All Middle East articles – Page 161

  • News

    Rezo takes on sales for Mikhail Khodorovsky documentary

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Rezo Films is handling international sales on Cyril Tuschi's feature documentary Rise And Fall of Mikhail B Khodorovsky which begins shooting in Moscow today (Feb 11).The film will feature interviews being conducted with members of the former oil magnate's family and schoolfriends. The co-production between Tuschi's LaLa Films and Leipzig-based ...

  • News

    Transylvanian Film Festival to launch development fund for local writers

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Cluj's Transylvanian International Film Festival (TIFF) is to launch a development fund dedicated to local screenwriters at this year's edition from May 30 to June 8. 'We are looking for new stories and new people in Romania in the first year', TIFF's honorary director Tudor Giurgiu told Screendaily.com. 'Euros ...

  • News

    CJ Entertainment sells four-pack to Germany's Splendid

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Korea's CJ Entertainment had a busy weekend selling to both Europe and Asia - sealing a four-picture deal with Germany's Splendid and selling three Asian territories on A Man Who Was Superman, starring Jun Ji-hyun.Splendid has pre-bought all German rights to The Divine Weapon, which wrapped two weeks ago, on ...

  • News

    Fandango Portobello stirs up deals for Quiet Chaos

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Fandango Portobello has seen chaotic interest in Competition title Quiet Chaos (Caos Calmo). The Italian drama, directed by Antonello Grimaldi and sarring Nanni Moretti and Valeria Golino, has sold to nine territories ahead of official Competition screening tomorrow. Deals have been struck with France (BAC), Spain (Alta), Benelux (Cineart), Switzerland ...

  • News

    Slingshot Hip Hop finds sales home in Celluloid Dreams

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Celluloid Dreams has picked up international sales rights to Sundance documentary competition entry Slingshot Hip Hop.The film was directed by Jackie Reem Salloum and produced by Rumzi Araj, Jackie Reem Salloum and Waleed Zaiter. Featuring the Palestinian Artists: DAM, Abeer, PR, Mahmoud Shalabi and Arapeyat. The deal was brokered between ...

  • News

    Schmid explores industry options in break from legal woes

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Andreas Schmid, former CEO of VIP Medienfonds, who was sentenced by a Munich court to six years in prison for tax evasion last November, was in characteristically fighting mood on a visit to Berlin this week.At the festival to refresh old and forge new contacts, Schmid said that he had ...

  • News

    Nordisk, Trust rack up EFM sales, with US deal on Bornedal thriller

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Nordisk Film has sold Ole Bornedal's Just Another Love Story to Netflix's Red Envelope Entertainment and Koch Lorber Films in the US following on from its screening in world dramatic competition at Sundance last month.The deal was negotiated by Thom Zadra of Red Envelope Entertainment, Richard Lorber of Koch Lorber ...

  • News

    Norwegian Film Institute bids farewell to Vigdis Lian

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    As she steps down today from her position as managing director of the Norwegian Film Institute, Vigdis Lian is being honoured tonight (Tuesday Feb 12) with a farewell reception in Berlin on her last working day.Her departure from the Institute follows from the decision to merge The Norwegian Film Fund, ...

  • News

    Beta Cinema takes on Norwegian Film Fund-backed Orange Girl

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Norwegian director Eva Dahr's The Orange Girl (Appelsinpiken), from Jostein Gaarder's novel, is one of six new Norwegian features the Norwegian Film Fund gave the go-ahead by channelling $9.1m (NOK 50.3 million) production funding into the projects, closing almost half of the $20.4m (NOK 112 million) budgets.At the European Film ...

  • News

    Petzold's Yella named best feature film by German critics

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Christian Petzold's Berlinale 2007 competition film Yella picked up two prizes for Best Feature Film and Best Cinematography at the German Film Critics Awards presented in Berlin on Monday evening. Other prizewinners included Pia Marais' The Unpolished (Best Feature Debut), Ulrich Noethen (Bst Actor for Mein Fuehrer), Maren Kroymann (Best ...

