It’s Back! The 89th Hollywood Christmas Parade Supporting Marine Toys for Tots

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After cancellation of the 2020 Hollywood Christmas Parade due
to the COVID 19, Hollywood kicks off the 2021 Christmas Holiday.

The 2021 Hollywood Christmas Parade is co-hosted by parade producer, Laura McKenzie, Montel Williams, Dean Cain, Erick Estrada and special co-host Elizabeth Stanton.

The Grand Marshall is The Talk co-host Sheryl Underwood.

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The celebrities helping to ring in the Christmas Season are, Kariamah Westbrook, Rome Flynn, Lou Ferrigno, Kimberlin Brown, Lynnette Romero, Matt Mauser, French Steward, Lieutenant General James B. Laster USMC (Retired)

The marching bands participating this year are, Gevorkian Dance Academy, PAVA Korean Traditional Band KAYPA, Greenwood Marching Woodman and Irish Guard, LA Police Emerald Society Pipes and Drums, Maker Empire, Milton High School Marching Band, Penn High School Marching Band, The Los Angeles Catholic Schools Band, LA Police Emerald Society Pipes and Drums, Mira Costa High Marching Band and Colorguard and Thundersquad Drumline.

The 2021 Hollywood Christmas Parade will be televised on The CW Network and for the international audience on Armed Forces Network.

10th Annual Key West Film Festival Announces Awards

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November 22, 2021, Key West, FL – The 10th Annual Key West Film Festival announced its awards today. The festival showed more than 75 films during the 5-day festival, which ran November 17-21 and celebrated its 10th Anniversary.

The award winners for the 10th annual Key West Film Festival were presented Saturday evening, November 21, with many awardees in attendance.

KWFF 2021 Awards 20 November 2021 Full-5821

The feature film winners were as follows:

Best Documentary - "Bernstein's Wall" directed by Douglas Tirola

Best International film - "The Hand of God" directed by Paolo Sorrentino

Best LGBTQ Film - "Firebird" directed by Peeter Rebane

Best Narrative Film - "Parallel Mothers" directed by Pedro Almodovar

KWFF Annual Critics Award - "Red Rocket" directed by Sean Baker, with a Special Mention for "Jockey" directed by Clint Bentley

KWFF 2021 Awards 20 November 2021 Full-5894

The short film winners were as follows:

Best Florida Short Film: Like the Girls Who Wear Pink, directed by Jennifer Msumba

Best Dramatic Short Film: Feeling Through, directed by Doug Roland

Best Comedy Short: Your Monster, directed by Caroline Lindy

Best Documentary Short: Voice Above Water, directed by Dana Frankoff

Best Animated Short: Mila, directed by Cinzia Angelina

Best World Student Short Film: Bambirak, directed by Zamarin Wahdat

Best Florida Student Short Film: Soundproof, directed by Gabriela Lima

This marks the first year that a non- English language film took home the Best Narrative Feature Award. All feature awards are audience based, except for the KWFF Critics Award, which is voted on by a jury of critics including Carlos Aguilar of the Los Angeles Times, Josh Rothkopf of Entertainment Weekly, David Fear of Rolling Stone, Tomris Laffly of Variety, Shirrel Rhodes of the Key West Citizen, Eric Kohn of Indiewire and Monica Castillo of Colorado NPR.

The 11th Annual Key West Film Festival will take place November 16-20, 2022.

ABOUT THE KEY WEST FILM FESTIVAL

Honoring creativity, diversity, sustainability and beauty, the Key West Film Festival is an annual celebration of film and filmmakers set to take place November 17-21, 2021.

A diverse, entertaining and artistically rigorous selection of films will be represented through a broad array of categories that offer opportunities for filmmakers, both aspiring and established, to commune and exchange ideas while showing their work to audiences in an historic and artistically vibrant tropical paradise.

Films that have been showcased in the last five years of the festival have amassed over SIXTY FIVE Academy Award nominations - five of which were for Best Picture - and 15 Oscar wins, including two for Best Picture (Spotlight and Shape of Water).

For more information, visit our website: https://kwfilmfest.com

Twitter - @keywestfilmfest
Instagram - @keywestfilmfestival
Facebook - Key West Film Festival

#kwff #kwff2021 #tropiccinema

GIANT PICTURES PRESENTS A 3 Arts Entertainment and Reno Productions film SALT IN MY SOUL

Salt In My Soul_Poster

A Feature Documentary Film by Will Battersby
Run time: 96 Minutes (USA- Feature Documentary)

SALT IN MY SOUL will be released theatrically in New York (Cinema Village) and Los Angeles (Laemmle Royal) on January 21 followed by the VOD Release in the US, Canada, and UK & Ireland and key territories worldwide on January 25.

Mallory Smith in Will Battersby's  SALT IN MY SOUL-
Mallory Smith in Will Battersby's SALT IN MY SOUL-

Based on the bestselling posthumously published memoir of the same name, SALT IN MY SOUL is a documentary and classic coming of age story about a young woman figuring out how to live while dying. Mallory Smith was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis at the age of three.

In her twenty five-year battle with the deadly disease, she carved out a life that most of us don’t come close to. Using Mallory’s posthumously published 25,000-page secret diaries, hundreds of hours of newly discovered footage, and audio recordings, the film offers Mallory as the narrator of her own extraordinary chronicle.

