All articles by Patrick Frater – Page 6
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Celluloid Dreams enjoys AFM sales spree
Powerhouse French sellerCelluloid Dreams has enjoyed a muscular start to the autumn AFM with strongsales in the US and Japan.It closed the last majorterritory on Francois Ozon's Venice competition title 5x2 when it closeda US sale with THINKfilm. The company will open it stateside in spring,2005 "What 5 X 2 ...
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Six suitors seek sales on sexy Shanghai Lady
At least half a dozen of the world's top sales companies havejoined the frenzied chase for the next Wong Kar-wai film The LadyFromShanghai, which stars Nicole Kidman and Gong Li.The sellers range from Studiocanal, TF1, Wild Bunch, Pathe andWong's regular sales and finance house Fortissimo Film Sales to US powerhouseSummit ...
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Fortissimo strikes first major sale on Seven Swords
Fortissimo Film Salesclocked up its first sale on new Tsui Hark film Seven Swords that it picked up on the eve of the American FilmMarket.Although many Italiancompanies are boycotting this autumn's AFM, whose move did so much to dent lastmonth's Mifed, Italian buyer Medusa was first to step up for ...
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Moonstone wraps Chen Kaige's Promise
EtchieStroh's Moonstone Entertainment has completed principal photography on ThePromise (Wu-Ji), a top-levelpan-Asian production in the hands of legendary Chinese director Chen Kaige.Filmingof the epic fantasy romance took six months on location in Beijing, InnerMongolia, Yunnan, Hengdian and Shangri-La with a glittering technical crew andan impressive cast.Inaddition to Farewell My Concubinedirector ...
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Becker's Love secures female lead
Canadianactress Sarah Gadon (Siblings, FastFood High) has been cast in the keyrole of Sabina opposite Armin Muller Stahl in the forthcoming Where LoveReigns, a drama about psychoanalystCarl Jung.Thefilm, which is to be executive produced by Martin Scorsese, is soldinternationally by Australian seller Becker Films International, headed byReiko Bradley.Itis a psychodrama ...
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MKB readies Shiri 2 and mega-budget Kang action flick
A sequel to Shiri anda new action film by the director of Shiri and record-breaker Tae GukGi give Korean sales company MKB plenty of leverage on what is its marketdebut.The company emerged from the merger earlier this year of production houses KangJegyuFilms and Myung Films which were acquired by local ...
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2046 leads Golden Horse nominations
Wong Kar-wai's 2046 came outas the favourite after nominations yesterday for Taiwan's 41stGolden Horse film awards.The romantic fantasy was nominated in eightcategories including best film, best actor (Tony Leung Kar-fai), best actress (ZhangZiyi), best cinematography, best art direction, best costume, bestmusicand best sound.But surprisingly,there was no nomination for Wong himself.Three ...
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Eurocine takes on international sales rights to El Rey
VenerableFrench sales and production house Eurocine has picked up international salesrights on El Rey, the Colombiansubmission for the foreign-language Oscar.Thefilm documents the origins of the drug-cultivation in 1940s Colombia, the USpolitical intervention that initially supported production and the origins oftrafficking when the political winds changed.El Rey is directed by Jose ...
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Dragon launched as first production services company in China
Underlining the growinginterest in China as a production location, the country's first productionservices company Dragon Studios was launched this week at the AFM.The company, which aims toprofessionalise and rationalise the Chinese industry, is a joint venture between Santa Monica andBeijing-based producer Peter Loehr, Er Yong, one of China's top line ...
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France's ARP falls for Spanish Queens
France's ARP has picked uplocal rights to star-studded romantic comedy Queens (Reinas) fromFortissimo Film Sales. The deal was struck over the phone on the eve of theAFM.The Euros4.5m film, whichcompleted its principal photography last month, is the first Spanish-languagefilm to be handled by Fortissimo. It was produced by Warner Bros' ...
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Fortissimo enters martial arts arena with Tsui's Seven Sword
Netherlands and HongKong-based Fortissimo Film Sales has picked up Seven Swords, the newfilm by celebrated Asian action director Tsui Hark.The $18m film, which is nowin production, is a return to the martial arts action-adventure genre whichTsui was instrumental in shaping earlier in has career. It is also the biggestinvestment to ...
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TF1 extends relations with Cattleya
France's TF1 is to extendits relationship with Italian producer Cattleya by handling the next twoprojects from the thrusting talent shop.It will handle the next filmby The Best Of Youth director Marco Tullio Giordano and the next film byveteran actor-director Michele Placido. Already on TF1's bulging autumn AFMslate is Cattleya's Eyes ...
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Int'l buyers snap up Pobby & Dingan rights
On the eve of the AFM,pan-European buying group Indie Circle has picked up its highest-profile filmto date. It snapped up multi-territory rights to Pobby & Dingan, thefantasy drama directed by The Full Monty's Peter Cattaneo.The picture is handled by UKsales and finance outfit Renaissance Films which also struck deals with ...
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One Last Dance begins in Singapore
Production begins next week on One Last Dance,a Hong Kong-set gangster picture which is already attracting internationalinterest.The $2.5m film has an unusual cast of co-producersincluding Mediacorp Raintree Pictures of Singapore, China's Ming Productionsand A-Film of The Netherlands.Shot in Cantonese and directed by Brazilian-AmericanMax Makowski, One Last Dance is described by ...
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EU drops antitrust case against six Hollywood studios
The European Commission (EC) has called on NBC Universal andParamount Pictures to drop what it regards as unfair conditions in their outputdeals with European broadcasters.The EC's departing Competition Commissioner Mario Monti saidyesterday that his organisation had dropped its investigation into thepractices of the other six "major Studios", Buena Vista International ...
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Romania's MediaPro takes on London
Romanian film studioMediaPro Pictures has opened a representative office in London. The new branchis expected to increase the flow of footloose productions that make use ofRomania's low cost base and fast improving skills base.The branch will be housed atthe London office of UK independent producer Box TV. "Working with Box ...
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Darclight plans slate of Australian genre movies
Darclight, the specialist division of increasinglysuccessful sales and financing outfit Arclight, has committed to produce atleast two genre films per year in its native Australia.The commitment came hard on the heels of the sale byArclight of Wolf Creek, a horrorthriller that is currently in production, to Optimum Releasing of the ...
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Trust takes on Hawaii, Olso sales
Denmark's Trust Film Sales has picked up internationaldistribution rights to Norway's foreign-language Oscar hopeful, Hawaii,Oslo.The magical-realist drama about a handful of people who cross each other'spath on the hottest day of the year is the second film in a planned trilogy bydirector Erik Poppe and screenwriter Harald Rosenloew Eeg. On ...
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MIFED briefs: deals from the Milan market
*East European distributor SPI Entertainment recentlyadded to its slate with the acquisition of Matthew McConnaughy and PenelopeCruz-starring action adventure Sahara. It bought the big-budget actionadventure for Hungary only from Summit Entertainment sister company IS FilmDistribution.The film, now in post-production, is produced by CrusaderEntertainment and Paramount Pictures with finance from the ...
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'Judgement of Solomon' settles 9 Songs dispute
The three month-long disputeover UK distribution of Michael Winterbottom's sexually explicitrelationship drama 9 Songs hasbeen settled with what aggrieved distributor Tartan Films described as "ajudgement of Solomon".9 Songs, which had its market debut in Cannes and screenedin the Venice festival, will now be handled in the UK by Tartan's rivalOptimum ...