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This July, HBO Max is bringing you a lot of entertainment, from the highly anticipated streaming releases of Ryan Coogler‘s Sinners and Paul Rudd and Jenna Ortega‘s Death of a Unicorn. However, for the purposes of this article, we are only including the films that are coming to HBO Max next month and have a 90% or higher Rotten Tomatoes score. So, check out the 12 best films coming to HBO Max in July 2025 with a 90% or higher Rotten Tomatoes score.

Woman at War (July 1) Rt Score: 97% Credit – Köggull Filmworks, Solar Media Entertainment, Gulldrengurinn, Vintage Pictures, and Slot Machine

Woman at War is an Icelandic-Ukrainian comedy-drama film directed by Benedikt Erlingsson, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Ólafur Egill Egilsson. The 2018 film follows Halla, an environmental activist trying to destroy the local aluminium business, but her priorities change...

Did you catch the trailer for the upcoming Black Phone 2? There’s some pretty gnarly stuff happening there. Derrickson’s film appears to be a total departure from the tone of the original, opting instead for a blend of Sinister and A Nightmare on Elm Street. It’s bloody. It’s bonkers. It’s pretty damned scary looking, and brimming with subtle horror homages.

Among them is a deep cut sequence that diehard slasher fans will surely lose their minds over. Whether it’s intentional or not, the scene where Ethan Hawke’s Grabber is skating across the ice with an axe toward the camera calls to mind one of the best, yet often forgotten, slasher movies around. Luckily, the film is now streaming free online, so you can travel back to 1983 and relive one of the earliest and best slasher entries. Read on as we explore more about...

JFK’s grandson has criticized American Crime Story producer Ryan Murphy’s upcoming show, American Love Story, clarifying his family’s lack of involvement. Murphy is one of the biggest names in TV, creating big-name shows like American Horror Story and Glee. In 2021, Ryan Murphy's TV show, American Love Story, was announced. It will follow the anthological format of his past shows, focusing on famous romantic relationships. The first season will follow the relationship of John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy.

Jack Schlossberg, the grandson of John F. Kennedy, has taken to Instagram to criticize Ryan Murphy’s American Love Story series, which will focus on the romance between JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy. He is unhappy that the show is being made and wants people to know that the Kennedy family is not involved with the show. In his video, Schlossberg said this:

Lately, my news feed has...

General delegate Thierry Fremaux bristled at the notion that Cannes Film Festival always selects the same filmmakers for its Competition, saying that “it’s really not true.”

At the pre-festival press conference, Fremaux was asked why the Dardenne brothers are in Competition for the ninth time, with their film The Young Mother’s Home.

“This question hides another one,” said Fremaux, mimicking those who say “‘the Dardenne brothers yet again, it’s always the same people!’”

“If you look at the statistics, it’s not,” said Fremaux, citing the first-time filmmakers in Competition this year, including Ari Aster with Eddington, Carla Simon...

Movie sets can be tense places. Between Hollywood-size egos, similarly massive budgets at stake and all the ways things can go wrong, tensions are bound to flare. It can lead to anything from strong words to actual fists thrown. Like when…

5 George Clooney Choked David O. Russell on the Set of ‘Three Kings’

It’s no secret that, in Clooney’s words, Russell is a “miserable f--k” to work with, and he found that out firsthand on the set of Three Kings. Clooney got fed up with Russell bullying extras, “so I went over and put my arm around him. I said, ‘David, it’s a big day. But you can’t shove, push or humiliate people who aren’t allowed to defend themselves.’ He turned on me and said, ‘Why don’t you just worry about your f---ed-up act? You’re being a d--k. You want to hit me?...

[Editor’s note: This story was originally published on April 10, 2025 when the first lineup announcement for this year’s Cannes Film Festival was released. It has been updated today to include two new additions to the competition section, including Lynne Ramsay’s “Die My Love.” It was also updated on May 8, 2025 to account for one new addition to the competition slate.]

Updated, April 23, 2025: As promised when the Cannes lineup was first released on April 10, 2025, the festival has now added two more films to its official competition slate, including Lynne Ramsay’s “Die My Love.” With that addition, this year’s competition lineup now includes seven films directed by women, tying 2023’s then-record-breaking slate of female directed-films. Our original story follows, with an update below in the “2025” section of our official breakdown.

It’s a tradition I long ago grew weary of: waking up early on an April morning to see how few women filmmakers had made it into Cannes’ competition section. For a long time, the festival seemed destined to stall out with just four films directed or co-directed by women in the section. Hell, Cannes didn’t...

Since premiering in 1597, William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet has endured as one of the greatest and most tragic love stories ever written. It's been performed countless times all over the world. On Broadway alone, there's been a grand total of 37 productions. Since the Tony Awards were established in 1947, there have been six revivals up for consideration, and all were snubbed for the prize.

