WHY DID HOLLYWOOD GET A TAX BREAK? L.A. COLUMNIST ASKS

“The extension of a federal tax break for movies and TV shows shooting in the U.S. typifies the giveaway mentality that still pervades Congress,” writes Mark Lacter, the business editor of LAObserved.com. Lacter notes that the tax incentives, which went on the books in 2004, were designed to discourage “runaway production” but that there is […]

MIXED RECEPTION FOR GHOST ON BROADWAY

Another Hollywood movie has been recreated on Broadway as a musical, producing widely disparate reviews from critics. Charles Isherwood of the New York Times calls the music that was added to the movie’s plot “rudimentary” and “bland.” He does have a few words of praise for the “nifty special effects” but remarks, “These high-tech flourishes […]

GERMAN STUDY SHOWS HOLLYWOOD INFLUENCES TEENAGE DRINKING

A German study of teenagers in six European countries has concluded that drinking scenes in Hollywood blockbusters significantly influence a large number of them to engage in binge drinking. The study, headed by Reiner Hanewinkel of the Institute for Therapy and Health Research in Kiel and published in Pediatrics magazine, concluded that 14 percent of […]

KODAK GETS GO-AHEAD TO END NAMING DEAL WITH HLYD. THEATER

The Eastman Kodak Company, which has been married to Hollywood virtually from the dawn of motion pictures themselves, is severing one of its final ties, by removing its name from the building that has been the site of the annual Oscar awards telecast for the last ten years. The company received permission from a New […]

HOLLYWOOD SNEAKS INTO CHINA

Hollywood studios, which for years have been stymied in their efforts to find a market for their movies and television shows in China, may have found a back-door entryway: the Internet. Vincent Tao, CEO of the video website China PPLive, told today’s (Monday) edition of the English-language Shanghai Daily, “We want to introduce a lot […]

MORE TV PRODUCERS LURED AWAY BY TAX INCENTIVES

Even as production of television pilots booms, thanks to more original programming being produced for cable TV, the percentage being produced in Hollywood continues to dwindle, according to a new report by FilmL.A., the group that coordinates the issuance of film permits for location shooting in the area. The report indicates that while 169 pilots […]

CONSERVATIVE COMMENTATOR PRAISES 2010’S MOVIES

CNSNews.com, a unit of the conservative Media Research Center that is generally a harsh critic of Hollywood’s output, has published an end-of-the-year commentary by Ben Shapiro, the young conservative columnist and radio talk-show host, that concludes, “Surprisingly, it’s been a good year for movies.” He notes that the best films of the year “tended to […]

THE WASHINGTON POST EDITORIALLY BLASTS FAIR GAME

One month after it was released, Summit Entertainment’s Fair Game has become fair game for the Washington Post. Generally regarded by conservatives as a bully pulpit of the left, the Post editorially accused the filmmakers of engaging in “Hollywood myth-making.” It went on: “Hollywood has a habit of making movies about historical events without regard […]

HOLLYWOOD AND BOLLYWOOD COME TOGETHER

In a pact aimed at strengthening the ties between Hollywood and Bollywood, the world’s two leading motion picture production centers, the Motion Picture Association of America and representatives of the Indian film industry have agreed to work together to develop co-productions and battle piracy. At a ceremony at Paramount studios on Wednesday local officials and […]

FACETIME CREATOR CRITICIZES FACEBOOK MOVIE

Mark Zuckerberg has claimed that The Social Network presents a gross distortion of what actually occurred at the time of Facebook’s origins. Speaking to Stanford University’s Y Combinator startup school on October 16 — and reported Wednesday in the Hollywood Reporter — Zuckerberg said that the writers gave the story a Hollywood spin. “Kind of […]

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