Mallory Smith in Will Battersby's SALT IN MY SOUL. Photo: Giant Pictures
Mallory Smith in Will Battersby's SALT IN MY SOUL. Photo: Giant Pictures

Following her realization at age nine that she would die young, Mallory secretly began to record her inner thoughts in her diary while throwing herself at life: friendships in elementary school, lovers and sports teams in high school, the little travel her disease would allow. She attended college and explored the wider world, one that was just beyond her grasp.

She became a devoted environmentalist, seeing a startling and vivid metaphor for her declining health in the destruction of our world. Her father feverishly researched treatment options, desperate that the death sentence be commuted. Her mother obsessively helped her to live, cooking to maintain her weight and create community, raising money for research, and teaching her to prioritize relationships over all else.

Mallory fought. And she wrote; about her fears, her loves, her pain, her depression, her hopes, and gave a voice to the many millions who struggle with invisible or visible illness. In Mallory’s final days, her father uncovered a long-forgotten treatment that is now changing the world of medicine. Heartbreakingly, it came too late to save his daughter.

Mallory was a young woman who lived with illness her whole life, who suffered immeasurably but who always found the will to live happy. Her story is a testament to enduring parental love and determination and the healing power of memoir as medicine, inspiring all of us to live life as fully as possible in the face of the challenges we all face.

SALT IN MY SOUL-Filmmaker Will Battersby
SALT IN MY SOUL-Filmmaker Will Battersby

Will Battersby (Filmmaker) has been producing documentaries and features for 15 years. His first documentary as producer, Trumbo, won the National Board of Review Freedom of Speech award. The film, about blacklisted Hollywood screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, was released by Samuel Goldwyn Films and had its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.

SALT IN MY SOUL is Will’s second documentary as director. The first, The Canal, will be released by Showtime which is currently adapting it into a limited series. Will is producing alongside Patricia Arquette, who will also direct. The Canal is the first feature documentary about the environmental tragedy in the Love Canal neighborhood of Niagara Falls and the extraordinary group of working-class women who fought to save their families.

Will’s narrative feature credits include: SXSW favorite The Spine of Night, a hand-drawn animated fantasy film that RLJE released in October 2021, which stars Richard E. Grant, Lucy Lawless and Patton Oswalt; Stephen King’s A Good Marriage starring Joan Allen; They Remain starring Will Jackson Harper, and The Bleeding House, the first feature from Emmy Award-winning writer/director Philip Gelatt (Love, Death & Robots). Will served as Head of Development on Alex Gibney’s Oscar-nominated documentary Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, and Stephen Soderbergh’s Bubble.

SALT IN MY SOUL-  Diane Shader Smith
SALT IN MY SOUL- Diane Shader Smith

Follow us at @SaltInMySoulDoc on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.


http://www.facebook.com/SaltInMySoulDoc
http://www.instagram.com/SaltInMySoulDoc

ABOUT THE BOOK

SALT IN MY SOUL: An Unfinished Life, by Mallory Smith, is a powerful, intimate, and inspiring portrait of a brave young woman living with chronic illness. Mallory understood that patient voices need to be amplified in order to improve healthcare, that the i ntersection of human behavior and nature is critical to environmental sustainability, and that love and friendship give life meaning. As Mallory’s body deteriorated, she sharpened her mind, crystalized her thinking, and honed her writing skills. In her 2500 pages of private journal entries, she created poetry out of prosaic experiences. Beautifully written, provocative, and peppered with insights, SALT IN MY SOUL reminds us to follow Mallory's mantra and "Live Happy."

For more information about the book SALT IN MY SOUL: An Unfinished Life please go to: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/607965/salt-in-my-soul-by-mallory-smith/

GIANT PICTURES

Giant Pictures is a leading digital distributor that is committed to empowering filmmakers to own their distribution. With offices in New York and Los Angeles, we work directly with rights owners to distribute movies and TV shows to VOD and streaming platforms in North America and worldwide. Our content partners range from first-time filmmakers to award-winning independent producers, as well as notable studios Alamo Drafthouse Films, Abramorama Selects, Participant, Tribeca Enterprises, Utopia Distribution, and XYZ Films. A division of Giant Interactive, the award-winning digital media and technology services company, we distribute across 45+ platforms, including AppleTV, Netflix, Prime Video, The Roku Channel, Pluto TV, Tubi, and Peacock.

Learn more at: www.giant.pictures

 

RETURN OF THE 18 BRONZEMEN

Museum of the Moving Image and Subway Cinema

In association with Taipei Cultural Center in New York, Ministry of Culture, Republic of China (Taiwan)

Subway Cinema Logo

Proudly Present
9th Old School Kung Fu Fest: Joseph Kuo Edition!
December 6-13, 2021

Including eight all-new 2K digital restorations with new English-language subtitles New York, NY (November 15, 2021) - The Old School Kung Fu Fest is back, and this time Museum of the Moving Image and Subway Cinema will co-present eight newly restored films and one fan favorite classic by Kuo on glorious 35mm — four titles available exclusively online, December 6–13, and another five films for in-person big-screen viewing at MoMI, December 10–12.

