Kamila Andini’s ‘Before Now and Then’ Heads APSA Award Nominations

EXCLUSIVE: The award-winning documentary Long Line of Ladies, about a 13-year-old Native American girl’s coming of age ceremony in the Karuk tradition, will premiere on the New York Times Op-Docs channels Tuesday, the first day of Indigenous Peoples Day.

Elon Musk, who just took over Twitter in a $44 billion leveraged buyout, sought to allay fears about the direction of the social media company by saying it is forming a content moderation council.

The new Kander & Ebb stage musical New York, New York, inspired by the 1977 Martin Scorsese film starring Liza Minnelli and ‎Robert De Niro, will begin performances Friday, March 24, 2023 and officially open Wednesday, April 26, 2023 at Broadway’s St. James Theatre.

There’s a new showrunner at the helm of HBO Max’s The Batman prequel series about Arkham Asylum. The Staircase creator Antonio Campos has been tapped to serve as showrunner-executive producer and also will direct on the series, Deadline has confirmed.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Singapore has banned the release of “#LookAtMe,” a feature film by local director Ken Kwek. The InfoComm Media Development Authority said that the film exceeds film classification guidelines because it denigrates a religious community. Supposedly based in true events, the film depicts a man who is offended by a pastor who preaches against homosexuality, but whose behavior contradicts his teachings. The protagonist’s viral video about the aberrant priest lands him in jail, causing the man’s gay identical twin to fight for justice. “#LookAtMe,” premiered at the New York Asian Film Festival and local media report that the film has been selected for next month’s Singapore International Film Festival. But the IMDA ruling means that it cannot now be shown in any form in Singapore unless Kwek is successful with an appeal.

Clayton Davis The Critics Choice Documentary Awards announced its nominees where Sara Dosa’s lava-fueled love story “Fire of Love” led the field with seven nominations including best documentary feature and director. Co-distributed by National Geographic and Neon, the film’s Ryan White’s “Good Night Oppy,” the moving reflection on the Mars rovers, received a hearty six-nom tally including editing and score. “This year’s nominees prove that documentaries of all lengths and formats are advancing nonfiction media like never before,” said Christopher Campbell, Co-President of the Critics Choice Association Documentary Branch.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Australia’s SLR Productions has announced production on season two of the award-winning original CGI animated series, “Space Nova” for ABC ME. The 15 x 22-minute season has received significant production funding from both Screen Australia and the Australian Children’s Television Foundation as well as development funding from ABC ME and Create NSW. “Space Nova” will be co-produced with Giggle Garage in Malaysia and distributed internationally by ZDF Studios, with ACTF representing the series across Australia and New Zealand. Targeting a six- to ten-year-old global audience, the first season sold to broadcasters or streamers in Germany, the U.K., Norway, Finland, Sweden, Poland, the U.S, Singapore, East Asia, Indonesia, and Brazil.

K.J. Yossman Emmy Award nominated journalist and anchor Anelise Borges has signed with CAA, Variety can exclusively reveal. Borges, who speaks four languages fluently including French, Spanish and Portuguese, has reported from more than 30 countries, covering war, migration, dictatorships and Europe’s identity crises. She boasts over a decade of experience in the field. She has worked at Euronews, TRT and France 24 covering topics including the war in Syria, the European refugee crisis and the Greek economic bailout. While based in Istanbul, she covered the Middle East, Africa, and Europe, breaking stories and reporting from the field.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Korean film “A Wild Roomer” and India’s “Shivamma” have been announced as the joint winners of the New Currents competition, the prestige discovery section of the Busan International Film Festival. “We were particularly sensitive to the lightness and subtlety of the director’s view of his characters. Through his innovative cinematography, he creates original circulations between the characters within a house, and builds a very contemporary universe,” the competition jury said of the Lee Jeon-hong-directed “A Wild Roomer.” “We appreciated the originality and intensity with which the director was able to tell this very contemporary story. Here documentary and fiction meet in an organic and spirited way of making cinema. The generosity of the actors and the scenes create a closeness with this universal story that takes place in an Indian village,” the jury said of the Jaishankar Aryar-directed “Shivamma.”

