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The film is based on the true story of a Long Island school superintendant (Jackman), his “assistant superintendent for business” (Janney) and the embezzlement scheme they concocted as they stole millions of dollars from school funds. All of this happened under the watch of a clueless school board. Here’s a snippet from my review: “Jackman and Janney are the perfect match to carry “Bad Education” forward, both delivering darkly comedic performances....

Is this a dumbing down of the masses? I don’t think so, it’s more an outright extinction of the old-school cinematic experience and a sucker punch to cultural perseverance. People now go to the movies for a different kind of experience. The culture has drastically shifted to television. Soderbergh saw the writing on the wall, telling an audience at the San Francisco International Film Festival, “The meetings have gotten pretty weird....

Its been many years since I stopped counting the number of movies I would watch in any given year. I’d say, between Sundance, Cannes and Toronto it must be around 120 and probably another 150+ or so outside the festival circuit. So, maybe, tops, 300. Richard Linklater seems to be the movie-watching king though. I unearthed a 2014 profile on Linklater by The New Yorker in which the “Boyhood” director says he used to watch a whopping 600 in his early twenties....

The usual suspects are named, most of them at least, but the research behind this piece is rather lazy. There’s a lot of wasted space for films that won’t even be seen this year. They list Luca Guadagnino’s “Bones and All” as a possibility. However, all they had to do was email the director, who told us last week that he won’t be at Cannes since he’s shooting “Challengers” in May and June....

Terminator: Dark Fate, is scheduled to open in theaters on November 1, 2019, reuniting both Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton for the first time since 1991’s “T2: Judgement Day” Directed by Tim Miller (Deadpool), the new story will introduce new characters played by Mackenzie Davis (Blade Runner 2049, Halt and Catch Fire), Natalia Reyes (Lady, La Vendedora de Rosas), Gabriel Luna (Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.), and Diego Boneta (Scream Queens, Rock of Ages)....

The AV Club has ranked all nine of Cameron’s films. I can’t say I agree with the ranking. “Titanic” is too low and “Avatar: The Way of Water” (#4) way too high. It’s interesting how after more than 40 years of filmmaking, Cameron has only managed to release none films in his career. Damn you, Avatar! Cameron is 68, he still has quite a few films left in him, but I hope he doesn’t revert to only making ‘Avatar’ for the rest of his career....

Now, in an interview with Vulture, Gray elaborated further, implying, as suspected, that part of the studio’s interference had to do with Brad Pitt’s voiceover narration: “I did not have final cut, so I could not say, ‘I don’t like it. That’s the way it is. […] Now, I was very upset about it because, as the writer-director, I felt that my view should win the day,” he said. “And when people start coming up to you and saying, ‘Why’d you do all that stupid voice-over?...

Gunn is just not having it that Coppola and Scorsese, two of the greatest filmmakers of all-time, don’t like his brand of moviemaking, so much so that he’s decided, yet again, to sound off, or vent, whatever you want to call it, on Instagram: “Many of our grandfathers thought all gangster movies were the same, often calling them ‘despicable,’” he wrote. “Some of our great grandfathers thought the same of westerns, and believed the films of John Ford, Sam Peckinpah, and Sergio Leone were all exactly the same....

Leto potentially garnering and Oscar nod for ‘Gucci’ would only mark the fourth time an actor has been up for both an Oscar and a Razzie for the same performance; he would be joining the ranks of James Coco in “Only When I Laugh”, Amy Irving in “Yentl” and, just last year, Glenn Close in “Hillbilly Elegy.” Back to Leto, on 11.25.21 I wrote: “All hail Jared Leto as Paolo Gucci....

A whistleblower came to WoLF telling them that last month’s vote “was very close”. “There’s a lot of dissent” from the planned change, the source added. Of course, the dissenting members of the LAFCA will remain quiet and not publicly express their negative attitude towards the gender-neutral switch. If they did then they’d probably be ridiculed and even booted from the group. WoLf executive director Mahri Irvine went on to add something that seems a little wobbly to me, but she claims to base this on research data: With their gender-neutral announcement, the LAFCA virtue-signaled how boldly resistant they were to the patriarchal norms....

