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Meghan Markle is making her voice heard.

The Suits star has worked as United Nations ambassador, visited Rwanda with World Vision Canada, visited India on a trip to support women and girls living in slum communities and most recently wrote a powerful essay on combating the stigma surrounding menstruation for Time.

This month, in Vanity Fair U.K., she’s being honored for her philanthropic work in a feature that highlights several other big names who straddle the line between the Hollywood world and the humanitarian one, such as Cher and Emma Watson.

In her own photograph, Markle poses with Mary Robinson,...

The director of Viceroy’s House argues that her film about India’s partition of 1947, far from ignoring the freedom struggle, celebrates it

Bhutto on Viceroy’s House: ‘I watched this servile pantomime and wept’

Fatima Bhutto, in reviewing my film Viceroy’s House, has every right to express her opinion about it. Everyone sees history through their own lens; some only see what they want to see. My film is my vision of the events leading up to India’s partition. It is not the first and it will not be the last interpretation, and I am delighted that it is provoking such heated public debate.

What saddens me is that a film about reconciliation should be so wilfully misrepresented as anti-Muslim or anti-Pakistan.

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©Apple Corps Ltd

Apple Corps Ltd., White Horse Pictures and Imagine Entertainment have announced they will produce a new authorized documentary for Apple, based on the first part of The Beatles’ career — the touring years.

The film will be directed by Academy Award-winning director Ron Howard and will be produced with the full cooperation of Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono Lennon and Olivia Harrison. White Horse’s Grammy Award-winning Nigel Sinclair, Scott Pascucci and Academy Award winner and multiple nominee Brian Grazer of Imagine Entertainment will produce with Howard. Imagine’s Michael Rosenberg and White Horse’s Guy East will serve as executive producers.

Howard said, “I am excited and honored to be working with Apple and the White Horse team on this astounding story of these four young men who stormed the world in 1964. Their impact on popular culture and the human experience cannot be exaggerated.”

This film...

Apple Corps Ltd., White Horse Pictures and Imagine Entertainment have announced they will produce a new authorized Documentary for Apple, based on the first part of The Beatles ' career - the touring years. The film will be directed by Academy Award-winning director Ron Howard and will be produced with the full cooperation of Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono Lennon and Olivia Harrison. White Horse's Grammy Award-winning Nigel Sinclair, Scott Pascucci and Academy Award winner and multiple nominee Brian Grazer of Imagine Entertainment will produce with Ron Howard. Imagine's Michael Rosenberg and White Horse's Guy East will serve as executive producers.

Ron Howard said,

"I am excited and honored to be working with Apple and the White Horse team on this astounding story of these four young men who stormed the world in 1964. Their impact on popular culture and the human experience cannot be exaggerated."

This film will focus...

Documentary will focus on The Beatles’ touring years from their early days in Liverpool and Hamburg to their last public concert in 1966.

Ron Howard is to direct an official documentary about The Beatles’ years on tour in the early 1960s, produced with the cooperation of band members Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr alongside Yoko Ono and Olivia Harrison, widows of John Lennon and George Harrison.

Howard, director of Apollo 13, Rush and the upcoming Heart Of The Sea, said: “I am excited and honoured to be working with Apple and the White Horse team on this astounding story of these four young men who stormed the world in 1964. Their impact on popular culture and the human experience cannot be exaggerated.”

The film will focus on The Beatles’ journey from the early days of the Cavern Club in Liverpool and gigs in Hamburg to their last public concert in Candlestick Park, San Francisco...

Once programming announcements were complete for Tiff, my thinking was that all arrows pointed to Sundance programmers gobbling up Amy Berg’s new direction in filmmaking. A crime film based on the screenplay by another Park City regular in Nicole Holofcener and shot late March in NYC, this is a departure for the filmmaker/producer of Sundance preemed doc films such as Deliver Us from Evil, Bhutto and West of Memphis. Lensed by Rob Hardy (The Forgiveness of Blood), Every Secret Thing will be a sought after acquisitions title with a new newcomer Danielle Macdonald being supported by Dakota Fanning, Diane Lane and Elizabeth Banks.

