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Flawless has partnered with XYZ Films to sell US rights at EFM on an English-language version of Tom Tykwer’s Berlinale opening night film The Light that used the AI company’s immersive dubbing technology.

The process involves Flawless’s visual translation tool TrusSync, which has been praised by SAG-AFTRA’s top negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, and matches up manipulated lip movements of consenting original actors to a dubbed dialogue track in another language.

The Light is the latest in a growing pipeline of international films to undergo this process that Flawless and XYZ Films have acquired and, in some cases,...

Flawless has partnered with XYZ Films to sell US rights at EFM on an English-language version of Tom Tykwer’s Berlinale opening night film The Light that used the AI company’s immersive dubbing technology.

The process involves Flawless’s visual translation tool TrusSync, which has been praised by SAG-AFTRA’s top negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, and matches up manipulated lip movements of consenting original actors to a dubbed dialogue track in another language.

The Light is the latest in a growing pipeline of international films to undergo this process that Flawless and XYZ Films have acquired and, in some cases,...

Has Hollywood reached peak AI paranoia? This awards season, before Karla Sofía Gascón’s posts on X (formerly Twitter) about George Floyd and Islam became the focus of consternation, the Oscar uproar was centered on the use of artificial intelligence in the tweaking of voice performances in Emilia Pérez — for Gascón’s singing — and in Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist, to improve the pronunciation of Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones’ Hungarian-language dialog.

The virulence of the backlash against such minor and technical applications of AI — used, in both cases, with the full participation and approval of the artists involved — illustrates the widespread perception, inside the film industry and among the general public, that AI is a threat to jobs and to artistic integrity. An AI zero-tolerance policy has become fashionable for celebrities, with the likes of Robert Downey Jr., Glenn Close and Hank Azaria raising the alarm. Distributors have taken...

As of this writing, author Nicholas Sparks has written 23 novels, and every single one of them has been a New York Times Bestseller. His first novel, "The Passing," was published in 1985, and he immediately established himself as one of the world's preeminent pop-romance writers, authoring broad, tragic stories about unquenched longing, suffering lovelorn women, and flawless rescue studs. His 1999 novel "A Walk to Remember" was inspired by the tragic death of his younger sister, killed by cancer at age 33. Sparks' novels, mostly set in North Carolina, are known for their placid, pastoral tones, sweeping melodrama, and weepy endings. 

Hollywood got their hooks into Sparks in 1999 when they adapted his book "Message in a Bottle" into a notable hit starring Kevin Costner. That film made $118 million on a $30 million budget, and major film studios seem to have found a winning formula. Since then, 11 additional Sparks novels have been adapted into films,...

Does AI present an opportunity or challenge for the industry?

That was the question posed today at a Zurich Summit panel featuring Jim Rivera, Chief Product Officer at AI production company Flawless, David Unger, CEO Artist International Group, Chris Jacquemin, Partner & Head of Strategy WME, and Sara Murphy, Producer Fat City.

The answer was largely positive from the panel, while they also acknowledged significant challenges around implementation and ethics.

Rep David Unger expressed optimism about the current direction and also noted the transformational impact of AI.

“I think this is the transitional moment to a new cinematic language that we can’t yet foresee. It’s like the birth of sound. It’s that transformative moment where films will never be the same, and we can’t imagine where they’re going to go, and it’s going to give birth to a whole new generation of creatives and artists...

At present, watching a piece of foreign language content that’s been dubbed in English is an exercise in discomfort.

Thanks to the proliferation of local-language film and TV — brought to us mostly by streaming platforms — the experience of viewing a dubbed Danish crime procedural or a Spanish boarding school soap opera are nightmarish trips to the Uncanny Valley. That’s the term widely used for technology that does not suspend our disbelief and, in fact, takes human resemblance and tosses it into a blender of dystopian nightmares.

Enter Flawless, an AI-driven filmmaking studio that wants you to stream buzzy shows and still be able to sleep at night (sans visions of mismatching mouth movements and brutal scene cuts). Founded in 2018 by multi-hyphenate director Scott Mann and Nick Lynes, Flawless’ proprietary tech TrueSync maps over the faces of actors and delivers translations that are the most impressive we’ve seen...

Director Scott Mann’s thriller Fall, which stars Grace Caroline Currey (Shazam!: Fury of the Gods) and Virginia Gardner (Halloween 2018) as a pair of characters who get stuck at the top of a 2000 foot tall radio tower, was given a theatrical release, but it wasn’t really a break-out hit. It made $21 million worldwide, on a budget of $3 million. More viewers watched it on Amazon, purchased it on Blu-ray or DVD (order it Here), or caught it on Starz or Netflix… and Fall was so successful on Netflix, it was enough to get back-to-back sequels greenlit by Capstone Studios! Mann will be writing and directing Fall 3 himself, but he has decided to hand the helm of the middle installment of this trilogy over another director. Or, as it turns out, other directors. Capstone Studios’ CEO Christian Mercuri has announced that Fall 2 is set to be directed by the filmmaking...

