Notizie

Kate Hudson discusses the sequel chances for How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. The 2003 rom-com starred Hudson alongside Matthew McConaughey. Hudson is open to How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days 2 if the script is right.

Kate Hudson discusses the potential for a sequel to How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. The 2003 movie stars Hudson alongside Matthew McConaughey, the latter of whom plays a man named Benjamin Barry, who works as an advertising executive and has the hubris to believe that he can make a woman fall in love with him in only 10 days. How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days was directed by Donald Petrie, and in addition to Hudson and McConaughey, features a leading cast including Adam Goldberg, Kathryn Hahn, Annie Parisse, Thomas Lennon, and Michael Michele.

Speaking with Watch What Happens Live (via Deadline), Hudson discusses the possibility of making a sequel...

In 2014, Naomi Watts voiced an animated version of herself in the “BoJack Horseman” episode “One Trick Pony.” The Watts in Hollywoo — the “BoJack” stand-in for the entertainment industry’s epicenter, inhabited mostly by anthropomorphic animals — is starring opposite BoJack in a biopic about his frenemy, Mr. Peanutbutter. She appears on set preparing to play Diane, a burgeoning writer. The meta joke is the actress accepted the part to get a break from emotionally draining, praiseworthy performances.

“I just keep getting pigeonholed as these complex characters in highly acclaimed movies,” the animated Watts bemoans to a character who is a parody of host Ryan Seacrest (A Ryan Seacrest Type). “For once, I would just love to phone it in and play a two-dimensional girl in a rom-com with no inner life of her own. That’s kind of the reason I got into this business.”

Ten years later, that tongue-in-cheek guest appearance now feels almost prophetic.

Waypoint Entertainment takes a genre-agnostic approach to selecting projects, focusing on uniqueness and subversion. The studio emphasizes collaboration with filmmakers to bring their visions to life, prioritizing creativity and feasibility. Despite challenges in the industry, the team is excited about future projects, including the horror movie Longlegs, the horror-thriller Cuckoo and Blumhouse's Wolf Man reboot.

With over a decade of work already under their belts, Ken Kao and Josh Rosenbaum are looking to keep their bright streak in Hollywood rolling at Waypoint Entertainment. The production company was first co-founded in 2010 by Kao, quickly getting the ball rolling with 2011's Rampart, the crime drama led by Woody Harrelson and co-written by acclaimed crime novelist James Ellroy. With only a limited theatrical release, the movie was just a modest box office success, but garnered generally favorable reviews from critics and audiences alike.

After a few years off, Waypoint would come back in...

Documentary fans have a lot to be excited about this month on HBO and Max. April begins with the premiere of The Synanon Fix, a docuseries that follows the rise and fall of the cult-like drug rehabilitation program Synanon. The documentary Brandy Hellville and the Cult of Fast Fashion takes a deep-dive into the controversial “one size fits most” clothing brand Brandy Mellville and the impact of fast fashion on the planet.

An American Bombing: The Road to April 19th looks at the surge of political violence and anti-government sentiment that led to the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing, and the effects still felt nearly 30 years later. HBO is also returning with a second part to their popular docuseries The Jinx, with filmmakers continuing their investigation of Robert Durst.

But if documentaries aren’t your thing, there’s still plenty of popular films hitting Max in April, like Scott Pilgrim vs. The World,...

It's a new month, and HBO and Max will be showering their subscribers with gifts all April long! This month, the Wbd properties will welcome the arrival of unscripted projects like the premiere of Conan O’Brien’s new travel comedy series “Conan O’Brien Must Go” and the fourth season of the Emmy Award-winning drag-centric “We're Here.” Plus, Park Chan-wook and A24’s “The Sympathizer” limited series and the highly anticipated continuation of “The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst” will all be available to stream throughout the month.

Find out everything coming to Max this April, including The Streamable’s top picks to add to your watch list!

Sign Up $9.99+ / month Max.com What are the 5 Best Shows and Movies Coming to Max in April 2024? “Alex Edelman: Just For Us” | Saturday, April 6

Filmed in front of a live audience at Broadway’s Hudson Theatre in August 2023, Alex Edelman brings his solo special,...

Filmmaker Andrew Jarecki continues his investigation of convicted murderer Robert Durst in The Jinx – Part Two, a six-episode documentary series premiering on Max on April 21, 2024. The streaming service’s April lineup also includes the seven-episode limited series The Sympathizer, based on Viet Thanh Nguyen’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel and starring Oscar winner Robert Downey Jr in multiple roles.

Comedian Alex Edelman hosts a brand new comedy special, and Conan O’Brien visits favorite fans from his podcast series in the four-episode unscripted series Conan O’Brien Must Go. The documentary series The Synanon Fix exploring the drug rehabilitation program joins Max’s lineup on April 1st. And the streaming service has set April premiere dates for the documentaries Brandy Hellville & The Cult Of Fast Fashion and An American Bombing: The Road To April 19th.

Series & Films Arriving On Max In April 2024

April 1

American Renegades (2018)

Basquiat (1996)

Black Swan (2010)

Body of Lies (2008)

Bridget Jones’s Diary...

When you think of the great directors in cinema history – Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Alfred Hitchcock, etc. – chances are the first films that come to mind are Goodfellas, Jaws and Vertigo. But every brilliant filmmaker has their duds. Now, Rolling Stone – you know, the publication that doesn’t think Roseanne and Bill Cosby had historic shows just because of their wrongdoings – has put out a list of the 50 worst movies by some of the most renowned directors…And yes, they have missed the mark considerably.

