‘Empire of Light’ Trailer: Sam Mendes Crafts An Ode To Cinema Starring Olivia Colman

2021 was a big year for Léa Seydoux. Having appeared in one of the year’s most anticipated films in Wes Anderson’s “The French Dispatch,” Seydoux also reprised her role as Madeleine Swann in the latest addition to the Bond franchise, “No Time To Die,” helping the film become the fourth highest-grossing film of 2021 with a worldwide box office total of $774.2 million.

During my time working in a cinema, we used to joke that we needed our reality show. From making popcorn, shifting candy, getting stocklists, making sure the projectors are set, climbing up on a marquee to make sure it is up to date, joking about the things that you find while ushing, and the pure rush of adrenaline when you’re selling out showtimes left and right, a unique bond is formed behind the concession stand at a movie theater.

EXCLUSIVE: A slew have just boarded Paramount’s upcoming Transformers: Rise of the Beasts including Peter Dinklage (as the voice of Scourge), Liza Koshy (as the voice of Arcee), John DiMaggio (as the voice of Stratosphere), David Sobolov (as Rhinox/Battletrap), Michaela Jaé Rodriguez (as Nightbird), Cristo Fernández (as Wheeljack), and Tobe Nwigwe (as Reek).

EXCLUSIVE: Brian Cox (Succession), Nicola Coughlan (Bridgerton), Oscar winner Daniel Kaluuya (Get Out) and Emilio Villa-Muhammad (The Man Who Fell to Earth) are heading up the all-star cast of Audible Original title Oliver Twist, produced by Oscar winner Sam Mendes (1917). 

Alejandro González Iñárritu (Bardo) is set to receive the Cinema Audio Society’s Filmmaker of the Year honor at the59th CAS Awards, taking placing at the InterContinental Los Angeles Downtown hotel on March 4.

Sideshow/Janus Films EO held well in week two, grossing $23,217 for the five-day holiday frame ($11,609 per screen) and $16,900 for the three-day weekend ($8,450 per screen). The new cume is $50.7k in a crowded arthouse market, a strong showing for the film starring a melancholic gray donkey. It expands to LA next week opening at Laemmle Royal, Alamo Drafthouse DTLA, Los Feliz 3, and Santa Barbara’s Riviera Theater at SBIFF. Director Jerzy Skolimowski will be on hand for Q&As all weekend.

Over the 5-day Thanksgiving stretch, Netflix’s one week sneak preview of Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery buried all new and old major studio adult counterprogramming with an estimated $13.3M over 5-days for what is projected to be a $15M first week by Tuesday.

DreamWorks Animation on Friday unveiled a new, 32-second curtain raiser that will open its films going forward. 

It’s starting to sink in that Harrison Ford is hanging up his whip with “Indiana Jones 5.” The 80-year-old actor ends his tenure as the beloved tomb raider and part-time archaeology professor next summer. The fifth installment is directed by James Mangold (“Ford Vs.

EXCLUSIVE: Sam Mendes has cast Johnny Flynn (Emma, Beast), Tuppence Middleton (Downton Abbey, Mank) and Sherlock’s Mark Gatiss to portray legendary stars Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor and John Gielgud in The Motive and the Cue, a mouth-watering new play by Jack Thorne that explores how acting giants Burton and Gielgud staged Hamlet on Broadway in 1964.

The Palm Springs International Film Awards announced on Monday that Cate Blanchett will receive the Desert Palm Achievement Award, Actress for Todd Field’s “Tár,” in which she plays a driven orchestra conductor.“Cate Blanchett is truly one of the best actresses of this generation, whose performances are always extraordinary no matter the role. In her latest film ‘Tár,’ Cate perfectly embodies Lydia Tár as an orchestra conductor at the height of her career whose life begins to unravel,” Palm Springs Film Festival chairman Harold Matzner said.

EXCLUSIVE: In step with domestic, Walt Disney Animation Studios’ Strange World will make its offshore theatrical debut this week, and is eyeing an overseas start in the $21M-$29M range. That’s lower than where a new animated movie from Disney might normally kick off, but the studio has taken a voluntary pass on more than 20 markets, choosing not to submit the film in countries where its LGBTQ+ content would have very likely forced demands for edits.

The Florian Hoffmeister lensed thriller Tár from director Todd Field topped the Camerimage main competition, collecting the Golden Frog during the closing ceremony of the cinematography film festival Saturday.

Three rite-of-passage movies are vying for attention this week at a moment when the rewards of maturity seem to be offering more gratification than the agonies of youth.

EXCLUSIVE: Steven Spielberg looks to have found his Frank Bullitt as sources tell Deadline Bradley Cooper has closed a deal to play the no-nonsense San Francisco cop in the new original Bullitt story centered on the classic character famously played by Steven McQueen in the 1968 thriller, which is set up at Warner Bros. Cooper will also produce the pic along with Spielberg and his producing partner Kristie Macosko Krieger (marking their second collaboration after Maestro), with Josh Singer on board to pen the script. Steve McQueen’s son, Chad ,and granddaughter Molly McQueen will exec produce the new movie.

“Magic Mike’s Last Dance” is almost here and the film’s debut trailer gives a great impression of what we can expect from the final film in the trilogy.Once again starring Channing Tatum as “Magic” Mike Lane, who appears to be stuck in Florida and working as a bartender for a monied older woman (Salma Hayek Pinault). After they strike up a romance and he shows her his, um, moves, she suggests that they take his act abroad – to foggy London town! While there, Mike is forced to find new dancers and construct a show from the ground up, while also connecting with his love’s young daughter.Steven Soderbergh, who directed the first “Magic Mike” but sat out the sequel (only serving as editor, camera operator and cinematographer, as this was during the brief period where he was “retired”) returns to direct “Magic Mike’s Last Dance.” Originally intended as an HBO Max original movie, as Soderbergh’s recent “No Sudden Move” and “KIMI” were, “Magic Mike’s Last Dance” was recently moved into pole position (get it?) – over Valentine’s Day weekend, 2023.