Free Republic

Usually movie makers strive to stay ahead of the cultural curve. It makes them "visionaries" who are "cutting edge" because they "push the envelope." Two years ago, "Occupy Wall Street" was the hot fad, stoking the usual left-wing outrage at bankers and the finance industry. They were the ones portrayed as greed-heads never held accountable for their crimes. Businessmen just twirl their mustaches and laugh evil laughs. But that was two years ago. Time for something fresh -- and edgy. A new movie suggests that movement was for sissies. It's time for someone to start a new campaign: Assassinate Wall...

As Soderbergh's Liberace biopic hits our screens, why is it that homosexual love stories now work so much better than hetero?I know where I'll be Sunday night. The reviews coming out of Cannes for Steven Soderbergh's Liberace biopic, Behind the Candelabra, which airs on HBO on Sunday night, have turned it into must-see TV. We might have been able to guess that Soderbergh's take on the kitsch-addicted superstar would turn out to be "mesmeric, riskily incorrect, outrageously watchable and simply outrageous" (The Guardian). Or that Michael Douglas would be "shrewd, rude, wickedly funny" (Indiewire) in the central role. What is...

Actor Brad Pitt suspects he suffers from "face blindness." The 49-year-old star believes he suffers from prosopagnosia, a medical condition that prevents people from recognizing faces. A 2006 study found one in every 50 people have this conditioN

We’re only halfway through the season, and it’s only May, but it’s already hard for me to imagine any show topping Game of Thrones on my 2013 year-end best-of list. There are more innovative and original series, but none that satisfies on so many levels, or that juggles so much plot and so many characters with the appearance of ease. Since HBO’s blockbuster adaptation of George R.R. Martin’s fiction debuted in 2011, many have lodged complaints about the show’s racial stereotypes and simplistic sexual dynamics—and rightly so; Thrones was a problematic series and still is, despite course corrections that suggest...

Bill Maher on Friday once again exposed himself as a total hypocrite. Minutes after telling his HBO Real Time panel "the Second Amendment is bulls--t," he admitted having two firearms in his house - "one upstairs and one down" - claiming, "As long as we live in the gun country, I ain’t giving up my gun"

Director J.J. Abrams' 2009 prequel to the dusty Star Trek property got the space saga out of mothballs and back on the pop culture radar. Star Trek Into Darkness resumes the franchise's penchant for futuristic allegories to modern times. Well, if you consider the Bush years the state of today's foreign policy debates.The '60s series never bludgeoned viewers with its mission statements, and the Star Trek sequel similarly embraces razzle dazzle over speechifying. Abrams is too keenly focused on ambitious action sequences, those maddening lens flares and the bond between the ship's crew that made those prior voyages such a...

Ron Howard and Brian Grazer‘s original plan for adapting Stephen King‘s The Dark Tower series was to do it as a series of movies bridged by a few seasons of TV. It always struck me as ambitious to the point of arrogance, while also rich in potential and, actually, quite exciting. But I wasn’t surprised when both Universal and Warner Bros. turned them down. Since then, they managed to lock a deal with MRC to produce a single film, with the possibility of more if it turns out to be a hit. That’s the way these things usually go, of...

ACLU: Time for 'Modern Family' gay couple to wed NEW YORK The ACLU is lobbying for the gay couple on "Modern Family" to get married. ACLU Action started a campaign to urge the show's producers to write a wedding episode for Mitchell and Cameron, fathers of an adopted child and one of three couples at the heart of the show. The ACLU says it is appealing to the fictional family to draw more attention to the real issue as it awaits Supreme Court decisions on two important marriage equality cases. "Mitch and Cam are a couple that America has come...

