News

In a move that promises to create a new indie production powerhouse in Belgium, Caviar, the company behind The Sound Of Metal, War Pony and The Rider, has taken 45% of the shares of leading Belgian outfit Versus Production and its two sister companies Inver Invest and O’Brother Distribution.

The remaining 55% of the shares will stay in the hands of Versus founder Jacques-Henri Bronckart. Together, the aim is to develop larger-scale, international-facing projects across film and television.

Founded in 1999, Versus is one of Belgium’s most respected production outfits, known for its work with directors like Bouli Lanners and Joachim Lafosse...

Amazon Prime Video has set the launch date and unveiled art for Mélanie Laurent’s upcoming heist romance “Freedom” (“Libre”) starring Lucas Bravo (“Emily in Paris”).

The movie, which will launch exclusively on Prime Video on Nov. 1 across more than 240 countries, reteams the streamer and the acclaimed actor-turned-filmmaker following “The Mad Women’s Ball” which world premiered at Toronto Film Festival in 2019.

Based on a true story of a renowned French gangster of the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, “Freedom” stars Bravo as Bruno Sulak, a highly charming criminal à la Arsène Lupin who orchestrated daring heists without firing a single shot. The film also charts Sulak’s cat-and-mouse game with George Moréas (Yvan Attal), a tenacious police commissioner, as well as his numerous escapes from prison and relationship with lover Annie, who is played by newcomer Léa Luce Busato.

Thomas Dubois, head of French originals at Amazon Studios, said working...

The Fantasia International Film Festival returns with its 28th edition from July 18 through August 4, 2024, returning to the Concordia Hall and J.A. de Sève cinemas, with additional screens and events at Montreal’s Cinémathèque québécoise and Cinéma du Musée. The second wave of programming has been unveiled, adding even more genre premieres to an already packed slate.

Come To Daddy director Ant Timpson‘s Bookworm (starring Elijah Wood and Evil Dead Rise‘s Nell Fisher) is the fest’s 2024 Opening Film. Fantasia is also hosting the World Premieres of the dark fantasy The Beast Within, starring “Game of Thrones” actor Kit Harington, Cannes’ hit The Count of Monte-Cristo, and more. The festival is also giving their Canadian Trailblazer Award to Vincenzo Natali, to be presented before the premiere of the new 4K restoration of his 1997 classic Cube.

The second wave of titles, from the press release:

Bookworm

Fantasia’s 28th...

Mallory Wanecque, the breakout actor of “The Worst Ones” who headlines Cannes competition title “Beating Hearts,” is starring alongside Sami Bouajila (“Through the Fire”) in “Vultures,” a thriller directed by Peter Dourountzis (“Rascal”).

Produced by Mediawan-owned 24-25 Films (“Black Box”), “Vultures” is represented internationally by Ginger & Fed, the new international film sales arm of Federation Studios headed by former TF1 Studio boss Sabine Chemaly. The cast is completed by Sami Bouajila (“Through the Fire”), Jean-Pierre Darroussin (“All Your Faces”), Pierre Lottin (“The Night of the 12th”) and Valerie Donzelli (“Declaration of War”).

“Vultures” will be delivered during the second quarter of 2025. Bouajila stars as Samuel, a journalist who partners with his intern daughter Ava to cover the brutal murder of a young girl that lead them to a male supremacist group headed by the enigmatic Nemesis. The movie marks Dourountzis’ follow-up to “Rascal,” an edgy film starring Pierre Deladonchamps as an outsider-turned-killer.

Studiocanal has unveiled an exclusive first-look still of Matt Dillon and Anamaria Vartolomei (“Happening”) starring as Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider in Jessica Palud’s movie “Maria,” which is slated to bow at the Cannes Film Festival.

Palud’s film sheds light on the tragic life of Maria Schneider, who starred opposite Marlon Brando in Bernardo Bertolucci’s “The Last Tango in Paris” at the age of 19 and never recovered from the shoot. The film depicts how Schneider was imposed an un-simulated rape scene on the set of “The Last Tango in Paris” by Bertolucci and Brando.

