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03/11/2010
Disney to release Indian film in southern dialect (AP)
AP - Encouraged by the reception of its Hindi animated movie, Disney is shooting a new adventure film in the southern Indian dialect of Telugu as it deepens its localization drive in the populous country.
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03/11/2010
Sushi chef charged with serving illegal whale (AP)

AP - Federal prosecutors filed charges Wednesday against a sushi chef and a Santa Monica restaurant on allegations that they served illegal and endangered whale meat.

03/11/2010
3-D boosts box office worldwide to record $30 bln (AP)
AP - The appeal of 3-D movies helped boost movie ticket sales by nearly 8 percent to a record $29.9 billion worldwide in 2009, according to the Motion Picture Association of America.
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03/11/2010
Witherspoon: First lady is DC's top fashionista (AP)

AP - Actress Reese Witherspoon says her "Legally Blonde" character Elle Woods has been ousted as the most stylish woman to come to the nation's capital by first lady Michelle Obama.

03/10/2010
Jason Segel, Ed Helms high on "Home" (Reuters)
Reuters - Jason Segel and Ed Helms are starring in "Jeff Who Lives at Home," a stoner comedy chronicling a day in the life of two brothers.
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03/10/2010
Thai thriller straddles homophobia, homoerotica (Reuters)
Reuters - In the slasher-thriller "Slice," a cop-turned-convict tracks down a serial killer by delving into his own troubled childhood memories.
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03/10/2010
Film futures markets to launch soon (Reuters)

Reuters - If start-up Media Derivatives and broker dealer Cantor Fitzgerald have their way, investors may soon be able to place bets on the box office showing of summer blockbuster "Iron Man 2."

03/10/2010
"2012" debuts atop three video charts (Reuters)
Reuters - The end-of-the-world drama "2012" debuted at the top of all three home video charts the week ending March 7, the first release in nearly a month with a box office pedigree of more than $100 million.
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03/10/2010
Clint Eastwood eyes J. Edgar Hoover project (Reuters)

Reuters - Clint Eastwood is lining up his next directing project, a biopic of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, the nation's No. 1 crimefighter for almost 50 years.

03/10/2010
Corey Haim prolonged tragic Hollywood tradition (AP)

AP - Corey Haim's story is sadly familiar in Hollywood: A teen talent who discovered drugs as he tasted his first success and whose personal problems increased as his star-power faded.

03/11/2010
Imax rebounds to profit, sees strong first quarter (Reuters)
Reuters - Giant-screen movie operator Imax Corp said on Thursday a strong slate of films, including the blockbuster "Avatar", helped it bounce back to a fourth-quarter profit and it forecast a "very strong year" ahead.
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03/10/2010
Tribeca unveils film lineup, Spitzer in spotlight (Reuters)
Reuters - The Tribeca Film Festival on Wednesday unveiled its first group of films for April's event, including one documentary about the prostitution scandal that brought down former New York governor Eliot Spitzer.
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03/11/2010
Broadhurst Box Office Opens for 'Enron' (Playbill)
Playbill - The box office at Broadway's Broadhurst Theatre opens March 11 for sales to the U.S. premiere of Lucy Prebble's Enron, the highly theatricalized tale of the financial scandal and collapse of the American energy corporation.
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03/10/2010
Global movie box office nears $30 billion in 2009 (Reuters)
Reuters - Global movie ticket sales hit $29.9 billion last year, up 7.6 percent, with the most growth in the Asia Pacific region, the leading U.S. movie industry representative said on Wednesday.
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03/10/2010
New Matt Damon movie may bring Iraq war into mainstream (Reuters)

Reuters - They conjured box office magic with their "Bourne" spy movies, but Matt Damon and Paul Greengrass risk their reputation as sure-fire hitmakers when the Iraq war thriller "Green Zone" debuts on Friday.

