What is Jenny McCarthy thinking? Or should we say, Watts is she thinking?

The Masked Singer returns Wednesday (Fox, 8/7c) after a brief World Series-induced hiatus, and as you’ll see in TVLine’s exclusive sneak peek of the episode, McCarthy thinks she has the Bluebell all figured out. The catch? As usual, she’s way off.

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Are you as into “The Masked Singer” as we are? As much as we love watching the over-the-top performances on “The Masked Singer,” we get even more enjoyment from figuring out the names of the celebrities competing. That is especially true if we can crack the code as to who is hiding inside a costume before the four judges.

Season 12 of “The Masked Singer” is proving to be the most competitive yet. The producers packed the line-up with 17 stars. One of the two women who contended in Week 4 was disguised as Bluebell and she wowed the crowd with her cover of the Pat Benatar tune “We Belong.”

We’ve been reviewing the clues and that performance on October 16 as well as the sneak peek of her cover of the Dua Lipa hit “Dance The Night” on October 23 and have all your “The Masked Singer” spoilers, including the answer to the question,...

On Sunday September 1 2024, Fyi broadcasts Fully Torqued!

Firebird Fury Season 4 Episode 10 Episode Summary

The upcoming episode of “Fully Torqued,” titled “Firebird Fury,” promises an exciting mix of classic car restoration and modern upgrades. In this episode, Steve takes on a significant project involving a fully-gutted 1969 Pontiac Firebird for a client named John Gramola. This iconic muscle car has a lot of potential, and viewers can expect to see the transformation process as Steve dives into the details of the build.

In addition to the Firebird project, the team will also be working on a Chevy C20. They will install a new Holley Efi kit, which is a popular upgrade for improving performance and efficiency. This segment will showcase the team’s expertise in modernizing classic vehicles while maintaining their unique charm.

Another interesting part of the episode features a customer bringing in a Gen 3 1992 Camaro that needs some updates. This...

Jenna Coleman is Detective Ember Manning in the BBC’s newly released trailer for The Jetty.

The series, launching on BBC iPlayer and BBC One on July 15, sees the Doctor Who alum investigating a case that threatens to unravel threads of her past. After a fire tears through a property in a lakeside Lancashire town in England, Manning must work out how it connects to a podcast journalist investigating a missing persons cold case and an illicit relationship between a man in his twenties and two underage girls.

Created and written by Cat Jones and produced by Firebird Pictures for the BBC, the four-part mystery examines sexual morality, age of consent, grooming, identity and memory.

Alongside Coleman stars Archie Renaux (Shadow and Bone, The Greatest Beer Run) as Ember’s sidekick Hitch, with Laura Marcus (Bad Education, The Great Escaper), Bo Bragason (The Radleys, Three Girls), Amelia Bullmore (Gentleman Jack,...

This month’s Hong Kong International Film Festival will showcase over 190 films from 62 countries and regions, including five world premieres, and 64 Asian premieres.

Running 12 days (March 28 – April 8), the festival will open with the Asian premiere of local director Ray Yeung’s “All Shall Be Well,” which won the Teddy Award at the recent Berlin festival.

The closing film is the Asian premiere of “All the Long Nights,” directed by Miyake Sho and starring Matsumura Hokuto and Kamishiraishi Mone, which also premiered in Berlin. Variety’s review of “Nights” called it “gently luminous.”

Chinese-language films selected for the Firebird competition include: “Borrowed Time,” “Brief History of a Family,” “Carefree Days,” Fresh off Markham,” “A Journey in Spring,” “Snow in Midsummer,” “Some Rain Must Fall” and “A Song Sung Blue.”

Foreign films for the Firebird competition’s other section include: “Arcadia,” “Arni,” “Ivo,” “Pepe,” “Sons,” “Sujo,” “The Tenants” and “Who Do I Belong to.

Jenna Coleman had “avoided” playing a detective – until she was approached about playing rookie cop Ember Manning in a scenic lake town in Lancashire in North West England in BBC Studios’ The Jetty from creator and writer Cat Jones and Firebird Pictures.

“What appealed to me was that the character of Ember was completely there on page one,” she tells The Hollywood Reporter. “Also, it’s a crime thriller, but it’s wrapped up in such a human, emotive, and poetic piece. It is crafted so it has all of the great things of a crime thriller – turning the page and having all of the beats. But it’s also such a feminine piece that really explores relationships and provokes. It has all sorts of blurred boundaries and is asking a lot of uncomfortable questions without fully answering them.”

The four-part series, a Firebird Pictures production for the BBC, is...

On a recent visit to Zagreb in Croatia, I was stopped in my tracks by this poster, above, in the Museum of Contemporary Art. It is a design for the First Science Fiction Fair held in 1972 in the museum’s previous incarnation as the Gallery of Contemporary Art. The poster’s artist, Mihajlo Arsovski, had been designing exhibition posters for the Gallery for more than a decade and this poster was awarded the Gold Medal at the International Poster Exhibition in Varese, Italy, in 1973. After finding it, I posted about the design on my Movie Poster of the Day Instagram and asked whether anyone followed my account in Croatia, which led to my meeting up with two Croatian artists/designers Neven Udovičić and Sara Kern Gacesa. Neven told me more about Arsovski, who had died at the age of 83 in 2020, and also about Boris Bućan, whose famous poster for Stravinsky...