“Maria,” the only movie directed by a female filmmaker that’s set for Cannes Premiere, is based on “Tu t’appelais Maria Schneider,” a book written by Vanessa Schneider, the actress’ cousin. Haut et Court, the banner behind the Cesar-winning movie “The Night of the 12th,” will release “Maria” in French theaters on...

France’s mk2 Films will kick off sales in Cannes for Caroline Poggi and Jonathan Vinel’s apocalyptic teen adventure Eat The Night, set to world premiere in Directors’ Fortnight.

The second feature from the directing duo following 2019 debut Jessica Forever is set in the French city of Le Havre and follows a small-time dealer and his teenage sister who share an obsession with an online video game. When one sibling’s reckless choices provoke the wrath of a dangerous rival gang, their virtual life and reality collide.

It is produced by Thomas Verhaeghe and Mathieu Verhaeghe of France’s Atelier de Production,...

Mediawan Rights has boarded “Kabul,” a highly anticipated thriller series produced by France’s 24 25 Films and Cinétévé.

Shervin Alenabi (“Tehran”) and “Euphoria’s” Eric Dane (in a small role) have joined the international cast of the show, which already comprises Jonathan Zaccaï (“Le bureau des legendes”), Thibault Evrard (“The Night of the 12th”), Vassilis Kukalawi (“Kandahar”), Jeanne Goursaud (“Pax Massilia”), Gianmarco Saurino (“L’estate piu Calda”) and Valentina Cervi (“Medici: Masters of Florence”).

The series, set against the backdrop of U.S. troops’ withdrawal from Afghanistan and Taliban’s sweep to power, just started filming on April 1. Mediawan Rights will introduce the gripping series project to international buyers at upcoming markets, and is handling worldwide distribution with the participation of Entourage.

“Kabul” explores the chaotic evacuation of various characters, from diplomats to soldiers to civilians, who desperately seek refuge and solidarity in a country in crisis, with the arrival of the Taliban in Kabul.

David Thion, the French producer of Justine Triet’s best picture contender “Anatomy of a Fall,” is preparing a raft of projects helmed by daring female directors including Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet (“Anais in Love”) and Emily Atef (“More Than Ever”).

Speaking to Variety ahead of the Oscars, Thion said he and Marie-Ange Luciani, who also produced “Anatomy of a Fall,” have also signed Triet for her next movie, the topic of which hasn’t been decided yet.

“Justine has devoted herself fully to the awards campaign for ‘Anatomy of a Fall’ and she hasn’t had time to decide what her next film will be, but she has a few ideas,” Thion said. He added that Triet’s next film will likely be “mainly shot in French, but could have an Anglo-Saxon actress as the lead.”

Bourgeois-Tacquet, who made her feature debut with “Anais in Love,” which premiered at Cannes’ Critics Week,...

The life of Rosa Bonheur, a trailblazing feminist and artist who rose to fame in 19th century France, will be played by Melanie Laurent in a sprawling period movie directed by Fabienne Berthaud.

“Rosa Bonheur” is being produced by Carole Scotta, Barbara Letellier and Caroline Benjo at Haut et Court, the company behind “Coco Before Chanel” and “The Night of the 12th,” which won a raft of Cesar Awards last year.

The biopic reteams Haut et Court with Berthaud following her previous films, notably Diane Kruger starrer ”Lily Sometimes,” which played at Cannes’ Director’s fortnight in 2010, and 2019’s ”A Bigger World,” starring Cecile de France, which bowed at Venice. Haut et Court will also distribute “Rosa Bonheur” in France.

The movie will shoot on location in Bonheur’s well-preserved atelier at her Château de By in Thomery, where she worked and lived for over 40 years, alongside her partner Nathalie...

Paris-based company Indie Sales has acquired “Happy Holidays,” the sophomore feature of Oscar-nominated Palestinian filmmaker Scandar Copti.

