The second season of "Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath" is set to premiere on Tuesday at 9 p.m. But before you tune in, you'll want to get caught up on all the revelations about the notorious church from the show's first season.

After splitting from the church in 2013, "King of Queens" star Leah Remini gave other former Scientologists a platform with the A&E series to discuss their experiences.

She was joined by former high-ranking people in the organization, who each have stories about secretive teachings, alleged shady business dealings, and purported abuses of its followers, former members, and their families.

In the upcoming season, Remini is stepping up the stakes. She hopes to provide enough evidence of wrongdoing to prompt a federal investigation into the religion.

"I'm talking about the FBI, the police, the Department of Justice, the IRS," Remini said. "If the FBI ever wanted to get anywhere, all they would need to do is do a raid. Everybody who's ever gone to Scientology has folders, and anything you've ever said is contained in those folders."

The church declined to take part in the series. It said that the statements Remini and the other contributors to the show have made about Scientology are false and driven by a desire to profit or gain publicity from their time in the religion.

To prepare you for the season two premiere, here are all the most shocking revelations about Scientology, according to the show:

SEE ALSO: Conan O'Brien says Scientology is 'not happy' about his revealing Leah Remini interview

DON'T MISS: Scientology created a website to bash Leah Remini and her new TV show of 'liars'

Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard was under investigation in multiple countries and lived on a ship supposedly to evade any one country's jurisdiction.

Scientology's former international spokesman Mike Rinder explained that in the early years of Scientology, the church was under investigation for being a cult. In fact, Australia banned the church in 1965 after an investigation.

L. Ron Hubbard lived on a ship called the Apollo. Rinder described it as the "floating headquarters for Scientology." Since he was being investigated by the UK and other countries, Hubbard found that he could sail away into international waters when necessary and away from the jurisdiction of any one country.

Hubbard based Scientology on his claim that he healed himself from war injuries — a claim that "Going Clear" author Lawrence Wright says is fabricated.

Lawrence Wright, the author of the best-selling book on Scientology, "Going Clear," says his research found that Scientology's documentation of Hubbard's injuries and military service was faked.

Wright said his research into Navy documents found that Hubbard had no serious injuries, which Wright sees as a major fault in the church's foundation.

Additionally, Wright said he found that Scientology's claims that Hubbard received many military service awards and records were false. In response, Wright said, the church told him that the records were "sheep-dipped" — that the military created a whole set of fake documents to cover up Hubbard's covert military duties.

"That's the person that the church has to protect," Wright said. "With encasing [Hubbard] in this myth, they try to cover the efforts of people like me and others to uncover the truth."

David Miscavige rose to lead Scientology by capitalizing on Hubbard's death.

After steadily rising through the ranks and becoming Hubbard's adviser, David Miscavige announced the founder's death in 1986. Hubbard's passing was framed as an intentional decision by him to leave his body to go onto even higher levels of spiritual being.

"The core belief of Scientology is that you are a spiritual being," Remini said. "L. Ron Hubbard had reached, obviously, the highest level of Scientology there was to reach, promoting this idea that there's an afterlife, and he found the answer to it by deciding to discard this body to go explore new OT levels. All of this is bulls---. L. Ron Hubbard died of a stroke."

As Hubbard's closest adviser, Miscavige assumed the leadership of Scientology. His official title is chairman of the board of the Religious Technology Center. But according to Rinder, Miscavige likes to refer to himself as "the pope of Scientology."

Attorneys representing a HuffPost contributing writer are fighting back against Fox News host Eric Bolling's $50 million defamation lawsuit, calling it "utterly devoid of merit" and demanding that it be dismissed.

"The Summons with Notice you filed ... is purposefully sparse on allegations, and does not identify which purportedly 'false and misleading' statements could possibly support a $50 million damages award," Yashar Ali's attorney, Patricia Glaser wrote in a letter addressed to Bolling's attorney.

Bolling filed the defamation lawsuit against Ali, a paid freelancer under contract, who published allegations that Bolling sent lewd messages to some colleagues at Fox News. Attorneys for Bolling claim that Ali's report had injured their client's reputation "through the intentional and/or highly reckless publication of actionable false and misleading statements."

Ali's counsel are fighting the defamation accusation, saying that "there is no evidence of actual malice" and that Ali had "conducted a thorough investigation and verified his information with 14 independent sources."

"As a result, Mr. Bolling, a public figure, is not entitled to any damages from Mr. Ali. Furthermore, truth is always a defense to defamation," Glaser's letter continued.

The fiery response also appeared to call out the specific target of the dispute. "We view your decision to sue Mr. Ali in his individual capacity, for $50 million, without also naming the Huffington Post, as a calculated effort to harass and intimidate Mr. Ali personally. It will not work," the letter said.

"We welcome the opportunity to depose Mr. Bolling and review his message history, as we presume that you have instructed him to preserve communications," the letter to Bollin's attorney read. "At best, you failed to investigate Mr. Bolling's claims, at worst, you were aware his claims were false but proceeded regardless."

SEE ALSO: Fox News host Eric Bolling is suing a reporter for $50 million over a story about sexual-harassment allegations

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NOW WATCH: 8 details you might have missed on season 7 episode 4 of 'Game of Thrones'

• Pussy Riot's Nadezhda (Nadya) Tolokonnikova hasn't stopped fighting Putin's autocratic rule, using art as activism
• Tolokonnikova spent 22 months in a Siberian prison camp for a 2012 performance
• She talks democracy, political engagement, and the US-Russia connection

Nadezhda (Nadya) Tolokonnikova is one brave soul.

Much of the world cowers at the mention of Vladimir Putin these days, especially after Russia’s brazen interference in the 2016 US presidential election. Tolokonnikova, a prominent face of the art collective Pussy Riot, actively resists Putin’s oppressive dictatorship with bold acts of expression as political activism that often threaten her personal safety — and even her freedom.

Now that American politics has become increasingly Putinized, the Russian activist has a simple message for Americans: Don’t take your liberties for granted because they can be stripped away in an instant. 

"Starting the 1990s, people started to believe that, oh, we can just spend time with our own issues, our own private stuff and not pay attention to what’s going on in politics because it’s not really relevant," Tolokonnikova told Business Insider from Moscow in a wide-ranging telephone. "We have enough freedoms and we don’t need to fight for them anymore. Activism was no longer cool."

Now that Trump is in power, she says, "I think that what’s going on right now is a backlash." She continued, "It’s a reminder to all of today’s young kids that it’s important to fight for your rights because they can easily be taken away."

Rather prophetically, Pussy Riot released a video called "Make America Great Again" on YouTube on October 27, 2016, just a week before the fateful presidential election. In the video, Tolokonnikova appears as a news anchor for "Trump TV" (which now actually exists), announcing that "everyone’s favorite, the great Donald Trump, has won the presidential election."

The clip then takes a dark turn as the song takes thinly-veiled swipes at Trump’s proposed policies. The refrain is a call to action that flips Trump’s own messaging on its head: "Let all the people in. Listen to your women. Stop killing black children. Make America great again."

"I totally understand Putin and Trump and their people can have something in common —  their background is similar," Tolokonnikova said.

She’s currently rushing to raise funds on Kickstarter for an immersive theater project that would take the audience through a deeply experiential tour of the Russian prison system, from its kangaroo courts to its lawless, fetid jails.

Tolokonnikova’s own reminders of the need for political involvement were never too far away, — and neither were extreme conditions. She was born just before the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989, in the glacially-northern Russian town of Norilsk, where the average temperature during the year is -10 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Farenheit). A Soviet mining town built from scratch in 1935, Norilsk has a population of around 180,000 and is one of the most polluted places on the planet.

"There was not a lot of culture there, so it was very lucky that a couple of amazing artists came to my town," Tolokonnikova said. "I remember I looked at them and I thinking they were truly alive because they way they navigated our cultural heritage was so free, it was the opposite of what I saw in my school.

