Small MPU – Page 519
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      NewsMill Film ups Hughes to head operationsThe UK's Mill Film has appointed Neil Hughes to the newly created position of facilities and operations manager as the effects house beefs up its facilities.As well as looking after the day-to-day management of the company, Hughes, formerly production accountant for Mill Film, will maintain and develop relations between Mill ... 
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      NewsLoewy to return to MPD, focusing on New Line product, says reportThe dispute between filmdistributor Motion Picture Distribution and its former chairman Victor Loewyhas been resolved, according to a newspaper report in Canada. Citing unnamed sources, theGlobe and Mail newspaper said Loewy had negotiated a return to the MPDexecutive suite which will see him deal exclusively with the output deal withNew ... 
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      NewsCruz, Williams, Bullock added to lineup of Oct Hollywood Film AwardsThe Hollywood Film Awards has added Robin Williams, Penelope Cruzand Sandra Bullock to its line-up of honorees at its annual bash on Oct 23 inBeverly Hills.Williams stars in drama The Night Listener and will receive the Hollywood CareerAchievement Award, while Cruz will appear later this year in the Spanish drama ... 
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      NewsSachar to oversee financing, development at Kindred Media GroupFilmmaker and actor Jonathan Sachar has joined USdistribution outfit Kindred Media Group as executive vice president and willoversee development and financing.Sachar has been working with Kindred on One Part Sugar starring Danny DeVito, Dylan Walsh andJustin Long; Southern Gothic; and Superheroes.Kindred Media Group president Jeffrey D Erb said:'We're very happy ... 
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      NewsFox, MySpace launch preview screenings programme with BoratTwentieth Century Fox and corporate sibling MySpace have teamed upon a new promotional tool that will enable MySpace users to see previewscreenings of upcoming features.The Black Carpet scheme will kick off with the preview screeningof Toronto hit Borat.MySpace users in six countries Ð the US, UK, Ireland, Australia, Germany andCanada ... 
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      NewsBunny Chow's Dv8 renews slate deal with South Africa's NFVFJoel Phiri and Jeremy Nathan's Dv8 Films, the production companybehind John Barker and Dog Pack's Toronto world premiere comedy Bunny Chow, have renewed their slate deal with theSouth African government's entertainment industry agency NFVF.The deal commits to the production of at least fourfeatures over the next 18 months, with a ... 
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      NewsBVI's Pirates has final territorial opening in ItalyPirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest will cross the $600m international markthis weekend as it launches in its final market of Italy.Buena Vista International's (BVI) adventure yarn has taken$594.6 to date and will surely pass $600m with the Sept 13 Italian release.Meanwhile Cars,which overtook its BVI stablemate as the ... 
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      NewsSusanne Bier to direct UK shoot for The DuchessDirector Susanne Bier willdirect period love story The Duchessfor Qwerty Films and MagnoliaMae Films. The project will shoot onlocation in the UK in early 2007 after Bier completes work on her current project, Dreamworks' Things WeLost InThe Fire, starring Halle Berry and Benicio Del Toro.The Duchess is based onAmanda Foreman's ... 
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      NewsJapan names Hula Girls as Oscar selectionThe MotionPicture Producers Association of Japan (Eiren) hasannounced Lee Sang-il's Hula Girls as Japan's official entry for Best ForeignLanguage Film for the Academy Awards. The final five films nominated in thecategory will be announced by AMPAS on January 23.Hula Girls tells the true story of a group of Japanese coalminers' ... 
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      NewsNew Manchester festival commissions film by Greg HallThe Manchester InternationalFestival has commissioned director Greg Hall and composer Steve Martland to create a new feature film that will premiere atthe inaugural festival in 2007. Greg Hall's feature debut The Plague, a low-budget urban dramachampioned by Mike Leigh, will be released in UK cinemas on Oct 6. Martland'smusic has ... 
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      ReviewsBonnevilleDir: Christopher M Rowley. US.2006. 104mins.A slushy salute to female friendship and the greatmysteries of life and death, Bonnevillehas the unmistakable feel of a TV-movie tearjerker. Filled with predictabledevelopments and heart-tugging revelations, it is bereft of surprises anddripping in syrupy sentiment. It has been a long while since an older ... 
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      NewsAustralia's Energee to create TV Magic PuddingAustralian animation house Energee Entertainment is planning to spin its not-yet-released first feature, The Magic Pudding, into a television series. International sales agent Icon Entertainment International has sold The Magic Pudding feature to more than a dozen territories including Bac Films for France and Gruppo Minerva for Italy. It will ... 
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      ReviewsMacbethDir: Geoffrey Wright. Aust. 2006.109mins.Shakespeare's bloodthirsty Scottish warlords are transportedto contemporary Melbourne, recent home to Mafia-style vendettas, tit-for-tat slayingsand alleged police corruption, for Geoffrey Wright's Macbeth. The result makes for a good genre fit, casting the centuries old plot in a new light with suavely dressed killers,beautiful women and a ... 
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      ReviewsThe Optimists (Optimisti)Dir: Goran Paskaljevic. Serb-Monaco. 2006.94mins.Eight years after his feature The Powder Keg portrayed Milosevic's Serbia self-destructing with avengeance, Goran Paskaljevicreturns for another look at his homeland with The Optimists. But although the former Serbian leader is now gone,and democracy of sorts has replaced him, Pasklajevicis not really enchanted by what ... 
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      ReviewsStrike (Die Heldin Von Danzig)Dir: Volker Schloendorff. Ger.2006. 104mins.Billed in the opening credits as a "ballad", Strike is based on events in the Leninshipyards in Gdansk, Poland during the early 1980s,which sparked the creation of the Solidarity movement and, ultimately, thebeginning of the end of the Cold War.Coming off as a Polish Norma Rae ... 
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      ReviewsStarter For TenDir: Volker Schloendorff. Ger.2006. 104mins.Billed in the opening credits as a "ballad", Strike is based on events in the Leninshipyards in Gdansk, Poland during the early 1980s,which sparked the creation of the Solidarity movement and, ultimately, thebeginning of the end of the Cold War.Coming off as a Polish Norma Rae ... 
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      ReviewsStarter For TenDir. Tom Vaughan. UK. 2006. 96mins.James McAvoy confirms hisposition as Britain's brightest newcomer in StarterFor Ten, a solid, rather endearing comedy, basedaround Britain'slong-running quiz show University Challenge. A period piece setin 1985-6, with all the music and haircuts to match, it is produced by TomHanks, via Sam Mendes, and, despite ... 
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      NewsPicturehouse takes Lopez/Anthony starrer El CantantePicturehouse has swooped on North American rights to ElCantante following itsworld premiere at Toronto in what sources close to negotiations said was thebiggest deal of the festival so far.The distributors' senior vice president of acquisitions Sara Roseand New Line's executive vice president of business affairs and co-productionsCarolyn Blackwood concluded marathon ... 
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      NewsIFC Films steps up to buy Dahl's You Kill MeIFC Films has picked up all North American rights in Toronto fromICM to Code Entertainment's upcoming mob comedy You Kill Me.John Dahl directed the picture, which is currently inpost-production and stars Ben Kingsley as an alcoholic hitman sent to the WestCoast to dry out. Tea Leoni, Luke Wilson, Dennis Farina, ... 
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      NewsFortune Star acquires China Star libraryRegional broadcaster StarGroup's content arm, Fortune Star, has acquired 100 library titles from Hong Kong's China Star Entertainment Group, in a deal valued at $18m. Most of the titles wereproduced in the past five years by China Star production subsidiaries OneHundred Years of Film, China Star Pictures and S&W. The ... 
 








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