All articles by Wendy Mitchell – Page 22
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News
Fassbender signs on as Heathcliff for Wuthering Heights
Michael Fassbender, star of Un Certain Regard opener Hunger, has been confirmed for the role of Heathcliff in Ecosse Films' new Wuthering Heights.HanWay films is handling internationals sales. John Maybury is directing the project, which is now searching for a new Cathy after Natalie Portman pulled out last week.Fassbender previously ...
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News
Sally Hawkins to play Northern Irish civil rights campaigner
Sally Hawkins, coming off her Berlinale Best Actress award for Happy-Go-Lucky, will star in Aisling Walsh's The Roaring Girl.Kate Gartside wrote the script and producers are Sophie Balhetchet for Cougar Films and Tristan Orpen Lynch for Subotica. The Irish Film Board and Northern Ireland Screen supported the film's development.The story ...
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Features
United Kingdom - Burning bright
Poetry is a drug really, it goes into your head and it sticks," says the Oscar-winning writer-director Jane Campion. If that is her drug, Campion is getting plenty of buzz from her latest project Bright Star - the story of the unlikely love affair poet John Keats had with his ...
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News
Strand asks Bankside: How About You'
UK-based sales company has struck a deal with LA-based Strand Releasing for all US rights to Anthony Byrne's comedy How About You. Strand plans a September launch.Hayley Atwell stars alongside Vanessa Redgrave, Imelda Staunton, Brenda Fricker, and Joss Ackland. The story is about a young woman who has to run ...
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News
Capitol restructures but says business is solid
Following recent disparaging press reports and rumours following staff departures, Capitol Films managing director Peter Naish reiterates that the business is solid, if a bit dampened by current market conditions.Naish, who joined Capitol from Icon about a year ago, said that the recent departure of his co-MD Nick Hill wasn't ...
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News
Sam Riley, Mads Mikkelsen in talks for Black Heart
Christine Alderson's UK-based production company Ipso Facto Films is working with Italy's Orisa Produzioni and South Africa's Film Afrika to Produce political thriller Black Heart.The story is based on the real diaries of ex-mercenary Jean Vaudrec. Mads Mikkelsen and Sam Riley are in discussions to play estranged brothers who try ...
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News
High Point takes on Shadows In The Sun with Jean Simmons
London-based High Point Films has taken on world rights for David Rocksavage's Shadows In The Sun. Jean Simmons stars with James Wilby and Jamie Dornan.Nick O'Hagan (Daylight Robbery) produced for Giant Films.The film is set in England's Norfolk coast during a hazy summer in the late 1960s. A man visiting ...
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News
Velvet Octopus takes on sales for Intrepid's Prodigy
UK-based sales company Velvet Octopus is on board for sales of Prodigy, the next film from Chuck Russell, the US director of The Mask and The Scorpion King. Los Angeles-based Intrepid Pictures is fully financing the $25m film as its first feature not to go through Universal or Rogue. Intrepid ...
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News
Karl Urban joins the cast of Horse for ContentFilm Intl
Karl Urban has joined the cast of action thriller Horse, which ContentFilm International is selling worldwide.Urban previously appeared in Star Trek, The Lord Of the Rings, The Bourne Supremacy and forthcoming Black Water Transit.Laurence Malkin directs and producers are Paul Schiff, Tai Duncan and Roseanne Korenberg.Horse starts shooting in New ...
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News
Bankside says g'day to four Australian features
UK-based sales company Bankside Films has added four new Australian features -- all shooting this summer or autumn -- to its slate.They are Andrew Lancaster's Accidents Happen, Rupert Glasson's Coffin Rock, Ana Kokkinos' Blessed and Rachel Perkins' Bran Nue Dae.Hilary Davis and Stephen Kelliher of Bankside have plenty of Australian ...
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News
Elephant Eye takes on Frat Girl, Audience Of One
New US producer/distributor/sales company Elephant Eye Films has taken on two new projects, one for production and one for sales.Elephant Eye will produce Frat Girl, which will be written and directed by Nate Meyer, the director/producer of festival favourite Pretty In The Face. Derrick Tseng (Palindromes, Snow Angels) will co-produce.For ...
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News
Arturi Films in Cannes unveiling footage of Zimbabwe documentary
UK production company Arturi Films is in advanced production on especially timely Zimbabwe documentary Mugabe And The White African.Channel 4’s More 4 True Stories strand has bought the UK broadcast rights via commissioning editor Sandra Whipham.The film follows a white farmer, Mike Campbell, who is taking Robert Mugabe to court ...
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News
Intandem, WMI swim down Stream with Tommy Lee Jones
Intandem Films and William Morris Independent will be selling Tommy Lee Jones' new action drama Islands In The Stream. Intandem will handle international and WMI will represent domestic rights. The companies are in Cannes actively discussing the project, which is adapted from the Ernest Hemingway classic. Jones will star as ...
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News
BBC Films former head David Thompson sets up Origin
David Thompson, the former head of BBC Films, is launching a new independent film and TV production company, Origin Pictures.Origin kicks off with a three-year, first-look development deal with BBC Fiction for both feature films and TV drama.Also for its TV projects, Origin also has a first-look development deal with ...
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News
Andrea Arnold dives into Fish Tank with UKFC, BBC Films, Limelight
Andrea Arnold is following her Cannes 2006 jury prize-winner Red Road with her second feature Fish Tank, which is being backed by the UK Film Council’s New Cinema Fund with $1.1m (£570,000).Sources close to the film say it will start shooting in Kent, England on June 23 with a cast ...
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News
Real Holywood unveils first slate including Simon Callow's debut
Belfast-based production company Real Holywood plans a June shoot for its first feature, Yankee King, starring Bill Campbell, Claire Forlani, Kelly Brook and Rosemary Harris.Gerry Lively (Dungeons & Dragons II) will direct for the new production company, which is backed by property developer Robert Whitton and Richard Attenborough's longtime producer ...
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News
UK new media complex cleared by local government
Outline planning permission has been granted for the new Centre for Creative Excellence at Seaham, County Durham in the northeast of England. The proposed centre would have a media business park, an educational campus, two hotels and an agricultural college. Backers predict it could contribute more than $100m to the ...
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News
Radical Comics sells 40,000 units of first two Hercules, Caliber comics
Radical Publishing, which is partnered with film company Intandem, has had hits with its first two comic book releases through subsidiary Radical Comics: Hercules: The Thracian Wars and Caliber: First Canon Of Justice. Radical Comics sold out of 40,000 units of the two titles during its launch week starting April ...
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News
Penn's selection The Third Wave surges with Content, Cinetic
Competition Jury president Sean Penn has selected The Third Wave as an unprecedented Special Presidential Jury Screening to be held Friday at 7:15 pm. ContentFilm International is now handling international sales, with Cinetic Media selling North America.Alison Thompson directs the documentary about four volunteers who go to Sri Lanka after ...
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News
UK's Molinare sells majority stake to Indian giant Century
UK post-production house Molinare has struck a multi-million pound deal to sell a majority stake to Indian media giant Century Communications, parent to its post-production division Pixion.The deal was done May 2 and has now been announced by Molinare's chief executive Steve Milne and managing director Mark Foligno.Century's 'intensive investment ...