News

Marlene Warfield, the New York actress known for her feisty turns as the prostitute ex-girlfriend of James Earl Jones’ boxer in The Great White Hope on Broadway and the big screen and as a young revolutionary in Network, has died. She was 83.

Warfield died April 6 of lung cancer at a hospital in Los Angeles, her sister, Chequita Warfield, told The Hollywood Reporter.

Warfield also recurred as Maude’s third and last regular housekeeper, the Jamaica-born Victoria Butterfield, on the sixth and final season (1977-78) of the famed Norman Lear-created CBS sitcom that starred Bea Arthur.

After appearing in the East Village at St. Mark’s Playhouse in French dramatist Jean Genet’s The Blacks — where she understudied for Cicely Tyson and also worked alongside the likes of Jones, Godfrey Cambridge and Maya Angelou — Warfield made it to Broadway in October 1968 when she was cast as Clara in The Great White Hope,...

Aki Aleong, an actor who appeared in No Down Payment, Braddock: Missing in Action III and V and a singer who also had stints in the music industry as a songwriter, producer and executive, has died. He was 90.

Aleong was dealing with dementia and died Sunday at his home in Sylmar, his wife of 38 years, Conchita, told The Hollywood Reporter.

A native of Trinidad who advocated for minorities throughout his career, Aleong also worked in lots of martial arts movies. He played Principal Elder in Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story (1993), starring Jason Scott Lee, and was a trainer alongside Jean-Claude Van Damme in The Quest (1996).

In his first prominent role, Aleong portrayed the young employee of a store owner (Pat Hingle) who encounters racial bias when he wants to move with his wife into a suburban California enclave in Martin Ritt’s No Down Payment (1957), starring Joanne Woodward, Sheree North and Tony Randall.

When it comes to ranking the best Western movie actors, Paul Newman rarely troubles the likes of John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Gary Cooper at the top of all-time lists. Sure,  one of his most beloved movies was starring alongside Robert Redford in "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," but arguably his most iconic roles were brooding outsiders like Eddie Felson in "The Hustler" and Luke Jackson in "Cool Hand Luke." Even so, Newman starred in his fair share of Westerns over the course of his career, putting in big performances for Arthur Penn in "The Left-Handed Gun," John Huston in "The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean," and Robert Altman in "Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson." He also made two of the greatest Westerns ever with one particularly underrated director, Martin Ritt.

Ritt is arguably one of the most unsung Hollywood filmmakers, working...

Dalene Young, the screenwriter whose credits included the coming-of-age comedy-drama Little Darlings, featuring Tatum O’Neal and Kristy McNichol, and the Mary Steenburgen-starring drama Cross Creek, has died. She was 85.

Young died May 9 in Portland, Oregon, of complications from Alzheimer’s disease, her husband, director Robert Martin Carroll, announced.

Young received a Daytime Emmy nomination for co-writing the 1999 Showtime children’s special Locked in Silence and landed a Christopher Award and a Humanitas Prize nomination for her work on the 1992 NBC telefilm Jonathan: The Boy Nobody Wanted.

She also wrote the films The Baby-Sitters Club (1995) and Baby Luv (2000) and other telefilms, including 1983’s Will There Really Be a Morning? — based on actress Frances Farmer’s autobiography — 2000’s The Last Dance and 2002’s Miss Lettie and Me.

“In her heyday, she was arguably the top writer of made-for-television movies,” her husband noted.

Young had a long career on the stage as well,...

The British Film Institute has added veteran James Bond producer Barbara Broccoli and filmmaker Terry Gilliam to the board of its U.S. outpost and changed the stateside organization’s name from Friends of the British Film Institute to BFI America.

Other members of the new board include Colin Walsh, Deborah Schindler (Producer), Penelope Wong (Producer and marketing expert), and Dr. Mali Heled Kinberg (UCLA Professor).

The new-look BFI America and its board will be officially launched at a reception in Los Angeles next month, during which a celebration will also be held for the BFI National Archive’s 90th anniversary.

Following the event, six films from the BFI National Archive’s collection, including an original print of Steven Spielberg’s Jaws, will screen as part of the TCM Classic Film Festival. The screening will mark the film’s 50th anniversary and will be introduced by BFI Chief Executive Ben Roberts.

In the early 1990s, Sean Connery and Cher almost appeared together in a romantic adventure called Road Show. Here’s why it never got made:

The ending of this story is that the movie never happened. Sean Connery and Cher never came together in a feature film from the director of Die Hard, and if you follow their respective IMDb pages, you’ll know their streams never crossed.

But for time in the early 1990s, it nearly happened. The project that nearly brought them together sounds as unlikely now as the cast list.

For over a decade, a script called Road Show was doing the rounds among Hollywood studios. A romantic action-adventure set in and around a ranch, it was in turn based on a book called The Last Cattle Drive, penned by Robert Day, and it moved onto the docket of director John McTiernan just after he’d enjoyed...

Before he became a household name as the voice of Darth Vader in Star Wars, James Earl Jones had already made himself known in Hollywood, delivering a breakthrough performance in the Academy Award-nominated dramaThe Great White Hope. Released in 1970, the film brings to life the struggles of Jack Jefferson, a fictionalized version of the first Black heavyweight boxing champion, Jack Johnson.