03/11/2010
Imax posts 4Q profit, reversing loss (AP)
AP - Giant-screen movie technology company Imax Corp. posted a fourth-quarter profit Thursday, reversing a year-ago loss on a sharp jump in its movie theater equipment sales and rentals.
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03/11/2010
Corey Haim dies of overdose in Los Angeles (Reuters)

Reuters - Corey Haim, a Hollywood teen star of the 1980s who became as famous for his struggles with substance abuse as his acting, died in Los Angeles of an apparent prescription drug overdose. He was 38.

03/10/2010
Review: Pattinson still brooding in `Remember Me' (AP)

AP - In "Remember Me," Robert Pattinson has temporarily stepped away from "Twilight," apparently in search of his "Five Easy Pieces" or "Rebel Without a Cause."

03/10/2010
Review: `Green Zone' is a failure of intelligence (AP)

AP - All the war-zone authenticity in the Arab world cannot salvage the silly Hollywood plot at the heart of "Green Zone," Matt Damon and Paul Greengrass' first collaboration outside the Jason Bourne realm.

03/10/2010
"Wall Street" sequel delayed by five months (Reuters)

Reuters - Fox is bumping Oliver Stone's Wall Street sequel to the fall.

Indie News from Cinematical

03/10/2010
Histoire de Serge Gainsbourg: Seven Memorable Moments

Filed under: Foreign Language, Independent, Fandom, Trailers and Clips

The Édith Piaf biopic La Vie en Rose omitted a significant part of the singer's history: life in Nazi-occupied France -- a time where Piaf was a regular performer at German forces social gatherings and many considered her to be a traitor. Later she would claim to be a member of the Resistance, but she would always be suspect.

Screenwriter and cartoonist Joann Sfar is following suit with his directorial debut, Gainsbourg (Vie héroïque), about the life of legendary French singer-songwriter, actor and director, Serge Gainsbourg. The film made its French premiere in January and stars Eric Elmosnino as the chanteur -- following his beginnings in Nazi-occupied Paris, through his song-writing career in the 60's, to his death in 1991. Early reviews for the film have indicated that Sfar may have glossed over the turbulent 80's -- a darker period in Gainsbourg's life where he grew more aloof, alcoholic and his charming bad-boy behavior became a lot less tolerable for many.

While Sfar has indicated his film is not intended to be a straightforward biopic: "It's not the truth about Gainsbourg that interests me, but his lies," the director has said -- it seems odd that he would make a film about such a prominent figure and neglect to even touch upon this part of his life. Gainsbourg was a brilliant, complex and influential artist, and these controversial moments were part of what made him such a beautiful and tragic figure.

After the jump, check out seven memorable moments in the musician's provocative life that may or may not be included in Gainsbourg (Vie héroïque), but will be sure to entertain nonetheless. If you know anything about Gainsbourg, then you can probably guess that some of these videos may be NSFW.

Continue reading Histoire de Serge Gainsbourg: Seven Memorable Moments

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03/10/2010
Indie Roundup: 'Mercy,' 'Breathless' (Yeah, That One)

Filed under: Classics, Drama, Foreign Language, Independent, Deals, Box Office, Distribution, Cinematical Indie

Cinematical's Indie Roundup: 'Mercy,' 'Breathless'

Deals. Scott Caan stars in Mercy, which has been picked up by IFC Films, according to indieWIRE. Caan, who also wrote and produced, plays a romance novelist "who doesn't believe in love." Until, I'm sure, he meets the right woman, possibly the beautiful and mysterious title character (Wendy Glenn). Caan's real-life father, the legendary James Caan, plays his fictional father. Mercy will close this year's Gen Art Film Festival, which Erik Davis recently explained is the coolest thing ever. The film will be available on demand on April 28 before opening theatrically in New York and Los Angeles.

Also due in theaters this spring: Jean-Luc Godard's original, daring, influential Breathless. For the first time in its 50 years of existence, the film has been restored, making the new wave look new again. After debuting at the inaugural TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood next month, it will open at New York's Film Forum on May 28 before rolling out nationally, courtesy of Rialto Pictures. I first saw Breathless at the Nuart Theatre in Los Angeles many moons ago, and it left me stunned, so I'm very happy that a new generation will be able to experience Breathless the way it was meant to be seen.

