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Get ready for the Honey Boys. That’s the title of the English-language version of Israeli comedy-drama Johnny and the Knights of the Galilee, which is being worked up by Tehran co-producer Paper Entertainment. The yes Studios-distributed series has already been successfully remade in France as Escort Boys.

The English-language take on the show will follow Ben, a struggling actor based in London, who returns to his hometown in Cornwall after his father’s death. His family farm is struggling and Ben and three childhood friends start an escorting business to make ends meet. What starts as a short-term fix becomes far more meaningful, rocking their pre-conceived ideas about love and sexuality.

The original Johnny and the Knights of the Galilee series was created, written and directed by Dani Rosenberg and Tom Shoval. It was made yes TV and July August Productions for Israel’s yes TV.

The French-language adaptation,...

Kibbutz Legend by late Israeli filmmaker Yahav Winner, who was killed during Hamas’ terror attack on October 7 last year, is now headed into post-production via Zoa Films and is eyeing a 2025 release.

Winner wrote and stars in the dramatic comedy opposite his widow Shay-Lee Atary who has taken on the editing process for the feature.

The film is loosely based on the couple’s own lives, giving a haunting glimpse into the Kibbutz Kfar Aza before the 2023 attacks.

It follows a struggling actor and his pregnant wife who move to a kibbutz on the Gaza border and decide to direct...

The indie market is feeling pretty good. A big film from India Kalki 2898 Ad may unseat Rrr’s North American opening weekend. June Squibb-starrer Thelma is blowing through midweek shows and stands at $3.75 million heading into week 2 steady at 1,280 theaters. Searchlight Pictures Kinds Of Kindness by Yorgos Lanthimos (Poor Things) starring Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons jumps to 500 screens from five after the best limited opening of the year last weekend.

Annie Baker’s Janet Planet from A24 goes from 2 screens to 300 and a handful of interesting indies open in limited release from Catherine Breillat‘s Last Summer to Jake Paltrow’s June Zero. Things are still quite tough but there’s room for optimism. Not clear if that will last, but it’s nice..

New: Telugu sci-fi epic Kalki 2898 Ad on 900+ screens is rivaling crossover blockbuster Rrr as distributor Prathyangira Cinemas said the film grossed $5.56 million in...

After teaming with Noah Baumbach to direct one of the best-ever documentaries about filmmaking, De Palma, Jake Paltrow is back with a new feature. June Zero is a vividly textured telling of the preparations for the 1962 execution of Adolf Eichmann through a triptych of perspectives––a Jewish Moroccan prison guard, an Israeli police investigator (and Holocaust survivor), and a clever and precocious 13-year-old Libyan immigrant. In advance of the June 28 release from Cohen Media Group, we’re pleased to exclusively reveal a series of influences the director has programmed for NYC’s Quad Cinema.

“Origin Stories: Jake Paltrow’s Notes on June Zero,” which runs June 21-27, features seven films that informed and influenced June Zero, with titles spanning humanist deep-cuts of world cinema from the likes of Miloš Forman and Abbas Kiarostami to underscreened classics of 1970s Israeli cinema. Watch the exclusive trailer for the series below, along with...

Exclusive: June Zero, the latest from writer-director Jake Paltrow and producers Oren Moverman, Miranda Bailey and David Silber, is set for theatrical release in New York on June 28, Los Angeles July 5 and nationwide July 12 by Cohen Media Group.

The film had its U.S. premiere at Film at Lincoln Center’s New York Jewish Film Festival and was an official selection at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (see Deadline review) a well as the Deauville American Film Festival, Jerusalem Film Festival, Atlanta Jewish Film Festival, Miami Jewish Film Festival, JxJ Washington Jewish Film Festival and others.

It’s set around the trial, verdict and 1962 execution of Adolf Eichmann, a principal architect of the Holocaust, revisited by Paltrow in a new and surprising way. Based on true accounts,...

Mexican directors Astrid Rondero and Fernanda Valadez’s Sujo won the Grand Prix at this year’s Sofia International Film Festival (March 13-24).

The Mexican-French-us co-production about a boy who must fight against the temptation of local gangs premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival where it won the Grand Jury Prize, and is being handled internationally by Alpha Violet.

The festival’s top prize has gone to a film from Mexico for the second year running after Carlos Eichelmann Kaiser’s Red Shoes won last year.

The international jury, presided over by Hungarian actor-writer-director Szabolcs Hadju and including outgoing EFM director Dennis Ruh,...

The Berlinale’s contentious closing ceremony on February 24 was the subject of a special session of the supervisory board of the Kulturveranstaltungen des Bundes in Berlin organisation on March 11, according to Germany’s dpa news agency.