Gist: Based on Laura Lippman’s 2003 novel, when a young girl in a small town goes missing, the crime resembles a similar disappearance from seven years prior that ended in tragedy. Police officer Nancy Gates (Banks), still haunted by the outcome of that case, believes...

Dubai, Nov 15: Pakistani author Fatima Bhutto has shot down rumours that she had turned down a role in a big-budget Bollywood film.

The 31-year-old writer laughed and said that it was one of the funniest stories that she heard but it is patently and spectacularly untrue, the Gulf News reported.

Bhutto has made her debut as a novelist with 'The Shadow of the Crescent Moon', after having been a non-fiction writer.

Published by Penguin, the novel is set in Mir Ali, a small town in the troubled tribal region of Waziristan, close to the Afghan border.

She wanted the town, the epicenter of the story, to be.

Filmmakers Pamela Green and Jarik van Sluijs have worked on documentaries in various roles including as co-producer of the Emmy-nominated documentary Bhutto. Their company, Pic Agency, has produced titles for movies including 42 and The Kingdom, and they have also produced content for award shows, commercials and other productions. “People come to us to add to the story when you can’t turn the camera back on,” says Green. They have specialized in creating new content by combining graphics, stock footage, new footage and editorial. These techniques should be especially useful for their first documentary, Be Natural, about the first female […]...

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences brings you the Oscars (yep, that's why they're called Academy Awards), and on Friday, the organization announced that it was prepared to invite 176 new folks to its fold.

In a list posted on its website, the Academy deemed Matthew McConaughey, Jean Dujardin, Terrence Malick, Jonah Hill, Berenice Bejo, Jessica Chastain, Octavia Spencer and a host of other film luminaries worthy of inclusion in its nearly 6,000-member army.

The Academy has drawn the ire of critics who bemoan its overwhelmingly male, white population. A Los Angeles Times investigation found that of all Academy members, 94 percent are Caucasian and 77 percent are male. A mere 2 percent are black, with Latinos constituting an even smaller portion. Only 14 percent of members are under the age of 50.

Full members of the Academy select and vote on Oscars nominees. The organization was started in 1927 and is now governed by a 43-person board.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences extended their 2012 membership invitations today to 176 lucky actors, directors, cinematographers, and other members of the filmmaking industry.

Terrence Malick, who somehow wasn’t already a member, received an invitation, as did fellow directors Rodrigo Garcia and Asghar Farhadi.

For actors, Melissa McCarthy’s invitation continues her incredible post-Bridesmaids rise. In addition, actors Jonah Hill, Matthew McConaughey, Andy Serkis, Jessica Chastain, and Octavia Spencer were all invited to be members, among others.

Voting membership in the organization has now held steady at just under 6,000 members since 2003, according to the Academy’s website.

HollywoodNews.com: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is extending invitations to join the organization to 176 artists and executives who have distinguished themselves by their contributions to theatrical motion pictures. Those who accept the invitation will be the only additions in 2012 to the Academy’s roster of members.

“These film professionals represent some of the most talented, most passionate contributors to our industry,” said Academy President Tom Sherak. “I’m glad to recognize that by calling each of them a fellow Academy member.”

Voting membership in the organization has now held steady at just under 6,000 members since 2003.

The 2012 invitees are:

Actors

Simon Baker – “Margin Call,” “L.A. Confidential”

Sean Bean – “Flightplan,” “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring”

Bérénice Bejo – “The Artist,” “Oss 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies”

Tom Berenger – “Inception,” “Platoon”

Demián Bichir – “A Better Life,” “Che”

Jessica Chastain – “The Help,” “The Tree of Life”

Clifton Collins,...

Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari, Pml-n chief Nawaz Sharif, former President Pervez Musharraf, Pml-q chief Shujaat Hussain, and Pti chief Imran Khan are friends on social networking website Facebook.  Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and Mqm chief Altaf Husssain, however, have not added any political figure on their profile pages. According to the Facebook profile page of Sharif, out of total 4810 friends, he enjoys the company of Musharraf, Hussain, Zardari, Imran, Pakistan Supreme Court Bar Association President Asma Jahangir, Ppp co-Chairman Bilawal Bhutto and All Pakistan Muslim League (Apml) Secretary General Muhammad Ali Saif. Zardari has added Hussain, former Punjab Chief Minister ...

Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari, Pml-n chief Nawaz Sharif, former President Pervez Musharraf, Pml-q chief Shujaat Hussain, and Pti chief Imran Khan are friends on social networking website Facebook.  Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and Mqm chief Altaf Husssain, however, have not added any political figure on their profile pages. According to the Facebook profile page of Sharif, out of total 4810 friends, he enjoys the company of Musharraf, Hussain, Zardari, Imran, Pakistan Supreme Court Bar Association President Asma Jahangir, Ppp co-Chairman Bilawal Bhutto and All Pakistan Muslim League (Apml) Secretary General Muhammad Ali Saif. Zardari has added Hussain, former Punjab Chief Minister ...

If it's Friday, it means that it's time to figure out what to see at the movies this weekend. And if it's a Friday in December, it means that your choices are at polar opposites, as they consist of either envelope-pushing awards bait or bombastic crowd-pleasers. This weekend sees a handful of releases in both categories. At the heavy-rotation end of the spectrum, there's the Asian action epic "The Warrior's Way," but if you're in the mood for something a little more challenging (and you live in the New York or Los Angeles areas), your cup runneth over. There's "All Good Things" (which features Ryan Gosling as a doomed real estate mogul), "I Love You Phillip Morris" (an unusual gay prison romance flick starring Jim Carrey), "Night Catches Us" (a '70s black power throwback) and "Bhutto" (a gripping documentary about Benazir Bhutto, the first woman elected as the head...

We've got a pretty odd assortment of movies kicking off December this year; in fact, with so much genre stuff and so little in the way of awards contenders you'd almost think it was January already. Sngmoo Lee's The Warrior's Way is the only new wide release, a blend of both Eastern and Western sensibilities with a cast that includes Koren superstar Dong-gun Jang plus Kate Bosworth, Geoffrey Rush and Danny Huston. Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan also makes its theatrical debut this weekend, unfortunately it is playing on less than 20 screens. Also in limited release we have I Love You, Phillip Morris starring Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor, All Good Things starring Ryan Gosling and Kirsten Dunst, and the Finnish holiday fantasy/horror film Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale. What will you be watching this weekend? The Warrior's Way [1] Black Swan [2] (limited) Dead Awake [3] (limited) Rare Exports...

Benazir Bhutto was a remarkable figure in the modern history of the Middle East. After all, she was the democratically elected Prime Minister of a country that had previously sent women to jail when they were raped and looked down on women who drove cars or showed their faces in public. She was not simply a woman who happened to be a politician. Rather, her femininity and her feminism informed her political advocacy, her life, and ultimately her tragic death. She was, to no surprise, a polarizing figure within her own country. Pro-democracy Pakistanis saw her as a beacon of hope for the country’s future and her election as a clean slate in place of a torrid history, while fundamentalists saw her as an emblem of Western decadence and a threat to the Islamic way of life. Benazir Bhutto, and all the implications associated with her name, is the subject of Duane Baughman and Johnny O...

Benazir Bhutto, the two time Pakistani prime minister who in 2007 was assassinated just days after she returned from military imposed exile in Dubai to once again attempt to take control of the country, was the countries’ most significant civilian political figure of her generation. Using the tragic life and times of the Muslim world’s most dynamic and successful female politician as a lens through which to capture the larger political machinations and social upheaval that has led to the sixty-seven year old Pakistani state constantly being handed back and forth between an imperiled civilian government and a conservative military establishment, Bhutto is not light on substance. However glamorous and entitled this scion of one of the country’s richest feudal families was, it’s clear in Duane Baughman’s incisive, well-researched and ultimately moving documentary that Benazir Bhutto’s motives were primarily civic duty and national pride, even if those convictions compelled her…...