Saw it last night. Couldn't make sense of certain aspects of it until I realized they're telling the 9/11 truther plot that Bush planned everything. (Spoilers ahead with plot details revealed)

Gay actors George Takei and Jesse Tyler Ferguson have teamed up for a new Funny or Die video supporting same-sex marriage. Like most of the site's videos it's not remotely funny, but it does express plenty of intolerance while preaching a message of ... tolerance. The clip, a sendup of '50s era America, finds Takei narrating the sad tale of a guy named Dale who opposes same sex marriage. (VIDEO-AT-LINK) "What you can't tell about Dale is that he's sick. He opposes marriage equality. Dale looks normal, but he gives off clues of his prejudice with buzz words like pro...

"....AMC has released this first look image of series star Andrew Lincoln as Rick Grimes -- with a walker notably lurking in the background -- to hype the new season. As if the biggest show on TV needs any more hype. Fans curious to see what's going on with Carl, Daryl, Michonne and the rest -- not to mention where the heck the Governor is at -- will have to wait. But for now take a look at the full first look image......\ Patriot Babe; WXRGina; autumnraine; CatherineofAragon

“Hunchback of Notre Dame” star Bette Midler declared that she loves the Internal Revenue Service for targeting the tax-exempt status of conservative groups. “I LOVE THE IRS!!! HOW CAN A POLITICAL ORGANIZATION BE CALLED A NON-PROFIT THAT PROMOTES GENERAL WELFARE??,” Midler tweeted in all caps Monday. The IRS apologized Friday for improperly giving extra scrutiny to the tax-exempt status of conservative nonprofit groups — a confession White House press secretary Jay Carney said President Barack Obama would find “outrageous” if confirmed by an independent report. Midler, an Obama supporter who has previously tweeted that “Obama inherited this [economic] mess, he...

When "Love and Honor" was filmed in Ann Arbor in 2011, it received statewide media attention. But when the movie was released, the film was more like its original working title, "AWOL." The movie was released March 22 to two theaters and grossed $2,815 in its opening weekend. As of April 11, it has grossed $16,769, according to Box Office Mojo. Michigan taxpayers gave the "Love and Honor" production company $1.6 million in film incentives for $4.1 million in spending in the state. "Love and Honor" was far from the only movie shot in Michigan to fizzle at the box...

As the broadcast TV channels prepare to reveal their fall schedules this week, the renewed-or-canceled announcements that blasted out at the end of last week have already determined one characteristic of the 2013-14 TV season: It will be a lot more heterosexual than the current season, which officially ends next Wednesday. Among the shows that won’t be back next year are The New Normal, Go On, Smash, The Office, 1600 Penn, Happy Endings, Don’t Trust the B___ in Apartment 23, 90210, Emily Owens, M.D., The L.A. Complex, Partners, and Southland, all of which featured gay or lesbian characters. (You can...

MY MOTHER fought cancer for almost a decade and died at 56. She held out long enough to meet the first of her grandchildren and to hold them in her arms. But my other children will never have the chance to know her and experience how loving and gracious she was. We often speak of “Mommy’s mommy,” and I find myself trying to explain the illness that took her away from us. They have asked if the same could happen to me. I have always told them not to worry, but the truth is I carry a “faulty” gene, BRCA1,...

Why would a Starfleet admiral ask a 300-year-old frozen man for help?’’ asks Captain Kirk in his latest adventure — and, after sitting through two-plus hours of the mind-numbing “Star Trek Into Darkness,’’ damned if I could tell you why.

LOS ANGELES, May 12 (UPI)--Four U.S. TV shows with prominent gay story lines during a record-breaking season for openly gay characters will be cut for the next season, officials said. NBC's "The New Normal" and "Smash" and "Go On" and CBS's "Partners," will get the ax, the Hollywood Reporter said Saturday. Heather Morris, who plays a bisexual on Fox's "Glee," will not be returning next season, the Reporter said. A Hollywood Reporter survey in November discovered that gay characters on TV, including couples on "Grey's Anatomy" and "Modern Family," helped voters to support gay marriage at the polls. "This data...

