James Ulmer
Author info
James Ulmer
A contributing writer for The New York Times, James Ulmer's 20-year journalistic career has included penning two national columns for Premiere magazine, and writing and directing for the BBC in London. He was a senior analyst and executive producer at the internet company Creative Planet, and served for eight years as international editor and columnist for The Hollywood Reporter, where he reported from over 50 festivals and markets worldwide.
Ulmer is the author of James Ulmer's Hollywood Hot List -- The Complete Guide to Star Ranking from St. Martin's Press., and founded the Hollywood database company The Ulmer Scale (www.ulmerscale.com. He has been interviewed in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times Magazine, The Los Angeles Time and Newsweek, and his commentaries have been featured on "Entertainment Tonight," "CBS This Morning," and the BBC, CBS, CNN, HBO, and E! networks. He has frequently been seen on the Reelz Channel as a commentator and on-camera presenter.
A graduate of Harvard College and an Iowa native, Ulmer discovered his passion for Italy as a teenager living in Naples, where he often spent weekends haunting his favorite piazzas.
Vampires Away: Radu Gabrea’s Film Festival Brings New Blood to an Old World
MEDIAS, Romania -- With Europe slouching toward its own version of The Great Recession and economists divining the death of the euro, you wouldn’t think heading to Romania to check out another first-time film festival would be in sync with the global gestalt. Who has the resources to cover such ... Full story
Transylvania Film Festival Wraps 10th Edition with Top Honors for No Return
CLUJ, Romania -- The Transylvania International Film Festival (TIFF) concluded its successful 10th edition -- and its first as a newly accredited A-level film festival by the international film organization FIAP -- by handing out two of its top prizes ... Full story
Berlinale Unbound: Fashioning Success in German Films
Germany may have lost its bid for best foreign language film at the Oscars this year (though The White Ribbon did conquer that category at the Golden Globes), but on their home turf, German films seem to be winning all ... Full story
Regina Ziegler completes 7-year quest with Henri IV
BERLIN -- One of Europe’s foremost producers of feature films and television, Regina Ziegler has become renowned over the past three decades for her work with leading directors Rainer Fassbinder, Andrzej Wajda, Nic Roeg, Ken Russell, Krzysztof Zanussi and Bob ... Full story
Most Journos "Shuttered Out" of Berlin's SHUTTER ISLAND press conference
Martin Scorsese's highly anticipated psycho-thriller SHUTTER ISLAND, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Ben Kingsley, Mark Ruffalo, Michelle Williams and Patricia Clarkson, lived up to its hype during the second day of the Berlin Film Festival, with the press conference mobbed by hundreds ... Full story
Entering PARADISO: A Guide to Inhabiting Your Favorite Film
Like comfortable old shoes, favorite films are meant to be lived in. Some evenings I’ll shuffle about my DVD collection and slip into a well-worn movie for the sheer, toe-squishing pleasure of revisiting old friends and haunts. These companions never ... Full story
Meet The Holloways
Almost any veteran of the European film festival circuit knows of Ron and Dorothea Holloway, and if they don’t they should. As journalists, critics, publishers and filmmakers over the past 30-odd years, they’re Berlin’s longest-running co-production, a husband and wife ... Full story
Shelfless Dedication: Brian Newman of the Tribeca Film Institute's Reframe
BERLIN, Germany -- Serious filmmakers and film collectors who find themselves inundated by the oceans of media flooding the internet will be happy to wash ashore onto the website Reframe (http://www.reframecollection.org). An adventurous new program from the Tribeca Film Institute, ... Full story
Berlin's Chilly Liaisons
BERLIN, Germany -- The bitter winds of winter are back at this year’s Berlin International Film Festival, and I don’t just mean the snow flurries and frozen writing fingers here in the Potzdammer Platz. (Global warming has made a brief ... Full story
The Rise of Romanian Cinema
CLUJ, Romania -- One of Europe's most innovative and newly-heralded filmmaking communities is Romania's New Wave, which last summer was put in sharp focus at the country's leading film forum, the Transylvania International Film Festival. CWB's International Editor James Ulmer ... Full story
Transylvanian Tales
CLUJ, Romania - Last year, filmmakers from this often-overlooked country conquered Cannes with a double whammy: the Palm d’Or for Cristian Mungiu’s abortion drama 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days, along with the top prize in the sidebar ... Full story
Little Birds, Big Hopes
After several years of planning, Madrid will finally serve up its newest entrée in the city’s tapas bar of international cultural events with the first edition of Filma Madrid, otherwise known as the Madrid International Film Festival, from March 28 ... Full story
Ilmar Taska talks about "THY KINGDOM COME"
After a long career as writer-producer, Ilmar Taska’s second feature, Thy Kingdom Come, moves the Estonian-born talent not only more confidently into the director’s chair, but through new territory in the horror genre as well. This Spanish-Italian co-production with a ... Full story
BERLINALE UNBOUND: No Country For Horndog Men
BERLIN, Feb. 11 -- It’s hard to resist the tickle of a good movie title, no matter how the movie itself stacks up. Such was my take on Absurdistan, a comedy screening at the Berlinale’s European Film Market which, absurdly ... Full story
Berlinale Unbound, Market Animals Part 1
BERLIN, Feb. 13 -- Angela Hawkins calls it like she sees it, and on a good day she sees the European Film Market as the rough equivalent of a human zoo. While visiting the Market one afternoon, we found this ... Full story
Berlinale Unbound: Market Animals Part 2 (Watch Video)
Visiting the European Film Market is a bit like going out for pot luck in the neighborhood: you never who or precisely what you’ll encounter, you just pray the food is edible and the diners are bearable. Like any ... Full story
Berlinale Unbound, Gala Glitters in the Shadow of Berlin's Wall (Watch Video)
BERLIN -- For the past five years the Cinema for Peace celebrity gala has been one of the city’s hottest annual events, a fusion of film, fundraising and philanthropy that lures over 400 notables to honor films and individuals who ... Full story
BERLINALE UNBOUIND: A Tango, and those Bolly-Jolly Berliners
BERLIN, Feb. 10 -- You would think all the cheers and stomping and paparazzi pandering at yesterday’s Berlinale press conference was for Daniel Day Lewis or another export from Hollywood, but in fact it was for Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh ... Full story
Berlinale Unbound, Feb 9, Maria Schrader interview
She may be relatively unknown in America, but Maria Schrader can excite the paparazzi in Berlin. When we cornered her at the party for the film company X in Berlin, people couldn’t stop dropping by to talk about her new ... Full story
Berlinale Unbound, Feb. 8
BERLIN (Feb. 8) - Despite a bitter chill in Berlin, crowds here at the opening night of 58th Berlinale warmed up quickly when all four of the Rolling Stones arrived on the red carpet for the world premiere of Martin ... Full story