Variety reported that Dershowitz, who served on Epstein’s legal team and helped ensure that Epstein only spent 18 months in prison via a plea deal in 2008, took issue with a recently aired Season 4 episode of the CBS All Access legal drama, in which fictional characters referred to Dershowitz several times, including calling him a “shyster.” On July 17, Dershowitz’s lawyers sent CBS and several individuals connected to “The Good Fight” a letter demanding the streaming service remove the episode’s Dershowitz-centered content, desist from airing other allegedly defamatory content in the future, and to issue a public apology to Dershowitz....

Ring founder and inventor Jamie Siminoff previously appeared on “Shark Tank” as a contestant and later a Guest Shark. “The Ring surveillance network used to garner clips for Ring Nation does so at the expense of Black and brown people. Ring has a long history of using racially coded dog whistles and weaponizing race to promote their products,” the letter states. “And the accompanying Neighbors app gamifies the profiling and criminalization of Black and brown individuals....

When filmmaker Zack Snyder and his producer (and wife) Deborah Snyder took their original zombie movie “Army of the Dead” to Netflix, the streaming giant offered them plenty that other studios (including the Snyders’ long-time home, Warner Bros.) balked at: a guaranteed, multi-pronged new franchise. As Deborah Snyder explained to IndieWire earlier this month, “I don’t think would have been made had it not been for Netflix. Everyone has to make these safe choices and I feel with the streaming services, they’re a little bit more bold and brash, and I think that’s really good for filmmakers....

These important titles at key film festivals are now in the purview of their streaming distributors. That turns what was once a relatively straightforward proposal — promoting a film’s theatrical run — into something much more complex, even political. How does a streamer distribute a film that was made to be seen in theaters while not undermining the reason that it bought the title in the first place — i.e., to tempt the public to subscribe so they can see it at home?...

“John is a really big fan of Jacques Audiard,” Plaza said. “There’s a movie called ‘The Beat That My Heart Skipped’ and that movie was a big reference for him. A lot of foreign films. We talked a lot about ‘Head-On,’ which is Fatih Akın. And also the Safdie Brothers’ ‘Good Time.’ That movie was a reference because there’s something about the momentum of those movies that they just barrel forward....

After cracking some self-deprecating jokes about the fan perception that he has permanently changed his voice to sound more like Elvis, Butler gave a shoutout to his sister in the crowd and told some stories about their childhoods. “We grew up in Anaheim, California, hence the Southern accent,” he said. “And since we were homeschooled, sometimes my mom would say ‘we’re taking the day off, we’re going to Disneyland!’ And we were so excited, but by the ninth time she did that I was like ‘I don’t think Mom knows how to teach....

By the end of the weekend, after multiple showings, “Belfast” was the crowdpleaser of the festival. “It was a very charged experience,” Branagh said in a recent interview in Los Angeles. “When we got there, first of all I was impressed by the size of the venue and the size of the screen, all these basic things that accompany the release of a film, and then how many people were there....