I love “Faces/Places” the movie made by 89 year old legend Agnes Varda and 33 year old French artist JR. It’s nominated for the Oscar, and I’d be thrilled if it won.

Anyway, JR dropped by Martin Scorsese’s set for “The Irishman” and brought his cardboard cut out of Varda– it makes it easier for travel purposes. JR posted this video of Scorsese and Robert DeNiro– obviously in makeup for his role of labor organizer Frank “The Irishman” Sheeran in the movie. It’s pretty funny. And inadvertently we get to see DeNiro made up as a younger Sheeran, who is likely to have killed Jimmy Hoffa. (Apparently, Scorsese is also using CGI to de-age DeNiro.)

Below JR’s post- see Sheeran’s video:

GoodFellas 🙏🏻 @agnes.varda is nominated for the first time in her career @facesplacesfilm #nominatedforbestdocumentary

A post shared by JR (@jr) on Feb 18, 2018 at 6:12am PST

“Black Panther” scored another record yesterday: second biggest Sunday ever. Ryan Coogler’s blockbuster took in $60.1 million, probably because Saturday night results were suppressed by bad weather in so many places. “BP” just missed the Sunday record by about $400K, held by “The Force Awakens.”

The three day weekend will come in around $202 million. The four day weekend could get up to $235 million. That will make it respectively 5th place for the former, 3rd place for the latter. “Black Panther” is the biggest Marvel movie, and biggest comic book movie (if you don’t count the “Star Wars” series).

Final numbers will be in tomorrow.

Needless to say, sequels are coming. There are many reports that Coogler doesn’t have a contract for a sequel, but that’s always the case with these franchise movies and not a big story. Patty Jenkins was in the same situation with “Wonder Woman.”

Don’t worry, Coogler will be back for one if not two more “Panthers.” The great treat will be seeing all the other terrific black actors out there getting  cameos, villains, etc. as the series progresses. It’s about time, too.

Meantime, the soundtrack CD, which sold 156K copies in its first week, has slowed down over the weekend. Interscope only moved about 25K copies on Friday and Saturday. We’ll see how it does this week…

EXCLUSIVE It’s been turmoil all weekend for The Weinstein Company — well, turmoil for a long time, like since October 5, 2017 when all hell started breaking loose.

This weekend the board– whoever’s still on the board– fired COO David Glasser, who knows where all the bodies are buried. That’s what concerned the NY State AG Eric Schneiderman since Glasser was negotiating two ends to the middle– he was planning to run the new company TWC would become once it was sold.

But maybe the AG’s office didn’t realize that one of the three movies TWC still can call an unreleased asset is actually produced by Glasser’s brother, Philip. That’s “The War with Grandpa” which stars Robert DeNiro and– are you ready?– Uma Thurman. It was made last year, not in 1994. Last year.

Uma Thurman? She hates The Weinstein Company, right? Ms. Thurman didn’t mention to Maureen Dowd in their New York Times Opinion piece that she hated Harvey Weinstein so much she was starring in one of his new big productions. Seems like it escaped everyone’s attention. Thurman, who turned redder than the red carpet last October when asked about Weinstein, is still on his payroll. I do not get this. Uma Thurman is a BIG star. She’s headlining on Broadway right now. She could work with anyone. So how did she wind up back at the Weinstein Company?

But then again, how is the Chief Operating Officer’s brother producing “The War with Grandpa”? It’s a Robert DeNiro movie. Philip Glasser has 8 prior producer credits, all movies no one’s ever heard of even in Wakanda, starring people so anonymous they could be on milk cartons and never get rescued. Surprisingly, the Glassers’ father, Richard Glasser, is not the music supervisor on “Grandpa.” That’s odd, because he’s been on the TWC payroll since around 2009 when David joined the company.

Sunday’s LA Times story mentions some of the lawsuits David Glasser has been in before and during his time at TWC. But the Times didn’t get that all three Glassers– David, brother Philip and father Richard– were sued by a man named Jeffrey Cooper who wanted his $500,000 back after investing in the Glasser family’s movie production company– a company that existed while David was already working for the Weinsteins and his father was the company’s music supervisor.

