The Usual Suspects
''The Usual Suspects'' is a 1995 crime thriller film directed by Bryan Singer and written by Christopher McQuarrie. It stars Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Benicio del Toro, Kevin Pollak, Chazz Palminteri, Pete Postlethwaite and Kevin Spacey. The plot follows the interrogation of Roger "Verbal" Kint, a small-time con man, who is one of only two survivors of a massacre and fire on a ship docked at the Port of Los Angeles. Through flashback and narration, Kint tells an interrogator a convoluted story of events that led him and his criminal companions to the boat, and of a mysterious crime lord—known as Keyser Söze—who controlled them. The film was shot on a $6 million budget and began as a title taken from a column in '' Spy'' magazine called "The Usual Suspects", after one of Claude Rains' most memorable lines in the classic film ''Casablanca'', and Singer thought that it would make a good title for a film. The film was shown out of competition at the 1995 Canne ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bryan Singer
Bryan Jay Singer (born September 17, 1965) is an American filmmaker. He is the founder of Bad Hat Harry Productions and has produced almost all of the films he has directed, as well as multiple television series. After graduating from the University of Southern California, Singer directed his first short film, ''Lion's Den (1988 film), Lion's Den'' (1988). On the basis of that film, he received financing for his next film, ''Public Access (film), Public Access'' (1993), which was a co-winner of the Grand Jury Prize at the 1993 Sundance Film Festival. In the mid-1990s, Singer received critical acclaim for directing the neo-noir crime thriller ''The Usual Suspects'' (1995). He followed this with another thriller, ''Apt Pupil (film), Apt Pupil'' (1998), an adaptation of a Stephen King novella about a boy's fascination with a Nazi war criminal. In the 2000s, he became known for big budget superhero films such as ''X-Men (film), X-Men'' (2000), for which Singer won the 2000 Saturn A ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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British Board Of Film Classification
The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) is a non-governmental organization, non-governmental organisation founded by the British film industry in 1912 and responsible for the national classification and censorship of films exhibited at cinemas and video works (such as television programmes, Trailer (promotion), trailers, adverts, public information/campaigning films, menus, bonus content, etc.) released on physical media within the United Kingdom. It has a statutory requirement to classify all video works released on VHS, DVD, Blu-ray Disc, Blu-ray (including Blu-ray 3D, 3D and Ultra HD Blu-ray, 4K UHD formats), and, to a lesser extent, some video games under the Video Recordings Act 1984. The BBFC was also the designated regulator for the UK age-verification, UK age-verification scheme, which was abandoned before being implemented. History and overview The BBFC was established in 1912 as the British Board of Film Censors, under the aegis of the Incorporated Associa ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Academy Award For Best Original Screenplay
The Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay is the Academy Award (also known as an Oscar) for the best screenplay not based upon previously published material. It was created in 1940 as a separate writing award from the Academy Award for Best Story. Beginning with the Oscars for 1957, the two categories were combined to honor only the screenplay. See also the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, a similar award for screenplays that are adaptations of pre-existing material. Eligibility Screenplays are eligible if they are not based on "previously published material". The Writer's Branch of the academy determines if a screenplay is adapted or original, based on possible sources in question, interviews given about the film and the film's publicity materials, and sometimes places screenplays in a different category than the Writers Guild of America. For the 75th Academy Awards, ''Gangs of New York'' was nominated as an original screenplay despite being based on the book Th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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1995 Cannes Film Festival
The 48th Cannes Film Festival took place from 17 to 28 May 1995. French actress Jeanne Moreau served as jury president for the main competition. French actress Carole Bouquet hosted the opening and closing ceremonies. Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica won the ''Palme d'Or'', the festival's top prize, for a second time with the comedy-drama film ''Underground (1995 film), Underground''. The festival opened with ''The City of Lost Children'' by Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, and closed with ''The Quick and the Dead (1995 film), The Quick and the Dead'' by Sam Raimi. Juries Main competition * Jeanne Moreau, French actress - Jury President * Gianni Amelio, Italian filmmaker * Jean-Claude Brialy, French actor and director * Nadine Gordimer, South African author * Gaston Kaboré, Burkinabé filmmaker * Michèle Ray-Gavras, Michele Ray-Gavras, French producer and journalist * Emilio García Riera, Mexican actor, writer and film critic * Philippe Rousselot, French ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Casablanca (film)
''Casablanca'' is a 1942 American romantic drama film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, and Paul Henreid. Filmed and set during World War II, it focuses on an American expatriate (Bogart) who must choose between his love for a woman (Bergman) and helping her husband (Henreid), a Czechoslovak resistance leader, escape from the Vichy-controlled city of Casablanca to continue his fight against the Nazis. The screenplay is based on '' Everybody Comes to Rick's'', an unproduced stage play by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison. The supporting cast features Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter Lorre, and Dooley Wilson. Warner Bros. story editor Irene Diamond convinced producer Hal B. Wallis to purchase the film rights to the play in January 1942. Brothers Julius and Philip G. Epstein were initially assigned to write the script. However, despite studio resistance, they left to work on Frank Capra's ''Why We Fight'' ser ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Claude Rains
