The 2019 Film Independent Spirit Awards were handed out in a ceremony in Santa Monica this afternoon hosted by Aubrey Plaza.  Annapurna Films’ “If Beale Street Could Talk” ruled the afternoon taking three awards including Best Film, Best Director (Barry Jenkins) and Best Supporting Actress (Regina King).  For the most part, however, Film Independent voters spread the love.

READ MORE: Barry Jenkins discusses his transcendent “If Beale Street Could Talk” [Interview]

Fox Searchlight’s “Can You Ever Forgive Me?” took Best Screenplay and Best Supporting Male (Richard E.

Continue reading ‘If Beale Street Could Talk’ Takes Best Film & Rules 2019 Spirit Awards at The Playlist.

THR hosts only their second Songwriters Roundtable on this week’s “Close Up with The Hollywood Reporter.” The conversation includes Academy Award frontrunner Mark Ronson for “Shallow” (“A Star is Born”), in addition to nominee Diane Warren for “I’ll Fight” (“RBG”). The other songwriters include David Crosby (“Little Pink Houses”), Kesha (“On the Basis of Sex”), Boots Riley (“Sorry to Bother You”), Tim McGraw (“Free Solo”), and Jack Antonoff (“Love, Simon”).

Continue reading Mark Ronson, Kesha, Diane Warren & More Discuss Scores, Soundtracks & Political Songwriting [Watch] at The Playlist.

One of the more debated films in 2018 was Boots Riley’s directorial debut, “Sorry to Bother You.” The film wasn’t really hated by many people, however, it did either land in either the “Holy shit, this is incredible!” or “Interesting, but meh” camps. That being said, ‘Bother You’ was a film that landed in quite a few Best of 2018 lists and wouldn’t have shocked many if it found its way into one or two Oscar nominations.

Continue reading Armie Hammer On Why ‘Sorry To Bother You’ Got Zero Oscar Noms: “Another Example Of The Academy Keeping It In The Academy” at The Playlist.

One of the upsides of living through turbulent sociopolitical times is that popular art becomes bolder, more subversive, more versatile, and more creative as things in the real world get worse. It’s the end of the world as we know it, but at least we’ll meet it with some great movies. The bitter conflicts, divide, and confusion the US and in many cases the rest of the world went through during the late ‘60s and most of the ‘70s resulted in some of the best and most enduring work in film history.

Continue reading Watch Oktay Ege Kozak’s Top 20 Movies Of 2018 Video at The Playlist.

On this episode of The Playlist Podcast, I’m joined by Editor-in-Chief Rodrigo Perez and Managing Editor Charles Barfield, to discuss the 20 Breakthrough Directors of 2018, though it cannot be stressed enough that our topic at hand today was a collective pick from many members of our staff to which we are merely the mouthpiece for. We continue our extensive year-end coverage with our director’s conversation.

READ MORE: The 100 Most Anticipated Films Of 2019

It’s been talked about at-length how strong the year in film was for 2018, but maybe not as much about how some of the best, most-acclaimed films of the year were from either first-time directors or filmmakers with few directorial credits who made a huge splash with a recent release.

Continue reading The 20 Breakthrough Directors of 2018 [Podcast] at The Playlist.

Karma, they say, is a bitch. Yet it must be down to some cosmic law of balance that as terrible as things have been on a daily basis in other spheres of life, 2018 has been among the most remarkable years for cinema in recent memory. Maybe it’s that the instability and uncertainty of the zeitgeist has ignited channels of creative expression that might have remained dormant in more complacent times; maybe it’s that 2-hour breaks from the constant blithering nonsense that is being alive in 2018 are precious even if you’re watching the “Overboard” remake.

Continue reading The 25 Best Films Of 2018 at The Playlist.

When talking about films that should seriously be considered for Best Screenplay Oscar nominations, the conversation will most definitely include films like “The Favourite,” “Sorry to Bother You,” “The Sisters Brothers,” and “Hereditary.” And yes, those will be in the Oscar conversation, but they’ll have to do so without any love from the Writers Guild of America.

Continue reading ‘The Favourite,’ ‘Hereditary,’ ‘The Sisters Brothers’ & More Deemed Ineligible For WGA Awards at The Playlist.

