The United States of America is gearing up for one of the most important events in recent times: 2024 Election Day. While elections are usually a big deal, this year’s are even more so given the current political climate across the world and within the country. Thus, several celebrities have come together to show their support for either of the two presidential candidates: Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.

Former President Donald Trump; Vice President Kamala Harris in the Presidential debate |

Credits: ABC News

While Trump has his share of celebrity endorsers, Harris recently hit it big when the ‘Avengers’ came together to vouch for her. Even Robert Downey Jr., whose good friend Mel Gibson is a staunch Trump supporter, came along to endorse Harris.

Robert Downey Jr. Vouches for Kamala Harris as Mel Gibson Shows Support for Trump Mel Gibson will vote for Donald Trump | Credit: The Professor and the Madman / Vertical

Robert Downey Jr.

Is Juror #2 Clint Eastwood”’s swan song?

“Who knows? He’s been saying that for a long time” exclaimed Eastwood’s longtime producer Tim Moore last night at the world premiere of the Warner Bros movie. Juror #2 was played the Tcl Chinese Theatre in Hollywood as AFI Fest’s closing night film.

Moore continued, “At 94 years old, he’s still making films. I’ve been with him for 23 years. I always said I’d retire before he did and I haven’t retired yet.” Moore credits with Eastwood including the 4x Oscar winner’s highest grossing title, American Sniper ($547.6M) as well as The Mule, J. Edgar and more.

Juror #2 follows Nicholas Hoult as Justin Kemp, a recovering alcoholic-journalist who is awaiting his first child with his wife. He gets called to the jury of a murder trial in Georgia, and soon realizes he might be closer to the victim than originally realized.

Indie releases from limited (Memoir of a Snail) to wide (Conclave) are testing an increasingly lively specialty box office heading into awards season with a handful of decorated documentaries this week including Dahomey, Black Box Diaries, My Name Is Alfred Hitchcock and A New Kind of Wilderness and some notable expansions.

Also hitting theaters this weekend, a new documentary showing the soft side of Donald Trump, The Man You Don’t Know, whose producers are crying foul, saying a number of theaters have bailed on opening weekend.

Expansions: Anora, Neon’s Cannes Palme d’Or-winning film by Sean Baker, expands to 35 screens after posting 2024’s top limited opening of $550,000 on six screens. It heads into week 2 with a $752,400 cume. Utopia’s The Line goes from one screen to 55, and High Tide from Strand Releasing expands from NYC to Los Angeles at the Laemmle’s Royal and NoHo 7.

A24’s We Live In Time...

Filmmakers and distributors of awards-hopefuls have until Nov. 4 to submit their category preference — drama versus musical or comedy — to the Golden Globes organization, which reserves the right to overturn any classification that it finds egregiously inaccurate.

Some of this year’s cases are inarguable — for instance, Netflix’s Emilia Pérez, in which characters spontaneously burst into song, is clearly a musical (if not a comedy), and A24’s The Brutalist, in which an immigrant faces all sorts of harrowing hurdles, is clearly a drama. There are, however, also plenty of close-calls, about which many have made assumptions, but, in most cases, not confirmed.

The Hollywood Reporter has been working the phones and can now report which way almost every contender is breaking. This intel is, of course, subject to change prior to Nov. 4, and to being overturned by the Globes thereafter — but it is current as of this writing.

Joining...

In The Lost Lands, from Paul W S Anderson, is heading to cinemas in 2025, based on the short story by George R R Martin.

The first new film from director Paul W S Anderson since his videogame adaptation Monster Hunter in 2020 is In The Lost Lands.

It’s an adaptation of a George R R Martin story, with the project first announced back in 2021. Milla Jovovich and Dave Bautista signed up to appear at that stage too, and the movie is now in post-production.

It’s flown a bit under the radar, but it’s back in the news (via Deadline) now as the US rights for the movie have just been snapped up. Vertical has acquired the film in the States, and has confirmed a cinema release for it as well. We wait to see who’s acquiring it in the UK.

We do know a little more about the film,...

