moving heading home to take on a new role in this peanut’s life,” she wrote on Instagram in April 2018. “There isn’t an obstacle I wouldn’t tackle or challenge I wouldn’t face to see you and Meaghan smile. Against all odds and despite all the obstacles, we are going to make it.” In a Christmas Day 2018 Instagram post, Madison confirmed that she was filing for custody of Myah.

She expanded on her custody journey in a Feb. 2020 Instagram post, revealing that she received all the final paperwork that gave her custody of Myah one year prior (Feb. 2019). “Although it has been almost two years since I moved home to take care of her, we are still adjusting,” Madison wrote. “I’m still figuring out what it takes to be a sister-mom. She’s still figuring out how to be a sister-daughter. We have both made mistakes. A lot of tears have been cried trying to figure out this new norm and I don’t know if we ever will. We were dealt a bad hand but I wouldn’t trade this crazy life for the world.” Myah graduated high school in May 2022, according to an Instagram post.

4. Madison had major surgery as an infant

“Fun fact, I have a 6 inch scar on my stomach from having 20 percent of my small intestine taken out when I was 7 weeks old,” Madison wrote in an Oct. 2020 Instagram post. She proudly posed in a crop top to show off the scar in the photo.

5. How old is Madison?

Madison Johnson was 26 years old when she filmed The Bachelor in the fall of 2022. She lives in North Dakota.

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View gallery Image Credit: ABC Madison Johnson is a

Tech

Plenty of us have shrunk the space taken up by our music collection with the advent of digital and streaming services, but scientists at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) have taken that to the limit.

In a feat of miniaturization, the research team at DTU has managed to create what it claims to be the world’s smallest music record.

Measuring just 15 x 15 micrometres in size – that’s 40 μm/micrometres or microns in diameter, which is almost half the diameter of an average human hair – the tiny disc can barely be seen without the use of a magnifying glass. 

Able to hold just 25 seconds of the opening bars of the festive classic Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree, the record is unsurprisingly unplayable on a standard record player.

The disc was created using a process which saw the audio inscribed into polymer film using DTU’s new Nanofrazor Scholar 3D lithography technology, which is a series of words we definitely understand.

Emphasizing just how tiny the record is, Postdoc Nolan Lassaline explained “It’s so small that the entire thing we’re patterning can fit within one single groove of a regular vinyl record”.

DTU Physics researcher Peter Bøggild added: “The Nanofrazor was put to work as a record-cutting lathe – converting an audio signal into a spiralled groove on the surface of the medium. In this case, the medium is a different polymer than vinyl.” 

“I have done lithography for 30 years, and although we’ve had this machine for a while, it still feels like science fiction,” he added.

Unsurprisingly, DTU doesn’t envisage the technique being developed further as a music format, but instead sees the technology being used to help provide breakthroughs in scientific research.

“While we make these kinds of grooves here with nanometre precision, we can transfer these to a number of other materials, where that will fundamentally allow us to manipulate material properties on a nanoscale,” Professor Bøggild explained. 

“We are doing something that we have never really been able to do in physics and material science before now.

“Another thing that also we would use this for is to make tiny magnetic field sensors that allows us to measure the currents in the brain, and for that we are hoping in the long term to create some affordable technology that would allow us to answer questions pertaining to Parkinson’s Disease and Alzheimer’s.”

So it looks like the best portable music players portable music players will remain larger than a human hair, and able to play more than 25 seconds per song.

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Plenty of us have shrunk the space

Video

Netflix’s new co-CEOs Ted Sarandos and Greg Peters have addressed a major elephant in the room: the streamer’s decision to cancel fan-favorite TV shows.

Among the most recent cancellations that have sparked outrage on social media are “1899,” “Inside Job,” and “Warrior Nun.” However, Sarandos maintained while speaking to Bloomberg’s Screentime newsletter that the company has “never canceled a successful show.”

“A lot of these shows were well-intended but talk to a very small audience on a very big budget,” he explained. “The key to it is you have to be able to talk to a small audience on a small budget and a large audience at a large budget. If you do that well, you can do that forever.”

In the same joint interview, co-CEO Peters noted their über-popular international hit from South Korea, “Squid Game,” as an example of this.

“It is very rare that a show like “Squid Game” from Korea would be as global as it was. Within 30 hours, the world was watching ‘Squid Game’ with no human intervention to try to market ‘Squid Game’ to the world,” he said. “We’re just getting started to make ‘Squid Game’ not an unusual thing, but basically something that happens literally every week.”

When it comes to their content strategy, Sarandos described Netflix as “equal parts HBO, AMC, FX, the Food Network, HGTV and Comedy Central.”

“You used to have to hunt through 500 channels of cable to find them all and now they’re gonna be on Netflix,” he explained. “The measure of quality is, if you love a dating show, make it as good as ‘The Ultimatum,’ make it as good as ‘Love is Blind.’ There’s no difference in prestige quality television in each of these genres as long as they’re well executed.”

Netflix Names Greg Peters Co-CEO With Ted Sarandos as Reed Hastings Takes Executive Chairman Role

Looking ahead, Netflix plans to grow its advertising business and continue expanding its games offering in 2023, with a focus on Netflix-related IP. Netflix will also begin experimenting with live programming, partnering with Chris Rock on a standup special in 2023.

Additionally, the company plans to begin a broader rollout of paid sharing in the first quarter of 2023 to crack down on an estimated 100 million households sharing passwords.

“Those people know how to watch Netflix. They’ve watched something on Netflix that they’ve loved. Our job is over the next couple of years to win all of them back,” Peters said. “We won’t do that out of the gate. Some of those folks are borrowing because they’re more price sensitive, they’re less engaged or whatever. But if we deliver a ‘Wednesday’ every week, if we deliver a ‘Glass Onion’ every week, we’ll get the vast majority of those viewers back.”

Netflix’s Reed Hastings Is Stepping Out on a High Note – and the New Co-CEO Has Work to Do | Analysis

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Netflix’s new co-CEOs Ted Sarandos and Greg

Entertaintment


By Anna Menta

You probably hadn’t heard of To Leslie before celebrities like Gwyneth Paltrow and Cate Blanchett suddenly started praising it in a last-minute Oscar campaign for lead actress Andrea Riseborough. Well, I’m here to tell you that Gwyneth and Cate are right: To Leslie is really good, and it’s available to rent for cheap on digital platforms now. Riseborough stars as a single mother named Leslie, who wins $190,000 in her local Texas lottery, but eventually loses all her winnings to alcoholism. In the quiet, intense character study that follows, Leslie lets down her loved ones and blows her second, third, and fourth chances. Riseborough injects her performance with heartbreaking vulnerability and helplessness, and you’ll find yourself unable to look away.

Photo: Everett Collection

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By Anna Menta You probably hadn’t heard of To Leslie

Movies

1.

First, That ’70s Show creators Bonnie and Terry Turner initially turned down doing a spinoff at Netflix. However, during the pandemic, they loved the thought of “wanting to go home,” and that’s where the idea for setting That ’90s Show back in the Formans’ house came from.

2.

Gregg Mettler, who wrote for the original series, was then brought on as showrunner and co-creator of That ’90s Show, alongside Bonnie, Terry, and their daughter, Lindsay Turner.

3.

Gregg was the one who actually came up with the idea to have That ’90s Show set over the summer and have it center on Eric Forman and Donna Pinciotti’s daughter, Leia, staying with Red and Kitty.

4.

In fact, the idea came from Gregg not wanting the series to start because of a tragedy. He knew he didn’t want someone from That ’70s Show to have died, or for their life not to have worked out, and that’s why we’d be back in Point Place.

5.

Setting That ’90s Show over a summer vacation also gave the creators and writers a chance to invite original cast members back without them having to be in every single episode.

6.

Debra Jo and Kurtwood immediately said yes to returning after hearing the initial pitch for the spinoff series. Both of them brought their own ideas as to how Kitty and Red Forman have changed in the 15 years since we last saw them.

7.

One of the most emotional days of filming involved watching Debra Jo and Kurtwood step onto the re-created sets for the first time.

8.

In fact, Bonnie said she was “brought to tears” several times while filming That ’90s Show — namely, when she first saw the set, when Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis filmed their scene together, and when Topher Grace and Laura Prepon did the same.

9.

The moment when Eric and Donna push each other’s head while sitting on the hood of the car in the Formans’ driveway, which is reminiscent of a scene in the That ’70s Show pilot, was unscripted.

10.

Once Ashton and Mila agreeded to come back for an episode, the writers knew they had to write in a “Damn, Jackie” for Kelso. Their scene was one of the “easiest” to write for Gregg.

11.

Prior to filming Episode 1, Ashton was sending Gregg videos of himself running around the house in Kelso’s wardrobe and yelling, “Damn, Jackie.”

12.

While filming Episode 1, Ashton studied his lines on the couch in the Formans’ basement, just like he did while filming That ’70s Show. He fell asleep, and when he woke up, he said it was the “strangest feeling” to see Mila dressed as Jackie standing over him.

13.

Wilmer Valderrama hadn’t done his iconic Fez voice since That ’70s Show ended. The first time he did it again was for Bonnie and Terry, when they called to ask if he’d guest-star on That ’90s Show.

14.

A lot of thought went into how the Formans’ house has changed since That ’70s Show ended. For starters, the couch that used to be in the living room is now in the basement.

15.

Also, in That ’70s Show, Kitty had decorated the house with owls, so you’ll notice that they’re hidden on the bookcase in the living room in That ’90s Show.

16.

Some of the furniture from the original That ’70s Show set was actually in Ashton and Mila’s basement at their house. They brought back some of it for That ’90s Show.

17.

Casting director Marc Hirschfeld, who cast the original That ’70s Show, was brought back to cast That ’90s Show. His talent “for finding people who are unsuspecting” and “natural actors” was one of the reasons he was brought back. Plus, it added to the “magic” of having the original casting director find the new generation.

18.

When the original That ’70s Show cast was on set, they took the time to chat with the new cast and give them advice. They talked about what their lives were like both on- and offscreen while filming the original series.

19.

The creators saw “a lot of people” for the role of Leia Forman, until finally Callie Haverda popped up in an audition and they got “chills.”

20.

Mace Coronel didn’t originally know he was auditioning to play Jackie and Kelso’s son, Jay. As soon as the creators saw his first taped audition, they couldn’t help but notice the strong resemblance he has to Ashton and Mila.

21.

Before Mace’s chemistry read with Callie, Gregg finally told him he was auditioning to play Jackie and Kelso’s son. Once he knew, Gregg said, Mace really leaned into it and began to embody Ashton’s Kelso.

22.

The writers decided to pair up Leia and Jay in Season 1 because the idea of a Forman and a Kelso dating was “too good to resist.”

23.

Sam Morelos, who stars as Nikki, was attending a performing arts high school when she auditioned for the role. In fact, she did her callback in between classes and was struggling to find a Wi-Fi signal so she could sign into the Zoom call.

24.

Reyn Doi, who plays Ozzie, was the first person they cast for That ’90s Show. Previously, Reyn appeared in Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar, which is where some of the producers knew him from.

25.

The idea for Ozzie to come out as gay to Kitty came from the writers’ knowledge that Kitty would “embrace the ’90s” and all of the changes that come with it.

26.

Maxwell Acee Donovan, who plays Nate, reminded the Turners a lot of Ashton when he was cast on That ’70s Show. Both Max and Ashton were able to really grow comedically over the course of Season 1.

27.

Almost all of the original That ’70s Show cast members who returned brought back props they had taken when the original series wrapped. First, Debra Jo had the memorable glass grapes that sat on Kitty’s table as well as pictures from the original set, including one with Betty White and Tom Poston, who played Kitty’s parents.

28.

Wilmer had Eric’s Vista Cruiser, which he brought back alongside some of Fez’s That ’70s Show wardrobe.

29.

When creating the new generation of teenagers for That ’90s Show, Gregg was “hyperaware” that they’d be compared with the original teens. Ultimately, they created characters who were different enough but had similar mannerisms because “times change, but kids don’t.”

30.

Writing the show from a “female protagonist’s point of view this time” was important to the That ’90s Show creators. It allowed them to explore different storylines they didn’t get to when Eric was the lead character. In fact, the series had a “female-heavy” writers room this time around.

31.

In fact, one of the things that having a female protagonist allowed was exploring female friendships, namely with Leia and Gwen Runck (played by Ashley Aufderheide). While Jackie and Donna were important to That ’70s Show, Leia and Gwen are the “heart of the show” this time around.

32.

One of Terry’s favorite scenes that really illustrates Leia and Gwen’s friendship is in the Season 1 finale, when they talk about Leia’s almost-kiss with Nate.

33.

Laura actually directed the final two episodes of That ’90s Show Season 1, and it was “magical” having her on the other side of the camera this time around.

34.

One of the best parts about That ’90s Show was watching Debra Jo and Kurtwood hang out with the new generation of teenagers. In particular, Terry recalled watching Debra Jo, Reyn, Ashley, and Callie hanging out in the kitchen between takes and Debra Jo being “mesmerized” by them.

35.

Bonnie’s favorite That ’70s Show Easter egg is the faded pot leaf on the water tower. She loves that the water tower was able to become a central set on this show, too.

36.

Meanwhile, Lindsay loves that the Green Bay Packers helmet and the Candy Land board game are still in the Formans’ basement in That ’90s Show.

37.

Gregg has a very sentimental Easter egg he hid in That ’90s Show. He placed a photo of That ’70s Show writer Rob DesHotel, who died in 2018, in the basement because he “loved writing scenes down in that basement set with those kids in the 360s.”

38.

Costume designer Melina Root, key hairstylist Cindy Costello, and more worked on That ’70s Show and returned to work on That ’90s Show.

39.

While filming one of the classic Forman basement 360-degree shots, the young cast started singing “Careless Whisper” by George Michael in between takes.

40.

And finally, the That ’70s Show actor the new cast was most excited to meet was Tommy Chong, who plays Leo. In fact, when he first arrived, they all went to set and took pictures with him.

What did you think of That ’90s Show? Tell us in the comments below!

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Film

In a massive deal, Sundance stand-out Fair Play has sold to Netflix.

It’s the first whopper deal to come from a sales title and one that begat a bidding war when it premiered Saturday. Searchlight, Lionsgate, Neon were among those in the running with the final price tag in the $20 million range. Netflix had no comment on the financial aspects of the deal.

The feature debut from Chloe Dumont, Play follows Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) and Luke (Alden Ehrenreich), a newly engaged couple who work at a high-powered New York finance company, whose relationship is thrown into disarray when Emily gets promoted ahead of Luke. The movie is Domont’s feature film debut after making a name for herself directing shorts and television episodes of such shows Billions, Suits and Ballers.

Rian Johnson’s T-Street banner and MRC are behind the movie, which was produced by Leopold Hughes, Ben Leclair, Tim White, Trevor White and Allan Mandelbaum. Johnson and Ram Bergman exec produced.

It’s the first film to come out of the deal that T-Street’s Rian Johnson and Ram Bergman made with MRC to hatch vehicles with emerging talent. MRC handled the sale on behalf of the filmmaker.

Other deals are still percolating at the festival. Midnight Dreams, the dark Jonathan Majors drama, is said to have multiple offers, as does John Carney’s musical drama, Flora and Son.

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In a massive deal, Sundance stand-out Fair

TV

Public relations veteran Joe Schlosser is leaving his position at Endemol Shine/Banijay to launch his own communications firm.

Schlosser has spent 11 years with the company, most recently as executive vp communications at Banijay Americas. He’ll be consulting with the company and handling communications chores for Banijay-owned Bunim/Murray Productions. Jaycee Medina, vp marketing/communications will continue handling internal communication efforts during the transition.

As exec vp at the TV production company, Schlosser oversaw all corporate, consumer and internal communications across North America and Latin America and led all talent relations, awards and events coordination. He also oversaw communications efforts for nine different production labels, including Endemol Shine North America, Bunim/Murray Productions, Authentic Entertainment, Truly Original, 51 Minds Entertainment and Steven David Entertainment.

Shows under his purview included Big Brother, MasterChef, LEGO Masters, The Real Housewives of Atlanta, The Real Housewives of Dubai, The Real World Homecoming: Los Angeles and Below Deck.

He previously was senior vp communications for Endemol Shine North America before Banijay acquired the company.

Before joining the company in 2012, he spent 10 years with NBCUniversal in various top communications roles, including senior vp NBC Entertainment Television Publicity.

He began his career in communications at Hallmark Channel after working as a journalist, serving as Los Angeles bureau chief at Broadcasting & Cable. He also has taught the UCLA Extension course “Working With the Media” for several years.

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Public relations veteran Joe Schlosser is leaving

What to Watch

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Great news! “Narvik” is available to watch on Netflix USA!

 

Date Added: 23rd January 2023

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Description:

Against the backdrop of the WWII battle known as Hitler’s first defeat, a Norwegian soldier returns home and learns a shocking truth about his wife.

 

Certificate: TV-14
Parents strongly cautioned. May not be suitable for ages under 14.

 

Year: 2022

Duration: 1hr 49m

Audio: English, Spanish – Audio Description, Spanish, French, Italian, Norwegian – Audio Description, Norwegian [Original]

Subtitles: English, Spanish, Norwegian, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese

 

Cast and Crew

Director: Erik Skjoldbjaerg

 

Cast: Kristine Hartgen, Carl Martin Eggesbø, Christoph Gelfert Mathiesen, Henrik Mestad, Mathilde Holtedahl Cuhra, Stig Henrik Hoff, Kari Bremnes, Christoph Bach, Ollie Campbell, Holger Handtke, Magnus Dugdale, Edvard Lie Aalstad, Øyvind Trøite

 

Production & Box Office Details:

“Narvik” was produced by Nordisk Film Norway with a budget of $8m.

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Awards

The psychological thriller starring Phoebe Dynevor and Alden Ehrenreich saw at least a half-dozen bidders.