“Everything Everywhere All at Once” continues its strong awards season performance by pulling off an impressive sweep at the 14th Annual Dorian Awards. The Dorians are bestowed by Galeca: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics, a group of over 400 critics, journalists, and media icons. A24’s multiverse-jumping family drama scored seven wins, a victory in every category for which it was nominated.

“Everything Everywhere” snatched the coveted Film of the Year title, while creative duo Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert co-won both best director and best screenplay honors. In Galeca’s gender neutral acting races, Michelle Yeoh seized Performance of the Year and Ke Huy Quan edged out two of his costars for Supporting Performance. Though Stephanie Hsu lost the supporting race, the critics group did name her their Rising Star of the Year. The movie also won LGBTQ Film of the Year and Visually Striking Film of the Year.

Taika Waititi and Rhys Darby star in ‘Our Flag Means Death’ (Photograph by Aaron Epstein / HBO Max)

Nominees have been announced for the 34th Annual Glaad Media Awards, recognizing fair, accurate and inclusive representations of LGBTQ people and issues. Netflix topped the list of all outlets by picking up 21 nominations, followed by ABC with 11, HBO Max with 10, and Hulu with nine.

Winners will be announced during the GLAAD Media Awards ceremonies taking place in Los Angeles at the Beverly Hilton on Thursday, March 30, 2023, and in New York City at the Hilton Midtown on Saturday, May 13, 2023.

“With violence, harmful legislation, false rhetoric, and other attacks on the LGBTQ community continuing to escalate, it’s more crucial than ever that our community remains visible and included in the stories that the world sees in film, television, music, journalism, and other forms of media,” said GLAAD President & CEO Sarah Kate Ellis. “This...

Nominations have been revealed for the 34th annual GLAAD Media Awards, the annual honours presented by the LGBTQ media advocacy organization.

As Deadline reported, the nominations were announced by “RuPaul’s Drag Race” stars Salina EsTitties and Sasha Colby via a ‘GLAAD Drag Story Time’ video that just debuted on GLAAD’s YouTube.

In the video, Colby commented on recent attacks on drag performers. “Performers like us are being threatened with anti-lgbtq bills, nasty protests, and even violence,” Colby declared. “You know what’s scary? People with guns, not queens with books!”

Read More: 2022 GLAAD Media Awards: The Complete Winners List

“With violence, harmful legislation, false rhetoric and other attacks on the LGBTQ community continuing to escalate, it’s more crucial than ever that our community remains visible and included in the stories that the world sees in film, television, music, journalism, and other forms of media,” said GLAAD President & CEO...

GLAAD, the world’s largest lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) media advocacy organization, has today announced the nominations for its 34th Annual GLAAD Media Awards.

With 2022 being a standout year for fair, accurate, and inclusive representations of LGBTQ people and issues, this year’s nominees not only include historic projects like “Bros,” “Fire Island,” and “A League of Their Own,” but also films currently in the Oscars conversation like “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and “TÁR.” In fact, for the first time ever, the Outstanding Film — Wide Release category includes 10 nominees.

Other changes made include a splitting of the Outstanding Reality Program category, nominating both reality competition series and non-competition series independently. The Outstanding Kids & Family Programming category was also split to nominate animated and live action programs independently.

For the non-competitive Special Recognition Awards given to media projects that do not fit into one of the existing GLAAD Media Awards categories,...

Nominees have been announced for this year’s GLAAD Media Awards, which honor media for fair, accurate and inclusive representations of LGBTQ people and issues.

RuPaul’s Drag Race stars Salina EsTitties and Sasha Colby announced the nominees in a “GLAAD Drag Story Time” video that debuted on GLAAD’s YouTube channel (watch at bottom). The 34th Annual GLAAD Media Awards ceremonies will take place in Los Angeles on March 30, and in New York City on May 13.

More from TVLineGLAAD Media Awards: Yellowjackets, Chucky, Doom Patrol, Harlem and Hacks Among First-Time TV NomineesGLAAD Media Awards 2021: Star Trek: Discovery, I May...

GLAAD has announced the nominees for its 34th annual GLAAD Media Awards, with Variety earning two nods for outstanding print article (Angelique Jackson’s piece on Aunjanue Ellis) and magazine overall coverage.

Other nominees include “A League of Their Own,” “Abbott Elementary,” “Anything’s Possible” and “Bros.” GLAAD is the largest LGBTQ media advocacy group, and its awards recognize media portrayals that are accurate, inclusive and fair. GLAAD also selects nominees for their boldness and originality, impact and overall quality. This year’s media awards are presented by Gilead Sciences, Inc. and Ketel One Family Made Vodka.

