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Fresh off the premiere of its new Fox drama “Murder in a Small Town,” Jeff Wachtel’s Future Shack Entertainment shingle is ramping up its development slate — next via a first-look pact with Daily Beast chief content officer Joanna Coles. Future Shack and Coles have multiple projects in development, including a take on MSNBC anchor Katy Tur’s memoir “Rough Draft.”

Wachtel and Coles are also shopping the drama “Base Camp,” which looks at the crowded — and dangerous — queue to get to the top of Mt. Everest. Playwright and screenwriter Anchuli Felicia King is the scribe behind that project.

Additionally, Future Shack and Coles have two more scripts in the works at 20th Television. Coles, who was previously chief content officer at Hearst, was the inspiration for the Freeform drama “The Bold Type,” which she also executive produced. “She’s a phenomenal producer, but primarily a magazine editor and tastemaker,...

It's been 22 years since Rob Cohen directed a shameless knockoff of Kathryn Bigelow's "Point Break," starring Paul Walker instead of Keanu Reeves, Vin Diesel instead of Patrick Swayze, and street racing instead of surfing and sky diving. And while at the time, the success of the film "The Fast and the Furious" seemed only vaguely remarkable, over the course of the last two decades it has ballooned into a multi-billion dollar franchise, full of epic car stunts, ludicrous storylines, and endless ruminations about the meaning of "family."

Yes, "Fast and Furious" has become a household name, perhaps permanently associated with the blockbuster vehicular nonsense films of Vin Diesel and company. But it was not always this way. The common expression "fast and furious" has been used many times in Hollywood, for films about race car driving, funny murder mysteries, beloved Looney Tunes adventures, and low-budget crime thrillers.

Some of...

Late during an autumn night in 1954, Marilyn Monroe stood above a New York City subway grate at the corner of Lexington and 52nd. As a train passed beneath her feet, and a gust of air rushed ever upward, a smile erupted across her face. Cinematic history was made. The sequence in question was filmed for The Seven Year Itch, Billy Wilder’s exceedingly ‘50s romantic comedy. But while that movie’s antiquated plot has long since faded from memory, the vision of Monroe in the white dress never did.

For many it is the encapsulation of Monroe’s mystique: an innocent (some might even say infantilized) beauty whose sweetness belies blonde bombshell sex appeal. It was a manufactured image, of course, synthesized right down to the platinum hue of Monroe’s hair. In reality, she was a dirty blonde born to the name of Norma Jeane Mortenson. Marilyn was also...

Michael Curtiz’s flashy and splashy wartime morale booster began as a pre-Pearl Harbor show of support of our Canadian friends’ contribution to the war effort. A vehicle for James Cagney, its script is a trifle about bush pilots competing for a woman and then showing The Right Stuff when it comes time to join up to fight. Cagney’s ‘bad boy’ act is always good, but what slays us now are the stunning Technicolor images filmed in and over the vast Canadian forest country with its endless crystal clear lakes. The aerial work in 3-Strip Technicolor is breathtaking, especially in this full new digital restoration.

Captains of the Clouds

Blu-ray

Warner Archive Collection

1942 / Color / 1:37 Academy / 113 min. / Available at Amazon.com / Street Date March 22, 2022 / 21.99

Starring: James Cagney, Dennis Morgan, Brenda Marshall, Alan Hale, George Tobias, Reginald Gardiner, Air Marshal W.A. Bishop, Reginald Denny, Russell Arms, Paul Cavanagh, Clem Bevans,...

Helicopter coverage is a staple of today’s local news, but back in the ’80s and ’90s, Marika Gerrard and her then-husband Zoey (formerly Bob) Tur pioneered the newsgathering technique.

The documentary “Whirlybird,” out in theaters and on demand Friday, chronicles the family business they created together: the Los Angeles News Service.

For nearly two decades, Gerrard shot thousands of videos, ranging from raging wildfires to enraged celebrities — including Madonna and Sean Penn on their wedding day. But two of her videos — the dragging and beating of truck driver Reginald Denny after the 1992 Rodney King verdict, and the 1994 O.J. Simpson freeway chase — forever changed America … and her.