Whether you know his name or not, when someone says “Old School Kung Fu” the first image that flashes across your brain is probably from a Joseph Kuo movie. Taiwan’s ultimate independent filmmaker, Kuo put his stamp on the Seventies as his own boss, writing, producing, and directing dozens of movies through his production company, Hong Hwa International Films, which he founded in 1973.

Kuo’s credo was simple: “I cannot let down the person who buys my works.” He learned to deliver maximum impact on minimum budgets, taking the latest trends of the day and turning them into hard-hitting spectacles boasting unlimited mayhem. To make his movies rock the hardest on the smallest of budgets he assembled a rotating cast of charismatic action stars that included Wen Chiang-lung (who looks like Bruce Lee after a Cantopop makeover), the musclebound Carter Huang, the puckish Li Yi-Min, the underrated female fighter, Jeanie Chang, the versatile Jack Long and Mark Long. Working with action choreographers like Corey Yuen, one of the Seven Little Fortunes, and Yuen Cheung-yan, brother of Yuen Wo-ping, his flicks feature wall-to-wall fight scenes, and in an attempt to please every single audience member these fight scenes go on, and on, and on, continually changing location and upping the stakes, so that just when you think you’ve seen every possible variation on two guys standing in a field kicking the stuffing out of each other, Kuo takes it to another level.

Full of funky editing tricks that momentarily turn his movies into experimental flicks, Kuo hooks eyeballs with convoluted storytelling structures packed with frenetic flashbacks that force viewers to pay close attention. Everyone is related to everyone else, everyone has a secret identity, there’s almost always a last minute revelation popping up out of nowhere, usually with evil laughter on its lips, and every movie single revolves around revenge. While the first half hour of any Joseph Kuo film takes some patience while he clears his throat and gets down to business, once things kick off it’s a non-stop roller coaster ride that ends in an apocalyptic beatdown that leaves the main characters doling out a galaxy-shattering finishing movie before confronting the futility of vengeance. Delivering martial arts mayhem and a moving moral message in 90 minutes or less, Joseph Kuo gets in, delivers the goods,
makes his point, then gets out, leaving you hungry for more. And in this year’s Old School Kung Fu Fest we’re offering plenty more.

Key Art

Lineup

Five In-Person Screenings!
18 Bronzemen & Return of 18 Bronzemen (1976)
Theatrical World Premiere of the brand new 2K restorations!
Starring: Carter Huang (aka Carter Wong), Polly Shang-kuan, Tien Peng

When Shaolin Temple movies became the next big thing, Kuo delivered these back-to-back movies about the world’s toughest college of kickass. “Overthrow Qing! Restore Ming!” was the rallying cry that echoed throughout the land. The Qing Dynasty were the Manchu invaders who stormed China and deposed the 300 year old Ming Dynasty, whose loyalists promptly went into hiding and led an underground resistance for the next 400 years centered on the cradle of Southern Chinese martial arts, the Shaolin Temple. Kuo tells the same story in both movies, each with essentially the same cast, but one’s from the point-of-view of the good guys, while the other takes the POV of the bad.

18 Bronzemen gives us Carter Huang as the son of heroic Ming rebels, spirited away from a Qing-led massacre of his family and hidden in Shaolin Temple. There he spends 20 years learning Shaolin kung fu before graduating by entering the labyrinth of death where he must face the 18 Bronzemen, who are gold-skinned fighting robots, as well as a series of tests that can drive you mad. But once he graduates he can take his revenge on the evil Qing scum with his Diploma of Death!

Inexplicably released before 18 Bronzemen everywhere except its native Taiwan, the sequel, Return of 18 Bronzemen, takes us to the dark side where Carter Huang plays an evil Qing prince who stages a coup, murders his dad, poisons his brother, and then someone asks him if they should burn Shaolin Temple to the ground because it’s full of rebels. Pausing, Huang stares at a tiny statue of one of the 18 Bronzemen on his desk, the screen does a wipe, and suddenly we’ve traveled back in time for a flashback that will take up the rest of the movie. Here, Huang is a young, fun-loving Qing punch-a-holic who discovers that he can’t beat Shaolin kung fu, so he disguises himself and enrolls in the monastery, determined to pack their 20 year training program into a single year. Taking on a heavy course load, including a trip through the labyrinth of death, and multiple battles with the 18 Bronzemen, he ultimately learns that he can be a Shaolin monk or he can be a Qing prince, but he can’t be both. That’s when we come back to the present and realize that we’ve just watched an entire 90 minute movie about one man making a single decision. It doesn’t get any more ambitious or experimental than that! Kuo’s invention, the 18 Bronzemen, would become so popular they remain a staple of the Shaolin legend to this day.

THE 7 GRANDMASTERS (Courtesy of Mei Ah Entertainment Group Ltd.)
THE 7 GRANDMASTERS (Courtesy of Mei Ah Entertainment Group Ltd.)

