All articles by Mike Goodridge – Page 47

  • Reviews

    Perfect Stranger

    2007-04-13T06:00:00Z

    Dir: James Foley. 2007. US. 109minsPerfect Stranger is perfect trash, crafted with all the costly polish and production values that Hollywood can muster. A throwback to lurid sex thrillers from the 1990s like Disclosure, Jade and Colour Of Night, it is the ultimate guilty pleasure, compulsively watchable, even when the ...

  • Features

    United States - India meets Hollywood

    2007-04-13T00:00:00Z

    Los Angeles-based Christina Marouda had always enjoyed Indian cinema. But it was only when she worked at the city's two biggest film festivals, Afi Fest and the Los Angeles Film Festival, that she realised Indian films needed a better platform in the world's movie capital."Apart from Cannes and Berlin, Indian ...

  • News

    Dutch FilmWorks co-founder Roelofs takes on freelance role

    2007-04-03T22:57:00Z

    Wiljan Roelofs, one of the founders of Dutch FilmWorks (DFW) has decided to take a step back from his role as commercial director and will take up a freelance role at the Netherlands distributor.Roelofs will now oversee the DVD rental arm of the company, but will continue to work closely ...

  • Features

    United States - Shooting range

    2007-03-30T00:00:00Z

    "Not everyone should have, or wants to have, a film industry," says Jean Prewitt, the president and chief executive officer of the Independent Film & Television Alliance (Ifta). "Countries and communities have to understand why they are doing it."Prewitt has had so many inquiries over the years from countries, states ...

  • News

    Anita Monga joins Seattle Film Festival programming team

    2007-03-25T21:37:00Z

    Anita Monga has been hired as senior programmer at the Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF), reporting to festival director Carl Spence. She will work with Spence and his team on the annual 25-day festival in May and June but primarily focus on programming the new SIFF Cinema in Seattle.Monga comes ...

  • News

    Cannes' Asian selections set to be strongest in years

    2007-03-21T22:00:00Z

    With the Cannes Film Festival pulling out all the stops for a glittering 60th edition, the Asian selection promises to be the strongest in years.New titles from Jiang Wen, Lee Chang-dong, Kim Ki-duk, Im Kwon-taek, Takeshi Kitano and Wang Xiaoshuai could line up next to Hou Hsiao-Hsien's first French-language film ...

  • News

    D-Street, Volkswagen team on US release of Summer

    2007-03-15T20:41:00Z

    Fledgeling US distributor D-Street Releasing has partnered with Volkswagen AG to support the marketing of the upcoming domestic release of Andreas Dresen's Summer In Berlin.The deal is part of an ongoing collaboration between D-Street and Volkswagen to promote and celebrate international film in the US market. The German film opens ...

  • News

    AFCI launches Global Initiatives to assist producers

    2007-03-14T18:01:00Z

    The Association Of Film Commmissioners International (AFCI), which is staging its annual Locations Trade Show in Los Angeles April 12 to 14, is launching a series of AFCI Global Initiatives.The initiatives include a worldwide educational programme covering the breadth of the film commission profession, easy access to the most current ...

  • News

    Violin, Banished, Red Road take top honours at Miami

    2007-03-11T21:23:00Z

    Francisco Vargas Quevedo's El Violin from Mexico and Marco Williams' Banished from the USA won the respective Ibero-American drama and documentary competition sections at the 24th annual Miami International Film Festival during the awards evening on Saturday night (March 10).Meanwhile, Andrea Arnold's much acclaimed Red Road won the World Cinema ...

  • News

    De Bokay takes reins of Miami Film Festival from Guillemet

    2007-03-11T21:22:00Z

    Patrick De Bokay is to succeed Nicole Guillemet as director of the Miami International Film Festival. Guillemet had announced last year that she would be leaving the festival after this year's event which finished yesterday (Sunday).French-born De Bokay's career has principally been in film marketing and advertising and has held ...