"So I moved to Moscow when I was 16, because it was literally impossible to be a free-spirited, open-minded in a really small town, you will just not survive."

Effectively, Tolokonnikova grew up in a fledgling post-Soviet democratic experiment that never quite took hold and fairly quickly morphed into a brutal dictatorship led by a former KGB agent. That inspired her to become politically and artistically engaged at the early age of 14.

"I decided to become an artist and a philosopher because for me it was the same," she said.

After high school, Tolokonnikova enrolled in a philosophy program at Moscow State University and met up with other artists around the city who had similarly subversive inclinations to form the beginnings of what would become Pussy Riot.

'Virgin Mary, Mother of God, we pray thee, banish him!'

Pussy Riot rose to notoriety in 2012 after they performed a feminist punk-rock protest song in Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior, the Russian Orthodox religion’s most prominent symbol, which was increasingly in bed with an oppressive Kremlin regime that was jailing political prisoners and violently stifling dissent. It’s not difficult to see why the song was slightly offensive to the church patriarchy — or the proud autocrat. 

"Virgin Mary, Mother of God, banish Putin," the song begins. "Virgin Mary, Mother of God, become a feminist, we pray thee, become a feminist, we pray thee."

"Patriarch Gundyaev believes in Putin," it continues. "Better believe in God, you vermin! Fight for rights, forget the rite – join our protest, Holy Virgin."

What most people don’t realize is that Tolokonnikova and fellow activists Maria Alyokhina and Yekaterina Samutsevich were not arrested on the spot. They got kicked out of the church well before their song was finished, as the video shows. It was when the clip started to air on social media and came to the attention of the authorities that they became wanted by Putin’s security forces.

Tolokonnikova says she spent a week on the lam, literally running away from Putin’s cops by changing locations at different times, restricting communication, and hiding in secret spots. At one point she tried to sneak out to buy her daughter, who was about to turn four, a birthday present. She was detained by what she describes as a group of thuggish, plain-clothes characters whom the cops at the local precinct first thought to be criminals themselves.

Then came a prolonged period of psychological pressure and uncertainty that came with her sentencing, which was completely random in nature since technically no actual crime had been committed other than perhaps trespassing. Can one even trespass a church? No matter: Putin’s regime figured out a crime with which to charge them — "hooliganism."

"You could be stuck in prison for the next seven years," guards would warn her. She recalls being taunted in the most grotesque ways, saying the high-profile nature of her case forced the police to refrain from physical abuse that might leave visible scars, resorting instead to psychological terror.

"You’re a beautiful young woman, but when you get out you’ll be old, 29, nobody will want to f--- you," Tolokonnikova recalls being taunted by male officers.

Her ultimate sentence ended up being 22 months in a cruel and desolate penal colony in Mordovia, a judgment Amnesty International called unjustifiable and actively fought.

While in prison, Tolokonnikova started to protest the dire living and working conditions, which included 16-hour days of torturous and painstaking sowing and other manual labor with unreachable quotas that forced women to toil breathlessly until they fell ill. Punishments for even the tiniest of infractions, often concocted ones, included being left outside in the sub-freezing Siberian cold for prolonged periods. Tolokonnikova eventually went on a hunger strike.

Her bandmate, Alyokhina, reportedly described her time in prison as a series of "endless humiliations," including forced gynecological exams almost every day for three weeks.

'We think we are civilized'

Following their release, the pair immediately vowed to continue their fight against Putin’s autocratic regime by launching both an independent news outlet aimed at countering Russia’s propaganda machine and a prison advocacy group working to bring awareness of the plight of other inmates.

They traveled the world to discuss their own experience and advocate for prison reform. But instead of leaving Russia, where they could undertake artistic projects more freely and safely, the pair were resolute about returning to Moscow.

During the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics, Pussy Riot members were brutally beaten for another attempted performance protest.

To Tolokonnikova, who visited Rikers Island and other US jails, one of the most striking parallels between the United States and Russia are the two country’s giant, cruel and costly prison systems.

"It’s really striking to me, a lot of people really believe that we’re living in a civilized world, it’s 2017 and are civilized human beings," she said. "Um, not really. We have an army of slaves and America is the biggest one and second is China. Russia is third so it’s not great company."

Tolokonnikova urges everyone, especially young people, to be politically active and informed not as a matter of curiosity but, rather painfully in her case, out of urgent duty. "We can’t really wait for somebody else to come fix this problem for us," she said. "They will not."

SEE ALSO: Putin's show of strength overseas is masking a pressing domestic crisis

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NOW WATCH: Wells Fargo Funds equity chief: Shorting anything is 'playing with fire'

For millions of kids in the '90s, the war between Super Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog was serious business.

And for Nintendo and Sega, it was actually serious business. Nintendo controlled north of 90% of the video game market before Sega — and a speedy blue cartoon hedgehog named Sonic — showed up.

"Sonic the Hedgehog" — the original Sega Genesis game, not the character — is beloved among game fans of a certain age. It starred the hard-edged Sega equivalent of Nintendo's goofy, floppy-hatted Super Mario. It was fast, it was edgy, and it was fresh. (It didn't hurt that Sega included the game for free with new Genesis consoles, making it the first-ever successful free-to-play game.)

For years, fans have wanted a return to the original, 16-bit-era version of "Sonic the Hedgehog" that they grew up with. And now, those fans are taking over the creation of exactly such a project.

This is "Sonic Mania":

SEE ALSO: Nintendo is about to release a miniature version of the original SNES — here's everything we know about it

If "Sonic Mania" looks familiar, that's because it's a spitting image of the original "Sonic the Hedgehog" games.

It stars Sonic (the hedgehog), Tails, and a third playable character....

Knuckles! He's an echidna.

The PlayStation 4 is the world's most popular game console — by a mile.

There are many contributing factors to the PS4's dominance, but the biggest and most important reason is the games. Not only does it play most games made available on other rival consoles (like the Xbox One), but it also has an incredible lineup of games that are literally not playable elsewhere.

Many of the games on this list are Sony- or PS4-exclusive, but all of the following games are worth owning if you're one of the 63+ million people that owns a PlayStation 4. Check it out:

SEE ALSO: Every PlayStation 4 game I own — RANKED

The Witness

In "The Witness," you're alone on a colorful, serene island teeming with puzzles. Your job is to solve those puzzles. Some are easy, others will drive you to the brink of insanity — there's no other game like it.

The Last Guardian

"The Last Guardian," like "The Witness," is also about solving puzzles, but it's also about love and friendship, too. Most notable here is the hand-drawn art style — it looks and feels more like a living Studio Ghibli movie than a video game. It's also a PS4 exclusive.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

You will literally never run out of things to do in "The Witcher 3." The number of tasks, missions, and side quests is almost overwhelming — but it really speaks to the immersive level of this open-world fantasy game, which won several Game of the Year awards in 2015.

Online betting sites are typically thought of as spaces reserved for betting on sporting events, horse racing, and the like — but entertainment betting is now seeing a rise in popularity. 

Online gamblers — depending on what state they live in — now have a bunch of entertainment bets they can make: Everything from who will win the Emmy for best comedy series, to who will end up on the Iron Throne on "Game of Thrones."

Yes, you can even bet on "Game of Thrones." Or at least you could, until episodes started to leak.

Since the occurrence of "Game of Thrones" script and episode leaks this season, "Game of Thrones" betting lines have been pulled down.

Business Insider spoke to Pat Morrow, Head Oddsman at the online gambling site Bovada, about the effects that these leaks have had on his "Game of Thrones" lines. 

Morrow has helped create, and curate, the "Game of Thrones" betting lines over the past two years at Bovada. The lines Morrow created included predictions for who would be killed off in each episode, and who would take the Iron Throne at the end of season seven and eight. 