Set against the backdrop of early 20th-century America, the film is both a harsh portrayal of racial oppression and a personal exploration of the effects of fame. With its critique of systemic racism, The Great White Hope offers a powerful examination of the limits of resistance and the price of success in a world that refuses to accept Black excellence.

The Great White Hope Tells the Story of One of History's Greatest Boxers

The Great White Hope is a biographical drama following Jack Jefferson (James Earl Jones), a fictionalized...

By Juan Carlos Ojano

Martin Ritt’s 1963 revisionist Western Hud is remembered these days for mainly two things: for Patricia Neal’s Best Actress-winning performance (one of the shortest in Oscar history) and for hailing one of Paul Newman’s seminal works as an actor, two years after his Oscar-nominated turn in The Hustler. Hud further solidified Newman’s film star persona, now with indelible iconography within an all-too American genre. However, Newman’s performance as well as the film’s overall prickliness help the film transcend surface-level memorializing...

by Cláudio Alves

The Long, Hot Summer (1958) Martin Ritt

On January 26th, it'll be a century since Paul Leonard Newman came into this world. To celebrate this centennial, various writers from our Film Experience team will explore some of the blue-eyed star's best performances and most interesting pictures. There'll be some analysis of Oscar-honored triumphs, perchance a look at his directorial career, re-evaluations and sweet farewells as we remember one of the greats. As one dives into Newman's life on screen, feel free to explore the actor's tag on the site and re-discover some of the many, many pieces we've already posted about him over the years. From Oscar histories to overviews of his creative partnership with Joanne Woodward, there's a lot to enjoy.

For now, let's go back to the start, where everything began. Let's look at Paul Newman's early roles, those 1950s projects that saw him...

The 1960s were a period of tumult and change across the world, and this was definitely echoed in iconic art that was created during the decade. From music, to fashion, to film and television, artists pushed the boundaries and limits of their disciplines by exploring controversial themes and experimenting with new techniques to comment on them, in the process.

Among these, film was one of the most adventurous, with several projects from this decade inspiring the future generation of filmmakers. Several classic films of the 1960s have held up to today's standards. In fact, many pioneered the method for much of modern film. For example, Stanley Kramer's Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, discussed important societal issues of race and interracial relationships, while artistic French new wave movies like The Umbrella's of Cherbourg, used technicolor and experimental cinematography to expand the visual capabilities of film. In these instances, these 1960s...

[Editor’s note: For this article, The Hollywood Reporter only looked at the shortest and longest screen times in the lead acting categories. Best supporting actor and actress were not included.]

Longest Screen Times Vivien Leigh, Gone With the Wind (1939)

Movie Length 3 hrs 58 mins

Time Onscreen 2 hrs 23 mins

Percent of Run Time 60 Percent

Vivien Leigh holds the record for the longest performance to win an Oscar, though the work took a deep physical and mental toll on her. The film itself is also the longest to win best picture. At the 12th Academy Awards, Victor Fleming’s Gone With the Wind also won best supporting actress for Hattie McDaniel, who became the first African American to win an Oscar. Leigh was nominated alongside Bette Davis (Dark Victory), Irene Dunne (Love Affair), Greta Garbo (Ninotchka) and Greer Garson (Goodbye, Mr. Chips).

Charlton Heston, Ben-Hur (1959)

Movie Length 3 hrs 32 mins

Time Onscreen 2 hrs 1 min

Percent of Run Time 57.1 Percent...

In the Texas Panhandle, communities live and die on two things: Energy and cattle. After oil and massive natural gas reserves were found in the area in the 1910s, this land that had traditionally been taken up by cattle ranches since it was colonized by European settlers in the late 1800s moved heavily toward the harvesting of natural energy resources. However, despite the tremendous amount of money and land given over to oil and gas, raising cattle never stopped on the massive ranches of the Texas Panhandle (the Xit Ranch was 3 million+ acres at one point). In fact, ranches both corporate and family-run account for a large portion of the jobs and incoming money in the Panhandle today.

Because it relies on the land, the Texas cattle ranching industry is heavily susceptible to nature, including the weather, wildfires and cow-born diseases. These can prove the difference between thriving and losing everything in the Panhandle,...

I spent my first decade in New York working at Variety’s former offices on Park Avenue South and more than once found myself sharing an elevator with James Earl Jones while he was on his way to or from Verizon to shoot commercials. The giant of an actor, who died today at age 93, never failed to say a warm, “Good morning” or “Good afternoon,” and even if I hadn’t recognized his face or his imposing 6-foot, 2-inch frame, there was no mistaking that sonorous voice.

His voice was the earth-shaking basso rumble coming from behind the forbidding mask of Darth Vader in the Star Wars saga, starting with the original 1977 film, and the stentorian growl of Mufasa, King of the Pride Lands and father of Simba in The Lion King.

It was also the voice of a revered stage actor, who forged his reputation in the 1960s and ‘70s,...

When “Boulevard Nights” opened in early 1979, it was one of several major studio films — along with “The Warriors,” The Wanderers,” and “Over the Edge” — to take on gang violence as its primary subject. After the movies inspired a handful of violent incidents at theaters, Paramount doubled down on the marketing of Walter Hill‘s “The Warriors” and turned it into a box office hit; unfortunately for “Boulevard Nights” director Michael Pressman, Warner Bros. went in the opposite direction and pulled their film from the venues where violence had broken out, essentially abandoning the movie.