1951: starring Douglas Watson and Olivia De Havilland; directed by Peter Glenville 1956: starring John Neville and Claire Bloom; directed by Robert Helpmann 1962: starring John Stride and Joanna Dunham; directed by Franco Zeffirelli 1977: starring Paul Ryan Rudd and Pamela Payton-Wright; directed by Theodore Mann 1986: starring Rene Moreno and Regina Taylor; directed by Estelle Parsons 2013: starring Orlando Bloom and Condola Rashad; directed by David Leveaux

A seventh revival is in the running at the 2025 Tonys. Will it be lucky this time around? The...

If houses could talk, the one in David Fincher’s Panic Room would have both plenty and very little to say about the Altmans. In this 2002 film, Jodie Foster and Kristen Stewart’s characters, a recently divorced mother and her young daughter, ended up only living in their Upper West Side “townstone” for a brief period. Nevertheless, their stay was nothing short of eventful. Bizarre and harrowing, these tenants’ domestic nightmare was manifested with technical boldness and performed with dramatic flair. Today, Fincher’s endeavor in popcorn filmmaking isn’t held anywhere in the same regard as his other works, but even so, beneath Panic Room’s polished surface lurks a story teeming with texture.

David Koepp’s script for Panic Room sounds like an update of Lady in a Cage, that 1964 film where Olivia de Havilland’s rich character becomes trapped within her home’s built-in elevator, and is...

On July 6, 2022, one of Hollywood's most iconic actors passed away at the age of 82.  Best remembered for his Oscar-nominated performance in "The Godfather" (1972), James Caan's career spanned almost 60 years of theatrical and television work.

Born in the Bronx on March 26, 1940, Caan made his TV debut on an episode of "Naked City" in 1961, and his film debut two years later in an uncredited role in Billy Wilder's "Irma la Douce." He soon made a name for himself co-starring alongside such Hollywood legends as Olivia de Havilland in "Lady in a Cage" (1964) and John Wayne and Robert Mitchum in "El Dorado."

In 1971, he earned his sole Primetime Emmy nomination for his title role in the tearjerker "Brian's Song," and the following year achieved an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor, for his memorable turn in "The Godfather." This was the role with which he became most identified; however, over the next half century,...

The 2020s are a new golden age for horror. The once-derided genre is gaining long-deserved respect and even the red carpet treatment. In 2024, A-list stars took prominent roles in some of the year’s best and scariest flicks. Heretic featured Hugh Grant as the cheerful cult leader-slash-college professor-slash-titular heretic terrorizing Mormon missionaries. Brat Pack alum Demi Moore tackled the Hollywood machine in the gut-wrenching body horror The Substance. This time, it’s John Lithgow and Geoffrey Rush, two long-established, serious actors, who have charged into the horror renaissance, this time tackling an especially scary subject — senility and senior abuse.

Directed by James Ashcroft, a New Zealand actor with an impressive directing roster, The Rule of Jenny Pen is already poised to be the most disturbing horror thriller of the year. Based on the short story of the same name by Owen Marshall, the story follows the imperious and arrogant yet...

Nathan Lane recalled a time when he had to pull Joaquin Phoenix aside to give him an acting tip after noticing his “Beau Is Afraid” co-star getting a little too intense for the film’s comedic undertone.

The conversation came about during Lane’s appearance on Mike Birbiglia’s “Working It Out” podcast last week. The iconic actor and singer discussed how much he loved working with writer-director Ari Aster and Phoenix on “Beau Is Afraid.” However, Lane said Aster gave him a heads up that Phoenix would likely improvise his own lines instead of what was in the script and requested that he keep the “Joker” star on track. Lane said that after three hours of filming, it became clear that was the case and compared Phoenix’s performance to Olivia de Havilland in “Lady in a Cage,” Neither Lane, Aster nor Phoenix were happy with the takes, which...

The Academy Awards have been handing out a Best Actress trophy since the very first ceremony in 1928. Janet Gaynor for a combo of 7th Heaven, Street Angel, and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans was the first recipient for his leading roles.

Since then, only one woman has won the category four times: Katharine Hepburn for Morning Glory, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, The Lion in Winter, and On Golden Pond. Next with three is Frances McDormand. The ladies with two lead wins have included Ingrid Bergman, Bette Davis, Olivia de Havilland, Sally Field, Jane Fonda, Jodie Foster, Glenda Jackson, Vivien Leigh, Luise Rainer, Emma Stone, Meryl Streep, and Hilary Swank. Streep holds the record of most lead nominations at 17.

The oldest winner was Jessica Tandy (Driving Miss Daisy) at age 80. The oldest nominee was Emmanuelle Riva (Amour) at age 85. The youngest winner was Marlee Matlin (Children of a Lesser...

