Month: January 2022

Alexis Langlois won both the Junior Jury Award and the Silver Pardino in the Leopards of Tomorrow section at the Locarno Intl. Film Festival in 2021 with his meta, genre-bending fantasy short “The Demons of Dorothy.” Now, the film looks to close out an impressive international run with its streaming premiere at Unifrance Rendez-Vous’ MyFrenchFilmFestival.
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Naïla Guiguet’s “Dustin” rounds out its festival run at this year’s MyFrenchFilmFestival, the entirely online portion of the Unifrance Rendez-Vous, after strong showings at major international festivals and winning best short film prizes at Toronto, Zagreb and several other events. Not bad for a first-time director. Kicking off in an abandoned warehouse, a crowd of
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Caroline Cherrier’s short “Horacio” has earned nominations at Clermont-Ferrand, Palm Springs and Annecy over the past year. Now, “Horacio” rounds out its festival run at the Unifrance Rendez-Vous’ upcoming 12th MyFrenchFilmFestival. It is Cherrier’s first pro work after several shorts made as a student at leading European animation school Gobelins. “Horacio” delivers a portrait of
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Only one entirely French short film made it into competition at Cannes 2021, Adrian Dullin’s “The Right Words.” Not finished there, the short has enjoyed an award-winning festival run which caps off this month at the Sundance Film Festival and Unifrance’s MyFrenchFilmFestival. Unraveling entirely on a crowded public bus after school has let out, disparate groups
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“Notting Hill” actor Hugh Grant, “The Thick of It” creator Armando Iannucci and soccer star turned sports host Gary Lineker are among the industry heavyweights criticizing the U.K. government’s threats to freeze and potentially scrap the licence fee altogether. Any U.K. household that watches any form of live television on any network or streaming platform
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SPOILER ALERT: This piece contains spoilers for the Season 1 finale of “Yellowjackets,” “Sic Transit Gloria Mundi,” which premiered Sunday, January 16 on Showtime. Internally at “Yellowjackets,” the nickname for the show’s trifecta of showrunners is JAB — which stands for Jonathan Lisco, Ashley Lyle and Bart Nickerson. Lyle and Nickerson created the genre-defying Showtime
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SPOILER ALERT: Do not read if you haven’t seen the first two episodes of “Euphoria” Season 2.  In HBO’s “Euphoria,” music isn’t just a supplementary factor to the plot — it’s arguably as important as the characters themselves. For proof, look no further than the titles of the episodes — most are named after songs,
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After nearly six years of wide-ranging assessments, parties involved with Prince’s estate have finally agreed on its value: $156.4 million, according to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune and the Associated Press. The estate’s outgoing administrator, Comerica Bank & Trust, had valued it at $82.3 million, provoking howls of outrage from multiple parties, not least the heirs of
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SPOILER ALERT: This piece contains major spoilers for “Sic Transit Gloria Mundi,” the Season 1 finale of “Yellowjackets,” which premiered Sunday, January 16 on Showtime. The central mysteries of “Yellowjackets” are as tantalizing as the wilderness that inspires it: thick and even seductive with possibility, but also grounded in the banal pain of just trying
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Filmmaker and environmental activist Cyril Dion is planning a follow-up documentary to his Cannes-selected documentary “Animal” as well as his first fiction feature film, adapted from Pierre Ducrozet’s eco-themed novel, “Le Grand Vertige.” Dion first rose to international prominence with his 2015 environmental documentary “Tomorrow,” in which he and co-director Mélanie Laurent highlighted important initiatives
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Argentine helmer Gaspar Noé’s latest feature “Vortex” world premiered in Cannes, where it was greeted with a standing ovation and critical acclaim. Variety spoke to the director at the Unifrance Rendez-vous in Paris this week about the film. “Vortex,” lensed during the 2020 lockdown, follows an elderly couple in a Paris apartment. Shot entirely in
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Olivier Dahan’s “Simone, A Woman of the Century” completes the trilogy he began with the Edith Piaf biopic “La Vie en Rose,” starring Marion Cotillard, and “Grace of Monaco,” starring Nicole Kidman. Dahan spoke with Variety during the Unifrance Rendezvous in Paris, where the film had its market premiere. “Simone,” starring Elsa Zylberstein (“Un plus
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Rising production-distribution player Miam! Animation seems primed for a breakout year in 2022 as the French multi-hyphenate presents its first series produced in-house – using industry trendsetting technology – to buyers, while beginning work on its first international co-production on a project for WarnerMedia. Launched in 2016 as a socially engaged development and distribution outfit,
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Cinétévé Sales, the global distribution branch of Paris-based production banner Cinétévé, has scored a raft of international sales for non-fiction projects presented at this year’s Unifrance Rendez-Vous in Paris. Among the titles brought to market at this year’s edition – the first to welcome film and television buyers under the same roof – include a
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Iranian-born, France-based actor Golshifteh Farahani, who was nominated for a Cesar for “The Patience Stone,” played in Ridley Scott’s “Body of Lies,” and now stars in the Apple TV Plus drama “Invasion,” will feature alongside Marion Cotillard and Melvil Poupaud in the cast of Arnaud Desplechin’s “Brother and Sister,” Desplechin tells Variety. The French auteur
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The annual BBC license fee of £159 is to be frozen for two years, U.K. Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries is expected to reveal this week. While there has been no official government announcement yet, Dorries tweeted a link to an article in U.K. tabloid The Daily Mail, which reported the news first, along with the
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