“Warner Bros. said, ‘We’re very proud of this movie, don’t get us wrong,'” Pressman told IndieWire, “‘but we’re not about to risk lawsuits.'” Over the years, however, “Boulevard Nights” has found the audience it always deserved via repertory screenings (it’s a perennial favorite at Quentin Tarantino’s New Beverly Cinema...

With Richard Linklater, Edgar Wright, and Tom Cruise calling Glen Powell the modern version of an Old Hollywood leading man, it’s only fitting that Paul Schrader would chime in.

The “Oh, Canada” writer/director posted on Facebook that Powell is akin to Paul Newman, Robert Mitchum, and William Holden in terms of his star power.

“Glen Powell is a movie star in the Holden/Mitchum/Newman mold,” Schrader wrote. “Now he needs to make his ‘Hud.'”

Newman starred in the 1963 Western-tinged drama “Hud,” directed by Martin Ritt, which helped cement the rise of the antihero main characters. Newman’s titular Hud Bannon lives on his family cattle ranch in Texas and battles his nephew (Brandon de Wilde) for the affections of housekeeper Alma (Patricia Neal). Newman gave a performance as an arrogant, abusive alcoholic that earned him an Academy Award Best Actor nomination. The film went on to win Best Cinematography,...

Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. To keep up with our latest features, sign up for the Weekly Edit newsletter and follow us @mubinotebook on Twitter and Instagram.NEWSNorma Rae.The Academy Foundation Workers Union has approved its first contract, including structured raises, extended leave time, increased job security, and other benefits.Just weeks after the conclusion of the festival, Hot Docs has announced it will lay off staff and temporarily shutter its year-round cinema in Toronto.The Hollywood Commission, chaired by Anita Hill, has introduced an online tool to report workplace abuse in the American motion-picture industry.The organizing wave in New York cinemas continues as the Cinema Village union becomes official. In PRODUCTIONIn his signature direct-oblique style, David Lynch is teasing “something…for you to see and hear,” which “will be coming along” on June 5.REMEMBERINGSuper Size Me.Morgan Spurlock has died at 53. The filmmaker followed his debut feature,...

Terry Gilliam has been to Cannes with three of his own films since 1983, but one of his favorite memories of the festival takes him back to that very first time, at the 36th edition, as the co-writer and co-star of Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life. Along with Graham Chapman and the film’s director Terry Jones, he’d emerged from the Carlton hotel’s iconic entrance, then bedecked with promotion for the upcoming Bond movie Octopussy, to encounter a camera crew. Jones started grabbing people at random, shouting, “Who Ees Monty Python???” in a ridiculous foreign accent, and got so carried away that, when they reached the hotel’s famous terrace, he accidentally did it to Gilliam too.

The crowd loved it, and the day only grew stranger. Out on the Carlton’s jetty, they gave an interview to British news channel ITN, with Jones hiding behind Graham...

In 1963 Paul Newman went to the Venice Film Festival for the Italian premiere of Martin Ritt’s Hud, a few months following its U.S. release, and sat down with Italian journalist Oriana Fallaci to discuss his life and career. At the time he was 38 and becoming a director was but a dream. Only two years earlier, the rising movie star cemented that status with what would become (and remain) perhaps his most iconic role: “Fast Eddie” Felson in The Hustler. Four years after this interview, he’d be Cool Hand Luke, his other most iconic role.

Fallaci, slightly younger than Newman and already known for her controversial interviews, had made waves in 1956 when the magazine L’Europeo dispatched her to Los Angeles hoping to get a fresh perspective on the Hollywood star system. Her interviews extended beyond movie stars to encompass a diverse array of insiders, from producers and directors to aspiring actors,...

Dianne Crittenden, the casting director whose impressive résumé included the first Star Wars film, The In-Laws and the Terrence Malick features Badlands, Days of Heaven and The Thin Red Line, has died. She was 82.

Crittenden died Wednesday at her home in Pacific Palisades after a battle with several cancers, fellow casting director Ilene Starger told The Hollywood Reporter.

“Dianne was my mentor, we’ve known each other for 44 years,” Starger said. “She was also my dear friend, more like an older sister, really. So generous, kind, brilliant, funny. A people magnet. Her knowledge of and insight into actors was extraordinary.”

A former head of casting at Warner Bros., Crittenden collaborated with Martin Ritt on Murphy’s Romance (1985) and Stanley & Iris (1990); with Roger Donaldson on Thirteen Days (2000) and The World’s Fastest Indian (2005); and with Peter Weir on Witness (1985), The Mosquito Coast (1986) and Green Card (1990).

Crittenden was born in Queens on Aug.

Since the beginning of the Academy Awards in the late 1920s, Hollywood filmmakers have been making socially conscious films. Many of the best of those have scored the film town’s top honor — Oscar best picture.

This year, that winner could be “Oppenheimer,” a film that boldly and starkly dramatizes the creation of man’s most dangerous invention: atomic weapons.

It could be “Killers of the Flower Moon,” a film that brought a lost and dreadful piece of American history into the sunlight of the Cannes Film Festival and ultimately the spotlights of awards season.