North America’s critics’ groups honors are coming fast and furious and both Toronto and San Francisco announced their winners on Sunday.  Like the New York Film Critics Circle and the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, they both named Alfonso Cuarón’s “Roma” as Best Picture.  They two orgs only agreed on a few other honors.

“Won’t You Be My Neighbor” took the Documentary honor from each group and “First Reformed” earned Screenplay from both organizations (in Original from the San Fran critics and a tie or in general from the Canadians).

Continue reading Toronto & San Francisco Critics Also Anoint ‘Roma’ Best Picture at The Playlist.

Movie marketing can be a weird thing to celebrate, no doubt. Posters, trailer and all kinds of promotional materials are selling tools explicitly designed to captivate (dupe?) the broadest, biggest audiences into attending your movie. These materials are created to attract the most mouth-breathing-friendly flies which usually means, big, dumb, loud and in the case of many posters, a healthy dose of criminal Photoshop abuse. Sometimes that means an overwrought collage-diarrhea on a superhero poster where it appears that one character is inevitably flatulating out an explosion, or the designer is just visually impaired, and sometimes it’s just the most egregious concept of all time.

Continue reading The 20 Best Movie Posters Of 2018 at The Playlist.

The 2019 Independent Spirit Awards nominations were announced this morning and Paul Schrader’s “First Reformed” was the standout with four nominations including Best Feature, Best Director (Schrader), Best Male Lead (Ethan Hawke) and Screenplay. “We The Animals” earned five mostly below-the-line nods including Best First Feature and Cinematography. “Eighth Grade” also earned four nods including Best Feature, Best Female Lead, and Best Supporting Male.

Continue reading ‘Eighth Grade,’ ‘First Reformed’ Top 2019 Independent Spirit Awards Nominations at The Playlist.

It’s been over two decades since Tom Cruise and his “Mission: Impossible” franchise first hit theaters. Normally, that would mean diminishing returns, with an aging leading man and a sixth entry in the franchise. However, with “Mission: Impossible — Fallout,” Cruise has proven that the spy franchise is doing better than ever.

This weekend, ‘Fallout’ hit theaters and earned an estimated $61.5 million, which was easily good enough for the top spot.

Continue reading ‘Mission: Impossible — Fallout’ Scores Best-Ever Box Office Opening For The 22-Year-Old Franchise at The Playlist.

As we approached this weekend, the story to watch out for was whether or not “Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” would have a good enough second weekend to knock incoming film, “The Equalizer 2,” to #3. Because clearly, “Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again!” was going to take the top spot. Well, apparently, we should never count out Denzel Washington.

Continue reading ‘Equalizer 2’ Surprises Everyone And Sucker Punches ‘Mamma Mia 2’ At The Box Office at The Playlist.

Everything in its right place…

On this episode of Adjust Your Tracking, Joe and I get back on mic for the first time since our “Hereditary” episode last month. But it’s for a damn good reason, as we dive into the truly oddball and singular world of Boots Riley‘s “Sorry To Bother You.” The film, a bizarre satire with sci-fi/fantasy elements that skewers our modern existence with the force of a blunt strike to the head while also being incredibly silly (not a pejorative in this case) and packed with layers.

Continue reading Unpacking ‘Sorry To Bother You’ And ‘Legacy Of A Whitetail Deer Hunter’ [Adjust Your Tracking Podcast] at The Playlist.

As this weekend approached, box office analysts predicted that the #1 spot would be a battle between the animated threequel “Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation” and Dwayne Johnson’s “Die Hard” knock-off, “Skyscraper.” While ‘Hotel Transylvania’ did what was expected, “Skyscraper” ended up burning to the ground, so to speak.

Coming in at #1, surprising no one, is ‘Hotel Transylvania 3,’ with a weekend total of $44.1 million.

Continue reading ‘Hotel Transylvania 3’ Wins The Weekend As ‘Skyscraper’ Crumbles At The Box Office at The Playlist.

