Latest news with #JaneRosenthal
New York Times
2 days ago
- Business
- New York Times
Lin-Manuel Miranda Reflects on Upcoming Latinx Films
The Tribeca Festival is undoubtedly a star-studded event with famous figures, including actors, directors, musicians and artists gracing red carpets and showcasing their works. But supporting aspiring and emerging filmmakers through its artist development programs is also very much part of the festival's DNA, according to its chief executive, Jane Rosenthal, who founded the event with Robert De Niro and Craig Hatkoff. 'So much of the festival is about discovery, and the development programs are part of that,' she said. 'We are always looking for new voices and stories and new ways of telling stories, and there are not enough programs supporting aspiring artists.' Since 2015, the artist development programs have included eight initiatives that give producers, directors, writers and other creative people in the moviemaking industry full funding for their projects. Rosenthal said that they have awarded close to $2 million annually, supported more than 1,000 filmmakers and seen celebrities such as Kerry Washington, Queen Latifah and John Leguizamo get involved as mentors and judges. 'Everybody needs an advocate, and celebrities, no matter where they are in their careers, help lift these filmmakers up through their support,' Rosenthal said. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Geek Tyrant
3 days ago
- Business
- Geek Tyrant
Ariana Grande Joins MEET THE PARENTS 4 with Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro — GeekTyrant
After earning an Oscar nomination for her role as Glinda in Wicked, Ariana Grande is jumping from Oz to a much more grounded and dysfunctional world: the Focker family reunion. Grande is officially joining Meet the Parents 4 , starring alongside franchise staples Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro. The sequel is coming from Universal Pictures, which has banked over $1.1 billion globally on the series since the original debuted back in 2000. That's a lot of awkward family dinners. While plot details are under wraps, longtime producer Jane Rosenthal previously teased: 'Stiller is now the same age that [De Niro] was when we did the first one, and his kids have grown up, and they have to come home and meet the parents.' So yes, it looks like it's Stiller's turn to play the overprotective dad, and if we're placing bets, Ariana Grande might just be the significant other walking into the family firestorm. John Hamburg, who co-wrote all three previous films, returns as both writer and director. Rosenthal and De Niro will produce under Tribeca Productions, with Jay Roach on board via Delirious Media, and Stiller producing through Red Hour Films. Universal is targeting a November 25, 2026 theatrical release. Grande is already a proven hitmaker for the studio thanks to Wicked , and she brings more than just pop power. The artist now has serious acting clout with an Academy Award nomination, plus nods from the Golden Globes, BAFTA, and SAG. Whether she's playing the poised outsider or matching Stiller's neurotic energy with her own comedic attempts, Grande's addition adds fresh energy to a franchise that has always thrived on uncomfortable generational clashes. Get ready. The circle of trust is opening back up, this time with Ariana Grande at the table.
Forbes
15-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
Runway AI's Gen-4: How Can AI Montage Go Beyond Absurdity
NEW YORK, NEW YORK - MAY 09: (L-R) Jane Rosenthal and Cristobal Valenzuela speak onstage during the ... More 2024 AI Film Festival New York Panel at Metrograph on May 09, 2024 in New York City. (Photo by) The recent release of Runway AI's Gen-4 has ignited both excitement and existential questions about the future of cinema and media in general. With the company now valued at 3 billion following a $308 million funding round led by the private equity firm General Atlantic and backed by industry heavyweights like Nvidia and SoftBank, AI's march into Hollywood appears unstoppable. The film industry, alongside all creative sectors, from digital marketing to social media, stands at a technological crossroad. As artificial intelligence begins to reshape every aspect of visual storytelling and change the landscape of entertainment and digital commerce, we must assess its potentials and pitfalls. Major production companies are rapidly adopting AI video tools. Fabula, the acclaimed studio behind Oscar-winning A Fantastic Woman and biopic Spencer, just announced a partnership with Runway AI to integrate AI across its production pipeline. Lionsgate signed a deal with Runway last fall to explore AI-powered filmmaking. Experimental directors like Harmony Korine have already debuted AI-assisted film at Venice last year. The broad applications of AI videos are already impressive, from pre-visualizing scenes for Amazon's House of David to creating advertisement for Puma. Yet beneath these flashy demonstrations lies a more fundamental question: can AI-generated content evolve beyond technical spectacle to deliver truly meaningful stories? Runway's Gen-4 represents significant progress in several areas: character consistency, scene coherence, and visual fidelity. An example Runway AI releases show two main characters stay consistent across different shots ranging from walking, running, petting a cow, lighting up a match, and maintain fidelity of the look of a steppe in gloomy weather. Yet these technical improvements don't address the core challenge: AI excels at generating individual moments but struggles with coherent and sustained storytelling. While it can create a stunning shot of giraffes and lions roam in the New York City, can it make audiences care about a city turned into a zoo? AI videos risk repeating the early mistakes of Computer Generated Imagery (CGI), prioritizing visual gimmicks over in-depth messages. As barriers to creative production and film making disappear, we may face a flood of visually polished but emotionally hollow contents, derivative works optimized for algorithmic efficiency, or compelling synthetic media that lacks human touch. While AI videos can wow first-time viewers, can they make audiences want to watch them more? Can AI