Die Geheimdienstakte Charlie Chaplin


Freigegebene Dokumente der Londoner Spionageabwehr beweisen, wie die USA den Komiker als Kommunisten verunglimpfen wollten.

..... Im direkten Auftrag des FBI hatte das britische MI5 nicht nur versucht, den genauen Geburtsort des Schauspielers zu recherchieren, sondern auch Belege für seine angebliche Verbindung zu kommunistischen Kreisen zu finden. Die Agenten gingen auch dem amerikanischen Verdacht nach, Chaplin habe in Wahrheit Israel Thornstein geheißen und sei womöglich in Frankreich geboren worden. ..........

abendblatt.de

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Es war einmal - Uhrwerk Orange


Wie jeder Film aus der Reihe "Es war einmal ..." befasst sich auch diese Dokumentation mit der Entstehung eines Kultfilms. Sie stellt den umstrittenen Film "Uhrwerk Orange" von Stanley Kubrick in einer Mischung aus Archivbildern, Filmausschnitten und Interviews in den politischen, sozialen und kulturellen Kontext der rebellischen und nach Modernität strebenden 70er Jahre. Unter anderem kommen der Autor der Romanvorlage, Anthony Burgess, die Malerin und Ehefrau des Regisseurs Christiane Kubrick, Hauptdarsteller Malcolm McDowell, der Schauspieler Warren Clarke, Filmproduzent Jan Harlan, die Psychoanalytikerin Elisabeth Roudinesco und der französische Filmemacher und Kameramann Gaspar Noé zu Wort.

arte.tv

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Pic reunites Monty Python members


Members of Monty Python's Flying Circus are reteaming for "Absolutely Anything," a sci-fi farce combining CGI and live action, with Terry Jones to direct and Mike Medavoy to produce.

Plans are for filming to begin in the U.K. this spring, with the Pythons voicing key roles as a a group of aliens who endow an earthling with the power to do "absolutely anything" to see what a mess he'll make of things -- which is precisely what happens. There's also a talking dog named Dennis who seems to understand more about the mayhem that ensues than anyone else does. Robin Williams will voice the character.

reunites Monty Python members

variety.com

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Anonymous Documentary We Are Legion Peels Back Hacktivist Group’s History


New documentary We Are Legion puts an actual human face on Anonymous, the hacktivist group whose members usually are seen wearing Guy Fawkes masks — if they are seen at all.

Considering Anonymous’ retaliatory acts against websites run by the Department of Justice and the entertainment industry just last week in response to the government takedown of file-sharing site Megaupload, We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists could almost be mistaken for a 93-minute news segment.

But unlike most news segments about the group, the documentary contains genuine moments with actual Anons (some maintain their anonymity in the doc, but others don’t).

“The last two or three days we’ve seen a lot of what Anonymous does,” We Are Legion director Brian Knappenberger said in an interview with Wired.com here Saturday, the morning after the documentary’s premiere at the Slamdance Film Festival. “You know, there was a film about the Weather Underground that came out a few years ago, and that was made 30 years after they were blowing up buildings, and I love that film. But picture making a film like that while they were still blowing up buildings — that’s what I’m talking about.”

wired.com

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How Stanley Kubrick Invented the Modern Box-Office Report


Stanley Kubrick believed that "filmmaking is an exercise in problem solving." He meant that to include the distribution and marketing of his films as well as their production, and he devoted more time and effort to managing the release of his films than any other director. In my view, it's one of the reasons he made only 13 films in 46 years. He relished the problem-solving.

I spent two years overseeing the marketing of Kubrick's 1968 masterpiece, 2001: A Space Odyssey, devising its successful 70-mm. relaunch strategy, before joining him in England to handle the release of A Clockwork Orange. Our collaboration began shortly after Clockwork wrapped and lasted through its December 1971 premiere, its official U.S. release date of February 2, 1972, and throughout its extended rollout. With Stanley's rare combination of meticulousness and creativity, we achieved what we set out to accomplish -- but the most influential result of our collaboration was unexpected.

moviefone.com

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George Lucas is retiring from movie making


This was a new feeling for George Lucas. He made a movie about a plucky band of freedom fighters who battle an evil empire — a movie loaded with special effects like no one had seen before. Then he showed it to executives from all the Hollywood studios. And every one of them said, “Nope.”

One studio’s executives didn’t even show up for the screening. “Isn’t this their job?” Lucas says, astonished. “Isn’t their job at least to see movies? It’s not like some Sundance kid coming in there and saying, ‘I’ve got this little movie — would you see it?’ If Steven (Spielberg) or I or Jim Cameron or Bob Zemeckis comes in there, and they say, ‘We don’t even want to bother to see it. . . .’ ”

nytimes.com

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Produzent Bernd Eichinger gestorben


Er hat den deutschen Film geprägt, stand hinter Erfolgen wie "Der Name der Rose", "Das Parfum" oder "Der Untergang". Jetzt ist Bernd Eichinger überraschend gestorben. Der Produzent erlag in Los Angeles einem Herzinfarkt. Er wurde 61 Jahre alt.

spiegel.de

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Hollywood lobt Kopfgeld aus


Hollywoods Filmszene will sich bei den Ermittlungen zum Mord an der PR-Legende Ronnie Chasen nicht allein auf die Polizei verlassen. Zur Ergreifung des Täters haben die Agenten ein hohes Kopfgeld ausgelobt.

Die 64-jährige Ronnie Chasen war am frühen Dienstagmorgen auf der Fahrt nach Hause in Beverly Hills erschossen worden. Sie kam gerade von einer Premierenparty für den Kinofilm "Burlesque" mit Cher und Christina Aquilera. Chasen war in den Promoter-Kreisen Hollywoods eine Berühmtheit. Von ihrem Mörder fehlt bisher jede Spur.

spiegel.de

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Werner Herzog has teamed up with David Lynch


Werner Herzog's output has swung perilously close to mainstream of late. His 2006 Vietnam war action film Rescue Dawn was mostly well-received, while his Bad Lieutenant was released last month to widespread admiration. Has the famously idiosyncratic German director gone straight? Not a chance. His latest movie, which screens at the Edinburgh international film festival this week, sees him back on the fringes of artistic expression.

guardian.co.uk

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Actor Dennis Hopper dies aged 74 after cancer battle


Known for such cult classics as Easy Rider, Apocalypse Now and Blue Velvet, Hopper embodied the image of the Hollywood icon.

Hopper died on Saturday morning surrounded by friends and family at his home in Venice, California.

He was last seen in public in March when he was honoured with a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame.

"Dennis Hopper died this morning at 8:15 am from complications of metastasised prostate cancer. He died at home in Venice surrounded by family and friends," manager Sam Maydew said in a statement.

bbc.co.uk nytimes.com

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Scarlett Johansson cast in 'lost' Stanley Kubrick film


Among the discarded projects of the famously fastidious Stanley Kubrick are "lost" movies about Napoleon Bonaparte, the Holocaust and the American civil war. Now, 11 years after his death, a treatment by the legendary film-maker titled Lunatic at Large looks set to make it to the big screen, with Scarlett Johansson and Sam Rockwell attached to star.

Production Weekly broke the news on Twitter last night, reporting that the project is based on an original story by Kubrick and pulp writer Jim Thompson. The film-maker was set to shoot the movie in the early 1960s, but withdrew after being offered the chance to direct Roman epic Spartacus by its star, Kirk Douglas.

guardian.co.uk

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160 greatest Arnold Schwarzenegger quotes


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