Individual 'Indiana Jones' movies hit DVD for the first time on May 13th

Just in time to capitalize on the May 22nd release of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Paramount and LucasFilm are releasing the first three Indiana Jones movies on DVD individually for the first time on May 13th.

Previously, the films were only available on DVD as a complete collection. In May, the films will be available as both singles and as a collectible set.

All three films have new bonus features:

Raiders of the Lost Ark
Raiders of the Lost Ark: An Introduction by Steven Spielberg & George Lucas
Indiana Jones: An Appreciation - The cast and crew of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull pay tribute to the original trilogy.
The Melting Face - A recreation of the amazing physical effect of the villain's melting face in Raiders of the Lost Ark, including Steven Spielberg and George Lucas commenting on the evolution of visual effects and CGI.
Storyboard Sequence - The Well of Souls
Galleries: Illustrations & Props, Production Photographs & Portraits, Effects/ILM, Marketing
Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures Game Demo and Trailer

Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom: An Introduction by Steven Spielberg & George Lucas
Creepy Crawlies - Steven Spielberg, George Lucas and Frank Marshall reminisce about snakes, bugs and rats
Locations - Travel across the world to discover where the films take place and where they were shot.
Storyboard Sequence - The Mine Cart Chase
Galleries: Illustrations & Props, Production Photographs & Portraits, Effects/ILM, Marketing
Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures Game Demo and Trailer

Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: An Introduction by Steven Spielberg & George Lucas
The Women: The American Film Institute Tribute - The three Indiana Jones women (Karen Allen, Kate Capshaw and Alison Doody) reunite for a discussion.
Friends and Enemies - Steven Spielberg, George Lucas and Indiana Jones writers discuss how they created the most iconic characters in film history, including a look at new faces in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
Storyboard Sequence - The Opening Sequence
Galleries: Illustrations & Props, Production Photographs & Portraits, Effects/ILM, Marketing

Performing an Audio Pan in FCP

You can make your audio more dynamic in Final Cut Pro by panning sound effects from the left speaker to the right from within the Viewer Window.

A sound effect, such as a passing car panning from the left speaker to the right, can add another dimension to your project and lessen the flatness of canned sound effects.

Before you try this, keep in mind that you only need a mono clip to perform this effect, so if you have a stereo pair, unlink the two and delete one of the tracks.

1 Double click on the audio clip to load it into the viewer.2 Click on the channel tab in the Viewer Window.3 Option click on the purple audio spread overlay in order to get the pen tool to create keyframes and drag the points of the line so that it looks like the diagram below. When you begin to move the purple overly you will see a pink line underneath it. It helps if you think of it in this way: think of anything above the pink line as being the right channel and anything below as being the left channel.

Now the audio in this clip will pass from the left speak through the right when played.

Film

Film is a term that encompasses individual motion pictures, the field of film as an art form, and the motion picture industry. Films are produced by recording images from the world with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or special effects.

Films are cultural artifacts created by specific cultures, which reflect those cultures, and, in turn, affect them. Film is considered to be an important art form, a source of popular entertainment, and a powerful method for educating — or indoctrinating — citizens. The visual elements of cinema give motion pictures a universal power of communication; some movies have become popular worldwide attractions by using dubbing or subtitles that translate the dialogue.

Traditional films are made up of a series of individual images called frames. When these images are shown rapidly in succession, a viewer has the illusion that motion is occurring. The viewer cannot see the flickering between frames due to an effect known as persistence of vision, whereby the eye retains a visual image for a fraction of a second after the source has been removed. Viewers perceive motion due to a psychological effect called beta movement.

The origin of the name "film" comes from the fact that photographic film (also called film stock) had historically been the primary medium for recording and displaying motion pictures. Many other terms exist for an individual motion picture, including picture, picture show, photo-play, flick, and most commonly, movie. Additional terms for the field in general include the big screen, the silver screen, the cinema, and the movies.

READING BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN

Putting together a syllabus for a course at Dartmouth - Queers, Queens, and Questionable Women: How Hollywood Shaped Post-War GLBT Politics and Vice Versa - Michael Bronski was amazed "at not only how brief, and fast moving, the history of specifically queer criticism has been, but also how protean it has been." His brief history begins with "the brilliant, and now largely forgotten by younger queer writers and academics, Parker Tyler," and takes Richard Dyer, B Ruby Rich and Vito Russo into consideration on his way to the present: "Academic queer film studies now finds itself in the sometimes awkward position of responding both to a need to continue to professionalize its work as well as to wrestle with the changing state of the market, which is now utterly different than it was a decade ago, never mind three decades. This cultural shift is, to varying degrees, apparent in the three volumes of recent queer film writing under review." And they are: The View from Here: Conversations with Gay and Lesbian Filmmakers, The Cinema of Todd Haynes: All That Heaven Allows and Reading Brokeback Mountain: Essays on the Story and the Film.

What movie grossed the most on Leap Day (February 29th)?

February isn't really known as a box office friendly month as most blockbusters either came out during the previous holiday season or are being held until the Summer. However, if you were to rank the highest grossing day from each month, February would come in 6th, behind only May, July, June, November and December.
The main reason for this uncanny success is due to one movie, The Passion of The Christ, which occupies four of the top five highest February days of all-time. The Passion of The Christ came out in 2004, also a leap year, and its Sunday take of opening weekend was $27.9 million, good enough for the second best single day in February ever. It so happened that is was also Leap Day.
Today, Will Ferrell's Semi-Pro opens and should do great business this weekend, but I would be shocked if it came close to challenging The Passion of The Christ's record.

Interview. Tony Gilroy.

Tony Gilroy had been writing screenplays and watching directors turn them into movies for about a decade when he wrote Michael Clayton. For six years, the project simply would not get up off the ground. Then along came Jason Bourne. With the help of, among others, George Clooney, Sydney Pollack and Steven Soderbergh, he was finally able to get Michael Clayton made - and direct it himself.

The film was well-received when it premiered at the Venice Film Festival and lauded in Toronto. But when it hit theaters... well, you may have missed it. Now's your chance. It's out on DVD this week, just in time for the Oscars. It's been nominated for seven of those, including Best Picture. And Gilroy's been nominated for Best Director and Best Screenplay.
Michael GuillÃ