7 Grandmasters (1977)
Theatrical World Premiere of the brand new 2K restoration!
Starring: Li Yi-min, Jack Long, Corey Yuen

Three movies dominated Times Square grindhouses in the ‘70s and ‘80s. Mad Monkey Kung Fu from Shaw Brothers’ king of kung fu, Lau Kar-leung, was one. But the other two were both by Joseph Kuo: Mystery of Chess Boxing and 7 Grandmasters. With action choreography by Corey Yuen (one of Jackie Chan’s opera school brothers) and Yuen Cheung-yan (one of action genius Yuen Wo-ping’s real life brothers) 7 Grandmasters is a non-stop series of freaky fight scenes, with martial artists kicking up dirt and dishing out hurt as Master Sang Kuan-chun (Jack Long) receives an anonymous challenge on the eve of his retirement that sends him on a martial arts road trip to prove he’s still the best by taking on every single master of the martial arts he can find. No one dies because these fights are about respect, and tradition, and acknowledging that Master Sang is the better marital artist no matter what anonymous challenge letters written by meanies say, but somewhere along the way Master Sang gets framed…for MURDER! As if that isn’t bad enough, he also acquires a new student, Li Yi-min, who is so irritating that his other students try to beat him to death on a regular basis.

By the time we get to the final, no-holds-barred showdown, Li has become our hero, albeit a conflicted one, as secrets are revealed, hidden uncles spring back to life, we see an earth shattering weapons duel between Jack Long and choreographer Corey Yuen, a totally bananas battle with Monkey Liu, and a psychedelic progression of increasingly insane kung fu stances that sound like someone’s making them up as they go along: Eagle Catches Chicken, Cicada Shedding Its Skin, Buddha Standing on His Hands, the mystical Downstream Current, and our personal favorite, Falling On the Ground. Kuo’s flicks deliver pure, uncut action and the fact that these movies were made so fast and cheap actually makes the sheer athleticism of the performers that much more impressive.

THE OLD MASTER (Courtesy of Mei Ah Entertainment Group Ltd.)

Mystery of Chess Boxing (1979)
Starring: Li Yi-Min, Jack Long, Mark Long (aka Lung Kuan-wu), Jeanie Chang, Simon Yuen

A riff on Jackie Chan’s box office-shattering Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow (1978), this is the movie that provided inspiration for the Wu-Tang Clan, with Ghostface Killah taking his name from its unforgettable bad guy, Ghost Faced Killer (Mark Long). Shot outdoors, like most classic Kuo productions, the action’s on overdrive right out of the gate, and these fights hurt.
Kuo knows how to keep a story cooking, he’s got a knack for framing, and he’s excellent at delivering fun effects with nothing more than some nimble editing and clever camera tricks.

When a young novice who’s the butt of his kung fu school’s jokes gets sent to learn “real kung fu” from a master who keeps making him play chess all day, he complains, “I didn’t come here to learn chess! I wanted to learn kung fu.”

“You’ve been learning,” the master purrs, before barking out a series of chess moves and stances, turning the novice into a living, fighting chess piece, complete with groovy animations.

This kind of “You’re not painting my fence, you’re learning martial arts” schtick was the core of the Shaolin kung fu flick, and later of Jackie Chan’s kung fu comedies, and it would eventually find its fullest expression in the West via The Karate Kid ,
but Kuo delivers it here with an intense, acrobatic style that makes it easy to understand why this movie played for almost 10 years in Times Square, finally tapping out in 1989 paired on a double feature with Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing.

36 Deadly Styles (1979)
Theatrical World Premiere of the brand new 2K restoration!
Starring: Cheung Lik, Jeanie Chang, Hwang Jang-Lee, Jack Long, Bolo Yeung

Few Joseph Kuo movies Kuo quite as hard as 36 Deadly Styles . A nutso opening half-hour that feels all over the place? Check. A complicated structure full of flashbacks? Check. Everyone is in disguise and maybe all related to each other? Check. Revenge-motivated main characters? Check. And, finally, some of the longest, most intense, ground level acrobatic fight scenes ever put on film? Check!!!

A kid on the run from a rival clan determined to wipe his clan from the face of the earth finds safety in a temple where he meets a soy milk salesgirl (Jeanie Chang) and her dad who help him out with the kung fu. He needs all the help he can get as a quartet of the best screen fighters ever assembled come gunning for him, all of them wearing deeply tragic wigs, including Bolo Yeung (the musclebound brute from Enter the Dragon) and Hwang Jang-Lee (the Korean superkicker tapped to be the big bad in both of Jackie Chan’s hit movies, Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow and Drunken Master). It all leads to a final fight in a field where people kick each other in the face until they can’t stand up anymore and their guts explode, their quests for revenge bleeding out on a bleak landscape littered with motionless bodies as haystack fires leave black smudges floating across an uncaring blue sky.

WORLD OF THE DRUNKEN MASTER (Courtesy of Mei Ah Entertainment Group Ltd.)
WORLD OF THE DRUNKEN MASTER (Courtesy of Mei Ah Entertainment Group Ltd.)

Four Virtual Screenings!

Shaolin Kung Fu (1974)
Starring: Wen Chiang-lung, Yi Yuan, Liu Hsiu-yun

After the wu xia (heroic swordsman) resurgence of the late Sixties, Jimmy Wong-yu changed everything with his Shaw Brothers hit, The Chinese Boxer (1970), playing an angry young man fighting his oppressors with kung fu, and that came right before Bruce Lee’s box office-shattering kung fu flicks of ’72 and ’73. Suddenly, everyone wanted pissed-off poor dudes with badass brawler skills bashing open the skulls of The Man and Joseph Kuo delivered. He and flying kick specialist, Wen Chiang-lung, made seven movies together between 1972 and 1974, including this one, which is a remake of their Rikisha Kuri shot the previous year.