Barack Obama held another fundraiser last night with Jessica Biel, Justin Timberlake and other Hollwood elitists at Harvey Weinstein’s house. Barack Obama held a fundraiser with Hollywood leftists last night. During the high-dollar event Obama told his supporters that he hasn’t quite broken the the Republicans yet. He also blamed Rush Limbaugh for the gridlock in Washington DC. The Atlantic Wire reported: President Obama told donors like Jessica Biel, Justin Timberlake (who was wearing hipster glasses), and Tommy Hilfiger that Washington gridlock is pretty much Rush Limbaugh’s fault on Monday evening at a fundraiser at Harvey Weinstein’s house in New...

It's been a rough end to what started out as a record-breaking season for openly gay characters on the small screen.

Today in show business news: NBC is cleaning house while CBS is adding more clutter, including a Robin Williams/Sarah Michelle Gellar show. Yes, you read that right. More cancellation news from the Peacock as the network gets ready to present its new schedule to advertisers at next week's upfront presentation in New York. Yesterday it was Whitney and 1600 Penn, today it's Matthew Perry's freshman sitcom Go On and Brian Williams's weekly news magazine Rock Center. They are really cleaning house as they do yet another yearly overhaul, hoping that this is the one that works. This leaves The New...

Supply-siders, led by Arthur Laffer, have made the case that taxes affect behavior — a proposition rejected by the Obama Administration until now. In a closed-door meeting at the White House, Vice-President Biden endorsed a new tax on violence, a move that would force film producers, writers and software developers to reconsider the material they are creating. In essence, Mr. Biden is conceding that a higher tax would impede development and encourage creators to move their energies toward other endeavors. According to participants in the meeting, the vice president endorsed evangelical preacher Franklin Graham’s proposal to tax movies, books and...

The autobiography of Mother Dolores Hart (written with her long-time friend, Richard DeNeut), The Ear of the Heart: An Actress' Journey from Hollywood to Holy Vows, is now available from Ignatius Press. Here is some of the descriptive copy, from the Ignatius Press site: Dolores Hart stunned Hollywood in 1963, when after ten highly successful feature films, she chose to enter a contemplative monastery. ... Dolores was a bright and beautiful college student when she made her film debut with Elvis Presley in Paramount's 1957 Loving You. She acted in nine more movies with other big stars such as...

Raymond Frederick Harryhausen Born: Los Angeles 29th June 1920 Died: London 7th May 2013. The Harryhausen family regret to announce the death of Ray Harryhausen, Visual Effects pioneer and stop-motion model animator. He was a multi-award winner which includes a special Oscar and BAFTA. Ray’s influence on today’s film makers was enormous, with luminaries; Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Peter Jackson, George Lucas, John Landis and the UK’s own Nick Park have cited Harryhausen as being the man whose work inspired their own creations. Harryhausen’s fascination with animated models began when he first saw Willis O’Brien’s creations in KING KONG with...

Did you hear that? The shotgun blast heard ‘round the world? It happened when A&E Network’s hit reality TV show Duck Dynasty reached over 8 million viewers in its season premiere. Like any gunshot, it got my attention. I tuned in to see what all the fuss is about and am now hopelessly hooked on this revolutionary bit of televised perfection. I quickly discovered that Duck Dynasty has very little to do with ducks or duck hunting, and everything to do with traditional American values and the current American condition.Like all great television, Duck Dynasty works because it follows...

Speaking at a gathering of digital advertisers in New York City last night, Mr Schmidt refused to forecast when internet video would displace television, instead declaring: "That's already happened." "It's not a replacement for something that we know," he added. "It's a new thing that we have to think about, to program, to curate and build new platforms." YouTube recently surpassed the milestone of a billion unique users a month. Only the Google search engine and social network Facebook are frequented more often by those browsing the internet worldwide. However, the video site lags behind traditional television in the UK,...