In the list, titled “50 Terrible Movies by Great Directors”, there are plenty of bottom-barrel films, those that are absolutely anomalies in otherwise remarkable careers. We wouldn’t argue that man-child family comedy Jack (#1) isn’t Francis Ford Coppola’s worst movie or that Rob Reiner’s North (#2) wasn’t worthy of Roger Ebert’s famed “hated, hated, hated, hated, hated” review. Those guys didn’t...

Greenland: Migration, a sequel to the 2020 film Migration, reveals its start date for filming as well as returning cast members. Greeland: Migration does not yet have a release date, but will begin filming in April of this year. Greenland was forced to release during lockdown in 2020, meaning that Greenland: Migration has a huge potential for growth within the series.

The Greenland sequel, Greenland: Migration, gets a major filming and returning cast update. Released in 2020, Greenland is an apocalyptic film starring Gerard Butler. Its plot focuses on an intimate story of a family who struggles to stay alive in the face of catastrophic natural disaster. Since the release of Greenland, a sequel titled Greenland: Migration has been confirmed.

As per Deadline, major updates have been announced for Greenland: Migration. The Greenland sequel will begin filming in April 2024. In addition, both Butler and former co-star Morena Baccarin will be returning to their roles,...

The mythology around Japan as a nation of everyday ghosts — where the living and the dead share space, occasionally in view of each other — can lead certain western filmmakers into dubious territory: If you don’t recall how Gus van Sant floundered with the mawkish, condescending exoticism of “The Sea of Trees,” trust that it’s best forgotten. Centered on a long-grieving Frenchwoman who finally makes peace with her husband’s death over the course of a Japanese work trip, “Sidonie in Japan” risks similar pitfalls — but Élise Girard’s droll, bittersweet romance mostly dodges them with grace and good humor, plus a pointed awareness of the limitations of its outsider perspective.

Premiering in the Venice Days sidebar at this year’s Venice Film Festival, this is a sweetly unassuming affair that is given some vinegary oomph by the presence of Isabelle Huppert in the lead — which will doubtless secure...

Though having left the genre behind, Matthew McConaughey recalls how a fortune-teller was behind his rom-com success. Having first found success with his work in more dramatic fare with Joel Schumacher's A Time to Kill and Steven Spielberg's Amistad in the '90s, among others, McConaughey began looking to the brighter side of things at the turn of the millennia starring in the likes of satirical comedy EDtv and the Jennifer Lopez-co-starring The Wedding Planner. Though the latter was a box office success, it would be his next film in the genre that would propel him to further stardom.

While speaking with Vanity Fair to discuss the film's 20th anniversary, Matthew McConaughey reflected on his decision to star in How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. The actor recalls being approached by a fortune-teller shortly after being offered the future hit rom-com, who convinced him to star in the film,...

It’s almost the end of another year…another grueling, relentless, shuffle around the pitiless sun. But before that: more content! HBO Max’s list of new releases for December 2022 is filled with a handful of exciting original TV series.

December 2022 truly is TV’s time to shine on HBO Max. Things get started on day one with the release of Gossip Girl season 2 (Dec. 1). That will be followed by His Dark Materials on Dec. 5. Adapting The Amber Spyglass, this season promises to be the most action-packed yet for the BBC/HBO fantasy collaboration. December 8 sees the arrival of Doom Patrol season 4. This DC comic property doesn’t have the cultural cache of some of its CW contemporaries but when it’s rolling, it might be one of the best comic series around.

Now that Warner has mostly scuttled its simultaneous streaming/theatrical release strategy, there aren’t many big original movies to speak of.

HBO Max is rounding out the year by adding the returns of several hit shows and new holiday-themed movies for December 2022. In addition to the streaming debuts of Don’t Worry Darling and See How They Run, HBO Max’s November 2022 slate included the exclusive premieres of movies like A Christmas Story Christmas, Holiday Harmony, and A Christmas Mystery. HBO Max’s new titles in November also featured the returns of big TV shows like Titans season 4 and The Sex Lives of College Girls season 2, as well as new episodes of continuing series like The White Lotus season 2.

As the holiday season continues, HBO Max’s December 2022 catalog is bringing even more original movies and long-awaited TV premieres. HBO Max subscribers will be able to enjoy the premiere of A Hollywood Christmas (December 1), a new original romantic movie about a woman who directs Christmas movies, and the streaming debut of the...

Exclusive: Gus Van Sant (Good Will Hunting), Lenny Kravitz (Lee Daniels’ The Butler), Beverly D’Angelo (Violent Night), Colleen Camp (Back on the Strip) and Gavin Rossdale (The Bling Ring) have signed on to star alongside Vito Schnabel in the dark comedy The Trainer, which Tony Kaye (American History X) is directing from Schnabel and Jeff Solomon’s script.

The film currently in production, after nearly a decade in development, is based on an original story by Schnabel. It unfolds over eight days of sleep-deprived chaos and follows Jack (Schnabel), a down-on-his-luck fitness expert living with his mother in Los Angeles, who takes a maniacal swing at fame and fortune, trying to realize his version of the American dream.

Julia Fox, Steven Van Zandt, Taylour Paige, Stephen Dorff, John McEnroe, Gina Gershon, Luka Sabbat, Soo Joo Park, Brock O’Hurn, Bella Thorne, Laird Hamilton and Duke Nicholson are also set to star.

Exclusive: Katie Aselton (The Morning Show) has signed on to star alongside Bill Burr, Bobby Cannavale and Bokeem Woodbine in the comedy Old Dads, which Burr wrote and is directing for Miramax and his company All Things Comedy.

The comedian’s feature directorial debut centers on a middle-aged father, Jack (Burr), and his two best friends (Cannavale and Woodbine), who after selling their company to a millennial, find themselves out of step and behind the times as they hilariously struggle to navigate a changing world of culture, career and fatherhood.

Aselton is playing Jack’s wife, Leah. Burr and Ben Tishler penned the script and are producing alongside Bill Block, Monica Levinson and Mike Bertolina, with production underway in Los Angeles.