The Sundance Film Festival is well under way, yet just a few of the over 80 films that were available coming into the festival have found homes. And yet there’s interest swirling around many of the hottest sales titles and others that have broken out.

Here’s the latest of all the deals we’re tracking out of Sundance.

Films Acquired During the Festival

Title: “Fair Play”
Section: U.S. Dramatic
Distributor: Netflix

In the first major, big money deal of the festival, Netflix is nearing the global rights to “Fair Play,” an individual with knowledge told IndieWire, and which several outlets have reported is for a $20 million deal. The erotic, psychological thriller from director Chloe Domont played in the U.S. Dramatic competition. It stars Alden Ehrenreich and “Bridgerton” actress Phoebe Dynevor, as well as Eddie Masran and Rich Sommer. The film is about a couple that keeps their relationship secret while working for a ruthless and cutthroat hedge fund.

Related

Related

As many as seven distributors reportedly bid on the rights to “Fair Play,” with Searchlight and Neon being among them. MRC is the studio behind the film and also handled the sales rights.

“Fair Play” boasts Rian Johnson and Ram Bergman from T-Street as executive producers, and the film is the first in a deal between T-Street and MRC that backs films with emerging talent. Domont has cut her teeth directing episodes of “Billions,” “Suits,” and “Ballers.”

Title: “Kokomo City”
Section: NEXT
Distributor: Magnolia

Magnolia has been active, as following the theatrical pickup of “Little Richard: I Am Everything” earlier in the fest, the indie distributor staged an all-night negotiation to acquire worldwide rights to “Kokomo City,” the directorial debut of Grammy-nominated producer and singer D. Smith.

Smith, a trans performer also known for “Love & Hip Hop Atlanta,” directed, wrote and edited this documentary shot in all black and white and playing in the NEXT section about four Black transgender sex workers in Atlanta and New York City who fight to break down the walls of their profession.

Lena Waithe is among the executive producers on the film, and Magnolia will release it later this year following a screening at Berlin Panorama. CAA Media Finance brokered the deal with Magnolia.

Title: “Little Richard: I Am Everything”
Section: U.S. Documentary
Distributor: Magnolia/CNN Films

Though it originally sat with CNN Films, Magnolia has acquired the worldwide theatrical rights to distribute “Little Richard: I Am Everything” and will release the film in domestic theaters this April. And Magnolia will also rep international sales rights on the title at EFM later this year. The film will still air on CNN later this year following its theatrical run.

Lisa Cortés (“Precious,” “All In: The Fight for Democracy”) directs this documentary about the rock icon Little Richard but approaches his legacy in the context of Blackness and queerness, as well as his own personal identity as it relates to his faith and Christianity. It also boasts Dee Rees as an executive producer and was produced by Bungalow Media + Entertainment for CNN Films and HBO Max, in association with Rolling Stone Films.

“I Am Everything” is a Day One movie at Sundance, but it’s also one of six of the final long-form movies to come out of CNN Films that were commissioned from outside producers and filmmakers.

Title: “Run Rabbit Run”
Section: Midnight
Distributor: Netflix

“Succession” actress Sarah Snook stars in this Midnight title from director Daina Reed, known for “The Shining Girls” and “The Handmaid’s Tale.” The film is a thriller and horror movie about a fertility doctor who believes firmly in life and death, but after noticing the strange behavior of her young daughter, must challenge her own values and confront a ghost from her past. The film was shot on location in Melbourne, Australia and other parts of the country. Hannah Kent (“The Good People,” “Devotion”) wrote the screenplay.

Netflix picked up worldwide rights (excluding Benelux, Portugal, Eastern Europe, Middle East, Latin America, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Philippines, Nordics and Taiwan) to “Run Rabbit Run” on Thursday as the festival was kicking off and will release it later in 2023. XYZ Films co-financed the title, handled international sales, and brokered the deal with Netflix.

Title: “In My Mother’s Skin”
Section: Midnight
Distributor: Amazon Prime Video

Amazon hours before Sundance kicked off acquired “In My Mother’s Skin,” the only Filipino film playing in the festival and the only international feature playing in the Midnight section. “In My Mother’s Skin” is the second feature from director Kenneth Dagatan, who previously directed 2018’s “Ma.” “In My Mother’s Skin” is set in 1945 in the Philippines and explores how a young girl’s duty to protect her dying mother is complicated by her misplaced trust in a beguiling, flesh-eating fairy. The film stars Beauty Gonzalez, Felicity Kyle Napuli, Jasmine Curtis-Smith, James Mavie Estrella, and Angeli Bayani.

“This is truly a moment for Filipino filmmakers to be seen by the international audience, and I hope this opens doors for more Filipino content to be watched by the rest of the world,” Dagatan said in part in an official statement.

Amazon Prime Video acquired global rights to the title and plans to release “In My Mother’s Skin” by the end of 2023.

Films Acquired Ahead of the Festival

Title: “Other People’s Children”
Section: Spotlight
Distributor: Music Box Films

Music Box Films on Tuesday, January 10 acquired the U.S. rights to Rebecca Zlotowski’s family drama “Other People’s Children,” which first premiered at Venice in competition and will make its U.S. premiere at Sundance on January 20. The film stars Virginie Efira, Roschdy Zem, and Chiara Mastroianni, and IndieWire out of Venice called it “delightfully French” and praised Efira’s performance. She plays a high school teacher who falls in love with a man and soon grows a close bond to his 4-year-old daughter, making her grapple with her own ambitions with motherhood.

Music Box Films is planning a release for “Other People’s Children” in theaters and on home entertainment platforms this spring.

Title: “Squaring the Circle (The Story of Hipgnosis)”
Section: Spotlight
Distributor: Utopia

Anton Corbijn (“Control,” “The American”) gets back to his rock music history roots by telling the stories of some of the most famous album cover artwork ever, all of it spawning from the art design studio Hipgnosis. Corbijn interviews talent like Paul McCartney, Roger Waters, and Jimmy Page to tell the stories of albums such as Wings’ “Band on the Run,” Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon” and Led Zeppelin’s “Houses of the Holy” in a film that should be catnip for classic rock heads.

“Squaring the Circle” first made its premiere at Telluride 2022 and will play in the Spotlight section of the festival. Utopia, which acquired the movie on Jan. 6, is planning a summer release.

Title: “Joyland”
Section: Spotlight
Distributor: Oscilloscope

Malala Yousafzai and Ramin Bahrani both executive produce this film that was the first Pakistani movie to ever premiere at Cannes. “Joyland” is directed and written by Saim Sadiq and is the story of a young man as a backup dancer in a Bollywood-style burlesque show, only to fall in love with a trans woman who leads the show.

Oscilloscope acquired “Joyland” on Jan. 6 and will release it theatrically later this year.

Title: “My Animal”
Section: Midnight
Distributor: Paramount

“My Animal” is a horror movie and romance starring Bobbi Salvör Menuez (“Under the Silver Lake”) and Amandla Stenberg (“The Hate U Give”) as two teens in a small town who fall for each other, only for one girl’s growing desires to slowly clash with her darker animal instincts within (translation: she’s a werewolf). Director Jacqueline Castel has collaborated with everyone from John Carpenter, Jim Jarmusch, and David Lynch and should be able to go beyond the traditional genre beats. Jae Matthews (“The Runner”) wrote the script.

Paramount Worldwide Acquisition Group picked up the worldwide rights (excluding Canada) to “My Animal” ahead of the festival, though whether the film will be theatrical, released through Paramount+, or another channel has yet to be determined.

Title: “The Deepest Breath”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: Netflix

From “Free Solo” to free diving. Irish filmmaker Laura McGann directs this documentary about a champion freediver training to break a world record with the help of an expert safety diver. The film explores not just the silent depths of the ocean but the depths of the emotional bond formed between the two divers.

Netflix collaborated on “The Deepest Breath” with A24 alongside Motive Films, Ventureland, and RAW, the latter of which was behind Netflix’s documentary hit “The Tinder Swindler.”

“Past Lives”

Jon Pack

Films Arriving with Distribution

Title: “Past Lives”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: A24

This South Korean romance is the debut feature from playwright Celine Song (“Endlings”) and spreads out over three generations of bonding and missed connections. The film stars Greta Lee, Teo Yoo, and John Magar0, and A24 will release the film following its Sundance premiere.

Title: “Earth Mama”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: A24

Another A24 film and another first time director, “Earth Mama” follows a pregnant single mother, with two children in foster care, who embraces her Bay Area community as she fights to reclaim her family. Savannah Leaf wrote and directed the film, her first feature after having won awards for her documentary short “The Heart Still Hums” and even earning a Grammy nomination for Best Music Video for directing Gary Clark Jr.’s “This Land.”

Title: “Stephen Curry: Underrated”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: Apple TV+

“Underrated” is a documentary about Golden State Warriors icon Stephen Curry that explores through a combination of cinéma vérité, archival footage, and interviews how Curry went from being a low rated, undersized college kid at a Division I school to rising to be a 4-time NBA champ. Ryan Coogler produces and Peter Nicks (“The Waiting Room,” “Homeroom”) directs this film that will debut on Apple TV+ later this year through its partnership with A24. “Underrated” was a late addition to the Sundance lineup in the Premieres section.

Title: “Infinity Pool”
Section: Midnight
Distributor: Neon and Topic

Brandon Cronenberg, son to David Cronenberg, makes his return to Sundance with his follow-up to “Possessor.” Early buzz suggests that he delivers. This Midnight title stars Alexander Skarsgard and Mia Goth and follows a couple on an all-inclusive resort vacation that reveals a perverse subculture of surreal horrors and hedonistic tourism after a fatal accident.

Neon and Topic came into the festival with the rights for “Infinity Pool” and promptly released a twisted and surreal trailer, and the film will now open January 27.

Title: “Still: A Michael J. Fox Story”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: Apple TV+

Davis Guggenheim’s first documentary feature in seven years follows “Back to the Future” icon Michael J. Fox in a film that charts this Canadian kid’s meteoric rise to stardom and how his life was altered by his Parkinson’s diagnosis at age 29. Guggenheim’s telling of Fox’s story is described via the festival’s description as a playful and humorous account of an “eternal optimist” dealing with the unthinkable.

Apple TV+ is releasing “Still” and acquired the rights to it back in April.

Title: “Landscape with Invisible Hand”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: MGM

Director Cory Finley (“Thoroughbreds,” “Bad Education”) makes his return to Sundance with an adaptation of M.T. Anderson’s National Book Award winner. It’s a darkly comedic sci-fi and coming-of-age story about two teenagers who have to livestream their courtship to curious alien invaders as a means of making money and scraping by an existence after the advanced alien technology has made all but the wealthiest humans obsolete.

MGM’s United Artists Releasing is distributing the film backed by Annapurna and Brad Pitt’s Plan B, and it also stars Tiffany Haddish, Michael Gandolfini, William Jackson Harper, and Clifton Collins Jr.

“You Hurt My Feelings”

courtesy of Sundance Institute/A24

Title: “You Hurt My Feelings”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: A24

Julia Louis-Dreyfus reunites with her “Enough Said” director Nicole Holofcener for this dramedy about a successful New York novelist who is offended and devastated to learn that her husband of decades doesn’t like her latest novel. The film has a rare comedic turn for Tobias Menzies and also stars Michaela Watkins and Arian Moyaed. A24 is distributing the film.

Title: “Cassandro”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: Amazon Prime Video

Gael García Bernal stars as a gay luchador tired of losing and tired of hiding behind a mask during his wrestling matches who manages to break barriers within the lucha libre circuit by developing an eccentric “exótico” character that takes crowds by storm. Roger Ross Williams, who is best known for his documentary “Life, Animated” that played at Sundance in 2016, is making his narrative feature debut on “Cassandro.” Amazon Prime Video is releasing the film.

Title: “Judy Blume Forever”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: Amazon Prime Video

Davina Pardo and Leah Wolchok (“Very Semi-Serious”) co-direct this documentary about one of literature’s most influential children’s authors, Judy Blume. In addition to profiling the author, it also shows fans who share heartfelt letters that they wrote to the author over the years.

Amazon Prime Video is releasing the film that is produced by Ron Howard and Brian Grazer’s Imagine Documentaries.

Title: “L’immensita”
Section: Spotlight
Distributor: Music Box Films

Penélope Cruz stars in this ’70s period drama set in Rome as a mother who forms a deeper bond with her teenage child who is just beginning to discover their transgender identity. The film is the first movie from Italian director Emanuele Crialese in 11 years, and early reviews have praised Cruz’s performance and its Italian pop music soundtrack.

Music Box Films is releasing “L’immensita” in the U.S., while Warner Bros. Italy has the Italian distribution rights. It first made its premiere at the Venice Film Festival.

Title: “A Thousand and One”
Section: U.S. Dramatic
Distributor: Focus Features

Those in Sundance circles have long anticipated “A Thousand and One,” which is the feature debut of a Sundance Lab alumnus A.V. Rockwell. The film is about a mother bouncing around from shelter to shelter in ‘90s New York who kidnaps her own 6-year-old son from a foster home and attempts to build a new life together. The film spans years and is hyped to feature a star-making turn from the musician and singer Teyana Taylor.

Focus Features has already set a theatrical release date for March 31, 2023 for the film.

“Rye Lane”

Searchlight Pictures

Title: “Rye Lane”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: Searchlight Pictures

Though it’s in the splashier Premieres section, “Rye Lane” is an under-the-radar feature directorial debut of UK filmmaker Raine Allen-Miller and is a rom-com about two 20-somethings who pair up and cavort around London after they each have to confront some awkward recent break-ups. Searchlight Pictures is releasing.

Title: “All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt”
Section: U.S. Dramatic
Distributor: A24

“All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt” is the feature directorial debut of poet Raven Jackson, who manages to bend the cinematic medium in surprisingly poetic and lyrical ways. The film spans decades in charting the growth, loves, and heartbreaks of a Black woman in Mississippi from her childhood to adult years.

The film is one of two movies A24 is bringing to Sundance, but this one has the backing of Barry Jenkins and his Pastel banner.

Title: “The Amazing Maurice”
Section: Kids
Distributor: Sky Cinema

The animated “The Amazing Maurice” is based on a book by the same name and follows a street-smart cat who along with a gang of rats develops a moneymaking scheme.

Toby Genkel directs, and Emilia Jones, Hugh Laurie, Himesh Patel, and Gemma Arterton make up the voice cast. The Sky Original will hit theaters February 3.

Title: “The Eight Mountains”
Section: Spotlight
Distributor: Sideshow Releasing and Janus Films

Felix van Groeningen (“Beautiful Boy”) and Charlotte Vandermeersch, both Sundance alums, direct this drama that’s set in Italy and is based on a novel about a boy from the city visiting a tiny mountain village over the summer.

Sideshow Releasing and Janus Films acquired “The Eight Mountains” after it won the Jury Prize at this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

Title: “Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: ABC News on Hulu

Named for her breakout role when she was just 12, “Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields” has been described as a revealing and critical documentary about a teen model and icon. Lana Wilson, who most recently got some intimate details out of Taylor Swift for her doc “Miss Americana,” directs the film.

The two-part documentary will air on Hulu via ABC News.

Title: “20 Days in Mariupol”
Section: World Cinema Documentary
Distributor: Frontline/PBS

A timely news documentary about the Russian invasion in Ukraine, Ukrainian filmmaker and AP News video journalist Mstyslav Chernov was up close and personal during the early days of the attacks on the city of Mariupol as one of the last international journalists to flee the country. Some of Chernov’s footage should already be familiar around the world and in some cases has directly refuted Russian misinformation.

“20 Days in Mariupol” is part of a larger editorial collaboration between Frontline and AP, and the film will be released by PBS Distribution following its Sundance premiere.

Title: “birth/rebirth”
Section: Midnight
Distributor: Shudder

A new take on the classic Frankenstein story, “birth/rebirth” is about a single mother and a mortician who form a bond after they manage to re-animate a 6-year-old girl from the dead. The psychological horror film is directed by Laura Moss, and it stars Marin Ireland, A.J. Lister, and the young Judy Reyes in a breakout turn.

“birth/rebirth” is a Shudder original film that only kicked off production in September of this year, and the horror streamer will release it in North America in 2023.

Title: “Murder in Big Horn”
Section: Premieres
Distributor: Showtime

Sundance will present all three episodes of this Showtime docuseries in which each episode explores the missing person case of an Indigenous woman or girl who has disappeared from a reservation in the Big Horn region of Montana. Each episode is told from the perspective of the Native families and journalists involved in the case and who are still grieving. Razelle Benally and Matthew Galkin direct the series.

“Polite Society”

Focus Features

Title: “Polite Society”
Section: Midnight
Distributor: Focus Features

A different kind of Midnight movie, “Polite Society” is a mashup of comedy, horror, and martial arts movie and is also the feature directorial debut of “We Are Lady Parts” creator Nida Manzoor. The film follows an Indian girl who stages an elaborate heist in order to save her older sister from her upcoming marriage.

Focus Features will release “Polite Society” in theaters on April 28, 2023.

Title: “Victim/Suspect”
Section: U.S. Documentary
Distributor: Netflix

Nancy Schwartzman directs this documentary about a journalist investigating numerous cases of women reporting sexual assault to the police who are then accused of fabricating their stories and are charged with crimes of their own.

Netflix partnered on the feature with the Center for Investigative Reporting.

Title: “The Stroll”
Section: U.S. Documentary
Distributor: HBO

“The Stroll” takes audiences back to New York in the 1990s and tells the history of the city’s Meatpacking District, specifically from the perspective of transgender sex workers. Its co-director Kristen Lovell walked the streets in that time herself and is a long-time trans activist able to bring an intimate, personal touch to the film.

HBO Documentaries will air the film both on HBO and on HBO Max following its Sundance premiere.

