ITV

Category: International

  • Kodak-a notable absentee at Oscars

    Kodak-a notable absentee at Oscars

    MUMBAI: This year‘s Oscars will see one significant absentee that of Kodak as the company is cancelling its naming contract on the Hollywood Theatre.

    In the midst of bankruptcy, the Eastman Kodak company requested permission to cancel the contract in an effort to improve the company‘s financial situation.

    It has been reported that the original $74 million deal signed in 2000 gives the company naming rights to the theatre. Kodak‘s advisors now say that the benefits of having the company‘s name on the 3,300-seat venue aren‘t living up to the cost of the contract.
     
    Receiving court approval on Wednesday, Kodak is having a hard time justifying the $4 million annual cost of the 20-year contract. It is understood that the Motion Picture Academy has a say in the new sponsor of the Hollywood theatre if they choose to continue to host the event there.

    In case if the Academy chooses to move to a new venue, they lose their say on the theatre‘s name.

  • China-Dreamworks deal creates Oriental Dreamworks

    China-Dreamworks deal creates Oriental Dreamworks

    MUMBAI:In a deal endorsed by China‘s vice-president Xi Jinping, DreamWorks Animation has unveiled a joint venture Oriental DreamWorks with three Chinese companies.


    The deal to create the new outfit will have DWA in partnership with China Media Capital, Shanghai Media Group and Shanghai Alliance Investment Limited to produce films, TV series and other content aimed at the Chinese market.


    Jeffrey Katzenberg, DWA chief executive met Jinping this week at a State Department event held in Washington. “It‘s hard to over estimate how big a deal this is for DreamWorks Animation,” Katzenberg has been quoted to have said.


    “When you look at this in the context of what the world will look like in five to seven years from now, China will be the world‘s number one media market. It will be the largest live entertainment market, the number one consumer products market … so to create a family-branded entertainment company [in China] is an honour for us and a huge opportunity.”
     
    The Chinese groups involved in the venture will hold around 55 per cent of the shares in Oriental DreamWorks while DWA will control the rest. DWA said the that the new company would initially be capitalised with cash and intellectual property valued at $330m. Oriental DreamWorks will launch in Shanghai this year.


    The scale of the deal makes it the most significant tie up yet between a Hollywood studio and a Chinese partner.


    Hollywood studios have been keen to partner with Chinese groups to give them a foothold in China which has been seen upping the number of cinema screens at a rate of about three screens a day.


    China is forecast to be the world‘s biggest cinema market within the next decade and touched $2bn in box-office receipts in 2011, a near $400m increase on 2010.

  • Streep, Roberts to play mother daughter

    Streep, Roberts to play mother daughter

    MUMBAI: Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts will star in the film adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning play August: Osage County.


    The John Wells directed film, based on the play written by Tracy Letts, follows the women of a family whose lives have splintered in many directions until a crisis bring them back to their childhood home and to the dysfunctional woman who raised them, the Hollywood Reporter said.
     
    Streep, who has endeared herself by playing Britains strong lady Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady will play the pill-popping matriarch Violet Weston. On the other hand, Roberts will play her daughter Barbara.


    Streep is currently in the best actress Oscar race for The Iron Lady.

  • Jennifer Aniston to get Hollywood Walk of Fame award

    Jennifer Aniston to get Hollywood Walk of Fame award

    MUMBAI: The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce will honour Jennifer Aniston with the Hollywood Walk of Fame on 22 February.

    It may be noted that Aniston received five Emmy nominations, two SAG Award nominations, two Golden Globe nominations, an Emmy (2002) for her ten-season period on Friends as well as a Golden Globe (2003) in lead actress in a comedy category and five People’s Choice Awards.

    Subsequently, the actress came to doing feature films including Rumor Has It, The Break-Up, Friends With Money and Marley and Me.

    Aniston will next be seen in Wanderlust that would be released by Universal Pictures.

  • Zina Bethune no more

    Zina Bethune no more

    MUMBAI: In a bizarre accident, actress, choreographer and dancer Zina Bethune was killed in the early morning hours last Sunday after she left her car along Forest Lawn Drive in Los Angeles to look after an injured animal but was struck by oncoming traffic. She suffered head injuries and died at the scene. Bethune was 66.


    Bethune is best known for playing the girl with a past opposite Harvey Keitel in Martin Scorsese’s 1967 Catholic morality tale Who’s That Knocking at My Door.
     
    Earlier, Bethune starred as a na?ve student nurse in the 1962-65 CBS primetime series The Doctors and the Nurses.


    At age six, Zina Bethune began her dancing career at George Balanchine’s School of American Ballet and performed with the New York City Ballet, where she starred as Clara in the first televised The Nutcracker.

  • Chinese vice-president set to unveil jv with Hollywood

    Chinese vice-president set to unveil jv with Hollywood

    MUMBAI: Chinese vice president Xi Jinping will endorse the growing ties between his country and Hollywood on Friday when he is scheduled to unveil a joint venture between DreamWorks Animation (DWA) and two state-owned Chinese media groups.


