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      In Australia, Hollywood Stars Have Found an Escape From the Virus. Who’s Jealous?

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }At HomeFall in Love: With TenorsConsider: Miniature GroceriesSpend 24 Hours: With Andra DayGet: A Wildlife CameraAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyIn Australia, Hollywood Stars Have Found an Escape From the Virus. Who’s Jealous?Dozens of international film productions have been lured to the country, where cases of the coronavirus are few. In turn, actors have found almost paradise.Chris Hemsworth is filming “Thor: Love and Thunder” in Australia.Credit…Getty Images for The Critics Choice AssociationMarch 10, 2021Updated 4:52 a.m. ETMELBOURNE, Australia — In the photo posted to Instagram, the actors Chris Hemsworth, Idris Elba and Matt Damon, all wearing 1980s-style sweats, embrace. They are maskless. Touching. Happy, even. The caption reads: “A little 80s themed party never did any harm!”Their fans, indignant, peppered the post with comments. What of the pandemic? Social distancing? Masks? We are still, after all, suffering through a pandemic that has all but crippled the travel industry and blocked most people from casually taking off for vacation in paradise.But the Hollywood brigade was in Australia, a country that has effectively stamped out the coronavirus, allowing officials to ease restrictions for most gatherings, including parties (with dancing and finger food). As a result of the near-absence of the virus, plus generous subsidies from the Australian government, the country’s film industry has been humming along at an enviable pace for months compared to other locales.Australia has managed to lure several Hollywood directors and actors to continue film production. In effect, many celebrities, including Natalie Portman, Christian Bale and Melissa McCarthy, have found freedom from the pandemic there.As one person wrote on Mr. Hemsworth’s Instagram post: “Before you comment, remember that not everyone lives in America.”Though the quickened pace of vaccinations in the United States has raised hope of returning to some semblance of normalcy by the summer, the country still leads the world in the number of coronavirus cases and deaths. Movie theaters reopened only last week in New York City. Some fans are cautiously creeping back, while others are still wary of contracting the virus.But thousands of miles away, many stars who appear on the big screens can be seen frolicking, or filming, on location in Australia. (Mr. Hemsworth is himself a permanent fixture — he moved back to Australia in 2017 after several years of living in Los Angeles.) In the United States, where hundreds are still dying every day, some fans have looked on with envy.“These Hollywood stars have been transported to another world where the problems of this world aren’t,” said Robert Thompson, a professor of popular culture at Syracuse University in New York. He added that the temporary exodus from the United States revealed a further crumbling of the myth that Hollywood was the endgame for celebrities.Village Roadshow Studios in Gold Coast, Australia.Credit…Bradley Kanaris/Getty ImagesAustralia has become the “hip place” where “fabulous people want to go,” Professor Thompson said. “When you’re trying to be a star, you’ve got to go out to the West Coast to make your bones.” When you become “a really big star,” you buy property somewhere exotic, like Australia, he added.“It definitely feels like a time machine,” Ms. Portman, calling in from Sydney, told the late-night host Jimmy Kimmel in December. “It’s so different, all the animals are different, all the trees are different, I mean even the birds, like, there’s like multicolored parrots flying around like pigeons,” she added. “It’s wild.”A spokeswoman said the government had helped 22 international productions inject hundreds of millions into the local economy. Paul Fletcher, the federal minister for communications, said, “There’s no doubt it’s a very significant spike on previous levels of activity.”But even as celebrities preen and pose on social media, some Australians grumble that the country’s strategy for stamping out the virus has left tens of thousands of citizens stranded overseas. Several tennis players and 2021 Australian Open staff were allowed into the country for the tournament. And now, they say, Hollywood’s rich and famous are turning up during the pandemic, angering critics who see a clear bending of the rules for those with money and power.