Director: Duane Baughman Duane Baughman’s biographical documentary Bhutto may focus on Benazir Bhutto -- the first (and to date, the only) female Prime Minister of Pakistan (1988–1990; 1993–1996) and the first (and to date, the only) woman ever elected to lead a Muslim state -- but it also does an excellent job of synopsizing the political history of Pakistan, a history to which the Bhutto family (once referred to as the “Kennedys of Pakistan”) has found itself fatefully entwined. The Islamic Republic of Pakistan adopted its constitution in 1956 and in 1957 Benazir Bhutto’s father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, began his political career as the youngest member of Pakistan's delegation to the United Nations. He soon became the head of the energy ministry; then the head of the ministries of commerce, information and industries. In 1962, he was appointed as Pakistan's foreign minister. In 1967, he founded the Pakistan Peoples Party (Ppp). Zulfikar Ali Bhutto...

Directors Duane Baughman and Johnny O’Hara’s award-winning documentary “Bhutto” is a spellbinding portrait of the beautiful and enigmatic leader who, at the age of 35, became the first female prime minister of a Muslim country. Born on June 21, 1953, Benazir Bhutto was assassinated on Dec. 27, 2007. Her murderers remain unknown, and at large.

Bhutto’s legacy began with her father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Fourth president and ninth prime minister of Pakistan, the charismatic and flamboyant patriarch was both loved and hated. He is primarily remembered for developing nuclear weaponry, establishing the Pakistan Peoples Party (Ppp), and for his execution ordered by Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq — the general he had appointed as Chief of Army Staff.

Recognizing his eldest child’s potential for inheriting his political mantle, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s selection of Benazir over eldest son Murtaza caused a life-long feud between the two siblings that ended only when the increasingly militant Murtaza Bhutto was killed on Sept.

Last week, PBS revealed that Ugly Betty star America Ferrera would take over hosting duties for the upcoming ninth season of their documentary series Independent Lens, which premieres Oct. 19. It’s certainly an interesting choice, considering her success with mass-appeal projects like Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and Betty, but it makes sense for the star, considering her love for documentaries. Lately, she’s been traveling the world promoting the documentary The Dry Land — about soldiers back from tours in Iraq who are suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder — that she produced alongside her fiancé Ryan Piers Williams. EW took a...

A documentary about Benazir Bhutto, which premiered in London last night, makes for gripping but troublingly partial viewing

"Zulfikar Ali Bhutto: Executed, 1979. Shahnawaz Bhutto: Murdered, 1985. Mir Murtaza Bhutto: Assassinated, 1996. Benazir Bhutto: Assassinated, 2007."

This chilling roll call, which appears on the front cover of Fatima Bhutto's politicial memoir, Songs of Blood and Sword, reads like a trailer for a Hollywood thriller – so incredulous, that it couldn't possibly be true. But you can't make this stuff up.

Murder, corruption, assassination, exile and family feuds: if ever there was a political story that makes for superbly gripping viewing, it's definitely the Bhutto story. And now it's finally been translated to screen in Bhutto, a documentary film put together by an American political-consultant-turned director and production team.

At a time when both Pakistan's flood calamity and precarious politics dominate the global media landscape, Bhutto provides a condensed and comprehensive glimpse...

By contributing 0,000 toward the flood-ravaged victims of Pakistan, Hollywood glam girl Angelina Jolie has overtaken the help extended by most Pakistani politicians, including President Asif Ali Zardari.

Jolie was overcome with emotion at the "compassion fatigue" affecting the flood victims in Pakistan, which made the actor go for such a huge donation to help rescue and relief work. Jolie, who is also a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations, donated from her own pocket and indicated that she might also pay a visit to the country once the media hype was over.

Some Pakistani leaders who made donations to the flood relief have not revealed their amount but said that their money went directly into party coffers.

While Zardari and Altaf Hussain, chief of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, have contributed Rs 5 million each (,400), Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and other top leaders of the Pakistan Muslim League-q, Awami National Party...

