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Spike Lee's new film 'BlacKkKlansman' is based on an electrifying true story, and it has a 98% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes

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blackklansman poster

Critics are praising Spike Lee's latest film, "BlacKkKlansman," as the best work in years from the acclaimed filmmaker. 

The movie is based on the true story and memoir of Ron Stallworth, the first African-American detective to work in the Colorado Springs police department, who in the late 1970s devised a plan to infiltrate and expose the Klu Klux Klan. 

"BlacKkKlansman" was developed and produced by Jordan Peele (the Oscar-winning director of "Get Out"). Peele brought the project to Lee as a working concept in 2017, and critics are calling the resulting work a dynamic mix of crime drama and comedy, as well as a sharp social commentary on both the past and present.

The film, which stars John David Washington and Adam Driver, currently has a 98% "fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes. 

Here's what critics have said about "BlacKkKlansman," which opens nationwide on Friday:

SEE ALSO: The 100 best science fiction movies of all time, according to critics

"Spike Lee returns to form with a true-life story that works as comedy, crime drama and political alarm-bell all at once."

Rafer Guzman, Newsday



"Spike Lee's hellraiser about a black cop who infiltrated the KKK in the 1970s is also an incendiary indictment of our current Trump moment and one of the best films of the year. A cinema giant has found his voice again and the power to make it heard."

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone



"Its fiery message couldn't be more timely - and its rage more justified."

Chris Nashawaty, Entertainment Weekly



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The Marvel Cinematic Universe needs to save the 'X-Men' franchise and start it from scratch

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xmen

  • The "X-Men" franchise as we know it needs to end so that the Marvel Cinematic Universe can reinvigorate its characters after the Disney-Fox merger.
  • Upcoming "X-Men" movies, "Dark Phoenix" and "The New Mutants," have faced delays and extensive reshoots, which could spell trouble. 
  • The franchise's timeline has become a convoluted mess, and the movies are only good when they ignore it.
  • The MCU would breathe new life into the X-Men characters like it has others, but Disney shouldn't be afraid to hit the pause button either.

 

It's been 18 years since the original "X-Men" movie arrived in theaters. It kickstarted a superhero movie revolution, leading the way for "Spider-Man" and other, less successful movies to follow in the immediate years after.

Since then, the "X-Men" franchise has grown into its own cinematic universe, before that term was even mainstream. It's spawned prequels, sequels, and spin-offs — some better than others. The Marvel Cinematic Universe owes a lot to the "X-Men" franchise, which has managed to churn out movie after movie over such a long period of time.

And now, the "X-Men" franchise as we know it needs to end — if only to survive. How it should do so is by succumbing to its new owner Disney and joining the MCU, which has been its competition for the last ten years.

The next film in the "X-Men" series, "X-Men: Dark Phoenix," was pushed back in March from this November to February 2019. And now, according to Montreal newspaper La Presse, the film will need three months of  extensive reshoots, based on a report from the Quebec Film and Television Council.

A spin-off horror movie focused on superpowered youths called "The New Mutants" also saw changes in its release date — twice. It was first pushed back from this April to February 2019, and then moved again to August 2019 for reshoots.

Reshoots don't necessarily spell disaster for movies, and the creators have maintained that they aren't a sign of trouble.

But reshoots can mean that a movie is in trouble. The "Star Wars" franchise is a fine example. "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" went through reshoots, but ended up being, for the most part, a critical and commercial success. This year's "Solo" was a different beast. It was the worst-reviewed movie in the franchise since "Attack of the Clones," and was expected to lose Disney money when it disappointed at the box office.

At this point, especially with the news that "Dark Phoenix" reshoots will take three months, it's not hard to imagine that the franchise needs to be reinvigorated and start from scratch. The best way to do that would be for these characters to join the MCU after the Disney-Fox merger.

Ever since 2014's "X-Men: Days of Future Past," the franchise's timeline has been a convoluted mess. "Logan" got around that by being a standalone movie that focused on the title character, and subtly acknowledged the history of the other movies. The "Deadpool" movies have also been able to succeed despite the timeline issues, mostly because they are parodies of superhero movies that are only loosely connected to the "X-Men" franchise.

But the most recent movie that tried to maintain its existence within the larger "X-Men" universe was a failure. "X-Men: Apocalypse" has a 48% Rotten Tomatoes critic score, making it one of the worst-reviewed movies of the series. It made over $500 million worldwide, which isn't terrible, but is also well below the R-rated "Logan" and both "Deadpool" movies, and its predecessor "Days of Future Past." I don't foresee "Dark Phoenix" or "The New Mutants" performing much better.

The merger casts such a large shadow over the current incarnation of the "X-Men" franchise, that it's hard to be excited about the upcoming movies even if they weren't surrounded by reported production issues."Dark Phoenix" and "The New Mutants" might not even matter in the near future storywise.

the avengers

We don't know what Disney plans to do with the X-Men characters, but it has numerous release dates set for yet-to-be-announced Marvel movies through 2022. Disney won't let a popular property like the X-Men sit idle for too long, though the series would benefit from taking a break.

The MCU has proven to be a successful launchpad for unknown characters like the "Guardians of the Galaxy," but has also breathed new life into characters like the Hulk and Spider-Man. It could do the same for the X-Men ... maybe just not right away. It's okay for Disney and Marvel to hit the pause button, but in a few years, the X-Men could use a complete reimagining.

If the MCU can strip the franchise down to its essentials —a small, core team like the Avengers started out as — then the X-Men characters would be able to start fresh for new and old audiences (the same be said for Fox's other superhero property, the Fantastic Four, which has seen its own share of problems on the big screen). 

The X-Men's inclusion into the MCU would also open up tons of story possibilities going forward. In the comics, X-Men villain Magneto is the father of Scarlet Witch, played in the MCU by Elizabeth Olsen. Because Fox owned the X-Men, the MCU hasn't been able to use the term "mutants." Now, it can.

The MCU would benefit from these possibilities if its veteran actors like Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr. distance themselves from the universe after next year's "Avengers 4."All signs also point to "Avengers 4" being a turning point for the MCU, and the franchise will need new blood if it wants to last another 10 years or more.

Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige has said that "Avengers 4" is a "conclusion" for this era of the MCU, and Disney CEO Bob Iger has teased that the MCU will most likely focus on a "new franchise beyond 'Avengers'" in the future. The X-Men are the perfect substitute. 

If the only way to save the "X-Men" franchise is for it to die, then so be it. It would rise again.

SEE ALSO: What the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe could look like after Disney buys Fox and all its superheroes

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NOW WATCH: How a black cop infiltrated the KKK — the true story behind Spike Lee's 'BlacKkKlansman'

7 great movies you can watch on Netflix this weekend

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We're here to make your weekend binge-watching a breeze. 

Every week, we look through the movies available on Netflix and recommend seven movies you can watch over the weekend.

Some of our selections recently came to Netflix and some have been available for awhile — you might have just missed them because of Netflix's algorithm.

From the groundbreaking superhero drama "The Dark Knight" to the bad-but-great early 2000s surf movie "Blue Crush," these are some awesome movies on Netflix you can watch this weekend.

Here are seven movies on Netflix you should check out (along with their scores from Rotten Tomatoes).

Note: Not all of these films are available in countries outside the United States. Sincere apologies!

SEE ALSO: Netflix's new show 'Insatiable' is an offensive mess that goes way beyond fat shaming

"The Dark Knight" (2008)

Netflix description: As Batman, Lt. Gordon and the district attorney continue to dismantle Gotham's criminal underground, a new villain threatens to undo their good work.

Critic score: 94%

Audience score: 94%

Superhero movies have changed a lot since "The Dark Knight" came out ten years ago (yikes!).  This movie is the epitome of the dark superhero movie that's trying to be a prestige drama. You might long for some levity when you rewatch it, but Heath Ledger's performance and the excellent cinematography will keep you as on the edge of your seat as you were when you saw this in theaters. 



"Amy" (2015)

Netflix description: Rare home videos and interviews with Amy Winehouse's inner circle offer an intimate look at her journey from charismatic teen to troubled star.

Critic score: 94%

Audience score: 87%

"Amy" is a powerful but devastating documentary that shows the rise of Amy Winehouse's career and her struggles with addiction, especially as it relates to her rise into celebrity. The doc also explores the downsides of celebrity in a new way that will really make you think. 



"Her" (2013)

Netflix description: Love comes to a lonely writer in the sleekest of packages when he finds himself falling for the advanced operating system he bought to run his life.

Critic score: 94%

Audience score: 82%

This sort-of sci-fi movie is not for people are are feeling super lonely. Joaquin Phoenix makes a ridiculous premise (basically falling in love with Siri) emotional and believable, and Scarlett Johansson does captivating voice work that she didn't get enough credit for pulling off. 



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Nicki Minaj is surprise releasing her new album today, a week before it was scheduled

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  • Nicki Minaj announced on Thursday that she is releasing her new album, "Queen," today at noon EST, a week before it was scheduled for release on August 17.
  • Minaj's album faced several delays this year.

Nicki Minaj announced on Apple Music's Beats 1 Radio on Thursday that she is surprise releasing her new album, "Queen," today at noon EST (9 a.m PST), a week before it was scheduled for release on August 17. 

The album has faced several delays this year. Most recently, it was pushed back a week from August 10 to August 17 over a sample clearance for a Tracy Chapman song.

Earlier this month, Minaj wrote in a since-deleted tweet directed at Chapman, "Tracy Chapman, can you please hit me," regarding the sample's clearance.

"So there's a record on #Queen that features 1of the greatest rappers of all time. Had no clue it sampled the legend #TracyChapman – do I keep my date & lose the record? Or do I lose the record & keep my date? ‍do we push #Queen back 1week? Ugh! I’m torn, y’all help," Minaj wrote on August 1, in another deleted tweet. 

Minaj also asked her fans to vote in a Twitter poll whether to lose the song that sampled Chapman or to push the album back one week, to August 17, and keep the song. It is unclear if the Chapman-sampled song will appear on the LP now that it drops August 10. 

When Minaj took to her Beats 1 Radio show, "Queen Radio," on Thursday night to announce that she had moved up the release of "Queen," she said, according to Pitchfork, "I was gonna play the album right now but someone f---ed up. It's a lot of corporate drama in here."

Minaj's "surprise" release date follows a years-long trend of artists trying to catch listeners off-guard with the release of their albums, a shift from the previous model of set release dates anticipated by a string of single releases. 

In June, Beyoncé and Jay-Z dropped their joint album, "Everything Is Love," as a true surprise release without any promotional singles, following in the path of Beyoncé's surprise releasing of her solo albums "Beyoncé" in 2013 and "Lemonade" in 2016.

Minaj's "Queen," her fourth studio album and first release since 2014's "The Pinkprint," has been preceeded by two singles, "Chun-Li" and "Bed," featuring Ariana Grande.

SEE ALSO: Spike Lee's new film 'BlacKkKlansman' is based on an electrifying true story, and it has a 98% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: How a black cop infiltrated the KKK — the true story behind Spike Lee's 'BlacKkKlansman'

The best way to watch Jason Statham's new giant shark movie, 'The Meg,' is in a theater where water drips on you and the seats move

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  • Jason Statham's new giant-shark movie, "The Meg," is a fun action movie, but is best seen in 4DX, where the seats move and you're sprayed by water.
  • The water effects were a tad disappointing, but you're not going to find that in any other theater experience.
  • The movie is best seen in a theater with an engaged audience looking for a good time, and 4DX heightens that.

