“Two movies on similar missions are opening within weeks of each other this season, Racing Extinction and This Changes Everything, both exploring the devastation humanity has wrought on the natural world. Yet rather than focusing only on what is dying and lost, both films offer messages of hope, profiling people who have helped stop, animal by animal, acre by acre, the pillaging of wildlife and land.”
Category: media
How Billy Crystal’s One Five-Minute Scene Nearly Derailed ‘The Princess Bride’
Mandy Patinkin came away with a bruise, and for some takes Cary Elwes had to be replaced with a mannequin.
Is The Internet Doing To TV What It Did To Newspapers And The Music Business? Maybe Not
“Despite sharing the vulnerabilities of other long-standing media – shrinking audiences, changing consumption patterns, new competition for ad dollars – the television dinosaur has only grown fatter.”
What American TV Tells Us About Our Jobs
“One might expect TV to say about work what The Office says: that what you are obliged to do all day is pointless. … Although associated with the freedom to mute, surf, and binge-watch, TV pays attention not only to what we do when we’re on the clock, it also asks philosophical questions about work and the meaning of life, urging us to demand more meaning (whatever that might be) from what we do for a living.”
The ‘Stonewall’ Movie With The ‘Straight-Acting’ Lead Completely Tanked
“The drama has a 9% positive rating, with many critics lambasting its attempt to depict a pivotal moment in American history. Vanity Fair critic Richard Lawson called the film ‘terribly offensive, and offensively terrible.'”
The Banned Iranian Filmmaker Who Keeps Making Films Anyway
“After Mr. Panahi’s release, he was barred for 20 years from making films, writing screenplays, speaking to the media or leaving the country. Today, he lives in a legal limbo and would face six years in prison if authorities decided to charge him with violating the ban.”
How To Fix The BBC? Put More Artists In Charge
“It’s notable in theatre… at the National Theatre a brilliant director like Nick Hytner is also capable of running the organisation. And I would like to see more creatives as part of the decision making going forward at the BBC.”
Where Did The Audience Go? Fall TV Premiere Week Ratings Collapse
According to Nielsen fast national data, every returning Tuesday night drama suffered double-digit ratings declines, while the three new series were a mixed bag.
‘Stonewall’ Isn’t Just A Bad Movie, It’s A Rorschach Test
With Roland Emmerich’s new film, as with the 1969 protest/uprising/riots that sparked the modern gay rights movement, “we see in it what we need to see.” J. Bryan Lowder looks at what the (very) many different criticisms of the movie say about the people making them and about the queer community in America today.
Netflix Says Its Data Can Pinpoint When You Get Hooked On A Show
“Netflix has no plans to use Big Data to rejigger the way TV shows get made, in order to put the strongest emotional hooks earlier in a season (which would result in more viewing by subscribers). Instead, the company sees the metrics as validation of its binge-release strategy of delivering all episodes of a season at once.”