Here, Wen plays a rickshaw driver who’s promised his blind wife he won’t fight. Turns out that’s a hard promise to keep when a rival rickshaw company keeps stealing his fares, bullying a kid selling hardboiled eggs, and kidnapping his wife. A series of escalating brawls break out, building to a torture-filled climax and, don’t worry — there’s a (very) brief flashback to Shaolin Temple to justify the title of the film. Turns out there’s no film genre that doesn’t get better when you add a little Kuo.

Shaolin Kids (1975)
Starring: Polly Shang-kuan, Tien Peng, Carter Huang (aka Carter Wong)

In the early Ming Dynasty, the first Emperor Zhu believed his Chancellor, Wu Wei-yung, wanted to take over the throne. In retaliation, he had Wu, his family, and 30,000 of his nearest and dearest murdered. Despite this, history generally remembers Emperor Zhu fondly as a kind and effective leader. Wu, on the other hand, is remembered as a dirty traitor and Shaolin Kids is the largely fictitious tale of the brave heroes and tragic martyrs who worked to bring his treachery to the attention of kindly old Emperor Zhu.

Only World of the Drunken Master boasts the kind of budget Kuo has in Shaolin Kung Fu, and this posh period exercise allows him to return to the world of wu xia swordplay, this time putting a woman in the driver’s seat. Polly Shang-kuan ( 18 Bronzemen, Return of 18 Bronzemen), was discovered by Taiwan’s great cinematic innovator, King Hu, when he cast her in his groundbreaking Dragon Inn, and here she plays the daughter of a court official murdered by Chancellor Wu as the first step in his attempted coup. Shang takes it on herself to round up a bunch of friends to form a ragtag band of freedom fighters and bust skulls in revenge.

The Old Master (1979)
Starring: Master Yu Jim-yuen, Bill Louie

One of the strangest movies ever made, this cult-classic-in-the-making stars Master Yu Jim-yuen, the teacher of Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, Corey Yuen, and a host of others, as a fish-out-of-water martial artist in contemporary Los Angeles. The 74 year old Master Yu finds himself in LA trying to save one of his lazy student’s kung fu schools that the kid has almost lost through his gambling debts, but then he discovers that his student is paying off what he owes by setting Master Yu up in fights and betting on the outcome. Fortunately, he meets American karate champion, Bill Louie, and agrees to teach him kung fu (Louie’s other teacher is a toy robot — yes, you heard that right).

Armed with an earworm synth soundtrack and a complete and total commitment to disco, this flick feels like a bad dream where you just can’t wake up. Along the way, Louie more than demonstrates why he’s a superstar in the ring, we get to witness the birth of chainsaw-fu, there’s a face-melting dance number scored to the disco version of “Popeye the Sailor Man”, and every time a fight breaks out Master Yu turns his back to the camera so he can be doubled by one of his students (rumor has it that his double is the world famous Yuen Biao). You won’t believe the lunacy that’s unfolding before your eyes.

World of the Drunken Master (1979)
Starring: Jack Long, Mark Long (aka Lung Kuan-wu), Li Yi-Min, Jeanie Chang, Simon Yuen (kind of)

Between appearing as Beggar So in Jackie Chan’s 1978 Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow, and dying in January, 1979, Simon Yuen (Yuen Wo-ping’s 66 year old father) played his Beggar So character in no less than 15 movies, and Joseph Kuo made two of them. He first appeared in Kuo’s Mystery of Chess Boxing, although his character disappears halfway through the movie leading some to speculate that he died during its production. Then he appears in some footage shot on a beach at the beginning of this film, which is probably some of the last footage ever filmed of Yuen. And you know what? That’s okay. Because World of the Drunken Master is one of the finest-looking, best-made Kuo movies around, and the entire thing is a touching tribute to Beggar So, the kung fu character that Simon Yuen forever made his own.

In the framing story, an elderly Beggar So meets his frenemy, Northern Jug (Jack Long), at a roadside bar and the two of them flash back to their glory days as kids before they ever learned Drunken Boxing and from there it’s a high velocity hayride of comedy, kung fu, and crazy battles in the middle of fields. Released only 10 months after Simon Yuen’s death and with action choreographed by his son, Yuen Cheung-yan, World of the Drunken Master looks fantastic, probably because it’s shot by Chris Chen, who’d go on to film a lot of Jackie Chan’s early movies ( Young Master, Dragon Lord), but it’s also a highlight in Yuen Cheung-yan’s filmography. The acrobatic action makes your joints ache and its relentless intensity just keep ramping up as the combat gets more and more gravity-defying. A fitting tribute to the master himself, Simon Yuen.

We’re deeply grateful for the support of Taipei Cultural Center in New York, Ministry of Culture, Republic of China (Taiwan).

We would also like to thank Winnie Chan / Mei Ah Entertainment, Professor Edwin Chen, Frank Djeng, Po Fung, Dan Halsted / 36 Cinema, Jacob Milligan / Eureka! Entertainment, and Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute.

