Nakoula Basseley Nakoula (also known as Sam Bacile) has been revealed as the creator of the anti-Muslim film that has contributed to violent protests in the Middle East. “Innocence of Muslims”, a low-budget movie filmed this year, has been blamed at least in part for the recent political and social unrest in the already volatile region. Here’s the New York Daily News’ photo of Nakoula Basseley Nakoula (a.k.a. Sam Bacile ) on the set of Innocence of Muslims with actress Anna Gurji … Nakoula, who resides in Cerritos, Calif., is believed to have gotten considerable financial backing for the now-infamous movie from strident anti-Islam organizations. The film triggered violence in Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia, Morocco, Sudan, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Palestinian territories and Libya, where Ambassador Chris Stevens was killed. Federal investigators questioned – but later released – Nakoula, who is on probation for a check-kiting scheme. The 55-year-old was not arrested by authorities. The Egyptian-born filmmaker has since gone into hiding, according to The AP. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton denounced the video as “disgusting and reprehensible” last week but defended the right of American citizens to express their opinions.
Also in Monday morning’s round-up of news briefs, a Fox studio co-head prepares to leave, consolidating leadership at the movie giant. Author Salman Rushdie says a controversial book he published in ’88 would “never be published today.” And remembering film professional/journalist Sandy Mandelberger. Hezbollah Leader Calls for More Protests Against Anti-Muslim Movie Sheik Hassan Nasrallah called for protests to continue Monday as the fall out from the anti-Muslim video Innocence of Muslims appears to be continuing into another week. The news comes after the U.S. State Department called for the removal of non-essential personnel from its embassies and consulates in Tunisia and Sudan,” Deadline reports . Fox Filmed Entertainment Co-Chief Tom Rothman to Exit Studio Co-Chairman Tom Rothman is exiting Fox at the end of the year. Jim Gianopulos will become the sole Chairman/CEO at the studio, which will be consolidated into the freshly dubbed Twentieth Century Fox Film, Deadline reports . The Master Sets Specialty Box Office Record It’s not every weekend that a specialty film can claim a record, but The Master opened with an incredible $145,949 per-theater average, the best limited release ever for a live-action film, topping another record-breaker from earlier this year, Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom , which bowed with with an average of $130,749 at four locations, Deadline reports . Salman Rushdie: ‘ Satanic Versus would not be published today’ The author said he thinks a climate of fear and reprisal exists today that would prevent him from getting his controversial 1988 novel The Satanic Versus from being published today. He said the banning of the book in many countries and the subsequent threats on his life including a fatwa by Iran’s then supreme leader Ayatollah Khomeini, had created a “long-term chilling effect,” BBC reports . RIP Arthur Sandy Mandelberger Mandelberger was a film professional and journalist, most recently Editor in Chief of FilmFestivalToday. He died at 57 on August 29th and is survived by his mother Eta and his partner of 37 years, Richard and sisters Miriam and Fanny. He battled cancer for nine years and asked that any donations be made to the Film Society of Lincoln Center.
Are athletes becoming more comfortable with their sexuality ? Baltimore Ravens linebacker Brendon Ayanbadejo is going “full steam ahead” after his battle with Maryland legislator C. Emmett Burns Jr., who last week wrote a letter calling on the team’s owner to silence Ayanbadejo regarding his public advocacy of gay marriage , only to back down amid a national uproar: As a pro-football player with an international platform, Ayanbadejo has been promoting LGBT equality for several years, working with Equality Maryland. In the wake of the confrontation with Burns, he sees a marked difference in the response to his advocacy from just five years ago, noting how he used to experience jabs from teammates and some fans. “In years past it would be just random people, who would write ignorant things [in response to my advocacy],” he said. “I haven’t had a single negative comment from any of my teammates or anybody around the NFL [after this episode], whereas in the past it was a completely different story. The fans — people all over the country, all over the world — have just invigorated me to fight even harder for marriage equality. I’ve been energized from the outpouring from all over the world. Maybe around 20 people — players, people in the building, whether it be a secretary or a janitor, or even coaches — have come up to me and given me a high-five.” “Whether it was women’s rights or interracial marriage or civil rights, whatever it was, it’s all led to where we are today,” he continued. “And now it’s gay rights. And it’s all the same issue even though they’re all different things. They’re all predicated on equality