‘The Help’ tops nods for Screen Actors awards

LOS ANGELES (AFP) ― “The Help,” a film about the lives of black housekeepers in the U.S. south before the civil rights era, and hit silent movie “The Artist” topped nominations at the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) awards on Wednesday.“The Help” scored four nods for the SAGs including best actress for Viola Davis, while “The Artist,” a black-and-white tribute to the silent movie era, was shortlisted in three categories.On the small screen, Emmy-winning sitcom “Modern Family” won five nominations incl

Dec. 15, 2011

Arab women filmmakers shine at Dubai festival

DUBAI (AFP) ― A tale of forbidden love in the Gaza Strip won the top prize at the eighth Dubai Film Festival on Wednesday, where a new generation of Arab women directors stole the spotlight.“Habibi” (My Love in Arabic), directed by Susan Youssef, won Best Arab feature film, and the film’s star, Maisa Abdel Hadi, won best actress.The film, which also won the best editor award, tells the story of two Palestinian lovers, Qais and Leila, growing increasingly religious under the control of the Islami

Dec. 15, 2011

Fugitive Chinese TV actor arrested after 13 years

An actor who played a detective and a monk on Chinese television has been arrested after 13 years on the run from charges of attacking a police officer, state media said on Thursday.Ji Siguang, who performed under an alias, was accused of involvement in the assault on a police officer in 1998 in the

Dec. 15, 2011

Eddie Murphy to star in biopic on Washington ex-mayor

WASHINGTON (AFP) ― Eddie Murphy is to star in a television film under development by HBO about Washington’s colorful and controversial former mayor Marion Barry, the U.S. cable channel said Tuesday.In an email to AFP, it confirmed a report in The Washington Post that Spike Lee will direct Murphy ― seen most recently in the comedy caper “Tower Heist” ― in the still-untitled project.Barry was well into his third term as mayor when, in an FBI sting operation caught on video, he was busted in Januar

Dec. 14, 2011

Spielberg, Jackson bring Tintin to U.S.

SAN DIEGO (AP) ― Steven Spielberg hopes he’s the typical American when it comes to Tintin. The filmmaker had never heard of the guy, but once he got acquainted, they became friends for life.Peter Jackson knows he’s the typical non-American when it comes to Tintin. He’s known him since before he could read, and the character’s globe-trotting adventures are part of his own storytelling DNA.Together, the two Academy Award-winning filmmakers hope to achieve something that eluded Belgian artist and w

Dec. 14, 2011

Spielberg announces new Tintin movie

NEW YORK (AFP) ― Steven Spielberg announced in New York a sequel to his 3-D movie version of the comic book hero Tintin.He told a press conference Sunday that “Lord of the Rings” director Peter Jackson would direct the new film and that he had already chosen the book by the Belgian author Herge that would serve as the basis for the script.Spielberg was promoting the U.S. premiere on Dec. 21 of his “Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn,” which already premiered in Brussels in October and h

Dec. 13, 2011

American movies thrive abroad, but foreign films face challenge in U.S.

LOS ANGELES ― Although Hollywood movies are making more money than ever overseas, it’s still a struggle for foreign films to sell tickets in the United States.“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows ― Part 2” collected nearly a billion dollars abroad this year, the most of any American studio production. About $120 million of that sum came from one country ― Japan. Other U.S. films that hit big overseas this year were also sequels: “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides” made more than $800

Dec. 13, 2011

Christian Bale says his Chinese film not propaganda

BEIJING (AFP) ― Oscar winning actor Christian Bale defended Sunday the upcoming Nanjing Massacre film “The Flowers of War,” by China’s most famous director, Zhang Yimou, as more than an anti-Japanese propaganda film.In the film, Bale plays an American drifter who becomes the unwitting protector of a group of Chinese schoolgirls and prostitutes trying to escape the Japanese army’s brutal sacking of China’s wartime capital.The Nanjing Massacre, in which Japanese troops killed tens of thousands of

Dec. 12, 2011

Zombies storm Havana cinema festival

HAVANA (AP) ― The hottest ticket in Havana is a gory, campy zombie flick with a wicked sense of humor about Cuba’s obsessive relations with the United States, one that revels in islanders’ knack for making the best of things even when everything around you ― buildings, streets, human limbs ― is falling to pieces.Audiences thronged movie houses this week to catch screenings of “Juan of the Dead,’’ or “Juan de los Muertos’’ in the original Spanish, and organizers had to hastily add extra midnight

Dec. 11, 2011

Tom Cruise undisputed star at opening of Dubai film festival

DUBAI (AFP) ― Actor Tom Cruise was the undisputed star on the red carpet at the opening of the Dubai Film Festival, sharing the limelight with Bollywood stars and the widow of late Palestinian president Yasser Arafat.Cruise attended the screening of his latest release, “Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol,” which was filmed in Dubai and includes a dramatic scene where the U.S. actor climbs the sides of the world’s tallest building, Burj Khalifa, which stands 828 meters high.Dozens of adoring fans

Dec. 9, 2011