News

Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt — perfect?

Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel in "(500) Days of Summer"

Photo: Fox Searchlight

"(500) Days of Summer" is a breezy first feature by former music-video director Marc Webb, and it looks nothing like what you'd dread: It's light and airy and filled with surprises. The picture was written by two hot up-and-comers, Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber, who clearly know more about life than what's taught in screenwriting courses. And while what they've created is a love story, it's a love story of an unusual sort. As a voiceover tells us at the beginning of the film, "This is not a love story."

The picture could be pigeonholed as a romantic comedy, but it's not about finding the right person — it's about finding the wrong one. It's also about the pitfalls of euphoric infatuation: how it misguides us, while at the same time driving away the object of our desire,...

Beyonce has spent her last few weeks touring around the world, but yesterday she brought the show back to the states. She took the stage at Madison Square Garden, and Jay-z helped her kick off the show with a medley of duets including "Crazy in Love" and "I Just Wanna Love U (Give It 2 Me)." After the opener Jay let his lady take the spotlight as she performed in a variety of sexy costumes. Beyonce is a powerhouse all on her own, but sharing the stage with her husband is quite the way to welcome her tour home. Getty and Splash News Online View 15 Photos › More of Beyonce and Jay-z if you read more. View 15 Photos ›...

Known for his gritty crime dramas, James Gray's latest offering, Two Lovers, is anything but. Set in Brooklyn, the film follows a heartbroken young man (Joaquin Phoenix) who returns home after a suicide attempt only to discover two new love interests, one of whom is as troubled as he. Gray talks about the film's roots in 19th century Russian literature and his views on the nature of love. Q: Two...

Known for his gritty crime dramas, James Gray's latest offering, Two Lovers, is anything but. Set in Brooklyn, the film follows a heartbroken young man (Joaquin Phoenix) who returns home after a suicide attempt only to discover two new love interests, one of whom is as troubled as he. Gray talks about the film's roots in 19th century Russian literature and his views on the nature of love. Q: Two...

Juno was the top winner at this year's Independent Spirit Awards, nabbing three awards including Best Feature. The hit comedy, which is also the highest-grossing of the five Oscar nominees for Best Picture, also won awards for Best Female Lead for star Ellen Page, who professed her adoration for director Jason Reitman, and Best First Screenplay for ebullient writer Diablo Cody. Winning two awards each were two films also up for Oscars: The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, which received Best Director for Julian Schnabel (clad in his requisite pajamas) and Best Cinematography, and The Savages, which took home Best Screenplay honors for Oscar nominee Tamara Jenkins and Best Male Lead, in a bit of a surprise, for Philip Seymour Hoffman. The supporting awards went to a very pregnant Cate Blanchett (I'm Not There) and an absent Chiwetel Ejiofor (Talk to Me), while Once was named Best Foreign Film, Crazy Love received Best Documentary, and The Lookout won Best First Feature.

Hosted by first-timer Rainn Wilson of The Office, the Spirit Awards also bestowed I'm Not There with the first Robert Altman Award, honoring the outstanding director, casting director, and ensemble cast of an independent film; director Todd Haynes paid homage to late star Heath Ledger as well as his acclaimed cast. In between award presentations, there were songs performed -- some parodies, some not -- as it rained outside in Santa Monica and Javier Bardem, who presented the Best Director award, became the object of affection for host Wilson. You can check out photos from the Spirit Awards, courtesy of WireImage.

Get the full list of winners in our Road to the Oscars section.

As the awards season begins, no less than four critics' groups announced their awards over the past two days, with the highest-profile group, the New York Film Critics Circle, giving its top honor to emerging favorite No Country for Old Men. Quickly turning into the movie to beat this season, the Coen brothers movie also won the Best Director, Best Screenplay, and Best Supporting Actor (Javier Bardem) awards from the Gotham critics. Top acting honors went to Daniel Day-Lewis (There Will Be Blood) and Julie Christie (Away From Her), with the supporting actress award going to Amy Ryan (Gone Baby Gone), who is appearing on as many winners' lists as the Coen brothers. Other winners included The Lives of Others (Foreign Language Film), Persepolis (Animated Film), and No End in Sight (Documentary).

In Los Angeles on Sunday, there was blood -- and lots of it -- as Paul Thomas Anderson's historical epic There Will Be Blood swept the awards, taking Best Picture, Director, and Lead Actor (Daniel Day-Lewis) honors. Marion Cotillard of La Vie En Rose was named Best Actress, Vlad Ivanov of the Romanian abortion drama 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days was the surprise supporting actor winner, and -- yes -- Amy Ryan was named best supporting actress for Gone Baby Gone as well as Before the Devil Knows You're Dead. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days also won the foreign language film award, and Tamara Jenkins's The Savages received best screenplay honors. No End in Sight was the documentary winner, with Ratatouille and Persepolis sharing the animated feature award.