 

The new giant-shark movie, "The Meg," from "National Treasure" director John Turteltaub, is a dumb, fun action movie that's perfect to end the summer with. And if you're willing to shell out $30 a ticket on a movie where Jason Statham has a "Star Wars"-type battle with a shark (under water, of course), then 4DX is the best way to watch it.

A 4DX theater tries to replicate the environment in a movie to the best of its ability with water, scent, wind, and light effects. In a movie like "The Meg," where a lot of it obviously takes place under water, you get sprayed and dripped on. The seats move and vibrate during action-heavy scenes, too, and it's all in 3D.

"The Meg," in case you're unfamiliar, follows a former diver named Jonas Taylor (Statham), who is brought back into the game to stop a prehistoric, giant shark that has escaped a newly discovered region deep within the ocean. Who discovered it and set off this terrifying chain of events? Scientists at a research facility funded by an arrogant billionaire played by Rainn Wilson.

"The Meg" is already an entertaining movie, but 4DX makes it more enjoyable. The water effects were apparently maximized to their full potential for the movie. The effects didn't quite live up to my high expectations (I guess I anticipated being soaked). In fact, I think the most I felt water dripping on me was during a scene where Jason Statham takes a shower, which was odd.

But you're not going to get sprayed by water in any other theater, so it's tough to complain. You have the option to turn the effect off, but who would want to do that after dropping $30 on a shark movie? Just make sure to bring a sweatshirt, because it will get cold. 

the meg 4dx

4DX is most fun in a theater with an invested audience. The audience in my theater was fully into the human-eating, shark-fighting goodness, and people lost their minds during a few key scenes.

Remember when Samuel L. Jackson gave a rousing speech in "Deep Blue Sea" and is suddenly eaten by a shark mid-sentence? I've never trusted a scene since where a character is standing by him or herself facing a group of people. They either get eaten by a large animal or hit by a vehicle, and in the case of "The Meg," the worry is obviously that they will get eaten by very large shark. 

There's a few scenes like that in the movie that make you cringe with anticipation, and it delivers for the most part, albeit nothing like that scene in "Deep Blue Sea." The movie is mostly predictable in that sense, and hits all the familiar beats of a movie like this. But the best thing about it is that it works. It gets off to a slow start, and I found myself wondering "is this a giant shark movie?" a few times in the beginning. But once it delivers on the giant-shark promise, it never lets up. 

Would I have enjoyed it as much if not for 4DX, though? Probably not. Jason Statham fighting a giant shark, while also trying to be charming, can only go so far. 

SEE ALSO: 'The Meg' director isn't looking for an Oscar, he just wants everyone to enjoy the 'big f---ing shark'

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: How a black cop infiltrated the KKK — the true story behind Spike Lee's 'BlacKkKlansman'

2 Wall Street banks made millions selling the collapsing shares of MoviePass' parent company, as their analysts kept 'buy' ratings on the cratering stock (HMNY)

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MoviePass

  • As MoviePass' parent company — the Nasdaq-listed Helios and Matheson Analytics — has seen the value of its shares nosedive 99.99% in recent months, two Wall Street banks have made millions in fees selling the stock.
  • Since last August, when Helios bought MoviePass, a popular movie-theater subscription service, the company has covered massive losses by selling new shares to the public and diluting previous shareholders.
  • To sell these new shares, Helios has primarily employed the services of two investment banks: Canaccord Genuity, which has served as the sole bookrunner, and Maxim Group, which has served as the comanager on several offerings.
  • While these banks made millions in commission from Helios, research analysts at the two firms kept "buy" ratings on the stock as it slid, advising clients that Helios was a good deal. Neither ever put a "sell" rating on the stock. Both recently suspended coverage.
  • One retiree investor told Business Insider he used the analyst coverage as part of his decision to pour almost $190,000 into Helios. His stake is now worth about $240.

In early October, Brian Kinstlinger, a stock analyst at a small New York-based investment bank, Maxim Group, started covering Helios and Matheson Analytics. Helios is the owner of MoviePass, a popular monthly subscription service for movie screenings that effectively makes up all of Helios' business.

Kinstlinger's advice to investor clients: "Buy."

He set his price target at $20, a mark of where he thought the shares could trade in the future. That was a significant bump from $12.98, where the stock closed that day.

"We see numerous ways to monetize a large user base and drive profitability, such as movie promotions, profit sharing, rebates, concessions, data sales and advertising," Kinstlinger wrote in his note to clients.

Kinstlinger added that Maxim's "model assumes HMNY will need to access capital to finance the MoviePass deal and to achieve its longer-term goals."

That much has proved true. MoviePass last year introduced a business plan in which it stood to lose money on some subscribers who saw as few as one movie a month using its service. In the first three months of this year, Helios lost nearly $23 million a month. That ramped up to $40 million in May because of rapid increases in subscriber growth and an estimated $45 million in June and July, according to Helios' filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Helios has covered the massive losses incurred by the popular movie-theater subscription service by selling new shares to the public and diluting previous shareholders.

Maxim and another investment bank, Canaccord Genuity, have been instrumental in making this possible. Helios has employed the two banks to help it raise funds on multiple occasions, typically with Canaccord as the sole bookrunner and Maxim Group as the comanager.

While these banks made millions in commissions from Helios, research analysts at the two firms kept "buy" ratings on the stock as it slid, advising clients that Helios was a good deal. Neither ever put a "sell" rating on the stock, even as the share price has cratered 99.99%. Both recently suspended coverage.

If you invested $100,000 in Helios stock on that day in October when Maxim's Kinstlinger initiated coverage with a "buy," your shares would now be worth about $1.85.

Kinstlinger did not respond to a request for comment, and Maxim pointed Business Insider to its disclosure section on its coverage, which mentions its banking relationship with Helios. Canaccord declined to comment.

'Human nature being what it is ...'

It’s worth noting that sell ratings are uncommon on Wall Street. The research firm FactSet said last year that only 6% of about 11,000 recommendations on stocks in the S&P 500 were sell (or equivalent), according to The Wall Street Journal. And despite there being a Chinese wall between banking, which handles deals for corporate clients, and research, which caters to investors, it's common to have banks whose analysts have a rosy view of a business work on an equity deal for that company.

"Human nature being what it is, no CEO is likely to throw business to a bank whose analyst is negative on the CEO's company," Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business, told Business Insider.

"There are examples of analysts reiterating 'buy' ratings 30 days before a company went under," Gordon said.

But banks are unlikely to face consequences for this behavior unless there is definitive proof they were intentionally misleading clients, Gordon said.

In addition, the buy and sell ratings and price targets are only meant as a guide. Still, many investors use them to help inform investment decisions.

One retail investor, a retiree named Ken, contacted Business Insider this month to ask whether we knew about the analyst recommendations, which he had seen on E-Trade and which he said helped inform his decision to buy shares of Helios. (Ken requested his last name not be used when discussing his personal finances.)

"I use the analyst research to decide if I am going to buy a stock and after buying it, when to sell," Ken told Business Insider. Had the analysts not recommended buy, he said, "I (and probably others) would not have purchased HMNY, and especially held onto the stock, as the 'buy' recommendation didn't change during the near 100% devaluation."

According to E-Trade screenshots shared with Business Insider, Ken began to build his stake in March, when the stock was trading at about $4.50. At the time, both Maxim and Canaccord had buy ratings on the stock, with price targets of $16 and $15.

Over the next few months, as the analysts kept their buy ratings and high price targets, Ken put almost $190,000 into Helios, buying hundreds of thousands of shares.

Today, that stake is worth about $240.

etrade helios screenshot

Getting millions in fees as the stock collapsed

This year, Canaccord and Maxim have helped Helios sell hundreds of millions in shares, reaping millions in fees.

On February 13, Helios announced in SEC filings that it had sold $105 million in stock. Maxim had acted as the comanager on the sale, while Canaccord took a more senior role as the sole bookrunner. The banks got commissions and underwriting discounts of $5.88 million and incurred about $450,000 in offering expenses. The stock was trading at $5.43.

About a week later, on February 22, the Canaccord analyst Austin Moldow initiated coverage of Helios, putting a buy recommendation on it with a price target of $15 a share. A few days later, on February 28, Maxim's Kinstlinger reaffirmed his buy rating with a target price of $16. Both of those price targets were well above where the stock, which closed that day at $4.76, was trading.

Moldow declined to comment.

On April 18, Helios filed a prospectus supplement with the SEC to authorize it to sell $150 million in equity, at-the-market, again using Canaccord, which would be entitled to 5% of gross sales.

Helios got off to a quick start selling new shares. On April 19, Canaccord acted as the sole bookrunner on another share sale, with Maxim and Roth Capital Partners serving as comanagers. Helios got $27.5 million from the sale, while the banks got underwriting discounts and commissions of $1.66 million, with expenses of $1.05 million.

On April 23, Moldow at Canaccord reiterated his buy rating with a price target of $12. The stock closed at $2.46.

Kinstlinger changed jobs and moved to another firm, Alliance Global Partners, where he started coverage of Helios on May 8. His advice was again "buy," with a price target of $12.

On April 25, another Maxim analyst, Nehal Chokshi, picked up coverage of Helios with a buy rating and a price target of $12. The stock closed at $2.51. Chokshi did not respond to a request for comment.

The stock plummeted over the weeks that followed, closing at $0.09 on July 24. After trading ended that day, Helios enacted a 1-for-250 reverse stock split, boosting the share price to $22.50. When trading started the next day, however, it began to fall again.

Maxim put yet another analyst, Allen Klee, on Helios starting July 26. He put a "hold" rating on the stock, the first of its kind from Maxim, with no price target. The stock closed at $6.83. That's equal to a price of about $0.03 before the reverse stock split. Klee declined to comment.

On July 27, Canaccord put its recommendation of Helios "under review," as the stock price closed at $2. "Given the number of moving parts with Helios … related to the recent reverse stock split, share authorization, capital raises, and operational updates, we are placing our rating and price target under review," Moldow wrote.

Then, on July 31, Maxim suspended coverage of Helios. "We suspend coverage based on new information raising questions about the ability of HMNY to raise enough capital to continue as a going concern," Klee wrote, noting a $6.2 million emergency loan the company had to take. The stock closed at $0.50.

Neither firm has ever given Helios a sell recommendation.

It is now trading at about $0.06.

If you are an HMNY investor, or know anything about the company or MoviePass, email the author at nmcalone@businessinsider.com.

SEE ALSO: The strange story of how MoviePass' owner was created by an Indian company accused of massive fraud

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: How a black cop infiltrated the KKK — the true story behind Spike Lee's 'BlacKkKlansman'

5 movies in 2018 that could be nominated for the new, controversial 'popular film' award at the Oscars

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The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' announcement this week of a new award for "popular films" at the Oscars was met with eye-rolling and vitriol from critics and celebrities alike. 

It was a vague announcement, only saying that a "new category is being designed around achievement in popular film." We don't exactly know what that means yet, what qualifies as a "popular" film, and what the criteria will be. Will it honor movies that made big bucks at the box office compared to their budgets? Is it an award for achievement in marketing to audiences?

We only know that a movie can compete for both the "popular film" Oscar and the traditional, coveted "best picture" award, and that it will be introduced at the next Oscars in early 2019 that honors films of this year.

At any rate, the mere thought of such a category has spawned outrage, with people arguing that a "popular" movie can be held to same standards as a best-picture contender, and that the award is offensive to the Oscars as a celebration of film achievement. 