Online / On Demand Viewing. If you're not 'mock-doc' averse, you'll want to take a look at What the Funny?, a new web series by Lynn Shelton that's debuting exclusively on Babelgum this week. Shelton made the bromance male relationship flick Humpday, so she knows a little bit about dry and humorous. The first episode is up, and if you like it, you can look forward to ten more episodes in the days ahead.

After the jump: a secret, a prophet, and dolphins.

Continue reading Indie Roundup: 'Mercy,' 'Breathless' (Yeah, That One)

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03/10/2010
Jesse Ventura Also Involved In Secret Wachowski Project

Filed under: Action, Documentary, Independent, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Casting, RumorMonger, DIY/Filmmaking, Newsstand, War

Last year, Slashfilm reported that blogger extraordinaire Ariana Huffington was claiming she was shooting scenes for a secret sci-fi film directed by the Wachowskis. (We're not calling them brothers here!) Huffington said it was a movie about the Iraq War but filmed from the perspective of the future. She had photos of herself with Andy and Lana, backed by green screen, and it was all very odd. At the time, our Erik Davis speculated it could be Tom Tykwer's adaptation of Cloud Atlas, which the Wachowskis are producing. But Slashfilm is now reporting that Jesse Ventura has also filmed a role in the secret movie, and what he says just adds to the mystery.

Ventura appeared on the Howard Stern show yesterday, and when asked if he'd ever return to the big screen, he revealed he had filmed some sci-fi weirdness with the Wachowskis. He doesn't know what the film is, he was shown no script, and he was merely told to improv.

"They brought me [in], and they brought Arianna Huffington in after me. Arianna was there, and they had her looking like Cleopatra ... Do you remember what John Travolta looked like in that horrible film Battlefield Earth? They put multicolored dreadlocks on me all the way to here. They gave me this crazy beard that was hanging down pointed, looked like Travolta, right? And they put a third eye in the middle of my forehead. Because what this is, is this is a hundred years in the future, and they wanted me to talk about the current war in Iraq and how I felt about it. And so I got to vent, looking like this maniac in this whole outfit."

Continue reading Jesse Ventura Also Involved In Secret Wachowski Project

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03/10/2010
'The Cove' Director Brings New Project to Tarantino Partner

Filed under: Documentary, Foreign Language, Independent, Quentin Tarantino, Cinematical Indie

Is Quentin Tarantino seriously getting into the documentary business, or is it just a coincidence that this is my second post in two days linking the Inglourious Basterds director to a non-fiction project? Unfortunately, it's just a coincidence, as QT has even less to do with Louie Psihoyos's next project than he does with a potential doc profiling Harvey Weinstein. Rather, it's Tarantino's longtime producing partner Lawrence Bender who may be collaborating with the director of The Cove, according to Showbiz 411 blogger Roger Friedman.

Psihoyos, who won an Oscar Sunday night (along with mic hog Fisher Stevens) for his work on the arousing doc about dolphin captivity and slaughter, has already selected his next subject: endangered species. As in more generally than just marine mammals, the filmmaker will reportedly "follow the list of extinct-prone animals and organisms, and the battles to save them." The environmentalism angle fits well with Bender, actually. Among the docs he's produced is the Al Gore global warming warning An Inconvenient Truth.

Continue reading 'The Cove' Director Brings New Project to Tarantino Partner

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03/09/2010
Viggo Mortensen Will Take David Cronenberg's 'Talking Cure'

Filed under: Drama, Independent, Romance, Casting, DIY/Filmmaking

When an actor wins an Oscar, all bets are off, including the ones he's made with David Cronenberg. Last December, Cronenberg revived The Talking Cure and had recruited Michael Fassbender, Keira Knightley, and Christoph Waltz to psychoanalyze one another in the name of love and medicine. But Waltz has been buried in offers, and Deadline Hollywood Daily reports that he's dropped out of the project in favor of Water For Elephants. Luckily, Cronenberg has a very good actor and friend in his contacts, and he just called him up. The result is that Viggo Mortensen has now joined The Talking Cure as Sigmund Freud.

