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  • News

    Valerio Zingarelli joins Babelgum as new CEO

    2007-07-05T13:30:00Z

    New Internet TV platform Babelgum has appointed Valerio Zingarelli as its new CEO. Zingarelli succeeds Babelgum co-founder Erik Lumer, who will now focus on strategic product development. Zingarelli previously worked at Vodafone, where he was global director of networks and service platforms, and he also served as an independent board ...

  • News

    Yereven to host 12 projects at first regional co-production forum

    2007-07-05T10:53:00Z

    Nine features and three documentary projects from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Serbia, Russia and Turkey are to be pitched to potential co-producers and financiers at the Directors Across Borders' (DAB) first Regional Co-Production Forum (July 10-12) during next week's Golden Apricot International Film Festival in Yerevan. The low-budget projects include the ...

  • News

    Chandra and Screwvala line up for MIPCOM's India Day

    2007-07-04T16:46:00Z

    TV and digital content market MIPCOM will have a spotlight on India at its next event, to be held October 8-12 in Cannes. India Day is planned for October 8, organised with The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), and will examine the growth and potential of ...

  • News

    Jean-Jacques Bernard takes over as president of Critics Syndicate

    2007-07-04T13:32:00Z

    France's Critics Syndicate, which notably runs the Critics Week sidebar at the Cannes Film Festival, has elected Jean-Jacques Bernard to the post of president. Bernard replaces Gerard Lenne who held the post for six years Bernard is a journalist and critic who has worked for TV network France 2, Premiere ...

  • News

    Arab film festivals launch guild to share expertise

    2007-07-03T20:40:00Z

    Directors from key Middle Eastern film festivals have agreed to form an Arab Film Festival Guild, aimed at increasing cooperation and sharing expertise in the region, and promoting the Arab film industry internationally.The final plans for the Guild were discussed at a meeting held during Morocco's Rabat Film Festival attended ...

  • News

    Corneau's Second Wind to open Rome Film Fest competition

    2007-07-03T17:59:00Z

    Second Wind (Le Deuxieme souffle) directed by Alain Corneau will open the Rome Film Fest's competition section on the Fest's opening day, the Rome Film Festival announced Tuesday. The film is based on a book by the same name by Jose Giovanni. In a statement, the Rome Film Fest called ...

  • News

    Oliver Stone's Iranian biopic gets blocked by government

    2007-07-03T15:56:00Z

    The 'not making of' Oliver Stone's latest film would make a good script in itself. In 2006, the US director approached Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's people, hoping to make a film about the Iranian president's rise to power. Unsurprisingly, he was turned down - albeit a year later, via the media, and ...

  • News

    Spike Lee's Italian project St. Anna to boast $45m budget

    2007-07-03T15:44:00Z

    Director Spike Lee and the Italian On My Own Production have announced new details on Lee's new Tuscany-set film project.The film will have a $45m budget, is to be produced 50% by On My Own - the new independent production company launched by ex-Mikado founders and owners Roberto Cicutto and ...

  • News

    Buena Vista partner on fifth outing of Wild Soccer Bunch

    2007-07-03T15:29:00Z

    The German outpost of Buena Vista International will also distribute the fifth film of The Wild Soccer Bunch franchise which begins shooting today at locations in Saarland and Munich. With the working title of DWK5 - Die Wilden Kerle: Hinterm Horizont, the SamFilm production by Joachim Masannek sees the cast ...

  • News

    German sales company Cine-International to close its doors

    2007-07-03T12:23:00Z

    Munich-based world sales company Cine-International Filmvertrieb has announced that it will be shutting down operations as of tomorrow (Wednesday). Rumours had been circulating within the film industry in Germany that the company was having problems, and speculation was fuelled further when Cine-International did not attend the MIP-TV in April or ...

