Two online archives of shorts, from biopics to animation, showcase the genre?s potential to innovate and subvertRandom Acts, Channel 4?s innovative short film programme, is a tricky animal to classify. It?s ostensibly a television series, collating handfuls of disparate short films into weekly half-hour episodes, but cinematic in spirit and scope. However, it?s online, where the films are archived following their TV premiere, that the youth-targeted project has really prospered. Not many people may be watching at midnight when the episodes first hit the airwaves, but the bite-size individual films (none longer than four minutes) are perfectly suited to streaming via social media. That they mostly hinge on stylistic novelty ? the emphasis is on creative experimentation rather than standard scripted drama ? helps the word of mouth along.This year?s series started last Tuesday, kicking off on a particularly eye-popping note with German animator Brenda Lien?s Call of Cuteness, a witty, gruesomely imagined subversion of internet cat-video culture that may give the feline-inclined among us nightmares for a week. Continue reading...
Japanese screenwriter best known for the the film classics Rashomon and Seven SamuraiWhen Rashomon won the Golden Lion at the Venice film festival in 1951, it opened up the floodgate forJapanese films to be shown in the west and made its director, Akira Kurosawa, who had already been making films for more than a decade, internationally known. It also launched the career of the film?s scriptwriter, Shinobu Hashimoto, who has died aged 100, helping him to become an essential component in the director?s celebrated oeuvre.Hashimoto?s screenplay (co-written with Kurosawa), widely considered one of the best ever, was based on a 1922 short story, In a Grove, by Ryunosuke Akutagawa. Set in feudal Japan, it tells of a samurai travelling through the woods with his wife. She is raped by a bandit, who then kills her husband. At the trial, the incident is described in four conflicting, yet equally credible, versions by the bandit, the wife, the samurai (communicating through a medium) and a woodcutter, demonstrating the subjective nature of truth. This became known as the ?Rashomon effect?, which plays with the viewers? sense of perspective, making them question what they are seeing. Continue reading...
Disney sacked director after his old tweets joking about paedophilia, 9/11 and the Holocaust resurfacedGuardians of the Galaxy star Dave Bautista defended filmmaker James Gunn after he was fired by Disney for a string of recently resurfaced offensive tweets.Alan Horn, chairman of Walt Disney Studios, said in a statement on Friday that Gunn, 51, had been fired because the messages, written in 2008 and 2009, were deemed ?indefensible?. Continue reading...
Summer box office sales down 20% despite release of Ocean?s 8 and Jurassic Park sequelEngland?s World Cup run and the sweltering weather have hit summer cinema attendance, with UK box office sales slumping 20% since June despite the release of blockbusters such as the Jurassic Park sequel and Ocean?s 8.UK cinemas have taken Ł103m at the box office from 1 June to 12 July, down 19% on the Ł128m taken during the same period last summer. Continue reading...
Director to release much-anticipated sequel to 2000?s Unbreakable and 2016?s Split in January 2019M Night Shyamalan has unveiled the trailer for his upcoming superhero horror movie Glass. Shyamalan, who has directed films such as The Sixth Sense and Signs, will release the much-anticipated sequel to 2000?s Unbreakable and 2016?s Split in January next year. Continue reading...
A rip-roaring tale of code-switching and capitalism, it?s the most significant state-of-the-nation satire since Jordan Peele?s masterpiece Boots Riley: how the outspoken musician is taking on Hollywood Early on in Boots Riley?s Sorry to Bother You, wet-behind-the-ears telemarketer Cassius Green (Lakeith Stanfield) is smarting from yet another person hanging up on him. His co-worker Langston (Danny Glover) gives him a much-needed tip: success in this game requires him to ditch his natural tone and start speaking in a ?white voice? (?I?m not talking about Will Smith white,? he says). Suddenly, people stop slamming their phones down and start listening. His sales increase. Then they skyrocket. Cassius?s ?white voice? (dubbed by Arrested Development?s David Cross) gets him promoted up and up until he is elevated to a ?power caller?, an exclusive broker to the wealthiest 1%. Continue reading...
James Gunn, who directed the first two Marvel hits, has been taken off the third film after old tweets covering 9/11 and rape were resurfacedJames Gunn has been fired as director of the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise after a series of offensive tweets have resurfaced.The 51-year-old film-maker had been behind the first two Marvel hits and was working on the script for the third. Tweets of his from 2008 and 2009 were discovered by the conservative site the Daily Caller that made light of rape, pedophilia, 9/11 and the Holocaust. Gunn has been vocal in his criticism of Donald Trump, tweeting last year that the US is in ?a national crisis with an incompetent president?. Continue reading...
Singer-songwriter to take first major acting role, alongside Ian McKellen, James Corden and Jennifer Hudson, in Hooper?s adaptation of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musicalTaylor Swift is to take her first lead acting role in the film adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber?s Cats, directed by Tom Hooper.Swift, 28, has one significant screen credit to her name: she voiced the environmentalist Audrey in the 2012 animation The Lorax. She is expected to actually appear on screen ? albeit wearing paws and whiskers ? in the film, which will begin production later this year in London. Continue reading...
The Thai government has formed a committee to oversee production of all the films planning to dramatise the rescueThe rush of films inspired by the dramatic rescue of 12 boys and their football coach from a flooded cave in Thailand has now expanded to encompass six, plus a documentary, and a government committee has been set up to co-ordinate and oversee the planned productions.According to the Thai newspaper the Nation, Thailand?s culture minister, Vira Rojpojchanarat, said: ?Five international film production companies have proposed to the Commerce and Foreign ministries that they make a movie and a documentary about the rescue operation.? Variety magazine has reported a sixth production is in the works, from Thai-based outfit DeWarrenne Productions. Continue reading...
BBFC?s worst offender list topped by X-Men spin-off, Indian epic Padmaavat and violent Charlize Theron spy romp Atomic BlondeLogan, Hugh Jackman?s third Wolverine spin-off from the X-Men film series, was the most complained-about film at UK cinemas in 2017.The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), which administers the cinema ratings system, issued its annual report on Thursday in which it said 20 complaints were received about the film, which it had given a 15 certificate. (This compares with the 51 complaints received in 2016 for Deadpool, and 40 the year before for Spectre.) Continue reading...
Summer 2018 has been a season filled with highly-anticipated sequels as well as exciting superhero action - and this weekend we have a full double dose.
In the days since we have heard from a few members of the franchise family, including Dave Bautista, Sean Gunn, and Michael Rooker - but two key names we didn't hear from were Chris Pratt and Zoe Saldana. That silence has ended.
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Independence Day