Small MPU – Page 783
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News
France wins 'cultural exception' fight in EU charter
France won a last-ditch battle this week to maintain its right of veto in a future European Union constitution to protect its film and television industry in international trade negotiations. The committee drafting the EU's first constitution agreed to add a clause sought by Paris on the so-called "cultural exception" ...
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German box office, admissions fall sharply
German cinema admissions and box office revenues fell by 10.9% and 12.2% respectively in the first six months of 2003 compared to the same period last year, according to statistics compiled by Nielsen EDI.Around 67.46m cinemagoers were registered until June 29 - compared to 75.2m in 2002 - while box ...
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Euro film to benefit from EIB bank deal
The European Investment Bank (EIB) has provided Euros40bn of credits to Natexis Coficine and Cofiloisirs, two French banks specialising in film lending.The two Euros20bn loans are continuations of previous loans arranged in November 2001. They are expected to have the twin effects of boosting Coficine and Cofiloisirs' lending capacities while ...
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Germany benefits as kids stay in the picture
Although the German box office is significantly down for the first six months of this year, there is one bright spot: German market share has climbed up to 14.3% from an overall 11.9% for 2002 (Screen Daily, July 11).Part of this upswing is being driven by an unlikely source: German ...
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Capitol Films' Five Children And It starts shooting
Filming has started on John Stephenson's Five Children And It, which will shoot for ten weeks on the Isle of Man and at Shepperton Studios.Five Children And It is a Capitol Films project in association with Endgame Entertainment (US), the Isle of Man Film Commission and the UK Film Council's ...
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Pere replaces Da Silva as Director's Fortnight chief
Francois Da Silva has been replaced as artistic director of Directors' Fortnight by Parisian cinema-programmer Olivier Pere. Da Silva, the Marseille-based cinema operator quit as artistic director of the Directors' Fortnight (Quinzaine Des Realisateurs), on Thursday (July 10) after a single festival.According to Agence France Presse, 32-year old Olivier Pere ...
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Wenders wrests back control of back catalogue
Wim Wenders is understood to have successfully taken back control of the copyright to his own back catalogue of some 20 films, such as The American Friend and Paris, Texas.Earlier this year, it looked as if Wenders may lose the copyrights to the films, after Das Werk - parent company ...
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Berlin signs up with European Film Festival network
The Berlin International Film Festival has become the first A-list festival to sign up as a member of the European Coordination of Film Festivals (ECFF), a network of over 200 festivals across Europe dedicated to the promotion and circulation of European cinema.ECFF President Thom Palmen told Screen Daily said that ...
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Czech distribs pounce on Karlovy Vary titles
The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival came to a close over the weekend with several deals in place or close to completion for Czech distribution of foreign titles. Czech art house ArtCam is in negotiations for local distribution of three films, according to ArtCam's Eliska Fuchsova. The films are Buddy, ...
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Specialist distributor launches in Ireland
Tribal Films, a new US-Irish specialist distributor of art house and indie titles was launched by former Shooting Gallery exec Will Silke at the Galway Film Fleadh last week. Its first acquisition for the territory, the dialogue free Hungarian film Hukkle, was shown at the festival on Thursday. Hukkle is ...
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Ozpetek's Facing Windows scoops top Karlovy Vary prizes
Ferzan Ozpetek's Facing Windows won the top prize, the Grand Prix Crystal Globe, at the 38th annual Karlovy Vary International Film Festival on Saturday night (July 12).The Turkish-Italian director, who was carried to the stage by muscular dancers to pick up his award at the closing ceremony, also took the ...
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Pirates conquer the box office
Buena Vista plundered thebox office and scored one of the few well-reviewed movies of the summer with PiratesOf The Caribbean: The Curse Of The Black Pearl which took $46.4m over the weekend and $70.4m intotal since its Wednesday opening.The expensive pirateadventure "inspired by" the theme park ride at Disneyland is ...
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Lyons replaces Williamson as production chief at Focus
Following the announcementon Friday that Glenn Williamson is leaving his post as president of production,producer John Lyons is joining Focus Features as its next president ofproduction.Lyons will report directlyto co-presidents David Linde and James Schamus and, unlike Williamson, will bebased in New York City at Focus headquarters where he will ...
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Reviews
Bad Boys 2
Dir: Michael Bay. US. 2003. 147 mins. Finally reuniting stars Will Smith and Martin Lawrence with director Michael Bay and producer Jerry Bruckheimer, the big budget sequel to unassuming 1995 action comedy Bad Boys is the kind of juggernaut we've come to expect from Bruckheimer and Bay since they first ...
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Warner Bros' long China march pays off with Shanghai gala
Warner Bros. marked its latest push into the fast growing Chinese film market at the weekend with a gala opening of its newly approved joint venture multiplex in Shanghai. The company also expressed confidence that regulatory reform in the industry was on track. Millard Ochs, President of Warner Bros. International ...
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Chadha's Bride And Prejudice begins Ealing shoot
Filming begins today (July 14) on Bride And Prejudice - The Bollywood Musical, the Bollywood style re-telling of the Jane Austen classic by the team behind Bend It Like Beckham - director/producer Gurinder Chadha and producer Deepak Nayar.The film stays faithful to Jane Austen's central story of a mother and ...
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Reviews
Northfork
Dir: Michael Polish. USA. 2003. 103mins.Despite its all-star cast, Northfork, actor-writer-director Michael Polish's dreamlike fable about the flooding of a small community will be a hard sell for Paramount Classics when it opens in the US on July 11. Nevertheless, it should prove a welcome guest at festivals looking for ...
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Reviews
The Silence Of The Forest (Le Silence De La Foret)
Didier Ouenangare and Bassek Ba Kobhio's slight tale has been billed as the first ever Central African film, says Lee MarshallDirs: Didier Ouenangare, Bassek Ba Kobhio. Central African Republic-Cameroon-Gabon. 2003. 91minsMore a consciousness-raising gesture than a piece of cinema, pure and simple, The Silence Of The Forest is a slight, ...
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Intertainment results hit by Franchise dispute
German licence trader and producer Intertainment has blamed its failure to return to profit in the 2002 financial year on the "ongoing negative effects" of its dispute with US producer Franchise Pictures.Intertainment's spat with Franchise has been dragging on since 2000, when the company alleged that Franchise and its principals ...
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Six-hour epic emerges as surprise Italian hit
A six-hour long epic about the lives of two brothers between 1966 and 2002 has become a surprise sleeper hit in Italy.Marco Tullio Giordano's La Meglio Gioventu - which won the Altadis award in this year's Un Certain Regard section at Cannes - has posted good results at Italy's slow ...