Those of us who know Bob Dylan’s story well can point to his transformative influence on the folk music scene in Greenwich Village in the early 1960s. What is remarkable is how Dylan shaped his own style from a unique amalgam of folk singers of the time, borrowing what he needed from Woody Guthrie and absorbing the best of the rest from everyone else. That didn’t explain his genius, nor does it explain his subsequent disgust with traditional folksinging – disgust that was manifested in his going electric, infusing his lyrics with rock-n-roll poetry, and refusing to be lumped in with the protest folkies of the time.

While none of that may seem to matter in Joel and Ethan Coen’s melancholy meditation on the time before Dylan changed everything, awareness of the schism that was brewing makes “Inside Llewyn Davis” all the more interesting. The...

Several thousand miles away from the South of France, the Seattle International Film Festival opened this week with Joss Whedon’s version of Shakespeare’s “Much Ado About Nothing.” But on the Croisette, the motto might as well be “Much Ado About Everything.”

The opening night film was Baz Luhrmann’s ultra-extravagant “The Great Gatsby,” about a wealthy pretender who throws ridiculously lavish parties … and it was followed by yep, a ridiculously lavish party.

The Un Certain Regard sidebar, typically the province of small art movies, opened with another Hollywood movie about extravagance, Sofia Coppola’s “The Bling Ring” … and attracted no less than Paris Hilton to its own afterparty.

Headlines talked about how $1.4 million in Chopard jewelry earmarked for the stars was stolen...

A group of entertainment veterans have launched Wentworth Media & Arts, a London-based independent film finance, production and distribution company, led by the former chairman of EMI, Eric Luciano Nicoli, the company announced on Saturday.

According to a news release, the company will both acquire films and seek to produce three to four feature films per year “in various budget ranges.” See Photos: The Scene at Cannes Film Festival 2013

Other company founders include William Lewis, John Stanley and Dean Goldberg.The company said it was backed by "major private equity sources in the UK," but did not further specify.

“WMA will acquire completed films for domestic, international and/or worldwide distribution and also pre-buy rights to well-packaged projects that have or are likely to have meaningful distribution,...

The Weinstein Company unveiled its slate for the year at the Cannes Film Festival on Friday, giving a glimpse of their game plan for Oscar season, which includes an intriguing documentary-style feature about the elusive writer J.D. Salinger, a biopic on Nelson Mandela and a southern vehicle for A-list Actresses, "August: Osage County."

The presentation included a small parade of stars, including Nicole Kidman, Rooney Mara, Michael B. Jordan and a host of other actors and directors joined by co-chairman Harvey Weinstein at the event.  Weinstein joked that he would have invited George Clooney, a coproducer on "August," but he was still sore over losing the Best Picture Oscar...