Oscars 2025 (Photo Credit – Prime Video)

The 97th Academy Awards will air on Sunday, March 2, 2025. It will be held at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. The event will be live-streamed in India on Monday in the wee hours of 5 A.M. on March 3, 2025. There are only a few hours left, so the red carpet has been rolled out, champagnes have been kept on ice, celebs are getting ready to turn heads with their glamorous looks, and we are waiting for the new batch of Oscar winners.

Conan O’Brien is going to host the event this year. Everyone is anticipating the big night to celebrate the huge wins. Before the celebration for this year begins, here’s a list of actresses, from Meryl Streep and Jane Fonda to Katharine Hepburn and others, who have won the maximum number of Oscars over the years. Scroll ahead.

Katharine Hepburn (4 wins out of 12 nominations...

Exclusive: Lauren McQueen (Here) has been cast as the female lead opposite Jack Patten in MGM+‘s upcoming series Robin Hood.

Rounding out the main cast of the drama are Lydia Peckham (Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes), Steven Waddington (The Trap), Marcus Fraser (Foundation), Angus Castle-Doughty (Shadow and Bone) and actor/digital creator Henry Rowley. In addition to Patten, they join previously cast Sean Bean.

Lydia Peckham, Steven Waddington, Marcus Fraser, Angus Castle-Doughty and Henry Rowley

From Lionsgate TV and showrunner John Glenn, Robin Hood is described as a sweeping, romantic adventure, a modern take of the classic tale that brings historical authenticity, psychological depth, and a heightened focus on the relationship between Rob and Marian.

In the series, following the Norman invasion of England, Rob (Patten) – a Saxon forester’s son – and Marian, the daughter of a Norman lord – fall in love and work together to fight for justice and freedom.

If you could increase your lifespan by some three and a half years, wouldn't you do everything in your power to do it?

No sweat. All you need to do is win an Academy Award and an extended life can be yours.

Indeed, a Plos One journal study published in 2022 found that the individuals who had won Oscars lived on average 77.1 years, while those who had merely been nominated lived 73.6 years. For further context, overall life expectancy in the U.S. is 77.4 years, so Oscar winners are about on par with civilians, while Oscar losers have shorter lives.

To find out why Oscar winners live longer, Gold Derby reached out to study author Ian Robertson, founding director of the Trinity College Institute of Neuroscience in Dublin, and now a distinguished scientist in the Center for BrainHealth at the University of Texas at Dallas, who has devoted an inordinate amount of...

French actress Juliette Binoche has been named President of the Jury for the 2025 edition of the Cannes Film Festival in May.

The honor, which was announced on Tuesday morning Paris time, will fall exactly 40 years after the Oscar-winning The English Patient star first touched down at the festival with André Téchiné’s Palme d’Or contender Rendez-vous in 1985.

Binoche follows in the footsteps of U.S. director Greta Gerwig whose jury feted Sean Baker’s Anora with the Palme d’Or last year.

“I’m looking forward to sharing these life experiences with the members of the Jury and the public. In 1985, I walked up the steps for the first time with the enthusiasm and uncertainty of a young actress; I never imagined I’d return 40 years later in the honorary role of President of the Jury. I appreciate the privilege, the responsibility and the absolute need for humility,” said Binoche.

Juliette Binoche has been named this year’s Cannes Film Festival jury president.

The news, announced by the festival early on Tuesday morning, comes nearly 40 years after Binoche’s Croisette debut in André Téchiné’s Rendez-vous.

The French star won the Cannes best actress prize for Abbas Kiarostami’s Certified Copy in 2010. That same year sheprotested against the imprisonment of Jafar Panahi, brandishing a placard bearing the director’s name on stage.

Binoche has been a frequent attendee on the red carpet through roles innumerous Cannes selections, including Michael Haneke’sCode Unknown in 2000 andHidden in 2005, Olivier Assayas’Clouds Of Sils Maria...

Juliette Binoche, the Oscar- and César-winning actress who’s a regular at the Cannes Film Festival, will serve as its jury president for the 2025 edition. The festival runs May 13 – 24 on the French Riviera, where Binoche will be responsible for overseeing the main competition jury, comprised of an international crop of actors and filmmakers.

The iconic Binoche has been a Cannes mainstay since André Téchiné’s “Rendez-vous” made her the belle of the festival in 1985. That’s exactly 40 years ago come this year’s Cannes. In other words, Binoche was born at Cannes. She’s taken many projects to the festival, including the films of Michael Haneke and Claire Denis, and she won Best Actress for Abbas Kiarostami’s “Certified Copy” in 2010. Last year, she gave Meryl Streep (perhaps the equivalent of an actress of Binoche’s stature here in the United States) the Honorary Palme d’Or. In 2023, filmmaker Anh Hung Tran...

Touting her lifelong “love affair with the camera,” the Cannes Film Festival announced Monday that Oscar-winning actress Juliette Binoche has been named president of the 2025 main competition jury. The 78th edition of the festival will run from May 13th to 24th.

