Movies

Action thriller “Trigger,” from writer-director Richard Somes (“We Will Not Die Tonight,” “Supremo”) has wrapped production and is beginning sales at the European Film Market. “Trigger” (aka “Tokakk”) tells the story of a lonely security guard (played by Arjo Atayde) previously discharged from the military due to his post-traumatic stress disorder. He finds himself embroiled

Acclaimed “Phantom Thread” actor Vicky Krieps’ latest film, “Ingeborg Bachmann – Journey into the Desert,” directed by German cinema legend Margarethe von Trotta, has its world premiere in competition at the Berlin Film Festival. Krieps plays the titular Austrian Bachmann, one of the most renowned German-language poetry and prose writers of the 20th century. The

The Locarno Film Festival’s Locarno Pro initiative dedicated to pics in post is set to look at films from the U.K. that are in their final stage of production for its upcoming 76th edition. Locarno’s First Look focus on indie U.K. film segues from the fest having developed a close rapport with the British industry over

George MacKay is virtually unrecognizable in the erotic revenge thriller “Femme,” directed by Sam H. Freeman and Ng Choon Ping. With slicked-back hair and a heavy-handed neck tattoo, the dashing, soft-spoken British actor, well known for his period roles, is transformed into the kind of East London gangster you’d go out of your way to

Vanessa Redgrave and Freida Pinto have boarded the family feature “The Boy at the Back of the Class,” based on the acclaimed children’s book. Directed by Stephen Herek (“101 Dalmations”), the film centers on a mysterious new boy called Ahmet who joins nine-year-old Alexa’s school. As Alexa learns that he is a refugee, separated from

Prolific Andalusian production company La Claqueta has tapped award-winning screenwriter-producer Alberto Marini (“La Unidad,” “Apagón”) to direct rural thriller “Últimos días de caza” (“Last Days of Hunting.”) Penned by José Cabeza, co-scribe on 2016’s “7 Years,” Netflix first Spanish original movie, “Last Days of Hunting” has a completed screenplay and has initiated financing.  The aim

“Los pequeños amores,” the latest film from Celia Rico who made a splash at the 2018 San Sebastian Festival with “Journey to a Mother’s Room,” has been acquired for international sales by Spain-based Latido Films. Produced by Barcelona-based Arcadia Motion Pictures, which co-produced Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s 2023 Goya winner and box office breakout “The Beasts, and France’s

Paris-based Italian director Giacomo Abbruzzese says making the Berlin Film Festival competition cut with his first feature, “Disco Boy,” which toplines German star Franz Rogowski (“Passages,” ”Undine”), is “certainly a dream come true.” But he also points out that his remarkable debut was a long time coming.  A graduate of several film schools, including France’s

It is probably Australia. But it could be anywhere where the sun is hot enough to bake the earth into boundless stretches of cracked crazy-paving. It is probably an alternate recent past. But it could be any period in human history when mankind has divided itself into categories of oppressor and oppressed. The most remarkable

Hot on the tail of a recent slew of pickups and sales, Paris-based sales-producer-distributor Alief has snapped up international rights to the West African folktale “Mami Wata.”   North America rights to the film are represented by Marissa Frobes at CAA Media Finance. Alief is presenting the film to buyers and festival programmers at this week’s

Acclaimed New York-based theater director Tina Satter has worked on productions on and off Broadway for more than a decade. Now, in her first ever venture into film, Satter makes her directorial debut with “Reality,” starring Sydney Sweeney, based on Satter’s play “Is This a Room.” The film premiered Saturday at the Berlin Film Festival

Nathan Stewart-Jarrett is ready for his close-up. After making a mark with TV’s “Misfits” and “Utopia” and in the film “Candyman,” the British actor is set to explode upon the world stage with “Femme,” world premiering at the Berlin Film Festival’s Panorama strand. Stewart-Jarrett plays Jules, whose alter-ego is Aphrodite, a celebrated drag queen in

One of the hottest packages at the EFM has been taken off the table for international. Sources tell Variety that Prime Video has snapped up all international rights, excluding the U.S., to Justin Kurzel’s “The Order,” which stars Jude Law and Nicholas Hoult in a story about the titular white supremacist organization that operated in

A reboot feature of “Hellboy,” titled “Hellboy: The Crooked Man,” will begin production in March, Millennium Media announced Saturday. Brian Taylor, who co-directed the “Crank” films and “Gamer” with Mark Neveldine and solo directed the 2017 horror comedy “Mom and Dad,” will helm the picture. Mike Mignola, the creator of the “Hellboy” comics, co-wrote the

In the widely covered story of the U.S. intelligence operative harshly sentenced in 2018 for leaking a confidential report on Russian election interference to The Intercept, the accidental (in)appropriateness of the operative’s name was always an eyecatching detail. Could one of recent reality’s most highly public losers actually be called Reality Winner? Playwright Tina Satter’s

