News

Reda Kateb to star as legendary jazz guitarist while Pathé will also launch sales on Marion Cotillard-Guillaume Canet comedy Rock ‘n’ Roll.

Pathé International is set to launch sales on a quartet of new titles in Cannes, led by Guillaume Canet’s mid-life crisis comedy Rock ‘n’ Roll, in which he stars as himself opposite Marion Cotillard as his wife and Django Reinhardt drama Django

“It’s sort of Guillaume Canet and Marion Cotillard playing themselves but not quite. It’s a fantastic concept. It’s sort of based on their real life together but it’s not. It’s very sarcastic, very funny,” says Sauzay of Rock ‘n’ Roll.

Canet stars as Guillaume Canet, a 42-year-old actor who decides to overhaul his life when a beautiful young co-star on a film he is shooting tells him he is no longer ‘rock ‘n’ roll’ or high-up on her list of ‘bangable’ actors.

The actor-director...

Reda Kateb to star as legendary jazz guitarist while Pathe will also continue to sell Marion Cotillard-Guillaume Canet comedy Rock ‘n’ Roll.

Pathé International has boarded sales on Etienne Comar’s upcoming biopic Django Melodies starring French actor Reda Kateb [pictured] as the legendary French jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt.

The feature focuses on Reinhardt’s adventures during World War Two when he tried to flee France to escape persecution by the Nazi because of his Roma ethnicity.

The jazz guitarist – who co-founded the iconic Quintette du Hot Club de France with violinist Stéphane Grappelli in the 1930s - was at the peak of his career when war broke out in 1939, performing regularly in the top clubs of Paris as well as collaborating with Us artists such as Louis Armstrong or Dizzy Gillespie.

It is a directorial debut for Colmar, who is best known as screenwriter on Of Gods And Men and producer on some 20 titles, including...

Rome — Armando Trovajoli, an Italian who composed music for some 300 films and whose lush and playful serenade to Rome is a much-requested romantic standby for tourists, has died at age 95.

The city's mayor, Gianni Alemanno, mourned Trovajoli's passing, saying in a statement that `'the voice of Rome has been extinguished." The Italian news agency Ansa said widow Maria Paola Trovajoli announced the death Saturday, saying her husband had died a few days before in Rome but declining to give the exact date.

Roman by birth, Trovajoli began his musical career as a pianist, playing jazz and dance music. He appeared with many jazz stars, among them Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, Chet Baker, Louis Armstrong, Stephane Grappelli and Django Reinhardt.

In the 1950s, his prolific relationship with the film world took flight. Travojoli composed for many of Italy's hit movies of the next decades, especially comedies.

He wrote the music for...

Pierre Etaix is much on my mind, you could say, since I've just written about 9,000 words on him (to be trimmed down considerably, I assure you) for the forthcoming Criterion Collection box set of his cinematic works. Though his last film for the cinema (as director: he has continued to act in films such as Micmacs and Le Havre), Etaix had a brief burst of activity directing for TV in the 1980s, which included one feature, L'âge de Monsieur est avancé, a filmed play which bursts its bounds and includes the audience and stagehand in the drama. It looks delightful, but as my French is at the level of your average two-year-old (and not even a French two-year-old), I can't really write about it.

But See Rank Le cauchemar de Méliès (The Nightmare of Méliès), produced the next year for a TV compendium tribute to Georges Méliès (also featuring contributions...

I've already gone over the best of 2011, and periodically rounded up rock and pop releases as the year went along, yet there were many more albums that came out last year that I also meant to review but didn't get around to then, for one reason or another. Here are a few of them.

Pink Floyd: Wish You Were Here Experience edition (Capitol)

Last time I did a review roundup, I dissed the Dark Side of the Moon two-cd remaster's second disc. I'm happy to report that this one's a lot more interesting.

Three extended tracks from a 1974 Wembley concert open it. The concert version of "Shine on You Crazy Diamond" predates the studio version and is significantly different from it in both arrangement and improvisation. It's Parts 1-6, so that's a good 20 minutes right off the bat. "Raving and Drooling" and "You've Got to Be Crazy" are very...

Dylan performed 'Blind Willie McTell,' a song used in Scorsese's PBS documentary series 'The Blues.'

