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Hong Kong – Two widely recognized actors, Tang Wei and Jang Dong-gun, will be honored with the Excellence in Asian Cinema Award at the 18th Asian Film Awards on March 16. The event, hosted at the Xiqu Centre in Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District, highlights performers and filmmakers who have made a lasting impact on the industry.

Jang, a Korean actor with more than three decades in the spotlight, expressed his appreciation for the recognition. “It is a tremendous honor to receive this award, and I sincerely thank the Asian Film Awards for this recognition. Having my three-decade acting career acknowledged is deeply meaningful and inspires me to keep going,” he said.

His career began in 1992 with the television drama Son and Daughter, and his rise to stardom came shortly after with The Last Match. His performance in Friend (2001) helped define the gangster film genre in South Korea, while Tae...

Martial arts movies often borrow elements of Westerns, highlighting the contrast between the Old World and the New. The incongruity between East and West is often portrayed humorously in martial arts Western comedies. Martial arts Westerns can examine racial stereotyping and cultural acceptance through the lens of action-packed stories.

For whatever reason, the Western genre has always gone hand in hand with martial arts. Some of the greatest martial arts movie stars of all time have made films in the Wild West, including Jackie Chan and Jet Li. These stories tend to focus on the implicit conflict between the traditional and the new way, as exemplified by the East and the West. Western movies explore the exciting time when American society was pushing into a new uncharted frontier, and this makes it a perfect backdrop for martial arts stories which can have themes of loyalty, justice and moral strength.

The...

Director N Lingusamy’s much awaited action entertainer ‘The Warrior’, featuring Ram Pothineni in the lead, will hit screens worldwide on July 14, its makers announced on Sunday. The unit of the film also released a power-packed poster featuring Ram Pothineni. In the poster, Ram is seen sitting on an explosives box on the platform of […]...

“The 1917 of action flicks” Screen Daily

“A frenetic, fast-paced samurai film” Nerdly

“The Raid style against all odds action flick” The Horrorcist

Synopsis: When a master samurai arrives to duel the disgraced Yoshioka dojo, he walks into an ambush. In the world’s first feature length, one-take action film sequence, Miyamoto Musashi fights for his life against 400 warriors, earning a place in history as the “Crazy Samurai Musashi”.

From director and famed action coordinator Yûji Shimomura, “Crazy Samurai: 400 vs 1” is a thrilling slice of action cinema and a must-see for genre fans.

Dazzler Media presents Crazy Samurai: 400 vs 1 on Blu-ray, DVD & Digital 5th July...

Exclusive: Asif Kapadia has signed with Cinetic Media for management in all areas.

The Academy Award, BAFTA and Grammy-winning director-producer is best known for his innovative trilogy of narratively driven, archive-constructed documentaries, Senna, Amy and Diego Maradona.

Following its world premiere at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, Amy went on to win the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, as well as the BAFTA for Best Documentary, the European Film Award for Best Documentary and a Grammy for Best Music Film.

Senna won BAFTAs for Best Documentary and Best Editing and was nominated for “Outstanding British Film of the Year”; Kapadia’s debut narrative feature The Warrior won the latter award and others.

News of Kapadia’s signing to Cinetic comes shortly after the debuts of his series 1971: The Year That Music Changed Everything and The Me You Can’t See, both of which are streaming on Apple TV+. Kapadia executive produced the former project,...

The esteemed London Indian Film Festival is ready to entertain, inspire and make people think with their special line-up of films, and guests this June. Titled To India With Love, this year the festival will be presented in a special hybrid format!

In a challenging year for India and South Asia, the Bagri Foundation London Indian Film Festival and its sister festivals in Birmingham and Manchester will be a love letter to the homelands, continuing to premiere the very best of new indie films from the Indian subcontinent and diaspora, from 17th June to 4th July 2021. As always it goes Beyond Bollywood!

Festival Director Cary Rajinder Sawhney MBE says: “Last year we grew our audiences quite substantially by going online and UK-wide. With the UK scene improving, we are delighted to not only offer a strong high definition online experience on LoveLIFFatHome.com, but to also welcome our audiences back...

Patty Smyth joined Jimmy Fallon Wednesday to mark the end of the President Donald Trump era with an updated version of her hit “Goodbye to You.”

Fallon kicked off the Fall 2020 rendition: “Four years with you in charge went so very slow/Now the time has come for us to let you go/You tweeted ‘Fraud,’ ‘Stop The Count,’ ‘Fake News’/Pennsylvania must hurt so bad to lose/It’s not a pity to say…”

That’s when Smyth popped up to hit the chorus: “Goodbye to you! Goodbye to you-ouuu!”

From there, Fallon and Smyth traded lyrics. While they were both in Fallon’s “Tonight Show” studio at 30 Rock, the duet-ing duo stayed socially distanced.

Like: “Will we ever see a president like we saw in you?/Stare directly at the sun/toilet paper on your show.”

