Latest – Page 527

  • Features

    United States - Snake handler

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Black Snake Moan is the latest release in the promising career of John Singleton, producer. John Hazelton spoke to the multi-hyphenate film-maker.

  • Features

    United States - Mountain men

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Paul Hardart had been working in Los Angeles for nine years when he decided to move back to New York and set up Adirondack Pictures with his brother Tom.In Los Angeles, Paul created and co-ran (with Claudia Gray) Universal Focus, the specialty division of Universal Pictures. He also founded Universal's ...

  • Features

    Adirondack slate

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Annie Leibovitz: Life Through A Lens (American Masters/Thirteen/Wnet New York/Adirondack Pictures/Ranoah Productions). A documentary on photographer Annie Leibovitz. Directed by Barbara Leibovitz and featuring interviews with Hillary Rodham Clinton, Mick Jagger and Yoko Ono. Int'l sales: Fortissimo.The Night Of The White Pants (Harrison Prods/Adirondack Pictures). Written and directed by Amy ...

  • Features

    Hyphenate highlights: selected John Singleton credits

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Four Brothers (2005): directorHustle & Flow (2005): producer2 Fast 2 Furious (2003): directorShaft (2000): writer-director-producerHigher Learning (1995): writer-director-producerBoyz N The Hood (1991): writer-directorJohn Singleton is best known, of course, as the writer-director of such films as Boyz N The Hood, his powerful 1991 debut about West Coast gang life, and ...

  • Features

    US/Iraq - Her country, their country

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    The hoopla that accompanies the Academy Awards could not be further from the experience of making a documentary in today's Iraq. Nominated for best documentary award, Laura Poitras' My Country, My Country has stood out among the recent run of Iraqi-set material, in large part due to the director's determination ...

  • Features

    Germany - Majestic bow for a former Senator

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    When former Senator executive Benjamin Herrmann decided to join forces with film financing expert David Groenewold to launch a new producer-distributor Majestic Film into the German marketplace, he was not worried about an overcrowded landscape."I think if you filter out the completely undercapitalised companies which only release two to three ...

  • Features

    Industry moves

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Chorot steps down as Gaumont CEOGaumont co-CEO Franck Chorot has stepped down from his post. Chorot will continue to work with the French major as an in-house producer as well as working on co-productions. Following a stint as the head of UIP France, Chorot returned to the Gaumont fold in ...

  • Features

    Shorts and documentaries - Awards countdown - Hard-hitting docs take centre stage

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    My Country, My CountryNew York-based director-producer Laura Poitras (Flag Wars) spent eight months working alone in Iraq on her film, produced with Jocelyn Glatzer, about the months leading up to Iraq's first post-Saddam election in 2005. Poitras focuses on a Sunni doctor running for office as difficulties mount in an ...

  • Features

    Market watch: Berlin - Hunting ground

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Speak to a range of British independent distributors and it quickly becomes apparent that they have very different feelings about the Berlinale. For some, it is the place, as Swipe's Frank Mannion puts it, for "brave, innovative movies that can be marketed uniquely". Revolver's Justin Marciano agrees that "the European ...

  • Features

    Production - The view from Ireland

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    When The Wind That Shakes The Barley picked up the Palme d'Or at Cannes last May it was the start of an undeniably upbeat year for the Republic of Ireland's film industry. Ken Loach's film, set and shot in and around Cork, showcased Ireland's locations to an international audience and ...

  • Features

    IFTA Awards - Celebrating Irish cream

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Pierce Brosnan (The Matador), Colin Farrell (Miami Vice), Cillian Murphy (Breakfast On Pluto, and The Wind That Shakes The Barley), and Neil Jordan (Breakfast On Pluto) are a few of the internationally recognised members of the Irish film-making community among the nominees for this year's Irish Film and Television Awards ...