TheWrap’s Lawrence Yee caught with Gerrard and Matt Yoka, the director of “Whirlybird,” to talk about the impact of these two events on Gerrard. “Whirlybird” largely centers on how the Denny footage negatively affected Tur, who was battling gender dysphoria-driven depression...

O. J.Marika Gerrard, Zoey Tur, Katy Tur, Jamie Tur, Lawrence Welk III. Simpson’s Bronco chase. Madonna flipping off paparazzi on her wedding day to Sean Penn. Michael Jackson’s sequined glove wanly waving as the pop star was wheeled to a burn unit. Whenever a big breaking news story overtook the Los Angeles TV airwaves in the ’80s and ’90s, viewers expected to hear a sign-off from married helicopter reporters Bob Tur and Marika Gerrard who spent the best — and worst — years of their relationship high in the sky. Tur was a literal news junkie, an adrenaline addict who’d emotionally crash at the end of each pursuit. “There was never a movie date with Bob,” Gerrard reflects. “It was a car crash or an air crash or a fire tape.”

“Whirlybird,” by director Matt Yoka, is the compelling story of the thrill-seeking couple’s rise and descent...

DeSean Jackson will wear Rodney King-themed cleats for the Bucs game Sunday ... featuring the words "Black Lives Matter" and a depiction of a police officer raising a baton. For the next few weeks, the NFL is allowing players to raise awareness for causes they support using custom kicks as part of the league's "My Cause, My Cleats" program. DeSean chose black-and-blue colored spikes for his cause ... a clear message he's trying to help end police brutality in America.

Katy Tur, who rose to prominence during the 2016 presidential race for her reporting on then-candidate Donald Trump, is now dealing with some backlash… from her own parent. In a Facebook post Tuesday, Zoey Tur, who became known as Chopper Bob for filming a mob beating driver Reginald Denny during the L.A. Riots and also the O.J. Simpson car chase, said her own daughter is “terrified” to meet her, noting that “it’s been 1,500 days since she last saw me and told me I was a terrible father after having just come out. I was crushed.” This isn’t the...

There’s no question that Rodney King was brutally beaten by Los Angeles Police Department officers – video taken of the savage act proves it. Yet the four men seen clubbing King were acquitted by a Simi Valley jury in 1992, lighting a match for one of the deadliest and costliest civil unrests in U.S. history.

Read More: How Spike Lee, John Singleton and John Ridley Left Their Marks on the 25th Anniversary of the Los Angeles Riots

It’s 25 years later, and Los Angeles – and the Lapd – have changed. But has the rest of the country? Regular reports of police brutality, now well-documented in an age of phone cameras, makes it clear that we haven’t come all that far. Several new documentaries explore the L.A. riots, including the underlying reasons, the actual events, what happened next, and how it relates to today. Among the filmmakers putting their own...

This year, the April 29 anniversary of the Rodney King riots became a recognized event on the programming calendar. Over the next week, networks are releasing a half-dozen nonfiction narratives to commemorate the 25 years since the Los Angeles uprising, including three from some of our most compelling African-American filmmakers: Spike Lee, John Singleton, and John Ridley.

“Black directors have different viewpoints,” said Lee, who directed writer-actor Roger Guenveur Smith’s one-man show “Rodney King” for Netflix. “We don’t see the world all the same.”

Read More: L.A. Riots 25th Anniversary Documentaries, Ranked: Which Ones Best Explain the Unrest Now

Ridley and Singleton took a more traditional path to the material, digging into period video archives and interviewing many of the people directly involved in the riots that yielded 55 lives lost, 1,100 buildings destroyed by fire, and some $1 billion in property damage.

Lee came at the subject from another direction. Smith has...

This year, the April 29 anniversary of the Rodney King riots became a recognized event on the programming calendar. Over the next week, networks are releasing a half-dozen nonfiction narratives to commemorate the 25 years since the Los Angeles uprising, including three from some of our most compelling African-American filmmakers: Spike Lee, John Singleton, and John Ridley.