But as long as it's actually happening, we'll have to get used to this new award, and as more details surface, maybe it will make more sense. In a perfect world, these movies would be recognized more by the Academy without an additional award. But we don't live in a perfect world, and as much as "Black Panther" deserves a best-picture nomination, there's no guaranteeing that it would have gotten one.

We've thought about the movies so far in 2018 that could compete for such a prize, based on a traditional definition of what a "popular" movie might be — one that is a box-office success and a hit with audiences and critics alike.

Below are five movies in 2018, so far, that could be considered for the "popular film" Oscar:

SEE ALSO: The Marvel Cinematic Universe needs to save the 'X-Men' franchise and start it from scratch

"A Quiet Place"

John Krasinski's hit horror movie, "A Quiet Place," about a family fighting to survive in a world populated by creatures that hunt by sound, was met with critical praise, earning a 95% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes. It also took in an impressive $332 million worldwide off of a $17 million budget. 



"Avengers: Infinity War"

No other film so far this year embodies the notion of a "popular movie" than "Avengers: Infinity War." It broke the record for biggest opening-weekend box office in the US with $258 million, and has since grossed over $2 billion worldwide. It is one of the biggest, most popular movies ever made, and not only did fans love it, but critics did, as well. "Infinity War" would never be recognized as a best-picture contender, but it's the best representation of the new Hollywood: franchises reign supreme, but they can still deliver great movies.



"Black Panther"

Before "Infinity War," "Black Panther" proved Marvel's dominance in the franchise wars, and is a cultural sensation on its own terms. The movie is the first superhero movie with a predominantly black cast, set in Africa. It broke box-office records, and has grossed over $1 billion worldwide. It was also a favorite among many critics in the best-picture race, which would make it the first superhero movie to be nominated for the award. And now that we know that it can compete in both the best picture and best popular film categories, there's still hope.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

The comedy icon who spotted talent like Jon Stewart, Dave Chappelle, and Michelle Wolf explains how she's done it

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  • Caroline Hirsch is the cofounder and owner of the New York comedy club Carolines and is behind the annual New York Comedy Festival.
  • She's been respected for over 30 years for the way she's able to spot and showcase emerging talent ahead of huge fame, like Jon Stewart, Dave Chappelle, Jerry Seinfeld, and Michelle Wolf.
  • She explained how thinking from a customer's perspective has been foundational to her success.


For more than three decades, Caroline Hirsch has been a legend in the comedy industry. As the cofounder and namesake of the New York comedy club Carolines, she's discovered or helped develop some of comedy's biggest names: people like Jerry Seinfeld, Jon Stewart, Dave Chappelle, and Michelle Wolf.

She's also the visionary behind the New York Comedy Festival, which turns 15 this year.

From the time she booked her first comedy act, then-rising star Jay Leno, she's been motivated by one experience, she told us for an episode of Business Insider's podcast "This Is Success": "This room packed with people laughing and having a great time, this is what it's about. People having a great time."

When she got into the business in 1982, Hirsch's only qualification was a love of standup.

Listen to the full episode here:

Subscribe to "This Is Success" on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, or your favorite podcast app. Check out previous episodes with:

Transcript edited for clarity.

Caroline Hirsch: So back in the early '80s, I was working in retail, and I worked for a big department store in New York City called Gimbels, and Gimbels was closing. So I had two friends in the city at that time who owned bars in the city and they decided they wanted to open up a cabaret, and they found this little space on Eighth Avenue, on 26th Street, and they decided to name it Carolines. And they said, "Well, would you like to be a partner with us?" And I said, "OK, sure."

Richard Feloni: Did they name it after you before you were even approached with this offer?

Hirsch: Almost, almost. And I guess Carolines had that ... Yeah, now, it's a pretty popular name around, but then it really wasn't. So it was fun. It was fun to be part of something to build early on. And did I know anything about it, about running a cabaret? No — but learned very quickly. I did know about the comedy business from growing up, and I always was a fan of "The Tonight Show."

Feloni: Did they approach you because you were just a fan of comedy?

Hirsch: They were friends; they were personal friends. And they knew I wasn't working, they said: "Well, why don't you come and do this with us? It'll be fun." And that was it.

An eye for talent

Feloni: What were you bringing to the table?

Hirsch: I brought a little bit of money. That always helps.

Feloni: Exactly.

Hirsch: And just that I'd be part of it with them, and we wanted to work together. They were really good operators. So we started out doing that and we learned a lot. We learned a lot about the life and the business. But about a year into being a cabaret, we found that there weren't enough acts going around that could draw up people. So we had this idea and we said, "Let's turn it to comedy." It was the rise ... It was this time when David Letterman was going on at 12:30 at night and was bringing on all of these young observational comedians — Jay Leno and Jerry Seinfeld.

Feloni: So that's when it was really emerging, like that style of humor.

Hirsch: Yeah, absolutely. We had the '60s, when George Carlin kind of broke out, and George was known because he started that observational humor. And then, like 20 years later, you had Jay Leno and Jerry Seinfeld kind of taking off from where he was on that, and then you saw a whole string of comedians come out of that. So we turned the club into basically doing only comedy and we found that we were getting a great group of people coming in. We're getting all contemporaries at the time. So we were bringing in people who really were not appearing in New York City at all, and then we were drawing this young group of people to come in, which is kind of what every advertiser wanted, was people in their early 30s. So it paid off for us in the end.

Feloni: So was it a matter of doing research on these people? Or is it a matter of just seeing them like from the audience, like this person's got it?

Hirsch: Right now it is. After being in business for so long and seeing so many people, you kind of ...

Feloni: You get that click.

Hirsch: You kind of get to know what's going to happen, but it takes a long time to develop into a talent. So yeah, we'll see some people who are just starting, I mean, just starting, that's three or four years, that's just starting, and you'll see that they might have this little something and we watch them. And that's really how we develop talent at the club.

Feloni: If you were to be in the audience seeing an up-and-coming comedian, what would be things that you're looking for?

Hirsch: A unique voice. And how a person finds that voice doesn't happen overnight. It takes a lot of stage time. It takes a lot of them knowing how to react to the audience, even changing a pronoun around to make the joke better.

Feloni: So at this point, stand-up wasn't mainstream yet?

Hirsch: Oh, no. Oh, no, not at all. Not at all. No, it was like I had to beg them to come in. I said, "You've got to see these people. This is part of our new generation of what's going on here." And then it started to click. It really started to click when Stephen Holden, from The New York Times, was calling me about some comedians who were going to appear at the club. And we started talking and he said, "You know what. This is not about the comedians. This is about Carolines and what it is doing right now." When we had this article in The New York Times, it kind of pushed us over the top, and that also made for other comedians wanting to work there.

Another thing that I learned from watching "The Tonight Show," which I go back to, is that when I was a kid and I was watching a comedian on "The Tonight Show," like a David Steinberg, he would say, "Well, I'm appearing at Mister Kelly's in Chicago." And I remember that, and I remembered as a kid, "I want to go to Chicago and see David Steinberg at Mister Kelly's." So I got the idea that when Jay Leno was going on "The David Letterman Show" that he always had to mention he was at Carolines, and he did.

Feloni: So you had that connection before he was even on the show, and then you could use him to like advertise the club.

Hirsch: We did, we did. It was our marketing, it was our national play then because this went around the country, so now the country knew about Carolines. So these were things that I had to put together early on, opening that club, so things you learn because you have to learn them.

Feloni: So this was like a turning point for the business?

Hirsch: It was.

Feloni: It seems like with this you started to build a lot of momentum that created a network effect.

Hirsch: Well, you also have to convince the industry that you are doing the right thing, too, not only with our customers. I had to convince the agents and managers that this was a place to take people to, this was a place they needed to work. So we set that up also. So we're also known ... We're known, what Carolines is, as a place to come to for comedy, but we're also known as the industry that treats the talent right, and we get behind them and we do the right thing. So that's half of the battle there.

Feloni: And then you moved to Time Square, and that was before it was like a bustling place, right?

Hirsch: Yeah, it was way before Mickey Mouse got there, way before. What happened was I had the Eighth Avenue spot, and then we went down to the seaport for about five years. And I really wanted to be uptown again, I wanted to be in the entertainment area, and Times Square was just about blooming at that time. It was making a turning point. I went to look at one spot uptown and that didn't work out and I said, "You know what, I really want to be here." So we took some space, I took some space in the building I am now and it's worked out. So I've been in that space since 1992. That's 26 years in that particular space.

Feloni: Yeah. Even in that, it kind of seems like you have an eye for like what's happening next, even in terms of like picking where you're going to have your place.

Hirsch: It was a good move, it was a good move, and people followed, and they use Carolines as part of the draw for a lot of other things that were coming around at that time.

Feloni: So yeah. This year you've got the 35th anniversary of Carolines and the 15th anniversary of the New York Comedy Festival.

Hirsch: Yes.

Feloni: So what is exciting to you right now, in 2018?

Hirsch: That we are still in business and we're still going strong, considering what is going on in the city right now with restaurants closing, clubs are closing, but Carolines is stronger than ever. And I guess that's because comedy is bigger than ever, too. So we're really happy about what we've achieved at Carolines. And we're excited about all the talent that we're able to secure for the festival this year.

Feloni: What are some of the upcoming names that you're most excited about?

Hirsch: We find this emerging talent that we do kind of in the festival with Comics to Watch, and we also have New York's Funniest. We were able to find the people who are now getting well known, like Michael Che, Michelle Wolf, this young man Tim Dillon. So these people break with us during the festival and then work at Carolines and come through. And actually even ... Listen, when we had emerging talent years ago, her name was Leslie, which is Leslie Jones today. So those are the people that we find at the club and through the festival.

Feloni: What do you think is the common thread among all of these up-and-comers right now?

Hirsch: I think that all of those people worked on having their own true voice. They're all so different from one another. Every single one of them is so different, and that's how you really stand out. That's what you really have to adopt to succeed.

Caroline's Caroline Hirsch

In a constant state of adaptation

Feloni: What do you think it is about your business that you've been able to like have this longevity?

Hirsch: Well, I think basically what has happened is that we're able to reinvent ourselves every week, we're able to bring in new talent, like a restaurant will have to change its dishes all the time, but we just change the talent that's at the club. And also because we do have quite a reputation in New York City after being in business for 35 years, I think people know where to go for comedy, it would be at Carolines. And then we do things for the community, we have lots of private events at the club, branding with advertisers. So it's all these new businesses that have also helped Carolines stay in business for all these years, and the festival.

Feloni: And you see that as like a week-to-week transformation?

Hirsch: Yes, Carolines is kind of a week-to-week transformation. On Monday nights we'll have a new-talent night where we get to see people who are coming up the ranks. We have a breakout series that we usually have once a week, then we have New York's funniest comedians around during the week, and then usually our headliners are Thursday through Sunday. So we kind of have this little formula about what goes on.

Feloni: And with that quick turnaround, I mean, it happens in any industry, but in comedy specifically, something that could get a room full of huge laughs tonight, like a year from now it might be met with like dead silence.

Hirsch: Yes.

Feloni: How do you stay on top of that? Is it looking at what's next, or is it kind of like guiding where the taste is going?

Hirsch: No, we don't guide the taste. I mean, I think the customer has a certain taste that they have, but I think that we're always open to new people coming in. So starting out with Jay Leno, Jerry Seinfeld, Bill Maher, Garry Shandling, and then finding the next Jon Stewart and that whole that came up from there, so we're constantly doing that. The Dave Chappelle's — Dave Chappelle started on my stage. He was 19 years old. He was a little showcase act that we had at the club and he evolved. Chris Rock was also another one and he evolved. So we're constantly ... Every 10 years there's a new group that comes through at the club.

