All articles by Tim Dams – Page 75
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Actors to talk shop at EFA conference
TheEuropean Film Academy is to hold a conference to debate the working conditionsof actors in Europe.CalledShop Talk: Actors Talk AboutTheir Work, it will take place onDec 11 in Barcelona. The European FilmAwards will be held later in the evening.The conference will beopened by Wim Wenders,president of the European Film Academy, ...
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UK Film Council launches sales support scheme
The UK Film Council is launching a £70,000 InternationalFestival Sales Support (IFSS) scheme to help boost UK films invited to competeat next year's Sundance, Rotterdam and Berlin festivals.Open from now until 31 March 2005, the new funding isdesigned to raise the profile of UK talent, services and crews internationallyand to ...
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British Independent Film Awards unveil starry guest list
Bob Hoskins, Mike Leigh, Matthew Vaughn, Shane Meadows,Christian Slater and Naomie Harris are among the guests confirmed to attend theBritish Independent Film Awards on Nov 30.Held at the Hammersmith Palais and hosted by RichardJobson, BIFA sponsors this year include Bloomberg, Nokia, Chiltern, and LauraMercier.Expected nominees and guests on Tuesday also ...
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Dog Years wins two short film prizes at Brief Encounters
Short film Dog Years directed by Sam Hearn andRichard Penfold, picked up two of the top prizes at this year's BriefEncounters, the UK's leading short film festival.The short, made for just £50, won the ITV West Award aswell as the prestigious UK Film Council Audience Award.Meanwhile, the International Jury Award ...
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Osama triumphs at Cape Town
Afghan feature Osama, by director Siddiq Barmakhas won the best feature film award and the best director prize at theCape Town World Cinema Festival.The film beat off 19 features in competition, includingan impressive showing of eleven South African features, most by first-timedirectors.The story of a girl who has to dress ...
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Stelios' easyGroup ploughs into UK DVD rental market
Stelios Haji-Ioannou's easyGroup is entering the onlineDVD rental market with an easyCinema DVD service powered by rental platformVideo Island.Due to be launched in January, the service will operate apay-as-you-go model, charging easyCinema customers £1.99 per DVD rental andoffering a 21-day return policy.easyGroup joins existing Video Island partners, such asnational brands ...
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Content, Room 9 ready Smoking and Queen Lara
ContentFilm has joined forces with Room 9 Entertainment, theNorth American production company launched by former PayPal chief operatingofficer David Sacks, to co-finance and co-produce two feature films that willbegin shooting in the coming months.The films are the first announced productions withContentFilm's financing partner, Entertainment Investor, LLP.The first film to go ...
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British films win extra airtime on UK television
Thenumber of recent British films shown on UK television in the first six monthsof the year increased by 51%, according to new figures released by the UK FilmCouncil.However, the total number of UK films shown was stilllow. Just 52 films made within thelast eight years were aired on the UK's ...
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Biggest UK electrical retailer Dixons dumps VCRs
The UK'slargest electrical chain, Dixons, has said it is to stop selling video cassetterecorders, leading to predictions of the imminent demise of the VCR market inthe country.Dixonsis phasing out VCRs due to the boom in DVD players, which can now be bought foras little as £25.Theretailer expects to sell its ...
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Buyers snap up Element X's Moguls
UK sales companyElement X has unveiled a string of sales concluded at this month's AFM.Michael Traeger'sThe Moguls sold to Universal for the UK and Australia, Nordisk forScandinavia, Lumiere/EBA Films for Brazil, New Films for Eastern Europe andCathay for Singapore.The film starsJeff Bridges and is about the citizens of a small ...
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Kinky Boot Factory kicks off in Northampton
Harbour Pictures/BVIproduction The Kinky Boot Factory is to start shooting at the end ofNovember with Joel Edgerton and Chiwetel Ejiofor to star as the two male leads,Charlie Price and Lola.Julian Jarrold (Cracker;Crime & Punishment; White Teeth) is directing, with producers NickBarton and Suzanne Mackie working again with the production arm ...
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BVITV strikes Russian pay-TV package deal
Buena Vista International Television (BVITV) has struck itsfirst pay TV agreement in Russia, with the DTH broadcaster NTV Plus for thelicensing of first-run, re-run, and library features.First-run features will include Pirates Of The Caribbean:The Curse Of The Black Pearl, Freaky Friday, The Village, Calendar Girls, SweetHome Alabama and The Ladykillers.Re-run ...
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The Works unveils Proposition, Tara Road deals
UK based sales oufit TheWorks has unveiled a string of deals completed at this month's AFM.- John Hillcoat's TheProposition, which is currently shooting in Australia, closed a pre-sale at the AFM with Triangelfilm forScandinavia. The film has also beensold to Columbia TriStar for Australia and New Zealand, A Film for ...
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Marrakech festival unveils 14 title competition line-up
The 4th MarrakechInternational Film Festival (Dec 6-12)has selected 14 films to play in its maincompetition.The films range from highprofile US fare such as Alexander Payne's Sideways to Spanish director Alex de la Iglesia's PerfectCrime and Sengalese director OusmaneSembène's Moolaade.A high proportion of thecompetition films are also by first time directors, ...
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McGuckian lines up eclectic cast for Rag Tale
Five weeks of principal photography begins today (Nov 16) inLuxembourg and London on writer/director Mary McGuckian's (The Bridge of San Luis Rey, Best) contemporary urban satire Rag Tale.Set in the ruthless world of British tabloid newspapers,McGuckian will produce and direct from her own original story.Heading the international cast are Simon ...
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Newmarket, The Works take Tristram Shandy rights
London based sales outfit The Works has taken internationalrights to Michael Winterbottom's Tristram Shandy, while Newmarket Films has picked up distributionrights for North America.Based loosely around Laurence Sterne's Englishliterature masterpiece, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, the project is a comic, post modern take onthe construction of a ...
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ITV links with Video Island for online DVD service
ITV, the UK's largest commercial broadcaster, haslinked up with online DVD rental service Video Island to launch ITV MovieClub.The move sees ITV launch its own online rental service whichwill be powered by Video Island and integrated directly onto www.itv.com.The service will be launched later this year and will offerviewers across ...
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Italy's Sky Cine Classics acquires Granada package
Granada International hassold a package of classic movies to newly launched Italian channel Sky CineClassics.Thirty films from GranadaInternational's British movie portfolio will be airing shortly on the newchannel, which is part of the Sky Italia platform. Classic movies, from the Korda, Rank and ITC film collections arepart of the deal ...
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Metrodome acquires UK rights to pair of films
UK distributor Metrodome has acquired UK rights to TheAssassination of Richard Nixon and Private for its 2005 slate.The Assassination of Richard Nixon played in UnCertain Regard at Cannes this year. It was directed by Niels Mueller andwritten by Mueller together with Kevin Kennedy, and stars Sean Penn, NaomiWatts and Don ...
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Oscar Moore winner teams with Secretary director
Oscar Moore prize winnerLindsay Shapero is adapting Tibor Fischer's award-winning novel Under TheFrog for American director/producer Steve Shainberg (Secretary).The film, which is currentlyin development, will be produced by Shainberg and directed by US-basedHungarian director Dezso Magyar.Under the Frog is a black comedy set against the backdrop of theHungarian uprising of ...