“RuPaul’s Drag Race” stars Salina EsTitties and Sasha Colby revealed the nominees of select categories on YouTube Wednesday morning in a video entitled “GLAAD Drag Story Time.”

In the clip, Colby mentioned recent violence against drag performers. “Performers like us are being threatened with anti-lgbtq bills, nasty protests, and even violence. You know what’s scary?...

“Bros,” Fire Island,” “The White Lotus” and “Only Murders in the Building” are among the nominees for GLAAD’s 34th Annual Media Awards, the organization announced Wednesday.

“Everything Everywhere All at Once,” “Tár,” Strange World,” “Fire Island,” “Crush,” “My Policeman,” “Do Revenge,” and “The Fallout,” among others, will be considered for the Outstanding Film categories, while “Abbott Elementary,” “A League of their Own,” “The White Lotus,” “Only Murders in the Building,” “Hacks,” “Gossip Girl” and “What We Do in the Shadows” are a few of the many shows recognized in the TV categories.

“RuPaul’s Drag Race” stars Salina EsTitties and Sasha Colby, who are currently competing on the show’s 15th season, announced the nominees in a story time video responding recent attacks on drag performers across the country.

Also Read:

Maren Morris Apologizes for Country Music’s Relationship With LGBTQ+ Community on ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’

Reality programs “RuPaul’s Drag Race...

GLAAD is gearing up to give out some trophies.

The organization has revealed nominations for the 34th annual GLAAD Media Awards, a roster that features high-profile awards season contenders like Tár, A Man Called Otto, Everything Everywhere All at Once and The Inspection; acclaimed series like The White Lotus, Abbott Elementary, Hacks, Harley Quinn, Only Murders in the Building and What We Do in the Shadows; and buzzy music stars Kim Petras, Omar Apollo, Orville Peck, Steve Lacy, Dove Cameron and Anitta.

The awards, created to “honor media for fair, accurate and inclusive representations of LGBTQ people and issues,” will be doled out during a pair of ceremonies, first in Los Angeles at the Beverly Hilton on March 30 and later in New York City at Hilton Midtown on May 13. The awards are presented by Gilead Sciences, Inc. and Ketel One Family Made Vodka.

New this year: the outstanding reality program...

GLAAD, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) media advocacy organization, today announced the nominees for the 34th Annual GLAAD Media Awards.

Current RuPaul’s Drag Race stars Salina EsTitties and Sasha Colby announced nominees in select GLAAD Media Awards categories in a ‘GLAAD Drag Story Time’ video that just debuted on GLAAD’s YouTube.

In the video, Sasha Colby commented on recent attacks on drag performers across the country: “Performers like us are being threatened with anti-lgbtq bills, nasty protests, and even violence. You know what’s scary? People with guns, not queens with books!” In 2022, GLAAD found over 140 incidents of anti-lgbtq protests and threats targeting drag events, including events run by the organization Drag Story Hour.

The 34th Annual GLAAD Media Awards nominees were published, released, or broadcast between January 1 and December 31, 2022. The GLAAD Media Awards ceremonies, which fund GLAAD’s work to accelerate LGBTQ acceptance, will be...

UKTV’s network Drama has entered the original production game.

The channel’s first original scripted series will be Outrageous, a six-part show from BBC Studios-owned Firebird Pictures, written by Sarah Williams.

The series will look at the famous British socialite sisters the Mitfords, whose antics in the 1930s made their family one of the most well known in the UK, and what drove them in various directions and to very different end points. Several infamously support fascism and the Nazis, though two became staunch opponents of the ideology. Two became well known authors.

Cast and crew will be announced over the coming months, with production kicking off next summer.

According to UK, Outrageous will “bring the full, uncensored story of the Mitford sisters to the screen for the first time – a story of family betrayals, public scandal, political extremism, personal heartache and even imprisonment.

Cast your mind back to 1997. Britpop’s bubble had yet to burst, the Spice Girls were the biggest band on the planet, and Aqua’s “Barbie Girl” was inescapable. Then out of nowhere came “Torn” by Natalie Imbruglia, a pop-rock banger so perfect it broke airplay records in the UK and Australia. Trying to sing along, badly, to its slide guitar solo was practically a rite of passage.

“Torn” catapulted 22-year-old Imbruglia to global fame, making her the latest Neighbours alum to pull off the tricky transition from soap to pop. But Imbruglia‘s sound and attitude, harnessed enthrallingly on her debut album Left of the Middle, was much more unexpected than her Ramsay Street predecessors. Her pure, expressive and slightly plaintive voice sounded tremendous on the album’s grungey but catchy pop songs, which were underpinned by Garbage-style guitar loops. Whether Imbruglia was exploring sexual jealousy on “Wishing I...

BBC Studios has taken full control of Firebird Pictures, the British drama indie behind Prime Video’s Wilderness and BBC One’s Wahala.

The BBC’s commercial arm already had a stake in the company, which former BBC execs Elizabeth Kilgarriff and Craig Holleworth run together.

