All articles by Martin Blaney – Page 167
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GERMANY 31 August
This year's top film so far - German blockbuster (T)Raumschiff Surprise - Periode 1 - mayhave clocked up over 1,000 more admissions than King Arthur but had to contend with second place based onbox-office takings. Six weeks into release for Constantin Film, the film parodyis still showing on 937 screens ...
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Bavaria takes on Midwinter sales
Bavaria FilmInternational (BFI) is to handle world sales on Serbian director GoranPaskaljevic's latest feature MidwinterNight's Dream which will be in competition at the forthcoming San SebastianFilm Festival.The disturbingand moving film about a man returninghome after ten years of absence to start a new life in today's Serbia starsLazar Ristovski who ...
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Lord Of The Rings parody starts Swiss shoot
Shooting has begun this week in Switzerland on The Ring Thing, a Swiss parody of the Lord Of The Rings trilogy, which will bereleased theatrically at Christmas in Switzerland by the local outpost of BuenaVista International (BVI).Speaking exclusively to Screendaily.com,Kristian Widmer of Condor Communications, which is producing the film with ...
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New film sales company opens in Germany
Germany's film sales community has a new player with thelaunch of Sola Media.Managed by Norwegian-born Solveig Langeland (pictured),Sola Media's initial sales line-upincludes Dito Tsintsadze's San Sebastian-winner Gun Shy (Schussangst), Pepe Danquart's latest feature film C(r)ook, Bernd Sahling's German FilmAward-winning children's film Blindflyers(Blindgaenger), the live-action/animation children's film Alby (Pumuckl) and Tony ...
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German DVD distributor moves into theatrical
Leading German DVD distributor e-m-s new media is to take amajority 52.38% stake in theatrical distributor 3L Filmverleih which was set upat the beginning of this year by e-m-s new media's Chairman and CEO WernerWirsing and his wifeIn a statement, e-m-s new media, which will finance itsstake by a capital ...
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Switzerland's national film fund to be reviewed
Pascal Couchepin, head of Switzerland's Federal Departmentof Home Affairs (EDI) has commissioned an independent report on the running ofSwitzerland's national film funding programme at the Federal Office for Culture(BAK).The report, to evaluate BAK's criteria for grantingsubsidies, comes after previous criticisms by Couchepin of "lack oftransparency" and "too large a bureaucracy" ...
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Cassel to head Oldenburg jury
Veteran American indie actor Seymour Cassel will serve asthe president of the International Jury for the German Independence Award -Best German Film to be presented for the first time at the forthcoming FilmfestOldenburg (Sept 8-12).Cassel and the other jury members - German PR and marketingexpert Heike Melba-Fendel, Spanish author and ...
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German cinema admissions leap in 2004
Germany's distributors and exhibitors have cause forcelebration as 1 million more cinema tickets were sold in the first half of2004 compared to the same period last year, according to official figuresunveiled by the Berlin-based German Federal Film Board (FFA).The FFA reported that 72.3m tickets were sold in the periodto June ...
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Reding re-selected for EU media job
Viviane Reding is to keep the audiovisual policyand MEDIA Programme portfolio in the new team of commissioners unveiled by JoseManuel Barroso, President-designate of the European Commission.Reding has been commissioner for Education,Culture, Youth, Media & Sport since 1999 and will now serve as theCommissioner for Information Society and Media. She will ...
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Upbeat Constantin raises targets for 2004
German producer-distributor Constantin Film hasraised its sales forecast for 2004 to at least Euros 200m.The move came after Constantin posted a 175%year-on-year increase in sales for the first six months of this year. In the period up toJune 30, the Constantin Group achieved sales of Euros 99m, compared to Euros36m ...
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Locarno director responds to criticism
Locarno Film Festivalartistic director Irene Bignardi has declared herself "very happy" with herfourth event and has defended herself against criticism from former Locarnodirector Moritz de Hadeln."The final result of thisyear's programme saw us able to paint a picture consistent through all thesections showing that we had chosen the right moment ...
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German home entertainment market hits new high
Turnover in the German homeentertainment market continues to boom with revenues from sell-through andrental videos and DVDs increasing by 14% to Euros 720m in the first half of2004, according to the German Federal Film Board (FFA).The results for videosell-through were particularly impressive with overall turnover rising by 19%from 2003's Euros ...
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Euro cinema foundation suspends operations
The MonteCinemaVeritaFoundation, which was one of the backers of this year's Locarno competitionfilm The Hunter (Okhotnik) byKazakhstan's Serik Aprymov, has suspended operations and laid off coordinatorLaurence Hoffmann in order to restructure its organisation.Over the last ten years, theSwiss Foundation has supported the production and post-production of film projectsfrom the South ...
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New Swiss arthouse distributor launches
A new player has appeared on the Swiss distribution scene with thelaunch of Lucerne-based Cinepix Distribution in collaboration with the KiwiGroup arthouse cinema chain.Speaking to Screendaily.com in Locarno this week,Cinepix's managing director Patrick Riesen said that he plans to release 3-5films per year with a particular - although not exclusive ...
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Splendid Film ordered to pay $2.1m to Gold Circle
The future liquidity ofSplendid Film is in jeopardy following a decision ordering it to pay $2.1m toLos Angeles-based Gold Circle Films.This turn of events cameafter the 100% subsidiary of Cologne-based Splendid Medien was ordered to paythe amount by an arbitration board of the Independent Film & Televisionalliance as an additional ...
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Swiss locations receive promotion boost
Switzerland's profile as alocation for international film productions is set to receive a major boostafter the decision by Film Location Switzerland (FLS) to become a member of thepromotion agency Swiss Films.Commenting on the move, SwissFilms' managing director Micha Schiwow explained in Locarno at the weekend thatthis would "complement the activity ...
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Schwarzenegger doc selling well at Locarno
Sales company MGI International has concluded a raft ofdeals on Alex Cooke's documentary HowArnold Won The West which was screened in Locarno's Filmmakers of thePresent Video sidebar.MGI's Claude Nouchi reported that the film about ArnoldSchwarzenegger's election campaign to become Governor of California had been'very well received by the public and ...
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GERMANY 10 August
Constantin Film's release of the camp sci-fi spoof (T)Raumschiff Surprise - Periode 1 waspushed off the top spot by the Will Smith futuristic thriller I, Robot with just 4,000 more ticketsbeing sold (698,696 compared to 694,567): the Fox release grossed $ 5.2m on itsopening weekend compared to (T)Raumschiff's$5m which was ...
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First Locarno deals concluded
After only two days, Locarno had already seen its firstdeals concluded by Friday (August 6) before the festival's first weekend.Celluloid Dreams picked up international distribution rightsfor German director-cinematographer Thomas Riedelsheimer's (Rivers And Tides) new documentary Touch The Sound which had its worldpremiere in Locarno's Critics' Week on Sunday evening (Aug ...
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Talent Campus heads to Far East, Latin America
Following the successful staging of Talent Campuses in Kievand New Dehli, the Berlinale Talent Campus plans to further export its conceptto the film festivals in Pusan and Buenos Aires in 2005.This announcement comes after the first Talent Campus India washeld during last month's Osian's Cinefan Film Festival - from July ...