Cure centers on a young Carl Jung who uses Sigmund Freud's "talking cure" on a young and troubled Russian woman. In the process of psychoanalyzing her, he falls in love with her. Freud comes along, marvels at his success, and anoints him his psychiatric successor. When Jung starts to develop his own ideas about therapy, Freud isn't too happy, and their professional relationship sours. DHD says that the producers have promised "lots of spirited sex" which Cronenberg has always filmed rather well, so no surprise there.

Mortensen and Cronenberg have two excellent films under their belt, and there's no reason to sneer at a third. (Or a fourth if they ever make that Eastern Promises sequel.) I'm eager to see Mortensen work with Fassbender and Knightley (who both rank among my favorites) and the two method men should really fire up the screen. It's going to be good.

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03/09/2010
Liam Hemsworth Boards a Carpet for 'Arabian Nights'

Filed under: Action, Independent, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Casting, DIY/Filmmaking, Newsstand

I feel incredibly old and slow all of a sudden. As everyone has whispered about the unknown Chris Hemsworth who is currently wielding Mjolnir, I have failed to realize there's more than one Hemsworth. There's three. One of them is named Liam Hemsworth, he's in an upcoming Nicholas Sparks adaptation The Last Song, and he dates Miley Cyrus. My world is blown in some small way. Even so, that's a small kindness in comparison to the one created by his latest starring role. According to THR's Heat Vision, Hemsworth the Younger will be taking the lead in Chuck Russell's Arabian Nights.

I protested this Arabian Nights re-imagining back in November, because the plot centered around a young commander who joins forces with Sinbad, Ali Baba, and the Genie to rescue Scheherazade from evil forces. Scheherazade, who was quite capable of thinking her way out of tight spots, now needs to be rescued. Now, the plot is tempered a little bit by the fact that her husband (who was so initially eager to execute her) has been assassinated, and she's been kidnapped. I still don't like it, but if they could at least have her go down fighting and outnumbered, I could stomach it somewhat.

But if Scheherazade is a disappointment, how about the casting of an Australian as a Middle Eastern warrior? I mean no disrespect to Mr. Hemsworth, but how is that appropriate at all? Does no one in Hollywood have Naveen Andrews' number?

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03/08/2010
Who Will Draw King Arthur's Sword From the Stone? Take Your Pick

Filed under: Independent, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Warner Brothers, RumorMonger, Scripts, 20th Century Fox, DIY/Filmmaking, Newsstand, Dreamworks, Remakes and Sequels

As you know, Hollywood loves trends. Be it meteor movies, ant movies, Ninth Legion movies, Easter Bunny movies, volcano movies, Greek mythology movies, they know there's no project that's not awesome enough to do in twos, threes or fours. Now we may get competing King Arthur movies because everyone in L.A. woke up and read Morte'd Arthur.

According to The LA Times, Sylvain White is currently negotiating to direct Pendragon for New Regency. Penned by Lee Shipman and Brian McGreevy, the script is being described as "an origin story" that explains how Arthur, Guinevere, and Lancelot all meet in Camelot. I'm not sure how that's different from every other Arthur story ever written, filmed, or sung by troubadours but ok.

Naturally, that's not the only possible Arthur movie kicking around. Pajiba reported last week that Guy Ritchie is contemplating directing Warren Ellis' Excalibur for Warner Bros, which is not the Captain Britain series he penned, but an untitled Arthurian project he announced on his blog last July. Ellis told Ain't It Cool News that it was "differs from the prior 751 King Arthur movies in many ways, but perhaps most obviously in that it is very specifically about the gathering of the Knights." Since most versions of the story (be they on paper or screen) do concentrate on what brings the knights to the Round Table, I'm not sure what's unique about Ellis', though he's certainly not a writer to sneer at.

