FBI tried in vain to stop 'Deep Throat' film (AP)

MIAMI - When the FBI investigated the landmark 1972 porno movie "Deep Throat," the case touched the highest levels of the FBI, even its second-in-command W. Mark Felt, the shadowy Watergate informant whose "Deep Throat" alias was taken from the movie's title.

The FBI documents newly released to The Associated Press reveal the bureau's sprawling and ultimately vain attempt to stop the spread of a movie some saw as the victory of a cultural and sexual revolution and others saw as simply decadent.

Agents seized copies of the movie, had negatives analyzed in labs and interviewed everyone from actors and producers to messengers who delivered reels to theaters.

"Today we can't imagine authorities at any level of government — local, state or federal — being involved in obscenity prosecutions of this kind," said Mark Weiner, a constitutional law professor and legal historian at Rutgers-Newark School of Law. "The story of 'Deep Throat' is the story of the last gasp of the forces lined up against the cultural and sexual revolution and it is the advent of the entry of pornography into the mainstream."

The papers are among 498 pages from the FBI file on Gerard Damiano, who directed the movie and died in October. Released this month following a Freedom of Information Act request by the AP, they are just a glimpse into Damiano's roughly 4,800-page file. More than 1,000 additional pages were withheld under FOIA exemptions and because they duplicated other material; the balance of the file has not yet been reviewed and released.

Many parts of the released files are whited out and the FBI's ultimate targets are unclear, but the seriousness with which the agency treated the investigation is unquestionable.

The file includes memos between the FBI's top men — L. Patrick Gray, William Ruckelshaus and Clarence Kelley, successive heads of the agency after J. Edgar Hoover — and field offices so widespread, it seemed nearly all of the country's biggest cities were involved.

On various entries in the file, a checklist of top FBI brass appears in the top right corner, with initials next to some names. One of those listed is W. Mark Felt, the FBI second-in-command whose "Deep Throat" alias as a Watergate informant came from the movie's title. None of the markings indicate he read any of the materials on the movie whose name became synonymous with his role in bringing down Richard Nixon's presidency. However, former FBI agents interviewed by the AP after the documents were released said Felt almost certainly would have been aware of the huge investigation.

Felt got the double-entendre nickname because he leaked crucial information about Nixon administration corruption on "deep background" to Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward. His identity remained a secret until 2005. He died in December.

While much of the probe centered in New York, where many involved in the film lived, and Miami, where it was largely shot, agents from Honolulu to Detroit were involved.

Aside from investigative records tracking subpoenas, interviews, screenings and shipments of the film, the Damiano file includes various FBI agents' play-by-play accounts of the movie's plot, and the specific role of Damiano in the agency's investigation.

The FBI notes Damiano had been "somewhat cooperative," On Aug. 7, 1973, an assistant U.S. attorney general writes to Kelley, saying Damiano is being considered for immunity. The memo doesn't specify the crime, though mentioned throughout the file is the charge of interstate transportation of obscene material.

Among the areas of the case file whited out is an interview with the star of the film, who at the time went by the name Linda Lovelace.

"Deep Throat" achieved fame unlike any pornographic film in history and become the most widely known adult film to reach a general audience. It was hugely profitable — made for about $25,000 and amassing hundreds of millions in receipts — and became a cultural buzzword.

Authorities have long said the movie was made with mafia money — and the FBI has linked the mob with porn over the years — but the file includes no mention of mob links.

Officials at every level of government tried to stop screenings and obscenity trials continued for years. But in the end, experts say, it represents the end of an era in which the government sought to stop the changing cultural tides.

Eugene Volokh, a law professor at UCLA, said the oddity of the scope of the investigation into "Deep Throat" is a reflection of very different times.

"Certainly today, with our broadly socially less restrictive attitude to most pornography and to sex more broadly it may seem odd that the government was spending so much effort on something like this," he said. "But attitudes back then were much different."

Drag Me to Hell

Betsey Sharkey

If a one-eyed gypsy with very bad teeth asks you for anything, and really, I cannot emphasize this enough, say yes. Don't waver, don't bargain; anything short of yes could put you on a fast track to damnation as surely as a broken mirror will bring you seven years of bad luck.

