Karina Longworth

Jonah Hill and Russell Brand

Men and the City

In Forgetting Sarah Marshall, a comedy of love triangles produced by Judd Apatow and directed by Nicholas Stoller, British comedian Russell Brand co-starred as Aldous Snow, a debauched rocker who steals an aimless man child's girlfriend and spirits her away to Hawaii, where the star is semi-stalked by a creepy-intense......
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Dennis Hopper Dies, Easy Rider Star/Director Was 74

Dennis Hopper has died at his home in Venice, after a battle with prostate cancer. The actor/director/artist recently received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his long, storied career, which included appearances in such films as Rebel Without a Cause, Apocalypse Now, Blue Velvet and Speed; directorial......
Stripped-down Rambo: Zachary Oberzan in Flooding With Love for the Kid

Rambo: First Film

A feature-length video-film made for less than $100, Flooding With Love for the Kid retells the story of John Rambo, the Vietnam vet made iconic by Sylvester Stallone, who starred in and co-wrote the 1982 film loosely based on David Morell's novel, First Blood. Actor Zachary Oberzan, 36, adapted, directed,......
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Human Centipede: Play Along At Home

Surely by now you've heard of The Human Centipede, the extreme twist on torture porn that's taking the nation by storm (or, at least, sold out enough midnight shows at the Nuart that it expanded to three theaters last weekend)? If you love the idea of a horror film loosely......
Credit: PHOTO BY KEVIN SCANLON

Hadrian Belove: Pathologically Idiosyncratic Programming

In the lobby of the Silent Movie Theatre on Fairfax, a set of stairs leads to the hidden headquarters of Cinefamily, the outfit that has programmed and managed the theater for the past three years. Upstairs, two walls are lined with dry-erase boards bearing non sequitur lists, the fruits of......
Credit: PHOTO BY KEVIN SCANLON

Sanaa Hamri: Through an L.A. Lens

Local is a word that often comes up in conversation with filmmaker Sanaa Hamri. She had to temporarily relocate to the East Coast to shoot the recently released Just Wright, a "Cinderella story in the NBA" starring Common and Queen Latifah, but her heart remained in her home hood of......
Credit: PHOTO BY KEVIN SCANLON

Brendan Lott: Newsman

Brendan Lott is an artist. I met him when he was studying film at San Francisco Art Institute, where we were both undergrads at the turn of the millennium; he went on to the prestigious MFA program at Stanford. Brendan Lott is also a businessman. In late 2009, he moved......
Back to the future: Will Forte is MacGruber

Children of the '80s, All "Grown Up"

MacGruber (Will Forte), a highly decorated soldier of fortune known for "making life-saving inventions out of household materials," faked his death and went into hiding after his fiancée (Maya Rudolph) was killed at their wedding, likely by MacGruber's archenemy, wealthy industrialist Dieter Von Cunth (Val Kilmer). Years later, when the......
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3-DIY: LA 3-D Movie Festival showcases indies

When it comes to 3-D films, says Eric Kurland of the Los Angeles 3-D Club (SCSC), "There's a certain audience expectation--people expect things to pop out at you." Those expectations are likely to be subverted at SCSC's 7th annual LA 3-D Movie Festival, a 12-hour movie marathon taking place this......
We're a happy family! Harmony Korine's Trash Humpers

Trash Humpers: Talking Tall

Trash Humpers is not really a movie. Or so its credited writer/director, sometime indie-film enfant terrible Harmony Korine (writer of Kids, director of Gummo, julien donkey-boy and Mister Lonely), has claimed repeatedly since its film-festival premiere last fall. "It's made to be more like an artifact," he says. "You can......