And: “Ignored Fauci and fell for Kim Jong-un/Said you’d shoot someone on Fifth Avenue.

To keep connected and support the South Asian community, 3rd i’s eighteenth annual San Francisco International South Asian Film Festival: Bollywood and Beyond (Sfisaff) will be offered for Free this year as a completely virtual experience, Oct 23-25, 2020. Festival attendees can access scheduled screenings and filmmaker discussions from the safety of their homes, after registering online. The three-day Festival will screen a select program of narrative features and shorts by independent filmmakers from South Asia and its Diaspora, including stories from India, South Africa, and the Pakistani and Sikh communities in the USA.

This year’s festival presents an homage to one of the greats of Indian cinema, Irrfan Khan, who was lost too soon in a battle with cancer in early 2020. Khan made a phenomenal crossover from Bollywood films to International acclaim, starring in some of the most memorable films of the last few decades including “The Lunchbox...

Asif Kapadia, Oscar-winning “Amy” director and BAFTA winner for “Senna” and “The Warrior,” will debut in the Xr (extended reality) and immersive filmmaking space with “Laika.”

Adapted from Nick Abadzis’ eponymous 2007 graphic novel, “Laika” will tell the story of planet Earth’s first voyager into space, an unwanted stray who survived the streets of Moscow to become the most famous dog in the world. Through the medium of animated VR, the story, co-written by Kapadia and Abadzis, will be told from Laika’s point of view. It is a collaboration with award-winning animation studio Passion Pictures.

The project is presented by the BFI London Film Festival and commissioned by StoryFutures Academy, the U.K.’s National Centre for Immersive Storytelling, run by the National Film and Television School (Nfts) and Royal Holloway, University of London, with support from the BFI Film Fund and Film4.

Kapadia will discuss the project’s...

This is a noteworthy fantasy swordplay action movie in which hundreds of ninjas drop down from the sky like rain, but it’s set in a small, dusty town in the American West. Caught up in between those cowboys and ninjas, we’ve a swordsman from Asia who’s on the run and with a baby.

At the start of the movie, Yang (Jang Dong-gun), a top warrior from the Sad Flute Clan has become the world’s greatest swordsman after killing the last greatest swordsman of an enemy clan. However, as he’s about to kill the last member, a baby girl, he changes his mind and flees with her to the American Wild West. Needless to say, this upsets the Sad Flute Clan and now they’re out for his blood and the hunt is on.

Although “The Warrior’s Way” is director Sngmoo Lee’s first movie,...

The webinar was called ’What We Do Today Will Create Our Tomorrow: What is Your Development Strategy?’

“Build your production company into a brand”, was one of the key messages to emerge from an online conversation between key figures in the UK and Irish film and TV industries as part of this year’s Fleadh Forum series at the Galway Film Fleadh this week.

“We’re looking for strong films from an eclectic, diverse range of filmmakers,” said Ben Coren, head of development at the UK’s Film 4, in the webinar called ‘What We Do Today Will Create Our...

When Kapadia cast a 34-year-old Khan in The Warrior, it ignited both men’s careers – and sparked a lifelong friendship. Here, the director pays tribute to a man of ‘immense dignity and charisma’

I first met Irrfan Khan 21 years ago in a cheap beach hotel in Mumbai. I was 28 and casting my debut film, The Warrior, about a conflicted enforcer in feudal India. None of the actors I’d seen were right. I’d tell them I wanted to make a western, a mix of Robert Bresson and Sergio Leone, and their eyes would glaze.

They weren’t interested in doing a movie without songs or romance or much dialogue, filmed far away in Rajasthan and the Himalayas. A film which wasn’t typically British and was shot in Hindi, but wasn’t totally Indian, either.

“You get the opportunity to reflect your work. Your dreams. Your pains. Your desires. Your aspirations. You can share them through stories to others. What a story does to people’s hearts is a very, very, very special part of being an actor.” – Irrfan Khan

The world mourns the passing of a special individual.

Iconic actor Irrfan Khan has passed away yesterday.

Irrfan had revealed in 2018 that he had been diagnosed with a rare form of an endocrine tumour.

The actor has passed away just 4 days after his mother, Saeeda Begum. According to sources, Irrfan was not able to attend the funeral of his mother due to the Covid-19 lockdown crisis.

The actor’s contribution to both Hindi and Western film industry is one that will not be forgotten. His Hindi films included Rog, Life in a… Metro, 7 Khoon Maaf, Piku, Hindi Medium and the recent Angrezi Medium. In Western...

Charismatic Indian actor who starred in British, Us and Hindi cinema, including Slumdog Millionaire and The Warrior

The charismatic actor Irrfan Khan, who has died aged 53 from a colon infection following diagnosis of a neuroendocrine tumour, had a successful career in British and Us cinema while also headlining blockbusters in his native India. His contrasting roles in two recent Oscar-winners alone hinted at his range: in Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire (2008), he was the incredulous police inspector putting the screws on the plucky young hero (Dev Patel), while in Ang Lee’s film of Yann Martel’s Booker-winning fable Life of Pi (2012) he was a more benevolent presence as the narrator spinning the tall tale of a tiger and a child lost at sea.