Firebird now sits in a stable of BBC Studios indies that include Gentleman Jack firm Lookout Point, Steve Coogan’s Baby Cow Productions, Sherwood maker House Productions, The End of the F*cking World indie Clerkenwell Films and Killing Eve‘s Sid Gentle Films. The BBC also has minority stakes in the likes of Various Artists Limited, Expectation, Curve and Mothership Productions and is backing YouTuber Joe Suggs’ new venture Final Straw Productions.

Firebird launched in 2019 with minority support from the BBC after Kilgarriff and Holleworth left their respective roles as BBC Senior Commissioning Editor and BBC Drama/BBC Films Head of Business. Recent greenlit are Wilderness,...

Prime Video has no shortage of shows or movies arriving in September. The biggest new show on the block for Amazon Studios is “Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” which is a prequel based on the work of J.R.R. Tolkien that’s set thousands of years before the events of “The Hobbit” and “Lord of the Rings.” Several new 2022 films will be available on the streamer as well: including Channing Tatum’s “Dog,” Michael Bay’s “Ambulance,” Zac Efron’s “Firestarter,” Dylan O’Brien’s “The Outfit,” and more.

Noteworthy library titles arriving this month include “Fight Club” (1999), “Legally Blonde” (2001) and “The Silence of the Lambs” (1991).

Here’s everything new on Amazon Prime Video and Freevee in September.

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With its list of new releases for September 2022, Prime Video is finally unveiling the most anticipated (and expensive) series in the streamer’s history.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power will arrive to Prime Video’s servers on Sept. 2, 2022. This Lord of the Rings prequel, set in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Second Age, is in many ways the kind of TV property that Prime Video must have always wanted. It’s certainly the TV property most fitting with the company’s largesse and riches. The Rings of Power will cover the creation of the titular rings and many important events from Tolkien’s lore (condensed into a more TV-appropriate timeframe).

Middle-earth is going to be the happening spot on Amazon and the streaming world at large this month, but Prime Video does have a handful of other originals for the fantasy-phobic. Flight/Risk, a documentary about the Boeing 737 Max design disasters,...

Future Frames is a next generation showcase comprised of short works by students and recent graduates of European film schools, curated by the Karlovy Vary Fest in cooperation with European Film Promotion. The selected directors and their films will be introduced on-site to Karlovy Vary audiences. American indie director Tim Sutton (whose new film “Taurus” screens in the festival program) will mentor the group and teach a masterclass.

Angelika Abramovitch

“Catcave Hysteria”

Stockholm University of the Arts

Sweden

Before entering film school, Abramovitch directed music videos, commercials and art films in London. “Catcave Hysteria,” her graduation work, is an audacious drama set over the course of one night in a nightclub’s ladies’ toilet.

Alica Bednáriková

“Liquid Bread”

Academy of Performing Arts Bratislava

Slovak Republic

A poet and short story writer as well as a director, Bednáriková’s humorous but bittersweet, multi-layered and perfectly modulated story of a dysfunctional family...

Abacus Media Rights Parent Amcomri Entertaiment Buys Flame Media Program Assets For 2.4M

Amcomri Entertainment has paid C3M (2.4M) for the assets of UK-Australian factual TV distributor Flame Media’s assets. The library comprises around 2,200 hours and more than 500 titles. Flame will be integrated into Amcomri’s TV sales arm Abacus Media Rights, with its staff reporting to Abacus Managing Director Jonathan Ford. The deal comes 15 months after Flam founder John Caldon passed away. Flame’s key titles include Outback Truckers and Outback Opal Hunters from Prospero Productions, The Moors Murders from Map TV, and Life in Colour with David Attenborough from Humble Bee Films and SeaLight Pictures. Upcoming titles including New Zealand from a Train from Making Movies and Ningaloo with novelist Tim Winton from Artemis Productions. “We have the utmost admiration for the high-quality business and senior management team that Mr. Caldon assembled over the previous 12 years,...

Click here to read the full article.

Joseph David-Jones, who stars as lead Jharrel Mateo in CW’s 4400 series reboot, has signed with APA.

The 4400 sci-fi series originally ran on USA from 2004 to 2007 and, as with the original, the new series explores what happens when 4,400 people who went missing over the past 60 years return all at once.

David-Jones’s TV credits include playing Connor Hawke on CW’s Arrow, co-starring as Clayton Carter on CMT’s Nashville, and guest-starring on Amazon’s Hysteria, Intelligence on CBS, and Fox’s America’s Most Wanted: America Fights Back.

On the film side, David-Jones co-starred in Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit, the 1967 Detroit riots docudrama that focuses on a specific incident of police violence against a group of black men at a hotel, appeared opposite Shailene Woodley in The Divergent Series: Allegiant, and Roman J. Israel, Esq., where he starred alongside Denzel Washington.

David-Jones is...