William Claude Rains (10 November 188930 May 1967) was a British and American actor whose career spanned almost seven decades. He was the recipient of numerous accolades, including four Academy Award nominations for Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actor, and is considered one of the screen's great character stars who played cultured villains during the Golden Age of Hollywood. From McFarlane's ''Encyclopedia of British Film''. London: Methuen/BFI, 2003, p. 545 The son of a stage actor, Rains began acting on stage in his native London in the 1900s. He became a leading thespian on the West End theatre, West End, and an acting teacher at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts. He moved to the United States in the late 1920s and became a successful Broadway theatre, Broadway star, before making his American film debut as Griffin (The Invisible Man), Dr. Jack Griffin in ''The Invisible Man (1933 film), The Invisible Man'' (1933). He went on to play prominent rol ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Spy (magazine)
''Spy'' was a satirical monthly magazine published from 1986 to 1998. Based in New York City, the magazine was founded by Kurt Andersen and E. Graydon Carter, who served as its first editors, and Thomas L. Phillips Jr., its first publisher. ''Spy'' specialized in irreverent and satirical pieces targeting the American media and entertainment industries and mocking high society. Overview Some of its features attempted to present the darker side of celebrities such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, John F. Kennedy Jr., Steven Seagal, Martha Stewart, and especially the real-estate tycoon Donald Trump and his then-wife Ivana Trump. Pejorative epithets of celebrities, such as " Abe 'I'm Writing As Bad As I Can' Rosenthal", "short-fingered vulgarian Donald Trump", "churlish dwarf billionaire Laurence Tisch", "antique Republican pen-holder Bob Dole", "dynastic misstep La Toya Jackson", "bum-kissing toady Arthur Gelb", "bosomy dirty-book writer Shirley Lord", and "former fat girl Dianne Bri ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Keyser Söze
Keyser Söze ( ) is a fictional character and the main antagonist in the 1995 film ''The Usual Suspects'', written by Christopher McQuarrie and directed by Bryan Singer. According to the main protagonist, petty con artist Roger "Verbal" Kint (Kevin Spacey), Söze is a crime lord whose ruthlessness and influence have acquired a mythical status among police and criminals alike. Further events in the story make these accounts unreliable; in a twist ending, a police sketch identifies Kint and Söze as one and the same. The character was inspired by real-life murderer John List, and the spy thriller '' No Way Out'', which features a shadowy KGB mole who may or may not actually exist. The character has placed on numerous "best villain" lists over the years, including AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains. Spacey won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, turning him from a character actor into a star. Since the release of the film, the character has become synonymous with i ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Narration
Narration is the use of a written or spoken commentary to convey a story to an audience. Narration is conveyed by a narrator: a specific person, or unspecified literary voice, developed by the creator of the story to deliver information to the audience, particularly about the plot: the series of events. Narration is a required element of all written stories (novels, short stories, poems, memoirs, etc.), presenting the story in its entirety. It is optional in most other storytelling formats, such as films, plays, television shows and video games, in which the story can be conveyed through other means, like dialogue between characters or visual action. The narrative mode, which is sometimes also used as synonym for narrative technique, encompasses the set of choices through which the creator of the story develops their narrator and narration: * ''Narrative point of view, perspective,'' or ''voice'': the choice of grammatical person used by the narrator to establish whether or ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Flashback (narrative)
A flashback, more formally known as analepsis, is an interjected scene (fiction), scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point in the Plot (narrative), story. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened before the story's primary sequence of events to fill in crucial backstory. In the opposite direction, a flashforward (or prolepsis) reveals events that will occur in the future. Both flashback and flashforward are used to cohere a story, develop a character, or add structure to the narrative. In literature, internal analepsis is a flashback to an earlier point in the narrative; external analepsis is a flashback to a time before the narrative started. In film, flashbacks depict the subjective experience of a character by showing a memory of a previous event and they are often used to "resolve an enigma". Flashbacks are important in film noir and melodrama films. In films and television, several camera techniques, editing approaches and special e ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Port Of Los Angeles
The Port of Los Angeles is a seaport managed by the Los Angeles Harbor Department, a unit of the Los Angeles, City of Los Angeles. It occupies of land and water with of waterfront and adjoins the separate Port of Long Beach. Promoted as "America's Port", the port is located in San Pedro Bay (California), San Pedro Bay in the San Pedro, Los Angeles, San Pedro and Wilmington, Los Angeles, Wilmington neighborhoods of Los Angeles, approximately south of downtown. The port has 25 cargo terminals, 82 container cranes, 8 container terminals, and of on-dock rail. The port's top imports were furniture, automobile parts, apparel, footwear, and electronics. In 2019, the port's top exports were Waste paper, wastepaper, pet and animal feed, scrap metal and soybeans. In 2020, the port's top three trading partners were China (including Hong Kong), Japan, and Vietnam. In 2022, the port, together with the adjoining Port of Long Beach, were considered amongst the world's least efficient ports ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Con Man
A scam, or a confidence trick, is an attempt to defraud a person or group after first gaining their trust. Confidence tricks exploit victims using a combination of the victim's credulity, naivety, compassion, vanity, confidence, irresponsibility, and greed. Researchers have defined confidence tricks as "a distinctive species of fraudulent conduct ... intending to further voluntary exchanges that are not mutually beneficial", as they "benefit con operators ('con men') at the expense of their victims (the 'marks')". Terminology Other terms for "scam" include confidence trick, con, con game, confidence game, confidence scheme, ripoff, stratagem, finesse, grift, hustle, bunko, bunco, swindle, flimflam, gaffle, and bamboozle. The perpetrator is often referred to as a scammer, confidence man, con man, con artist, grifter, hustler, or swindler. The intended victims are known as marks, suckers, stooges, mugs, rubes, or gulls (from the word ''gullible''). When accomplices are employ ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |