Category: media

“In the age of blogs and MySpace, college radio might seem an anachronism, an analog remnant in a digital world. With young people listening to the radio less, student stations no longer enjoy the influence they had when they gave bands like R.E.M. and Nirvana an early boost to stardom.”

The National Board of Review has named Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire as the best film of 2008. “Clint Eastwood was named best actor for his upcoming drama Gran Torino, while Anne Hathaway won the best actress award for Rachel Getting Married. The NBR’s members include teachers, historians and industry professionals.”

“The woman behind a new BBC film adaptation of The Thirty-Nine Steps is braced for complaints this Christmas from fans of previous screen portrayals of the classic adventure. Gone from her version is Mr Memory, the music hall performer cruelly shot as he reveals the secret at the core of the story; gone is the gripping scene on the Forth Bridge; gone is the villain’s tell-tale missing finger joint (or rather, it is back); and gone, too, is the hero’s death-defying struggle on the clockface of Big Ben.”

“The Canadian founder of the Dubai International Film Festival is renewing legal action against its current chairman and managing director, alleging they were behind public statements that he is ‘racist’ and an ‘Arab hater’ in order to justify his removal from the festival.”

“The programmers of the Sundance Film Festival on Wednesday announced a schedule of competition films that in their view, reflect an unusual tilt toward the emotional — maybe even melodramatic — side of independent cinema… Alienation is out. Engagement is in.”

“Ballast, an austere drama about a grieving man who forms a bond with a woman and her young son; Frozen River, a somber tale about the relationship between two poverty-stricken women; and Rachel Getting Married, an intimate drama about a young woman confronting her demons at her sister’s nuptials, dominated the nominations for the 2009 Film Independent’s Spirit Awards on Tuesday, earning six each.”

Gus van Sant’s new biopic on Harvey Milk, the gay activist and politician assassinated in San Francisco’s City Hall in 1978, opened just three weeks after voters passed a constitutional amendment undoing California’s legalization of same-sex marriage. “How does Proposition 8 change the meaning – the symbolic significance as well as the real-world function – of Milk? And if the film had found an audience early enough, could it have made a difference?”

“The National Institutes of Health and a nonprofit advocacy group, Common Sense Media, have another reason for President-elect Barack Obama to keep urging parents to ‘turn off the TV.’ In what researchers call the first report of its kind, a review of 173 studies about the effects of media consumption on children asserts that a strong correlation exists between greater exposure and adverse health outcomes.”

“Every year, entertainment reporters rattle off the type of roles that are usually Oscar bait: Alcoholics-druggies, people with mental or physical afflictions, etc. … But the last decades have offered proof that there are subtler things that can help steer actors into a surefire nomination, and maybe even a win.”

The recently announced Qatar branch of the Tribeca Film Festival makes sense “when you consider that [Robert] De Niro created the original festival to bring business back downtown after the attacks of September 11. But it makes even more sense if you consider what’s happening with Qatar’s next door neighbor, the United Arab Emirates,” which is pouring money into TV and Hollywood films.