Copti’s feature debut, “Ajami,” co-directed by Yaron Shani, won the Camera d’Or Special Mention at the Cannes Film Festival in 2009 and was nominated for an Oscar in the international feature category.

“Happy Holidays” takes place in contemporary Israel, where a minor accident in Jerusalem triggers a chain of events. “Lies and unspoken truths will sow division among a multi-faceted patriarchal society,” reads the synopsis.

Nicolas Eschbach, Indie Sales’ CEO and co-founder, described “Happy Holidays” as a “highly-expected second feature from Palestinian director Scandar Copti after his Cannes-selected critically-acclaimed debut.”

Currently in post-production, the film is expected to be delivered in the spring. “Happy Holidays” is produced by Red Balloon Film in Germany, together with Tessalit Productions in France, Intramovies in Italy and Fresco Films in Palestine.

Indie Sales will introduce the...

Orange Studio has boarded true-crime-tinged psychological thriller “An Ordinary Case” and will launch sales at this week’s Unifrance Rendez-Vous in Paris. Top-lined, co-written and directed by French cinema stalwart Daniel Auteuil, this pulled-from-the-headlines drama also boasts “Borgen” and “Westworld” star Sidse Babett Knudsen alongside acclaimed actor Grégory Gadebois (“An Officer and a Spy”).

Auteuil adapted the feature from the work of Jean-Yves Moyart – a jurist-turned-blogger-turned-bestselling author who wrote of his experiences in the French legal system – and will star as Jean Monier, a disillusioned lawyer defending a man accused of murdering his wife. While all signs point to the accused’s guilt, Monier remains steadfast in his presumption of innocence. What begins as an ordinary case turns out to be anything but.

Following in the footsteps of Alice Diop’s Venice and César winner “Saint Omer,” of Cédric Kahn’s Cannes-acclaimed “The Goldman Case,” and of Justine Triet’s...

Indie Sales has boarded Nathalie Najem’s “No Way Back,” a timely feature debut tackling domestic violence with a cast led by Bastien Bouillon (“The Night of the 12th”) and Zita Hanrot (“Angry Annie”).

Now in post, “No Way Back” will be introduced to buyers by the banner Indie Sales at the Unifrance Rendez-Vous showcase next week.

“No Way Back” tells the story of Laura, who is rebuilding her life after years under the toxic influence of Joachim and is raising their daughter on her own. When Joachim’s new girlfriend, Shirine, shows up at her door in dire straits, Laura realizes that they must help each other to get rid of Joachim’s harmful influence. The film appears to be in a similar vein as Xavier Legrand’s Venice prizewinner “Custody,” with an emphasis on sisterhood.

Bouillon won last year’s Cesar Award for best male newcomer for his...

Bookmark this page for the latest updates in the territory.

Screen is listing the 2023 release dates for films in the UK and Ireland in the calendar below.

For distributors who wish to add/amend a date on the calendar, please get in touch with Screen here. Screen is also running a calendar for festival and market dates throughout 2023 here.

December

December 31

Berliner Philharmoniker Live: New Year’s Eve Concert 2023 (Trafalgar - event cinema)

Previous releases January

January 6

Piggy (Vertigo), The Enforcer (Vertigo), Alcarràs (Mubi), A Man Called Otto (Sony), Rashomon (BFI), Till (Universal)

January 7

Andre Rieu In Dublin 2023 (Piece of...

Former French President François Hollande has found a new gig. The Socialist Party leader, who served as the leader of France before current President Emmanuel Macron, has joined the voice cast of Silex & the City – The Movie, a feature-film spinoff of a popular, Simpsons-style short-format animated series.

Hollande will lend his famous voice to the new film, which is currently in production, joining more established French talent including Bruno Solo, Julie Gayet, Stéphane Bern, Léa Drucker, Frédéric Beigbeder, Guillaume Gallienne, Léa Salamé and Amélie Nothomb.

Silex & the City follows a Stone Age family, the Dotcoms who embark on a time-travel adventure into the future. Father Blog, voiced by Franck Ekinci, mother Spam (Noémie De Lattre) and their rebellious children Url (Fabien Limousin) and Web (Camille Serceau) are familiar to French audiences. A short-form series based on the comic of the same name by French cartoonist Jul has been a...

