State of the Art Cinema exhibition (Film)

Residing at The Strand Gallery, the STATE OF THE ART CINEMA exhibition includes nearly 100 posters, images and photographs – giving a snapshot of British and international films for release in UK cinemas in 2015/16. FDA has also commissioned a unique LEGO® model of a cinema which took 150 man hours to complete and comprises 25,000 LEGO® bricks.

This FREE exhibition is open to the public each weekday until 28 August 2015.

FDA Chief Executive, Mark Batey, said: “We’re thrilled that the new LEGO® model makes such a brilliant centre-piece of this summer’s exhibition, which celebrates all the fun of the cinema as well as highlighting the vital role of creativity and design in connecting films with audiences.”

The exhibition comprises seven sections: Family releases; Coming of Age stories; Action & Adventure; Comedy; Biographies & Documentaries; Thrills & Suspense; and a large section called Britain on Screen containing images from both UK films and international movies that were made in the UK, a global filmmaking hub. Visitors will find one or two iconic classic images among the display too.

STATE OF THE ART CINEMA 2015 is now in its second of two central London residencies this summer. Having previously run at The Coningsby Gallery, this enlarged version is at The Strand Gallery between Tuesday 11 and Friday 28 August.

The exhibition is taking place at the heart of FDA’s celebrations marking the centenary of UK film distribution. Exactly 100 years ago, feature-length films were emerging as a storytelling medium in their own right, two decades after the invention of the cinématographe machine. It was in December 1915 that the fledgling yet ambitious enterprises dedicated to supplying and promoting filmed entertainment founded their UK trade association (now FDA).

For further information on the autumn 2015 release schedule, please visit www.launchingfilms.com.

Notes

• STATE OF THE ART CINEMA is an interactive exhibition offering a snapshot of contemporary film poster design and photography from the UK and around the world. It showcases the skills of graphic designers and typographers and their use of symbols and illustrations, as well as on-set and portrait photographers – all aimed at distilling the essence of a film, its storyline, setting and characters, into a single, coherent, compelling image or montage.

• STATE OF THE ART CINEMA is free of charge to visit. It is currently showing at The Strand Gallery, 32 John Adam Street, London WC2N 6BP. Free colouring/activity sheets for children will be available throughout.

• Established in 1915, FDA celebrates the UK film distribution sector’s centenary year in 2015. Today distribution remains the lynchpin and locomotive of the entire film business – films only come to life when they are actually experienced and shared by public audiences. Discover more about how films and audiences connect at FDA’s dedicated website, www.launchingfilms.info.

• Films released by FDA’s 32 member companies generate 99% of UK cinema admissions. FDA’s President is Lord Puttnam of Queensgate CBE. Copies of the 120-page FDA Yearbook 2015 are available free on request, subject to availability.

TheEntertainmentWebsite.com reaches 100,000 hits!

TheEntertainmentWebsite.com has reached the remarkable number of 100,000 hits (page views) in just over one year since its inception. It’s an amazing milestone in that there are so many film blogs and film websites out there on the internet; this proves that there is room for one more – one that is unique in terms of content and style, and which stands out from the others.

TheEntertainmentWebsite.com covers film, DVD and theatre reviews, as well as the current Box Office figures, upcoming film releases and West End productions, film awards, and Film Trailer of the Week. TheEntertaimentWebsite.com also covers breaking entertainment news – including the untimely death of comedienne Joan Rivers last week.

In the past year alone, TheEntertainmentWebsite.com has covered press conferences for major film releases including Philomena, Saving Mr. Banks, 12 Years a Slave and Red 2. TheEntertainmentWebsite.com has also interviewed actor Alan Cumming to discuss his career and the release of his 2013 film Any Day Now. TheEntertainmentWebsite.com has also been invited to attend the London, Sundance and BFI Flare Film festivals, the announcement of the 2014 BAFTA nominations, as well as dozens of film premieres and red carpet events. Just last week TheEntertainmentWebsite.com was granted access to Pride Director Matthew Warchus and writer Stephen Beresford as well as co-star Andrew Scott. An interview with Warchus and Beresford, along with a review of the film, can be viewed at TheEntertainmentWebsite.com.