Continue reading Who Will Draw King Arthur's Sword From the Stone? Take Your Pick

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03/08/2010
SXSW Exclusive Trailer for 'The Happy Poet'

Filed under: Comedy, Independent, SXSW, Trailers and Clips

On one end of the comedy spectrum you've got the broad antics of the Paul Blart: Mall Cops of the world. They're loud and they're base and they're instantly forgettable because, well, they're not funny. Somewhere in the middle of the spectrum you can find the smaller comedies, the ones that never fully penetrate into theaters across the nation but find a good deal of success at home thanks to late night cable. And then on the far side you can expect to find an absolute deadpan comedy styling; the word-of-mouth kind that that can serve as a litmus test for someone's sense of humor. As I think you can probably guess from that introduction, The Happy Poet looks like the latter.

Set to have its world premiere this Sunday at SXSW in Austin, TX, writer/director/star Paul Gordon's The Happy Poet is, "an all-organic, mostly vegetarian comedy about Bill, a struggling poet who pours his heart, soul, and last few dollars into starting a healthy food stand, surprising friends and customers with his dry wit and offbeat passion. Motivated by help from a rag-tag group of supporters and a budding romance with a poetry-loving customer, Bill strives to make a difference in the world, until surprising complications jeopardize his new friendships and threaten Bill's dreams for a hot dog-free future."

Check out the Happy Poet trailer premiere below and then head over to the film's SXSW page for screening details and dates throughout the fest.

Continue reading SXSW Exclusive Trailer for 'The Happy Poet'

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03/07/2010
Oscar Showdown: 'District 9' vs. 'Up in the Air'

Filed under: Drama, Independent, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Awards, Fandom, Oscar Watch

Top: 'District 9,' bottom: 'Up in the Air'

You may have heard that the race for best picture is between blue aliens and ticking time bombs, or perhaps you've become distracted by all the talk about ex-spouses and e-mails and misspelled bastards. Therefore, I'm here to tell you that the real Oscar showdown tonight should have been between two of the less-heralded nominees for best picture: Neill Blomkamp's District 9 and Jason Reitman's Up in the Air.

Up in the Air was the early front runner, highly-heralded out of the gate in September at the Telluride and Toronto film festivals thanks to a wave of good reviews (our own Eugene Novikov recommended it with reservations). That early praise had somewhat dissipated by the time the film finally dribbled out in limited release in December. And did holiday travelers really need to see George Clooney in an oppressively traditional character drama intent on discovery through self-flagellation? The movie became something that you saw because certain critics said you should. Still, admirers of the film were more than happy to reward it with nominations for best picture, director, actor (leading), actress (supporting - two), and screenplay adaptation.

District 9 is the more obviously audience-pleasing title, opening wide in August on the strength of its concept and Peter Jackson's good name, The popcorn picture earned rave reviews from the likes of me (and other critics too), addressing issues in a smart, subtle way while delivering big entertainment value. Its Academy Award nominations for best picture and screenplay adaptation may have been surprises, but were well-earned. It also won nods for best editing and visual effects.

Continue reading Oscar Showdown: 'District 9' vs. 'Up in the Air'

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03/06/2010
SXSW Exclusive: New Images from Indie Mind-Bender 'Wake'

Filed under: Independent, SXSW, Mystery & Suspense, Newsstand, Movie Marketing, Images

Roy's Motel is not what it seems. In writer/director Chad Feehan's debut film Wake, a young couple on the road, played by Josh Stewart and Jamie-Lynn Sigler, stop for the night at Roy's on the road to California, hoping for a warm bed and hot coffee, and end up in a strange psycho-drama where all of their darkest secrets are laid bare. It's a movie that defies easy categorization, a corkscrew morality play that rivals the very best episodes of The Twilight Zone, and we've got four exclusive pics from the new film.

Wake makes its debut at SXSW on Saturday, March 14th with Feehan and his stars on-hand for the premiere. If you like your movies a little more unpredictable than the average flick, you'll definitely want to keep Wake on your radar. Check out the gallery for our exclusive stills.

Gallery: Exclusive Images from Chad Feehan's 'Wake'

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