Look at what happens to Christine, a very good egg boiled to perfection by circumstance and a lot of good work by Alison Lohman. One bad decision and suddenly director Sam Raimi throws her under the bus of his terrific new horror film, Drag Me to Hell.

If you've been worried that Raimi's decade spent spinning the Spider-Man web might have caused him to go soft, well stop. The director who gave us the Evil Dead trilogy is back with a vengeance that rivals the one-eyed gypsy I warned you about.

With that fire in his belly, Raimi's Drag Me to Hell does everything we want a horror film to do: It is fearsomely scary, wickedly funny and diabolically gross, three stomach-churning states that argue for taking a pass on the $10 box of popcorn. Which also makes the movie an excellent economic investment in these tough times.

I mention the economy because Raimi has made it an issue at the heart of Drag Me to Hell, in the spirit of campy cultural commentary that good horror can do so well. The director and his brother Ivan began the script 10 years ago before Peter Parker's many tribulations in Spidey tights sidelined it. If the Raimis really are as prescient as Drag Me would suggest, I'd like to put in a good word for them to be added to the Obama economic recovery team.

You see, Christine is a lending agent at a bank and ambition has made her desperate for a promotion. The gypsy is old Mrs. Ganush (Lorna Raver), who just wants a little of the candy on Christine's desk and another extension on her home loan. Sounds reasonable to me. And it did to Christine too until her boss (David Paymer) hints that if she is serious about that promotion . . .

So good, decent Christine goes against her better judgment and denies Mrs. Ganush's request. Bad choice, Christine. Before she can begin what will be a long string of "I'm sorrys," that become "How dare yous," there's a curse on her head and the nightmare begins. Not too many scenes later you may find yourself wondering if the title was meant to refer to Christine or the rest of us.

Against all the craziness that any decent ghost story conjures up, there has to be the rational voice. In Drag Me, it comes from the Mac guy, Justin Long, who I'm sure will one day have a role that will turn his Apple ad stint into nothing more than a footnote, but this won't be it.

As the very proper professor Clay Dalton, Long is torn between what he knows is reality and his increasingly delusional girlfriend's belief that she's got just a few days to fend off the devil who's nipping at her heels. Clay doesn't have what it takes to fight off demons anyway, assuming he even believed in them, but he's a good boyfriend, willing to humor Christine even when he thinks she's completely lost her mind.

In Mrs. Ganush, Raimi and Raver have created a horrific otherworldly fiend that can hold her own against the best of the Freddy Kruegers of the world. This is one woman who can roar (still, I do worry that given the slimy dentures, projectile vomiting and that really bad temper, Raver won't be doing lunch in town any time soon). Other evil forces are churned up by that angry curse and rise too; the particularly deadly dark spirit called Lamia is the one to worry about.

Though the film has echoes of Raimi's earlier and much loved Evil Dead series -- especially what he does with mischief-making, chill-inducing wind -- Drag Me to Hell should not be dismissed as yet another horror flick just for teens. The filmmakers have given us a 10-story winding staircase of psychological tension that is making very small circles near the end. Though Christine is technically the one doing the climbing, it's nearly impossible not to feel like she's dragging us right along with her, which is after all the point.

There are all manner of grisly things that Christine must deal with before it is finished, but it's really grisly-lite, nothing like the torture-porn of the Hostel series or the bodies-on-meat-hooks style of sadomasochism you find in Hellraiser.

When Raimi says Lohman is in virtually every scene except the opening historical note, he's not exaggerating. In broad strokes, because you should experience the fear and loathing of the specifics for yourself, she must decide exactly how far she is willing to go to stay alive. There is one point that risks having sympathy turn to antipathy, and I'm betting that a contingent of the audience won't be able to get past it, but Lohman, with her strange blend of apple pie sweetness and business school pragmatism, is the right one for the job, making sure most of us stay on Christine's side.

