Thompson on Hollywood

IN THE WORKS: Studios Raid Hitchcock Files, First 'Rebecca,' Now 'Suspicion'

News

Joan Fontaine was nominated for the Oscar for two back-to-back Hitchcock masterpieces, 1940's "Rebecca" and 1941's "Suspicion," and won for the latter. In the space of a week it looks like two studios are prepping remakes of those films. Of course, Working Title/DreamWorks and Montecito/Paramount insist that they are returning to the source, Daphne Du Maurier and Francis Iles ("Before the Fact"), respectively. (UPDATE: For more on these Hitchcock films, read Dave Kehr's latest NYT DVD column.)

By Anne Thompson
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February 13, 2012 9:41 PM
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Crazy Brilliant? DreamWorks and Working Title To Remake Hitchcock Classic 'Rebecca'

News

Is it total hubris or a stroke of genius to attempt a remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s masterfully intense psychological thriller "Rebecca"? Either way, DreamWorks and Working Title are planning to pull it off, setting Steven Knight ("Eastern Promises") to write the screenplay.

By Justin Lowe
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February 10, 2012 12:50 AM
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Weekend Box Office: Holdover Puss in Boots Holds Off Challenger Tower Heist

Features

Amazingly, 3-D animated family feature Puss In Boots held off challenger Tower Heist this weekend, reports Charles Lyons.

By Charles Lyons
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November 6, 2011 7:35 AM
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Del Toro Exec Producing DreamWorks Feature Adaptation of Creepy Short Film: Alma

Guillermo del Toro, who executive produced Puss in Boots, will work again with DreamWorks Animation on Alma, another animated film based on a the popular short film (below) by Rodrigo Blaas. The former Pixar animator will also helm the feature, which is being written by Megan Holley (Sunshine Cleaning). Alma is adorable, but the vibe is wonderfully creepy--we hope (perhaps futilely) that DreamWorks keeps it that way--not to mention the gap in her teeth. A potential animated franchise with a female lead who isn't a princess? Yes, please, we need more of those!

By Sophia Savage
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October 31, 2011 6:35 AM
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Media Watch: Twitter Proves People Are Happiest on Weekends, Netflix vs. Amazon

Looking at a catalogue of real-time updates from Twitter, scientists at Cornell University were able to track mood changes throughout the day and week, and found confirmation of the obvious: people are happiest on their days off. Cornell University analyzed over 500 million Tweets from 2.4 million people, from 84 countries and using a computer program to look at words indicating positive or negative moods, found that positive attitudes peaked early in the morning and then again around midnight. Moods dipped in the middle of the workday and peaked on weekend mornings.

By Maggie Lange
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September 30, 2011 6:19 AM
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Spielberg's Tintin Opens in Europe First; Director Talks Robopocalypse, Lincoln

With the Tintin comics much more well-known in Europe than stateside, the plan was always to open the Peter Jackson/Steven Spielberg collaboration The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn overseas first, in late October, followed by a December holiday-friendly release in North America. (Trailer below.)

By Anne Thompson
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September 29, 2011 5:38 AM
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Honor Roll: Producers Guild Recognizes Steven Spielberg

The Producers Guild of America will honor Steven Spielberg with the 2012 David O. Selznick Achievement Award in Motion Pictures. The guild will bestow the producer, director, writer and Principal Partner of DreamWorks Studios with the award at the 23rd Annual Producers Guild ceremony on January 21st at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.

By Anne Thompson and Maggie Lange
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September 21, 2011 5:36 AM
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Oscar Watch: Rango Honored by Hollywood Film Festival

In a shrewd bit of Oscar positioning, Rango is the first non-Pixar film to receive The Hollywood Film Festival's animation award, which will be presented by Starz Entertainment at the 15th annual ceremony on Oct. 24 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. The festival is deployed by many Oscar campaigners as a promotional event on the road to the Oscars.

By Bill Desowitz
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September 6, 2011 10:36 AM
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Oscar Watch: Mid-Year Top Animation Contenders in the Year of the Sequel

Awards

As we head into the fall awards season, Bill Desowitz looks at where the animation Oscar race is heading: it's so far a weak field The good news is that the Oscar race for best animated feature is wide open -- the widest, in fact, since Happy Feet beat Cars in 2006 (the last time Pixar lost the Oscar). And, lo and behold, here we are again with Happy Feet 2 competing against Cars 2 in the Year of the Sequel. Thanks to a new policy, a maximum of four films can now be nominated if 13-15 qualify. In the past, anything under 16 qualifiers meant three Oscar nominees. So expect either four or five nominees this Oscar season. The bad news, of course, is that there's a dearth of originality -- at least thus far. In fact, DreamWorks's Katzenberg told Fortune that it's the worst year for movies overall that he can remember.

By Bill Desowitz
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August 26, 2011 8:29 AM
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Oscar Watch: Critics, Academy, Men, Women: The Help vs. Rise of the Planet of the Apes

It's not surprising where @spikelee falls on The Help. He's retweeting the articles that support his views, from indieWIRE's Eric Kohn to Michael Phillips in The Chicago Tribune. UPDATE: And The Association of Black Women Historians also disapproves.