Earlier this year, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange popped Benedict Cumberbatch an email message, warning the actor not to go ahead with “The Fifth Estate,” the Hollywood movie based on Assange. The message aimed at halting the movie based on him, his website and his rivalry with Daniel Domscheit-Berg, played by Daniel Bruhl. The email has been widely reported, quoted by many sources, but only recently first published in full by WikiLeaks, and is re-printed below. Continue reading »
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FILM NOTES | 20 years later, Miami fest screens River Phoenix’s final film “Dark Blood”
“Dark Blood is a film of legend, one of Hollywood’s great mysteries,” said Miami International Film Festival Executive Director Jaie Laplante in a prepaed statement. “The tragic loss of River Phoenix’s outstanding talent is still profoundly felt 20 years later. Continue reading »
ON FOREIGN-FILM DIPLOMACY | Why this year’s Golden Globe Awards are so Eurocentric
Have you noticed that the French and the Scandinavians dominate this year’s Golden Globe nominees for best foreign language films? To a disproportionate degree. So what exactly happened that only the French and the Scandinavians grabbed most of the Golden Globes booty? Are the best of the best among this year’s foreign language films really so Eurocentric? Continue reading »
FILM-FLAM DIPLOMACY | Will you accept a post of culture minister in Siberia if you were Gérard Depardieu?
The Siberian region is notorious for its Stalin-era gulag prison camps. It is also the same area where one of the members of the punk band Pussy Riot is presently serving a two-year sentence for reciting an anti-Putin prayer in a Russian orthodox church in February 2012. Continue reading »
Slideshow | German director Wim Wenders (“Pina” and “Wings of Desire”) exhibits his landscape photography
For those who are curious to glimpse the personal photography of filmmaker Wim Wenders exhibited in “Places, strange and quiet,” click here to view a slideshow. Continue reading »
Watch short film on Papo Ortega’s Cubanoson, NYC’s popular Cuban orchestra, here…
Released by MeLu Films, Cubanoson: The Story, is described as “a behind-the-scenes look at what makes this popular orchestra unique in the world of Latin music. Continue reading »
U.K.’s National Theatre Live re-broadcasts Richard Bean farce “One Man, Two Guvnors” on U.S. screens
ACROSS THE UNITED STATES: This past September, National Theatre Live, the popular initiative that offers theatrical performances on film screens, kicked off its third season with Nicholas Hytner’s feel good production of One Man, Two Guvnors, Richard Bean’s new version of The Servant of Two Masters by Carlo Goldoni, with songs by Grant Olding. The farce, staged by … Continue reading »
Movie Review: Theatre Svoboda, a documentary film by Jakub Hejna
THEATRE SVOBODA (DIVADLO SVOBODA) Czech Republic, 2011 98 Min, Color DIRECTOR: Jakub Hejna PRODUCER: Jiří Konečný SCREENPLAY: Jakub Hejna, Barbora Příhodová DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY: Jiří Chod CAST Josef Svoboda EDITOR Jakub Hejna MUSIC Anthony Phillips The most riveting scene of Theatre Svoboda — the feature-length documentary film about the famous Czech scenographer Josef Svoboda — takes place … Continue reading »