Fear reached dizzying new heights in Lionsgate’s Fall, a survival thriller from the producers of 47 Meters Down that was released in August 2022. Its surprise success means there are not one but two sequels on the way, and today, the Spierig Brothers have been announced to direct Fall 2.

Michael and Peter Spierig (Lionsgate’s Jigsaw, Winchester, Daybreakers) are set to direct the sequel. Scott Mann, who directed and co-wrote the first film, is returning to co-write Fall 2 with Jonathan Frank.

In Fall, “For best friends Becky (Grace Caroline Currey) and Hunter (Virginia Gardner), life is all about conquering fears and pushing limits. But after they climb 2,000 feet to the top of a remote, abandoned radio tower, they find themselves stranded with no way down. Now, Becky and Hunter’s expert climbing skills will be put to the ultimate test as they desperately fight to survive the elements, a lack of supplies,...

Horror and thriller directors Michael and Peter Spierig (Lionsgate’s Jigsaw) are set to direct Fall 2, it was announced by Capstone Studios’ CEO Christian Mercuri. Scott Mann, who directed and co-wrote the first film, is returning to co-write Fall 2 with Jonathan Frank.

Following the successful survival thriller Fall released in 2022 by Lionsgate, Fall 2 will reunite producers Mark Lane and James Harris of Tea Shop Productions (47 Meters Down), Capstone’s Christian Mercuri, David Haring, and Scott Mann via the Flawless banner.

Dan Asma, John Long, and Roman Viaris will also reunite as executive producers alongside Capstone’s Ruzanna Kegeyan. Capstone will finance the sequel, with Fall 2 set to begin shooting in June 2024.

Capstone Global is handling worldwide rights to the franchise. In late 2023, Capstone Studios greenlit both Fall 2 and Fall 3 under the franchise. Mann will return to write and direct the third installment.

“We’re extremely excited to helm the second...

Tech company and AI pioneer Flawless and the UK’s Tea Shop Productions have launched a production partnership in Cannes backed by an initial $100m fund.

Flawless Productions plans to produce and fully finance up to 10 commercial genre features in its first year. Flawless co-founders and co-CEOs Scott Mann and Nick Lynes announce the partnership and are taking meetings here with Tea Shop co-founders James Harris and Mark Lane will run the venture.

Tea Shop, which is currently in production in the UK on the Naseem Hamed boxing biopic Giant with AGC Studios and White Star Productions, will continue its own production work,...

Seinfeld is widely considered one of the best sitcoms ever made thanks to the undisputed genius of Jerry Seinfeld. As a standup comedian extraordinare, the celebrity incorporated his masterful and hilarious observations about regular situations and basic human nature to create a show that found common ground with every viewer across the world.

Hollywood comedian Jerry Seinfeld

With a total of 9 seasons and 180 episodes between 1989 and 1998, the show succeeded in not just becoming everyone’s favorite sitcom, but also played a huge role in its creator’s massive net worth.

As per a report in 2024, the actor is now officially a billionaire, and a lot of it has to do with the success of the sitcom. To give further context, the comedian’s financial status is more than the box office collections of two prominent Marvel films.

At Almost 70 years Old, Jerry Seinfeld Is Officially A Billionaire

The numbers have...

January is here and Hulu is rolling out the red carpet all month long! The streamer is heading into the new month (and the new year) with several specials, including the 75th Primetime Emmy Awards, the 2023 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony Special, and “The Golden Bachelor” wedding special, “The Golden Wedding.”

But Hulu will also debut several major new series and films, including its all-new murder mystery series “Death and Other Details” and the new Marvel series “Echo,” which will be available to watch on both Hulu and Disney+.

See The Streamable’s top picks for what’s new this month, and find out everything coming to Hulu in January!

30-Day Free Trial $7.99+ / month hulu.com What are the 5 Best Shows and Movies Coming to Hulu in January 2024? 2023 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony Special | Tuesday, Jan. 2

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame celebrates its new class...

As the aftereffects of the writers’ and actors’ strikes hit streaming in a big way, there’s not a lot of new content to offer subscribers early in 2024. Hulu still has some interesting things to offer in January, though.

The biggest new Hulu Original series in the new year is Death and Other Details, a locked room murder mystery starring Mandy Patinkin as Rufus Cotesworth, who is said to be the world’s greatest detective – at least in this universe. In the new series, Cotesworth comes to the rescue when an unfortunate soul is killed on lavish Mediterranean ocean liner, and he has to team up with the prime suspect (Violett Beane) to solve the crime.

The big Original movie premiere in January is Self Reliance, which follows a middle-aged dude (Jake Johnson) who gets randomly invited into a limo by Brooklyn Nine-Nine star Andy Samberg, and is soon offered...