I View Film Festival 2010, presented by the human rights organization Engendered and runnning from Sept. 18-26 at the Tribeca Film Center and Asia Society in New York City, will open with Indian director Onir's "I Am."

The festival focuses on South Asian Cinema.

The line-up also includes Duane Baughman and Johnny O’Hara's "Bhutto," about assassinated Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto, and Kaushik Ganguly and Rituparno Ghosh's "Just Another Love Story."...

North American rights to Duane Baughman Sundance '10 documentary "Bhutto" have been picked up by First Run Features. Glenn Aveni of Icon Tmi negotiated the deal with Seymour Wishman, president of First Run Features. A November theatrical release is planned for North America, with home video, internet platforms, and television to follow. Educational sales begin immediately. "Bhutto" follows the epic story of Benazir Bhutto, the first woman in history to lead ...

Architect Norman Foster and author Margaret Atwood to spearhead partial tie-up between festivals

Norman Foster and Margaret Atwood are to star in a collaboration between two of Edinburgh's largest festivals as part of a new initiative to expand the reach and audience of the city's international book festival.

In a joint project with the Edinburgh film festival this August – the first on this scale attempted by two of the city's 12 annual festivals – Foster and Atwood will be amongst a number of prominent guests exploring the different techniques film-makers and writers use for biographies.

The events will be staged at the Filmhouse cinema complex, where this year's film festival is now taking place, as part of plans by the new director of the city's international book festival, Nick Barley, to develop an event based for nearly 30 years in a "tented city" in the gardens of Charlotte Square in the city's Georgian New Town.

It's been nearly two and half years since the assassination of former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. Since her murder her party has won democratically contested parliamentary elections, established a government, elected a Prime Minister, installed the Muslim world's first female Speaker, elected her husband Asif Ali Zardari as president and restored the nation's democratic constitution that had been perverted by decades of dictatorship. For a woman who once told a Joint Session of the U.S. Congress that "democracy is the greatest revenge" one would think her murder has been avenged. But the United Nation's Commission of Inquiry into her death has recently opened new wounds with a blistering indictment of General Pervez Musharraf and his government, holding them responsible and accountable for the assassination by deliberate decisions to reject even minimal security arrangements for Ms. Bhutto...

Bakhtawar Bhutto Zardari, the elder daughter of slain former Pakistani premier Benazir Bhutto and President Asif Ali Zardari, is quietly documenting her pain in the world of music. While her fiery cousin Fatima Bhutto makes headlines by her memoir on the Bhutto dynasty, Bakhtawar has released nine songs, mostly in her mother’s memory, and one on the many dead members of the Bhutto family. Bakhtawar’s musical talent first got noticed when she released a song, I’ll take the pain away, on the internet on her mother’s first death anniversary. A student at Edinburgh University, Bakhtawar, 20, wrote on her webpage: “It ...

Bhutto: The Film was one of sixteen documentaries selected for judging at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. Entertaining, compelling and heartbreaking, Bhutto did not "win" at Sundance, but in this case winning is certainly not everything. The visually dazzling opening flashback sequence ends with a bomb blast announcing the assassination of Benazir Bhutto in December 2007. That image slowly fades over Pakistan's green flag with its crescent moon and five-point star. A history lesson begins to take hold, but never overwhelms. If the goal of a good documentary is to tell the story and motivate thought, questions and discussion, then the makers of Bhutto should rest easy. In this case, history and its retelling has a soul, and the soul of Benazir Bhutto inhabits this film. A friend sent me the trailer and it was so beautifully...

My Sundance Film Festival Monday (Jan. 25) began with a pair of high profile entries from the U.S. Documentary Competition slate. However, despite fascinating subject matter for "Bhutto" and favored Sundance director Jeffrey Blitz behind "Lucky," neither doc fully engaged me. Brief reviews for "Bhutto" and "Lucky" after the break... "Bhutto" (directors Jessica Hernandez and Johnny O'Hara) - The late Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto gets adoring and arduously by-the-numbers bio-doc treatment in "Bhutto," which aspires to nothing less than a full history of Pakistan, the Bhutto family and a year-by-year chronicle of the iconic politician's life. Although not without enlightening...