Director Joseph Kuo (Courtesy of Courtesy of Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute)
Director Joseph Kuo (Courtesy of Courtesy of Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute)

Schedule

On-line screenings (December 6-13)
SHAOLIN KUNG FU, THE SHAOLIN KIDS, THE WORLD OF DRUNKEN MASTER, and THE OLD MASTER

In-person screenings at Museum of the Moving Image (December 10-12)

Friday, Dec 10
7:00pm- THE 36 DEADLY STYLES

Saturday, Dec 11n
1:00pm- 18 BRONZEMEN
4:00pm- RETURN OF THE 18 BRONZEMEN

Sunday, Dec 12
1:00pm- 7 GRANDMASTERS
4:00pm- MYSTERY OF THE CHESS BOXING

Tickets

For more information please go to: moving image.us
In-theater tickets: $15 / $11 seniors & students / $ 9 youth ages 3–17 / $7 MoMI Online tickets: $6 for individual film / $5 MoMI $20 series pass for all four films / $16 for MoMI

OLD SCHOOL KUNG FU FEST
Launched in 2000, Subway Cinema’s Old School Kung Fu Fest (OSKFF) is an aperiodic celebration of the rarest, wildest, and most incredible martial arts and action cinema from the ‘60s, ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s. Designed for the maximum audience enjoyment and OSKFF “brings back memories of the days when you could see a double feature at an atmospheric Times Square Theater for half-price” (Daily News)

ABOUT MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE
The Museum's mission is to advance the understanding, enjoyment, and appreciation of the art, history, technique, and technology of film, television, and digital media. It fulfills this mission by presenting exhibitions, education programs, and screenings and events on-site at the Museum; online through live conversations with artists, filmmakers, scholars, media educators, and other industry professionals; articles published in MoMI's online film magazine Reverse Shot and science and film resource Sloan Science & Film; and by providing access to the Museum's collection, including through virtual tours and recorded programs. For more information, visit movingimage.us. Follow MoMI on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.

ABOUT SUBWAY CINEMA
Subway Cinema Inc. is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit volunteer-run organization dedicated to the exhibition and appreciation of Asian popular cinema and preservation of America’s Asian film exhibition heritage. Founded in 1999, it has played a key role in nurturing the growth of Asian film culture in the U.S. by championing the works of Johnnie To, Tsui Hark, Park Chan-wook, Bong Joon-ho, Takashi Miike, Kim Jee-woon, Ryoo Seung-wan, Seijin Suzuki, Sion Sono, and other notable directors. It founded and ran the annual New York Asian Film Festival (NYAFF) for 17 consecutive years, establishing it as North America’s leading festival of popular Asian cinema. Subway Cinema’s current events include the Old School Kung Fu Fest (a showcase for the best of classic martial arts and action films) and Hong-Kong-a-Thon! (12-hour marathons of classic Hong Kong action films from the 80s and 90s). www.subwaycinema.com / twitter: @subwaycinema / instagram: @subwaycinema

LABYRINTH OF CINEMA an End of Year and Best of 2021 Consideration

Cresendo House Logo
Labyrinth of Cinema Poster

Director: Nobuhiko Obayashi (House)
Writers: Nobuhiko Obayashi, Tadashi Naito, Kazuya Konaka
Cast: Takuro Atsuki, Takahito Hosoyamada, Yoshihiko Hosoda, Rei Yoshida, Riko Narumi, Hirona Yamazaki, Takako Tokiwa
Genre: Fantasy, Drama, War
Country: Japanese
Language: Japanese with English subtitles
Runtime: 2 hours 59 minutes

Maverick filmmaker Nobuhiko Obayashi's LABYRINTH OF CINEMA continues to expand regionally in the US:

Full list of regional dates: https://crescendo.house/pages/ labyrinth-of-cinema including:
San Francisco- November 4
Seattle- November 5
Dallas- November 7
Portland- November 7
New Orleans- November 19
Cleveland- December 12
Houston- December 31

Labyrinth of Cinema Still

The final film by Nobuhiko Obayashi finds the late director returning to the subject of Japan’s history of warfare following the completion of his “War Trilogy,” which ended with Hanagatami. On the last night of its existence, a small movie theater in Onomichi—the seaside town of Obayashi’s youth where he shot nearly a dozen films—screens an all-night marathon of Japanese war films. When lightning strikes the theater, three young men are transported into the world onscreen where they experience the violent battles of several wars leading up to the bombing of Hiroshima. A breathless cinematic journey through Japan’s past, Labyrinth of Cinema finds Obayashi using every trick in his book to create an awe-inspiring, visually resplendent anti-war epic that urges us to consider cinema as a means to change history. The culmination of an exceptional 60-year career worth celebrating.

Born in Hiroshima in 1938, Nobuhiko Obayashi was a director, screenwriter and editor of films and television advertisements. He began his filmmaking career as a pioneer of Japanese experimental films before transitioning to directing more mainstream media, and his resulting filmography as a director spanned almost 60 years.

He was notable for his distinct surreal filmmaking style, as well as the anti-war themes commonly embedded in his films. He died on 10 April 2020 at the age of 82, from lung cancer in Tokyo.

Filmmaker Nobuhiko Obayashi
Filmmaker Nobuhiko Obayashi

“Forget a swan song: Nobuhiko Obayashi’s final film is a shriek, a tirade, a lecture and a rollicking action-adventure stuffed into a three-hour pop-art package.”

