All articles by Martin Blaney – Page 196
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Forced exit for Tobis distribution head
Marlies Weber, head of distribution at Berlin-based Tobis Film, has been forced to vacate her position as of today.Speaking to Screendaily.com, Weber (pictured) said that she was "not going of her own free will" and does not yet have anything else lined up.Meanwhile, Magnus Vortmeyer, Tobis Film's head of press ...
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New films by Rohmer, Akerman and Fridriksson get Eurimages cash
New feature films by Eric Rohmer, Chantal Akerman and Fridrik Thor Fridriksson are among nine projects awarded over Euros 3.3m by Eurimages.Two projects were backed in the funding category for larger projects with commercial promise: Euros 700,000 for Didier and Thierry Poiraud's French-German-UK co-production Le Retour De James Bataille and ...
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German politician urges Jackass boycott
On the eve of its German opening, a Bavarian politician has called on cinema-owners to drop Jackass - The Movie from their programmes.In a statement, Markus Soeder, who is chairman of the of the conservative Christian Social Union party's Media Committee, said that "the series and film contain repulsive and ...
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Audiovisual Eureka to close by end of June
The European Union's enlargement eastwards and changes in its membership have resulted in Audiovisual Eureka deciding to close down in June, leaving Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and states of the former Yugoslavia without a broad support programme.In a statement, the Brussels-based body explained the context for the decision: "the geopolitical developments ...
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German Film Academy launches international exchange programme
German Film Academy Baden-Wuerttemberg, whose graduates Chris Stenner, Heidi Wittlinger, Georg Gruber and Arvid Uibel have been nominated for an Academy Award with their animated short Das Rad, has launched an international student exchange programme.The new venture is aimed primarily at students attending foreign film schools and universities and wishing ...
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French projects set to animate Cartoon Movie market
Reflecting the strong French animation market, over a quarter of the 47 animation feature projects looking for financing or distribution at this year's Cartoon Movie market in Babelsberg (March 13-15) have been initiated by French animation studios. Among the 13 French projects, four are from Les Armateurs (Crossroad - The ...
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New proposal to stem the flow of German tax money to Hollywood
Ahead of next week's 'Alliance for Film' industry gathering in Cologne, producer-director and fund initiator Uwe Boll has added his voice to the debate about German media funds by proposing the adoption of the Canadian tax credit points system for the tax assessment of German funds.As Boll pointed out, "in ...
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Producers team for Nettelbeck's Helen
Sandra Nettelbeck's next feature Helen is to be produced by MTM Medien & Television Muenchen's Andreas Bareiss and co-produced with Pandora Film's Karl Baumgartner, who produced her international hit Mostly Martha.Helen, which will be shot in English, centres on a law professor fighting to save her life and her family ...
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Sarajevo film festival launches Balkan script development project
The Sarajevo Film Festival (SFF) has attracted support from Rotterdam International Film Festival's Hubert Bals Fund and the Dutch foundation HIVOS for a "Regional Script Development Project" which aims to support film production in Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia. SFF director Mirsad Purivatra announced that the new venture will be launched ...
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Good Bye, Lenin! - success at home and abroad
Wolfgang Becker's Good Bye, Lenin!, this year's winner of the Berlinale's Blue Angel award for the best European film, has become the top German opener at this year's local box-office and has been sold to more European territories by sales agent Bavaria Film International (BFI).Becker's tragi-comic farce starring Daniel Bruehl ...
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New kind of tax-based German production fund proposed
German feature film producers could receive an injection of Euros 70m-80m worth of fresh cash from an unexpected source - the pay-TV platform Premiere.The offer came after Premiere CEO Georg Kofler criticised the different VAT rates which apply in Germany for those subscribing to pay television (16%) and taking out ...
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Cyprus becomes MEDIA Programme's 25th member
Cyprus has become the 25th member of the European Union's MEDIA Programme following the Slovak Republic which signed its association agreement on January 10. Both agreements have been back-dated to January 1, 2003.While the Slovak Republic has committed to pay Euross 160,000 annually as its financial contribution towards the MEDIA ...
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European broadcasters called on to increase film funding
German broadcasters have been called on to double their financial contribution to the German Federal Film Board to bring them into line with the cinema owners' annual payments of Euros 21m.In a declaration on the revision to the German Film Funding Law (FFG), the four German exhibitor trade ...
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Kosslick reflects on his second Berlinale
As the Berlinale drew to a close with the out of competition screening of Gangs Of New York, festival director Dieter Kosslick for one was happy.With the threat of war being declared on Iraq at the back of people's minds during the festival, Kosslick observed that the festival's motto ...
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Winterbottom's World wins Berlinale
Michael Winterbottom's In This World was the surprise winner of the Berlinale Golden Bear, beating off competition from favourites The Hours and The 25th Hour.Winterbottom's digitally-shot semi-documentary tale of an asylum seeker's journey from Afghanisatan to London also received the Peace Film Prize and the Prize of the Churches of ...
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German media fund takes 'hands on' approach
Private German media fund Cinerenta is to become more "hands on" in the development and production of the features it finances - moving away from the previous strategy of coming onboard projects developed by other producers."We are to become more involved in development and are expanding our production department in ...
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Odeon closes animation production division
Odeon Film has closed its animation production arm in the wake of a decision to concentrate in future on live action production for film and television.In a statement, the Munich-based company stated that "animation rights already acquired are to be exploited by way of licensing or through the passive participation ...
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Bankruptcy workshop draws Talent attention
One of the hotest draws at this week's Berlinale Talent Campus was the work shop on Bankruptcy and Resurrection, with an insiders view of the experience provided by Kinowelt's Rainer Koelmel and producers Cedomir Kolar (No Man's Land) and Nik Powell (The Crying Game).Bankruptcy is something that often hovers over ...
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Splendid lines up 2003 production slate
Germany's Splendid Medien, which co-produced Martin Scorsese's Gangs Of New York through its then subsidiary IEG by stumping up $65m for the worldwide rights except for domestic, is lining up a number of new productions for shoot later this year.Splendid's CEO Andreas Klein told Screen International that the outfit's production ...
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VIP aims to raise Euros 500m for 20 projects
German private media fund VIP is aiming to raise up to Euros 500m this year to fully finance or co-produce up to 20 features.Initially, the Munich-based outfit set a target volume of between Euros 105m-150m to finance or co-produce up to ten projects, but VIP managing director Andreas Schmid told ...