The Kbb oversees the administration of the festival and is chaired by Claudia Roth, state minister for culture and media,

Following the meeting on March 11, the 12-person board issued its official response: “The Berlinale must remain a place that is free from hatred, incitement, antisemitism, racism, Islamophobia and all forms of misanthropy,” it stated, going on to emphasise, “the personal opinions of individual award...

Israeli filmmaker Tom Shoval has expressed his growing fears for Gaza hostage, former actor and friend David Cunio and called on the Israeli government to explore all possible ways, including a ceasefire, to secure his release and that of all the hostages.

Cunio, his wife, three kindergarten-age children, sister-in-law and her young daughter were among more than 200 people abducted by Hamas, during its brutal terror attack on Southern Israel on October 7, which killed 1,300 people.

“I try to think from which sense I need to talk. Should I be careful or brave, frontal or complex. What angle will serve the cause that is what I need right now? In the midst of disaster, I don’t need sides, right or wrong, I need action,” Shoval wrote to Deadline in a heartfelt message.

“Therefore, I will write as a human being, plain and simple, who is in the midst of a war...

Israeli actor David Cunio is believed to have been abducted by Hamas alongside his wife, 3-year-old daughters, sister-in-law and niece during Saturday’s massacre.

Cunio, who made his debut in Berlinale-premiering feature film “Youth” in 2013 alongside his twin brother Eitan Cunio, was a resident of Nir Oz, a kibbutz in Southern Israel that was the scene of some of the worst atrocities perpetrated by Palestinian terrorists.

Cunio’s brother-in-law, Aharon Aloni, told CNN that the actor woke up to the sound of bombs on Saturday morning and sought refuge in his home’s bomb shelter alongside his wife Sharon, the couple’s 3-year-old twin daughters, Sharon’s sister Danielle and her 5-year-old daughter Amelia. But after terrorists set fire to their home the family were forced to flee and have not been seen or heard from since, leading officials to believe they are among the 150 people who have been abducted into Gaza.

A growing list of 300 film professionals, including Martin Scorsese, Olivier Assayas, Joanna Hogg, and Radu Jude, have signed an open letter calling for the contract of outgoing Berlinale Artistic Director Carlo Chatrian to be reinstated and extended beyond 2024.

Late last week, Chatrian released a statement via the Berlinale website announcing his intention to step down following next year’s edition of the German festival. In his statement, Chatrian pointed to the German Ministry for Culture and Media’s decision to scrap the Berlinale’s dual management structure as the main catalyst for his departure.

Last month, German Culture Minister Claudia Roth announced that she wants the Berlinale to be placed back under the control of a single director. Roth is reported to have told a meeting on Thursday of the supervisory board of federal cultural events in Berlin (Kbb), which oversees the festival, that her conclusion was the film should be led by one person.

More than 200 international filmmakers have rallied in support of ousted Berlinale artistic director Carlo Chatrian, pledging their names to an open letter imploring the cultural organization to keep the artist director in place. Among the first signatories were Martin Scorsese, Paul Schrader, Joanna Hogg, “Corsage” director Marie Kreutzer, Andrew Ross Perry, and Olivier Assayas. Over the course of the day on Wednesday, another 130 directors joined them, the list swelling to include M. Night Shyamalan, Ryusuke Hamaguchi, Tilda Swinton, and Claire Denis. 260 filmmakers have now signed the open letter.

“We, a diverse group of filmmakers from all over the world, who have deep respect for Berlin International Film Festival as a place for great cinema of all kinds, protest the harmful, unprofessional, and immoral behavior of state minister Claudia Roth in forcing the esteemed Artistic Director Carlo Chatrian to step down despite promises to prolong his contract,” says the letter.

Chatrian...

Martin Scorsese, Radu Jude, Joanna Hogg, Claire Denis, Bertrand Bonello, M. Night Shyamalan, Kristen Stewart, Hamaguchi Ryusuke and Margarethe von Trotta are among the international filmmakers and talents who have signed an open letter in support of Carlo Chatrian whose mandate as artistic director of the Berlinale will come to an end next year. The number of signatories has now exceeded 400 names and keeps growing.

As we reported last week, Chatrian had been expected to stay on beyond 2024, and was surprised to learn that the German body which oversees the festival, Kulturveranstaltungen des Bundes in Berlin (Kbb), announced that it would no extend his contract. The org had previously said it would abandon the model of having an executive director and an artistic director and return instead to having a single director, following the next edition. The festival’s executive director Mariëtte Rissenbeek will also be leaving her post after the next edition.

Welcome to Deadline’s International Disruptors, a feature where we’ll shine a spotlight on key executives and companies outside of the U.S. shaking up the offshore marketplace. This week, we’re talking with German indie producer Sol Bondy of One Two Films. Bondy, whose credits include Angry Indian Goddesses and The Tale, most recently produced Iranian crime thriller Holy Spider which is Denmark’s submission to the 2023 Academy Awards and he tells us how challenging it was to get this impactful project off the ground.

