Category: media

In This Our Life, starring Bette Davis as a Southern white woman who tries to blame a young black man for a death she caused while driving drunk, “clarifies how [bigotry’s] casual presence in the daily lives of Southern whites had become so natural that ill intent seemed absent. At least to those who were not required to think about it.”

“This is a very low-tech process, one that involves stacking ballots on a table — and not leaving a paper trail. Called the ‘preferential system,’ it’s an intricate and little-used process also known as instant runoff voting.”

“Exhibitors have drawn a line in the sand, steadfastly resisting the compression of release dates that they view as a threat to their livelihood. They get nervous when a studio attempts to release a movie on DVD less than 90 days after opening in theaters. Nonetheless, theater executives now are acknowledging they may need to adapt.”

“Network television revenue fell 21.5 percent, and syndicated television stumbled a relatively benign 7.2 percent, according to a report from the Television Bureau of Advertising. Local broadcast television, stung by the absence of political advertising in a nonelection year, plummeted 28.1 percent in the third quarter.”

“After an absence of several years, movies are back big time on commercial television. They’re everywhere all of a sudden, filling up holes, used to correct poor programming decisions and taking up dead airtime.”

“Total ticket sales over Christmas weekend were $278 million, beating the record of $261 million set in July 2008, when “The Dark Knight” was the hit film. ‘It’s an absolutely fitting end to the biggest box office year of all time’.”

“In the age of YouTube and viral marketing campaigns, it was only a matter of time before independent filmmakers came to realize that cutting the middleman out of the process is sometimes the best way to guarantee large audiences see their works. This is especially true at a time when funding from studios has been seriously hit by the recession — just as it was on the way up.”

“One critic calls the $3,200 price tag for a permit to film at one of the city’s buildings the highest fee in the nation by a municipality. But the city, which attracts about $5 billion in business each year through the film trade, defends it as a small increase affecting a slim percentage of productions in a place that has long been among the friendliest filming venues in the country.”

Across the globe, the 10 highest-grossing films of the decade all stemmed from the decades franchises, according to box-office takings tracker Box Office Mojo.

“The remarkable thing about “Avatar” is the degree to which the technology is integral to the story. It is important to show Pandora and its Na’Vi natives in 3-D because “Avatar” is fundamentally about the moral necessity of seeing other beings fully.”