Binoche, 60, is the winner of best actress prizes from all three of the major international film festivals. She first walked on the Cannes red carpet with her early role in André Téchiné’s “Rendez-vous,” which caused a stir at Cannes 40 years ago.

The Paris-born actress quickly made her name as an international star, appearing in acclaimed French and English-language dramas such as “The Unbearable Lightness of Being,” “Three Colours: Blue,” “Damage” and “The English Patient,” for which she won an Oscar and a BAFTA in 1997.

“I’m looking forward to sharing [my] life experiences with the members of the jury and the public,” Binoche said in a statement. “In 1985, I...

Ahoy, and meet the granddaddy of all pirate movies. Every swashbuckling film made after 1935 owes a debt of booty to Captain Blood, the Michael Curtiz-directed pirate adventure. It popularized the genre for decades to come and made a star out of its leading buccaneer, Errol Flynn.

Warner Bros., inspired by the success of other recent swashbuckling period dramas such as The Count of Monte Cristo, decided to set Rafael Sabatini's novel before the cameras with a pair of untested leads: Flynn and Olivia de Havilland. Though dated by 21st-century standards, the movie's legacy as a genre-setting touchstone, along with its old Hollywood craftsmanship, still makes it a worthy watch today. While Hollywood had produced swashbuckling pirate films before (including a silent version of Captain Blood in 1924), Captain Blood defined the genre ever after.

Captain Blood Invented the Modern Swashbuckling Movie The Film Popularized the Genre

Image via Warner Bros.

Classic Hollywood was a pinnacle time for some of the most infamous on-screen duos, such as John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara, Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland, and Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy. While the pages of cinema history are full of notable pairs, one dynamic duo, Humphrey Bogart and Bette Davis, deserves to be at the top of the ranks. Ironically, it's also one that doesn't really come to mind when discussions of "all-time best on-screen duos" happen.

Warning: This article discusses topics of racism, violence, and death.

The 1960s is a great era for murder mystery movies. The decade is remembered for several classic movies everyone must watch in their lifetime, and while the earliest murder mystery films are typically from the ‘40s and ‘50s, the subgenre truly blooms in the ‘60s. Plenty of classic 1960s movies were ahead of their time, and to this day, audiences are still enthralled by these old titles.

No murder mystery is the same. Although audiences nowadays are treated to the complex narratives of movies like Knives Out, for example, these ‘60s titles prove that an old-fashioned murder investigation is a timeless concept. From secret villainous protagonists to strained and exhausted detectives, murder mystery movies from the ‘60s are like no other, and they play a significant part in how the titles we see today are formed.

Hush... Hush, Sweet Charlotte...

The Golden Age of Hollywood was a pinnacle time for iconic duos such as Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy, John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara, and William Powell and Myrna Loy. While there are countless cinematic couples, Errol Flynn and two-time Oscar winner Olivia de Havilland effortlessly stole the hearts of audiences with their genuine real-life friendship and flirtatious on-screen chemistry. Ultimately, these two cemented themselves as one of the most alluring and complex on-screen duos in Hollywood history.

Meryl Streep is the best of the best.

Her performance in Sophie’s Choice (1982) has been voted the greatest Oscar Best Actress winner ever, according to a Gold Derby ballot cast by 21 of our film experts, critics, and editors, who ranked all 97 movie champs.

Diane Keaton ranked second for Annie Hall (1977), with Jodie Foster following in third for The Silence of the Lambs (1991). Liza Minnelli for Cabaret (1972) and Vivien Leigh for A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) rounded out the top five.

At the bottom of the list of the Best Actress winners is Mary Pickford for Coquette (1929). Just above that film in the rankings are Luise Rainer for The Great Ziegfeld (1936), Helen Hayes for The Sin of Madelon Claudet (1932), Loretta Young for The Farmer’s Daughter (1947), and Marie Dressler for Min and Bill (1931).

Another recent Gold Derby poll of cinema experts declared The Godfather (1972) as the greatest Best Picture Oscar winner of all...

The performance by Meryl Streep in Sophie’s Choice (1982) has been voted the greatest Oscar Best Actress winner ever. The results are from a recent Gold Derby ballot cast by 21 of our film experts and editors, who ranked all 97 movie champs.

Ranking in second place is Diane Keaton for Annie Hall (1977). Following in third place is Jodie Foster for The Silence of the Lambs (1991). Rounding out the top five are Liza Minnelli for Cabaret (1972), and Vivien Leigh for A Streetcar Named Desire (1951).

At the bottom of the list of the Best Actress winners is Mary Pickford for Coquette (1929). Just above that film in the rankings are Luise Rainer for The Great Ziegfeld (1936), Helen Hayes for The Sin of Madelon Claudet (1932), Loretta Young for The Farmer’s Daughter (1947), and Marie Dressler for Min and Bill (1931).