“Everyone knows there’s a separate set of rules, it seems, for everyone that’s a celebrity or has money,” said Daniel Tusia, an Australian who was stuck overseas with his family for several months last year. “There are still plenty of people who haven’t been able to get home, who don’t fall into that category, who are still stranded,” he added.In an emailed statement, the Australian Border Force said that travel exemptions for film and television productions were “considered where there is evidence of the economic benefit the production will bring to Australia and support from the relevant state authority.”A year ago, Tom Hanks, Hollywood’s everyman, made all-too-real the threat of the pandemic when he and his wife, Rita Wilson, tested positive for the coronavirus in Queensland, Australia, while he was filming an unnamed Elvis biopic. Their illness made personal a threat whose seriousness was only beginning to become crystallized at the time.The actors Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson at the Academy Awards in Los Angeles last year. They tested positive for the coronavirus in Queensland, Australia, about a month later.Credit…Robyn Beck/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut by May, Australia appeared to be on track to quashing the first wave of the virus, and the soap opera “Neighbors” became one of the world’s first scripted TV series to resume production. The federal government has committed more than $400 million to international productions, which, together with existing subsidies, provides film and television producers with a rebate of up to 30 percent to shoot in the country.More than 20 international productions, including “Thor: Love and Thunder,” a Marvel film starring Mr. Hemsworth, Mr. Damon, Ms. Portman, Taika Waititi, Tessa Thompson and Mr. Bale; “Three Thousand Years of Longing,” a fantasy romance starring Mr. Elba and Tilda Swinton; and “Joe Exotic,” a spinoff of the podcast made following the popular Netflix series “Tiger King,” starring the “Saturday Night Live” actress Kate McKinnon as the big-cat enthusiast Carole Baskin, are all either in production or set to be filmed in the coming year.Ron Howard is directing “Thirteen Lives,” a dramatization of the 2018 Thai rescue of a soccer team from a cave, in Queensland (the coast of Australia makes a good stand-in for the tropics). And later this year, Julia Roberts and George Clooney are set to arrive in the same state to shoot “Ticket to Paradise,” a romantic comedy.Though a number of American stars have landed in the country for temporary work, some like Ms. McCarthy, originally in Australia to work on “Nine Perfect Strangers,” have decided to stay on to shoot other projects, said those in the industry. “Oh, the birds!” she gushed in a YouTube video. “I love that I’ve seen a spider the size of my head.”Others, like Zac Efron, appear to have settled here permanently.Zac Efron has been spotted all over Australia.Credit…Lucy Nicholson/ReutersHis Instagram is flush with Australiana: Here he is in a hammock, in the red-earth desert, appearing to participate in an Indigenous ceremony or wearing the Australian cowboy hat, an Akubra. Last year, Mr. Efron even got what an Adelaide hairdresser described as a “mullet,” a much-maligned hairstyle popular in Australia.“Home sweet home,” he captioned one image of himself in front of a camper worth more than $100,000.Chances are the stars will keep showing up. They’ve been spotted camping under the stars, heading out to dinner sans masks, and partying (yes, like it’s 1989). Mr. Damon said in January that Australia was definitely a “lucky country.”But locals in Byron Bay — the seaside town that in recent years has been transformed from hippie to glittering — have complained that the influx of stars in the past year has irreparably changed the town.“The actors and the famous people are the tip of the iceberg,” said James McMillan, a local artist and the director of the Byron Bay Surf Festival. He added that the large cohort of production crew member from Melbourne and Sydney was pricing locals out of real estate.“It’s definitely changed more than I’ve ever seen it change in the past 12 months,” Mr. McMillan, who has lived in Byron Bay for two decades, added. “People have got stars in their eyes.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      'I Care a Lot': The Inspirations Behind the Movie

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyMood Board‘Jackie Brown’ and Tangerine Dream: What ‘I Care a Lot’ Is Made OfThe writer-director J Blakeson behind the blade-sharp Netflix thriller shares the films, images and sounds that guided him in crafting the movie.Credit…Seacia Pavao/Netflix, via Associated PressMarch 9, 2021Updated 7:03 p.m. ETRosamund Pike recently earned a Golden Globe for her portrayal of the cunning, utterly amoral Marla Grayson in the Netflix thriller “I Care a Lot.” Marla shrewdly, confidently games the system to con elderly folks out of their savings — until her latest victim’s son (Peter Dinklage) starts paying close attention. It is a dagger of a performance that is of a piece with the writer-director J Blakeson’s film, a “slick, savage caper” dominated by bold visual and sonic choices, and humor as black as Marla’s outfits are bright.In a video call from his home in London, Blakeson discussed some of the photos, songs and movies that inspired him when he was working on “I Care a Lot.”