Director Ryoo Seung-wan’s Smugglers has been acquired ahead of its Gala Premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Flawless, along with XYZ Films and Tea Shop Productions, announced today their acquisition of the South Korean crime-action epic. Deadline reported in May that Flawless, co-founded by filmmaker Scott Mann (Fall), had partnered with U.S. seller and distributor XYZ Films (Run Rabbit Run) and UK producer Tea Shop Productions (47 Meters Down) to acquire rights to foreign-language films and convert them to English for distribution in English-speaking territories.

Ryoo Seung-wan has helmed some of South Korea’s most commercially-successful titles and earned seven nominations from the Grand Bell Awards, the country’s equivalent of the Academy Awards. Set in the 1970s, the film tells the story of a pair of haenyeo — women free divers who harvest shellfish — who are driven to underwater smuggling and must battle it out with a...

This is Part Four of a series about AI and its impact on Hollywood. Keep reading WrapPRO for upcoming stories on AI and screenwriting, animation and production. Level up your entertainment career and subscribe!

A lot of names have been bandied about to replace Daniel Craig as the next James Bond. Henry Cavill. Tom Hardy. Idris Elba. But there’s one actor who’s already synonymous with the role, and he’s nothing if not available: Sean Connery.

Deceased actors have been brought back from the grave before: Carrie Fisher, Paul Walker, Peter Cushing and Harold Ramis, among others, have each been resurrected for the screen, with mixed results, thanks to old-fashioned CGI wizardry. But recent, startling advancements in artificial intelligence promise to deliver far more realistic results than ever before thought possible. According to the experts, the technology needed to create a totally believable deep fake 30-year-old Connery is just around the corner.

Generative AI entertainment tech firm Flawless has named Jen Hollingsworth to the role of chief commercial officer, the company said Tuesday.

Hollingsworth previously spent 15 years at Lionsgate, most recently as COO of its Motion Picture Group. At Flawless she will oversee commercial strategy, which will include collaborating with executives and content creators, as well as overseeing the company’s partners program.

She will report to Flawless co-founders and co-CEOs Nick Lynes and Scott Mann. The co-founders said in a joint statement: “We are thrilled to welcome an executive of Jen’s stature and expertise to Flawless as we embark on the next phase of our growth trajectory — pioneering and scaling generative AI. Jen is well prepared and mission critical to bringing our platform and product to the wider entertainment industry as we all grapple with both the uncontained promise of AI and the transformative, positive realities of our offerings.”

Hollingsworth added,...

The filmmakers behind indie action-thriller “Fall” were facing kind of a big freaking problem.

Lionsgate wanted to pick up the movie for U.S. theatrical release. But “Fall,” a vertiginous white-knuckler about two young women who are in danger of plunging from the top of a 2,000-foot-tall radio tower, was rife with F-bombs — which would result in an R rating, cramping the box office take for the small-budget pic.

The producers of “Fall,” which had a production budget of about 3 million, couldn’t afford to reshoot all the scenes in which the petrified tower-climbers screamed “fuck” (along with various permutations).

The solution? Scott Mann, who directed and co-wrote “Fall,” turned to the artificial-intelligence dubbing technology system developed by London-based Flawless, for which he also serves as co-ceo.

According to Mann, the Flawless team in post-production changed more than 30 F-bombs throughout the movie into PG-13-acceptable epithets like “freaking” along with...

Since announcing her first solo album of new material in more than five years, Beyoncé has yet again taken over the cultural conversation. As always, the legendary musician didn’t disappoint. From the instant hit “Break My Soul” to her photo shoot for British Vogue and making physical copies available for pre-order on her website (sorry, they’re currently sold out), the release of Reniassance has been one of the more refreshing, and exciting, rollouts of the past year. Even an unexpected leak two days before the July 29 release date sparked controversy,...

“The Maze Runner’s” Kaya Scodelario, “John Wick’s” Lance Reddick and “Bohemian Rhapsody’s” Ben Hardy are set to lead the cast of sci-fi thriller “Apteros.”

Independent Entertainment have launched international sales on the pic, which is written and directed by Edward Anderson (“Shuttle”). Producer Laura Rister (“Mr Malcolm’s List”) will handle North American rights with Independent Entertainment.

“Apteros” sees a crew of seven astronauts, including science officer Tressie (Scodelario), captain Mitchell (Reddick), systems engineer Wade (Hardy) and their onboard AI, en-route to Mars after bacterial life is discovered on the red planet in the not-too-distant future.

Soon however, a number of unusual events unfold aboard the spacecraft, which is named Apteros, and the crew find themselves divided in a tense psychological battle as they struggle to work out what is happening and realize nothing is as it seems.

Thrown into a desperate tailspin, soon it’s not just the mission at stake,...

If you’re looking for something to watch on HBO Max this month, you may want to prioritize the following titles that are leaving the streaming service throughout February. Below, we’ve assembled a complete list of everything leaving HBO Max in February, which ranges from Oscar-winning blockbusters to stone-cold classics to delightful comedies.