Feloni: What would you say the current climate for comedy is right now? What's the current taste?

Hirsch: So, technology over the years has been responsible for what happens in the entertainment business. So when HBO went on the air, HBO helped us increase our business, because when somebody had a great special on HBO people wanted to come out to see it. Case in point: Steven Wright. And when Steven had his great HBO special people came out to see him. And the same thing has happened today. So today what we have, it's not only the stand up specials, but we also have these YouTube stars that are around, so we kind of traced that also. We try to cover everything that a little something for everyone. It may not be my general taste, but it's what people want. So we give people what they want.

Feloni: I guess that seems difficult in the sense that you have to figure out what other people would find funny even if you don't personally.

Hirsch: Yeah, well, that's the job of a producer. You may not always feel that it's right for you, but you know it works for other people. So it's part of what we do.

Feloni: In terms of when HBO started having all these comedy specials, was that almost, like, instead of, cannibalizing the industry, it was almost like seeing like a live act — if you bought a band's album, seeing them at Carolines would be like seeing a concert or something?

Hirsch: Absolutely. I always use that analogy because people used to say to me, "Well, we can see so much of it on TV; we're streaming now." I go, "But that's the thing. You want to come out and see them in person." It's like going to the concert for the band's new album. It's exactly the same thing.

Feloni: And that still exists today, even with like Netflix, and YouTube, and things like that?

Hirsch: Absolutely. The thing about, like I said, about HBO and about Netflix right now, it's kind of given the performer a platform. And that really makes people want to come out and see them. We had a young lady at the club in the beginning of like last summer, I met Yvonne Orji — Yvonne's on "Insecure." She came to do a guest set at the club and I said, "Oh, Yvonne, you must come back and do a set." She came back a few months later and sold out. That's because all the young women in the room that came to see her, saw her on "Insecure" and wanted to see her. So it does help somebody's career.

jon stewart standup carolines

Feloni: What do you think about in terms of what people's sense of humor is like these days? There's a lot of talk being like, this generation is so sensitive that you can't play offensive stuff anymore. What do you think about that?

Hirsch: Well, it is sensitive, and I think that people are kind of minding themselves a little more onstage. I've always been asked how are the male comedians handling all the ... I think that they're much more respectful and I think that people have to really watch what ... they watch what they say. I mean, they're respectful of women at this point.

Feloni: With comedians, what if someone is like, "Oh I can't, if I have to police myself, I can't be a comedian anymore." What do you say to someone like that?

Hirsch: Well, the thing about your art as a comedian is that it really needs to be true. I mean, that's why you will see sometimes comedians crossing the line, and not a good way, because they just think it's pushing, it's always pushing that idea that they have. And the worst thing that really can happen to a comedian is when they kind of get a TV show and then the producers try to change what they are, and that's a bad thing.

Feloni: And in terms of just looking at like on this point of comedians changing their material or how they present themselves, specifically male comedians looking at #MeToo specifically, and that whole movement and how it affected people like Louis CK, for example. How has that affected your role in the industry, like as you see new talent and what your club is going to be aligned with?

Hirsch: Well, we're very respectful about the art, but we would not tolerate something that was not right at this point. We just wouldn't do it. That person wouldn't be working there.

Feloni: Yeah. And had that been in like such a male-dominated industry, was that something that you had to deal with through the years?

Hirsch: You know, I don't think I ever really realized that it was so male-dominated. Like everything else was male dominated at that time. So I never put any thought to it, but there happened to be two other women at that time that were running clubs ...

Feloni: Back in the early days.

Hirsch: In the early days ... Bud Freeman's wife in New York was running the Improv. So you had two other women running clubs. So to me, it wasn't anything out of the ordinary. But as I look back, I go, "Wow, it was really ... I'm kind of proud of where the club came from, and kind of who had presented, and as being successful as it is today.

Feloni: And in terms of, regardless of any gender dynamic or thing, just dealing with comedians in general, they can be like huge personalities, sometimes very difficult personalities. How did you learn to deal with those people?

Hirsch: You know, early on I tried to be like really buddies with everybody. I tried to be there all the time for them and developed great friendships with a lot of people early on, and I think that's how I'm able to kind of tolerate a lot of the behaviors.

Feloni: What do you mean?

Hirsch: Look, it's not that everybody wants to ... It's a business, it's business. So sometimes you'll come into contact with somebody who won't do the press and PR. All right, if it happens too many times, then you're not working at Carolines anymore. So that's just how it goes.

Feloni: Yeah. You hadn't been in a management position before this, right? Before getting into Carolines?

Hirsch: No, no.

Feloni: How did you learn how to adapt to that?

Hirsch: You just learn. You learn how to deal with people. You learn over time. It was a small club then. It was maybe 20 people or less working there at the time. It was bartenders, and waiters, and waitresses, and two people in the kitchen, and a lady who helped do press, and myself. And that was pretty much what it was. And I would sit there in a small office and pay every bill. I knew where all the money was going. I was able to keep where the food costs were going, where the liquor costs were going, and knowing all of that, where the advertising costs we're going. So I knew every line about what we were doing, and just learned. Then I learned years later that every week we should do a P&L report. So by doing a P&L report every week, I was able to keep things in check to see like, oh, that food cost may be going high, or that liquor cost, or that advertising's out of line, and that really helped my business. But that's something that I decided to do.

Feloni: Yeah.

Hirsch: So you learn.

Feloni: It sounds like whether it was management or even like finding new talent, it was really just putting in the time.

Hirsch: It's putting in the time, and it was just really by the seat of my pants, I have to tell you. But most ideas by the seat of your pants, most good ideas, I mean, online shopping. Who came up with that one, right? How many years ago when they'd say, "Oh, you're crazy. That would never happen." Well, now look what just happened. So it's staying with an idea, and following through, and working your hardest to see if it succeeds, and not just saying, "I have to work hard at this," because I have to put the time in, I have to make sure that I've covered everything that could've gone wrong. And I think that when somebody does that, they kind of succeed, or they pivot to something else.

A living legacy

Feloni: At what point did you realize that you had made it, that Carolines was something important?

Hirsch: I think in 1983 when we were hiring the first group of comedians coming through, and then celebrities were coming in to see them. I had Jay Leno there one night and he said to me, "Oh, Robin Williams is in New York doing a movie. He's coming in." So you knew when the TV stars were coming in to see the comedians that something was going on. David Letterman would then come in and even look at talent. One night Jay Leno was there and he said, "David's coming in tonight to see me, but I really want to introduce him to Paul Reiser." And I think he had Paul Reiser open for him, and that's how Paul was known and then was on David Letterman's show.

Feloni: At this time, this was when Judd Apatow was a kid, right? He would sneak in for interviews.

Hirsch: That's something I didn't know till later on.

Feloni: Yeah. So for background, he wrote in his recent book that as a kid, he would get into Carolines and sneak interviews with comedians like Jerry Seinfeld, pretending that he was a journalist, but he just wanted these for himself.

Hirsch: I think Judd was in high school at the time and you know you had to be 18 to come into the club. OK, that's one thing. So I ran into Judd at the premiere of "Train Wreck." So he was telling me how he was about 16 years old and he would sneak in and he goes, "You know, I snuck in and I saw Pee-wee Herman." And he goes, "And I went downstairs. Now, I knew he was there because the dressing room early on was downstairs." And that's when Paul [Reubens] was working there. So I knew that he really did come to the club to do those interviews.

Feloni: And then like a few years ago too, Lena Dunham, when she was accepting an award so that she ... The first reason she even got into comedy and acting and creating was when she saw a show at Carolines when her mom took her there.

Hirsch: Yes, this is when she was accepting a Writer's Guild Award. And she said, "I just want to tell you how it got into comedy. My mother took me to Carolines one new year's eve to see Lisa Lampanelli." And she said, "I just loved, loved, loved comedy, and I met Lisa afterwards. My mom got me backstage and we met Lisa, and that was my comedy career." Years later, I run into Lena and I had no idea is that Lena graduated from our comedy class at Carolines. She took the class, went onstage, and graduated from there. And so, I love that all these, and I love that these young women are so into comedy.

Feloni: Yeah. How does it feel to hear stories like that in terms of like a legacy of something that you've built?

Hirsch: I didn't know about what she said at the award show, was sent to me, and I felt really good about it. I felt like, "Wow, I did something that people wanted." You know, I'll be at my office till early evening, and I'll walk through the bar, and then I'll walk through the showroom doors. And when you go in there and you see this room packed with people laughing and having a great time, it really makes me feel good and I've fulfilled my job as a producer because this is what it's about, people having a great time.

Feloni: How do you personally define success?

Hirsch: I think you find the success in doing what you really love to do and happy to go to work every day, if you go to work.

Feloni: When did you realize that what you're doing with the club was what you love to do?

Hirsch: It made me very happy to see the payoff. When the festival comes around, it's a week where we don't know where to go first because we do so many shows and it's all good stuff, and it's like I have a big smile on my face during the festival because it's like, "Oh, what show am I going to go to tonight?" I see this one, that one, whatever else and be all over town. And then I'm watching and I'm in like the audience of the Beacon Theatre, which is 2,800 seats, and the whole audience is so into the show that makes me really happy.

Feloni: So it's kind of like making a product where you want to be the customer?

Hirsch: Sure. That's the best product to make. I mean, that is typically, you might say, what happened here. I was the person who loved the cabaret and the comedy shows and then I was able to do it. So I kinda knew what people wanted. It's basically knowing what people want.

Feloni: Is that just kind of like trusting your own instinct?

Hirsch: I always trust my own instinct. I really do. As I get older and older, my instinct's better than anybody else's. You learn never to doubt yourself.

Feloni: Is there a point where you trusted your instinct ever and it just didn't pan out?

Hirsch: I had a comedy-themed restaurant upstairs from Carolines once. It was a great real-estate deal for me. It worked out to be. The concept was really hard to pull over, but I had owned this fabulous lease. I was able to get out of it very gracefully. So it wasn't a total loss. I mean, look, you can be successful, but lots of successful people go on to do other things and they're not so successful, but they would not know that if they didn't try. So maybe the second thing, then the third thing works, and then the fourth maybe, but then everything else works for you. You don't know if it doesn't work, if you don't try it. And you just have to try it.

Feloni: And if you were to give advice to someone who wanted to have a career like yours, what would you say?

Hirsch: Oh, go for it. Why not? Why not? My career is much easier than being on the stage. Being on the stage is hard. Being onstage takes a real talent, and this is something that I learned. But to really be onstage, comedy is probably the hardest art form you will ever find. I mean, it's much easier to be a serious actor than to be a comedic actor, even that part of it. But comedy is one of the toughest things to get onto your belt.

Feloni: How come?

Hirsch: Because you have to come up with this logic that's different than anybody else's, and spin it around, and make everybody in the audience wonder what's going to come out of your mouth next. And the other part of it is taking that community in the audience and having they relate to all the same stuff. That's what makes us laugh because we go, "Oh, that happened to me, too." And that's why we laugh.

Hirsch: So it's hard thing to do. That's not easy.

Feloni: Well, you've had to have some of those skills in terms of finding what works.

Hirsch: You find what work after ... Yeah, like the same thing, you find what works, you have your challenges, things don't work, you change it around. I mean, that's why it takes many years for a stand-up to be successful onstage. And by successful I mean having a good act that they have, not financially, but just some sound material that they can go out with.