‘Jackie Brown’ (1997) by Quentin TarantinoCredit…MiramaxCredit…Seacia Pavao/Netflix, via Associated PressLike Pike’s Marla, Pam Grier’s title character is a smart master of the double cross and steers this vastly entertaining crime movie. “This is a film that I talked a lot about with both my cinematographer [Doug Emmett] and my production designer [Michael Grasley],” Blakeson said. “It felt like a good touchstone, tonally, for where we might end up.”As a flight attendant, Jackie Brown spends quite a bit of the film in her uniform. “She has that blue suit that she wears and now and again you’ll see that just against this bright green wall,” Blakeson said. “The joy I get from that is similar to the joy I get from seeing some of those Godard films where you have people in bright yellow or bright red or bright blue against a neutral background, and they really pop out in this sort of Technicolor/Kodachrome palette. In ‘Jackie Brown,’ she has a job where she’s always kind of wearing the same clothes, but you get this iconic look that she carries through the whole movie. And I really wanted Marla to feel iconic and memorable as a character — a very cinematic character rather than a realist character.”Harry GruyaertCredit…Harry Gruyaert/Magnum PhotosCredit…NetflixA major influence on the visual language of “I Care a Lot” is this acclaimed Belgian photographer. “It’s street photography, more or less, but the real world is really colorful and really interestingly framed,” the director said. “There’s a photograph where the yellow lines are really bright and somebody’s walking down the street wearing a brightly colored coat. It looks orchestrated, but it’s not. Our world is colorful, we just don’t see it because we don’t stop and look at it very much.”Marla herself benefits from people not looking, which feeds her confidence. “She has big windows in her office and you can just see in; she knocks on the door of a blue house in a yellow suit,” Blakeson said. “She’s not hiding away in a dark corner — she’s doing it out in the open.”‘Rid of Me’ by PJ HarveyCredit…NetflixBlakeson was listening to music at the gym when the title track of PJ Harvey’s second album (1993) really hit him. “The beginning of the song is very quiet, so you’re turning it up to try to hear, and suddenly it gets to the chorus and it blows your head off,” he said. “I started thinking about somebody trying to kill Marla, and she’s not going to die. The section where she escapes from a car underwater was written in my head while I was listening to ‘Rid of Me.’ Just a basic idea of, ‘I’m not going to go away, I’m not going to be beaten.’ When she gets out of the water, she screams — it’s like singing along to ‘Rid of Me.’”Pike asked the music-loving director to put together a list of songs Marla would have listened to as a teenager, and he included a lot of 1990s rock titles from bands like Ministry. “She sent me a text saying, ‘I think I just got caught speeding because I was listening to your playlist,’” Blakeson said.‘Ace in the Hole’ by Billy WilderCredit…Paramount PicturesCredit…NetflixA longtime admirer of the director of “Double Indemnity” and “The Apartment,” Blakeson singled out his 1951 pitch-black film about a corrupt journalist, Chuck Tatum (Kirk Douglas), who exploits an accident in which a man is trapped in a cave-in, even prolonging the ordeal. “He was so mercenary, would do such disgustingly manipulative things for his own gain,” Blakeson said of Tatum. “His ambition is driving and he’s just a passenger.”This, of course, is very much like Marla, whose ruthlessness and fearlessness fully emerge in a confrontation with Dinklage’s character. “Usually in the movies that’s where the woman is weeping and begging for her life, but Marla sees it as an opportunity to give her elevator pitch to a wealthy person,” Blakeson said. “There’s a bit in ‘Ace in the Hole’ where he’s trying to reassure the guy underground, and he’s lying because he could actually just get him out really quickly. That sort of manipulation of people is really interesting to me.”Alex PragerCredit…Courtesy Alex Prager Studio and Lehmann Maupin, New York, Hong Kong, Seoul and London.Credit…NetflixAnother photographic influence was this American artist’s meticulously staged pictures. “There is a sense of the surreal, but it is dramatic and melodramatic,” Blakeson said. “There’s a forced absurdity about it that we wanted to bring to this [film] a little bit. Like when Jennifer [Dianne Wiest] goes into the care home with those muted colors — all these nurses offering their chocolates and smiling at her, that sort of seems odd and surreal and disconcerting. Also certain moments in the scene with Peter and Rosamund facing off in the quarry. The lighting is kind of blue and red and like giallo [films] or something. We really wanted to push it.”‘Love on a Real Train’ by Tangerine DreamCredit…Warner Bros.Credit…NetflixThis German electronic band started off as an underground purveyor of so-called cosmic rock before bursting into the mainstream with its dreamy, repetitive contributions to such 1980s movies as “Risky Business” — where this track appears.“‘Love on a Real Train’ makes me think of the future and the past at the same time,” Blakeson said. “You feel like there’s ambition in there: The world is going to be a better place somehow if we join the American dream.”That feeling is echoed, often with menacing undertones, in Marc Canham’s pulsating electronic score for “I Care a Lot.” When working on the film, Canham, the composer, and Blakeson brought up the minimalist composers Philip Glass and Steve Reich, early-1980s tracks like Laurie Anderson’s “O Superman,” and more recent abstract electronic work by Aphex Twin and Orbital, but Tangerine Dream was a constant. “There’s a very dreamlike quality, which is sort of nostalgic and yearning but also kind of cold and calculating, and that’s a film about capitalism and business,” Blakeson said of “Risky Business.”“Obviously, it’s a very different version of business than in ‘I Care a Lot,’” he added, laughing.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      U.S. Lawmakers Suggest 25 Movies About Latinos to the Film Registry

