The black carpet was rolled out at the AMC Loews Lincoln Square cinemas for the feverishly-anticipated premiere of The Dark Knight. The film's cast and crew appeared at the premiere, but most talk, as it has been for the past since months, was about missing cast member Heath Ledger, whose sudden death in January shocked Hollywood and the public. The film's star, Christian Bale, said Ledger "steals the movie, I'm quite happy to say that......

A man posing as Heath Ledger's father managed to get free hotel rooms and talk to Tom Cruise and John Travolta after the actor's death last week. The Post reports the "twisted impostor" got Tom Cruise to console him on the phone and almost "got John Travolta to buy him a plane ticket to the United States." Why does this sound like a radio shock jock prank? With Ledger's father Kim (pictured) rumored to arrive......

The latest in the Batman canon, The Dark Knight, is poised to be next summer's blockbuster hit, and ex-Brooklynite/current Manhattanite Heath Ledger seems to be stealing the show. A trailer recently came out with plenty of focus on Ledger's Joker character, and you can watch it below (MTV also has a shot-by-shot analysis). Does he outshine Jack Nicholson's 1989 Joker? We're excited to see this new take on the crime clown. As with 2005's Batman......

The Todd Haynes Bob Dylan biopic I’m Not There has gotten so much press for so long we kept forgetting it wasn't actually released until today! The high-concept Oscar contender, for those who haven’t heard a million times already, features six different actors portraying a Dylan-type character at different stages of his career. It opens today at select theaters but film buffs have been cultivating opinions about the polarizing film since it first screened......

I Want Someone To Eat Cheese With (directed by Jeff Garlin) While there's quite a few new releases coming out that are worth checking out this weekend (like the western and the spacemen documentary), we wanted to reserve our pick for a charming little movie you might have otherwise ignored. Written, directed and starring comedian Jeff Garlin (who we interviewed earlier this week), it's the kind of modest, looking-for-love-in-all-the-wrong-places story you don't often see these......

The French Connection (directed by William Friedkin) Film Forum through September 6th A New York City procedural cop movie classic and the winner of five Academy Awards, a new 35 mm print of The French Connection gets a one-week run at Film Forum starting this weekend. Starring Gene Hackman as the porkpie wearing detective Popeye Doyle in a career defining role, the movie follows the attempt of a French criminal (Fernando Rey) to smuggle heroin......

Rescue Dawn (directed by Werner Herzog) Christian Bale seems to be willing to undergo any amount of physical hardship for the sake of a movie. If you saw his scary transformation into the 120 lb emaciated insomniac in the 2004 film The Machinist you know what he's capable of in terms of "method" realism, but in Werner Herzog's newest fiction film, Rescue Dawn he goes even further. Portraying real life Navy pilot Dieter Dengler, who......

This week at the movies, two actors known for their intensity on (and off) screen have new flicks coming out. The Oscar-winning over-reactor Russell Crowe goes the romantic comedy route with A Good Year about an English businessman softened by life in Provence. With a script by Peter Mayle, a novelist well versed in the French countryside, and direction by Ridley Scott, Crowe as Max Skinner actually comes across as incredibly charming. He's sure to......

The Guardian is reporting that Cate Blanchett is one of the actors playing the role of Bob Dylan in Todd Haynes's biopic. This wouldn't, of course, be the first time that a woman has played a man, or vice versa. The Australian actress and the Duluth musician don't have that much physically in common, but that's no matter. There will also be a lot of other actors playing Dylan. The film, I'm Not There,......

Jill Singer, Mediabistro Deputy Editor...

Gothamist can't help it: News that Ken Watanabe is joining the cast of Batman: Intimidation as villain Ra's Al Ghul does make us excited, as does the news of the rest of the cast: Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne/Batman, Michael Caine as butler Alfred, Katie Holmes as childhood friend "Rachel," Liam Neeson as Wayne's mentor Henri Ducard, Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox, "a former board member and sidelined employee of Wayne Enterprises," Cillian Murphy as......

Since it's been fun to cast The Parker Grey Show, Gothamist would like to look at the casting for the upcoming Batman movie that Memento director Christopher Nolan will be directing. The Hollywood Reporter says that these actors are in the running: Jake Gyllenhaal Christian Bale Joshua Jackson Cillian Murphy Henry Cavill Eion Bailey Hugh Dancy Clearly, this Batman is young and hot, but not in the prettiest way possible, and we think Bruce Wayne......

Roger Ebert's review of Laurel Canyon has two glaring mistakes: - Natasha McElhone's character is the one who drives Christian Bale's character home, not the other way around (which is what he writes). - Ebert compares Kate Beckinsale's overachieving MD-Ph.D. candidate character to Ally Sheedy's character in High Art, Laurel Canyon director Lisa Chodolenko's first feature. Wrong wrong wrong: Ally Sheedy's character is a heroin addicted artist whose lifestyle entices an up and coming book......