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The psychological thriller starring Phoebe Dynevor and

Music

Beyoncé headlining the grand reveal of Dubai’s newest luxury hotel, Atlantis The Royal
Photo: Mason Poole/Parkwood Media (Getty Images)

On Friday, it was revealed Beyoncé would perform live for the first time in four years, marking her first performance following the release of her 2022 album, Renaissance. Bubbling excitement from fans soon turned into confusion and scorn, as the Saturday set heralded the opening of a new luxury hotel in Dubai, Atlantis The Royal. From the venue to the setlist, Beyoncé’s return devolved into a head-scratching affair rather than a triumph.

The hour-long set was performed for an audience of 1,500, comprised of celebrities, influencers, and fellow money-makers. Beyoncé’s family, including Jay-Z, their children Blue Ivy, Rumi, and Sir Carter, as well as her parents, Tina and Mathew Knowles, were all in attendance. Those who made the trek to Dubai were treated with “epicurean feasts, beachside indulgences, and special reveal experiences including business class airfare, first-class ground transportation, and first-class accommodations at Atlantis the Royal,” per Pitchfork.

Elitist overtones aside, many were quick to decry Dubai’s aggressive laws against same-sex relationships—which can be punished by death in the city—and wondered why Beyoncé would agree to perform there. Upon the release of Renaissance, the singer shared she crafted the album as an ode to her Uncle Jonny, as well as the queer tastemakers and cultural artisans who were essential in the creation and popularity of genres such as disco.

Now, we’re going to set Renaissance aside, as Beyoncé did not perform a single song from the album during the set. Instead, she kicked off the hour with a rendition of Etta James’ “At Last,” and filled the rest of the evening with ballads such as “Freedom,” “Spirit,” and “Be Alive.” She also performed deep cuts such as “Beautiful Liar” and “Flaws And All.” The on-stage accompaniment was made up of the all-women Firdaus Orchestra and Lebanese dance troupe the Mayyas.

Overall, Beyoncé’s performance at Atlantis The Royal is a reminder that nobody amasses extreme wealth without participating in and perpetuating the evils of capitalism, and $24 million proved to be too much for the singer to pass up—regardless of who it came from. Rich people do rich people things, and Beyoncé is no exception. She seems to have imbued the performance with her standard level of flair and thoughtfulness, but the set definitely did not kick off a legendary live Renaissance-era everyone’s been hoping for, nor does it seem worthy of getting the Homecoming treatment.

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The first time we peasants get to see Queen Bey this year may be at the forthcoming Grammy awards, as she’s rumored to make an appearance at the ceremony.

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Beyoncé headlining the grand reveal of Dubai’s

Docs

SLAMDANCE FILM FESTIVAL 2023 REVIEW! Paranoia flares in director Shujaat Saudagar’s The Underbug as two characters face the ghosts of their past while being hunted by the literal ghosts of a safe house. Written by Saudagar, Abas Dalal, and Hussain Dalal, the film is set in a politically charged India, where two strangers (Ali Fazal and Hussain Dalal) are wounded during a riot and seek solace in an abandoned house. Not knowing which side either of them was on, the two decide to keep their religion and loyalties a secret from one another. However, their safety is a mirage as the strangers face the ghosts of the slain family that once lived in their hiding place.

The film conveys a constant feeling of being watched. As the two strangers search the house, they begin to have haunting visions of a small child and discern an unrestful spirit within the home. Each interaction gives an uneasy aura and palpable mistrust between the main characters. The supernatural occurrences amplify the mounting suspicion of the two, adding tension to an already volatile relationship. Ali Fazal and Hussain Dalal each portray the strangers with nuance as subtle anxiety builds throughout.

“…safety is a mirage as the strangers face the ghosts of the slain family that once lived in their hiding place.”

The Underbug uses dialogue sparingly to create eerie moods and intensify the emotions behind both characters. Having only each other to feed off, Fazal and Dalal maximize the conversations and squeeze as much character depth as possible as the two strangers contemplate their horrific situation. The performances of both leads create enigmatic characters and elevate a claustrophobic thriller to an interesting character piece. These two characters and the actors’ performances are some of the most compelling attributes of the film.

However, the narrative often struggles to find the build-up and thrills needed for the supernatural and psychological thriller it attempts to be. Saudagar crafts a strong sense of mystery and does subvert expectations in the climax. But, he does not build enough suspense to create the jaw-dropping twist the narrative goes for during the finale.

Creating unlikable yet fascinating characters is among the most impressive feats of The Underbug. The more the film reveals about the two, the further the likability or even relatability of the characters diminishes, yet fascination increases. Seeing them thrown into a terrorizing and dysfunctional scenario deepens the characterization and sharpens performances. Plus, the film is well-made, considering the small cast and tiny budget, a substantial showing of the skills of Saudagar. Unfortunately, a more heightened climax is missed, along with the steps toward the intended Shyamalan-esque twist. Yet, the standout performances of Ali Fazal and Hussain Dalal and the entrancing characters they portray will satisfy for at least a one-time watch.

The Underbug screened at the 2023 Slamdance Film Festival.

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SLAMDANCE FILM FESTIVAL 2023 REVIEW! Paranoia flares

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Never “Mr. Irrelevant” to her! Brock Purdy

Tech

Chloe Domont’s “Fair Play,” a Wall Street drama that has premiered at Sundance, sold to Netlfix in a $20 million global rights deal, according to Deadline.

“Fair Play” is led by “Solo” star Alden Ehrenreich and Phoebe Dynevor as Luke and Emily, co-workers at a financial firm who are deeply in love and about to be engaged. But their relationship falls apart when Emily gets a promotion at their firm, leading to a change in power dynamics that poisons their personal lives and eventually leads to violence. Eddie Marsan and Rich Sommer also star in the film.

The film was produced by MRC and Rian Johnson & Ram Bergman’s T-Street as part of a new production venture to highlight up-and-coming filmmakers. Because of the two studios’ relationship with Netflix—for which Johnson directed the “Knives Out” sequel “Glass Onion”—it is believed that the streamer has the inside track for acquisition, though it is not a guarantee.

MORE TO COME

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Chloe Domont’s “Fair Play,” a Wall Street

Video

The Deadline Studio at Sundance Film Festival runs January 20-23 at Hotel Park City, where the cast and creatives behind the best and buzziest titles in this year’s lineup sit down with Deadline’s festival team to discuss their movies and the paths they took to get to Park City.

MUTT

Section: U.S. Dramatic Competition 

Director: Vuk Lungulov-Klotz

Logline: Over the course of a single hectic day in New York City, three people from Feña’s past are thrust back into his life. Having lost touch since transitioning from female to male, he navigates the new dynamics of old relationships while tackling the day-to-day challenges of living life in between.

Panelists: Vuk Lungulov-Klotz (director, producer, writer), Lío Mehiel (actor, “Feña”), Cole Doman (actor, “John”), MiMi Ryder (actor, “Zoe”) 

First Screening: January 23, 2:55 p.m MST, Eccles Theatre, Park City

Key Quote: “It is definitely reflective of my own experience, but I was able to take it a little bit away from my life. I’m trans and I wrote this movie about six years ago. I tried to place all my fears in this film and through that process found a lot of love and empathy and trying to see myself reflected in the people that were most afraid about me being trans — like my family, like my fear of not finding love, my younger siblings, just society at large. And I realized that there was a lot of support and love around me. This movie is a lot about empathy.” — Vuk Lungulov-Klotz

“When I first read this script, I was so taken by how nuanced and complex Vuk… in the way that he was able to capture the trans experience, sort of just centering on the human aspects of our day-to-day lives that are not related to our gender, that are not motivated by our gender. That was a really big draw for me.” — Lío Mehiel

Click above to watch the panel video, and track all of our Deadline Studio content here.

RELATED: Sundance Film Festival U.S. Dramatic Grand Jury Prize Winners Through The Years – Photo Gallery

The 2023 Sundance Film Festival takes place from January 19-29. Follow Deadline’s complete coverage of the deals and the doings in Park City here.

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The Deadline Studio at Sundance Film Festival

Entertaintment

Ben Affleck’s upcoming sports drama AIR — starring the fillmmaker-actor opposite Matt Damon — will open in theaters across the globe on April 5 in advance of its debut on Amazon’s Prime Video.

The sports marketing drama about Nike’s game-changing early days is backed by Amazon Studios, Skydance Sports and Mandalay Pictures. It’s also the first project from Affleck and Matt Damon’s Artists Equity.

Plans for a global theatrical rollout are significant in signaling that Amazon is willing to give a movie a traditional release in cinemas. Amazon will handle AIR in North America, while Warner Bros. International has overseas duties per its distribution pact with MGM. The film’s release date on Prime hasn’t yet been announced.

“Ben, Matt and this all-star cast have delivered a fantastic film that will move, inspire and entertain audiences around the globe,” Jennifer Salke, head of Amazon and MGM Studios, said in a statement. “With Ben’s incredible direction, the film delivers a nostalgic look back at a culture-defining moment that absolutely lends itself to a global theatrical event.”

Added Affleck: “Matt and I are very excited for audiences to see AIR and proud that it’s the first release from Artists Equity. The movie was an extraordinary experience where we had the honor of working with some of the best cast and crew in the business, all of whom brought passion, persistence and creativity to a collective effort at recreating a remarkable and aspirational story.”

Affleck also gave a shout-out to the companies backing the film, as well as to Salke and newly minted Amazon Studios marketing head Sue Kroll, whom he worked with at Warner Bros. on his Oscar-winning Argo, among other titles. “We value the steps it took on each of their parts to make it happen and want to thank them. This was the best creative and personal experience of our lives and we look forward to many more like it,” he said.

Damon portrays former Nike executive Sonny Vaccaro, while Affleck plays Nike co-founder Phil Knight in a story around Nike’s long-shot effort to sign rising superstar basketball player Michael Jordan to a shoe contract in the mid-’80s, an endorsement that seemed impossible at the time but, thanks to the maverick sneaker salesman, would become the most significant relationship between an athletic brand and an athlete ever, launching the global, multibillion-dollar contemporary sneaker industry.

The cast also includes Jason Bateman, Chris Messina, Matthew Maher, Marlon Wayans, Chris Tucker, Viola Davis, Gustaf Skarsgård and Julius Tennon.

The project marks the first time Affleck will direct a feature starring his longtime pal, Damon. The two famously won an Oscar for writing the script to Good Will Hunting, which starred Damon and had Affleck in a supporting role and was directed by Gus Van Sant. The pair also reunited last year for The Last Duel, directed by Ridley Scott, with Damon again starring and Affleck in a supporting role.

With a script penned by Alex Convery, AIR is produced by David Ellison, Jesse Sisgold, Jon Weinbach, Affleck, Damon, Madison Ainley, Jeff Robinov, Peter Guber and Jason Michael Berman. Executive producers include Dana Goldberg, Don Granger, Kevin Halloran, Michael Joe, Drew Vinton, John Graham, Peter E. Strauss and Jordan Moldo.

AIR is the first major feature from David Ellison’s newly minted Skydance Sports division. Skydance already has a tie to the sports world through its investor RedBird Capital.

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Ben Affleck’s upcoming sports drama AIR — starring

Movies

Last Updated: August 20, 2020, 11:23 IST

The Gone Game

Cast: Sanjay Kapoor, Shweta Tripathi, Arjun Mathur, Shriya Pilgaonkar

Director: Nikhil Nagesh Bhat

Voot Select’s The Gone Game should be your streaming choice this week for its relatable Covid-19 setting that is effectively deployed to steer forth and embellish an interesting thriller plotline. 

The Gujral family is struck hard with the sudden announcement of lockdown due to coronavirus spread and can’t help but catch up on group video calls only. Not that they have been open with each other lately, but this mandatory physical distancing seems to come in as much-needed respite and a fitting excuse to be away from each other, without any guilt trip.

Sahil (Arjun Mathur) claims to have arrived from abroad and isolates himself in his house. His influencer wife Suhani (Shriya Pilgaonkar), absentee father Rajeev (Sanjay Kapoor), emotionally vulnerable mother Suneeta (Rukhsar Rehman) and independent, witty sister Amara (Shweta Tripathi) are other members trying to keep their wits about the entire pandemic situation. However, life goes for a toss when Sahil tests positive and is shifted to a hospital. Later, it is learned that he is dead and through happenstance Amara convinces herself and others that the terrible tragedy that has befallen the Gujrals may not be as simple as how it looks. 

Seeking help from a hacker and connecting some dots herself, Amara is now on the path to unravel the mystery surrounding her brother’s alleged death. But will lockdown make it any easier for her to get to the bottom of it and find the conspirators and real reason behind this façade?

The Gone Game stays honest in its intention of using Covid-19 crisis as one of the main plot drivers. As soon as you start easing into the narrative, forgetting even slightly about the pandemic, a reminder comes in some form and the characters feel restrained in their ability to do something about what they seemingly now love and value the most– their family. 

This not only gives the otherwise ‘normal situations’ a new depth, but also tests the breaking point of the Gujral family members.

Since production is limited to minimal setups and indoor locations, director Nikhil Nagesh Bhat relies on performances to create tension arising from the story and milieu. Each character has done a convincing job and you will not be able to make out one’s true intentions behind the ‘masks’. In that, The Gone Game not only serves well the thriller genre tropes but also goes beyond it, sometimes. 

Voot Select may have a winner on its hands in The Gone Game. With an interesting take on how the pandemic is fueling distrust among ourselves, the series also makes a commentary on opportunists that await certain times to show their true colors.

Rating: 3/5

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Last Updated: August 20, 2020, 11:23 ISTThe

Film

EXCLUSIVE: Fresh off his Sundance thriller Divinity, starring Stephen Dorff, Bella Thorne and Scott Bakula, writer-director Eddie Alcazar is teaming with British gaming mogul Paul Wedgwood to launch LA and London-based production company Entropy Pictures.

Wedgwood, who most recently executive-produced thriller The Kill Room starring Samuel L. Jackson and Uma Thurman, was a co-founder of successful video game developer Splash Damage.

The duo’s new film, TV and transmedia firm Entropy will look to “seed and develop IP which is character-driven, high-concept and has commercial appeal”. The company will look to make three to five films a year with financial backing from Wedgwood’s investment firm Supernova Capital.

Veteran games and studio exec Nick Bridger will serve as Head of Development and Production, while line producer James Allen — who has worked on all of Alcazar’s productions — is also aboard.

The first film on the slate is a hybrid live action-animated thriller called Absolute, which Alcazar wrote and will direct as his next feature, producing alongside Wedgwood.

The film follows a pair of college friends who are working on a device that will change humanity’s relationship with the universe. The device can transport a person into a neighboring dimension using one’s mind to complete a roadmap. When one of the friends experiences a devastating relationship breakup, he makes a choice to enter the portal they have created in search of a better version of his girlfriend.

According to the partners, financing is in place and the film is due to shoot this summer.

Alacazar wrote, directed and produced Divinity with a guiding hand from Steven Soderbergh, who served as executive producer. The black and white Sundance NEXT project is set in an otherworldly human existence where a serum named “Divinity” is all powerful.

Said Alcazar: “Creating a foundation for this type of film is very motivating as there are so many opportunities to explore different worlds and each can lend itself to many formats such as film, digital and animation to truly immerse the audience in a specific style of emotion. Ultimately this is a story about young adults striving to be recognized and significant in an imperfect world. They follow grandiose ideas in order to give their lives meaning and end up realizing peace of mind and love are found in simplicity, not absolute perfection.”

Wedgwood added: “I want to work with the most talented storytellers in the business – and Eddie is of course in that upper echelon of multitalented next generation writer/directors who really challenge audiences. In Absolute, he has created a gripping and evocative story that is a distinctly original cinematic experience. This is the type of bold film that will define Entropy.”

Wedgwood commented about Entropy: “As a company, we see ourselves as hyper-creative, nimble and collaborative. Eddie, Nick and myself are creators at heart and have complex projects we’ll develop and nurture very carefully. With the film landscape continuing to shift and evolve, our approach to championing distinctive material and bringing our creative visions to life is what drives us. I’m thrilled to start this exciting new endeavor with Eddie and Nick and work creatively and collaboratively to build a specialized brand.”

Added Alcazar: “With Entropy, we have an exciting new model for making films –  one that empowers creators and their vision. Paul and I share a unique creative vision and underlying business philosophies that will fuel us as we grow the company and our output.”

Alcazar is represented by CAA and Anonymous Content. 

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EXCLUSIVE: Fresh off his Sundance thriller Divinity, starring

TV

Joe Schlosser, who is EVP, Communications at Banijay Americas, is leaving the company and its various iterations after more than a decade.

The veteran comms chief is set to open his own communications shingle and will still work with a number of areas of the Banijay business.

Chelsea fan Schlosser joined Shine America as SVP, Communications in 2012 before becoming SVP, Communications for Endemol Shine North America after the merger with the Big Brother owner.

He was promoted to EVP, Communications at Banijay Americas in October 2021 after the French media group acquired Endemol Shine.

During his time there, he has overseen publicity for shows such as CBS’ Big Brother, Fox’s MasterChef, TBS’ Wipeout as well as Bravo’s Below Deck and a number of The Real Housewives shows.

He has also been in charge of all corporate, consumer and internal communications across North America and Latin America for Banijay.

Schlosser will consult with Banijay Americas and will be handling communications for The Real World producer Bunim/Murray Productions in his new venture.

Before joining Shine America, Schlosser spent 10 years with NBCUniversal in various top communications roles, including his last as SVP, NBC Entertainment Television Publicity, from November 2009 to November 2012.

Before joining NBC Entertainment, Schlosser served as SVP, Communications, NBC Universal Domestic Television Distribution, where he worked on shows including Deal or No Deal and The Martha Stewart Show.

Schlosser began his career in communications for The Hallmark Channel after being LA Bureau Chief for TV trade Broadcasting & Cable.

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Joe Schlosser, who is EVP, Communications at Banijay

What to Watch

 

Great news! “Narvik” is available to watch on Netflix UK!

 

Date Added: 23rd January 2023

Known expiry dates are shown above as well as on the Last Chance page.

