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      Princess Leia’s Dress From the Original ‘Star Wars’ Is Up for Bids

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      A ceremonial gown worn by Carrie Fisher was believed to be destroyed after the production of “A New Hope,” but it was recently found in an attic and restored.The long, white dress worn by Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia in the final scene of the original 1977 “Star Wars” movie, “A New Hope,” was once thought to have been long gone, destroyed after the film’s production.But the iconic dress was recently found in a London attic and will go up for sale at a live auction on Wednesday. It could sell for as much as $2 million, according to an estimate by Propstore, a company that sells film and TV memorabilia and is organizing the auction.In the film, Princess Leia wore the dress, a ceremonial gown that was made from lightweight silk and styled with a silver belt, during an awards ceremony. In the scene, the princess, who is a leader of the Resistance, honors Han Solo, played by Harrison Ford, and Luke Skywalker, played by Mark Hamill, with medals for their work in helping to save the galaxy.The dress was thought to have been destroyed after filming for the movie had been completed. Brandon Alinger, chief operating officer of Propstore, said it was common during filmmaking in the 1970s for costumes to be destroyed or returned if they were rented.“There was not a great focus on saving this material when that first movie was made,” Mr. Alinger said.The dress was among the items that had been slated to be destroyed, but a crew member of the set recognized it and held on to it. The dress had been stored for years, until recently, when it was found in an attic at the home of the movie crew member in London, Mr. Alinger said.Textile conservators spent months restoring the Princess Leia dress after it was found in “a poor state” in an attic in London, said Brandon Alinger, chief operating officer at Propstore. He wore white gloves to handle the dress at the company facility in Valencia, Calif.Frederic J. Brown/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“When we first saw it, it was in something of a poor state,” Mr. Alinger said.After the dress was found, textile conservators in London spent eight months working to restore it, removing dust and dirt that had accumulated on it and restitching open seams, according to Propstore.“This is sort of very painstaking work,” Mr. Alinger said. “Imagine someone bent over with a microscope or a magnifying lens, studying the little holes and trying to fill those holes with a similar material.”The dress was conceived of by John Mollo, who won the award for best costume design for “Star Wars” at the Academy Awards in March 1978.“It’s incredibly important because it’s literally the last thing that you see in the original ‘Star Wars’ film,” Mr. Alinger said of the dress. “I think if you’re a ‘Star Wars’ fan, you look at it and it just gels for you.”There are no words spoken in the final scene of the movie — except for guttural noises from the Resistance fighter Chewbacca and beeps from the droid R2-D2.In that scene, the leading characters, Luke Skywalker and Han Solo, walk down a long hall, where a crowd has gathered for the ceremony. Princess Leia places a medal over Solo and then another over the neck of Skywalker. Skywalker and Solo bow before Princess Leia, and then turn around and face those gathered in the hall as they applaud the heroes.The auction for the dress, which began on May 31 for online proxy bids, started at $500,000, and an absentee offer was submitted for $750,000, according to Propstore. Bids can be submitted online or in person at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles.The dress is among more than $12 million worth of TV and film memorabilia that will be sold at the auction, with bids ending on Friday. Items include a shield from the 2004 movie “Troy” that was worn by Brad Pitt while playing the main character, Achilles. More

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      ‘Twilight Zone: The Movie’ and the Deadly Accident That Plagued It