    Xi, who is due to visit Los Angeles on the final leg of his US visit will announce the tie-up between Shanghai Media Group, China Media Capital and DWA, according to several people familiar with the situation.


    Under the terms of the joint venture, the companies will construct a studio facility in Shanghai with the aim of developing film, television and live stage productions for the fast-growing Chinese media market.
     
    From a long time, Hollywood studios have been eager to find ways into China‘s fast-growing film market and this at a time when they are facing challenges on the domestic front: the decline of DVD sales.


    On the other hand, film business is booming in China where new cinemas are being added at a rate of about three screens a day, faster than that in any other country.


    China is forecast to be the world‘s biggest cinema market within the next decade and touched $2bn in box-office receipts in 2011, a near $400m increase on 2010.

  • Fox 2000 makes changes in staff

    Fox 2000 makes changes in staff

    MUMBAI: Fox Filmed Entertainment has announced that Elizabeth Gabler has renewed her deal as president of Fox 2000 Pictures. The studio has also announced that Jessica Goodman has joined Fox 2000 Pictures as executive vp production and Marisa Paiva has been promoted from creative executive to director of development.

    In about 12 years that Gabler has been in charge, Fox 2000 has consistently produced at least one or two sizable hits most years. “For the past 12 years, Elizabeth’s savvy, vision and taste has taken Fox 2000 Pictures to a level of success and accomplishment that exceeded our already high expectations,” Fox said in a statement.

    Among the films she has overseen are Walk the Line, The Devil Wears Prada, Marley & Me and the Alvin and the Chipmunks movies, which the studio says have grossed more than $1 billion worldwide.

    Forthcoming films that would come out of the Fox 2000 stable this year include Life of Pi, directed by Ang Lee; Guernsey, directed by Kenneth Branagh and the sequel Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Sea of Monsters.

    Goodman was recently with Warner Bros. where she was executive vp production overseeing projects such as Contagion, I Am Legend, Oceans 11 (and its two sequels), Michael Clayton and The Informant.

    Paiva is working on Life of Pi. Last year, she was creative executive on Water for Elephants.

  • ’62-made Lawrence of Arabia restored

    MUMBAI: The 1962-made David Lean’s classic Lawrence of Arabiai has been restored in 4K version. The restoration work was accomplished at Colorworks.


    The before-and-after clips of the film was recently screened by Grover Crisp, executive vp, asset management, film restoration and digital mastering for Sony Pictures Entertainment. He explained that the “emulsion was cracked” and “the negative is badly scratched” on the original.
     
    The film, starring Peter O‘Toole in the title role, depicts Lawrence‘s experiences in Arabia during World War I, in particular his attacks on Aqaba and Damascus and his involvement in the Arab National Council. Its themes include Lawrence‘s emotional struggles with the personal violence inherent in war, his personal identity, and his divided allegiance between his native Britain and its army and his newfound comrades within the Arabian desert tribes.


    The restored version of the film will be released on Blu-Ray later this year. A theatrical rerelease is also being planned.

  • Russel Crowe in Dracula film

    Russel Crowe in Dracula film

    MUMBAI: It is believed that Russell Crowe is in talks to star in forthcoming Dracula re-imagining Harker.

    The 47-year-old is in talks to appear in the re-imagining of Bram Stoker‘s Dracula as a tough London detective on the hunt for the ghoulish figure behind a string of gory murders, reported Contactmusic.
     
    The film, produced by Warner Bros, will be directed by Jaume Collet-Serra and produced by Leonardo DiCaprio.

    Crowe is currently working on Superman: Man of Steel.

  • Michael Bay to direct Transformers 4

    Michael Bay to direct Transformers 4

    MUMBAI: After signing a two-film deal with Paramount, Michael Bay will direct the fourth instalment in Paramount‘s Transformers franchise. This would be preceded by a bodybuilding film Pain and Gain.

    Bay will direct the fourth film based on the Hasbro toy line. The third instalment in the franchise, Transformers: Dark of the Moon released last summer in 3D.

    Producer Di Bonaventura has been quoted as saying that the film would be a reboot of the franchise and that none of the cast of the original three movies have been signed for the project. It’s likely that he and Bay would create at least a few new characters for the film, it is understood.

    Pain and Gain is based on a true story and centers on a group of bodybuilders engaged in a campaign of kidnapping and murder in Florida is being produced by Bay, Donald De Line and Bryce.

    “Michael has been working on Pain and Gain for a number of years but has patiently waited for the perfect casting to trigger a start,” said Paramount Film Group president Adam Goodman in a statement. “Clearly his patience has paid off as we couldn‘t be more excited about this combo. His passion for this project is just awesome,” he added.

    Transformers 4 will release on 29 June, 2014.