Morrow came up with the idea to offer "Game of Thrones" betting after watching "Game of Thrones" blow up his Twitter feed every Sunday night. Morrow started to look at what fans were talking about most, and questioned what kinds of betting odds he could put together for the show.

Morrow himself is a "Game of Thrones" fan, and has read the "Game of Thrones" books several times. He also regularly peruses fan theories on Reddit and other fan forums. Morrow proved to be the perfect person to create the "Game of Thrones" odds and betting lines, and took it upon himself to do so.

Betting lines, or proposition bets, are bets based on whether or not something will happen. Typically when oddsmen create these for sports, player stats (among other things) are factored in. But how gambling odds are created for a television show are a whole other ball field (pun fully intended). 

Morrow explained what is taken into consideration when creating the odds and betting lines for "Game of Thrones":

"There are a lot of different things that drive it. Part of it, I'd say the last couple of seasons — before the TV show not just caught up with the book, but then passed it — I was able to work off of book knowledge. After the fact it was the combination of not just my own knowledge, but also scouring the internet for the best fan theories, and trying to separate the ones that sound fun, and the ones that seem to be a bit more credible. And then of course, the last part is profiling. I often use this example, especially when we're talking about an entertainment setting like this, but someone betting — whether it's Los Angeles, or someone's betting from a part of the world were we know they're filming this, we would take a wager like that much more seriously than we would of someone betting in Iowa City. And that's not to bemoan the great people of Iowa City, but as far as I know, they're not doing any filming there. So, there's not the kind of hard math that we prefer to use when we deal with sporting events."

But sometimes a betting line is thrown into the mix just for fun.

"Last season, we put Hodor up on the Iron Throne at 5,000 to one, and took a few bets for that because we thought we'd have a laugh. And I guess it was worth it for the pay out as well. We tried to post more serious stuff this year. But unfortunately those leaks have hampered us a little bit," said Morrow. 

The leaks Morrow is referring to aren't just those from the recent HBO hack, but from other online sources that have given away spot-on details for unaired "Game of Thrones" episodes this season. Morrow cited one man's YouTube channel in particular, which gave away so many details about the first four episodes of "Game of Thrones" that Bovada ultimately had to take their betting lines down.

"He's not revealing his sources, but as a result, based on his YouTube channel, the entire season has kind of been spoiled, so it's forced us to pull everything down for the remainder of the season," Morrow said.

Morrow didn't say what the name of the "Game of Thrones" YouTube channel was that revealed these major plot points, but based on the popular "Game of Thrones" subreddit Freefolk (known for posting leaked "Game of Thrones" scripts and episodes), the YouTube channel Morrow is most likely referring to is Frikidoctor's. It is unclear where Frikidoctor is getting its information. 

At this point, there have been multiple leaks, and where spoilers are coming from has become confusing, but one thing that is certain is that "Game of Thrones" betting lines will be down for the remainder of the season. 

Since the spoilers reveal what happens in the future, it's impossible to fairly bet on any kind of "Game of Thrones" odds, and if Bovada were to adjust their betting lines according to leaked spoilers, they could give away the season's outcome. 

But not to worry, Morrow said that betting lines for season eight of "Game of Thrones" will go up right after the end of season seven, to get ahead of any spoilers that may leak.

And as for the oddsmaker's prediction for who will sit on the Iron Throne when all is said and done: Jaime Lannister. Do with this information what you will. 

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: 7 details you might have missed on season 7 episode 2 of 'Game of Thrones'

The 90s are so hot right now, and the creators of "Wet Hot American Summer" took advantage of that with "Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later," which made its debut on Netflix last week.

"10 Years Later" takes place in 1991, while the original 2001 film, and the first Netflix series "First Day at Camp," take place in 1981. 

While the absurd spirit of the out-there comedy remains in "10 Years Later," its 90s setting changed some things, from the hair to the fashion to the music. 

Creating a soundtrack that mirrors and makes fun of the best (and worst) of the 90s grunge scene was quite a challenge.

Business Insider recently spoke to Matt Novack, one of the composers, about the challenges of composing comedy, and parodying the music of a nostalgic decade. 

Here's what it's like to compose comedy, especially one like "Wet Hot," that is so outside the norm:

SEE ALSO: We talked to the guy who makes dragons come to life on 'Game of Thrones' about Sunday's big, fiery battle

"I fell into comedy and it just kind of hit me unexpectedly and I've loved it ever since."

Novack originally wanted to compose drama and sci-fi scores. 

"With 'Children's Hospital' and 'Wet Hot,' having the ability to score seriously with such an absurd style of comedy really helped sell the comedy itself, rather than just writing jokey, slap-sticky queues."

Novack pointed out that with comedy, it's easy to go too big with the music. Novack and his team work with the directors and creators of the show to make sure that they're letting jokes and scenes speak for themselves. 

"Everyone on 'Wet Hot' — all the actors, everyone involved, treats it as serious as possible. Even though it's completely bonkers . . it's true."

"A lot of the comedy works because the performances, everyone is committing to it," Novack said. "So I think the score takes the same approach. And this season, a lot of it had to do with doing a parody. This season there's a lot of horror, thriller, psychotic storylines. Part of that was just being an homage to that type of thriller."

In this shortened, seven-episode season of "Game of Thrones," basically anyone can be killed — and at any time. 

So to prepare you (and ourselves) for this intense season, which is already filled with deaths, we put together a list of all the characters still alive, with their chances of dying this week, and in the season generally.

We'll update each character's risk of death percentage every week, depending on what happens as the story progresses. 

Season seven episode five, "Eastwatch," airs Sunday night on HBO.

Here's who will live and who will die this week on "Game of Thrones:"

SEE ALSO: The 12 biggest questions we have after this week's 'Game of Thrones'

Tyrion Lannister — 100%

Chance of survival this episode: 100%. Turns out getting wrongfully accused of murder and having to escape execution is the best thing that has ever happened to this guy. 

Chance of survival this season: 75%. Tyrion is at a huge risk being in Westeros. And Dragonstone is too close to King's Landing for comfort. But the chances that we will see his death on the show are very slim. He's one of the people to root for and it's unlikely that George R.R. Martin will let the writers kill off his favorite character.

Samwell Tarly — 100%

Chance of survival this episode: 100%. This week Sam is fine, unless scooping maester poop. The Citadel is safe from any surprise attacks. 

Chance of survival this season: 88%. Sam will probably survive the series unless he catches Jorah Mormont's greyscale and can't seem to cure himself. 

Gilly — 100%

Chance of survival this episode: 100%. Gilly is fine!  

Chance of survival this season: 60%. Sam's got important things to do and they go everywhere together, which could be her ultimate downfall. 

Romantic comedies have been a staple in the Hollywood machine for as long as movies have been around. But the 1980s and 1990s was the genre’s golden era, as the likes of Rob Reiner (“When Harry Met Sally…”), Garry Marshall (“Overboard,” “Pretty Woman”), and Nora Ephron (“Sleepless in Seattle,” “You’ve Got Mail”) elevated the movies into emotional tear-jerkers that were perfect for date nights.

For those decades, the titles were solid box office moneymakers for the studios, and went on to become cash cows on DVD and cable (where many still play to this day).

And though the early 2000s saw new classics come into the fold like "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" and "Hitch," around 2010 romantic comedies at the studio level drastically slowed down. In recent years, they’ve all but stopped. Since 2010, rom-coms went from nine major studio wide releases (a high water mark for the genre in the 2000s) to zero released at the studio level in 2017.

The last rom-com to earn over $100 million domestically at the box office was 2015's "Trainwreck." 

What happened?

A big factor is the studios realized that comic book movies were where the money was (especially overseas, where rom-coms rarely ever make coin). The major studios only had three wide releases of comic book adaptations in 2010. Since then, there’s been a steady stream of six, sometimes eight (in 2014) comic book movies released by the studios yearly. By the end of 2017, five will have hit the multiplex.