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“There are wonderful studios out there, but Universal has made it a mandate to release original films,” Shyamalan stated today about the new deal. “They are the best at finding an audience for new stories with unexpected tones. I believe original films are crucial to the longevity of the theatrical experience. I am so excited to be working with them again and bringing new stories to the movie screen for years to come....

The upcoming Disney streaming service is bound to become an arch nemesis for Netflix. The cancellation of “Daredevil,” Netflix’s most popular Marvel show, will no doubt have fans raging, but chances are that the series will come back on Disney+ in 2019, a streaming site that is set to have all the Marvel, Lucasfilm, Disney and 20th Century Fox films (when that merger eventually happens.) In news that had rocked the industry to its core, Disney announced late last year that it would, eventually, be pulling its movies from Netflix and start a new streaming service solely composed of the Disney content — past, present, and future — which actually is pretty gigantic and could easily fill any streaming service....

Guaranteeing 193 million subscribers a new feature every week in 2021 isn’t the easiest thing to accomplish, especially with productions being postponed/delayed left and right all around the world, but the 71 movies announced today by Netflix will do just that. I’ve rummaged through the 71 titles, some like duds, others are majors question marks, but I found 10 movies, across various different genres, that I can’t help but get very excited for....

An interesting title that kept popping upthat will not be part of the 2020 edition is Christian Petzold’s “Undine,” for the simple reason that it has already been announced as being part of the competition for this February’s Berlin Film Festival. Another two titles that can also be taken out as candidates for Cannes include “Raw” director Julia Ducourneau’s “Titane,” and Miguel Gomes’ “Selvajaria,” both in pre-production. And so, without further ado, here is the most up-to-date list of possible Cannes 2020 competition titles....

Here’s an excerpt from an interview Refn did on the Deadline podcast: “Hollywood is very seductive and intoxicating, but it’s also a system that’s falling apart desperately. And I think they’re doing it to themselves more than anything else. Who knows? I would love to make something grandiose and big, but I would want to maintain my freedom, my impulse and creative control. The theatrical market is in its own redefinition of existence....

“No Bears,” his latest meta-resistance indictment of Iran, screened today to rousing acclaim. The imprisoned Iranian filmmaker managed to sneak his film into Venice competition just before his detainment in July. Raves are coming in from Variety, Deadline, THR, Screen, IndieWire and many more. So, I guess we should add “No Bears” with the other Golden Lion contenders, which include Todd Field’s “TAR,” Laura Poitras’ “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed,” and Alice Diop’s “Saint Omer....

Neville’s narrative in ‘Dead’ focuses on Welles’ final few decades on earth. The documentary is an attempt to dissect Welles’ controversial and mysterious personality and to explain the experimental style in which Welles’ worked between 1970-1990. Neville’s 98-minute doc is a cinephile’s wet-dream and has its focus concentrated on the incalculable amount of Welles’ projects which fell apart and were never completed. There’s a sort of backhanded message in this film that maybe, just maybe, the legendary director never intended to finish these projects in the first place and that he was just experimenting, trying to find something out of nothing or, as Welles says, finding the “happy accidents,” the stuff that happens without intention as you shoot a film....

The only pundit out there brave enough to discount “Everything Everywhere All At Once” from their Oscar predictions is Anne Thompson. In Thompson’s early Best Picture predictions, NOT ONCE did she mention “Everything Everywhere All At Once” as a possible contender. In fact, she decided to add it as a “longshot” a few days after her piece was published. An Academy-voting screenwriter of several top-tier dramas in the ‘90s, emailed me today about my famous (or infamous) mixed review of “Everything Everywhere All At Once”....

Right now, it’s all about “The Fabelmans,” that’s the film practically everyone is predicting to win, but, as mentioned before, it feels a tad to predictable. I have this sneaking feeling Steven Spielberg’s film might lose steam as the season goes on. McDonagh’s film is, technically, better-reviewed than Spielberg’s, but it’s also more artful and may be a little too vague for the Academy’s tastes. Don’t get me wrong, ‘Banshees’ is quite possibly the best film I’ve seen so far this year, and yet it has the kind of risk-taking that might not necessarily adhere to the broad tastes within the academy’s branch of voters....