It could be either “Barbie” or “Poor Things,” two of the wildest, most colorful and inventive investigations of feminist and/or post-feminist womanhood to ever hit the big screen.

It could be “American Fiction,” a wry and witty look at Black American middle-class identity and family relations under preposterous, dispiriting cultural pressures.

But will the...

Under the non de plume John Le Carre, David Cornwall penned a series of best-selling spy novels including “The Spy Who Came in from the Cold,” “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy,” ‘The Little Drummer Girl’’ and “The Russia House,” that are cerebral, unadorned, gritty. The antitheist of Ian Fleming’s suave James Bond. In fact, his most popular character George Smiley just blended into the crowd: “Obscurity was his nature, as well as his profession,” Cornwall described him in “A Murder of Quality.” “The byways of espionage are not populated by the brash and colorful adventure of fiction. A man who, like Smiley, had lived and worked for years among his country’s enemies learns only one prayer; that he may never, never be noticed. Assimilation is his highest aim.”

Before his death at the age of 89 in in December, 2020, Cornwall sat down for a rare interview with award-winning documentarian Errol Morris...

Paul Newman, one of the greatest actors of the 20th century, had a remarkable career in Hollywood, earning one Academy Award and nine nominations. While primarily known for his dramatic roles, Newman also appeared in several Western films, including "Hombre" and "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid." Newman's performance in "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" is especially praised, showcasing his onscreen chemistry with Robert Redford and the film's witty and action-packed script.

Paul Newman is one of the most celebrated actors of the 20th century and has a number of appearances in classic Western movies. He is arguably most famous for his star role in Cool Hand Luke and is responsible for his contributions in defining the look of Hollywood's rugged yet charming lead throughout the New Hollywood era of the film industry. Newman earned one Academy Award for his performance in The Color of Money alongside a young Tom Cruise.

David Jacobs, the writer and producer who changed the face of television in the 1980s by creating the primetime soap operas Dallas and Knots Landing, has died. He was 84.

Jacobs died Sunday at Providence Saint Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, his son Aaron told The Hollywood Reporter. He had battled Alzheimer’s over the years and died of complications from a series of infections.

Dallas in its original incarnation aired for 14 seasons and 357 episodes, starting out as a five-part miniseries in April 1978 before wrapping in May 1991, and it was the No. 1 show in the Nielsen ratings after its fourth, fifth and seventh seasons. Meanwhile, the spinoff Knots Landing debuted in December 1979 and also ran for 14 seasons — and 344 episodes — a solid Thursday night staple through May 1993.

Based on his work as a story editor for the ABC drama Family, Jacobs had scored a deal at Lorimar Productions, where he struck up a friendship with Michael Filerman,...

If you ever happen across Tommy Lee Jones in a public setting, should you find yourself sharing an elevator with him or spot him across the room in a restaurant, do yourself a favor and leave him be. If you're at all adept at reading body language, you should realize fairly quickly that the man is a walking "do not disturb" sign. Should you try to engage, know that he will swiftly and bluntly shut you down. Whatever bond you feel you've formed with Jones, it doesn't extend beyond the movie theater or your television screen. Not for him.

If you ever get the opportunity to interview Tommy Lee Jones, prepare. Do your research, write your very specific questions down well in advance and do not deviate. If you ask good, thoughtful questions, you'll get a good interview. Do not try to have a conversation. If your inquiries ramble or,...

Trigger Warning: The following references sexual assault.The Pacific-blue eyes. The aquiline nose. The puckish grin. The lean physique. They all added up to make Paul Newman even greater than the sum of his parts. In films like 1958's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and 1962's Sweet Bird of Youth, the Oscar-winning actor was the embodiment of the term "matinee idol." His ability to combine innocence and naïveté with an intense sense of lurking animalism drew moviegoers to him like magnets to a steel blade. Newman came into his own as a sex symbol in director Martin Ritt's 1958 melodrama The Long, Hot Summer. Standing shirtless in the steamy evening Mississippi heat outside Joanne Woodward's bedroom, clutching a pillow and calling out, "Clara! Claaara!" Newman was the man every woman (and more than a few men) wanted to invite inside the house. Film critic Fiona Underhill described the...

Harlan County, USA

Filmmakers loves an underdog and movies have a long tradition of supporting the rights of workers, dating all the way back to the silent era. Here are some classic movies that celebrate workers’ right to strike for better wages and safer working conditions and the sometimes unlikely allies they find along the way. Many are based on true stories, including John Sayles’ masterful “Matewan,” about a coal miner strike in West Virginia, as well as Barbara Kopple’s Oscar-winning documentary, “Harlan County, USA.”

Photo credit: Disney

“Newsies” (1992)

“Headlines don’t sell papes, Newsies sell papes!” In this exuberant and pro-worker musical, Christian Bale’s Jack Kelly leads a group of newsboys in a strike against penny-pinching newspaper owner Joseph Pulitzer. They’re aided by Bill Pullman’s kindly, reform-minded journalist and, of course, Teddy Roosevelt, who was then governor of New York.

Photo credit: 20th Century

“Norma Rae...