Noteworthy films leaving HBO Max this month include “Dunkirk,” “Blade Runner 2049,” “Amistad,” “Pitch Perfect,” “Independence Day,” “Godzilla: King of the Monsters,” “The Goonies,” “Joker” and “The Lego Batman Movie.” It’s also last call for DC films “Wonder Woman,” “Aquaman,” “Birds of Prey” and “Suicide Squad.”

The end of February will also mark the departure of a number of documentary series that aired on CNN, including “The Bush Years,” “The Seventies,” “The Eighties,” ”The Nineties,” ”The Movies” and ”The Story of Late Night.”

Check out the full list of everything leaving HBO Max in February 2022 below.

Exclusive: We have learned that Andie MacDowell is set to star in the female ensemble My Happy Ending, based on the Israeli play, Sof Tov by Anat Gov.

The Golden Globe nominated Four Weddings and a Funeral actress will play a Hollywood star who finds herself in a British hospital room with three other women who help her with the most difficult role she has ever played…herself.

The pic is directed by Israeli team, Sharon Maymon and Tal Granit and will mark the third collaboration between producers and directors after The Farewell Party, which premiered in Venice and Toronto Iff 2014 and Flawless which premiered at 2018 Tribeca Iff. Maymon co-wrote the screenplay for the Oscar winning live action short, Skin.

My Happy Ending also stars BAFTA winner Miriam Margolyes,(The Age of Innocence, Harry Potter), Sally Phillips (Bridget Jones), Rakhee Thakrar (Sex Education), Tamsin Greig (Episodes), Tom Cullen (Weekend), Michelle Greenidge, and David Walliams (Little Britain).

MacDowell is currently starring in Netflix’s original series Maid, inspired by Stephanie Land’s New York Times bestselling memoir, alongside her daughter Margaret Qualley, and from Molly Smith Metzler, LuckyChap Entertainment and John Wells Productions. Shortly after its global premiere, the series quickly made history as one of the streamer’s most-watched limited series of all time. During the week ending Nov. 7, the series clocked 41.3M hours watched on the streamer in its sixth week. MacDowell’s feature credits include IFC’s No Man Land, Searchlight horror pic Ready or Not, Four Weddings and a Funeral, and Sex, Lies and Videotape, which won the Palme d’Or in 1989 and received an original screenplay Oscar nomination.

My Happy Ending is an Israeli/UK co-production bringing together producers Talia Kleinhendler & Osnat Handelsman-Keren/Pie Films, and Hannah Leader/Bbm (Gosford Park) and Daisy Allsop/Archface Films (Tell It To The Bees starring Anna Paquin).

“Watching her iconic performances over the years, Andie MacDowell’s ability to combine deep emotion and vulnerability with comedy made her the perfect choice for this role. We couldn’t be more excited to work with her and this wonderful ensemble of actors”, say producers Kleinhendler and Handelsman-Keren.

The movie just wrapped production in Wales. The film is financed by Media Finance Capital and United King Films, and received one of the first grants from the new UK Global Screen Fund, financed by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Dcms) and administered by the BFI.

Moshe Edery, Tmira Yardeni, Arik Kneller and Bonnie Timmermann are executive producing along with Mfc’s Charles Dorfman and Marlon Vogelgesang. WME Independent are selling domestic rights.

MacDowell is repped by The Gersh Agency and Rms Productions.

The summer movie season may be winding down, but HBO Max is keeping the movie ball rolling in September 2021. HBO Max’s list of new releases this month is heavy on the film side of things – both in library and original offerings.

Two Warner Bros. films of note arrive this month. The James Wan-directed horror tale Malignant premieres on Sept. 10 and is followed by Clint Eastwood’s Cry Macho on Sept. 17. The next installment in Adventure Time: Distant Lands (which is kind of like a film series!) is titled Wizard City and opens the month on Sept. 2

Of course, it wouldn’t be a new month of HBO Max releases without some interesting evergreen Warner movie titles. Sept. 1 finds all eight Harry Potter movies returning to WarnerMedia’s streaming service. They will be accompanied by The Goonies, The Evil Dead, Cloverfield, and more. Later on in the month, Mortal Kombat (Sept.

British filmmaker Scott Mann directed Robert De Niro in the 2015 action thriller “Heist.” The film was a critical and box office fop ($4 million at the box office on a $15 million budget), so no one could’ve predicted at the time the film’s greatest legacy would be an artificial intelligence that automatically dubs movies into any language. Mann and his business partner Nick Lynes unveiled their new dubbing company Flawless this week in a feature published by Input Magazine. The company uses AI to digitally recreate and edit an actor’s face so that his or her mouth movements match the dub, thus maintaining the authenticity of the performance.