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyU.S. Lawmakers Suggest 25 Movies About Latinos to the Film RegistryBy diversifying the films added to the national registry, members of Congress hope that more opportunities will open up for Latinos in Hollywood.Salma Hayek during the shooting of “Frida“ (2002), which is on the list of the caucus’s nominees.Credit…Miramax FilmsMarch 8, 2021The Congressional Hispanic Caucus is continuing work it started in January, when it nominated the movie “Selena” for the National Film Registry, with a list of 25 more films it would like to see the registry add.The movies nominated by the caucus last week are from as early as 1982, and they also include films like “Spy Kids” (2001), a comedy featuring a Latino family, and “Frida” (2002), an Oscar-winning movie about the artist Frida Kahlo. The registry typically adds new movies in December.“It is essential that the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry reflect the true diversity of American culture,” the chairman of the caucus, Representative Raul Ruiz, a Democrat from California, said in a statement. “Including more Latino films in the National Film Registry will help elevate Latino stories, promote an inclusive media landscape, and empower Latino filmmakers and storytellers.”Established by Congress in 1988, the registry preserves films that it deems “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant.” Each year, a committee selects 25 films to add.“The Library of Congress is grateful for the nominations from the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and for their interest in the National Film Registry,” Brett Zongker, a spokesman for the Library of Congress, said in a statement, adding, “The registry seeks to ensure the preservation of films that showcase the range and diversity” of America’s film heritage.Latinos make up the largest minority group in the United States, at 18.5 percent of the population. But they continue to be underrepresented in films and on television. A 2019 study from the University of Southern California’s School for Communication and Journalism found that only 4.5 percent of all speaking characters across 1,200 top-grossing films from 2007 to 2018 were Latino.Of the nearly 800 films in the registry, at least 17 are examples of Latino stories. The number of Latino directors in the registry is tiny: There are 11. Of them, nine are men and two are women.Representative Joaquin Castro, a Democrat from Texas, led the move for nominations. Latino creators and their stories are often pushed away by gatekeepers of American culture, like Hollywood and the national registry, Castro has said. He added that Latinos are often portrayed negatively in all media — as gang members, drug dealers or hypersexualized women.In a letter to the Librarian of Congress, Castro and Ruiz wrote that such misconceptions and stereotyping in media are significant factors “motivating ongoing anti-Latino sentiment in American society,” affecting areas “from immigration law to the education system to the current public health crisis.”The caucus’s list was developed through feedback from constituents, and movies were also identified by, among others, the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures, the National Hispanic Foundation of the Arts, the National Hispanic Media Coalition and the Latinx House (which uses a gender-neutral term for Latinos).“Our stories have often been missing from American film, and even less often been recognized as important cultural pieces in American history,” Castro said in a phone interview. “This is an effort to change that.”The 25 films the caucus chose reflect stories from a variety of nationalities, including Mexican, Puerto Rican, Dominican, Cuban, Colombian, Argentine, Salvadoran and Nicaraguan.The list speaks to many parts of the Latino experience, including people who are native to the United States and its territories and those who migrated to the country because of its politics and interventions in Latin America, Theresa Delgadillo, a Chicana and Latina studies professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said in an interview.“It is an important way to influence that diversity effort in an industry,” Delgadillo said about the caucus’s effort.She and other professors, though excited about the effort, were also critical of the list, because, they say, there were few stories about Latinas and L.G.B.T.Q. people. AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Directors Guild Nominations Make History With Two Female Contenders

