When the president of Pathé approached filmmaker Jean-Jacques Annaud (Quest for Fire, The Name of the Rose) about making a documentary about the catastrophic blaze, he decided to make a thriller instead. "We have an international star, very beautiful and very famous. And an exceptional villain: fire." - The Guardian
"Hitchcock's fear and loathing of women is accompanied by a lucid understanding of – and even sympathy for – women's problems in patriarchy. ... His female characters were never underwritten, and in the case of Frenzy they are certainly the warmest and most sympathetic parts." - BBC
"The country's small film industry has made 20 horrors in the past six years, with another two (this) autumn. ..." Says one filmmaker, "Irish folklore is particularly dark and lends itself to horror. Not a lot of happy endings – a lot of people being dragged to their doom." - The Guardian
"Award-wining director Mohammad Rasoulof and colleague Mostafa Al-Ahmad were taken into custody for posting a statement on social media urging members of the Iranian security forces to lay down their weapons." When Panahi went to prosecutors' offices out of concern for the other two, he was also arrested. - The Guardian
Jane Campion, who directed the artsy Power of the Dog and won Best Director for it at the 2022 Academy Awards, is worried. "I do think they're going to be more picky about other projects or, maybe, what's sad is not taking risks on people without names." - BBC
The worry doesn't come from money, but from audience grades - a B+ for Thor: Love and Thunder follows a B+ for Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness and the tepid B for Eternals. - Los Angeles Times
Fans don't have to see everything. Instead, they can follow the series and movies the way they would with comic books - only committing to several superheroes or stories they're interested in. (Sorry, Disney overlords; we have other things to do with our time.) - Wired
NFL player Trevor Pryce visited 20th Century Fox in 2005 and fell for animation. Now, his Kulipari series - "Kulipari, an Australian Outback aboriginal word for poison, is set in the Amphibilands, a secluded community of tree frogs" - is produced in East Baltimore, not traditionally an animation hub. - Baltimore Sun
How to handle, or how not to handle, memes about your movie: "The difference between the Morbius flop memes and the GentleMinions trend is that Sony mistook ironic fondness for the real thing." - Slate
Rogers posted a notice on its website Friday saying the outage was impacting both its wireless and home service customers and is also affecting phone and chat support. - Toronto Star
Human reviewers manually examine thousands of Twitter accounts at random and use a combination of public and private data in order to calculate and report to shareholders the proportion of spam and bot accounts on the service, Twitter said. - Reuters
There’s a preponderance of copaganda and superheroes saving the day and a category of narrative best described as wealth-aganda — stories focused on the interior lives of the rich, from the aspirational to the ridiculous to the unscrupulous. - Chicago Tribune
Featured on the commercial networks' coverage this week: a "Government Resignations Ticker", an anti-Brexit campaigner belting "Bye Bye Boris", a discussion of the Tories' future set to "Yakety Sax" (played at actor Hugh Grant's request), a star cameo by 10 Downing Street's resident cat, and a psychic pig. - Variety
The longer that this new “business model” is allowed to operate, the harder it will be to change. I often think about how 25 years ago the introduction of the DVD became a cautionary lesson in when you choose to fight. - Deadline
