This week, the country announced that it wouldn’t submit a film to the Best International Feature category for the 95th Oscars ceremony. Russia’s own Oscar committee said the decision was a surprise and resigned, but the decision didn’t come out of nowhere. For months, Russia’s presence at major film events has been a contentious subject. In early March, festivals ranging from Cannes to Venice banned Russian delegations from their gatherings; on the 94th Oscars broadcast later that month, the Academy brought out Ukrainian-born Mila Kunis to condemn the war....

Arriving in theaters more than eight years after the mild success of Jon M. Chu’s “G.I. Joe: Retaliation” and requiring exactly zero knowledge of either the previous movies or the Hasbro toys that inspired them, “Snake Eyes” is such a generic “cage-fighting orphan gets recruited into the Yakuza and then tries to earn his way into Japan’s most respected ninja clan” story that the valuable I.P. behind it seems almost irrelevant until the third act....

As arresting as it is disorienting, the imagery in “Son of Monarchs” eclipses its unwieldy script, which crowds its compelling protagonist with too many sub-plots and incidental players. Pared down to its essentials, “Son of Monarchs” is a visually daring hybrid of science and art anchored by a riveting performance by Mexican actor Tenoch Huerta (“Narcos: Mexico”). Gambis tries to do too much in 97 minutes, overstuffing the plot with an American girlfriend and too much time in New York, betraying a mistrust in just how compelling the fundamentals could have been on their own....

“Amy [Pascal] and I and Disney and Sony are talking about — yes, we’re actively beginning to develop where the story heads next, which I only say outright because I don’t want fans to go through any separation trauma like what happened after ‘Far From Home,’” said Feige, referencing the period in 2019 when the pact between Disney and Sony to develop more Spider-Man titles fell through. “That will not be occurring this time....

The first look at Season 4 shows Netflix’s beloved tweens, played by Millie Bobby Brown, Noah Schnapp, Charlie Heaton, Finn Wolfhard, Gaten Matarazzo, and Caleb McLaughlin, struggling to adapt to the growing pains of adolescence, all while surviving supernatural occurrences across the country. The season is split into two parts, with Volume 1 premiering May 27 and Volume 2 premiering July 1. “Stranger Things 4” picks up six months after the Battle of Starcourt, which brought terror and destruction to Hawkins....

The 400 free images mean each film mentioned above has 50 new high-resolution stills to explore. The note to use the images with “common sense” means fans have the green light from Suzuki to share the stills on social media and make artwork out of them, but don’t think about selling them for profit. Suzuki teased that more free images from additional Studio Ghibli movies will become available in the future....

“His reasoning was, ‘Look, Quentin, this is a movie that anybody can watch. But with that torture scene, you’re gonna alienate women; they’re not gonna wanna see this. So you’re literally putting your own movie in a little box. But without that scene, anybody can go and see this movie and everybody will enjoy it,’” Tarantino said. “And [in rejecting Weinstein’s wishes], that’s kind of actually where I became me, because Harvey was used to winning these type of arguments....

Here’s the synopsis: The cast of characters include recently undead Trophy Fantasy (voiced by Maria Bamford); her teenage daughter, Euthanasia “Annie” Fantasy (voiced by Jo Firestone); Annie’s Oedipus-complex-stricken Uncle Pete (voiced by Tim Robinson); and Annie’s “old country” immigrant grandmother Baba (voiced by Bebe Neuwirth). Now, 15 years later, Trophy returns to Tender Endings…as a corpse, for burial. When a bolt of lightning strikes Baba’s homemade embalming fluid and one of Annie’s tears, Trophy comes back from the dead....

But while Malick’s fans wait for that passion project to see the light of day, the director has completed a new project featuring his unique visual style. Malick has directed a new Louis Vuitton commercial that weaves together dreamlike shots of various locations throughout the United States. The official synopsis for the collaboration between Malick and the legendary fashion house reads: “As part of an enduring journey exploring dreamlike landscapes around the globe, Louis Vuitton lands in the USA for the latest chapter of its ongoing campaign....

But that doesn’t mean 2022 doesn’t already have a bevy of fantastic new offerings we’ve been lucky enough to see, review, and champion. These films include a number of our favorite festival picks (from 2020 and 2021) gearing up for theatrical and VOD release in the coming months. IndieWire has curated 15 titles worthy of anticipation and combined them all into a single guide, complete with release dates and review snippets that provide a sneak peek at several movies bound to be a part of the year-end conversation 12 months down the line....

