All articles by Martin Blaney – Page 157
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Last Train delayed after director injured on set
Filming on the Holocaust drama The Last Train (Der LetzteZug) has been stopped in Prague after onlyone day of shooting following an accident on set involving the director JosephVilsmaier (Comedian Harmonists, Stalingrad).According to press reportsat the weekend, Vilsmaier has had to be hospitalised "for at least aweek" after being injured ...
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Diagonale directors step down from Austrian festival
Changes are afootagain at Graz's Diagonale - Festival of Austrian Cinema little more than sixweeks after the successful 2005 edition in March.Due to 'differing opinions with respect tothe running of the Diagonale', Robert Buchschwenter and Georg Tillner arestepping down from the festival management.The third member of the management team - ...
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Cannes launch for European production initiative
A new Europeaninitiative - Capital Regions for Cinema (CRC) - is to be launched at nextweek's Cannes Film Festival to promote and support closer cooperation andco-production between European producers.CRC's founding members are Commission du Filmd'Ile de France, Rome's Lazio Film Commission, the Madrid Film Commission andMedienboard Berlin-Brandenburg GmbH. They will ...
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Eurimages doles out Euros 3.8m in funding
New feature projects by Otar Iosseliani (Jardins enAutomne) and Gianni Amelio (La Stella Che Non C'e) are among 12European co-productions supported with Euros 3.8m by the Council of Europe'sEurimages at its latest funding session. Amelio's La Stella Che Non C'e is an Euros 8mdrama about the dismantlement of an Italian ...
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German media funds reel as cabinet agrees tax overhaul
German Minister of FinanceHans Eichel held out an olive branch to the German film industry on Wednesday(May 4) after the Federal Cabinet agreed on proposed tax legislation which willclose the door to the old-style German media funds (ScreenDaily.com, May 2).Eichel said that a workinggroup convened by Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder earlier ...
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Death knell tolls for German media funds
German media funds look set to be put out of business thisweek because of a proposed tightening up of tax fund legislation by FinanceMinister Hans Eichel.Eichel's plans to curtail tax breaks for media investmentfunds will be hugely painful for US producers. They will also be "acomplete catastrophe for the German ...
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Studio Babelsberg shares start trading
Shares in Studio Babelsbergbegan trading on Frankfurt's 'Freiverkehr' exchange on Friday morningat Euros 1.65 after 10% of the company's 15m shares had been floated at anissue price of Euro 1 each. The free flotation of the1.5m shares was open to studio staff as well as friends and partners from thefilm ...
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3L Filmverleih drafts in senior management team
Ahead of this year's Cannes Film Festival,leading German DVD distributor e-m-s new media has made two high-profileappointments to the management team of its theatrical distribution arm 3LFilmverleih. PeterHeinzemann, previously managing director of the now insolvent Solo-Film Verleih[ScreenDaily.com, March 2005], has been named head of distribution anddeputy to 3L Filmverleih managing ...
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MDC takes on sales for Puipa's Forest Of The Gods
Berlin-based MDC International has taken oninternational sales for veteran Lithuanian director Algimantas Puipa's latestfeature Forest Of The Gods.The film has beenincluded in MDC's Cannes Market line-up and is set for delivery this autumn .A co-production between Lithuania's Baltic FilmGroup and the UK's IMS G LLP and starring Valentinas Masalskis, Steven ...
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European 'Producers on the Move' named
Nineteen Europeanproducers have been selected to be presented at the forthcoming Cannes FilmFestival as "Producers on the Move" by the member organisations ofthe pan-European promotional body European Film Promotion (EFP).The producers will be able to discuss theirprojects at a Co-Production Lunch with 100 producers from all over Europe andat a ...
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Pipeline wins top prize at Nyon documentary fest
Nino Kirtadze's The Pipeline Next Doorwas the winner of this year's Grand Prix Visions du Reel at this year'sinternational documentary festival in Switzerland's Nyon (April 18-24).Kirtadze's drama of asmall Georgian village facing the dragon of globalisation in a BP oil pipelinepassing over the villagers' land also received the John Templeton ...
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Swiss launch film fund to support world cinema
Films from Asia, Africa,Latin America and Eastern Europe are set to receive support for theirproduction and international promotion through the creation of the newSwiss-based Visions Sud Est (VSE) fund.The fund, which hasstart-up capital of $424,000 (CHF 500,000), has been set up by Nyon's"Visions du Reel" International Documentary Festival, FribourgInternational Film ...
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German DVD distributor e-m-s launches production arm
Leading German DVD distributor e-m-s new mediahas set up its own in-house production arm 3L Filmproduktion to serve as aco-producer on German feature film projects.The new division will be managed by Berlin-basedUlf Israel who previously worked for X-Filme creative pool for three years andthen as an independent producer on such ...
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German funder doles out Euros 4.5m to int'l projects
New feature films by Lone Scherfig, Hans Weingartner andOskar Roehler are among 21 projects backed by Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburgwith over Euros 4.5m in its latest funding session.Euros 400,000 was awarded to Danish filmmaker Lone Scherfigfor her World War II drama Good, based on C.P. Taylor's play, which willbe produced at Berlin ...
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Russian, Polish directors take top Wiesbaden prizes
Women filmmakers were the main winners at this year'sgoEast Festival of Central and East European Film in Wiesbaden when the awardswere presented on Tuesday evening (April 12).The International Jury, headed by Polish director Robert Glinski,its best film prize to veteran Russian director Kira Muratova's modern farce TheTuner (Nastrojscik), while the ...
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Hot newcomers, veterans share Filmstiftung NRW cash
Award winning Britishshort film director Steve Hudson has received Euros 850,000 in funding for hisdebut feature Dragnet from Dusseldorf-based subsidy body FilmstiftungNRW.Hudson won the Prix UIP in Venice last year forhis short Goodbye. Dragnet is about a group of Scottish fishermen whoget involved in the human trafficking of Chinese refugees ...
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German box office plunges in first quarter of 2005
German box office and admissions plunged by 11% in thefirst three months of 2005 compared to the same period last year.German cinemas took Euros 181.5m in box office, while thenumber of cinema-goers slipped from 34.8m to 31.1m in the first quarter.The sobering statistics have dispelled any optimism feltby German exhibitors ...
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Germany's FFA doles out Euros 25m of funding
The German Federal Film Board (FFA) has paid out a total ofEuros 24.9m in retroactive "reference" funding to local producersand distributors.The FFA pays out the money each year to producers anddistributors whose films have racked up significant box office admissions. Themoney must then be invested in the production of new ...
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Studio Babelsberg plans initial stock market float
Germany's Studio Babelsberg plans to go public and begintrading on Frankfurt's Stock Exchange on April 29.The company said it will offer 10% of a total of 15million shares. The remaining shares will be held by Carl Woebcken and co-proprietorChristoph Fisser as well as financial investors and employees. Studio Babelsberg is ...
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De Palma's Black Dahlia starts Bulgarian shoot
Brian de Palma's long gestating adaptation of James Ellroy'snovel The Black Dahlia, starring JoshHartnett and Scarlet Johannsen, has begun shooting at studios in Sofia for AviLerner's Millenium Film with the German media fund Equity Pictures KG III.The $60m crime drama had originally planned to recreate setsfor 1940s Los Angeles at ...