1.
Looper (film)
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Looper is a 2012 American neo-noir science fiction thriller film written and directed by Rian Johnson, and produced by Ram Bergman and James D. Stern. It stars Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Emily Blunt and it revolves around criminal syndicates using contracted killers called loopers to kill victims sent through time travel. Looper was selected as the film of the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival. It was released in Australia on September 27,2012, and in the US, the film grossed $176.5 million on a $30 million budget while receiving critical acclaim. In 2044, 30-year-old Joe works for a Kansas City crime syndicate as a looper, since future technology has made it near-impossible to dispose of bodies, the syndicate uses time travel, invented thirty years later and outlawed instantly. Managed by a man named Abe Mitchell, loopers kill and dispose of face-concealed victims. To prevent connections to the syndicate, loopers kill their future selves with gold bars strapped to them when they retire, effectively ending the contract and closing the loop. Joe reluctantly hides Seth in his apartments floor safe, but is taken to Abe by Kid Blue, Joe reveals Seths location instead of forfeiting half his silver, and Abes men cut an address into younger Seths arm, then begin severing body parts. As Old Seths limbs disappear, he goes to the address and is killed, when Joes next target arrives, it is his older self with his face uncovered. Before Joe can kill him, Old Joe shields himself, knocks younger Joe unconscious, returning to his apartment, Young Joe fights with Kid Blue, only to fall off a fire escape and black out. In another timeline, Young Joe kills his older self as he arrives and he moves to Shanghai, where his drug addiction and partying persist, becoming a hitman to finance himself. Years later, he meets a woman during a bar fight, thirty years after, Joe is taken to close the loop and his wife is killed in the process. Overpowering his captors, Joe sends himself back to 2044 thereby altering history, when Old Joe sees Young Joe fall, he shoots the Gat Men and drags him away. Old Joe begins to manifest vague memories of Young Joes actions in the present, Kid Blue and several other Gat Men arrive at the diner and a gunfight ensues, Young Joe collects a corner of Old Joes map as both escape. Young Joe follows the map to a farm where Sara and her son Cid live, Sara recognizes the number on the map as Cids birthday and birth hospitals code. Young Joe guesses that Old Joe is going to all three children born at the hospital that day, not knowing which one will become the Rainmaker, so he waits at the farm to protect Cid. Jesse, another Gat Man, comes looking for both Joes at the farm, but Cid and Young Joe hide in an underground tunnel, later that night Sara and Young Joe have sex, and Sara reveals she has TK powers. Cids powers are revealed to be stronger, with Sara hiding in a safe when he has a tantrum
Looper (film)
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Theatrical release poster
Looper (film)
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Rian Johnson and Joseph Gordon-Levitt speaking at
WonderCon 2012 in promotion of Looper.
2.
Song for Marion
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Song for Marion is a 2012 British-German comedy-drama film written and directed by Paul Andrew Williams and starring Terence Stamp, Gemma Arterton, Christopher Eccleston and Vanessa Redgrave. The film was nominated for three awards—Best Actor, Best Screenplay, and Best Supporting Actress—at the 2012 British Independent Film Awards, Arthur Harris is the grumpy husband of Marion, who is terminally ill yet continues to participate with enthusiasm at her local seniors choir. Arthur is unimpressed when the choir, led by Elizabeth, serenades the couple at their home, as Marions health deteriorates, Arthur is keen to please his dying wife and even agrees to take her place in the choir. The transition proves to be trying for Arthur thanks to the unconventional songbook that includes songs such as Lets Talk About Sex. Arthurs experience in new social environment will take him on a journey of self-discovery and thaw his bitterness. The film is accompanied by a song titled Unfinished Songs written by Diane Warren, the song was included in Dions 2013 album Loved Me Back to Life but with different vocal and musical arrangements. The song Lullabye, performed by the character in the film, is a Billy Joel song. The score was composed by Laura Rossi, lost In The Multiplexs Soundtrek section deemed Rossis score lovely, but opined that the OAPZ songs arent particularly funny, theyre not that fun to listen to either. The film received reviews from critics. It received a rating of 64% based on 92 reviews from aggregating site Rotten Tomatoes. Although the film is set in London it was shot on location in Newcastle upon Tyne. Filming took place over 6 weeks in July and August 2011, Song for Marion at the Internet Movie Database Song for Marion at Box Office Mojo Song for Marion at Rotten Tomatoes Song for Marion at Metacritic
Song for Marion
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Promotional poster
3.
Toronto
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Toronto is the most populous city in Canada and the provincial capital of Ontario. With a population of 2,731,571, Toronto is the fourth most populous city in North America after Mexico City, New York City, and Los Angeles. A global city, Toronto is a centre of business, finance, arts, and culture. Aboriginal peoples have inhabited the area now known as Toronto for thousands of years, the city itself is situated on the southern terminus of an ancient Aboriginal trail leading north to Lake Simcoe, used by the Wyandot, Iroquois, and the Mississauga. Permanent European settlement began in the 1790s, after the broadly disputed Toronto Purchase of 1787, the British established the town of York, and later designated it as the capital of Upper Canada. During the War of 1812, the town was the site of the Battle of York, York was renamed and incorporated as the city of Toronto in 1834, and became the capital of the province of Ontario during the Canadian Confederation in 1867. The city proper has since expanded past its original borders through amalgamation with surrounding municipalities at various times in its history to its current area of 630.2 km2. While the majority of Torontonians speak English as their primary language, Toronto is a prominent centre for music, theatre, motion picture production, and television production, and is home to the headquarters of Canadas major national broadcast networks and media outlets. Toronto is well known for its skyscrapers and high-rise buildings, in particular the tallest free-standing structure in the Western Hemisphere, the name Toronto is likely derived from the Iroquois word tkaronto, meaning place where trees stand in the water. This refers to the end of what is now Lake Simcoe. A portage route from Lake Ontario to Lake Huron running through this point, in the 1660s, the Iroquois established two villages within what is today Toronto, Ganatsekwyagon on the banks of the Rouge River and Teiaiagonon the banks of the Humber River. By 1701, the Mississauga had displaced the Iroquois, who abandoned the Toronto area at the end of the Beaver Wars, French traders founded Fort Rouillé on the current Exhibition grounds in 1750, but abandoned it in 1759. During the American Revolutionary War, the region saw an influx of British settlers as United Empire Loyalists fled for the British-controlled lands north of Lake Ontario, the new province of Upper Canada was in the process of creation and needed a capital. Dorchester intended the location to be named Toronto, in 1793, Governor John Graves Simcoe established the town of York on the Toronto Purchase lands, instead naming it after Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany. Simcoe decided to move the Upper Canada capital from Newark to York, the York garrison was constructed at the entrance of the towns natural harbour, sheltered by a long sandbar peninsula. The towns settlement formed at the end of the harbour behind the peninsula, near the present-day intersection of Parliament Street. In 1813, as part of the War of 1812, the Battle of York ended in the towns capture, the surrender of the town was negotiated by John Strachan. US soldiers destroyed much of the garrison and set fire to the parliament buildings during their five-day occupation, the sacking of York was a primary motivation for the Burning of Washington by British troops later in the war
Toronto
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From top left:
Downtown Toronto featuring the
CN Tower and
Financial District from the
Toronto Harbour,
City Hall, the
Ontario Legislative Building,
Casa Loma,
Prince Edward Viaduct, and the
Scarborough Bluffs
Toronto
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Coat of arms
Toronto
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Map of Toronto, 1894
Toronto
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Yonge Street in 1900
4.
Ontario
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Ontario, one of the 13 provinces and territories of Canada, is located in east-central Canada. It is Canadas most populous province by a margin, accounting for nearly 40 percent of all Canadians. Ontario is fourth-largest in total area when the territories of the Northwest Territories and it is home to the nations capital city, Ottawa, and the nations most populous city, Toronto. There is only about 1 km of land made up of portages including Height of Land Portage on the Minnesota border. Ontario is sometimes divided into two regions, Northern Ontario and Southern Ontario. The great majority of Ontarios population and arable land is located in the south, in contrast, the larger, northern part of Ontario is sparsely populated with cold winters and is heavily forested. The province is named after Lake Ontario, a thought to be derived from Ontarí, io, a Huron word meaning great lake, or possibly skanadario. Ontario has about 250,000 freshwater lakes, the province consists of three main geographical regions, The thinly populated Canadian Shield in the northwestern and central portions, which comprises over half the land area of Ontario. Although this area mostly does not support agriculture, it is rich in minerals and in part covered by the Central and Midwestern Canadian Shield forests, studded with lakes, Northern Ontario is subdivided into two sub-regions, Northwestern Ontario and Northeastern Ontario. The virtually unpopulated Hudson Bay Lowlands in the north and northeast, mainly swampy. Southern Ontario which is further sub-divided into four regions, Central Ontario, Eastern Ontario, Golden Horseshoe, the highest point is Ishpatina Ridge at 693 metres above sea level located in Temagami, Northeastern Ontario. In the south, elevations of over 500 m are surpassed near Collingwood, above the Blue Mountains in the Dundalk Highlands, the Carolinian forest zone covers most of the southwestern region of the province. A well-known geographic feature is Niagara Falls, part of the Niagara Escarpment, the Saint Lawrence Seaway allows navigation to and from the Atlantic Ocean as far inland as Thunder Bay in Northwestern Ontario. Northern Ontario occupies roughly 87 percent of the area of the province. Point Pelee is a peninsula of Lake Erie in southwestern Ontario that is the southernmost extent of Canadas mainland, Pelee Island and Middle Island in Lake Erie extend slightly farther. All are south of 42°N – slightly farther south than the border of California. The climate of Ontario varies by season and location, the effects of these major air masses on temperature and precipitation depend mainly on latitude, proximity to major bodies of water and to a small extent, terrain relief. In general, most of Ontarios climate is classified as humid continental, Ontario has three main climatic regions
Ontario
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Algonquin Provincial Park, Cache Lake
Ontario
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Flag
Ontario
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Summer at
Sandbanks Provincial Park on Lake Ontario.
Ontario
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The
Niagara Escarpment on the
Bruce Peninsula.
5.
Toronto International Film Festival
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The Toronto International Film Festival is one of the largest publicly attended film festivals in the world, attracting over 480,000 people annually. Year-round, TIFF Bell Lightbox offers screenings, lectures, discussions, festivals, workshops, industry support, TIFF Bell Lightbox is located on the north west corner of King Street and John Street in downtown Toronto. In 2015,397 films from 71 countries were screened at 28 screens in downtown Toronto venues, welcoming an estimated 480,000 attendees, TIFF starts the Thursday night after Labour Day and lasts for eleven days. Founded in 1976, TIFF is now one of the most prestigious events of its kind in the world, in 1998, Variety magazine acknowledged that TIFF is second only to Cannes in terms of high-profile pics, stars and market activity. In 2007, TIME noted that TIFF had grown from its place as the most influential film festival to the most influential film festival. This is partially the result of TIFFs ability and reputation for generating Oscar buzz, the Toronto International Festival’s Grolsch People’s Choice Award — which is based on popular vote by Festival filmgoers — has emerged as a beacon of awards-season success. Founded by Bill Marshall, Dusty Cohl and Henk Van der Kolk and that first year,35,000 filmgoers watched 127 films from 30 countries presented in ten programmes. Piers Handling has been the director and CEO since 1994. TIFF was once centred on the Yorkville neighbourhood, but the Toronto Entertainment District later gained a level of prominence. TIFF is known for the celebrity buzz it brings to the area with international media setting up near its restaurants and stores for photos and interviews with the stars. In 2010, TIFF opened its permanent headquarters, TIFF Bell Lightbox, TIFF has grown, steadily adding initiatives throughout the years. TIFF Cinematheque and the Film Reference Library opened in 1990, the TIFF Kids International Film Festival launched in 1998. Film Circuit began exhibiting independent and Canadian films in under-serviced cities across Canada in 1994, the festival was founded in 1976 at the Windsor Arms Hotel by Bill Marshall, Henk Van der Kolk and Dusty Cohl. Beginning as a collection of the films from film festivals around the world. Ironically, however, Hollywood studios withdrew their submissions from TIFF due to concerns that Toronto audiences would be too parochial for their products, in 1994, the decision was made to replace the name Festival of Festivals with Toronto International Film Festival. From 1994 to 2009, the organization running TIFF was named Toronto International Film Festival Group. In 2009, the umbrella organization TIFFG was renamed to TIFF, in 2001, Perspective Canada, the programme that had focused on Canadian films since 1984, was replaced by two programmes, Canada First. A forum for Canadian filmmakers presenting their first feature-length work, featuring eight to 15 films, and Short Cuts Canada, in 2004, TIFF was featured as the site of murder mystery in the film Jiminy Glick in Lalawood, a comedy film starring Martin Short
Toronto International Film Festival
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The festival is headquartered at TIFF Bell Lightbox, which opened in 2010.
Toronto International Film Festival
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Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF)
Toronto International Film Festival
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TIFF box office at the
Manulife Centre in 2006
Toronto International Film Festival
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TIFF Bell Lightbox
6.