He was also in Wes Anderson’s The Darjeeling Limited (2007), The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) and Jurassic World (2015), in which he was the billionaire owner of a dinosaur park.

Irrfan Khan, the Bollywood star who also starred in films like Slumdog Millionaire and Life of Pi, died Wednesday at the age of 53.

No cause of death was revealed, but the actor was recently admitted to Mumbai’s Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital due to a colon infection, his reps said. Khan previously battled high-grade neuroendocrine cancer in March 2018, CNN reports.

“It’s saddening that this day, we have to bring forward the news of him passing away,” Khan’s reps said in a statement. “Irrfan was a strong soul, someone...

Tribute My first memory of Irrfan Khan was 14 years ago, in a TV series called Mano Ya Na Mano (Believe it or not), and I’ve been captivated ever since.Geetika MantriIrrfan/FacebookI remember the first time I watched Irrfan Khan on screen, 14 years ago. Not unusually, 12-year-old me was surfing the channels on the TV till something grabbed my attention on Star One. It was his voice that caught me – he was setting the stage for an episode of a show called Mano Ya Na Mano (Believe it or not). The show itself was about mystical, inexplicable and spooky things that have happened in India – which was right up my alley – but it was Irrfan’s calm anchoring that pulled me in. From that day on, I would try to catch the reruns of the show every afternoon – I wasn’t allowed to watch TV too late at night,...

Prominent members of the Indian film industry took to social media to share an outpouring of grief following the death on Wednesday of top actor Irrfan Khan.

Khan starred in Indian films including “Salaam Bombay,” Asif Kapadia’s BAFTA winner “The Warrior” and Tigmanshu Dhulia’s “Paan Singh Tomar.” His credits in Hollywood included "The Lunchbox," “The Life of Pi,” “Jurassic World,” “Inferno” and international co-production “Slumdog Millionaire.”

After being diagnosed with a neuroendocrine tumour in 2018, he was Tuesday admitted into the intensive care unit of Mumbai’s Kokilaben hospital with a colon infection. He was 53.

Indian superstar Aamir Khan wrote “Very sad to hear about our dear colleague Irrfan. How tragic and sad. Such a wonderful talent. My heartfelt condolences to his family and friends. Thank you Irrfan for all the joy you have brought to our lives through your work. You will be fondly remembered. Love. A,” in a Twitter posting.

The Lunchbox star, who has died aged 53, was a vital bridge between Bollywood and Hollywood, and possessed a strong romantic appeal

A life in pictures

Irrfan Khan was a distinguished and charismatic star in Hindi- and English-language movies whose hardworking career was an enormously valuable bridge between South Asian and Hollywood cinema. He was armed with a sensitive and seductive gaze: his good looks matured in middle age in such a way that he could play dramatic or villainous roles but also romantic leads of a certain age and of a certain emotional wistfulness. You could almost call him Mumbai’s Clooney — although it would be condescending to explain this colossal Indian star in Hollywood terms.

I first became aware of Khan and his marvellous screen presence in Asif Kapadia’s terrific 2001 film The Warrior, in which he has a powerful lead role as the warrior Lafcadia, the erstwhile servant...

Leading Indian actor Irrfan Khan has died at the age of 53 after being admitted to a Mumbai hospital this week with a colon infection. The sad news has been confirmed to us by the actor’s representatives.

The Life Of Pi, The Lunchbox and Jurassic World star was diagnosed with a neuroendocrine tumour in 2018 but continued to act.

A moving statement from Khan’s family to Indian media read: “I trust, I have surrendered”; These were the some of the many words that Irrfan expressed in a heart-felt note he wrote in 2018 opening up about his fight with cancer. And a man of few words and an actor of silent expressions with his deep eyes and his memorable actions on screen. It’s saddening that this day, we have to bring forward the news of him passing away. Irrfan was a strong soul, someone who fought till the very end...

Irrfan Khan, the wide-eyed actor who enjoyed art house acclaim in his native India and crossover-success with major Hollywood roles including “Life of Pi,” "The Lunchbox," “Jurassic World” and “Inferno,” died on Wednesday. He was 53.

Khan was previously diagnosed with a neuroendocrine tumour in 2018 and underwent extensive treatment in London. He recovered well enough to shoot what would turn out to be his last film “Angrezi Medium,” the release of which was abruptly cut short due to the coronavirus pandemic in March.

On Tuesday, he was admitted into the intensive care unit of Mumbai’s Kokilaben hospital with a colon infection.

After a brief stint in television, Khan made his film debut with a cameo in 1988 with Mira Nair’s Oscar-nominated “Salaam Bombay.” He returned to Indian television for the next decade. He shot to global prominence playing the lead in Asif Kapadia’s BAFTA winner “The Warrior” in 2001.

His major breakthrough...