Want to keep forever? Try looking for ‘Narvik’ on Amazon (paid link)

 

Description:

Against the backdrop of the WWII battle known as Hitler’s first defeat, a Norwegian soldier returns home and learns a shocking truth about his wife.

 

Certificate: Suitable for ages 15 and up

Year: 2022

Duration: 1hr 49m

Audio: English, French, Hindi, Norwegian – Audio Description, Norwegian [Original], Polish, Brazilian Portuguese

Subtitles: Arabic, English, French, Norwegian, Polish, Ukrainian

 

Cast and Crew

Director: Erik Skjoldbjaerg

 

Cast: Kristine Hartgen, Carl Martin Eggesbø, Christoph Gelfert Mathiesen, Henrik Mestad, Mathilde Holtedahl Cuhra, Stig Henrik Hoff, Kari Bremnes, Christoph Bach, Ollie Campbell, Holger Handtke, Magnus Dugdale, Edvard Lie Aalstad, Øyvind Trøite

 

Production & Box Office Details:

“Narvik” was produced by Nordisk Film Norway with a budget of $8m.

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Watch the trailer for “Narvik”

 

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Awards

Twice-impeached former president Donald Trump once again went on a late night social media spree on Sunday, making a series of posts to his Truth Social account after 1 a.m. local time.

During that time, Trump once again targeted “Morning Joe” on MSNBC, misnaming the hosts and claiming that they are “Trump deranged.”

“Wow. Morning Joe (Scarborough) and his lovely and very soothing wife, ‘Mike,’ have really bad television ratings,” Trump wrote. “That’s what happens when you become ‘Trump Deranged.’ Better yet, Fake News CNN & MSDNC are dying!!!”

In reality, “Morning Joe” averaged 839,000 viewers in 2022, second only to “Fox & Friends.”

This isn’t the first time Trump has tried to call out the morning show hosts this month. In fact, he made a similar claim less than a week ago.


Trump wrote at the time, “Will Morning Joe be canceled? He and Mika’s ratings are very low—they are having an extremely hard time finding an audience to listen to the Fake News they spurn. Losing them would be very sad—hope it doesn’t happen!”

In response, host Joe Scarborough mocked Trump’s choice of words for the post and laughed it off, saying “he can’t quit us!”

“Even says that would be a shame, that would be a shame, with Morning Joe,” he added. “Well thank you Mr president, we appreciate that.”

Following his post about “Morning Joe” this week,” Trump went on to write several posts complaining about the special counsel assigned to oversee one of the many investigations into him, before reposting multiple memes from one user, mostly praising his golf skills.

‘Morning Joe’ Says ‘Both Parties’ Should Want the Truth of Biden’s Docs: ‘Nothing Stupid About’ Needing to Know (Video)

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Twice-impeached former president Donald Trump once again

Music

Beck and Phoenix are splitting the bill on the newly-announced Summer Odyssey tour. The 20-date shows will make stops across North America with support from Sir Chloe on most nights and additional appearances from Japanese Breakfast, Jenny Lewis, and Weyes Blood.

The Summer Odyssey tour kicks off on Aug. 1 in Seattle, Washington, and spans through Sept. 10, when Beck and Phoenix will wrap with a final show in Columbia, Maryland. In between, the musicians will make stops in Los Angeles, Orange County, Houston, Chicago, Toronto, Boston, New York, and more.

Tickets for the Summer Odyssey tour will be available via Ticketmaster beginning Friday, January 27, at 10 a.m. local time.

Trending

In 2018, Beck joined Phoenix during their Los Angeles residency at the Fonda Theater, performing his records “Lost Cause” and “Jack-Ass” for the crowd. The tour marks their first large-scale collaboration.

Beck and Phoenix Summer Odyssey 2023 Tour Dates:
Aug. 1 – Seattle, WA @ Climate Pledge Arena
Aug. 3 – Bend, OR @ Hayden Homes Amphitheater
Aug. 5 – Concord, CA @ Concord Pavilion
Aug. 7 – Los Angeles, CA @ Kia Forum
Aug. 8 – San Diego, CA @ Viejas Arena
Aug. 9 – Orange County, CA @ OC Fair
Aug. 11 – Phoenix, AZ @ Footprint Center
Aug. 12 – Las Vegas, NV @ Michelob ULTRA Arena
Aug. 15 – Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre
Aug. 18 – Rogers, AR @ Walmart AMP
Aug. 20 – Houston, TX @ Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion
Aug. 21 – Dallas, TX @ Dos Equis Pavilion
Aug. 22 – Austin, TX @ Moody Center
Aug. 31 – Chicago, IL @ Huntington Bank Pavilion
Sept. 2 – Detroit, MI @ Pine Knob Music Theatre
Sept. 3 – Toronto, ON @ Budweiser Stage
Sept. 5 – Boston, MA @ MGM Music Hall at Fenway
Sept. 8 – Philadelphia, PA @ TD Pavilion at the Mann
Sept. 9 – New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
Sept. 10 – Columbia, MD @ Merriweather Post Pavilion

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Beck and Phoenix are splitting the

Docs

January 17, 2023 · 2:12 PM

Coming to DVD this coming Tuesday, January 24:
BRAINWASHED: SEX-CAMERA-POWER

Director:
Nina Menkes

World Premiere:
Sundance 2022

Select Festivals:
Berlin, CPH:DOX, IDFA, Karlovy Vary, Thessaloniki Doc, BFI London, Jeonju, Istanbul, Beldocs, Docaviv, Frameline, Encounters, Bergen, Ambulante

About:
Based on Nina Menkes’ acclaimed talk “Sex & Power: The Visual Language of Cinema,” this is a mesmerizing journey into how shot design intersects with the twin epidemics of sexual abuse/assault and employment discrimination against women.

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January 17, 2023 · 2:12 PM Coming to

Global

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov today warned the war between Russia and the West is no longer hybrid but was ‘almost a real one’, as he blasted Western nations for sending billions of pounds worth of arms to Ukraine.

Western allies have pledged to send billions of pounds worth of weapons to Kyiv and Poland’s prime minister said today his government would ask Germany for permission to send Leopard tanks to Ukraine – and planned to send them whether or not Berlin agreed.

The Kyiv government desperately wants the German-made Leopard 2 tank to break through Russian lines and recapture territory this year. 

Lavrov today said the war in Ukraine is a ‘real war’ that the West has been ‘plotting’ against Russia.

‘When we speak about what is happening in Ukraine – it is a war, not a hybrid one, almost a real war, that the West has been plotting for a long time against Russia,’ Lavrov said today.

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov today warned the war between Russia and the West is no longer hybrid but was ‘almost a real one’, as he blasted Western nations for sending billions of pounds worth of arms to Ukraine

Western allies pledged billions of dollars in weapons for Kyiv last week and Poland's prime minister said today his government would ask Germany for permission to send Leopard tanks (pictured) to Ukraine - and planned to send them whether or not Berlin agreed

Western allies pledged billions of dollars in weapons for Kyiv last week and Poland’s prime minister said today his government would ask Germany for permission to send Leopard tanks (pictured) to Ukraine – and planned to send them whether or not Berlin agreed

‘The goal is to destroy everything Russian, from language to culture, that has been in Ukraine for centuries and to prohibit people from speaking their mother tongue,’ Lavrov claimed, parroting the same line that Vladimir Putin has used since the beginning of the war. 

Lavrov’s comments during a visit to South Africa comes as Poland’s government today pushes its Western allies to move faster on supplying Kyiv with more military hardware to thwart Russia’s invasion.

Previously, Polish officials have indicated that Finland and Denmark were ready to join Warsaw in sending Leopards to Ukraine, while the UK has pledged to send some of its Challenger tanks.

Leopard tanks are seen by defence experts as the most suitable heavy battle tanks to help Ukraine as Russia prepares for a new mobilisation.

Meanwhile, Lavrov also claimed Moscow was willing to negotiate with Ukraine in the early months of the war but the U.S. and other Western nations advised Kyiv against it. 

Lavrov’s remarks on a visit to South Africa were similar to those made last year by Russian President Vladimir Putin that his country was for talks but Ukraine’s Western allies prevented that from happening.

The U.S. and other Western nations have said that Russia is not serious about negotiations to end the war, set to mark its one-year anniversary next month.

‘It is well known that we supported the proposal of the Ukrainian side to negotiate early in the special military operation and by the end of March, the two delegations agreed on the principle to settle this conflict,’ Lavrov said.

‘It is well known and was published openly that our American, British, and some European colleagues told Ukraine that it is too early to deal, and the arrangement which was almost agreed was never revisited by the Kyiv regime.’

Russia has repeatedly rejected Ukrainian and Western demands that it withdraw completely from Ukraine as a condition for any negotiations. President Joe Biden has indicated he would be willing to talk with Putin if the Russian leader demonstrated that he seriously wanted to end the invasion.

Lavrov is in Pretoria for talks with his South African counterpart Naledi Pandor as Russia pushes to strengthen ties with Africa’s most developed country and an historical ally amid the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.

South Africa was seen as the most significant of several African nations to take a neutral stance on the war and refuse to condemn Russia’s invasion – to the disappointment of the U.S. and other Western partners who also view South Africa as pivotal to their plans to build relationships in Africa. 

Pandor today deflected criticism of joint military drills planned with Russia and China, saying that hosting such exercises with ‘friends’ was the ‘natural course of relations.’

South Africa is one of Russia’s most important allies on a continent divided over the invasion and Western attempts to isolate Moscow because of its military actions.

Sergei Lavrov (L), the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, is welcomed for bilateral talks with his South African counterpart, Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Dr. Naledi Pandor (R), in Pretoria, South Africa, on Monday

Sergei Lavrov (L), the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, is welcomed for bilateral talks with his South African counterpart, Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Dr. Naledi Pandor (R), in Pretoria, South Africa, on Monday

Firefighters work near the site where a helicopter crashed near a kindergarten in Brovary, outside the capital Kyiv, killing Sixteen people, including two children and Ukrainian interior minister, on January 18

Firefighters work near the site where a helicopter crashed near a kindergarten in Brovary, outside the capital Kyiv, killing Sixteen people, including two children and Ukrainian interior minister, on January 18

South Africa has little trade with Russia but champions a world view – favoured by China and Russia – that seeks to undo perceived U.S.-hegemony in favour of a ‘multipolar’ world in which geopolitical power is more diffuse.

Lavrov said the military drills were transparent and that Russia, China and South Africa had provided all relevant information.

Pandor has said South Africa will not be dragged into taking sides, and has criticised the West for condemning Russia while ignoring issues such as Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory.

The South African armed forces said last week the exercise was a ‘means to strengthen the already flourishing relations between South Africa, Russia and China’.

Russia’s TASS news agency reported on Monday that a Russian warship armed with new generation hypersonic cruise weapons would take part in the drills.

Lavrov was visiting six months ahead of a Russia-Africa summit in July. There was no official public comment from the Ukrainian embassy but officials said it had asked the South African government to help push a Ukrainian peace plan.

Lavrov met with Pandor in the South African capital and is expected to visit other African countries on his trip.

The war in Ukraine and its impact on Africa’s 1.3 billion people, which includes rising global oil and food prices, is expected to take centre stage during Lavrov’s talks with Pandor.

‘We are fully alert that conflict, wherever it exists in the world, impacts negatively on all of us, and as the developing world it impacts on us particularly as the African continent,’ Pandor said. 

‘This is why as South Africa we consistently articulate that we will always stand ready to support the peaceful resolution of conflicts in the continent and throughout the globe.’

A destroyed Russian tank is seen by the side of the road on December 15, 2022 in Kupiansk, Ukraine. Ukraine has been asking for more advanced weaponry to continue its momentum against the invading Russian forces

A destroyed Russian tank is seen by the side of the road on December 15, 2022 in Kupiansk, Ukraine. Ukraine has been asking for more advanced weaponry to continue its momentum against the invading Russian forces

Several NATO countries have the powerful Leopard 2 tanks (pictured, file photo) in their arsenals and have expressed their wish to send some to Ukraine. However, any such move would require sign-off from the German government. Some have said they may defy this

Several NATO countries have the powerful Leopard 2 tanks (pictured, file photo) in their arsenals and have expressed their wish to send some to Ukraine. However, any such move would require sign-off from the German government. Some have said they may defy this

Russia’s Soviet-era T-72 main battle tank

Type: Main battle tank

Origin: Russia

First produced: 1973

Cost per unit: $1 million – $2 million

Main armament: 125 mm 2A46M/2A46M-5 smoothbore gun

Top speed: 37 mph

Weight: 41.5 tonnes

Crew: 3 

Length: 31.2 feet

Width: 11.77 feet

Height: 7.31 feet

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German-made Leopard 2 main battle tank

Type: Main battle tank

Origin: Germany

First produced: 1979

Cost per unit: $5.74 million

Main armament: 120 mm Rheinmetall L55 smoothbore gun

Top speed: 45 mph

Weight: 55.15 – 62.5 tonnes 

Crew: 4 

Length: 32.7 feet

Width: 12.3 feet

Height: 9.84 feet

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Meanwhile, Poland’s prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki said today his government would ask Germany for permission to send Leopard tanks to Ukraine, and planned to send them whether or not Berlin agreed.

The United States and its allies failed during talks in Germany last week to convince Berlin to provide its Leopard battle tanks to Ukraine, a key demand from Kyiv as it tries to breathe new momentum into its fight against Russian forces.

Poland is pushing for countries who have Leopards to send them to Ukraine, even if Germany does not want to join them. However, re-exporting the German-made tanks would normally require Berlin’s approval.

Germany’s foreign minister had said on Sunday that Berlin would not stand in the way if Poland wanted to do so. However, a German government spokesperson said on Monday that Berlin had still not received any requests to authorise the re-export of the tanks.

‘Pressure makes sense, because this weekend, the foreign minister of Germany sent a slightly different message that gives a glimmer of hope that not only Germany will not block (sending tanks) but will finally hand over heavy equipment, modern equipment to help Ukraine,’ Morawiecki said.

Defence analyst Konrad Muzyka said that if tanks were sent without Berlin’s consent, a potential consequence could be Germany refusing to supply spare parts for them.

The issue of supplying the German-made Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine has dominated recent discussions among Western allies about how much and what sort of material aid they should give Ukraine as the first anniversary of the Russian invasion nears.

Berlin, though it has provided substantial aid, has been criticised for dragging its feet on providing military hardware.

Meanwhile, Poland's prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki said today his government would ask Germany for permission to send Leopard tanks (file photo) to Ukraine, and planned to send them whether or not Berlin agreed

Meanwhile, Poland’s prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki said today his government would ask Germany for permission to send Leopard tanks (file photo) to Ukraine, and planned to send them whether or not Berlin agreed

Air Defense Missile Group 24 begins moving the first two of three committed Patriot air defense missile squadrons from Germany to Poland in Gnoien, Germany, on Monday

Air Defense Missile Group 24 begins moving the first two of three committed Patriot air defense missile squadrons from Germany to Poland in Gnoien, Germany, on Monday

A Patriot system launcher is unveiled at a press event hosted by Air Defense Missile Group 24 ahead of the transfer of the first two of three committed Patriot air defense missile squadrons from Germany to Poland in Gnoien, Germany, on Monday

A Patriot system launcher is unveiled at a press event hosted by Air Defense Missile Group 24 ahead of the transfer of the first two of three committed Patriot air defense missile squadrons from Germany to Poland in Gnoien, Germany, on Monday

German government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said Monday it was important for Germany not to take a ‘reckless’ step that might be regretted afterward, adding that a decision will not be rushed.

‘These are hard questions of life and death,’ he added. ‘We have to ask what this means for the defence of our own country.’

Ukrainian officials have been pleading with Western allies to supply them with Leopard tanks for months, but Germany has held back from sending them or allowing other NATO countries to re-export them. Leopards, held by an array of NATO countries, are seen by defence experts as the most suitable for Ukraine.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said Warsaw would ask Germany for permission to re-export tanks to Ukraine, ‘but this is an issue of secondary importance.

‘Even if we did not get this approval… we would still transfer our tanks together with others to Ukraine’, he told reporters. ‘The condition for us at the moment is to build at least a small coalition of countries.’

Western allies pledged billions of dollars in weapons for Ukraine last week but they failed to persuade Germany to lift its veto on providing the tanks.

But in an apparent shift in Germany’s position, foreign minister Annalena Baerbock said on Sunday her government would not block Poland if it tries to send its Leopards.

Baerbock’s remarks appeared to go further than Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s comments at a summit in Paris earlier that day that all decisions on weapons deliveries would be made in co-ordination with allies, including the United States.

Ukraine says the heavily armoured battle tanks would give its ground troops more mobility and protection ahead of a new Russian offensive expected in coming months.

A close ally of Putin said on Sunday that deliveries of offensive weapons to Kyiv that threaten Russia’s territories would lead to a global catastrophe and make arguments against using weapons of mass destruction untenable.

Vyacheslav Volodin, speaker of Russia’s lower house of parliament, warned that the United States and NATO’s support of Ukraine was leading the world to a ‘terrible war’.

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Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov today warned the

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Tech

Amazon Music is getting a bit pricier for some customers.

In the U.S. the Amazon Music Unlimited individual plan for non-Prime members is rising $1 per month, from $9.99 to $10.99 per month. In addition, the Amazon Music unlimited student plan is going from $4.99 to $5.99 per month.

In the U.K., Amazon Music Unlimited Individual is rising from £9.99 to £10.99 per month and the unlimited student plan is changing from £4.99 to £5.99 per month.

The updated prices are effective as of Feb. 21, 2023. Customers will see the new price (plus applicable taxes) on their first bill after that date. “To help us bring you even more content and features, we’re updating the prices of select Amazon Music Unlimited plans,” the ecommerce company said in a notice on its support site.

In May 2022, the company raised the price of the Amazon Music Unlimited individual plan for Prime members from $7.99 to $8.99 per month (or from $79 to $89 per year). That came after Amazon raised the price of Prime memberships in the U.S. in early 2022 for the first time in nearly four years, hiking the annual fee for the program 17%, from $119 to $139.