Having paid my 8.50 to see Top Gun: Maverick last weekend, my local cineplex inadvertently improved my appreciation of the film. For three minutes the sound clicked off and, minus dialogue, I was instantly caught up in the soaring jets, hyper-caffeinated cast and the durable charisma of its star. Then sound returned, the story unfolded and reality set in: This is not really a plot but a superbly crafted business plan, half video game and half military recruitment film. It’s the perfect structure for a Tom Cruise genre-bashing blockbuster.

Historians may ultimately cite the movie as a turning point — the film that reignited audiences, young and old, to pay homage to their movie palaces. FiIm critics may also single out the Top Gun sequel as a defiant reinvention of the classic war genre.

Does it measure up to the classics? Sure it does, but only Cruise would set out to...

Peeter Rebane’s film is the story of a clandestine love affair between a Soviet Air Force pilot and a young Estonian officer.

Peeter Rebane’s romantic drama Firebird, starring Tom Prior and Ukrainian actor Oleg Dagarodnii, has sold to Arti Film (Benelux), Enorama Films (Greece), Lucky Dogs (Scandinavia), Optimale Distribution (France), Rialto Distribution (Australia/New Zealand) and Salzgeber & Co with releases scheduled between May and September this year.

The story is the clandestine love affair between a Soviet Air Force pilot and a young Estonian officer in Soviet-occupied Estonia in the 1970s. The film has touched a raw nerve in some countries,...

by Nathaniel R

Writer/Director Peeter Rebane (left) and his narrative feature debut "Firebird"

Sometimes timelessness is a curse. We don't neccessarily want period pieces about forbidden oppressed gay romances to feel especially resonate in the now. Neverthless that's what's happened with Firebird. Peeter Rebane's narrative debut, which recently opened in select cities, tells the true story of a gay soldier and his clandestine romance with a fighter pilot in a Russian airforce base in Estonia during the Cold War. The film has been in the works for ten years but in the interim Russian culture has become more virulently anti-gay (stoked by homophobic 'strong-man' Putin) and aggressive about it; please see the tremendous documentary Welcome to Chechnya if you haven't. At the moment Russia is also waging war on Ukraine which adds yet more unexpected charge to the film since one of the two leads playing Russian military men,...

Photo: ‘Firebird’ Overview Somewhere on a military base in Soviet-occupied Estonia, a young man captures a photograph of a beautiful woman conversing with a pilot, only his lens is not tracking the lipstick or pinned back curls. “To be or not to be, that is the question” – Shakespeare asks of life or death. “Is it better to speak or to die” – asks André Aciman in ‘Call Me By Your Name’. Truly, is it not the same question? And if not, then does a common answer make it two of a kind? For Serghei, a question posed by his friend yields the answer to both. “Do you have time to develop some photographs?” – to speak it is. ‘Firebird’ - Dreaming a Fantasy A private of an Estonian military base, Serghei (portrayed by Tom Prior) has a love for photography and theater. All he reasonably expects is going back to the farm...

Vortex — which opened this weekend to a full house at NYC’s IFC Center — has an unusual star, Dario Argento. Here’s how the film’s helmer Gaspar Noe convinced the iconic Italian horror movie director into his first lead acting role.

“There were three reasons” he said yes, Noe told Deadline. “The first one, he said, because you are my friend and I like your movies.” [Noe has known Argento for 30 years and is friendly with his daughter, Asia Argento.] “The second and the third, because I told him that I would not given him any lines to learn. That he could improvise his dialogue. He could invent his character all by himself. I said, ‘I’ll just handle the camera and the editing. So you’ll direct your part, and I’ll direct my part.’” In fact, the screenplay he showed Argento was only ten pages long.

Vortex follows an elderly couple in crisis. Argento plays an author and movie...

Tom Prior and Oleg Zagorodnii, in the romantic thriller Firebird. Courtesy of Roadside Attractions.

Set in Cold War-era Estonia, then occupied by the Soviet Union, a two young men, a soldier and a pilot, fall in love, a dangerous relationship forbidden by homophobic law, in the English-language romantic thriller/drama Firebird. Appropriately, this moving film is debuting in St. Louis just as Cinema St. Louis’ QFest, its celebration of gay-themed film, kicks off on Friday, April 29.

Sergey (Tom Prior), Luisa (Diana Pozharskaya) and Volodja (Jake Thomas Henderson) are an inseparable trio, in military service at the Soviet Air Force base in Estonia, and as the film opens, the three friends have sneaked off to swim on the rocky coast. When a Soviet security patrol catches them, Volodja’s family connections keep them out of trouble but the tension of living in 1977 Soviet-occupied Estonia is made clear. Also made clear in the scene,...

Chicago – With the subject of Russia at the top of the news, the roots of their oppressive attitudes are revealed in the new film “Firebird,” opening this Friday April 29th. The fascinating based-on-truth story is set in the Cold War era Soviet Union, and was co-written – with director Peeter Rebane – by Tom Prior, who also portrays Sergey, one of the lead roles in the film.