By Eric Ditzian

Bob Dylan performs at the 16th Annual Critics' Choice Movie Awards

Photo: Kevin Mazur/ WireImage

Any excuse to hear Bob Dylan play live is a pleasure. The experience is made all the more pleasurable when it's in the service of honoring filmmaker Martin Scorsese.

Such was the case at the Critics' Choice Movie Awards on Thursday (January 12) when Scorsese was selected as the Music + Film honoree. After a scorching montage that touched on not only his feature films but his excellent work in musical documentaries — from the Band's "Last Waltz" to the Rolling Stones' "Shine a Light" — Dylan took the stage to perform "Blind Willie McTell," a tune included in Scorsese's PBS documentary series "The Blues."

The two artists' connection goes back further though, back to the 2005 doc "No Direction Home,...

Dylan performed 'Blind Willie McTell,' a song used in Scorsese's PBS documentary series 'The Blues.'

By Eric Ditzian

Bob Dylan performs at the 16th Annual Critics' Choice Movie Awards

Photo: Kevin Mazur/ WireImage

Any excuse to hear Bob Dylan play live is a pleasure. The experience is made all the more pleasurable when it's in the service of honoring filmmaker Martin Scorsese.

Such was the case at the Critics' Choice Movie Awards on Thursday (January 12) when Scorsese was selected as the Music + Film honoree. After a scorching montage that touched on not only his feature films but his excellent work in musical documentaries — from the Band's "Last Waltz" to the Rolling Stones' "Shine a Light" — Dylan took the stage to perform "Blind Willie McTell," a tune included in Scorsese's PBS documentary series "The Blues."

The two artists' connection goes back further though, back to the 2005 doc "No Direction Home,...

Beryl Davis has died in Los Angeles, aged 87. The British singer, who was perhaps best known for her war-time ballad 'I'll Be Seeing You', passed away on Friday from complications from Alzheimer's disease. Plymouth-born Davis launched her performing career with her band leader father Harry Davis at the age of 3 and later shot to fame after singing on Bob Hope's radio show. She said that she was inspired by Us singers such as Ella Fitzgerald and toured around Europe before the war playing with well-known musicians Stephane Grappelli, Ted Heath and George Shearing. (more)...

Nyff George Harrison in an image from the documentary “George Harrison: Living in the Material World.”

Because Martin Scorsese’s achievements in feature film are so towering, it’s tempting to view his documentaries as side projects–“The Last Waltz” as a palate cleanser between “Taxi Driver” and “Raging Bull.” But the director himself views his non-fiction films as “counterparts” to his features, cinematic siblings that “deal with similar themes.”

In his new documentary, “George Harrison: Living in the Material World...

The rock band Pink Floyd, in the wake of settling a legal tussle with music label Emi, is preparing to release a six-disc version of its classic album “Dark Side of the Moon.” The group is also set to issue enhanced versions of other recordings from its catalog, as well as previously unreleased songs. The new material, which will be on CD, DVD, Blu-ray and various digital formats, will start to hit the market on September 26. One of the recordings...

One of the great jazz pianists and bandleaders, he wrote Lullaby of Birdland

The pianist George Shearing, who has died aged 91 of heart failure, was the first postwar British jazz musician to move permanently to the Us and build a solid career there, effectively clearing the way for a host of other players to follow the same path. This was in 1947, at a time when Shearing and his countrymen, prevented by a Musicians' Union embargo from hearing the best American musicians in person, tended to regard these stars as supermen, wearing out their recordings, yet never imagining that it might be possible to perform alongside them in New York. However, Shearing put such negative thoughts aside and took the decision to emigrate.

His success was speedy and spectacular. By 1949, he had hit on the formula that brought him worldwide fame and colossal record sales, forming his quintet, later a sextet,...

I have to confess my age in writing this particular review, because Johnny Carson was off the air by the time I was watching late night television (or rather, watching and appreciating it). For my generation, the names headlining the late night shows were and, with a little bit of controversy, remain Jay Leno and David Letterman. In my case, I had to familiarize myself with Carson through YouTube clips years after he’d retired. Tonight, the most complete compilation of episode’s from Carson’s 30-year-long career as host, starts 4 years into his career (1965) and spans up to 1990 (4 years short of his final bow) in a 15-disc set featuring some great moments and some of the best guest appearances (with a particular focus on comedians for this set, it would seem). It’s doubtful we’ll ever see a full set, just because the undertaking of committing that much...