Ticket sales are up as this year's festival opens with a programme of films starring James Franco, Kristen Stewart and Banksy. We round up the likely hits

The 31st Sundance film festival opens tonight and business is already booming – at the box office, at least. According to festival figures, 185,000 tickets have already been sold for events at Robert Redford's showcase for the best in independent film-making – 5,000 to 10,000 up from the same point last year.

Yet even today there was still accommodation available in Park City, Utah, where the festival unfolds – a first for more than a decade. This suggests the makeup of festivalgoers may be changing: gone are the days when studios would mass lease ski lodges for their clients and buyers; in their place are lower-fi buffs and film-makers.

Partly it's a result of the recession – the contraction in the movie market over the past 18 months means studios...

Duane Baughman produced upcoming Sundance U.S. Documentary Competition feature, “Bhutto” - directed by Johnny O’Hara, (whose film, “Fields of Fuel,” won the 2008 Sundance Audience Award) and co-directed by Jessica Hernandez a veteran television editor. The film turns the spotlight on the assassinated former Pakistani prime minister with “exclusive interviews from the Bhutto family and never-before-seen footage. Filmmakers Jessica Hernandez and Johnny O’Hara have crafted a sweeping epic of a transcendent, …...

Duane Baughman produced upcoming Sundance U.S. Documentary Competition feature, “Bhutto” - directed by Johnny O’Hara, (whose film, “Fields of Fuel,” won the 2008 Sundance Audience Award) and co-directed by Jessica Hernandez a veteran television editor. The film turns the spotlight on the assassinated former Pakistani prime minister with “exclusive interviews from the Bhutto family and never-before-seen footage. Filmmakers Jessica Hernandez and Johnny O’Hara have crafted a sweeping epic of a transcendent, …...

Judging by names like Gibney, Blitz, Poitras, Guggenheim, Stern/Sundberg and Grady/Ewing, 2010's Sundance Documentary Competition will be stellar edition with so many return Sundance filmmakers clogging up the section. - Judging by names like Gibney, Blitz, Poitras, Guggenheim, Stern/Sundberg and Grady/Ewing, 2010's Sundance Documentary Competition will be stellar edition with so many return Sundance filmmakers clogging up the section. I'll do more groundwork but off the bat, I'm automatically interested in Gibney's exploration of Jack Abramoff and crew (the official title for the doc is Casino Jack and the United States of Money), Amir Bar-Lev moves from Kids who paint pictures to adults creating their own pictures as was the bad judgment calls from some high ranking folk in the U.S. government (I'm Pat ------- Tillman) and Jeffrey Blitz's long awaited doc on lottery winners (Lucky). Dammit. I pretty much want to see the entire section.

Sundance released their slate for 2010. It includes:43 documentaries on the Middle East12 films about friends who 'discover' something33 movies about people you've never heard about1 comedyHopefully the lineup this year is strong but it doesn't look that way compared to last year. Last year we had Push (Precious), that Lil Wayne documentary that never went anywhere, Mystery Team which might make my top ten, Moon, Mike Tyson documentary, Cold Souls. Just so much last January that was excellent. I hope I don't go out therer and freeze my tail off just to see...I don't know, a documentary about a former Pakistani prime minister or something silly like that.Here's the lineup so far: Premieres To showcase the diversity to contemporary independent cinema, the Sundance Film Festival Premieres section offers the latest work from American and international directors as well as world premieres of highly anticipated films. Presented by Entertainment Weekly.

Sundance released their slate for 2010. It includes:43 documentaries on the Middle East12 films about friends who 'discover' something33 movies about people you've never heard about1 comedyHopefully the lineup this year is strong but it doesn't look that way compared to last year. Last year we had Push (Precious), that Lil Wayne documentary that never went anywhere, Mystery Team which might make my top ten, Moon, Mike Tyson documentary, Cold Souls. Just so much last January that was excellent. I hope I don't go out therer and freeze my tail off just to see...I don't know, a documentary about a former Pakistani prime minister or something silly like that.Here's the lineup so far: U.S. Documentary Competition This year’s 16 films were selected from 862 submissions. Each film is a world premiere. Bhutto(Directors: Jessica Hernandez and Johnny O'Hara; Screenwriter: Johnny O'Hara)—A riveting journey through the life and work of recently assassinated Benazir Bhutto,...