Exclusive: Young up-and-comers Levi McConaughey and Ava Torres (Match Me If You Can) have landed supporting roles in Way of the Warrior Kid, Apple and Skydance’s youth empowerment tale, based on the novel by Jocko Willink.

The duo’s roles are under wraps. As previously announced, Chris Pratt, Linda Cardellini and Jude Hill lead the cast, with the latter tackling the title role.

Written by Will Staples, with McG aboard to direct, Way of the Warrior Kid follows a self-doubting boy (Hill) who gets bullied and is hard-pressed to complete a single pull-up. That’s until his uncle Jake (Pratt), an elite Navy Seal, is injured on a mission and moves in with his sister (Cardellini) for rehab. When he discovers his 13-year-old nephew, Marc, is struggling academically, socially and physically, Jake takes on a new mission: using his Seal Team training over three months of summer to help...

By far the biggest of the May movie releases, “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” (Disney) is #1 in its initial week on both iTunes and Fandango’s top 10 VOD lists.

This comes 60 days after its theatrical debut, with the longer-than-average window now typical for most Disney titles after aggressive home viewing placement during and right after Covid.

What’s surprising is how easily Jeff Nichols’ “The Bikeriders” (Focus) beat out Sony’s animated “The Garfield Movie” among other new releases. The former just passed the $20 million domestic gross mark over its fourth weekend. “Garfield” is at $91 million, four and a half times bigger, and part of a period where animated titles dominate both on screen and at home.

“The Bikeriders” was #2 most of the week at iTunes and #2 at Fandango for the full-week chart. It’s now #3 at iTunes, behind “Civil War” (A24), surging at a reduced price after significant success at $19.99 earlier.

One would be forgiven for not knowing it, but a new exorcism movie starring Oscar-winner Russell Crowe hit theaters this past weekend. No, we're not talking about last year's "The Pope's Exorcist." Rather, we are talking about a brand new film from Vertical Entertainment simply titled "The Exorcism" that was, more or less, dumped after sitting on the shelf for several years. Unfortunately, the film is a flop in the early going by most metrics. However, it now holds a record for the folks at Vertical, representing the company's biggest opening weekend ever, amazingly enough.

Director Joshua John Miller's "The Exorcism" opened to $2.4 million, coming at number seven on the charts behind John Krasinski's "If" ($2.7 million), a movie in its sixth weekend in theaters that is already on VOD. Not exactly a blockbuster. That said, the number was big enough to overtake 2018's "Gotti" ($1.7 million) to become Vertical's biggest opener.

No one saw this coming. “Inside Out 2” (Disney) fell only 35 percent in its second weekend. Following a great $154 million opening, huge initial weekdays, it’s added an estimated $100 million. That puts it at $355 million in only 10 days.

How big is that? Second only since Covid to “Spider-Man: No Way Home” in 2021, which had December 25 and 26 in the first 10 days of its opening, eventually grossing $470 million in that time. It even edges out “Barbie” ($351 million) and bests the full run of “Oppenheimer.”

This is phenomenal. In many ways, this weekend is even more impressive than the strong debut. With less emphasis on premium screens and of course many lower-price tickets for kids, sales outpace any release since “No Way Home.” Kids also always elevate concessions, which makes the bounty for theaters even greater.

The total weekend gross will be around $152 million, an improvement of $41 million from last year and reducing the year-to-date shortfall to 21 percent.

The Exorcism is heading into cinemas this week, but Joshua John Miller’s horror film was actually shot all the way back in 2019.

It’s a good week to be a fan of Russell Crowe doing exorcisms on the big screen. Joshua John Miller’s The Exorcism, which was previously known as The Georgetown Project, is heading into cinemas this Friday, but it’s been a long time coming.

World Of Reel reports that the film was actually shot in 2019 and has simply been in post-production limbo ever since. It seems that the studio behind the film, Miramax, wasn’t too keen on the film back in 2019, but the pandemic put a stop to reshoots.

Crowe then went on to do The Pope’s Exorcist which enjoyed moderate success, but it was enough to convince Miramax to get everyone back together for reshoots and the film was finally finished in...

