Innholdsfortegnelse for Dec-18-15 i The Hollywood Reporter

THIS IS WHAT A HOLLYWOOD blockbuster looks like in Spain these days: a low-budget rom-com that pokes fun at the Catalan independence movement. Universal’s A Spanish Affair 2 became the top opener in the country with $8.4 million in November, beating the $8.2 million record set by the studio’s Fifty Shades of Grey in February. The $3 million-budgeted sequel is on track to become the top earner in Spain this year, just one of several local-language hits bankrolled by U.S. studios. In the past decade, Hollywood increasingly has invaded key foreign markets with custom-made films, producing and distributing non-English titles from Buenos Aires to Berlin to Bangalore. Warner Bros. is behind a series of German comedy hits, including Til Schweiger’s 2014 blockbuster Head Full of Honey ($66.5 million local gross),…

Sex and nudity in movies remain the top concern for parents, but violence and language — save for the F-word — have fallen to the lower end of that spectrum. Those findings are part of the 2015 Parents Ratings Advisory Study conducted by Nielsen for the ratings agency run by the MPAA and NATO. While 80 percent of U.S. parents are concerned about graphic sex scenes in movies, only 64 percent bemoan graphic violence. Ratings board chair Joan Graves touts the findings as evidence of why, despite criticism, the board has been tougher on sex than violence.…

ALTHOUGH HER STUDIO HAS YET TO release a single film, and her name remains unfamiliar to most in the industry, Alibaba Pictures president Zhang Wei arguably is the most powerful woman in Chinese entertainment. Shortly after Alibaba Group founder and executive chairman Jack Ma took his Chinese e-commerce behemoth public in September 2014 — raising a historic $25 billion on the New York Stock Exchange — he handpicked Zhang to become the chief international strategist and outward face of his ambitious new film endeavor. Ma’s expansion into film is part of a rapidly growing entertainment empire that spans mobile movie ticketing services, cinema distribution tech, minority stakes in top local movie studios Huayi Brothers and Le Vision, the Netflixlike streaming video service Tmall Box Office, a multiyear movie licensing deal…

WHEN KATHLEEN KENNEDY took the helm at Lucasfilm in 2012, she acknowledged that plunging into the Star Wars universe was “daunting.” That was an understatement considering the many moving parts involved in restarting one of the most iconic properties in industry history — from movies to television to games to merchandise to brand partnerships — while protecting an invaluable piece of IP that she describes as “fragile.” But this unflappable producer’s decades of working with the industry’s most A-list talent may have made her the best possible candi date for the job. The list includes Clint Eastwood (The Bridges of Madison County), Robert Zemeckis (Back to the Future), David Fincher (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button) and, above all, Steven Spielberg — from 1982’s E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial to Lincoln. Kennedy’s…

I WAS 10 YEARS OLD IN 1977 WHEN I RAN DOWN the steps on Christmas morning to find the double album LP of Star Wars waiting for me. I ripped it open, ran back up to my bedroom and threw it on the turntable. That was the day I truly understood that music was storytelling. I listened to that album day and night, memorizing every single note. By studying those liner notes, I discovered the various instruments of the orchestra, learning which type of instrument was used for this or that cue. My education in music had begun. So at 10 years old, I began listening to John Williams. I listened to everything I could get my hands on. It started with his scores to Close Encounters, 1941, Raiders of…

PUT SIX OF THE WORLD’S GREATEST FILMMAKERS TOGETHER IN ONE room, and it’s inevitable they’ll talk about their favorite films. But who’d have thought a visual stylist like Ridley Scott would have chosen an Australian comedy (Muriel’s Wedding) or that David O. Russell would sing the praises of an old British comedy called Hobson’s Choice? Those were some of the surprises that emerged when the filmmakers — Danny Boyle (Steve Jobs), 59; Tom Hooper (The Danish Girl), 43; Alejandro G. Inarritu (The Revenant), 52; Russell (Joy), 57; Scott (The Martian), 78; and Quentin Tarantino (The Hateful Eight), 52 — gathered in an L.A. photo studio on the morning of Nov. 12 to talk about the thing they love most. Another surprise? To see how thrilled Tarantino was to be seated…