Feloni: What's next for you beyond this festival?

Hirsch: Beyond the festival? Well, there are other projects that have gone into producing films and documentaries and busy doing that at this point, and then also developing my business even more. So we have this brand extension of Carolines where people come to us now to say, "How can we get to know your audience?" And that's another part of our business right now, which we're expanding. So whether it's podcasts, whether it's video, internet projects, they come to us for this. So that's kind of an extension of my brand. So we're constantly growing. I mean, years ago, I grew through the A&E show. I kind of backed off a little with TV production, but I'm getting right back into that. We're doing more and more of that. So it's all fun. It's all good. It's taking what we know and just spinning it around and doing it in another way.

Feloni: And are you hopeful for the state of the industry? What would you say to a comedian being like, "Oh, comedy is dead, stand-up is dead"?

Hirsch: Oh, no. My goodness — it's not dead. Oh, my God, I've never seen so many emerging comedians as today. And I get asked by a number of students in college that they want to come and intern because they want to work around the club because it's fun. I mean, the first day one of the interns was working there and Neil Patrick Harris is doing this branded social-media commercial for Jiffy peanut butter, and he was like, "Oh, my God, I can't believe he was here." It's like there's always something going on at the club. And like I said, women, oh, my goodness. I've had only women assistants in the last maybe 10 years of my office, and they come out of college and want to be in the comedy business. And I said to one of the young ladies one day, who I was working with, and I said, "Why don't you ever want to do this?" She said, "Well, I used to watch Jon Stewart on Comedy Central and I always wanted to do what he wanted to do, and I wanted to be maybe a producer or a writer on the show." Like Lena Dunham, it's opened up this whole other industry, and I'm totally flattered that there's a bunch of young women that want to be involved in it.

Feloni: Thank you so much, Caroline.

Hirsch: Thank you.

SEE ALSO: The CEO of Nasdaq asks herself two questions to keep her career and her company moving forward

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NOW WATCH: There are two types of laughter — here's the difference between them


'The Miseducation of Cameron Post' is an inspiring movie that won Sundance, and it's our indie pick of the weekend

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miseducation cameron post sundance institute final

  • "The Miseducation of Cameron Post" won the grand jury prize at this year's Sundance Film Festival.
  • Actress Chloë Grace Moretz gives the best performance of her career, so far.


The winner of the grand jury prize at this year's Sundance Film Festival, "The Miseducation of Cameron Post," is a stirring look at sexuality and acceptance that is beautifully executed by director Desiree Akhavan ("Appropriate Behavior") and headed by Chloë Grace Moretz, who gives the best performance so far in her young career.

Based on the novel by Emily M. Danforth, Moretz plays Cameron — Cam for short — who is growing up in early 1990s Montana with her paternal grandmother after her parents die in a car crash. As she tries to cope with the loss of her parents she's also discovering that she's homosexual. At the start of the movie, she's outed and her grandmother brings her to God's Promise, a camp that does "conversion therapy."

Akhavan structures the story similar to movies like "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" or "Girl, Interrupted" as we follow Cam into this foreign new normal. Surrounded by males and females all there with the hopes (at least on the surface) of "getting better," they go through daily exercises and talks with therapists in the process of being "re-educated." But as much as Cam and others try, they can't fight who they are. And she quickly learns that she's not the only one who realizes all they are doing is playing along.

Filled with powerfully dramatic moments and Moretz showing a range she hasn't been able to in a lot of her previous work, "Cameron Post" is a coming-of-age movie that is essential viewing, regardless if you are gay or straight.

See where "The Miseducation of Cameron Post" is playing near you.

 

SEE ALSO: The 100 best science fiction movies of all time, according to critics

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NOW WATCH: How a black cop infiltrated the KKK — the true story behind Spike Lee's 'BlacKkKlansman'

How a black cop infiltrated the KKK — the true story behind Spike Lee's 'BlacKkKlansman'

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Spike Lee's new movie "BlacKkKlansman" chronicles the true story of an African American police detective named Ron Stallworth, who, in 1978, launched an investigation into the local chapter of the Ku Klux Klan in Colorado Springs, Colorado. By speaking with KKK members over the phone, Stallworth established himself as a viable candidate for membership. He then coordinated with a white detective who assumed his identity when he needed to meet the Klan members in person.

We spoke to the real Ron Stallworth, played in the movie by actor J.D. Washington (son of Denzel), and he told us the amazing story of the investigation and its results. The movie arrives in theaters on the one-year anniversary of the "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, where one woman lost her life during a protest. Lee incorporates imagery from the rally in the film.  Following is a transcript of the video. 

WARNING: This video contains graphic language.

Graham Flanagan: So you said you have the card in your wallet. 

Ron Stallworth: I do.

Flanagan: Can I see that?

[This man infiltrated the KKK. His story inspired the movie “BlacKkKlansman.”]

Stallworth: I'm Sergeant Ron Stallworth, retired. When I was the detective at the Colorado Springs Police Department, in 1978, I launched an investigation into the Ku Klux Klan, a chapter that was forming and trying to expand, in my city. I launched it based on seeing a want ad in the classified section of the newspaper, and there was a P.O. Box number. I wrote a note, a letter if you will, to that P.O. Box. I basically said, "I hate n******, s****, c*****, J***, J***, and anybody else who isn't pure Aryan White like me."

And, I wanted to join something that would allow me to direct my attention towards that. About a week, two weeks later, I get a phone call in my office. The voice on the end of the phone said, "Hi, this is Ken O'Dell, I'm the local chapter president of the Colorado Springs Ku Klux Klan." His response to me was, "You're just the kinda guy we're looking for, when can we meet?" That's when I said, "Oh hell, what do I do now?"

I immediately formulated a strategy and it was simply to get a white officer, posing as me, to go meet this guy. Chuck, that's not his real name, I knew Chuck well, he was a good undercover officer, and so I chose him. When I set off to do this, it was simply to gather information on the Klan, who they are, what they are, where they are, how many they are, and take it from there. Chuck, his lieutenant said, "This'll never work because Chuck will walk into the meeting and they'll immediately recognize from his voice that he's not black."

I said to the lieutenant, "What does a black man sound like?" And then he said, "You know, shucking and jiving, and saying mother blank-blank." I said, " I can shuck and jive if I have to, but B, I can speak correct English when I need to."

When I needed a physical body to attend a Klan meeting, I would go tell him, we need you for this. Most of these guys carry guns, and Chuck would go into the situation knowing that these people were armed and they're unpredictable.

David Duke was the National Director/Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. I called him up one day to find out where my membership card was, 'cause you were supposed to get it within two weeks of applying. On this particular day, David Duke happened to be there, picked the phone up. He told me that there'd been an administrative snafu, and he personally would process the membership and send my card to me. I actually have the card in my wallet. I've carried that card in my wallet since I got it in January of 1979, and I also have a certificate of membership to the Ku Klux Klan, both documents signed, prepared and signed by David Duke.

During the seven and a half months of the undercover phase, the results were, we prevented three cross burnings. Cross burning is a domestic act of terrorism, it's been classified as such. So, we prevented three of those in Colorado Springs, no one ever had to wake up and be terrorized seeing a burning cross in the distance.

We also learned of two military personnel working at North American Air Defense Command, NORAD, who had top security clearance to man the console that monitored the North American airspace. We uncovered two members of the Klan who had that job. I was invited into NORAD, met the Deputy Commander, and based on the information I provided to him, he contacted the Pentagon, talked to some General there, and that General ordered him to order those two men off NORAD and to reassign them. I was told that they were going to, quote, unquote, the North Pole.

They nominated Chuck/me to become the local chapter president. When I told my Chief of Police this latest development, he said, "End the investigation now." He said, "It's gone far enough."

I was told to have no further contact with the Klan, don't answer the phone, don't go to any more meetings. He also ordered me to destroy the file. I have two notebooks, about oh, three inches thick maybe. When my Sergeant wasn't looking, I took the notebooks, put 'em under my arm, walked out to my car and took 'em home.

[Stallworth didn’t speak about the investigation until 2006. His book “Black Klansman” was published in 2014.]

Groups like the Ku Klux Klan, Neo-Nazis, Skinheads, Alt-Right, call 'em what you will, they're basically all the same. We need to be aware of who they are, what they are, why they are, and we need to address these issues when they come up. Too many people are afraid to talk about the issue of race. We should be willing to address it, and more importantly, when it rears its ugly head we should be willing to take a stand and try to stomp it out, whatever the action may be at a particular time.

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'Despacito' rapper Daddy Yankee says he had $2 million in jewelry stolen by a man who impersonated him

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daddy yankee

  • "Despacito" rapper Daddy Yankee was allegedly robbed of $2 million in jewelry in Spain this week by a man who impersonated him to gain access to the safe in his hotel room.
  • His representatives confirmed the robbery in a tweet on Thursday. 

"Despacito" rapper Daddy Yankee was robbed of $2 million in jewelry in Spain this week, his representatives said on Thursday. 

The Puerto Rican rapper, whose real name is Ramón Luis Ayala Rodríguez, was out of his hotel room when a man allegedly impersonated him to gain access to the safe in his room, local news outlet Las Provincias first reported

Rodríguez's public relations team, Nevarez PR, confirmed the robbery in a tweet on Thursday. 

"Daddy Yankee's press office confirms that the artist has been victim of a robbery while he was out of his hotel in Valencia, Spain," the tweet read. "A law firm has been hired and there will not be any more statements in order to not hinder the investigation."

Las Provincias reported that the robber impersonated Daddy Yankee in order to ask the staff at the Melía Valencia hotel, where Rodríguez stayed, to open a safe in the rapper's room. The man allegedly made off with gold chains, diamonds, and other jewelry worth over $2 million and around $2,500 in cash from two separate rooms. 

Federal police have begun an investigation into the robbery and are using security cameras, the hotel's guest list, and possible fingerprints in an attempt to track down a suspect, according to Las Provincias. 

Daddy Yankee's single "Despacito," a collaboration with Puerto Rican singer Luis Fonsi, became the most viewed music video in YouTube's history last summer. A remix of the song featuring Justin Bieber spent a record-tying 16 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart last year.

SEE ALSO: Musicians only got 12% of the $43 billion the music industry generated in 2017, and it mostly came from touring

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: How a black cop infiltrated the KKK — the true story behind Spike Lee's 'BlacKkKlansman'

What happens to old Broadway costumes

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Have you ever wondered what happens to all of the elaborate Broadway costumes once a show is over? Some of them actually end up in Astoria, Queens where they are collected and rented out to other performances to give them a second life. We spoke with the director of the TDF Costume Collection, Stephen Cabral, to find out how it all works and take a peek at some of their famous pieces. Following is a transcript of the video.

Narrator: Broadway shows don't last forever. But some of the costumes used on stage can get a second act, thanks to a not-for-profit organization called the TDF Costume Collection.

Cabral: We have a dress from Wicked, worn by Elphaba, as well as one of the "Mamma Mia!" jumpsuits.

Narrator: That's Stephen Cabral, the director of the collection, which is based in Astoria, Queens. TDF accepts donations from various theatrical performances at the end of their run and rents them back out to other performances for re-use.

Cabral: We do approximately 1,000 productions a year, renting over 10,000 costumes, both here in New York City as well as nation-wide.

Narrator: They have over 80,000 items in their collection, including shoes, shirts, dresses, hats, gloves, and various other accessories.

