All articles by Adam Minns – Page 26
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UK film production sector slumps by almost 40%
Confirming the worst fears of anyone in the UK struggling to get a film off the ground, local production levels have collapsed this year by almost 40%.The crash exacerbates last year's 57% slump in inward investment from overseas productions shooting. However, as Screen International reveals in this week's UK Focus ...
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Pathe UK accesses Ingenious equity funding
Underlining how far the UK's fast-growing production tax funds have moved into the mainstream, leading local financier Ingenious is to provide 35% of the budget on a slate of titles from Pathe UK.Ingenious is initially providing a fund for three pictures, but Cameron McCracken, deputy head of Pathe UK, expects ...
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Kuhn, Bazalgette join NFTS board of governors
Former PolyGram Filmed Entertainment chief Michael Kuhn is to chair the board of governors at the UK's National Film and Television School (NFTS), the school announced this week.Peter Bazalgette, chairman of Endemol UK, will serve as Kuhn's deputy. The duo take over from former Channel 5 chief David Elstein, whose ...
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UIP exec Marion Pilowsky tapped by Myriad in London...
Myriad Pictures, the Los Angeles-based sales & financing outfit, is beefing up its overseas presence by appointing UIP acquisitions chief Marion Pilowsky to head its London operation.Under the title of head of international production, Pilowsky aims to board between two and five projects in her first year from the UK ...
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UIP chairman Oneile expected to step down
UIP chairman Paul Oneile is expected to announce his departure from the international distribution giant imminently.London-based Oneile, who is understood to be leaving for personal reasons, has headed the international distribution venture of Universal Pictures and Paramount Pictures since 1996.UIP president Andrew Cripps is seen as a likely to candidate ...
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Optimum makes the most of new acquisitions
Mostly Martha, the German-language film currently on more than $3m at the North American box office, has secured a UK release through independent distributor Optimum Releasing.Optimum picked up UK rights from Paramount Classics, which is releasing the film in North America. Directed by Sandra Nettelbeck, the story of a celebrated ...
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Artificial Eye takes 11'09'01 for the UK
UK distributor Articificial Eye has picked up controversial September 11 film 11'09"01.The distributor bought all rights to the picture, which caused a storm in the US with its critical take on US foreign policy. The Venice title combines 11 films shot by a group of leading directors including Samira Makhmalbaf, ...
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Artificial Eye takes Dolls, Springtime for UK
Artificial Eye has picked UK rights to Takeshi Kitano's Dolls and Tian Zhuangzhuang's Springtime In A Small Town.The veteran UK independent distributor will open both titles in May next year. Dolls, which played at Venice and Toronto, will screen at November's London Film Festival.Artificial Eye's release schedule includes Bertrand Tavernier's ...
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Quirky kidnap comedy is Rio's surprise discovery
TheRio International Film Festival scored an unlikely hit on Saturday with DurvalRecords (DurvalDiscos), ajet-black Brazilian comedy from a first-timer on a shoestring budget that stolethe show so far for many delegates.Directedby TV writer and film critic Anna Muylaert, the quirky film is inauspiciouslyset in a Sao Paulo record shop, where ...
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Latin American sizzle heats up foreign markets
In the fickle world of acquisitions, Latin America has a fair claim to being this week's hot new cinema. Boosted by Miramax's expected Oscar push for Brazilian sensation City Of God and a strong reception for Mexican Cannes title Japon, Wild Bunch director of acquisitions, Alain De La Mata was ...
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Rio festival sambas on despite election fever
Competing forattention in Rio seems impossible in presidential election week. Streets aredraped with banners for leftist favourite Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva -known as simply as Lula - and if that wasn't distraction enough, druglords ordered an unofficial curfew on Monday, possibly as a sabre-rattlingexercise ahead of Sunday's voting.And yet, ...
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Miramax's Weinsteins to receive BFI fellowships
Miramax Films co-chairmen Harvey and Bob Weinstein are to be awarded British Film Institute fellowships for outstanding contribution to cinema, the UK cultural institution's top honour.The body is also honouring cinematographer and director Jack Cardiff, whose work includes The African Queen, A Matter Of Life And Death, And Black Narcissus, ...
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UK's Civilian Content 'cautiously positive' about half-year results
Civilian Content, the UK media concern currently bidding to extend its National Lottery franchise: The Film Consortium, is inching towards profitability after posting a pre-tax loss of $390,000 (£250,000) for the first half of the year.The loss marks an improvement of 68% on the first half of last year, when ...
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Natural Nylon team unravels as founder producer Bryant exits
Natural Nylon founder Damon Bryant is exiting the company he launched with leading British actors Ewan McGregor, Jude Law and Jonny Lee Miller and fellow producer Bradley Adams.Bryant is taking two projects with him which were developed at Natural Nylon under its first-look arrangement with Alliance Atlantis. John Maybury (Love ...
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Oscar hopefuls hit language barrier
Qualifying for the foreign language Oscars has long been the source of some confusion, but this year the imbroglio of the world's most important film trophy is boiling over into resentment. The Oscar for most angry country goes to Sweden, which argues that the criterion of language ghettoises national cinemas. ...
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Winchester stock rises after Helkon buys into company
Winchester Entertainment's stock rose a hefty 44% yesterday after Simon Franks and Zygi Kamasa's UK distributor Helkon SK bought 3.67% of the media company.Winchester chief executive and founder Gary Smith played down speculation that Helkon might bid for the company, saying that the share purchase had acted as a catalyst ...
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$20m Edgardo Mortara bites the dust
Edgardo Mortara, one of the most ambitious productions at the UK's FilmFour, has collapsed only weeks before it was due to start principal photography.The $20m period epic starring Anthony Hopkins and Javier Bardem appeared to have survived Channel 4's decision to close down FilmFour as a stand alone operation and ...
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UK rides risky business boom
Anyone looking for the next Germany should consider the UK. A $2.5bn (£1.6 bn) avalanche of financing is pouring into the film sector as changes in last April's budget start to kick in. But tax financing is in such flux that, like Germany, the boom could suddenly turn sour.With TV ...
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UK's Granada Film axed
Granada Film, the UK operation behind Ghost World, Bloody Sunday, The Gathering and Mira Nair's upcoming Vanity Fair adaptation, is being axed.The move means that none of the major ITV commercial broadcasters in the UK have a permanent film operation, despite announcements that the service would spend $155m (£100m) on ...
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DNA seeks joint venture backer
Fox Searchlight is in talks to form a joint venture with DNA, the UK National Lottery franchise of leading British producer Andrew Macdonald and Duncan Kenworthy.The offshoot of Twentieth Century Fox is likely to take over from DNA's current backer Universal Studios, although the franchise has been talking to other ...