Former French President François Hollande is part of the voice cast for “Silex & the City – The Movie,” a big-screen spinoff of the popular short-format animated series set in the Stone Age.

“Silex & the City” is adapted from the comic book series by the same name created by French cartoonist Jul, which has sold over a million copies. The animated series, meanwhile, has been a hit on Franco-German network Arte, airing on primetime.

Written and co-directed by Jul alongside Jean-Paul Guigue, the film will blend 2D animation with live-action sequences. Besides Hollande, the well-known voice cast includes Bruno Solo, Julie Gayet, Stéphane Bern, Léa Drucker, Frédéric Beigbeder, Guillaume Gallienne, Léa Salamé and Amélie Nothomb. Now in production, the film is expected to be completed by spring 2024.

“Silex & the City – The Movie” follows the adventure of the Dotcom family — which consists of hunting professor Blog, geography teacher Spam and their rebellious children...

16 nominees in each category will compete in the first round of voting.

France’s Cesar Academy has revealed the breakout stars selected for its annual Revelations list of local up-and-coming talent who will vie in the most promising actor and actress categories at the 2024 awards set for February 23 in Paris.

16 nominees in each category will compete in the first round of voting among Academy members, that will then be whittled down to five in each category.

The Revelations committee is comprised of 18 casting directors active in French film production and is then validated by the board of the Academy.

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In nearly every police precinct, detectives are inevitably confronted with a case that goes unsolved. The more heinous the crime, the more it haunts those whose duty it is solve it. Such is the dilemma for Yohan Vivès—a young, recently promoted police Captain—when he begins investigating the gruesome murder of a young women named Clara in the town of Grenoble. It’s clear that the attack was pre-meditated, and the violent nature of the crime suggests revenge. Vivés’s team methodically digs through the details of Clara’s life, uncovering her secrets in hopes of weeding out the killer. Certain their suspect is a scorned ex-lover, Vivés is confronted with another, more complicated question: which one?

The Night of the 12th is available on DVD on October 17.

Enter for your chance to win a DVD of The Night of the 12th, courtesy of Film Movement. Five (5) winners will be selected at random.

A group of 200 internationally renowned writers, publishers, directors and producers have signed an open letter sounding the alarm over the implications of AI for human creativity.

“Several generative models of language and images have recently appeared in the public and private domains; they are developing at breakneck speed, accessible to all for any task which involves writing and creating,” read the letter, published online on Tuesday.

“These models are shaping a world where, little by little, creation can do without human beings, thereby hastening the automation of many creative and intellectual professions formerly deemed inaccessible to mechanization.”

The letter, initiated by European translation professionals under the banner of “Collective For Human Translation – In Flesh And Blood”, comes amid growing concern about the impact of generative AI technology on professionals working in the creative industries.

Signatories from the literary world included Nobel Prize-winning author Annie Ernaux (Happening) as well as best-selling...

Writers’ Development

The U.K.’s National Film and Television School (Nfts) has partnered with “The Crown” producer Left Bank Pictures on the Nfts Diverse Writers Development Program that kicks off in March 2024. It will select six emerging U.K. screenwriters from under-represented backgrounds to contribute their voices to the entertainment landscape and inject fresh perspectives into scripted drama.

The chosen writers will embark on a paid 10-week program, during which four full series ideas will be developed and pitched, with the aim of creating commercially viable television drama concepts. The participants will work through a curriculum designed by the Nfts. The initiative will connect writers with production executives from Left Bank Pictures and potentially other British production companies.

Applications are open now and close Oct. 31.

Promotion

Alexandre Moreau has been promoted to head of sales at Paris-based company Memento International. The executive will oversee Memento International’s slate of films and strategy,...

To find her voice as a filmmaker, Paris-based documentarian Lina Soualem had to first look to the past.