“Black directors have different viewpoints,” said Lee, who directed writer-actor Roger Guenveur Smith’s one-man show “Rodney King” for Netflix. “We don’t see the world all the same.”

Ridley and Singleton took a more traditional path to the material, digging into period video archives and interviewing many of the people directly involved in the riots that yielded 55 lives lost, 1,100 buildings destroyed by fire, and some $1 billion in property damage.

Lee came at the subject from another direction. Smith has performed “Rodney King” for four years in small venues and when “Rodney King” hits Netflix on April 28 in 190 countries,...

William Cameron Menzies. William Cameron Menzies movies on TCM: Murderous Joan Fontaine, deadly Nazi Communists Best known as an art director/production designer, William Cameron Menzies was a jack-of-all-trades. It seems like the only things Menzies didn't do was act and tap dance in front of the camera. He designed and/or wrote, directed, produced, etc., dozens of films – titles ranged from The Thief of Bagdad to Invaders from Mars – from the late 1910s all the way to the mid-1950s. Among Menzies' most notable efforts as an art director/production designer are: Ernst Lubitsch's first Hollywood movie, the Mary Pickford star vehicle Rosita (1923). Herbert Brenon's British-set father-son drama Sorrell and Son (1927). David O. Selznick's mammoth production of Gone with the Wind, which earned Menzies an Honorary Oscar. The Sam Wood movies Our Town (1940), Kings Row (1942), and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943). H.C. Potter's Mr. Lucky...

It's the John Ford film you never heard of, not because it's bad, but because it's a little confused. Richard Greene, David Niven and an emotional George Sanders (!) dedicate their lives to clearing their father's name of a smear by international arms smugglers! Their spirited companion Loretta Young behaves almost as if this were a screwball comedy. So does the director! Ford aficionados will be fascinated. Four Men and a Prayer 20th Century Fox Cinema Archives 1938 / B&W / 1:37 flat Academy / 85 min. / Street Date December 15, 2015 / 19.98 Starring Loretta Young, Richard Greene, George Sanders, David Niven, C. Aubrey Smith. J. Edward Bromberg, William Henry, John Carradine, Alan Hale, Reginald Denny, Berton Churchill, Barry Fitzgerald, Chris-Pin Martin. Cinematography Franz Planer Film Editor Louis R. Loeffler Written by Richard Sherman, Sonya Levien, Walter Ferris from a novel by David Garth Produced by Kenneth Macgowan Directed by John Ford

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

We all...

Donald Trump vs. Starbucks' War on Christmas. The War on Christmas: The movies that come to mind We're still in November, but the War on Christmas – according to online buzz, a second cousin once removed of the War on Cops – has begun. Weeping and gritting of teeth has seized certain population segments in the U.S.A. (and perhaps other countries as well) after Fox News, that beacon of intellectual freedom at the end of the cable news tunnel, announced that … Starbucks' holiday season cups are a) red b) devoid of Christmas decorations. Could it be a satanic conspiracy disguised as politically correct inclusiveness? The result of a communist takeover at the Seattle-headquartered company? Cruel and unusual Christian persecution in the form of paper cups? Your guess is as good as mine. Far-right Republican icon, U.S. presidential candidate, and 2015 political circus ringmaster Donald Trump seems to think that Starbucks...

Norma Shearer: The Boss' wife was cast in 'The Divorcee.' Norma Shearer movies on TCM: Early talkies and Best Actress Oscar Note: This Norma Shearer article is currently being revised and expanded. Please Check back later. Norma Shearer, one of the top stars in Hollywood history and known as the Queen of MGM back in the 1930s, is Turner Classic Movies' Star of the Month of Nov. 2015. That's the good news. The not-so-good news is that even though its parent company, Time Warner, owns most of Shearer's movies, TCM isn't airing any premieres. So, if you were expecting to check out a very young Norma Shearer in The Devil's Circus, Upstage, or After Midnight, you're out of luck. (I've seen all three; they're all worth a look.) It's a crime that, music score or no, restored print or no, TCM/Time Warner don't make available for viewing the...