and treating people fairly. So I just see it from that standpoint. I see it a little bit broader than everybody else, but there’s always been someone that’s been discriminated against. And we’re just trying to tackle one issue at a time. Right now it’s the time for gay rights and it’s time for them to be treated equally and for everybody be treated fairly, in the name of love.” Life occasionally hands people a platform from which to speak, and it’s telling to note how he’s chosen to use the platform he has earned. He decided to stand up for other people, when, let’s face it, he didn’t have to do that. Not one person would have criticized him for staying silent about gay civil rights. But he went there, anyway. With straight football players like him stepping up the way they are, we’re afraid they’re in the process of killing the gay guy’s capacity to be cynical. Source NOH8/Instagram
Hermione who? Emma Watson has cast off her Hogwarts uniform and good girl image to play the broken Sam in Stephen Chbosky’s adaptation of his own novel, The Perks of Being a Wallflower . Last night The Cinema Society, along with Lancome and Nylon, hosted a special screening of the teen flick at the hip Crosby Street Hotel in Soho – just the kind of event the quirky characters in the film would have loved to attend! But their alter egos were there, as Watson was joined by co-stars Logan Lerman and Ezra Miller. Not only are their performances in the film impressive, but also the respect they have for Chbosky’s novel and the intense issues it addresses. Plus, you have just got to hear Miller’s history with The Rocky Horror Picture show! It’s all in the video below – check it out! Follow Movieline on Twitter . Follow Grace on Twitter .
It’s a big week for the filmmaking Paul Andersons. Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master opened in a handful of cinemas in New York and Los Angeles, and Paul W.S. Anderson’s Resident Evil: Retribution in theaters everywhere (in 3D and otherwise). While The Master offers up a immersive, abstract look at an unstable man being courted by the head of a cult-like movement, Resident Evil: Retribution in its own way also departs from the usual narrative confines of moviemaking. It’s the closest thing you’ll find yet to a recreation of a video game sensibility on the big screen — which is in line with the franchise’s source material — and makes for a memorably unsettling if not particularly satisfying viewing experience. Resident Evil: Retribution finds action star (and Anderson spouse) Milla Jovovich returning to play Alice, a former employee turned sworn enemy of the evil Umbrella Corporation. Considering how crazily far and, frankly, nonsensical the story has gotten from its start as the story of a weaponized virus infecting a secret genetic research facility, the film pays surprising attention to the basic premise before skimming over the developments of the more recent installments in an intro sequence. The series’ ability to shuck off its own history is put on display in the initial action scene, which picks up where the last film left off: a slow-motion sequence of explosions and gunfire that runs backwards before lurching forward at full speed to neatly do away with the Arcadia and any other surviving characters on board. Then again, who cares about those guys? The Resident Evil films have clearly become a continuing discombobulated nightmare belonging to Alice and Alice alone. Again and again, she seems to find safety, only to wake up in some new, terrible scenario in which she has to fight for her life. Resident Evil: Retribution takes this idea to its end point by being set in an underwater Umbrella-run base in which different test stages have been built for the company to demonstrate its bioweapons. All-white hallways string together life-size recreations of Times Square, downtown Tokyo, central Moscow and a suburban street. Each houses a scenario in which, at the bidding of the central A.I., swarms of infected humans, ax-wielding mutants or zombie soldiers will be released to attack. Resident Evil: Retribution , in other words, has taken great pains to find a way to have real-life game stages. This sensibility extends to the way the film explains its mission — rendezvous with a rescue team and find a way out — and the way it provides weapons for its characters: armories rise out of the ground, or, in a sequence that demonstrates definite game logic, Alice looks in an abandoned cop car, heads to a nearby bike to take its chain, smashes in the window and adds both her new tool and a gun from the vehicle to her inventory. This is even the case in the way actors from earlier installments in the franchise — Michelle Rodriguez and Oded Fehr — are folded into the film, thanks to Umbrella’s fondness for cloning. A glimpse of multiple versions of Alice in storage also reinforces the idea that if she were to die, she could just respawn and start over. Video games and movies have an uneasy partnership. The first Resident Evil is one of the best of a shaky history of adaptations from console to big screen, but the franchise has skewed toward the sensibility of the former medium rather