Jerry Seinfeld’s highly touted (and largely panned) feature directorial debut, “Unfrosted,” spent four days leading Netflix’s top 10 movie chart before another Netflix original, “Mother of the Bride” starring Brooke Shields, took the slot before the thematically appropriate weekend holiday.

“Unfrosted” led for just four days, with “Shrek” from 2001 leading midweek before the debut of “Bride.” The Dreamworks animated classic is still in second place, while Seinfeld’s Pop-Tarts comedy dropped to fourth.

“Bride” comes from director Mark Waters. Perhaps best known for his “Freaky Friday” remake and the original “Mean Girls,” Waters went on to direct “The Spiderwick Chronicles,” “Vampire Academy,” and “Bad Santa 2.” In the new rom-com, Shields is a mom who realizes the father of her future son-in-law broke her heart decades ago.

“Bride” and “Unfrosted” are the sole Netflix originals on its weekly list of the top 10 domestic movies. Reflecting the start of summer’s school vacations,...

Russell Crowe (The Pope’s Exorcist) is starring in a brand new meta possession horror movie titled The Exorcism, and Vertical has unleashed the official trailer this afternoon.

Vertical has picked up the North American rights to The Exorcism, which they’ll be bringing to theaters on June 7. Shudder is also on board to bring the film home later this year.

Joshua John Miller, who wrote 2015’s The Final Girls and also starred in films including Near Dark and And You Thought Your Parents Were Weird, directed The Exorcism.

Joshua John Miller also wrote the script with M.A. Fortin (The Final Girls). This one is personal for Miller, as his late father was the star of the best possession movie ever made.

Miller said in a statement this week, “The origins of the film stem from my childhood spent watching my father, Jason Miller, playing the doomed Father Karras flinging himself...

A few weeks ago I received a rather intriguing invite. Vvs Films, one of the biggest film distributors in Canada, invited JoBlo.com to participate in a press junket for the new film, The King Tide, which was to be held in Newfoundland. As a proud Canadian, I was excited, as I had never visited the Maritimes before.

Indeed, the studio seemed to be rolling out the red carpet for the assembled press, with us being treated to a wonderful experience in St. John’s, Newfoundland, which included me being “screeched in” (watch it right here) at a local pub (located on St. George Street which has the highest amount of per capita bars per street in the country), which included drinking rum (count me in!), kissing a cod and eating baloney (ewww – gross). We also got to take a trip to scenic Bonavista, close to where the film was shot.

Filmmaker Renny Harlin has spent much of his career playing around in the horror genre, directing Prison, A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master, Deep Blue Sea, The Exorcist: The Beginning, and Devil’s Pass, and he’s making his return to horror in a big way with upcoming movies including Deep Water and Lionsgate’s The Strangers reboot trilogy.

And then there’s Refuge, another brand new Renny Harlin movie that is actually releasing this week! From Vertical, Refuge will be released onto VOD outlets on Friday, April 19.

You can watch the official trailer for Refuge down below. Read on for more…

“In this horror-thriller, a U.S. military veteran — Sergeant Rick Pedroni — returns home changed and dangerous after a tour of duty in Afghanistan where he suffered an attack by a mysterious force. While officials dismiss his behavior as Ptsd, and order trauma therapy, Rick’s wife...

Fluff your powdered wig and fill your snuffbox because a trailer for French filmmaker Maïwenn’s Jeanne Du Barry is here to give you a front-row seat to one of history’s most notorious scandals. The lavish footage depicts Johnny Depp as Louis Xv and Maïwenn Besco as Jeanne Vaubernier, a woman willing to give a gloved middle finger to tradition to rise through society’s ranks. Decadent, scandalous, and filled with more drama than a season of Bridgerton, today’s Jeanne Du Barry trailer highlights Depp’s first significant feature since his public court battle with his ex-wife Amber Heard.

Here’s the official synopsis for Jeanne Du Barry:

“Jeanne du Barry follows Jeanne Vaubernier (Maïwenn), a working-class woman determined to climb the social ladder, using her charms to escape her impoverished life. Her lover, the Comte du Barry (Melvil Poupaud), wishes to present her to King Louis Xv...

