PangeaSeed, artist Craig Drake and Hero Complex Gallery are pleased to announce a shark-saving effort of monstrous proportions: Smile, You Son of a Bitch! An Art Tribute to JAWS!

For three days only, from November 1 - 3, 2013, at Hero Complex Gallery in Los Angeles, we will host a one of a kind art exhibition featuring original artworks created by 70+ of today’s most renowned artists in celebration of one of the most iconic films in movie history. This unprecedented exhibition aims to engage the audience by helping to further bring much needed awareness to the global plight of sharks.

The three day event will see guest appearances by original cast and crew from the movie, original film memorabilia and collectibles on display, special guest presentations from some of today’s leading shark experts and exciting film screenings. Search deep and wide, without a doubt this is the must-see event of the year for JAWS fans!

Leading up to the opening night reception on November 1, PangeaSeed will release 4 limited edition fine art screen prints entitled “JAWS: The Lost Trading Card Set” created in collaboration with supporting artist Craig Drake and printed via Seizure Palace Screen Printing. A new print will be released monthly to help make this event possible - we greatly appreciate your support.

Follow PangeaSeed.org for more event information and updates.

The year was 1972 and Jerry Lewis was embarking on the the riskiest venture of his long, successful screen career. He would star in and direct The Day the Clown Cried, a dramatic and sobering tale about a Jewish clown who is imprisoned in a Nazi concentration camp. He is only able to survive by making himself useful to his captors by distracting doomed children with his antics as he leads them to the gas chamber. The announcement that Lewis would be involved in such a production raised eyebrows at the time and more than a bit of skepticism that he could pull it off. Lewis had been one of the top boxoffice attractions in the world in the 1950s and 1960s, but by the advent of the 1970s he knew that his squeaky clean family films were out of touch with the Woodstock generation. He was convinced he could launch a new career as a dramatic star and director. However, the film ran into problems almost immediately with production funds from private sources routinely drying up. This forced Lewis to cut the budget practically to that of a home movie level. Still, he soldiered on a completed the film. However, legal battles over the rights have prevented it from ever being released. Over the years, Lewis has shown the movie to only a handful of trusted confidants. Their reaction was uniformly terrible and Lewis now accepts the blame for the movie's artistic failures, saying "I lost the magic" and vowing no one else will ever see the movie. Nevertheless, some footage has surfaced from a German documentary done at the time of production that shows Lewis on the set of the movie and a glimpses of him performing as a clown. Click here to view  

If you're not thrilled with the announcement that Ben Affleck will be the screen's latest Batman, you're not alone. There is already a public petition that has garnered thousands of signatures protesting the studio's choice of Affleck. Some fans actually got a petition temporarily posted on the White House web site begging President Obama to do something about it!  (Click here to read more). We'll give ol' Ben the benefit of the doubt. After all, from the moment Daniel Craig was announced as the new 007, fan protest sites sprang up around the world. They vanished as soon as the film premiered and Craig received a BAFTA nomination for Best Actor. Maybe luck will shine on Affleck, as well, though comic book fans are even more cynical and hard to please than 007 buffs. In any event, the newly launched web site Do Your Remember? weighs in on the subject, with writer Neil Vazquez offering evidence for his choices for the screen's worst Caped Crusaders. (Fortunately, Adam West did not make the list). Click here to read. 

Cinema Retro has received the following press release:

Eureka! Entertainment are delighted to announce the Halloween 2013 theatrical and home video releases of an eagerly awaited new restoration of F. W. Murnau's legendary silent cinema horror classic Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror (1922), expertly restored in Germany by the world-renowned Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung (FWMS). 

This revival of a horror classic, one of the most famous of all silent films, follows Eureka! Entertainment's hugely successful restoration showcases of Fritz Lang's Metropolis (1927) in 2010 and Carl Theodor Dreyer's The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928) in 2012. 

Nosferatu's UK theatrical run will be co-ordinated by Eureka! Entertainment and will open in selected cinemas nationwide on Friday October 25, 2013, just in time for Halloween, and will also feature as part of the BFI’s GOTHIC: The Dark Heart of Film which runs from 21st October 2013 – 31st January 2014. This year the BFI will take Britain back to darker times and thrill the nation by uncovering, as never before, the dark heart of film. With over 150 titles and around 1000 screenings GOTHIC features spectacularly terrifying special events to thrill every corner of the UK. GOTHIC will explore film’s most popular theme, spawning some of the medium’s most iconic, powerful and terrifying scenes and characters whose lasting popularity just refuses to die www.bfi.org.uk/gothic .

Blu-ray, Blu-ray SteelBook and DVD releases of Nosferatu will follow with a raft of special features to be announced nearer the release date, as part of Eureka! Entertainment's award-winning The Masters of Cinema Series www.mastersofcinema.org .

Ron Benson, head of Eureka! Entertainment, comments: “Eureka! Entertainment have had the real pleasure of releasing some of the absolute classics of silent cinema, and there are arguably no more iconic than F. W. Murnau's Nosferatu, the grandfather of all vampire films, which continues to thrill, chill, and horrify audiences nearly 100 years after it was made.”

Craig Keller, producer of The Masters of Cinema Series, adds: “This new restoration of Nosferatu has been meticulously prepared and looks truly outstanding. It will allow a new generation to experience afresh one of the greatest of all cinematographic horrors, and a monument of German expressionism, looking better than ever. The film is uncanny, legitimately terrifying – to see it on the big screen in the midst of the Halloween season will make for an unforgettable experience.”

Critical praise for Nosferatu:

"The first and probably the greatest of all vampire films." –Jonathan Rosenbaum

"[F. W. Murnau is] the greatest film director the Germans have ever known." – Lotte Eisner

Online:

Eureka Entertainment website www.eurekavideo.co.uk

Masters of Cinema Website www.mastersofcinema.org

Twitter: @eurekavideo / @mastersofcinema

Facebook: www.facebook.com/EurekaEntertainment

The ever-talented artist Pete Emslie of the Cartoon Cave helps us celebrate the 88th birthday of actor Mike Connors with this artwork. Check out Pete's site for more great cartoons.  

James Cameron has promised (threatened?) that there will indeed be three more films based on his blockbuster Avatar. He will be working with four different screenwriters on the films, which Fox will release over a three year period beginning in 2016. Cameron will co-script each of the films, which will be shot simultaneously presumably with Cameron directing (he is also producing).  It is not certain whether these will be sequels, prequels or both. Cameron has the unique distinction of having the two top grossing films of all time: Avatar and Titanic. Fox is said to be committing to a combined budget of up to $1 billion for the project (Cameron does not work cheap and often exceeds his budget estimates.) Yet, Cameron is considered to be "money in the bank" for any studio lucky enough to enlist his talents. For some of us, Avatar was over-hyped and over-praised, but there is no denying moviegoers embraced the film, seeing it numerous times. Whether that enthusiasm will have waned by 2016 remains to be seen, but it's a likely bet that Cameron-Mania will still be in full swing. - Lee Pfeiffer

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