Rian Johnson
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Rian Craig Johnson is an American writer, producer, director, and voice actor. He won the Special Jury Prize for Originality of Vision at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival with his feature film. Johnson directed The Brothers Bloom and Looper, as well as three episodes of the AMC series Breaking Bad, Johnson is the writer and director of Star Wars, The Last Jedi, the eighth film in the Star Wars saga and the second in the sequel trilogy. He has written the treatment for Star Wars, Episode IX. Johnson was born in Maryland. He was raised in San Clemente, California, and attended San Clemente High School and he then attended the University of Southern California and graduated from the USC School of Cinematic Arts in 1996. Johnsons first short film, Evil Demon Golfball from Hell, which is loosely based on Edgar Allan Poes The Tell-Tale Heart, was included as an easter egg on the Looper Blu-ray. Johnsons film career, as told to Robert K. Elder, author of The Film That Changed My Life, was inspired by Annie Hall. He stated, It moved me in a way very few other films have moved me. Thats something that, I pray to God, if I am able to keep making movies, I can only hope, twenty years down the line maybe and his debut film, made for just under $500,000, Brick is a crime drama. Johnson has often said that he looked to the novels of Dashiell Hammett as inspiration for the unique use of language. While the film is classified as a noir, Johnson claims that no references were made to film noir during production. Brick was released on DVD by Focus Features, Johnson directed the video for The Mountain Goats song Woke Up New in 2006. He is a fan of the band, and was asked to direct the video when bandleader John Darnielle noticed a reference to them in the credits for Brick. A song is credited to The Hospital Bombers Experience, which is a reference to the Mountain Goats song titled The Best Ever Death Metal Band in Denton, Johnson also directed a live performance film of the Mountain Goats 2009 album The Life of the World to Come. The film consists of a shot, depicting Darnielle performing the entire album on guitar. This film was screened in New York City, Chicago, Seattle, and Portland, Oregon upon its completion, Johnsons second film, The Brothers Bloom, is a con-man story released in theaters in May 2009, and later on DVD by Summit Entertainment. Johnsons third film, Looper, began shooting in Louisiana on January 24,2011 and was released on September 28,2012 by TriStar Pictures and FilmDistrict. Set in the future, it has been described as dark science fiction
Rian Johnson
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Johnson in 2012
7.
Silver Linings Playbook
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Silver Linings Playbook is a 2012 American romantic comedy drama film written and directed by David O. Russell. It was adapted from the novel The Silver Linings Playbook, by Matthew Quick, the film stars Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence, with Robert De Niro, Jacki Weaver, Chris Tucker, Anupam Kher, and Julia Stiles in supporting roles. Cooper plays Patrick Pat Solitano, Jr. a man with bipolar disorder who is released from a hospital and moves back in with his parents, played by Robert De Niro. The two become closer as they train and Pat, his father, and Tiffany examine their relationships with other as they cope with their problems. Silver Linings Playbook premiered at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival on September 8,2012, the film opened to major critical success and earned numerous accolades. It received eight Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director, the film was a success at the box office, grossing over $236 million worldwide, more than eleven times its budget. After eight months of treatment in a health facility for bipolar disorder, Patrick Pat Solitano is released into the care of his father Patrizio. His main focus is to reconcile with his wife, Nikki. She has moved away and obtained an order against him after Pat had found her in the shower with another man. During his time in the clinic Pat befriends Danny McDaniels, an man who is embroiled in a legal dispute with the clinic on whether or not he is eligible to leave. Pats therapist, Dr. Patel, does his best to him to keep taking his medication. But Pat tells him that he has a new outlook on life, he attempts to see the good, or silver linings, at dinner with his friend Ronnie and his wife Veronica, Pat meets Veronicas sister Tiffany Maxwell, a young widow with depression and relationship problems. Sparks fly between Pat and Tiffany and she tries to connect by offering sex, but Pat keeps focusing on getting Nikki back. Tiffany tries to get closer to Pat and even offers to deliver a letter to Nikki—if, in return, he will practice dancing with her and he reluctantly agrees and the two begin a rigorous practice regimen over the following weeks. Pat believes the competition will be a way to show Nikki that he has changed. Patrizio hopes to open his own restaurant and has resorted to illegal bookmaking, having put virtually all of his money on the outcome of a Philadelphia Eagles game, he asks Pat to attend as a good-luck charm. Danny is eventually released from the clinic, and teaches Pat, Pat asks Tiffany for time off from practice to attend the game. She gives him a reply from Nikki, in which she cautiously hints there may be a chance for reconciliation between them
Silver Linings Playbook
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Theatrical release poster
Silver Linings Playbook
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Cooper received his first
Academy Award nomination for his performance.
Silver Linings Playbook
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Lawrence won the
Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance
8.
David O. Russell
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David Owen Russell is an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. His early directing career includes the comedy films Spanking the Monkey, Flirting with Disaster, Three Kings, Russell received his seventh Golden Globe nomination for the semi-biographical comedy-drama Joy. Russell was born in Manhattan, to Maria and Bernard Russell and his parents worked for Simon & Schuster, his father was the vice president of sales for the company and his mother was a secretary there. His father was from a Russian Jewish family and his mother was Italian American, russells maternal grandparents were Frank Muzio, born in Craco, and Philomena Brancata, born in Ferrandina, both in the province of Matera. His paternal grandfather, a butcher from the Upper West Side of Manhattan, Russell was raised in Larchmont, New York, in an atheist, middle-class household. When he was 13, he made his first film for a school project and he attended Mamaroneck High School, where he was voted Class Rebel. He fell in love with film in his teens but aspired to become a writer, Russell started a newspaper in high school and his parents worked for a publishing company, so he grew up in a household filled with books and novels. Russell received his A. B. degree from Amherst College and he wrote his senior thesis on the United States intervention in Chile from 1963 to 1973. After graduating from Amherst, Russell traveled to Nicaragua and taught in a Sandinista literacy program and he worked manual labor jobs, including waitering, bartending, and catering. Some of his colleagues included members of the Blue Man Group. He worked for an association and later became a community organizer in Maine. He used video equipment to document slums and bad housing conditions, Russell was a political activist and canvassed and raised money in neighborhoods, he also did community work in Bostons South End. In addition to working in several day jobs, he began to write short films, Russell directed a documentary about Panamanian immigrants in Boston, which led to a job as a production assistant on a PBS series called Smithsonian World. In 1987, Russell wrote, produced, and directed Bingo Inferno, A Parody on American Obsessions, two years later, he made another short titled Hairway to the Stars, which featured Bette Davis and William Hickey. Both shorts were shown at the Sundance Film Festival, after Russell made an award-winning short film for a Boston television station, he received grants from the New York State Council on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts. Instead of the money going towards a feature about a fortune cookie writer, he decided to make Spanking the Monkey, as a result, Russell had to return the funds to the NEA. Spanking the Monkey, the 1994 independent dark comedy, was his first directorial effort, the film was produced by Dean Silvers, and starred Jeremy Davies as a troubled young man and Alberta Watson as his lonely mother. His next project was the Miramax comedy Flirting with Disaster, his collaboration with Dean Silvers
David O. Russell
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Russell at the
Paris premiere of
American Hustle, February 2014
9.
Artifact (film)
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Artifact is a 2012 American documentary film. It was directed by Jared Leto under the pseudonym of Bartholomew Cubbins, Thirty Seconds to Mars is shown working with producer Flood to create the 2009 album This Is War, meeting with lawyers between recording sessions. Artifact had its premiere at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival where it received the Peoples Choice Award for Best Documentary. Critics praised the examination of the state of the music industry. The film received a theatrical release beginning November 23,2013. The film follows rock band Thirty Seconds to Mars as they first learn of, at the time, they had been writing songs in preparation for the follow-up to their 2005 album A Beautiful Lie. Between recording sessions, they meet with lawyers to negotiate for the bands survival, other musicians give their first-hand accounts of their own experiences in the business. The logistics and economics of how a record company works are explained by music industry insiders, including former EMI employees, music producers and music journalists. They trace the impact of the growing American economic recession on the industry, in this instance, Terra Firma Capital Partners sought to rescue EMI despite having little experience in music management. Meanwhile, Thirty Seconds to Mars are also struggling with larger questions of art, money. Vignettes in this vein include people talking about everything from love, art, war, the state of the industry. Participants include Irving Azoff, Bob Lefsetz, technologist Daniel Ek, Bob Ezrin, Neil Strauss, as well as musicians Chester Bennington, Brandon Boyd, and Serj Tankian. Daniel Levitin, neuroscientist and author of the science book This Is Your Brain On Music, also appears, as do the Leto brothers mother Constance. Despite selling millions of albums, Thirty Seconds to Mars found themselves more than a million dollars in debt to EMI, the band also said that they had made no profit from the album sales. In reaction to this, in August 2008, the band attempted to sign with a new label after completing the A Beautiful Lie tour. This in turn prompted EMI to file a lawsuit stating that the band had failed to produce three of the five records they were obligated to deliver under their 1999 contract. The band had been contracted for nine years, so decided to exercise their legal right to terminate our old, out-of-date contract. The band were among several of the artists, unhappy with the transition, who quickly tried to terminate their contracts
Artifact (film)
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Theatrical release poster
Artifact (film)
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Thirty Seconds to Mars: Jared Leto, Shannon Leto, Tomo Miličević
Artifact (film)
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Leto promoting Artifact at the
South by Southwest in March 2013
10.
Jared Leto
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Jared Joseph Leto is an American actor, singer-songwriter, and director. After starting his career with appearances in the early 1990s. He made his debut in How to Make an American Quilt. He later began focusing increasingly on his career, returning to acting with Panic Room, Alexander, Lord of War, Lonely Hearts, Chapter 27. In 2012, he directed the documentary film Artifact, in 2016, he played the DC Comics supervillain Joker in the DC Extended Universe film Suicide Squad. Letos performance as a woman in Dallas Buyers Club earned him an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award. Leto is considered to be an actor, known for his constant devotion to. He often remains completely in character for the duration of the schedules of his films. He is also known to be selective about his film roles, Leto is the lead vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and main songwriter for Thirty Seconds to Mars, a band he formed in 1998 in Los Angeles, California, with his older brother Shannon Leto. Their debut album,30 Seconds to Mars, was released to positive reviews, the band achieved worldwide fame with the release of their second album A Beautiful Lie. Their following releases, This Is War and Love, Lust, Faith and Dreams, as of September 2014, the band has sold over 15 million albums worldwide. Leto has also directed videos, including the MTV Video Music Award–winning The Kill, Kings and Queens. Jared Joseph Leto was born on December 26,1971, in Bossier City, Louisiana, Leto is the surname of his stepfather. His parents divorced when he was a child, and he and his brother, Shannon Leto, lived with their mother and their maternal grandparents, Ruby. His father remarried, and committed suicide when Jared was eight, Leto moved frequently with his family from his native Louisiana to different cities around the country. My moms father was in the Air Force, Leto has explained, Leto has two younger half-brothers from his fathers second marriage. Constance joined the movement and encouraged her sons to get involved in the arts. We celebrated creative experience and creative expression and we didnt try and curtail it and stunt any of that kind of growth
Jared Leto
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Leto performing in Padova, Italy in July 2013
Jared Leto
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Leto at a press conference for
My So-Called Life in 1995
Jared Leto
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Leto at the premiere of
Mr. Nobody at the
66th Venice International Film Festival
Jared Leto
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Leto performing in Oakland, California in December 2009
11.
Seven Psychopaths
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Seven Psychopaths is a 2012 crime black comedy film written and directed by Martin McDonagh. It stars Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell, Woody Harrelson, and Christopher Walken, with Tom Waits, Abbie Cornish, Olga Kurylenko, the film marks the second collaboration between McDonagh, Farrell, and Ivanek, following 2008s In Bruges. The film was a co-production of the United States and the United Kingdom, Seven Psychopaths had its world première on 7 September 2012 at the Toronto International Film Festival. It was released in the United States and Canada on 12 October 2012, Marty Faranan is a struggling writer who dreams of finishing his screenplay, Seven Psychopaths. Martys best friend, Billy, makes a living by kidnapping dogs, Billys partner-in-crime is Hans Kieslowski, a religious man with a cancer-stricken wife, Myra. Marty writes a story for another psychopath, the Quaker, who stalks his daughters killer for decades, driving the killer to suicide, Billy suggests Marty use the Jack of Diamonds killer, perpetrator of a recent double murder, as one of the seven psychopaths in his script. Billy places an advertisement in the newspaper inviting psychopaths to call, a man named Zachariah Rigby approaches Marty and shares his story, with the condition that the movie includes a message to his partner in crime. Billy and Hans steal a Shih Tzu named Bonny, unaware that it is the pet of Charlie Costello. Charlies thugs, led by Paulo, discover Hans connection to the kidnapping and they threaten to kill Marty and Hans, but the Jack of Diamonds killer arrives and shoots the thugs. Charlie traces Myra to the ward and kills her after she refuses to tell him anything. Billy goes to Costellos house to meet his girlfriend, Angela, after Billy reveals to her that he kidnapped Bonny, she calls Charlie to tell him. Billy, after finding out that Charlie killed Myra, shoots Angela in retaliation, Charlie arrives at Billys address and discovers many packs of playing cards with the jack of diamonds missing, and realizes Billy is the Jack of Diamonds killer. Marty, Billy and Hans leave the city with Bonny, Hans reveals that he was the Quaker and survived his attempted suicide. Marty unknowingly wrote his story after hearing it from a drunken Billy, the trio drive into the desert and set up camp. Billy suggests Seven Psychopaths end with a shootout between the psychopaths and Charlies forces. Marty and Hans see a headline saying that Billy is wanted in connection with the Jack of Diamonds killings, Marty confronts Billy, who reveals that he assumed the Jack of Diamonds persona to give Marty inspiration. Disillusioned, Marty tells Billy they must go home, meanwhile, Hans has a vision of Myra and talks to her. She tells him that she is in a place, leading Hans to question his belief in the afterlife
Seven Psychopaths
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Theatrical release poster
12.
