Latest Neo-noir Stories
Roman Polanski's lawyers have filed a request in a Los Angeles court asking that criminal charges brought against the filmmaker 30 years ago be dropped. The Oscar-winning director pleaded guilty to a charge of unlawful intercourse with a minor after he was accused of having sex with a 13-year-old girl in actor Jack Nicholson's home in 1977. Shortly before he was due to be sentenced, the French-born Polanski fled the United States and headed to Europe. He has not returned since. The Los...
**1/2 (130m | PG-13) Taking a cue from the wildly successful "Spider-Man" movies, director Christopher Nolan ("Memento") delves deeply into Bruce Wayne's psyche in this fresh reboot for the fallen "Batman" franchise. Returning to the dark roots of the character, half the picture takes place on a spiritual journey before the stoic young billionaire (played with portentous, anguished magnetism by Christian Bale) even dons the now-bulletproof Batsuit (fashioned from experimental...
By Scott Bowles BEVERLY HILLS -- Mark Wahlberg pushes away a bread bowl and drops his head on folded arms. He's clearly a little run-down. His 2-year-old son, Michael, isn't adjusting well to the new baby in the family, 1-month-old Brendan. He has four television projects with HBO. He recently wrapped shooting on Peter Jackson's The Lovely Bones and has been promoting his latest film, Max Payne, even stopping by Saturday Night Live to spoof himself this past weekend. Oh, and he has...
Hollywood producer George Lucas made a surprise appearance at the "Scream 2008" awards event in Los Angeles, Spike TV says. The network said the "Star Wars" creator showed up at the third annual "Scream" awards event at the Greek Theatre Saturday to accept the Comic-Con Icon Award for his career body of work. Other movie industry stars honored included actor Anthony Hopkins, who given the Legend Award, and filmmakers Tim Burton and Wes Craven, who earned Scream Immortal and Scream...
Joel and Ethan Coen's last film, 'No Country for Old Men', won four Oscars and was their biggest box-office hit to date - so, James Mottram asks them, why the long faces? It's 10.30am, the morning after Joel and Ethan Coen's latest film, Burn After Reading, has opened the Venice Film Festival. Carrying huge cups of coffee, the sibling film-makers troop into the appointed hotel room looking like bespectacled hippie academics having bad-hair days. At 53, Joel is the older by three years, and...
By VICTORIA SHOULDIS Joe Pantoliano - that's Joey Pants to his friends and everyone who could be a friend, and that includes you - ended up in pieces, quite literally, in one of his most famous roles, the gleeful psychopath Ralphie Cifaretto on The Sopranos. With his intense yet approachable acting style, Pantoliano has made a strong career for himself in the often fickle world of Hollywood, imbibing his characters - from an early role as the evil pimp Guido in Risky Business to the...
By Ross, Deborah Taken 15, Nationwide Taken is the latest film from the French film-maker Luc Besson and is about American, ex-CIA agent Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) who turns Paris upside down -- 'I'll tear down the Eiffel Tower if I have to!' -- in his search for his abducted, 17-yearold daughter, Kim, although, personally, I wouldn't have bothered. Kim is so irritating. Kim is so excitable and such a pampered flouncer to boot. 'Bryan, ' I'd have said to him if I could, 'you're better off...
By MAL VINCENT By Mal Vincent The Virginian-Pilot Mildly amusing. That's the review for "Burn After Reading." 'Nuff said. If you want to read on, feel free. Amusing is good. In the case of the Coen brothers, however, mild is not so good . The brothers are known for quirky, mischievous and, when in top form, outright devilish comedy-dramas about selfish, foolish people who get into hot water with never a clue. They sometimes kill each other, as in "Blood Simple" (1984). They sometimes,...
By Sophie Morris Today, his films are considered cinematic masterworks - yet David Lynch is still smarting from criticism of his debut, Eraserhead. On the eve of its re-release, the director talks to Sophie Morris No one in Hollywood is shy of self-promotion. David Lynch, though - despite being the man who led a cow through town to advertise his last film - is the person one would least expect to put his name and face to a range of merchandise. Yet, at mid-morning in his Los Angeles...
By MIKE GRUSS FROM THE PEOPLE who brought you "Diamonds in the Raunch: Pro- life Positions Emerge in 'Knocked Up' and 'Waitress' " ... And from the writer of "Believing Is Seeing: The Rhetoric of Redemptive Wager in 'The Polar Express' " ... the story of a man who takes movies seriously. Very seriously. Marc Newman is an assistant professor in the School of Communication at Regent University in Virginia Beach. He has one of those great gigs teaching about the rhetoric of movies. He's been...