The latest price increase by Amazon Music comes after Apple in October 2022 raised the price of Apple Music for the first time, increasing from $9.99 to $10.99 per month for the individual plan (and increasing the price of the family plan with up to six accounts from $14.99 to $16.99 per month). Spotify chief Daniel Ek has said the company also is considering a price increase in the U.S., where it still charges $9.99 per month for an individual plan.

Meanwhile, last fall Amazon Music increased the number of songs available as part of Prime from 2 million previously to its full catalog of 100 million tracks and added hundreds of thousands of podcast episodes ad-free, including the entire slate of Wondery’s shows. However, Prime members listening on Amazon Music (who don’t subscribe to an unlimited plan) are now mostly limited to shuffle-play mode, based on artist, album or playlist, whereas previously the 2 million songs were available to stream on-demand.

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Amazon Music is getting a bit pricier

Video

“It’s not about victimization, it’s about justice,” explained director Razelle Benally on her experience in working on a docuseries about the ongoing Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) crisis.

“Murder in Big Horn” directors Benally and Matthew Galkin, joined National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center executive director Lucy Simpson and journalist Luella Brien, in the Variety Studio presented by Audible, to discuss their upcoming Showtime docuseries “Murder in Big Horn.” 

The three-part, series examines the epidemic of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) and girls of the Crow and Northern Cheyenne Nations in Big Horn County, Montana. “Murder in Big Horn” is portrayed through the perspectives of Native families, Native journalists and local law enforcement. 

The docuseries approaches the MMIW crisis from the direction and perspective of a young Native woman, Benally, who has lived this reality her entire life. The director explains “With my own lived experience as a Native woman, as a Native girl, I’ve always known about this issue. The fear of going missing or being murdered or just disappearing. It’s been very real my entire life.” Benally continued, “We just wanted to bring that truth, that the fear is a reality.”

Lucy Simpson, executive director of the National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center asserts the lack of due diligence and response to this epidemic “is certainly frustrating.” Simpson proceeds to explain how aside from the public’s requirement to raise awareness, the greater public must learn that the current reality of the MMIW crisis, “goes back to colonization, goes back to these federal policies that are still being put out there by Congress that provide for lack of law enforcement, lack of jurisdiction [and] ultimately, lack of justice for our community members.”

Following the docuseries premiere, Simpson outlines the next steps, “[the] ultimate goal is getting those policies changed, allowing Native people to advocate for themselves and to create their own laws and actually exercise their tribal sovereignty.”

“Murder in Big Horn” aims to honestly address “the invisibility of Native women and girls, Native people in general in this country,” and does so with the help of Native crew members, “in a way that allows Native representation and Native people are telling our stories,” said Simpson.

Benally is an Ogala Lakota/Diné MFA candidate in film production at NYU Tisch in her thesis year. She served as a Sundance Native Lab, Producers and Screenwriters Intensive fellow. Benally wrote AMC’s “Dark Winds” and is developing a directorial feature debut. Galkin directed Showtime’s “Murder on the Bayou,” HBO’s “Kevorkian,” HBO’s “I am an Animal: The Story of Ingrid Newkirk and PETA” and “loudQUIETloud: A Film About the Pixies.”

Benally, Ivan MacDonald and Ivy MacDonald produced “Murder in Big Horn.” Galkin and Vinnie Malhotra executively produced the docuseries with Lisa Kalikow and Joshua Levine as co-executive producers.

“Murder in Big Horn” is premiering all three episodes at Sundance in person Jan. 22 and online Jan. 24. The episodes will premiere on Showtime Feb. 5, Feb. 12 and Feb. 19, respectively.

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“It’s not about victimization, it’s about justice,”

Entertaintment

EXCLUSIVE: Web3 media and entertainment firm Doodles is set to acquire transatlantic animation studio Golden Wolf. 

Doodles began as a series of digital collectibles based on characters created by artist Burnt Toast in October 2021 and has built into a franchise of animation, gaming, merchandize, music and live events. It is now pushing harder into original content with the Golden Wolf acquisition. 

The deal, financial terms of which were not revealed, is set to close in the next few weeks. Once complete, Golden Wolf’s team will join Doodles. Golden Wolf’s CEO and Founder Ingi Erlingsson will become Doodles’ Chief Content Officer but will continue to oversee and operate Golden Wolf’s offices in London and New York. 

Furthermore, Doodles will leverage Golden Wolf’s strategic partnership with creative studio Psyop to launch a joint venture, Active Ingredient. This will aim to “reinvent storytelling and the tools used to make them a reality” using advancements in AI and blockchain technology to create tools and techniques for brands, filmmakers and producers.

As part of the deal, Psyop will invest in Doodles, which counts Pharrell Williams on its board.

Golden Wolf is known for producing ancillary content for Adult Swim animated series Rick & Morty and bills its style as “living in the space between irreverent humor, intensely dynamic action and psychedelia.” It has also made content for Disney, Illumination, Nike and Facebook among others and is pushing into longer-form original content development.

An early project will see Burnt Toast and Golden Wolf collaborate on “original narrative content” and development of the Doodles characters and story. This could encompass original series, video games and product marketing assets.

“This partnership will unlock boundless potential within each of our businesses, accelerating our goal of redefining entertainment through engaging storytelling and worlds,” said Erlingsson.

“Web3 is powering a new generation of collecting, fandom, and consumer mindset,” said Julian Holguin, CEO of Doodles. “This investment is a move that advances our strategic priorities of creating world class content, leveraging technology to incubate new formats and ultimately, spreading joy to millions around the world.”

Holguin told Deadline that Doodles was “in discussions with several traditional media companies and creatives/producers to make a show.”

He added: “Golden Wolf will produce always on content that is distributed through social channels for Doodles and we are already in the process of developing longer-form content, and we will incubate new IP – some in partnership with well-established Hollywood creatives. Some of these initiatives will lead with Web3 and some will not.”

Golden Wolf will also continue with service work for other brands and companies.

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EXCLUSIVE: Web3 media and entertainment firm Doodles is

Movies

Last Updated: January 23, 2023, 19:03 IST

At the global box office, the film apparently reached the 50-crore club.

On January 26, the movie will be released in Tamil and Telugu.

Malikappuram, starring Malayalam actor Unni Mukundan, is currently dominating the Kerala box office after it hit the theatres on December 30. At the global box office, the film apparently reached the 50-crore club. Made on a small budget of Rs 3.5 crore, it managed to mint good money at the box office. In its fourth week, Malikappuram continues to draw audiences to the movies.

Following the success of the film, the residents of Palakkad Bheeman have placed 75 feet cut out of Unni Mukundan. It is to honour the success of the movie and tribute to his career in cinema. Circling back to the collection, Unni wrote, “Reporting the highest grossing single day for Malikappuram Day 24. Late evening shows and extra shows are yet to start/ ongoing!”

Film trade experts are posting some images of Unni and a theatre-packed at the Kavitha theatres in Ernakulam, Kerala. It’s a great divine blockbuster, according to the post’s caption. Malikappuram is still playing on its 23rd day of release, and the famous Kavitha in Ernakulam, Kerala’s largest single screen, is “house full”! Unni Mukundann is content and at ease while author Abhilash Pillai is celebrating success.

In Kerala, Malikappuram has been successfully battling against Thalapathy Vijay’s Varisu and Ajith Kumar’s Thunivu. Varisu and Thunivu, according to reports, were the two biggest Tamil Pongal releases and obtained a large number of screens in Kerala; however, Malikappuram has new show dates due to the film’s great demand.

The director of Malikappuram is Vishnu Sasi Shankar. In addition to Unni, Deva Nandha and Sreepath play important roles in the movie. The story of the movie centres on an eight-year-old girl named Kalyani who longs to travel to Sabarimala but is unable to do so despite her best efforts. After going through a personal tragedy, her resolve to get to Sabarimala grows stronger. She ultimately decides to continue the trip with her classmate Unni. On January 26, the movie will be released in Tamil and Telugu.

Read all the Latest Movies News here

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Last Updated: January 23, 2023, 19:03 ISTAt

Film

Barcelona-based indie studio Filmax is hailing into Content Americas selling the semi-autobiographical series “Selftape,” made by members of a new generation of women TV writers and directors now building in Spain.

Described as fiction with autobiographical overtones, the series revolves around the real-life Spanish actresses and sisters, Joana Vilapuig and Mireia Vilapuig who, in a personal touch, found fame as teen actresses  in “The Red Band Society,” one of Filmax’s most successful TV productions ever. A decade on, now 27 and 25, they are now figuring out how to move their careers forward and trying to find their place in the film-TV industry and life in a present which is far from certain. That sums up the malaise of much of their generation.

The sisters co-wrote the series with Ivan Mercadé (“Everybody Lies,” “Cites”), Carlos Robisco (“Lucky Strike”) and Clara Esparrach (“Three Days of Christmas”). 

Bàrbara Farré directs. Her credits include the award-winning short film “The Last Virgin” and video clips for some of Spain’s most lauded artist, such as “F*cking Money Man” by Rosalía, and “El Relámpago,” by Amaia.

The project is executive produced by Mercadé and the Vilapuig sisters, as well as Pau Freixas, one of Spain’s foremost showrunners  (“You Shall Not Lie,” “Three Days of Christmas,” The Red Band Society) and Carlos Fernández and Laura Fernández Brites.

The series is shot in several languages, but mostly in Spanish and Catalan. It will play on Spanish VOD platform Filmin as a Filmin Original bowing on Filmin during the first quarter of 2023.

“Our creative team continue to write exciting scripts. The series is fresh and modern and its interesting mix of reality and fiction make it very original,” said Ivan Diaz, Filmax head of international. “The themes dealt with in the series affect young women everywhere in today’s world and so we’re sure it will travel well internationally.”

“Selftape” is a Filmax production carrying the Filmin Original label, and is made with the participation of Spanish public broadcaster RTVE and the support of the Institut Català de les Empreses Culturals (ICEC), the Catalan audiovisual agency. 

Filmin has established itself as the main digital platform for independent cinema and European series in Spain, and expanded in recent years into other territories including Mexico, and Portugal. “Doctor Portuondo” (2021) was its first original series and was produced with Filmax. 

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Barcelona-based indie studio Filmax is hailing into

TV

Update:

Broadcasting union Bectu has called for Richard Sharp’s appointment as BBC Chair to be investigated by the U.K.’s Commissioner for Public Appointments.

“As a public service broadcaster it is absolutely essential that the public and Parliament can trust the BBC to carry out its duties and appointments free from any real or perceived conflict of interest,” said Bectu head Philippa Childs. “The corporation has been vocal about the importance of impartiality and transparency across all levels of the organisation and in its output, and Bectu members and other staff at the BBC face intense scrutiny to this effect in carrying out their roles. The corporation must be equally scrupulous in applying these standards to members of its Board, who set its strategic vision and must ensure BBC decisions are made in the interests of the public.”

“While we note confirmation that the BBC Board will review the conflict of interest claims, it is clear that in this case, with claims relating to a member of the Board, investigation by its Board alone is not sufficient. Mr Sharp’s appointment must be fully investigated by the Commissioner for Public Appointments.”

Previously: Controversy is swelling around the appointment of BBC Chair Richard Sharp following a report by The Sunday Times of London that the senior television exec helped “arrange” a loan for Boris Johnson when Johnson was still Prime Minister.

Under the BBC’s Royal Charter, which governs the broadcaster, the position of BBC Chair is appointed by British monarch on the recommendation of the Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).

Sharp, a banker and former chair of the Royal Academy of Arts, was appointed in Jan. 2021 on the recommendation of Oliver Dowden, then DCMS secretary, and Boris Johnson, who was still Prime Minister at the time.

A new report in The Sunday Times alleges that Johnson put forward the recommendation just weeks after Sharp “helped to arrange a guarantee on a loan of up to £800,000 [$990,000 ]” for Johnson.

Johnson’s financial woes have been widely reported in the U.K. press, dating back to his time as Prime Minister. According to one Guardian report, he “is said to regularly complain to friends that he is hard up, citing his second divorce, several children and his reduced income since entering No 10.”

The U.K. Prime Ministerial salary currently stands at £164,080 ($203,000) per annum.

According to The Sunday Times, Sharp was drawn into Johnson’s finances while dining with the Prime Minister and businessman Sam Blyth, a friend and “distant cousin” of Johnson’s. The report states that Blyth had agreed to act as a guarantor for the loan and wanted Sharp’s “advice on the best way forward.”

The dinner took place just two months before Sharp was publicly unveiled as the government’s “preferred candidate” for the role of BBC Chair.

The Sunday Times said that in Dec. 2020 the government’s propriety and ethics team sent Johnson a letter instructing him to stop “seeking Sharp’s advice about his personal finances, given the forthcoming BBC appointment.”

The newspaper also claims that Sharp did not disclose to the BBC or the House of Commons his involvement in the loan during the application process.

In a statement, Sharp reportedly told The Sunday Times: “There is not a conflict when I simply connected, at his request, Mr Blyth with the cabinet secretary and had no further involvement whatsoever.”

On Monday, however, BBC News reported that Sharp would defer to the BBC’s board to “review any potential conflicts of interest he may have.” A source stressed to Variety that the BBC board can only review current conflicts of interest.

A BBC spokesman said: “The BBC plays no role in the recruitment of the Chair and any questions are a matter for the Government.”

In a memo addressed to BBC staff following publication of the report, Sharp wrote: “I was not involved in making a loan, or arranging a guarantee, and I did not arrange any financing. What I did do was to seek an introduction of Sam Blythe to the relevant official in Government.”

“I believe firmly that I was appointed on merit, which the Cabinet Office have also confirmed,” he added.

Read Sharp’s full memo below:

“Dear all,

You may have seen reporting over the weekend about the nature of my appointment as Chairman of the BBC.

As Chairman of the BBC I have a responsibility to you, and to our audiences, to make sure that the BBC is always held in high regard, and I don’t want this episode to distract from the important work that you are doing. I wanted to write to you directly to set out the facts.

Prior to my appointment, I introduced an old friend of mine – and distant cousin of the then Prime Minister – Sam Blythe, to the Cabinet Secretary, as Sam wanted to support Boris Johnson.

I was not involved in making a loan, or arranging a guarantee, and I did not arrange any financing. What I did do was to seek an introduction of Sam Blythe to the relevant official in Government.

Sam Blythe, who I have known for more than forty years, lives in London and having become aware of the financial pressures on the then Prime Minister, and being a successful entrepreneur, he told me he wanted to explore whether he could assist.

He spoke to me because he trusts me and wanted to check with me what the right way to go about this could be. I told him that this was a sensitive area in any event, particularly so as Sam is a Canadian, and that he should seek to have the Cabinet Office involved and have the Cabinet Secretary advise on appropriateness and indeed whether any financial support Sam might wish to provide was possible. Accordingly Sam asked me whether I would connect him with the Cabinet Secretary.

At the time I was working in Downing Street as a special economic adviser to the Treasury during the pandemic, and I had submitted my application to be Chairman of the BBC. I went to see the Cabinet Secretary and explained who Sam was, and that as a cousin of the then Prime Minister he wanted to help him if possible. I also reminded the Cabinet Secretary that I had submitted my application for the position of BBC Chairman. We both agreed that to avoid any conflict that I should have nothing further to do with the matter. At that point there was no detail on the proposed arrangements and I had no knowledge of whether any assistance was possible, or could be agreed.

Since that meeting I have had no involvement whatsoever with any process. Even now, I don’t know any more than is reported in the media about a loan or reported guarantee.

I am now aware that the Cabinet Office have a note of this meeting, and that this included advice to the Prime Minister that I should not be involved, to avoid any conflict or appearance of conflict with my BBC application.

The Cabinet Office have confirmed that the recruitment process was followed appropriately and that I was appointed on merit, in a process which was independently monitored. Moreover they have confirmed that they gave advice at the time that I should have no involvement whatsoever in any process which might or might not take place, precisely to avoid a conflict or perception of a conflict of interest.

This matter, although it took place before I joined the BBC, is a distraction for the organisation, which I regret. I’m really sorry about it all.

I am proud and honoured to have been appointed as the Chairman of the BBC. I have never hidden my longstanding relationship with the former Prime Minister, however I believe firmly that I was appointed on merit, which the Cabinet Office have also confirmed.

We have many challenges at the BBC, and I know that distractions such as this are not welcomed.

Our work at the BBC is rooted in trust. Although the appointment of the BBC Chairman is solely a matter for the Government, I want to ensure that all the appropriate guidelines have been followed within the BBC since I have joined. The Nominations Committee of the BBC Board has responsibility for regularly reviewing Board members conflicts of interest and I have agreed with the Board’s Senior Independent Director, Sir Nicholas Serota, that the Committee shall assess this when it next meets, reporting to the Board, and in the interests of transparency publish the conclusions.

I look forward to continuing our work together.

Best wishes,
Richard
Richard Sharp
BBC Chairman”

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Update: Broadcasting union Bectu has called for

What to Watch

With an exceptionally busy January, thankfully, February is going to be considerably quieter. So far 78 movies and TV shows are scheduled to leave the library, but we expect more to be announced.

In case you missed it we’ve also been keeping track of all of the movies and TV shows leaving Netflix UK in January 2023.

One of the biggest losses to the library in February 2o23 is the removal of all 5 seasons of Jane the Virgin.