Aselton is an actor and filmmaker perhaps best known for her starring role as Jenny on FX’s comedy The League. She...

Exclusive: Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla cast member Ken Watanabe has joined his upcoming New Regency film True Love in a role originally to have been played by Benedict Wong, following the latter actor’s departure due to scheduling conflicts.

Watanabe will share the screen with previously announced cast members including John David Washington, Gemma Chan, Allison Janney and Sturgill Simpson.

The latest film written and directed by Edwards is billed as an original sci-fi story set in the near future. Specifics as to its plot and the role Watanabe is playing are currently undisclosed, with production underway.

Edwards is producing with his Rogue One collaborator Kiri Hart and New Regency, which has provided the film’s financing. His latest film sits on an upcoming slate from the company that also includes an untitled original film from David O. Russell starring Christian Bale, Margot Robbie,...

There’s a load of great content coming to Netflix in November, but just as is always the case, there are also a bunch of titles being removed from the streaming service at the same time. Next month, the platform is losing 53 movies and TV shows. There are some classics amongst them, too, unfortunately, so you might want to fit in a last minute rewatch before they vanish from Netflix’s library.

On the first day of November, four titles are being removed, including horror remake Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark, children’s animated sequel Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil and Gerard Butler action movie Olympus Has Fallen. 2017 horror Death House is also leaving on the 4th, while drama Into the Forest departs Netflix on the 6th and Jamie Foxx vehicle Sleepless is among those disappearing the following day.

Here’s the full list of everything leaving in November:...

An Australian family moves on from tragedy with the help of a bird in a modest and warm-hearted true story

Naomi Watts, an adept and at times electrifying actor, has found herself adrift in recent years. The star who shone bright in Mulholland Drive and King Kong has dimmed with each rotten project, from the disastrous schmaltz of The Book of Henry (a film so bad it was rumoured to have cost director Colin Trevorrow a Star Wars gig), to Gus Van Sant’s maudlin suicide mystery The Sea of Trees (a film that was met with a chorus of boos at Cannes) to clumsy, barely released trans drama 3 Generations. Even her small-screen projects have underwhelmed, whether it be the swiftly cancelled Netflix thriller Gypsy or her role as Gretchen Carlson in the buzz-free Fox News drama The Loudest Voice that was quickly overshadowed by Bombshell (her Game of Thrones...

Matthew McConaughey drinks, smokes, has sex, and that’s about it in The Beach Bum.

It’s been a minute since the McConaissance came around and brought us excellent Matthew McConaughey movies like The Lincoln Lawyer, Dallas Buyers Club and Mud, and in the years since we’ve seen something of a McContraction, with stinkers like The Sea of Trees, Gold, The Dark Tower, and this year’s Serenity slinking in and out of theaters faster than one could drawl, “All right, all right, all right.” Does The Beach Bum, McConaughey’s new collaboration with indie maverick filmmaker Harmony Korine, signal the return of the former or the continuation of the latter? It’s hard to say.

One thing is for sure though: McConaughey leaves it all on the field in the movie, a languid comedy about a man named Moondog whose one-time fame as a writer and whose wife...

The Whistler Film Festival (November 28 — December 2) is hosting the industry’s top screenwriters at highly anticipated 7th consecutive event in Whistler.

This year’s honoured screenwriters will share their personal stories and challenges related to succeeding in today’s film industry at an afternoon conversation on December 1 as part of Wff’s Signature Series as well as receive their coveted award at Wff’s Awards Celebration on December 2.

Hosted by Canadian broadcast veteran George Stroumboulopoulos, festival goers will join this prestigious class of film scribes as they discuss tips and tricks for navigating the film landscape in 2018. The group will also share a behind the scenes look at their current and future projects during this intimate conversation.

Variety’s class of 2018 screenwriters and notable credits include:

Joe Robert Cole, Black PantherBryan Woods and Scott Beck, A Quiet PlaceAshleigh Powell, The Nutcracker And The Four RealmsJay Longino, Uncle DrewElizabeth Chomko, What They HadSofia Alvarez,...

Netflix has confirmed that 57 new original series, movies and specials will be debuting on the streaming service in November, including the first season of “The Kominsky Method” and the sixth and final season of “House of Cards.” Likewise, there will be plenty of movies making their first Netflix appearances including the red-hot Oscar contenders “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs” and “Outlaw King.”

Available November 1

Angela’s Christmas (Netflix Original)

Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Bring It On: In It to Win It

Cape Fear

Children of Men

Close Encounters of the Third Kind

Cloverfield

Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo

Doctor Strange

Fair Game – Director’s Cut

Follow This: Part 3 (Netflix Original)

From Dusk Till Dawn

Good Will Hunting

Jet Li’s Fearless

Julie & Julia

Katt Williams: The Pimp Chronicles: Pt. 1

National Lampoon’s Animal House

Next Avengers: Heroes of Tomorrow

Planet Hulk

Scary Movie 2

Scary Movie 3

Sex and the...

Christmas is coming early to Netflix, with the streaming platform adding a host of new holiday movies to its November lineup.

Kicking off the month is “Angela’s Christmas” — an animated feature about a young Irish girl — followed by another heartwarming holiday tale, “The Holiday Calendar,” about a young photographer who discovers a magical advent calendar that can predict the future. Later on, Netflix is releasing the much anticipated follow-up to “A Christmas Prince,” revisiting the characters of Prince Richard (Ben Lamb) and Amber (Rose McIver), as she begins to question her upcoming wedding and the ascension to royalty that comes with it.

Viewers who aren’t in the mood for Christmas cheer will also be able to watch the final season of “House of Cards” on Nov. 2 — this time sans Kevin Spacey and with Claire Underwood serving as president. A number of popular films are also coming to the streaming platform,...