The network hasn’t been without controversy, though. HBO faced questions about its lack of diversity in flagship series, including “Game of Thrones” and “Girls,” throughout the 2010s. And, unshackled from the restrictions of broadcast TV, the various steps the network took to push the limit of what’s allowed on screen garnered a fair share of pearl-clutching headlines; see “The Sopranos” in the ’90s and “Euphoria” just a few years back....

Every afternoon — for as long as anyone on the tiny, fictional Irish isle of Inisherin can remember — two friends have sat together at the only pub in a town for a few pints of Guinness. This shared ritual might be the only thing these men have in common. Pádraic Súilleabháin (Colin Farrell), the younger of the two, is a sweet and simple type who doesn’t ask for much from life, and gives it exactly that in return....

The rise in COVID cases is putting pressure on studios looking to either stay the course or rethink their plans. One major tentpole on the horizon is Warner Bros.’ “The Batman,” from director Matt Reeves and starring Robert Pattinson. Right now, it’s scheduled to open in theaters on March 4 — after already being pushed twice, first from July 2021 to October, and then to March of this year — before streaming on HBO Max 45 days later on April 19....

Charlie Kaufman is what happens when a creative lets their imagination run wild. The Oscar-winning screenwriter, director, and producer’s impressive roster of films include cult hits such as “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” “Being John Malkovich,” and the gorgeous 2015 animated film, “Anomalisa.” Similar to the characters in his most thought-provoking, and sometimes polarizing, films, Kaufman’s art seemingly invites viewers into the layers of his creative subconscious. His most recent release, “I’m Thinking of Ending Things,” premiered on Netflix in 2020....

But with such an embarrassment of riches, it’s important to single out the projects truly get it. We’re finally approaching a point where queer audiences can afford to be choosy, and the mere existence of a queer character is not a compelling enough reason to watch. Similarly, the abundance of queer characters on all types of projects means there are very few solely LGBTQ shows, like “Pose” or “The L Word: Generation Q....

From a pure logistical standpoint, no other series has as full a sense of its world’s mechanics quite like “The Expanse.” Much of that comes from its source material, the books written by James S.A. Corey, the pseudonym of writing team Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck (who also write a good portion of the scripts for the new Season 6). The long-established geopolitical relationships between citizens of Earth, Mars, and the Belt complement the tactile nature of resources and equipment it takes to travel between those locations (and beyond them)....

The odds are slim — and memory is a murky body of water even before you filter it through the stuff of historical trauma — but such a twist of fate is hardly inconceivable. The perpetrators of the Holocaust scattered as far and wide as the diasporas they attempted to destroy, and Lt. Aldo Raine wasn’t able to carve a swastika into all of their foreheads before they went into hiding....

Where to Watch “The Terror”: Hulu (the series originally aired on AMC) The men of Season 1 of “The Terror” are confined to their fates well before they realize it. Without detailing too much about the circumstances that end up befalling the Arctic voyages of the HMS Terror and the HMS Erebus, things only get more terrifying as that reality starts to set in for both them and those watching....

One could argue audiences can’t get enough of Hupp’s twisted tale — or, just as easily, that Jack Donaghy’s lessons in synergy have not been forgotten at the Peacock. Either way, the quantity of stories derived from one woman’s horrific actions necessitate varied takes on her motivation, her mindset, and her history. That Hupp never agreed to sit down with “Dateline” makes room for showrunner Jenny Klein’s adaptation to pull back the curtain on the elusive subject, and the cheeky episode titles — “She’s a Good Friend,” “She’s a Helper,” “She’s a Loving Daughter” — embrace the confounding complexities of this oft-discussed killer....

Major titles announced today include Sarah Polley’s “Women Talking,” Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale,” and Sam Mendes’ “Empire of Light.” They all screen in the high-profile Special Presentations section that also includes the previously announced world premieres of Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans,” Rian Johnson’s “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery,” and Nicholas Stoller’s “Bros,” in addition to several highlights from earlier in the festival calendar. TIFF CEO Cameron Bailey marks his first year as the sole leader of the festival with a refurbished programming team, some new venues, and robust efforts to maximize industry attendance....