Cabral: A lot of times when a Broadway show will eventually close, the costumes are usually retained for the tour or backup. But every once in a while, a Broadway show will say, "Okay, we're done with these clothes; you can have them."

Narrator: TDF started back in the early '70s, when the Metropolitan Opera moved to Lincoln Center and donated costumes from 22 shows. TDF has since expanded, offering all sorts of items donated from a variety of performances and individuals.

Cabral: Recently, we received a rather large and very exciting donation. Hollywood, Broadway fashion designer, Bob Mackie.

Narrator: Some notable pieces Mackie donated were a dress worn by Julia Louis Dreyfuss at the 1997 Emmy awards and an entire production of "The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public."

Cabral: When the original production of "Rent" finally closed, after running for many, many years, we were very fortunate to receive all of the original costumes from the original off-Broadway production, before it moved to Broadway. We received many donations over the years from "Mamma Mia!" when "Mamma Mia!" was on Broadway. We have a dress worn by Jane Krakowski from a recent production of "She Loves Me," some costumes worn by Patti Lupone in the revival of "Gypsy."

Narrator: While many of the items are iconic, you won't necessarily find something worn by big celebrities like Cher or Barbara Streisand.

Cabral: Many celebrities actually wanna hold on to their costumes, either to potentially open a museum or more likely later on in life have some sort of celebrity auction.

Narrator: Many amateur stage performances rent from TDF, but so do some TV shows and movies. Cabral: "Saturday Night Live," when they're filming, depending on their season and their needs, is in here sometimes every week.

Narrator: TDF costumes can be seen in this skit with Betty White. "Now all we need is a dress and some proper shoes and a little womanly allure."

Narrator: And this skit with Justin Timberlake as Mozart.

Cabral: Both "Birdman" and "12 Years a Slave" featured costumes in the film that were rented here from the TDF Costume Collection. The only type of rental that we really don't do is Halloween Our costumes are really not Halloween-worthy. We also try to avoid doing rentals where there is any food or beverage involved.

Narrator: Anyone can go in and explore the collection. But if you wanna try anything on, you have to fill out some paperwork first. They have mannequins you can use to check sizes and dressing rooms you can book in advance.

"Here I go!"

Narrator: Cost is based on a whole look, not per individual item.

Cabral: The other part of our pricing exists with number of weeks of performances and how large your theater is.

Narrator: You also have to pay to have the costumes dry cleaned before returning them. Stephen says they have a green strategy in place to make sure all the items get as much use as possible. Once an item gets too ragged, it's moved to a special area, where these types of items are in demand.

Cabral: We have a distressed section. So for productions like "Les Mis" or "Urinetown," these are costumes that need to not look so great.

Narrator: And two or three times a year, they open up the warehouse for a special bag sale.

Cabral: You pay for that bag, you go in, and whatever you can shove into that bag and take out the door is yours.

Narrator: So no matter what condition a costume is in, there's always a chance at an encore performance.

Cabral: We sometimes will put costumes on people and there's nothing. Nothing changes, they're just kind of like, "Eh." Then you put costumes on people and it brings out a whole other personality or two. And it's kind of fun.

"Lovely to meet you."

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Elon Musk loves video games — here are his favorites

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Elon Musk

Elon Musk may be the CEO of two different companies, but he still makes time to game.

As the head of Tesla Motors, Musk is leading the rebirth of all-electric vehicles. At SpaceX, he's steering a company whose mission is to "revolutionize space technology, with the ultimate goal of enabling people to live on other planets." And that's not to mention that he oversees SolarCity, a company focused on making solar energy commonplace that Tesla bought last year.

But when he's not busy transforming transportation, space travel, and energy use, Musk plays video games. Well, he does lots of other things, but video games are one of those things. Heck, he's even putting video games into Tesla's cars!

As it turns out, Musk has excellent taste in games. Here are some of his favorites, which we gleaned from a Reddit AMA and Musk's Twitter account:

SEE ALSO: Elon Musk wants to let people play video games on the dashboard screen of Tesla cars

DON'T MISS: After weeks of bugging him on Twitter, Elon Musk finally told me his 'dark secret'

"Overwatch"

"Overwatch" isn't just a good game — it's the best game that came out in 2016, folks. Musk was quick to get hip to the game. His first tweet about it was in June 2016, a month after the game launched.

Showing how he's a man of taste, Musk has been playing the PC version of the game. Not only is that the prettiest version of "Overwatch," but a PC would give him the most control over the game's performance. And if we know anything about Musk, it's that he has a thing for being in control. 

BONUS: The main character he uses in the game is Soldier 76, which I'd personally call a bit on the boring side. Soldier 76 is a good character, no doubt, but as a main? Come on, Elon. You're more sophisticated than that.



"BioShock"

On paper, "BioShock" isn't anything special. It's a first-person shooter set in an underwater city that has fallen into disrepair. 

In reality, "BioShock" is a genre-pushing, narrative-driven shooting game that raises questions about our basic concepts of how video games work. If I said any more, I'd ruin the game. 

That said, it's not a huge surprise that Musk is a fan: The game is an Ayn Rand-inspired exploration of objectivism, capitalism, and power. It's also a tremendously stylish, innovative game.



The "Mass Effect" series

Moving to a subject that's near and dear to Musk's heart, the "Mass Effect" series focuses on space travel, interstellar diplomacy, and the future of the human race. The second game in the series is "one of the best games ever," Musk has said.

He's not alone in that sentiment — many video fans agree that "Mass Effect 2" ranks among the best games ever made.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

The 16 biggest games coming this fall, from an all-new ‘Fallout’ to the hotly-anticipated ‘Red Dead Redemption 2’

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Red Dead Redemption 2

Can you smell it in the air? This year's "Madden" is almost here, its annual mid-August launch signaling the coming wave of blockbuster video games about to arrive on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC. 

Huge new entries from already massively popular franchises are the standouts this year, and "Red Dead Redemption 2" (seen above) is the heaviest heavy of them all. The long-awaited sequel to Rockstar Games' brilliant original "Red Dead Redemption" is a kind of "Grand Theft Auto" meets "The Magnificent Seven" — a fitting game from the folks behind the "Grand Theft Auto" series. 

But this fall's not all cowboys and train robberies.

super smash bros ultimate

Below, we've put together the 16 biggest games slated to arrive in the biggest game release season of the year:

SEE ALSO: Nearly 5 years after launch, we compared the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One — and it's a harder decision than ever

1. "Madden NFL 19"

Every year, another "Madden" game. 2018 is no different, with the latest entry in the football simulation series arriving this August.

A handful of changes are being made this time around, like every year, but let's be honest: You're not buying "Madden" because of changes. Is anyone? "Madden NFL 19" is simply the latest iteration of a formula that's been working for over 25 years, which is exactly what it's supposed to be.

Release Date: August 10

Platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC



2. "Spider-Man"

The new "Spider-Man" game — a PlayStation 4 exclusive game — features a massive New York City that you can swing around, with plenty of enemies to pummel along the way. It's focused on re-creating the "Spider-man" experience as closely as possible

This is the classic Peter Parker/Spider-Man you already know and love.

"Our Spider-Man features a 23-year-old Peter Parker who has become a masterful Spider-Man," the game's creative director, Bryan Intihar, said of the game. "While he may be more experienced, Peter and Spider-Man's worlds continue to collide as he tries to juggle them."

Release Date: September 7

Platforms: PlayStation 4



3. "NBA 2K19"

For the 2oth anniversary of the NBA 2K series, newly minted Los Angeles Laker LeBron James is gracing the cover.

As per usual, "NBA 2K19" is a gorgeous basketball simulation — the basketball equivalent of "Madden" for football. It sets the standard for sim basketball games. Also like "Madden," it doesn't change too much from year to year. The focus is on updating the game to be a strong reflection of the current NBA, and it consistently delivers on that. Expect "NBA 2K19" to continue that tradition.

Release Date: September 11

Platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, Nintendo Switch



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

$2.3 billion later, Magic Leap's futuristic headset has the same problem as Microsoft's HoloLens

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Magic Leap One

  • Magic Leap is a secretive Florida-based startup that makes augmented-reality headsets.
  • On Wednesday morning, it launched its first device: Magic Leap One. It's a product that's over six years and $2.3 billion in the making.
  • The first media impressions were published on Wednesday morning, and they all point to the same problem shared by Microsoft's HoloLens headset: a tiny field of view.


The next step after smartphones is almost certainly some form of augmented reality — at least, that's what investors believe, to the point where they've pumped over $2.3 billion into Magic Leap, a Florida-based startup that creates AR headsets.

For years, Magic Leap has raised astronomical rounds of funding from the likes of Google, Alibaba, Fidelity, and JPMorgan. And on Wednesday morning, after years of hype and fundraising, Magic Leap released its first product: the Magic Leap One Creator Edition.

It includes a headset, a controller, and a corresponding computer (the circular thing on the left in the picture above). The idea is simple: It's a wearable computer.

Magic Leap One (Lightwear headset)

Looking through Magic Leap One's "Lightwear" glasses, you can manage your email, watch YouTube videos, or do whatever other stuff you'd do on a smartphone or computer. Instead of on a screen, it's projected into the world around you.

You know the movie "Minority Report"? It's kind of old at this point, but if you've seen it, you may remember Tom Cruise using a computer essentially projected into the world in front of him.

minority report tom cruise

Magic Leap's headset is similar, and it goes where you go. But there's a huge difference between what Magic Leap is promising and what it's offering.

This line in one hands-on with the headset, from CNET's Scott Stein, says it all: "The display's small field of view doesn't cover everything you see in the room."

Simply put, Magic Leap's headset offers a viewing window into an "augmented" reality, rather than fully engulfing users in that reality.

Imagine a window-sized rectangle in the middle of your view, through which you can see various things — your emails floating in mid-air, or an NBA game running on a floating screen, or whatever other stuff you'd normally do on a smartphone or a computer. That's what it's like using Magic Leap One. It's like looking through a window into a digital world, but the edges of it disappear the moment you turn your head.

It turns out, that feels about as natural as it sounds.

"Not being able to see a fuller view of the room's virtual objects is a serious drawback," Stein said. "Sometimes I lose track of things I can't see, and require sound to help me track where the augmented things are hiding, and where to turn." Stein wasn't alone in his criticism — every one of the handful of previews Magic Leap One issued the same concern.

It's the same problem that Microsoft's similarly futuristic AR headset, HoloLens, suffers from; using HoloLens feels like looking through a window into a different world rather than moving into one.

Stein makes a similar comparison: "It's not all that fundamentally different from the HoloLens," he wrote. "The Magic Leap One feels better in terms of display, controls, graphics and immersiveness ... Still, though, there are significant drawbacks to Magic Leap's AR hardware, mostly in terms of its limited field of view."

Microsoft HoloLens / Magic Leap One (Lightwear)

Seeing only what's directly in the middle of your vision while wearing a headset is one of HoloLens' biggest limitation, and it ends up feeling like a tease of something amazing.

When I last wore the HoloLens, it told me where to walk by painting arrows on the floor in front of my eyes.

The proof of concept there is obvious — imagine wearing a simple pair of glasses that offered Google Maps within your vision. Amazing!

But so are the limitations. Magic Leap One and HoloLens can't project anything into your peripheral vision, nor can they get anywhere near close to filling the field of vision of an average person. 

This is tremendously meaningful in ways that are inherently human, like seeing something moving out of the corner of your eye and being able to shift attention accordingly. It's only after you limit your field of vision that it feels so integral to sight, but it really is — try walking around for a few minutes with your hands held up to your eyes, binoculars-style, and see how it goes. 

