Universal Pictures’ The Five Year Engagement–a comedy reteaming director/writer/producer Nicholas Stoller and writer/star Jason Segel of Forgetting Sarah Marshall–has been selected to open the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival. The premiere is set for Wednesday, April 18, and the Festival runs through April 29.
Beginning where most romantic comedies end, The Five-Year Engagement looks at what happens when an engaged couple, Segel and Emily Blunt, keeps getting tripped up on the long walk down the aisle. The film, also produced by Judd Apatow (Knocked Up, The 40-Year-Old Virgin) and Rodney Rothman (Get Him to the Greek), opens nationally on April 27.
“When Jason and I met during the production of Undeclared, we couldn’t have imagined that one day we would write a comedy that would open such a prestigious film festival as Tribeca,” said Stoller. “We are so honored that the festival organizers have given us this platform to premiere the film. To be honest, this is all just a ploy to stand on top of a building with Robert De Niro and look out over New York City at dusk.”
The 2012 Tribeca Film Festival will announce its feature film slate on March 6 and 8.
Founded by Robert De Niro, Jane Rosenthal and Craig Hatkoff in 2001 following the attacks on the World Trade Center, to spur the economic and cultural revitalization of the lower Manhattan district through an annual celebration of film, music and culture, the Tribeca Film Festival brings the industry and community together around storytelling.
The Tribeca Film Festival, now in its 11th year, has screened more than 1,300 films from more than 80 countries since its first edition in 2002. During its first 10 years, the Festival has attracted an international audience of more than 3.7 million attendees and has generated an estimated $725 million in economic activity for New York City.
Apple and Google Face UK Investigation Into Mobile Browser Dominance
Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers, a British watchdog said Friday in a report that recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year.
The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker's tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. Apple does this by restricting progressive web apps, which don't need to be downloaded from an app store and aren't subject to app store commissions, the report said.
"This technology is not able to fully take off on iOS devices," the watchdog said in a provisional report on its investigation into mobile browsers that it opened after an initial study concluded that Apple and Google effectively have a chokehold on "mobile ecosystems."
The CMA's report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers "the clearest or easiest option."
And it said that the a revenue-sharing deal between the two U.S. Big Tech companies "significantly reduces their financial incentives" to compete in mobile browsers on Apple's iOS operating system for iPhones.
Both companies said they will "engage constructively" with the CMA.
Apple said it disagreed with the findings and said it was concerned that the recommendations would undermine user privacy and security.
Google said the openness of its Android mobile operating system "has helped to expand choice, reduce prices and democratize access to smartphones and apps" and that it's "committed to open platforms that empower consumers."
It's the latest move by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to crack down on the... Read More