TV / Film News

Gits Punk Band Singers Murder

Source: Michael Ricci
July 7, 2008

At Last, Closure for the Gits

In 1993, the punk band's singer was murdered. A documentary looks at the crime's effects on the band and the Seattle music scene, and the decade until her killer was found. In the summer of 1993, everything seemed to be going the Gits' way. Bypassed in the initial wave of interest in Seattle's grunge bands, the punk quartet was close to signing with a major label and had begun recording its second album. But ...

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How Wall-E Met Hello Dolly

Source: Michael Ricci
July 4, 2008

Two songs from the movie musical help Pixar's robot express his romantic feelings.

I'm still blown away by the fact that two songs of mine that are close to 50 years old have been used as the underpinning, -Jerry Herman

In high school, “Wall-E" director Andrew Stanton played the shy Yonkers store clerk Barnaby in the Jerry Herman musical “Hello, Dolly!" Decades later, two of the show's lesser-known songs would play a pivotal part in the critically acclaimed ...

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All You Need is Love Takes On New Meaning

Source: Michael Ricci
July 3, 2008

All You Need Is Love, a 17-hour celebration of American music and its offspring, hits L.A.

Jazzz greats Chalie Bird and Miles Davis are featured in documentary segments playing Hollywoods Egyptian Theater this weekend. And all you thought was about Beatles.

British documentary maker Tony Palmer called his 17-hour TV series exploring the origins of American popular music All You Need Is Love, because John Lennon told him it would make a great title. But in the three decades since ...

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Jazz up Summertime with Turner Classic's Big-Band Movie Marathon

Source: All About Jazz
July 2, 2008

When it rose in popularity between the Jazz Age and the advent of rock 'n' roll, big band music was aided by dovetailing nicely with the movies being made at the time. Turner Classic Movies takes advantage of this for a monthlong, 42-film Wednesday night festival of “Big Bands in the Movies." It begins with the 1937 Busby Berkeley-directed “Hollywood Hotel" (8 p.m.) featuring the work of a young Benny Goodman. It's followed by the 1941 “Las Vegas Nights" (10 ...

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Vocalizing Wall-E to R2-D2.....Too!

Source: Michael Ricci
June 30, 2008

Ben Burtt: The man behind R2-D2 and Wall-E's beeps

AUDIO PUPPETEER: We wanted to have this illusion that the voices for Wall-E and Eve and the other characters are part of their function, (sound designer Ben Burtt says of Pixar's Wall-E.)

Burtt speaks the characters' language. In fact, he's created a galaxy of unusual noises in his 30-year career: the crack of Indy's whip, Chewbacca's yowl, the lightsaber hum. IT'S A RISKY MOVE by anyone's standards. Pixar's delightfully ...

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MTV Urges Fans to Remix Music Videos

Source: PC Magazine
June 27, 2008

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Seeking new ways to entertain audiences, music television network MTV has recently begun allowing fans of new and upcoming shows to discuss and post their own versions of music videos on the Web. This month the network launched “FNMTV", which airs new videos every Friday night and invites viewers to go online to comment on them and upload their reinterpretations at MTV.com. MTV has used a similar strategy in limited ways on past programs such as ...

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Six Concerts from 2007 Rochester International Jazz Festival to Air This Summer on PBS Stations Nationwide

Source: Dalmath Associates Inc.
June 25, 2008

See and hear more exciting scenes and sounds from the Rochester International Jazz Festival on PBS stations around the nation. WXXI Public Broadcasting (wxxi.org) in Rochester, NY will present season two of the Festival capturing the essence of the 2007 nine-day music festival with spectacular performances by some of today's hottest musicians and legendary names in jazz. The entire series will air on PBS HD across the country (including WXXI-HD DT21.1/cable 1011) in July and run through August. Shot in ...

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Artist as the Perennial Subject of Films

Source: Michael Ricci
June 23, 2008

Why can't the muse and real life get along?

“He wants to be normal, he just doesn't know what that means."

The life of the artist has long been romanticized and debunked, portrayed in turn as full of glamour, inner torment, the high life and low fortunes. This year's Los Angeles Film Festival features a number of documentaries that explore la vie bohme from many angles. Among the art-themed selections screening are the films “Finishing Heaven," “The Art of Failure: ...

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