Small MPU – Page 1304
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News
Norway's Film Fund supports first-time directors
The Norwegian Film Fund has greenlit seven new films, all of which are set to roll this year, with newcomers and children's films grabbing most of the $4.1m support from the fund.Production outfit Yellow Cottage has received funding for two high-profile children films based on well-known local franchises. Originally a ...
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News
UK's Gala acquires Mon-rak Transistor
The UK's Gala Film Distributors has made its first acquisition of a Thai film, buying Pen-ek Ratanaruang's Mon-rak Transistor, which will get its international premiere in Cannes Directors' Fortnight.The film is billed as a contemporary genre-defying odyssey of self-discovery about a young man from rural Thailand. Handled by Fortissimo, the ...
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News
My Brother Tom wins 'Britspotting' audience award
The 3rd 'Britspotting' British Independent Film Festival in Berlin awarded audience prizes for the first time this year, with the Best Feature Film category won by Dom Rotheroe's feature debut My Brother Tom which took home Euros 13,000 in prize-money donated by Das Werk and Metropolitan TV.The prize for Best ...
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News
Beckham picked up for Germany
Highlight Film has picked up German speaking rights for Gurinder Chadha's box office hit Bend It Like Beckham, which has so far clocked up $6.6m on its UK release. Highlight plans to organise a large scale marketing campaign to launch the football comedy into German cinemas this year and has ...
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Director's Fortnight unveils six more titles
The Director's Fortnight (Quinzaine Des Realisateurs) came closer to completing its line up when it announced the selection of a further five films. These included Shane Meadows One Upon A Time In The Midlands, Lynne Ramsay's Morvern Callar from the UK, Romanian first film Occident by Christian Mungiu and three ...
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Fortissimo to handle remaining sales on Pau's The Touch
Han Entertainment, Thomas Chung's nascent media empire, is to appoint fellow Hong Kong outfit Fortissimo Film Sales to handle outstanding territories on big-budget extravaganza The Touch. Produced by superstar Michelle Yeoh through her Mythical Films, which has a deal with Han, the film is the English-language directorial debut of Oscar-winning ...
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News
Farrugia appointed chairman of Canal Plus SA
Dominique Farrugia (pictured) has been appointed chairman of Canal Plus SA, the principal French channel within the Canal Plus and Vivendi Universal empire. His appointment, which is subject to approval by Canal Plus shareholders at a meeting tomorrow (Friday, April 26), sees him replace Pierre Lescure at the channel. Lescure ...
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Reviews
A Snake Of June (Rokugatsu No Hebi)
Dir: Shinya Tsukamoto. Japan. 2002. 80 mins.Having burst onto the international indie scene in 1989 with Tetsuo: The Iron Man, Shinya Tsukamoto has always been a one-main show, writing, filming, editing and acting his private visions of a nightmare world in which humans have fused to machines, all set to ...
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Digital pay-TV platforms fold in Spain and the UK
Two European pay-TV platforms, Spain's Quiero TV and the UK's ITV Digital have simultaneously reached the end of their struggles to survive.Spanish pay television platform Quiero TV, Europe's second digital terrestrial television platform behind the UK's ITV Digital (formerly Ondigital), is pending formal closure following a decision by shareholders to ...
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Reviews
Life Or Something Like It
Dir: Stephen Herek. US. 2002. 103 mins. "Live every day as if it was your last" is the none-too-original moral of Life Or Something Like It, an insipid romantic-comedy/drama that casts Angelina Jolie as a post-feminist Marilyn Monroe who discovers the drawbacks of blonde ambition and the virtues of true ...
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News
Five-hour thriller wins top prize at Singapore's Silver Screen Awards
Despite a running time of five hours, the Filipino thriller Batang West Side, directed by Lav Diaz, beat 14 other contenders to win the Best Asian Feature Film prize at the Silver Screen Awards of the 15th Singapore International Film Festival (April 11-27). Quantity with quality paid dividends for Batang ...
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News
Advanced's corrected figures show deeper losses in '99, but less red ink in 2000
German rights trader Advanced Medien has published its revised financial statements for 1999 and 2000 after auditors exposed "dubious" transactions in the original filing, rendering them "ineffective" and, according to some analyst allegations at the time, possibly fraudulent. (ScreenDaily, March 21, 2002)According to the corrected figures, the company recorded revenues ...
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Messier called to account for his actions by French TV watchdog
Jean-Marie Messier will have to detail the half-year accounts of Canal Plus Group and French pay-TV channel Canal Plus, a 49% subsidiary of Vivendi Universal, to the CSA (Conseil Superieur de l'Audiovisuel), the French broadcasting industry watchdog.Following Messier's controversial firing of Canal Plus Group's chairman Pierre Lescure, the CSA has ...
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News
Sex-scandal priest drama acquired by Columbia TriStar Mexico
A topical and controversial story of a priest involved in a sex scandal has been acquired by Columbia TriStar Mexico. Carlos Carrera's El Crimen Del Padre Amaro, starring Mexico's fast-rising star Gael Garcia Bernal (Amores Perros, Y Tu Mama Tambien, Motorcycle Diaries) sold all Mexican rights, with a first option ...
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Moby Dick gets biggest slice of German film fund backing
New feature film projects by Soenke Wortmann, Sherry Hormann, Wolfgang Panzer and Benjamin Quabeck are among more than 20 projects backed with over Euros 6m by FilmFernsehFonds Bayern in its latest round of funding.The largest single amount of Euros 1.5m though, went to Trixter Film for Moby Dick: The Legend ...
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Berlusconi's Mediaset posts heavily-reduced profits
Mediaset, the leading private Italian network owned by Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi, recorded a sharp drop in net profits in 2001 on the back of losses linked to its 2.3% stake in KirchMedia. Net profits were down to Euros 248.4m, compared to Euros 423.5m in 2000.Overall, the group's net ...
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Reviews
Hollywood Ending
Dir: Woody Allen. US.2002. 112 mins.Woody Allen's HollywoodEnding follows more in thevein of his recent run of pleasurable but throwaway comedies than it does thefar more emotionally affecting Purple Rose Of Cairo, his other film to deal specifically with cinema itself. With an emphasis on visual humour, both literal and ...
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News
Fox departs online distribution joint venture with Disney
Fox Entertainment Group is exiting Movies.com, its joint venture with The Walt Disney Company intended to provide movies and other entertainment content on demand to US consumers through digital cable systems or broadband internet. The partners have now chosen to pursue other strategies to distribute their films to the broadband ...
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Angelina doesn't come close to The Scorpion King
The Scorpion King held its sting and top place in the domestic charts with weekend takings of $17.6m, according to studio estimates released today. Universal's spin-off from The Mummy stars The Rock in his first action lead and has taken $60.8m in its first ten days.Total weekend grosses rose for ...
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Directors' Fortnight line-up complete
The Directors' Fortnight (Quinzaine Des Realisateurs) wrapped up its 2002 line-up today (Monday Apr 29) when it announced the inclusion of Werner Schroeter's Franco-German production Deux and Romain Goupil's Une Pure Coincidence.In Deux, last year's Palme-winning actress Isabelle Huppert plays twin sisters deprived of love by a tyrannical mother. Sex ...