  • News

    Ascot Elite takes Swiss rights to Doerrie's How To Cook

    2007-03-01T23:24:00Z

    Zurich-based Ascot Elite has bought Swiss rights to Doris Doerrie's documentary How To Cook Your Life from Atrix Films.The film, which had its world premiere in the Berlinale Special section at the Berlin Film Festival last month, follows Doerrie as she engages Zen Master Edward Espe Brown to explain the ...

  • News

    Sony, SND/M6, Tele Muenchen among buyers of Marvel films

    2007-02-28T02:24:00Z

    Marvel Studios has announced a series of international deals on Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk, the first two films which it is self-financing through its recent $525m credit facility from Merrill Lynch.Sony Pictures has acquired distribution rights to both films in Japan and Spain, SND/M6 has taken them for ...

  • Features

    The showman

    2007-02-16T00:00:00Z

    The omission of Bill Condon from the list of directing Oscar nominees was a shock to the growing legions of Dreamgirls fans across North America. Condon's DreamWorks and Paramount-backed production, which won the best picture (musical or comedy) Golden Globe, also faced a crushing shutout in the best picture Oscar ...

  • News

    Criterion commits to Berlin Alexanderplatz

    2007-02-11T04:00:00Z

    In what promises to result in its most lavish compendium to date, high-end US DVD distributor The Criterion Collection has bought US DVD rights Reiner Werner Fassbinder's monumental 939-minute Berlin Alexanderplatz: Remastered. The film is screening in its entirety today at the Volksbuhne, starting at 10am and finishing at 3am ...

  • News

    Fortissimo scores German hat trick with Kinowelt

    2007-02-10T04:00:00Z

    Fortissimo Films has closed a three-picture deal with Kinowelt Filmverleih consisting of Martin Scorsese's untitled Rolling Stones documentary, Christopher Guest's comedy For Your Consideration and Marion Hansel's Africa-set drama Sounds Of Sand. The deal was brokered by Kinowelt's founder and chief Rainer Kolmel and Fortissimo executive vice president, international sales, ...

  • Reviews

    Under The Same Moon (La Misma Luna)

    2007-02-02T06:40:00Z

    Dir: Patricia Riggen. US. 2007. 109 mins.Patricia Riggen's first feature film La Misma Luna (The Same Moon) is a road movie which starts off as one of those earnest movies which 'wears its heart on its sleeve' and ultimately, irretrievably, descends into cliche and sentimentality. Centred around a Mexican boy ...

  • Features

    Foreign Language Films - And then there were five

    2007-02-02T00:00:00Z

    In 2006, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for the first time unveiled a shortlist of nine films for the foreign-language film category, a week before the nominations were announced. Some 61 films were submitted in October 2006, nine were shortlisted and the final five were announced on ...

  • Reviews

    Summer Rain (El Camino De Los Ingleses)

    2007-02-01T23:43:00Z

    Dir: Antonio Banderas. Spain. 2007. 118 mins.A dreamlike and seductive second feature from Antonio Banderas, Summer Rain follows a group of young men and women in Malaga in the 1970s as they struggle to transition into adulthood. A nostalgic exercise of sorts for Banderas, himself born and raised in Malaga, ...

  • Reviews

    Clubland

    2007-01-31T22:02:00Z

    Directed by Cherie Nowlan. Australia. 2007. 108 mins.Clubland, Cherie Nowlan's first film since Thank God He Met Lizzie in 1997 is a rambling but likeable movie which continues the Ozzie tradition of blending offbeat comedy and high melodrama, a campy feelgood cocktail familiar from Muriel's Wedding, Strictly Ballroom, The Adventures ...

  • Reviews

    Slipstream

    2007-01-26T10:49:00Z

    Dir: Anthony Hopkins. US. 2007. 110mins.Anthony Hopkins' first film as a director since 1996's August is arambling, sporadically engaging experiment which attempts to illustratea man's descent into madness through stream-of-consciousness visualsand distorted, overlapping narratives.Although David Lynch has proved time and again that there is a limitedtheatrical audience and potential cult ...