But all the blame can’t be pointed at Iron Man and Wonder Woman. The studios also lost touch with how young people today connect romantically.

“Less people are getting married, or getting married young now than they were years ago, and the whole dating culture with the apps and online, there’s a subtle sea change in what that audience is looking at in terms of romantic comedy entertainment,” Billy Mernit, author of “Writing the Romantic Comedy” and story analyst at Universal, told Business Insider. “So you have the studios still making the same formulaic romantic comedy where it's a courtship story that leads to marriage, and it usually revolves around a young professional woman who gets a leg up by getting involved with an alpha male. The target audience, the twentysomethings and above, just no longer related to that kind of a movie and yet the studios seemed to be tone deaf to that change.”

But romantic comedies haven’t gone away completely. They’ve been modernized at the independent film level and have found success there.

Over the years movies like 2014's "Obvious Child" and 2015's "Sleeping with Other People" have proven that rom-coms can delve into some dramatic waters while still cracking jokes about the dating scene.

One of the most talked about movies of 2017 is Judd Apatow-produced “The Big Sick.” Though it's a romantic comedy, what stands out is its unique multicultural love story between a Pakistani man (Kumail Nanjiani) and white woman (Zoe Kazan). And it manages to find laughs even though it revolves around the guy caring for the girl who is in a coma.

The buzz about the movie going into this year's Sundance led to Amazon buying it for $12 million. Lionsgate is doing the theatrical release, and the movie has grossed over $35 million worldwide to date (it was made for $5 million). 

"There is slowly a shift in perception on what a romantic comedy is," Mernit said. "The smart romantic comedy writer of 2017 is writing a script that they aren't calling a romantic comedy. They have to have a fresh angle."

Or perhaps the smart rom-com writer is headed to TV. As movies find success now with raunchy R-rated comedies like "Bad Moms" and "Girls Trip," Mernit pointed out TV is where you can find the rom-coms, whether its "The Mindy Project" or "Catastrophe."

"The Catch 22 of the industry right now is the fact that tentpoles supersede all other types of filmmaking," Jeff Bock, senior box office analyst at Exhibitor Relations, told Business Insider. "Truth is, the romantic comedy genre doesn’t seem to have too many maestros as it once did. The Nora Ephrons of the world have faded to black, and love and laughs seem to have gone the way of the sitcom, and into streaming content."

So even though occasionally we may see someone like Amy Schumer convince a studio to release a movie starring her in search for love, the rom-com of yesteryear is pretty much extinct.

"The golden era of a romantic comedy coming out every week, we're done with that," Mernit said. "But the romantic comedy genre will never die because whether it's lesbian lovers, a threesome, or a girlfriend in a coma, we are still interested in seeing those stories. I don't think that's ever going to go away."

SEE ALSO: Steven Soderbergh has a new plan to make Hollywood movies outside the control of big studios

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: 8 details you might have missed on season 7 episode 4 of 'Game of Thrones'

One of the highlights from this year's Sundance Film Festival was "Ingrid Goes West" (opening in theaters Friday), a dark comedy starring Aubrey Plaza as Ingrid, a girl so addicted to her Instagram account that she becomes dangerously obsessed with the "Insta-famous" Taylor (Elizabeth Olsen).

With the help of Taylor's account, Ingrid knows everything from where Taylor lives to her favorite shops and restaurants. After inheriting over $60,000 following the death of her mother, and trying to put her life together after ruining her friend's wedding because she wasn't invited, Ingrid decides to start a new life out in California, in the same neighborhood Taylor lives in. The movie then chronicles Ingrid's "Single White Female"-like lengths to become Taylor's friend.

Plaza and Olsen talked to Business Insider at Sundance about the movie's commentary on social media, their realization that being internet famous can be a good business model, and the story behind one of the movie's funniest scenes (if you were a fan of K-Ci & JoJo, keep reading).

Jason Guerrasio: Is it frightening to think that there might be a person like Ingrid out there trying to connect with you through social media?

Aubrey Plaza: I don't think about that. I wouldn't think about that.

Elizabeth Olsen: I just don't want people to know what I'm doing. [Laughs] And not that I think I have a stalker, I just want to stay private.

Guerrasio: What do you guys think of social media in general? The movie is kind of a commentary on where we are.

Plaza: I think it's its own animal that is evolving and it's something that in years to come we'll look back on and learn a lot about. We're in it right now, so it's really hard to have a perspective on it, but it feels scary to me.

Olsen: I think it's advancing so fast and there's something always new, I think we're still exploring how it's most beneficial. "Black Mirror" is a show that shows you the scariest version, it's almost a cautionary tale.

Guerrasio: I feel this movie is the same way, too. I mean, there are things you want to tell your fans, but you also want privacy and not to be trolled.

Plaza: Yeah, I'm a private person and don't like sharing my private life with people, but as a producer and being in a professional business, there is a part of it where you need to give back. It's nice to emote something and you want to make things for those people, so having that is good sometimes.

Olsen: I keep thinking about maybe doing it —

Guerrasio: Really?

Olsen: Yeah, but I probably won't.

Plaza: [Laughs]

Olsen: Though I think about doing it.

Plaza: It's like coming up with something to post and then going, "Forget it, I'm not doing it."

Olsen: Yeah, I mean, honestly, from a specific business point of view, it would help me. But not in film or acting, it would help me in the other picture of all this, which is branding. Using it when I do a cover story, that would be helpful for me. And inevitably that is helpful for your projects. So there is a cycle and social media is very important to all those companies that you want to be on good terms with so you can promote your projects. I understand it from a business point of view and I have friends who handle it like a business, like you Aubrey (after a hiatus on Instagram, Plaza is back on it). But I just don't know how to commit to it.

Guerrasio: You can always start one and have someone else be in charge of it.

Olsen: No, I would want to do it. (Olsen is now on Instagram.)

Guerrasio: Aubrey, did you do a lot of research to play Ingrid?

Plaza: I definitely did a lot of thinking about it. I think the script was well-written and the character just jumped off the page. I think [director] Matt [Spicer] and I had so many conversations about what's wrong with her — it's never really stated.

Guerrasio: How about you, Elizabeth?

Olsen: Yeah, I did research. Matt actually had a list of 35 people on Instagram who we could model Taylor off of. When Matt first told me to do it, I was like, if I'm playing someone who does drugs, I don't have to go and become a drug addict, but at a point I was like, "Eh, lean into it." So I learned how to take Instagram-pro quality pictures with my phone.

Guerrasio: Doing the perfect selfie.

Olsen: Well, I'm not good at that. So Matt set up a fake account for me and I followed 35 people and it's fascinating. I have no clue who these people are, but they have millions and millions of followers and they get paid for it and they all look fabulous and they get invited to very prestigious things. I thought it was fascinating and humanizing. I try not to place judgments as a general rule of thumb but I think I had a little bit of judgment before and now I understand it's a potential career just like any other career.

Guerrasio: One of the funniest scenes is when you two are in the car singing the K-Ci & JoJo song "All My Life." How did that come together?

Olsen: I think there was another song first, but they couldn't get the rights for it.

Plaza: Yeah, it was Seal's "Kiss from a Rose."

Olsen: Oh, right! And doing this song was so much better.

Plaza: Wasn't that our first day together?

Olsen: Yeah, first scene we shot. I had practiced those lyrics so many times.

Plaza: I had not practiced. But yeah, you knew it. We were just in a desert in that truck in the middle of the night just singing that song.

Olsen: It was so much fun.

Guerrasio: How many renditions did you do?

Plaza: We did numerous versions. All different levels of energy from both of us. I'm sure we did real weird stuff, even weirder than the finished cut.

Olsen: We smoked so many cigarettes.

