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The Rough Cut Presentations section has expanded, including five additional projects from Ukraine.

IDFA Forum (November 12-15), the co-production and co-financing market of International Documentary Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), has selected its 2023 edition titles, with the likes of Aboozar Amini, Asmae El Moudir and Michael Madsen returning with their latest projects to Forum Pitch, while the Rough Cut Presentations section has expanded.

Afghanistan-born, Netherlands-based filmmaker Amini’s Kabul, City In The Wind screened at IDFA in 2018, and is now pitching Kabul, Year Zero, which threads together four vivid coming-of-age stories against the backdrop of war.

After presenting The Postcard at IDFA...

Amazon’s Comic-Con slot on Friday provided updates to for number of upcoming projects including its I Know What You Did Last Summer series.

The streamer revealed that the YA series, which is a modern take on the 1997 slasher, is set to debut in October, setting the scene for Halloween this year. The project is from py Sony Pictures Television and studio-based Original Film.

Written by Sara Goodman based on the 1973 novel by Lois Duncan, the I Know What You Did Last Summer series has the same premise as the movie adaptation – in a town full of secrets, a group of teenagers are stalked by a mysterious killer a year after a fatal accident on their graduation night.

Cast members are Madison Iseman, Brianne Tju, Ezekiel Goodman, Ashley Moore, Sebastian Amoruso, Fiona Rene, Cassie Beck, Brooke Bloom and Bill Heck. Sonya Balmores and Spencer Sutherland are set to recur.

I Know What You Did Last Summer...

An army of the undead along the U.S.-Mexico border will collide with drug lords and the American military in “Narcos vs Zombies,” a Mexican TV production coming to Amazon Prime Video in 2020.

Amazon announced “Narcos vs Zombies,” an eight-episode series that blends sci-fi, horror and action genres, will be available exclusively next year on Prime Video in more than 200 countries and territories worldwide, including Mexico and the rest of Latin America. The series is produced by Dynamo and Red Creek Productions.

The action-drama series is a Mexican production created and written by Nicolas Entel (“Pecados De Mi Padre”) and Miguel Tejada Flores and directed by Rigoberto Castañeda. Entel serves as showrunner.

“Narcos vs Zombies” stars Sergio Peris-Mencheta, Fátima Molina, Horacio García Rojas, Nery Arredondo (“Vuelven”) and Adria Morales (“La Reina Soy Yo”).

In “Narcos vs Zombies,” legendary narco kingpin Alonso Marroquín (Peris-Mencheta) escapes from a high-security Mexican prison...

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50 fabulous documentary films, covering hard politics through to music, money and films that never were...

Thanks to streaming services such as Netflix, we’ve never had better access to documentaries. A whole new audience can discover that these real life stories are just as thrilling, entertaining, and incredible as the latest big-budget blockbuster. What’s more, they’re all true too. But with a new found glut of them comes the ever more impossible choice, what’s worth your time? Below is my pick of the 50 best modern feature length documentaries.

I’ve defined modern as being from 2000 onwards, which means some of the greatest documentaries ever made will not feature here. I’m looking at you Hoop Dreams.

50. McConkey (2013)

d. Rob Bruce, Scott Gaffney, Murray Wais, Steve Winter, David Zieff

Shane McConkey was an extreme skier and Base jumper who lived life on the edge, and very much to the full.

Director: Nicolas Entel Writer(s): Nicolas Entel, Pablo Farina The titular padre -- Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar -- was gunned down by Medellín (or meddling, depending on your perspective) authorities in 1993. As the leader of the drug cartel that once controlled 80 percent of the global cocaine market, Escobar was public enemy number one (he was also known as the “World’s Greatest Outlaw”). In some circles, Escobar is regarded as the richest and most successful criminal in history (other circles claim he was the second richest criminal ever, after Amado Carrillo Fuentes). In 1989, Forbes magazine estimated Escobar’s personal fortune at $25 billion (U.S.). But all good things must come to an end... Two widely admired Colombian politicians -- Justice Minister Rodrigo Lara and presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galan -- were murdered at Escobar’s command after they vowed to shut down his drug trade. Soon, Escobar and...