Another recent poll had The Godfather (1972) declared as the greatest Best Picture Oscar winner of all time (view...

The Best Picture Oscar nominees of 1936 contained a few stone-cold classics and a large handful of duds. The Academy nominated 10 films for Best Picture that year, with the top honor going to Robert Z. Leonard's three-hour glitzy musical biopic "The Great Ziegfeld". "The Great Ziegfeld" is visually spectacular but kind of mushy as a melodrama, serving more as a fond farewell to its subject (who died in 1932) than a legitimately great film.

The legit bangers nominated that year included Frank Capra's "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town," one of the master director's more notable comedies. Also pretty good were William Dieterle's "The Story of Lois Pasteur" starring Paul Muni, and Jack Conway's delightful screwball film "Libeled Lady" with Powell and Myrna Loy. Conway also directed a serviceable adaptation of "A Tale of Two Cities," which many readers may have watched in their junior high school classrooms.

But...

Feud: Part 2

We kicked off December with a look at the vastly underseen 2019 gem I See You (listen) before heading to Paris for Joel Schumacher’s 2004 adaptation of The Phantom of the Opera (listen). For our third episode of the month, Trace and I are headed to Louisiana for Robert Aldrich‘s unofficial Hagsploitation sequel, Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964).

In the film, Bette Davis plays Charlotte, the “mad woman” recluse who purportedly killed her lover John Mayhew (Bruce Dern) with an axe at a party thirty years earlier. In the interim, she’s been shunned by society and she’s on the cusp of eviction so a new highway can be built on her property.

Enter cousin Miriam (Olivia de Havilland), who arrives to help pack, much to the chagrin of Charlotte’s maid, Velma (Agnes Moorhead in an Oscar-nominated performance) and to the delight of Miriam’s former flame,...

The Golden Age of Hollywood gave moviegoers some of the most iconic on-screen duos, such as John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara, William Powell and Myrna Loy, and Olivia De Havilland and Errol Flynn. Although they reign as favorites among many classic movie fans, Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy are one pair in particular who simply captivated audiences both on and off the big screen.

by Cláudio Alves

This week, I was a guest on The Lone Acting Nominees podcast. Every episode, the show considers a different film whose only Oscar nomination was for one of the four acting categories, going over the individual performance, the picture overall, and the awards season they found themselves within. For my first appearance, Gordon McNulty and I talked about George Cukor's Edward, My Son, a stage-to-screen adaptation from 1949 that earned Deborah Kerr her first Academy Award nomination. Of course, as we all know, she lost to Olivia de Havilland in The Heiress in what was to be one of six defeats in the race for gold. Not that Kerr's record-setting losses are widely mourned. She was never recognized for her best and riskier works, her Oscar sextet making for a terrible introduction to her talent. Still, you have to admire Kerr's big swings in Edward, My Son…...

From Agatha to Elphaba, it’s been a season of witches on film and television. But whatever charms witches conjure in the narratives that entertain us, the Mubi documentary “Witches” shows how ideas about too powerful, too magical women have variously defined and reinforced the contradictions of femininity; and yet also helped women make sense of themselves.

Director Elizabeth Sankey does this using the medium of film itself, telling her own story of a post-partum depression severe enough to require psychiatric treatment through speaking directly to camera, through talking-head interviews with friends and experts alike, and through an archive’s worth of relevant film clips. The more montages Sankey weaves together of girls, mothers, psychiatric patients, and, of course, witches, the easier it is for us to see how our media archetypes cast a spell that can settle deep into our bones.

The process of pulling footage and organizing the...

Did Leonardo DiCaprio face a lawsuit for lack of character research? ( Photo Credit – Instagram )

It turns out that playing a corrupt stockbroker can land you in a courtroom yourself. In 2013, The Wolf of Wall Street had everyone talking—except Andrew Greene, who was fuming. Greene claimed he was the unfortunate muse for Nicky “Rugrat” Koskoff, the shady character who partied hard and lived even harder. His gripe? The movie made him look like a degenerate criminal, and he wasn’t about to let it slide. So, he lawyered up and went straight for Leonardo DiCaprio, Martin Scorsese, and the whole production crew.

Greene’s defamation suit was no small fry. He argued that the filmmakers didn’t just stretch the truth—they didn’t even try to get it right. No deep dives into the facts, no cross-checking, just vibes. His lawyers called it “clear and convincing evidence of reckless disregard” for accuracy.

Kicking off the 12th edition of the International Classic Film Market (Mifc) in Lyon, France, guest speaker Cassandra Moore, VP Mastering and Archive at NBC Universal, discussed her company’s vast catalogue and restoration techniques.

The Mifc runs alongside the Lumière Film Festival, a nine-day event dedicated to heritage cinema, featuring an impressive screening program of over 150 films, mostly classics but also some contemporary titles.

