Small MPU – Page 530
-
News
Academy takes over European Film Awards
The European FilmAcademy has taken over the production of its annual awards ceremony, theEuropean Film Awards, which will be held this year in Berlin on Dec 3.For the past eightyears, DDA Productions has financed and executive produced the ceremony. In a statement,both parties described the move as a "mutually agreed ...
-
News
Strong opening for Fly's Manslaughter
Danish director Per Fly Manslaughter had a strong opening in itslocal market over the weekend on the back of rave reviews. Manslaughter, the third in Fly's trilogy of class filmsthat includes The Bench andInheritance, opened number one in Denmark with over 38,000admissions, three times as many as the second placed ...
-
News
South Africa names Tsotsi as Oscar submission
GavinHood's gritty gangster-drama Tsotsi, a double winner at the EdinburghInternational Film Festival over the weekend, has been named as South Africa'sofficial entry into the foreign language category of the 78thAcademy Awards.The South African selection committee wasconvened by the National Film and Video Foundation and the country'sIndependent Producer's Organisation. It was ...
-
News
San Sebastian launches North African financing initiative
TheDonostia-San Sebastian International Film Festival (Sept 15-24) is expandingits geographical reach with a new financing initiative targeting North Africanfilmmakers, building on its current reputation as a hotbed for emerging Latintalents.The festival has unveiled two sections in two days: thepopular Latin Horizons competition, where many of the films are alumni orfinalists ...
-
News
Fortissimo takes on sales for Cuesta's Twelve
FortissimoFilms is to handle worldwide sales on Twelve And Holding, the secondfeature from director Michael Cuesta (L.I.E).Thefilm is to world premiere at next month's Toronto International Film Festival(Sept 8-17) in the Contemporary World Cinema section.TwelveAnd Holding is the story of three twelve year olds, who sparked by the tragicdeath of ...
-
News
Bond serves up Haggis for Casino Royale polish
The screenwriting teambehind the new James Bond feature have confirmed that Oscar-nominatedscreenwriter Paul Haggis has been brought on board.Robert Wade told ScreenDaily.comthat Haggis,who adapted Million Dollar Babyas well aswriting and directing Crash,will do a three-week polishonthe second draft of Sony/MGM's Casino Royale, originally penned byhimself and co-writer Neal Purvis."What I ...
-
News
Winkler to teach three-day masterclass at Deauville
Irwin Winkler (pictured) will teach athree-day directing masterclass at the 31st Deauville American Film Festival in France.Winkler, a four-time AcademyAward producing nominee who shared best picture honours for Rocky in 1977, has directing credits including De-Lovely, The Net, Guilty By Suspicion, Life As A House and Night And The City.Winkler ...
-
Reviews
Seven Swords (Qi Jian)
Dir: Tsui Hark. HK-Chi-SKor. 2005. 152mins.Hong Kong auteur TsuiHark's most ambitious film to date, Seven Swords makes for an energeticVenice curtain-raiser after the dreary plod of last year's The Terminal.The director has talked upSeven Swords as the Saving Private Ryan of martial arts films, of areturn to basics and focus ...
-
News
Chinese film companies launch anti-piracy agency
The China Film Copyright Protection Association (CFCA), anon-profit organisation formed by 62 film-related companies, was officiallylaunched in Beijing on Monday.Headedby former Shanghai Film Group president Zhu Yongde, the association aims tohelp the Chinese film industry to combat the nation's high levels of DVD, VCDand online piracy.Apart from advising its members ...
-
Reviews
The Great Goblin War (Yokai Daisenso)
Dir: Takashi Miike. Jap.2005. 124mins.Announcing the production of the $30m The Great Goblin War lastSeptember, Kadokawa Group chairman Tsuguhiko Kadokawa said the film would'rival Harry Potter and Lord Of The Rings in its worldwideappeal".To make its chairman's wordsa reality, Kadokawa hired Takashi Miike, a director best known for hisfull-frontal plunges ...
