Category: media

“When something breaks on a projector, usually you can get it up and running in a few minutes. And usually it’s a $5 part. When something goes wrong in the digital realm, you have to call your IT department. And I don’t know anyone who likes to call their IT department.”

“After desperate attempts to prop up the industry’s once-thriving DVD business, studio executives now believe the only hope of turning around a 40% decline in home entertainment revenue lies in rapidly accelerating the delivery of movies over the Internet.”

“Hollywood has begun converting some of its highest-grossing titles to 3-D for planned rerelease at the box office, including “Star Wars,” “Titanic” and “Top Gun.” The surprisingly strong ticket sales for the 17-year-old animated movie “The Lion King 3D,” which Disney converted and returned to theaters last weekend, is likely to spur even more updates of catalog films.”

“The re-issue of The Lion King has made $61.7m (£39.9m) since its release. The original film came out in 1994 and was re-released for the first time in 2002. The 3D version has surpassed expectations, according to Disney. Its head of distribution, Dave Hollis, said the studio will leave the film in cinemas longer than its planned two-week run.”

“A row has broken out over Russia’s nomination for the best foreign language film at the Oscars after the most expensive movie in the country’s history” – Nikita Mikhalkov’s Burnt by the Sun 2: Citadel – “was chosen despite being a flop and panned by the critics.”

“The further away one stands from Rome and Italy, the more likely one is to read [many of the director’s fantastical set pieces] as the work of a genial fantasist. Spend some time in the Eternal City, and you realize that in many respects Fellini was an out-and-out realist.”

“New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is threatening to revoke a $420,000 subsidy his state’s Economic Development Authority is giving to MTV’s “Jersey Shore” for filming there.”

“The festival, which opens in Istanbul on Friday, will screen about 100 films from 40 countries dealing with all kinds of crimes and punishments, but focusing especially on coups d’état, the inaugural year’s main festival theme.”

“In 1991 two films changed the landscape of indie cinema by making the frugality of the budget a selling point. Where are the microbudget film directors now?”

A report from the British Film Institute “claimed that the British public regards film as more important than, in diminishing order: world news, restaurants, the countryside, pop and rock music, literature, politics, museums, pubs and clubs, watching and playing sport, theatre, art, celebrities and religion.”