The Sundance Institute announced today the first list of films that will play at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival, which I will once again be attending and covering for Fsr. This announcement includes the U.S. and World Cinema Dramatic and Documentary Competitions for the fst. In addition to the four Competition Categories, the Festival presents films in five out-of-competition sections to be announced on December 3. The 2010 Sundance Film Festival will also feature several category changes including a new section devoted to low- and no-budget filmmaking and Sundance Film Festival U.S.A.- a one-night only event when eight filmmakers from the Festival will visit eight cities nationwide. In addition, the Festival will break tradition by foregoing the conventions of one opening night film and instead focus on launching the total program: one narrative film, one documentary and one shorts program will play the first Thursday (January 21), beginning the roll out of the competitions. “Being...

Every new year brings us another Sundance Film Festival and with 50 more days left until Sundance 2010 kicks off, Sundance has officially announced the first half of this year's complete line-up. Featured in four different competition categories are 58 individual films that will be showing at world's greatest film festival in January. The remaining half of the line-up, which will includes the premieres and midnight films, will be announced tomorrow (so check back then). The line-up looks fantastic so far this year, with a lot of films I haven't even heard of yet. Even if you're not attending, I suggest you check out the full list below. U.S. Documentary Competition: This year's 16 films were selected from 862 submissions. Each film is a world premiere. Bhutto (Directors: Jessica Hernandez and Johnny O'Hara; Screenwriter: Johnny O'Hara) — A riveting journey through the life and work of recently assassinated Benazir Bhutto, former Pakistani ...

And the first announcement is upon us and includes quite a few movies we've already reported on.. What does that include?

The incredible looking Estonian drama The Temptation of St. Tony for which we got the exclusive trailer on a while ago. It's by Veiko Õunpuu who did the incredible Sügisball and I'm greatly looking forward to seeing this.

From Spencer Susser, the director of the incredible zombie short I love Sarah Jane comes Hesher, his first feature which stars Jgl!

David Michôd's Australian thriller Animal Kingdom which stars Guy Pearce.

From Taiki Waititi, director of Eagle vs Shark comes Boy which we previously reported on, but then it was known as The Volcano.

Full list after the break!

U.S. Documentary Competition

This year’s 16 films were selected from 862 submissions. Each film is a world premiere.

Bhutto (Directors: Jessica Hernandez and Johnny O'Hara; Screenwriter: Johnny O'Hara)—A riveting...

This year’s 16 films were selected from 862 submissions. Each film is a world premiere. Bhutto (Directors: Duane Baughman and Johnny O’Hara; Screenwriter: Johnny O’Hara)—A riveting journey through the life and work of recently assassinated Benazir Bhutto, former Pakistani prime minister and a polarizing figure in the Muslim world. World Premiere Casino Jack & The United States of Money (Director: Alex Gibney)—A probing investigation into the lies, greed and corruption surrounding …...

Although the Sundance Film Festival might have tried to wring some extra sunshine from its selections last year, the 2010 lineup looks to be back to its typical mirthless self. One could say it has gone from "You gotta give 'em hope" to "You gotta give 'em mope."

"That's our filmmakers," festival director John Cooper said with an amused mix of pride and resignation. "There's some lightness in here somewhere."

Yes, it's wedged back behind the assassinations, political corruption, war carnage, crumbling educational system and Khmer Rouge revelations. The fest, which runs Jan. 21-31 in Park City, Salt Lake City, Ogden and Sundance, Utah, might start to feel like 11 Days of Glummer.

But perhaps that's to be expected. The implosion of the independent distribution system amid the ever-present threats of a maimed economy and two wars has provided festival organizers and filmmakers an opportunity to cut loose and follow their probing passions,...