  • News

    Beeson, Engel launch new UK distributor New Wave Films

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Robert Beeson and Pam Engel have launched a new UK distribution company called New Wave Films. The London-based outfit is planning to release films theatrically while also setting up a label for 'classic' DVDs.Here at the EFM, New Wave has already made its first acquisition, picking up UK rights to ...

  • News

    Montage, Quality, MGN among buyers for IM Global's Shelter

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    IM Global has reporting a storming business on the upcoming $25m supernatural thriller Shelter set to star Julianne Moore. Jonathan Rhys Myers is a recent addition to the cast.Deals have closed in South Korea (Montage), Latin America (Quality), Russia (MGN), Benelux (RCV), the Middle East (Gulf), Greece (Village Roadshow), Turkey ...

  • News

    SPE buys North America on Leiner's Balls Out

    2008-02-12T06:00:00Z

    Sony Pictures Entertainment picked up North American rights to Danny Leiner's comedy Balls Out: The Gary Houseman Story (aka Gary The Tennis Coach) in an eight-figure deal that closed late on Sunday night [Feb 11].Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions Group's (SPWAG) Scott Shooman brokered the agreement with UTA acting on behalf ...

  • Reviews

    Love And Other Crimes (Liebe und andere Verbrechen)

    2008-02-11T16:31:00Z

    Dir. Stefan Arsenijevic, Ger/Serb/Aust/Slovenia 2008, 105minsIn Love and Other Crimes, Anica (Dobra) is a woman approaching middle age who decides to leave her dreary high-rise Belgrade suburb with the money that she plans to steal from a solarium run by an older mobster (Stojanovic) who is her boss and lover. ...

  • News

    Berlin Today short prize goes to Pakistan's Maheen Zia

    2008-02-11T14:57:00Z

    At a Sunday night dinner at the Berlinale Talent Campus, the Berlin Today Award 2008 went to Maheen Zia from Pakistan for her short Match Factor.Wim Wenders presented the prize, now in its fifth year. Zia's short is about an Iraqi man who finds himself the subject of a manhunt ...

  • Reviews

    Be Like Others

    2008-02-11T13:57:00Z

    Dir: Tamaz Eshaghian. USA, Canada, Iran, 2008. 74minsBe Like Others , a documentary on a topic that seems almost like the start of a joke -- did you know that in Iran, homosexuality is punishable by death, but sex-change operations are not only sanctioned by the governing clerics but almost ...

  • Reviews

    Son of a Lion

    2008-02-11T13:25:00Z

    Dir: Benjamin Gilmour. Australia/Pakistan. 2007. 92mins.Childrens' exposure to gun culture is fast becoming one of the fail-safe themes of world cinema, but we haven't yet seen it in quite the context presented by the inventive Pakistan-set drama Son Of A Lion.Benjamin Gilmour's no-frills DV feature, co-written with collaborators from the ...

  • News

    Senator buys 25.1% stake in Berlin rights trader A Company

    2008-02-11T12:32:00Z

    Senator Entertainment has taken a 25.1% stake in the Berlin-based rights trading company A Company Consulting & Licensing as part of a strategy to expand its own position in the international licensing business and invest in the burgeoning Central and East European market.Over the past five years, A Company has ...

  • News

    Nanni Moretti to be the subject of Locarno retrospective

    2008-02-11T11:30:00Z

    Italian director-actor-producer Nanni Moretti will be the subject of this year's retrospective at the Locarno Interational Film Festival (August 6-16).'I am total fan of his work and am very happy that he will be in Locarno,' says the festival's artistic director Frederic Maire exclusively to Screen Daily.com. 'We will be ...

  • News

    European admissions fall 2.2% in 2007

    2008-02-11T10:07:00Z

    Total box-office admissions in European Union countries fell 2.2% in 2007 compared to 2006.The Europe's European Audiovisual Observatory says that 910m tickets were sold, which means 2007 was still well above the low of 898.8m in 2005.Bucking the trend was the UK up 3.7% and Italy up 8.4%.Eastern Europe saw ...