—The New York Times

ABOUT CRESCENDO HOUSE

Crescendo House is a new boutique distribution company that aims to reinvigorate the American film landscape with a new model for distribution. Our goal is to expand the mainstream visibility of international or otherwise underrepresented films in order to provide viewers with an array of choices that more accurately reflects the diverse world we inhabit.

For more information: https://crescendo.house/

VIEW TRAILER BELOW!

Finding Kendrick Johnson Premiering on STARZ

FINDING KENDRICK JOHNSON art poster

Director:  Jason Pollock
Narrator: Jenifer Lewis
Producer: Malcolm D. Lee
Runtime: 1 hour 42 minutes
Rating:  Not Yet Rated
Genre: Documentary

FINDING KENDRICK JOHNSON will be premiering on STARZ in December 2021. Available Now on VOD.

VOD Platforms: https://linktr.ee/findingkendrickjohnson

Finding Kendrick Johnson “Paints a picture with the evident lack of care on behalf of Georgia law enforcement, in addition to discovering a possible FBI coverup happening behind the scenes.” -
Valerie Complex, Deadline

“There are forces actively burying the facts of this case.”
- Alan Ng, Film Threat

“One of the best documentaries you never heard of.”
- Linda Cook, Our Quad Cities

Finding Kendrick Johnson pic 3

On January 11th, 2013, Kendrick Johnson was found dead in his high school gymnasium rolled up in a gym mat. The state of Georgia ruled his death as an accident, having died from positional asphyxia. When the family hired their own Forensic Pathologist, not only did he find KJ’s organs missing from his body during the autopsy, he determined the cause of death to be from non-accidental blunt force trauma. To this day, no one knows where KJ’s organs have gone.. So what really happened to KJ?

Finding Kendrick Johnson pic 1

FINDING KENDRICK JOHNSON is the feature documentary product of a 4-year undercover investigation into the facts of this case. From the creator of 'Stranger Fruit', this new documentary hopes to shed light on one of the most important American stories of our time.

Told through the eyes of KJ's family and close friends, Narrated by Hollywood legend, Jenifer Lewis, Directed by 'Stranger Fruit' creator, Jason Pollock, with an amazing team of Producers including Actor Hill Harper, and Space Jam 2 Director Malcolm D. Lee, FINDING KENDRICK JOHNSON shares this truly historic, heartbreaking, and unbelievable story with the world for the first time.

Finding Kendrick Johnson pic 4

“The case of Kendrick Johnson is one the most important cases in U.S. history,” says writer/director Jason Pollock. “KJ deserves justice, and hopefully our film will help his family get one step closer to that outcome.”

"This is the most important film I've ever worked on,” says actor and activist Jenifer Lewis. “What this family has gone through is unspeakable but we must speak it so the public knows the truth. Jason has done a brilliant job on this vital story of injustice.”

FINDING KENDRICK JOHNSON screened in U.S. theaters in October 2021 and will be premiering on STARZ in December 2021. Available Now on VOD.

VOD Platforms: https://linktr.ee/findingkendrickjohnson

U.S. THEATRICAL PREMIERE OF DENNIS HOPPER’S CONTROVERSIAL MASTERPIECE OUT OF THE BLUE

POSTER - 4K Restoration -OUT OF THE BLUE

Directed by: Dennis Hopper
Starring Linda Manz, Dennis Hopper, Sharon Farrell, Don Gordon, Raymond Burr

TIMED TO 40TH ANNIVERSARY

Opening At New York City's Metrograph starting Wednesday, November 17, 2021.
Presented by Chloë Sevigny & Natasha Lyonne

Official Selection: Cannes Film Festival, Venice Film Festival and SXSW Film Festival.

"Thumbs Up! Bitter, unforgettable. An unsung treasure." -
Roger Ebert
“In many ways, it’s maybe my best film.” -
Dennis Hopper
“If a masterpiece comes along, people ought to see it.”
- Jack Nicholson

OUT OF THE BLUE-Dennis Hopper (Jail Phone) (Photo Credit Discovery Productions)
OUT OF THE BLUE-Dennis Hopper (Jail Phone) (Photo Credit Discovery Productions)

Shocking. Controversial. Unforgettable. - Dennis Hopper’s brilliant punk rock masterpiece of adolescent rebellion is ready for a new, long overdue close-up!

A kind of spiritual sequel (and cautionary counterpoint) to Hopper’s own Easy Rider, OUT OF THE BLUE chronicles the idealism of the sixties decline into the hazy nihilism of the 1980’s.

Don Barnes (Dennis Hopper) is a truck driver in prison for drunkenly smashing his rig into a school bus. Linda Manz (Days of Heaven) plays Cebe, his daughter, a teen rebel obsessed with Elvis and The Sex Pistols. Her mother (Sharon Farrell) waitresses, shoots up drugs and takes refuge in the arms of other men. Cebe runs away to Vancouver’s punk scene and ends up on probation under the care of psychiatrist Raymond Burr. After Don’s release, the family struggles to re-connect before the revelation of dark secrets leads to a harrowing conclusion.