'Saint Joan': Constance Cummings as the George Bernard Shaw heroine. Constance Cummings on stage: From sex-change farce and Emma Bovary to Juliet and 'Saint Joan' (See previous post: “Constance Cummings: Frank Capra, Mae West and Columbia Lawsuit.”) In the mid-1930s, Constance Cummings landed the title roles in two of husband Benn W. Levy's stage adaptations: Levy and Hubert Griffith's Young Madame Conti (1936), starring Cummings as a demimondaine who falls in love with a villainous character. She ends up killing him – or does she? Adapted from Bruno Frank's German-language original, Young Madame Conti was presented on both sides of the Atlantic; on Broadway, it had a brief run in spring 1937 at the Music Box Theatre. Based on the Gustave Flaubert novel, the Theatre Guild-produced Madame Bovary (1937) was staged in late fall at Broadway's Broadhurst Theatre. Referring to the London production of Young Madame Conti, The...

Top Ten Scream Queens: Barbara Steele, who both emitted screams and made others do same, is in a category of her own. Top Ten Scream Queens Halloween is over until next year, but the equally bewitching Day of the Dead is just around the corner. So, dead or alive, here's my revised and expanded list of cinema's Top Ten Scream Queens. This highly personal compilation is based on how memorable – as opposed to how loud or how frequent – were the screams. That's the key reason you won't find listed below actresses featured in gory slasher films. After all, the screams – and just about everything else in such movies – are as meaningless as their plots. You also won't find any screaming guys (i.e., Scream Kings) on the list below even though I've got absolutely nothing against guys who scream in horror, whether in movies or in life. There are...

Groucho Marx in 'Duck Soup.' Groucho Marx movies: 'Duck Soup,' 'The Story of Mankind' and romancing Margaret Dumont on TCM Grouch Marx, the bespectacled, (painted) mustached, cigar-chomping Marx brother, is Turner Classic Movies' “Summer Under the Stars” star today, Aug. 14, '15. Marx Brothers fans will be delighted, as TCM is presenting no less than 11 of their comedies, in addition to a brotherly reunion in the 1957 all-star fantasy The Story of Mankind. Non-Marx Brothers fans should be delighted as well – as long as they're fans of Kay Francis, Thelma Todd, Ann Miller, Lucille Ball, Eve Arden, Allan Jones, affectionate, long-tongued giraffes, and/or that great, scene-stealing dowager, Margaret Dumont. Right now, TCM is showing Robert Florey and Joseph Santley's The Cocoanuts (1929), an early talkie notable as the first movie featuring the four Marx Brothers – Groucho, Chico, Harpo, and Zeppo. Based on their hit Broadway...

Brad Pitt 'Glory Days' costar Nicholas Kallsen Brad Pitt 'Glory Days' costar Nicholas Kallsen dead at 48 Nicholas Kallsen, who was featured opposite Brad Pitt in the short-lived television series Glory Days, has died at age 48 in Thailand according to online reports. Their source is one of Rupert Murdoch's rags, citing a Facebook posting by one of the actor's friends. The cause of death was purportedly – no specific source was provided – a drug overdose.* Aired on Fox in July 1990, Glory Days told the story of four high-school friends whose paths take different directions after graduation. Besides Nicholas Kallsen and Brad Pitt, the show also featured Spike Alexander and Evan Mirand. Glory Days lasted a mere six episodes – two of which directed by former Happy Days actor Anson Williams – before its cancellation. Roommates Nicholas Kallsen and Brad Pitt vying for same 'Thelma & Louise' role? The Murdoch tabloid also...

People in the transgender community are angry at Bruce Jenner for packaging his announcement he's becoming a woman into a TV show, saying he's more interested in money than setting an example. Zoey Tur, a leader in the L.A. transgender community, tells TMZ Live there's a lot of anger because they have no real role models now and here is a world class athlete who could literally save lives by way of example but...