From the stuff that is driven into and through bodies to the stuff that comes out of them and all the other strange things that go bump in the night, the look of the film is a studied balance between over-the-top camp and believable enough moments that, taken together, might give you a few sleepless nights. A certain grave-site scene demonstrates both nicely, so a special shout-out to the vast teams that handled the stunts, the effects, the makeup and the rest of it.

Horror might not be your thing, but if you can push through the fear, stomach the gross and just let yourself go with it, the payoff is experiencing a filmmaker totally in his element. Raimi is having the time of his life -- he knows exactly what he's doing with every scene and every scream. He's confident, he's smiling. If he has us squirming in our seats, then so much the better.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra

This movie is adapted from the famous cartoon series GI Joe. Paramount Pictures and Hasbro, whose previous collaboration was the worldwide blockbuster “Transformers,” join forces with Spyglass Entertainment for another extraordinary action-adventure “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.” From the Egyptian desert to deep below the polar ice caps, the elite G.I. JOE team uses the latest in next-generation spy and military equipment to fight the corrupt arms dealer Destro and the growing threat of the mysterious Cobra organization to prevent them from plunging the world into chaos. “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.” is directed by Stephen Sommers (”The Mummy,” “The Mummy Returns”).

Release Date : August 7, 2009

Director : Stephen Sommers

Writer : Stuart Beattie

Cast : Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Christopher Eccleston, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Byung Hun Lee, Sienna Miller, Rachel Nichols, Ray Park, Said Taghmaoui, Channing Tatum, Marlon Wayans, Dennis Quaid

Studio : paramount

IMDB : link

Runtime :

Website : http://www.gijoemovie.com/

Actor David Carradine found dead in Bangkok

BANGKOK - Much like the character that made him famous, David Carradine was always seeking, both spiritually and professionally, his life forever intertwined with the Shaolin priest he played in the 1970s TV series "Kung Fu."

Just as the character, Kwai Chang Caine, roamed the 19th Century American West, Carradine spent his latter years searching for the path to Hollywood stardom, accepting low-budget roles while pursuing interests in Asian herbs, exercise and philosophy, and making instructional videos on tai chi and other martial arts.

Carradine was found dead Thursday in Thailand. The 72-year-old actor appeared to have hanged himself in a suite at the luxury Swissotel Nai Lert Park Hotel, said Lt. Teerapop Luanseng, the officer responsible for investigating the death.

"I can confirm that we found his body, naked, hanging in the closet," Teerapop said. He said police were investigating and suspected suicide, though one of his managers questioned that theory.

"All we can say is, we know David would never have committed suicide," said Tiffany Smith, of Binder & Associates, his management company. "We're just waiting for them to finish the investigation and find out what really happened. He really appreciated everything life has to give ... and that's not something David would ever do to himself."

Carradine had flown to Thailand last week and began work on "Stretch" two days before his death, Smith said. He had several other projects lined up after the action film, which was being directed by Charles De Meaux with Carradine in the lead.

A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy, Michael Turner, said the embassy was informed by Thai authorities that Carradine died either late Wednesday or early Thursday.

"I was deeply saddened by the news of David Carradine's passing," said director Martin Scorcese. "We met when we made 'Boxcar Bertha' together, almost 40 years ago. I have very fond memories of our time together on that picture and on 'Mean Streets,' where he agreed to do a brief cameo."

Carradine came from an acting family. His father, John, made a career playing creepy, eccentric characters in film and on stage. Half-brothers Keith, Robert and Bruce also became actors, and actress Martha Plimpton is Keith Carradine's daughter.

"My Uncle David was a brilliantly talented, fiercely intelligent and generous man. He was the nexus of our family in so many ways, and drew us together over the years and kept us connected," Plimpton said Thursday.

Carradine was "in good spirits" when he left the U.S. for Thailand on May 29 to work on "Stretch," Smith said.

"David was excited to do it and excited to be a part of it," she said by phone from Beverly Hills.

Filming began Tuesday, she said, adding that the crew was devastated by Carradine's death and did not wish to speak publicly about it for the time being.