OUT OF THE BLUE- Linda Manz (Photo Credit Discovery Productions)
OUT OF THE BLUE- Linda Manz (Photo Credit Discovery Productions)

ABOUT DENNIS HOPPER: Born in Dodge City, Kansas, May 17,1936: Actor-director Dennis Hopper’s “Out of the Blue” premiered at Cannes in 1980. His directorial debut, “Easy Rider “(1969, Cannes Award “Best First Work,” was a countercultural landmark whose success helped spark the New Hollywood era of seventies filmmaking). His follow-up “The Last Movie” (1971) won the CIDALC Critics Prize Award at the Venice Film Festival. He went on to direct “Out of the Blue,"(1980) - Official Cannes selection; “Colors," (1988) “Backtrack,” (1990) and “The Hot Spot,” (1990). His 200+ acting roles include “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Giant,” “Mad Dog Morgan,” “Apocalypse Now,” “Blue Velvet,” and “Hoosiers” (Academy Award nomination, Best Supporting Actor). Also a renowned photographer and artist, Hopper died in Los Angeles, May 29, 2010.

FILM PRESERVATION

Working from the original 35mm negative restored by Discovery in 2010, John Alan Simon and Elizabeth Karr’s Discovery Productions undertook the digital scan and mastering of Out of the Blue to premiere as an official selection at the Venice Film Festival in 2019, preserving Hopper’s landmark film to make it available to new audiences.The New 4K restoration is being shown for the first time on the big screen theatrically at Metrograph in November, 2021 in New York.

Despite critical acclaim at its original Cannes premiere in 1980, OUT OF THE BLUE went unreleased because it was considered too bleak for U.S. audiences.
John Alan Simon, then a film critic/journalist, rescued the film from the shelf, secured distribution rights and took it on the road with Dennis Hopper back in 1982 to art house theaters across the U.S. including a 17-week record-breaking run at the Coolidge Corner Cinema in Boston and then NYC and Los Angeles theatrical releases.

OUT OF THE BLUE- Dennis Hopper (Whiskey)(Photo Credit Discovery Productions)
OUT OF THE BLUE- Dennis Hopper (Whiskey)(Photo Credit Discovery Productions)

“It’s incredibly important to us that OUT OF THE BLUE be preserved for future generations to experience its emotional impact and as the artistic achievement
that helped re-establish Dennis Hopper as an important American director,” commented Elizabeth Karr on behalf of Discovery Productions.

"For me, this restoration project was pay-back for all I learned from Dennis Hopper when we originally took OUT OF THE BLUE on the road in 1982 after I rescued it from the shelf.

He was an amazing artist and friend and OUT OF THE BLUE remains as unforgettable as he was and serves as an indelible tribute to the talents of Linda Manz,” John Alan Simon from Discovery Productions concluded.

 

SOCIAL MEDIA/ WEB:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OutOfTheBlueDennisHopper/
Twitter: @HopperMovieOOTB https://twitter.com/HopperMovieOOTB
IG: outofthebluefilm https://www.instagram.com/outofthebluefilm/
Web: www.outofthebluedennishopper.com

ABOUT DISCOVERY PRODUCTIONS

John Alan Simon and Elizabeth Karr are the nucleus of Discovery Productions, an indie writing/directing/producing team. Discovery’s development slate includes prestigious literary works from authors Philip K. Dick, Jim Thompson, Lucius Shepard and Ian Watson. The distribution arm of Discovery Productions has released independent films, including RADIO FREE ALBEMUTH, the adaptation of the sci-fi novel by Philip K. Dick, directed and adapted by John Alan Simon and Dennis Hopper’s OUT OF THE BLUE, currently embarking on its 4K digital restoration and 40th Anniversary re-release.

RIVER’S END, About Global Water Crisis Released TODAY on VOD

Giant logo
RIVERS END key art

RIVER'S END, the award-winning, timely new documentary on the global water crisis is released TODAY, November 2.nd, on VOD in the US, UK, Canada and other key territories.

VOD Platforms: Apple TV/iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Vudu (US, Canada, UK)

Cable Platforms: InDemand TVOD (Comcast, Spectrum, Cox), DirectTV/AT&T and more (US)

With the recent expansion of the drought state of emergency in California, this powerful doc has never been more relevant, as it tackles the root causes of water problems, revealing the complex, behind-the-curtain view. RIVER'S END is vital viewing for all of us in areas where water security is threatened (sadly, it’s a growing list worldwide).

CONNECT ON SOCIAL MEDIA:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/riversendfilm/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Riversendfilm
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/riversendfilm
Hashtag: #RiversEnd

GIANT PICTURES

Giant Pictures is a leading digital distributor that is committed to empowering filmmakers to own their distribution. With offices in New York and Los Angeles, we work directly with rights owners to distribute movies and TV shows to VOD and streaming platforms in North America and worldwide. Our content partners range from first-time filmmakers to award-winning independent producers, as well as notable studios Alamo Drafthouse Films, Abramorama Selects, Participant, Tribeca Enterprises, Utopia Distribution, and XYZ Films. A division of Giant Interactive, the award-winning digital media and technology services company, we distribute across 45+ platforms, including AppleTV, Netflix, Prime Video, The Roku Channel, Pluto TV, Tubi, and Peacock.

Learn more at: www.giant.pictures