Christmas may be more than a month away, but that isn’t stopping streaming platforms from adding some holiday cheer to their November lineups.

Beginning with the animated film “Angela’s Christmas” on Nov. 1, Netflix is adding several holiday movies to its streaming slate, including “The Holiday Calendar,” “The Princess Switch,” and “A Christmas Prince: The Royal Wedding.” Hulu and Amazon Prime are also following suit with “A Cinderella Christmas” on Nov. 15 and “Christmas With the Kranks” on Nov. 1, respectively.

November is also seeing the premiere of several platform originals, including the final season of Netflix’s “House of Cards” and Julia Roberts’ Amazon Prime debut, “Homecoming.” The documentary “McQueen” is also joining Amazon’s slate while Netflix will launch “Doctor Strange,” “Sixteen Candles,” and “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End.” Hulu will see a similarly large influx of new films, including “Goldeneye,” “Amelie,” and “Kick-Ass.”

See the...

In Don’t Worry He Won’t Get Far On Foot, Joaquin Phoenix is reunited once again with his To Die For director Gus Van Sant in this quirky, unconventional and heartfelt biopic about the life of controversial cartoonist John Callahan and his struggles with addiction and physical disability. Adapted from Callahan’s best selling memoir of the same name, the film is a return to form for Van Sant whose last film The Sea of Trees sadly proved to be a critical and box office misfire.

Set in the mid 70s and structured in a rather disjointed and non-linear fashion, Don’t Worry He Won’t Get Far On Foot offers a tender and painfully honest depiction of a life in tatters, and what it took to get it back on track. After a near-fatal car-crash lands him in a wheelchair for the rest of his days, John Callahan...

With a seemingly endless amount of streaming options — not only the titles at our disposal, but services themselves — we’re highlighting the noteworthy titles that have recently hit platforms. Check out this week’s selections below and an archive of past round-ups here.

Ant-Man and the Wasp (Peyton Reed)

After the apocalyptic implications following the cliffhanger of Avengers: Infinity War, one wonders where Marvel could go next. Small, of course. Ant-Man was the franchise’s most playful, inconsequential offering, so it’s only fitting that another insular story featuring Paul Rudd’s Scott Lang and shrinkable company would make a worthwhile breather in a world of superheroes where the fate of the world is often the name of the game. That’s clearly–and thankfully–not the mission here and in his follow-up Peyton Reed doubles down on the comedic charms of his cast, playing up Rudd’s aloofness and...

When Gus Van Sant began working on Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot more than 20 years ago, the movie looked a whole lot different. Back then, Robin Williams, at the height of his considerable fame, had optioned the memoir of the same name by John Callahan and was set to star as the quadriplegic, recovering-alcoholic Portland cartoonist. And when Robin Williams is in your movie, it looks different.

“It was always thought of, I think, as a Robin Williams film – people, including Robin, thought of it...

Joaquin Phoenix stars in his second Specialty release in the last few months with Gus Van Sant’s Don’t Worry He Won’t Get Far On Foot, with Jonah Hill and Rooney Mara. Amazon Studios is opening the title in several locations in New York and Los Angeles ahead of a wider roll out. The title will likely headline a fairly busy weekend of Specialty newcomers given the tentpole season. Rob Reiner put up his own money to finance, in part, his latest directorial effort Shock And Awe, a project that was twenty years in the making and takes a look at events precipitating the Iraq Invasion in 2003. PBS Distribution is opening Kimberly Reed’s doc Dark Money in New York ahead of a select national roll out. The feature examines the role of ‘dark money’ in U.S. politics. Among foreign-language titles, Cohen Media Group opened Gauguin: Voyage to Tahiti...

On the surface, it sounds like one of those true-life, triumph-over-adversity tearjerkers that Hollywood spoon-feeds folks with numbing frequency. But thankfully, Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot approaches the cliff of sentiment without going over the edge. Based on the 1989 memoir by Portland, Oregon cartoonist John Callahan, the film traces what happens when this party-hard, skirt-chasing boozehound is rendered a wheelchair-bound quadriplegic by an alcohol-fueled car accident. His journey from wallowing in despair to becoming a successful satirical cartoonist makes the usual stops at physical therapy sessions and work-the-program meetings,...

The last time a Gus Van Sant movie premiered at a major film festival, the film was “The Sea of Trees” and the festival was Cannes, where the movie was booed unmercifully at its first screening.

So it’s with a degree of relief that we can report that Van Sant’s new film, “Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot,” was met with nothing but applause when it premiered earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival.

And to be sure, “Don’t Worry” is a far better movie than the inert “Sea of Trees.” Originally in the works not long after Van Sant made “Good Will Hunting” in 1997, the film stars Joaquin Phoenix as John Callahan, the Portland cartoonist who began his career after an auto accident rendered him a quadriplegic at the age of 21.

Also Read: 'Skyscraper' Film Review: Dwayne Johnson Checks...

Where were you the first time you heard “McConaissance”? The term went viral between 2011 and 2014 as Matthew McConaughey transitioned away from light romantic-comedies to more serious fare and/or auteur collaborations with “The Lincoln Lawyer,” “Bernie,” “Killer Joe,” “Mud,” “Magic Mike,” and more. Suddenly, McConaughey was earning the best reviews of his career and turning into the most exciting actor in Hollywood.

The “McConaissance” hit its peak in 2014 when McConaughey’s role in “Dallas Buyers Club” won him the Oscar for best actor. At the same time, McConaughey was dazzling television with his stellar work on HBO’s “True Detective,” which netted him an Emmy nomination later that year. His 2014 success continued with the release of Christopher Nolan’s “Interstellar” in November, but since then the “McConaissance” has been on hold. The actor’s “The Sea of Trees,” “Free State of Jones,” and “Gold” were all dismissed by critics and audiences,...