This is one of the largest limitations of all augmented/mixed reality at the moment, and Magic Leap One is no different. Subsequent models of Magic Leap's hardware are expected to expand the field of view, but in reality it's clear that it needs to fill your field of view — or at least come close enough to not feel like you're looking through a window.

When that future comes, augmented-reality products will come much closer to delivering what they promise. But, for now, they're just very impressive computer glasses.

SEE ALSO: People finally got to try Magic Leap, the futuristic device that Google and others invested over $2 billion into — and the results aren't very positive

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NOW WATCH: People are going crazy for this holographic version of 'Minecraft'


Kanye West says he was cut off before he could answer Jimmy Kimmel's question about Donald Trump

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Kanye West on Jimmy Kimmel

  • Kanye West has responded to reports that he was left stumped by a question about Donald Trump on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!", which aired on Thursday night.
  • Kimmel asked the rapper whether he thought the president cared about black people or "any people at all."
  • West took a long pause before the host cut to an advertising break.
  • Taking to Twitter, West said he "wasn’t given a chance to answer the question."
  • West upset people this year by declaring support for Trump, and, separately, suggesting that slavery was "a choice."


Kanye West has responded to media reports that he was stumped on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" by one of the host's questions about his support of President Donald Trump.

Kimmel asked the rapper if he thought Trump cared about black people or indeed "any people at all," during his Thursday-night appearance.

West appeared to take a long pause, leaving Kimmel to cut to an advertising break.

West took to Twitter on Saturday, though, to say that he wasn't stumped, he "wasn’t given a chance to answer the question."

West continued by saying that, "The question was so important I took time to think," however, the rapper also went on to praise the "civil" dialogue that took place between him and the host.

It looks like there are no hard feelings between West and the talk show host as the rapper ended the stream of tweets by saying, "I appreciate Jimmy and his team. You guys are Jedi's [sic]."

Much of the interview that aired on ABC centred on West's views of the president, of whom he has been a vocal supporter in the past.

When asked about Trump's capabilities as president, the rapper instead riffed on the concept of love, saying it "took me a year and a half to have the confidence to stand up and put on the hat, no matter what the consequences were."

In April, West posted a photo of himself wearing the Trump campaign's signature "Make America Great Again" hat, upsetting fans who oppose Trump and leading artists including Chance the Rapper to distance themselves from West.

Donald Trump Kanye West

West was hospitalized for exhaustion in November 2016, days after saying he "would have voted" for Trump, if he had voted, at a show in San Jose, California. That announcement was met with boos and a few claps from the audience.

He also landed in hot water this May when he said slavery "sounds like a choice." It prompted the TMZ host Van Lathan to say he was "unbelievably hurt by the fact that you have morphed into something, to me, that's not real."

West said in a song that he told his wife, Kim Kardashian West, that she could leave him after the slavery comments but that she decided not to.

Responding to a question Thursday, he suggested that he could design the uniforms for Trump's newly announced Space Force ("I'm into designing"). He also told Kimmel that Trump "is a player" when asked whether he was ever concerned about his wife being alone in the Oval Office with Trump while discussing the release of Alice Marie Johnson from prison earlier this year.

Watch the full clip here:

 

SEE ALSO: Kanye West was asked to explain his support for Trump in a wild interview with Jimmy Kimmel — and replied 'you can't explain love'

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: How a black cop infiltrated the KKK — the true story behind Spike Lee's 'BlacKkKlansman'

Apple's secret charm offensive: How an invite-only meeting at Apple's luxury loft in New York helped transform how software is sold on the iPhone (AAPL)

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tim cook apple apps

  • Apple's App Store may be the world's largest software distribution platform.
  • But there are concerns that the competitiveness of the marketplace may make it difficult to maintain high-quality utility apps. 
  • Apple is strongly encouraging developers to transition to a subscription, software-as-a-service model, and held an invitation-only meeting in the spring of 2017 to convince developers to lean in to the new business model.

In April 2017, a group of over 30 software developers gathered at a luxury loft in New York City's trendy Tribeca neighborhood after receiving an invitation from Apple. They didn’t know exactly why they had been summoned, but all of them had one thing in common: they developed apps for Apple's devices, according to people who attended the event. 

The developers at Apple’s loft soon realized the hardware giant needed something from them: Apple was a few months into a major shift in the App Store’s core business model, and it needed buy-in from developers.

Developers, Apple said, needed to realize the business model of apps was changing. Successful apps tended to focus on long-term engagement instead of upfront cost. Indie developers who wanted to capitalize on this needed to move to a subscription model, as Apple had made possible in the past year in a splashy announcement. 

Why Apple, one the strongest forces in the world of technology, held an invite-only meeting for smaller, often one-or-two person indie developers is a story that goes back to the beginning of the App Store in 2008. Shortly after the App Store was turned on for iPhones, people realized that the market for apps had a tendency to drive prices for software down. 

Eventually, iPhone owners got used to apps costing only $1 or $2.

Months after the App Store launched, former Apple CEO Steve Jobs referenced the shifting market for apps in a 2008 interview that was recently unearthed.

"I think some of the folks have come down from $10 to $5, and see their sales go up more than 2X. I think these guys are trying to maximize revenue and they’re experimenting," Jobs said at the time. "They could ask us, 'What should we do?' and we’re going to say, 'We don’t know.' Our opinions are no better than yours because this is so new."

10 years later, the App Store isn't new anymore, and Apple continues to tweak its rules so that developers can create sustainable business models, instead of selling high-quality software for a few dollars or monetizing through advertising. If Apple can't make it worthwhile for developers to make high-quality utilities for the iPhone, then the vibrant software ecosystem that made it so valuable could decay.

Apple's main tool to fight the downward pricing pressure on iPhone apps is subscriptions.

Some apps are "hammers" 

php developerSome software is like a network, and other software is like a hammer.

For example, an app for connecting you to friends and family, like Facebook or Snapchat, is a network. On the other hand, an app that allows you to, say, crop or alter a photo is more of a tool, like a hammer.

The advent of the App Store in 2008 made most software for iPhone and iPads ever-cheaper as Apple's userbase was exploding, which was great for network-style apps: they got access to a huge userbase, and since they make money through advertising or other methods, the race to the bottom in terms of pricing didn't hurt them.

But the App Store put a lot of stress on hammer makers, people and small businesses who developed tools for people to draw, or write, or program — basically, apps called "utilities" in the App Store. These developers would sell an app for a few dollars in a one-time transaction, and then they were stuck paying server costs and upkeep indefinitely with free updates.

"Once the customer is acquired and they pay the money, they don't get charged again. So what keeps the app up?" Ish Shabazz, an indie iOS developer, said. 

In response, in 2016 Apple introduced what was reportedly internally called "Subscriptions 2.0," a way for developers that made utilities and other kinds of apps to bill their customers on a regular, recurring basis, creating the cashflow necessary to keep a hammer-style app up-to-date and effective. 

It also, according to developers that Business Insider spoke to, made it possible to create a large and sustainable software business based on App Store sales. 

This September, "Subscriptions 2.0" turns two year old. Subscription-based apps remain a very small fraction of the 2 million apps available from the App Store, but Apple is pleased with the uptake. 

"Paid subscriptions from Apple and third parties have now surpassed $300 million, an increase of more than 60% in the past year alone," Apple CEO Tim Cook said during a conference call last month. 

"What's more, the number of apps offering subscriptions also continue to grow. There are almost 30,000 available in the App Store today," he continued.

A secret developers conference 

tinder goldThe emphasis Apple is putting on subscription business models for app makers is clear from the invite-only meeting that the iPhone giant held in New York in 2017.

Apple holds an annual developers conference in San Jose, but it held a separate session that year for smaller developers encouraging them to adopt subscription business models. 

But if the transition didn’t go well, and developers stopped making hammer-style apps, Apple could lose some of the vibrant software that made its iPhone and iPad so valuable.

Up until 2016, when a developer sold an app to a customer, 30% of the transaction went to Apple, and the other 70% arrived in the form of a check to the app's creator.

The new way Apple wanted to promote: Instead of users paying for apps once, they’d pay on a regular basis, putting money into developer coffers on a regular schedule. Apple would still get a 30% cut of the subscription's cost, but if a customer continued to subscribe after a year, Apple's cut would go down to 15%.

At the meeting, Apple underscored that the app model was changing. The meeting touched on topics including launching, customer acquisition, testing and marketing, engagement, retention, monetization, and paid search ads. 

An Apple representative said at the meeting that paid apps represent 15% of total app sales and is on the decline, according to a person who was there who did not want to be identified to maintain their relationship with Apple. 

This meant that developers needed to spend time turning free customers into high-value customers, and also worry about churn — the percent of customers that used to subscribe but canceled. Apple suggested several tactics, like offering 2-4 options to improve conversion rate, segmenting users by price. Apple also suggested that after a month, it was seeing 41% retention on apps that increased their prices, only slightly lower than the 61% retention that it was seeing when subscription prices were kept the same. 

The message was clear: successful apps now focus on getting regular engagement from their users, not one-time sales. For developers, that meant embracing the subscription model.

If you focus on paid apps, instead of subscriptions, Apple warned, your business will eventually hit a cap.

An elite developer finds prices can go even higher

FaceTune without SkitchOne of the biggest winners from the changes to the App Store is Lightricks, an Israel-based developer which makes several serious photo editing apps for iPhones and iPads under the Enlight brand.

It makes FaceTune, a fun app that improves selfies — smoothing out imperfections, fixing the lighting, and generally making you look your best.

FaceTune was the No. 1 most downloaded paid app on the United States App Store on Friday. It's a paid app that costs $3.99. But although most developers would love to have those kind of numbers, Lightricks cofounder Itai Tsiddion is more excited about FaceTune 2, which uses the subscription app model. 

FaceTune 2 has over 500,000 active subscribers, Tsiddion said, and through research he's been able to figure out that the people who are engaged and using the app value it highly enough to pay much higher prices than what a paid app could command. 

If you want to sign up on a monthly basis, FaceTune2 costs $5.99 to unlock. Annually, it costs $32. And if you just want to buy it outright forever, it's a whopping $69.99. 

"Those are the prices we can command with subscriptions," Tsiddion said. "We were pitching, 'we'll get to $20.' We're at $36 now!" 

Lightricks achieved a $40 million run rate this year and is profitable, Tsiddion said, but in the early days, there were questions from Silicon Valley investors about whether it's possible to build a real business making mobile apps on the Apple App Store. 

"Even on Sand Hill Road, nobody believed it was a sustainable ecosystem," before the subscription changes, Tsiddion said, speaking of Lightricks' early days. 

With paid apps, he found they were "hitting a ceiling around $10 million per year in revenue, which is not very much when you have serious R&D."

But now, the recurring revenue from the company's App Store subscriptions have transformed a company whose primary product is iPhone and iPad apps into a "real business" with 140 employees. 

Dominated by big players

game of thronesStill, even with some hammer-makers finding huge success, the majority of Apple's subscription revenue doesn't appear to come from apps that are specific tools — instead, it's coming from big content businesses like Pandora, HBO, and Netflix. 

“My suspicion is that a good portion of those subscriptions are content subscriptions,” independent Apple analyst Neil Cybart wrote in May.

"Really, the growth of those applications has been cemented by the subscription applications,"Alex Malafeev, co-founder of Sensor Tower, an app analytics firm, told Business Insider. "It's definitely a top-heavy market right now in terms of the revenue." 