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      It’s been 40 years since the release of the film, but questions of what risks are permissible in the making of art have persisted.When the anthology film “Twilight Zone: The Movie” opened on June 24, 1983, reviews were mixed; The New York Times’s Vincent Canby deemed it “a flabby, mini-minded behemoth,” and that was a fairly representative view. A middling box office performer, the film may well have been forgotten entirely were it not for another news event, related to the picture, reported that same day: the unsealing of the grand jury indictments against five of the filmmakers, including the director John Landis, for their responsibility in a stunt gone horrifyingly awry, killing three people during the picture’s production.It happened at 2:20 a.m. on Friday, July 23, 1982. Landis’s segment — which concerned a loudmouthed bigot (Vic Morrow) who gets a taste of his own medicine when he steps into the Klan-era South, Nazi Germany and a Vietnam War battle, and is mistaken for the very people he’d previously derided — was to culminate in a spectacular display of stunts and firepower. Chased by a military helicopter, Morrow’s character was to carry two Vietnamese children across a river to safety as a village exploded behind them. But the sequence was poorly planned and barely rehearsed, and the explosions damaged the rotor blades of the chopper, causing the pilot to lose control. The helicopter crashed into the river, dismembering Morrow and the two children: Myca Dinh Le, age 7, and Renee Shin-Yi Chen, 6 (spelled Renee Shinn Chen in The Times’s early reporting).As investigators examined the crash, they discovered that the children’s mere presence on the set had been illegal. Child labor law regulations prohibited children from working at that late hour; further, no on-set child-welfare worker would have permitted them to work in such proximity to explosions or a helicopter. So Landis and one of the producers, George Folsey Jr., went outside regulations, casting children of mutual acquaintances, keeping their names out of the production’s official paperwork and paying them in petty cash. A production secretary recalled Landis joking of the scheme, “We’re all going to jail!”That cavalier attitude carried over onto the “Twilight Zone” set. Landis was described as a “screamer,” prone to temper tantrums and abusive invective, and thus resistant to concerns raised by crew members about the safety of that sequence — or an earlier scene, in which Landis, unsatisfied with the effects achieved by fake gunfire, ordered the use of live ammunition.The director John Landis, center, in February 1987, when he was on trial on charges of involuntary manslaughter. He would later be acquitted.Bob Riha Jr./Getty ImagesCommunication between the director, the special-effects crew and the helicopter pilot was all but nonexistent that night. When a stunt performer noted that the explosion was more forceful than expected in an earlier helicopter shot, Landis reportedly replied, “If you think that was big, you haven’t seen nothing yet.”It took three more years, after the unsealing of those indictments on the film’s opening day, for the case to come to trial. Landis, Folsey and three other defendants were charged with involuntary manslaughter, a felony. The trial was a media sensation, promising “some of the splashy drama of a guns-and-action Hollywood film.” Yet the defendants were acquitted on all charges, thanks to a somewhat bungled prosecution and a seemingly star-struck jury.There were some consequences for the filmmakers and for Warner Bros., the studio behind the picture, including fines for labor violations and settlements in civil suits filed by the families of the deceased. But in spite of the deaths on his set, and the troubling stories of his behavior and decisions leading up to it, the industry rallied behind John Landis. Sixteen significant directors — including Francis Ford Coppola, Ron Howard, John Huston, George Lucas, Sidney Lumet and Billy Wilder — signed an open letter of support for the filmmaker. Several director pals also appeared in cameos in “Into the Night” and “Spies Like Us,” two of the features Landis made between the deaths and his acquittal.Landis also directed the music video for Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” and the feature comedies “Trading Places” and “Three Amigos” in that period. Dan Aykroyd, who appeared in the Landis-directed “Twilight Zone” prologue as well as in “Trading Places” and “Spies Like Us,” dismissed the tragedy: “That was an industrial accident, nothing more.” After the trial, the “Trading Places” actor Eddie Murphy hired Landis to direct his 1988 comedy “Coming to America,” though they clashed during production; while promoting the film, Murphy was asked if he’d ever work with Landis again, to which he replied, “Vic Morrow has a better chance of working with Landis than I do.” But the film was a gigantic hit, and six years later, Landis again directed Murphy in “Beverly Hills Cop III.”Landis’s career would eventually slow down — not because of the deaths, but because his films stopped making money. In a hearing after the “Twilight Zone” deaths, Art Carter, the chief of the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, said that while speaking to industry veterans and union representatives about tightening safety restrictions on sets, “No one could recall a single instance in which a given movie or television program could not be made because of safety considerations. Rather, it was a matter of spending the necessary money to assure protections.”After the “Twilight Zone” deaths, the Directors Guild of America issued formal, firmer safety guidelines, yet the cutting of budgetary corners has continued to put the lives of actors and crew members in jeopardy. The very day the verdict was handed down in the “Twilight Zone” case, a helicopter crash on the Manila set of “Braddock: Missing in Action III” killed four Filipino soldiers. The camera assistant Sarah Jones was killed by a freight train while working on the low-budget film “Midnight Rider” in 2014. And apparent negligence on sets resulted in the shooting death of the actor Brandon Lee during the production of “The Crow” in 1993 and of the cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on the set of “Rust” in 2021.The questions of verisimilitude versus safety, of what risks are permissible in the making of art, have not gone away in the 40 years since “Twilight Zone: The Movie” was released. But the sole public statement on the matter from Steven Spielberg, who directed another of the film’s segments, remains illuminating. His name was conspicuously absent from the open letter of filmmakers supporting Landis, and in April of 1983, he summed up the experience in a Los Angeles Times interview: “No movie is worth dying for. I think people are standing up much more now than ever before to producers and directors who ask too much. If something isn’t safe, it’s the right and responsibility of every actor or crew member to yell, ‘Cut!’” More