A few days after Ali Abbasi’s second directorial effort Border premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2018, Danish producer Jacob Jarek approached Sol Bondy to co-produce the Iranian helmer’s next project Holy Spider. Jarek, who had produced Abbasi’s debut feature Shelley, had previously worked with Bondy on Icelandic titles Under the Tree and The County and with beguiling body horror...

Mediawan’s newly launched banner StoryNation Productions label is kicking off with a pair of internationally driven shows based on hit IP’s, “Escort Boys” and “Hot Ones.”

The company was created last year by two well-established producers, Charlotte Toledano Detaille and Jean-Paul Géronimi who both previously worked at Lagardere Studios which is now part of Mediawan.

Ordered by Amazon Prime Video, “Escort Boys” marks the TV debut of Ruben Alves, the filmmaker of the “Gilded Cage” and “Miss.” StoryNation is producing the series with Myriam Gharbi de Vasselot at Oberkampf Productions, another Mediawan group label.

“Escort Boys” is loosely based on the Israeli series “Johnny and the Knights of the Galilee,” produced by Yes Studios, and by created by Dani Rosenberg and Tom Shoval.

The anticipated six-part French adaptation shot in the South of France with a cast of up-and-comers and fresh faces including Guillaume Labbé, Thibaut Evrard, Simon Ehrlacher,...

Exclusive: Cohen Media Group has acquired North American distribution rights to June Zero, writer-director Jake Paltrow’s historical drama about the last days of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann.

The distribution deal was negotiated by Robert Aaronson, Cohen Media Group Senior Vice President, and CAA Media Finance. Films Boutique is representing International rights for the film at the American Film Market.

June Zero, shot in Israel and Ukraine, is set in 1962 Israel, where, after an emotional public trial, Adolf Eichmann – one of the key architects of the Holocaust – has been tried and sentenced to death for crimes against humanity and crimes against the Jewish people. The film explores the experiences of three characters involved in the nation-defining event: David, a precocious 13-year-old Libyan factory worker; Haim, Eichmann’s main prison guard, tasked with protecting this dead man walking; and Micha, a police investigator for the prosecution, on his first trip...

For director Ofir Raul Graizer, everything changed in Karlovy Vary. In 2017, the Israeli filmmaker brought his feature debut “The Cakemaker” to the Czech film festival, entering the spa town an unknown and leaving a rising star.

If the route that carried Graizer to his Karlovy Vary world premiere was dotted with eight years of false starts and rejection letters from international film funds, after the romantic drama received an historic 12-minute ovation – so ardent that people still talk about it until this day – Graizer’s path forward was set. Not only would “The Cakemaker” sweep Israel’s Ophir Awards (thus becoming that country’s Oscar submission), the film’s galvanizing reception opened new doors into the European industry.

And so, when Graizer’s more ambitious follow-up “America” made its world premiere at this year’s Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, the project did so as the first Israeli-German-Czech co-production, carried...

Set around the infamous trial of Adolf Eichmann, the architect of the mass extermination of Jews during World War II, Jake Paltrow’s latest film, “June Zero,” follows three characters on the periphery of history. The film follows a teenage Libyan immigrant named David, a Moroccan prison guard named Hiyam, and a Polish survivor of Auschwitz who became the chief interrogator at Eichmann’s trial, Micha. As each character finds their lives intertwined in the same strand of history in the making, Paltrow examines the very nature of history itself.

Continue reading ‘June Zero’: Jake Paltrow & Tom Shoval On Reexamining The History Of A Notorious Nazi Criminal Trial [Karlovy Vary Interview] at The Playlist.

Jake Paltrow has been spending the Independence Day holiday weekend in the Czech Republic for the world premiere of his Adolf Eichmann drama June Zero, which had a special screening at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.

The Hebrew-language feature unfolds in the lead-up to the Nazi war criminal’s hanging in Israel in May 1962, as debate raged in the country over whether his death sentence should be upheld. At the end of this story you can watch an exclusive first-look clip from the film.

June Zero is the New York-based director’s fourth feature after the documentary De Palma and fiction works Young Ones and The Good Night.

Paltrow (brother of Oscar winner Gwyneth) started digging into the events surrounding this key moment in Israeli history after coming across a detail on how the authorities secretly ordered the construction of a portable cremation oven to incinerate Eichmann’s body...

However many books and movies take it as their subject, a historical travesty on the incomprehensible scale of the Holocaust must always contain within it an uncountable number of untold stories. Given this wealth of untapped dramatic potential, it’s all the more perplexing that American director Jake Paltrow should choose to refer to his family’s Jewish heritage (the Paltrows have Belarusian and Polish Jewish ancestry) with “June Zero,” a polished, well-performed but thinly stretched attempt to communicate the seismic impact of Adolf Eichmann’s 1962 execution on Israeli society. Though it occasionally brushes up against intricate ideas about memory and memorialization — who gets to be commemorated, who must not, and the genesis of the ‘never forget’ ethos — “June Zero” itself leaves a quickly fading impression.

