The L.A. Film Festival wraps up today with a gala screening of Danny Boyle's Sunshine at 7:00 p.m. at the Wadsworth Theatre. One hundred dollars will buy you a ticket to the screening and admission to the party afterwards (or you can wait until July 20th and see it when it opens wide). The rest of the day is filled with screenings (no more free music or panels--boo!) There is a free screening, though,......

The weekend is here so lots of free stuff is on tap for the L.A. Film Festival. The Festival Promenade on Broxton will be taken over by Family Day activities. There'll be screenings, games, giveaways, pony rides, a petting zoo, magician Ryan Majestic and characters from Playhouse Disney to entertain the kiddies. Events will run from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Two free programs will be held at Bel Air Camera today. At 1:00......

The L.A. Film Festival lumbers towards its final weekend today and The Director Lunch Talk series has its best interview yet. John Horn talks to Danny Boyle (Sunshine, Trainspotting) at 12:30 p.m. at the Target Red Room. Another free talk is on tap at 7:00 p.m. at the Hammer Museum. It's Been There, Done That: A Conversation with Mickey Rooney. If you've never seen Mr. Rooney talk in person, treat yourself to this program.......

There are some films, particularly foreign films--no, particularly foreign foreign films--where you have to throw your critic's hat out the window and just try to keep up. That's how I felt watching Half Moon. I'm fairly certain that there were many Iranian jokes and Persian allusions that I just didn't get. (How do I know that? Well, there was an Iranian guy sitting next to me in the theater who obviously did.) Still, I......

Though Westwood is now a smoking ruin, I am happy to announce that Optimus Prime and his heroic Autobots have defeated Megatron and his dastardly Decepticons. For those of you now whining "spoiler!"--come on. Does anyone really not know how Transformers is going to end? Don't worry. They left plenty of room for sequels. I just want to take this time to personally thank the programmers of the LA Film Festival for finding a......

Thousands of innocent Angelenos are expected to perish today when a highly advanced robot civilization descends on Westwood. However, the carnage is not expected to ensue until 8:15 p.m. so you'll have most of the day to get your affairs in order. That's right, the LA Film Festival is celebrating the glory of independent film with a mult-theater premiere of the multi-million dollar budgeted Transformers. Indie favorite Michael Bay directs. If such esoteric fare......

Today the festival begins with another Director Lunch Talk at 12:30 p.m. at the Target Red Room. Los Angeles Times writer John Horn talks with Scott Prendergast, director of Kabluey (screening at this year's LAFF). At 7:00 p.m., Who Let the Blogs Out?, a panel discussion of L.A. film bloggers, kicks off at the W Los Angeles in Westwood. Variety's Anne Thompson moderates and one of my favorites, the curmudgeonly Jeffrey Wells, is on......

A good documentary tells a compelling story that may have otherwise remained unknown. The best ones do so through people you can't believe actually exist. Such is the case with The Town That Was. Using a blend of archival footage and recent interviews, directors Chris Perkel and Georgie Roland tell the sad, strange story of Centralia, Pennsylvania and one of its last remaining residents, the marvelously eccentric John Lokitis. In 1962, Centralia was a......

Now that the frenzied first weekend is over, it should be much easier going at the L.A. Film Festival in terms of actually getting to see a movie. Virtually every film playing today shows either standby availability or tickets available at the door. Free events, unfortunately, are in short supply. Of course, there's the daily Bands on Broxton at noon and 7 p.m. at the Festival Promenade, but the only other free event is......

The festival kicks off this morning with a director's coffee talk at the Landmark. Scheduled panelists include moderator James Mangold, Paul Haggis and the next Bond director Marc Forster. Tickets are $11. The big event today (and it's free!) starts at noon and runs until 6:00 p.m. at the Landmark Regent Theater. It's Live Earth Day: A Celebration of Earth and includes 50 short films commissioned by SOS-Live Earth. Some of the filmmakers who've......

Horror movies seem to come and go in cycles. Just as the wave of Japanese re-makes tapered off, so-called “torture” porn began its ascent. Given that, it’s refreshing to watch a horror film like The Wizard of Gore that doesn’t fit neatly into any category. It certainly has its share of gore (wonderfully specific and gruesome, by the way), but the bloodletting never overshadows the psychological war that is at the heart of the......

It's Saturday so expect lots of LA Film Festival action in Westwood. At 9:30 a.m. you can attend a free Hi Def Video Expo at Bel Air Camera. Other free events are the Made in L.A. screening at noon at the Mann Festival Theater, The Game of SKATE Tournament at 1:00 p.m. at the Festival Promenade on Broxton, The Bands on Broxton at 4:30 p.m. (also at the Promenade), A Conversation with Festival Artist-in-Residence......

A man sitting to my left exited the theater at about the one hour mark, never to return. Were I not obligated to give the film a fair and complete review, I might have joined him. Rare is the movie that prompts that reaction in me (think Johnny Be Good) but The Year After was so interminably dull that I actually considered it. The film follows 17 year-old Manu (Anaïs Demoustier) in the year......

It's the first real day of the LA Film Festival so naturally a lot of films have sold out. But take heart--there are plenty of things to see. As of this morning, stand-by tickets are still available for Interview. Directed by Steve Buscemi and starring Buscemi and Sienna Miller, Interview tells the story of a journalist interviewing a celebrity that he doesn't particularly like (imagine that?). An adaptation of Theo Van Gogh's 2003 film......

The LA Film Festival returns to Westwood tonight with the world premiere of Kasi Lemmons’ Talk to Me (not Talk To Me) at the Mann Village Theater. The film stars Don Cheadle and Chiwetel Ejiofor and tells the story of Ralph Green, an ex-drug addict and convicted felon who became one of Washington D.C.’s most prominent disc jockeys and community activisits in the 60s and 70s. A sure to be congested after-party follows the......