Irrfan Khan has understood the true meaning of life, and importance of living in the moment after his health scare. While recuperating from a rare illness, the actor said he was restless to be fine, and now has resolved to put his health as top priority.

The actor, who is still under treatment from the disease, is taking baby steps back into the acting world. He was away from the big screen since the release of "Karwaan" in 2018 -- the year when he was diagnosed with a neuroendocrine tumour. He will be back on the silver screen with "Angrezi Medium", a follow-up to his 2017 film "Hindi Medium". The film is slated to release on March 13.

Also Read:?Irrfan Khan and Deepak Dobriyal give sibling rivalry a delightful touch

Irrfan says he was not restless about getting back to work, but to get fit and fine.

"No work was never my anxiety.

As a young and aspiring actor from the National School of Drama, Pankaj Tripathi?s biggest inspiration, was Irrfan. By his own admission, Tripathi?s very reason on why he began his journey as an actor was the influence that watching Irrfan as an actor had on him.

Also read:?'Angrezi Medium' Trailer: Irrfan Khan and Radhika Madan's father-daughter relation is a hilarious roller coaster ride

Pankaj has longed to share screen space with Irrfan and jumped when the opportunity presented itself with Angrezi Medium. His cameo in Angrezi Medium is a true dedication of his sheer admiration for the actor.

Tripathi shares, ?I?ve always been inspired by Irrfan's performances as an actor. He has had a huge impact on my life, especially with his performances from Haasil, Maqbool, The Warrior and Pan Singh Tomar.

My guru and also my senior from the National School of Drama,...

Not only will you be able to get a behind-the-scenes look at David Ayer's Suicide Squad, but you'll also get a few new glimpses at Gal Gadot as the Amazonian Warrior Princess in Patty Jenkins' Wonder Woman when you get your hands on the Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice Ultimate Edition. In the Batman v Superman Ultimate Edition featurette, The Warrior, The Myth, The Wonder, you'll be able to check out snippets of new footage from the upcoming Wonder Woman film, and these new behind-the-scenes moments of Gal Gadot in her full Amazonian battle gear.     Wonder Woman hits theaters June 2, 2017. Wonder Woman stars Gal Gadot, Chris Pine, Robin Wright, Connie Nielsen, Danny Huston, Säid Taghmaoui, David Thewlis, Elena Anaya, Ewen Bremner, and Lucy Davis. The film is directed by Patty Jenkins and written by Jason Fuchs. Follow @_Kr08 !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.

On what's sure to be one of the slowest weekends of the year, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1 should easily hold on to first place at the box office.The closest thing there is to a nationwide release this week is 20th Century Fox horror movie The Pyramid, which is going out in 589 theaters*just shy of the 600 theater nationwide threshold. With a light marketing effort and moderate release, The Pyramid will almost certainly open below $5 million.The weekend after Thanksgiving is notoriously one of the worst of the year. Instead of heading out to theaters, most moviegoers are instead focused on the beginning of the Christmas season. In the past four years, only three movies have opened nationwide on this weekend: Out of the Furnace, Killing Them Softly and The Warrior's Way all opened below $7 million and closed below $20 million.This is a bit of a self-fulfilling...

While some of the Holiday Forecast picks are locks (The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, etc.), there are a handful of fringe titles (Unbroken, Horrible Bosses, Annie, The Interview) which could wind up outside the Top 12 when all is said and done.Which upcoming releases could move in to one of those spots? Here's a brief look at box office prospects for the rest of the movies set to open between now and the end of the year.Wide ReleasesDumb and Dumber To (Nov. 14): This is the movie that has the best chance of cracking the Top 12 holiday releases. The first Dumb and Dumber opened 20 years ago and earned $127.2 million; that's the equivalent over $241 million today. If the sequel sells half as many tickets, it will be one of the biggest hits of the season.Still, there are...

"Who... are you?" Today's indie trailer is the first official teaser for a kinetic South Korean action film titled No Tears for the Dead, from Jeong-beom Lee of the 2010 revenge film The Man from Nowhere. In this new film, Jang Dong-gun stars along with Kim Min-hee in a "love story between a professional hitman and his next target". While that kind of story could go either way on screen, this one goes for a much more energetic, explosive feeling. I'm not sure what is with the English subtitles for English-spoken dialogue, but aside from that, this actually looks pretty cool with a few great shots (like the one seen above). Take a look. Watch the first teaser trailer for Jeong-beom Lee's No Tears for the Dead, direct from YouTube: From the Cj Entertainment description: A love story between a professional hitman and his next target. Jeong-beom Lee's...

Welcome back Lee Jeong-beom! The director of one of our favorite Korean action films, The Man From Nowhere, is returning this summer with the assassin thriller The Crying Man (우는 남자). There is not much of a description of the plot of the film, but here's what we know:Veteran killer Gon (Jang Dong-gun - My Way, The Warrior's Way and Taegukgi) receives a mission, which is to target Mo-kyeong (Kim Min-hee). Trouble is, he has developed feelings for her. The teaser trailer was released and it oozes with style and the action looks impressive as well. For Lee's North American fans his new film also marks the Korean language debut of Brian Tee (Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift and The Wolverine). *Our man in Korea, Pierce Conran was speaking with...