Exclusive: Malcolm McDowell is saddling up with James Paxton, Bernadette Peters and Laura Marano for Adam Rifkin’s Western Last Train to Fortune.

Last Train to Fortune also reteams McDowell with his former wife, Oscar winner Mary Steenburgen, the duo previously starring together in the 1979 sci-fi drama Time After Time and the 1983 Martin Ritt drama Cross Creek.

In the pic, McDowell plays Cecil Peachtree, a stuffed-shirt schoolmaster who misses the last train to Fortune and meets an outlaw named Dooley (Paxton), at which point they strike a deal: The gunslinger will ride the book-loving Cecil to Fortune in exchange for his teacher’s stipend awaiting him. Along the way there are gunfights, jailbreaks and saloon gals, and our mismatched heroes form an unlikely bond. The pic, which is produced by Michael P.J. Gerstein, Paxton, Matt Williams, Rifkin and Brad Wyman (the Oscar-winning Charlize Theron drama Monster) is said to be...

So, did you ever wonder why Carol Burnett always tugs her ear? It was a way she could say “hi” to her beloved grandmother. The first time she did it was when she made her TV debut at 22 on the Dec. 17, 1955 episode of the popular “The Paul Winchell and Jerry Mahoney Show.” She played the girlfriend of the woody dummy. “The first song I sang on TV was ‘Over the Rainbow’ to Jerry Mahoney,” she noted in a 2016 L.A. Times interview with me. “I remember I called my grandmother to tell her I was going to be on television. Nanny said say hello to me. That’s when we came up with pulling my ear.”

Nearly seven decades later, Burnett is still tugging at her ear, singing and making people laugh And on April 26th, which is her 90th birthday, NBC is throwing her a celebration “Carol Burnett: 90 Years of Laughter + Love.

The relationship between fathers and sons is complicated. It can be tough, tender, loving, combative, disappointing, violent, the stuff of Shakespearean and even Greek tragedy. It’s little wonder there have been countless films exploring fathers and sons including “East of Eden,” “Finding Nemo,” “Back to the Future,” “Field of Dreams,” “Nebraska,” “Fences,” “Beginners” and “Kramer vs. Kramer.”

One of the most indelible is Martin Ritt’s “Hud,” which celebrates its 60th anniversary. And time hasn’t diminished the power of this unapologetic drama starring Paul Newman, Melvyn Douglas, Patricia Neal and Brandon De Wilde.

Newman had played characters of questionable morality such as his Oscar-nominated turn “Fast” Eddie Felsen in 1961’s “The Hustler,” but he had never played anyone quite like Hud, the ultimate heel who never met a bottle of booze he wouldn’t drink or a married woman he didn’t seduce. Living on a cattle ranch in a tiny,...

Fifty years ago, Angela Lansbury opened the 45th Academy Awards ceremony, with a song-and-dance number that paid homage to a day on a movie set. Carol Burnett, Michael Caine, Charlton Heston and Rock Hudson shared Oscars hosting duties on March 27, 1973, a historical night of Academy controversies, record-making, and memorable moments. Enjoy our Oscar flashback 50 years to the ceremony on NBC.

It began with Heston running late due to a flat tire; he was scheduled to deliver the voting rules in a “Ten Commandments” manner. Asked to fill in at the last minute was Clint Eastwood, who humorously claimed, “They pick the guy who hasn’t said but three lines in 12 movies to substitute for him.” Fortunately, Moses showed up and saved Dirty Harry about midway through the speech.

SEEOscar Best Picture Gallery: History of Every Academy Award-Winning Movie

Five completely different types of films were represented in the Best Picture category,...

It’s Labor vs. Capital, in basic terms! Sean Connery is the tough, embittered miner looking to strike back against the bosses, and Richard Harris the underdog who sees a way out by becoming an agent provocateur for the Pinkertons. An admirable true-life history lesson, Walter Bernstein & Martin Ritt’s downer of a drama didn’t grab the public’s imagination. But there’s no better vision of the time and place, thanks to James Wong Howe’s realistic, nearly monochromatic cinematography.

The Molly Maguires

Blu-ray

Viavision [Imprint] 172

1970 / Color / 2:39 widescreen / 124 min. / Street Date October 26, 2022 / Available from Viavision / au 34.95

Starring: Sean Connery, Richard Harris, Samantha Eggar, Frank Finlay, Anthony Zerbe, Philip Bourneuf, Anthony Costello, Bethel Leslie, Brendan Dillon.

Cinematography: James Wong Howe

Art Director: Tambi Larsen

Costumes designed by: Dorothy Jeakins

Film Editor: Frank Bracht

Original Music: Henry Mancini

Written by Walter Bernstein suggested by a book by Arthur H. Lewis

Produced by Walter Bernstein,...

Award-winning writer and director Hugo Blick tackles the Western genre in The English, now streaming on Prime Video. The 6-episode series follows two individuals who join forces for personal revenge, but it speaks to a wider narrative of race and class that is often overlooked when enjoying the wild West. At the same time, it is a love story that demands a strong connection to and between the leads.

Thankfully, The English has Emily Blunt (who also serves as executive producer) and Chaske Spencer as those leads, and they light up the screen together. Blunt plays Cordelia Locke, a noblewoman searching for her son's murderer, while spencer plays Eli Whipp, a Pawnee scout who is still rejected by white men even after serving with them. By presenting the bloody landscape of America in the 1890s through the lens of two people living on its edges, The English manages to be equally awe-inspiring and heartbreaking.