Mann was inspired to create Flawless after he saw a foreign-language dub of “Heist.” The director remembered how obsessive De Niro was in the creation of the character, going so far as to analyze what cufflinks would be best for his character to wear.

Amazon Prime Video has confirmed that several original shows will be debuting new episodes on the streaming service in May, including the third season of the crime drama “Sneaky Pete”; the sophomore season of the seriocomic “Fleabag” ; and the first installment of the supernatural “Good Omens.”

Likewise, there will be plenty of movies making their first appearances on Amazon Prime Video in May including the horror film “Suspiria”; a slew of films in the “Friday the 13th” franchise; and several entries in the “Night of the Living Dead” series.

Below is the full schedule of everything that is coming to Amazon Prime Video in May 2019. Unlike Netflix, Amazon does not disclose the shows and movies leaving the service in any given month. We’ve done some digging and unearthed a few titles that will be exiting Amazon Prime Video in the first week of May.

See Netflix schedule: Here’s...

Prom night is a relatively new concept for Israeli youth, one spurred on by the import of American teen TV series like Beverly Hills, 90210 during the mid-1990s. Even overseas, this end-of-high-school ritual is no less given to extravagant gestures. In the surreal first scene of Sharon Maymon and Tal Granit's Jerusalem-set Flawless, a male student rides a horse through empty school hallways, arriving at a gymnasium where he asks a girl to prom and then whisks her away like Prince Charming might Cinderella.

This grandiloquent action makes many hearts flutter, but breeds resentment in Mika (Netsanet Zenaneh Mekonen) and Keshet ...

Prom night is a relatively new concept for Israeli youth, one spurred on by the import of American teen TV series like Beverly Hills, 90210 during the mid-1990s. Even overseas, this end-of-high-school ritual is no less given to extravagant gestures. In the surreal first scene of Sharon Maymon and Tal Granit's Jerusalem-set Flawless, a male student rides a horse through empty school hallways, arriving at a gymnasium where he asks a girl to prom and then whisks her away like Prince Charming might Cinderella.

This grandiloquent action makes many hearts flutter, but breeds resentment in Mika (Netsanet Zenaneh Mekonen) and Keshet ...

Coachella turned 20 this year, but prior to 2018, no African-American woman had headlined the arts and music festival’s main stage. It feels appropriate that Beyoncé, quite possibly the biggest artist in the world today, was the one to make history, and in doing so, she metaphorically took the festival’s 250,000 ticket holders to school: Featuring a song list peppered with empowering quotations from black intellectuals and a set designed to look like the most elaborate Ncaa halftime show of all time, Ms. Knowles-Carter celebrated historically black colleges and universities — and black identity and excellence — in a space, and to an audience, that no one had before.

Not content to dominate just one festival cycle, Beyoncé released the self-directed “Homecoming” documentary (and its accompanying live album) in between weekends one and two of Coachella 2019, reminding fans of her show-stopping sets from the previous year, and drawing back the curtain on what...

RuPaul’s Drag Race alum Shangela lip-synced to a career-spanning medley of Beyoncé songs at the GLAAD Awards. Beyoncé and her husband Jay-z received the Vanguard Award at this year’s ceremony.

Shangela put her history of intensive dance performances and love for Beyoncé to work on the GLAAD stage. The drag superstar was flanked by four crop top-wearing male dancers as she powered through a mixture of Destiny’s Child and solo Beyoncé hits, including “Bootylicious,” “Partition,” “Single Ladies” and “Flawless.” In the crowd, Beyoncé was caught cheering throughout...

Beyoncé and Jay-z accepted the Vanguard Award from GLAAD on Thursday night, at the advocacy group’s 30th annual Media Awards, held at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles, California.

Approaching the stage to the couple’s 2003 hit “Crazy in Love,” the duo gave short, but heartfelt, speeches. Jay-z spoke for less than two minutes, saying, “This journey is filled with highs, lows and a lot of learning.” He used his time to honor his mother Gloria Carter, a lesbian whose story was shared on Jay-z’s “Smile,” and who...

The film will compete in Tribeca’s International Narrative Competition section.

Cohen Media Group has acquired Us rights to Anne Fontaine’s racy new comedy-drama White As Snow, ahead of its premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival (April 24-May 5) next month.

The film will compete in Tribeca’s International Narrative Competition section alongside films including Sharon Maymon and Flawless’s Flawless, Bora Kim’s House Of Hummingbird and Scott Graham’s Run.

A contemporary re-telling of the Snow White fairytale with a comedic and erotic edge, the feature co-stars Isabelle Huppert as evil stepmother Maud opposite Lou de Laâge as...

Peter Strickland’s In Fabric among inaugural Tribeca Critics’ Week sidebar.

New work from Werner Herzog, the directorial debut of Christoph Waltz and a documentary about the late Inxs front man Michael Hutchence are among the line-up at the 18th Tribeca Film Festival presented by At&T, which includes the inaugural Tribeca Critics Week.