21 Movies Leaving Netflix UK on February 1st, 2023:

  • Amelie (2001)
  • Biking Borders (2019)
  • Christmas Under Wraps (2014)
  • The Cider House Rules (1999)
  • Collateral (2004)
  • Equilibrium (2002)
  • Event Horizon (1997)
  • Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)
  • Guest House (2020)
  • Holmes & Watson (2018)
  • Hostel (2005)
  • The King’s Speech (2010)
  • Letters to Juliet (2010)
  • Love Happens (2009)
  • Love Jacked (2018)
  • Meet the Parents (2000)
  • Miracles from Heaven (2016)
  • Newness (2017)
  • School of Rock (2003)
  • Separation (2021)
  • Why Did I Get Married? (2007)

5 Series Leaving Netflix UK on February 1st, 2023:

  • Angel Beats (1 Season)
  • The Defiant Ones (Limited Series) N
  • The Mystic River (Season 1)
  • Pop Team Epic (1 Season)
  • Prison Playbook (Season 1) N

1 TV Show Leaving Netflix UK on February 3rd, 2023

  • Imperial Dreams (2014) N
  • Jane The Virgin (5 Seasons)

2 Movies and TV Shows Leaving Netflix UK on February 4th, 2023

  • Broken Hearts Gallery (2020)
  • Fukrey Boyzzz (1 Season

2 Movies Leaving Netflix UK on February 5th, 2023

  • Brokeback Mountain (2005)
  • Hachi: A Dog’s Tale (2009)

1 Movie Leaving Netflix UK on February 6th, 2023

2 TV Shows Leaving Netflix UK on February 8th, 2023

  • Bangkok Love Stories: Hey You! (1 Season)
  • Sons of the Caliphate (2 Seasons)

2 Movies Leaving Netflix UK on February 9th, 2023

  • Peter Rabbit (2018)
  • Pirates (2021)

2 Movies Leaving Netflix UK on February 11th, 2023

  • Jenni Rivera: Mariposasa de Barrio (2017)
  • The Roads Not Taken (2020)

1 Movie Leaving Netflix UK on February 12th, 2023

1 Movie Leaving Netflix UK on February 13th, 2023

1 Movie Leaving Netflix UK on February 14th, 2023

5 Movies Leaving Netflix UK on February 14th, 2023

  • The Bad Education Movie (2015)
  • Christmas with the Coopers (2015)
  • Dear John (2010)
  • Ladies in Lavender (2004)
  • Pottersville (2017)

28 Movies and TV Shows Leaving Netflix UK on February 16th, 2023

  • About Time (2013)
  • Along Came Polly (2004)
  • Antz (1998)
  • Barbie in a Mermaid Tale (2010)
  • Barbie: The Princess & the Popstar (2012)
  • Battleship (2012)
  • Big Fat Liar (2002)
  • Bring It On: In It to Win It (2007)
  • Darkest Hour (2017)
  • Dead Silence (2007)
  • Enemigo intimo (2020)
  • The Great Wall (2016)
  • Happy Gilmore (1996)
  • Kindergarten Cop (1990)
  • Kindergarten Cop 2 (2016)
  • The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration (2003)
  • The Last House on the Left (2009)
  • The Little Rascals Save the Day (2014)
  • Mr. Peabody & Sherman (2014)
  • Nightmare High (2016)
  • O Brother, where art thou? (2000)
  • Red Dragon (2002)
  • Repo Men (2010)
  • Spark (1 Season)
  • Split (2016)
  • Tower Heist (2011)
  • The Unborn (2009)
  • Wanderlust (2012)

1 Movie Leaving Netflix UK on February 18th, 2023

2 Movies Leaving Netflix UK on February 19th, 2023

  • A Place in the Stars (2014)
  • Peru: Tesoro escondido (2017)

1 Movie Leaving Netflix UK on February 20th, 2023

1 TV Shows Leaving Netflix UK on February 22nd, 2023

  • Fifty: The Series (1 Season)

Which of your favorite movie and TV shows will you be sad to see leave Netflix UK in February 2023? Let us know in the comment below.

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With an exceptionally busy January, thankfully, February

Awards

The 38th edition of the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, which will run Feb. 8-18, will open with Miranda’s Victim, one of 52 world premieres in this year’s lineup, and will close with the U.S. premiere of I Like Movies, one of 78 U.S. premieres, the fest announced Wednesday.

These are, of course, in addition to a slew of the career-retrospective tributes for which the fest is famous, which this year will celebrate the likes of Cate Blanchett, Brendan Fraser, Angela Bassett, Jamie Lee Curtis, Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson, as well as panels with breakthrough artists, artisans, directors, writers, producers, female creatives and international filmmakers.

The fest will also offer a variety of free educational programs, including Mike’s Field Trip to the Movies (for 4,000-plus fourth through sixth grade students from low-income schools throughout Santa Barbara County), which this year will feature a screening of Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio followed by a Q&A with filmmaker Guillermo del Toro; and Film Studies Program (for 30 undergraduate film students invited from across the country), which provides priority access to films, panels, filmmaker seminars and tributes, as well as intimate Q&As with filmmakers.

“At a time where there’s a dwindling of movie theater attendance, the role of film festivals has never been more important,” SBIFF executive director Roger Durling said in a statement. “At SBIFF, with the 38th edition, our marching orders are clear: to celebrate movies and to nurture and exalt the film community, the artists as well as the cinephiles. It’s a great slate with 43 countries represented.”

Opener Miranda’s Victim recounts the story of an 18-year-old woman who was kidnapped and brutally raped in 1963, and whose fight to bring her attacker to justice triggers a law that transforms the nation. Directed by Michelle Danner, it stars Abigail Breslin, Ryan Phillippe, Luke Wilson, Donald Sutherland, Mireille Enos and Andy Garcia.

I Like Movies, the closer, tells the story of a 17-year-old cinephile who lands a job at a video store, where he forms a complicated friendship with his older female manager. Directed by Chandler Levack, it stars Isaiah Lehtinen, Romina D’Ugo, Krista Bridges and Percy Hynes White.

Below is the full festival screening lineup …

30 WORLD PREMIERE FEATURE FILMS (listed alphabetically)

21 Miles in Malibu

Directed by Nic Davis

United States

American Outlaws

Directed by Sean McEwen

United States

Bringing Back Our Wetland

Directed by Michael Love

United States

Bullets

Directed by Peter Pontikis

Sweden

Call Me Dancer

Directed by Leslie Shampaine, Pip Gilmour

United States

Commitment to Life

Directed by Jeffrey Schwarz

United States

Dancing With Mom

Directed by Trish Neufeld

Canada

The Dirty Divide

Directed by Paul Freedman

United States

Dr. Tony Fauci

Directed by Mark Mannucci

United States

Full Circle

Directed by Josh Berman

United States

Go On, Be Brave

Directed by Miriam McSpadden, Brian Beckman

United States

Grace Point

Directed by Rory Karpf

United States

The Harvest

Directed by Caylee So

United States

HELEN|BELIEVE

Directed by Dylan Mulick

United States

The House Band

Directed by Laura Brownson

United States

Ibiza Blue (La corriente)

Directed by Jesús Lloveras

Spain

Karen Carpenter: Starving for Perfection

Directed by Randy Martin

United States

Killing Me Softly With His Songs

Directed by Danny Gold

United States

The Legend of MexMan

Directed by Josh Polon

United States

Miranda’s Victim

Directed by Michelle Danner

United States

Rachel Hendrix

Directed by Victor Nuñez

United States

Rachel’s Farm

Directed by Rachel Ward

Australia

The Right to Read

Directed by Jenny Mackenzie

United States

Samichay, in Search of Happiness (Samichay, en busca de la felicidad)

Directed by Mauricio Franco Tosso

Peru

The Team (El equipo)

Directed by Bernardo Ruiz

United States

Tove’s Room (Toves værelse)

Directed by Martin Zandvliet

Denmark

Vishniac

Directed by Laura Bialis

United States

Voices Rising: The Music of Wakanda Forever

Directed by Bernardo Ruiz

Wade in the Water: A Journey Into Black Surfing and Aquatic Culture

Directed by David Mesfin

United States

53 U.S. PREMIERE FEATURE FILMS (listed alphabetically)

Alam

Directed by Firas Khoury

Palestine

Autobiography

Directed by Makbul Mubarak

Indonesia

Baby Ruby

Directed by Bess Wohl

United States

A Bit of Light

Directed by Stephen Moyer

United Kingdom

Black Mambas

Directed by Lena Karbe

Germany

Bones of Crows

Directed by Marie Clements

Canada

Bread and Salt (Chleb i sól)

Directed by Damian Kocur

Poland

A Bunch of Amateurs

Directed by Kim Hopkins

United Kingdom

The Chambermaid (Sluzka)

Directed by Mariana Čengel Solčanská

Slovakia

Coyote (Le coyote)

Directed by Katherine Jerkovic

Canada

Daughter of Rage (La hija de todas las rabias)

Directed by Laura Baumeister

Nicaragua

Dear Memories

Directed by Nahuel Lopez

Germany

Everybody Wants to Be Loved (Alle wollen geliebt werden)

Directed by Katharina Woll

Germany

Exodus

Directed by Abbe Hassan

Sweden

Fathers & Mothers (Fædre og mødre)

Directed by Paprika Steen

Denmark

Filip

Directed by Michał Kwiecinski

Poland

The Hotel (Lu guan)

Directed by Wáng Xiăoshuài

Chinese Hong Kong

How is Katia? (Yak Tam Katia?)

Directed by Christina Tynkevych

Ukraine

I Like Movies

Directed by Chandler Levack

United States

Into My Name (Nel mio nome)

Directed by Nicolò Bassetti

Italy

Jane Campion, The Cinema Woman (Jane Campion, la femme cinéma)

Directed by Julie Bertuccelli

France

La jauría

Directed by Andrés Ramírez Pulido

Colombia

Lakelands

Directed by Robert Higgins, Patrick McGivney

Ireland

Leila’s Brothers

Directed by Saeed Roustaee

Iran

A Letter from Helga (Svar við bréfi Helgu)

Directed by Ása Helga Hjörleifsdóttir

Iceland

Lyra

Directed by Alison Millar

Ireland

Maestro(s)

Directed by Bruno Chiche

France

A Man (Aru otoko)

Directed by Kei Ishikawa

Japan

Manuela

Directed by Clara Cullen

United States

My Name Is Happy

Directed by Nick Read, Ayse Toprak

United Kingdom

The Nannies (Les femmes du square)

Directed by Julien Rambaldi

France

Narcosis

Directed by Martijn de Jong

Netherlands

North Circular

Directed by Luke McManus

Ireland

The Other Widow (Pilegesh)

Directed by Ma’ayan Rypp

Israel

Pinto

Directed by Narges Abyar

Iran

Red Shoes (Zapatos rojos)

Directed by Carlos Eichelmann Kaiser

Mexico

Retreat (Réduit)

Directed by Leon Schwitter

Switzerland

Sanaa

Directed by Sudhanshu Saria

India

Savoy

Directed by Zohar Wagner

Israel

Second Act (Andra akten)

Directed by Mårten Klingberg

Sweden

Semret

Directed by Caterina Mona

Switzerland

The Sixth Child (Le sixième enfant)

Directed by Léopold Legrand

France

Stay With Us (Reste un peu)

Directed by Gad Elmaleh

France

Stellar (Ananghoonska)

Directed by Darlene Naponse

Canada

Summerlight and Then Comes the Night (Sumarljós og svo kemur nóttin)

Directed by Elfar Aðalsteins

Iceland

T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets

Directed by Sophie Fiennes

United Kingdom

The Taste of Apples Is Red (Ta’am al tufah, ahmar)

Directed by Ehab Tarabieh

Israel

Three Nights A Week (Trois nuits par semaine)

Directed by Florent Gouëlou

France

Traces (Tragovi)

Directed by Dubravka Turić

Croatia

Valeria Is Getting Married (Valeria mithatenet)

Directed by Michal Vinik

Israel

The Volunteer (La voluntaria)

Directed by Nely Reguera

Spain

Wild Flowers (Girasoles silvestres)

Directed by Jaime Rosales

Spain

Woman at Sea (Grand marin)

Directed by Dinara Drukarova

Iceland

The Young Arsonists

Directed by Sheila Pye

Canada

NON PREMIERE FEATURE FILMS (listed alphabetically)

26.2 to Life

Directed by Christine Yoo

United States

The 50

Directed by Brenton Gieser

United States

American Dreamer

Directed by Paul Dektor

United States

Anxious Nation

Directed by Vanessa Roth, Laura Morton

United States

The Art of Eating: The Life of M.F.K. Fisher

Directed by Gregory Mark Bezat

United States

The Baby Daddy (ארי והזרע הקדוש)

Directed by Adi Rabinovici, Yair Cymerman

Israel

Butterfly in the Sky

Directed by Bradford Thomason, Brett Whitcomb

United States

Category: Woman

Directed by Phyllis Ellis

Canada

Chile ’76

Directed by Manuela Martelli

Chile

Cinema Sabaya

Directed by Orit Fouks Rotem

Israel

Corner Office

Directed by Joachim Back

Canada

Desperate Souls, Dark City and the Legend of Midnight Cowboy

Directed by Nancy Buirski

United States

The Grab

Directed by Gabriela Cowperthwaite

United States

Gumbo Coalition

Directed by Barbara Kopple

United States

The Happiest Man in the World (Najsreќniot čovek na svetot)

Directed by Teona Strugar Mitevska

North Macedonia

I Like It Here

Directed by Ralph Arlyck

United States

It Ain’t Over

Directed by Sean Mullin

United States

Kerr

Directed by Tayfun Pirselimoğlu

Turkey

Know Your Place

Directed by Zia Mohajerjasbi

United States

A Little Prayer

Directed by Angus MacLachlan

United States

Luxembourg, Luxembourg

Directed by Antonio Lukich

Ukraine

No Ordinary Campaign

Directed by Christopher Burke

United States

Other People’s Children (Les enfants des autres)

Directed by Rebecca Zlotowski

France

Our Father, the Devil (Mon père, le diable)

Directed by Ellie Foumbi

United States

Patrick and the Whale

Directed by Mark Fletcher

Austria

The Prank

Directed by Maureen Bharoocha

United States

Pray for Our Sinners

Directed by Sinéad O’Shea

Ireland

The Quiet Girl (An cailín ciúin)

Directed by Colm Bairéad

Ireland

Return to Seoul (Retour à Séoul)

Directed by Davy Chou

Cambodia

Safe Place (Sígurno mj́esto)

Directed by Juraj Lerotić

Croatia

Shot in the Arm

Directed by Scott Hamilton Kennedy

United States

Snow and the Bear (Kar ve ayı)

Directed by Selcen Ergun

Turkey

The Soldier’s Opinion (Daato shel hahayal)

Directed by Assaf Banitt

Israel

Soul of the Ocean

Directed by Howard Hall

United States

Starring Jerry as Himself

Directed by Law Chen

United States

Susie Searches

Directed by Sophie Kargman

United States

Viking

Directed by Stéphane Lafleur

Canada

We Are Still Here

Directed by Beck Cole, Dena Curtis, Tracey Rigney, Danielle MacLean, Tim Worrall, Renae Maihi, Miki Magasiva, Mario Gaoa, Richard Curtis, Chantelle Burgoyne

Australia

Werner Herzog: Radical Dreamer

Directed by Thomas von Steinaecker

Germany

Who Are the Marcuses?

Directed by Matthew Mishory

Israel

2023 SBIFF SHORT FILMS – (listed alphabetically)

22 WORLD PREMIERES AND 25 U.S. PREMIERES 

À la vie à l’amor

Directed by Emilie Mannering

US Premiere

Canada

All-inclusive (Todo incluido)

Directed by Duván Duque Vargas

US Premiere

Colombia

Apayauq

Directed by Zeppelin Zeerip

World Premiere

United States

Are You Awake?