On Friday morning, with little fanfare, A24 announced that David Robert Mitchell’s sprawling film noir, “Under the Silver Lake,” would no longer be released June 22. Instead, it’s been pushed to December 7. Nor was the company interested in discussing the six-month time shift. A24 spokeswoman Nicolette Aizenberg only responded to our query with a cryptic email: “Indeed we moved the date.”

However, in a company known for smart and radical moves, this appears to be another one. Here’s why.

1. Cool Cannes reception

Mitchell had plenty of reasons to be grateful to the festival for supporting his first two films, “The Myth of the American Sleepover” and “It Follows,” which both played Critics Week. Positive reaction for his debut gave Mitchell the confidence to quit his editing job and focus on getting “It Follows” made. The festival “helped to make that happen,” he told me at an American Pavilion panel at Cannes.

On Friday morning, with little fanfare, A24 announced that David Robert Mitchell’s sprawling film noir, “Under the Silver Lake,” would no longer be released June 22. Instead, it’s been pushed to December 7. Nor was the company interested in discussing the six-month time shift. A24 spokeswoman Nicolette Aizenberg only responded to our query with a cryptic email: “Indeed we moved the date.”

However, in a company known for smart and radical moves, this appears to be another one. Here’s why.

1. Cool Cannes reception

Mitchell had plenty of reasons to be grateful to the festival for supporting his first two films, “The Myth of the American Sleepover” and “It Follows,” which both played Critics Week. Positive reaction for his debut gave Mitchell the confidence to quit his editing job and focus on getting “It Follows” made. The festival “helped to make that happen,” he told me at an American Pavilion panel at Cannes.

I have to confess that as a Cannes Film Festival veteran, and a journalist who attends nearly all the competition screenings, I was hoping this day would come.

I’m talking, of course, about the hand-slapping move that the Cannes Film Festival has pulled for its 2018 edition. The culprits reaching for the cookie jar, in the mind of festival director Thierry Frémaux, are the many journalists and critics from around the world who travel to the Côte d’Azur each May in the hopes of being the first to have their say on the movies in Frémaux’s selection.

It’s how things have always been: 8:30Am morning screenings the day of their splashy red carpet premiere in the evening. Or perhaps even the night before, since Cannes always does a double world premiere feature, with press screenings split up in order to accommodate the volume of features and festgoers.

A version of this story first appeared in TheWrap magazine’s Cannes edition.

The Cannes Film Festival has laid down some new, or at least updated, rules this year. No selfies on the red carpet. No Netflix films. No press screenings in advance of premieres.But what does that mean? Is the 71st Cannes Film Festival a bold new reinvention of the venerable institution, or simply a tweaking of a format that’s been going strong for decades? And will they take away attention from the films that ought to be at the heart of any Cannes experience?

We think it’s a tweak, and we think attention will go right back to the films once Cannes gets underway on Tuesday.

For starters, those three rules were widely touted in the press as being brand new additions to this year’s festival, but that isn’t really true. General Delegate Thierry Frémaux, for instance, told guests not to take selfies three years ago. A de facto Netflix ban — i.e., no competition berths without a French theatrical release — was announced even before last year’s festival began, along with the note that it wouldn’t go into effect until 2018. And the cutback on advance press screenings has been hinted about, if not officially instituted, for more than six months.

Also Read: Quelle Horreur! Cannes Film Festival Bans Selfies on Red Carpet

Still, the rules do have a chance to change the Cannes experience. Take selfies, for instance. In 2015, Frémaux said that those photos are “ridiculous and grotesque” and slow down the red carpet. But his plea to stop them didn’t really work, as plenty of guests still found it irresistible to snap a shot at the top of the stairs that lead into the Grand Théâtre Lumière.

Every Cannes premiere, and lots of Cannes press screenings as well, becomes a staging ground for innumerable selfies. Yes, the festival could deploy some of its security guards to try to stop the practice, in the same way that those guards have been known to police women’s footwear and men’s neckware. But here’s guessing that at best it’ll make people take faster, sneakier selfies.

The Netflix ban is more significant, though it’s not really a ban. The streaming company is still welcome to submit its films to Cannes, but it can’t have them in the main competition unless it commits to a French theatrical release. But that release is governed by the Media Chronology Law, which requires a clearly untenable 36-month window between theatrical and screening.

Also Read: Netflix Bails on Cannes Over Theatrical Release Mandate

Lots of major Hollywood studios are perfectly happy with the out-of-competition slots that are still open to Netflix: That’s where Disney is showing “Solo: A Star Wars Story” this year and where Warner Bros. showed “Mad Max: Fury Road” in 2015, among others. If Netflix really wants to be one of the big boys, maybe that’s where it belongs — but the company also backs auteurs like Bong Joon-Ho and Noah Baumbach, so on the heels of its 2017 competition entries “Okja” and “The Meyerowitz Stories,” its feelings were hurt by the competition ban, and it opted not to submit anything to the festival.

The absence of Netflix won’t change the artistic complexion of the competition much, but this year it robbed the festival of what could have been a true highlight: the Cannes Classics screening of Orson Welles’ final, unfinished film, “The Other Side of the Wind,” whose completion Netflix financed.

That’s not a Cannes upheaval by any means, but it is a shame.

Also Read: Cannes Lineup Reaches From Spike Lee to Jean-Luc Godard

Of the recent changes, the change in press screenings has the biggest chance to truly impact the festival, at least in the way the 4,000 accredited press members experience it and the way movie fans read about it.