Clockwise from left: Anyone But You (Sony Pictures Releasing), Rebel Moon: Part Two – The Scargiver (Netflix), Scoop (Netflix) Image: The A.V. Club

Netflix adds a few high-profile originals and a recent rom-com blockbuster to kick off the first full month of spring. Rebel Moon: Part Two – The Scargiver is the...

IFC Films’ Late Night With The Devil topped the specialty market in its second week, as a Tollywood and a Bollywood film both made the top ten in a rare occurrence. Strong horror and Indian fare have helped buoy the box office since Covid. They continue to fill in the top ten, including this week, which boasts a monstrous hit in Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire — but is a neighborhood with fewer overall wide release due to Hollywood strikes.

Scary first: Late Night With The Devil by Australian duo Colin and Cameron Cairnes stars David Dastmalchian, perfection as a late 1970s talk show host whose quest for ratings on a Halloween night broadcast goes nowhere good, unleashing evil into the nation’s living rooms. It grossed $2.2 million on 1,442 screens in week two, for a cume of $6.2 million. The film is in the top ten again, at no. 7.

A pleased...

Liam Neeson crime thriller In the Land of Saints and Sinners opens on 896 screens this weekend, joined by Sean Penn in Asphalt City — the Godzilla vs. Kong of the specialty market?

Neeson reunites with The Marksman director Robert Lorenz as a newly retired assassin in a remote Irish village who finds himself drawn into a lethal game of cat and mouse with a trio of vengeful terrorists. Ciarán Hinds, Kerry Condon, Colm Meaney and Jack Gleeson also star in Land of Saints and Sinners, which premiered at Venice, and was shot in County Donegal, Ireland. Screenplay by Mark Michael McNally and Terry Loane. Samuel Goldwyn Films’ widest release post-pandemic sits at 80% with critics on Rotten Tomatoes.

Penn stars with Tye Sheridan in Asphalt City, Vertical’s co-release with Roadside Attractions that opens on 297 screens, also with a national footprint. Young paramedic Ollie Cross (Sheridan) is paired with seasoned partner Gene...

James Hawes’ true-life drama One Life starring Anthony Hopkins has broken out at the international box office through FilmNation’s network of buyers, earning $26m and counting weeks before it opens in the US through Bleecker Street on March 15.

‘One Life’: Toronto Review

The biographical drama about Nicholas Winton, the UK stockbroker who saved the lives of 669 children in the former Czechoslovakia from the Nazis, is produced by UK-Australian outfit See-Saw Films. It made its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) in September 2023 and has gone on to open in key markets including the UK and Ireland,...

The LA Art Show announced that award-winning actress Lucy Hale will be the official host of the 2024 LA Art Show Opening Night Premiere Party kicking off the Los Angeles 2024 art season.

Lucy Hale to Host Official LA Art Show Opening Night Premiere Party

Credit/Copyright: Claire Leahy

The event will be held at the Los Angeles Convention Center on Wednesday, February 14th from 6:00pm-10:00pm. The LA Art Show will take place February 15th – 18th. Tickets are currently available for purchase at LAArtShow.com.

Hale, whose credits include Pretty Little Liars, Puppy Love, and Vertical’s hit The Hating Game, can next be seen in Decal’s upcoming romantic drama Which Brings Me To You opposite Nat Wolff and will be released January 19th. Lucy is a longtime supporter of arts & culture and will be a first-time host of the LA Art Show, the city’s largest and longest running art fair,...

Noémie Merlant plays the titular role in the erotic drama based on a script co-written by Diwan and Rebecca Zlotowski.

Naomi Watts and Will Sharpe have rounded out the cast of Audrey Diwan’s English-language feature Emmanuelle that has just wrapped production in Paris. Pathé will release the film in France and France Télévisions has pre-bought the film for local TV broadcast.

Emmanuelle is Diwan’s first English-language feature from Venice Golden Lion-winning Happening director Diwan also features Jamie Campbell Bower, Chacha Huang and Anthony Wong in supporting roles. Shooting started in October and took place in Hong Kong and Paris.