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyDirectors Guild Nominations Make History With Two Female ContendersThe group has never nominated more than one woman in a year. Emerald Fennell and Chloé Zhao made the cut, along with Lee Isaac Chung, Aaron Sorkin and David Fincher. Emerald Fennell, second from right, on the set of “Promising Young Woman,” with her cast and crew, including Carey Mulligan, left, and Laverne Cox.Credit…Merie Weismiller Wallace/Focus Features, via Associated PressMarch 9, 2021, 2:07 p.m. ETThe Directors Guild of America announced its feature-film nominees on Monday that included more than one woman in the top directing category for the first time in the guild’s 72-year history.The selection of Lee Isaac Chung (“Minari”), Emerald Fennell (“Promising Young Woman”), David Fincher (“Mank”), Aaron Sorkin (“The Trial of the Chicago 7”) and Chloé Zhao (“Nomadland”) contained no curveballs: These five films have all had strong awards-season runs and are considered to be best-picture locks when the Oscar nominations are announced on March 15.Still, the inclusion of both Zhao and Fennell in the same race was a first for the guild. Though eight of the previous 10 DGA Award lineups were all-male, the guild has a slim but somewhat better track record than the Oscars when it comes to nominating women: Lina Wertmüller, Randa Haines, Barbra Streisand, Jane Campion, Sofia Coppola, Valerie Faris, Kathryn Bigelow and Greta Gerwig have all made the Directors Guild cut in years past, while only Wertmüller, Campion, Coppola, Bigelow and Gerwig were also nominated for an Oscar.The guild’s selections tend to line up fairly closely with those of the movie academy, give or take one substitution: Last year, Bong Joon Ho (“Parasite”), Sam Mendes (“1917”), Martin Scorsese (“The Irishman”) and Quentin Tarantino (“Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood”) were recognized by both groups, though DGA nominee Taika Waititi (“Jojo Rabbit”) was supplanted by “Joker” director Todd Phillips come Oscar time.That could provide a path forward for the “One Night in Miami” director Regina King, who was nominated for the best-director Golden Globe but missed the cut here. The guild did recognize King in the category reserved for first-time filmmakers, where she was nominated alongside Radha Blank (“The Forty-Year-Old Version”), Fernando Frías de la Parra (“I’m No Longer Here”), Darius Marder (“Sound of Metal”), and Florian Zeller (“The Father”).Here is the DGA Award nomination lineup:Outstanding Directorial Achievement — Feature“Mank,” David Fincher“Minari,” Lee Isaac Chung“Nomadland,” Chloé Zhao“Promising Young Woman,” Emerald Fennell“The Trial of the Chicago 7,” Aaron SorkinOutstanding Directorial Achievement — First-Time Feature“The Forty-Year-Old Version,” Radha Blank“I’m No Longer Here,” Fernando Frías de la Parra“One Night in Miami,” Regina King“Sound of Metal,” Darius Marder“The Father,” Florian ZellerOutstanding Directorial Achievement — Documentary“Boys State,” Amanda McBaine and Jesse Moss“My Octopus Teacher,” Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed“The Painter and the Thief,” Benjamin Ree“The Truffle Hunters,” Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw“Welcome to Chechnya,” David FranceAdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      BAFTA Nominations: ‘Nomadland’ and ‘Rocks’ Lead Diverse List

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Nomadland’ and ‘Rocks’ Lead Diverse BAFTA NominationsBut the nominees include many independent films, after BAFTA overhauled its voting processes to rectify all-white, all-male shortlists.Frances McDormand in “Nomadland,” which won the award for best motion picture, drama, at the Golden Globes in February.Credit…Courtesy Of Searchlight Pictures/Searchlight Pictures, via Associated PressMarch 9, 2021Updated 12:56 p.m. ETLONDON — “Nomadland,” Chloé Zhao’s drama about a middle-aged woman who travels across the United States in a van seeking itinerant work, scored the biggest number of high-profile nominations for this year’s EE British Academy Film Awards, Britain’s equivalent of the Oscars.On Tuesday, the film, which stars Frances McDormand and won the Golden Globe for best drama in February, picked up seven nominations for the awards, commonly known as the BAFTAs.It will compete for best film against “The Trial of the Chicago 7,” “Promising Young Woman,” “The Father” and “The Mauritanian.”The best-film nominees are almost the same as the titles that competed for best drama at this year’s Golden Globes. (Only “Mank,” David Fincher’s revisiting of “Citizen Kane,” is missing, replaced by “The Mauritanian.”) But in the talent categories for this year’s BAFTAs, the nominees are more diverse than the Golden Globe lists. Many come from low-budget, independent films, such as “Rocks,” a British coming-of-age tale about a Black teenager in London, that also received seven nominations. This appears to be the result of a recent overhaul of BAFTA’s voting rules to increase the diversity of the nominees after recent criticism. Last year, no people of color were nominated in the BAFTAs’ main acting categories, and no women were nominated for best director. Those omissions prompted a social media furor and criticism from the stage at the award ceremony. “I think that we sent a very clear message to people of color that you’re not welcome here,” Joaquin Phoenix said when accepting the best-actor award for his performance in “Joker.”BAFTA required all of its 7,000 voting members to undergo unconscious bias training before voting on this year’s nominees, as well as requiring them to watch a selection of 15 films to stretch the range of titles viewed. Among dozens of other changes to the voting procedures to increase the diversity of the nominees, they were selected for the first time from “longlists” prepared by BAFTA, with the input of specialist juries.In contrast to the male-skewed nominee lists of previous