"If you look at maybe the top 20 or 30 apps and companies, these are going to be the names you hear in the media all the time, they're generating a lot of that revenue. Netflix. Spotify. Tinder. YouTube," he continued. "Part of this is driven by these companies introducing new media subscription monetization and doing really well."

One of the apps that is the best example of content subscriptions is Tinder, Malafeev said — a network-style app, and as a part of giant IAC, certainly not an indie developer. 

"Tinder probably being the best example where the majority of their monetization is from "Gold" premium subscriptions, but they also have considerable purchases that you can buy as well to boost your profile or something like that," he said.

Apple likes to tout its payouts to developers. In June, it said that it had paid out $100 billion to App Store developers, of which there are 20 million. But some smaller developers worry that figure is misleading, with the majority of that going to the big players.  

"They say they paid developers $100 billion dollars, which I think is hilarious. Who are they paying $100 billion dollars? HBO and Netflix are two of the top-grossing apps on the App Store. It seems disingenuous to take credit for 'Game of Thrones,'" Shabazz said. 

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One way that "hammer" developers are adapting to the new subscription focus is to bundle content into their tool apps. 

Shabazz is working on a daily planner and notebook app called Capsicum, which will be monetized through subscriptions. He's shooting for $19.99 per year. 

"The way that works is we're going to be adding content constantly over time," Shabazz said, citing additions like weather, backup features, and daily graphics inside the journal.

It also costs money and time to retool a popular app for subscriptions. Popular iOS app Ulysses changed from a $25 app to a $5 per month app last year, for example. "Adding subscription to Ulysses took us 7 months, with 1 man-year engineering, 1.5 man-years total effort. It’s 22k lines of production code," Ulysses cofounder Max Seelemann tweeted

There's also a danger that consumers may not want to pay on a monthly basis for a utility. "You’ve seen many apps changing their business models, and the consumer reactions are mixed," Denys Zhadanov, a VP at Readdle, which makes Spark, a mail client, as well as other utilities, told Business Insider in an email.

The trick is to "provide recurring value, so that you can ask for a recurring fee. If the app/service is a more of a tool (hammer) that is used once a month — charging for that every month doesn’t make much sense," he continued. "Yet there are exceptions on the App Store who trick users into free trials and charge them $3.99 a month, making $1M revenue per month."

How many subscriptions?

Tim CookApple hasn’t said how many in-app subscriptions are currently being paid for and didn't respond to a request for  comment for this story.

Apple has 300 million people paying it for subscriptions, according to its most recent earnings call. Some are subscriptions to Apple's own services, like Apple Music, but the majority are subscriptions to third-party apps. 

The number certainly stacks up well to other content subscription services: Netflix has 125 million subscribers and HBO Now only has 5 million. Spotify has 83 million paid subscribers.

Apple is quietly building one of the biggest subscription businesses in the world — something that’s core to the company as iPhone sales growth slows. Apple wants its services, supported by the App Store, to be a Fortune 50 business by 2020, or about $55 billion per year in revenue. 

While a lot of that lifting can be done by content, to build a business that big, Apple is going to need a lot of hammers too. 

Are you an app developer with a story to share? Contact the reporter of this story at kleswing@businessinsider.com

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All 38 notable Jason Statham movies, ranked from worst to best by critics

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Jason Statham

With actor Jason Statham's new giant-shark movie, "The Meg," in theaters this weekend, we've looked back at the action star's filmography to see which of his movies are the best — and worst.

Turns out, he's been in a lot of bad movies, at least according to critics. But he's also one of Hollywood's most consistent leading men in action movies, and is synonymous with the genre.

We ranked all of Statham's movies based on Rotten Tomatoes critic scores, and broke any ties with audience scores. We didn't include movies where he is listed in uncredited roles on IMDb, and his 2005 movie "Chaos" didn't have a critic score.

Below are 38 Jason Statham movies, ranked from worst to best according to critics:

SEE ALSO: The best way to watch Jason Statham's new giant shark movie, 'The Meg,' is in a theater where water drips on you and the seats move

38. "In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale" (2008)

Rotten Tomatoes critic score: 4%

Description: "A man named Farmer sets out to rescue his kidnapped wife and avenge the death of his son – two acts committed by the Krugs, a race of animal-warriors who are controlled by the evil Gallian."



37. "Turn It Up" (2000)

Rotten Tomatoes critic score: 8%

Audience score: 28%

Description: "Turn It Up is an explosive contemporary drama about a gifted musician's struggle to rise above the crime-plagued urban streets and realize his dream. Diamond ("Pras" of the Fugees and Mystery Men) is unwittingly drawn into the world of drug-running by his childhood friend Gage (rapper Ja Rule, Backstage). The sudden death of Diamond's mother, and the untimely pregnancy of his girlfriend, force Diamond to make hard choices about his life and the people around him. His estranged father (Vondie Curtis Hall, Eve's Bayou, Gridlock'd, T.V.'s Chicago Hope) re-enters Diamond's life looking for reconciliation. Diamond devotes himself to his music and finds support and true inspiration in unexpected places."



36. "13" (2011)

Rotten Tomatoes critic score: 8%

Audience score: 34%

Description: "A naïve young man assumes a dead man's identity in order to join an underground game of Russian roulette. He finds himself embroiled in an underworld labyrinth of power, violence, and luck. The stakes are high, but the payout is more than he can resist. His only collateral is his life and however long his luck can hold. Are his odds any better than any other player in this most deadly game?"



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We probably won’t see the next major ‘Grand Theft Auto’ game until at least 2020, after the new PlayStation and Xbox consoles launch — here’s why

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Grand Theft Auto 5 (cash)

Nearly five years after "Grand Theft Auto 5" first launched, the game continues to quietly dominate. As of late June, nearly 100 million copies have been sold.

It's the third best-selling game of all time, just below "Tetris" and "Minecraft." That's because it keeps selling — "GTA 5" has been on the top 20 best-selling games in the US every month since it launched, barring a single month where it dropped to number 21.

And the studio that made "GTA 5," Rockstar Games, is on the verge of releasing a brand new game: "Red Dead Redemption 2."

Red Dead Redemption 2

It's for these reasons, broadly speaking, that we're likely still years away from the next entry in the "Grand Theft Auto" series.

But, as you might expect, it's much more complicated than that.

SEE ALSO: One of the best-selling games of 2018 is nearly five years old — and the makers say 'there's plenty more content to come'

1. "GTA 5" keeps selling.

Games like "Grand Theft Auto 5" — third-person, story-driven, open-world action games — don't usually enjoy sales performance like "GTA 5" does. Most games in general don't enjoy the type of sales performance of a title like "GTA 5."

It is an anomaly, statistically speaking. "Its performance is just other worldly," The NPD Group's Mat Piscatella told me in a recent email; NPD tracks game sales data in the United States. "No other title comes anywhere near close." 

Since "GTA 5" went on sale in September 2013, it has appeared in the top 20 best-selling games list 57 out of 58 times. "The only time it didn't was October 2014 when it hit at #21," Piscatella said.

Simply put: Why release a new "GTA" when the last one is still selling so well? 

In fact, Rockstar Games re-issued "GTA 5" in a "Premium Edition" earlier this year. It comes with additional content and a bunch of virtual money to use in "GTA Online" — the massively popular online component of "GTA 5."



2. "GTA Online" is very popular.

Speaking of, "GTA Online" is quite popular. It's not clear exactly how popular it is, as Rockstar Games doesn't release player numbers. When we asked, representatives declined to answer.

Here's what we do know about how popular it is: Rockstar Games said in January that "GTA Online" had more players in December 2017 than any previous time. Which is to say that more and more people are playing "GTA Online" over time.

It's not surprising, either. With 100 million copies sold, that means that even if only 1% of buyers are playing "GTA Online," that's still a million people. And given Rockstar's previous comments on player growth, we can assume that it's probably much more than 1%. 

We also know that it's popular enough that Rockstar keeps making major additions — and those additions aren't cheap to make. 

Part of what makes "GTA Online" so alluring is it takes the open world of the offline game and turns it into a multiplayer playground. You can take on heists with friends, or go racing around San Andreas, or become a business magnate.

Better still: It costs nothing to play other than the initial price of the game. There are virtual items and bonuses  you can buy within "GTA Online," but it's otherwise an infinite extension of an already massive open-world game.



3. It doesn't make sense to release a new "GTA" game anywhere near "Red Dead Redemption 2" because it could hurt sales of both.

Games like "Grand Theft Auto 5" are rare.

Not just open-world, third-person action games — there are lots of those every year — but games with massive worlds brimming with possibility. Those games tend to be beloved. I'm talking about stuff like "The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim" or "The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild." The kind of games where players spend hundreds of hours exploring, long after the main story has ended, just for the thrill of it. 

These are also the games that sell huge, record-setting numbers. They break out of the "core" gaming audience and enter the mainstream. And they sell for years.

But there can only be so many of those games. They are the exceptions — mainstream audiences will only buy so many games, and even the most hardcore players don't have time to focus on multiple massive open-world games. 

In so many words: Putting out a second massive open-world game in "GTA 6" anywhere near the release of "Red Dead Redemption 2" would be a mistake.

It could limit both games as people chose one or the other, or fell off of the first one to pick up the second, or simply skipped the first for the latter. If history is any indication, Rockstar intends to continue selling "Red Dead Redemption 2" long after its initial launch in October.



See the rest of the story at Business Insider

'The Meg' proves that even a silly shark movie works in this year's box office, as it wins the weekend with a surprising $44.5 million (T)

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the meg movie

  • Warner Bros.' "The Meg" earned $44.5 million to win the weekend box office.
  • That doubles the industry projection for the movie.
  • It's now the highest-grossing live-action shark movie ever (not counting inflation), and the biggest opening this summer for a non-sequel movie.

Just how good has this year's summer box office been to Hollywood? Even a shark movie that has more of a "Sharknado" feel than "Jaws" is making a killing at the multiplex.

Warner Bros.' "The Meg," starring Jason Statham versus a prehistoric shark, took in an incredible $44.5 million at the domestic box office, doubling industry expectations. It's now the highest-grossing live-action shark movie ever (not counting inflation).

That's quite a finish for a movie Hollywood has been trying to make since the 1990s when Steve Alten's book, "Meg: A Novel of Deep Terror," came out.

Though its star, Statham, didn't hold back while promoting the movie that its wacky tone wasn't what he signed on for, expecting a more gory R-rated action movie, he might be singing a different tune this morning.

"The Meg" director, Jon Turteltaub ("National Treasure" franchise), looks to have captured the right tone of big shark fear and silly action to get audiences to come to the movie its opening weekend (despite its 49% Rotten Tomatoes score).

the meg warner bros

And it didn't just do well in the US — internationally the movie took in around $90 million over the weekend.

Warner Bros. and its co-financier, China's Gravity Pictures, were probably in cold sweats when industry projections had the movie opening around just $20 million in North America. The movie's budget before marketing has been reported to be anywhere between $130 million to north of $170 million.

But the $4 million Thursday preview take domestically likely calmed a lot of nerves.

The movie then took in a strong $16.5 million on Friday, which confirmed that WB had a hit. And it took in another $16.3 million on Saturday.

The summer movie season has been full of surprises, but perhaps the biggest is that out of the non-sequels released, it's not the Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson vehicle ("Skyscraper") that had the biggest opening weekend, but the movie from the director behind "Last Vegas."

SEE ALSO: "The Meg" director isn't looking for an Oscar, he just wants everyone to enjoy the "big f---ing shark"

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