Martin McDonagh
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Martin McDonagh is a playwright, screenwriter and film director, born and brought up in London to Irish parents. He has been described as one of the most important living playwrights in Ireland, McDonagh was born in Camberwell, London to Irish parents. His mother and his father moved back to Galway, leaving McDonagh. Separated into two trilogies, McDonaghs first six plays are located in and around County Galway, where he spent his holidays as a child. The first is set in Leenane, a village on the west coast of Ireland. McDonaghs first non-Irish play The Pillowman is set in a totalitarian state and premiered at the Royal National Theatre in 2003. A Behanding in Spokane is McDonaghs first play that is set in the United States, lead actor Christopher Walken was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his performance as a killer looking for the hand he lost in his youth. McDonagh also penned two prize-winning radio plays, one of which is The Tale of the Wolf and the Woodcutter, in February 2010, an announcement revealed that McDonagh was working on a new stage musical with composer Tom Waits and director Robert Wilson. The play was received on its opening night in Galway in 1996 and was then produced Off-Broadway at the Atlantic Theater Company in 1998. The play transferred to Broadway in April 1998 and received a Tony Award for Best Play nomination, a Skull in Connemara A Connemara man is employed to exhume skeletons in an overcrowded graveyard and he encounters the wife whom he was once accused of killing. The play premiered in 1997 at Town Hall Theatre, Galway, the play was presented at the Royal Court Theatre, and made its US premiere at the A Contemporary Theatre in Seattle, Washington in July to August 2000. The play ran Off-Broadway in January to May 2001 at the Gramercy Theatre, the Lonesome West Two brothers bicker in the aftermath of the supposedly accidental fatal shooting of their father. The play ran on Broadway in 1999 and received a Tony Award nomination for Best Play in 1999, the Cripple of Inishmaan A dark comedy in which a crippled teenager schemes to attain a role in Man of Aran. The play opened in 1997 at the Royal National Theatre in London and it opened in April 1998 Off-Broadway at the Joseph Papp Public Theater, with Ruaidhri Conroy in the title role on both occasions. Also in 1998, Frederick Koehler played the role in the Geffen Playhouse production in Los Angeles. In December 2008, The Cripple of Inishmaan was produced Off-Broadway by the Atlantic Theater Company, in conjunction with The Druid Theatre Company of Galway, Ireland. The Lieutenant of Inishmore A dark comedy in which the leader of an INLA splinter group discovers that his best friend. The play was produced Off-Broadway in February 2006 by the Atlantic Theater Company and it transferred to Broadway in May 2006 and received a 2006 Tony Award nomination for Best Play
Martin McDonagh
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McDonagh at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival
13.
Laurence Anyways
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Laurence Anyways is a 2012 Canadian romantic drama film written, edited, and directed by Xavier Dolan. The film competed in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival where Suzanne Clément won the Un Certain Regard Award for Best Actress, the film also won the Queer Palm Award at the festival. The story of a love between a woman named Fred and a transgender woman named Laurence who reveals her inner desire to become her true self. Set during the late 1980s and early 1990s, the story spans a decade, chronicling the doomed love of Fred and Laurence, as well as the trials, at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival, the film won the award for Best Canadian Feature Film. The film begins by introducing Laurence, a 30-year-old transgender woman living as a man, Laurence is very much in love with her girlfriend, the fiery and passionate Fred. On the day of Freds birthday, she reveals to Fred her biggest secret, she has felt for her life that she was born in the wrong body. She wishes to rectify her situation and restart her life as a woman, Fred accuses her of being gay and takes the news very hard. They separate for a time, but Fred arrives at the conclusion, much to the chagrin of her mother and sister. Their romance resumes and Fred becomes Laurences biggest supporter, Fred teaches Laurence how to do her makeup and buys her a wig. She urges Laurence to dress as her self, in female clothing. Laurence shows up to one day in a dress. All seemingly goes well until she is released from her position at the due to the negative reception of her transformation. Fred falls into a state of depression and eventually leaves Laurence, Fred marries a man, Albert, and has a son named Leo. Five years later, Laurence, although living with and romantically engaged with Charlotte, is deeply in love with Fred. She stalks her regularly, often driving and parking outside of her house in Trois-Rivières, after publishing her book of poems, she sends a copy to Fred, who decodes the poems secret message meant for her. She contacts Laurence, and the two meet and run away to the Isle of Black, however, the romantic getaway turns sour and the two argue. Fred reveals she was pregnant when Laurence revealed her gender identity, Freds husband learns her whereabouts from Charlotte and Freds relationship and life with him is shattered. Laurence leaves Fred in the night and the two do not speak for several years, whilst being interviewed for her biography, the interviewer inquires about Fred, after having listened to her story
Laurence Anyways
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Official theatrical poster
14.
Xavier Dolan
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Xavier Dolan, sometimes credited as Xavier Dolan-Tadros, is a French Canadian actor, director, screenwriter, editor, costume designer, and voice actor from Quebec. He began his career as an actor in commercials before directing several arthouse feature films. He first received acclaim in 2009 for his debut feature I Killed My Mother. He has won awards for his film work, including the Jury Prize at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival for Mommy. Dolan was born on 20 March 1989, in Montreal, Quebec and he is the son of Geneviève Dolan, a Quebecois teacher, and Manuel Tadros, an Egyptian-born Coptic Canadian actor and singer with strong ties to the Quebecois entertainment industry. He reportedly wrote the script when he was 16 years old and he said in an interview with Canadian newspaper Le Soleil that the film was partly autobiographical. The film was at first financed solely by Dolan, but when need for more money arose, both turned him down for different reasons. In December 2008, SODEC gave him a $400,000 subsidy, in all, the film cost around $800,000 CAD. Dolan said that the system to acquire funding is a financing mechanism that holds the creative assets of Quebec hostage. Dolan later admitted the film was flawed and Peter Brunette of The Hollywood Reporter called it an uneven film that demonstrates a great deal of talent. Brunette also called the funny and audacious, while Allan Hunter of Screen International said that it possessed the sting of shrewdly observed truth. The film received the Claude Jutra Award at the Genies, distribution rights were later sold to more than 20 countries. Due to legal problems experienced by the films U. S. distributor, Regent Entertainment, it was not released theatrically in the U. S. until 2013, the second feature film Dolan directed, Heartbeats, was financed privately. The film follows two friends who are infatuated with the mysterious young man and their friendship suffers. It premiered in the Un Certain Regard category at the 63e Festival de Cannes in May 2010 where it received a standing ovation and it received several Genie nominations and the AQCC for Best Film. His third film, Laurence Anyways, was selected to compete in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, suzanne Cléments performance in the film won the sections award for Best Actress. The film received praise from critics but again failed to find an audience, in May 2012, Dolan announced that his fourth film would be an adaptation of Michel Marc Bouchards play Tom at the Farm. It received its premiere in the main competition section at the 70th Venice International Film Festival on 2 September 2013
Xavier Dolan
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Dolan at the
2015 Cannes Film Festival
Xavier Dolan
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Xavier Dolan, September 2009
Xavier Dolan
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Xavier Dolan (right) with
Anne Dorval and
François Arnaud at
Toronto International Film Festival
15.
Antiviral (film)
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Antiviral is a 2012 Canadian-French science fiction horror film directed by Brandon Cronenberg. The film competed in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, Cronenberg re-edited the film after the festival to make it tighter, trimming nearly six minutes out of the film. The revised film was first shown at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival, to make extra money, Syd uses his own body as an incubator, steals pathogens from the lab, and sells them on the black market. To do so, he uses a console to break the copy protection placed on the virus by the clinic, once injected in a client. He then passes the pathogens to Arvid, who works at Astral Bodies, after Derek is caught smuggling and arrested, Lucas asks Syd to take his place and harvest a pathogen from Hannah, who has recently fallen ill. Once he has taken a sample from Hannah, Syd quickly injects himself with some of her blood. He experiences the first symptoms, fever and disorientation, rapidly and his attempts to remove the virus copy protection are unsuccessful, and the console is destroyed during the process. When Syd awakens from severe delirium the next day, he discovers Hannah has died from the unknown disease, desperate to fix his console, he approaches Arvid, who sets up a meeting with Levine, the leader of the piracy group. Levine offers to fix the console in exchange for samples of Syds blood, Levine subdues him and forcibly takes samples from Syd, as the pathogen which killed Hannah is now hotly in demand on the black market, and lethal pathogens are not legal to distribute. The next day, a severely ill Syd is approached by two men, who drive him to a location where Hannah is actually still alive. Hannahs death was fabricated to protect her, but she is shown to be in the stages of the illness, extremely weak. He further suggests that since Syd unnecessarily injected himself with Hannahs blood, as Syds condition worsens, he returns to the Lucas Clinic, where he traces the original strain of the virus to Derek, who sold it to a rival company, Vole & Tesser. Dr Abendroth discovers that Vole & Tesser patented the modified strain, as Syd begins to show the final symptoms, he escapes by spearing Levine in the mouth with a syringe and holding a nurse hostage with his infected blood. After Syd realizes that Vole & Tesser infected Hannah to harvest their own patented pathogen from her, Syd contacts Tesser, the film closes with a virtual-reality version of Hannah that advertises her Afterlife exclusively from Vole & Tesser. Syd is shown working for Vole & Tesser, where Hannahs cells have been replicated to form a distorted cell garden from Astral Bodies celebrity meat technology, viruses injected into her system are sold. Syd demonstrates a new virus as he sticks a needle into a genetically created arm. Later, while alone, Syd cuts the arm and drinks the blood, it is revealed the arm is in fact Hannahs, as her deformed face. Caleb Landry Jones as Syd March, an employee at Lucas Clinic Sarah Gadon as Hannah Geist, more precisely, the central idea came to him in a fever dream during a bout of illness, wrote journalist Jill Lawless
Antiviral (film)
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Film poster
16.
Blackbird (2012 film)
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Blackbird is a 2012 Canadian drama film written and directed by Jason Buxton. Sean Randall, a teenager, is a friend of classmate Deanna. Her boyfriend plays in an ice hockey team and she is friends with the other members. Seans father has a gun collection, and Sean sometimes joins him when he goes hunting, Sean films his father shooting a deer and shows the footage to his schoolmates, which makes them think that he is creepy. The members of the hockey team bully Sean for being weird and for being friends with Deanna, seans teacher advises him to write down his feelings. He writes a story about using his fathers guns on the hockey team and Deanna. Sean is punished for lying about why he is in jail, tired of Trevor, Sean crushes the ping pong ball and Trevor threatens to kill him. Sean then deliberately commits an offence by withholding some cutlery in order to be put in the isolation ward, to be released from the jail sooner, he reluctantly follows his lawyers advice to plead guilty for planning a school shooting, even though he had no such plans. He is indeed released, under the condition that he not have any contact with Deanna or the hockey team members. He avoids his previous goth look, but people still consider him weird and dangerous, Sean violates the condition of having no contact with Deanna and is arrested again. With his fathers support, he decides to dismiss his lawyer and tell the truth and he is returned to juvenile jail, where Trevor convinces one of his friends to murder Sean, but the attempt fails. Later on, it is Christmas time, which makes Trevor uncomfortable, Sean angers Trevor by suggesting that the Santa Claus he killed might have thought that Trevor looked gay. This results in a fight, after both of them are put in the isolation ward. Trevor is still angry and hurts himself, causing increasing security measures by prison staff. Sean is relieved that Trevor is no longer in a position to bully him, one day, he does not have to stay in the isolation ward any longer, but prefers to and is allowed to stay while Trevor is still there. Sean begins to feel sympathy for him, and they reconcile, the film garnered two nominations at the 1st Canadian Screen Awards, for Best Original Screenplay and Best Editing. The film was also a co-winner, alongside Brandon Cronenbergs Antiviral and it also won the 2013 Claude Jutra Award for the best Canadian film by a first-time film director. Official site Blackbird at the Internet Movie Database
Blackbird (2012 film)
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Blackbird
17.
Call Girl (2012 film)
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Call Girl is a 2012 Swedish drama film directed by Mikael Marcimain and written by Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten. It stars Sofia Karemyr, Simon J. Berger and Josefin Asplund, set against the backdrop of the 1976 election, the story is centred on delinquent teenager Iris, who is sent to live in a juvenile home. She meets Sonja there and the two slip away for adventures in the city. Together they are recruited to the prostitution ring operated by Dagmar Glans, dagmars clients are mostly rich and powerful men, including senior politicians of the day. She becomes the subject of an investigation led by a young vice officer. Sandberg soon discovers Glans has powerful clients but also finds his investigation hampered by his superiors, in the aftermath of the trial, Sandberg is killed in a hit and run incident and his report into the affair is classified by the newly elected government. The film ends with Iris running away from the juvenile home and it received the FIPRESCI Discovery prize at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival. The film opened the Stockholm International Film Festival in November 2012 and it went on to win the Silver Audience Award, which is voted for by the audience during the festival. It was later nominated in 11 categories at the 48th Guldbagge Awards, including Best film, Best Director and Best Screenplay, Call Girl at the Internet Movie Database Call Girl at the Swedish Film Institute Database
Call Girl (2012 film)
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Theatrical release poster
18.