Rating: 4.0/5.0

Sergey is a private in the Soviet Air Force in the 1970s, working in a flight group that is anchored by pilot and senior officer Roman (Oleg Zagorodnii), while at the same time becoming a confidant and friend to a woman officer named Luisa (Diana Pozharskaya). When Roman and Sergey begin an illegal (in the Soviet Union at the time) love affair, the opportunity for blackmail and expulsion floats to the surface. To divert attention, Roman begins an affair with Luisa, and this love...

“Firebird,” the first narrative feature by director Peeter Rebane, is clearly a labor of love. It is based on a 1996 memoir by the Russian actor Sergey Fetisov called “A Tale About Roman,” which details a forbidden love affair he had with a handsome fighter pilot on a Soviet air base in Estonia in the 1970s.

Rebane co-wrote the script with Tom Prior, an English actor (“Kingsman: The Secret Service”) who stars as Sergey in the film, and it took them many years to get “Firebird” made and released. Whether all this effort was worthwhile is open to question.

The first half of “Firebird,” set on the base, takes its time to let us see the slow-building attraction between Prior’s Sergey and Roman (Oleg Zagorodnii). Sergey likes to take photographs, and when he first sees Roman, he can’t help but let his camera linger over this man’s eyelashes,...

Not that we needed a reminder, but Russia’s recent human rights violations — while flagrant — are sadly not a new phenomenon. David France’s “Welcome to Chechnya” documented the horrific genocide being waged against LGBTQ people in what is now a Russian Republic, a terrifying sign of what could lay in store for LGBTQ Ukrainians. Taking an altogether different tack, the stately period drama “Firebird” tells the true story of an ill-fated military romance between two men in Soviet-occupied Estonia during the late 1970s and early ’80s.

Based on a memoir by Sergey Fetisov, the steamy Cold War drama The film’s tragic throughline won’t break any molds, but with smoldering performances by its two strapping young leads, the target audience is unlikely to care.

Despite the heat of its title, “Firebird” begins in the water as three lithe bodies splash playfully in a dark sea. The horseplay is...

At a crucial point in “Firebird,” two perfectly chiseled servicemen steal away from the Soviet Air Force base where they’re stationed for a skinny dip in the Baltic Sea. Behind craggy rocks and away from prying eyes, they kiss, before one gives the other a charged underwater handjob; as they jointly climax, director Peeter Rebane cuts to an image of two fighter jets blazing overhead, the lovers’ clenched moans drowned in a roaring sonic boom. Subtlety is in short supply in “Firebird,” a swooning gay romance that firmly supplants “Top Gun” as the queerest film ever set in the air force; it may even top Tony Scott’s closeted kitschfest for most phallic military imagery per frame.

But if such isolated moments of hot-and-bothered vulgarity suggest a winking exercise in heightened horniness, “Firebird’s” story of forbidden love in an oppressive authoritarian regime is otherwise played, for want of a better word,...

“Firebird,” the debut feature from Peeter Rebane, is a clockwork romance about the secret love affair between Private Sergey Serebrennikov (Tom Prior) and his superior, Lieutenant Roman Matvejev (Oleg Zagorodnii), in the cutting cold of a Soviet-Estonian Air Force base. Teeming with all the usual corny plot twists and bromidic constructs, “Firebird” feels routine, straight from the assembly line, or whipped up in Romance Movies 101.

Continue reading ‘Firebird’ Review: Peeter Rebane’s Gay Cold War Romance Feels All Too Routine at The Playlist.

No new titles in the top five.

RankFilm (distributor)Three-day gross (Apr 22-24)Total gross to date Week 1. Sonic The Hedgehog 2 (Paramount) £1.64m £20.2m 4 2. Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore (Warner Bros) £1.59m £16.5m 3 3. The Lost City (Paramount) £1.4m £5.6m 2 4. Operation Mincemeat (Warner Bros) £758,285 £2.6m 2 5. The Bad Guys (Universal) £737,853 £9.4m 4

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.27

Paramount’s Sonic The Hedgehog 2 has retaken the UK-Ireland box office lead from Warner Bros’ Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, on a weekend when no new titles managed to break into the top five.

Sonic The Hedgehog 2 added £1.64m on its...

After almost a year in festival rounds, the searing, heartfelt film “Firebird” is now here. From director Peeter Rebane and based on the book The Story of Roman by Sergey Fetisov, the film tells the story of Sergey (Tom Prior who also co-wrote the script with Rebane), a troubled young private who falls in

The post Tom Prior Talks Love, Homophobia, and LGBTQ Film “Firebird” appeared first on Manny the Movie Guy.

Festival titles ‘Happening’ and ‘Playground’ are also new this week.

It is a fairly quiet week for openers at the UK-Ireland box office, with Lionsgate’s The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent the widest release, opening at 563 locations, and the chief contender for making a dent in the top five.

The action comedy sees Nicolas Cage – who is also a producer on the feature – play a fictionalised version of himself, with the actor teaming up with the CIA stop a Cage superfan who may also be the dangerous head of a cartel. Tom Gormican directs, and has co-written the screenplay with Kevin Etten.

“The Lost City” and “Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore” led the U.K. and Ireland box office over the four-day Easter holiday weekend.