Directed by Gabriel Caste

World Premiere

United States

Barefoot Empress

Directed by Vikas Khanna

India

Becoming Yamazushi

Directed by G Yamazawa

United States

Big Water Summer: A Creation Story

Directed by Sophie Harris

United States

Bourn Kind

Directed by Rachel Myers

United States

Broken

Directed by Farzaneh Omidvarnia

World Premiere

Iran

Cara Romero: Following the Light

Directed by Kaela Waldstein

United States

Christopher at Sea

Directed by Tom CJ Brown

France

Daisy

Directed by Torbjörn Edwall

US Premiere

Sweden

Earthbound: Nzambi Matee

Directed by Farhoud Meybodi

World Premiere

Japan

Echo

Directed by Ben Wolin, Michael Minahan

World Premiere

United States

Epicenter (소문의 진원지)

Directed by Heeyoon Hahm

US Premiere

South Korea

Everything at Once (Alt på en gang)

Directed by Henrik Dyb Zwart

US Premiere

Norway

Falling Forward Into an Unknown and Dangerous Future

Directed by Mike Ambs

World Premiere

United States

The Fear Cycle

Directed by Dexter Brierley, Matt Seger

World Premiere

United States

Followers

Directed by Julia Bales

World Premiere

United States

The Golden Cage

Directed by Francisco Lopez, Mitchka Saberi

World Premiere

United States

Here to Stay

Directed by Jared Peraglia

United States

I Have No Tears, and I Must Cry (Sin lágrimas para llorar)

Directed by Luis Fernando Puente

United States

ifine

Directed by Adisa Septuri, Ebony Gilbert

World Premiere

United States

III

Directed by Salomé Villeneuve

US Premiere

Canada

It’s Nice in Here

Directed by Robert-Jonathan Koeyers

US Premiere

Netherlands

Ivalu

Directed by Anders Walter

US Premiere

Denmark

John Leguizamo Live at Rikers

Directed by Elena Francesca Engel

United States

Junglefowl

Directed by Kalainithan Kalaichelvan

World Premiere

Canada

Lamara

Directed by Bo Yoon Ha

Uganda

Lamb

Directed by Sinéad O’Loughlin

Ireland

Last Weekend With Jenny and John (Sista helgen med Jenny och John)

Directed by Jimmy Olsson

US Premiere

Sweden

Locals Only: The Big Little Pub

Directed by Gareth Kelly

World Premiere

United States

The Moisture (Rutubet)

Directed by Turan Haste

US Premiere

Turkey

Money and Happiness

Directed by Ana Nedeljković, Nikola Majdak

US Premiere

Serbia

More Than Hair (Plus que des cheveux)

Directed by Fitch Jean

Canada

Mud Crab

Directed by David Robinson-Smith

US Premiere

Australia

Night Cafe

Directed by Joshua Nowak

World Premiere

United States

Nowhere to Go but Everywhere (行き止まりのむこう側)

Directed by Masako Tsumura, Erik Shirai

US Premiere

Japan

Oskar

Directed by Max Vannienschoot

US Premiere

Canada

Pillow Fortress

Directed by Zander Coté

US Premiere

United States

Please Hold the Line (Qing bie gua duan)

Directed by Tan Ce Ding

US Premiere

Malaysia

Range Rider

Directed by Colin Arisman

World Premiere

United States

The Red Suitcase (La valise rouge)

Directed by Cyrus Neshvad

Luxembourg

Regular Rabbit

Directed by Eoin Duffy

Ireland

Rejoice in the Lamb

Directed by Courtney Bush, Will Carington, and Jake Goicoechea

World Premiere

United States

Requiem for a Whale (מותו של לוויתן)

Directed by Ido Weisman

Israel

Run

Directed by Alex Prager

World Premiere

United States

See You In My Dreams (Rencontres nocturnes silencieuses)

Directed by Ariane Louis-Seize

US Premiere

Canada

Shirampari: Legacies of the River (Shirampari, herencias del río)

Directed by Lucía Flórez

Peru

Snow in September

Directed by Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir

France

The Soft Skinned

Directed by Nicky Tyndale-Biscoe

US Premiere

Australia

Starving

Directed by Bobby Louise, Brig

World Premiere

United States

The Tadpole Trilogy (La trilogie des têtards)

Directed by Léonard Giovenazzo

US Premiere

Canada

Take Me Home

Directed by Liz Sargent

United States

Telos

Directed by Jesse Hovey

World Premiere

United States

This Is Not a House

Directed by Morgan Neville

World Premiere

United States

This Will Not Be a Festival Film (To nie będzie film festiwalowy)

Directed by Julia Orlik

US Premiere

Poland

Three Grains of Salt (Trois grains de gros sel)

Directed by Ingrid Chikhaoui

US Premiere

France

Thursday (Czwartek)

Directed by Bren Cukier

World Premiere

Poland

Tommies

Directed by Brian Fairbairn, Karl Eccleston

US Premiere

United Kingdom

Troy

Directed by Mike Donahue

United States

Trundle and the Lost Borscht of Atlantis

Directed by Laura Lee

World Premiere

United States

Two Chairs, Not One

Directed by Austin Kolodney

United States

The Vacation

Directed by Jarreau Carrillo

United States

Voces de Old Town Carpinteria

Directed by Brent Winebrenner, Leslie A. Westbrook, Suzanne Requejo

World Premiere

United States

Waves Apart

Directed by Josh Greene

World Premiere

United States

Whale-Roads

Directed by Michael Lee, Ethan Takekawa, Meg Kievman, Emma Holm-Olsen

World Premiere

United States

Whiteness at Work

Directed by Peter Bonde Becker Nelson

World Premiere

United States

Will You Look at Me (Dang wo wang xiang ni de shi hou)                                                                                                                                                                                               

Directed by Shuli Huang

China

You’ll Be Happier

Directed by Daniel Lombroso

United States

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The 38th edition of the Santa Barbara

Docs

Anonymous Content has announced its new partnership with No Nation Films, and their recently launched sales division, AC Independent. The collaboration includes the documentary, “5 Seasons of Revolution” from young independent filmmaker and reporter, Lina.

“5 Seasons of Revolution” documents the Syrian revolution, as Lina adopts a series of aliases to avoid detection from the violent state. Lina stands as both the director and subject of her directorial debut, the film is produced by the Head of No Name Films, Diana El Jeiroudi (“Republic Of Silence”) and Laura Poitras (“All the Beauty and Bloodshed” and “Citizenfour”). 

The documentary will make its world premiere on Saturday Jan. 21 at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival in the World Documentary section.

Throughout “5 Seasons of Revolution” and over the course of a decade, Lina uses video diaries of smuggled footage to share this personal story of her close friends as they are slowly pulled deeper into the struggle for freedom and autonomy against enemies known and unknown.  One by one, each friend is detained and targeted by the regime and Lina ends up alone and isolated amidst the violence and chaos.  

“Lina’s film is a labour of solidarity and of the passion and commitment to tell one’s own story despite the odds. Lina worked bravely and relentlessly under unforgiving circumstances, under cover for 11 years to bring this fragile and complex story to screen.  ‘5 Seasons of Revolution’ is a story of coming of age, of building and sustaining friendships, and of the will to guard one’s own voice amidst polarized political turmoil.  After all those years, I cannot think of a better partner than Anonymous Content to champion our film,” stated lead producer, Diana El Jeiroudi.

Executive producer Laura Poitras added “This is a film of breathtaking courage and scope that will reverberate for generations to come. Lina has made an essential work about the bonds of friendship and revolution.”

Nick Shumaker, head of Anonymous Content Independent’s film and sales division commends the filmmaker for her “bravery and grit,” as she “shares a truth the world has yet to see.”

Read here to learn more about which other films will be premiering alongside “5 Seasons of Revolution” at Sundance Film Festival.

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Anonymous Content has announced its new partnership

Global

By Staff

The Canadian Press

Posted January 23, 2023 8:03 am

Sunwing airlines has reduced its flight schedules from three airports in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

Tiffany Chase with the Halifax International Airport Authority confirmed Sunday that Sunwing cancelled its plans to launch once-weekly flights in February from Halifax to Orlando, Fla., and to Cayo Largo del Sur, Cuba.

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She says a twice-weekly flight to Varadero, Cuba, set to begin in February will be reduced to once a week.

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Courtney Burns, president of the Greater Moncton International Airport Authority, says the airline has cancelled one of two weekly flights from Moncton to Varadero, which were planned to run from mid-February until mid-May.

Burns said the airline will rebook those affected on another flight, or it will offer a full refund.

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Sunwing cancellations continue: 35 per cent of Saskatoon flights removed

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Meanwhile, the Fredericton International Airport said in a Jan. 12 Facebook post that Sunwing cancelled flights to Cayo Coco, Cuba, “due to operational constraints.”

Sunwing did not respond to a request for comment.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 22, 2023.

&copy 2023 The Canadian Press

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By Staff The Canadian Press Posted January 23, 2023

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Lisa Marie Presley and Danny Keough’s daughter Riley, 33, is a mom.

The actress secretly welcomed a daughter with husband Ben Smith-Petersen, her rep confirmed to Us Weekly.

The baby was mentioned at Lisa Marie’s memorial service on Sunday. The singer died January 12 after going into cardiac arrest at her Calabasas, California, home.


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Ben read a letter from Riley to her mom, which said, in part, “Thank you for showing me that love is the only thing that matters in this life. I hope I can love my daughter the way you loved me, the way you loved my brother and my sisters.”

The eulogy continued, “Thank you for giving me strength, my heart, my empathy, my courage, my sense of humor, my manners, my temper, my wildness, my tenacity. I’m a product of your heart.”

Riley met Ben, a stuntman, while working on the 2012 film “Mad Max: Fury Road.”

He proposed in 2014 and they were married in 2015.

Smith-Petersen gushed over Keough on Instagram as they celebrated their seven-yearanniversary in February 2022. He wrote at the time, “7 years of RAD luck. I love you to the moon & back. 7,000 more years please.”

Stars We've Lost in 2023

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Tech

Audio streaming giant Spotify on Monday said that it would be laying off about 6 percent of its workforce, or about 600 people, as the streaming audio giant becomes the latest company in the technology space to cut back on staff amid a challenging economy.

The company said that it expects to take severance costs of between $38 million-$49 million in connection with the layoffs.

The layoffs, unveiled by CEO Daniel Ek in a blog post, were expected to be more broadly based than a previous round of cuts in October, which hit staff working on canceled shows from in-house podcast studios Gimlet and Parcast.

To that end, one of Spotify’s most high-profile executives, chief content and advertising officer Dawn Ostroff, will depart the company “as part of a broader reorganization,” the company said. Ostroff will become a senior adviser to Spotify to help with the transition.

As part of other executive changes, Alex Norström, currently chief freemium business officer, and Gustav Söderström, currently chief research & development officer, are being elevated to co-presidents of the company. Norström will oversee content issues.

“As we evolve and grow as a business, so must our way of working while still staying true to our core values,” Ek wrote in his blog post. “To offer some perspective on why we are making this decision, in 2022, the growth of Spotify’s operating expenses outpaced our revenue growth by two times. That would have been unsustainable long-term in any climate, but with a challenging macro environment, it would be even more difficult to close the gap.”

He added: “Personally, these changes will allow me to get back to the part where I do my best work—spending more time working on the future of Spotify — and I can’t wait to share more about all the things we have coming.”

The CEO also addressed Ostroff’s exit. “As a part of this change, Dawn Ostroff has decided to depart Spotify,” he wrote. “Dawn has made a tremendous mark not only on Spotify, but on the audio industry overall. Because of her efforts, Spotify grew our podcast content by 40 times, drove significant innovation in the medium and became the leading music and podcast service in many markets.” 

Spotify executives previously signaled they had plans to reduce headcount-related expenses, with CEO Daniel Ek telling staff last June that the company would reduce its hiring growth by 25 percent and “be a bit more prudent with the absolute level of new hires over the next few quarters.” Paul Vogel, the company’s chief financial officer, also pointed to “increasing uncertainty regarding the global economy” at Spotify’s investor day in June as a reason for “evaluating [Spotify’s] headcount growth in the near term.”

Spotify is also the latest technology company to unveil big job cuts.

Google parent Alphabet, Amazon, Facebook, Instagram parent Meta Platforms and Microsoft are among the other tech powerhouses that have recently unveiled layoffs. Alphabet said last week that it would lay off 12,000 people. Amazon said earlier this month that it would reduce its staff by 18,000, while Microsoft earlier this week said it would lay off 10,000 people. Meta announced plans to cut 11,000 employees last year, with the likes of Snap, Twitter and Netflix also making significant reductions in 2022.

As of the end of the third quarter, Spotify employed around 9,800 people. The audio company brought in €3.04 billion in revenue and added 195 million paid subscribers during the third quarter. At the time, Ek said the economic downturn had not had a “material impact” on the company’s business but that Spotify would be “more selective” with its “overall spending.”

Spotify will report its fourth-quarter earnings on Jan. 31 before the market opens.

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Audio streaming giant Spotify on Monday said

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Sundance: Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Michaela Watkins are stellar as sisters still learning how marriage works (or doesn’t), but despite that hefty theme, the film often feels far too lightweight.

Filmmaker Nicole Holofcener has long been one of our foremost chroniclers of the minutiae of everyday life, someone uniquely equipped to marry the very funny with the very honest, the sort of creator who makes things that hurt, in both good and bad ways. For her first original feature in a decade — she’s been making plenty of TV in recent years, and in 2018, directed and scripted the Ted Thompson adaptation “The Land of Steady Habits” — Holofcener returns to classic territory: a New York City story about neuroses and good intentions and the slights that keep us at night. It’s, of course, about love.

And while “You Hurt My Feelings” is not without all the things Holofencer does so very well — all that honesty, all that understanding of the texture of everyday life, plus Julia Louis-Dreyfus in the spotlight, where she belongs — it also feels decidedly low-key for such a insightful filmmaker. The shagginess of it, the missteps, the rambling bits are pleasurable enough, and there are plenty of laughs and insights here, but there’s also nothing new. If you like Nicole Holofcener films, you will like this one, and there’s comfort in that, if not an edge of disappointment, too.

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Perhaps that’s even intentional, because “comfortable but a little disappointing” often seems to sum up the state of long-term relationships in Holofcener’s films (and, ahem, life itself), and that’s exactly what “You Hurt My Feelings” is about. Beth (Louis-Dreyfus) is a mid-level novelist who also teaches writing classes, while her husband Don (Tobias Menzies) is a therapist who spends his days trying to help vaguely disaffected middle-class New Yorkers. (Don’t ask how they afford their lovely Manhattan apartment, particularly when we’re told over and over that Beth’s books don’t sell quite as well as they should, but at least it all makes for a lovely setting.)

Their son Elliott (an excellent if underused Owen Teague) is also trying to be a writer, when he’s not working at a local pot store and trying to figure out why his unseen girlfriend doesn’t like him anymore. And Beth’s sister Sarah (Michaela Watkins, also excellent) is grown bored of her thankless interior decorating gig, as her own husband Mark (Arian Moayed) is shuffling through his unfulfilling acting career. Everyone is happy-ish, and their lives toggle back and forth between romance and work, with little else in between.

The major inciting incident of the film — that Beth overhears Don telling Mark he really doesn’t like her new book, just as she’s fighting to get it published — is hardly a secret. It’s long being touted as the film’s entire synopsis, and the moment in which it unfolds is just as heartbreaking and horrifying as it should be. Louis-Dreyfus is devastated by the admission, and the actress expertly pulls off the full spectrum of emotions that Beth rapidly cycles through in the aftermath.

But Holofcener also weaves in other occurrences where someone overhears some horrible truth about themselves that add to the texture of Beth’s big heartbreak. Most of those events happen, funnily enough, to Don, who in the midst of his marital trouble has to contend with another bombshell: that he’s a bad therapist. (Real-life married couple Amber Tamblyn and David Cross appear frequently as a bickering couple who see right through Don, while Zach Cherry is another patient who has grown weary of Don’s inability to actually help him.) Similarly, Don isn’t the only person who makes Beth feel bad about her work. Even her own agent doesn’t seem to like it, and the motley crew of wannabe writers she teaches down at the New School don’t even know the title of her most famous book.

It all feels very real, very relatable, and very familiar. That’s not always a good thing. Even audiences accustomed to Holofcener’s filmmaking might find themselves waiting for it all to kick into another gear, but it never does, gliding along gently, worn-in and shaggy as an old sweater, just vaguely not quite there.

Other concerns are easier to identify. While Louis-Dreyfus and Watkins are delightfully credible as sisters (with the added bonus of Jeannie Berlin playing their picky mom), other couplings make less sense, like Watkins and Moayed (the pair feel more like zany best pals than a long-time couple) or even Louis-Dreyfus and Menzies, who feel out of step with each other even before their big blowout (oddly enough, when the pair are with Teague, the family unit actually clicks delightfully into place).

Again, perhaps that disconnect is the point, but in the moments when the film really shines, it’s clear that there is smarter stuff just under the surface. But even low-key Holofcener boasts the things that make her work so fun to watch — endless city-set walk-and-talks, costumes and settings that actually seem suited to their characters, and snappy editing (care of Alisa Lepselter) that play up the laughs — and “You Hurt My Feelings” is packed with each of them. We just wish it hurt a bit more.

Grade: B

“You Hurt My Feelings” premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. A24 will release it later this year. 

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Sundance: Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Michaela Watkins are

Entertaintment

“Queer Canadian female teen werewolf movie” may sound mighty specific as a subgenre, yet 23 years after John Fawcett’s delicious cult item “Ginger Snaps,” along comes “My Animal” to ensure it’s no longer in a category of one. A sleek, sensuous debut feature from accomplished short film and music video director Jacqueline Castel, this chilly tale of a suburban outcast whose headlong crush on an alluring figure skater threatens to expose her shape-shifting secret skitters lithely between genres — touching on young adult romance, creature horror and dysfunctional family drama — while keeping its own identity as fluid and elusive as that of its wounded, haunted protagonist.

As played by striking nonbinary performer Bobbi Salvör Menuez, protagonist Heather is among the more intriguing werewolves in horror history: a girl whose introverted demeanor and androgynous appearance have already placed her on the social fringes of her sleepy, snow-blanketed northern Canadian town, and whose hereditary lycanthropy seems to her both an additional affliction and a potential escape valve. But as her conflicted sense of self is sent into overdrive by the advances of beautiful, ultra-cool Jonny (a suitably magnetic Amandla Stenberg), Jae Matthews’ screenplay swirls around in circles, shying away from cathartic transformation or confrontation until the eleventh hour.

That ultimately makes this Sundance Midnight premiere something of an elegant tease — by no means scary enough for demanding horror-heads. Still, its dreamy blood-and-ice aesthetic and bristling sapphic energy will seduce connoisseurs of LGBTQ+ genre fare, while Paramount has already secured global distribution rights outside Canada.

An eerie prologue further proves the maxim that horror films from “Poltergeist” through to “Skinamarink” have taught us: When the camera alights upon a TV set blaring in an otherwise pitch-black room in the middle of the night, nothing good can be afoot. As pale, stern-faced redhead Heather watches a Z-grade werewolf movie, the full moon outside triggers her furry transformation; before her parents Henry (a fine Stephen McHattie) and Patti (Heidi von Palleske) can contain her, she bolts from the house on an animal rampage. Henry has the affliction himself, which is seen in the family not as a curse but a condition to be managed — rather like the matter-of-fact presentation of cannibalism in Luca Guadagnino’s recent “Bones and All.” Heather must be shackled to her bed in advance of her attacks, while her midnight curfew is a little more urgent than most teenagers’.

By day, however, she’s just a regular weirdo. A friendless tomboy who works at the local ice rink and yearns to play goalie for its all-male hockey team, she has nobody with whom to share her secrets — not just her werewolf identity, which is less of a bane on her unhappy home life than her mother’s violent alcoholism, but her burgeoning lesbian sexuality. So when the impossibly glamorous Jonny doesn’t just give her the time of day, but seems sincerely interested in her, Heather’s world positively spins off its axis. She may not confess her supernatural burden to her new friend, but a different animal emerges as her pent-up sexual energy finally finds an outlet: Though Jonny can’t quite let go of her sneering jock boyfriend Rick (Cory Lipman), she and Heather find in each other’s bodies the escape they mutually crave from frozen reality.