Cary Grant movies: 'An Affair to Remember' does justice to its title (photo: Cary Grant ca. late 1940s) Cary Grant excelled at playing Cary Grant. This evening, fans of the charming, sophisticated, debonair actor -- not to be confused with the Bristol-born Archibald Leach -- can rejoice, as no less than eight Cary Grant movies are being shown on Turner Classic Movies, including a handful of his most successful and best-remembered star vehicles from the late '30s to the late '50s. (See also: "Cary Grant Classic Movies" and "Cary Grant and Randolph Scott: Gay Lovers?") The evening begins with what may well be Cary Grant's best-known film, An Affair to Remember. This 1957 romantic comedy-melodrama is unusual in that it's an even more successful remake of a previous critical and box-office hit -- the Academy Award-nominated 1939 release Love Affair -- and that it was directed...

Yes, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie turned over much of the planning for their Aug. 23 wedding to their six children - including the cake and even the dress. But when it came to making things official, they tapped someone rather more experienced. Their officiant of choice: retired California judge John Ouderkirk, who presided over the Aug. 23 non-denominational civil ceremony at the family's French estate, Château Miraval. The judge currently handles conflict-resolution cases for private firms. But he made headlines in 1993 while presiding over the hot-button trial of two black men accused of trying to murder white truck driver Reginald Denny...

Zoey Tur -- the famed L.A. chopper pilot who just completed gender reassignment surgery -- wants to make 2 more changes to make it all legal.Tur -- who was born Robert Albert Tur -- just filed court docs to legally change her gender ... and her name.Tur included in the docs a letter from the surgeon in Bangkok, Thailand ... he's the doctor who completed the sex reassignment surgery.According to the doctor ... the surgery consisted of a penectomy,...

Jane Fonda: From ‘Vietnam Traitor’ to AFI Award and Screen Legend status (photo: Jason Bateman and Jane Fonda in ‘This Is Where I Leave You’) (See previous post: “Jane Fonda Movies: Anti-Establishment Heroine.”) Turner Classic Movies will also be showing the 2014 AFI Life Achievement Award ceremony honoring Jane Fonda, the former “Vietnam Traitor” and Barbarella-style sex kitten who has become a living American screen legend (and healthy-living guru). Believe it or not, Fonda, who still looks disarmingly great, will be turning 77 years old next December 21; she’s actually older than her father Henry Fonda was while playing Katharine Hepburn’s ailing husband in Mark Rydell’s On Golden Pond. (Henry Fonda died at age 77 in August 1982.) Jane Fonda movies in 2014 and 2015 Following a 15-year absence (mostly during the time she was married to media mogul Ted Turner), Jane Fonda resumed her film acting career in 2005, playing Jennifer Lopez...

Former legendary news helicopter pilot, Bob Tur, can officially roar like a woman ... because she's completed gender reassignment surgery. Bob ... who now goes by Zoey ... famously covered the O.J. Bronco chase and captured the Reginald Denny beating for Kcbs in L.A. Zoey tells TMZ she finished the sexual reassignment surgery last week, and is recovering in the hospital.  We're also told she had "major cranial facial surgery."  Zoey called in to TMZ Live...

Two L.A. helicopter pilots who went mano a mano during the O.J. Simpson saga are no longer mano -- they're both women.TMZ broke the story ... former Kcbs pilot Bob Tur -- who famously shot the Reginald Denny beating and covered the O.J. slow speed Bronco chase -- underwent sexual reassignment surgery and is now Zoey Tur.Former Knbc chopper pilot Dirk Vahle was a fierce competitor of Bob's during O.J. ... she's now Dana Vahle.

