Lessons learned template

Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy has been around Hollywood a long time. But she’s still learning. Speaking to Vanity Fair’s Anthony Breznican , she admitted that the 2018 Solo film, about the younger years of the swashbuckling space cowboy Han Solo, taught her a lesson: don’t recast a core role. Kennedy took over Lucasfilm in 2012 with a goal to inject new energy into the Star Wars franchise. Solo was one such attempt, with Alden Ehrenreich in the iconic Han Solo role pioneered by Harrison Ford. The film made less at the box office than any other live-action Star Wars movie. “There should be moments along the way when you learn things,” says Kennedy. “Now it does seem so abundantly clear that we can’t do that.” The success of the slate of Star Wars television series may make it easier to break new ground, as new stars and storylines are introduced. “I hesitate to use the word trilogies anymore, because Star Wars is much … [Read more...] about Kathleen Kennedy Reveals The Lesson Learned In Her ‘Star Wars’ Filmmaking Experiences

Even though her life has taken so many tumultuous turns, she always appears as a strong woman who knows what she has to do with her life. Yes, we are speaking about Malaika Arora who is often in the headlines owing to her relationship with Arjun Kapoor. It's been a few years since she divorced Arbaaz Khan and decided to live her life on her own terms without caring much about how the world will look at her. In her recent tete-a-tete with Grazia magazine, Malaika opened up about her childhood and witnessing her parents' separation and what lessons she learnt at a very young age. Malaika said, "I had a wonderful childhood, but it wasn't easy. In fact, in retrospect, the word I would use to describe it is tumultuous. But tough times teach you important lessons too. My parents' separation allowed me to observe my mother through a new and unique lens. I learned a rock-steady work ethic and the value of getting up each morning to do whatever it takes to become … [Read more...] about Malaika Arora Recalls Her Parents’ Separation; ‘Those Early Lessons Are The Cornerstones Of My Life’

ABC will share more on the Williams family with The Wonder Years set to return for Season 2. The network revealed the renewal news on Friday ahead of a busy upfronts week looming. The ABC freshman, which premiered back in September, premiered to a steady 0.6 demo rating and 2.85 million viewers but has since continued to decline steadily in both measures. After 35 days of multi-platform viewing , The Wonder Years premiere rose to a 2.56 demo rating and 8.0 million total viewers. The latest episode nabbed a 0.3 demo rating and 1.80. million total viewers . Inspired by the 1988 series of the same name, The Wonder Years is an original coming-of-age comedy that tells the story of the Williams family during the late 1960s. The series is narrated through the point of view of imaginative 12-year-old Dean, as he navigates growing up in a Black middle-class family in Montgomery, Alabama, and the friendship, laughter, and lessons learned along the way. The Wonder … [Read more...] about ‘The Wonder Years’ Renewed For Season 2 At ABC

In the aftermath of the Jan. 6 insurrection, the FBI told Congress and the American people that the agency had failed to prevent or fully prepare for the worst attack on the U.S. Capitol in more than 200 years in part because it lacked the authority and capabilities to more aggressively monitor social media, where much of the planning for the insurrection took place. As FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress last summer, the FBI had circulated intelligence materials and other resources before Jan. 6, but the agency had limits in what it could and couldn’t gather from social media. “When we have an authorized purpose and proper predication, there are a lot of things that we do at social media and we do do,” Wray said, “but [what] we cannot do on social media is, without proper predication and authorized purpose, just monitor just in case on social media.” Wray added, “Now, if the policies should be changed to reflect that, that might be one of the important lessons … [Read more...] about FBI Documents Expose Bureau‘s Big Jan. 6 ‘Lie‘

Understandably, the terrorist attacks in Paris on the night of November 13, 2015 have been treated with great sensitivity by the French film industry, and the only other film in the Cannes Film Festival ’s lineup this year to touch on those events — Alice Winocour’s Paris Revoir — is a lightly fictionalized drama set in the aftermath of the night 130 people were killed, most of them at a rock concert at the city’s Bataclan nightclub. Though many names have been changed, for obvious security reasons, Cedric Jimenez ’s Novembre is, by contrast, a heavy-artillery just-the-facts-ma’am police procedural detailing the manhunt that followed in the next five days. The Cannes out-of-competition film starts in a quite surprisingly low-key way, following a woman jogging the banks of the Seine as David Bowie’s mournful early 1970s cover “Sorrow” plays. The events of the night play out on screen, and though, quite rightly, we are not shown any of the carnage, we do find out … [Read more...] about Cannes Review: Jean Dujardin In Cedric Jimenez’s ‘Novembre’