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      Sterling K. Brown Is on His Best Behavior, Just in Case

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      The Emmy-winning actor and star of the new movie “Biosphere” is sweet on vegan cookies, his Audi e-Tron and Toni Morrison’s “The Bluest Eye.”The first time Sterling K. Brown read the script for “Biosphere,” his new sci-fi movie with Mark Duplass, he thought, “‘This is very non-Randall-esque,’ which is always one of the criteria that I’m looking for in the next project.”He was referring, of course, to his beloved character in “This Is Us,” which aired for six seasons on NBC and snagged Brown an Emmy, a Golden Globe and a Screen Actors Guild Award.“But being known for a character and being known for a body of work are two different things,” he added.In a video call from Los Angeles — during which one of his sons lugged in a Harry Potter book for his dad to read to him — Brown talked about some of his coming projects in addition to “Biosphere,” which opens July 7: Cord Jefferson’s untitled adaptation of the Percival Everett novel “Erasure”; and “Washington Black,” Brown’s debut as a TV producer.He’ll also reunite with Dan Fogelman, the creator of “This Is Us,” in a Hulu series about a Secret Service agent.“I have a secret man crush on Dan Fogelman, I think because of what he was able to do for me for six years,” Brown said before revealing a few other things he’s been crushing on, like the relationship expert Esther Perel and the Tony-nominated play “Fat Ham.” These are edited excerpts from the conversation.1Trader Joe’s Vegan Oatmeal Chocolate Chip CookiesIs it sugar? Yeah. Is it health food? Not by any stretch of the imagination. But I have a sweet tooth, and it’s vicious. If I have two to three of these cookies, my sweet tooth is sated and I get a chance to go on with the rest of my day.2PelotonI find the instructors on this medium to be exceptional. The level of positivity that they have and the things that they share with you are the kinds of voices that you want reverberating in your head as you take on physical challenges. One of my favorite instructors is Jess Sims.3Audi e-TronIt’s nice to know that you’re not putting anything into the air. And nobody hears you coming. I’m not a flossy man, so I don’t need a car that peacocks too loudly. But I do enjoy comfort. I do enjoy a few bells and whistles. And as far as a luxury vehicle is concerned, I feel it blends in in a pretty nondescript way. I like to flash, but in the least flashy way possible.4Cocoa ButterBeing African American, something happens when you don’t moisturize your skin. You get what we call in the community “ashy,” where you can draw “D-R-Y” across your skin and it just stands out (#notagoodlook). So I drink a lot of water and I moisturize. I keep my skin as supple as I possibly can. Because the alternative for someone with a deeper shade of soul is you look like you’ve been walking around kicking flour.5Esther PerelMy wife and I have been married 17 years, and we’ve known each other since we were 18. The love that you have deepens over time with your partner. But what can suffer is the spontaneity and that spark that you had in the beginning. Esther has given us a couple of tools and insights. Just because we’ve been together this long doesn’t mean that passion has to die.6AlexaAlexa is Encyclopaedia Britannica, basically. If you want something quick-quick, Alexa gives you a fast answer, and then will ask you, “Did that help?” And you’ll be like, “Yes, Alexa, that did. Thank you very much.” I try to be polite. Listen, as A.I. is continuing to develop, and we don’t know if we’re making ourselves extinct to any potential sentient being, Brown is on his best behavior.7‘The Bluest Eye’There can be an inferiority complex that becomes internalized when you don’t get a chance to see yourself presented to the world as beautiful. In “The Bluest Eye,” Toni Morrison encapsulates that internalization in the most profound, poetic and incredible way.8‘Fat Ham’You’re taking the story of Hamlet, you’re putting it in a backyard barbecue in the South with a young, queer, Black male protagonist. It is such a faithful following of Hamlet until it’s not. Then it’s such a delightful departure.9My Children PlayingI played basketball, football, soccer, track, a little bit of Ultimate Frisbee. The joy of watching your children accrue skills and be able to engage with you in something that was such a big part of your own childhood is great.10Crying in the TheaterThe first Broadway show that I ever saw, in 1998, was “Ragtime.” Audra McDonald came out and sang “You have your daddy’s hands.” And I was like, “Is this woman an angel? Is she a real human being?” You want to see Sterling cry? Then I had the privilege of working with Renée Elise Goldsberry. If she sings “It’s Quiet Uptown” [from “Hamilton”] — child, please. I am a mess. More