Gregory Peck from ‘Duel in the Sun’ to ‘How the West Was Won’: TCM schedule (Pt) on August 15 (photo: Gregory Peck in ‘Duel in the Sun’) See previous post: “Gregory Peck Movies: Memorable Miscasting Tonight on Turner Classic Movies.” 3:00 Am Days Of Glory (1944). Director: Jacques Tourneur. Cast: Gregory Peck, Lowell Gilmore, Maria Palmer. Bw-86 mins. 4:30 Am Pork Chop Hill (1959). Director: Lewis Milestone. Cast: Gregory Peck, Harry Guardino, Rip Torn. Bw-98 mins. Letterbox Format. 6:15 Am The Valley Of Decision (1945). Director: Tay Garnett. Cast: Greer Garson, Gregory Peck, Donald Crisp. Bw-119 mins. 8:15 Am Spellbound (1945). Director: Alfred Hitchcock. Cast: Ingrid Bergman, Gregory Peck, Michael Chekhov, Leo G. Carroll, Rhonda Fleming, Bill Goodwin, Norman Lloyd, Steve Geray, John Emery, Donald Curtis, Art Baker, Wallace Ford, Regis Toomey, Paul Harvey, Jean Acker, Irving Bacon, Jacqueline deWit, Edward Fielding, Matt Moore, Addison Richards, Erskine Sanford, Constance Purdy. Bw-111 mins. 10:15 Am Designing Woman (1957). Director: Vincente Minnelli.

Joan Fontaine movies: ‘This Above All,’ ‘Letter from an Unknown Woman’ (photo: Cary Grant, Joan Fontaine in ‘Suspicion’ publicity image) (See previous post: “Joan Fontaine Today.”) Also tonight on Turner Classic Movies, Joan Fontaine can be seen in today’s lone TCM premiere, the flag-waving 20th Century Fox release The Above All (1942), with Fontaine as an aristocratic (but socially conscious) English Rose named Prudence Cathaway (Fontaine was born to British parents in Japan) and Fox’s top male star, Tyrone Power, as her Awol romantic interest. This Above All was directed by Anatole Litvak, who would guide Olivia de Havilland in the major box-office hit The Snake Pit (1948), which earned her a Best Actress Oscar nod. In Max Ophüls’ darkly romantic Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948), Fontaine delivers not only what is probably the greatest performance of her career, but also one of the greatest movie performances ever. Letter from an Unknown Woman...

Eleanor Parker: Palm Springs resident turns 91 today Eleanor Parker turns 91 today. The three-time Oscar nominee (Caged, 1950; Detective Story, 1951; Interrupted Melody, 1955) and Palm Springs resident is Turner Classic Movies’ Star of the Month of June 2013. Earlier this month, TCM showed a few dozen Eleanor Parker movies, from her days at Warner Bros. in the ’40s to her later career as a top Hollywood supporting player. (Photo: Publicity shot of Eleanor Parker in An American Dream.) Missing from TCM’s movie series, however, was not only Eleanor Parker’s biggest box-office it — The Sound of Music, in which she steals the show from both Julie Andrews and the Alps — but also what according to several sources is her very first movie role: a bit part in Raoul Walsh’s They Died with Their Boots On, a 1941 Western starring Errol Flynn as a dashingly handsome and all-around-good-guy-ish General George Armstrong Custer. Olivia de Havilland...

Bob Tur -- a legendary news helicopter pilot who captured the Reginald Denny beating that triggered the L.A. Riots, the O.J. Simpson slow-speed chase and countless of other seminal news events -- is in the midst of a transgender procedure that will make him a woman.Tur was on TMZ Live Wednesday ... and explained he always felt he was a woman trapped in a man's body.  He's currently in the early stages of the procedure,...

Innocence of Muslims / 'Desert Warrior' director Alan Roberts best-known for '70s soft-core porn The polemical anti-Islam "film" (actually, a cheap, grade Z amateur video), now has not only a producer, but also a director. The "Israeli entrepreneur Sam Bacile" has been exposed as the Egyptian Coptic Christian Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, who allegedly misled all (or most) involved in the production. And Gawker has reported that Alan Roberts aka Robert Brownell, the director of a handful of softcore porn movies in the '70s and early '80s, helmed "Desert Warrior," a cheesy Arabian adventure that was to become -- following some sloppy overdubbing -- Innocence of Muslims. Besides the now infamous Islamophobic YouTube sensation, which has been blamed for riots in several Muslim countries from Tunisia to Pakistan, Alan Roberts' movie credits include several now long forgotten titles. (Please scroll down for more details.) Alan Roberts also produced several little-known movies,...