Unveiling the programme on Tuesday (5), festival brass noted that female directors account for half of the three competition strands. The feature programme includes 103 films from 124 filmmakers, of whom 42 are first-timers, and 19 return to Tribeca.

Some 40% of the feature films have one or more women directors, 29% are directed by people of color,...

Being a celebrity is big business, and thanks to the beauty industry, it's only gotten bigger.  Hollywood stars like Rihanna, the owner of Fenty Beauty, Kylie Jenner, the selfie guru behind Kylie Cosmetics and Gabrielle Union with her hair-care line, Flawless by Gabrielle Union, are making major moves in the beauty industry with successful brands and innovative products. It's a relatively new phenomenon, as celebs are consciously moving away from collaborative efforts with big name cosmetics and hair companies and towards entrepreneurship. They want to call the shots. It's also understandable. The people that spend an hour plus in makeup and hair everyday certainly have a good grasp of what works...

Butler plays a workaholic whose son’s cancer forces him to become a better man in this treacly drama

“Reach deep inside and feel that small part of you that’s predatory, or there’s the door,” says Dane Jensen, played with bluster by Gerard Butler early in The Headhunter’s Calling. Dane is a ruthless Chicago-based corporate headhunter, and he’s training a new kid on the job. In closing, he tells the newbie to watch and learn from Oliver Stone’s Wall Street. He should really be talking to the film’s writer, Bill Dubuque (The Judge). The Headhunter’s Calling, the directorial debut of producer Mark Williams (Flawless), boasts none of that classic’s verve.

It starts out like most financial thrillers do, with our egomaniacal hero telling us in voiceover that he peddles “the American dream”. Dane is presented as the type of workaholic who starts...

Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie cares deeply about American politics, not only because of the years she's spent here. "What happens in America, just by virtue of being really the most powerful country in the world, will in some ways affect other people who are not necessarily Americans," the Americanah author and 2008 MacArthur Grant recipient tells People. Adichie, who splits her time between the States and Nigeria, has been profoundly frustrated by the news coverage of the 2016 election. "It's sad reputable media houses have to say things like, 'We have to make sure that President Obama did not found Isis,...

Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie cares deeply about American politics, not only because of the years she's spent here. "What happens in America, just by virtue of being really the most powerful country in the world, will in some ways affect other people who are not necessarily Americans," the Americanah author and 2008 MacArthur Grant recipient tells People. Adichie, who splits her time between the States and Nigeria, has been profoundly frustrated by the news coverage of the 2016 election. "It's sad reputable media houses have to say things like, 'We have to make sure that President Obama did not found Isis,...

Biopic based on the life of Jacques Cousteau.

The 64th San Sebastian Festival (Sept 14-24) is to close with the world premiere of The Odyssey, a film based on the life of Jacques Cousteau, written and directed by Jérôme Salle.

The €35m film looks at the challenging relationship between the underwater exploration pioneer and his son Philippe. The screenplay is based on the books Mon père, le Commandant Jacques-Yves Cousteau, by Jean Michel Cousteau, and Capitaine de la Calypso, by Albert Falco.

Salle is perhaps best known for writing action romance The Tourist, starring Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie, and directing both Cannes 2013 closer Zulu and César-nominated Anthony Zimmer, which starred Sophie Marceau.

The Odyssey stars Lambert Wilson, Pierre Niney and Audrey Tautou in the parts of Cousteau, his son Philippe and his wife, respectively.

Wilson’s, known for performances in Xabier Beauvois’ Of Gods and Men and André Téchiné’s Rendez-vous, will make his...

It was announced just a few days ago that Gerard Butler is taking the lead in personal crisis drama The Headhunter’s Calling. He’ll be joined by Willem Dafoe and Alfred Molina.Butler is starring as a ruthless, hard-charging corporate headhunter called Dane Jensen, who has been surging at the company he works for and is primed to snatch the top job. But then his 10-year-old son falls gravely ill and Jensen’s priorities take a major shift. Dafoe is playing Butler’s boss, the CEO who is planning to retire and hand the reigns to his driven employee. Molina, on the other hand, will be a family-focused engineer who is struggling through unemployment. Mark Williams, a producer on the likes of Flawless and Malice In Wonderland, is making his directorial debut with the film, written by The Judge’s Bill Dubuque and it’ll all start shooting later this month in Toronto.

Gerard Butler is taking a break from action blockbusters to sign up for understated drama The Headhunter's Calling.

The 300 star will lead the directorial debut from Flawless and Malice In Wonderland producer Mark Williams, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The drama focuses on Butler's high-flying headhunter, who is forced to reconsider his work-life balance after his son is taken seriously ill.

Voltage Pictures will attempt to find a buyer for the film - which is written by The Judge's Bill Dubuque - at the Toronto Film Festival later this month.

Elsewhere, Butler is starring in Olympus Has Fallen sequel London Has Fallen as a hard-as-nails Us agent.

