All articles by Patrick Frater – Page 7
-
News
PriceWaterhouse highlights UK intellectual property concerns
UK media companies have made little progress inthe last five years in their exploitation of intellectual property (IP) rights.Most problems identified by accountancy andconsulting firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PWC) five years ago remain concernstoday and, with the exception of piracy, are even ranked the same.In a new study Embracing The Challenge of ...
-
News
Toubon re-elected as Eurimages chief
JacquesToubon, the former French minister of culture, has been re-elected as presidentof film support body Eurimages.The re-election took place thisweek in Istanbul at Eurimages' 91st management board meeting.Toubon, who was first appointed in November 2002, now has another two-yearterm. Normal Eurimages rules only allow a president to be re-elected once.Although ...
-
News
Germany's Downfall proves a hit with buyers
Germany's EOS Distribution saidthat Germany's Oscar hopeful The Downfall by Oliver Hirschbiegel has nowbeen sold in more than 25 territories and demand from buyers is still strong.Thefilm, which puts a human face on tyrant Adolf Hitler, was last week sold toSandrew Metronome for Scandinavia and to Best Hollywood for Hungary. ...
-
News
ICA Projects picks up UK rights to Turtles, Cafe Lumiere
ICA Projects, the distributionarm of the UK's Institute Of Contemporary Art, has moved quickly to pick up twoof the hottest films of the moment.Turtles Can Fly, the Iraqi-Kurdistani drama by Bahman Ghobadi, whichwon the top prize Golden Shell at San Sebastian, was acquired from Frenchseller Bac Films at Toronto where ...
-
News
Dutch film tax system gets reprieve
Dutch producers have given a warm, but guarded, welcome tonews that the Dutch tax-backed support system for film is to be reprieved. Itseems that the system will benefit from Euros20m of tax money.The government announcement of a reprieve came as somethingof a surprise. At the beginning of the week the ...
-
News
Rotterdam to focus on South East Asian cinema
The forthcoming International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR)will feature a special section - SEA Eyes - dedicated to films from South EastAsia.Announcing the sidebar, IFFR chief Sandra Den Hamer said:'We don't often do geographic focuses, but this is a fascinatingregion with huge young talents who remain largely unknown, while the world ...
-
News
Fortissimo recruits Mackey to launch London office
Veteran film sales executive Nicole Mackey is joiningFortissimo Film Sales to launch the company's new London branch office.Mackey joins Fortissimo from Capitol Films, where she washead of sales for the last two years. Before that she held a similar post atthe ill-fated Signpost Films and at LolaFilms UK. Previous sales ...
-
News
Palm Pictures to launch Caribbean Goldeneye festival
US-UK distributor and producer Palm Pictures is launching what it claimsis the world's most exclusive film festival at company founder ChrisBlackwell's home in the Caribbean.The Goldeneye FilmFestival (Dec 8-13, 2004) will invite about 100 VIP guests to Blackwell'sIsland Outpost property -- Goldeneye -- located in Oracabessa Bay, Jamaica,where some 150 ...
-
News
Barco to focus on digital cinema sector
Belgian projector manufacturerBarco, one of the leading players in the growing digital cinema sector, hassold its home cinema activities to French company TEC.The company says that theoperation, part of its media and entertainment division, was its last activityto be focused on the consumer market."As digital cinema is about todevelop in ...
-
News
Film Sales Company takes on Hidden Flaws
Worldwide sales of Paulavan de Oest's Toronto film Hidden Flaws (Verborgen Gebreken) areto be handled by Andrew Herwitz's New York-based The Film Sales Company following a deal struckduring the last days of the festival.The film, adapted by Tamara Bos, from Renate Dorrestein's novel A CryingShame, is a family drama that ...
-
News
Bavaria scores with pack of Bombon sales
Bavaria Film International hada busy Toronto with its shaggy dog story Bombon - El Perro whichratcheted up a pack of high profile sales.The film was licensed to TF1for France, Cinequanon for Japan, Pathe for the UK, A Film for Benelux, LevFilms for Israel, Audiovisual for Greece and Hopscotch for Australia. ...
-
News
Yesterday named as South African Oscar choice
AIDS drama Yesterdayhas been selected as South Africa's official contender for the foreign-languageOscar nomination.Yesterday, directed by Darrell Roodt, follows a village woman(played by Roodt's Sarafina star Leleti Khumalo) who has contractedAIDS, but is disowned by her husband. Alone, she travels the country fendingfor herself and their daughter.The selection was made ...
-
News
Red Dust scores first Toronto sales
South African film RedDust scored a clutch of international sales at the Toronto festival whereit had its world premiere.The courtroom drama which is set against the Truth AndReconciliation Commission was licensed by Svensk FilmIndustri for Scandinavia, DNCSpA for Italy and RSVS for Benelux. Sales agent Pierre Weisbein of new salesagent ...
-
News
Pathe takes rights trio on Black Book
In a rare pre-sale of aDutch-language film, Pathe has picked up French, Swiss and Belgian rights toPaul Verhoeven's forthcoming wartime drama Black Book. The sales arranged by producer San Fu Maltha and salesagent Katapult Films, are understood to have been critical to the financing ofthe $15m (Euros12m). Structured as a ...
-
News
F For Film picks up Angola's The Hero
French seller F For Film haspicked up international rights to Toronto festival film The Hero (O Heroi),directed by Zeze Gamboa. The film is a multilayered drama about four characters inan impoverished and war-torn Angola and stars Oumar Makena Diop, Milton Coelho,Patricia Bull, Neusa Borges. TheAngola-Portugal-France co-production was produced by David ...
-
News
Fortissimo sells Kidd's Love to Germany
Fortissimo secured its first everlicence deal with leading German indie distributor Tobis Filmkunst with thesale of Dylan Kidd's romantic comedy PS ILove You.The film, which premiered in Venicelast week, was also sold to Dendy for Australia and New Zealand and SandrewMetronome in Scandinavia.PS, which starsLaura Linney and Topher Grace, received ...
-
News
Wild Bunch wraps up Howl load of deals
Frenchsales house Wild Bunch has secured a couple of high profile Japanese and UKsales and a raft of Italian deals for its bulging Toronto slate.WildBunch closed a deal with Gaga Communications for Arnaud Desplechin's Rois Et Reine and with Comstock forMarziyeh Yeshkini's Afghanistan-set StrayDogs in Japan.Rois was also soldto Artificial ...
-
News
Gaga, Momentum sign on for Rahtree
Gaga of Japan leads an impressive list of buyers which have signedup for Rahtree: Flower Of The Night ahead of its North American premiere tomorrow (Sept 15).Handled by independent Hong Kong sales outfit GoldenNetwork, the Thai horror spoof also sold to Momentum for the UK, Panorama forHong Kong, Flash Forward ...
-
News
Stephen Chow denied entry visa into Canada for Toronto fest
Toronto is today to be denied the pleasure of the company ofStephen Chow (aka Stephen Chiau), who was today (Tues Sept 14) to havepresented his hugely anticipated directorial effort Kung Fu Hustle as a world premiere. Chow was refused avisa by Canadian immigration authorities.Festival press officer Gabrielle Free, confirmed yesterday: ...
-
News
Media Luna picks up four to launch at MIFED, AFM
German sales house MediaLuna has picked up a quartet of new pictures which it will take to market atMifed and AFM later this autumn.Atlast week's Montreal festival it boarded Metallic Blues, a tragicomic road movie about a couple ofdim-witted Israeli car dealers. Directed by Danny Verete, it won best actor ...