A comprehensive, personal, and kaleidoscopic look at representation, Elvis Mitchell’s Is That Black Enough For You?!? is a passionate and loving walk through film history framed by Blaxploitation cinema of the 1970s. Written, directed, and narrated by the master conversationalist, curator, film scholar, and cultural critic, this is a densely packed visual essay told through film clips, archival materials, and interviews with Black stars of multiple eras who speak to the influence of this sub-genre on their lives and careers.

Borne from the notion that America was in a freefall spiral circa 1968, a new kind of subversive independent cinema arrived on the scene, forcing Hollywood to compete and adapt. Mitchell notes landmarks of representation along with the way—including Robert Downy Sr.’s Putney Swope, an experimental comedy set in the world of advertising,, and Martin Ritt’s The Great White Hope starring James Earl Jones.

Black Enough is...

Angela Lansbury, whose career crossed theater, film, and television across more than seven decades, has died at the age of 96. Her death was announced by MSNBC’s Ali Velshi on his Twitter account on Tuesday afternoon and confirmed by NBC News. “The children of Dame Angela Lansbury are sad to announce that their mother died peacefully in her sleep at home in Los Angeles at 1:30 Am today, Tuesday, October 11, 2022, just five days shy of her 97th birthday,” her family said in a statement.

The actress is best known for “Murder, She Wrote,” but started her career in 1944 and has delighted generations of fans with nearly 150 credits. That includes everything ranging from voice-over performances to musicals and dramas. Lansbury was able to be anything an audience needed, from a warmhearted mother to a vicious villain.

Angela Brigid Lansbury was born on October 16, 1925 in London, England. She was born into entertainment,...

Actor/writer/director Ethan Hawke discusses a few of his favorite films with Josh Olson and Joe Dante.

Show Notes: Movies Referenced In This Episode

Explorers (1985) – Glenn Erickson’s Blu-ray review

The Verdict (1982)

The Color Of Money (1986) – Rod Lurie’s trailer commentary

Nobody’s Fool (1994)

Three Faces Of Eve (1957)

Mr. And Mrs. Bridge (1990)

North By Northwest (1959)

Torn Curtain (1966)

Psycho (1960) – John Landis’s trailer commentary

Frenzy (1972) – Joe Dante’s trailer commentary

Topaz (1969)

Boyhood (2014)

An Officer and a Gentleman (1982)

Blue Collar (1978) – Josh Olson’s trailer commentary

First Reformed (2017) – Glenn Erickson’s trailer commentary

Taxi Driver (1976) – Rod Lurie’s trailer commentary

The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Hombre (1967)

Hud (1963)

Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid (1969)

The Life And Times Of Judge Roy Bean (1972) – Josh Olson’s trailer commentary, Glenn Erickson’s Blu-ray review

Buffalo Bill And The Indians, Or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson (1976) – Glenn Erickson’s Blu-ray review

The Outrage (1964)

Rashomon (1950) – Brian Trenchard-Smith’s trailer commentary,...

Though their “’80s Horror” lineup would constitute enough of a Halloween push, the Criterion Channel enter October all guns blazing. The month’s lineup also includes a 19-movie vampire series running from 1931’s Dracula (English and Spanish both) to 2014’s A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, the collection in-between including Herzog’s Nosferatu, Near Dark, and Let the Right One In. Last year’s “Universal Horror” collection returns, a 17-title Ishirō Honda retrospective has been set, and a few genre titles stand alone: Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte, The House of the Devil, and Island of Lost Souls.

Streaming premieres include restorations of Tsai Ming-liang’s Vive L’amour and Ed Lachman’s Lou Reed / John Cale concert film Songs for Drella; October’s Criterion editions are Samuel Fuller’s Forty Guns, Bill Duke’s Deep Cover, Haxan, and My Own Private Idaho. Meanwhile, Ari Aster has curated an “Adventures...

Cinematography retrospectives are the way to go—more than a thorough display of talent, it exposes the vast expanse a Dp will travel, like an education in form and business all the same. Accordingly I’m happy to see the Criterion Channel give a 25-film tribute to James Wong Howe, whose career spanned silent cinema to the ’70s, populated with work by Howard Hawks, Michael Curtz, Samuel Fuller, Alexander Mackendrick, Sydney Pollack, John Frankenheimer, and Raoul Walsh.

Further retrospectives are granted to Romy Schneider (recent repertory sensation La piscine among them), Carlos Saura (finally a chance to see Peppermint frappe!), the British New Wave, and groundbreaking distributor Cinema 5, who brought to U.S. shores everything from The Man Who Fell to Earth and Putney Swope to Pumping Iron and Scenes from a Marriage.

September also yields streaming premieres for the recently restored Bronco Bullfrog, Ang Lee’s Pushing Hands,...

HBO’s “The Last Movie Stars,” Ethan Hawkes’ exceptional six-part series on Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, works on so many levels. For baby boomers who grew up watching the Oscar-winning couple, the series is a strong emotional tug at the heartstrings. For actors and those who love acting, it’s a primer on the craft. For those who love and admire the fact they remained married for 50 years, it’s a perceptive depiction of the highs, lows and struggles of a marriage. And by peeling away the legend of their union, you end up admiring and loving Newman and Woodward more than ever. And be prepared to blubber several times in the final episode.

