All Berlin articles – Page 229

  • News

    David Lee steps down as EVP at Weinstein Company in Asia

    2008-02-14T06:00:00Z

    DavidLee has stepped down as executive vice president of Asian Operations atThe Weinstein Company, where he was responsible for overseeing creativeaspects of the company's Asian Film Fund. He will be partially replaced by Steve Squillante who has come on board as a consultant for the fund. Squillantewill work alongside TWC's ...

  • News

    Niels Arden Oplev preps Scandinavian detective opus

    2008-02-14T06:00:00Z

    Danish director Niels Arden Oplev, whose Worlds Apart screened in official selection in Berlin, has revealed further details of his big budget new project Men Who Hate Women, an adaptation of the first part of Stieg Larsson's 'detective trilogy.' Oplev is directing the first part as both a feature film ...

  • News

    Andrzej Wajda lines up Tatarak with Krystyna Janda

    2008-02-14T06:00:00Z

    Further details have emerged this week about Tatarak, the next project from revered octogenarian Polish auteur Andrzej Wajda whose Oscar-nominated Katyn screens out of competition in Berlin on Friday.Production will begin later this year on the film which is an adaptation of the book by Polish novelist and poet Jaroslaw ...

  • News

    Cinema Libre acquires worldwide rights to Bloodline

    2008-02-14T06:00:00Z

    Cinema Libre Studio has acquired worldwide rights to Bruce Burgess' hot-button Holy Grail documentary Bloodline and has set the US premiere for May.The film-makers interviewed archaeologists and members of secret societies and investigated a tomb that some say could prove the existence of a Jesus Christ-Mary Magdalene bloodline.The subject of ...

  • Reviews

    Filth and Wisdom

    2008-02-13T21:56:00Z

    Dir: Madonna. UK. 2008. 81 minsContrary to billing, there's not much filth and precious little wisdom in Madonna's directing debut. Even so, you have to applaud her for daring to get behind a camera, given that her career in front of it has been strewn with clunkers. While Filth And ...

  • Reviews

    What No One Knows (Det Som Ingen Wed)

    2008-02-13T16:14:00Z

    Dir. Soren Kragh-Jacobsen. Denmark/Sweden, 2008. 95minsNow 61, Danish director Soren Kragh-Jacobsen has only made a handful of films in the last thirty years, and while they have done well in Denmark , they haven't left much of a mark elsewhere. The well-known exception was Mifune (1999) which enjoyed the distinction ...

  • News

    In Berlin, Madonna says directorial debut was 'learning curve'

    2008-02-13T15:52:00Z

    Madonna, in Berlin with her directorial debut Filth And Wisdom, says the 81-minute feature was her version of 'film school.' 'I wanted to do it under the radar because I had to learn how to make a film,' the star told Screen International. 'I paid for it myself and begged, ...

  • Reviews

    Sonetaula (2007)

    2008-02-13T14:54:00Z

    Dir: Dir. Salvatore Mereu. Italy/France/Belgium.2008. mins Sonetaula, Sicilian director Salvatore Mereu's remarkable second feature, follows, in measured scenes of great formal beauty, a young Sardinian man's tragic arc from his adolescence in the late 1930s as a mountain shepherd to his life on the run as a bandit and fugitive. ...

  • Reviews

    Full Battle Rattle

    2008-02-13T14:16:00Z

    Dir: Tony Gerber, Jesse Ross. US. 2008. 92 minsAmerican tanks roll under the desert sun, the minaret of a mosque stands out on the horizon, a wounded soldier spurts blood... a scene from the Iraq war, surely' Not quite - the tanks are real, but the mosque isn't, and ...

  • Reviews

    War Child

    2008-02-13T12:01:00Z

    Dir: Christian Karim Chrobog. USA . 2007. 94 mins.Most hip-hop artists sell themselves on their school-of-hard-knocks credentials, but few rappers can have known the kind of hell that Sudanese artist Emmanuel Jal has endured - and lived to tell the tale. A universe apart from the ...