Working predominantly in a palette of snow, black ice and emergency-light red, Castel and DP Bryn McCashin use swaying, intoxicated camera movement, heavily saturated filters and the occasional juddering strobe effect to sequester Heather and Jonny in their own world when they’re together. A centerpiece scene of the two young women hungrily making out in a darkened bar bathroom, the camera snaking over and under and around them, works up a humidity that feels wildly foreign to this bitter locale, otherwise framed in severe, serene compositions. The glassy, massing synths of Augustus Miller’s throwback score likewise swell with Heather’s physical excitement and agitation; the filmmaking in “My Animal” climaxes faster and more frequently than the tentative writing does.

“My Animal” finally leaves a few too many tantalizing possibilities on the table, its use of animal transformation as a metaphor for a surging libido only superficially explored. Hints of genderqueer identification in our protagonist remain just that, while Jonny’s seemingly conflicted sexuality is only seen through Heather’s eyes. Yet even as their incompletely drawn characters remain largely in limbo, we feel for these two misfit lovers, in large part thanks to the easy, skin-prickling onscreen rapport between Menuez and Stenberg. Menuez has something of Andrea Riseborough’s flexibly transparent intensity about them; their recessive, offbeat physicality is somehow both out of time and completely in tune with Stenberg’s glittery movie-star strut. Whether werewolf or mere vixen, both seem not quite of this world, least of all the small, snowed-in world presented here.

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“Queer Canadian female teen werewolf movie” may

Movies

We’ve known dolls were creepy way before M3GAN.

4.

“Living Doll” — The Twilight Zone (1963)

6.

Dolls (1987)

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Scream Factory

This is an interesting spin on the creepy doll formula because the story isn’t about a seemingly innocent toy that starts acting up. 

Instead, a couple brings the dolls to life and has them kill adults who become stranded at their home, while children are allowed to live. They also transform some victims into dolls, making for one of the most brutal scenes in the movie.

8.

Magic (1978)

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20th Century Fox

Starring Anthony Hopkins, Magic is about a man suffering from a mental illness that, at the time, was referred to as split-personality disorder. In the movie, a homicidal part of the character’s mind is funneled into his ventriloquist dummy.

But perhaps the scariest thing of all was how little we knew about dissociative disorders back then.

15.

Pin (1988)

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New World Pictures

Another movie with an outdated concept of dissociative disorder, Pin is about a boy, Leon, who starts to identify with a medical dummy his father uses to teach his kids about the human body.

The dummy, who is called Pin, “tells” Leon to kill anyone who goes against what the boy wants. What’s unique in this movie is that, towards the end, the dummy actually condemns Leon for his actions. 

He reminds Leon that he did everything out of his own self-interest. I won’t spoil the very end, but it’s an interesting twist on the dissociative trope.

16.

“The Doll” — Night Gallery (1971)

17.

“Night of the Living Dummy II” — Goosebumps (1996)

19.

Finders Keepers (2014)

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Lionsgate

So we’ve got the same problem in this movie as in “The Doll” episode of Night Gallery…WHO WOULD WANT TO PLAY WITH THAT THING?

Which other doll movies or episodes belong on this list? Let me know in the comments!

And for more movies like M3GAN, check out the best movies about A.I. here!

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Film

Bella Ramsey and Anna Torv
Photo: Liane Hentscher/HBO

Apart from the hero’s journey-cum-quest narrative that doubtless will occupy much of The Last Of Us this season, creators Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann are bound to keep doling out back story as to how this fungal apocalypse began. And thus the second episode cold open takes us to Jakarta, Indonesia in 2003, a short time before the outbreak went global.

A middle-aged woman’s afternoon lunch (beef satay!) is interrupted by a pair of cops who escort her to a car. The dignified lady is assured she has not committed a crime. They confirm she is Ibu Ratna (Christine Hakim) professor of mycology at University of Indonesia. Ah yes, the unwitting scientist dragged in my government officials because some Weird Shit Is Going Down, a beloved and necessary trope for end-of-the-world narratives.

Dr Ratna is taken to a lab, squints at a sample of the fungus Ophiocordyceps through the microscope and is told it was taken from a human. She knows (and we know from the last episode’s cold open) the fungus can’t live in the heat of the human body. She then examines the corpse it was taken from, and extracts white, writhing tendrils from deep in the throat. The female subject, shot through the head by police, had been bitten on the ankle and subsequently bit a few coworkers. Who are all now executed. Where did they all work? A flour and grain processing factory. Dr. Ratna puts it all together in a tense debrief with a military official (Yayu A.W. Unru). Clearly a fast-spreading phytonotic (plant-to-human) event has occurred. The good doctor’s terse advice: Bomb the city and everyone in it.

Let’s pause a moment and consider, in a fit of wildly premature speculation, where The Last Of Us is ultimately headed. Yes, it’s a zombie-adjacent survival epic with a grieving-father-surrogate-daughter emotional through-line. Yes, it’s a narrative pretext for chases, gunplay, gore, heroism and horror. But where’s it going to leave us after season two or three, after the game’s 2020 sequel has been digested in another 18 or so breathless installments?

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My money’s on: Humans lose. Joel and Ellie (or whoever replaces them) puts up a good fight, they maintain their dignity and ethics, and die of natural causes—maybe because both are immune? In any case, humanity becomes extinct. The fungus flourishes. The Anthropocene ends, and nature begins to heal. That’s what I posit as Mazin-Druckmann’s long game: it’s the end of the world and we feel fine. All the gross stuff with undead cannibals and gruesome Clickers and so forth? All a beautiful part of Gaia’s epic reset. No demons. No aliens. No God. Just fungus and root systems and a happy planet for the next few billion years. Posthuman cli fi in Romero drag.

Okay, back to the zombie blasting! Post-credits (Game Of Thrones meets Time-Lapse Mold) we see Ellie (Bella Ramsey) curled up in fetal position, on the floor of a house overgrown with grass and weeds. Her bed is a mossy green patch and light streams down from the busted roof. It’s a pretty pastoral image of rewilding nature (the episode was deftly directed by Druckmann).

Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Tess (Anna Torv), now that they know that Ellie has been bitten, have keeping watch over Ellie, guns out, all night. Exasperated, Ellie points out that she hasn’t turned into a “fucking monster.” Joel, with possibly fractured fingers from pummeling the soldier to pulp last night, is still on high alert. Tess argues they push on, bring Ellie to the State House and get the car battery and other booty from the Fireflies. Joel wants to return the girl to the Quarantine Zone (QZ) and continue without her. Neither knows what’s so special about this girl.

Which seems a bit improbable. You don’t have to be a mycology professor or epidemiologist to know that if a person appears to be immune to an insanely infectious agent, they are of humongous scientific value. But okay, years in the smuggling racket have hardened Joel and Tess beyond normal reason. At any rate, Ellie has to explain that there’s a Firefly camp out west with scientists who are trying to create a vaccine and the need to study her immune system. Joel scoffs that he’s heard about miracle cures for years. But Tess wins out: whether or not the girl is for real, the Fireflies think so, and they need the gear. They head out.

The bulk of the episode that follows is a trek-and-fight through the bombed out, cantilevered wreckage of downtown Boston, buildings Tower-of-Pisa’ed into crazy angles and festooned in miles of moss, vines, and ferns. Shoutout to cinematographer Ksenia Sereda and the series’ reported squad of art directors for engineering such a haunting, painterly Beantown Without Us (Tarkovsky’s unforgettable Stalker was easily in the image library).

As they walk in daylight through the open city, no infected around, Tess asks Ellie questions: age, family, how she got bitten. Ellie in turn marvels at the lack of infecteds and asks about some of the beasties we are sure to encounter: super-infecteds who spew spores, and ones with burst-open heads who lurk in the shadows.

The trio enters the lobby of a semi-submerged grand hotel (cue random frog plonking keys on a piano as it leaps away). They wade through the green mucky water. Ten floors up, they find a collapsed mass of concrete that bars the way forward. Tess clambers over it to scout the way, leaving Ellie and Joel to get to know each other, a bit of human interaction that goes nowhere fast. She learns he’s from Austin, Tess is from Detroit, the infecteds can live for a month or 20 years, and he’s killed lots of them. When the girl asks about the soldier last night, Joel can’t find it in himself to say, He triggered a memory of my daughter being shot when she was your age. But I hope Pascal gets to act that highly emotional scene in a later episode.

Tess reappears through a side door and guides them on an alternate route. From the rooftop, they look down and see scores of undead prone in the street, groaning and writhing. Tess has a short speech about the fungus isn’t only in the infected, but growing underground (“long fibers like wires, some of them stretching over a mile”), creating a network in which all the infected are connected and sharing information. (This mycorrhizal framing of zombies reinforces the dee-ecology theory of Last Of Us; they are of the Earth, whereas humans are the mutation.)

Their way blocked by Sleeping Uglies, Joel and Tess take Ellie to the museum. Here’s the haunted house part of the episode. They walk tensely through the creepy place by flashlight, find a dead body. Joel says the continue in total silence. Very creepy climb up a staircase. Don’t touch the ‘shrooms, Joel! We are so ready for a Clicker to appear.

Pedro Pascal

Pedro Pascal
Photo: Liane Hentscher/HBO

And one obliges. The three are stopped in their tracks (after a sudden collapse that conveniently occurs after they get through a doorway) by the sound a strangulated glottal cackle coming from a hallway. The raspy ghoul enters the room, stalking around glass display cases. Joel signals to Ellie to be totally silent; they are drawn by sound. But when Ellie gets a glimpse of the thing, with its braised-cauliflower head, she gasps and it pounces with a scream. Joel fights off the creature. The noise draws a second fried artichoke, and Tess and Ellie get separated.

The Steadicam work in the ensuing sequence is quite effective, controlling how much we see the Clickers, making use of wildly swinging flashlights and panicked bodies in motion. Joel steers Ellie to safety; wastes a Clicker before it can French kiss him with its mycelium tendrils; Tess buries an axe in the head of another that Joel finishes off with a few bullets. (Clickers can take more rounds before dropping.) Ellie was scratched or bitten on the arm—again—but she’ll survive. Tess, on the other hand, looks stricken.

Our group gets to the roof of the museum, makes their way across a rickety looking plank bridge to the next building, and continue on their way to the gold-domed state house. When they actually get there, they find the bloodied bodies of numerous Fireflies in the lobby. What happened? Joel reads the scene and deduces that one got bit and the infected and healthy killed each other in firefight. Tess frantically searches through the Firefly supplies for anything they can use: a radio, a map. Joel shouts at Tess it’s over; they should go home. Tess refuses. “I’m staying,” she says. “Our luck had to run out sooner or later.” That’s when Ellie realizes the truth. “Fuck,” the girl says. “She’s infected.”

Somewhere during the fight in the museum, Tess was bitten. Joel demands to see it. Tess shows a nasty, livid infection on her neck and shoulder. “Whoops, right?” she jokes (same as the game, btw). Just then we see tendrils on the mossy ground, like parasitical worms, stretch out and burrow under the skin of dead men’s fingers. The fungus is waking up the infected (which we saw earlier having a nap), giving them a boost of vitamin Cordyceps. Untold dozens of the flesh-eaters leap up and start running toward the state house.

Tess doesn’t have much time. She tells Joel to promise to get the girl to Bill and Franks. Tess then dumps several barrels of gasoline in the lobby, scatters some hand grenades on the floor, and commands Joel: “Save who you can save.” Joel pulls Ellie away, who protests and curses him for leaving Tess behind. Tess makes a heroic last stand against the marauding undead mob, finally igniting a zippo and blowing up the state house, mid-tendril kiss with a Clicker. Joel and Ellie, a safe distance from the Capitol, see the conflagration, register the loss of a comrade, and keep going.

The episode’s emotional arc among the three characters goes something like: hostile mutual mistrust melts incrementally into wary allegiance. Tess, like a friendly aunt, made the earliest overtures to Ellie by way of bonding, while Joel remained stony and silent on the outside. Once Tess is bitten, she can’t afford to deepen any emotional attachment to the girl. Joel’s raw grief over losing Tess can convert either to bitter resentment toward Ellie, or a fresh sense of paternal responsibility. Or an anguished meld of both. When and if Joel allows himself to feel for Ellie as he did for Sarah, it’s going to be explosive stuff.

And so, another fine episode in which the world-building emerges organically and persuasively, the visuals and acting continue to be top-notch, the tension builds to a bloom of satisfying violence. Still unclear whether the series is slickly repackaged horror tropes or a deeply philosophical (forgive the term) game-changer. But we’re in no hurry to find out.

Stray observations

  • Last recap, I included a full disclosure that I’m not a gamer and never played the Naughty Dog version of The Last Of Us. However, research was conducted over here, for those with ten hours to kill.
  • In the previous episode’s extended prologue set in 2003, Joel, Tommy and Sarah were having breakfast when a news report came on the radio about an emergency in Jakarta.
  • Ellie waking up on the ground is an elegant call-back to Sarah waking in bed up at 2am when the outbreak hits Austin.
  • As someone from New Hampshire who has lived in New York a long time I must say, Boston has never looked so livable.
  • The Last Of Us is the furthest from z comedy (where my Return of the Living Dead fans at), which makes Ellie’s wisecracks and teen sass all the more welcome. Her “twitch” gag and then muttering okay, if she can’t have a gun she’ll throw a sandwich is low-key but refreshing comic relief.
  • Tess’s line, “It’s the long or way or the we’re-fucking-dead way,” is one I plan to use on my next car trip.
  • Art direction kudos: One-second shot of empty restaurant: tablecloths covered in moss, water glasses brimful of green. Nearly every shot has a verdant splash, even when the trio cross the hotel roof bar, plastic chairs are bright green.
  • Is the idea of a Zombie Siesta new in z lore? When the undead aren’t actively chasing lunch or out for a nice shamble, do they take a grumbly disco nap?
  • Random thought re: the colonial history we glimpse in the spooky museum: White European settlers were an invasive species in the Americas.
  • Calling it now: Tendril smooch with Anna Torv? Most sex in all of season one.

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Bella Ramsey and Anna TorvPhoto: Liane Hentscher/HBOApart

TV

Toy Story (1995) Trailer #1 | Movieclips Classic Trailers

If it had been nothing but a major breakthrough in the world of computer animation, Toy Story would still stand today as a monumental achievement, but what we got was so much more. In the hands of an early Pixar Animation dream team, this simple tale of two toys vying for bedroom superiority and becoming best friends in the process soared. Toy Story was Pixar’s first film, and it immediately established the company as the world’s new go-to for emotional, family-friendly entertainment.

It’s hard to overstate just how groundbreaking Toy Story was and continues to be, both in terms of technical achievement and storytelling. It was a kid’s film that didn’t feel juvenile, that wasn’t a slog for parents to sit through; it really did offer something for everyone, which many films claim to do but few can deliver on. It established themes that Pixar continues to revisit with each of its films, and the company keeps returning to them because they work. For so long, children’s entertainment pacified kids and occasionally taught lessons; Toy Story was one of the first times a film aimed at kids said, “I know how you feel, I know it’s hard, and you’re not alone.” In 1995, that was revolutionary, and you can still feel the effects of Toy Story’s novel approach to storytelling in films that are being produced today. [Matthew Jackson]

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Toy Story (1995) Trailer #1 | Movieclips

What to Watch

by Regina Avalos,

Selling the OC will continue! Netflix renewed the spinoff of Selling Sunset for a second and third season. Jason and Brett Oppenheim, Alex Hall, Alexandra Jarvis, Alexandra Rose, Austin Victoria, Brandi Marshall, Gio Helou, Kayla Cardona, Lauren Shortt, Polly Brindle, Sean Palmieri, and Tyler Stanaland are featured in the real estate reality series.

Netflix revealed the following about the renewal of the series in a press release.

“Netflix has renewed the hit docusoap series, Selling The OC, for two additional seasons. Production will start this winter. ·

Season 1 Synopsis: A fresh set of realtors square off, competing to establish themselves at The Oppenheim Group’s second office on the Orange County coast. Will the pressure prove too much for these agents to handle?”

A premiere date for Selling the OC season two will be announced later.

What do you think? Are you a fan of this Netflix reality series?

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by Regina Avalos, January 23, 2023 Selling the

Awards

Paul Simms, the creator of the NBC comedy NewsRadio and currently showrunner on FX’s What We Do in the Shadows and an executive producer on Atlanta, will be this year’s recipient of the WGA East’s Herb Sargent Award for Comedy Excellence. The honor will be presented by Atlanta‘s Donald Glover at the 75th annual Writers Guild Awards ceremony March 5 at New York’s Edison Ballroom.

“I’m deeply honored to receive the Herb Sargent Award and truly grateful to the writers I’ve worked with over the years,” Simms said. “Without their input, I’m not even capable of coming up with a funny quote, and I look forward to their assessments of all the various ways this quote you’re reading right now missed the mark and could have been better.”

Simms joined the guild in 1990 as a writer for Late Night with David Letterman. He was a writer and producer for the first three seasons of HBO’s The Larry Sanders Show, and in1995 created the NBC sitcom NewsRadio, starring the late Phil Hartman. His many other writing credits include Flight of the Conchords and Girls.

“Paul Simms has been a creative spark for many of this generation’s greatest comedic voices,” said WGA East president Michael Winship. “He brings out the best in those with whom he works and often has been the not-so-secret ingredient who takes a series and makes it a hit. Time and again, Simms has proven that he is more than deserving of the Sargent Award. We are pleased to honor him at this year’s ceremony in New York.”

The Herb Sargent Award is named after the former WGA East president who was a Saturday Night Live writer-producer for more than 20 years. The guild says it’s awarded to a writer “who embodies the spirit, commitment and comic genius of Mr. Sargent, as well as his dedication to mentoring new writers.” Past recipients include Judd Apatow, Lorne Michaels, James L. Brooks, Tina Fey & Robert Carlock, Steve O’Donnell, Norman Stiles and Paula Pell.

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Paul Simms, the creator of the NBC