[Read the whole post on twitchfilm.com...]...

Relativity Media's Out of the Furnace is the only new nationwide release on the first weekend of December, which is typically one of the slowest frames of the year. The gritty action flick is unlikely to do much business, though, which leaves the battle for first place up to strong holdovers Frozen and The Hunger Games: Catching Fire.Catching Fire won last weekend with $74.2 million, though Frozen was surprisingly close with $67.4 million. With great word-of-mouth, it's possible that Frozen only dips around 40 percent*in comparison, Tangled fell 56 percent at the same point. Meanwhile, the Harry Potter and Twilight movies typically lost 60 percent on this weekend. Catching Fire should hold a bit better. Ultimately, it will be a close weekend, though Frozen seems to have a slight edge.Otherwise, this is going to be a quiet weekend. Since 2010, the major studios have completely avoided scheduling new movies on the weekend after Thanksgiving,...

Thanks to its strong appeal among neglected adult audiences, Lee Daniels' The Butler easily took first place at the box office this weekend. Meanwhile, Kick-Ass 2 opened well below its predecessor, while Jobs and Paranoia both bombed.The Top 12 earned $121.4 million, which is off five percent from the same weekend last year when The Expendables 2 ruled the box office.Playing at 2,933 locations, The Butler opened to $24.6 million. That's a bit lower than The Help ($26 million), which opened in August 2011 and also dealt with the African-American experience during the civil rights movement (The Help also burned off some demand with a Wednesday debut). The Butler was also a bit stronger than Eat Pray Love and Julie & Julia, both of which were August releases targeted at adult audiences.The Butler's success can first-and-foremost be attributed to strong scheduling. August has historically been a great time to release movies like this:...

Barry Josephson, the producer of films like "Enchanted" and an executive producer on Fox's "Bones", has come onboard the superhero flick "Annihilator" at Magic Storm Entertainment and China's National Film Capital.

Created by Stan Lee and penned by Dan Gilroy ("The Bourne Legacy," "Real Steel"), the storyline centers on a Chinese expat who gets out of jail time by signing up to be a part of a top secret supersoldier program.

Douglas Falconer ("The Warrior's Way") is also set to produce. Magic Storm is planning a whole slate superhero pics with global crossover appeal.

Source: Variety...

Blu-ray & DVD Release Date: March 12, 2013

Price: Blu-ray/DVD Combo $39.99

Studio: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment

Anthony Hopkins, Helen Mirren (r.) and Scarlett Johansson make a toast in Hitchcock.

Anthony Hopkins (Thor), Helen Mirren (The Debt), and Scarlett Johansson (Marvel’s The Avengers) star alongside Danny Huston (The Warrior’s Way), Toni Collette (Velvet Goldmine), Jessica Biel (Total Recall), Michael Stuhlbarg (Men in Black 3) and James D’Arcy (W.E.) in Hitchcock, a 2012 biographical drama about the great filmmaker Alfred, er, you-know-who, and the making of one of his most iconic films, Psycho.

In the movie, the already-legendary Hollywood filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock (Hopkins) is plagued by both a reckless ego and nagging self-doubt when he becomes obsessed with a grisly murder story that the studios won’t back. Determined to make the film, Hitchcock risks his reputation, his home and even the love of his wife Alma (Mirren), as he...

The weekend after Thanksgiving is typically a quiet one at the box office, and over the last few years the major studios have mostly avoided releasing any new movies during this period. This year, at least, The Weinstein Company and upstart distributor Ld Entertainment are giving it their best shot with Killing Them Softly and The Collection, respectively. With Brad Pitt playing a ruthless hitman, Softly has the most potential, though it's going to be hard to get near the top of the chart against strong holdovers like The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 and Skyfall. The weekend after Thanksgiving wasn't always such a dead zone; back in 2003, for example, The Last Samurai and Honey opened to $24.3 million and $12.9 million, respectively. In recent years, though, it's become a dumping ground, and no movie has opened north of $10 million since Aeon Flux ($12.7 million) in 2005. In fact, this will be the third...

For the second time in two months, Brad Pitt's "Killing Them Softly" is changing its release date. According to Deadline.com, TWC has shifted the film from Oct. 19 to a wide release on Nov. 30.

On first glance, the move makes plenty of sense from both a box office and awards standpoint. As Weinstein Company chief Harvey Weinstein noted to Deadline.com, there are no other major wide releases scheduled for Nov. 30, meaning the film could find a significant audience. By releasing at the end of November, "Killing Them Softly" will also be fresh in Oscar voters' minds for consideration.

