The Thing

Sep 18, 2017 — 1. The first Newport Folk Festivals took place in 1959 and 1960 and were the result of a collaboration between Newport Jazz Festival producer George Wein and Albert Grossman, who at the time were partners in music and artist management....

Apr 25, 2017 — 1. Before Rumble Fish became a novel, S. E. Hinton wrote an early version of it as a short story, which was published in 1968 in the University of Tulsa literary magazine, Nimrod. Two details were inspired by her pets: the title alludes to...

Jan 25, 2017 — 1.  Senegalese master Ousmane Sembène was already a celebrated novelist before becoming a filmmaker. His decision to direct was fueled by his recognition of cinema as a “political tool,” one that could rally the masses against a depicted social injustice,...

Nov 30, 2016 — 1.Marlon Brando and his father founded Pennebaker, Inc., one of several companies in the 1950s that were started by leading actors and backed by a major studio. This business model became popular as the “Big Five” studio system began to...

Aug 26, 2016 — 1. Director Tony Richardson selected Rita Tushingham for the lead role of Jo after auditioning two thousand young women. A Taste of Honey marked Tushingham’s screen debut, and while her performance went on to win the best actress award at Cannes in...

Mar 21, 2016 — 1. This week, we’re proud to release our long-awaited 4K restoration of Edward Yang’s 1991 masterpiece A Brighter Summer Day. Long unavailable on home video in the United States, this incomparable work of Taiwanese cinema is now out on Blu-ray and DVD,...

Jul 27, 2015 — 1. My Beautiful Laundrette launched a number of careers: that of writer Hanif Kureishi, soon to be regarded as one of the most important voices of his generation; those of producers Tim Bevan and Sarah Radclyffe, whose then fledgling company, Working...

Mar 30, 2014 — 1. In 1964, Ingmar Bergman wrote a script for a film titled The Cannibals. It was to star Bibi Andersson, and included a small part for the up-and-coming Norwegian actress Liv Ullmann, but it was ultimately tabled when Bergman became very ill...

Apr 4, 2013 — 1. Director Robert Bresson originally titled his screenplay Aide-toi . . ., a reference to the French expression “Aide-toi et le ciel t’aidera” (“Heaven helps those who help themselves”). He ultimately decided instead to use the title Devigny’s journalistic account of his...

Nov 29, 2011 — 1. Krzysztof Kieślowski directed all three films in the trilogy, Blue, White, and Red, in less than ten months (from September 1992 to May 1993). 2. The ending of Red was the first scene shot in the entire trilogy. Cinematographer Piotr Sobocinski decided that the image...