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      John Williams on ‘Indiana Jones’ and His Favorite Scores

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      In a long career making music for the movies, the composer has made an indelible contribution to cinema. Williams shares his thoughts on some landmark works.When the New York Philharmonic honored the work of the film composer John Williams this past spring, the director Steven Spielberg introduced a clip of the opening scenes of “Raiders of the Lost Ark” — without the music. The effect, he noted apologetically, was like something out of the French new wave.The clip was played again, this time with the orchestra joining in. Like magic, the adventuresome spirit of the movie was restored.On June 30, the rugged archaeologist at the heart of that film (played by Harrison Ford) will return for the fifth entry in the franchise, “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.” He’ll be accompanied, as ever, by Williams’s indispensable music.The composer, who turned 91 this year, had said it would be his final film score. Speaking during a video call more recently, he walked back his retirement plans. “If they do an ‘Indiana Jones 6,’ I’m on board.”Ahead of the new film’s opening, Williams shared his thoughts — with contributions from others closely connected to this work — on milestone moments in an extraordinary career.1966‘How to Steal a Million’Williams made some of his earliest contributions to movie music playing piano for the scores of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” and “West Side Story,” among others. (That’s also him playing the chugging piano riff on the “Peter Gunn” theme for television.)Under the name Johnny Williams, he gradually transitioned, as he put it, “from the piano bench to the writing desk,” composing several light, jazzy scores for comedies. “How to Steal a Million,” an art-heist caper starring Audrey Hepburn, was an early high point. “It was the first film I ever did for a major, super-talent director, in William Wyler,” Williams said.With moments of comedy and tongue-in-cheek suspense, that score was an early clue of “just how versatile John Williams could be,” said Mike Matessino, a producer of numerous Williams soundtracks.Many years later — long after his name had become synonymous with the sound of the cinematic blockbuster — Williams would channel his earlier, funnier work into the jazz-inflected score of “Catch Me if You Can.” That mode “had been residing there in the intervening decades, waiting to come howling to the surface,” Williams said. “It was the easiest thing in the world for me to do, and I was giggling while I was doing it.”1972‘Images’1973‘The Long Goodbye’Working with the director Robert Altman produced a couple of the strangest entries in Williams’s filmography. The soundtrack to “The Long Goodbye,” Altman’s woozy neo-noir starring Elliott Gould as a laconic Philip Marlowe, consists of several cheeky variations on the title tune, including a bluesy nightclub number, a mariachi and a tango.For the psychological horror “Images,” Altman gave Williams the kind of freedom he famously gave his actors. “‘Do whatever you want. Do something you haven’t done before,’” Williams remembers Altman saying.The result was an eerie, fractured score that reflects the deteriorating mental state of the protagonist. The music was a collaboration with the Japanese percussionist Stomu Yamashta, who performed on sculptures by the artists François and Bernard Baschet. Williams said that had he devoted his career to composing for the concert hall rather than the cineplex, his work would have sounded most like his “Images” score.When Spielberg was looking for menacing music to accompany scenes of dread in “Jaws,” he tried sounds from “Images.” But Williams believed the movie needed something more primal, less psychological, and eventually built a theme around two brutish bass notes.1977‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind’How to sum up the Williams-Spielberg collaboration? Beginning with “The Sugarland Express” and concluding (for now, at least) with “The Fabelmans,” the partnership has spanned 29 films.Spielberg has described Williams’s score for “Schindler’s List” as “one of