Also handing out awards on Sunday was the Boston Society of Film Critics, which jumped on the No Country for Old Men bandwagon, naming it their best picture and Javier Bardem as the supporting actor winner. While Marion Cotillard (La Vie En Rose) was the lead actress winner, the group threw a couple curveballs with awards to lead actor Frank Langella for the acclaimed but little-seen drama Starting Out in the Evening, and to director Julian Schnabel for The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (which also won cinematography and foreign language film honors). Once again, Amy Ryan won the supporting actress award for Gone Baby Gone. Other winners included Ratatouille (screenplay) and Crazy Love (documentary).

And sharing in the fun was the Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association, which along with Boston and New York named No Country for Old Men as their Best Picture, and giving the Coen brothers directing honors and Javier Bardem the supporting actor award; to exacerbate the sense of deja vu, Amy Ryan was again the supporting actress winner for Gone Baby Gone. A bevy of usual suspects rounded out the DC awards, with George Clooney (Michael Clayton) and Julie Christie (Away From Her) nabbing lead acting awards, and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly taking the foreign language film honor. Other winners included Michael Moore's Sicko (documentary), Ratatouille (animated film), Charlie Wilson's War (adapted screenplay) and Juno (original screenplay and breakthrough performance for Ellen Page).

Following up these critical honors will be the announcement of the Golden Globe nominations this Thursday morning; the Academy Award nominations will be unveiled next month on Tuesday, January 22. --Mark Englehart, IMDb staff...

The five nominated features in the 23rd annual International Documentary Assn. Distinguished Documentary Achievement Awards competition were announced Thursday, and Crazy Love, Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience, Sicko, Taxi to the Dark Side and A Walk to Beautiful made the cut.

Winners will be announced at the IDA Awards gala benefit Dec. 7 at the DGA Theatre in Los Angeles.

Nominees in the short-film category are Black and White, "Body & Soul: Diana & Kathy," The Fighting Cholitas, Freeheld, and A Son's Sacrifice. Nominated programs in the continuing series competition are 30 Days (FX), American Experience (PBS), American Masters (PBS), This American Life (Showtime) and Wide Angle: Season Five (PBS). Limited-series category noms are Addiction (HBO), Coming Out Stories (Logo), The Hill (Sundance Channel) and The Supreme Court (PBS).

The IDA also will present the ABCNews VideoSource Award for the best utilization of television news footage as an integral component of the work; the Pare Lorentz Award to the filmmaker whose documentary best represents the activist spirit and lyrical vision of Pare Lorentz, who was the first recipient of the IDA Career Achievement Award; and the David L. Wolper Student Documentary Award.

The Film Sales Co. has closed international sales on Dan Klores and Fisher Stevens' Crazy Love, which premiered at January's Sundance Film Festival.

The documentary, which follows the five-decade roller-coaster relationship between Linda Riss and Burt Pugach that landed the pair's saga on the cover of newspapers and magazines, will be released in the fall by Tartan Films in the U.K., Palace Films in Australia and Shani Films in Israel.

Released domestically by Magnolia Pictures, Crazy hits U.S. theaters Friday.

NEW YORK -- Dori Begley has joined Magnolia Pictures in the newly created position of director of acquisitions.

Begley will report to longtime head of acquisitions Tom Quinn in the company's New York headquarters. She arrives at Magnolia after serving as manager of acquisitions at Sony Pictures Classics from 2000-07 and most recently as associate programr for the Tribeca Film Festival.

"I've known (Dori) for some time and have always wanted to work with her in some capacity," Quinn said. "She brings a breadth of experience and talent which will enable us to be a more proactive buyer as we continue to grow."

Begley said: "Magnolia's infectious passion is unparalleled in this business. As the industry evolves, their dynamic model makes it a very exciting place to be. I couldn't be more thrilled to come on board."

During her time at SPC, which began in 1998, she helped acquire such titles as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, The Fog of War, Cache and Volver.

Magnolia, headed by president Eamonn Bowles and owned by Wagner/Cuban Cos., recently released The Host and soon will distribute Severance and its 2007 Sundance Film Festival acquisition Crazy Love.

The buying frenzy of the Sundance Film Festival continued into the wee hours of the night when Magnolia Pictures entered final negotiations for North American, U.K. and Australian rights to the horror film "The Signal" after the film's midnight screening.

The indie company is said to be purchasing the rights for around $2.3 million, though Magnolia won't confirm the sale as some deal points remain outstanding.