  • News

    Tornatore's The Unknown wins best director in Moscow

    2007-07-03T11:04:00Z

    The ten-day 29th Moscow International Film Festival ended on Saturday, with Italian director Giuseppe Tornatore winning the festival's Best Director award for his film The Unknown (La Sconosciuta). The film stars Russian actress Ksenia Rappoport as a young Ukrainian woman in today's Italy working as domestic help and trying to ...

  • News

    Alexander McCall Smith adaptation marks Botswana first

    2007-07-02T21:44:00Z

    The Weinstein Company (TWC) and Mirage Productions will begin filming on July 9 in Botswana on The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency based on Alexander McCall Smith's bestseller. This marks the first time a major film will be shot entirely in Botswana. The project, which is being made for television ...

  • News

    Lemhagen's gay adoption story among Swedish-backed projects

    2007-07-02T17:00:00Z

    Swedish director Ella Lemhagen, who had her international break with the award-winning Tsatsiki, Mum and the Policeman (1999), is readying her new project, Patrik 1,5, with $1m (Euros 800,000) production support from the Swedish Film Institute.Scripted by Lemhagen from Swedish dramatist Michael Druker's play, Patrik 1,5 is the story of ...

  • News

    Arts Alliance signs content deal with HP's Video Merchant arm

    2007-07-02T12:24:00Z

    Arts Alliance Media (AAM) has signed a deal to become the international content provider for HP's new Video Merchant Services business. HP will now offer AAM's film content to distribution partners around the world, including North America. HP Video Merchant Services powers online video web stores and provides content fulfilment ...

  • News

    Bavaria Film International picks up The Anarchist's Wives

    2007-06-29T12:54:00Z

    Bavaria Film International has picked up international distribution rights to Marie Noelle and Peter Sehr's new feature The Anarchist's Wives which begins its German shoot at the MMC Studios in Cologne today (Friday). The German-Spanish-French co-production between Noelle and Sehr's P'Artisan Filmproduktion, ZIP Films (Barcelona), KV Entertainment/Ibarretxe & Co. (Bilbao), ...

  • News

    Screenwriting: odds even.

    2007-06-29T00:00:00Z

    Initiated at Sundance, screenwriters' group 1.3.9 hopes to work directly with actors and directors on film projects. So how will the arrangement work' John Hazelton reportsChristopher McQuarrie (The Usual Suspects) and Erik Jendresen (TV series Band Of Brothers) hatched the idea for 1.3.9, their recently launched writers' co-operative, after stints ...

  • News

    Writers' co-op: singular vision

    2007-06-29T00:00:00Z

    John Wells' Writers' Co-Op draws together a stable of veteran writers to generate scripts and share in a project's upside. Unveiled three months ago, John Wells' Writers' Co-Op has been in the works for several years.For Wells (writer of ER and producer of movies including White Oleander and Doom) and ...

  • News

    European screenwriters' manifesto: world in motion

    2007-06-29T00:00:00Z

    Signatories from the US and Europe have backed a manifesto to give more rights to writers. John Hazelton reportsLaunched at this year's Berlin International Film Festival, the European Screenwriters' Manifesto had around 2,000 signatories as of late May.Most of them were writers, but the document has also been endorsed by ...

  • News

    Abu Dhabi to establish branch of New York Film Academy

    2007-06-28T17:57:00Z

    The Abu Dhabi government has signed a deal to establish a branch of the New York Film Academy (NYFA), the first film and acting school in the Gulf. Mohamed Khalaf Al Mazrouei, the director-general of the Abu Dhabi Authority for Culture and Heritage (ADACH), Jerry Sherlock, Director, President and Founder ...

  • News

    International projects take the lead with new German fund

    2007-06-28T15:33:00Z

    International co-productions shooting in Germany have received more than half of the $28m (Euros 20.9m) allocated by the new German Federal Film Fund (DFFF) in its first six months of operation. Speaking at a review of the DFFF's first six months at this week's Munich Film Festival, project manager Christine ...