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Director Michael Bay put his stars in the line of fire filming Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen . | Photos | Trailer

The West Yorkshire city has trumped Los Angeles, Cannes and Venice to win the UN honourThe world's first City of Film will be announced by Unesco today, with the honour going unexpectedly to Bradford.Although Los Angeles, Cannes and Venice might have been considered shoo-ins for the title, the Yorkshire city has got there first with a bid based on classics such as Room at the Top and the latest work of British Bollywood.Although it is better known for its textile heritage, Bradford nonetheless has a long tradition of film-making, built with the help of its striking landscape and local acting talent, including Billie Whitelaw and Tony Richardson. The successful bid has been powered by the National Media Museum, the most visited museum outside London, whose move to Bradford in 1983 was a turning point in the city's regeneration.The prize from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation is a 'badge of honour' rather than a source of direct funding, but Bradford's

You used to be able to tell a director from the way he shot, cut and lit a film. But today's film-makers no longer have a signature, says David ThomsonFifty years ago, when Alfred Hitchcock's North By Northwest opened, it was received with gratitude, appreciation and nearly complete misunderstanding. After all, said the wise judges of 1959, the world is not like this - its schemes of espionage do not turn on men as frivolous and charming as Cary Grant's character in the film. Those people boarding the American railway system cannot expect to meet femmes as fatale as Eva Marie Saint (behaving in a very unsaintly manner). And it was absurdity - albeit a killer joke - to have a bus stop on a bare midwest prairie, where a plane might hunt a man. All of those ingredients, it was said, were at the convenience of the movie, the essence of its movieness. But you'd never find them in life.That's exactly correct, Hitchcock might have said: I have made a movie - something you see in the dark. I a

Bollywood's top stars gathered in the Chinese gambling enclave of Macau on Thursday for the Indian film industry's annual roadshow, pitching their elaborate song-and-dance productions to the booming Chinese market and other Asian countries. One of ...

Film News: Intrepid Pictures taps director for 'Diver' -- Intrepid Pictures has set Bruce A. Evans to direct 'Diver,' a thriller that was penned by Diane Ademu-John.

Considering all the effort put into shrouding Barack Obama in swarthy otherness during the election, it's a wonder that one biographical factoid went without much scrutiny. On their first date, he took Michelle to see Spike Lee's the dystopian meditation on race relations that, a full 20 years after its release, remains the hottest firebomb in Lee's provocative filmography. Never mind Jeremiah Wright and Michelle's Princeton thesis; if anything would have given 'hardworking white Americans' pause, it's the thought of their president and first lady courting at a film that features a black mob gleefully torching a white man's business. There's even a recitation of a Louis Farrakhan quote about how the black man will one day 'rise and rule the earth as we did in our glorious past,' but Obama wasn't asked to reject or denounce his choice of date movie.

Film News: Theatrical-to-DVD windows get wider -- Theatrical-to-DVD windows for the first half of 2009 are more than two weeks longer than they were early last year, a phenomenon industry execs are attributing to this year's late Easter and the unusually strong box office business.

State health officials are looking into the latest HIV case reported in California's multibillion-dollar porn industry, fearing that reckless practices on film sets might be raising the risk of new infections.

In an interview with MTV News, Alexander Skarsgard revealed he'd actually gotten as far in the Thor casting process as trying on the outfit and filming an audition. The studly Swede confirmed to MTV that he met with Marvel Studios Chief Kevin Feige and Thor director Kenneth Branagh a number of times before ultimately losing out on the leading role to Chris Hemsworth (Captain James T Kirk's dad in the latest Star Trek film). It should be pointed out that Skarsgard had lots of people rooting for him to play the hammer-wielding hero. Skarsgard had the votes of almost every female True Blood fan (myself included), as well as a fair amount of support from the online movie community in general. Thankfully for Skarsgard supporters, the experience of trying out for and then not being chosen for a key role in a superhero film hasn't soured him on the prospect of ever pursuing another big budget epic if the right opportunity comes along. 'It depends on the circumstances,' Skarsgard told MTV in

International News: World premieres, more industry events set -- After making an initial success of its move to June last year, the 63rd Edinburgh Intl. Film Festival has lined up more world premieres and a deeper program of industry events in an effort to take its evolution to the next stage.