Category: media

This has been one of the shabbiest movie summers in memory – a stretch as desolate as a beach closed by the Board of Health. Still, out of habit, people make the trek, and while remaining fully dressed poke at the debris that’s washed up. There’s always something to be admired in this old boot or that chunk of scrap metal, decomposing amid the syringes and jellyfish. – The Nation

BBC chief announces major new initiative to revamp the public broadcaster. “BBC3 would target younger viewers with home-grown comedy, drama and music and BBC4 would be an “unashamedly intellectual mixture of Radio 3 and Radio 4 on television”. He said that the 800,000 visitors to the Monet exhibition at the Royal Academy last summer and the huge popularity of Tate Modern proved that there was a potential audience for a channel for ‘arts, ideas and in-depth discussion’.” – The Telegraph (UK)

The UK’s new Film Council will be investing in movies. Art films? Documentaries? Not hardly. “There’s no difference between the Film Council and the mini-studios that exist in Britain, such as FilmFour, Momentum, Redbus, Renaissance, Sky Pictures, Intermedia. We are not dirigistes, as you are in France. Public money should be invested prudently, just like private money. We are not prepared to take unnecessary risks.” – The Guardian

A Santa Monica California radio station decides to abandon broadcast operations and exist only on the web. “It’s still a bit early, but we want to be there when the technology catches up to the demand.” With the push of a button, listeners will be able to purchase the works of the artists they’re hearing, and concert tickets, too. Down the road, advertisers will be able to target ads to individuals. – Chicago Tribune

Can a whole industry declare bankruptcy? Movie theatre companies are filing for court protection after building too many megaplexes in recent years. “Edwards Theatres said Wednesday it filed for Chapter 11. Carmike Cinemas did the same a few weeks ago, and Regal Cinemas, the nation’s biggest chain, gave notice it may not be far behind. Meanwhile, United Artists is trying to hash out a deal with its bankers and bondholders in lieu of an outright bankruptcy filing.” – Variety

The hottest thing in Hollywood right now is the internet. “The lures are obvious: Internet greed, and the chance to pioneer a whole new art form, to be both D.W. Griffith and Louis B. Mayer. It’s an all-star game. The world’s best pitchers, catchers and home-run hitters, people like Steven Spielberg and Ron Howard, want in. The only problem is, no one has invented baseball yet.” – LA Weekly

It’s hardly been a summer to remember at the movie box office in America. Nonetheless, American movies have clobbered French films in French theatres. “After eight weeks, the battlefield is strewn with corpses, le Parisien said yesterday. Only one film – Destinées Sentimentales is expected to survive the season.” – The Times (UK)

• The technology is here to allow producers to use digital actors instead of live ones. Does that mean real actors will be out of work? “Producers and directors who think virtual actors will be easier to work with than their human counterparts are also deluding themselves. The truth is that instead of one creative temperament or sensibility to deal with, you have 50. It’s simply better and cheaper to use a real actor.” – Backstage

It seems like corporate people make all the decisions in television these days, that creative people – like writers – are at the mercy of the suits. “Some in Hollywood’s creative community are nevertheless trying to break this stranglehold – the one that says Disney, as just one example, will own, shape and control pretty much everything broadcast on ABC. They are taking chances many view as liberating after toiling on the focus-group driven, overly massaged ‘product’ networks are most comfortable serving up. These efforts vary wildly in size and scope and venture capital.” – Los Angeles Times

An interview with Michael Colgan, artistic director of Dublin’s Gate Theatre and the producer behind The Beckett Film Project – an ambitious enterprise involving some of the world’s most famous filmmakers to create movies of all 19 of Beckett’s dramas. – CBC