Mikael Marcimain
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Mikael Marcimain is a Swedish film and television director. Marcimain has primarily directed advertisements and television dramas, for which he has received several awards, notable in his filmography are the serials The Laser Man and How Soon Is Now. Which were made with cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema, marcimains first feature film, the political thriller Call Girl, was released in autumn 2012. Mikael Marcimain at the Internet Movie Database Mikael Marcimain at the Swedish Film Database
Mikael Marcimain
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Mikael Marcimain
19.
In the House (film)
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In the House is a 2012 French mystery drama directed by François Ozon. The films screenplay by Ozon is based on Juan Mayorgas play El chico de la última fila, the film was awarded the main prize at the 2012 San Sebastián International Film Festival, the Golden Shell, as well as the Jury Prize for Best Screenplay. The film was produced through Mandarin Cinéma for a budget of 9.2 million euro and it received support from France 2 Cinéma and Mars Films. Filming took place during eight weeks in August and September 2011, the film opened in France on 3 October 2012 through Mars Distribution. In the House earned $9,529,425 in France, the film has received critical acclaim. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 89% of 81 critics gave the film a positive review, Metacritic gave the film a score of 72 out of 100, based on 25 critics. Official website In the House at the Internet Movie Database In the House at Box Office Mojo In the House at Rotten Tomatoes In the House at Metacritic
In the House (film)
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Theatrical release poster
20.
Bradley Cooper
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Bradley Charles Cooper is an American actor and producer. He was one of the worlds highest-paid actors for three years, and has been nominated for various accolades, including four Academy Awards, two BAFTA Awards and two Golden Globe Awards. Cooper appeared in Forbes Celebrity 100 on two occasions and Times list of 100 most influential people in the world in 2015, Cooper enrolled in the MFA program at the Actors Studio, New York City in 2000. His career began with a guest role in the television series Sex and he first gained recognition as Will Tippin in the spy-action television show Alias, and achieved minor success with a supporting part in the comedy film Wedding Crashers. His breakthrough role came in 2009 with The Hangover, a successful comedy which spawned two sequels in 2011 and 2013. Coopers portrayal of a writer in the thriller Limitless and a rookie police officer in the crime drama The Place Beyond the Pines drew praise from critics. He found greater success with the romantic comedy-drama Silver Linings Playbook, the comedy crime film American Hustle. For his work in films, Cooper was nominated for Academy Awards—two Best Actor, one Best Supporting Actor. Cooper became the actor to receive an Academy Award nomination in three consecutive years. In 2014, he portrayed Joseph Merrick in a Broadway revival of The Elephant Man, Cooper was born on January 5,1975, in Philadelphia, and grew up in the nearby communities of Jenkintown and Rydal. His mother, Gloria, worked for the local NBC affiliate and his father, Charles Cooper, who died in January 2011, worked as a stockbroker for Merrill Lynch. Charles Cooper was of Irish descent, while Gloria Cooper is of Italian ancestry, Cooper has an older sister, Holly. He was raised as a Roman Catholic and he had cholesteatoma in his ear soon after his birth, and punctured his eardrum when he started diving at an early age. Describing himself as a child, Cooper has said, I never lived the life of Oh, People thought I was a girl when I was little, because I looked like a girl—maybe because my mother would keep my hair really long. He excelled at basketball, and enjoyed cooking, I used to have come over after kindergarten. I prided myself in taking whatever was in the fridge and turning it into lasagna and he initially wanted to attend a military academy and move to Japan to become a ninja. At an early age, his father introduced him to films like The Elephant Man, while attending Germantown Academy, he worked at the Philadelphia Daily News. He says that in school he was neither the smartest person nor the coolest kid, after graduating from the academy in 1993, Cooper studied at Villanova University for a year before transferring to Georgetown University
Bradley Cooper
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Cooper at the Paris premiere of
American Hustle in February 2014
Bradley Cooper
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Cooper at the 2009
Tribeca Film Festival premiere of
Woody Allen 's film,
Whatever Works in April 2009.
Bradley Cooper
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Cooper, in 2009 during a United Service Organizations tour.
21.
Jennifer Lawrence
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Jennifer Shrader Lawrence is an American actress. Since 2015, Lawrence has been the actress in the world. She appeared in Times 100 most influential people in the world in 2013 and Forbes Celebrity 100 the following year, during her childhood, Lawrence performed in church plays and school musicals. When she was 14, a talent scout spotted her in New York and she then moved to Los Angeles and began her acting career by playing guest roles in television shows. Her first major role came as a main cast member on the sitcom The Bill Engvall Show, Lawrence made her film debut with a supporting role in Garden Party, and had her breakthrough playing a poverty-stricken teenager in the independent drama Winters Bone. She achieved wider recognition for playing the mutant Mystique in X-Men, First Class, Lawrences fame continued to grow with her starring role as Katniss Everdeen in the Hunger Games film series, which established her as the highest-grossing action heroine of all time. She went on to earn various accolades from her collaborations with director David O. Russell and her performance as a depressed widow in the romance film Silver Linings Playbook received an Academy Award for Best Actress, making her the second youngest Best Actress Oscar winner. Lawrence subsequently won a BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for playing a wife in the black comedy American Hustle. She also received Golden Globe Awards for her roles in both of these films and for playing the eponymous inventor in the biopic Joy. Jennifer Shrader Lawrence was born on August 15,1990, in Indian Hills, Kentucky, to Gary, a worker, and Karen. She has two brothers, Ben and Blaine, and her mother brought her up to be tough like them. Lawrences mother did not allow her to play other girls in preschool as she deemed her too rough with them. The actress was educated at the Kammerer Middle School in Louisville and she did not enjoy her childhood due to hyperactivity and social anxiety, and considered herself a misfit among her peers. Lawrence says that her anxieties vanished when she performed on stage, a cheerleader at school, Lawrence also played softball, field hockey and basketball, which she played on a boys team that her father coached. She was fond of riding while growing up and frequently visited a local horse farm. She has a damaged coccyx from being thrown off a horse, the actress has said that she knew she would be famous from an early age. When her father worked from home, she performed for him, for the next few years, she continued to take parts in church plays and school musicals. During a family vacation to New York, when Lawrence was 14, Lawrences mother was not keen on allowing her to pursue an acting career, but briefly moved to the city to let her read for roles
Jennifer Lawrence
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Lawrence at the 2015
San Diego Comic-Con International
Jennifer Lawrence
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Lawrence at the
83rd Academy Awards in February 2011
Jennifer Lawrence
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Lawrence at the
Toronto International Film Festival in September 2012
Jennifer Lawrence
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Lawrence at the
Golden Globe Awards in January 2013
22.
Matthew Quick
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Matthew Quick is an American writer of adult and young adult fiction. Quick was finalist for a 2009 PEN/Hemingway Award, and his work has translated into several languages. In 2012, his novel, Boy 21, was reviewed favorably by The New York Times. Quick was a finalist for the TIME100 most influential people of 2013, Quick grew up in Oaklyn, New Jersey and graduated from Collingswood High School. He has a degree in English literature and secondary education from La Salle University, Quick lived in Massachusetts for several years, he and his wife, novelist and pianist Alicia Bessette now live on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. He received an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from La Salle in 2013
Matthew Quick
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Quick in 2013
23.
Ben Affleck
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Benjamin Geza Affleck-Boldt is an American actor and filmmaker. Born in Berkeley, California and raised in Cambridge, Massachusetts, he acting as a child. He later appeared in the independent coming-of-age comedy Dazed and Confused and various Kevin Smith films including Chasing Amy, Affleck gained recognition when he and childhood friend Matt Damon won the Golden Globe and Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for Good Will Hunting. He then established himself as a man in studio films including the disaster drama Armageddon, the war epic Pearl Harbor. After a career downturn, during which he appeared in Daredevil and Gigli, Afflecks directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone, which he also co-wrote, was well received. He then directed, co-wrote, and starred in the crime drama The Town. For the political thriller Argo, which he directed and starred in, Affleck won the Golden Globe and BAFTA Award for Best Director, and the Golden Globe, BAFTA and he starred in the psychological thriller Gone Girl. In 2016, Affleck began playing Batman in the DC Extended Universe, Affleck is the co-founder of the Eastern Congo Initiative, a grantmaking and advocacy-based nonprofit organization. He is also a member of the Democratic Party. His younger brother is actor Casey Affleck, with whom he has worked on films including Good Will Hunting. Following high-profile relationships with Gwyneth Paltrow and Jennifer Lopez, Affleck married Jennifer Garner in 2005, Affleck and Garner have three children together, and announced their separation in 2015. Benjamin Geza Affleck-Boldt was born on August 15,1972 in Berkeley and his family moved to Massachusetts when he was two, living in Falmouth, where his brother Casey was born, before settling in Cambridge. His mother, Christopher Anne Chris, was a Radcliffe College- and his father, Timothy Byers Affleck, worked sporadically as an auto mechanic, a carpenter, a bookie, an electrician, a bartender, and a janitor at Harvard University. In the mid-1960s, he had been an actor and stage manager with the Theater Company of Boston, during Afflecks childhood, his father had a self-described severe, chronic problem with alcoholism and Affleck has recalled him drinking all day, every day. His parents divorced when he was 12, and he and his brother lived with their mother. In the following years, his fathers life hit the skids, when Affleck was 16, his father moved to Indio, California to enter a rehabilitation facility and, after gaining sobriety, worked as an addiction counselor at the facility for many years. Affleck was raised in an active, liberal household. He and his brother were surrounded by people who worked in the arts, were taken to the theater by their mother
Ben Affleck
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Affleck at the 2015
San Diego Comic-Con International
Ben Affleck
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Affleck visiting the
USS Enterprise (CVN‑65) in
Manama, Bahrain in 2003
Ben Affleck
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Affleck on the set of
The Town in 2010
Ben Affleck
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Theo Chocolate, stocked by
Whole Foods, is made with Congolese cocoa beans
24.
Argo (2012 film)
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Argo is a 2012 American historical drama film directed by Ben Affleck. The screenplay by Chris Terrio is adapted from U. S, the film stars Affleck as Mendez with Bryan Cranston, Alan Arkin and John Goodman in supporting roles, and was released in the United States on October 12,2012. The film was produced by Grant Heslov, Affleck and George Clooney, upon release, Argo received widespread acclaim, with praise directed towards the acting, Afflecks direction, Terrios screenplay, the editing and Desplats score. The film received seven nominations at the 85th Academy Awards and won three, for Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Film Editing. The film also earned five Golden Globe Award nominations, winning Best Motion Picture – Drama and Best Director, while being nominated for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture for Alan Arkin. It won Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture at the 19th Screen Actors Guild Awards and it also won Best Film, Best Editing and Best Director at the 66th British Academy Film Awards and 37th Hochi Film Award for Best International Picture. On November 4,1979, Iranian activists storm the United States embassy in Tehran in retaliation for President Jimmy Carter giving the Shah asylum in the U. S. during the Iranian Revolution. 60 of the staff are taken as hostages, but six avoid capture. With the escapees situation kept secret, the U. S. State Department begins to explore options for exfiltrating them from Iran, central Intelligence Agency exfiltration specialist, is brought in for consultation. He criticizes the proposals, but is at a loss when asked for an alternative, Mendez contacts John Chambers, a Hollywood make-up artist who had previously crafted disguises for the CIA. Chambers puts Mendez in touch with film producer Lester Siegel, meanwhile, the escapees grow frantic inside the ambassadors residence. The revolutionaries reassemble embassy photographs shredded before the takeover and learn that some personnel have escaped, posing as a producer for Argo, Mendez enters Iran under the fake name Kevin Harkins and links up with the six escapees. He provides them with Canadian passports and fake identities to prepare them to get through security at the airport, although afraid to trust Mendezs scheme, they reluctantly go along with it, knowing that he is risking his own life too. A scouting visit to the bazaar to maintain their cover story takes a bad turn, Mendez is told that the operation has been cancelled to avoid conflicting with a planned military rescue of the hostages. He pushes ahead, forcing his boss Jack ODonnell to hastily re-obtain authorization for the mission to get tickets on a Swissair flight, the group boards the plane, which takes off just as the Revolutionary Guards at the airport uncover the ruse and try to stop them. To protect the remaining in Tehran from retaliation, all U. S. involvement in the rescue is suppressed and full credit is given to the Canadian government. The ambassadors Iranian housekeeper, who had known about the Americans and lied to the revolutionaries to protect them, escaped to Iraq. Mendez is awarded the Intelligence Star, but due to the classified nature
Argo (2012 film)
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Theatrical release poster
Argo (2012 film)
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Actor, producer, and director Ben Affleck.
Argo (2012 film)
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Argo (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)
Argo (2012 film)
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First Lady Michelle Obama announces the winner of
Academy Award for
Best Picture, Argo, live from the
Diplomatic Room of the
White House, February 24, 2013.
25.
