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Oscars 2018: The Insult Review

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6 years ago

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Ziad Doueiri’s The Insult, Lebanon’s Best Foreign Film Oscar candidate, is a heartfelt and strident message movie, and how successfully and powerfully that message gets across depends on your knowledge of the politics of the Middle East and how strident you like your message movies.

If your preference is for the adroitly and poignantly delivered courtroom speech, then you’re in the right place. If your preference, however, is for something more subtle, more shown than told, then you’re also in the right place, occasionally. The problem of the film is that the former too often overpowers the latter. That being said, it’s still a movie worth seeing and thinking about.

Doueiri, who has worked in Hollywood with Quentin Tarantino, has his mentor’s love of pointed and combative dialogue, and in The Insult, he pursues the subject of the power of words; particularly, the power of words to ignite and damage. The incendiary politics of Lebanon…the parties involved here are Lebanese Christians, Palestinian refugees, and, always unseen but mentioned, the Israelis are fueled by the heated political rhetoric of both the leaders (specifically, Bachir Gemayel, the leader of a powerful Christian militia in the Lebanese civil war) and their followers. Positions are taken and backing down becomes unthinkable. Demonizing becomes the de rigueur response. Words lead to violence. And the story ends up in court, a hopefully fair and just arena for truth to be discerned.

I don’t know a great deal about Lebanese political histor. I learned much from this film, I will say, though it wasn’t always easy to keep the players straigh. So, like many American viewers, I would guess, I was relating to the events and the characters more on individual and archetypal levels. Seen that way, this film has much to say about both the devils and better angels of our nature. Resentment that leads to hate, the difficulty and power of forgiveness, love of family vs love of ethnicity, political beliefs that masquerade for personal demons, Doueiri aims high and to the heart. And most of the time, he hits his mark, though ironically more in the characters’ actions than their words.

Also, like most Americans, I was watching the film for its parallels to the current American political climate. You could replace the Christians and the Palestinians with any number of American social and political factions. Seen in that light, The Insult, is a powerful mirror of this dark night of our divided nation, as well as a film of hope.

The Insult is one of those films that takes awhile to percolate, revealing more wisdom than its eagerness to entertain and move us initially allows room for. The morning after viewing it, you wonder how you would have acted in like circumstances, and just how alike and different you are from these characters, individuals who seem additionally fresh and revealing to us because they are not played by the usual cast of American and British actors.

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Paramount+ Reveals Official Main Title Sequence for the Upcoming Series TALES OF THE TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES

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13 hours ago

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July 26, 2024

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During the TALES OF THE TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES panel earlier today at San Diego Comic Con, Paramount+ revealed the official main title sequence for the series. The sequence is composed by EMMY® nominee, Matt Mahaffey, known for his work on Sanjay and Craig, Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Movie and much more. 

From the studios of the Mutant Mayhem film, the all-new Paramount+ original series TALES OF THE TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES explores the adventures of everyone’s favorite pizza-loving heroes as they emerge from the sewers onto the streets of NYC. Leo, Raph, Donnie and Mikey are faced with new threats and team up with old allies to survive both teenage life and villains lurking in the shadows of the Big Apple. The series is produced by Nickelodeon Animation and Point Grey Pictures.

TALES OF THE TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES is executive produced by Chris Yost (The Mandalorian, Thor: Ragnarok) and Alan Wan (Blue Eye Samurai, Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles [2012 Series]). Production is overseen for Nickelodeon by Claudia Spinelli, Senior Vice President, TV Series Animation, Nickelodeon, and Nikki Price, Director of Development and Executive in Charge of Production.

In addition to the upcoming new series, stream all things Turtles on Paramount+.

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Comic-Con 2024: Those About to Die Activation

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16 hours ago

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July 26, 2024

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DISNEY+ CASTS DANIEL DIEMER AS FAN-FAVORITE ‘TYSON’IN SEASON TWO OF “PERCY JACKSON AND THE OLYMPIANS”

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16 hours ago

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July 26, 2024

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 in Hall H at San Diego Comic-Con, Rick Riordan and Disney+ revealed that Daniel Diemer (“Under the Bridge”) will star as fan-favorite cyclops “Tyson” in the epic adventure series “Percy Jackson and the Olympians.” Diemer joins Walker Scobell (Percy Jackson), Leah Sava Jeffries (Annabeth Chase) and Aryan Simhadri (Grover Underwood) as a series regular. The Disney+ Original series from Disney Branded Television and 20th Television will start filming its second season next week in Vancouver.

Season two of “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” is based on the second installment of Disney Hyperion’s best-selling book series titled “The Sea of Monsters” by award-winning author Rick Riordan. In the new season, Percy Jackson returns to Camp Half-Blood one year later to find his world turned upside down. His friendship with Annabeth is changing, he learns he has a cyclops for a brother, Grover has gone missing, and camp is under siege from the forces of Kronos. Percy’s journey to set things right will take him off the map and into the deadly Sea of Monsters, where a secret fate awaits the son of Poseidon.

Diemer stars as Tyson – a young Cyclops who grew up all alone on the streets, and finds it difficult to survive in the human world.  Shy and awkward, with a heart almost as big as he is, Tyson soon discovers that Poseidon is his father, which means Percy Jackson is his half-brother… and that Tyson may have finally found a home. 

Diemer recently starred in the Hulu limited series “Under the Bridge” based off the critically acclaimed book of the same name and a tragic true story of a missing teen girl in Vancouver in 1997. He will next star in the indie “Thug” opposite Liam Neeson and Ron Perlman for director Hans Petter Moland. Daniel was recently seen as the lead in the indie “Supercell” opposite Alec Baldwin and Skeet Ulrich and the lead in the film “Little Brother” opposite Phil Ettinger and JK Simmons. Daniel can also be seen in the Netflix series “The Midnight Club” and recently starred as the male lead in the breakout hit Netflix feature “The Half Of It” from producer Anthony Bregman and director Alice Wu. He is a graduate of Victoria Academy of Dramatic Arts in Vancouver.

Created by Rick Riordan and Jonathan E. Steinberg, season two of “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” is executive produced by Steinberg and Dan Shotz alongside Rick Riordan, Rebecca Riordan, Craig Silverstein, The Gotham Group’s Ellen Goldsmith-Vein, Bert Salke, The Gotham Group’s Jeremy Bell and D.J. Goldberg, James Bobin, Jim Rowe, Albert Kim, Jason Ensler and Sarah Watson.

The first season of “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” is available on Disney+

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