EXCLUSIVE : George Miller is distracted. Five minutes into our meeting, he begs forgiveness to take a quick call. And then, on an iPad tilted in his direction, the filmmaker watches as a camera feed from the Australian outback offers him a live view of a pre-shoot for his next feature, Furiosa . His supervising stunt coordinator and second unit director, Guy Norris, whose work with Miller stretches back to 1981’s Mad Max sequel The Road Warrior , is already shooting sequences for the new film. Set 15 years before the events of Mad Max: Fury Road , the film will tell the backstory of Charlize Theron’s enigmatic Furiosa, this time played by Anya Taylor-Joy. “Here I am doing an interview with you halfway across the world, and I’m able to look at this footage being shot far west from where I am and we’re discussing it as we go through the process,” says Miller, marveling at the technology. “It’s amazing, really.” It has been seven years since Fury Road … [Read more...] about Inside George Miller’s 20-Year Quest To Make ‘Three Thousand Years Of Longing’, As ‘Furiosa’ Revs Her Engines – Cannes

It starts with one of them casually saying, “Write what you know” — it may be Mark McKinney, slightly leaning back in his chair and staring at the ceiling, or it might be Bruce McCulloch, who’s wandering around the conference room, checking his phone as it charges and idly munching on a pastry. Whoever said it first, it’s definitely Kevin McDonald who quickly jumps in and, as if on cue, immediately chants, “Write what you know!” He says it again, at which point Dave Foley joins in as well. “Write what you know!” “Write what you know!” McKinney and McCulloch, both grinning, start singing along as well: “Write what you know! Write what you know! Write what you know!” Scott Thompson is too busy laughing to harmonize at first, until he finally composes himself, clears his throat, and then beautifully bellows out, in the most operatic tenor imaginable: “Wriiiiite! Whaaat! Yoooouuuu! Knoooooowwwwwwww !!!” Minutes before, the legendary sketch-comedy quintet the Kids in the Hall had … [Read more...] about The Kids in the Hall Are Back — Older, Slightly Less Angry and Still Incredibly F–king Funny

With civil liberties in America under attack, those willing to fight to obtain them could learn a thing or two from the Patricio Guzmán documentary My Imaginary Countr y ( Mi Pais Imaginario ) about the Chilean protest of 2019. The people of Chile are fighting for the same things folks in the USA are. The only difference is that the Chilean people NEVER took their foot off the necks of their oppressors and successfully achieved their goal. Guzmán shows the duality of war, how it breeds anger and violence but also creativity, ingenuity, hope. He archives varying perspectives and allows the Chilean public to speak for themselves. The protest were non-violent at first, but things escalated when President Pinera called a state of emergency and sent in military troops to disburse people in the street, and in response, protestors destroyed public property. These protests are considered Chile’s worst period of civil unrest since the end of Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship. In … [Read more...] about Cannes Review: Patricio Guzmán’s ‘My Imaginary Country’ Chronicles The Chilean Protest Of 2019

Top Gun : Maverick ’s Cannes Film Festival premiere marks another high point in the movie star career of Tom Cruise . The actor turns 60 on July 3, and unlike most leading men of that age who become quicker to call for the stunt double, Cruise shows little evidence of slowing down after 43 films. If anything, his Mission: Impossible stunts seem to grow more ambitiously dangerous, not to mention the fact that he and director Doug Liman will become the first to actually shoot a space film in space for real—aboard one of Elon Musk’s SpaceX crafts with the cooperation of NASA. So how does Cruise continue to carve such a path? “I’ve gotten to work with a number of actors who’ve had great success and long careers, Tom being at the top of the heap,” says Top Gun: Maverick director Joseph Kosinski. “He approaches every day with the enthusiasm that it’s his first movie, and at the same time puts the effort into it like it’s his last movie. That’s a good attitude … [Read more...] about What Makes Tom Cruise’s Star Shine So Brightly? Directors Share Their Insights – Cannes Disruptors

“Have you ever had mochi ice cream?” Mike Shinoda asks with a grin. “Did you know it was invented in Los Angeles?” The Linkin Park rapper and multi-instrumentalist, 45, continues: “That’s a Japanese American creation. This thing people think of as Japanese, but actually is American. People don’t know that.” For him, the point is about more than just ice cream. The indistinction he’s discussing between Japanese and Japanese American is where the trouble began 80 years ago. Shortly after the Pearl Harbor attack drew the U.S. into World War II in December 1941, Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, leading to Japanese American families along the West Coast being rounded up and sent to prison camps under the belief that they could be operating as wartime spies. Among the tens of thousands of men, women, and children incarcerated for their ethnicity were Shinoda’s father and his family. Not a single Japanese American was ever convicted of treason or espionage … [Read more...] about ‘Racism Wasn’t a Feeling, It Was a Fact’: Mike Shinoda on His Family’s WWII Incarceration