Of course, studios tend to shy away from releasing films on the weekend immediately following Thanksgiving. Last year, when the frame fell on Dec. 2-4, the only new film to arrive in theaters was "Shame," and that was a limited release. In 2010, "The Warrior's Way" was the only wide release...

While the last few months of the year are what Hollywood designates as "Oscar Season," there is one weekend that is always a total bummer: the first weekend of December. For whatever reason the movie industry treats this one particular three day stretch like the plague. Last year the biggest movie to open on that weekend was Steve McQueen's Shame, and that only opened in 10 theaters. The year before that the biggest new movie was The Warrior's Way, which placed ninth and made only $3 million. Needless to say, it's not great news if your film is opening on that weekend, which means I have some bad news for those looking forward to Andrew Dominik's Killing Them Softly. Deadline reports that the gangster drama is being pushed from its October 19th release date to November 30th. In a comment to the source, Harvey Weinstein said, "In this industry it...

DVD Release Date: May 8, 2012

Price: DVD $29.99

Studio: Zeitgeist

Danny Huston stars in The Kreutzer Sonata.

The 2008 British psychological drama film The Kreutzer Sonata is based on the classic 1889 novella by Leo Tolstoy.

In the film, Edgar Hudson (Danny Huston, The Warrior’s Way) and concert pianist Abby (Elisabeth Röhm, TV’s Heroes) become romantically involved and ultimately have a child together, though it was not something that was planned. As the years begin to pass by, Edgar grows in wealth and becomes a man who has everything, including a gorgeous wife and two beautiful children. But the significant changes in Abby’s life have made being a pianist, her true passion, a distant memory, causing her to descend into a period marked by restlessness and a lack of fulfillment.

Directed by Bernard Rose (Mr. Nice), The Kreutzer Sonata also features a supporting turn by Angelica Huston (The Big Year) as...

A large scale production requires large scale promotion and Kang Je-gyu's upcoming WWII action drama My Way is absolutely no exception. With only weeks away before the film released locally, the official site has been updated with an eight minute promo that chronically previews the overall story (spoiler alert) and the major set pieces including the historical event of D-Day, the Allied invasion of Normandy. As mention before, the all-star pan-Asian cast include Jang Dong-gun (The Warrior's Way), Joe Odagiri (Air Doll) and Fan Bingbing (Shaolin, Bodyguards and Assassins). The setting is Seoul, in Japan-colonized Korea. Jun-shik, who lives and works in a large Japanese estate--which belongs to Tatsuo's grandfather--and Tatsuo are rivals, both aiming to become competitors in the upcoming marathon. Jun-shik becomes...

The biggest Korean film of the year is unmistakably Kang Je-gyu's upcoming WWII film My Way and it really shows in the latest making-of video. Every aspect about the production, from the large sets to the all-star cast of Jang Dong-gun (The Warrior's Way), Joe Odagiri (Air Doll) and Fan Bingbing (Shaolin, Bodyguards and Assassins), loudly screams blockbuster. The setting is Seoul, in Japan-colonized Korea. Jun-shik, who lives and works in a large Japanese estate--which belongs to Tatsuo's grandfather--and Tatsuo are rivals, both aiming to become competitors in the upcoming marathon. Jun-shik becomes elected to participate in the Tokyo Olympics as a marathon runner, but war breaks out with the U.S.S.R. and he is forced to enlist in the army. One day, Tatsuo is recruited...

Release Date: Dec. 20, 2011

Price: DVD $30.99, Blu-ray $35.99

Studio: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment

The 2011 remake Straw Dogs stars James Marsden (X-Men) and Kate Bosworth (The Warrior’s Way) in the roles Dustin Hoffman and Susan George played in the original 1971 thriller.

Directed by Rod Lurie (The Contender), the movie tells the story of quiet screenwriter David Sumner (Marsden) and his wife Amy (Bosworth), who relocate to her hometown in the Deep South. As tensions build between the couple, tensions also build with locals, until they become a threat.

James Woods (Once Upon a Time in America), Dominic Purcell (TV’s Prison Break) and Alexander Skarsgard (TV’s True Blood) also star in the R-rated film.

Despite the name actors and cache of the past cult classic, the new Straw Dogs didn’t score at the box office, grossing only $10 million in wide release. Maybe it was the bad reviews that kept viewers away.

Here’s the Movies That Became Available to Stream on Netflix Over the Past Week: Season of the Witch (PG13 | 2011)

Flickchart Ranking: #6384

Times Ranked: 2564

Win Percentage: 37%

How Many Top-20′s: 11 Users

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Directed By:Dominic Sena

Starring: Nicolas Cage • Ron Perlman

Genres: Action • Action Thriller • Supernatural Thriller • Thriller • Witchcraft

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Jesus Christ Superstar (G | 1973)

Flickchart Ranking: #2053

Times Ranked: 7192

Win Percentage: 35%

How Many Top-20′s: 10 Users

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Directed By:Norman Jewison

Starring: Ted Neeley • Barry Dennen • Bob Bingham • Leeyan Granger • Carl Anderson