London Has Fallen will hit cinemas in January 2016. Watch Butler talk about Olympus Has Fallen with Digital Spy below:...

Taking a break from his run of guns and gung-ho action thrillers and dramas, Gerard Butler is tackling something a little more low-key. He’s signed on to star in The Headhunter’s Calling. Though it sounds like another action-orientated concept, it’s actually the story of a ruthless, hard-charging corporate headhunter called Dane Jensen, who has been surging at the company he works for and is primed to snatch the top job. But then his young son falls gravely ill and Jensen’s priorities take a major shift.Mark Williams, a producer on the likes of Flawless and Malice In Wonderland, is making his directorial debut with the film, written by The Judge’s Bill Dubuque. Voltage Pictures is selling the rights to the film at the Toronto Film Festival and it’ll kick off shooting in the city later next month.Butler has just seen weatherpocalypse thriller Geostorm...

The hand-drawn animation is serene and charming, but the story and characters are so unpleasantly retrograde that I found little enjoyment here. I’m “biast” (pro): nothing

I’m “biast” (con): nothing

I have not read the source material

(what is this about? see my critic’s minifesto)

Maybe it’s because I was not introduced to the beloved Moomins when I was a child. But I don’t see the attraction. Sure, Finnish cartoonist Tove Jansson’s family of hippo-like creatures are odd but gentle bohemians, which should theoretically appeal to me. Yes, the hand-drawn animation is more serene than the CGI onslaught that modern animation tends to be; it’s simple yet charming and reflects the colors and esthetics of the time when this story first appeared in British newspaper comic strips in 1955 (even though the original strips where in black-and-white, of course). But the story and characters are unpleasantly retrograde,...

Anything Elsa: Radford’s Remake Rough Around the Edges

English director Michael Radford, still best known for earlier works 1984 (1984) and the critical darling Il Postino (1994), arrives with his most notable effort since that Demi Moore diamond heist flick, Flawless (2007) with a remake of Argentinean director Marcos Carnevale’s 2005 film, Elsa & Fred. Featuring two iconic American stars in this rehashed material gains Radford a lot of leverage in what’s otherwise a rather feeble claptrap of mounting cliché, though it will indubitably find a strong herd of champions from older audience members hungry for mainstream-minded cinematic vehicles aimed at their sensibilities and starring familiar faces.

In tax-break friendly New Orleans, octogenarian Fred (Christopher Plummer) has recently lost his wife, and is aggravated this his daughter Lydia (Marcia Gay Harden) has taken it upon herself, and with the help of her smarmy husband (Chris Noth), to relocate him to a smaller apartment.

What’s new, what’s hot, and what you may have missed, now available to stream.

streaming now, before it’s on dvd

The Unknown Known: documentary interview with Bush-era insider Donald Rumsfeld is like a horror movie with a calm sociopath at its center [my review] [iTunes UK] The Last Days on Mars: the near-future space-geek atmosphere is very cool, but ultimately it’s just another xerox of Alien [iTunes UK] The Quiet Ones: there aren’t many outright scares here, and when they do come, they are curiously circumspect, but the old-fashioned Hammer Horror atmosphere is appealingly spooky [my review] [iTunes UK]

new to stream

Half of a Yellow Sun: oh what a lovely film! as romance and history, this is by turns funny and tragic, suspenseful and celebratory, and never less than solidly entertaining [my review] [iTunes UK]

streaming now, before it’s on dvd

The Last Days on Mars: the near-future space-geek atmosphere is very cool,...

Might be the most ridiculously cute movie I’ve ever seen, in a way that transforms adorableness into something honest and wise and deeply satisfying. I’m “biast” (pro): nothing

I’m “biast” (con): nothing

I have not read the source material

(what is this about? see my critic’s minifesto)

This might be the most ridiculously cute movie I’ve ever seen. Not cute in a schmalty, sappy, insipid way, but in a way that transforms adorableness into something honest and wise and deeply satisfying, like how the best children’s picture books do. (Indeed, this is based on the series of books by Gabrielle Vincent.) An ineffable sweetness arises as if by accident from this simple story of a mouse, Celestine (the voice of Pauline Brunner), and a bear, Ernest (the voice of Lambert Wilson: Flawless), who overcome the “natural” animosity between their kind to...

Big dogs of both human and fanged varieties played big parts in this week's episode. Let's jump right in!

We start the episode running through the woods at ground level - either I'm rewatching Evil Dead, or we're in one of Bran's kooky dreams again.

Sure enough, Bran (Isaac Hempstead Wright) - who can walk in his dreams, like the kid from A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors - sees the Third Eye Blind Raven, and he tries to shoot it with Jon Snow's (Kit Harington) help. He misses. He hears Ned's voice, then some bratty kid who looks like a Muppet Baby version of Tate from American Horror Story shows up to tell him that he can't kill the raven because the raven is Him. Is this like that "one set of footprints" thing?