George Trumbull Miller, an Australian film and television director whose most notable credits include “The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter” and “The Man From Snowy River,” died of a heart attack in a hospital in Melbourne. He was 79 years old. Miller’s death was confirmed by the Sydney Morning Herald. No details regarding a

Jeon Do-yeon who earned the Cannes best actress award for her part in Lee Chang-dong’s tragedy-ridden “Secret Sunshine” back in 2007 and has long had the reputation as Korea’s most-admired female actor, gets a chance to show her range in “Kill Boksoon.” The Netflix-backed action film plays in the Berlinale Special section of the Berlin

The first rule of “Manodrome” is you don’t talk about “Fight Club.” “Fight Club” looms large over writer-director John Trengrove’s unsettling second feature, even if no one overtly mentions David Fincher’s provocative late-’90s movie in this dark psychological-thriller-cum-social-critique, which finds the state of masculinity even more fraught than Fincher did a quarter-century ago. Trengrove, who

Oliver Wood, an English cinematographer whose credits include “Die Hard 2,” “Face/Off,” “The Other Guys” and the original “Bourne” trilogy, died Monday, Feb. 13, at his home in Hollywood following a battle with cancer. He was 80. With a career spanning across seven decades, Wood worked across a wide variety of projects, collaborating with directors

Depending on the state of your own family network, the relationship between the trio of grown siblings at the center of “The Adults” may strike you as intensely, skin-crawlingly familiar or quite desolately alien. Either way, Dustin Guy Defa’s determinedly quiet family-reunion drama seeks to be discomfiting, gradually giving the viewer that hollow, lurching, pit-of-the-stomach

Breaking out of traditional, male, Rio de Janeiro/São Paulo strongholds to finally embrace regional, Black and Indigenous writer-directors, Brazil’s next generation of cinematic talent tackles a huge gamut of themes, styles and concern about social issues. Variety profiles 10 figures who look set to help shape the future of Brazilian filmmaking. Caru Alves de Souza

In subscription terms, Brazil rates as the Netflix’s second-biggest market in the world, with a 2022 year-end estimate of 16.4 million subscribers, says Ampere Analysis’ Guy Bisson. “The market is huge and the talent outstanding,” agrees Fremantle’s Manuel Marti. As Brazil shapes up as Latin America’s ground zero for streamer wars, where do you find

“Euphoria” and “The White Lotus” star Sydney Sweeney communicated with the real-life Reality Winner to portray her in Tina Satter’s “Reality,” which world premieres at the Berlin Film Festival. The film, which contains verbatim dialogue from the unedited transcript of an FBI audio recording, follows a tense 90 minutes in the life of whistleblower Winner

Zurich-based Tellfilm, the Swiss outfit behind this year’s Golden Bear contender “Ingeborg Bachmann – Journey into the Desert,” has lined up a robust co-production slate, teaming with European partners on the psychological thriller “Motherhood” and the period drama “Gloria!,” while developing their first scripted series “How to Be Sad – The Right Way” with an

Uncork’d Entertainment has acquired the North American rights for suspense sci-fi thriller “I’ll Be Watching” from Iuvit Media Sales at the European Film Market in Berlin. The film has also been picked up by Falcon Films in the Middle East and North Africa, while Dolphin Medien has taken German-speaking territory rights. The film is directed

Portuguese director Susana Nobre’s first scripted fiction film, “Cidade Rabat,” is about a producer who grew up in the Cidade Rabat neighborhood in Lisbon, and who suddenly has to come to terms with the death of her mother. The title is partly inspired by her own life, since she grew up in the “Cidade Rabat”

Five years ago, South African director John Trengove’s feature debut, “The Wound,” scored coveted berths at Sundance and Berlin before being short-listed for an Academy Award — even as the powerful gay drama set in the secretive world of Xhosa initiation ceremonies faced angry protests in his home country. His sophomore effort, “Manodrome,” which plays

Singapore-based film production outfit Potocol, whose “Tomorrow is a Long Time,” by Jow Zhi Wei bowed at the Berlin Film Festival’s Generation 14plus competition, has revealed a diverse Asian slate. Potocol’s recent triumphs include Bangladeshi filmmaker Abdullah Mohammad Saad’s Cannes selection “Rehana Maryam Noor” and Indonesian director Makbul Mubarak’s Venice winner “Autobiography.” The company, led

101 Films Intl. has secured worldwide distribution rights for World War II adventure film “War Blade,” starring Joseph Millson (“Casino Royale,” “The Last Kingdom”), Paul Marlon (“Trigger Point”), Michael McKell (“Murder Investigation Team,” “Doctors”) and Rebecca Scott (“The Capture,” “Transhuman”). The sales company is presenting the film to buyers at the European Film Market in

Adrien Brody is not interested in the culture wars. It’s fascinating, he admits, “but it’s really tragic.” “We see how fractured our world is. Look around: It’s not hard to see,” says the Oscar-winning actor from his home in New York. Brody had to dive into these dark corners when preparing for “Manodrome,” in which