Plaza: It was so trashy, I loved it.

Olsen: [Laughs] It was great.

Plaza: It was this "Thelma & Louise" vibe.

Guerrasio: Aubrey, you are a producer on this film and another Sundance entry "The Little Hours." How does that feel, having work that you started from the ground up?

Plaza: It's really exciting. I've never produced before so it's always exciting as an actor to see your movie at Sundance, but as a producer it's even more exciting because you were there from the very beginning. It's like your child.

Guerrasio: Is the next step directing?

Plaza: I mean, I went to film school for writing and directing and I definitely want to direct, but I don't know when that will be.

Guerrasio: Any directing aspirations, Elizabeth?

Olsen: No.

Plaza: Really?

Olsen: I like acting. Though right now I'm developing two things and I have never had more fun pitching and being on projects from the beginning. It's frustrating but it becomes this thing that you fall in love with.

SEE ALSO: Al Gore explains our chances against climate change, and his fateful meeting with Donald Trump

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NOW WATCH: Here's the first trailer for the second season of 'Westworld'

You probably had never heard of Josh and Benny Safdie before this weekend. Though the brothers have been making shorts and feature films for the last ten years, none of them had a movie star, so without that vital component they might as well have been released on Mars.

However, that doesn’t mean their movies aren’t good. In fact, the Safdies’ past features “Daddy Longlegs” (2009), “Lenny Cooke” (2013), and “Heaven Knows What” (2014) are critically acclaimed works that showcase the incredible talents the brothers have as storytellers.

And that’s what caught Robert Pattinson’s eye when he saw a production still of “Heaven Knows What,” then watched the movie, and sought out the brothers about working together.

That has led to “Good Time” (currently in select theaters, nationwide August 25), a heist-gone-wrong movie that uses the pulpy feel of the genre to explore major themes, ranging from racial profiling to the prison industrial complex.

But its biggest triumph is the explosive performance by Pattinson as the movie’s lead, Connie. His transformation into a Queens criminal has given the movie a thrust into the mainstream, and with that, a higher profile for its directors.

The rewards have been life changing for the brothers. They walked amongst the legends in the South of France when “Good Time” had its world premiere in competition at the esteemed Cannes Film Festival earlier this year; they have done the top-flight interviews to promote it, like Charlie Rose; and now the Safdies are taking calls from major stars and Hollywood executives who want the same magic they sprinkled on Pattinson.

“Rob [Pattinson] had a desire to get deep with a project and he looked to us and felt some type of connection to us,” Josh Safdie told Business Insider. “Immediately it changed our budget, it changed everything.”

It was only a matter of time before the Safdies started working with Hollywood talent. At the time Pattinson came calling, the brothers were in the middle of getting their long-developed project “Uncut Gems” off the ground, and were chatting with Jonah Hill to play the lead. Set in Manhattan’s Diamond District, the project has Scott Rudin attached as a producer, Martin Scorsese as an executive producer, and A24 (the company that released “Moonlight”) as its distributor. The latter happened after the Safdies made “Good Time.”

But Pattinson’s enthusiasm to work with the brothers made them halt work on “Uncut Gems” (which because of Hill’s busy schedule was easy to do) and decide to build a project from scratch.

Taking ideas from a project the brothers' cowriter Ronald Bronstein was unsuccessful in trying to get off the ground, and Josh Safdie’s interest in making a movie with a bank robbery, they pitched Pattinson a story about a guy who tries to reconnect with his brother (played by Benny) after a stint in prison — which leads to disastrous results.

And thanks to Pattinson’s involvement, the movie features things the brothers never had access to before. They got aerial shots from helicopters, and permission to shoot in a bank and a shopping mall (in their previous movies they often “stole” shots around New York City, not having the budget to pay for permits).

“Someone asked us after ‘Daddy Longlegs,’ ‘What would you do with more money?’ and we were like, ‘We would make a bigger paper tornado,’” Benny Safdie told Business Insider. “We just want more and more.”

The Safdies admit, though, that the reason many of their previous movies didn’t have traditional roles, like an assistant director or a script supervisor, wasn’t because they shunned the mainstream. They just didn’t have the financial resources. With “Good Time,” the brothers feel it showcases what they can offer general audiences, when combining a respectable budget with their own unique talents. (The Safdies didn’t give an exact number for the budget, only that it was “way more” than their previous movies.)

“Hollywood, in large, has really embraced this movie, and really important, powerful people love this movie because I think for $200 million they can't buy what we did,” Josh said. “You have to know how to do it and that's a specialized skill and that's greater than CG. I think 10 years of filmmaking is starting to show in our work.”

Now the brothers are enjoying the rewards. When “Good Time” premiered at Cannes they spent their stay on the movie’s financier's yacht. They said the phone has been ringing constantly with top actors and executives. They want the experience the brothers gave Pattinson.

But the brothers are staying level headed about their new fame. They said they have already turned down a big budget movie offered to them because “it just wasn’t right.” What they really want to do, other than get hired to do the next big movie, is come in with ideas that launch the next Hollywood trend.

“I want to be the termite in there,” Josh said. “We are trying to reinvent this idea of what can be populous cinema. What can be pop culture. Movies. TV shows. There's a lot of ideas that we have that once we figure out a way in, we can start exploring.”   

Next for the brothers is “Uncut Gems,” which they plan to start shooting early next year. They said they would never have been able to pull off their plans for the movie if they didn’t make “Good Time” first. But Pattinson’s performance also showed Hollywood actors the type of dedication the Safdies expect when you sign on.

“Working with Rob sent a message to the industry saying we are willing to play the game,” Josh said. “We are willing to work with the people that you guys have anointed as stars, and we'll work with them. And not only will we work with them, we'll do it in a way that will be so satisfying to them, that other actors will want to do it. We're seeing that, but Rob set the bar high.”

SEE ALSO: Robert Pattinson opens up about his insecurities and his career-defining new movie

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NOW WATCH: 8 details you might have missed on season 7 episode 4 of 'Game of Thrones'

Alfred Hitchcock is more than just the master of suspense.

Throughout his career, the legendary director transformed cinema as we know it today through his unique visual eye, masterful storytelling, and incredible showmanship.

In celebration of his birthday on Sunday, we look back on his most memorable works — ranging from the crowd-pleasing "Psycho" to a movie regarded as one of the best ever made, "Vertigo."

Here are the 13 Alfred Hitchcock movies you need to watch in your lifetime:

SEE ALSO: How a guy who injected PEDs to see the effects scored a Netflix deal and uncovered the biggest doping scandal in Olympics history

1. "The Birds" (1963)

Hitchcock uses the attack of birds on a small Northern California town to highlight the madness that overcomes people when thrust into extraordinary situations. Made three years after the hit "Psycho," and in the midst of the TV show "Alfred Hitchcock Presents," this is the high watermark of Hitchcock's prominence in popular culture in his lifetime.

2. "Dial M for Murder" (1954)

Perhaps the most famous "Hitchcock blonde," Grace Kelly stars in this crime thriller about a man who attempts to kill his wife after learning she's had an affair. And things get very complex from there.

3. "North by Northwest" (1959)

Another favorite of Hitchcock's, Cary Grant plays a New York advertising executive who is mistaken for a government agent and finds himself on a cross-country chase from police, and bad guys, to clear his name. The movie features the iconic plane-chasing-Grant shot, and the thrilling conclusion on Mt. Rushmore.

• Filmmakers Billy Corben and Alfred Spellman used the perspective of drug dealers and hitmen to tell the story of "Cocaine Cowboys."
• When criminals get out of prison, they want to tell their stories to Corben and Spellman.
• Corben and Spellman explained their failed attempt to make the real-life story of Martin Scorsese's "Casino." 

Born and bred in Miami, Florida, director Billy Corben and producer Alfred Spellman grew up knowing a simple fact: their city has been, and will always be, a sunny place for shady people.

