Kaan Müjdeci’s “Hamlet” reskins Shakespeare’s darkest tragedy in a modern retelling of family betrayal and horse carriages. When Kedir Kesmeci murders his brother in secret, his niece Hazar must find the courage to expose him. Indeed her sorrows “come not single spies,” and there on the island of Büyükada, off the coast of Istanbul, she
Erik Barmack’s Wild Sheep Content, the new L.A.-based company of the former Netflix VP, has boarded “Cromosoma 21,” an original crime mystery series created and directed by Chile’s Matías Venables Brito which adds major twists to a classic murder witness narrative. Executive produced by Nico Martínez Bergen, Barmack and Venables, and shooting in Chile from
The Showtime anthology “Super Pumped,” the first season of which will chart the rise of Uber, has cast Bridget Gao-Hollitt, Variety has learned exclusively. Gao-Hollitt joins previously announced cast members Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Kyle Chandler, Kerry Bishé, Babak Tafti, Mousa Hussein Kraish, Jon Bass, and Hank Azaria. Planned as anthology, the first season of “Super Pumped” is
Venice Film Festival contender “Leave No Traces” will represent Poland at next year’s Academy Awards. A statement from New Europe Film Sales, handling the film’s sale, said, “We are happy to announce that Jan P. Matuszyński’s “Leave No Traces,” premiering in Venice Competition next week has just been selected as Poland’s Oscars entry for Best
The French box office, hampered by an increasingly rigorous series of COVID health protocols, took a plunge in recent months, resulting in week-to-week falls of up to 41%. But for all their caveats, industry analysts talk about the current landscape in tones of cautious optimism. In France, a growing number of commercial spaces are prohibited
In “Dune,” Denis Villeneuve’s droolingly anticipated, eye-bogglingly vast adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 cult sci-fi novel, the characters fly around in airplanes that have three sets of wings, all of which flap very fast. The planes look like insects, and the film suggests that’s one way that a flying machine, in another planetary sphere, might
Thanks in part to his work with auteurs Benoit Jacquot, Claire Denis and Stéphane Brizé, Vincent Lindon had long become something of a festival-world habitué, a sturdy and reliable fixture on the international circuit. But even with well over two decades’ red carpet experience, nothing could quite prepare the French actor for what he cheekily
Kristen Stewart as Princess Diana? You better believe it. Judging by the rapturous response at the premiere of “Spencer” at the Venice Film Festival on Friday afternoon, the 31-year-old actor has pulled off one of the most dazzling onscreen transformations of the year. As the closing credits of the dramatic film, which bills itself as
Asked for the umpteenth time why she’s famous for a new Hulu docuseries about her life, 16 year-old Charli D’Amelio rolls her eyes. She’s thought about this question a lot, but still doesn’t have a great answer for her outsized TikTok notoriety. Maybe, she suggests, it was the shared boredom of COVID-19 quarantine, during which
System of a Down released “Toxicity,” its second studio album, back on September 4, 2001, unleashing onto the world a unique concoction of hard rock with Armenian folk influences and Middle Eastern melodies. A relentless assault of crushing drop tuned guitar and bass riffs, intricate and powerful drumming with dynamic vocals ranging from frantic guttural
ACQUISITION Abacus Media Rights (AMR) has picked up global distribution rights to BBC Two’s Joan Collins documentary, produced by Salon Pictures and commissioned by Mark Bell at BBC Arts. Promising to tell the life story of the Hollywood actor from her point of view, the 90-minute documentary will be narrated by Collins herself. Clare Beavan
Peter Dinklage’s musical interpretation of the “friend zone” took center stage at the Telluride Film Festival for the world premiere of “Cyrano,” and a leading Oscar contender for best actor appeared to emerge. The premiere started with an actor’s tribute to Dinklage, which highlighted notable performances such as his Emmy-winning role in HBO’s “Game of
BTS are set to appear on a special episode of YouTube Originals’ weekly music series “Released” on Thursday, September 9 at 11:45 PM ET, which will lead directly into the premiere of “BTS ‘Permission to Dance’ MV (Shorts Challenge ver.)” on September 10 at Midnight ET. The band will be joined by Coldplay frontman, Chris
Drake made good on his promise to drop his new album — belated though it was — and he smack-talked Kanye hard. “Certified Lover Boy” was unveiled as promised — at midnight — 9 months after Drake had planned to release it. Drizzy doesn’t mention Ye by name, but no need to … he’s clearly
RTL-owned production and distribution giant Fremantle, which has two films in competition in Venice, has entered exclusive negotiations to buy Italy’s Lux Vide, the prominent TV production company behind, most recently, the high-end “Medici,” “Devils” and “Leonardo” skeins. Sources have confirmed to Variety a report in Italian financial daily Il Sole 24 Ore that Fremantle,