A bus carrying 36 migrants arrived in Washington, D.C., Thursday morning outside Vice President Kamala Harris' home. Additionally, three more buses dropped off migrants at the Port Authority transit hub in New York City. Harris' residence at the Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C., has become a recurring destination for migrants being transported out of border states to sanctuary cities.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Chinese filmmaker, Bi Gan, best-known for his single-take feature “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” has seen his “A Short Story” picked up by Kino Lorber for distribution in North America. A fairy tale that follows the relationship between man and cat, the film had its world premiere in competition at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival and now has its North American premiere in the Currents section of the New York Film Festival. Kino Lorber plans to qualify “A Short Story” for the 96th Academy Awards, showing it theatrically nationwide in early 2023 in tandem with a theatrical re-release of “Long Day’s Journey Into Night.” “Kino Lorber rarely acquires short films, but Bi Gan has packed more cinematic delight into the fifteen minutes of ‘A Short Story’ than many feature length films deliver in two hours,” said Kino Lorber SVP Wendy Lidell. The deal was brokered by Les Films du Losange.

Manori Ravindran International Editor New York’s South Asian International Film Festival has appointed Chayan Sarkar as its new president. A filmmaker, entrepreneur and festival director, Sarkar is also the founder of the Indian International Film Festival of Queensland in Australia. He takes over from SAIFF founder Shilen Amin, who will step down as president, but will remain a member of the festival’s board of directors. Sarkar joins SAIFF as the festival enters its 19th year as a leading film festival in the U.S. for new cinema from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal, and within the Indian diaspora. In recent years, SAIFF has become increasingly influential as a platform for South Asian cinema, both in the U.S. and internationally. Fourteen of India’s submissions for the international feature film Oscar have had their North American premieres at the festival.

AUSTIN, Texas – Vice President Kamala Harris should tack on a visit to the southern border during her trip to Texas, several people in Austin told Fox News. "Absolutely she should," one man, Mike, said. "But will she? I highly doubt it." But Marcia wasn’t as adamant.

Unaccompanied migrant children arrived on flights to a rural New York community and local officials said Friday they were given no advance notice by the Biden administration. Montgomery police chief Paul Arteta and Mayor Steve Brescia joined "Fox & Friends First" to explain what happened when the flights arrived at Orange County Airport from Texas, carrying minors between 13-18 years old. "I've never seen anything like this before," said Brescia, whose town is located in the Hudson Valley, about 75 miles north of New York City.  Arteta said officials don't know where the parents are, but the children continued on to other areas of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut.  FILE: Kathy Hochul, governor of New York, speaks during the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) annual meeting in New York, US, on Tuesday, Sept.

Jennifer Aniston and Justin Theroux have had one of the healthiest breakups in Hollywood. The couple, which were together for eight years, continues to spend time together and have a healthy friendship. This past Friday, Aniston and Theroux were spotted having dinner together, accompanied by a group of friends.David Schwimmer teases Jennifer Aniston with a shower picture ahead of her LolaVie releaseJennifer Aniston buys Oprah Winfrey’s $14.8 million Montecito estateThe pair met up in the restaurant Laser Wolf and were accompanied by Howard Stern, Jason Bateman, Jon Hamm and Jimmy Kimmel.

Another bus carrying illegal migrants stepped off the bus in Washington, D.C., Thursday morning, not far from Vice President Kamala Harris' residence. Additionally, two more migrant buses arrived in New York City at Manhattan's Port Authority transportation hub Thursday. Seven buses arrived in New York on Wednesday.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Paramount has ordered a series of ‘Taskmaster Australia’ to be produced by Avalon Television with Kevin & Co for Network 10. Set to air in 2023, the show will be hosted by Tom Gleeson and Tom Cashman. The production in Australia joins a growing list of countries with local adaptations of Alex Horne’s BAFTA and National Comedy Award winning “Taskmaster” format. The show involves an all-powerful Taskmaster who, with the help of his loyal assistant, sets out to test the wiles, wit and wisdom of five comedians through a series of strange and surreal challenges.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Next month’s London Korean Film Festival cloaks itself in a panoply of the country’s recent cinema, with a mix of commercial blockbusters, festival titles and documentaries. The long-running event also pays tribute to Kang Soo-youn, the performer who was the first Korean to win a best acting award in Venice and who died in May this year. The event runs from Nov. 3 – 17, 2022 in venues across London and comprises 35 films. It opens with a previously announced screening of “Alienoid.” The Cinema Now section includes: Jeong Ji-yeon’s psychological thriller “The Anchor”; Davy Chou’s “Return To Seoul,” which premiered in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard; Byun Sung-hyun’s “Kingmaker”; “Hot Blooded,” the long-awaited directorial debut by acclaimed novelist and screenwriter Cheon Myeong-kwan; nostalgic road chase movie “Stellar: A Magical Ride”; “Director’s Intention,” by Kim Min-geun.

Carl Samrock, a former VP National Publicity for Warner Bros Pictures and home video executive who also was a photojournalist for The New York Times, died October 1 of pancreatic cancer. He was 81.