By Leah Rozen LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Years from now, doctoral candidates are likely to write entire extended theses on Alan Garner, the character so memorably and brilliantly played by Zach Galifianakis in the "Hangover" series. This bearded baby-man - he's a walking Chia Pet - is pure id, one of the most transgressive characters to ever pop up in a mainstream movie. He's annoying, peculiar, perverse, prideful, cuddly and outrageously funny, all rolled into a single squat, hirsute package. Fortunately for "The Hangover Part III," much of it is all about Alan. ...

By Alexandria Sage CANNES (Reuters) - Paolo Sorrentino's "The Great Beauty," a nostalgic, melancholic ode to the eternal city Rome, is one of several films that touch on the unraveling of contemporary Italy in official selection at the Cannes film festival this year. Also competing for the prestigious Palme d'Or award to be handed out on May 26 is "Un Chateau en Italie" ("A Castle in Italy") by Franco-Italian director Valeria Bruni Tedeschi about the demise of an aristocratic family. ...

By Belinda Goldsmith CANNES (Reuters) - The relationship between the flamboyant pianist Liberace and his young lover dazzled at the Cannes film festival on Tuesday and threw the spotlight on gay rights at the movie industry's largest annual gathering. Director Steven Soderbergh said he struggled five years ago to secure funding for "Behind the Candelabra" because some financiers thought the film would only appeal to a gay audience and, at a cost of $25 million, would be a financial risk. ...

By Mike Davidson CANNES (Reuters) - He's played a science-fiction hero, policeman and even Hamlet. But now actor Keanu Reeves is taking on a new role - as director of a contemporary martial arts movie aimed at both Chinese and Western audiences. Reeves has stepped behind the camera to make his directorial debut with "Man of Tai Chi", a trilingual film loosely based on the life of a stuntman, Tiger Chen, whom he befriended while working on the sci-fi "The Matrix" trilogy. ...

By Alexandria Sage CANNES (Reuters) - Japanese director Takashi Miike got the final week of the Cannes film festival off to an explosive start on Monday, with big budget cop thriller "Shield of Straw" a sharp contrast to the more intense, intimate movies screened so far. Typically for Cannes, where critical passions run high, both exuberant cheers and boos rang out after an advance press screening of "Wara No Tate" ("Shield of Straw"), one of 20 entries vying for the top Palme d'Or prize awarded on Sunday. ...

By Jeff Sneider LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Relativity is back in business with its "Paranoia" star Liam Hemsworth, who has signed on to lead the upcoming action film "Aurora Rising." Written by Christian Gudegast, the story follows a surfer (Hemsworth) turned military fighter pilot who, after acing a complicated and messy first combat mission, gets recruited to be part of an elite team to test the next generation of aircrafts just as an international conflict begins to escalate. ...

By Brent Lang NEW YORK (TheWrap.com) - Seth MacFarlane will not return to host the 2014 Oscars, the filmmaker and hit TV writer/producer announced on Monday. MacFarlane said that his schedule did not permit him to return. "Traumatized critics exhale: I'm unable to do the Oscars again. Tried to make it work schedule-wise, but I need sleep," MacFarlane tweeted. MacFarlane's turn as emcee of the 2013 Oscars divided the community. Some found him funny and eager to experiment while many found him crass and unoriginal, citing a long gag about breasts. ...

By Jeff Sneider LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Kate Hudson is set to play the female lead opposite Zach Braff in the director's Kickstarter-approved indie movie "Wish I Was Here." Braff stars as Aidan Bloom, a struggling actor, father and husband who is still trying to find his identity and purpose at age 35. Hudson will play Braff's wife and the mother of his two children. She joins a cast that includes Mandy Patinkinand Josh Gad as Braff's father and brother, respectively, as well as Anna Kendrick, Jim Parsons and Braff's "Scrubs" co-star Donald Faison. ...

By Brent Lang LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Chinese actress Li Bingbing has joined the cast of "Transformers 4," Paramount Pictures said Monday. She will co-star in the sequel along with Mark Wahlberg, Stanley Tucci, Kelsey Grammer and Jack Reynor. Michael Bay will once again direct and orchestrate the fireballs and global mayhem. Li has previously appeared in "Resident Evil: Retribution" and "Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. ...