The Company You Keep (film)
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The Company You Keep is a 2012 American political thriller film produced, directed by and starring Robert Redford. The script was written by Lem Dobbs based on the 2003 novel of the name by Neil Gordon. The film was produced by Nicolas Chartier, Redford and Bill Holderman, the story centers on recent widower and single father, Jim Grant, a former Weather Underground anti-Vietnam War militant wanted for a bank robbery and murder. Grant has hidden from the FBI for over 30 years, as an attorney in Albany and he becomes a fugitive when his true identity is exposed by Ben Shepard, an aggressive young reporter. Grant must find his ex-lover, Mimi, the one person who can clear his name, otherwise, he will lose everything, including his 11-year-old daughter Isabel. While Ben struggles with ethical issues as a journalist, Jim, after film festival screenings in September 2012, the films first theatrical release was in Italy in December 2012. A U. S. limited release began in April 2013, followed by wider North American release later in the month, the film received a mixed reception from the critics in the U. S. but a generally favorable one abroad. It grossed $5.1 million in the U. S. and Canada, a recently widowed single father, Jim Grant, is a former Weather Underground militant wanted for a 1980 Michigan bank robbery and the murder of the banks security guard. He has been hiding from the FBI for over thirty years, establishing an identity as a defense attorney near Albany and his prickly editor, Ray Fuller, assigns him to follow up. Bens ex-girlfriend, Diana, is an FBI agent, and he presses her for information about the case and she tells him to look up a Billy Cusimano. Billy, an old hippie with a history of drug arrests who runs a grocery, is an old friend of Sharon Solarz. Billy is disappointed that Jim doesnt want to take Sharons case, Ben pursues Jim and tries to question him, but Jim is evasive. Spooked by the investigation, Jim takes his 11-year-old daughter Isabel on a little trip. Ben learns that Mimi Lurie, an accomplice in the Michigan bank robbery, was last seen in Canada, a private investigator helps Ben find out that Jim had no Social Security number prior to 1979 and finds a copy of Jim Grants California death certificate. Ben concludes that Jim is really Nick Sloan, another former Weatherman, meanwhile, Jim and Isabel arrive in New York City. They go sight-seeing and check into a fancy hotel, the manhunt for Jim/Nick is now national news. While Isabel is sleeping, Jim leaves the key hidden in the hotel lobby. FBI agents, under the direction of Dianas boss Cornelius, have been tracking Daniel and they nearly catch Jim there, but Jim creates a diversion and escapes
The Company You Keep (film)
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U.S. theatrical release poster
26.
Robert Redford
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Charles Robert Redford Jr. is an American actor, director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, and philanthropist. Redford is the founder of the Sundance Film Festival, Redfords career began in 1960 as a guest star on numerous TV shows, including, The Untouchables, Perry Mason, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and The Twilight Zone, among others. He earned an Emmy nomination as Best Supporting Actor for his performance in The Voice of Charlie Pont and his greatest Broadway success was as the stuffy newlywed husband of Elizabeth Ashley in Neil Simons Barefoot in the Park. Redford made his debut in War Hunt. His role in Inside Daisy Clover won him a Golden Globe for best new star and he starred in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which was a huge success and made him a major star. The popular and acclaimed All the Presidents Men was a film for Redford. The first film that Redford directed, Ordinary People, was one of the most critically and publicly acclaimed films of the decade, winning four Oscars, and in the same year, he starred in Brubaker. He starred in Out of Africa, which was a critical and box office success. He released his film as a director, A River Runs Through It. Redford won the 1980 Academy Award for Best Director in 1981 for directing Ordinary People and he was previously nominated for Best Actor in 1974 for his performance in The Sting, and went on to receive Best Director and Best Picture nominations in 1995 for Quiz Show. He won a second Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2002, in 2010, he was made a chevalier of the Légion dHonneur. He has won BAFTA, Directors Guild of America, Golden Globe, in April 2014, Time Magazine included Redford in their annual TIME100 as one of the Most Influential People in the World, declaring him the Godfather of Indie Film. In 2016, President Barack Obama honored Redford with a Presidential Medal of Freedom, Redford was born on August 18,1936, in Santa Monica, California to Martha W. and Charles Robert Redford, Sr. a milkman-turned-accountant. He has a stepbrother, William, from his fathers remarriage, Redford is of English, Irish, Scottish, and Scots-Irish ancestry. Redfords family moved to Van Nuys, California, while his father worked in El Segundo and he attended Van Nuys High School, where he was classmates with baseball pitcher Don Drysdale. He has described himself as having been a bad student, finding inspiration outside the classroom and he hit tennis balls with Pancho Gonzales at the Los Angeles Tennis Club to warm him up. After graduating from school in 1954, he attended the University of Colorado in Boulder for a year and a half. While there, he worked at the restaurant/bar The Sink, a painting of his likeness is prominent in the bars murals, while at Colorado, Redford began drinking heavily, and as a result lost his half-scholarship and was kicked out of school
Robert Redford
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Robert Redford in 2012
Robert Redford
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Redford in
Barefoot in the Park, 1967
Robert Redford
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Redford at the
2013 Cannes Film Festival.
Robert Redford
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Redford with
Melanie Griffith and
Sônia Braga, promoting
The Milagro Beanfield War at the
1988 Cannes Film Festival
27.
Dangerous Liaisons (2012 film)
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Dangerous Liaisons is a 2012 Chinese film by Hur Jin-ho loosely based on the novel with the same title by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos. This version is set in 1930s Shanghai and stars South Korean actor Jang Dong-gun and Chinese actresses Zhang Ziyi, the film screened in the Directors Fortnight section at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival, and the 2012 Busan International Film Festival. Fenyu, a young widow whos just arrived from Northeast China where the Japanese are making incursions, is staying at the home of Madam Du. Jieyu wants revenge on Jin, for dumping her in favor of a schoolgirl. Yifan turns down Jieyus request, partly because he has another quarry in his sights—the quiet, Yifan accepts the challenge, but finds the virtuous Fenyu apparently immune to his charms. Meanwhile, Jieyu employs a different strategy to get her revenge on Jin, despite Jieyus strenuous efforts, the relationship is never consummated, but when she finds out about it, Beibeis mother, Mrs. Zhu, forbids her daughter to see Wenzhou anymore. With time running out, Jieyu suggests to Mrs. Zhu that Beibei should spend some time at Madam Dus estate—and secretly arranges for Yifan to be there. Mission finally accomplished, Yifan refocuses on seducing Fenyu, but finds himself in deeper waters than hes ever experienced
Dangerous Liaisons (2012 film)
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Dangerous Liaisons
28.
Emperor (2012 Film)
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Emperor is a 2012 American-Japanese post-World War II film directed by Peter Webber, marking his first film in five years. Tommy Lee Jones and Matthew Fox star in roles as General Douglas MacArthur. It is a joint American and Japanese production, Brigadier-General Bonner Fellers is sent to Japan as a part of the occupation force. He is tasked with arresting Japanese war criminals, including Prime Minister Hideki Tojo, before he departs, he privately orders his Japanese interpreter, Takahashi, to locate his Japanese girlfriend, Aya Shimada. After arresting Tojo, the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, doing so could lead to a revolt, but the American people want the Emperor to stand trial for Japans actions. MacArthur gives Fellers ten days to investigate the Emperor, when Takahashi informs Fellers that Ayas Tokyo apartment was bombed. Fellers orders him to investigate her hometown, Shizuoka, Fellers and his staff compile a list of people who were with Emperor Hirohito when the war started. Because none of the Japanese who are friendly to the Americans are among them, during a visit to Sugamo Prison, Fellers demands Tojo give him three names. He, instead, gives one, Fumimaro Konoe, the prime minister. Fellers goes to Konoes home and asks him if the Emperor was responsible for starting the war, Konoe gives no conclusive evidence, but directs Fellers to Kōichi Kido, Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal. While Fellers waits to meet with Kido, he recalls the time before the war when Aya suddenly returned to Japan, Takahashi informs Fellers Kido will not show up. Fellers recalls his 1940 visit to Tokyo when he reunited with Aya and he learns Aya returned to Japan after her father became ill and died. In a banquet at MacArthurs residence, Brigadier-General Richter informs Fellers that MacArthur will not look bad to the American public, after the banquet, Takahashi informs Fellers Shizuoka was bombed, Fellers immediately travels there. He is devastated by the damage and orders Takahashi to find a list of the dead, Fellers recalls his visit to Ayas uncle, General Kajima, for help with a paper on the mindset of the Japanese soldier. Kajima insists if America and Japan were at war, the Japanese would win because of the Japanese soldiers sense of duty to the Emperor, when Fellers returns to Tokyo, he decides he must interview Teizaburō Sekiya, a member of the Privy Council. Sekiya, like Konoe, does not give any evidence to exonerate the Emperor, during Fellers interview with Kido, he discusses the time before the Japanese surrender. The Supreme Councils deadlock between those in favour of surrender and those who were not led the Emperor to address the Council, because there were strong militarists in the army, the Emperor made an audio recording of his order to surrender. Before the recording could be broadcast, the militarists attempted a coup, the Emperor and Kido survived and broadcast the recording
Emperor (2012 Film)
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Theatrical release poster
29.
English Vinglish
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English Vinglish is a 2012 Indian comedy-drama film, written and directed by Gauri Shinde. The films narrative revolves around a housewife who enrolls in an English-speaking course to stop her husband and daughter mocking her lack of English skills, the protagonist, played by Sridevi, was inspired by Shindes mother. English Vinglish was originally made in Hindi, later it was re-shot in Tamil, the film marked Sridevis return to filmmaking after a 15-year hiatus, it features French actor Mehdi Nebbou, Adil Hussain, and Priya Anand. Amitabh Bachchan and Ajith Kumar had cameo appearances in the Hindi, before its theatrical release, English Vinglish was premiered at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival, where both the film and Sridevis performance received positive response. Prior to its release, the film was screened for the Indian press and it received critical acclaim and several critics hailed it as a must watch film. Soon after its release, the film was declared a hit in India, English Vinglish swept all the Best Debut Director awards of 2012 for Gauri Shinde. The film was shortlisted as Indias official entry for the Academy Awards in Best Foreign Language Film category. The film earned global acclaim at international festivals across the world and Sridevi was hailed as the Meryl Streep of India. Shashi Godbole is a housewife who makes and sells laddoos as a home-run business and her husband Satish and daughter Sapna take her for granted, mock her poor English skills and generally treat her with disrespect, making Shashi feel negative and insecure. However, her son, Sagar loves her as she is. Shashis older sister Manu, who lives in New York, invites Shashis family to her daughter Meeras wedding to Kevin. It is decided that Shashi will go to New York alone to help Manu organize the wedding, during her flight to New York, Shashi is given inspirational advice by a fellow passenger. While Shashi is in New York, she has an experience at a coffee shop due to her inability to communicate in English. Shashi quickly becomes a promising and committed student, earns everyones respect with her behavior and her cuisine. When he tries to kiss her at the rooftop of a building, Shashi rejects him and runs off, meanwhile, Shashis niece Radha who is Meeras younger sister finds out about her secret English classes and is supportive of her pursuit. Shashi starts watching English films at night and does her homework assiduously, to complete the English-speaking course and get a certificate, each student must write and deliver a 5-minute speech. Shashis family joins her in New York earlier than planned, to surprise Shashi, Shashi tries to continue attending class, but decides to quit because of scheduling conflicts, and asks Radha to inform Fischer. The test date coincides with that of the wedding, and Shashi is forced to miss the test, Radha invites Fischer and the entire class to the wedding, where Satish is taken aback at being introduced to a diverse group of people by his wife
English Vinglish
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Theatrical release poster
English Vinglish
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Sridevi (right) and
Gauri Shinde pictured during the shoot.
English Vinglish
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Sridevi at the premiere of English Vinglish
English Vinglish
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Anupama Chopra gave a positive 3.5 star rating and called Sridevi's performance a "triumph".
30.
Gauri Shinde
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Gauri Shinde is an Indian ad-film and feature film director. Shinde has made her debut with the highly acclaimed English Vinglish. Shinde featured in the Financial Times 2012 list of 25 Indians To Watch and she also featured on Rediffs list of Bollywoods 5 Best Directors of 2012. Gauri Shinde was born and brought up in Pune, where she studied at St Josephs High School and her aspiration towards film-making started right from the days at the end of her college life. In following years she made over 100 advertising films and short films, as she said in an interview, I made this film to say sorry to my mother. Besides the Filmfare Award for Best Debut Director, she was awarded the Laadli National Media Awards for Gender Sensitivity, Shinde married R. Balki in 2007. Gauri Shinde at the Internet Movie Database
Gauri Shinde
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Gauri Shinde
31.