In general — though there are lots of exceptions to this — Cannes holds black-tie premieres in the Grand Théâtre Lumière for two of the main competition titles each day, one in the afternoon or early evening and the other later in the evening. In the past, the earlier premiere was usually screened for the press the night before in the Salle Debussy, while the later one got an 8:30 a.m. press screening in the Lumière on the morning of its premiere.

That timing meant that tweets and reviews had been circulating for hours before the official premiere took place. For a movie that wins raves, like “Toni Erdmann,” “Bpm” and “Son of Saul” in recent years, that simply built up expectations; for widely panned efforts like “The Sea of Trees,” “The Last Face” and “The Search,” it meant that the savage reviews cast a pall over the premiere, and made the inevitable standing ovations seem more like a forced reaction to those mean critics and press-screening boobirds.

This year, the early-premiere films will hold their press screenings simultaneously with the public screenings, which will give the critics and the invited guests an equal shot at spreading the word. Realistically, though, one of those groups is more eager to make their opinion known than the other, so there’s not much a few thousand invited guests can do to stem the tide of vitriol if a movie is hated.

But it’ll be nicer for the filmmakers, because they won’t know that the critics hate their film until after the premiere, rather than walking the red carpet already feeling like a failure.

For the late premieres, the press may have to wait until the morning after to get a look. This will delay the formation of a critical consensus until the filmmakers have had a night of hearing nothing but nice things from their invited guests. But it may also create incentive for the most well-connected press members to snag premiere invites and scoop their colleagues.

And watch out, Cannes filmmakers: It could well make that morning-after press audience even crankier than usual, and less inclined to soft-pedal their criticism since they’ve been denied their position as the first voices.

Will the press grumble? Of course they will. Will they adjust? Naturally. And as they adjust, attention in Cannes should turn to an intriguing batch of films, one that’s uncharacteristically heavy on newcomers to the competition (Nadine Labaki, David Robert Mitchell, Kirill Serebrennikov, Eva Husson … ) and light on filmmakers who in the past were given all-but-automatic berths at the festival (Naomi Kawase, Paolo Sorrentino … ).

So Cannes will present some intriguing matchups: Jean-Luc Godard, such a cinematic eminence that his 1965 movie “Pierrot le Fou” inspired this year’s poster, vs. A.B. Shawky, a young Egyptian-American director who landed in the competition with his first film, “Yomeddine.” Nuri Bilge Ceylan, whose “Winter Sleep” won the Palme d’Or in 2014 but didn’t land a foreign-language Oscar nomination, vs. Pawel Pawlikowski, who has never been in the Cannes competition but whose 2013 film “Ida” won the Oscar.

Then there’s Spike Lee with “BlacKkKlansman,” sure to be a hot-button title; and Terry Gilliam with “The Man Who Killed Don Quixote,” the troubled production that will close the festival unless a lawsuit blocks the screening; and Lars von Trier’s “The House That Jack Built,” that will return the Danish provocateur to the festival that declared him persona non grata in 2011 after his press-conference comments about being a Nazi and sympathizing with Hitler.

Plus the festival will present the world premiere of “Solo: A Star Wars Story,” and Christopher Nolan presenting a 50th anniversary screening of “2001: A Space Odyssey,” and films from two directors, Jafar Panahi and Kirill Serebrennikov, who likely won’t be allowed to leave their home countries and come to Cannes.

Chances are, that’s enough to make most of us forget that we aren’t supposed to take selfies and aren’t seeing any Netflix movies.

Read original story Cannes Film Festival 2018 Preview: No Selfies, No Netflix, No Problem At TheWrap...

Returning to the Sundance Film Festival for the first time since Gerry, Gus Van Sant has had a peculiar run since. After experimental highlights like Elephant and Paranoid Park, he earned acclaim with Milk, but then his last trio of features–Restless, Promised Land, and The Sea of Trees have been forgettable–or worse. His latest film, Don’t Worry, You Won’t Get Far on Foot, finds him returning with a beating heart, courtesy of Joaquin Phoenix’s stand-out lead performance, but this biopic is ultimately let down by its shapeless, uncinematic approach.

Based on a memoir by Portland’s John Callahan, the scattershot editing structure finds us jumping between his early 20s–when his alcoholism led him to becoming paraplegic after a horrible accident–and his life confined in his wheelchair, from his early, angry days to finding some peace with crafting off-color cartoons and support at an AA group.

The last time a Gus Van Sant movie premiered at a major film festival, the film was “The Sea of Trees” and the festival was Cannes, where the movie was booed unmercifully at its first screening. So it’s with a degree of relief that we can report that Van Sant’s new film, “Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot,” was met with nothing but applause when it premiered on Friday night at the Sundance Film Festival. And to be sure, “Don’t Worry” is a far better movie than the inert “Sea of Trees.” Originally in the works not long after...

In a career that began with “sex lies and videotape” in 1989, “Logan Lucky” is Steven Soderbergh’s 26th theatrical release. It will extend his record as the top-grossing American director to come out of the independent scene in its formative years — a period we’ll define as 1975 (Joan Micklin Silver’s “Hester Street”) through 1992 (Quentin Tarantino’s debut, “Reservoir Dogs”).

To be clear, Soderbergh’s an outlier; his billion-dollar box office dwarfs every other indie filmmaker. However, looking at the performance of his contemporaries who got their start in that indie film movement, you may be surprised at who’s on the list. (Note: “Outside wide release” means less than 1,000 screens. Also, the list doesn’t include directors like Sam Raimi and Abel Ferrara, who have independent roots but were not discovered via the film festival/arthouse pathway, or Alan Rudolph, another significant ’80s figure; he started in horror films in the early ’70s.

In what’s been a fairly wretched summer box-office season, Oscar-winners Casey Affleck, Brie Larson, and Matthew McConaughey had some of the worst of it with “A Ghost Story,” “The Glass Castle,” and “The Dark Tower.” Casting didn’t drive those failures, but possessing Hollywood’s most-coveted award offered little or no bottom-line benefit.

