All articles by Martin Blaney – Page 196
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Blue Moon wins Grand Prize at Diagonale
Andrea Maria Dusl's feature debut Blue Moon was the winner of this year's Euros 19,000 Grand Prize at the Diagonale Festival of Austrian Cinema which closed in Graz on March 30. Meanwhile, the Diagonale's Euros 10,000 Prize for Innovative Production was shared ex aequo by Nikolaus Geyrhalter Filmproduktion (for Elsewhere) ...
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Germany's Constantin Film reports increased sales
Germany's leading independent distributor-producer Constantin Film posted a 3% year-on-year increase in sales to Euros 131.2m "in spite of the continuing crisis on the German media market last year", according to figures for the 2002 fiscal year.Constantin reported that it had reached the targets set at the beginning of 2002 ...
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Oberhausen engulfed in Iraq war ban controversy
The International Short Film Festival Oberhausen (May 1-6) has become embroiled in controversy after announcing that it intends to ban official representatives of the US, UK, Spanish and Italian governments from attending the festival following their policy on Iraq.In an official statement, the festival said that "the world's oldest and ...
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Saban completes takeover of KirchMedia film library
As planned following the purchase of the majority of ProSiebenSat.1 Media on March 17 (Screendaily, March 17), US media mogul Haim Saban has now concluded a deal with insolvency manager Michael Jaffe and the KirchMedia management to acquire the film library of 18,000 films and TV series and the film ...
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Das Werk sold to German production outfit
Huerth-based production outfit Media Select has acquired the core activities of the insolvent Das Werk postproduction group, in the face of stiff competition from a number of rival bidders from Germany, Europe and the USA. According to an official statement, the new owner plans to run Das Werk's regional operations ...
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Slovenia joins EU MEDIA Programme
Slovenia has become the seventh Central and East European country to become a member of the European Union's MEDIA Programme following Poland, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.The association treaty, which is back dated to January 1 2003, was signed on March 25 and sees Slovenia committing an ...
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Bavarian film fund to sign accord with Quebec film body
Bavaria's regional film fund FFF Bayern is to sign a Film Agreement with Quebec's Societe de Developpement des Entreprises Culturelles (SODEC) during a Bavarian Arts and Business Week in Montreal in mid-May.'There has been a collaboration with Quebec for some time', FFF Bayern spokesman Lothar Just said. "We had a ...
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German media lawyers propose adoption of UK's sale & leaseback model
The UK's sale & leaseback model and Canada's tax credit model are two options proposed by the German producer pressure group Film 20 to Gerhard Schroeder's administration to improve the international competitiveness of the German film industry.The proposals are among a series of recommendations drafted by a legal "think tank" ...
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Austrian, Slovenian industries get together at Diagonale fest
Austrian filmmakers will meet their counterparts from neighbouring Slovenia for the first time, at an industry get-together on March 28 during the Diagonale - Festival of Austrian Cinema, which started yesterday.While representatives from the Austrian Film Instiute (OFI), Slovenian Film Fund and broadcasters ORF and RTV-Slovenija will discuss the ...
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Argentina wins big at Fribourg
Argentinian cinema was the big winner at this year's Fribourg International Film Festival which closed on Sunday March 23 with the $21,500 (SFR 30,000) Regard D'Or going to Carlos Sorin's Historias Minimas.In addition, the Special Jury Award went to Luis Ortega's feature debut Caja Negra and the General Public Award ...
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German publisher to up stake in ProSiebenSat.1
German publishing empire Axel Springer has confirmed that it will increase its interest in ProSiebenSat.1 Media by 2% to 13.5% and receive another seat in the broadcasting group's supervisory board. These moves were made after talks with US billionaire Haim Saban who secured a controlling interest in the ProSiebenSAT.1 Media ...
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Advanced Medien calls AGM to report new losses
Beleaguered German rights trader Advanced Medien is to call an annual general meeting after preparations for its 2002 financial report showed that the company incurred a loss amounting to at least half of its capital stock.According to Advanced, the loss is "primarily due to the valuation allowance for loans to ...
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Culture Minister increases German Film Award prize money
Germany's State Minister of Culture Christina Weiss will increase the total prize-money allocated to the German Film Awards (Lolas) by Euros 310,000 to Euros 3.125m this year.An additional Euros 250,000 is being made available for a seventh title to be nominated in the "Best Feature Film" category, and a total ...
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RTL unveils new management as revenues rise
Europe's leading broadcaster and content provider RTL Group has unveiled a new management structure as audited preliminary figures for 2002 show that group revenues performed strongly despite a difficult market.Just a week after he was appointed RTL Group's new CEO, Gerhard Zeiler has announced a new executive committee which will ...
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Sellers welcome future Berlin-AFM breathing space
When the Berlin Film Festival announced its 2004 dates - Feb 5-15 - last week, the early scheduling was primarily motivated by the fact that next year's Academy Awards ceremony will be held almost a month earlier, on Feb 29.For many industry executives used to jetting between the Berlin's European ...
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France receives two Cartoon Movie tributes
France's domination of the European animation sector was recognised at the end of this year's Cartoon Movie market when two of its Cartoon Movie Tributes went to animation producers from France.Didier Brunner, whose company Les Armateurs has produced such films as Kirikou Et La Sorciere, Belleville Rendez-vous and The Boy ...
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New Wim Wenders film gets German regional film fund cash
Wim Wenders' next feature Don't Come Knockin' has received the highest amount - Euros 500,000 - from Hamburg's regional film fund FilmFoerderung Hamburg (FFH) in its latest round of a total Euros 2m in funding.With a screenplay by Sam Shepard and starring Shephard and Jessica Lange, Don't Come Knockin' will ...
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TV-Loonland sells stake in Korea's SRE Corp.
German integrated media company TV-Loonland has sold its 72.6% stake in the loss-making South Korean media house SRE Corporation to Seoul-based Moohandae Media LtdIn a statement, TV-Loonland pointed out that SRE had already posted losses of Euros 1.1m in the 2001 financial year on revenues of Euros 14.7m and these ...
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Saban buys broadcasting group from insolvent KirchMedia
Hollywood mogul Haim Saban (pictured) has taken the first step in buying the assets of KirchMedia by acquiring German TV broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1 Media.US billionaire media mogul Haim Saban has founded a new subsidiary of his Saban Group to acquire 36% of the ordinary shares (72% of the voting rights) in ...
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German Film Board hands out record amount of cash
A record Euros 22.6m in retroactive "reference" funding is to be distributed to around 100 German producers and distributors by the German Federal Film Board (FFA) for successful theatrical releases of German films in 2002. Last year, the FFA had handed out Euros 21.6m. The Oscar-nominated Nowhere In Africa and ...