films ever produce classic pieces that draw generations of movie-goers? Current multi modal AI technologies center on innovations in film, media, and video games. A recent project spearheaded by researchers from Nvidia, Stanford and UCSD uses Test-Time-Training layers in machine learning models to generate 60-seconds animations of Tom and Jerry. To achieve this, the team trained the model on 81 cartoon footages between 1940 and 1948, which add up to about 7 hours. The model generates and connects multiple 3-second segments, each guided by storyboard annotating plots, settings, and camera movements. The technique highlights significant potential to scale video productions and animation series creations. A poster for Joseph Barbera and William Hanna's 1950 cartoon 'The Framed Cat'. (Photo by Movie ... More Poster) But the technology also reveal critical flaws that persist among AI video generators such as Sora, Kling, Runway, Pika, etc. One limitation is continuity error. For example, rooms, landscapes, and lighting shift unnaturally between 3-second segments. Physics defiance is another problem. For instance, in the earlier mentioned Tom and Jerry AI videos, Jerry's cheese float or morph into different sizes and textures at segment boundaries. Another issue is narrative disjointedness. As the segmentation of content is necessary for algorithms to effectively learn the contents, understand the prompt, and accurately generate videos, AI models struggle to show logical scene progression. These traces of what I call AI montage also appear in Runway AI's videos, the elephants walking across the Time Square is abruptly followed by a scene of a cheetah running across a bridge. One is set in cloudy weather while the next in a sunny day. The changes do not push the storyline forward nor do they convey any logic. The absurd, the fragmented, and the incongruous, are what AI video generators currently good at producing. For now, AI struggles to replicate the coherence of even a 5-minute cartoon, let alone a feature film. AI-generated videos show strength as a medium for critiquing both itself and the societies that produce it. Director Jia Zhangke's recent AI film made using Kling AI imagines a future run by robotic caretakers. The film provokes audiences to reflect on the crisis of aging populations, societal neglect, and the erosion of empathy in an era of breakneck competition, capitalism, and exploding automated technologies. Jia's film show robot companions taking the elderly for a walk or helping them harvest crops, in lieu of real sons and daughters. Such a theme is grounded in societal challenges today. The film critiques the substitution of human connection with automated machines and transactional relationships, and raises the concern over relentless stress and long hours in workplaces. Just as Charlie Chaplin used industrialization-era tools to critique industrialization in Modern Times, today's filmmakers can use AI to critique the conditions of its own existence. Consider how synthetic news anchors might expose media manipulation, or endlessly combinable streaming content could comment on algorithmic culture. Just like science fictions that critique environmental disasters, human greed, and inequality, the most compelling AI films will likely be those that embrace their own artificiality to engage with real social problems. Rather than fearing obsolescence, filmmakers might focus more intensely on what machines cannot replicate: the nuance of human emotions, complexities of human nature, the weight of lived experience, and the cultural resonance of authentic storytelling. History suggests that film and media have always adapted to technological upheaval, from silent to sound, black-and-white to color, celluloid to digital, each time emerging with new creative possibilities. The question is no longer whether AI will change filmmaking, but how filmmakers will harness it to tell stories that matter.
Yahoo
07-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Billy Joel Doc ‘And So It Goes' to Open 2025 Tribeca Film Festival
The Tribeca Film Festival has selected the two-part HBO documentary 'Billy Joel: And So It Goes' to be its opening night feature on June 4, co-founder and CEO Jane Rosenthal announced at NAB Show's Business of Entertainment event on Sunday. 'For nearly 25 years, the Tribeca Festival has celebrated the artists who give New York its heart and soul, and on the opening night of the 2025 Festival, we are thrilled to honor Billy Joel — an artist who has embodied that very spirit,' Rosenthal said. 'Paying tribute to the legendary performer who captured the essence of a 'New York State of Mind' is a perfect way to kick off this year's celebration of creativity and inspiration.' The official synopsis describes the doc as 'an expansive portrait of the life and music of Billy Joel, exploring the love, loss and personal struggles that fuel his songwriting. With unprecedented access to never-before-seen performances, home movies and personal photographs, along with extensive, in-depth one-on-one interviews, the documentary intimately explores the life and work of Joel, whose music has endured across generations.' Susan Lacy, creator and executive producer of PBS' 'American Masters,' directed the film as part of a production deal with HBO. The film will screen at Tribeca's opening night event at the Beacon Theatre in New York, with OKX and City National Bank as sponsors. 'I and my co-director, Jessica Levin, couldn't be more thrilled about our film 'Billy Joel: And So It Goes' opening the esteemed Tribeca Festival,' Lacy said in a statement. 'Our thanks go out to Jane Rosenthal and the Festival team and to HBO and the wonderful folks there who have supported us throughout in our efforts to bring an in-depth, honest and musically expressive portrait of this complex talent. We are beyond appreciative of Billy Joel's trust in us to bring his story to the screen. There is no better place for this film to premiere than at the Beacon Theater, the venue for so many historic musical events for decades, and in the city so important to Billy Joel.' The full slate for Tribeca 2025 will be released soon. The post Billy Joel Doc 'And So It Goes' to Open 2025 Tribeca Film Festival appeared first on TheWrap.