A historical drama about two men duelling to determine the veracity of a woman’s rape in 14th century France doesn’t, at first glance, scream “feminism.” But in the deft hands of “Alien” director Ridley Scott, “Can You Ever Forgive Me?” scribe Nicole Holofcener and “Free Guy” star Jodie Comer, the woman in question — a
Jodie Comer will begin shooting Ridley Scott’s latest project, “Kitbag,” towards the new year, she confirmed to Variety. Comer will play Josephine opposite Joaquin Phoenix’s Napoleon Bonaparte in the historical drama about the military leader and emperor. The ‘Killing Eve’ actor is about to embark on promotion for Scott’s “The Last Duel,” another historical drama
Director Denis Villeneuve hopes that audiences will watch “Dune” in movie theaters. “At the end of the day these are difficult times for everybody, safety first, if the audience feels comfortable I encourage them to watch it on the big screen,” Villeneuve said at a press conference on Friday at the Venice Film Festival. “It
Interest in the royals has never been higher but in death, as in life, it’s Diana, Princess of Wales, who continues to nab the headlines. The princess, who would have turned 60 in July, died in a Paris car crash in 1997 alongside her then beau Dodi Fayed. She was only 36. While her sons,
Berlin-based sales agency Picture Tree International has boarded “Farha,” the debut feature from Jordanian writer-director Darin J. Sallam, which world premieres in the Discovery section of Toronto Film Festival. The company has shared the film’s trailer. [embedded content] Inspired by true events, the film tells the story of 14-year-old girl Farha in Palestine in 1948,
After winning the Platform prize in Toronto in 2018 with his “Cities of Last Things,” Malaysian director Ho Wi Ding’s latest effort “Terrorizers” will get its premiere at the Canadian festival this month. It boasts shock value, stylish delivery and a director who has done his time serving convention and is now desperate to break
TVNow, RTL Deutschland’s streaming service, high-flying Berlin-based production house X Filme Creative Pool and production-distribution powerhouse Beta Film are partnering on what looks like one of the biggest German drama series productions of 2021: “House of Promises,” (a working title). Beta Film is handling world sales and will present first moving images of the series
Charles Gillibert, the thriving French producer behind Leos Carax’s Cannes prizewinning “Annette,” spoke to Variety about his recent acquisition of Les Films du Losange, one of France’s oldest and most revered auteur-driven production and distribution companies. Gillibert teamed up with French financier Alexis Dantec, former managing director of the film financing group Cofinova, to complete
The Chinese government’s crackdown on the tech and entertainment sectors has now turned to “sissy idols,” “effeminate men” and all things “overly entertaining.” The measures were sketched out in an eight-point plan on Thursday by the National Radio and Television Administration. It called for “further regulation of arts and entertainment shows and related personnel.” Announcing
Louis Wain painted cats, hundreds if not thousands of cats. He painted the critters with big googly eyes, gathered round the dinner table, serving tea or slurping at straws. He painted them standing on their hind legs, holding golf clubs and swinging Ping-Pong paddles, and he painted them seated, driving cars and smoking cigars. Premiering
Taken together, boundless courage, physical stamina and emotional resilience form the magnetic core of co-directors E. Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin’s nonfiction oeuvre. The duo behind Oscar-winning nail-biter “Free Solo” naturally gravitate toward real-life you-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it tales, extracting from them a great deal more than beautifully photographed and entertaining accounts of perseverance and survival. Far greater
The vast majority of sports movies are about exceptional talent. “King Richard” is about exceptional belief: the conviction of one man, Richard Williams, to turn his daughters Venus and Serena into the world’s greatest tennis players. It’s a plan he hatched — together with wife/queen Brandi — even before the girls were born and put
After weeks of grueling work on Kanye West’s “Donda” album, producer and self-proclaimed ‘synth god’ Mike Dean is ready to kick back with a new project of his own. Two sold-out solo headlining shows at the Echoplex in Los Angeles on August 21 and 22 provide the contents of a new visual album, “ECHOPLEX (Live
After months of speculation, delays and heart-shaped haircuts — and a surprisingly tight lid on the content — Drake’s new studio album, “Certified Lover Boy,” has finally arrived… an hour behind its expected release time, coming in at 1 a.m. ET instead of midnight. For an album he first promised would come out a year
Ahead of its world premiere in competition at the Venice Film Festival, “Lost Illusions,” Xavier Giannoli’s $17.5 million period film, has already lured major buyers in key territories for Gaumont. Produced by Olivier Delbosc (“Renoir,” “The Midwife”), “Lost Illusions” is a modern adaptation of Honoré de Balzac’s masterpiece starring Benjamin Voisin (“Summer of 85”), Cecile