A look at what's new on DVD today:

"Buried"

Directed by Rodrigo Cortes

Released by Lionsgate

"Paper Man"

Directed by Kieran and Michele Mulroney

Released by Mpi Home Video

While one can't feel too badly for the future "Green Lantern" star and People's sexiest man alive, Ryan Reynolds' two stabs at glory outside the beaten path went largely unseen, which is particularly a shame in the case of Rodrigo Cortes' "Buried," the thriller where Reynolds has no acting partner but a cell phone as a military contractor who finds himself trapped in a coffin with no knowledge of how or why he got there. A success at Sundance, Lionsgate scrapped expansion plans for the film when it didn't do well in limited release, so home video will be the first chance for many to catch it. Still, that was a considerably bigger success than "Paper Man," which snuck in...

Tonite, you've got the choice of not one, but two documentary films making their television premieres. After Venice, Telluride and Nyff premieres, PBS are wasting no time in releasing Martin Scorsese/Kent Jones documentary A Letter To Elia on American Masters [9:00-10:30 Pm/Et]. Kazan the honoree was not always so reserved and retiring. Elia Kazan the director bravely and artfully confronted some of the more pressing social issues of his time: topics such as class division, bigotry and corruption. His courage and talent behind the camera delivered some of Hollywood’s most unforgettable cinematic achievements, such as A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), On the Waterfront (1954) and East of Eden (1955). His leadership and tutelage elicited Oscar®-Winning performances from screen greats such as Vivien Leigh, Anthony Quinn, Marlon Brando and Eva Marie Saint. From the Sundance Film Festival, Nicolas Entel's Sins of My Father [HBO 9pm Et/Pt] interviews Sebastian Marroquin (formerly Juan Pablo Escobar) and his mother,...

We have the trailer as well as images in from HBO Documentary Films' "Sins of the Father." Directed and produced by Argentina- and New York-based filmmaker Nicolas Entel, "Sins of the Father" features interviews with Sebastian Marroquin (formerly Juan Pablo Escobar) and his mother, Maria Victoria, and never-before-revealed home movies, photographs and audio recordings from the Escobar family archive. Marroquin, who changed his name and fled Colombia after his father was gunned down in 1993, grapples with the impossible task of reconciling the conflicting roles of his father: the doting family man he still loves, and the stone-hearted criminal who publicly threatened his enemies and their own families. Below are still as well as the trailer. Be sure to visit the official site as well.

This blog, Latin America in Sundance, will continue to be updated at least up to the day of the World Cinema round tables January 28 which Caroline Libresco inaugurated several years ago. The focus of this blog obviously will be the selection of Latin American films from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Columbia, Cuba, Mexico, and Peru. We shall see if any creates enough of a stir - or what I consider a stir - within my purview of buying and selling (the agents surely will discover the directors and other talent without my prompting) - for a longer span of my attention. The politics of the films also interest me as Latin America is such an integral part of the USA today.

Nalip has this to say about the current state of Latino programming: "... in Nalip's 11th year, this seems worse than slow: it appears that diversity is really on a backburner.

HBO Documentary Films has secured the U.S. television rights to the provocative film "Sins of My Father." The film tells the story of the notorious Columbian drug lord Pablo Escobar through the eyes of his only son.

Sebastian Marroquin, the only son of Escobar, will break his decade-long silence, along with his mother, Maria Victoria. The two give deeply personal interviews, share never before seen pictures and home movies that lets viewers see an intimate portrait of their family's life.

Marroquin changed his name and fled Columbia after his father's death. The documentary will also see Marroquin's efforts for reconciliation with the men whose prominent political fathers were killed by Escobar 20 years ago.

The film was directed and produced by Argentinean and New York-based filmmaker Nicolas Entel. The documentary had its world premiere at the 2008 International Documentary Film Festival and opened in 25 theaters in Colombia and will premiere on...