Other interviews granted to TheEntertainmentWebsite.com include ones with David W. Ross, star and writer of the American drama I Do; Stacey Passon – Director of the newly-released on DVD film Concussion: Shane Bitney Crone – Producer and star of the riveting documentary Bridegroom; and Darren Stein – Director of the camp comedy G.B.F.; and several others.

TheEntertainmentWebsite.com was created by Tim Baros in July 2013. Tim also writes for and contributes to Pride Life Magazine and website, The American Magazine and website, www.Hereisthecity.com and www.Blu-Raydefinition.com. Tim Baros is a member of the UK Regional Film Critics and is the UK representative for the Gay & Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association.

What’s next for TheEntertainmentWebsite.com? Coverage of the upcoming London Film Festival, next year’s BFI Flare Film Festival, and following that, attendance at the biggest film festival in the world – the Cannes Film Festival.

Keep on clicking on TheEntertainmentWebsite.com!!

Lauren Bacall – screen legend – dies at 89

Lauren Bacall, screen legend, dies in her New York City home on Tuesday. She was 89.

Bacall’s career—anchored in part by her beauty, that husky voice and her signature “look” but given longevity by her sharp wit and charisma—flourished for several decades.

In addition to being a smart, sassy and always sexy film noir heroine, she was known for comedic (yet still whip-smart) roles in How to Marry a Millionaire, opposite Gregory Peck in Designing Women, and with Tony Curtis and Henry Fonda in Sex and the Single Girl.

The list of iconic actors she worked with was long (Bogart, Peck, Charles Boyer, Rock Hudson and John Wayne, to name a few) and Bacall worked with an estimable list of directors, too: Hawks (To Have and Have Not, The Big Sleep), John Huston (Key Largo),Douglas Sirk (Written on the Wind), William Wellman (Blood Alley), Vincente Minnelli(Designing Woman), Sidney Lumet (Murder on the Orient Express) and Rob Reiner(Misery).

She took her talents to Broadway, winning Tony Awards for Applause (based on the Bette Davis classic All About Eve) in 1970; and Woman of the Year (based on the Tracy-and-Hepburn film of the same name) in 1981.

It’s hard to believe she never won an Oscar in competition, or wasn’t even nominated (for Best Supporting Actress) until she played Barbra Streisand’s still-gorgeous and gloriously vain mother in The Mirror Had Two Faces, for which she did win the Screen Actors Guild Award and the Golden Globe—four years after she got the Globes’ Cecil B. DeMille Award for lifetime achievement.

The above courtesy of Eonline.com

Robin Williams – actor, comedian – dies

Robins Williams is dead at the age of 63

He committed suicide at his home.

July 21, 1951 – August 11, 2014

Shockingly, suddenly, tragically, the actor was found dead at his home in Tiburon, Calif., Monday morning, according to the Marin County Sheriff’s Office Coroner Division.

“Robin Williams passed away this morning,” his rep confirmed to E! News. “He has been battling severe depression of late. This is a tragic and sudden loss. The family respectfully asks for their privacy as they grieve during this very difficult time.”

Williams had been extremely candid–and humorously self-deprecating–when it came to his past battles with substance abuse. Earlier this summer he had checked into a preventive treatment facility as part of what his rep called his “continued commitment” to staying sober.

According to the Marin County authorities, a 911 call was received at 11:55 a.m. reporting that a male adult had been found unconscious and was not breathing. The Sheriff’s Office and Tiburon Fire Department and Southern Marin Fire Protection District were dispatched to the scene and arrived at noon.

Williams was pronounced dead at 12:02 p.m. on Monday.

The Coroner Division has confirmed the death was suicide due to asphyxia.

Some of the many hit movies Williams starred in include:
Mrs. Doubtfire

Good Morning Vietnam

Patch Adams

Good Will Hunting (Best Supporting Actor Oscar)

One Hour Photo

The Fisher King

Dead Poets Society

The Zero Theorem – Film

The Zero Theorem is a film where, after I walked out, asked myself “what have I just seen?” The answer to that is: “I have no idea!”

I expected The Zero Theorem to be a film right out of left field, just like Director Terry Gilliam’s previous films The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus and The Brothers Grimm. But The Zero Theorem is not even in a ball park, it is clearly in a different realm, and it makes no sense to me at all. What should’ve tipped me off as to how bad it was was when there were only 5 people at the press screening I went to. And the reaction from them at the end of the movie was not a very good one.