Among them is Steven Spielberg’s “The Sugarland Express,” which NBC Universal restored in time for its 50th anniversary. The film, which won Best Screenplay in 1974 at the Cannes Film Festival, had its newly restored version screened this year at Cannes Classics, the festival’s section dedicated to repertoire cinema.

Moore guided the crowd in Lyon through the restoration process, which took six months. After retrieving the original from the vault, the team inspected the negative and audio elements and created a repair report before getting to work.

It looks like business as usual at Brentwood’s Country Mart.

Laptops and lattes sit on every table at Caffe Luxxe’s patio. Around the corner, a woman corrals two teens near luxury décor shop Hudson Grace. “Let’s go to Goop real quick,” she declares loudly in directing them toward a pitstop at Gwyneth Paltrow’s curated store. The pastry counter at Farmshop has a queue four deep, though the lunch rush is winding down. One wouldn’t be surprised to see Country Mart regulars like Larry David or Jennifer Garner on a quiet, sunny Wednesday afternoon like this.

The quietude of the scene belies the tumult that occurred here just days before. A few feet from Diesel Bookstore’s entrance, this reporter is scanning a window display when a Diesel staffer approaches from a courtyard nearby. “Can I help you?” he asks. Forgive the direct approach, he adds,...

With 11 Emmy nominations, including one for outstanding limited or anthology series, and viewership in the all-time U.S. top 10, Baby Reindeer has proved a massive success for Netflix.

Richard Gadd’s dramatic thriller — about a woman named Martha (Jessica Gunning) who stalks Gadd’s bartender character, Donny — claims in a title card to be “a true story” based on Gadd’s experience.

But a defamation lawsuit filed in June by the real-life Martha, Fiona Harvey, alleges that Baby Reindeer is not as true as it claims. Unlike Martha, Harvey never went to jail for stalking Gadd and has never been convicted of a crime. “[Gadd is] making money out of my misery,” she told Piers Morgan. “He’s the ultimate misogynist.”

The case has led to a splashy legal back-and-forth in which Gadd has admitted in filings that the show “is fictionalized and is not intended to portray actual facts” and Netflix...

Michael Curtiz directed Dodge City, a classic Western praised for its daring cinematography & timeless plot. Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland starred in the successful film, with Flynn fully embracing Westerns after its success. Dodge City remains a masterpiece of classic Westerns, with unique use of composition, color, and a 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating.

American-Hungarian director Michael Curtiz was prolific. With a five-decade-long career from the early 1910s to the early 1960s, he dipped his toes into silent films, talkies, and eventually color movies, directing a total of 178 films. With so many movies produced, they cannot all be masterpieces. However, some separate themselves from the pack, notably Casablanca (1942), The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), or Mildred Pierce (1945). Another lesser-known but just as acclaimed film by the director is the 1939 Dodge City.

Curtiz was also a frequent collaborator of heartthrob Errol Flynn and classic actress Olivia de Havilland. The three worked together on Dodge City,...

1978's The Swarm was called the worst movie ever. This was the case in spite of the fact that it starred MIchael Caine, Henry Fonda, and seven other Oscar nominees. The movie's 9% Rotten Tomatoes score belies its quality, though it still has entertainment value.

The 1978 movie The Swarm, which features a star-studded cast that includes Henry Fonda, Michael Caine, and many other Oscar winners and major celebrities, has been called "the worst movie ever." This is an astonishing fact considering the track record of its cavalcade of major performers. Critical reception for movies featuring these stars has generally been high. In fact, on Rotten Tomatoes, only 10 of Fonda's 41 pre-1978 movies later received Rotten scores.

Michael Caine had also only had 10 Rotten movies before The Swarm. While the iconic star's career has varied wildly between beloved classics and outright flops, he is best known for well-received movies as varied as the...

Over the 96 years of Academy Awards history, over 900 men and women have been honored with acting nominations. On July 4, 2024, the oldest surviving acting winner (or nominee) has turned 100 years old. Our research shows that Eva Marie Saint joins a very short list of centenarians who received Oscar acting nominations, with four winning the award.

A star of stage, radio, TV and film, Saint won the Best Supporting Actress statue in 1955 for her debut movie performance in “On the Waterfront;” she is also the earliest surviving acting winner, and one of the last stars of the Golden Era. She later starred alongside Cary Grant in one of Alfred Hitchcock‘s most acclaimed films, “North by Northwest” (1959), and became known to a younger generation as Clark Kent’s adoptive mother in “Superman Returns” (2006). Although she’s never received another Oscar nomination, she’s earned five Emmy nominations, winning Best Miniseries Supporting Actress...

She received five Academy Award nominations in ten years, winning for Best Actress twice. She was the spunky heroine to Errol Flynn’s dashing adventurer. She was Melanie, the sweet, compassionate counterpart to the spoiled, passionate Scarlett. And she became one of the oldest-living survivors of the Golden Age of Hollywood until her death at age 104 in 2020.