Whether it’s the refuge for retired mafia kingpins of the past, or most recently O.J. Simpson’s likely new home once he's released from prison in October, The Magic City has never been able to shake its notorious reputation.

For Corben and Spellman, memories of being kids in Miami include racing home after suddenly coming upon a massive drug bust on their way to school and realizing that all their neighbors suddenly were driving around in fancy cars, had big boats, or were building additions on their houses — all while the rest of the country was going through a recession in the '80s.

And then there was “Miami Vice.”

“The big thing [growing up] was finding, in town, where 'Miami Vice' was shooting," Spellman told Business Insider. “They were always just shooting the other day near your friend's house, that was the talk. It was a huge thing in elementary school."

When the two grew up (they've known each other since the 9th grade), and decided to get into making movies through their production company Rakontur, they didn't set up camp in Los Angeles or New York City. They stayed put in Miami and decided to tell the taboo stories of the city.

The first: making the real-life "Scarface" movie.

The Smugglers

Miami was the entry point for cocaine moving into the country in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It made the people who were trafficking it extremely rich, but it also made Miami, in that time, the most violent place in the country. The Colombian and Cuban drug cartels set up hits almost on a daily basis around the city.

It was a story Corben and Spellman felt had been glamorized in movies and TV, but never told the real way in documentary form. They planned to do that with "Cocaine Cowboys" — tell the story through the accounts of the people who were there. And not just on the law enforcement side, but the underworld as well.

But there was a problem. Corben and Spellman had zero connections in the city's drug world of that era. However, there's another simple fact about Miami: "You are basically two degrees of separation away," Corben told Business Insider. "You'll be at a bar and end up sitting next to a former smuggler."

And that's what happened to Corben's cousin on a sunny Miami day in 2003. While Corben and Spellman were beginning their research on the movie, Corben got a call.

“My cousin called me and he said, ‘Do you know who Jon Roberts is?’ And I’m like ‘No, but let me ask the office.’ And Alfred yells out, ‘Yes!’” Corben said.

In his research, Spellman had come across the book “The Man Who Made It Snow,” and in it Roberts is featured as a former New York City club owner who moved down to Miami to deal marijuana, and ended up being one of the major players dealing cocaine for the Medellín Cartel.

“It turns out Billy’s cousin met him at a pool and Jon wanted to know if we wanted to do lunch and meet,” Spellman said.

Up until this point, Corben and Spellman had hit closed doors whenever it came to talking to the people behind the cocaine that flooded into Miami in the 1980s. By the early 2000s “Scarface” was a bonafide classic constantly referenced on TV shows and rap songs, but for people living in southern Florida, the topic was still a sensitive subject.

“In Miami, you didn’t talk about cocaine, it’s just an era that had never been talked about,” Spellman said.

“My grandfather, who was a real estate developer in Miami Beach and South Florida, he was appalled we were doing the movie,” Corben said.

But after a sit down with Roberts, in which they explained to him that the movie would not feature a narrator, or have an agenda, and instead would be focused on the first-person accounts, Roberts was on board. And Roberts’ partner, Mickey Munday, a modern-day pirate who was in charge of smuggling the drugs into Miami through air and sea, quickly followed.

Corben and Spellman realized they possessed a tool that the former gangsters desperately needed to get back on their feet after years in prison: notoriety.

“Most people coming out of prison don’t have anything,” Corben said. “It’s life reset. You’re not helpless, but you have no income, you have no savings, some people don’t have any support system when they come out because people have disowned them. So you come out and all you have is your stories. I don’t want to call it your currency, but that’s what you have.”

Though Corben and Spellman said they never paid for an interview, they do not take their subjects’ life rights, which means the people they interview are free to use the notoriety they get from the movie to try and land a book or movie deal. (Thanks to the success of “Cocaine Cowboys,” both Roberts and Munday have done just that.)

After snagging Corben and Spellman, the filmmakers now had law enforcement, newspaper reporters, and smugglers all retelling how cocaine got to the shores of Florida. But they still didn’t have any Colombian enforcers.

The Hitman

Landing someone who would go on camera and speak about the murders they committed was obviously a huge challenge. In most instances, the hitmen were in prison for a single murder, so the person could only speak on what they had been convicted of. Corben and Spellman would want to talk to someone who could speak about a wide range of criminal activity.

Through the help of a homicide detective, Corben and Spellman reached out to three hitmen serving prison sentences. One was a man convicted for the murder of Barry Seal, the drug smuggler for the Medellín Cartel who Tom Cruise will be playing in the upcoming movie “American Made.” They also reached out to Miguel Perez, who is featured in “Cocaine Cowboys” as a hitman who once killed a target at an airport in broad daylight with a bayonet.

“This guy was described to us by a veteran homicide detective in the documentary as one of the scariest people he had ever encountered in his life,” Corben said of Perez.

Perez agreed to be interviewed. But after weeks of preparing, and hours on the day setting up lights and dolly track at the prison, Perez appeared from his cell to tell the filmmakers he would no longer do the interview after speaking to his lawyer.

“This took months to get to this point,” Corben said. “I’m on the other side of the room with the crew and I see Alfred wagging his finger at Miguel saying, ‘We came all the way here….’”

“I’m just yelling at him,” Spellman added. “And he said he couldn’t do it.”

The third person was Jorge “Rivi” Ayala. An enforcer for drug lord Griselda Blanco, aka “The Godmother,” Ayala was unique to the other hitmen the filmmakers reached out to. Why? Because Ayala had turned on Blanco and cooperated with authorities. Instead of getting the death penalty, he had immunity and could speak about over 20 homicides instead of just the one he was convicted on.

For five to six hours a day, for three visits, Corben and Spellman, along with a film crew, visited Ayala. And what they got from the interviews is some of the most compelling and memorable footage of “Cocaine Cowboys.” Ayala held nothing back as he talked about the people he killed and how insane his boss, The Godmother, was.

After “Cocaine Cowboys” premiered at the 2006 Tribeca Film Festival, the movie was bought by Magnolia Pictures. Though its theatrical release wasn’t that impressive, the movie would later gain a loyal following on the bootleg market, and quickly became a popular title in the hip-hop world. The movie has since found even more fans on Netflix and airs on movie channels like Showtime.

The filmmakers have also built up their status through their popular ESPN “30 for 30” documentaries “The U” and “Broke.”

That has made Corben and Spellman’s job of landing interviews with shady characters much easier. A major reason why “Cocaine Cowboys 2,” which delved deeper into the reign of Blanco, was made is because the main subject of the movie, Charles Cosby, saw that the promotional material for “Cocaine Cowboys” had a photo of him and Blanco. Cosby reached out to Spellman to get the photo, which led to the two talking and eventually deciding to do a movie.

And their two movies released in 2011, “Limelight” and “Square Grouper,” were made when the subjects reached out to the filmmakers directly. In the case of “Square Grouper,” main subject Robert Platshorn's first call after 29 years in prison for marijuana smuggling was to Corben and Spellman.

“We say, ‘When you get out of prison the first call you make is to your mother and the second is to Rakontur,’” Spellman said.

The real 'Casino'

But the pair hasn't landed every movie idea they’ve gone after.

Shortly after the theatrical release of “Cocaine Cowboys” in 2007, Corben’s cousin came through again. He told him that Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal, a mob associate and the person Robert De Niro's character is based on in Martin Scorsese’s “Casino,” lived in Miami Beach. As “Cocaine Cowboys” was spun as the real “Scarface,” Corben and Spellman felt it was time to tell the real-life “Casino.”

The duo tracked down Rosenthal, who suggested they meet at the posh Joe’s Stone Crab in Miami Beach.

Rosenthal, impeccably dressed as Corben recalled, dazzled the filmmakers with stories about his power plays with Hollywood, like how he forced the studio that released “Casino,” Universal, to change the real-life names of the mobsters for the movie. In the movie, Rosenthal’s name is changed to Sam “Ace” Rothstein. But when Corben pitched to Rosenthal the idea of a documentary about him, Rosenthal's reaction was simply that he’d “consider it.”

“So a two-hour, $250 lunch later, we walked out with a definite maybe,” Spellman said.

Two more very expensive lunches followed, including one in which Spellman had to move Rosenthal’s car so it wouldn’t get towed  — “I’m walking to the car and I’m thinking, ‘Are people still after him?’ I took a deep breath and started the car,” Spellman said — but they were still at a stalemate. Months after the final lunch, Rosenthal died.

“Funny enough, a month or so later I have lunch with an FBI agent we know, and I was spitballing ideas with him, and I told him the whole story about Lefty and he looked at me and paused and said, ‘He was the biggest snitch we ever had. He ratted on people until the day he died.’ So I realized he was still an asset of the agency and didn't want to put himself out there with doing a movie,” Spellman said.

Corben believes what has made them successful over the years is they are completely honest with their subjects. They don’t have fixers or field producers trying to track people down and convince them to be in the movie, like other movies and TV shows. It’s just Corben and Spellman building the relationships.

“I don’t even know what a fixer is,” Corben said with a laugh. “So much of what we do and the candid nature, we’re asking people to recount embarrassing, unflattering, or humiliating parts of their lives, like going to prison. Those relationships are so much about trust. I don’t know how we could do this any other way.”

And because of that they also are meticulous in the edit room to make sure nothing a subject says on screen is taken out of context. To date, the filmmakers say no one featured in one of their movies has ever said they were depicted unfairly.

“You’re dealing with people who would be very upset if we weren’t truthful,” Spellman said.

The duo aren’t done with the “Cocaine Cowboys” franchise. A third one, which will focus on a Miami Cuban crime family headed by Willie Falcon and Sal Magluta, is currently being made into a six-hour miniseries. But before that, there will be another documentary we’ll see from them. At the moment they are keeping that under wraps, but you can bet it will be set in Miami and involve shady people.

“All I’ll say for that one is the people called us on the way to prison and then on the way out,” Corben said.

SEE ALSO: The big Hollywood romantic comedy is dead — here's what happened to it

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NOW WATCH: Marvel dropped another trailer for 'Thor: Ragnarok' — and it looks incredible

Short sellers know you stayed home watching Netflix instead of going to the movies last night. And they're making wagers to profit from that very fact.

They've boosted short interest — a measure of bets that share prices will drop — in the four largest North American movie theater chains to the highest in years, according to data compiled by IHS Markit. That group includes Regal Entertainment Group, AMC Entertainment Holdings, Cinemark Holdings and Cineplex.

At the core of their bearish wagers is a declining movie-going audience — one that's shifting towards digital streaming and shunning the blockbuster fare that had been such a reliable driver of box office returns for so long.

In 2016, US moviegoers bought about 38 million fewer tickets than the previous year, causing total box office receipts to decline by $36 million, despite the average ticket price increasing by 2.6%.

The slowdown is even more pronounced amongst millennials. The audience of 18-to-39-year-olds declined for five straight years through 2015 before ticking slightly upward in 2016, according to the Motion Picture Association of America.

At the root of the slowdown is how the general population — particularly millennials — now consume their entertainment. With cord-cutting on the rise, they've already shown a willingness to eschew traditional cable in favor of streaming services like Netflix and Amazon. Now they're hurting your local cineplex too, and traders have noticed.

"Movie theater stocks are some of the least rewarding assets to own right now," said Simon Colvin, an equity and credit markets analyst at data provider IHS Markit. "The industry’s ability to keep drawing audiences — and its wider relevance in a highly competitive landscape — is now under question. An increasing number of short sellers are vying to enter this horror show."

For an indication of just how seriously film studios are taking the shifting dynamics of the movie industry, look no further than Disney's recently-announced standalone streaming service. The entertainment juggernaut is removing its films from Netflix to build its own platform.

It's a classic case of "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em," and it's just the beginning of the war for your eyeballs.

Here's a more detailed look at the big bets being made by short sellers against Regal and AMC, the two biggest movie theater chains in the US:

Regal Entertainment Group

While Regal has outperformed its peers in recent months, that relative strength has made it the most popular target in the movie theater industry for short sellers. It currently has more than 15% of its shares on loan, while the demand to borrow Regal's shares has surged by more than 50% in the last three months, according to IHS Markit.

AMC Entertainment Holdings

While AMC has 5.6% of its shares on loan, the highest in at least three years, the demand to short the company is actually even higher, says IHS Markit. Since the majority of the company's shares are held by shareholder Dalian Wanda Group, the portion of the AMC's free float being short is higher than it appears.

SEE ALSO: Companies are crushing earnings — but traders have nothing to show for it

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NOW WATCH: Stocks have shrugged off Trump headlines to hit new highs this week

You may not know his name, but chances are you’ve used a service or watched a channel with connections to John C. Malone.

The largest individual landowner in the US, Malone is the chairman of Liberty Media and has interests as wide ranging as race cars, the Discovery Channel, and the Atlanta Braves.

Here's a taste of his diverse interests:

• He is largest stakeholder of Liberty Media, which is worth $24 billion.
• He owns 28% of Discovery Communications, which just sealed a $14.6 billion deal for Scripps.
• He owns a quarter of Liberty Global, the largest international cable company with 29 million subscribers.
• He owns 8% of the publicly traded Atlanta Braves.
• He owns 2.2 million acres of land, making him the single largest landowner in the US.

But the media mogul wasn’t just born into his $9.22 billion net worth. Here’s how one of the richest and most powerful people in American business rose to prominence.

John C. Malone was born to parents of Irish descent on March 7, 1941, in Milford Connecticut, a suburb about two hours north of New York City.

He attended the prestigious Hopkins School in neighboring New Haven, graduating with a National Merit Scholarship in 1959.

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The school, founded in 1660, is one of the oldest and most prestigious in the country. But Malone didn't always feel that he fit in.

"I was neither a preppy nor a town kid," Malone said in 1994. "So I put a lot of energy into athletics." He got letters in fencing, track, and soccer. "It was raw drive, not skill," he says.

He has since donated $25 million to fund school's science center, which bears his name.

After high school, Malone stayed in New Haven and attended Yale University. He graduated in 1963 with a degree in electrical engineering and economics.

He has since donated $50 million to the university's engineering school, where some professorships bear his name.

Warning: Huge spoilers for "Game of Thrones" season seven, episode five, "Eastwatch." If you aren't caught up on the series or the season, read at your own risk. 

After another long week, season seven episode five of "Game of Thrones" finally arrived with more scheming and reunions.

There's a lot to remember, between the fermented crab and the return of Gendry, so we highlighted the episode's biggest moments. 

Here's our recap of "Eastwatch:"

SEE ALSO: Here's the preview for the next episode of 'Game of Thrones'

Daenerys has Drogon burn Randyll and Dickon Tarly alive for failing to bend the knee.

Daenerys tells the survivors of the Loot Train Battle that they can bend the knee to her or die. But Randyll and Dickon Tarly are too stubborn to surrender, despite their fluctuating loyalties. 

Tyrion opposes her decision, but they did betray Olenna Tyrell, so they kind of deserved it anyway. Less Mad Queen, more punishing people for being rude. 

Jaime and Bronn manage to make their way back to King's Landing safely because they're really good at holding their breath.

Their stories aren't over yet. 

Tyrion doesn't love the wreckage Daenerys and Drogon caused in the Loot Train Battle, so he tries to make some kind of peace.

Tyrion arranges a meeting with Jaime in King's Landing in an attempt to get Jaime to convince Cersei that they need to prepare for a common enemy: the army of the dead.