I was really confused about the plot after leaving the film, and then I read an article in a magazine about the film that kind of but not really cleared it up for me: Qohen Leth (a shaven-headed Christoph Waltz) works for a company called Mancom (it sounds to me like a gay dating sight, but it is not). There are very little clues as to what he does for the company or what kind of business the compay is in, but Leth’s job is to work on a project to prove that everything equals nothing (huh?). In other words, to determine if life has any meaning (another huh?).

Leth works from home, which used to be a church, but is now a burned-out wreck (it used to house priests who happened to have taken a vow of silence and therefore did not tell each other that their church was on fire), so Leth lives in a charred, dirty, rat infested place. To put it midly, it’s disgusting. He even, at times, sits in front of his computer, naked, while it keeps screaming at him “next installment is due in one hour, one must equal 100%”. So he just can’t seem to make his installment equal 100%. Are you still confused? I was too. To make matters even more confusing, Matt Damon (looking like a thiner Philip Seymour Hoffman) is The Boss of Mancom who happens to wear clothing that matches his surroundings (chair, curtains) – quite odd. The boss (called Management in the film) sends his teenage son around to Leth’s home to either 1.) do some spying on him or 2.) to help him with his job as the son is, as you would expect, a computer whizz, or 3) to try to annoy him. Perphaps it is all three, though this is not made clear in the film. Leth is also visited by a very seductive woman (unknown Melanie Thierry) who gives him a disc to insert into his computer, and when he does, it takes him (to meet her) at a very romantic and beautiful island. Perhaps this is to escape his boring life. He’s also been assigned a shrink from work – Dr. Shrink-Rom (Tilda Swinton) who speaks to him through his computer. Some other characters come and go but it is not clear what their purposes are.

Once in a while Leth ventures out of his house to a world that looks like London in 100 years time, with visual adverts that follow him as he walks along the sidewalk, and a skyline that looks futuristic, even including what looks to be the Shard under construction (though it was filmed in Bucharest as Gilliam prefers to shoot in that country because it is cheap for him to do so).

I find it unbelievable that 2 time Oscar-winning actor Waltz would sign up to play a part so confusing, mad, stupid, and incomprehensible, and even to allow himself to be shown in various states of undress, with a belly! The Zero Theorem cost over $13 million to make; sure the sets look amazing and the special effects are good, but you’d think they could’ve used some of the money to write a better script and hire a director who would make a movie that would be interesting and intellectual. What Gilliam & Co. have made is one big mess.

 

Academy Award Winners

OSCAR WINNERS of the 86th Annual Academy Awards:

Best Picture

Best Director

Alfonso Cuaron, Gravity

Best Actress

Cate Blanchett, Blue Jasmine

Best Actor

Matthew McConaughey, Dallas Buyers Club

Best Supporting Actor

Jared Leto – Dallas Buyer’s Club

Best Supporting Actress

Lupita Nyong’o, 12 Years A Slave

Best Costume Design

The Great Gatsby

Best Makeup

Dallas Buyer’s Club

Best Animated Short

Mr. Hublot

Best Animated Movie

Frozen

Best Visual Effects

Gravity

Best Live Action Short Film

Helium

Best Documentary Short

The Lady In Number 6

Best Documentary Film

20 Feet From Stardom

 Best Foreign Language Film

The Great Beauty

Best Sound Mixing

Gravity

Best Sound Editing

Gravity

Best Cinematography

Gravity

Best Editing

Gravity

Best Production Design

The Great Gatsby

Best Original Score

Gravity

Best Original Song

“Let it Go” from Frozen

Best Adapted Screenplay

John Ridley, 12 Years a Slave

Best Original Screenplay

Spike Jonze, Her

How to Survive a Plague – Film

How to Survive a Plague (Directed by David France), nominated this past year for an Academy Award for Best Documentary, begins in 1987, six years into what activist Larry Kramer called ‘The Plague’ – the AIDS crisis.

The Lone Ranger – Film

It is a mystery to me why The Lone Ranger flopped in America. It had everything a summer movie can ask for: drama, comedy, action, adventure, great performances, stunning scenery, and two classic American characters.

Review originally appeared on hereisthecity.com – please click this link to view

Wag! The Musical! – Theatre

The website of WAG! The Musical promises “one of the most extraordinary theatrical events of the year”. And sure enough, it is one of the most extraordinary theatricals events of the year – a very bad one at that!