the most stunningly evocative gifts that John has ever given us.” It says something about the range of their collaboration that “Jurassic Park” came out the same year, featuring another towering Williams score — infused with an almost religious awe for the prehistoric creatures of the film.In an interview, Emilio Audissino, the author of “The Film Music of John Williams,” made the case that “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” was the movie on which “the two fully realized the mutual advantage and compatibility of their partnership.” One moment in that film captures some of Spielberg and Williams’s alchemy: the musical dialogue between the humans and the otherworldly visitors, itself an artistic collaboration of sorts.Williams remembers spending hours with Spielberg, listening to countless musical phrases. “We were waiting for that eureka moment.”Many years later, Williams figured out why the phrase they ultimately chose (re, mi, do, do, so) feels so perfect. The “re, mi, do” feels musically resolved, he explained, after which “do, so” — the alien response — feels like an appropriately startling interjection. “I realized that 20 years after the fact.”1978‘Superman’Remember when superheroes had memorable themes?The score for “Superman” demonstrated one of Williams’s own musical superpowers: making the unbelievable feel thoroughly believable. His indomitable sounds are essential to audiences’ accepting — and being stirred by — the sight of a man in flight.The director Richard Donner had a theory that the three-note motif in the main theme — the one that makes you want to punch the air in triumph — is a musical evocation of “SU-per-MAN!”Is there anything to that?“There’s everything to that,” Williams told me.1999‘Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace’Williams remembers feeling “a little bit insecure” on the first day of recording “Star Wars” in 1977. But Lionel Newman, the studio musical supervisor, “who was sitting there next to me, said, ‘This is really going to work very well — you’ll see.’”The music for the central “Star Wars” saga was consistently extraordinary even when the films themselves failed to strike a chord. This is true of “The Phantom Menace,” which, despite its 51 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, features some of the composer’s most exciting work. Today, the Carl Orff-inspired symphonic banger “Duel of the Fates” is the most streamed piece of “Star Wars” music on Spotify.“It was pretty indescribable,” Maxine Kwok, a London Symphony Orchestra first violinist, said of the recording session. “I remember getting chills the first time the ostinato started.” Kwok joined the institution partly because she associated it with the music of “Star Wars” — the soundtrack to her childhood. “I grew up with those heroic trumpets and soaring strings. It had a profound effect on me.”Scoring “The Rise of Skywalker” in 2019, after more than 40 years with “Star Wars,” Williams said he didn’t want it to be over. “My feeling was, ‘This is fun. Let’s go back and do nine more.’”2023‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’The “Indiana Jones” movies feature a number of Williams’s most recognizable character themes. They also feature swaths of swashbuckling music precisely calibrated to the action onscreen.“I don’t see John as simply a genius of themes and tunes, which he is of course,” the director James Mangold said. “Rather, it’s John’s moment-to-moment scene work that astounds me. Film scoring is really a kind of duet between the director and the composer. It’s John’s sensitivity to this partnership that most defines his work for me.”On the appeal of scoring a fifth “Indiana Jones” movie, Williams said, “I just thought, if Harrison Ford can do it, I can do it.” The movie features a new theme for the character of Helena, played by Phoebe Waller-Bridge. “I had a wonderful time writing a theme for her,” Williams said.“When John first played that theme for me, with the orchestra, I was wowed, of course,” Mangold said, “completely knocked over by the music. But I was also a bit nervous that it was just too much — too damned lush. Too romantic. John just smiled, gently, and let me babble, because I think he knew it was going to work beautifully.” More

