In 1988, the news cycle didn't work with the same rapidity that it does today, when a story can go from the center of global attention to virtually nonexistent in a matter of days or even hours.  Almost 25 years ago, big stories became big stories without so many competing 24-hour news networks, all manner of social media, immediate meme-dom, and the eventual backlash. 

It was a year that included an American presidential election and the release of Die Hard, but one particular story that captured the imagination and attention not just of America but of the world at large was that of three California gray whales surrounded by encroaching ice in the Arctic Circle.  Multiple nations and even conflicting interests united to find a way to get the whales, known affectionately as Fred, Wilma, and Bam Bam, through miles of ice to the safety of the open ocean.

Operation Breakthrough, as it was known, was chronicled by Tom Rose in the 1989 book Freeing the Whales: How the Media Created the World's Greatest Non-Event.  That book inspired the new film Big Miracle, which dramatizes the events and stars Drew Barrymore and John Krasinski, who respectively play a Greenpeace activist and the journalist who first discovered the whale family.  With the new family-friendly drama arriving this Friday, both stars were recently on hand for a Los Angeles press conference, along with fellow actors Kristen Bell, Ted Danson, Dermot Mulroney, Vinessa Shaw, and director Ken Kwapis.  IAR's own Jami Philbrick was present to get these creative figures' thoughts on telling the story of Fred, Wilma, Bam Bam, and all those who aided in their journey.

Opening in theaters on January 27th is the new action-packed, wilderness-survival thriller from director Joe Carnahan (The A-Team) called The Grey. The movie features an exceptional cast of veteran actors including Liam Neeson (Taken), Dermot Mulroney (Abduction), Frank Grillo (Warrior), James Badge Dale (Shame), Dallas Roberts (3:10 to Yuma), Joe Anderson (The Crazies), and Nonso Anozie (Conan the Barbarian).

IAR's Managing Editor Jami Philbrick recently had an opportunity to sit down with actors Dermot Mulroney, Frank Grillo, James Badge Dale, and Dallas Roberts to discuss their work on The Grey. The exceptional group of actors talked about the new film, their characters' arcs, working with director Joe Carnahan, the movie's physically taxing demands, and why Frank Grillo actually got himself arrested to research his role.

Opening in theaters on January 27th is the new action-packed, wilderness-survival thriller from director Joe Carnahan (The A-Team) called The Grey. The movie features an exceptional cast of veteran actors including Liam Neeson (Taken), Dermot Mulroney (Abduction), Frank Grillo (Warrior), James Badge Dale (Shame), Dallas Roberts (3:10 to Yuma), Joe Anderson (The Crazies), and Nonso Anozie (Conan the Barbarian).

IAR's Managing Editor Jami Philbrick recently had an opportunity to sit down with director Joe Carnahan to discuss his work on The Grey. Carnahan talked about the new film, why he chose to depict the wolves as abnormally large, human nature's willingness to adapt and survive, reuniting with Neeson after The A-Team, and the production's extremely difficult weather conditions. 

With just a few days until the film actually hits theaters, a new trailer for The Grey has made its way online.  This trailer is notable for two things, being an age-restricted red band deal, and also being thoroughly badass.  It quite effectively exploits several very basic fears both modern and instinctual, from the fear of being in a place crash to the fear of freezing to death to the altogether more immediate fear of getting eaten by f*cking wolves. 

Opening in theaters on January 27th is the new action-packed, wilderness-survival thriller from director Joe Carnahan (The A-Team) called The Grey. The movie features an exceptional cast of veteran actors including Liam Neeson (Taken), Dermot Mulroney (Abduction), Frank Grillo (Warrior), James Badge Dale (Shame), Dallas Roberts (3:10 to Yuma), Joe Anderson (The Crazies), and Nonso Anozie (Conan the Barbarian).

IAR's Managing Editor Jami Philbrick recently had an opportunity to sit down with Academy Award-nominated actor Liam Neeson to discuss his work on The Grey. Neeson talked candidly about the new film, human nature's willingness to survive, his character's own sudden desire to live; the mantra that kept him going, what Neeson learned about himself from making the movie, and why in his opinion Joe Carnahan was the only man capable of directing the film. 