Amy DIRECTOR Asif Kapadia BOX OFFICE $8.4 million domestic AVAILABLE iTunes, VOD, DVD, theaters The breakout documentary of the year, about the late Amy Winehouse’s creativity as well as her struggle with success and addiction, has been named best doc by critics’ groups from Boston to Los Angeles. While the singer’s family initially cooperated, they dismissed the film as “misleading” shortly before its Cannes debut, but Kapadia countered that it’s “honest and truthful to Amy.” Best of Enemies DIRECTORS Robert Gordon, Morgan Neville BOX OFFICE $893,000 AVAILABLE VOD, iTunes, DVD, theaters Neville, an Oscar winner for 2013’s 20 Feet From Stardom, and Gordon recount the heated 1968 televised debates between conservative William F. Buckley and liberal Gore Vidal. Neville, who once worked for Vidal as a fact-checker, says, “This seemed…

Jaco Van Dormael has been here before. The Belgian director had two previous films submitted for consideration for the foreign-language Oscar: the 1991 cult hit Toto the Hero and 1996’s The Eighth Day. Neither received a nomination, but the third time could be the charm for the 58-year-old filmmaker. Since his latest feature, The Brand New Testament, premiered at Cannes in May, it has been embraced by critics and has become a crossover hit in Europe. The comedy’s high-concept setup — God is alive and lives in Brussels — makes way for a playful examination of faith and philos ophy after God’s rebellious daughter hacks his computer and sends all the people in the world a text message revealing the time and method of their death. The film has a…

FOR SHEER WACKINESS, the family in the venerable farce You Can’t Take It With You is given a run for its money by the clan at the center of Joy. David O. Russell’s third straight film to have the good fortune of starring Jennifer Lawrence is a story of perseverance over ridiculous odds but spends much of its time examining the paralysis caused by the irrationalities of its madly neurotic characters. That the film itself is nearly as chaotic as the family it examines either can be regarded as an artistic correlative or a crippling defect, but the splendidly dexterous cast ensures that this goofy success story keeps firing on all cylinders. When a movie runs through four editors, it’s usually a sign that something’s amiss in pacing, coherence, tone…

ALONG TIME AGO, before Disney could buy Star Wars outright, it tried launching its own sci-fi franchise with 1979’s The Black Hole. The years immediately following Star Wars’ May 1977 release — during which 20th Century Fox’s space epic amassed $230 million domestically (equivalent to $930 million today) — were heady ones for films set in space: Black Hole opened during the Christmas season alongside Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Alien had been a summer hit and even James Bond had achieved zero gravity in Moonraker. All of those releases wanted to get a head start on The Empire Strikes Back, which was opening in May 1980. But none got a review like the one Black Hole got in The Hollywood Reporter. In it, THR film critic Arthur Knight begins:…

Beat the Odds Awards Beverly Hills, Dec. 3 FIVE INSPIRING HIGH SCHOOL students are always the real stars of the Children’s Defense Fund’s gala, and the 25th annual Beat the Odds Awards, cochaired by J.J. Abrams, didn’t disappoint. The students — each honored with $10,000 toward college, plus support services — were feted with documentaries (and celebrity presenters) that detailed their hardship and perseverance. CDF founder Marian Wright Edelman also left a lasting impression with her impassioned speech targeting gun violence in the U.S. “We’ve got to retire the NRA from being in charge of our national defense,” said the activist, who received a standing ovation following her seven-minute speech. “A country that doesn’t keep its children and parents safe does not stand for anything.” The Hateful Eight Hollywood, Dec.…

CAMPOS & SUBERCASEAUX Antonio Campos, a co-founder of New York-based production company Borderline Films, married film editor Sofia Subercaseaux on Nov. 28 in Zapallar, Chile, in front of 200 guests. The couple became engaged in February. WEDDINGS Lauren Camp, co-founder and principal of PR firm The Brand House, married financier Peter Campbell on Oct. 10 at Ojai Valley Inn & Spa in Ojai, Calif., in front of 150 guests. ENGAGEMENTS Adam Griffin, manager and partner at Link Entertainment, became engaged to Kacie Higginbotham, senior manager of marketing at Inspire Energy, on Nov. 23 at the Hotel Erwin rooftop bar in Venice. BIRTHS Kim Kardashian and Kanye West welcomed son Saint West on Dec. 5 at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. Natalie Bruss, vp digital strategy at the PR firm…

