Film Industry

On a sultry mid-July afternoon on this military base, a few hundred Marines, some with spouses and children in tow, were mustering for a free screening of the movie "Warrior" at a squat cement cinema house on Mainside, the section of the 200-square-mile facility reserved for civilian comforts like the Stars and Strikes bowling alley and Smokey's House of BBQ. In the film, which won't arrive in theaters until September, a Marine just home from Iraq...

Amid mounting evidence that rival states are chipping away at California's movie and TV production business, a coalition of entertainment unions and film industry officials is renewing a push to provide long-term funding for California's popular film tax credit program. But the effort faces an uphill challenge in Sacramento, where lawmakers and Gov. Jerry Brown are wrestling with a wider-than expected $16-billion budget deficit. California currently sets aside $100 million annually for dozens of projects applying for credits that cover 20% to 25% of qualified production expenses.

— Beneath a star-filled African sky, crowds of city dwellers and rural farmers gather before a giant inflatable screen. It's movie night in Rwanda and thousands have come to see films selected in this year's Rwanda Film Festival. Most of them have never seen a motion picture on a large screen before and for many this will be the first feature-length film they have ever seen — in any format. Seventeen years after the genocide that tore this country apart — killing more than 800,000 in just 100 days — there is a palpable sense of renewal in Rwanda.

Annette Bening, Al Pacino, Ed Harris and several other celebrities helped power a surge in feature film shoots on the streets of Los Angeles last month, but film industry officials were hardly star-struck. Thanks to a flurry of low-budget celebrity-packed pictures, location shoots jumped 74% in April over last year, continuing double-digital gains from the first quarter of the year, according to FilmL.A. Inc., a nonprofit group that handles film permits for the city and the county.

For decades, the nation's pornographic film industry found a happy, largely accepting home in Los Angeles. Producers operated lucrative businesses in anonymous office parks in the San Fernando Valley. Available in the city were a steady supply of actors and film production talent as well as opulent mansions that often served as theatrical backdrops. By one estimate, at least 5% of on-location shoots were for adult films. But this coexistence has been suddenly shaken by sweeping health regulations that, starting March 5, will require porn performers to wear condoms while on location.

More than a dozen California state parks that have been a rich source of filming for such classic Hollywood movies as "High Noon," George Lucas' "Star Wars" sequel "Return of the Jedi" and Steven Spielberg's "Back to the Future III" are in danger of going dark. They are among 70 state parks, historic sites and recreation areas — or 25% of the 278 parks statewide — that Gov. Jerry Brown has proposed closing in response to the state's budget crisis. The planned closings, which are part of the $33 million in park cuts approved by the Legislature this year, are likely to be the subject of intense upcoming budget negotiations in Sacramento.

In a significant defeat for the adult film industry, the Los Angeles City Council has given final approval to a city ordinance requiring porn actors to wear condoms while performing. The 9-1 vote Tuesday marks a significant victory for the L.A.-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which has been rallying for years to protect the health of porn actors by asking agencies in California to mandate condom use during film shoots. In the past decade, porn shoots have been suspended several times after high-profile cases of porn performers infected by HIV. "It's a great day for the performers and safer sex in our society," said an ebullient Michael Weinstein, president of the foundation, which has been waging a largely lonely battle for mandatory condom use for years.

In a campaign where jobs and unemployment have become a signature issue, the two candidates seeking to replace former Los Angeles City Councilwoman Wendy Greuel are fighting over who will do more to stem the exodus of Hollywood production. With feature film production down 37% citywide compared to the same period last year, former Paramount Pictures Corp. executive Christine Essel and Assemblyman Paul Krekorian (D-Los Angeles) agree on one thing: City officials have waited far too long to address the issue.

Racism in our entertainment industry, historic and current, is undeniable. There have been and are racist Jewish producers, directors and writers. And "summits" are needed to educate them. But let's not lose sight of the fact that Jews do not own Hollywood, nor do we constitute a people trying to achieve such a thing. All of this is not to alleviate the "rest" of us from our responsibilities. We are living in a frightfully racist decade. As such, Jews can no more stand aside and watch people of color be oppressed than any other Euro-American people can. SILJA J.A. TALVI Oakland

The towering neon sign atop the Hollywood Taft Building at the fabled crossroads of Hollywood and Vine, which once guided fictional private eye Philip Marlowe through a thousand lonely nights, also cast its light on one of 1930s Los Angeles' most colorful real-life mobsters.

