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All Americas articles – Page 303
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Reviews
New York City Serenade
Dir. Frank Whaley. US 2007. 103 mins.The title of New York City Serenade and an opening aerial skyline shot would lead you to believe that the film is an ode to New York . It's really an ode to friendship with a friend who gets you to the wrong places ...
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Reviews
Cleaner
Dir: Renny Harlin US . 2007. 92 minsTen years have passed since the combination of Samuel L Jackson and director Renny Harlin was a guarantee of lively box-office action. Think The Long Kiss Good Night (1996) and Deep Blue Sea (1999). Harlin has steadily surrendered his A-list status and Jackson ...
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Reviews
The Last Lear
Dir. Rituparno Ghosh. India 2007. 130 min.An overly complicated film-within-a-film story, told through multiple narrators, causes confusion in Rituparno Ghosh's The Last Lear. The film was conceived as a vehicle for the greatest living idol of Indian cinema, Amitabh Bachchan, in his first full length English-language film. The role of ...
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Reviews
Dr. Plonk
Dir. Rolf de Heer. Australia 2007. 84 min.Deprived of the frantic mania and destructively anarchic passion that drove the best silent comedies, Rolf de Heer's attempt to revive the genre turns out into another capricious whimsy for a director whose erratic career has never followed a conventional path. Shot on ...
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Reviews
Just Like Home (Hjemve)
Dir Lone Scherfig Denmark . 2007. 97 minsFive years after her admired English-language debut Wilbur Wants To Kill Himself, writer-director Lone Scherfig makes an eagerly awaited return to her native Denmark for Just Like Home, an idiosyncratic ensemble comedy depicting a community in crisis. A slight, slow-burning tale, it lacks ...
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Reviews
Reservation Road
Dir: Terry George USA. 2007. 102 minsA respectable, well-intentioned exploration of grief, guilt and the instinct for revenge, Reservation Road boasts some fine performances but tries too hard to pass itself off as a weighty, tear-stained Oscar contender. A plot heavily reliant on coincidence may have worked on the page ...
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News
First Look spends $3m on US rights to comedy Bill
As Toronto headed into the closing weekend, First Look Studios paid just over $3m to US rights for Melisa Wallack and Bernie Goldmann's comedy Bill starring Aaron Eckhart. Maple Films paid mid-six figures for Canadian rights.First Look Holdings co-chairmen Avi Lerner and Henry Winterstern and executive vice president of acquisitions ...
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News
Arthouse signs Canadian distribution deal with Mongrel Media
Arthouse Films has signed an exclusive output and distribution deal with Mongrel Media in Canada.David Koh and Lilly Bright negotiated the deal for Arthouse Films with Stanley Buchthal of LM Media along with Mongrel Media president Hussain Amarshi.The multi-year deal covers more than 10 titles a year, kicking of with ...
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News
The Brave One opens number one in the US
Jodie Foster drew in a largely female crowd as Warner Bros' revenge thriller The Brave One opened top on an estimated $14m.Foster, in her first lead role since Flightplan in 2005, stars as a radio host who turns vigilante after she is nearly beaten to death. Neil Jordan directed and ...
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News
Maddin's Winnipeg sells to IFC, Soda, Maximum
Fresh from its victory for Best Canadian Feature at TIFF, Guy Maddin's idiosyncratic documentary My Winnipeg has been sold to IFC Entertainment in US, Soda Pictures in the UK and Maximum Films Distribution in Canada. The deals were announced by My Winnipeg producer (and DoP) Jody Shapiro from the podium ...
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News
Eastern Promises, My Winnipeg win top prizes as TIFF winds down
Guy Maddin's personal documentary My Winnipeg won the C$30,000 Toronto-City Award for Best Canadian Feature and David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises won the C$15,000 Cadillac People's Choice Award as the 32nd Toronto International Film Festival wrapped on Saturday. Runners up for the audience prize, first and second respectively, were Jason Reitman's ...
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News
Nova Scotia boosts tax credit for producers
Tax relief on local labour costs for productions shooting in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia has been increased from 35% to 50%, it was announced at the Atlantic Film Festival in Halifax. Nova Scotia premier Rodney MacDonald announced the rise at the opening gala screening of Roger Spottiswoode's Shake ...
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Reviews
Death Defying Acts
Dir: Gillian Armstrong UK/Australia. 2007. 97 mins.The period romance is back in style if the UK success of Atonement is anything to go by, but Death Defying Acts is so corny and old-fashioned that only diehard romantics are likely to consider it magical. The relationship between famed escapologist Harry Houdini ...
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Reviews
Married Life
Dir: Ira Sachs, US, 2007. 90minsIra Sachs's new film Married Life commences with wonderfully droll cartoon-like credits that simultaneously amuse with their archness and efficiently evoke the 1940s era in which the film is set. Like the film as a whole, however, they promise a great deal that is, alas, ...
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Reviews
Nothing is Private
Dir: Alan Ball. US. 2007. 124 mins.Perhaps the most polarizing film of the Toronto International Film Festival this week, Nothing Is Private marks the feature directorial debut of American Beauty writer and Six Feet Under creator Alan Ball. As you might expect from Ball's oeuvre to date, it is a ...
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News
Haitian Film Festival postponed to 2008
Film Festival Jakmel has postponed its annual event for a year, according to festival founder David Belle. Based in the southern resort town of Jakmel in Haiti, the festival last year injected over $1m in economic activity in the region. However, planning for the fourth iteration was plagued by funding ...
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News
Women In Film, General Motors name winners in Latina contest
Women In Film and the General Motors Corporation have announced the five winners of the second annual WIF/GM 2007 Opening Doors/Abriendo Puertas: The Acceleration Grant For Emerging Latina Filmmakers.The grant is a project of the WIF/GM Alliance aimed at supporting film-makers from Latina/Hispanic communities and other under-represented groups. The five ...
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News
The Collective buys genre website Bloody-Disgusting.com
Los Angeles-based The Collective has acquired the genre website Bloody-Disgusting.com with an eye to turning it into an online exhibitor.Deal terms were not disclosed, however it is understood that content will remain under the editorial control of founders Tom Owen and Brad Miska, with The Collective providing infrastructure, strategy and ...
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News
Keith joins Laika as vp, business operations, and CFO
Portland-based animation studio Laika has hired former Lucasfilm and Hanna-Barbera executive Alan Keith as vice president of business operations and chief financial officer and promoted Travis Knight to vice president of animation.Keith has more than 20 years of finance experience in the studio and non-Hollywood arenas and will lead the ...
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News
Arthouse signs US distribution DVD and digital deal with Arts Alliance
Arts Alliance America has signed an exclusive output deal to distribute Arthouse Films titles in the US on DVD and via digital distribution.The multi-year deal encompasses more than 15 titles a year, starting off with a slate that includes James Crump's documentary Black White + Gray: A Portrait Of Sam ...