All News articles – Page 5118
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French cinema admissions fall 4% in 1st quarter
For the first time in ages, the buoyant French theatrical market has slowed down. In March cinema admissions amounted to 15.1 million, some 16% down on the same month last year. That held the first quarter total to 54 million, a drop of 4% compared to the January-March period ...
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Digital cinemas expand in Brazil
Brazil now boasts the first digital cinemas to operate on a regular basis in Latin America, with five screenings scheduled daily. A joint venture between exhibitor UCI and Brazilian technology integrator Teleimage, and sponsored by telecommunications company Intel, the second Intel Digital Theatre opened Friday March 29 in Sao Paolo ...
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Scotland's Smuji pushes video compression
Scottish based production company Smuji Films is pioneering a revolutionary video compression system for broadcasting moving images over the internet. The Essential Viewing software plays images into a web browser without the need for plug-ins or players. The result is files a fraction of the size of conventional formats meaning ...
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Mr. Bones to get major German release
Anant Singh's Videovision has announced that South African comedy Mr.Bones which smashed all box office records for a local film in South Africa, will be distributed by Constantin Films in Germany with a release of 400 prints across the territory. Sanjeev Singh, head of distribution at the company, says, "It ...
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Bad Eggs smell good to Village Roadshow
While the comedy thriller Bad Eggs does not have a particularly large budget in terms of the norm in Australia, it has attracted the single biggest financial commitment to an independent feature in entertainment conglomerate Village Roadshow's long history. "Mass audiences demand big laughs and we believe that Bad Eggs ...
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Insolvent KirchMedia begins rights renegotiations
Debt-ridden media mogul Leo Kirch finally filed insolvency proceedings for the KirchMedia division of his KirchGroup empire yesterday morning (April 8).A provisional insolvency administrator Dr. Michael Jaffe was appointed by the Munich administrative court. Shortly after, consultants Wolfgang van Betteray and Hans-Joachim Ziems were named as a "turnaround management" team ...
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Ledoyen returns to host Cannes ceremonies
French actress Virginie Ledoyen was this week confirmed as hostess for the opening and closing ceremonies at Cannes, reprising her role from 2000.The local beauty who also represents perfume house L'Oreal, has starred in nearly 30 films and made her international break-through with James Ivory's A Soldier's Daughter Never Dies. ...
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Holdovers benefit in week of weak openers
Britney Spears vehicle Crossroads, distributed by Momentum Pictures, benefited over the weekend from a slew of underachieving openers at the UK box office.Crossroads, along with other films aimed at younger cinema goers, Return To Neverland, Ice Age and Jimmy Neutron - Boy Genius, took advantage of the end of the ...
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Cash or closure imminent for Spain's Quiero TV
Spanish DTT platform Quiero TV could be forced to close down as soon as next week if a buyer doesn't emerge in time.Backers of Quiero, led by telecoms operator Auna (Retevision), set April 15 as a deadline to sell off the pay outlet or else shut it down. While sources ...
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South Africa's Ster-Kinekor boosts local revenues
By closing some of its loss-making South African cinema sites, wooing Indian and black audiences by increasing its Bollywood offer - and effective management of its labour costs, Ster-Kinekor, the territory's leading distributor/exhibitor has managed to engineer a turnaround in its fortunes at home.The company reported a 39% improvement ...
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Italian publisher buys into Mikado Film
Italian publishing giant De Agostini has taken a majority stake in local arthouse production and distribution outfit Mikado Film, which recently co-produced Otar Iosseliani's Lundi Matin and released Jill Sprecher's 13 Conversations About One Thing. The move, which represents De Agostini's third major venture in the Italian film industry in ...
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Spean Bridge emerges as potential UCI investor
Vivendi Universal is looking to pull out of United Cinemas International (UCI) - its international exhibition joint venture with Viacom-owned Paramount Pictures.A report in the Financial Times on Wednesday (April 10) said that Vivendi chief Jean-Marie Messier was looking to make an exit from UCI in order to lower Vivendi's ...
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Seattle gives first Alpha Cine Award to Ching Ip
The Seattle InternationalFilm Festival (SIFF) has named Ching Ip as the recipient of the first annualAlpha Cine Filmmaker Award for her feature film See You Off The The Edge OfTown. Ip's film will receive afree transfer to 35mm and a gala world premiere screening of the new printduring the final ...
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Blockbuster gives its first Indie Filmmaker Award
Blockbuster Video hasawarded its first ever $100,000 Independent Filmmaker Award to writer/directorDean Pollack on the basis of his debut feature Show And Tell, which has screened at various film festivalsincluding the Austin Film Festival where it won the second place award.Set in the world of tabloidTV, Show And Tell is ...
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Jeff Coleman promoted to evp, production, at MGM
Jeff Coleman has beenpromoted to executive vice president - worldwide feature physicalproduction - for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's film units MGM Pictures andUnited Artists. He will report jointly to Michael Nathson, president and COO ofMGM Pictures, and Bingham Ray, president of United Artists.Coleman will oversee all aspectsof production from inception through post-production for ...
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Woody Allen's Hollywood Ending to open Cannes
Woody Allen's Hollywood Ending will mark the director's first trip to Cannes when it opens the festival out of competition, the event announced on Thursday.Publicity-shy Allen has shown Manhattan, The Purple Rose Of Cairo and Hannah And Her Sisters at Cannes, but has declined to attend the screenings. The French ...
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Ledoyen returns to host Cannes ceremonies
French actress Virginie Ledoyen was this week confirmed as hostess for the opening and closing ceremonies at Cannes, reprising her role from 2000.The local beauty who also represents perfume house L'Oreal, has starred in nearly 30 films and made her international break-through with James Ivory's A Soldier's Daughter Never Dies. ...
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Technicolor buys Southern Star's Duplitek
The Southern Star Group is expected to net about $26.4m (A$50m) from US-based video, CD, DVD and film print manufacturer Technicolor's acquisition of its duplication subsidiary Duplitek. Technicolour invested $17.4m (A$33m) in Duplitek nearly two years ago in a deal that gave it the right to expand its result minority ...
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Goldfish Memory wraps first digital production
Goldfish Memory, the first of four feature films to begin shooting in Dublin in March, has wrapped after a 24 day shoot, notching up 23 set ups a day according to producer Breda Walsh of Goldfish Films.Financed by a combination of Irish Film Board finance and deferrals, the Euros1.3m contemporary ...
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Dutch incentive to re-make European films
The Dutch film industry has turned to European films as a source for re-makes in an attempt to foster local production. Three titles - 14 Tage Lebenslaenglich and Sex Oder Liebe (both German) and the Swedish comedy Gossip - have been selected to be given a Dutch make-over.The Dutch industry ...