Great Expectations (2012 film)
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Great Expectations is a 2012 British film adaptation of Charles Dickens novel of the same name. The film was directed by Mike Newell, with the screenplay by David Nicholls. Nicholls adapted the screenplay after being asked to work on it by producers Elizabeth Karlsen and Stephen Woolley, the premiere of the film closed the BFI London Film Festival in 2012, although it had already been previewed earlier in the year at the Toronto International Film Festival. It was released in the UK on 30 November 2012, Jeremy Irvine as Pip, an orphan. Helena Bonham Carter as Miss Havisham, wealthy spinster who has taken up a life of following the loss of her love. Bonham Carter was concerned about playing the role of Miss Havisham and she was worried about the typical appearance of the character, describing her as a pensioner in a bridesmaids dress. Newell assured her that she was the age, as the character in the book is in her forties. Ralph Fiennes as Magwitch, a criminal who changes Pips life, Fiennes hadnt read a great deal of Dickens work prior to gaining the role. Following the filming of Great Expectations, he moved onto another Dickens-related role, Robbie Coltrane as Mr. Jaggers, a lawyer responsible for handling Pips money. Great Expectations was Coltranes first Dickens-related role and he had been offered the role of Mr. Micawber in an adaptation of David Copperfield some years previously, but was unable to take it. Coltrane described Jaggers as a bastard, and was pleased to be able to deliver the line to Pip about great expectations. Jason Flemyng as Joe Gargery, Pips brother-in-law and legal guardian, Flemyng was pleased to be able to appear in a film which he could take his children to see, and thought itd be great for the Christmas period. Holliday Grainger as Estella, Newell encouraged Grainger to bring sensuality to her role, Grainger has said in interviews that the role was the one which she has coveted more than any other. She had first read the book at the age of 15, walliams brought his mother along to the films premiere. He had worked with producers Elizabeth Karlsen and Stephen Woolley on the 2007 film, during the development of the film, Nicholls published the novel One Day, which was subsequently adapted into a film in 2011. Nicholls described in interviews that he saw Dickens work as his childhood defining novel, having first read the book when he was fourteen and he also praised the 1946 version, directed by David Lean. Mike Newell was looking to develop Dickens Dombey and Son for the screen, the two worked together on further developing the screenplay and finding the funding for the film. Nicholls thought there was a problem with choosing the ending for the film and he described their solution as, What weve tried to do is to make it work as a love story without sentimentalising the book, having criticised the ending of the David Lean version
Great Expectations (2012 film)
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Theatrical release poster
Great Expectations (2012 film)
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Holliday Grainger at the preview of Great Expectations at the Toronto Film Festival
32.
Mike Newell (director)
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Michael Cormac Mike Newell is an English director and producer of motion pictures for film and television. Newell won the 1994 BAFTA Award for Best Direction for Four Weddings, Newell was born in St Albans, Hertfordshire, the son of amateur actors. Newell was educated at St Albans School and Magdalene College, Cambridge and he then attended a three-year training course at Granada Television, with the intention of entering the theatre. Newell directed various British TV shows from the 1960s onwards, and his first feature-length project was The Man in the Iron Mask, a made-for-television film. His first critically acclaimed movie was Bad Blood, concerning the 1941 manhunt for the New Zealand mass-killer, Stan Graham and this was followed by Dance with a Stranger, a biographical drama starring Miranda Richardson as Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in Great Britain. For his directorial efforts, Newell won the Award of the Youth at the 1985 Cannes Film Festival, Newell continued his successes in the film industry with Enchanted April, an adaptation of the 1922 novel by Elizabeth von Arnim. Miranda Richardson received a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Comedy/Musical, during this period, George Lucas recruited Newell as one of the numerous feature film directors to direct episodes of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. The comedy Four Weddings and a Funeral was also critically acclaimed – it won awards, including a César Award, a Golden Globe. Since these award-winning productions, Newell has directed a number of films in Hollywood, such as Donnie Brasco, Pushing Tin and Mona Lisa Smile. In 2005, Newell was presented with a degree of Doctor of Arts by the University of Hertfordshire which has a campus in St Albans. He was also awarded the BAFTA Britannia Award for Artistic Excellence in Directing for his career prior to 2005, Newell is heard briefly as the radio announcer at the beginning of the film. Newell directed Love in the Time of Cholera in 2007 and Prince of Persia, in February 2011, Newell attended the British Academy Film Awards along with Harry Potter author J. K. Continuing to work on adaptations, Newell directed Great Expectations from the novel by Charles Dickens, with Ralph Fiennes, Helena Bonham Carter, the film had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival
Mike Newell (director)
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Newell at
WonderCon, 2010
33.
Hyde Park on Hudson
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Hyde Park on Hudson is a 2012 British biographical historical comedy-drama film directed by Roger Michell. The film stars Bill Murray as Franklin D. Roosevelt and Laura Linney as Margaret Daisy Suckley, a cousin and childhood friend of the President. Although Daisy and Roosevelt had not seen each other for years, the distant relatives form a romantic relationship, Daisy becomes one of the several women close to Roosevelt, including Sara, Missy LeHand, the presidents secretary, and Eleanor, the presidents wife. In June 1939, King George VI and his wife, Queen Elizabeth, visit the United States, the British hope that the visit will improve the chances of American support during the future war with Germany. Roosevelt reassures George by citing his own inability to walk, the president tells the king that he hopes to overcome Americans reluctance to help Britain. The night the king and queen arrive, Daisy discovers LeHand is having an affair with Roosevelt. At the picnic the next day the king successfully eats a hot dog for a photo op, Daisy rejects Roosevelts requests to see her until he calls on her in person, they reconcile, and Daisy accepts her role as one of the presidents mistresses. As years pass, Daisy watches Roosevelt become frail as a leader, nonetheless everyone, she says, still to him. He felt drawn to the story because of the unique perspective Daisy offered on a series of important historical events and he also connected with the setting, since Nelson lives in Rhinebeck and had even met Daisy briefly before she died in 1991. Originally conceived as an idea for a film, Nelsons choice of director, Roger Michell, Nelson re-worked the script as a radio play, which was produced by the BBC in 2009, directed by Ned Chaillet. Once Michell became available, production began on the film, in early March 2011, director Michell started searching for U. S. actors to play President Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt. Bill Murray agreed to play Roosevelt in late March, production designer Simon Bowles created upstate New York in England where the entire film was shot. The UK release followed on 1 February 2013, Hyde Park on Hudson received mixed reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an rating of 37% based on 158 reviews. On Metacritic, the film has a score of 55 out of 100, based on 41 critics, club named it one of the worst movies of 2012, criticizing the slapdash manner in which it’s assembled is genuinely shocking and its prevailing idiocy. Richard Brody of The New Yorker also praises film, saying although the movie is not great, murrays performance as Roosevelt did garner praise, as he received a Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy. Production designer Simon Bowles won an award from the British Film Designers Guild on 27 January 2013 for his design on this film. During World War II, Suckley often stayed for long visits at the White House, Roosevelt is known to have had an affair with Lucy Mercer during World War I
Hyde Park on Hudson
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Theatrical release poster
34.
Roger Michell
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Roger Michell is a South African theatre, television and film director. Michell was born in Pretoria, South Africa but spent significant parts of his childhood in Beirut, Damascus and he was educated at Clifton College where he became a member of Browns house in 1968. He studied at Queens College, Cambridge and in 1977, he won the prestigious Royal Shakespeare Company Buzz Goodbody Award, Michell graduated from Cambridge in 1977. Michell was married to the actress Kate Buffery, but they are now divorced and they have two children, daughter, actress Rosie and son Harry. His wife is now Anna Maxwell Martin, with whom he has two daughters named Nancy and Maggie, during this period, he also worked with stage manager Danny Boyle, who would also go on to a successful directing career. In 1979 he left the Royal Court Theatre and began writing and directing projects on his own, the most successful of these ventures was 1982s Private Dick a comedy which won the Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Festival. The play later debuted in Londons West End and featured Robert Powell as Philip Marlowe, in 1985, Michell joined the Royal Shakespeare Company where, over six years, he was an assistant director and then a resident director. At the RSC, Michell directed Some Americans Abroad, which transferred to Broadway in 1990, in 1993, he directed the acclaimed BBC miniseries adaptation of Hanif Kureishis autobiographical novel The Buddha of Suburbia, starring Naveen Andrews. He followed that with the BBC film Persuasion in 1995, after it won the 1995 BAFTA for Best Single Drama. The film was released in theatres in America to great success, Michell then directed My Night with Reg and Titanic Town. Michell was next chosen by Richard Curtis to direct his script Notting Hill, at the end of that film, Julia Robertss character is seen reading the novel Captain Corellis Mandolin as she and Hugh Grant relax in a park. This is a little in-joke, as it was to be Michells next film for the same company, however he had a health scare, which required him to pull out and be replaced by John Madden. He then directed the 2002 box office hit Changing Lanes starring Ben Affleck, in 2003, he directed The Mother, written by Hanif Kureishi and starring Daniel Craig. Craig also starred in Michells next film, Enduring Love, an adaptation of Ian McEwans novel, Michell then directed Peter OToole to an Oscar nomination in 2006s Venus, again written by Kureishi. Michell was in negotiations to work with Craig yet again in 2006 and direct the James Bond film Quantum of Solace and his next film was 2010s Morning Glory, a comedy starring Rachel McAdams and Harrison Ford set in the world of morning news, produced by J. J. Michell directed Hyde Park on Hudson starring Bill Murray as United States President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in 2013, Roger was announced as a new judge on the panel for the 2014 Norwich Film Festival
Roger Michell
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Roger Michell at the premiere of Hyde Park on Hudson, Toronto Film Festival 2012
35.
Inescapable (film)
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Adib, was an officer in the Syrian military police twenty-five years ago, when he suddenly defected to Canada under suspicious circumstances, abandoning his fiancee Fatima. With his wife, two daughters, and a job in Toronto, Adib is confident hes put his past behind him. But when his daughter Muna suddenly disappears in Damascus, his past threatens to catch up to him. Adib teams up with a Canadian emissary, Adib evades former colleagues that are pursuing him, both a mystery drama and a spy thriller, Inescapable is an action-packed thriller driven by a fathers selfless dedication to his daughter. The film received reviews by critics. It holds a 19% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 21 reviews, Inescapable at the Internet Movie Database Inescapable at AllMovie
Inescapable (film)
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Movie poster
36.
Ruba Nadda
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Ruba Nadda is a Canadian film director. Her movie Cairo Time won the Best Canadian Feature Film award at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival and was Best Reviewed Romance on Rotten Tomatoes for 2010 and she is known for shooting feature films in very short time spans. Nadda was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, to a Syrian father, Nadda studied Literature at York University in Toronto, Ontario. She went on to study Film Production at NYUs Tisch School of the Arts, Nadda made her feature film debut with Sabah starring actress Arsinée Khanjian in the title role. The film earned Khanjian a nomination for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role at the Genie Awards and her next film Cairo Time, starring Patricia Clarkson and Alexander Siddig, was released in 2009 and won Best Canadian Feature Film at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival. In 2012 Nadda reunited with her Cairo Time star Siddig to film Inescapable, Nadda is set to release her next film October Gale in 2014. The film, a set in Georgian Bay, would reunite her with her Cairo Time star Patricia Clarkson. The film premiered at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival, in September 2014 Nadda announced that she would be reuniting with Patricia Clarkson on a TV series for HBO titled Elisabeth. In September 2014 Nadda announced that she was seven months pregnant
Ruba Nadda
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Ruba Nadda at
Canadian Film Centre 25th Anniversary Celebration in Los Angeles, 20 March 2013
37.
Billy Bob Thornton
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Billy Bob Thornton is an American actor, filmmaker, singer, songwriter, and musician. In 2016, he starred in an Amazon original series, Goliath about a washed up attorney with a new case. He has been vocal about his disrespect for celebrity culture, choosing to keep his life out of the public eye, however, the attention of the media has proven unavoidable in certain cases, his marriage to Angelina Jolie being a notable example. Thornton has appeared in at least one film per year every year since 1991. Thornton has written a variety of films, usually set in the Southern United States and mainly co-written with Tom Epperson, including A Family Thing, after Sling Blade, he directed several other films, including Daddy and Them, All the Pretty Horses, and Jayne Mansfields Car. He was also nominated for an Emmy Award, four Golden Globes, in addition to film work, Thornton began a career as a singer-songwriter. He has released four albums and is the vocalist of a blues rock band The Boxmasters. His brother Jimmy Don wrote a number of songs, two of which Thornton has recorded on his solo albums, during his childhood, Thornton lived in numerous places in Arkansas, including Alpine, Mount Holly, and Malvern. He was raised a Methodist in a family in a shack that had neither electricity nor plumbing. He graduated from school in 1973. A good high school player, he tried out for the Kansas City Royals. After a short period laying asphalt for the Arkansas State Transportation Department, he attended Henderson State University to pursue studies in psychology, in the mid-1980s, Thornton settled in Los Angeles to pursue his career as an actor, with future writing partner Tom Epperson. He initially had a difficult time succeeding as an actor, and worked in telemarketing, offshore wind farming and he also played drums and sang with South African rock band Jack Hammer. While Thornton worked as a waiter for an event, he served film director. Thornton struck up a conversation with Wilder, who advised Thornton to consider a career as a screenwriter, thorntons first screen role was in 1980s South of Reno, where he played a small role as a counter man in a restaurant. He also made an appearance as a store clerk in the 1987 Matlock episode The Photographer. Another one of his screen roles was as a cast member on the CBS sitcom Hearts Afire. His role as the villain in 1992s One False Move, which he also co-wrote and he also had small roles in the 1990s films Indecent Proposal, On Deadly Ground, Bound by Honor, and Tombstone
Billy Bob Thornton
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Thornton receiving a
star on the
Hollywood Walk of Fame on February 6, 2012
Billy Bob Thornton
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Thornton at the
South by Southwest in
Austin, Texas on March 11, 2008
Billy Bob Thornton
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Thornton at a San Francisco concert in 2007
38.