Innocence of Muslims: Cast and crew repudiate rabidly anti-Islam 'film' An amateurish, rabidly anti-Islam 'film' -- actually, more like a homemade video made three decades ago -- whose Arabic-dubbed version was initially blamed for this week's attacks by Muslim fanatics against the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, and the U.S. embassy in Cairo, Muslims was initially called "Desert Warrior." (Photo: Actor purportedly as Islam's prophet Mohammad.) According to 80 cast and crew members of the film, they thought "Desert Warrior" was going to be an adventure flick set in Biblical times. Indeed, the movie's casting notice on Backstage calls it a "historical Arabian Desert adventure film." Below is the statement submitted to CNN on behalf of those who worked on what eventually became Innocence of Muslims. (Please scroll down to check out: Innocence of Muslims creator: Coptic Christian involved in meth manufacture, bank fraud.) "The entire cast and crew...

Los Angeles -- As a 22-year-old white kid from New Jersey fresh out of college, Mark Ford encountered the Los Angeles riots of April 1992 the way most Americans did -- through journalist Bob Turr's striking helicopter footage of the violence at Florence and Normandie avenues.

Turr's impromptu narration as a white outsider literally looking down on South Central Los Angeles ("Terrible, terrible pictures!" and "Nobody's helping him!") shaped how many Americans initially viewed the searing images: A group of angry black residents pulled white truck driver Reginald Denny from his cab and beat him severely. Earlier that day, four white Los Angeles Police Department officers had been acquitted of all charges in the brutal 1991 beating of black motorist Rodney King.

"I remember being kind of confounded by the riots," Ford said in an interview with The Huffington Post. "I understood theoretically why people felt an injustice was done, but I...

Latest Additions Include Star-Studded Appearances, Noted Film Historians,

An Opening-Night Poolside Screening of High Society (1956)

And a Vanity Fair Showcase of Architecture in Film

Complete Schedule for 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival

Now Available at http://www.tcm.com/festival

With just over two weeks left before opening day, the 2012 TCM Classic Film Festival continues to expand its already-packed slate with new events and live appearances:

On opening night of the festival, the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel will be the site of a poolside screening of the lavish Cole Porter musical High Society (1956), starring Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby. Actresses Maud Adams and Eunice Gayson will attend a 50th Anniversary screening of the James Bond classic Dr. No (1962) and participate in a conversation about being “Bond Girls.” Filmmaker Mel Brooks will be on hand to introduce his brilliant parody Young Frankenstein (1974). Filmmaker John Carpenter will introduce his favorite film, the...

"Uprising: Hip Hop & the La Riots" gets right to the point, starting off with a bang, or perhaps a police baton to the face, as Rodney King walks down the stretch of highway where his notorious beating took place, reenacting that fateful night. The film, produced by VH1 Rock Docs and directed by Mark Ford, tells the story of the 1992 La riots, using stunning archival footage and interviews with people who were there, while also drawing the connection between the riots and the gangsta rap of the time, featuring N.W.A., Ice Cube and Ice T as both the poets and prophets of this outburst of rage and destruction. Fittingly, it's narrated by Snoop Dogg, who found his success in the wake of the riots. The film is an explosive, blistering analysis of this historic event in American history, viewed through the lens of hindsight 20 years later.

'Uprising' lays out the...

DreamWorks and Working Title Films are planning a reboot of Alfred Hitchcock's classic mystery movie, Rebecca. Steven Knight will be penning the new script from the original book by Daphne DuMaurier.

The mystery follows a naive young woman who marries a rich widower and settles in his gigantic mansion, only to find that the memory of the first wife maintains a grip on her husband and the servants.

The writer is also currently working on his directorial debut Hummingbird which stars Jason Statham. Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner are producing the reboot.

This project is still in development.