RECENTLY, THE NEW YORKER, WHICH considers itself an arbiter of media business reputations and metatrends, suggested Time Warner should spin off HBO. This then became the focus of a theory for deconstructing the fate of dinosaur media conglomerates: a Superman analysis in which coveted assets blast off from a doomed planet Krypton. In a spinoff, a new public company is carved out of an existing entity, with shareholders of the original now owning shares in this new company. New Yorker financial columnist James Surowiecki theorizes that HBO is undervalued within Time Warner and that CEO Jeff Bewkes could realize HBO’s full purported $30 billion worth in a spinoff. Similarly, Surowiecki says, Disney should have spun off its choicest asset, ESPN, in 2014, before it began losing subscribers: “It’s hard to…

AS A KID, I WANTED TO BE A JEDI — THAT WAS THE ultimate goal. To find out you could move stuff, to find out that you were more than you thought, that it was something inside of you. It just spoke so clearly to what we’re all looking for: You wanna be special. I feel like the series was about becoming the best you can be as a person, being something special — even more so when you feel like you see something reflective of yourself. So what having John Boyega at the center of The Force Awakens does for future generations, in terms of how it affects them, is amazing because it actually puts them in the story in a much more layered and intrinsic way. Seeing that…

THE FORCE WAS DEFINITELY NOT WITH Star Wars in the months leading up to its release over Memorial Day weekend in 1977. Even executives at 20th Century Fox had their doubts. The Other Side of Midnight, based on Sidney Sheldon’s potboiler, was supposed to be the studio’s big summer hit, while George Lucas’ movie was considered the “B track” for theater owners nationwide. In those days, film buyers had to bid blind for titles (trade screenings happened at the eleventh hour). The decisions — right or wrong — defined careers. Here, THR talks to five buyers who were part of the Star Wars revolution — after opening on 42 screens, the film expanded to 1,750 and stayed in theaters for over a year — on their way to becoming Hollywood…

EARLY IN NOVEMBER, Saoirse Ronan was having drinks in a London pub with Irish author Colm Toibin when suddenly they were both overcome with the urge to sing. After all, they had reason to celebrate: Brooklyn, the Fox Searchlight drama based on Toibin’s 2009 novel and starring the 21-year-old Irish-American actress, had just opened to rave reviews (THR called it “a beautiful and moving film, classily and classically crafted”). So they set down their glasses, and in soft, reverent voices, began crooning an old Irish ballad called “The Auld Triangle.” “It’s the kind of music that really silences people,” says Ronan, recalling how the bustling bar settled down during the impromptu duet. “It’s something that Irish people sing all the time — it’ll happen at a wedding; it’ll happen at…

A TRADITIONAL OLD west survival-and-revenge tale assumes the dimensions of a harrowing voyage to the American frontier’s heart of darkness in Alejandro G. Inarritu’s new film. Pushing both brutal realism and visual poetry to the edge of what one customarily finds in mainstream filmmaking, Inarritu, cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki and a team of effects wizards have created a sensationally vivid and visceral portrait of human endurance under nearly intolerable conditions. Inarritu has turned around his most ambitious production within only a year of his awards-laden Birdman. Unlike that film, The Revenant uses plenty of cuts and takes place nearly entirely outdoors — but the fluid, prowling, sometimes gaspinducing camera moves, along with the great depth of field, are recognizably similar. Set in the Rockies in 1823, the story (based on Michael…

Melissa Rivers on Playing Her Mother in Joy David O. Russell brings back his actor A-team in Joy, but for the biopic about Miracle Mop creator Joy Mangano, he added a face sure to elicit double takes when the film opens Christmas Day. Melissa Rivers plays her mother, the late Joan Rivers, opposite Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper in scenes depicting her QVC days. In her first interview about the role, Melissa tells THR she was “terrified” her first day on the Boston set, stepping into an “emotionally risky” role six months after her mother’s death from a throat procedure at Manhattan’s Yorkville Endoscopy Center. “Honestly, once the wig was on, I stopped looking in a mirror — it was too bizarre,” says Melissa, who also worked with a dialect…

