Small MPU – Page 1608
-
News
George Washington takes top honours at Turin
David Gordon Green's George Washington scooped the top prize at this year's Turin Film Festival (November 17-25), marking the first time a US film has won the award since the festival was launched 18 years ago. The 25-year-old US director used non-professional actors for his debut feature, which revolves around ...
-
News
Werc Werk Works to produce, finance Epstein & Freidman's Howl
Elizabeth Redleaf and Christine Walker's Werc Werk Works will produce and fully finance Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman's Howl starring James Franco.Howl is set to go into production on March 16 in New York City and centres on the obscenity trial into Allen Ginsberg's groundbreaking Beat Generation poem of the ...
-
News
Opinion: Going back to basics
It wasn't just the critics who were gloomy at Berlin this year. Most of those attending the European Film Market (EFM) were facing some hard realities: buyers and sellers were shaking their heads trying to figure out the numbers, which no longer seemed to make sense. The mood was set ...
-
News
Berlin's raw deals for bear traders
In the wake of a slow Sundance and a very difficult American Film Market (AFM), distributors turned up in Berlin in expectation.
-
NewsWill Cannes 2009 deliver on high expectations?
With Berlin over, selectors at the Cannes film festival (May 13-24) are facing a deluge of films from the world’s greatest auteurs - so many, in fact, some big names could end up being excluded from official selection.Pedro Almodovar’s Broken Embraces opens in Spain on March ...
-
NewsAdam Yauch's indie music approach to film
Adam Yauch, co-founder of groundbreaking hip-hop group The Beastie Boys, is building on his experience and knowledge of the music world to create a new breed of film distribution company. In January 2008, he launched Oscilloscope Pictures, a full-service New York-based distributor.‘It’s an idea I’ve had for a ...
-
News
Christie Digital USA's Jack Kline on changing models
Over the past three years, digital cinema has finally become a reality for a growing number of exhibitors and distributors around the world. And although the global credit crunch has slowed the industry's conversion from 35mm prints and projection, Jack Kline still has his sights set firmly on the digital ...
-
News
Olaf de Fleur breaks the ice
Olaf de Fleur says he has been through 'a good film school of dos and don'ts' in the past few busy years making a string of very different feature films. 'I've been working on quantity, just doing a lot of films for the past four or five years,' the Icelandic ...
-
News
Tom Tykwer dreams big with 'fascinating' adaptation ofCloud Atlas
Much has happened in Berlin in the decade between the release of Tom Tykwer's Run Lola Run, which exploded onto the European film-making scene in the late 1990s, and his latest film, The International, which opened this month's Berlinale.'Berlin is completely up there with any other big film city in ...
-
News
Will Russia's film boom survive the credit crunch'
In recent years, the Russian film industry has been remarkably robust. The 78 Russian films released in 2008 enjoyed a 22% share of the $830m CIS gross (excluding Ukraine), according to local analysts Nevafilm. Russian box office grosses alone came to $548.1m (rub19.9bn). State funding for production increased to $88.5m ...
-
News
Hot Russia projects to tempt international buyers
The Inhabited IslandIn this two-part adaptation of a popular novel by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, an improbably handsome cosmonaut, played by Vasily Stepanov, crashes on a hostile planet. Fyodor Bondarchuk, who directed the 2005 hit The 9th Company now ventures an epic spectacle along the lines of Timur Bekmambetov's Night ...
-
News
The Grinch leads record-breaking Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving records collapsed over the five-day holiday weekend led by the phenomenal holdover success of Universal Pictures' Dr Seuss' How The Grinch Stole Christmas. The family adventure took an estimated $73.8m from Wednesday to Sunday - about $52.4m over the Friday to Sunday period - bringing its ten day total ...
-
News
Russian Film Hub - The billion dollar club box office
The Russian box office is predicted to hit the $1bn mark in 2009. According to the European Audiovisual Observatory, Russia became Europe's fourth biggest market in 2008 in terms of admissions - 123.9 million (a 16% increase on 2007). And according to local analysts Nevafilm, the CIS (excluding Ukraine) generated ...
-
News
Russian Film Hub - On Location - Moscow calling
Russia has two main production facilities: Mosfilm in Moscow and Russian World Studios (RWS) which has facilities in both Moscow and St Petersburg. The consensus among producers is that the country needs more modern facilities. Post facilities abound - in addition to RWS and Mosfilm, Cinemateka and Dr Picture have ...
-
News
Russian Film Hub - Q&A - 'Have a healthy budget and a lot of time'
Les WeldonProduction: Command Performance. Dolph Lundgren directed and starred in this action thriller, produced by Nu Image Films and Millennium Films. Shot on location on Red Square and elsewhere in Moscow for two days in autumn 2008, with other locations in Bulgaria.Why did you choose to shoot in Russia'We needed ...
-
News
Russian Film Hub - Company Profile - New world order
Founded a decade ago by Yuri Sapronov and Andrei Smirnov, Russian World Studios (RWS) comprises state-of-the-art studios in both Moscow and St Petersburg, a production company, a location scouting service and a camera rental house.The company is now preparing to launch a production and distribution unit with Sergei Chliyants' Moscow-based ...
-
News
International - Button holds fast
The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button dominates the international chart this week, crossing the $100m mark internationally and falling off just 6% to take $30.5m over the February 13-15 weekend. With Warner Bros distributing in 49 markets, David Fincher's Oscar contender now stands at $119.6m from eight weeks on release ...
-
News
Marston, Bahrani projects to get grant support from Cinereach
New work from Maria Full Of Grace director Joshua Marston and Man Push Cart director Ramin Bahrani are among a selection of ten works-in-progress to receive grants totaling $250,000 from non-profit film support body Cinereach.Cinereach was founded in 2006 by a group of young film-makers, philanthropists and entrepreneurs to champion ...
-
News
Dasgupta quits as CEO of India's Multi Screen Media
Kunal Dasgupta has quit as CEO of India's Multi Screen Media (MSM), previously known as Sony Entertainment Television (SET), after almost 14 years in the role. Sony Pictures Television International (SPTI) issued a statement on Thursday saying that Dasgupta had resigned for 'personal reasons'. However, local press is speculating that ...
-
News
Australia's ABC TV considers investing in film
Australian broadcaster, the ABC, is hoping to invest in 15 feature films over the next three years. 'We must be one of the few public broadcasters in the developed western world that does not have a connection with its national feature film industry,' said the director of ABC TV, Kim ...