Pierce Brosnan has a very particular set of skills in Vertical’s Fast Charlie trailer, and he’s not afraid to show you how he keeps them sharp. The upcoming thriller from director Phillip Noyce features Brosnan as Charlie Swift, a fixer whose latest victim is missing his head, and it’s up to Charlie to prove the rest of his body belongs to his intended target.

Based on the novel “Gun Monkeys” by Victor Gischler, Fast Charlie has the following synopsis:

Charlie Swift (Pierce Brosnan), aka “Fast Charlie,” is a fixer with a problem: the target he’s whacked is missing his head. And he must prove it’s the intended target to the man who paid for the hit – New Orleans’ most prominent and most ruthless mobster, Beggar Mercado (Gbenga Akinnagbe). Charlie enlists Marcie Kramer (Morena Baccarin), the victim’s ex-wife and a woman with the backbone and skillset Charlie needs.

Exclusive: Ryan Phillippe (American Murderer), Emile Hirsch (Once Upon a Time in Hollywood) and Mena Suvari (American Horror Story) will topline Kalahari, a new action thriller from Vertical, which has wrapped production.

Vertical fully financed the pic and has taken North American rights, with Voltage Pictures locking down rights for all international territories, preparing now to present the film to buyers at Cannes.

In the film written and directed by Mukunda Michael Dewil (Collide), a young couple is forced to flee their Christian missionary post in the Kalahari Desert aboard a rickety plane after an extremist militant group threatens their lives. Piloted by a corrupt smuggler (Hirsch), the plane loses power and crash-lands in the middle of an animal preserve populated by lions, leopards and hyenas. Injured, frightened, and being tracked by the extremists, this ragtag group must fight for their survival from both man and beast where only the strong will survive.

Exclusive: Roadside Attractions and Vertical have nabbed North American rights to the futuristic fable The Pod Generation, starring 4x Emmy nominee Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones) and Academy Award nominee Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years A Slave), which opened this year’s Sundance Film Festival and claimed its Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize. It’s slated for release exclusively in theaters this summer.

The third feature written and directed by Barthes (Cold Souls) is set in the very near-future world where AI is all the rage and technology has trumped nature in nearly every aspect of life. Its protagonists are Rachel (Clarke) and Alvy (Ejiofor), a New York couple who are ready to start a family. As a rising tech company executive, Rachel lands a coveted spot at the Womb Center, which offers couples the opportunity to share pregnancy on a more equal footing by way of mobile, artificial wombs,...

It took a price reduction, but Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans” (Universal/$5.99) is finally getting some significant viewing. With it down to standard VOD cost ($5.99) rather than its initial home viewing cost of $19.99, it is listed on the three charts below for the first time. And it got above #4 anywhere, hitting #1 on iTunes.

The film has been a major box office disappointment, with only $17 million in domestic grosses and $30 million worldwide with virtually all its take already in. That makes its performance as a home revenue asset that much more important.

Its low level of theatrical interest suggested that it might be a challenge to reach viewers willing to pay its initial premium cost. But it is now at a price where its awards attention, strong reviews, and of course Spielberg’s reputation have all boosted it as expected.

“The Fabelmans” is one of three films to take #1 spots. The...

Multiple Oscar-nominated films opened, expanded, or returned this weekend without much box-office impact. Best Picture Oscar nominee “Avatar: The Way of Water” (Disney) took #1 for its seventh weekend (and likely its last; M. Night Shyamalan’s “Knock at the Cabin” should replace it next weekend). It fell a bit off pace over the past two weeks, but it should still supplant fellow Best Picture contender “Top Gun: Maverick” as the biggest 2022 domestic release. James Cameron’s film stands at 620 million domestic, 2.117 billion total worldwide.

Best Animated Feature Nominee “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” (Universal) was #2, but that’s been consistently strong performer. At #3 was the Academy-ignored and critically derided “A Man Called Otto” (Sony). With 6,750,000 million in 3,957 theaters, it is the dominant film for older audiences despite its absence from the race.

Excluding “The Way of Water” and “Puss in Boots,” the other 11 nominated films that played this weekend...