Film Studios Say New York Gun Law May Ban Props ALBANY — The sweeping gun control measure signed by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and hailed by Democratic leaders has a surprising critic: Hollywood. Officials in the movie and television industry say the new laws could prevent them from using the lifelike assault weapons and high-capacity magazines that they have employed in shows like “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” and films like “The Dark Knight Rises.” Twenty-seven film and television projects, including programs like “Blue Bloods” and “Person of Interest,” are now in production in New York State using assault...

Damon Lindelof and Paramount have spilled the rotten tomatoes on Brad Pitt's "World War Z." Incomplete script, an incoherent ending, massive re-shoots, millions of dollars in budget overages, and even a Hungarian SWAT team raid are apparently just a few of the issues plaguing Pitt's troubled production, according to Vanity Fair's June cover story. According to "Lost" writer Lindelof, who rewrote the film's third act and spoke with VF contributor Laura M. Holson, the SWAT team was the least of the producing team's worries. After screening a first cut of Marc Forster's geopolitical zombie thriller, Lindelof said the ending was...

Sarah Palin's totem is the mama grizzly, and her admirers are as protective of her as the fabled bear is of her cubs. Their target today is the resurgent Netflix (NFLX), which reported its first quarter results earlier this week. Twitchy -- conservative commentator Mchelle Malkin's Twitter monitor/controversy generator -- reports that the hashtag #SarahPalinFilms arose on Tuesday night, attributing it to "lefties" whose apparent dismissiveness towards Palin is belied by their purported obsession with her: "You know, because her 15 minutes have come and gone and she's totally not living rent-free in their heads." #Sarcasm. Sensing an opportunity to...

Deanna Durbin, who as a plucky child movie star with a sweet soprano voice charmed American audiences during the Depression and saved Universal Pictures from bankruptcy before she vanished from public view 64 years ago, has died, a fan club announced on Tuesday. She was 91. In a newsletter, the Deanna Durbin Society said Ms. Durbin died “a few days ago,” quoting her son, Peter H. David, who thanked her admirers for respecting her privacy. No other details were given.

Brokeback Mountain Domestic Total Gross: $83,043,761 Distributor: Focus Features Release Date: December 9, 2005 Genre: Western Runtime: 2 hrs. 15 min. MPAA Rating: R Production Budget: $14 million

A spokeswoman for Catherine Zeta-Jones says the actress has “proactively” checked into a mental health facility for treatment of her bipolar condition. … Two years ago, the 43-year-old Oscar winner checked into a similar facility for a brief stay for treatment of her condition, known as Bipolar II. The disorder is characterized by mood swings and depressive episodes, and is commonly treated with medication and psychotherapy. …

"Actress Jane Fonda participates in a hand & footprint ceremony honoring her as part of the TCM Classic Film Festival, at TCL Chinese Theatre in the Hollywood section of Los Angeles on April 27, 2013." Read more: http://www.upi.com/News_Photos/Entertainment/Jane-Fonda-hand-footprint-ceremony-in-Los-Angeles/7662/#ixzz2RtQFiDXt

Jane Fonda placed her hand and footprints next to her father’s in the concrete shrine to celebrity outside Hollywood’s Chinese Theatre.

Pictures of him with Michelle-style bangs, quips about Jay-Z and sideswipes at the media and his political foes helped Barack Obama win laughs at this year's White House Correspondents Dinner. The traditional send-up speech saw the President earn some laughter at his own expense but also land some funny blows against the media and the Republican Party. The President opened with a soft joke about his time in office but increasingly moved onto more controversial territory - even joking about 'burning books with Michelle Bachmann'.

"Duck Dynasty" stars Korie Robertson and Willie Robertson just alighted on the swamps of Washington, D.C. ... for an appearance at the White House Corresopndents' Dinner! Just don't tell Tom Brokaw -- as we previously reported, the legendary newsman is boycotting the event after Lindsay Lohan made an appearance last year ... and that was the LAST STRAW.

