Large MPU – Page 756
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News
NEW ZEALAND 9 November
Taxi tried veryhard to accelerate past last weekend's box office topper Shall We Dance' but just missed out.Shall We Dance'took NZ$158,393 from 58 screens for BVI in its second weekend on releasecompared to Taxi's NZ$157,427 on 23less screens for 20th Century Fox. Taxi's screen average was the highest in the ...
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SWEDEN 9 November
Though AVPcouldn't shake As In Heaven from thetop of the Swedish chart, it did get a better screen average ($5,160) from its65 prints and grossed a solid $372,436.Collateralcontinued to do well on third, while PopularMusic dropped to sixth having grossed $2.4m and last week's new localrelease Fourteen Sucks (Fjorton Suger)to ...
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Warner, Lagardere pact for TV production push
Warner Bros International Television (WBIT)has struck a long-term alliance with Europe Audiovisuel, the audiovisual division of defence, communications and media conglomerate Lagardere.The two companies are to co-produce and co-finance English-language TV programmes for the international market, plus French-language TV drama aimed at the local market.WBIT and Europe Audiovisuel will share ...
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Reviews
After The Sunset
Dir: Brett Ratner. 2004.US. 93mins.Brett Ratner's capercomedy After The Sunset is a plodding, lifeless affair set on a Bahamasresort island that aspires to the level of To Catch A Thief but barelymusters the cultivated glitz of star Pierce Brosnan's Thomas Crown Affairremake.Instead it serves up anexotic Caribbean locale and two ...
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Reviews
Surviving Christmas
Dir: Mike Mitchell. US2004. 92minsAnybody hoping that thecomedy Surviving Christmas might resuscitate Ben Affleck's falteringcareer will be sorely disappointed. The very fact that DreamWorks did notrelease Mike Mitchell's feature in the heart of the season suggests they werehoping for some early holiday good cheer from audiences to buoy its chances.Sadly ...
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Reviews
Kings And Queen (Rois Et Reine)
Dir. Arnaud Desplechin.France, 2004. 150mins.Arnaud Desplechin'sstatus as a hero of the French intelligentsia, whose charms remain largelyunfathomable to the rest of the world, continues with Kings And Queen,which is as delightful and infuriating as his previous work.For two-and-a-half hours hespins two parallel tales that eventually converge to become one. Along ...
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GERMANY 9 November
UIP's release of 7 Dwarves attracted another 1.2m cinemagoers in its second weekendto bring the admissions tally up to 3.5m so far and a box office gross of$26m-plus.The comedy, which is already now moresuccessful than Otto's previous film outings - Otto - Der Katastrofenfilm and Otto- Der Liebesfilm -, again ...
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Salvatores begins shoot on psychological film noir
Oscar winnerGabriele Salvatores (Mediterraneo)has started shooting his latest film, a psychological film noir entitled Quo Vadis, Baby'Produced byMaurizio Totti's Colorado Film, the Euros 3m picture is adapted from theeponymous novel by Grazia Verasani. Its title is inspired by Marlon Brando'sfamous line in Last Tango In Paris.Quo Vadis, which Salvatores is ...
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Magimel tipped to star as career criminal Mesrine
Hot French star BenoitMagimel (The Piano Teacher) has beentipped to star as Jacques Mesrine in Barbet Schroeder's upcoming two-partadaptation of books written by the career criminal.The first instalment of thefilm, The Death Instinct, is based onMesrine's autobiography L'Instinct DeMort, written during one of the prison terms of France's Public EnemyNumber ...
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Illusive Tracks takes double top at Nordic Film Days
The Swedish film IllusiveTracks (Skenbart) by Peter Dalle proved a big hit with both the jury andaudience at this year's Nordic Film Days in Luebeck.The jury gave the Euros 12,500 NDR Promotion Prize toDalle's "frivolous black comedy" for an "excellent screenplay[which] forms the basis for an exceptionally good cast and ...
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Turin unveils competition line-up
David Gordon Green's Undertowis among the films that will compete at the upcoming Turin Film Festival (Nov12-20), Italy's leading festival for emerging and cutting-edge talent.The festival will kick off with John Sayle's Silver City and will close with theinternational premiere of Hong Kong director Benny Chan's New Police Story.The Asian-heavy ...
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Swiss producers welcome new Film Foundation
Swissproducers have received a welcome boost with the creation of a Film Foundationin Zurich which aims to have an annual funding budget of at least $7.4m(CHF8.8m).The launchmakes the Foundation one of the leading Swiss film funding institutions afterthe Federal Office for Culture and broadcaster SRG SSR idee suisse.The city of ...
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UK/IRELAND 9 November
Few other distributors stood a chance as UIP laid siege tothe UK box office last weekend. The chart shows that the distributor shot newtitle The Grudge into the top spot,dethroning stablemate Shark Taleafter three weeks. However, the UK is the only territory where UIP holdstheatrical rights.The Grudge claimed$4.2m (£2.3m) off ...
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Australia's RGM agency forms packaging venture
Sydney-based talent agency RGM Associates, which boasts clients including Cate Blanchett and Anthony La Paglia, has formed a joint venture that will work with producers to package and raise finance for film and TV projects. Partnering with RGM is Black Rock Entertainment, the new Melbourne-based entity created by former Scanbox ...
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Berlinale World Cinema Fund jury named
French independent distributor Isabelle Dubar of IDDistribution and Zimbabwe-born festival programme consultant and curator KeithM. Shiri will sit on the four-member international jury which will choose theprojects to be supported by the World Cinema Fund (WCF).The other jury members are the Berlinale's festival directorDieter Kosslick, who set up the Fund ...
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Bunch goes Wild at AFM
Wild Bunch rounded off theautumn AFM with a sales spree for its new American titles and for RegisWargnier's Cannes-tipped Man To Man.On Outlander, its$40m monster film from Ascendant Pictures, it sold Korean rights to J-Net, EastEurope to Monolith and Russian rights to Central Partnership. It had multipleoffers at or above ...
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Longtime Fox international executive Mars dies at 77
Harold Mars, theformer vice president of 20th Century Fox International, died of complicationsfrom pneumonia on Nov 1. He was 77.Born inBrooklyn, Mars started out in the film business with MGM International in 1946and moved to Fox in 1964, where he became the first director of operations forLatin America.He relocated toLos ...
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Palm acquires domestic rights to graffitti drama
ChrisBlackwell's Palm Pictures has acquired North American and Caribbean rights toAdam Bhala Lough's feature debut Bomb The System.Palm plans aspring 2005 release for the picture, which chronicles the lives of a group ofgraffiti artists who wage graffiti war on New York after the police beat up oneof their gang.Mark Webber,Jaclyn ...
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Leigh to get lifetime achievement award at Gothams
IFP/New York hasannounced nominees for its inaugural best feature and best documentarycategories at The Gotham Awards and named Mike Leigh this year's recipient ofthe Filmmaker Award for Lifetime Achievement.Officials added that DanTalbot will receive the Industry Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition ofhis work at New Yorker Films in introducing classic ...
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IFC takes US rights to Turtles Can Fly
IFC Films has acquired USrights in all media to Bahman Ghobadi's award-winning Iranian best foreignlanguage Oscar entry Turtles Can Fly.Set in Ghobadi's nativeKurdistan on the eve of the American invasion of Iraq, Turtles Can Fly follows the fortunes of a 13-year-old satellite dishinstaller who falls for an orphan girl.The picture, ...