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      Horror Movie Streaming Guide: ‘The Hole in the Fence,’ ‘Pastacolypse’ and More

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      In this month’s chilling picks, creepypasta and killer pasta, too.‘The Hole in the Fence’Rent it on Amazon.In Joaquín del Paso’s new gut punch of a morality tale, a group of teenagers master machismo at an exclusive summer camp in the Mexican countryside. The true-believer counselors are devoted to training the boys to become Christian tough guys, and if that means looking the other way as the kids bully the possibly gay kid, so be it.Not that the men aren’t watching the teens carefully because they are — through binoculars as they roughhouse shirtless. When the campers find a hole in a fence that divides them from the impoverished town outside, and one of the boys goes missing, it sets in motion a sinister force — of human, not supernatural, origin — with “Lord of the Flies”-style consequences.Emotionally gripping and formally icy, this is horror of the uncomfortable kind, thanks to a script by del Paso and Lucy Pawlak, that’s an exercise in brutality. Take the scene in which two of the teens sense an attraction brewing, and for seconds the camp’s demented lessons in manhood disappear and tenderness takes their place. Their bliss doesn’t last long, because that would get in the way of this skin-crawling film’s expedition to excoriate toxic masculinity, religious radicalism and class and racial entitlements.‘Pastacolypse’Stream it on Tubi.Animated horror films intended for adults don’t come around often these days, so I’m stoked to shout hallelujah for this very funny, stupidly gory horror-comedy from the “Aqua Teen Hunger Force” co-creator Matthew Maiellaro.The story is set in a “pastademic” world where gluten is banned. After being disqualified at the Global Pasta Championship for using bootleg gluten, the billionaire pasta maker Alfredo Manicotti (Dana Snyder) tracks down a hidden gluten reserve. But when he and a security guard, Al Dente Bob (William Sanderson), accidentally fall into a toxic vat of the stuff, it turns them into pasta monsters and gives Alfredo the ability to summon bow-tie demons. Drunk on power and blind to the needs of his spoiled daughter, Emma (Lauren Holt), Alfred sets out to install a “newdle world order” where gluten reigns.That paragraph barely scratches the surface of the cuckoo course this witty, boisterously animated (and free!) film takes. Snyder and Sanderson have stellar comic timing, and their performances elevate the potty-punny humor to whip-smart levels. Sorry, but not sorry: This movie will mac you smile.‘The Hopewell Haunting’Rent or buy on most major platforms.Newt (Timothy Morton) and his wife, Ollie (Audra Todd), show up one day at a small church in 1930s Kentucky to ask James (Ted Ferguson), the cranky old pastor, to bless the house they just moved into, claiming it’s inhabited by a dark spirit. James begrudgingly agrees, but on his first attempt all he finds is a ramshackle house and a dead raccoon. But when James returns, he faces an evil entity that makes him question who, exactly, is the real monster in the house.If it’s haunted house mayhem you want, see “The Boogeyman”; this film walks in the opposite direction. The writer-director Dane Sears delivers a tender but chilling parable about the consequences of unexamined grief and loss; he’s as confident keeping his camera still for long stretches to let darkness do its thing, even if his actors are often too pitched or muted, as he is racing it around. Some horror fans may find the film too spare to be scary, but I savored its austere unfussiness. The real star is the landscape of rural Bourbon County, Ky., where Sears was raised and where he shot parts of his film.‘Malum’Rent or buy it on most major platforms.Jessica (Jessica Sula), a rookie second-generation police officer, asks to be assigned to work the night shift at the station where, one year before, her father killed several colleagues and himself after he helped rescue three cult members in the grip of a Manson-like leader named John Malum (Chaney Morrow). As Jessica wanders the darkened hallways and keeps an eye on the deranged man she locked up in a holding cell, she discovers she’s not alone in a place that may itself be under Malum’s sinister supernatural spell.According to its production notes, Anthony DiBlasi’s movie is an “expanded reimagining” of “Last Shift” (2014), his smaller and scrappier (and to me, superior) film. This version is a similar and equally intense fever dream that reminded me of the terrifying where-are-we mysteries of “The Void.” It’s good-looking too, thanks to Sean McDaniel’s menacing cinematography and Russell FX’s extra-gory makeup effects. Hats off to DiBlasi and his co-writer, Scott Poiley, for being so ambitious with genre; they serve cultism, occultism, a monster, a ghost, comedy, sci-fi and family drama. By the end of the film I was stuffed, but horror fans with more maximalist tastes will be satiated.‘Creepypasta’Stream it on Screambox.Creepypasta, for those unfamiliar with the term, describes online horror stories that depict uncanny nightmare realms; some go viral, like Momo and Slender Man.This entertaining anthology compiles 10 creepypasta fictions from eight directors folded into a framing device about a man who finds a mysterious thumb drive in a house of horrors. The films vary in polish, fright and budget, but they’re generally eerie and all short, in some cases just a few minutes long — a nice departure from some of the bloatedness in the “V/H/S” franchise.My favorite is Tony Morales’s “BEC,” a macabre meditation on mortality. Filmed in blue-tinted black and white (and told in Spanish), it’s about an older woman who wanders her home with her mouth covered in a filthy CPAP mask as a record player plays a warped rendition of “Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?” You don’t need me to tell you that a wolf isn’t what she should be afraid of. More