The daughter of French actor Zinedine Soualem and Palestinian actress Hiam Abbass — seen recently as the Machiavellian Marcia Roy in HBO’s “Succession” — Soualem used her directorial debut, “Their Algeria,” to tell the story of her paternal grandparents’ decision to separate after more than 60 years of marriage. Now she returns with another intimate family portrait, “Bye Bye Tiberias,” which premieres Sept. 3 at the Venice Film Festival. Lightdox is handling world sales.

Soualem’s sophomore effort is an emotional journey that sees the filmmaker and her mother return to the family’s ancestral village in Palestine, which Abbass left in her early twenties to pursue her dream of becoming an actress in Europe. In the process, she left behind her mother, grandmother and seven sisters, along with questions that haunt the actress to this day.

Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

A Compassionate Spy (Steve James)

See an exclusive clip above.

The latest film from acclaimed documentarian Steve James, A Compassionate Spy, comes with a fascinating subject: the spy who leaked nuclear information from the Manhattan Project to the Soviet Union, therefore ensuring that America could not establish a nuclear monopoly on the world. It’s easy to see why James would be drawn to the spy, Theodore “Ted” Hall, and his wife Joan as he has often been interested in using individuals as the framework to explore larger societal issues. Utilizing a hybrid of recreations, archival footage, and modern-day interviews, James crafts a portrait of a man, a relationship, and the sheer weight of the decision to betray your country to save the world.

Fifty-something French couple Antoine and his wife, Olga, move to Galicia looking for a fresh start. Instead, they find only hostility and hardship in Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “The Beasts,” a deeply uncomfortable portrait of everyday evil that’s all the more terrifying for being true — not the two main characters, who are fictional, but the conflict that comes to define their new life in that wild corner of northwest Spain.

Antoine buys a modest plot on a primeval slope, fixing up the crumbling stone cottage into something cozy enough to call home. He and Olga, are fully prepared to face the challenges of raising crops on such unforgiving soil.

What they’re not prepared for is the open resentment of their xenophobic neighbors, 52-year-old Xan (Luis Zahera) and his brother, Loren (Diego Anido), who was kicked in the head by a horse at some point and has the jagged scar...

A dramatization of true events, The Night of the 12th mines a particular subgenre of the crime picture, the “Cold Case” (its own Bush-era CBS procedural). The one it rips from headlines occurred on October 12th, 2016, where we find Clara (Lula Cotton Frappier), a happy 21-year-old girl leaving a party by herself in a sleepy suburb of France. Confronted by a masked stranger who, in the flash of an eye, throws embalming liquid and a lit match on her, her promising life is cut short as a charred corpse turns up. Tasked with solving the case are two Grenoble detectives, whose intellectual and experiential might are considered superior to the small town’s police force, and the young-ish Captain Yohan (Bastien Bouillon) and veteran cop Marceau (Bouli Lanners) form a decidedly complementary couple in their affect and appearance.

Two splashy stylistic choices––the inciting incident presented in slow-motion and a superimposition of our cops’ faces,...

The letter targets “the political positions displayed by the Cannes Festival” in particular.

More than 123 French actors and actresses have signed an open letter denouncing sexual harassment in the French film industry, calling it “a dysfunctional system that crushes and annihilates”.

On the same day that Cannes welcomed Maïwenn’s Jeanne Du Barry and its star Johnny Depp, and just ahead of the premiere of Catherine Corsini’s Homecoming in competition, the letter targets “the political positions displayed by the Cannes Festival” in particular. “By rolling out the red carpet to men and women who assault, the festival sends the...

Hero Complex: Moll Refreshes Detective Procedural with Cat’s Paw Narrative

With his early naughts and grisly disappearance thriller Only the Animals being a bit more overt with the criminal element, for his seventh feature film, Belgian filmmaker Dominik Moll sidesteps the strictly sinister Huis clos narrative to put forth something that still has the conventional the aftermath of a crime scene but this is equal parts about the down time and desk job administrative type tasks. With characters who wear their warts and all in public view, La nuit du 12 (The Night of the 12th) deconstructs the hero complex and it makes for an restrained, easy-to-watch, void of over-dramatization and tonally more cerebral (with a light touch of humor) brand of crime film that is more of a how do we do this?…...