The film’s status as an Israeli prestige project is signalled by the involvement of the Israeli Ministry For Culture and Sport and The...

Jake Paltrow directs and co-writes June Zero, an unusual account of the death of Adolf Eichmann that’s screening at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.

Opening immediately after the verdict of his trial, it shows the impact of the Holocaust criminal’s 1962 execution on three very different characters: a boy, a prison guard and a police investigative officer. Shot on super-16mm in Israel and Ukraine, it’s Paltrow’s first foreign-language production after features including The Good Night and Young Ones.

The decision to use the Hebrew language was fueled by Paltrow’s co-writer Tom Shoval, and it gives the film an authentic flavor. The choice to open it with an adolescent boy, David, adds a sense of nostalgia and warmth that might seem surprising given the subject matter.

Newcomer Noam Ovadia puts in a charming performance as the lively young Libyan who gains work at an oven factory in Israel,...

“The Good Night” helmer Jake Paltrow returns to Karlovy Vary Intl. Film Festival with “June Zero,” his first foreign-language production. In the film – picked up for sales by ICM Partners and Films Boutique – he takes a closer look at the trial and execution of Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann, hanged in Israel in 1962.

“My father [television and film director and producer Bruce Paltrow, who died in 2002] was a World War II history obsessive. Some of my earliest memories of watching television are of ‘The World at War,’ which later became something we watched together every year. It was all deeply rooted in his Jewishness,” Paltrow tells Variety ahead of the film’s world premiere.

It was never his intention to focus solely on Eichmann, however, or the much-publicized trial, even though he still finds it “relevant and intriguing,” he says.

“I find it uninteresting and problematic to try and make a ‘character’ out of him. We’ve...

Films Boutique and ICM Partners have launched sales on Jake Paltrow’s upcoming drama June Zero, with Films Boutique handling international rights and ICM overseeing distribution in North America.

Paltrow’s first foreign-language production explores true stories surrounding the execution of Holocaust organizer Adolf Eichmann in 1962 Israel, through three characters intimately involved in the nation-defining event: David, a precocious 13-year-old Libyan factory worker looking to belong; Haim, Eichmann’s main prison guard, tasked with protecting this dead man walking; and the Police Investigative officer of the Eichmann trial, Micha, on his first trip back to Poland since surviving Auschwitz-Birkenau, where he tries to make sense of the future of the Jewish homeland’s soul post-execution.

Shot on Super-16mm film in Israel and Ukraine under strict Covid regulations, June Zero was written by Paltrow and Tom Shoval. Miranda Bailey (God’s Country), David Silber (Incitement) and Emmy winner Oren Moverman (Bad Education) produced,...

Jake Paltrow’s forthcoming feature film “June Zero” has been picked up for sales by ICM Partners in North America and Films Boutique for the rest of world.

Written by Paltrow and Tom Shoval, “June Zero” explores true stories surrounding the 1962 execution of Adolf Eichmann — one of the key architects of the Holocaust — in Israel through three characters intimately involved in the nation-defining event: David, a precocious thirteen-year-old Libyan factory worker looking to belong; Haim, Eichmann’s main prison guard, tasked with protecting this dead man walking; and the Police Investigative officer of the Eichmann trial, Micha, on his first trip back to Poland since surviving Auschwitz-Birkenau — where he tries to make sense of the future of the Jewish homeland’s soul post-execution.

“June Zero” was shot on Super-16mm film in Israel and Ukraine under strict Covid-19 regulations, and represents writer-director Paltrow’s first foreign language production. The filmmaker...

Period tragicomedy “Blackport,” backed by Icelandic public broadcaster Ruv and European network Arte, won top honors on Thursday at leading European TV festival Series Mania taking its Grand Prize.

The biggest plaudit at Lille’s Series Mania represents the festival’s second prize for the series after it awarded it best pitch kudos at the Berlinale Co-Pro Series in 2018.

“Blackport” represents a deep-dive into recent Icelandic history, kicking off in 1983 as a quota system is introduced in Iceland to protect fish stock, with ships being granted fishing rights based on their most recent three-year history.

Half family saga, half tragic farce, “Blackport” records how Harpa, a village council secretary builds a local fishing empire in a stunning western fjord but at an ever larger cost as the decade plays out.

Shot on location and based on true fact, “Blackport” oozes two of the calling cards of contemporary drama series: a...

All Eyes Off Me and Shake Your Cares Away shared the prize for best Israeli film.

Finnish director Juho Kousmanen’s Compartment No. 6 has won the best international prize at the Jerusalem Film Festival (Jff), with Hadas Ben-Aroya’s All Eyes Off Me and Tom Shoval’s Shake Your Cares Away sharing the award for best Israeli film.