Read More:The Most Surprising Movies of the 2017 Summer Movie Season

Beyond creating certain mention in the first sentence of an obituary, the long-term impact of an Oscar is never clear. In the 15 years since Halle Berry won an Oscar for “Monster’s Ball,” her roles have ranged from decorative to derivative — a trend that continued with this late-summer’s release of the low-budget, don’t-mess-with-Mama thriller “Kidnap.”

Still, is it too much to expect a short-term uptick in interest and box office? The summer of 2017 suggests that may be the case.

Brie Larson

Best Actress, 2016

Oscar-winning film: “Room,...

The critically loathed Stephen King adaptation The Dark Tower is the latest in a string of disappointments for the Oscar-winning actor, whose comeback has crumbled. But what should he do next?

What in the world has happened to Matthew McConaughey? It was just three and half years ago that his career comeback – gleefully dubbed the McConaissance – culminated in a best actor Oscar for his performance in Dallas Buyers Club, just as his memorable stint on HBO’s True Detective was coming to a victorious close. That apex turned out to be more like the crest of a wave. The backlash may have even started during his bizarre, off-putting Oscar speech. As he boldly asserted that “it’s a scientific fact that gratitude reciprocates”, you could feel the second thoughts pulsing through the auditorium. As if enacting some kind of institutional justice, McConaughey’s career started tanking just about as soon as the ceremony ended.

Though some people may be unaware, there’s an awards ceremony held every year to honor the true heroes behind our favorite films: the marketing team. That’s right, the Golden Trailer Awards hand out statues to those who work tirelessly putting together trailers, commercials and posters for hundreds of releases each and every year. And not just in film, but video games and TV, too. It’s an incredibly comprehensive ceremony as well, with awards for a whopping 116 categories. Yes, 116 – though not all of those are given out on stage.

The nominations for the 18th annual edition, set to go down on June 6th at the Saban Theater in Beverly Hills, are now in and it seems that Warner Bros. is leading the pack amongst the various studios, scoring an impressive 68 nods in total, 11 of which come from The Lego Batman Movie – the most of any title to be nominated.

She’s one of our best working actresses, but the career of Naomi Watts has had ups and downs recently. In the plus category, there’s an Oscar-nominated turn in “The Impossible,” plus acclaimed turns in critical and commercial hits like “Birdman,” “St. Vincent” and “While We’re Young.” In the minus, though, there’s a thankless role in franchise fare “The Divergent Series,” and some disastrous smaller pictures like “Demolition,” “The Sea Of Trees” and horror movie “Shut In.”

But 2017 looks like it’ll be a good one for Watts fans: she’s in theaters twice this week in “3 Generations” and “Chuck,” has Colin Trevorrow’s “The Book Of Henry,” and has a meaty role alongside Woody Harrelson and Brie Larson in potential awards contender “The Glass Castle.” But the project that might have the biggest impact is, in a sign of the times, on the small screen, as...

A24 cemented its perception as the new-model indie distributor when Barry Jenkins’ “Moonlight” won three Oscars, including that dramatic best-picture win. So what does the upstart indie, hailed for holding the skeleton key that unlocks the precious millennial demo, do for an encore?

The Tribeca Film Festival showcased two upcoming A24 releases, both of which seem oddly retro: World War II costume drama “The Exception,” starring Oscar-winner Christopher Plummer as Kaiser Wilhelm II, and “The Lovers,” starring Debra Winger and Tracy Letts as an unhappy older married couple. They also dropped the trailer for Yiddish-language Hasidic family drama “Menashe” and suddenly, the new boss looks a lot like the old one.

What gives? This older-demo arthouse trio could easily carry the signature blue-and-white logo of venerable specialty distributor Sony Pictures Classics. But don’t be deceived by appearances. A24 is a far cry from older-generation studio indies like Spc and Fox Searchlight,...

A24 cemented its perception as the new-model indie distributor when Barry Jenkins’ “Moonlight” won three Oscars, including that dramatic best-picture win. So what does the upstart indie, hailed for holding the skeleton key that unlocks the precious millennial demo, do for an encore?

The Tribeca Film Festival showcased three upcoming A24 releases, all of which seem oddly retro. There’s Yiddish-language Hasidic family drama “Menashe,” World War II costume drama “The Exception,” starring Oscar-winner Christopher Plummer as Kaiser Wilhelm II, and “The Lovers,” starring Debra Winger and Tracy Letts as an unhappy older married couple. Suddenly, the new boss looks a lot like the old one.

What gives? This older-demo arthouse trio could easily carry the signature blue-and-white logo of venerable specialty distributor Sony Pictures Classics. But don’t be deceived by appearances. A24 is a far cry from older-generation studio indies like Spc and Fox Searchlight, which tend to follow an established playbook.

There are movies that arrive with bad buzz, and then there’s “The Last Face,” Sean Penn’s now-infamous romance between aid workers crossing African conflict zones. The film has been moved to a summer release, and will come out on VOD first, according to reps for the title and its U.S. distributor, Saban Films.

The decision was made “months ago due to talent schedules,” Saban reps told IndieWire. No new date has been set.

The film, Penn’s fifth directorial effort, scored two bankable leads in Charlize Theron and Javier Bardem — but faced a firing squad when it premiered at Cannes last May, where it competed for the Palme d’Or and was greeted with a rapturous chorus of boos. Critics chided Penn for making a treacly white-savior movie that attempts to shame its audience with bloody war imagery. “The narrative panders on every level,” wrote IndieWire’s Eric Kohn.