By Brent Lang LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Zachary Levi, star of the late, lamented NBC action comedy "Chuck," will make his Broadway debut in the musical comedy "First Date," the show's producers said Monday. Levi anchored the cult TV series for five seasons, starring as a computer-whiz who becomes an improbable spy. He also did voice work for 2011's "Tangled" and is set to appear in "Thor: The Dark World." In "First Date," Levi plays a high-strung man who gets set up with a serial-dater. ...

By Brent Lang LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Martin Scorsese and Mel Brooks are rarely mentioned in the same sentence. Although both men are film legends, their styles and subject matter are worlds apart-- one is associated with gritty depictions of criminality while the other is best known for his pioneering fart jokes. The two men will share the same stage, however, on June 6, when Scorsese will present Brooks with the American Film Institute's 41st Life Achievement Award. ...

By Lisa Richwine and Andrea Burzynski (Reuters) - "Star Trek Into Darkness," the newest installment in the classic intergalactic franchise, blasted to the top of movie box office charts with $70.6 million in weekend ticket sales at theaters in the United States and Canada. The new 3D voyage for Captain Kirk and the crew of the Starship Enterprise knocked mighty "Iron Man 3" into second place, while the Marvel superhero sequel grabbed $35.2 million. Jazz Age drama "The Great Gatsby" finished third with $23.4 million, according to studio estimates. ...

By Belinda Goldsmith CANNES (Reuters) - Film stars come to Cannes to promote themselves and their projects - so where better to launch a wry documentary bemoaning the seeming dominance of celebrity pulling-power over content? With parties, pitching and paparazzi already in overdrive at the world's premier movie market, director James Toback on Sunday showed "Seduced and Abandoned", the story of how he and actor Alec Baldwin talked to directors, investors and studio heads at Cannes last year to seek funding for a film with no A-list star. ...

By Alexandria Sage CANNES (Reuters) - Folk music, Greenwich Village and a quick-footed cat star in the new Coen brothers movie at the Cannes film festival on Sunday, kicking off the first of five U.S. entries with its engaging misadventures of a struggling singer. "Inside Llewyn Davis" by directing duo Ethan and Joel Coen is a delightful tale about the early 1960s folk music scene, a tribute to artists living hand to mouth, and an ode to New York all at once. ...

By Belinda Goldsmith CANNES (Reuters) - Indian movie actors and a new wave of directors are on a mission at the Cannes film festival - to show that their industry, which turns 100 this year, is more than just Bollywood. The largest Indian contingent to date is on the French Riviera at the world's leading cinema showcase to promote the world's biggest film industry that makes over 1,000 films a year, compared with about 600 in Hollywood. ...

By Belinda Goldsmith CANNES (Reuters) - Native American actress Misty Upham never dreamt she would be walking the red carpet at Cannes to showcase a film shot on her reservation. Upham features in "Jimmy P. Psychotherapy of a Plains Indian", focused on the relationship between World War Two veteran Jimmy Picard, a Native American Blackfoot, and Georges Devereux, his psychoanalyst. Upham said like Picard, played by Puerto Rican actor Benicio Del Toro, she is Blackfeet, the largest tribe in Montana state. ...

By Alexandria Sage CANNES (Reuters) - A film about baby-switching by Japan's Kore-eda Hirokazu that ponders nature versus nurture premiered at the Cannes film festival on Saturday, joining an Iranian challenger as contenders for the top prize. "Soshite Chichi Ni Naru" ("Like Father, Like Son") is one of two Japanese films out of the international roster of 20 vying to take home the Palme d'Or prize on May 26 from the world's largest film festival being held on the French Riviera. Japan has won four times before, most recently in 1997 with Shohei Imamura's "Unagi" ("The Eel"). ...

By Matthias Galante CANNES, France (Reuters) - A man was arrested at the Cannes film festival on Friday after firing a starting pistol during a live TV broadcast on the palm-lined waterfront, sending actors Christoph Waltz and Daniel Auteuil running for cover. French TV station Canal+ was interviewing Austria's Oscar-winning Waltz and French actor Auteuil live on its nightly news show from a beach-front set before a crowd of spectators when a man fired two shots into the air. "The bodyguards jumped over the barriers into the crowd and pulled him to the ground. ...

