Category: media

Do Boston teamsters shake down Massachusetts movie producers to ensure they use union crews on locations? “Local film producers and officials said yesterday the Teamsters’ heavy hand has been felt in Massachusetts movie-making for decades and is a main reason major studios and independents avoid shooting in the Bay State.” The FBI is investigating. – Boston Herald 07/26/00

Hollywood studios are bracing themselves for potentially contentious negotiations and walkouts when many actors’ and screenwriters’ contracts expire next spring. In anticipation, studios are ramping up production and stockpiling scripts. The last Writers Guild of America and Screen Actors Guild strikes were in 1988 and cost the industry an estimated $500 million in losses. – Times of India (AP) 07/25/00 

Director Peter Jackson is doing his best to keep his movie version of “Lord of the Rings” top-secret until its release – despite the devious attempts by several people on the New Zealand set to leak clips and documents to the public. Three people have already been arrested for distributing video footage and photographs of the set, actors, and costumes. – Wired 07/25/00

Hollywood’s landmark Silent Movie Theater has recently reopened after a $1 million refurbishment, and audiences are packing the house every night to watch the silent era on screen. “With the greatest respect to modern cinema, people are grossed out with special effects and stuff done on computers. There’s a yearning for the purity of these old movies.” – The Telegraph (UK) 07/25/00 

• “Activists and citizen groups are crying out that public broadcasting in America has abandoned its Great Society-era foundations and is failing its Carnegie Commission mandate to present diverse perspectives. They warn that it has bowed to commercial pressures and corporate influence, due to inadequate funding. Charges of bias abound from both the right and the left. In a media-saturated country and a media-saturated age, can we still seclude some public space from the marketplace?” [a collection of stories about public broadcasting]  – Mediachannel 07/25/00

— Wednesday at age 76. One of France’s most popular filmmakers, he directed more than 30 features and won the Oscar in 1978 for “Une Histoire Simple.” – CBC 07/24/00

Plans for a short-film series by contemporary British artists to be shown on a huge outdoor screen in central London are causing quite an outrage. No surprise there: The films include “an actress dressed as Diana, Princess of Wales, crossing and uncrossing her legs in the manner of Sharon Stone in the film “Basic Instinct,” and the blown-up facial expressions of a series of men and women recorded while using the lavatory.” Although endorsed by the London Tourist Board, the Tories’ Home Secretary has publicly condemned the series, worried it could “tarnish Britain’s image abroad.” – The Age (Melbourne) (The Telegraph) 07/24/00 

Pat Mitchell, PBS’s new president, is talking about reinventing the public broadcaster. “If you look at this new media landscape we’re moving into, with more and more choices … who are viewers going to trust? Our mandate is … to bring a certain vitality and relevance to our schedule; new ideas that appeal to new viewers, as well as keeping the ones we have.” – The Star Tribune (Minneapolis) (St. Petersburg Times) 07/24/00

“It may not be dead, but some are wondering whether animation’s pulse – at least that of the traditional, two-dimensional variety made by anyone other than Disney – might be fading.” Fox Animation Studios closed down this week, and Warner Bros. and Paramount have scaled back production. “Audiences, they argued, were demanding up-to-the-minute digital magic and shying away from the traditional animation they remembered, unless the name Disney was attached.” – New York Times 07/24/00 

Since earning the grand prize at the Cannes Film Festival in May for his “Devils on the Doorstep,” director Jian Wen has met with nothing but resistance from government censors since returning home to China. “Censors have refused to allow his movie about wartime China to be shown in his homeland and they won’t tell him why. They also want to confiscate the movie’s negatives, and Jiang fears that he could be banned from directing and acting in China.” – Nando Times (AP) 07/23/00