June was something of a let down with, albeit, some decent films sprinkled throughout. However, mostly the month featured a list of films that immediately fell off of audience’s radar. Despite there being some high profile talent leading the films and a sequel from an animation titan, nothing felt particularly noteworthy, particularly in the blockbuster realm. July, on the other hand, is exciting due to the bizarre mix and match to be done over the course of the month with everything from a new Marvel Studios film, yet another installment to the “Mission: Impossible” franchise and one of buzzed-about about films of the year, “Sorry to Bother You,” which was a standout at the Sundance Film Festival this past January.

Continue reading 11 Movies To See In July at The Playlist.

While the general public talks about summer movie season and all the superhero fights, dinosaur action, and spaceship flying, we know that the wildest film to come out this season is going to be Boots Riley’s “Sorry to Bother You.” Debuting right in the heart of summer, the film, which is described as comedy, fantasy, and sci-fi, is sure to turn heads with its bonkers premise and style.

In the new red band trailer for the film, we get our best look yet at what is one of the more original films to come out in 2018.

Continue reading ‘Sorry To Bother You’ Trailer: The Wildest Movie This Summer Doesn’t Feature Capes Or Dinosaurs, Just Telemarketers at The Playlist.

Sure, it’s still April, but summer is almost here. At least the summer movie season, which starts extra early this year thanks to Marvel’s early release of “Avengers Infinity War”—yep, blockbusters are even encroaching into the spring because that precious release date real estate is getting harder and harder to find. And summer means blockbusters and huge tentpoles, but for the eclectic, omnivorous filmgoer, there’s a variety of high, low and in the middle art to take in.

Continue reading Summer Movie Preview: 36 Films Worth The Watch at The Playlist.

You’ve seen Lakeith Stanfield everywhere recently in a flurry of supporting roles including in the Oscar-winning “Get Out,” Netflix’s remake of “Death Note,” and a recurring role on Donald Glover’s hit show, “Atlanta.” In “Sorry to Bother You,” Stanfield finally gets shot as a leading man.

READ MORE: Boots Riley’s ‘Sorry To Bother You’ Is Visionary [Sundance Review]

“Cassius Green is sort of the central figure of this story in this alternate universe, which I found to be really fun and [it] mirrors ours.” Stanfield recently told THR at Sundance.

Continue reading ‘Sorry To Bother You’ Trailer: Lakeith Stanfield, Tessa Thompson & More Live In A Surreal Sci-Fi World at The Playlist.

The 2018 Sundance Film Festival has pretty much come to an end, and for awards season who braved the snow and freezing temperatures, there is the now the haunting realization that there was very little Oscar gold to mine in Park City’s slopes this year.  And, frankly, that’s a tad eyebrow raising and perhaps more a statement on the current state of “independent” film than anything else.  It’s not like there was one standing ovation after another at the festival this year.

Continue reading Is 2018 The Year The Oscars Skipped Out On Sundance? at The Playlist.

PARK CITY – Even if you are intimately familiar with Boots Riley’s musical career and progressive politics it cannot prepare you for his bold directorial debut, “Sorry To Bother You,” which premiered at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival on Saturday night. Even if you read the official synopsis that informs you the film takes place in an alternate reality and it’s classified as “Sci-Fi” and “Fantasy,” you are not prepared. 

Continue reading Boots Riley’s ‘Sorry To Bother You’ Isn’t Very Funny But It Sure Is Visionary [Sundance Review] at The Playlist.

It’s the new year which means, there’s no rest for the wicked and the Sundance Film Festival is upon us. It’s funny how January is known as a dead time for movies — and it is for mainstream films — but in the realm of independent cinema, the first month of the year is that time when filmmakers are cramming to finish their Sundance-bound pictures.

READ MORE: The 100 Most Anticipated Films Of 2018

And the diverse, eclectic Sundance lineup runs the gamut.

Continue reading Sundance 2018: The Most Anticipated Films Of The Festival at The Playlist.

We’re just getting started with our look at the best in film and TV of 2017, but before we really got sucked into the retrospective, we wanted to take a minute to look forward to what’s to come in the next twelve months or so. Lord knows we need things to keep us going in the shitshow that has been the second half of the 2010s, and fortunately, cinema has provided.

After a slow start, 2017 turned out to be a pretty great year for movies, and 2018 looks to keep that up in a big way.

Continue reading The 100 Most Anticipated Films Of 2018 at The Playlist.