The awards will be presented in-person before selected screenings tonight and tomorrow (September 2-3), with the total sum of the awards at this year’s festival approximately 1,000,000 Ils.

Compartment No. 6 premiered in competition at Cannes and is about a Finnish woman and...

The Jerusalem Film Festival has named the winners from its various competition strands this year, with Juho Kuosmanen’s Finnish drama Compartment No. 6 winning Best Film in the international competition.

“Compartment No. 6 is a cross-cultural road movie – entertaining, clever, and remarkably endearing. This is free cinema, released from confinements, where an entire world exists within a cramped train car and where impossible connections are forged between people from different borders and cultures,” said the jury, which was comprised of Ari Folman, Nili Feller and Shai Goldman. A special mention was also given to Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s Flee.

Compartment No. 6 previously shared the Grand Prix in Cannes Competition with Asghar Farhadi’s A Hero.

Elsewhere, in Jerusalem’s First Feature Competition, Amalia Ulman’s El Planeta won the Gwff Award for Best First Feature.

In the the Spirit of Freedom Competition, the Cummings Award for best Feature Film went to...

13 feature-length films will participate in the two Israeli Film Competitions.

Ari Folman’s animated title Where Is Anne Frank will open the 38th Jerusalem Film Festival (August 24-September 4), which has also selected 13 feature films for its two Israeli Film Competitions.

Where Is Anne Frank premiered as an out of competition title at Cannes last month. It follows the imaginary friend to whom Second World War diarist Anne Frank dedicated her writing, as she embarks on a journey across Europe to find Anne, who she believes is still alive.

Wild Bunch holds worldwide sales rights on the title; it will play...

The Jerusalem Film Festival is gearing up for a late August start, with celebrated Cannes title “Where is Anne Frank?” set to open the 38th edition of the fest.

Directed by Ari Folman, the animated film centres on Kitty, Anne Frank’s imaginary friend whom her diary was addressed to, who magically comes to life at the family home in Amsterdam and sets out on a quest to find her.

“Where is Anne Frank?” will kick off the festival at the Sultans Pool Amphitheatre, to an audience of 5,000, on Aug. 24. The event runs through to Sept. 4.

Elsewhere, the festival has also revealed its line-up of Israeli films. Altogether, 13 feature films will play in the two main Israeli film competitions. The total sum of prizes that will be awarded in the various festival competitions is Nis 1 million.

The Haggiag Competition for Israeli feature films will include Hadas Ben-Aroya’s “All Eyes Off Me...

The treaty is expected to come into effect by the end of the year.

Russia is set to sign a bilateral co-production agreement with Israel, it was announced at Key Buyers Event: Digital (June 8-10), the audiovisual content market organised by Russian state film body Roskino.

Speaking at a panel on co-production opportunities on Tuesday (June 8), Leonid Demchenko, head of the documentaries and animation cinema department at the Ministry of Culture and Russia’s Eurimages representative said: “I know that there is a need for this treaty and Israeli producers want to cooperate with us. Hopefully, the treaty will come...

Film is a contemporary remake of 1970s French comedy The Toy by Francis Veber.

Wild Bunch International (Wbi) has boarded sales on director James Huth’s comedy The New Toy, co-starring Daniel Auteuil and Jamel Debbouze.

A remake of Francis Veber’s 1976 comedy The Toy, it revolves around a journalist who becomes the plaything of the son of his newspaper baron boss but uses the situation to open the young boy’s eyes to the fact that money can’t buy everything.

A 1982 US remake directed by Richard Donner and starring Richard Pryor as the journalist was a hit at the box office,...

French Argentine actor Bérénice Bejo discussed her early career, breaking into French cinema and starring in a silent film, as part of the 2020 Sarajevo Film Festival masterclass series, hosted by Variety Streaming Room.

The conversation and subsequent audience Q&a, moderated by film critic Peter Debruge, covered the actor’s performance in “After Love” and “The Artist,” as well as advice for aspiring filmmakers.

Bejo made her screen debut through a newspaper advertisement in 1998. She called director Abdelkrim Bahlo’s number in her local paper and auditioned over the phone for her role in “Les Soeurs Hamlet.” Since her early 20s, Bejo has starred in over 50 films and two theatrical productions.

“For me, it was always onscreen. Every Saturday, [my dad] would show us like critics and decide what we will see, so while my friends were watching TV or things like that, I was not allowed to watch. I was watching John Wayne,...

Director Michel Hazanavicius and actress Bérénice Bejo, Oscar winner and Oscar nominee respectively for “The Artist,” will present individual Masterclasses at the 26th Sarajevo Film Festival this year. Also delivering Masterclasses are directors Michel Franco and Rithy Panh.

The Masterclasses, which like the rest of the festival are running online via ondemand.sff.ban, are organized in cooperation with Variety, and will be available worldwide via the Variety Streaming Room.