Box-office receipts are about to shoot into the stratosphere this weekend thanks to"The Hunger Games,"putting a phenomenal finish on what has been a surprisingly strong first quarter of moviegoing. The adaptation of Suzanne Collins' bestselling young-adult book is expected to have a blockbuster opening of $125 million to $150 million, according to pre-release audience surveys. That would not only make it the highest-ever debut for a non-sequel (not accounting for ticket price inflation)

When Los Angeles painted a 1.5-mile strip of Spring Street neon green last year, it was hailed as a major step in the city's effort to have cars and bicycles share the road. But now, the bike lane has become a symbol of how hard it can be to reserve room for cyclists in a city dominated by the car. The green lane has been criticized by the film industry, which frequently uses the stretch of Spring Street, in the heart of old downtown, as a stand-in for other cities and eras.

Raymond Zhou became China's most famous film critic by happenstance. It was 2001, and his work as the editor in chief of a bilingual high-tech website in Silicon Valley had been halved. With extra time on his hands, and unemployment looming, Zhou started writing Western-style movie reviews and sending them back to his home country. The casual, chatty and accessible style — then utterly new to China, where musty academic film criticism was the norm — was a hit. Over the year, Zhou reviewed about 100 new films, from Ridley Scott's "Black Hawk Down" to Steven Spielberg's "A.I.

Simi Valley is a quiet suburban community and wants to keep it that way: No lights, no cameras, no porn studios. Not that adult-film producers are flocking over the hill from the porn-rich San Fernando Valley, but the fear is that they might. Angered by a recent L.A. requirement for on-set condom use, producers have made noises about leaving, and officials next door in Simi Valley are trying to thwart an invasion before it gets started. "The bottom line is we don't want to be known as the porn capital of the world," said Mayor Bob Huber, who is pushing for a local condom measure similar to one the L.A. City Council approved in January.

For decades, the nation's pornographic film industry found a happy, largely accepting home in Los Angeles. Producers operated lucrative businesses in anonymous office parks in the San Fernando Valley. Available in the city were a steady supply of actors and film production talent as well as opulent mansions that often served as theatrical backdrops. By one estimate, at least 5% of on-location shoots were for adult films. But this coexistence has been suddenly shaken by sweeping health regulations that, starting March 5, will require porn performers to wear condoms while on location.

On a cold, wet afternoon two cowboys trudge across a muddy street in a western town carrying saddles on their backs as a loudspeaker blasts Jim Croce's hit song "I Got a Name. " The scene was being played out at the historic Melody Ranch in Santa Clarita, where director Quentin Tarantino was filming his upcoming western "Django Unchained," starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Jamie Foxx. "It's a blast shooting here," Tarantino said during a break from shooting. "Most other western towns look like dollhouses.

In a significant defeat for the adult film industry, the Los Angeles City Council has given final approval to a city ordinance requiring porn actors to wear condoms while performing. The 9-1 vote Tuesday marks a significant victory for the L.A.-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which has been rallying for years to protect the health of porn actors by asking agencies in California to mandate condom use during film shoots. In the past decade, porn shoots have been suspended several times after high-profile cases of porn performers infected by HIV. "It's a great day for the performers and safer sex in our society," said an ebullient Michael Weinstein, president of the foundation, which has been waging a largely lonely battle for mandatory condom use for years.

Just before noon on a clear fall day, the Newman stage on the 20th Century Fox lot is alive with bright lights, hovering microphones and a full 105-piece orchestra. It's one of the final scoring sessions for "Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol," and director Brad Bird and composer Michael Giacchino are listening closely to the music when a man with a snow-white ponytail and baseball cap leans over to whisper in Giacchino's ear. The composer nods and asks the conductor, Tim Simonec, to take it from the top, with a shade less emphasis on the piano.