As much as liberals had their fingers crossed after the Boston Marathon bombings -- please don't let it be a Muslim, please don't let it be a Muslim -- that's who the terrorists were. All that wishing and hoping is based on the very ugly premise that "middle America" is a cesspool of bigotry and hate, a sentiment shared by Muslim terrorists. Their quickest stereotype is that the vast majority of Americans traffic only in stereotypes. The hayseeds outside the elite media and universities don't have the brains to make nuanced distinctions between the Tsarnaev brothers and say, Muslim winners...

America should tax movies and games that glorify guns as one way to fight gun violence, says the Rev. Franklin Graham. “How much violence as a nation are we willing to accept?” Graham asked Wednesday in York. “We tax cigarettes, we can tax violence.” Graham was at Bethelwoods Camp and Conference Center in York for Samaritan’s Purse disaster relief training. The six-day session is to help relief workers improve their response skills. The training is as realistic as possible, Graham said, with people screaming and hollering. “We bring as much distraction as you can get. You literally have guts in...

The Searchers has its critics — but who seriously believes John Wayne had a drop of racist blood?Film critics, a tense and peculiar family (with apologies to the late Max Beerbohm), have spent a half century praising John Ford and John Wayne’s tense and peculiar movie, The Searchers, beyond all-reason. They do this because they believe it gives them a clean shot at calling the Duke a racist, something they enjoy doing, and which appears to be required by a Film Critics Union work rule. For those who haven’t seen the movie or don’t remember it, The Searchers tells the...

Attorney Alan Dershowitz on Monday struck back at Robert Redford and other liberals for their seeming devotion to violent, homegrown activists. Appearing on NewsmaxTV's Steve Malzberg Show, Dershowitz said, "I don’t understand the way some people on the Left glorify American terrorists" (video follows with transcript and commentary):Dershowitz: 'I Don’t Understand the Way Some People on the Left Glorify American Terrorists' STEVE MALZBERG, HOST: Robert Redford before this bombing was on Good Morning America, and he made a movie about the Weather Underground, and he was specifically asked by George Stephanopoulos, “You were followers of them. You kind of rooted...

Today, Shirley Temple will celebrate a very big birthday — her 85th. That's hard to imagine, even for those of us who discovered her movies decades after her fame had peaked. Her name instantly calls to mind a luminously adorable child star with bright blue eyes, ringlet-curled blond hair and charming dimples. Once the biggest celebrity in the world, Temple was the top box office star for the years 1935, 1936, 1937 and 1938 — a beam of sunshine for care-weary Depression-era moviegoers — and a true phenomenon. Today, there's no one quite like her. The closest America has to...

$300,000. That's how much a guy named 'Coomer' makes each month from an oil well he drilled. In his own back yard. So forget about digging for gold or trawling for Alaksan King Crabs, Discovery's newest show chronicles the “high stakes, comical roller coaster ride through the world of wildcat oil drilling.” “’Backyard Oil’ is our first foray into the comedy space, and it’s comedy at its finest. It’s a great sweet spot for us because they are drilling for oil but they happen to be hilarious as well,” the show’s executive producer, French Horwitz, told FOX411’s Pop Tarts column....

Reese Witherspoon said she is "deeply embarrassed" about what she said to police during the arrest of her and her husband during a traffic stop in Atlanta. "Do you know my name?" Witherspoon is quoted as asking the state trooper who stopped the couple. She also said, "You're about to find out who I am" and "You're about to be on national news," according to the arrest report. The Oscar-winning actress released a statement late Sunday apologizing for her behavior to police

Liberals are spinning the growing body of evidence that the two suspects in the Boston Marathon terrorist bombings were likely motivated by radical Islamic beliefs. Case in point: The Incredible Burt Wonderstone star Olivia Wilde, who unleashed a tweet this weekend that tried to distract Americans from that probability. She also shamefully used the terrorist attack as a cudgel against gun control critics. First up--Wilde blames America for creating terrorists using a week-old op-ed about hunger strikes at Guantanamo Bay prison. (TWEET-AT-LINK) Wilde offers no criticism of President Barack Obama, who promised to shut Guantanamo Bay down five years ago...

“Oblivion” is a spectacular science fiction movie... until it isn’t. Writer-director Joseph Kosinski (“Tron: Legacy”) has created a post-apocalyptic world so rich in detail and gorgeous design, that from the get-go it’s easy to assume this film will become a sci-fi classic. But as “Oblivion” crosses the threshold from the unknown to the all-too-obvious, the Tom Cruise alien adventure falls into familiar territory.

Actor and comedian Jay Mohr waded into the gun debate on Twitter after Monday’s deadly terrorist attacks at the Boston Marathon. “What bothers me most about today is that we’re getting used 2 it. ENOUGH. 2nd amendment must go. Violence has 2 stop. Culture MUST change,” the Jerry Maguire actor tweeted Monday night. What bothers me most about today is that we’re getting used 2 it. ENOUGH. 2nd amendment must go. Violence has 2 stop. Culture MUST change. — Jay Mohr (@jaymohr37) April 15, 2013

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Frank Bank, who played Clarence “Lumpy” Rutherford on the classic TV comedy “Leave It to Beaver,” died Saturday of undisclosed causes, People magazine reports. Bank turned 71 on Friday. Bank’s former costar Jerry Mathers, who played the titular scamp Theodore “Beaver” Cleaver, reflected on the reported death of his colleague on his Facebook page Saturday.” “I was so sad to hear today of the passing of my dear friend and business associate Frank Bank,” Mathers wrote. “He was a character and always kept us laughing.” Bank played Rutherford in both the original series, which ran from...

Film permits requested by the porn industry have all but ceased in Los Angeles County as producers decide how to work around much opposed law that requires actors to wear condoms during shoots. Film LA, the non profit organization that processes permits for motion picture, television and commercial production across Los Angeles, has seen applications for permits from the adult film industry plummet to only two so far this year. In previous years, an estimated 500 film permits are requested by the adult film industry annually. "Most production companies have ceased shooting in LA County," said Diane Duke, chief executive...

A few hours ago at the Arclight theater in Hollywood, director Neill Blomkamp showed off a rock-em-sock-em trailer for his new sci-fi epic Elysium, followed by an even more revealing ten-minute clip reel … but if he'd had his druthers, he'd have shown nothing at all. "I try to show as little as I can," he told reporters afterward. "The thing is, if you're a responsible, functioning filmmaker in the 21st century, you can't spend a hundred million dollars and then try to behave as though you're going to keep [the movie] wrapped under a blanket … I realize that...

Okay, I’d suspected just-deceased Roger Ebert – iconic, Chicago Sun Times film-critic/tv personality — skewed left in his politics. It wasn’t until the brash snipings of his last couple years, however, that his overt Liberalism became splenetically clear to me. For quite a while, the garrulous Chicagoan’s weekly film-review program, in all its various iterations, was must-see TV for me. From 1975-1999, he and late cohort Gene Siskel held forth on all things cinematic. Their trademark (and trademarked!) “thumbs up/thumbs down” verdict on specific movies’ artistic/entertainment worthiness became a vital factor in the ticket-buying decisions of multitudes. Moviefone’s Gary Susman...

Keep refreshing…Beginning at 6:55pm, watch the PBS taping of a salute to Memphis Soul live from the White House right here. The actual edited show airs on Aprul 16th. The show will use Justin Timberlake as bait for the contemporary audience. But the real reasons to watch are the Stax Records stars who made it onto the lineup including Mavis Staples, Sam Moore, Booker T. Jones– who will sing, which is rare–William Bell, as well as Cyndi Lauper and Queen Latifah. Al Green was supposed to be on the show, but no one could find him. Or they found him...