Fans at Saturday’s Ultimate Fighting Championship event in Las Vegas are going to get something more than a furious display of feet and fisticuffs. The pay-per-view event will feature footage from Inglourious Basterds, the upcoming Quentin Tarantino war film starring Brad Pitt as the head of a Nazi-busting unit. Basterds, a period piece inspired by the 1970s movie of the same name - but different spelling—will be advertised in the ring and on a billboard in the Las Vegas arena hosting the fights.
Read moreSo this morning I happened to be browsing the estimable Turner Classic Movies website, and I noticed that later this month -- July 20th, to be precise -- they're celebrating the 40th anniversary of the moon landing with a bunch of flicks about the exploration of space. A cool idea, I think you'll agree, and I was pleased to learn that along with some obvious choices -- The Right Stuff, Melies' A Trip to the Moon, and (my personal favorite) Ray Harryhausen 's First Men in the Moon -- they were airing the interesting 1960 B-obscurity Twelve to the Moon.
Read moreAs the King of Pop is laid to rest, movie theaters across the country will be broadcasting what is bound to be a memorable memorial service. Cinedigm Digital Cinema Corp. and AEG Network LIVE announced today that they are partnering to bring Michael Jackson’s Memorial Service to Cinedigm digital cinema equipped theatres in 31 states live on Tuesday, July 7 at 10am PT/1pm ET. The live feed direct from the Staples Center in HD Digital Cinema with stereo sound will be made possible via Cinedigm’s nationwide CineLive digital cinema network of theaters and will be commercial free in all theatres. Limited tickets to attend are free and will be available online for most locations on a first-come-first-serve basis.
Read moreMoviemaking seems glamorous but it’s an onerous effort and most who endeavor it retire early. Some directors, Titans of the field, keep working well into their older years. Agnès Varda is certainly one of these. It’s often assumed that Varda earned the title “The Grande Dame of the Nouvelle Vague” because she was the only woman in the group. But that’s a tad reductive. It’s similarly reductive to credit Varda's notoriety to her relationship with Jacques Demy, another integral member of the Left Bank of the Nouvelle Vague—though, prior to Demy’s death in 1990, they were quite the power couple. Varda trained her lens on an aspect of cinema that the rest only touched. While emotional realism was a credible goal to most of the Nouvelle Vague (a.k.
Read moreFor a third straight month a new monthly record was set at the domestic box office. However, as was the case in both April and May, the combined box office for June of 2009 fell short of setting a new record when adjusting for ticket price inflation. The overall box office for June totaled $1.09 billion, which topped the previous June record of $1.04 billion (set last year) by 4.8 percent. The adjusted record for the month stands at $1.16 billion and is shared by June 2002 and June 2004. The performance of the box office in June was especially impressive given that heading into the month it appeared that matching June 2008 would be a tough task.
Read moreThe latest summer smash is transforming more than just cars into audience-pleasing robots. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is changing the stock portfolios of some of the country’s biggest theater chains. The stocks for Carmike, Regal and Cinemark, three of the biggest publicly traded domestic theater chains, shot up 10 percent, 7 percent and 6 percent, respectively, since the Transformers sequel opened June 24. The theatrical advertising firm National CineMedia also got a boost, with its stocks jumping 9 percent.
Read moreWith the current political turmoil taking place in Iran, the entire world is paying attention to the violence and bloodshed that is plaguing the country. Yet in the small villages of Iran there is a barbaric method of punishment that is still practiced, and it is receiving far less media attention. With The Stoning of Soroya M., which is currently playing at select locations, writer/director Cyrus Nowrasteh uses the death of one woman at the hands of the village she lived in to shed light on the disturbing practice of stoning. Soroya M.
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