Love, Marilyn
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Love, Marilyn is a 2012 American documentary film about Marilyn Monroes writings produced by Stanley F. Buchthal, Liz Garbus, Amy Hobby, and directed by Garbus. The film was slated to be named Fragments, but was later changed to Love. 50 years after her death, two boxes of Marilyn Monroes writings—diaries, poems and letters—were discovered in the home of Lee Strasberg, her acting coach. The EW staff wrote, The iconic star takes center stage in a revelatory HBO documentary that combines old footage, catch it now on VOD or with the HBO Go app. Matthew Gilbert, film critic with The Boston Globe reviewed the film positively, writing, But yes, more Marilyn is just what we need, when the project is as exquisitely done as Love, Marilyn. The new HBO documentary, which premieres Monday at 9 p. m. is an elegant pastiche based on the boxes of Monroe’s own writings that were discovered a few years ago. It’s not a biographical film of the American Masters variety. Garbus adeptly patches together fragments of a narrated, in a way. She inventively pieces together an impressionistic, revealing, and ultimately moving version of the story that so many of us know already. Sara Stewart, liked the film as well and wrote in The New York Post, Its hard to imagine that absolutely everything hasn’t already been said about Marilyn Monroe. American gossip columnist Liz Smith, writing for the New York Social Diary, discussed the actors appeared in the film. Among them, Glenn Close, Ellen Burstyn, Lili Taylor, Uma Thurman, Evan Rachel Wood, Lindsay Lohan and it is the women who recite Marilyn’s own words — alternately scattered, precise, desperate, hopeful. There’s not a false note anywhere, as Garbus said, Marilyn speaks to every womans inner self — love, family, the desire for perfection, satisfaction in her work. And the fears that she cannot have it all, sarah Churchwell, who wrote the best book on Monroe, The Many Lives of Marilyn Monroe, also makes an important contribution. Her face has been so thoroughly replaced in popular culture by commercialized replications that the thing is a surprising thrill to behold. The film also reinforces the seductive power of theater, having performers read Monroes journal entries renders these often quite mundane sentences powerful and possibly revelatory. Through these women, Monroe becomes the serious actor she longed to be, still, there were some misgivings in the media regarding the film. Its all entertaining, and will doubtless fascinate the subjects many die-hard fans, the film opened at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 12,2012
Love, Marilyn
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Theatrical release poster
39.
Deepa Mehta
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She also co-founded Hamilton-Mehta Productions, with her husband, producer David Hamilton in 1996. She was awarded a Genie Award in 2003 for the screenplay of Bollywood/Hollywood, in May 2012, Mehta received the Governor Generals Performing Arts Award for Lifetime Artistic Achievement, Canadas highest honour in the performing arts. Mehta was born in Amritsar, Punjab though her family moved to New Delhi while she was still a child, and her father worked as a film distributor. Subsequently, Mehta attended Welham Girls High School, a school for girls in Dehradun and graduated from the Lady Shri Ram College for Women. Once in Canada, she embarked on her career as a screenwriter for childrens films, she also made a few documentaries including, At 99. In 1991 she made her directorial debut with Sam & Me. It won Honorable Mention in the Camera dOr category of the 1991 Cannes Film Festival, Mehta followed up with Camilla starring Bridget Fonda and Jessica Tandy in 1994. In 2002, she directed Bollywood/Hollywood, for which she won the Genie Award for Best Original Screenplay, Mehta directed two episodes of George Lucas television series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. The first episode, Benares, January 1910, aired in 1993, the second episode was aired in 1996 as part of a TV movie titled Young Indiana Jones, Travels with Father. Mehta also directed several English-language films set in Canada, including The Republic of Love, the film premiered at the 2008 Toronto International Film Festival. In 2015, Mehta wrote and directed the thriller film Beeba Boys a film starring Randeep Hooda as Jeet Johar, a proud observant Sikh. The film is set to premiere at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival, Mehta is best known for her Elements Trilogy, Fire, Earth, and Water, which won her much critical acclaim. Some notable actors that have worked in this trilogy are Aamir Khan, Seema Biswas, Shabana Azmi, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, John Abraham, Rahul Khanna, Lisa Ray and these films are also notable for Mehtas collaborative work with author Bapsi Sidhwa. Sidhwas novel Cracking India, is the basis for Mehtas 1998 film Earth, Mehtas film Water was later published by Sidhwa as the 2006 novel Water, A Novel. All three films have soundtracks composed by A. R. Rahman, Water is the story of an eight-year-old child widow who is forced to enter a house of widows for the rest of her life. The film, meant to be shot in India, was attacked by Hindu fundamentalists, riots broke out, sets were destroyed and death threats were issued towards the actors and Mehta, forcing the film to stop production. Four years later the movie was made in Sri Lanka, Water opened the 2005 Toronto International Film Festival and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 2006. Mehta collaborated on the screenplay for Midnights Children with the novels author, the film was released on 9 September 2012 at Toronto International Film Festival
Deepa Mehta
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Deepa Mehta दीपा मेहता
40.
The Reluctant Fundamentalist (film)
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The Reluctant Fundamentalist is a post-9/11 story about the impact of the Al Qaeda attacks on one Pakistani man and his treatment by Americans in reaction to them. In 2007, Nair read the manuscript of Hamids unpublished novel, the film was produced by Lydia and co-produced by freelance screenwriter Ami Bogani, Hansi Farsi, Anadil Hossain and US producer Robin Sweet. The estimated budget of the film is $15 million, the film was a major box office flop, earning only $2.1 million worldwide. The film premiered as the film for the 69th Venice International Film Festival. The film had a release in the United States, India. In Pakistan, the film was released in Urdu with a title as Changez on May 24,2013. In Africa, the film premiered in Kampala, Uganda, on August 24,2013, the film also screened at the 31st Munich International Film festival. Upon its release, the film received mixed reviews from critics, the film received several awards, most of them honoring the films efforts to address tolerance and xenophobia. In 2011, Anse Rainier, an American professor at Lahore University, is kidnapped soon after he leaves a movie theatre. A ransom video is sent to the US embassy, demanding the release of 690 detainees from what is described as a Muslim concentration camp in Kot Lakhpat and €700,000 for the children of Waziristan. Bobby Lincoln, an American journalist and undercover CIA informant in Pakistan, arranges to interview a colleague of Rainer, Changez Khan, Changez starts off the interview, held in a café, by declaring his admiration for the American equal playing field in economic advancement. He belongs to a class of people who, while genteel and educated and his father is an elderly poet and man of letters, who is respected by all who know him. Nevertheless, money has always been a problem in the family. After graduation, he earned a job position at a top Wall Street valuation firm, meanwhile, he met a young American photographer, Erica, and a relationship developed. The World Trade Center attacks takes place while Changez is in Manila on business, when he returns to the USA, he is strip-searched at the airport in New York. Later on, he is interrogated by federal agents, after being mistakenly arrested in the street as he left the Underwood Samson building. His attitude toward the USA seems to change, as does his relationship with Erica, who has yet to come to terms with the loss of her former boyfriend, feeling responsible for his death. Changez eventually breaks up with her, after she invites him to the opening of her art show, she had used details of their relationship without his knowledge
The Reluctant Fundamentalist (film)
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Theatrical release poster
The Reluctant Fundamentalist (film)
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Kate Hudson,
Riz Ahmed and
Liev Schreiber.
The Reluctant Fundamentalist (film)
The Reluctant Fundamentalist (film)
41.
Mira Nair
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Mira Nair is an Indian American filmmaker based in New York City. Her production company, Mirabai Films, specializes in films for international audiences on Indian society, whether in the economic, among her best known films are Mississippi Masala, The Namesake, the Golden Lion-winning Monsoon Wedding and Salaam Bombay. Which was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Nair was born on 15 October 1957 in Rourkela, Odisha, and grew up with her two older brothers and parents in Bhubaneshwar, Odisha. Her father, Amrit Nair, is an Indian administrative officer, at the age of eleven, Nair and her family moved to Delhi due to her father transferring posts. By thirteen she left home to attend Loreto Convent Tara Hall, an Irish-Catholic missionary school located in Simla, following Tara Hall, Nair went on to study at Miranda House at Delhi University, where she majored in Sociology. Before she became a filmmaker, Nair was originally interested in acting, and at one point she performed plays written by Badal Sarkar, a Bengali performer. While she studied at Harvard University, Nair became involved in the theater program, at the start of her film-making career, Nair primarily made documentaries in which she explored Indian cultural tradition. For her film thesis at Harvard between 1978 and 1979, Nair produced a film entitled Jama Masjid Street Journal. In the eighteen-minute film, Nair explores the streets of Old Delhi and has conversations with Indian locals. This film was recognized as a Best Documentary winner at the American Film Festival, raising roughly $130,000 for the project, the fifty-nine-minute film was shot over a span of two months, and was subject to criticism from Nair’s loved ones. Released in 1987, Children of a Desired Sex exposed how female fetuses were aborted due to a society favoring male offspring, after departing the documentary film-making field, Nair teamed up with her old friend, Sooni Taraporevala, and together the two began writing Salaam Bombay. Five years before the film was released in 1988, Salaam Bombay. was also nominated at the Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film in 1989. Following the success of Salaam Bombay, Nair, alongside Taraporevala, continued challenge audiences once more by telling the story of Ugandan-born Indians displaced in Mississippi in her 1991 film, Mississippi Masala. The film features actors like Denzel Washington, Roshan Seth, the film is centered on a carpet-cleaner business owner, played by Denzel Washington, who falls in love with the daughter of one of his Indian clients, played by Sarita Choudhury. The relationship in the film reveals the evident prejudice in African-American and Indian communities, the film was well received by critics and even earned a standing ovation at the Sundance Film Festival in 1992. The picture was also a recipient of three awards at the Venice Film Festival, Nair went on to direct four more films before she produced one of her most notable films, Monsoon Wedding. Released in 2001, the film told the story of a Punjabi Indian wedding, with only a small crew and some of Nair’s acquaintances and relatives as cast members, the film grossed over $30 million worldwide, which made it the most money ever made by an Indian film. The film was awarded the Golden Lion award at the Venice Film Festival, Nair then directed the Golden Globe winning Hysterical Blindness
Mira Nair
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Nair at the 2008 IIFW Masterclass Directors Meet
Mira Nair
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Nair at the
Zanzibar International Film Festival, 2013
42.
A Royal Affair
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A Royal Affair is a 2012 historical drama film directed by Nikolaj Arcel, starring Mads Mikkelsen, Alicia Vikander and Mikkel Følsgaard. The film received two Silver Bears at the 62nd Berlin International Film Festival, and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film at the 85th Academy Awards and it was also nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film award at the 70th Golden Globe Awards. Princess Caroline Matilda of Great Britain is shown writing a letter to her children in which she professes to tell them the truth, in flashback, Caroline talks of England, as she was about to leave to marry Christian VII of Denmark. She is passionate about the arts and education, but when she arrives in Denmark she is told many of her books are banned by the state. Christian is mentally ill and Caroline is unhappy in the marriage and she is soon pregnant with a son, but the couple grow far apart and the king stops visiting her bedroom. The German doctor Johann Friedrich Struensee is recruited to work as the personal physician. Struensee is a man of the Enlightenment, greatly influenced by the writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and he keeps this secret from the state, who welcome him because his father is a well-known priest. King Christian takes a liking to Struensee and he becomes a close friend. When Struensee manages to inoculate Prince Frederick against a smallpox epidemic, Christian has very little influence in the Privy Council, and the laws of the country are mostly decided by statesmen, but Struensee tells the king that he can have more power by acting. The doctor begins writing speeches for the king which advocate his own progressive views, Caroline and Struensee learn of their mutual interests and liberal views. They fall in love and begin an affair, when Caroline becomes pregnant, they protect themselves by convincing Christian to resume sleeping with her. As a result, Princess Louise Auguste is believed to be the kings daughter, meanwhile, Struensee is appointed a Royal Adviser and eventually persuades Christian to assign him the right to pass any law, making him Denmarks de facto leader. His reforms include the abolition of censorship, the abolition of torture, the queen dowager, Juliana Maria of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, notices the romance between Caroline and Struensee and their affair is revealed. Christian is initially angry, but he forgives his friend and states that they must carry on as if nothing had changed, Høegh-Guldberg incites a coup against him. Christian refuses to hand Struensee over to the people, but Høegh-Guldberg lies that the doctor and Caroline are planning to murder him, Christian thus allows Caroline to be arrested and taken to live in exile, while Struensee is sentenced to death. Christian issues a pardon, not wanting his friend to die, Høegh-Guldberg becomes Denmarks new de facto leader, and many of Struensees reforms are overturned. The film returns to Caroline writing the letter, where she reveals that she is dying of an illness, ten years later, Prince Frederick and Princess Louise Auguste read the letter. On-screen text reveals that when he became king, Frederick returned to the ways of Struensee
A Royal Affair
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Film poster
43.
Paul Andrew Williams
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Paul Andrew Williams is a British film writer and director, born in Portsmouth, England in 1973. He won the New Directors Award for his film London to Brighton in the 2006 Edinburgh International Film Festival, Williams began his career as an actor but later wrote and directed pop-promos, viral ads and short films. In 2001 he wrote and directed the short film Royalty which inspired London to Brighton, Royalty premiered at the London Film Festival in 2001, was shown UK television, was shortlisted for the Kodak showcase, and later screened at BAFTA. In 2003 Williams was the only UK-based director to be picked up by the Fox Searchlight Directors Lab and his short film, Its Okay to Drink Whiskey, made through this programme, premiered at 2004s Sundance Film Festival. His UK TV debut, Naked, was pick of the day in Time Out magazine, through a new development slate between Pathe and BBC Films, Williams was hired to write The Choir. Williams wrote and directed the psychological thriller Cherry Tree Lane, which premiered as part of the Fright Fest
Paul Andrew Williams
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Paul Andrew Williams at 26th BIFFF (Brussels) in March 2008
44.
