Month: July 2021

“Clara Sola,” the debut feature from Swedish-Costa Rican director Nathalie Álvarez Mesén, looks set for a French release. Luxbox has sold the rights in France to Paris-based art-pic distribution outfit Epicentre Films. News of the deal comes the same day that the magical realist is premiering in the Directors’ Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival.
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“We are all brothers in Islam. Anyone with a problem can come to talk.” With these words, a local imam offers supposed comfort and counsel to troubled single mother Amina (Achouackh Abakar Souleymane), not considering that addressing her as his “brother” might not be the most welcoming invitation. Least of all for the problem Amina
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A giant screen Imax theater will soon join the screening options in Cannes. The new venue was demonstrated Thursday and will open to the public later this summer as part of the new Cineum Cannes multiplex. The venue is operated by Compagnie Cinématographique de Cannes which will seek official venue status for the theater, allowing
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Kevin Hart’s Laugh Out Loud and the Sundance Institute are pairing up to put Black women at the forefront of comedy, with a new screenwriting fellowship program called “Women Write Now.” Designed to champion the next generation of Black women in comedy, the new initiative focuses on providing one-on-one mentorship opportunities to Black women screenwriters,
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“Red Notice,” the upcoming comedic action thriller starring Dwayne Johnson, Ryan Reynolds and Gal Gadot, is debuting on Netflix this fall. Johnson announced Thursday morning to his social media platforms that “Red Notice” will premiere on Nov. 12. “You’re officially on notice,” he wrote on Twitter in a message adorned with siren, fire and globe
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Check out the official Encanto Trailer starring Stephanie Beatriz! ► Sign up for a Fandango FanALERT for Encanto: https://www.fandango.com/encanto-2021-225033/movie-overview?cmp=MCYT_YouTube_Desc Want to be notified of all the latest movie trailers? Subscribe to the channel and click the bell icon to stay up to date. US Release Date: November 24, 2021 Starring: Stephanie Beatriz Directed By: Jared
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In the days since legendary filmmaker Richard Donner’s death at age 91, his longtime wife, Lauren Shuler Donner, has taken comfort in the outpouring of love and support from the “Superman” director’s fans and colleagues. “Each one is more remarkable than the next,” Shuler Donner tells Variety about the stories she’s heard about her late
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Talkshoplive, a startup whose a livestreaming ecommerce platform has attracted a roster of celebrities and businesses to host their own QVC-style shopping channels, announced that it has closed $6 million in follow-on seed funding. The funding gives L.A.-based Talkshoplive a valuation of $75 million, sources familiar with the funding told Variety. The seed extension funding
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Acclaimed dramatist and playwright Jack Thorne will deliver this year’s James MacTaggart Memorial Lecture at the Edinburgh TV Festival. Thorne’s credits include the West End play “Harry Potter and The Cursed Child,” Netflix film “Enola Holmes” and TV series “His Dark Materials.” As a disabled professional, Thorne is a vocal champion, campaigner and ally of
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Nadav Lapid was used to mining the past. With 2014’s “The Kindergarten Teacher,” he worked childhood poems into the script, while basing his Berlinale winning follow-up, “Synonyms,” on his early days in France after leaving Israel. But with “Ahed’s Knee,” which premieres on July 7 in competition at Cannes, the filmmaker confronted uncharted terrain: his
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Muriel Sauzay, Pathe Intl.’s former head, and Agnès Mentré, Wild Bunch’s former acquisition topper, have launched Maremako, a Paris-based banner banner with a special interest in adaptations and remakes. The company’s first slate includes an English-language remake of “Stalk” with Endeavor Content, in association with Drake’s DreamCrew and Ben Stiller’s Red Hour Prods.; and “French
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“Mothering Sunday’s” Odessa Young has been tapped for award-winning director Thordur Palsson’s upcoming psychological horror “The Damned.” The film will see Young star as Eva, a 19th-century widow tasked with making an impossible choice when, during an especially cruel winter, a ship sinks off the coast of her impoverished Icelandic fishing village. Any attempt to
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Chilean horror maestro Jorge Olguin and his producers will be at Cannes’ Marché du Film and Producers Network to seek international co-producers and distributors for his upcoming sci-fi horror film “The Shape of Fear” (“La Forma del Miedo”), described as a cross between “The Andromeda Strain” and “The Thing.” Its teaser trailer, unveiled exclusively in Variety, opens with a
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London-based production, finance and sales outfit Film Constellation has inked the key first deals on psychological thriller “John and the Hole,” directed by Pascual Sisto, on the back of the film’s virtual market premiere at Cannes. The film was written by Nicolás Giacobone, an Oscar-winner with “Birdman,” who adapted his short story “El Pozo.” “John
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French-Moroccan director Nabil Ayouch grew up in the Paris suburb of Sarcelles, which he says is “quite violent,” during the late ’70s and early ’80s when hip-hop was emerging in France. In the mid-’90s he moved to Casablanca, where he is now based, and became involved with the sprawling shantytown of Sidi Moumen on that city’s outskirts, a wasteland where extreme poverty
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Endeavor’s China offshoot announced Thursday that it has acquired the Shanghai-headquartered digital marketing agency Mailman Group and its Seven League subsidiary. Prior reports estimate the deal to be valued at $60 million. The move comes as Endeavor seeks to expand its footprint in the sports marketing space in China and the broader Asia-Pacific region. The
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Egyptian director and producer Ali El Arabi, who made a splash at virtual Sundance with doc “Captains of Zaatari,” about the soccer dreams of young Syrian refugees, is shooting another soccer-related project, this one centered on fan fever in the leadup to the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. “Ashish’s Journey” (working title), El Arabi’s new
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The position of Saudi women as second-class citizens receives a potent metaphoric visualization in Saudi helmer-writer Shahad Ameen’s parable-like debut drama, “Scales.” Revealing more through imagery than dialogue, the tale unfolds on a barren island where tradition dictates that each family sacrifice a daughter to the sea maidens to ensure the local fishermen a good
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On Thursday, the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures will highlight the work of Black VFX artists through an interactive online panel discussion. Lyndon Barrois, Andrew Roberts, Audrea Topps Harjo, Lauren F. Ellis, Corey Turner, and Greg Anderson are those who will be sharing their work, obstacles and discussing their career path. Jacqueline Stewart, chief artistic
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