Olivia de Havilland was born July 1, 1916, in Tokyo, Japan, to British parents. Her sister, actress Joan Fontaine, was born 15 months later. Her parents divorced when the girls were young, and her mother eventually settled in California with her two daughters. Growing up, de Havilland enjoyed performing in amateur stage productions. Although she originally planned to become a teacher, a role in one of those amateur productions, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, changed her fate. She was discovered, eventually cast in the Hollywood Bowl production of that play, and then in the 1935 film adaptation.

Although...

He was one of the biggest screen icons and one of the most colorful real-life characters in Hollywood history. Still considered the king of swashbucklers more than 60 years after his death, Errol Flynn’s success was a combination of happenstance, luck and his ability to charm.

Errol Leslie Flynn was born on June 20, 1909, in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia to an affluent family. A natural born rascal, he was thrown out of several private schools, and eventually wandered, working odd jobs. He fell into acting quite by chance when he won the role of Fletcher Christian in the Australian film “In the Wake of the Bounty” (1933). There are conflicting stories of how he landed this part, but it is the film that piqued his interest in acting, and eventually caught the attention of Warner Bros. executives.

In Hollywood, a combination of luck and Flynn’s athleticism and charm landed him the lead...

Airport '77 featured an ensemble cast of legendary older stars, similar to what The Expendables did with action heroes in the 21st century. The star-studded cast of Airport '77, including James Stewart and Jack Lemmon, contributed to its massive box office success. Despite facing competition from Star Wars, Airport '77 was a major blockbuster, grossing $91.1 million worldwide in 1977.

Sylvester Stallone famously assembled a star-studded cast of old-school screen legends for The Expendables, but the classic disaster movie Airport 77 pulled that casting trick first. The Expendables launched Stallones third franchise after Rocky and Rambo with the conceit of bringing all of Hollywoods action movie legends together for one big all-star action epic. Stallone was joined by Jason Statham, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jet Li, Bruce Willis, Dolph Lundgren, and many more. The sequels brought in Jean-Claude Van Damme, Wesley Snipes, Harrison Ford, and Mel Gibson.

While The Expendables is the most iconic...

Updated On April 22, 2024: With the addition of two new films to this year’s competition section, both directed by men, this year’s competition slate now includes 21 films, only four of which are directed by women. That tallies to just 19 percent of this year’s competition titles being helmed by women.

Our original story from April 11, 2024 follows.

Hot off last year’s record-breaking competition lineup — including seven films directed by women, plus an eventual Palme d’Or win for Justine Triet (only the third woman to win the festival’s top prize) — this year’s Cannes Film Festival has returned to old habits. The 77th edition will include (as of today’s announcement) just four films directed by women in the competition section, bringing representation down to 2021 levels (and returning the festival’s female-directed entries to a number that was only hit in 2011).

Among the competition titles announced today:...

Exclusive: Comedian and writer Julian Clary (Julian Clary: Live – Lord of the Mince) will play the title role in this festive season’s London Palladium pantomime Robin Hood, with singer and travel show presenter Jane McDonald (Cruising with Jane McDonald) topping the bill as Maid Marion.

The annual Palladium show, now in its ninth consecutive season, has become an eagerly awaited staple in the West End’s calendar. It runs from December 7 through January 12, 2025. Priority booking opens 10 Am (GMT) April 25.

Last year’s production, Peter Pan, with comedy legend Jennifer Saunders making her pantomime debut as Captain Hook, and with Clary playing Seaman Smee, was a sold-out success, playing 56 performances -often two a day – to an audience of more than 123,000 at the 2,200 capacity variety house.

When tickets went on sale, there was a moment when 90,000 people were in the queue, waiting their turn to book seats.

Since the inception of the Academy Awards, the U.S.-based organization behind them has always strived to honor worldwide film achievements. Their extensive roster of competitive acting winners alone consists of artists from 30 unique countries, three of which first gained representation during the 2020s. The last full decade’s worth of triumphant performers hail from eight countries, while 42.1% of the individual actors nominated during that time originate from outside of America.

The academy’s history of recognizing acting talent on a global scale dates all the way back to the inaugural Oscars ceremony in 1929, when Swiss-born Emil Jannings (who was of German and American parentage) won Best Actor for his work in both “The Last Command” and “The Way of All Flesh.” Over the next three years, the Best Actress prize was exclusively awarded to Canadians: Mary Pickford (“Coquette”), Norma Shearer (“The Divorcee”), and Marie Dressler (“Min and Bill...

David O. Selznick, one of the most famous producers in Hollywood history, almost passed on his most famous movie.