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      ‘The Perfect Find’ Review: Gabrielle Union and Keith Powers Light It Up

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      Fashion media workers, paired on a project that caters to their passion for all things vintage, fall for each other in this romance by Numa Perrier.Jenna Jones had it all: a fabulous career at a fashion magazine, power coupledom with a handsome man named Brian — their combined heat had even melted them into one headline-ready portmanteau entity, Brijenna.Then Jenna lost both job and relationship in a spectacular public crash. We can only guess at what happened because her rise and fall are quickly summarized in a collage of headlines during the opening credits of the Netflix romantic comedy “The Perfect Find.”What went down does not matter anyway: What does is that Jenna will get back up, and that Gabrielle Union endows her with the kind of casual charisma found only among elite members of the rom-com world. Good thing Union steers “The Perfect Find” with such sunny warmth and relatable poise, too, because the director, Numa Perrier, and screenwriter, Leigh Davenport (adapting Tia Williams’s 2016 novel of the same title), are not as assured.After a year hiding out at her parents’ house, Jenna returns to New York to rebuild her life. Sucking up her pride, she asks her frenemy — the friend part is very, very small — Darcy (Gina Torres) if there might a job in her media empire.Darcy ends up hiring Jenna as creative director, but not without casually mentioning that our heroine has just turned 45 (even if her skin probably glows even when she’s asleep).Since good things come in pairs, Jenna almost immediately falls for courtly, passionate Eric (Keith Powers), a videographer who happens to be a new colleague, much younger, and Darcy’s son.They embark on an affair that must be kept secret from their common boss, which should be easy since Darcy is barely around. Torres is tragically underused, as are Aisha Hinds and Alani “La La” Anthony as Jenna’s best friends.On a professional level, Jenna and Eric cook up a new segment called “the perfect find” for Darzine, Darcy’s hilariously named, well, magazine, which allows them to explore their shared taste for the vintage and the retro-classy. The adorkable lovebirds are also both fans of old Hollywood movies, bonding over their admiration for the golden-age Black actress Nina Mae McKinney.“The Perfect Find” is hampered by stilted dialogue and comedy that often falls flat, as well as a distinct lack of fizz for a film set in the fashion world. Fortunately, it is saved by two fleet-footed leads who have mastered the two steps forward, one step back dance at the heart of romantic comedy.The Perfect FindNot rated. Running time: 1 hour 39 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

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      ‘World’s Best’ Review: Straight Outta Calculus

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      A math prodigy channels the spirit of his rapper father in this lively musical.“World’s Best,” from the director Roshan Sethi, is a vibrant kid’s musical set to a simple beat. The seventh grade calculus prodigy Prem Patel (Manny Magnus) longs to be as cool and confident as his dad, Suresh (Utkarsh Ambudkar), a rapper who died of cancer when the boy was five years old. Prem’s mother, Priya (Punam Patel), is proud to raise a mathlete — until Prem slips on his father’s gold chain necklace and dad magically appears to inspire him to bust a rhyme at the school talent show. “I’m like a memory remixed with a fantasy,” Suresh says with a grin. I’d go with hype man or hype ghost.Suresh performed in the aughts, but wears ’90s Timberlands and worships the ’80s hitmaker Doug E. Fresh. Maybe the whiz kid can calculate the rate at which nostalgia flattens time? Yet, the script, by Ambudkar and Jamie King, is otherwise attuned to the emotional and comedic details, like when Priya seeks solace in a podcast on grief only to be interrupted by an ad for oat milk.Still, we’re here for the music which builds from subtle, classroom-rattling percussion — imagine the sound of pencils clacking on retainers — to a Hype Williams homage filmed in a five-sided cube with a fisheye lens. The rapping is great but the lyrics are strained (“Think Pythagoras meets Dr. Seuss/Square my sides to find my hypotenuse”) and the music is tinny and canned. I think Sethi wants to emphasize that these ditties are fantasies, but the overall effect is too phony. What works is the high energy, kooky cast who fling themselves into the carefree choreography — especially Magnus, a mugging, contagious delight.World’s BestRated PG. Running time: 1 hour 41 minutes. Watch on Disney+. More