Category: International

MUMBAI: This year‘s Golden Leopard in Locarno was annexed by Chinese novelist-filmmaker Xiaolu Guo for his She A Chinese a UK-German-French co-production.

The award for Guo came at an opportune time when the festival‘s Open Doors co-production event was dedicated to Greater China. The festival also was witness to Guo‘ Ufo In Her Eyes that was adapted from her latest novel of the same name.

This was the third Chinese film since 1998 to receive Locarno‘s top honour after Lü Yue‘s M. Zhao in 1998 and Wang Shuo‘s Father in 2000.

MUMBAI: Ron Shelton has been signed by David Friendly to direct Q School, a golf comedy based on a script he co-wrote with John Norville.

It is being rumoured that Dennis Quaid and Tim Allen have shown interest to star in the project. The indie aims to start shooting in the spring.

The film is said to be a comedy in which a group of hopefuls battle it out in a competition to make the PGA Tour, with both their game and their personal lives sometimes ending up in the drink along the way.

Shelton made his directorial debut more than 20 years ago with 1988‘s landmark hardball comedy Bull Durham and followed it up with the Woody Harrelson-Wesley Snipes basketball film White Men Can‘t Jump four years later.

Shelton also directed a boxing comedy Play It to the Bone. He also did a a cop comedy with Harrison Ford

called Hollywood Homicide in 2003.

MUMBAI: UK-based film producer Clive Parsons has expired. He was 66.

Oxford-educated Parsons started his film career in the legal department of Paramount Pictures in London; he then moved to Warner Bros. Europe as head of business affairs.

Parsons co-produced Tea With Mussolini and Callas Forever. He also worked on TV productions including The Queens‘ Nose and The Giblet Boys.

MUMBAI: Director Alex Holmes has been signed by XYZ Films, Time Inc Studios and producer Tamir Ardon to direct their feature film that is based on auto industry maverick John DeLorean.

The story recounts the latter years of the auto mogul‘s life when he was arrested for drug trafficking by the FBI and eventually acquitted on grounds of entrapment.

MUMBAI: The Reykjavik International Film Festival will give its ‘Honorary Award 2009‘ to director Milos Forman.

The Czech-born director‘s films include One Flew Over The Cuckoo‘s Nest, Amadeus, The People vs. Larry Flynt and Valmont, as well as earlier Czech New Wave notable works such as Black Peter, Loves Of a Blonde, and The Fireman‘s Ball.

Forman is currently working on The Ghost of Munich, about the 1938 Czech annexation meetings in Munich, in collaboration with Vaclav Havel.

The Reykjavik International Film Festival which will show a selection of his work will be held from 17 -27 September.

MUMBAI: The Cinema Exhibitors Association (CEA) in the United Kingdom is launching a funding group that will help small to medium-sized operators convert to digital technology.
The plan follows an “expression of interest” exercise that found more than 450 screens who were interested in being part of the group.

With digital transition already underway, 35mm prints will become increasingly difficult and expensive to source, particularly after the country‘s major cinema chains, have converted, it is understood.

MUMBAI: Maggie Q will co-star Paul Bettany and Cam Gigandet in a western horror film Priest that is being directed by Scott Stewart.

Adapted by Cory Goodman from a TokyoPop comic, Priest is set in a world ravaged by war between man and vampires and follows a warrior priest (Bettany) who teams with a sheriff (Gigandet) to track down a murderous band of vampires who have kidnapped his niece.

MUMBAI: Anne Dudek has been signed to co-star opposite Piper Perabo in USA Network‘s pilot Covert Affairs.”

The film centers on Annie Walker (Perabo), a multilingual CIA trainee who joins the agency while still reeling from a mysterious ex-boyfriend who appears to be of particular interest to her bosses. Dudek will play her sister.

MUMBAI: At the Locarno Film Festival‘s 2009 Open Doors Factory, Eleven Flowers, a film directed by Wang Xiaoshuai and produced by Isabelle Glachant, was awarded a grant of $46,000 (50,000 swiss francs) by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).
The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), has also given development grants to two other projects namely Bus No. 8 and Don‘t Expect Praises. The two grants were each worth $14,000 (15,000 swiss francs).

The four-day Open Doors co-production lab, which features a different filmmaking region each year, this year focused on Greater China with 12 projects selected out of 114 applications from mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

MUMBAI: The Korean Film Council (KOFIC) has announced that the country‘s entry to the Oscars best foreign language film category would be Bong Joon-ho‘s mystery thriller Mother.

The film features actress Kim Hye-ja as a mother in a rural village desperately trying to prove the innocence of her mentally-challenged son played by Won Bin when he is accused of murdering a high school girl.