Small MPU – Page 1400
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News
Vienna to subsidise key arthouse cinemas
The city of Vienna has agreed to subsidise the operation of two historic art house cinemas that were threatened with closure after they ran into financial difficulties. The Vienna International Film Festival has been asked to take over the running of the 736 seat central Vienna Gartenbau cinema, while ...
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MGM takes over own Canadian video distribution
MGM Home Entertainment Group is to assume all Canadian self-distribution responsibilities for video and DVD, taking over from Warner Home Video, president and chief operating officer David Bishop announced yesterday. The extension of operations will begin in April 2003 and will be headed up in Toronto by Martin Wragg, the ...
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Ichino promoted to VP business affairs at Universal
Masako Ichino has been promoted to vice president of business affairs at Universal Pictures. Ichino will continue to negotiate deals for books, screenplays and other source material as well as above-the-line talent agreements for writers, producers, directors and actors. She will also continue to report to Jimmy Horowitz, Universal's executive ...
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News
Spain scraps European film quotas
The Spanish government has decided to do away with a controversial quota system which requires exhibitors to programme one day of European cinema for every two days of films from other countries.The quotas will be gradually diminished and rendered invalid over the course of the next five years.According to Spain's ...
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Reviews
Hukkle
Dir: Gyorgy Palfi.. Hungary. 2002. 75mins.An authentic one-off - think Microcosmos meets Twin Peaks - Hukkle starts out as a serene, naturalistic portrait of rural life. But it slowly morphs into something much more sinister, as apparently disconnected scenes gel into a murder investigation whose key events unfold in the ...
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Latin American scripts win through at MPA Development Workshop
Screenplays from Mexico, Chile and Uruguay beat 16 other contenders at the Feature Film Project Development Workshop and Competition 2002 organized by the Motion Pictures Association (MPA) in Miami. The winning scripts were Enemigos Intimos (Intimate Enemies) by Ana Carolina Rivera Gonzalez (Mexico), El Bano Del Papa (Daddy's Bath) ...
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Thessaloniki festival unveils 160 strong film line-up
The Thessaloniki International Film Festival (Nov 8-17) has unveiled its full line-up for its 43rd edition, and will present over 160 films as well as workshops and exhibitions.Sixteen films have been shortlisted for the main international competition, which is reserved for first or second time directors. The line-up includes Dylan ...
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Spain mourns death of veteran director Juan Antonio Bardem
Spain awoke Thursday morning to the news that veteran director and scriptwriter Juan Antonio Bardem had died on Wednesday in Madrid at the age of 80.After getting his start as co-scripter on Luis Garcia Berlanga's Welcome Mr Marshall (Bienvenido Mr Marshall), celebrating its fiftieth anniversary this year, he directed such ...
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Sundance unveils new grant for science themed films
The Sundance Institute has announced a new grant and a $20,000 prize from the Alfred P Sloan Foundation to develop and reward films that explore science and technology. Each year a selected project from the Sundance Institute Feature Film Program will receive support from development to pre-production with year-round resources. ...
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The Tracker wins Australian critics prize
The Tracker has won best film prize at Australia's Film Critics Circle awards. Julie Ryan accepted the award, saying that Rolf de Heer, her co-producer on the film, was not just an inspiration to her but to the whole film community.Rolf de Heer had already been on stage to collect ...
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Turin festival unveils cutting edge line-up
The Turin Film Festival (Nov 7-15), Italy's leading cutting-edge event, has unveiled a brimming 20th edition line-up, which includes David Cronenberg's Spider, Toy Love by New Zealand director Harry Sinclair, and John Frankenheimer's last film, Path to War.The festivalwill open with competition title Pumpkin, Anthony Abrams and Adam Larson Broder's ...
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News
Rezo Films to produce Rohmer's Triple Agent
French distribution outfit Rezo Films is to produce Eric Rohmer's next film, Triple Agent. The Euros 4m film, which teams Rezo with Rohmer's own production outfit, C.E.R, will also mark the distribution outfit's first foray into the foreign sales sector.Rezo Film used to focus on the distribution (and sometimes the ...
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News
Moviehouse Entertainment takes Long Lunch
Moviehouse Entertainment, the one-year-old UK sales company, has picked up worldwide rights to Australian action-comedy The Long Lunch.The low-budget caper is directed by commercials director Antony Redman, who was named as one of the world's hottest new directors by London advertising magazine Campaign. Starring Jeanette Cronin, Ian Bliss and Vince ...
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News
Overseas' Emperor's Wife prepares to shoot
Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Max Beesley head the cast of The Emperor's Wife, an adult fairy tale directed by Julien Vrebos, which goes into production on Friday Nov 1. The cast also includes Spanish actresses Rosana Pastor, recently seen in Land And Freedom, and Leticia Dolera of The Other ...
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News
Nordisk Film Sales takes on Science Fiction
Nordisk Film Sales has taken on international sales duties for Belgian director Danny Deprez children's film Science Fiction. The film about two kids who believe that aliens in disguise are plotting to take over the world, was written by Jean-Claude Van Rijckeghem. Shot in Flemish, Science Fiction is released this ...
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News
Modern Entertainment expands into international sales
Modern Entertainment hasannounced it is expanding into worldwide sales and will be offering two newindependent pictures at MIFED, the Australian action thriller The Pact and the US erotic action thriller Fear Of Speed. 'We have been exploringthe market for some time now and we believe that these films offer enormousopportunities. ...
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News
New Line signs Metropolitan to its first output deal
New Line International (NLI) has completed extensions to 2005 on two major output deals - with Village Roadshow in Australia and Svensk Filmindustri in Scandinavia - and closed a third, also to 2005, with Metropolitan Filmexport in France. It is the first time NLI has struck an output deal with ...
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Reviews
The Sea (Hafid)
Dir: Baltasar Kormakur. Iceland/France/Norway. 2002. 109minsThe wicked sense of humour that helped make his sprightly debut feature, Reykjavik 101, an off-the-wall delight is all but submerged in Baltasar Kormakur's follow-up, which offers an even bleaker portrait of Icelandic desperation and dysfunction. As a roiling family psychodrama, The Sea brings to ...
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Media Asia's Mifed slate gets boost from Tong, Chan
Hong Kong's Media Asia has unveiled three new projects, to start shooting in the first half of next year, and confirmed that Stanley Tong will direct its big-budget Jackie Chan action vehicle, Titanium Rain. Tong previously directed Chan in his first three stateside hits - Supercop, Rumble In The Bronx ...
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Age of Realism kicks in for MIFED
There's a joke among US sellers that "even the buyers that don't pay aren't buying" at the moment. These sellers certainly lean towards gloom and doom in their conversations; indeed it's unlikely that a movie the size of Gangs Of New York could generate the eye-popping sales numbers today which ...