Synopsis: Inspired by the true story that captured the hearts of people across the world, the rescue adventure Big Miracle tells the amazing tale of a small town news reporter (John Krasinski) and a Greenpeace volunteer (Drew Barrymore) who are joined by rival world superpowers to save a family of majestic gray whales trapped by rapidly forming ice in the Arctic Circle. Local newsman Adam Carlson (Krasinski) can't wait to escape the northern tip of Alaska for a bigger market. But just when the story of his career breaks, the world comes chasing it, too. With an oil tycoon, heads of state and hungry journalists descending upon the frigid outpost, the one who worries Adam the most is Rachel Kramer (Barrymore). Not only is she an outspoken environmentalist, she's also his ex-girlfriend. With time running out, Rachel and Adam must rally an unlikely coalition of Inuit natives, oil companies and Russian and American military to set aside their differences and free the whales. As the world's attention turns to the top of the globe, saving these endangered animals becomes a shared cause for nations entrenched against one another and leads to a momentary thaw in the Cold War.

Three new images from The Grey have popped up online today, and if you're wondering what The Grey is exactly, it's the movie where Liam Neeson fights a feral wolf, using only a little knife and some jagged mine booze bottles affixed to his fist.  Sadly, these images do not contain Neeson engaging in fisticuffs with a wild animal, but they do remind us that The Grey is also a tense survival thriller about a group of oil-drilling roughnecks who find themselves stranded in the remote Alaskan wilderness following a plane crash.  And because that situation isn't quite horrific enough, they're being picked off by a pack of rogue wolves who presumably love the taste of roughnecks.  So check out the pictures below, knowing in your heart that once The Grey will include an  Oscar caliber actor wrasslin' with a wolf.*

The phrase, "Behind every great man there's an even greater woman," usually implies the solidarity of a healthy and supportive romantic relationship.  In the case of founding FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, the greater woman behind him was not a love interest, but his secretary Helen Gandy, who loyally served as his right hand for 54 years, even torching the controversial power-magnet's incriminating personal files after his death.  Clint Eastwood's new biographical film J. Edgar, which chronicles the early years of Hoover's tenure, would be incomplete without an appropriately forceful Helen Gandy, who is played by Oscar Nominee Naomi Watts.

Last week, the first official images from J. Edgar showed Leonardo DiCaprio as the title character, along with Armie Hammer as Clyde Toulson, with whom Hoover had a relationship that went beyond the strictly professional.  Now, another new image reveals Naomi Watts as Gandy, with DiCaprio present as a supremely agitated-looking Hoover.

The last time Leonardo DiCaprio played a prominent, controversial 20th Century historical figure, the world was gifted with my beloved The Aviator, in which Martin Scorsese depicted, with plenty of dramatic license, the early years of Howard Hughes. 

That sets a high bar for J. Edgar, the Clint Eastwood-directed biopic chronicling the early career of J. Edgar Hoover, the powerful and enduring bureaucrat who served as the first director of the FBI.  Way back in February, set photos of DiCaprio smoking a cigarette in his Hooverian vest and hair combo made their way online, but now an official image gives our best look at the actor, complete with some unnerving shark eyes.

Love, Wedding, Marriage opens in theaters on June 3rd and marks the directorial debut for actor Dermot Mulroney. The film is not that much of a departure for Mulroney who is best known for his roles in similarly themed wedding films such as The Wedding Date and My Best Friend's Wedding co-starring Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz. The film features a stellar cast of young, and veteran actors such as Mandy Moore (Tangled), Kellan Lutz (Twilight), Jessica Szohr (TV's Gossip Girl), Jane Seymour (Wedding Crashers), and James Brolin (Burlesque). We recently had a chance to attend the red carpet premiere of the film and speak with actors Kellan Lutz, and Jane Seymour, as well as director Dermot Mulroney, about the new romantic movie.