years, four of the best-director nominees announced on Tuesday are women; four of the six nominees in both leading actor categories are people of color. In the best-director category, for example, Chloé Zhao has been nominated for “Nomadland” and will compete against Lee Isaac Chung for “Minari”; Sarah Gavron for “Rocks”; Shannon Murphy for “Babyteeth”; Jasmila Zbanic for “Quo Vadis, Aida?” a retelling of a massacre in the Bosnian War of the 1990s; and Thomas Vinterberg for “Another Round,” a dark comedy about Danish attitudes to alcohol.In the best-actress category, Frances McDormand, the star of “Nomadland,” will compete against Radha Blank for her role in “The Forty-Year-Old Version,” Wunmi Mosaku for the horror film “His House,” and Bukky Bakray, the teenage star of “Rocks.” That list includes fewer recognizable star names than previous years: Rosamund Pike and Andra Day, who won the main actress awards at this year’s Golden Globes, are missing.Pippa Harris, BAFTA’s deputy chair, said in a video interview that the most important change that shaped this year’s nominations was the requirement that voters watch more films than usual, rather than letting them simply see those with the most buzz from other awards or marketing campaigns. “Time and again, people have emailed in, written in, phoned in to say that made a massive difference, and they watched films they would never have come to normally, and found work they absolutely loved,” she said. Movie awards are generally dominated by five or six highly touted films, said Marc Samuelson, the chair of BAFTA’s film committee, in the same interview. “If we’re disrupting that a bit, it’s a good thing,” he added.Some 258 films were submitted for consideration for this year’s awards, and they were watched over 150,000 times on a viewing portal created specifically for voters, he said.This year’s winners will be announced on April 11 at a ceremony in London. Samuelson would not explain how the event will be held, but he said it would conform with Britain’s coronavirus rules. Indoor events are not allowed in England until May 17 at the earliest. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is scheduled next Monday to announce nominations for this year’s Oscars.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      ‘Bombay Rose’ Review: Nostalgic Ruminations

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Bombay Rose’ Review: Nostalgic RuminationsA romance between a refugee and an escaped child bride is at the heart of this animated film.A scene from “Bombay Rose,” directed by Gitanjali Rao.Credit…NetflixMarch 8, 2021, 5:10 p.m. ETBombay RoseDirected by Gitanjali RaoAnimation, Drama, RomancePG-131h 33mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.The wistful animation “Bombay Rose” (streaming on Netflix) paints modern day Mumbai as an impressionistic cityscape where blurry street merchants hawk blobs that might be marigolds or oranges or heaps of turmeric. It’s as if the director, Gitanjali Rao, sharpens her focus only on the faces of two star-crossed lovers — Salim (voiced by Amit Deondi), a refugee from Kashmir, and Kamala (Cyli Khare), an escaped child bride — who sell flowers on opposite sides of a thoroughfare.As he’s Muslim and she’s Hindi (and still married), their romance mostly exists in their imagination. But it’s in their daydreams that Rao meticulously adds patterned trim to saris and a shine to the spoons, making them rich with details that don’t exist in Salim and Kamala’s hardscrabble lives in this harsh metropolis.Salim pictures himself a swaggering Bollywood hero rescuing his sweetheart from the trafficker who wants to sell her to dubious buyers in Dubai. Kamala imagines them embracing in India’s royal past. And they’re not the only ones dissatisfied with reality. Elsewhere, an older film actress insists on living in her black-and-white heyday, while her suitor, an antiques dealer, laments that young buyers no longer see the value in heirlooms.[embedded content]The nostalgic ruminations of “Bombay Rose” have the feel of one of the vintage music boxes that an actress tuts over while talking to her dead co-star. The movie is lovely, but airless and bolted with scraps that barely hold together.Ironically, Rao’s more contemporary beats wind up being the swooniest: a rainy kiss blocked by a wet car window that allows the couple to slip back out of focus — a nod to Bollywood’s kissing taboo — and the idea that if Salim’s corny, mustachioed movie heroes can’t save the day, perhaps it’s time to believe in a more humble movie heroine.Bombay RoseRated PG-13 for the suggestion of sex work. Running time: 1 hour 33 minutes. Watch on Netflix.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      What’s on TV This Week: ‘Coming to America’ and the Grammy Awards