HOW STAR WARS IS CHANGING HOLLYWOOD FANS AREN’T NEARLY AS HUNGRY FOR A NEW STAR WARS movie as The Walt Disney Co. is. The Dec. 18 opening of J.J. Abrams’ The Force Awakens represents the culmination of CEO Robert Iger’s lengthy courtship of Lucasfilm founder George Lucas, a rich $4.1 billion acquisition in 2012 that many analysts and rivals thought too pricey, and three years of intense and often problematic development of the all-important franchise relaunch. And now the film arrives with perhaps unprecedented hype, just as the Disney media giant — which has blown past competitors in recent years thanks to a boom in cable fees and theme park attendance, as well as savvy acquisitions such as Marvel Entertainment, Pixar Animation Studios and, yes, Lucasfilm — has seen its…

Let’s first stipulate that when it comes to providing opportunities for women, the motion picture industry isn’t doing a very good job. The facts speak for themselves. In 2014, only two films among the top 100-grossing movies were directed by women. And according to the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University, among the top 250 films in 2014, only 7 percent were directed by women, and women comprised only 11 percent of all writers, 19 percent of executive producers and 23 percent of producers. When the stats are compiled for 2015, those numbers aren’t expected to change dramatically. Let’s further stipulate that while television has begun casting actors of color in prominent roles, the motion picture business lags behind. Last season,…

Based on a short story by ninth century Chinese writer Pei Xing, Hou Hsiao-hsien’s The Assassin centers on a young woman struggling to accomplish the mission of killing her tyrannous warlord cousin. It’s a bit of a departure for the auteur, who has been a staple on the festival circuit since at least 1989, when his historical drama A City of Sadness won the Golden Lion in Venice. Hou, 68, added another fest honor to his résumé when The Assassin, which is Taiwan’s submission in the Oscar race, took home the best director prize in Cannes. THR talked to Hou about why he chose to put his spin on the venerable martial arts genre. Are you OK with people calling The Assassin a martial arts movie? I don’t really care…

Mustang is France’s submission for the best foreign-language film Oscar, but it’s a Turkish-language film that required subtitles in its home country. A coming-of-age drama directed Deniz Gamze Erguven, it didn’t lose anything in the translation, though. It claimed the top prize in Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes as well a European Film Award along with prizes across Germany, Russia and Bosnia. The Turkish-French director’s first feature, which revolves around five Turkish sisters who increasingly are isolated by their family as they near womanhood, also has managed to avoid the controversy that surrounded French director Jean-Jacques Annaud’s Wolf Totem, which was disqualified as China’s submission because of its top-heavy French team. Though Mustang was shot in Turkey, the country ponied up just a fraction of the French-German-Turkish co-production’s $1.4 million budget.…

NETFLIX’S NEW ANIMATED COMEDY F Is for Family chronicles the minor and major cataclysms affecting a single clan. Based loosely on the childhood of standup comic Bill Burr, who created the series with The Simpsons veteran Michael Price, the six-episode first season portrays setbacks and triumphs that, in isolation, are the stuff of standard family sitcoms. But the often hilarious running gags acquire dramatic heft as they pile up, producing genuine emotional payoffs. Set in 1973, the show centers on Frank Murphy (Burr), a pudgy, balding, beleaguered low-level baggage handler thrust into management after his boss meets an end that’s both shocking and side-splitting. His wife, Sue (Laura Dern), wonders if her life raising a family is enough. Eldest son Kevin (Justin Long) is only 14, but he’s already a…

YOU DON’T REALIZE HOW BADLY you needed to see a 12-year-old boy powering through a face-melting guitar solo, or his pint-size female counterpart pouting like the coolest of rocker chicks, until you witness them in the disarming new musical adaptation of School of Rock. Led by Alex Brightman in a star-making performance that genuflects to Jack Black in the movie while putting his own stamp on the role of Dewey Finn, the show knows its prime asset is the cast of ridiculously talented kids, ranging in age from 9 to 13. In terms of screen-to-stage remakes, this is neither the most imaginative nor the most pedestrian. But any nitpicking about the craft of book writer Julian Fellowes (a long way from Downton Abbey), composerproducer Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyricist Glenn…