Orange Studio is launching several French projects at the Cannes Film Market, including Simon Bouisson’s “Drone,” a thriller produced by Haut et Court (“The Night of the 12th”), and “Miss Violet,” a period drama directed by Eric Besnard (“Delicious”) and starring Alexandra Lamy (“Rolling to You”).

Bouisson, who is directing “Drone,” previously penned and directed the short-format series “Stalk” which was hit on France Televisions’ youth-centered service and has been optioned for a remake in the U.S. The thriller stars Marion Barbeau, the dancer-turned-actor who broke through in Cedric Klapisch’s “Rise,” as well as Eugénie Derouand (“Paris Police”), Cédric Kahn (“November”) and Stefan Crepon (“Peter Von Kant”)

“Drone” follows Emilie who has freshly arrived in Paris to study architecture. At night, to make ends meet, she works as a cam-girl, something which she keeps to herself. One evening, a mysterious drone appears at her apartment window. From then on,...

Watching a police-procedural homicide drama, whether it’s the grungiest of VOD potboilers or the most visionary film of the genre, Michael Mann’s silvery, dread-drenched “Manhunter,” we more or less know one thing: At the end of two hours, the grisly mystery we’ve been dunked in will have its catharsis and its resolution. We will know who the killer is, and in knowing that a kind of order will have been restored. David Fincher’s “Zodiac,” with its tantalizing ambiguities, might stand as an exception to the form — a singular winding creep-out, without the closure we’re thirsting for — yet even there you feel, by the end, that you’ve glimpsed the face of evil.

But “The Night of the 12th,” the French thriller that was nominated for 10 César Awards and won six of them, including best picture (it opens here on May 19), throws the audience a slow-motion...

Film Movement has acquired North American rights to Spanish writer-director Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren’s “20,000 Species of Bees,” a tender drama about growing up trans that recently won a Berlin Film Festival Silver Bear.

The New York-based distributor is planning to roll out this topical title — in which the child protagonist explores her gender identity — in U.S. theaters in late 2023, followed by a wide release on all leading home entertainment and digital platforms.

The announcement was made by Film Movement president Michael Rosenberg and Jennyfer Gautier, the head of international sales of Paris-based distributor Luxbox.

In the Spanish-language drama, 8-year-old Aitor, who is nicknamed Cocó, travels with her mother Ane and two older siblings to visit their grandmother in a sleepy village in the Basque Country. It’s here, amongst beehives, that Aitor explores her identity alongside the women of her family who, at her request, start to refer to her with male pronouns.

"Where were you on October 12th?" Film Movement has revealed their official US trailer for this acclaimed French true crime drama titled The Night of the 12th. This was a big hit in France last year - it opened in July after premiering in Cannes, did very well at the box office, then went on to win 6 total César Awards (France's Oscars) including Best Film & Best Director. Now it's finally opening in the US starting in late May in art house theaters - check your local listings for info. It is said that every investigator has a crime that haunts them, a case that hurts him more than the others, without him necessarily knowing why. For Yohan that case is the murder of Clara in the town of Grenoble. It's a gritty mystery that's "both highly effective and brilliantly acted, where procedures and mindsets reveal a frayed society", posing uneasy...

Besting the likes of Albert Serra’s Pacifiction and Louis Garrel’s The Innocent to win Best Film at this year’s César Awards––not to mention picking up six other awards––Dominik Moll’s mystery thriller The Night of the 12th is now arriving at U.S. shores to kick off the summer. Based on a true crime book by Pauline Guéna, the film was picked up by Film Movement for a May 19 theatrical release, and we’re pleased to exclusively debut the first trailer.

“In nearly every police precinct, detectives are inevitably confronted with a case that goes unsolved. The more heinous the crime, the more it haunts those whose duty it is solve it,” the synopsis reads. “Such is the dilemma for Yohan Vivès—a young, recently promoted police Captain—when he begins investigating the gruesome murder of a young women named Clara in the town of Grenoble.

