The last few years have not only brought LGBTQ films and stories further into the mainstream, but queer films have dominated awards seasons and found commercial success in unlikely places. This has been more than a long time coming: The New Queer Cinema was a major influence on the indie film boom of the ’90s, and set the bar high for the many queer films to follow. No longer limited by minuscule budgets, films with gay and lesbian stories have flourished in the first two decades of the 21st century....

It’s not as refined as Fennell’s own debut, but van Aart’s feature directorial debut, with a script by his long-time creative partner Daan Windhorst, often delights in the kind of bluntness that Fennell’s film studiously avoids for most of its running time. And while that is pleasurable in fits and starts, the overall result is a jumpy, fast-tracked feel and an overeagerness to get to the meat (and gore) of a story that needs more grounding....

“It’s funny, how over the three years that we’ve been working on it, the story has become more relevant and timely,” said first-time director Joel Crawford (head of story on “Trolls”). “We wanted to celebrate the tight family bond that the Croods share, and then you meet the Bettermans, who live behind a wall and have walls between walls in their huts and have all these modern advancements, but have lost that familial connection with each other....

Of course, none of those films were available in theaters. Instead, the only new wide release was graphic novel adaptation “The Empty Man,” a 20th Century title (released by Disney) produced in summer 2017. And while we don’t know the numbers for those home releases, “The Empty Man” placed fourth with $1.265 million, one of only four films that surpassed $1 million in gross. “The Empty Man” is a typical Halloween-timed horror release, but it’s unusually long (137 minutes!...

“It’s painful to talk about it,” Sorrentino said in an interview over Zoom this month. “And, indeed, it was very painful to make a film about it.” Yet “The Hand of God,” the Netflix-produced drama that launches in competition at the Venice Film Festival next week, doesn’t exclusively dwell on that grim event. Instead, the story turns on the efforts of the writer-director’s fictionalized stand-in, Fabietto (Filippo Scotti), as he works through the fallout of his sudden orphanhood against the majestic backdrop of his native Naples, and the catharsis he finds from discovering his true calling as a filmmaker....

“The Human Factor” drills down on the fluctuating tensions between Yasser Arafat and Israel’s revolving door of leadership. By speaking exclusively to the handful of negotiators involved in America’s efforts to broker a deal, Moreh’s focused collection of talking heads and archival footage is limited to a handful of takeaways about what went wrong. It turns out some policy wonks make eloquent storytellers and they excel at putting their own failings in context....

The 10-episode limited series, “The Offer,” about the true story behind making the “The Godfather,” arrives just in time for the half-century anniversary of Francis Ford Coppola’s Academy Award-winning epic. The show debuts April 28. Dan Fogler plays then-studio-newcomer director Coppola (hot off indie “The Rain People”), who is tasked with bringing Mario Puzo’s novel to life for Paramount Pictures. The studio wanted “someone who understands Italians” to direct the feature, and while Coppola’s Italian roots made him a prime choice to helm the feature, it was clear that traditional gangster movies were “dead” by the early 1970s....

Their first son, Ennis, was born in 2018; Howard arrived nine months after the wrap of Jane Campion’s western noir “The Power of the Dog” (Netflix), which is a frontrunner for Oscars in several categories including Best Picture and Director. Dunst has snagged Critics Choice, Golden Globe, and SAG nominations ahead of a likely Oscar nod, which would be her first. In “Power of the Dog,” Dunst plays Rose, a widow who runs a Montana boarding house, cooking meals for guests such as wealthy ranchers the Burbank brothers....

The “Thor: Love and Thunder” actress revealed on UK’s Capital FM (via Uproxx) that Hemsworth went without meat prior to filming their onscreen kiss to respect Portman’s diet. “He’s really nice,” Portman said of Hemsworth. “The day we had a kiss scene he didn’t eat meat that morning because I’m vegan. And he eats meat like every half hour. Like, that was so thoughtful. That’s not something I’m angry about or care about, but he was just being thoughtful....

The film debuts at 2022 Cannes and Tilda Swinton stars as a scholar who encounters a Djinn (Idris Elba), who offers her three wishes in exchange for his freedom. Their conversation, unfolding in a hotel room in Istanbul, leads to decades-spanning consequences neither expected. “Three Thousand Years of Longing” premieres in theaters August 31. Check out the first footage below. The teaser shows Elba’s character being horrifically sucked back into an urn, while Swinton as academic Dr....