Hazanavicius shot his first feature-length film, “Mes Amis,” in 1999. In 2006, he directed his second feature, “Oss 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies,” and then, three years later, “Oss 17: Lost in Rio.”

In 2011, he made “The Artist,” the silent, black-and-white film starring Bejo and Jean Dujardin, which won five Academy Awards in 2012, including best film, director and actor for Dujardin, while Bejo was an Oscar nominee for supporting actress.

The film premiered at Cannes, as did Hazanavicius’ “The Players” and “Redoubtable.

Project awarded “White Mirror Award” at the 2019 Torino Script Lab.

French production company 5a7 Films is joining forces with Berlin-based One Two Films to co-produce Swiss writer/director Sarah Arnold’s debut feature Wild Encounters.

The project just received $33,300 development funding from the German-French co-production fund Mini-Traite backed by Ffa and Cnc.

The team is aiming to shoot in 2021.

The project had already received funding from the Region Grand Est and Grand Region and was awarded the new White Mirror Award at the 2019 Torino Script Lab. The project also participated in the Full Circle Lab – Upper Rhine, where Arnold and...

Benoit Delépine and Gustave Kervern’s eighth joint feature won the Berlinale’s special Silver Bear this year.

Wild Bunch has secured a slew of sales on French directorial duo Benoit Delépine and Gustave Kervern’s comedy Delete History, which won the Berlinale’s special Silver Bear this year.

Deals tied up at the Berlinale’s European Film Market include to France (Ad Vitam), Benelux (September Film), Switzerland (Pathé), Germany (X Verleih), Spain (La Aventura Audiovisual), Italy (Officine Ubu), Portugal (Apm), Sweden (Njutafilms), ex-Yugoslavia (McF), Hungary (Cirko Film), Czech Republic (Film Europe) and Baltics (A-One).

Outside of Europe, it sold...

Company brings 10 recent sales acquisitions to the market also including feature animation The Summit Of The Gods.

Wild Bunch has boarded sales on Italian director Michele Placido’s upcoming drama Caravaggio’s Shadow, exploring the tempestuous life of the 17th-century painter.

It revolves around a secret Vatican investigation into Caravaggio, ordered by Pope Paul V as he debates whether to grant the artist clemency for murdering a love rival.

Riccardo Scamarcio plays Caravaggio opposite Louis Garrel as the investigator – known as The Shadow. Isabelle Huppert also features as a noblewoman who was a steadfast protector of the artist, hiding him...

The new company will produce films and TV dramas aimed at the international market.

Global production company Sweetshop and expanding Israeli company Green Productions are joining forces to launch a new Australia and New Zealand-based outfit, called Sweetshop & Green.

The new company, which will become fully operational in October, will produce films and TV dramas aimed at the international market.

Sharlene George, founding partner and global executive producer of Sweetshop, co-heads the joint venture with Israeli producer Gal Greenspan, co-founder and CEO of Green Productions. Both take the title of joint managing director.

Veteran Israeli producer Moshe Edery, president and...

Sol Bondy’s Berlin-based One Two Films has boarded Iranian helmer Rafi Pitts’ latest film, “Random Star Suicide,” produced by French shingle Les Films du Worso and set to shoot next year.

After 2016’s “Soy Nero,” Pitts again examines Americans living on the margins of society in a story that follows a young black man and a working-class veteran whose lives and destinies cross.

One Two Films is continuing its focus on international and English-language productions as it recalibrates following the recent exit of longtime partner Jamila Wenske. The company has a new office in Berlin and a slew of projects in the works as it seeks to broaden its reach as an international co-producer specialized in Germany’s soft money incentives.

One Two Films partnered with Denmark’s Profile Pictures on Grimur Hakonarson’s Icelandic drama “The County,” which premieres in Toronto’s Contemporary World Cinema section, and the...

Bondy will continue to run the company.

Jamila Wenske and Sol Bondy, founders and managing partners of German production outfit One Two Films, have decided to part ways.

Bondy will continue to run the company with investor and partner Christoph Lange. Fred Burle, One Two Films’ project manager since 2017, has started working on his own projects as a producer, reporting to Bondy.

Wenske will take her projects with her to Achtung Panda!, the Berlin-based production outfit she is joining as managing director. More details about her role at Achtung Panda! will be revealed soon.

One Two Films has made a...

Bondy will continue to run the company.

Jamila Wenske and Sol Bondy, founders and managing partners of German production outfit One Two Films, have decided to part ways.

Bondy will continue to run the company with investor and partner Christoph Lange. Fred Burle, One Two Films’ project manager since 2017, has started working on his own projects as a producer, reporting to Bondy.

Wenske will take her projects with her to Achtung Panda!, the Berlin-based production outfit she is joining as managing director. More details about her role at Achtung Panda! will be revealed soon.