Genres: Based-on-Theatre • Drama • Musical • Musical Drama • Religious Drama • Rock Musical

• • • • • • • •

Scared Shrekless (Nr | 2010)

Flickchart Ranking: #6557

Times Ranked: 564

Win Percentage: 34%

How Many Top-20′s: 4 Users

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Other entries available in the “Dreamworks Spooky Stories” series are:” Monsters vs. Aliens: Mutant Pumpkins from Outer Space” and “The Ghost of Lord Farquaad”

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The Warrior’s Way (R | 2010)

Flickchart Ranking: #6457

Times Ranked: 1057

Win Percentage: 42%

How Many Top-20′s: 3 Users

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Directed By:Sngmoo Lee

Starring: Kate Bosworth • Geoffrey Rush...

Unlike the previous trailer for Kang Je-gyu's upcoming WWII blockbuster film My Way, this teaser focus on the chaos of war over the human drama, a strength of the director he demonstrated so powerfully in his last effort in Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War.  Obviously, no expense were spare to ensure an epic experience in the large scale battle sequence.  As mention before, the Korea/Japan/China co-production has an all-star pan-Asian cast line-up that includes Jang Dong-gun (The Warrior's Way), Joe Odagiri (Air Doll) and Fan Bingbing (Shaolin, Bodyguards and Assassins). The setting is Seoul, in Japan-colonized Korea. Jun-shik, who lives and works in a large Japanese estate--which belongs to Tatsuo's grandfather--and Tatsuo are rivals, both aiming to become competitors in the upcoming marathon....

Kang Je-kyu's My Way war drama and 3D animated action movie Tarbosaurus go to Well Go Well Go USA has picked up North American DVD, TV, VOD and digital rights from Cj Entertainment to South Korean war drama My Way, reports Deadline. Helmed by Kang Je-kyu (Tae Guk Gi: Brotherhood of War), My Way stars Jang Dong-gun (The Warrior's Way), Bingbing Fan and Jô Odagiri. Also acquired from Cj Entertainment for North American theatrical distribution was animated action movie Tarbosaurus. Well Go USA has Donnie Yen hits like Ip Man and its sequel as well as Legend of the Fist. Their Shaolin starring Andy Lau...

Kang Je-kyu's My Way war drama and 3D animated action movie Tarbosaurus go to Well Go Well Go USA has picked up North American DVD, TV, VOD and digital rights from Cj Entertainment to South Korean war drama My Way, reports Deadline. Helmed by Kang Je-kyu (Tae Guk Gi: Brotherhood of War), My Way stars Jang Dong-gun (The Warrior's Way), Bingbing Fan and Jô Odagiri. Also acquired from Cj Entertainment for North American theatrical distribution was animated action movie Tarbosaurus. Well Go USA has Donnie Yen hits like Ip Man and its sequel as well as Legend of the Fist. Their Shaolin starring Andy Lau...

Release Date: Sept. 6, 2011

Price: Blu-ray $19.99

Studio: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment

Dustin Hoffman goes to extremes in Straw Dogs.

One of the toughest and most controversial thrillers of the 1970s, filmmaker Sam Peckinpah’s (The Wild Bunch) notorious Straw Dogs was banned in the United Kingdom for nearly two decades.

The suspenseful 1971 movie tells the story of American mathematician David Sumner (Dustin Hoffman, Little Fockers) and his British wife Amy (Susan George, Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry) who move to an isolated English village. Their presence provokes antagonism among the village’s men, whose routine bullying slowly gives way to vicious brutality. Backed into a corner as his manhood is challenged, the usually pacifistic David is forced to respond with the kind of violent and gruesome attitude that he abhors.

Presented with new 5.1 audio mix, the Straw Dogs Blu-ray contains an original theatrical trailer and three vintage TV commercials as bonus features.

Cowboys and Aliens over the weekend became the most recent film to attempt what -- outside of Serenity -- has yet to be a successful cross-genre mash-up with Westerns (and honestly, Serenity wasn't a box-office hit). There have been a number of good to great Westerns in recent years (3:10 to Yuma, True Grit, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and The Proposition), but Hollywood still hasn't realized that no one wants to see the purity of Westerns mixed up with the likes of martial arts, aliens, or comic-books. Look at the wasteland of Western mash-ups: Jonah Hex, Shanghai Noon (which was Ok), Shanghai Knights (which was not), the unforgivable Wild Wild West, The Warrior's Way (which was so bad it was good, but apparently only to me) and Sukiyaki Western Django, which mustered only $50,000 at the box office.

It's a bad idea to cross-pollinate Westerns with other genres,...