The other MIA Weinstein movies are Garth Davis’s “Mary Magdalene,” starring Rooney Mara, which is going into international release in time for Easter; and “The Upside,” the American remake of “The Intouchables” by Neil Berger, with Bryan Cranston, Kevin Hart and Nicole Kidman, which played great in Toronto and is now in limbo.

There are a lot of plot holes in everyone’s stories, I’d say. Can’t wait to see them get filled in.

Well, we’re waiting for two things– the BAFTA Awards from Britain and the NBA All Star Game.

BAFTA comes first, but don’t expect the Brits to choose our Best Picture for the Oscars. They’ve been getting it wrong lately.

Last year, of course, the BAFTA went to “La La Land.” We all know how that turned out. “Moonlight” was the really surprising winner of our Oscar.

In 2016, BAFTA went for “The Revenant.” Luckily, our Academy dubbed “Spotlight” Best Picture. Sometimes the bear eats you, sometimes you eat the bear.

For 2015, BAFTA warmed to Richard Linklater’s “Boyhood,” which I thought was the right choice. But in America, the meta-theater piece “Birdman” flew away with Best Picture.

You’re getting the idea.

If you want to see BAFTA and our Academy on the same page, you have to go back to 2014 and “Argo.” For several years preceding, the two Academies were also in agreement on “The Hurt Locker,” “The King’s Speech,” “The Artist,” and “12 Years a Slave.”

Will they go for hometown boy Christopher Nolan and “Dunkirk” this year? Or will the Best Picture award go to “The Shape of Water”? We’ll know the answer around 6pm Eastern, right before the NBA where more important debates will ensue.

PS Someone at BAFTA should fix their website so the database is usable.

“Black Panther” had to battle — of all things– snow and really bad weather last night seemingly everywhere.

The result was about a 14% drop from Friday to Saturday, and $65 million at the box office. That brings it to $141 million in two days. Not bad! The 3 day weekend will fall somewhere between $190 million and $200 million. That’s a February record.

But that also keeps “Panther” as the sixth highest opening ever, well behind Marvel’s “The Avengers.”

Still, Ryan Coogler gets all the credit for delivering a movie with characters and a theme unseen before– not a sequel but an original idea. Remember when Ryan went to Forest Whitaker for help making “Fruitvale Station”? Wasn’t that like, last month? (Kidding. Close.)

Internationally, “Black Panther” breaks the myth that black movies won’t play to a global crowd. The worldwide total is $361 million for three days. So much for that myth. Hollywood has new rules with movies like “Black Panther,” “Get Out,” and “Girls Trip” all going through the roof!

The struggle to find records for “Black Panther” to shatter continues…

Ryan Coogler’s fun and well crafted comic book movie made $75 million from Thursday and Friday nights total. It’s on track for a $185 million three day opening. That will make it the sixth biggest opening weekend ever. Hey, that’s not bad!

If you want to make it a four day test, “Black Panther” will come in 5th all time. We think. Sunday is still a mystery since snow is coming to the Northeast. And on Monday, “Get Out” is free everywhere.

Still, “Black Panther” regardless of what number it is all time, etc is a very enjoyable movie. And it has a lot of cultural significance.

Meantime, the right wing and completely nutty Breitbart website tried to spin “Black Panther” as a Trump-endorsing vehicle. Their reviewer, who must have taken too much Sudafed, said that Trump was the hero of the movie and the villain was Black Lives Matter. John Nolte also wrote that T’Challa was keeping immigrants out of Wakanda, which made him a Trump philosopher. The guy must be on LSD. I am not providing a link.

Nolte maybe didn’t stay until the very end of the movie– to the post- credits scene where T’Challa brings Wakanda to the United Nations. He is a globalist, not an isolationist, and I do believe Wakanda welcomes anyone who can find it. There were some isolationists at work this week, but they weren’t from Wakanda. They were from Disney.