Photo Mart Avandi and Liisa Koppel in “The Fencer,” directed by Klaus Haro. Credit CFI Releasing Inspirational teachers aren’t limited to any one time or place. “The Fencer,” a Finnish-Estonian-German coproduction drawn from a true story, may be set in Estonia in the early 1950s, when the Soviet Union occupied …

Photo Tairo Caroli in “Mister Universo.” Credit Vento Film The filmmaking team of Tizza Covi and Rainer Frimmel concoct fictional narratives around the real lives and professions of the nonactors with whom they work. This is an unusual formula but not an entirely novel one. While other examples of this …

But when he died on July 16 in Los Angeles at 90, he had never quite equaled the fame and commercial success achieved in the United States by other stars in his literary constellation — none of whom burned more blisteringly. Mr. Sigal was a prolific essayist for The Guardian …

Photo China Anne McClain as Uma, daughter of Ursula the sea witch, in “Descendants 2,” a big-budget follow-up to a 2015 television movie. Credit David Bukach/Disney Channel The kids are largely on their own in “Descendants 2,” a sequel to the 2015 television movie about the children of Disney villains. …

The result, somewhat anticlimactic, encapsulated how much the art and antiques trade — and interiors themselves — have changed in recent years. “More and more people want funky postwar design, pictures and decorative objects — and maybe one signature antique,” said William Rouse, managing director of Chiswick Auctions, a suburban …

Pablo Martinez Monsivais | AP New White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci speaks to members of the media in the Brady Press Briefing room of the White House in Washington, Friday, July 21, 2017. Christie, who served as a special assistant to President George W. Bush, said what the White …

You can see how the Bolshoi and City Ballet styles are related: long phrases, luxurious texture, expansive physicality, calmly off-balance emphasis. The Paris style, marvelously chic, proves far less right for Balanchine, above all in the women’s clipped phrasing and anti-musical dynamics (dwelling archly on transitions, flicking lightly through important …

Getty Images Attorney General Jeff Sessions holds a news conference to announce an ‘international cybercrime enforcement action’ at the Department of Justice July 20, 2017 in Washington, DC. Attorney General Jeff Sessions discussed key Trump campaign issues with the former Russian ambassador to the United States during the 2016 presidential …

Mr. Foccroulle’s approach was evident in the other work I saw at Aix, Bizet’s “Carmen.” It’s opera’s ultimate golden oldie, but Dmitri Tcherniakov’s production, meticulously staged and performed with rare intensity, questions why we keep coming back to this story. The traditional Spanish setting has vanished, in favor of a …

Brendan Smialowski | Getty Images Paul Volcker, former Federal Reserve chairman, speaks at the National Press Club April 20, 2015 in Washington, DC. U.S. financial regulators announced on Friday they would review Volcker Rule regulations to ensure foreign funds that should be exempt from the ban on proprietary trading by …