The couple collaborated on 16 movies and three plays. And in honor of “The Last Movie Stars,” here’s a look at several of those projects.

The two fell in love while working on William Inge’s 1953 Pulitzer-Prize-winning romantic drama ‘Picnic.

Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSJafar Panahi.Having been detained last week for protesting the arrest of fellow Iranian filmmakers Mohammad Rasoulof and Mostafa Aleahmad, Jafar Panahi has now been ordered to serve six years in prison. Ahead of this development Eric Kohn reported on the broader situation in Indiewire. “Maybe they will come for all of us one by one,” says one anonymous filmmaker who is quoted in the article.Martine Marignac, a producer of vital films by Jacques Rivette, Chantal Akerman, Leos Carax, Jeanne Balibar, Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet, and others, has died aged 75.The juries have been announced for the 79th edition of the Venice Film Festival. Julianne Moore will head up the main jury, supported by filmmakers Audrey Diwan, Leonardo di Costanzo, Rodrigo Sorogoyen, and Mariano Cohn, plus actor Leila Hatami and author Kazuo Ishiguro.

Lewis John Carlino’s family-oriented Mafia tale was filmed four years before The Godfather: Kirk Douglas is a loose-cannon capo who bosses his own brother Alex Cord and won’t listen when his fellow kingpins talk about modernization. Irene Papas and Susan Strasberg are married to the mob, while veteran hoods Luther Adler and Eduardo Ciannelli provide the menacing atmosphere. Director Martin Ritt was supposedly not thrilled with the project yet it’s a polished, involving crime-time drama set both in New York City and Palermo, Sicily.

The Brotherhood

Blu-ray

Viavision [Imprint] #119

1968 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 96 min. / Street Date April 27, 2022 / Available from / £34.95

Starring: Kirk Douglas, Alex Cord, Irene Papas, Luther Adler, Susan Strasberg, Murray Hamilton, Eduardo Ciannelli, Joe De Santis, Connie Scott, Val Avery, Val Bisoglio, Alan Hewitt, Barry Primus, Michele Cimarosa, Louis Badolati.

Cinematography: Boris Kaufman

Art Director: Tambi Larsen

Film Editor: Frank Bracht

Original Music: Lalo Schifrin

Written...

May on the Criterion Channel will be good to the auteurs. In fact they’re giving Richard Linklater better treatment than the distributor of his last film, with a 13-title retrospective mixing usual suspects—the Before trilogy, Boyhood, Slacker—with some truly off the beaten track. There’s a few shorts I haven’t seen but most intriguing is Heads I Win/Tails You Lose, the only available description of which calls it a four-hour (!) piece “edited together by Richard Linklater in 1991 from film countdowns and tail leaders from films submitted to the Austin Film Society in Austin, Texas from 1987 to 1990. It is Linklater’s tribute to the film countdown, used by many projectionists over the years to cue one reel of film after another when switching to another reel on another projector during projection.” Pair that with 2008’s Inning by Inning: A Portrait of a Coach and your completionism will be on-track.

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Cinema Retro continues covering films that are not currently available on home video in the U.S. or U.K.

By Brian Hannan

"Sanctuary" is an overheated melodrama that stands as a classic example of Hollywood’s offensive attitudes to women. Nobel prize-winning author William Faulkner could hardly blame the movies for sensationalising his misogynistic source material since, if anything, the movie took a softer line. The story is told primarily in flashback as headstrong southern belle Temple Drake (Lee Remick) attempts to mitigate the death sentence passed on her maid Nancy (Odetta). Given that such appeals are directed at Drake’s Governor father (Howard St John), and that the maid has been condemned for murdering Drake’s infant child, that’s a whole lot of story to swallow.

Worse is to follow. Drake takes up with Prohibition bootlegger Candy Man (Yves Montand...

I have always had a philosophy that if you are going to do a remake, remake a movie that didn’t work the first time like Howard the Duck, not a classic by a great filmmaker. Well, the latter is exactly what director Oliver Hermanus (Moffie) and Nobel Prize-winning screenwriter Kazuo Ishiguro have had the audacity to do in “reimagining” (the popular term for remakes today) iconic Japanese director Akira Kurosawa’s highly praised 1952 drama Ikiru. And they haven’t even bothered to change the early ’50s era in which it takes place, only the location and language, moving from Japan to England. Despite my reservations I am happy to say Living, which has its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival on Friday, works very well and that is solely thanks to the loving care these filmmakers have put into...

Sidney Poitier, Oscar-winning actor, filmmaker, activist, and Hollywood trailblazer, has died at the age of 94. The news was shared by Minister of Foreign Affairs Fred Mitchell out of the Bahamas, where Poitier held dual citizenship.

Representatives for Poitier did not immediately return IndieWire’s request for comment.

Poitier broke the color barrier in Hollywood. Rising to superstar status in an industry that has forever been controlled on both sides of the camera by primarily white men, he was an actor, director, and producer who completely shifted perceptions of race that had long been held, prior to his arrival, by both audiences and studio executives.