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyWhat’s on TV This Week: ‘Coming to America’ and the Grammy AwardsThe original “Coming to America” airs on Paramount Network. And this year’s Grammy Awards airs on CBS.Eddie Murphy, left, and Arsenio Hall in “Coming to America.”Credit…Paramount PicturesMarch 8, 2021, 1:00 a.m. ETBetween network, cable and streaming, the modern television landscape is a vast one. Here are some of the shows, specials and movies coming to TV this week, March 8-14. Details and times are subject to change.MondayCOMING TO AMERICA (1988) 10 p.m. on Paramount Network. In a recent interview with The New York Times, Eddie Murphy and Arsenio Hall discussed the comic chemistry that they share, which is a — perhaps the — key ingredient in this fish-out-of-water comedy. “I’m a stand-up comic and a guy who does TV,” Hall said. “Eddie is a movie star. But we share with each other because the bottom line is we’re both comfortable in our own skin.” In “Coming to America,” Murphy plays a prince from a wealthy African country and Hall plays his sidekick, in a journey that takes that pair to Queens, New York. The movie, directed by John Landis, immortalized Murphy and Hall’s easy rapport; pair it with the sequel, “Coming 2 America,” which was released last week.TuesdayAMERICAN EXPERIENCE: VOICE OF FREEDOM 8 p.m. on PBS (check local listings). The life of the great contralto Marian Anderson — whose groundbreaking career included becoming, in 1955, the first Black singer to perform at the Metropolitan Opera — is covered in this documentary program, which debuted last month and airs again on Tuesday. Its appraisal of Anderson’s life is built around footage of her famous 1939 performance at the Lincoln Memorial, which was attended by 75,000 people and became a symbolic moment in the civil rights movement.COVID DIARIES NYC 9 p.m. on HBO. Five filmmakers in their late teens and early 20s capture their pandemic-era lives in this series of short, first-person documentaries. Several of the filmmakers’ family members are essential workers, including a Washington Heights bus driver and a postal worker.WednesdayCynthia Erivo in “Harriet.”Credit…Glen Wilson/Focus FeaturesHARRIET (2019) 8 p.m. on HBO. Cynthia Erivo will return to screens later this month, playing Aretha Franklin in the third season of National Geographic’s “Genius.” It’s not her first time embodying a foundational figure from America’s past. Erivo played Harriet Tubman in this 2019 biopic, directed by Kasi Lemmons, which dramatizes Tubman’s escape from bondage and her leadership in the underground railroad. Erivo’s performance is “precise and passionate” and the film itself “rousing and powerful,” A.O. Scott wrote in his review for The Times. Leslie Odom Jr. and Janelle Monáe also star, and the score is by Terence Blanchard.CAKE 10 p.m. on FXX. This anthology series is called “Cake,” but what it offers are more like cake pops: Little comedy shorts, both animated and live-action, that make it easy to consume more than you intended. The show’s fourth season, which debuts Wednesday, offers an array of fresh shorts from a variety of creators.ThursdayGeorge MacKay in “True History of the Kelly Gang.”Credit…IFC FilmsTRUE HISTORY OF THE KELLY GANG (2020) 6 p.m. on Showtime 2. It was easy to miss the release of this film last April, when potential U.S. viewers would have been distracted by the newly arrived coronavirus (and by “Tiger King”). But fans of Westerns — intense ones — might consider giving it another look. The movie offers a fictionalized account of the life of the legendary outlaw Ned Kelly, who led a gang in Australia in the 19th century. George MacKay plays Kelly during the gang’s final days, as they evade the law in Australian bush. The film, directed with elaborate flair by Justin Kurzel, is based on a Booker Prize-winning novel by Peter Carey — but Glenn Kenny, in his review for The Times, wrote that the language in the film pales next to the book’s prose. “A climactic shootout with startling strobe-like lighting effects is undeniably impressive,” Kenny wrote. “But the jumpy, springy qualities of the movie’s visual style are unfortunately undercut by its verbal content.”FridayJo Van Fleet and James Dean in “East of Eden.”Credit…Everett CollectionEAST OF EDEN (1955) 6 p.m. on TCM. How do you heave “East of Eden,” John Steinbeck’s chunky and elaborate tale of two families in California’s Central Valley, onto film? This adaptation, directed by Elia Kazan from a screenplay by Paul Osborn, does so by focusing on only a slice of the book. It casts James Dean and Raymond Massey as the sons of a strict Christian farmer, focusing on family tensions that deepen when the younger son (Dean) discovers that his mother (Jo Van Fleet), who he’d been told was dead, is alive and running a brothel in Salinas. He also develops a relationship with his older brother’s girlfriend (Julie Harris). This was Dean’s first leading film role, and he didn’t exactly get a standing ovation from the Times critic Bosley Crowther. “This young actor, who is here doing his first big screen stint, is a mass of histrionic gingerbread,” Crowther wrote a 1955 review. “He scuffs his feet, he whirls, he pouts, he sputters, he leans against walls, he rolls his eyes, he swallows his words, he ambles slack-kneed — all like Marlon Brando used to do. Never have we seen a performer so clearly follow another’s style.” The director, Crowther added, “should be spanked for permitting him to do such a sophomoric thing.” Crowther did like the CinemaScope cinematography, though.SaturdayTHE 2021 NICKELODEON KIDS’ CHOICE AWARDS 7:30 p.m. on Nick. After an admirably weird appearance alongside Maya Rudolph at the Golden Globe Awards last month, Kenan Thompson will take on full hosting duties for this year’s installment of Nickelodeon’s film and TV awards show, where his oddball humor will be served with a side of green slime. The nominees list has little overlap with the higher-brow awards shows. It includes Jim Carrey for “Sonic the Hedgehog” and Vanessa Hudgens for “The Princess Switch: Switched Again.”SundayFrom left: Taylor Swift, Megan Thee Stallion and Dua Lipa are among the artists announced as performers for the 63rd annual Grammy Awards.Credit…Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images For Iheartmedia, Rich Fury/Getty Images For Visible, Kevin Winter/Getty Images For DcpTHE 63RD ANNUAL GRAMMY AWARDS 8 p.m. on CBS. Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa, BTS, Harry Styles, Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion are among the performers at this year’s Grammy Awards ceremony, which will be hosted by Trevor Noah on Sunday night. (The broadcast will mix live and recorded performances.) Swift, Lipa and Beyoncé dominate the nominees list; other performers up for multiple awards include the rapper Roddy Ricch, who will also perform, and the singer-songwriters Brittany Howard and Phoebe Bridgers.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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      Chloé Zhao, ‘Nomadland’ Director, Encounters a Backlash in China

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      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Awards SeasonGolden Globes: What HappenedBest and Worst MomentsWinners ListStream the WinnersRed Carpet ReviewAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyIn China, a Backlash Against the Chinese-Born Director of ‘Nomadland’Days after winning a Golden Globe for the film, Chloé Zhao was pilloried online for past remarks about China.Chloé Zhao, the director of “Nomadland,” at the drive-in premiere of the film last year in Pasadena, Calif., last year.Credit…Amy Sussman/Getty ImagesAmy Qin and March 6, 2021, 9:13 a.m. ETWhen Chloé Zhao won the Golden Globe for best director for her film “Nomadland” last Sunday, becoming the first Asian woman to receive that prize, Chinese state news outlets were jubilant. “The Pride of China!” read one headline, referring to Ms. Zhao, who was born in Beijing.But the mood quickly shifted. Chinese online sleuths dug up a 2013 interview with an American film magazine in which Ms. Zhao criticized her native country, calling it a place “where there are lies everywhere.” And they zeroed in on another, more recent interview with an Australian website in which Ms. Zhao, who received much of her education in the United States and now lives there, was quoted as saying: “The U.S. is now my country, ultimately.”The Australian site later added a note saying that it had misquoted Ms. Zhao, and that she had actually said “not my country.” But the damage was done.Chinese nationalists pounced online. What was her nationality, they wanted to know. Was she Chinese or American? Why should China celebrate her success if she’s American?Even a research center overseen by the government-affiliated Chinese Academy of Social Sciences weighed in. “Don’t be in such a hurry to praise Chloé Zhao,” read a social media post by the academy’s State Cultural Security and Ideology Building Center. “Look at her real attitude toward China.”On Friday, censors barged in. Searches in Chinese for the hashtags “#Nomadland” and “#NomadlandReleaseDate” were suddenly blocked on Weibo, a popular social media platform, and Chinese-language promotional material vanished as well. References to the film’s scheduled April 23 release in China were removed from prominent movie websites.It was not a complete blackout. Numerous stories about the movie were still online as of Saturday. And so far, there have been no reports that the film’s China release was in jeopardy. (China’s National Arthouse Alliance of Cinemas, which will oversee the theatrical release, did not immediately respond to a request for comment, nor did Searchlight Pictures, the Hollywood studio behind “Nomadland.”)But the online censorship was the latest reminder of the power of rising nationalist sentiment in China and the increasingly complex political minefield that companies must navigate there.Ms. Zhao, left, and the actress Frances McDormand, center, on the set of “Nomadland.”Credit…Courtesy Of Searchlight Pictures, via Associated PressFor years, the central government was the only major gatekeeper for films in China, determining which foreign movies got the official stamp of approval and, ultimately, access to the country’s booming box office. Now, more and more, China’s online patriots can also influence the fate of a film or a company.In many cases, winning over — or at least not offending — those patriots, sometimes derogatorily referred to as “little pinks,” has become another crucial consideration for companies seeking to enter the Chinese market.“There is much more space to punch figures like Chloé Zhao,” said Aynne Kokas, the author of “Hollywood Made in China.”The backlash against “Nomadland” was somewhat unexpected. Aside from Ms. Zhao, the film, which stars Frances McDormand in a sensitive portrait of the lives of itinerant Americans, has little if any connection to China. Though it is said to be a strong contender for the Academy Awards, it was not expected to bring in big Chinese audiences, given its limited theatrical release and its slow pacing.Awards Season More