· While late night undergoes some major changes at the hands of NBC, the rest of television's news feeds are remarkably calm this morning. One channel even has reason to celebrate -- HBO for snatching up the U.S. television rights to Sins of My Father, the prized documentary from Argentinean filmmaker Nicolas Entel about Colombia's most infamous drug lord, Pablo Escobar, as told from Escobar's son's point of view. The film premieres this month at Sundance. [THR]

Showtime picks up The Big C, NBC previews James Franco's episode of 30 Rock, and more TV Bites after the jump.

HBO has picked up the U.S. TV rights to the feature documentary "Sins of My Father," an official selection in the World Documentary competition at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival.

It is slated to premiere on the pay cable network this year, possibly in the fall.

"Sins," directed and produced by New York-based Argentinean filmmaker Nicolas Entel, tells the inside story of Pablo Escobar, the most notorious drug lord in Colombian history, through the eyes of his son, Sebastian Marroquin, who changed his name and fled Colombia after his father's death.

The documentary features interviews with Marroquin and his mother, Maria Victoria, as well as never before seen pictures and home movies from the Escobar archive. It also has Marroquin meeting the sons of prominent political figures, including Luis Carlos Galan Sarmiento, killed by Escobar and his men 20 years ago.

"Sins" took four years to make, said Entel, who came to the U.

Perhaps one of the festival's least popular sections, among the twelve selected titles in 2010's Sundance World Cinema Documentary Competition, we have seven world premieres including Jose Padiha's latest and the U.S premiere of Lixin Fan's Last Train Home - winner of the 22nd International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (Idfa). - Perhaps one of the festival's least popular sections, among the twelve selected titles in 2010's Sundance World Cinema Documentary Competition, we have seven world premieres including Jose Padiha's latest and the U.S premiere of Lixin Fan's Last Train Home - winner of the 22nd International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (Idfa). Word to publicists: please keep some screeners handy. Here are the selections: "Enemies of the People" (Cambodia-u.K.) - Directed by Rob Lemkin and Thet Sambath, which recounts the shocking revelations that ensue when a young journalist whose family was killed by the Khmer...

I feel a special bond with the Sundance Film Festival. Not because I’ve been there, but because the guy in charge of it this year, John Cooper, shares my name. Because we share this bond, I feel that I’m able to take license in referring to the man as Coop for the rest of this article.

For the annual event held in Park City, Utah from January 21-31, thousands of films are submitted and screened — this year, 3,724 films were viewed by the festival’s ten programmers. I wonder when they slept.

Coop has high hopes for the festival as a whole:

“We may even be going into a golden age for independent films, in that the technology will make it possible for the films to be made and for audiences to see them. The industry is going through a major evolutionary stage right now, there’s no doubt about that,...

Sundance Film Festival 2010 is a little over a month away and that means we can now bring you a list of the competition films that will be playing. Here you go boys and girls… enjoy!

Documentary Competition

“Blue Valentine” – Directed by Derek Cianfrance, written by Cianfrance, Cami Delavigne and Joey Curtis, a portrait of an American marriage that charts the evolution of a relationship over time. With Ryan Gosling, Michelle Williams, Mike Vogel, John Doman. “Douchebag” – Directed by Drake Doremus, written by Lindsay Stidham, Doremus, Jonathan Schwartz and Andrew Dickler, in which a man about to be married takes his younger brother on a wild goose chase to find the latter’s fifth-grade girlfriend. Features Dickler, Ben York Jones, Marguerite Moreau, Nicole Vicius, Amy Ferguson, Wendi McClendon-Covey. “The Dry Land” – Directed and written by Ryan Piers Williams, in which a returning U.S. soldier tries to reconcile his experiences overseas with his life in Texas.

Photo: Sundance Today the Sundance Institute announced the films that will be in competition at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival in both the U.S. and International dramatic and documentary categories. The festival will run from January 21-31 in Park City, Utah. There are a few changes this year as there will be no opening-night picture and the festival will take select festival films to eight cities during as the fest plays out.

Last year notable films such as this year's major Oscar contenders Precious and An Education debuted at Sundance 2009 as did audience and critical favorite (500) Days of Summer.

As for this year's crop I have highlighted a few titles among the list below in red, but I have primarily done so considering the names attached to the pictures not necessarily based on any advanced buzz I've heard around any of the films. Names to look out for include Ryan Gosling,...