-
News
Terra firms up Lycos acquisition
Terra, the Spanish and Portuguese-speaking world's leading internet portal majority owned by telecoms giant Telefonica, has closed a deal to acquire multi-brand network Lycos in a stock-for-stock transaction worth $12.5bn.The new company, dubbed Terra Lycos, has also closed a $1bn dollar, five-year commerce deal with European media giant Bertelsmann, which ...
-
Reviews
A Perfect Day
Dir/scr: JoanaHadjithomas, Khalil Joreige. Fr-Leb-Ger. 2005. 88mins.The perfect metaphor in search of a plot, thesecond feature from Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige assembles thenecessary ingredients to paint a portrait of life in Beirut but lacks thedramatic momentum to pull them all together and spark some life.Set in the Lebanesecapital, A ...
-
News
Pinewood blames tax policy for profit plunge
Pinewood Shepperton has blamed uncertainty over UK film taxpolicy and the weak US dollar for disappointingfirst-half results.The studio reported today that pre-tax losses for the firstsix months of 2005 were £108,000 compared with £1.63m for the same period lastyear. Revenues tumbled from £20.4 million to £13.3 million.Pinewood chief executive Ivan ...
-
News
Bim goes on pre-Venice buying spree
Rome arthouse distributor Bim has acquired Italiandistribution rights to a host of Venice films, including competition titles BrokebackMountain and The Constant Gardener.Sold by Focus/UIP, Ang Lee's Brokeback Mountain is about therelationship between a Wyoming ranch-hand and a rodeo cowboy. Heath Ledger andJake Gyllenhaal co-star.The Constant Gardener, which opened in North ...
-
News
Screen appoints Asia-Pacific bureau chief
Screen International has appointed Liz Shackleton asAsia-Pacific bureau chief.A Screen International reporter for more than adecade, Shackleton was responsible for the successful launch of ScreenDaily.comand has been reporting on Hong Kong and China for the magazine and websitesince 2001.From today, she will supervise a top-flight reporting teamfrom across the region, ...
-
News
Warsaw festival launches CentEast film market
The Warsaw International Film Festival (WFF)(Oct 7-16) is launching the CentEast regional film market for films fromCentral and Eastern Europe for the first time this year over four days fromOctober 12-15.WFF festival director Stefan Laudyn told ScreenDaily.comthat CentEast builds on the experiences of the festival's previous WarsawScreenings and will include ...
-
News
Celluloid seals international on Barney, Caravaca films
Celluloid Dreams has signedto handle international theatrical sales on Drawing Restraint 9, from Cremaster Cycle director Matthew Barney and all international rightson Eric Caravaca's Le Passager. Celluloid managing directorCharlotte Mickie told Screendaily.com that the company has already locked adeal on DR9 with Australia'sAccent and is considering offers for Japan, Germany, ...
-
News
Palm Springs ShortFest accepts 324 submissions
Films starringStephen Rea, Rosario Dawson, Sandra Oh, Selma Blair and Steve Buscemi arefeatured in the line-up of the upcoming 2005 Palm Springs InternationalFestival of Short Films (ShortFest), which runs Sept 20-26.Organisers haveunveiled a roster of 324 titles chosen from a record 2,400 worldwide entries,which they say has led to a ...
-
News
Lions Gate greenlights Lennon doc with Ono approval
Lions Gate Filmsand LSL Productions have begun pre-production on David Leaf and JohnScheinfeld's documentary The US Vs John Lennon, the third project from Lions Gate'sdocumentary unit following Grizzly Man and Leonard Cohen I'm Your Man, which receives its world premiere atToronto.Endorsed by YokoOno, The US Vs John Lennon covers the ...
-
News
Fox Searchlight lands US rights to Mehta's Water
Fox Searchlighthas picked up US rights to Water, the final instalment in Deepa Mehta's elemental trilogy thatwill open the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept 8.Set in 1930sIndia against the backdrop of Mahatma Gandhi's rise to power, Water charts the fallout on a temple communitywhen a group of widows arrives. ...