All articles by Anna Franklin – Page 4
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Russia's Three T announces plans for new national cinema chain
Russian film director Nikita Mikhalkov has announced plans for a new $40m chain of cinemas backed by Russian metals and banking mogul Vladimir Potanin. Potanin, one of Russia's richest men, heads the financial conglomerate Interros group, and already has interests in cinema via his company Profmedia. The new national chain ...
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Polish festival warms to Day Of The Freak
Despite a funding crisis in the Polish film industry that has cast doubts on the future of the event, the 27th annual festival of Polish Feature Film (17-21 September) in the Baltic coast resort of Gdynia managed to field a competition programme of 21 new features and a special new ...
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Polish government steps in to bail out struggling film industry
Poland's new culture minister Waldemar Dabrowski unveiled a government backed bail-out package for Poland's beleaguered film industry at last week's annual Festival of Polish Feature Film in the Baltic seaside resort of Gdynia. At a special industry forum of Polish filmmakers Dabrowski said that the government had agreed to a ...
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New minister of culture heralds turning point for Polish film industry crisis
Last week's appointment of Waldemar Dabroski as the new Polish Minister of Culture may signal an end to the political divisions that have been crippling the Polish film industry. Dabroski, who as minister for cinematography in the early 1990's was responsible for establishing the government-backed agency for film production, is ...
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Cuckoo heralds Russian spring
Last week's Moscow International Film Festival marked a milestone for the Russian film industry with Oscar-winning director Nikita Mikhalkov declaring at the closing ceremony that "the crisis in Russian film is over." Mikhalkov, who is both festival chief and Russia's best known director internationally, had good reason for his claim. ...
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Taviani wins top Moscow film festival prize for Resurrection
The 24th Moscow International Film Festival once again boasted a host of international celebrities at its closing ceremony with Harvey Keitel, Holly Hunter, Jacqueline Bisset, Atom Egoyan and Bob Rafelson turning up as well as Vittorio Taviani who collected the main prize for the film Resurrection.Based on a novel by ...
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National Amusements becomes first Int'l exhibitor in Russia
National Amusements has announced plans to build Russia's largest cinema, an 11-screen multiplex in Moscow, making it the first major international exhibitor to venture into the Russian market.Called Kinostar, the new complex will be built and operated by Rising Star Media, a new joint venture set up by National Amusements ...
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Endeavour finishes photography on biggest budget Russian picture since 1998
Major photography has just finished on new English language co-production, The St Petersburg Cannes Express, the biggest budget production to shoot in Russia since the 1998 financial crisis and the first in a slated series of new Russian projects being developed by Los Angeles-based Endeavour Productions. Directed and scripted by ...
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Moscow Festival welcomes back Russian films
Three Russian titles feature in this year's Moscow International Film Festival competition line-up, after last year's total lack of any local films in competition at all. The Festival, which runs June 21-30, this week unveiled its competition programme of sixteen feature films including, Alexander Rogozhkin's Cuckoo, Roman Pregunov's Solitude Of ...
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Russian films return to Moscow film festival
Three Russian titles feature in this year's Moscow International Film Festival competition line-up, after last year's total lack of any local films in competition at all. The Festival, which runs June 21-30, this week unveiled its competition programme of sixteen feature films including, Alexander Rogozhkin's Cuckoo, Roman Pregunov's Solitude Of ...
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De Niro quip gives birth to Siberian film festival
While most people would consider a resort like Cannes or Venice as the ideal location for a major festival, the organisers of a new film festival - to be held mid-winter in Siberia - are hoping to turn that concept on its head.The new Spirit Of Fire competitive film festival ...
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Russian war film sparks controversy
A controversial new film by Alexei Balabanov, one of Russia's leading directors, had its premiere in Moscow yesterday (March 14), sparking a political slanging match in the local media.. The film, War, which was shot last year in the Caucasus and war-torn Chechnya, features an international cast including British actor ...
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Polish 'Oscar' winner highlights funding fears
Despite the glittering surroundings of Warsaw's Royal Place and a guest list that included Agnieszka Holland and Krzysztof Zanussi, an air of gloom hung over the 'Orly 2002', Poland's version of the Oscars, on Saturday (March 9). Award winners bemoaned the sharp reduction in film backing from TVP (Polish Television), ...
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Kodak to sell its Kino Mir Moscow flagship cinema
Kodak is selling its landmark central Moscow cinema Kino Mir at the beginning of next year to concentrate on its core business. The sale of the high-profile site which often accounted for a staggering 50% of the total box office profits for the whole of the country, is a sign ...
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Polish blockbusters dominate local box office
The appetite of Polish audiences for home-grown blockbusters remains undiminished with Witchman (Wiedzmin), directed by Marek Brodski and produced by Warsaw-based Vision Film Production and Heritage Films, holding the number one position for the second week in a row with a gross of $1.37m (zlo5.7m).The $18m Polish blockbuster Quo Vadis, ...
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Central Asian films attract increasing interest
Abstracted from Screen InternationalFor years a largely forgotten part of the world, Central Asia has been put back put on the map by the war in Afghanistan. The war has also provoked a wave of interest in the largely forgotten film cultures of the republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan ...
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Warsaw fest attracts record audiences
Despite losing its backing from the Polish Ministry for Cinematography, this year's 17th annual Warsaw International Film Festival, (October 4-15) screened 126 films from 37 countries, drawing a record audience of 61,000 - making it the biggest edition so far. The international non-competitive festival awarded its audience poll prize to ...
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Russia to double film industry grant next year
The Russian Ministry of Culture has announced that it will double the amount of government funding for the film industry next year. The Ministry of Culture budget for 2002 will include $60m for film, 70% of which will support film production with the remaining 30% allocated for the funding of ...
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Paradise plans Russian exhibition boom
Abstracted from the weekly edition of Screen InternationalRussian distributor Paradise Productions is set to become the country's leading exhibitor when it opens its new $3.7m, five-screen multiplex in central Moscow this autumn. Taken together with a single-screen cinema opened in Vyborg last week and two more complexes opening soon in ...
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Russia's Vyborg Film Festival kicks off
The director's chair of the 9th Vyborg Film Festival (11-18 August) has been left vacant this year in homage to former festival director and highly respected Russian film director Savva Kulish who passed away in June of this year. Kulish whose career spanned more than 30 years had lately turned ...