Rebecca was released April 12th, 1940 and stars Laurence Olivier, Joan Fontaine, George Sanders, Judith Anderson, Nigel Bruce, Reginald Denny, C. Aubrey Smith, Gladys Cooper. The film is directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

DreamWorks and Working Title Films are planning a reboot of Alfred Hitchcock's classic mystery movie, Rebecca. Steven Knight will be penning the new script from the original book by Daphne DuMaurier.

The mystery follows a naive young woman who marries a rich widower and settles in his gigantic mansion, only to find that the memory of the first wife maintains a grip on her husband and the servants.

The writer is also currently working on his directorial debut Hummingbird which stars Jason Statham. Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner are producing the reboot.

This project is still in development.

Rebecca was released April 12th, 1940 and stars Laurence Olivier, Joan Fontaine, George Sanders, Judith Anderson, Nigel Bruce, Reginald Denny, C. Aubrey Smith, Gladys Cooper. The film is directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

Allegorical War Drama Highlights TCM.s Dec. 14 Salute

to The George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film

Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is set to make movie history this December when it presents the world television premiere of Fear and Desire (1953), the rarely seen debut film by legendary director Stanley Kubrick. Premiering Wednesday, Dec. 14, at 8 p.m. (Et), the allegorical war drama from the director of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and The Shining (1980) will be the centerpiece of an extraordinary 24-hour marathon honoring the preservation efforts of the Motion Picture Department at George Eastman House. TCM host Robert Osborne will be joined by Jared Case, Head of Cataloguing and Access at George Eastman House, to present 15 cinematic rarities from one of the country.s leading moving-image archives.

TCM.s Dec. 14 salute to the Motion Picture Collection at George Eastman House will begin at 6:15 a.m. (Et) with The Blue Bird...

Silent film stars are like World War One vets. They’re dying off and will soon be an extinct species. “Baby Peggy”(Diana Serra Cary), born October 26, 1918 is still with is as is 91-year old Mickey Rooney, who starred in silent shorts (as Mickey MGuire) and Dickie Moore, another child star from the silents. But Barbara Kent may have been the last one standing to have achieved substantial fame during the silent film era as an adult.

Born in Canada, the 4’11″ Ms Kent began her movie career in 1925 and ended it ten years later. She was known for comedies, starring opposite Harold Lloyd and Reginald Denny, but her most famous role may be as the heroine pitted against Great Garbo’s femme fatale in Flesh And Blood in 1926. She made the transition to talkies smoothly enough but married talent agent Harry Edington in 1932 and dropped out of the movies three years later.

Barbara Kent, a minor leading lady during the transition from silent to sound films, died October 13 in Palm Desert, in Southern California. A resident of the local Marrakesh Country Club, Kent was either 103 or 104. No cause of death was given. Barbara Kent was never a star. Not even close. In fact, most of her 35 movies were probably forgotten the week after their release. Paradoxically, Kent has become one of the most important performers of the silent era. No, not because she was Harold Lloyd's leading lady in his first talkie, Welcome Danger (1929). Or because of her career highlight: romancing Glen Tryon in Paul Fejos' naturalistic drama Lonesome (1928), frequently compared to F. W. Murnau's Sunrise. Barbara Kent has taken an importance incommensurate to her actual movie career because she was the very last individual to have had notable adult leads in American silent films. Everybody else, from Lillian Gish to Joan Crawford,...

Your weekly fix of great movies made before you were born that you should check out before you die. All this month, Old Ass Movies will be celebrating the 103rd anniversary of Bette Davis‘s birthday. The iconic film star acted in far too many movies to care to count, but it seems as though she’s been reduced to a pair of eyes in popular culture. She’s the subject of a 80s pop tune, not the star that she should be recognized for being, and that needs fixing. She had been in over twenty films before appearing in Of Human Bondage, but it was that film that really launched her career as a leading lady. In it, she plays a cruel, vile, deceitful woman who destroys the life of a young man while destroying her own. So, naturally, she emerged being loved by audiences everywhere. Of Human Bondage (1934) Directed By: John Cromwell Written By: Lester Cohen...