In the past, TIFF has yielded plenty of big deals, including some that impact awards season, such as Neon’s $6 million 2017 pickup of “I, Tonya” that resulted in a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for Allison Janney and Sony Pictures Classics’ 2014 acquisition of “Still Alice” that ultimately landed Julianne Moore her first statuette for Best Actress. Even during the pandemic, the sales continued: In 2020, Netflix picked up Halle Berry’s directorial debut “Bruised” for a reported $20 million after it premiered at a drive-in....

Earlier: Tim Burton is circling a live-action television series of “The Addams Family,” inspired by the beloved characters from the cartoons created by Charles Addams and the 1964 TV series produced by David Levy. Deadline first reported the news that Burton also is in talks to direct and executive produce all episodes of this latest take on the horror-comedy franchise. MGM Television, which controls the IP rights, financed the development on the series, and Deadline reports that numerous top bidders are in play, including Netflix....

Known as Kinokolo, the ceremony took place in an underground bunker in Kyiv on Thursday, with national broadcaster Suspilne Kultura airing the event live. First established in 2018, Kinokolo recognizes the best in national Ukrainian cinema, and is hosted on the first day of the annual Kyiv Critic’s Week. This year’s Critic Week runs until October 26. “Pamfir,” which premiered this year in Cannes’ Director’s Fortnight section, was the big winner of the night, taking the best feature prize....

Here’s the official synopsis: “Creatively unfulfilled and facing financial ruin, the fictionalized version of Cage must accept a $1 million offer to attend the birthday of a dangerous superfan (Pedro Pascal). Things take a wildly unexpected turn when Cage is recruited by a CIA operative (Tiffany Haddish) and forced to live up to his own legend, channeling his most iconic and beloved on-screen characters in order to save himself and his loved ones....

“Under the Open Sky” has nothing whatsoever to do with baseball (and for such a lyrical character study, it’s also surprisingly light on overextended metaphors), but this winsome, shaggy portrait of an ex-Yakuza’s struggle to adjust to life after prison finds a number of other ways to exhaust itself. Yakusho stars as the stubborn Mikami, a former mob enforcer who’s reached the end of a 13-year murder sentence without changing his ways....

Season 1 was notable as it led to the conviction of professional golfer Daniel Bowling, who aggressively pursued sex with Powell while she pretended to be a child online. The day after his episode aired, Bowling accepted a plea deal and was sentenced to three years in prison. “Our goal at SOSA is to help prevent the online sex abuse and exploitation of children. It takes more than identifying some bad actors online — it takes raising awareness and empowering a society to tackle the issue of online sex crimes together,” said Powell....

The 79th Venice International Film Festival, organized by La Biennale and directed by Alberto Barbera, will take place on the Venice Lido August 31–September 10. In an official statement shared with media, La Biennale di Venezia rejects “any form of collaboration with those who on the contrary have carried out or supported such a grievous act of aggression” when it comes to Russian filmmakers. Additionally, the festival will “therefore not accept the presence at any of its events of official delegations, institutions, or persons tied in any capacity to the Russian government....

What Warner Bros. Discovery’s army of accountants called “content impairment and development write-offs” are part of greater “pre-tax restructuring charges” recognized in its fiscal third quarter, totaling between $3.2 billion and $4.3 billion. The difference comes from other restructuring costs, like the severance packages that accompany mass layoffs, and the consolidation of offices and other facilities. That’s one way to balance the balance sheet. WBD performed what it called “strategic content programming assessments” to come up with the $2 billion-plus in write-offs of TV series and movies....

Products featured are independently selected by our editorial team and we may earn a commission from purchases made from our links. Enter the Boys — the titular group of this darkly comedic series aren’t a bunch of superheroes, instead they’re a ragtag motley crew of people with extremely valid grudges against the “supes” (namely, they’ve been wronged by the so-called heroes and seen firsthand how much death and destruction gets covered up on the heroes’ behalf)....

“Black Widow,” the highly anticipated MCU film starring Scarlett Johansson, arrived in theaters and on Disney+ on Friday. Disney+ subscribers who want to enjoy the film from the comforts of home can order the movie through Disney+ Premium Access and stream it as many times as you like for a onetime fee of $29.99. Natasha Romanoff (a.k.a. Black Widow) confronts her past while being pursued by a force determined to bring her down in the action-packed spy thriller directed by Cate Shortland and produced by Kevin Feige....