By Jeff Sneider LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - With three major movies on the horizon, Marton Csokas is a hot commodity in Hollywood and now he's in negotiations to join Denzel Washington in Antoine Fuqua's Sony drama "The Equalizer." Washington stars as black ops vigilante Robert McCall, the former intelligence officer played by Edward Woodward on the 1980s television series created by Michael Sloan. Csokas will play a rogue CIA agent who protects the Russian mob and winds up crossing paths with the vengeful protagonist. ...

By Lucas Shaw NEW YORK (TheWrap.com) - Terry Crews and Kevin Nealon have joined the cast of "Blended," a romantic comedy that will star Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore, several individuals with knowledge of the production told TheWrap. The film centers on a couple whose disastrous blind date finds them at a family resort with their children from previous marriages. Sandler and Barrymore play the couple, while Joe McHale will play Barrymore's former husband. ...

CANNES, France (Reuters) - Chopard jewelry worth $1.4 million intended to adorn movie stars at the Cannes film festival has been stolen, a police source said on Friday, but the company said the value had been exaggerated and the items were not for actresses to use. According to the source, who declined to be named because he was not authorized to discuss the case with the press, the jewels were in the safe of a room rented by an employee of the luxury jeweler, which is also a Cannes sponsor. "The jeweler hasn't yet furnished details of what exactly was stolen," the source said. ...

By Jeff Sneider LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Rising stars Rhys Wakefield and Emma Rigby have joined the cast of Universal Pictures' remake of romantic drama "Endless Love." Shana Feste ("Country Strong") is directing the film, which stars Alex Pettyfer and Gabriella Wilde as teenage lovers from opposite backgrounds. Bruce Greenwood and Robert Patrick play Wilde and Pettyfer's fathers, respectively. Wakefield will play Wilde's older brother who is under pressure to live up to the legacy of his late older brother. ...

By Lucas Shaw NEW YORK (TheWrap.com) - "Star Trek Into Darkness" took in $13.5 million during its first day in domestic theaters Thursday, putting it on track to net $100 million by the end of this weekend, according to studio estimates. The film opened on 3,762 screens, 336 of them IMAX 3D. J.J. Abrams' second foray into Gene Rodenberry's sci-fi universe is expected to surpass his first both at home and abroad. The 2009 film opened to $75 million in the U.S. en route to a domestic gross of $257.7 million. ...

By Alonso Duralde LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - Neuropsychologists should consider studying "Fast & Furious 6" (and its equally thrilling predecessor, "Fast Five") for its unique ability to completely bypass the brain's logic center and go right to pushing our pleasure buttons over and over again. Countless action directors aspire to the big, dumb fun that these last few franchise entries have provided, but whereas most of them only get "dumb" and maybe "big" right, director Justin Lin and his crew deliver fun, fun, fun. (And nobody takes anybody's T-Bird away. ...

NEW YORK (AP) — The Muppets are getting a new home in a Queens museum with a permanent exhibit the city hopes will persuade more tourists to venture beyond Manhattan.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Oscar winner Ang Lee canceled his plans to direct the pilot of new U.S. television series "Tyrant," saying on Tuesday that he needed to rest after spending four years working on 3D fantasy-adventure film "Life of Pi." Lee, 58, signed on to direct the pilot of the drama series for cable network FX in March, shortly after winning the Best Director Oscar for "Life of Pi." "It is one of the most brilliant ideas for a series that I've seen and one about which I was very excited," Lee said in a statement. ...

"The Hangover Part III" poster teases, "It All Ends" - but Hollywood loves sequels, especially successful ones.

NEW YORK (AP) — The Muppets may have taken Manhattan, but they're getting a spiffy new home in Queens.

Nicole Kidman is the chameleon of Cannes.

CANNES, France (AP) — La dolce vita came to Cannes on Tuesday, thanks to a pair of films set in Italy exploring lives of affluent ennui.

(Reuters) - Sony Corp is considering evaluating a proposal from top shareholder Third Point LLC to spin off part of its movie and music business, Japanese daily Nikkei reported. Sony's U.S. listed shares rose 9 percent on Tuesday on the New York Stock Exchange. Billionaire hedge fund investor Daniel Loeb last week called on the company to spin off its lucrative entertainment arm, setting the stage for a clash between his activist Wall Street fund and management at the Japanese electronics maker. Sony declined to comment when contacted by Reuters. ...