Hey - speaking of Brandon Stark, it's time to catch up on...

• Together again! Matt Damon is in talks to sign up with The Monuments Men, George Clooney’s next directorial effort, based on the true story of a crew of art historians and museum curators who infiltrate into Nazi Germany during the end of World War II in the hopes of recovering priceless works of art before the Nazis obliterate them. Clooney, who penned the script with writing partner Grant Heslov, will also star in the film, alongside a pack of unknowns like Daniel Craig, Cate Blanchett, Bill Murray, Jean Dujardin, John Goodman, Hugh Bonneville (Downton Abbey) and Bob Balaban (Moonrise Kingdom...

Synchronicity Entertainment is announcing its arrival in genre films with three horror films with impressive pedigree in Cooties, Due Process and Smiley on its debut slate. Cooties is to star Elijah Wood, Due Process will star John Cusack, and Smiley is already completed and on demand, and was reviewed here. Peruse the press release below!

Los Angeles, California (October 30, 2012) – Synchronicity Entertainment, the new genre film production and international sales label launched by Lisa Wilson and Myles Nestel’s The Solution Entertainment Group has unveiled its debut slate of three new feature films including: the horror film Cooties from the co-creator of the Saw franchise and Insidious writer Leigh Whannell and Paranormal Activity 1 – 4 producer Steven Schneider; the thriller Due Process starring Golden Globe nominee John Cusack (High Fidelity); and the completed psychological thriller Smiley, it was announced today by Ruzanna Kegeyan, Synchronicity’s President of International Distribution.

Executive produced by...

Synchronicity Entertainment has unveiled its debut slate of three new feature films, which include horror project Cooties from writer Leigh Whannell (Saw, Insidious) and producer Steven Schneider (Paranormal Activity franchise) starring Elijah Wood.

From the Press Release:

Synchronicity Entertainment is the new genre film production and international sales label launched by Lisa Wilson and Myles Nestel’s The Solution Entertainment Group. The other two features are the thriller Due Process, starring Golden Globe nominee John Cusack, and the completed psychological thriller Smiley.

Starring Elijah Wood (pictured above; Maniac, The Hobbit), Cooties is produced by top horror film producer Steven Schneider, who is behind the hugely successful Paranormal Activity franchise. Wood is also set to co-produce Cooties with partners Daniel Noah and Josh C. Waller under his new horror film production company, The Woodshed, which recently announced the films Toad Road and A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night.

Cooties is...

Synchronicity Entertainment, the new genre film production and international sales label launched by Lisa Wilson and Myles Nestel.s The Solution Entertainment Group has unveiled its debut slate of three new feature films including: the horror film Cooties from the co-creator of the Saw franchise and Insidious writer Leigh Whannell and Paranormal Activity 1 . 4 producer Steven Schneider; the thriller Due Process starring Golden Globe nominee John Cusack (High Fidelity); and the completed psychological thriller Smiley, it was announced today by Ruzanna Kegeyan, Synchronicity.s President of International Distribution.

Executive produced by The Solution who is arranging the financing for two of the new films, Synchronicity is handling the international distribution rights for the slate and will introduce the films to buyers at the upcoming American Film Market.

Starring Elijah Wood, Cooties is produced by top horror film producer Steven Schneider, who is behind the hugely successful Paranormal Activity franchise including the latest installment,...

Rising star Kellan Lutz (Twilight series, Nightmare on Elm Street) and Oscar nominee Samuel L. Jackson (Best Actor in a Supporting Role, Pulp Fiction,1994) face off in the action-packed, visually stunning thrill ride Arena, available on Blu-ray and DVD on January 2nd courtesy of Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.

How do you make a fortune from the bloodlust of millions? One sadistically savvy businessman (Samuel L. Jackson) has created an empire with his brutal, fight-to-the-death gladiator website. His newest warrior is David Lord (Kellan Lutz), a kidnapped fireman, now imprisoned and forced to fight for his life. To buy his freedom, Lord agrees to do a series of lethal bouts. But as the body count escalates, and with his most challenging battle remaining, Lord unleashes a torrent of bloody carnage and reveals a secret that threatens to tear down the entire enterprise. Also featuring Daniel Dae Kim (TV’s “Lost”) and...

Michael Radford, best known for his work on the Italian-language hit "Il Postino" in the late '90s, has signed on to direct "Castro's Daughter." Though Radford has been chasing that success with middling results over the last 15 years--please see "Flawless" or "The Merchant Of Venice" for evidence--the pedigree behind his next effort shows promise with Bobby Moresco (Oscar-winning screenwriter of "Crash") and Cuban playwright Nilo Cruz (Pulitzer Prizer-winning author of "Anna in the Tropics") penning the script. 'Daughter' will tell the story of Alina Fernandez, Fidel Castro's daughter, who escaped Cuba as a Spanish tourist and went on to…...