One Two Films has made a...

Prizes go to Mihal Brezis and Oded Binnun’s Dead Language and Maya Dreifuss’ Highway 65.

Dead Language by husband-and-wife filmmakers Mihal Brezis and Oded Binnun clinched the new $18,000 Jerusalem Foundation Award at the 14th edition of Jerusalem Film Festival’s (Jff) Pitch Point event, established to connect Israeli filmmakers with international partners.

The story follows a 27-year-old woman who, while waiting for her husband at the airport, ends up driving a complete stranger to his hotel after he mistakes her for his assigned driver – a random, short-lived encounter that shakes up her life.

It is Brezis and Binnun’s second...

The Israeli cinema veteran is stepping down at the end of the year.

Renen Schorr has just enjoyed his last edition of the Cannes Film Festival in his role as director of the prestigious Sam Spiegel School for Cinema and Television in Jerusalem, which he has spearheaded over the past 30 years.

The Israeli cinema industry veteran announced his departure in the Israeli press on the eve of the festival and is now on a swansong tour.

“I will be stepping down from the school in five months’ time, around November, December time,” Schorr told Screen. ”Until then I am working...

Jamila Wenske and Sol Bondy’s Berlin-based One Two Films, co-producer of this year’s Efm buzz title “Persian Lessons,” has scored another early winner with comedy-drama “Franky Five Star.”

The project, from writer-director Birgit Möller, won the Junior Entertainment Talent Slate (Jets) pitching competition at the Berlin Film Festival on Tuesday, securing it industry support from a broad range of international participants.

“Franky Five Star” stars Jella Haase, who shot to fame in the “Fack ju Göhte” franchise, as a young woman dealing with her often meddling multiple personalities as she navigates a blossoming romance.

The Jets initiative, organized by William Peschek’s German-u.K. group Wep Films, unites up-and-coming filmmakers and their feature film projects with producers, sales agents, financing companies and distributors from Germany, Canada, Ireland, Britain, Finland, Norway and the U.S.

This year the 13-member Jets jury, which included Sophie Green of Bankside Films; Antonio Exacoustos of Arri Media Intl.

Rosa Attab

Producer, Why Not Productions

Although she likes to keep a low profile, Attab is a key producer at Parisian outfit Why Not Prods., where she works with top filmmakers such as Cristian Mungiu, Arnaud Desplechin and Jacques Audiard, whose latest film “The Sisters Brothers” played at Venice and will screen next at Toronto. Attab’s first experience as a full-on producer was on Lynne Ramsay’s “You Were Never Really Here,” which world premiered in competition at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival and won prizes for actor (Joaquin Phoenix) and screenplay. Attab is developing an English-language feature with BAFTA-nominated helmer Yann Demange, who recently directed “White Boy Rick,” which unspooled at Telluride, and the feature debut of actor Samir Guesmi (“The Returned”).

Stephanie Bermann (pictured center)

Co-Founder, Domino Films

Bermann founded Domino Films with Alexis Dulguerian six years ago after heading acquisitions at leading independent distribution company Mars Films for eight years.

Berlin-based One Two Films, co-producer of such recent high-profile works as Jennifer Fox’s “The Tale” and Isabel Coixet’s “The Bookshop,” is set to follow its winning run with a slew of upcoming German and international productions.

One Two Films’ Jamila Wenske and Sol Bondy are partnering with Canadian writer-producer Mike MacMillan on two English-language films currently in development. “I Will Not Go Quietly” centers on a distant but desperate father who travels from Toronto to Switzerland to reach his ill daughter; the film is penned by MacMillan and Darragh McDonald. “Nightlife” is a comedy set in Berlin.

In addition, the company is co-producing Icelandic director Grimur Hakonarson’s recently wrapped “The County.” The film, which follows his 2015 Cannes Un Certain Regard award winner “Rams,” is a co-production by Iceland, Denmark, Germany, and France.

Wenske and Bondy — selected by Variety for its 2018 10 Producers to Watch list — are re-teaming with...

Massoud Bakhshi’s Yalda wins two prizes at the event.

Production awards worth more than €470,000 were handed out at the 2016 TorinoFilmLab Meeting Event (Nov 23-25), held within the Torino Film Festival.

Three films were awarded Tfl co-production awards worth €50,000 each; Danielle Lessovitz’s Port Authority; Maya Da-Rin’s The Fever and Massoud Bakhshi’s Yalda.

Yalda also took home the audience award, voted for by attendees at event, worth €30,000.

Tehran-born Bakhshi’s feature debut, A Respectable Family, premiered at Cannes in 2012.

The international jury, which was chaired by the Venice Film Festival’s Artistic Director Alberto Barbera, also awarded production awards worth €40,000 each to three films; The Guest by Duccio Chiarini; The Orphanage by Shahrbanoo Sadat and The Staffroom by Sonja Tarokić.