  • Reviews

    The Path (El Camino)

    2008-02-13T11:23:00Z

    Dir: Ishtar Yasin Gutierrez. Costa Rica/Nicaragua/France. 2008. 91 mins. The road trip of two desperately poor Nicaraguan kids in search of their absent mother becomes an other-worldly journey with echoes of The Night Of The Hunter in Costa Rican director Ishtar Yasin's impressive debut, which screened in the Forum. ...

  • News

    Sutherland sets up Fluorescent Productions slate

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    UK producer Mairi Sutherland, who has worked with director Robbie Moffat through their Palm Tree Entertainment, has set up new company Fluorescent Productions to work with directors in addition to Moffat.Her development slate includes WWII project Devils Harbour written by Jack MacLaughlan to be directed by Barry Campbell; Afghanistan-set love ...

  • News

    Fandango Portobello heats up Gomorra sales

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    Fandango Portobello has followed its successful sales of Competition title Quiet Chaos (Caos Calmo) with a round of deals on Matteo Garrone's Gomorra, which is now in post-production for Fandango and Rai Cinema (Fandango's Domenico Procacci is producing).Gomorra has gone to France (Le Pacte), Switzerland (Filmcoopi), Canada (Seville) and Benelux ...

  • News

    Intercinema picks up two French titles from Films Distribution

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    Russian sales agent and distributor Intercinema, which is screening a promo reel of Fedor Bondarchuk's two-feature $36.5 million sci-fi opus The Inhabited Island here at the EFM on Thursday, has picked up a package of two of films from French seller Films Distribution.Intercinema's Raisa Fomina confirmed that she has bought ...

  • News

    Key US sellers stir up debate over EFM

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    The heads of two of the biggest US sales companies have challenged the business viability of EFM and called for a return to the two-market calendar.The fact that the Berlin market follows hot on the heels of Santa Monica's AFM in November, Thanksgiving, Christmas and the Sundance festival in the ...

  • News

    Pretty Pictures strikes German deal for Joy Division

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    Pretty Pictures has added German rights on Grant Gee's Toronto hit documentary Joy Division. Pretty also holds the French and Benelux rights. 'We're considering our options,' said Paris-based Pretty Pictures head James Velaise. 'We think it makes sense with a documentary of this kind to acquire several territories. For example, ...

  • News

    UK producers Initialize co-production meetings

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    The UK's Skillset, UK Film Council and legal firm Olswang are hosting a new producers lab, Initialize Films, for 17 UK producers seeking European co-producers. The producers have been in Berlin attending the Co-Production Market and will have a day of pre-selected meetings today at the Marriott.Projects include Young from ...

  • News

    Visual Factory eyes slew of deals for Hideout, Concrete Romance

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    UK-based sales outfit Visual Factory has closed a number of deals here at the EFM. Marco Martani's gangster story Concrete Romance has gone to CanalPlus for France; Pupi Avati's The Hideout, a US-shot thriller starring Laura Morante, Burt Young and Treat Williams, has gone to Film Depot for Russia and ...

  • News

    Hungaricom has sales success with Egon & Donci, CATcher

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    Ambitious Hungarian distribution and sales outfit HungariCom has announced a raft of deals on its EFM slate.Its cartoon features are selling especially briskly. Here in Berlin the companyhas closed deals on Egon & Dönci and CATcher - Cat City 2 to HGC Entertainment for China and Media International Pictures for ...

  • News

    Magnolia's world sales bloom for Timecrimes, Gonzo

    2008-02-13T06:00:00Z

    Magnolia Pictures' international sales department under Laird Adamson has had a successful EFM with its Spanish time travel thriller Timecrimes as well as the quirky romance Quid Pro Quo and Alex Gibney's documentary Gonzo: The Life And Work Of Dr Hunter S Thompson. All three films, which will be handled ...