The Web site of the Thai newspaper The Nation said Carradine could not be contacted after he failed to appear for a meal with the rest of the film crew on Wednesday, and that his body was found by a hotel maid Thursday morning. It said a preliminary police investigation found that he had hanged himself with a curtain cord and there was no sign that he had been assaulted.

Police said Carradine's body was taken to a hospital for an autopsy that would be done Friday.

Carradine appeared in more than 100 feature films with such directors as Scorsese, Ingmar Bergman and Hal Ashby. One of his early film roles was as folk singer Woody Guthrie in Ashby's 1976 biopic, "Bound for Glory."

But he was best known for "Kung Fu," which aired from 1972-75.

Carradine, a martial arts practitioner himself, played Caine, an orphan who was raised by Shaolin monks and fled China after killing the emperor's nephew in retaliation for the murder of his kung fu master.

Pursued by revenge assassins from China, Caine wanders the American West in search of his half-brother Danny. His conscience forces him to fight injustice wherever he encounters it, fueled by flashbacks to his training in which his master famously refers to him as "Grasshopper."

Carradine left after three seasons, saying the show had started to repeat itself.

"I wasn't like a TV star in those days. I was like a rock 'n' roll star," Carradine said in an interview with Associated Press Radio in 1996. "It was a phenomenon kind of thing. ... It was very special."

Actor Rainn Wilson, star of TV's "The Office," said on Twitter: "R.I.P. David Carradine. You were a true hero to so many of us children of the 70s. We'll miss you, Kwai Chang Caine."

Carradine reprised the role in a mid-1980s TV movie and played Caine's grandson in the 1990s syndicated series "Kung Fu: The Legend Continues."

He returned to the top in recent years as the title character in Quentin Tarantino's two-part saga "Kill Bill." Bill, the worldly father figure of a pack of crack assassins, was a shadowy presence in 2003's "Kill Bill — Vol. 1." In that film, one of Bill's former assassins (Uma Thurman) begins a vengeful rampage against her old associates, including Bill.

In "Kill Bill — Vol. 2," released in 2004, Thurman's character catches up to Bill. The role brought Carradine a Golden Globe nomination as best supporting actor.

Bill was a complete contrast to Caine, the soft-spoken refugee serenely spreading wisdom and battling bad guys in the Old West.

"David's always been kind of a seeker of knowledge and of wisdom in his own inimitable way," Keith Carradine, said in a 1995 interview.

After "Kung Fu," Carradine starred in the 1975 cult flick "Death Race 2000." He starred with Liv Ullmann in Bergman's "The Serpent's Egg" in 1977 and with his brothers in the 1980 Western "The Long Riders." But after the early 1980s, he spent two decades doing mostly low-budget films.

Tarantino's films changed that.

"All I've ever needed since I more or less retired from studio films a couple of decades ago ... is just to be in one," Carradine told The Associated Press in 2004.

"There isn't anything that Anthony Hopkins or Clint Eastwood or Sean Connery or any of those old guys are doing that I couldn't do," he said. "All that was ever required was somebody with Quentin's courage to take and put me in the spotlight."

In the 2004 interview, Carradine talked candidly about his past boozing and narcotics use, but said he had put all that behind him and stuck to coffee and cigarettes.

"You're probably witnessing the last time I will ever answer those questions," Carradine said. "Because this is a regeneration. It is a renaissance. It is the start of a new career for me.

"It's time to do nothing but look forward."

Natalie Portman signs on for comedy "Your Highness"

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Natalie Portman is joining Danny McBride and James Franco in the fantasy comedy "Your Highness."

Written by Ben Best and McBride, the Universal Pictures project centers on an arrogant, lazy prince (McBride) who must complete a quest to save his father's kingdom. Joining him on the quest is McBride's more heroic brother, played by Franco.

Portman will play McBride's love interest, a warrior princess.

Director David Gordon Green ("Pineapple Express," "All the Real Girls") is shooting the film this summer in Northern Ireland.

Portman is working on "Hesher," an indie drama that marks her inauguration as a producer. She next stars with Jake Gyllenhaal and Tobey Maguire in the drama "Brothers," a remake of Susanne Bier's Danish film.