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In between his mega-hit “Back to the Future” sequels and his Oscar juggernaut crowdpleaser “Forrest Gump,” Robert Zemeckis directed the sublime black comedy “Death Becomes Her,” released to theaters 30 years ago on July 31, 1992. In a summer of mostly safe, audience-friendly comedies like “Sister Act” and “HouseSitter,” “Death Becomes Her” entered the marketplace an oddball piece of dark, absurdist humor that didn’t fit into a clear category. Let’s take a moment and reflect on the “Death Becomes Her” 30th anniversary.

Starring Meryl Streep, Bruce Willis and Goldie Hawn, the film tells of a fading actress named Madeline (Streep) who takes a magical immortality treatment that makes her beautiful and ageless, only to discover her old rival Helen (Hawn) long ago consumed the potion. After Madeline’s husband Ernest (Willis) pushes Madeline down the stairs, breaking her neck, havoc and hilarity ensue as both Madeline and Helen suffer increasingly debilitating...

Lee Wallace, the Ed Koch look-alike who coincidentally or not played mayors in The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and Tim Burton’s Batman, died Sunday in New York after a long illness, his family announced. He was 90.

Wallace also appeared in other notable films including Klute (1971), The Hot Rock (1972), The Happy Hooker (1975), Thieves (1977), Private Benjamin (1980) and Used People (1992).

He was a regular performer with the Williamstown Theatre Festival in Massachusetts starting in the mid-1960s and appeared opposite Glenn Close in a Yale Repertory production of Uncle Vanya in 1981.

Wallace also worked in eight Broadway productions, from A Teaspoon Every ...

Lee Wallace, the Ed Koch look-alike who coincidentally or not played mayors in The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and Tim Burton’s Batman, died Sunday in New York after a long illness, his family announced. He was 90.

Wallace also appeared in other notable films including Klute (1971), The Hot Rock (1972), The Happy Hooker (1975), Thieves (1977), Private Benjamin (1980) and Used People (1992).

He was a regular performer with the Williamstown Theatre Festival in Massachusetts starting in the mid-1960s and appeared opposite Glenn Close in a Yale Repertory production of Uncle Vanya in 1981.

Wallace also worked in eight Broadway productions, from A Teaspoon Every ...

Lisa Cholodenko talks to Rachel Cooke about her new film, The Kids Are All Right, and the new generation of women directors who are bypassing the Hollywood system

• Read interviews with Debra Granik, Nanette Burstein and Sanaa Hamri

For all that she was once a keen student of gender studies, film director Lisa Cholodenko isn't much of a one for hand-wringing. Ask her about Hollywood and she looks you hard in the face and tells it like it is. Yes, it's plastic. Yes, it's sexist. But what is a girl to do? Moaning will you get nowhere. Besides, the simple truth is that she just does not have any particular desire to make, say, a film about an alien invasion, featuring laser guns, copious gloop and plastic body suits.

"You know, I get asked why there aren't more female directors all the time," she says. "I'm kind of reluctant to talk about it.

One of the most radical things you can do as an independent filmmaker is go mainstream. Lisa Cholodenko, director of 1998's "High Art" and 2002's "Laurel Canyon," teamed up with screenwriter Stuart Blumberg ("The Girl Next Door") to try her hand at creating a commercial hit. And if the glowingly positive receptions at the Sundance, Berlin, and Los Angeles film festivals are any indication, their collaboration, "The Kids Are All Right" (out July 7) is about to hit the mainstream and awards season in a big way. The film centers on what happens when the teenage children (Mia Wasikowska and Josh Hutcherson) of a lesbian couple (Julianne Moore and Annette Bening) decide to meet their sperm donor dad (Mark Ruffalo). This cinematic family is portrayed as decidedly matter-of-fact, dealing with the same issues traditional families endure. Or, as Cholodenko dryly tells Back Stage, "Gay people deserve to be as miserable as straight people.