Small MPU – Page 1480
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News
Lot 47 Films buys North American rights to LIE
US independent Lot 47 Films has acquired North American rights to Michael Cuesta's L.I.E. which received acclaim on its recent world premiere in dramatic competition at the Sundance Film Festival.An Alter Ego/Belladonna production, L.I.E. is a drama about a 15 year-old boy who loses just about everything and everyone he ...
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News
Warner Bros hires Benzakein in new Euro initiative
Warner Bros Pictures has cemented its local language production and acquisition plans in Europe with the appointment this week of well-known French industry figure Simona Benzakein to the position of vice president, European production.She will report to Richard Fox, executive vice president, international, at Warner Bros and Lorenzo di Bonaventura, ...
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News
Hungry Miramax buys Tangled from Myriad
Miramax Films has acquired rights in the US, Australia and New Zealand to thriller Tangled from Myriad Pictures. Produced by Tapestry Films which produced She's All That for Miramax as well as Pay It Forward and The Wedding Planner, Tangled stars Rachael Leigh Cook, Shawn Hatosy, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Lorraine Bracco ...
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News
Tracking service Film Finders is independent again
Film Finders, the 13 year-old production tracking service run by Sydney Levine and Peter Belsito, has reclaimed its independence after striking an exclusive partnership last year with IFILM, the online movie site specialising in data and short film exhibition.The two have restructured their relationship so that, while they will continue ...
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News
Good Machine on Field's Radar
Ted Field and Scott Kroopf, the producers behind blockbuster hits Runaway Bride, Jumanji, Three Men And A Baby and The Hand That Rocks The Cradle, are turning to the international marketplace to fund their new production outfit Radar Pictures - sealing a longterm alliance with David Linde's Good Machine International ...
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News
Canada's indie plight draws first blood
Montreal-based TVA is winding down its international sales operations and executive vice president of distribution, Jean Bureau has left the company.The closure comes as TVA's ultimate owner, Quebec-based publishing and communications conglomerate Quebecor seeks to cut costs following its $3.3bn acquisition of cable company Groupe Videotron, TVA's original owner, in ...
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News
3000 soldiers join Mogador Lovers
Italy's Poetiche Cinematografiche has started shooting The Mogador Lovers, a love and war story which is being directed by the head of Morocco's national film body, Souheil Ben-Barka.Set in the 1930s, the film tells the story of a young Frenchwoman, the daughter of a judge stationed in Morocco, who defies ...
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News
Gaga Communications hires Company Man
Gaga Communications is understood to have picked up Japanese rights to Cube director Vincenzo Natali's Company Man, one of the US projects attracting most interest from international buyers at the AFM. Sales agent Pandora was apparently aiming to secure between $1.5m and $2m for Japanese rights to the project after ...
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News
UK welcomes yet another short film prize
The UK's FilmFour has partnered with mobile communications giant Orange to launch a major short film prize, which carries £10,000 and the opportunity to develop a feature with FilmFour Lab, the low budget arm of FilmFour.Aiming to find the UK film-makers of the future, the award - which supersedes Orange's ...
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News
Zelezny's French chateaux besieged by CME
Central European Media Enterprises (CME) has been awarded damages of $27.1m by a Czech court in its long running dispute with businessman Vladimir Zelezny. Zelezny is the former chief of CNTS, CME's Czech TV services company, and who took disputed control of the Nova TV company. The Czech order allows ...
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News
Harvey Keitel joins Sicilian Mafia thriller
Harvey Keitel is continuing his love affair with European cinema and is now shooting Ginostra, a Sicilian-set Mafia thriller by French director Manuel Pradal.He is joined in the cast by Andie MacDowell, Asia Argento and Stefano Dionisi. Shooting continues until the end of March. The $11.9m (FF86m) English-language picture is ...
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Jet Li's five year-old Dragon flies to Summit
Summit Entertainment has acquired international rights to five year-old Jet Li-starrer Red Dragon which features the spectacular flying techniques used in current smash Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Newmarket Capital Group-associated distributor Silver Nitrate Releasing will release the film domestically; it has never been available to international buyers. The project was ...
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News
Holiday pics lead, Traffic and Dragon strong
Over a weekend during which just one opener broke into the Top 15; children's fare gained from the end of the half-term holiday and Gladiator took the BAFTA award for best picture, Ridley Scott's other box office behemoth, Hannibal, continued its reign at the top of the UK box office. ...
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Telefonica reveals 2000 profit up by nearly 40%
Spanish telecoms and multimedia giant Telefonica confirmed its place among Europe's top operators with a 38.8% rise in net profits for the year 2000 to Euros2.5bn. Earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) rose 9.5% to Euros11.9bn.Multimedia filial Telefonica Media didn't fare so well, posting net losses of Euros627.1m, ...
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News
Heimat writer finds home at UFA
Bertelsmann's production arm UFA Film- & TV Produktion and Peter Steinbach, screenwriter of Edgar Reitz's internationally successful TV series Heimat (1984) and Margarethe von Trotta's award-winning Jahrestage (2000), have signed an exclusive agreement whereby Steinbach will work only with UFA on future projects for cinema and television.UFA producer Norbert Sauer ...
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New tax relief heralds Indian multiplex boom
The Indian exhibition industry is on the brink of a multiplex revolution following finance minister Yashwant Sinha's reduction of customs duty on cinematography equipment from 25 to 15 percent on 28 Febuary.India's exorbitant entertainment tax structure has always been the major obstacle to Western exhibition companies investing in the territory. ...
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Reviews
Princesa
Dir: Henrique Goldman. Italy/Germany/Brazil. 2000. 96 mins. Along with acclaimed documentary Southern Comfort and musical Hedwig And The Angry Inch, Henrique Goldman's absorbing Princesa blazed a trail at this year's Sundance Film Festival for movies with transgender heroes or heroines. Centred around a Brasilian transvestite working as a prostitute in ...
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Formula 1 teams manoeuvre to thwart Kirch
The prospect of German media baron Leo Kirch having a controlling interest over the Formula One racing event hangs in the balance as the motor teams threaten to revolt.On February 27, DaimlerChrysler (Maclaren-Mercedes), Fiat (Ferrari) and Ford (Jaguar) threatened to exit the Formula One tournament and set up their own ...
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News
Sweden supports local hits, but The Emperor rules
Local productions dominated the Swedish box office over the last week (ending February 22) with indigenous titles filling four of the top five positions in the territory, although the chart was topped by BVI's The Emperor's New Groove.Opener Festival, a coming-of-age drama about a girl visiting her first pop festival, ...
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Pathe, FilmFour team for bigger budget films
The UK's FilmFour and Pathe have formed an initial two-year alliance to jointly acquire and distribute large-budget films in the UK. Under the terms of the collaboration, the companies aim to pick up at least two titles over the next twelve months, and will split profits equally. The companies will ...