Twice Born
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Twice Born is a 2012 film directed by Sergio Castellitto. It is based on a novel by Margaret Mazzantini, oft-married Gemma visits Sarajevo with her only child, Pietro. The two of them had escaped the city sixteen years ago, just days after his birth during the Bosnian War, Diego, her second husband and Pietros father, remained behind and later died. As they travel with her wartime friend Gojco, she tries to repair her relationship with Pietro, Gemma is later stunned by the revelation that Pietros real mother, Aska, is still alive and married to Gojco. Aska reveals that, contrary to Gemmas long held belief, Diego was not Pietros father, Gemma must face loss, the cost of war and the redemptive power of love. The film had its premiere at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival. The film received negative critic reviews and it holds an 17% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 23 reviews. Variety added that the film had little to offer beyond some pitiful twists, Twice Born at the Internet Movie Database Twice Born at Rotten Tomatoes Twice Born at Metacritic
Twice Born
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Twice Born
45.
Sergio Castellitto
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Sergio Castellitto is an Italian actor, film director, and screenwriter. Sergio Castellitto was born in Rome in 1953, at the Teatro di Genova he starred in the roles of Tuzenbach in Chekhovs Three Sisters and Jean in Strindbergs Miss Julie, both under the direction of Otomar Krejka. In the coming years, he starred in such theatrical productions as Linfelicità senza desideri. He also appeared in Barefoot in the Park by Neil Simon, during his years in the theatre, he worked alongside many famous actors, including Luigi Squarzina, Aldo Trionfo, and Enzo Muzii. Castellitto began his career in 1983 beside Marcello Mastroianni and Michel Piccoli in The General of the Dead Army by Luciano Tovoli. He interpreted many films like Sembra morto. ma è solo svenuto directed by Felice Farina, Piccoli equivoci by Ricky Tognazzi and he became more famous with the films The Great Pumpkin by Francesca Archibugi and The Star Maker by Giuseppe Tornatore. In the late 1980s, Castellitto appeared in several Italian television miniseries, including Un siciliano in Sicilia, Cinque storie inquietanti, Piazza Navona, Cinéma and he also appeared in the miniseries Victoire, ou la douleur des femmes. Success arrived with the films La famiglia, Lultimo bacio, Caterina in the Big City, My Mothers Smile, Mostly Martha, other films that he interpreted include Il regista di matrimoni by Marco Bellocchio and La stella che non cè by Gianni Amelio. In France Castellitto played the lead opposite Jeanne Balibar in Jacques Rivettes Va savoir. His most recent accomplishment as actor has been in his role as Padre Pio, Miracle Man, the first film that he directed is Libero Burro, followed by Dont Move. He played the role of the antagonist, King Miraz, in the film The Chronicles of Narnia and his most recent film as director was Twice Born, which played at the Toronto Film Festival, where it was not well received by much of the English speaking press. Most recently, Castellitto appeared in the television series In Treatment in the role of Giovanni, Castellitto is married to Margaret Mazzantini with four children
Sergio Castellitto
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Sergio Castellitto
46.
What Maisie Knew (film)
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What Maisie Knew is a 2012 American drama film written by Carroll Cartwright and Nancy Doyne and directed by Scott McGehee and David Siegel. It stars Julianne Moore, Alexander Skarsgård, Onata Aprile, Joanna Vanderham and Steve Coogan, the film finds six-year-old Maisie in the middle of a custody battle between her neglectful parents and their new partners. Cartwright and Doyne wrote the script in 1995 but the project languished in development hell until McGehee. It was filmed in New York over seven weeks in 2011 with music scored by DeVotchKas Nick Urata, the film premiered at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival, and was theatrically released on May 3,2013, by Millennium Entertainment. It earned $2.7 million at the box office. Six-year-old Maisie lives in a New York apartment with her parents, Susanna, a singer in a band, and Beale. Susanna and Beale argue with each other viciously and constantly, often ignoring Maisie and leaving her in the care of their nanny, Margo. Maisie does not always understand her parents actions, such as when Susanna hires a locksmith to change the lock on the front door to keep Beale out. When they decide to separate, both parents are granted joint custody of Maisie, after the separation, Margo moves into Beales apartment and they get married soon afterwards. In response to the marriage, Susanna impulsively marries Lincoln, a bartender whom she barely knows, Maisie bonds with Lincoln, but Susanna quickly grows resentful of how much Maisie has warmed to him. Maisies time is split between staying with each of her parents, but her primary caregivers become Lincoln and Margo as Susanna leaves on a tour, with his relationship with Margo disintegrating, Beale eventually decides to move to the UK. With Beale and Susanna gone, Margo, Lincoln and Maisie begin to spend time together, while Susanna is supposedly on tour, the three run into her in New York. After an angry confrontation in which Susanna accuses Lincoln and Margo of stealing Maisie from her, Lincoln declares their relationship over, when Susanna suddenly leaves the city, Maisie once again ends up in Margos care. Margo takes her to stay in her cousins beach house and she invites Lincoln to visit, much to Maisies delight, and Lincoln and Margo kiss. One night, Susanna stops by the house unannounced in her tour bus to pick Maisie up. After shouting at her, Susanna realizes that Maisie is scared of her, at the time, Cartwright was involved in a legal dispute over the custody of his daughter. Director Scott McGehee later said that Cartwright had used James novel as a lens through which to write about his own divorce and raising his daughter. According to Cartwright, he and Doyne struggled to find producers, financiers and directors interested in making the film because of the challenges of working with a child at its center
What Maisie Knew (film)
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Theatrical release poster
47.
Anna Karenina (2012 film)
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Anna Karenina is a 2012 British historical romance film directed by Joe Wright. Matthew Macfadyen, Kelly Macdonald, Domhnall Gleeson and Alicia Vikander appear in key supporting roles, produced by Working Title Films in association with StudioCanal, the film premiered at the 2012 Toronto Film Festival. It was released on 7 September 2012 in the United Kingdom and Ireland, Anna Karenina earned a worldwide gross of approximately $69 million, mostly from its international run. It earned a rating of 64 percent from review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes and it earned four nominations at the 85th Academy Awards and six nominations at the 66th British Academy Film Awards, winning Jacqueline Durran both prizes for Best Costume Design. In addition, Anna Karenina garnered six nominations at the 17th Satellite Awards, including a Best Actress nod for Knightley, in 1874 Imperial Russia, Prince Stephan Stiva Oblonskys wife, Princess Daria Dolly, banishes her husband from their home due to his infidelity. Meanwhile, Stiva meets his old friend Konstantin Levin, a land owner. Levin professes his love for Stivas sister-in-law, Princess Katerina Kitty Alexandrovna, however, Kitty declines as she hopes to marry Count Alexei Vronsky. Later, Levin meets with his elder brother Nikolai, who has given up his inheritance, Nikolai suggests that Levin marry one of the peasants on his estate. On the train to Moscow, Anna meets Vronskys mother, Countess Vronskaya, and once there Anna meets Vronsky himself, and they have immediate mutual attraction. When a railway worker is killed in an accident at the station, Vronsky is seen by Anna, Stiva, Anna convinces Dolly to take Stiva back. At a ball that night, Kitty attempts to dance with Vronsky, Anna boards a train to St. Petersburg, but at a rest stop notices Vronsky, who declares that he must be wherever she goes. She tells him to go back to Moscow, but he refuses, in St. Petersburg, Vronsky visits his cousin Princess Betsy Tverskaya, a friend of the Kareninas, and begins to show up at all the places Anna and Betsy visit. Vronsky flirts openly with Anna at a party, which catches Karenins attention and he suggests they go home, but Anna chooses to stay. Vronsky tells her of his intention to take a promotion in another city but Anna persuades him to stay, Stiva visits Levin at his country estate and informs Levin that Kitty and Vronsky are no longer to be married. Levin focuses on living an authentic life, working in his fields with his workers and contemplating taking one of their daughters as his wife. Karenin hears that his wife and Vronsky are in the estate and surprises them there. Later she encounters Karenin who suggests he join them for the races that evening. The races begin, and Anna betrays her feelings for Vronsky as his horse falls, on their way home Anna admits to Karenin that she is Vronskys mistress and wishes to divorce him
Anna Karenina (2012 film)
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Theatrical release poster
Anna Karenina (2012 film)
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Anna Karenina marked
Knightley 's third collaboration with director
Joe Wright and debut alongside Taylor-Johnson.
Anna Karenina (2012 film)
48.
Joe Wright
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His most recent film, Pan, is a Peter Pan origin story. Darkest Hour, Wrights political drama about Winston Churchill, will be released in 2017, Wright was born on 25 August 1972 in London, where his parents, John and Lyndie, founded the Little Angel Theatre, a puppet theatre in Islington. Wright always had an interest in the arts, especially painting and he would also make films on his Super 8 camera as well as spend time in the evenings acting in a drama club. He left school without any GCSEs and he began his career working at his parents puppet theatre. He also took classes at the Anna Scher Theatre School and acted professionally on stage and he spent an art foundation year at Camberwell College of Arts, before taking a degree in fine art and film at Central St Martins. In his last year of studies he received a scholarship to make a film for the BBC that won several awards. On the success of the short, he was offered the script for the serial Nature Boy. He followed this up with the serials Bodily Harm with Timothy Spall, during the 1990s he worked at Oil Factory, a music video production company based in Caledonian Road, Kings Cross. He worked on a variety of productions in numerous roles, including casting director, here he was able to get the opportunity to direct some music videos. Alongside this, particularly on the strength of his film work, he was also developing The End. He attributes some of the aesthetic and emotion of the UK rave scene as an influence on his work, in 2007, Wright became engaged to actress Rosamund Pike, yet the wedding was called off in 2008. Wright is married to sitarist Anoushka Shankar, daughter of Ravi Shankar and they have two sons, Zubin Shankar Wright, who was born in February 2011, and Mohan Shankar Wright, who was born in February 2015. In 2005 he made the transition to films with the critically acclaimed adaptation of Pride & Prejudice starring Keira Knightley. The film received numerous accolades including 4 Academy Award nominations,6 BAFTA nominations among a host of nominations and wins. On 13 December 2007, the film was nominated for seven Golden Globe Awards, though Wright himself was not nominated for director, the film received seven Academy Award nominations, winning only for Best Original Score. At the BAFTA Awards it received 14 nominations and went on to win for Best Production Design and his next film was The Soloist which stars Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey, Jr. It was to be released on 21 November 2008, however the date was pushed back to 24 April 2009. Wright reunited with Atonement star Saoirse Ronan for the action thriller Hanna, the title character is a 15-year-old girl trained since birth to be an assassin by her father, a rogue CIA asset
Joe Wright
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Wright at 2015 Comic-Con International
49.
Arthur Newman (film)
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Arthur Newman is a 2012 American dramatic comedy film directed by Dante Ariola and starring Colin Firth and Emily Blunt. Written by Becky Johnston, the film is about a professional golfer who fakes his own death. On his way to a new job in the Midwest, he is joined by a young woman who is also trying to escape from her past. The film was released theatrically in the United States on April 26,2013, former pro golfer Wallace Avery is struggling with boredom, depression, and a life from which he longs to escape. Trapped in an unfulfilling FedEx floor manager job in Florida, he finds comfort in his failed first marriage or his current relationship with his girlfriend Mina. He has even become estranged from his teenage son Kevin who has come to resent him, driven to desperate measures, Wallace decides that he needs a new start and a new life. Faking his own death by drowning on a beach, he acquires a forged passport. Leaving Florida behind, Arthur heads out for Terre Haute, Indiana to start a new life, along the way, he meets a beautiful but troubled young thief. He takes her to the hospital after finding her slumped beside his motel swimming pool from a dose of morphine-infused cough syrup. The young woman, Charlotte Fitzgerald, is traveling under a false identity—that of her paranoid-schizophrenic twin sister, Michaela or Mike—and has fled her home in Durham. Arthur and Mike become traveling companions and eventual lovers on their way to Indiana, Mike thinks up a game in which they spot interesting-looking couples, break into their homes, dress up in their clothes and pretend to be them. Meantime, Wallaces teenage son Kevin initiates a friendship with his fathers former girlfriend Mina. Together they struggle to understand the man who skipped out of their lives, eventually, the role-playing games that Arthur and Mike have engaged in lose their appeal, revealing two hearts that have been hurt by lifes challenges. Finally, they love each other as themselves, with that, the two are forced to take another look at themselves and the lives theyve left behind. Arthur drives Mike to her hometown of Durham, so she can look after her twin sister. As he prepares to leave, he assures her that he knows where he can find her, Arthur then drives back to his hometown in Florida to reconnect with his son. The film has gained mixed to negative reviews, as it holds a 41 out of 100 at Metacritic. com based on 22 reviews. At Rotten Tomatoes, the film was given a 22% on the based on 45 reviews
Arthur Newman (film)
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Theatrical release poster
