All articles by Mike Goodridge – Page 149
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News
Viacom acquires BET for $2.43bn
Viacom has agreed to purchase BET Holdings, the parent group of successful US cable channel Black Entertainment Television (BET), for $2.43bn in stock and $570m worth of debt. Based in Washington DC, BET serves the African American market and will continue to be run by Robert L Johnson (chairman and ...
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News
Intermedia acquires remake rights to Sleepwalker
Intermedia has acquired the remake rights to Swedish/Norwegian thriller Sleepwaker from John M Jacobsen and AB Svensk Filmindustri. The English language version will be produced by Mark Johnson Productions which has a first look deal at Intermedia.The original film, a co-production between Filmnor, Svensk and Filmkameratene, was directed by Johannes ...
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Charlie's Angels a box office knockout with $40.5m
A disappointing year for Columbia Pictures was turned around overnight with the sensational $40.5m opening this weekend for Charlie's Angels, the big screen version of the campy 70s TV series famous for launching the career of Farrah Fawcett Majors. The long-awaited action adventure directed by first-timer McG and starring Cameron ...
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News
Crystal Sky, VCL, Cinetel coil around Viper
CineTel Films has teamed up with Steven Paul's Crystal Sky and Germany's VCL to produce the $5.2m action picture Viper starring Theresa Russell and Patrick Muldoon. CineTel's Paul Hertzberg and Lisa Hansen are producing the film, with Paul and VCL's Datty Ruth as executive producers. Jay Andrews, whose credits include ...
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News
Alpine Pictures, Strick deal in Love
Alpine Pictures has teamed with Cape Fear screenwriter Wesley Strick to produce teen thriller Love Is The Drug starring Leelee Sobieski, the fast-rising young actress who appeared in Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut.Love Is The Drug is billed as a Generation X thriller set against the Los Angeles rave scene ...
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Bacon & Eggs, Chickflicks fry up Coyote
UK production outfit Bacon & Eggs Productions is co-producing its first feature - a comic horror film called Coyote - with Chickflicks, the US production company founded by Sara Risher and being bankrolled by New Line Cinema, where Bacon & Eggs enjoys a first-look deal.Bacon & Eggs and Chickflicks will ...
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News
Miracle to work for Italian
Miracle Entertainment - the public LA-based company run by Tony Cataldo and Richard Abramson - is to fully finance and handle worldwide sales on The Italian, a drama to be directed by Stephen Gyllenhaal and produced by Mike Marcus and Carroll Kemp.The movie, which is the story of a man ...
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News
Tomorrow picks up Shadow Magic
Tomorrow Film Corp has taken international rights to Shadow Magic, Ann Hu's China-set period drama which had its world premiere in the World Cinema section at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival. Sony Pictures Classics has domestic rights to the film in which Jared Harris plays an English entrepreneur who travels ...
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News
Franchise adds Plan B, Stallone duo to slate
Franchise Pictures is debuting a range of new pictures at London including two new actioners starring Sylvester Stallone and the mob comedy Plan B starring Diane Keaton. And for the first time in several markets, all major territories are available on the titles since Franchise's German partner, Intertainment, has not ...
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News
Unified Film Organization creates theatrical arm
Unified Film Organization (UFO), the LA-based production and sales operation in which publicly traded German distributor Advanced Medien took a 51% stake earlier this year, has launched a theatrical level division called Consolidated Motion Pictures.First film to come out of the division is $6m New York-set romantic comedy Snatched with ...
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News
Fireworks buys Innocence for the US
Fireworks Pictures - the domestic distribution subsidiary of Jay Firestone's Toronto-based CanWest Entertainment - has closed its latest acquisition at MIFED, taking US rights to Paul Cox's award-winning crowd-pleaser Innocence from sales agent Cinemavault Releasing.The deal was sealed by Fireworks vice president of acquisitions and co-productions Bob Aaronson and Cinemavault ...
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News
New German buyer turns up the heat at MIFED
A new all-rights buyer from Germany, E-M-S New Media, has emerged at MIFED and is set to get more aggressive once it goes public on the Neuer Markt later this month. With an initial public offering set for Nov 21, E-M-S (short for European Multimedia Services) has snapped up all ...
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News
Permut signs Swank, sets DreamWorks remake
Hollywood producer David Permut has signed Oscar winner Hilary Swank to star opposite Richard Gere in Julia Pastrana, a romantic epic to which director Taylor Hackford has finally committed as his next film after Proof Of Life.Both this film and another, Thief Of Light, are being financed by a foreign ...
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News
Summit's Femme Fatale seduces buyers
Summit Entertainment has sealed a score of high-profile sales deals on its new titles including Brian DePalma-directed thriller Femme Fatale which will shoot in Paris no later than Feb 15.Nippon Herald, which has been noticeably aggressive in its acquisitions strategy at London and MIFED, perhaps in anticipation of its planned ...
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Reviews
The Legend Of Bagger Vance
Dir: Robert Redford. US. 2000. 119 mins.Prod cos: Allied Filmmakers, Wildwood Enterprises. US dist: DreamWorks SKG. Int'l dist: 20th Century Fox. Prods: Robert Redford, Jake Eberts, Michael Nazik. Exec prod: Karen Tenkhoff. Scr: Jeremy Leven, from the novel Gates Of Fire by Steven Pressfield. DoP: Michael Ballhaus. Prod des: Stuart ...
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News
Libra balances Esposito with Glasser
Anthony Esposito, president of Leading Pictures Inc, and independent producer Richard Glasser have formed a production/distribution outfit called Libra Entertainment which has a first-look production deal with David Glasser's Cutting Edge Entertainment. Richard Glasser is also director of acquisitions at Cutting Edge.Libra will concentrate on projects with Canadian content that ...
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News
Hilltop seals $50m Korean financing pact
LA-based Hilltop Entertainment and Korea's Media Film International (MFI) have sealed a $50m production, financing and distribution deal to deliver five action films with an average budget of $10m per picture. The two companies will jointly finance the films through direct investment and from a previously agreed financing facility arranged ...
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News
Malick, Mandoki turn to Constantin
New projects from Terence Malick and Luis Mandoki are being developed by Constantin Film, the production arm of Bernd Eichinger's Neue Constantin, through its joint venture with Propaganda Films. In addition the German outfit has purchased two books in the UK through its joint venture with Impact Pictures.Malick - who ...
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Rex Media rides high with Larson
Rex Media, which enjoys a multipicture relationship with Ray Stark's Rastar, is close to sealing a similar co-financing and sales arrangement with veteran TV producer Glen A Larson.The first picture to fall under the agreement will be a film version of long-running series Knightrider with original star David Hasselhof committed ...
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Amuse, CMC join Miramax client roster
After a frantic week in London, Miramax International had closed most of its territorial package deals by the first day of play at MIFED. Two new clients - Japanese heavyweight Amuse Pictures and Taiwan's CMC - were among the regular buyers snatching the latest six-pack from worldwide distribution chief Rick ...