The reunion between the two brothers is intense since Tyrion killed their father, Tywin, back in season four, but Jaime is probably willing to do anything to avoid another battle with a dragon at this point. 

Warning: Spoilers if you have not seen "Game of Thrones" season seven, episode five.

Lord Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish put part of his mysterious master plan into work on Sunday's episode of "Game of Thrones."

In a scene late in the episode, Arya follows Littlefinger to his room at Winterfell, where he receives a mysterious scroll from an unknown man. Littlefinger asks the man delivering the scroll if it is the last remaining copy in Winterfell, and is told that it is. After Littlefinger leaves his room, Arya enters and searches for the scroll. Arya finds the scroll and seems to be shocked by its contents.

The scroll is from the first season of "Game of Thrones," when Cersei tells Sansa that the only way she would spare the life of her father (Ned Stark) is if Sansa writes to her mother (Catelyn Stark) and brother (Robb Stark), and asks them to bend the knee to Joffrey. Of course, Ned Stark is executed in season one, but not before Sansa sends ravens to her mother and brother, doing as Cersei and her advisors at the time (one of whom was Littlefinger) instructed.

The scroll that Arya finds is the scroll that Sansa sent to Robb.

This is what the scroll says:

"Robb, I write to you with a heavy heart. Our good king Robert is dead, killed from wounds he took in a boar hunt. Father has been charged with treason. He conspired with Robert’s brothers against my beloved Joffrey and tried to steal his throne. The Lannisters are treating me very well and provide me with every comfort. I beg you: come to King’s Landing, swear fealty to King Joffrey and prevent any strife between the great houses of Lannister and Stark."

In Sunday's episode, Littlefinger watches Arya leave his room, smirking — clearly he intended to lead Arya to find the scroll. Littlefinger is trying to sow seeds of doubt between the sisters. After all, what could upset Arya more than finding a letter from Sansa asking Robb to bend the knee to the person highest on her kill list?

Earlier in the episode, Arya questions Sansa's motives for hearing out the neighboring houses of Winterfell, who criticize Jon Snow for meeting with Daenerys. Arya accuses Sansa of preparing for leadership, should Jon not return to Winterfell, insisting that Sansa secretly wants to rule.

Sansa is surprised and uncomfortable with Arya's accusations, and quickly dismisses them before exclaiming that she needs to return to work. The Stark sisters have only just united and are already skeptical of one another. Littlefinger can see this and is choosing to exploit it by having Arya find that scroll.

On “Game of Thrones: Inside the Episode” showrunner D.B. Weiss explained the motivation behind Littlefinger’s desire to drive a wedge between Arya and Sansa.

Weiss said:

“Arya is very used to being more clever and more stealthy, and smarter than any of the people she’s up against, but she hasn’t dealt with Littlefinger for a while. She gets roped into spying on somebody who's actually leading her by the nose to something that he wants her to have.

He’s looking for a way to prevent this sister bond from developing further because the tighter they are the more definitively he is caught on the outside of it. On the Sansa end of the relationship he’s seen the opening and now all he needs to do is give Arya a cause to display real rage towards Sansa. And, he knows full well that with what’s going on in Sansa’s head with regards to Arya and how dangerous she is, when Arya starts to act dangerous, and act angry, he knows where Sansa is going to turn.”

By actively working to keep the Stark sisters from forming a tight-knit bond, Littlefinger can remain Sansa's confidant. And thus Littlefinger is one step closer to being Sansa's sole counsel, and just a little more powerful.

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Warning: Spoilers for "Game of Thrones" season seven. If you aren't caught up with the series, read at your own risk. 

Season seven of "Game of Thrones" has already proven to be one of the most brutal yet. There's already been some major battles and major deaths, including one that made dying look cool.

For now, most of the dead folks on this list died at the hands of Cersei or Drogon, but we're worried that the army of the dead will be responsible for the next batch of deaths, coming to your TV very soon. 

So here is your guide to who died on "Game of Thrones" so far this season:

SEE ALSO: The 8 biggest questions we have after this week's 'Game of Thrones'

Obara Sand

Time of death: Episode two, "Stormborn."

Cause of death: In his attack on Yara's fleet, Euron Greyjoy stabs the daughter of Oberyn Martell in the gut with a spear. By the end of the battle, her body is hanging from the ship, so she's definitely dead. 

Nymeria Sand

Time of death: Episode two, "Stormborn."

Cause of death: In Euron's attack, he strangles Nymeria, who is a daughter of Oberyn (and not Arya Stark's direwolf). At the end of the battle, her body is hanging from the ship, so she's also definitely dead. 

Tyene Sand

Time of death: Episode three, "The Queen's Justice" (kind of).

Cause of death: Cersei locks Ellaria up in a dungeon with her daughter, Tyene, who she poisons the same way Ellaria poisoned Myrcella: with a kiss and a poison called "The Long Farewell." So Ellaria has to watch her own daughter die a brutal death, and there's nothing she can do about it.

Barron's magazine forecasts that Netflix stock could fall by more than 50% by the end of 2020.

Sure, Netflix is one of the so-called FAANG stocks that are growing quickly and driving much of the stock market's gains. Its stock has multiplied 69 times on a split-adjusted basis over the past decade. And its monthly streaming service is popular and growing faster than expected.

But content-wise, Netflix is "chiefly a hit-renter, not a hit-owner," Jack Hough wrote in the August 12 Barron's cover article. And that, Hough argues, is its biggest weakness.

Here are some of Hough’s key arguments:

• Video is expensive, and Netflix is running low on cash to make or buy blockbusters. Netflix expects its cash burn to total $2 billion to $2.5 billion this year, up from $1.7 billion in 2016. And it's financing this with a lot of borrowing — it holds $4.8 billion in long-term debt.
• Disney's decision to exclude its new content from Netflix starting in 2019 is "troubling." Netflix's bids for licensed content would become harder because many content owners have already signed deals with competitors like Hulu.
• Netflix's accounting practices — like not categorizing a canceled show as a write-down — may be understating how high the company's costs are.
• Netflix isn't generating enough cash to justify its valuation; it's trading at 146 times its estimated 2017 earnings, according to Bloomberg.

Netflix shares fell 5% last week after the Disney announcement and news that Facebook was launching its own slate of original video content.

But Barron's covers are jokingly called a contrarian indicator in some financial circles, and for good reason. Just look at the magazine's September 2015 forecast that Alibaba would fall 50% — the stock has surged 135% since that cover.

The Barron's cover was released just before news of a major coup by Netflix. The company poached Shonda Rhimes from ABC Studios after a 15-year relationship that yielded shows including "Scandal" and "Grey's Anatomy."

SEE ALSO: Netflix is falling despite announcing a content deal with Shonda Rhimes

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Tom Cruise apparently injured himself while attempting a stunt on the set of "Mission: Impossible 6" in London.

TMZ obtained video on Sunday of the superstar attempting to jump from the top of one building to another and falling short of his mark. 

Here's video of the stunt:

The 55-year-old actor, who has become known in the last decade for pulling off amazing stunts without the help of a stunt double, looks to have injured his right leg when he crashed into the side of the building he was jumping to. He's visibly limping after climbing onto the top of the building.

Cruise had two safety cables attached to him.

The actor was pulled back with the cables to the building he originally jumped from and is seen limping away out of view of the camera.

Business Insider contacted Paramount Pictures and Cruise's rep for an update on his condition and did not receive an immediate response.

This looks to be one of the more tame stunts Cruise has done in recent years. For "Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation," the actor hung on the side of an Airbus 400 as the plane sped down the runway and eventually took off. For "Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol," he climbed the tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

Paramount plans to release "Mission: Impossible 6" on July 27, 2018.

SEE ALSO: How the "Cocaine Cowboys" filmmakers built a career interviewing Miami's most notorious gangsters

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