Paramount’s “The Lost City,” with a star-studded cast including Sandra Bullock, Channing Tatum, Daniel Radcliffe and Brad Pitt, debuted with £2.7 million (3.5 million) atop the box office, according to numbers released by Comscore. Warner Bros.’ “Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore” was close behind with £2.6 million and has a total of £12.6 million after its second weekend.

In third position, Paramount’s “Sonic the Hedgehog 2” collected £2.04 million for a total of £16.3 million after three weekends.

Universal’s “The Northman,” directed by Robert Eggers and starring Alexander Skarsgård, Nicole Kidman, Anya Taylor-Joy and Ethan Hawke debuted in fourth position with £897,737.

Rounding off the top five was another debutant, Warner Bros.’ WWII drama “Operation Mincemeat,” starring Colin Firth, Matthew Macfadyen and Kelly Macdonald with £895,008.

There were two Indian debuts in the top 10 – “Beast,...

True story of lovers thwarted by the repressive Soviet military in the 1970s has sadly not lost any of its relevance

Made last year but suddenly obliquely relevant after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, this Estonian-British co-production examines some of the ways a repressive and homophobic state apparatus scars citizens with shame. Based on a true story according to the opening credits, the setting is the late 1970s when the Soviet Union still occupied the Baltic nations. Provincial Russian youth Sergey Serebrennikov is doing his national service at an army base in Estonia. He has a coy flirtation going with local beauty Luisa (Diana Pozharskaya), a secretary on the base for a commanding officer, and he is pally with his bunk mate Volodja (Jake Henderson). However, when Sergey is assigned to serve as a sort of valet to suave ace fighter pilot Roman Matvajev (Ukrainian actor Oleg Zagorodnii), the attraction...

"I see what goes on under my nose." Roadside Attractions has debuted a second official US trailer for an Estonian Cold War love triangle romantic thriller titled Firebird. It's now opening in April this spring after being delayed from release last fall. The film is made in Estonia but it's shot in English. At the height of the Cold War, a troubled soldier enters a forbidden love triangle with a fighter pilot and his female comrade amid the dangerous surroundings of a Soviet Air Force Base. Firebird shares the true story of forbidden love on a military base. This film is a journey of following love at all costs, of growing up, and of courage even in the most impossible of situations. It's inspired by the true story of Sergey Fetisov. The film stars Tom Prior as Sergey, along with Oleg Zagorodnii, Diana Pozharskaya, Jake Thomas Henderson, Margus Prangel, Ester Kuntu,...

Exclusive: Roadside Attractions has acquired North American rights to Peeter Rebane’s theatrical feature directorial debut, Firebird, with plans to release it exclusively in theaters on April 29.

Based on a true story that unfolded during the Cold War, Firebird is a love story set against the backdrop of a Soviet Air Force base in Estonia during late 1970s Communist rule. Sergey (Tom Prior), a soulful, young soldier who dreams of becoming an actor in Moscow, is counting the days until his military service ends. His life turns upside down when he locks eyes with Roman (Oleg Zagorodnii), an enigmatic ace fighter pilot newly assigned to his base.

Driven by their undeniable attraction, Sergey and Roman navigate the precarious line between love and friendship at a time when Soviet men in uniform caught having a sexual affair were met with the severest punishment. As their friendship grows into love, the men...

Exclusive: Pro basketball player Jarnell Stokes is partnering with veteran animation exec and producer Jay Fukuto to co-write and produce Wings to Fly, an animated feature based on his sports-themed children’s book of the same name.

The book published by Creation Nation Animation in April of 2020 is a redemption tale about a brilliant, but self-centered rising basketball star who is prematurely killed, only to discover his higher spiritual purpose helping a young girl. At a crossroad between a virtuous life and a path to crime, Louisa meets her guardian angel, Jerrold, who teaches her the game of life through basketball, learning that success comes with perseverance.

The book co-written by Stokes and Howard Flamm and illustrated by Eunsoo Jeong was also recently picked up for publication by Mascot Books. Dea Shandera-Hunter will exec produce, with pro-athlete career company Unique Sports Management on board...

If an awards ceremony happens and nobody attends, did it really ever happen at all? And if it does, will anyone care?

That’s what the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) is about to find out after hosting the 79th Annual Golden Globes ceremony on Sunday, January 9, in a private ceremony held at the Beverly Hilton. A far cry from the glitzy, televised ceremonies of old, HFPA opted to not live-stream the event, instead choosing to announce this year’s film and TV winners to the public via their website and social media accounts.

As far as specifics regarding the TV accolades, suffice it to say that if you watched the 2021 Emmy Awards and are familiar with TV at all, you’ll be wholly unsurprised by half of the night’s victors. And then history was made. (We’ll get to that later.)

The organization’s choice to leave the limelight wasn’t exactly self-imposed,...

[Warning: The following story contains spoilers about the Dec. 12 episode of “Succession,” “All the Bells Say.” Read at your own risk.]