Getting his start in the 1940s, as a member of Harlem’s American Negro Theatre, where he met lifelong friend Harry Belafonte, Poitier emerged as one of the most talented actors of his era. He was among the first Black actors to appear alongside white actors,...

Exclusive: Oscar-nominated actress Alfre Woodard is joining New Line’s Salem’s Lot bunch in the big-screen take of the 1975 Stephen King vampire novel, we can tell you first.

She’ll play Dr. Cody, who in the novel is a guy, Dr. Jimmy Cody. Cody assists Ben Mears (Lewis Pullman in the film), Susan Norton (Makenzie Leigh) and Matt Burke (Bill Camp) in fighting the spread of vampires. Spencer Treat Clark also stars as Mike Ryerson, as Deadline first reported. In King’s first New York Times No. 1 bestseller, author Ben Mears returns to his childhood home of Jerusalem’s Lot in search of inspiration for his next book, only to discover his hometown is being preyed upon by a bloodthirsty vampire.

Woodard recently starred in the critically acclaimed feature Clemency, for which she received a BAFTA Award nomination and a Spirit Award nomination for Best Female Lead. On the small screen,...

“That’s all he ever wanted out of life… was love. That’s the tragedy of Charles Foster Kane. You see, he just didn’t have any to give.”

Orson Welles’ classic Citizen Kane (1941) will be available on 4k and Blu-ray October 19th. A 4-disc 4K Uhd+Blu-ray Combo and a 3-blu-ray Edition will both be available.

In the most dazzling debut feature in cinema history, twenty-five-year-old writer-producer-director-star Orson Welles synthesized the possibilities of sound-era filmmaking into what could be called the first truly modern movie. In telling the story of the meteoric rise and precipitous fall of a William Randolph Hearst–like newspaper magnate named Charles Foster Kane, Welles not only created the definitive portrait of American megalomania, he also unleashed a torrent of stylistic innovations—from the jigsaw-puzzle narrative structure to the stunning deep-focus camera work of Gregg Toland—that have ensured that Citizen Kane remains fresh and...

Next month’s lineup at The Criterion Channel has been unveiled, featuring no shortage of excellent offerings. Leading the pack is a massive, 20-film retrospective dedicated to John Huston, featuring a mix of greatest and lesser-appreciated works, including Fat City, The Dead, Wise Blood, The Man Who Would Be King, and Key Largo. (The Treasure of the Sierra Madre will join the series on October 1.)

Also in the lineup is series on the works of Budd Boetticher (specifically his Randolph Scott-starring Ranown westerns), Ephraim Asili, Josephine Baker, Nikos Papatakis, Jean Harlow, Lee Isaac Chung (pre-Minari), Mani Kaul, and Michelle Parkerson.

The sparkling new restoration of La Piscine will also debut, along with Amores perros, Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s To the Ends of the Earth, Cate Shortland’s Lore, both Oxhide films, Moonstruck, and much more.

See the full list of August titles below and more on The Criterion Channel.

Abigail Harm,...

Director Richard Donner, who died on Monday at age 91, was once compared to Victor Fleming (“Gone with the Wind”) and Michael Curtiz (“Casablanca”), old-school filmmakers who worked hard to give their studio bosses what they wanted (and to give the public what they thought it wanted).

Donner may have come into his own as a hit-maker during the New Hollywood of the 1970s, but no one ever accused him of being an auteur. He made accessible entertainments — and if that were an easy task, everyone would have done it — and helped usher in the modern era of superhero cinema with 1978’s “Superman,” a thrilling and utterly unironic take on the comic-book icon that feels more influential to contemporary moviemaking with each passing year.

Born Richard Donald Schwartzberg in the Bronx, Donner moved to Los Angeles in the 1950s with hopes of becoming an actor. He was soon mentored by director Martin Ritt,...

Richard Donner, the prolific filmmaker best known for directing blockbusters like Superman, Lethal Weapon, and The Goonies, died on Monday, The New York Times reports. He was 91.

Donner’s wife, film producer Lauren Shuler Donner, confirmed the director’s death. However, she did not reveal a cause of death.

Several filmmakers memorialized Donner on Twitter, including Edgar Wright, who wrote that the director’s “big heart & effervescent charm shone in his movies through the remarkable performances of his cast, which is no mean feat.”

Richard Donner's big heart & effervescent charm...

Director-producer Richard Donner, best known for helming the “Lethal Weapon” film series, “The Goonies” and the original “Superman” film, died on Monday. He was 91.

Donner’s production company confirmed news of his death to Variety, though the cause was not disclosed.

Though not his first bigscreen effort, his big feature break came with 1976’s “The Omen,” starring Gregory Peck and Lee Remick. Thereafter, he brought his craftsmanship to the first “Superman.” He also branched out into producing, usually with his wife Lauren Shuler Donner — he executive produced the huge 2000 success “X-Men” and later the prequel “X-Men Origins: Wolverine.” But his career was highlighted by the “Lethal Weapon” series, starring Mel Gibson and Danny Glover, which elevated him to the ranks of directors generating more than a billion dollars in box office.

Born Richard Donald Schwartzberg in the Bronx, he attended Parker Junior College and then NYU, where he majored in business and theater.