“A Critically Endangered Species” will have its world premiere on Sunday, March 12, at this year’s SXSW. The drama stars Lena Olin (“Chocolat,” “Remember Me”) as the lead and Rosanna Arquette (“The Whole Nine Yards,” “Roadies”).

Read More: ‘Let There Be Light’ Exclusive Trailer: SXSW Documentary Explores Nuclear Fusion Research — Watch

The film follows Maya Dardel (Olin), an internationally acclaimed poet and novelist who decides to end her life. She makes the announcement on national radio and launches a search for young male published poetry writers to compete to become executors of her estate. As the men compete, Maya will make sure to challenge them intellectually, emotionally and sexually.

The cast also includes Nathan Keyes (“Britney Ever After’), Alexander Koch (“Always Shine”), Jordan Gavaris (“The Sea of Trees”), and Chris Voss (“There Is No God and We All Die Alone”). The film is by writing-directing duo Zachary Cotler and Magdalena Zyzak...

Let’s talk about the biggest news of an unforgettable Oscar night — and it’s got nothing to do with the Twitter-happy accountant who apparently gave Warren Beatty the wrong envelope. Here’s the real story: A $1.5 million gay, African-American, coming-of-age movie won Best Picture.

It’s the first gay movie to grab the big prize, one that was denied “Brokeback Mountain” a decade ago. It’s the first Best Picture winner with an all-black cast. It also showed that when a small-scale indie is involved, guild wins (“La La Land” won the PGA,”Hidden Figures” took SAG Ensemble) are no longer reliable Oscar predictors.

And never underestimate the potential of the underdog to come from behind (See: “12 Years a Slave,” “Spotlight,” “Argo”). This year’s passion vote was split among three movies: “La La Land,” “Moonlight,” and “Manchester By the Sea.”

Here’s how everything went right for “Moonlight.

Let’s talk about the biggest news of an unforgettable Oscar night — and it’s got nothing to do with the Twitter-happy accountant who apparently gave Warren Beatty the wrong envelope. Here’s the real story: A $1.5 million gay, African-American, coming-of-age movie won Best Picture.

It’s the first gay movie to grab the big prize, one that was denied “Brokeback Mountain” a decade ago. It’s the first Best Picture winner with an all-black cast. It also showed that when a small-scale indie is involved, guild wins (“La La Land” won the PGA,”Hidden Figures” took SAG Ensemble) are no longer reliable Oscar predictors.

And never underestimate the potential of the underdog to come from behind (See: “12 Years a Slave,” “Spotlight,” “Argo”). This year’s passion vote was split among three movies: “La La Land,” “Moonlight,” and “Manchester By the Sea.”

Here’s how everything went right for “Moonlight.

With it being nearly four years since Steve McQueen‘s last drama, the Oscar-winning 12 Years a Slave, production is finally coming together on his follow-up, an adaptation of the crime drama Widows, based on the British television series. Co-scripted with Gone Girl‘s Gillian Flynn, the cast already includes Viola Davis, Cynthia Erivo, and André Holland, and now a few more actors have joined.

Following four widows who come together to finish a robbery after their crooked husbands are killed on the job, Fast and the Furious‘ Michelle Rodriguez and Elizabeth Debicki (The Man From U.N.C.L.E., The Great Gatsby) have now rounded out the main cast. Intriguingly, Joe Walker, who has edited all of McQueen’s films thus far, has said he won’t be re-teaming with the director this time around, so perhaps we can expect a different feel for this genre outing. [Variety/Deadline]

Next up, after his latest film...

After creating not just a hit, but a film that seeped into the culture with Spring Breakers, Harmony Korine has had a difficult time getting his next project off the ground. There was his ambitious-sounding crime drama The Trap that never materialized and he still seems to be working on adaptation of the controversial Tampa. Half-a-decade later, it now looks like he’s found his next film and he’s already got a star attached.

Revealed at the European Film Market in Berlin, the film is titled The Beach Bum and will star Matthew McConaughey. The Interstellar star will play Moondog, “a rebellious and lovable rogue who lives life large,” who gets into “hilarious misadventures.” Knowing Korine, who also wrote the script, we can imagine there may be a darker and/or stranger side to the film, which will kick off shooting in July ahead of a likely 2018 premiere.

“In The Beach Bum,...

Welcome back to the Weekend Warrior, your weekly look at the new movies hitting theaters this weekend, as well as other cool events and things to check out.

This Past Weekend:

As per my Thursday update, M. Night Shyamalan’s thriller Split ended up winning the weekend but with way more than anyone, including myself, predicted, with more than $40 million for its opening weekend. That’s pretty impressive, and his first movie to open at that level since 2010’s The Last Airbender. Meanwhile, Vin Diesel’s sequel xXx: The Return of Xander Cage ended up making around where I predicted, taking second place with $20.1 million, not a great sign for the continuation of that franchise. Michael Keaton’s The Founder ended up right around where I predicted with $3.4 million, ending up just outside the Top 10. Hidden Figures, La La Land and Sing continued to do well with minimal drop-offs.

This...

Dan Guando, former head of acquisitions, production and development at The Weinstein Company, has joined Bloom as president of production.

Read More: Harvey Weinstein Isn’t Alone: Why Independent Film Distributors Are Taking a Beating

A 12-year veteran of TWC who began his career as Harvey Weinstein’s assistant at Miramax, Guando will relocate from New York to Los Angeles for the job. He will report to Bloom president Alex Walton, and will be tasked with growing and overseeing Bloom’s film slate. Guando left TWC last August.

The hire signals an expansion into content creation and ownership for Bloom, which has operated as an international sales agent since its founding in 2014. Walton co-founded the company with producer-financier Ken Kao.

“We are delighted that Dan is joining Bloom at this important next phase for our business,” Walton said in a statement. “I am very confident that Dan can help Bloom...