All Screen articles in 27 January 2000
View all stories from this month.
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News
FilmFour adds acquisitions chief
FilmFour, one of the most aggressive UK buyers at recent markets and festivals, is bolstering acquisition activities and has appointed Bobby Allen to the newly-created post of head of acquisition.Allen, formerly managing director of Lion's Gate Films UK, is to make his festival debut for FilmFour at Sundance. His appointment ...
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Maths may improve exhibitors' bottom line
Choose fewer "right" movies and show them longer: in the tight margin world of exhibition, this may become a mantra. Three academics who collaborated at the University of British Columbia have developed a mathematical programme that helps exhibitors determine which films to run, if and when to replace them and ...
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Mendel's sixth sense makes him partner Noonan
Barry Mendel, one of the producers on The Sixth Sense, is working with writer/director Chris Noonan on an adaptation of the novel Rule Of The Bone by Russell Banks, who also wrote the book on which The Sweet Hereafter was based. Sydney-based Noonan's most recent credit as a director was ...
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Beyond ups Fletcher to head distribution
Richard Fletcher has been confirmed as the new distribution manager for Beyond Films, the theatrical releasing arm of the diversified Australian film and TV group that is best known as a sales agent.The role sees Fletcher manage all distribution activities in Australia and New Zealand and take responsibility for the ...
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Spain scraps European film quotas
The Spanish government has decided to do away with a controversial quota system which requires exhibitors to programme one day of European cinema for every two days of films from other countries.The quotas will be gradually diminished and rendered invalid over the course of the next five years.According to Spain's ...
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News In Brief
UPC launches bond programmeLONDON: United Pan-Europe Communications (UPC), the Dutch cable operator, has launched a $1.6bn bond programme, the largest-ever high-yield bond deal from a European company. The rapidly expanding UPC previously raised $1.5bn last July. UPC, now Europe's second largest MSO, is one of the bidders for Deutsche ...
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Via Digital subscriber gains fuel merger talks
Spanish digital satellite platform Via Digital announced a 30% rise in subscribers over the last six months, bringing its total to 450,000. Though the numbers fall short of competitor Canal Satelite Digital's (CSD) 825,000 subscribers, Via is showing a faster rate of growth as well as a slight rise in ...
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News
News In Brief
UPC launches bond programmeLONDON: United Pan-Europe Communications (UPC), the Dutch cable operator, has launched a $1.6bn bond programme, the largest-ever high-yield bond deal from a European company. The rapidly expanding UPC previously raised $1.5bn last July. UPC, now Europe's second largest MSO, is one of the bidders for Deutsche ...
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News
CLT-Ufa signs five-year output deal with Fox
Luxembourg-based broadcaster CLT-Ufa has signed a five-year output deal with 20th Century Fox as part of an on-going strategy to consolidate its position in the German free TV market as a competitor to Leo Kirch's family of channels.The deal secures CLT-Ufa rights to Fox features such as Anna And The ...
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American Beauty scores at Golden Globes
American Beauty now officially leads the Oscar race after walking away with the Best Picture (Drama), Best Director and Best Screenplay prizes at the Golden Globe awards ceremony in Los Angeles last night. The DreamWorks SKG-produced film, which only cost $15m to produce, won prizes for producers Bruce Cohen and ...
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AtomFilms trusts in Sundance short
In the first internet licensing deal announced at a web-crazed Sundance Film Festival this year, AtomFilms has paid a modest upfront fee to acquire both on- and off-line rights to Jason Reitman's 16 minute short feature, In God We Trust. AtomFilms, a Seattle-based web operation that specialises in distributing short ...
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Artisan, Summit team up for Chuck And Buck
Artisan Entertainment, which last year walked away from Sundance with micro-budget The Blair Witch Project, has done it again, teaming with its foreign sales partner Summit Entertainment to acquire worldwide rights to Chuck And Buck, a low budget comedy which is in dramatic competition at the festival.But unlike Blair Witch ...
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Wajda to receive honorary Oscar
Veteran Polish film-maker Andrzej Wajda will be presented with an honorary Oscar at this year's Academy Award ceremony which takes place in Los Angeles on March 26. Wajda has been selected for the honour for a career that has included some of the most important European films of the post-war ...
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Down To You, Next Friday top US box office
Miramax Films' teen romance Down To You topped the US box office chart over the weekend with an estimated $8.3m, a small margin over last weekend's top film Next Friday, which came in this weekend with an estimated $8.2m.However, Down To You took only half of Miramax's 1999 She's All ...
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Benitez seeks fame through start-up outfit
Spanish producer Cesar Benitez is developing an ambitious international television series - Dreams - about a music and arts school in the style of popular 1980s US series Fame. The project is the first from Benitez's start-up firm, also called Dreams, formed several months ago with Alfredo Fraile, a music ...
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Spanish cinema-going amongst highest in Europe
Cinema attendance is higher in Spain than in most of Europe according to a report from Spain's General Society of Authors and Editors (SGAE) on the cultural consumption habits of Spaniards. Spaniards go to the movies on average 2.85 times per year, the report says, a figure well above ...
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Gaga set for Japan's first digital screenings
Japan's Gaga Communications plans to start public screenings of computer-graphics animation A*LI*CE from February 25, using a digital projection system that operates without film. The screenings will mark the first time a digital film has been released theatrically in Japan. Gaga also produced A*LI*CE, a sci-fi drama which is directed ...
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Sleepy Hollow keeps Stigmata off UK top spot
Competition for the number one slot was as intense as ever over the weekend (Jan 21-23) at the UK box office, with the top three films all grossing within £100,000 ($165,000) of each other. Stigmata (pictured), the supernatural thriller starring Patricia Arquette and Gabriel Byrne, broke into the UK chart ...
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MGM mulls restructure of United Artists Films
In reaction to the increasingly problematic international sales landscape, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) is looking to strike long-term output arrangements in major territories for films from its United Artists specialty label. That means a major restructure at its London-based sales and acquisitions operation London-based United Artists Films (UAF), run by sales veterans ...
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Sony Classics gets in the Groove
Sony Pictures Classics (SPC) has paid $1.5m to buy worldwide rights to rave drama Groove, the directorial debut of editor Greg Harrison, which is playing in the American Spectrum section of this year's Sundance Film Festival.Set over the course of one night, Groove follows a disparate group of characters as ...