This weekend, three new nationwide releases duke it out: Cowboys & Aliens rides on to approximately 5,600 screens at 3,750 locations, The Smurfs plucks around 5,400 screens at 3,395 locations (including 2,042 showing it in 3D), while Crazy, Stupid, Love. woos more than 3,300 screens at 3,020 locations. Throw in holdovers Captain America: The First Avenger and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, and that's the Top Five for the weekend. Historical antecedents point to a 50-60 percent drop for Captain America, which would give Cowboys & Aliens the edge to claim first place this weekend. On paper, an action spectacle directed by Jon Favreau (Iron Man), starring Daniel Craig (James Bond) and Harrison Ford (Indiana Jones/Han Solo), co-written by Alex Kurtzman and Bob Orci (Transformers, Star Trek), produced by Ron Howard and Brian Grazer and executive-produced by Steven Spielberg teams with box office potential. But Cowboys & Aliens has struggled in its extensive, year-long marketing campaign (including its Super Bowl spot). Sure,...

The Film:

In 1972, Terence Young directed a cool film called Red Sun, which featured the rogue cowboy, Charles Bronson, and a rogue samurai, Toshiro Mifune, in a western film with Eastern flavors. Guns and swords, two pinnacle weapons of cinema, yet rarely blended together. The Warrior’s Way is almost the next best thing, featuring ninjas and bandits, but director Sngmoo Lee’s fantasy film doesn’t have a toe grounded in reality, which makes it hard for us to get swept away. Imagine if Terry Gilliam directed a live-action anime. That’s The Warrior’s Way.

Not to say that’s a bad thing, it’s just a collision of genres thrown into a mixer, that when poured out, tastes like it is missing something. Sngmoo Lee certainly has a flair for non-stop action and slow-motion, as The Warrior’s Way has an energy to it. But it’s a bit silly,...

Chicago – Singmoo Lee’s “The Warrior’s Way” is by no means a traditionally “good” movie but it does pass one basic test of escapist Blu-ray fare — I was never bored. And I was often entertained by the cheesy merging of styles on display in this hyper-stylized ninja western, a piece of work that could easily find a loyal audience on the home market. It was summarily ignored in theaters, being released at the very wrong time of the year as a particularly-healthy awards season was kicking up at the end of 2010, but it’s just silly enough in the right ways to work as a rental.

Blu-Ray Rating: 3.0/5.0

“Assassin. Hero. Legend.” The back of the box for “The Warrior’s Way” may lead potential renters or buyers into thinking they’re in for a traditional lone swordsman piece but this is no “Zatoichi.” It’s a weird little movie that features waves of ninjas,...

Blu-ray Review

The Warrior’s Way

Directed by: Sngmoo Lee

Cast: Dong-gun Jang, Kate Bosworth, Geoffrey Rush

Running Time: 1 hr 40 mins

Rating: R

Due Out: June 28, 2011

Plot: A warrior-assassin (Jang) is forced to hide in a small town in the American Badlands after refusing a mission.

Who’S It For? Viewers capable of suspending disbelief. Suspending disbelief in the film’s manifest content, and also in the fact that such cheesy CGI FX actually exist. In all seriousness, people who get a kick out of action for action’s sake, will likely enjoy this film, and fans of Jang, Bosworth and Rush will likely be pleased with each actor’s respective performance.

Movie:

The Warrior’s Way is definitely a B-film. However, it maintains just enough self-awareness of it’s inherent silliness throughout, to make for a fairly enjoyable watch. My opinion before seeing the film, based solely on its trailer,...

DVD Playhouse—July 2011

By Allen Gardner

The Music Room (Criterion) Satyajit Ray’s 1958 masterpiece looks at the life of a fallen aristocrat as a metaphor for an India that is not only becoming Westernized, but modernized technologically and culturally beyond recognition. When the beloved music room, where he has hosted lavish concerts in the past, starts falling into disrepair as attendance drops steadily, the man realizes his way of life is vanishing. Stunningly shot in black & white, one of Ray’s finest works. Bonuses: Documentary on Ray from 1984 by Shyam Benegal; Interviews with Ray biographer Andrew Robinson and filmmaker Mira Nair; Excerpt from 1981 roundtable discussion between Ray, critic Michael Ciment, director Claude Sautet. Also available on Blu-ray disc. Full screen. Dolby 1.0 mono.

Beauty And The Beast (Criterion) Jean Cocteau’s sublime adaptation of the classic fairy tale become a beloved classic upon its 1946 release, and hasn’t faded since.

It's basically The Lord of the Rings and a bunch of crap this week as more of the year's lacklustre films desperately attempt to find an audience on DVD and Blu-ray. Zack Snyder's Sucker Punch was rushed to stores with a new R-rated extended cut in an attempt to correct some of the complaints people had about the film in theatres, while Nicolas Cage is once again slumming it in Season of the Witch and Alex Pettyfer and Vanessa Hudgens try to re-invent Beauty and the Beast for tweens in Beastly. Barney's Version starring Paul Giamatti also hits stores today along with The Warrior's Way and a handful of Criterion releases, but with The Lord of the Rings Motion Picture Trilogy: Limited Extended Edition on Blu-ray, you'll probably have more than enough content to keep you occupied until the end of the summer. Will you be buying or renting anything this week?...