From writers/directors David Bruckner, Jacob Gentry and Dan Bush, "The Signal" centers on a mysterious transmission which invades every cell phone, radio and TV in the city, turning its inhabitants into killers. "The Signal" will mark the second purchase for Magnolia and its largest acquisition at a festival. The Mark Cuban-owned studio landed the first sale of the confab with the documentary "Crazy Love" picked up late Saturday.

"We didn't give anyone else a chance on the film," said Cassian Elwes, co-head of William Morris Independent. "We really wanted to be in business with Magnolia on this one.

PARK CITY -- The dropping temperatures at the Sundance Film Festival seem to be tempering the acquisition fever that usually accompanies the annual Utah confab. While acquisition executives are looking at a healthy number of films premiering at the event, no one title has sent any firm into an unreasonable bidding war.

That being said, a number of titles have been sold or are in the process of being sold to a wide array of distributors.

Although opening-weekend deals didn't reach the stratospheric heights of last year's $10.6 million price tag for Little Miss Sunshine or the $6 million sale of The Science of Sleep, or 2005's Hustle & Flow, which went for $9 million, they still retained some of the late-night negotiating hustle that has become a Sundance staple.

James C. Strouse's John Cusack starrer Grace Is Gone lived up to its prefest buzz, luring the likes of the Weinstein Co., Fox Searchlight and Sony Pictures Classics into an all-night bidding war. The Weinstein Co. nabbed worldwide rights to the movie for $4 million, closing the sale at 4:30 a.m. in co-seller Cinetic Media's Deer Valley condo.

Dan Klores' documentary Crazy Love marked the first sale of the festival, fetching mid-six figures from Magnolia Pictures for North American rights excluding television. The film tells the bizarre, half-century love story of Burt and Linda Pugach, a New York couple who got married decades after Burt spent years in jail for blinding Linda.

Negotiations also heated up Sunday afternoon on the George Ratcliff-directed Joshua, with multiple parties entering the talks. Fox Searchlight was among several distributors vying for the psychological thriller, which centers on a precocious child who wreaks havoc on his family. Although the deal hadn't closed by press time, Searchlight is almost certain to be the buyer. UTA and attorney Andrew Hurwitz are co-selling the project.

Despite repeated denials that they were buying the feature, sources said late Sunday that the Weinstein Co.

PARK CITY -- Magnolia Pictures nailed a deal late Saturday for North American rights to Crazy Love, director Dan Klores' provocative documentary about a couple who marries some 16 years after the man has acid thrown in his future wife's face.

In the first theatrical deal of the Sundance festival, Magnolia bought domestic rights Saturday afternoon for mid-six figures. Klores retains international, TV and remake rights to the docu.

Klores and his producing partner Fisher Stevens took the chance of pre-screening the film before the festival, a risky decision that could have backfired dependent on how the film played. But according to Fisher, they thought they had the goods. "It was Dan's idea to go early and I agreed," said Stevens.

Klores, a native New Yorker, remembers reading about the seminal incident in Linda and Burt Pugach's lives, when Pugacah had his fiance blinded because he thought he was losing her to another man. But it wasn't until Klores read a New York Times story about the couple who reconnected after Pugach's 16-year jail sentence and wound up marrying each other that he decided to pursue the project.

PARK CITY -- Crazy Love, a bizarre true story of pathological love, possession and maiming, which certainly fits into the truth-is-stranger-fiction category, is a case of intriguing subject matter and lackluster execution. Despite the inherent, shocking nature of the material, Dan Klores' narrowly focused, poorly paced documentary lacks a narrative thrust that could have made for a more compelling film.

Old photographs and home movies of Linda Riss, who grew up in the 1950s, reveal an uncommonly attractive, sensual woman full of vitality. In on-camera interviews, numerous friends attest to her singular beauty and her hold over men. Her aura of glamour captured the imagination and triggered the compulsions of Burt Pugach, a philanderer and narcissistic manipulator with a lifelong habit of trimming the truth.

Burt is whom Jean Paul Sartre had in mind when he wrote: Hell is other people. Linda, initially impressed by Burt's money and style, found out he was married. After she broke it off, Burt threatened and stalked her before dispatching criminals who threw acid in her face and blinded her. The media ate the story up.

Linda, an inveterate New Yorker and one tough lady, gamely faces the camera, her disfigurement concealed behind a wig and sunglasses. She calls herself damaged goods. He had said that if he couldn't have her, nobody else would. He got his wish.

Burt went to prison. After he was released, she married the jerk. Then they went on the TV talk show circuit, queried by incredulous interviewers. They've been together for 28 contentious years and according to Linda's friends, that, in itself, is a form of justice: He got his punishment, she got her revenge.

Shoot the Moon Prods. in association with Stevens/Zieff...