than the latter in a way that’s unique but tiresome. At its best, Resident Evil: Retribution feels like a series of elaborate cut scenes strung together, but much of the time it’s a reminder of how incredibly unfun it can be to sit around watching someone else play without getting a chance yourself. The film’s extravagant action scenes have not a whiff of consequence to them, and other than Alice, the foremost quality of all of the characters is their disposability. A sequence like the one in which clones of familiar characters are put through an impossible test scenario is genuinely disconcerting in how it shakes up our perceptions of the reality of what’s on screen. But even that becomes a reminder that bringing one of the traditional qualities of a video game protagonist — his or her qualified immortality — to a movie further strips any sense of human investment in the character. Any consistency on screen is entirely stylistic: there are no rules in this universe other than that Alice will battle on, defying gravity and physics and looking fabulous despite the world eternally ending all around her. Follow Alison Willmore on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
Also in Friday morning’s round-up of news briefs, the Tokyo and Rio de Janeiro film festivals unveil details of their opening nighters. Thriller Errors of the Human Body heads to U.S. theaters. And Warner Bros. gives details on the Godzilla reboot. Thriller Errors of the Human Body Heads to U.S. Theaters IFC Midnight took North American rights to the film directed by Eron Sheean, starring Germany’s Karoline Herfurth ( The Reader ). In the film, Canadian geneticist Geoff Burton (Michael Eklund) works on a human regenerative gene with direct ties with a personal tragedy, yet matters prove increasingly difficult: jealous co-workers’ feelings are ruffled, old flames are rekindled and personal demons become consistently harder to suppress in this new and oppressive work environment. After a festival run overseas, the film will have its U.S. premiere at the upcoming Fantastic Fest. Rio de Janeiro Film Festival to Welcome 400 Films Brazilian director Breno Silveira’s Gonzaga – From Father to Son will open the Rio de Janeiro Film Festival September 27th. Jeremy Irons, directors Fernando Trueba, Leos Carax, Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris ( Little Miss Sunshine ), Teresa Villaverde, João Pedro Rodrigues, Roland Joffé, and the artist Marina Abramovic, are among those guests who have already confirmed their attendance at the festival. Tokyo Film Festival to Co-Open with Ridley Scott’s Japan in a Day with Andrew Adamson’s Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away The project is a collection of video submissions overseen by Ridley Scott that were filmed on March 11th, the anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami that devastated an large area of the country. The submissions have been compiled into a single film and apparently convey the message of Japan’s recovery. THR reports that the world premiere of Cirques du Soleil: Worlds Away 3-D will also open the festival. The 25th Tokyo International Film Festival takes place October 20 – 28. Around the ‘net… Christian Slater Joins Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac The film by the Danish director could be his most controversial yet, reportedly featuring genuine sex scenes. Christian Slater will join Charlotte Gainsbourg, Shia LeBeouf and Stellan Skarsgård. “Lars is a complete gentleman. It’s great to be on a set with someone who has such a loyal and talented team,” Slater said. “The majority of his crew are people he has worked with over the past 20 years. They love him and I understand why. It’s lovely as an actor to get opportunities a few times in your career to work on a truly special project with a director and leader who really understands his material and is able to convey what he wants so concisely.” The Guardian reports . A 2nd Filmmaker May Be Behind Incendiary Anti-Muslim Video News reports have identified Cerritos, CA resident Joseph Nassralla Abdelmasih, president of Duarte-based charity Media for Christ and an associate of Nakoula Baseley Nakoula (the individual earlier identified under the persona of Sam Bacile), the first person believed to have been behind the video. Both are Egyptian immigrants and have gone into hiding, Deadline reports . Godzilla Reboot Heads for May, 2014 Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures will bow the reboot of the Godzilla in franchise in 3-D on May 16, 2014. Gareth Edwards ( Monsters ) will direct the pic from a script by David Callaham who wrote The Expendables movies, Deadline reports .
‘Anything that feels guarded, in this particular movie especially, would just be so against the spirit of it,’ Stewart told MTV News of appearing nude in ‘On the Road.’ By Josh Wigler, with reporting by Josh Horowitz Kristen Stewart Photo: MTV News
Emma Watson, Logan Lerman and Ezra Miller will premiere brand-new clip on Tuesday, followed by an interview on MTV.com. By Kara Warner Emma Watson, Logan Lerman and Ezra Miller in “The Perks of Being A Wallflower” Photo: Summit Entertainment