  • Features

    Financing - Money in the pipeline

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    The newest funding source for film-makers is the Sound & Vision Fund, set up in 2005 by the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland (BCI). Aimed at Irish film, TV and radio projects, it has an annual budget of $11.6m (EUR9m).In its first two rounds it has given sums up to $987,000 ...

  • Features

    Promotional Feature - EFP AT 10 - European Union

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    The Berlinale has always been a rallying post for European cinema - but this year's event has more reason to celebrate than usual - 2007 marks the 10th anniversary of the founding of European Film Promotion (EFP).The Hamburg-based organisation was set up in 1997 to promote and market European cinema ...

  • Features

    Stand and Deliver

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Some industry expressions are like adhesive plasters. In that category the one that I find most nettlesome is the one that insists it is a product-driven marketplace. On the surface it implies simply that the films themselves determine the size of the audience; the better the choices, the larger the ...

  • Features

    Happy talk as Museum slips

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Sony happily knocked Fox's Night At The Museum off the top spot this week, as The Pursuit Of Happyness opened in an additional nine territories and took $16.5m at the weekend. While Night At The Museum slipped marginally - largely due to UK exhibitors pulling the film over a DVD ...

  • Features

    Analysis: International box-office Weekend February 2-4

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    (Last3-dayweek)Film (origin)gross $ScrsCume $Terr1(2)The Pursuit Of Happyness (US)$16,472,2873,177$72,496,684232(1)Night at the Museum (US)$14,534,7374,291$213,777,377393(3)Blood Diamond (US)$13,467,3063,127$45,237,141434NewVoice Of A Murderer (S Kor)$6,735,543530$8,903,32315(4)Rocky Balboa (US)$5,501,6382,392$48,825,020266(8)Babel (Mex-US)$5,157,5811,467$61,312,572357(23)Dreamgirls (US)$4,988,4681,136$9,353,219108(6)Apocalypto (US)$4,947,7681,924$55,230,580339NewDie Wilden Kerle 4 (Ger)$4,941,767844$4,941,767310(11)Casino Royale (Czech-Ger-UK-US)$4,743,4901,761$415,704,5873711(14)Arthur And The Invisibles (Fr)$4,492,8702,159$67,254,5512112(5)Salaam E Ishq: A Tribute To Love (Ind)$4,011,445723$14,504,6912113(49)Saw III (US)$3,883,797817$72,901,8192214(10)Dororo (Jap)$3,176,959296$10,475,434115(7)Manuale D'Amore 2 (It)$2,987,712494$23,132,938116NewNotes On A Scandal ...

  • Features

    Market focus - Boom time in Bollywoodland

    2007-02-09T00:00:00Z

    Indian box office revenues increased by 40% last year but it is widely expected to be just the start of a period of radical change and rapid growth.The quality of local content in a region where Hollywood has barely made a dent remains a vital factor. But an increasingly important ...

  • Features

    Editorial - Screen says Looping the loop

    2007-02-02T00:00:00Z

    ScreenDaily.com this week reported that Ryan Kavanaugh's Relativity Media is teaming up with Citigroup Corporate and Investment Banking to co-finance approximately 45 films from an as-yet-unnamed Hollywood studio over the next five years. Following the parameters of recent co-financing equity structures with Hollywood, as much as $1.1bn could be invested ...

  • Features

    Film finance - A question of duty

    2007-02-02T00:00:00Z

    Pierre Drouot is a worried and angry man. The director of the Flanders Audiovisual Fund fears that the work of 20 years' hard lobbying for a Belgian tax shelter to support film finance may soon be killed off. And he believes he has identified the culprits responsible."The analysis is very ...

  • Features

    In focus - Screen conference - Sunshine states

    2007-02-02T00:00:00Z

    Screen International is hosting a conference covering all aspects of film financing, from private equity to state tax breaks.Among the speakers will be Ryan Kavanaugh whose Relativity Media this week announced a monster deal, co-financing 45 films from an unnamed studio.There are also speakers on the tax breaks that have ...