Gerri Kellman has had a tumultuous third season on HBO’s “Succession.” J. Smith-Cameron’s character has faced professional highs and lows, from being named interim CEO of Waystar Royco at the beginning of the season to being exposed in a potential sexual harassment scandal in the penultimate episode, plus her betrayal of Kieran Culkin‘s Roman Roy in the season finale. Smith-Cameron has always been a fan favorite character – Gerri’s unexpected flirtation with Roman totally engrossed viewers last season – so with more weighty material, could Smith-Cameron earn a surprise Screen Actors Guild Award nomination next month?

According to our current combined odds, J. Smith-Cameron ranks in our top 10 for a nomination in Drama Actress in seventh place. She will need to outpace at least past SAG winner Julianna Margulies (“The Morning Show”) to land in the top five,...

Spoiler Alert: This post contains major spoilers for the Season 3 finale of “Succession” (“All the Bells Say”).

The moment Logan Roy (Brian Cox) realizes his children are attempting to overthrow him, he sizes them up and snarls with disdain. “You bust in here, guns in hand,” he says, “and now you find they’ve turned to sausages.” It’s a devastating blow made more devastating by the fact that Logan has, once again, somehow found his own gun where there should have been a black hole. But the line also recalls an earlier, equally brutal “Succession” scene that proves especially crucial in “All the Bells Say,” which sees the Roy kids bested by the two men they never thought had it in them.

In Season 2’s “Hunting,” written by creator Jesse Armstrong and Tony Roche, and directed by Andrij Parekh, an especially paranoid Logan goes on a tear during a work retreat.

The Side by Side LGBT Film Festival, which takes place annually in St Petersburg, Russia, has had its website taken down by authorities in a move that the organizers say was provoked by an orchestrated campaign of complaints from ultra-right-wing groups.

The event is taking place entirely online this year due to the pandemic. Its online cinema theater remains up because it is hosted by a third party, but the fest’s main website and subdomains, including the program, are inaccessible at present.

Established in 2008 by Manny de Guerre, Side by Side is a key LGBT event in Russia. It has been targeted by hate groups before, including during last year’s physical edition when the event was disrupted by a homophobic campaign.

This year’s event opened with a screening of Firebird, Peeter Rebane’s English-language feature that debuted at the BFI Flare Festival in the UK earlier this year.

"You know what happens to men like you?" An official US trailer has debuted for an Estonian Cold War love triangle romantic thriller titled Firebird, which is a slick name for a film like this. At the height of the Cold War, a troubled soldier forms a forbidden love triangle with a fighter pilot and his female comrade amid the dangerous surroundings of a Soviet Air Force Base. Firebird shares the true story of forbidden love, set on a military base at the height of the Cold War. This film is a journey of following love at all costs, of growing up, and of courage even in the most impossible of situations. It's inspired by the true story of Sergey Fetisov. The film stars Tom Prior as Sergey, along with Oleg Zagorodnii, Diana Pozharskaya, Jake Thomas Henderson, Margus Prangel, Ester Kuntu, and Nicholas Woodeson. It premiered at the 2021 BFI Flare...

The Dream Factory has debuted a new trailer for the love story ‘Firebird.’

Set in the Soviet Air Force during the Cold War. Sergey, a troubled young private, is counting the days till his military service ends. His life is turned upside down when daring fighter pilot Roman arrives at the base. Driven by curiosity, Sergey and Roman navigate the precarious line between love and friendship as a dangerous love triangle forms between them and Luisa, the secretary to the base Commander.

Sergey is forced to face his past as Roman’s career is endangered and Luisa struggles to keep her family together. As the walls close in, they risk their freedom and their lives in the face of an escalating Kgb investigation and the fear of the all-seeing Soviet regime.

Directed by Peeter Rebane, the film stars Tom Prior, Oleg Zagordnii, and Diana Pozharskaya.

Also in trailers – “We’re not ready for this…...

Variety Director to Watch Prano Bailey-Bond (“Censor”) and BAFTA-nominated “After Love” filmmaker Aleem Khan are among the 39 filmmakers longlisted in the British Independent Film Awards (BIFA) new talent categories.

The 39 longlisted filmmakers will be invited to join BIFA’s Springboard scheme, a tailored program of professional development, peer-to-peer support, mentoring, networking and skills enhancement aimed to nurture emerging talent as they build on the success of their first features.

The final five nominations in each category will be announced on Nov. 3. Winners will be revealed at the ceremony on Dec. 5.

The longlists:

The Douglas Hickox Award

(Best Debut Director)

Aleem Khan – “After Love”

Matt Chambers – “The Bike Thief”

Prano Bailey-Bond – “Censor”

Jonathan Butterell – “Everybody’s Talking About Jamie”

Sonita Gale – “Hostile”

Jack Clough – “People Just Do Nothing: Big In Japan”

Reggie Yates – “Pirates”

Celeste Bell “Poly Styrene: I Am A Cliché” [also Directed By Paul Sng]

Corinna Faith – “The Power”

Charlotte Colbert – “She Will...