According to Time, Selznick's story editor, Kay Brown, found author Margaret Mitchell's novel "Gone with the Wind" and tried to convince the producer to adapt it into a movie. (You can read her actual note to him here.) But when Selznick first read the synopsis and realized it was a Civil War story, he passed on the project, reportedly because it was too similar to a movie he had recently made, 1935's "So Red the Rose," which was a financial disappointment. No trailers for "So Red the Rose" are available on YouTube or any other legal streaming platform, but this tribute video contains some footage from the film. Watching that, it's easy to see why Selznick may have been hesitant to greenlight "Gone with the Wind" -- there are plenty of surface-level similarities,...

Has any entertainment scripted project ever featured more Oscar winners? Tour our special Valentine’s Day photo gallery to see which 33 Academy Awards champs made appearances on the very popular Aaron Spelling show “The Love Boat.”

For one full decade of 1977 to 1987, ABC could count on its comedy/drama series “The Love Boat” to bring in millions of audience members on Saturday nights. The show would have multiple story arcs (often three for a one-hour episode) with five to 10 celebrity guest stars each time. Some arcs were playing out for laughs, others for romance and the remainder could take on tough issues. The show airs daily on the Decades network and on Sunday afternoons for Me-tv. You can also stream every episode on Paramount+.

Regular cast members would either take command of some segments or be in the backseat on others. The charming actors throughout the decade were Gavin MacLeod...

Feud could explore the controversial friendship-turned-rivalry between Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie, offering an inside look at their lavish lifestyles and on-again-off-again dynamic. The behind-the-scenes feud between talk show hosts David Letterman and Jay Leno would provide an intriguing glimpse into the world of late-night television and the tensions surrounding the competition for The Tonight Show. The bitter rivalry between Elton John and Madonna, filled with snarky comments and public insults, would make for a thrilling season of Feud, showcasing the clash between two iconic pop legends.

There have been several highly-publicized Hollywood controversies that would act as the perfect candidate for upcoming seasons of the anthology series Feud. With the latest season of the Ryan Murphy, Jaffe Cohen, and Michael Zam-created series Feud, focusing on Capote vs. the Swans, and an excellent first season about Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, it begs the question of what other notable...

A Midsummer Night's Dream won Best Cinematography as a write-in at the 8th Academy Awards in 1936. Hal Mohr was honored by the Academy for his work in cinematography through a unique voting campaign. However, the Academy no longer allows write-in votes due to concerns about manipulations of the voting system.

It is considered an honor to win at the Oscars, but 88 years ago, one person managed to win the prestigious award without receiving a nomination. For a brief time during the early years of the award ceremony, the Academy initiated a new system of voting after receiving controversy for ignoring certain performances for nominations. One film involved in this unique voting system was the 1935 film, A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Adapted from the play by William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream looks at the adventures of four young lovers and a troupe of actors who find themselves in a forest inhabited by fairies.

Glynis Johns, most known for playing the high-spirited Mrs. Winifred Banks in Disney’s Mary Poppins, has died. She was 100 years old. Johns’ publicist, Mitch Clem, told ABC Eyewitness News that the legendary actor died of natural causes on Thursday, January 4. She was living in an assisted living facility. Before she played the suffragette in the 1964 Julie Andrews classic, Johns starred in another Disney film called The Sword and the Rose. She was named a Disney Legend in 1998 alongside Mary Poppins co-star Dick Van Dyke. Andrews was named one in 1991, with David Tomlinson (Mr. George Banks) being added in 2002 and Karen Dotrice and Matthew Garber (Jane and Michael Banks) being added in 2004. With the death of Betty White in 2021, Johns became the oldest living Disney Legend. With the death of Olivia de Havilland in 2020, she became the oldest living Oscar nominee for acting. Karen Dotrice, Glynis Johns, Matthew Garber, David...

Greta Gerwig will make history at the next Cannes Film Festival. On Thursday, the festival announced that the Barbie director will lead the jury next year, making her the first American woman to become the jury president.

“As a cinephile, Cannes has always been the pinnacle of what the universal language of movies can be,” Gerwig said in a statement. “Being in the place of vulnerability, in a dark theatre filled with strangers, watching a brand-new film is my favorite place to be.”

The distinction honors her as the second-youngest...

If it seems like Lily Gladstone is winning Best Actress prizes for her acclaimed performance in “Killers of the Flower Moon” multiple times per week, that’s because it’s true. Since the New York Film Critics Circle announced Gladstone as the group’s Best Actress prizewinner on November 30, the 37-year-old star has been awarded Best Actress by the National Board of Review, Boston Society of Film Critics, and Chicago Film Critics Association, and earned Best Actress nominations from the Golden Globe Awards and Critics’ Choice Awards.

“It feels like a lot,” Gladstone tells Gold Derby in an exclusive video interview when asked about her early success during awards season. “It’s really exciting. It’s been a little bit rapid-fire this last week, so I kind of have been joking that I get this news and I intellectualize it and I know it’s going to be waiting down...