New award

A new prize this year was the Lago development award, worth €5000, which went to Jan-Ole Gerster’s Imperium.

Apprentice by Boo Junfeng, Felicity by Alain Gomis, Jesús by [link...

Exclusive: One Two Films duo have joined the Icelandic-Polish-Danish co-pro from director Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurdsson.

Sol Bondy and Jamila Wenske’s Berlin-based One Two Films, recently a co-producer on Finnish hit The Happiest Day In The Life of Olli Maki [pictured], has joined Icelandic-Polish-Danish co-production Under The Tree.

Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurdsson (Paris Of The North, Either Way) directs the film, which is produced by Iceland’s Netop Films, Poland’s Madants and Denmark’s Profile. One Two Films joins the project alongside Zdf/Arte, under commissioning editor Holger Stern.

Backing also comes from the Nordisk TV & Film Fond, The Icelandic Film Centre, Danish Film Institute and Polish Film Institute.

“We are happy to have found strong partners in Germany,“ said producer Grimar Jonsson, whose credits include Rams. “One Two Films have been part of some very interesting European co-productions and Zdf/Arte is a great stamp of approval for our project.“

“We are happy...

Matan Yair’s Scaffolding [pictured] and Keren Yedaya’s Red Fields were among the winners at the 11th edition of the event.

The winners of the 11th edition of Pitch Point at Jerusalem Film Festival (July 7-17) have been revealed, with Matan Yair’s Scaffolding taking the $5,200 Van Leer Award.

The drama depicts a 17-year-old student whose life is thrown into turmoil when his literature teacher and role model commits suicide.

The jury, which included Dylan Leiner of Sony Pictures Classics, Vanessa Saal of Protagonist Pictures and Remi Burah of Arte France Cinema, commended the project for its “passion and inspiration” that will help it “cross all borders”. The film already has support from the Israeli Film Fund and the Polish Film Institute and was produced by Gal Greenspan, whose previous projects include Tom Shoval’s Youth.

Read: Pitch Point in focus

The event, aimed at connecting Israeli productions with international partners, presented the $17,000 Cinelab...

Exclusive: Shoval [pictured] was mentored by Iñárritu on the set of The Revenant.

Oscar-winning director Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu has boarded Israeli film-maker Tom Shoval’s second film Shake Your Cares Away as one of the film’s producers. The film revolves around Alma, a wealthy heiress with a crazy philanthropic streak who takes her charitable work to unconventional extremes when she moves to Israel from Paris.

French actress Bérénice Bejo has signed to play Alma and is studying Hebrew in preparation for the film, which is due to shoot between Paris and Israel in the second half of 2017. “I told her I am searching to cast the soul of my character, Alma, and to my good luck I found it in her,” said Shoval. “I can’t wait for our collaboration.”

Mexican film-maker Iñárritu mentored Shoval as part of the Rolex Mentors and Protégés Arts Initiative. He ended up supporting Shoval and his brother Dan as they co-wrote...

Exclusive: Shoval [pictured] was mentored by Inarritu on the set of The Revenant.

Oscar-winning director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu has boarded Israeli film-maker Tom Shoval’s second film Shake Your Cares Away as one of the film’s producers. The film revolves around Alma, a wealthy heiress with a crazy philanthropic streak who takes her charitable work to unconventional extremes when she moves to Israel from Paris.

French actress Bérénice Bejo has signed to play Alma and is studying Hebrew in preparation for the film, which is due to shoot between Paris and Israel in the second half of 2017. “I told her I am searching to cast the soul of my character, Alma, and to my good luck I found it in her,” said Shoval. “I can’t wait for our collaboration.”

Mexican film-maker Inarritu mentored Shoval as part of the Rolex Mentors and Protégés Arts Initiative. He ended up supporting Shoval and his brother Dan as they co-wrote...

Mentors include Israel Film Fund executive director Katriel Schory and film director Thanos Anastopoulos.Scroll down for the nine projects

The TorinoFilmlab has revealed the nine projects that will take part in the 2016 edition of FrameWork, the initiative’s flagship lab for first and second feature film projects.

Amongst the first and second-time filmmakers is Iranian director Massoud Bakhshi, whose first feature A Respectable Family debuted in Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes in 2012, and Israeli director Tom Shoval, whose 2013 drama Youth was named best Israeli feature at the 2013 Jerusalem Film Festival.

This year’s mentors include Israel Film Fund executive director Katriel Schory, script consultants Franz Rodenkirchen, Marietta von Hausswolff von Baumgarten and Anita Voorham, film director Thanos Anastopoulos, cinematographer Marko Brdar, post-production expert Niko Remus, producer Didar Domehri, acting coach and casting director Tatiana Vialle, sound designer Peter Albrechtsen and film promotion consultant Joanna Solecka.

The first session will take place in Izola (Slovenia) from May 30 to...