Lionsgate’s ‘John Wick: Chapter 4’, Disney’s ‘Rye Lane’ hold well.

RankFilm (distributor)Three-day gross (Mar 31-Apr 2)Total gross to date Week 1. Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves (eOne) £3.4m £3.5m 1 2. John Wick: Chapter 4 (Lionsgate) £2.6m £10.1m 2 3. Mummies (Warner Bros) £647,234 £647,234 1 4. Shazam! Fury Of The Gods (Warner Bros) £468,853 £4.9m 3 5. Creed III (Warner Bros) £424,645 £13.5m 5

Gbp to Usd conversion rate: 1.24

Action-adventure film Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves has opened top of the UK-Ireland box office with a £3.4m weekend.

The eOne title took a £4,940 average from 680 cinemas. It is up to £3.5m in total, with the film having made over...

Animation ‘Mummies’, French hit ‘The Night Of The 12th’ also open.

Action adventure Dungeons & Dragons: Honour Among Thieves sets off on its UK-Ireland box office run this weekend in 680 cinemas through eOne.

The film depicts a charming thief and band of unlikely adventurers who embark on a quest to retrieve a lost relic, but run afoul of the wrong people.

It is based on the tabletop role playing game that was first published in 1974, which has become one of the most popular tabletop games worldwide, with the game’s publisher Wizards Of The Coast claiming that over 50 million people...

Lionsgate’s “John Wick: Chapter 4” shot its way to the top of the U.K. and Ireland box office with a £5.3 million ($6.5 million) opening weekend, according to numbers released by Comscore.

In its second weekend, Warner Bros.’ “Shazam! Fury Of The Gods” collected £1.09 million in second place for a total of £4.09 million. In third place, Warner Bros.’ “Creed III” earned £731,273 and now has a total of £12.8 million after four weekends.

Paramount’s “Scream VI” grossed £597,937 in fourth place in its third weekend for a total of £6.2 million. Rounding off the top five was Warner Bros.’ “Allelujah” that took £463,973 in its second weekend for a total of £2.02 million.

The other debut in the top 10 was Paramount’s “80 For Brady” that earned £158,937 in ninth place.

Mubi release “The Five Devils” collected £16,766, including previews.

This week, among speciality releases, Kaleidoscope Entertainment is releasing “Heathers: The Musical,” the filmed version of the hit stage musical,...

Cold-case drama The Night of the 12th has just swept the board at the French Oscars and has the nation talking about misogyny and murder. We talk to its director, Dominik Moll, about how it made him question his own place in the patriarchy

At 6am on a Tuesday in May 2013, the half-charred, petrol-doused body of a young woman was found on a residential street in Lagny-sur-Marne, 25km east of Paris. It was 21-year-old Maud Maréchal, who had been returning at night from a friend’s house to her family home, just a few metres from where she was killed. A neighbour discovered the corpse, the police fruitlessly investigated this horrific murder, and then Maréchal’s death was filed away, hardly noticed by the French press.

Until now. A fictionalised account of the murder, The Night of the 12th by Franco-German director Dominik Moll, has just swept the boards at France’s Oscars equivalent,...

Last month, the 48th César Awards ceremony took place and alongside trophies given to recent releases, David Fincher was bestowed the Honorary César. It looks like the director––who is in post-production on his Michael Fassbender-led crime thriller The Killer ahead of a November release––took the honor seriously as he watched all the Best Film nominees: Pacifiction, Forever Young, Rise, The Innocent, the evening’s winner The Night of the 12th.

Across the viewings, the only one he appreciated was reportedly Albert Serra’s Pacifiction. Star of the film and César Best Actor winner Benoît Magimel told Allocine that he went to a dinner featuring Fincher and Brad Pitt, who relayed the kind words about the film. Magimel said, “[Brad Pitt told me]: ‘David Fincher is pretty tough. In twenty years, I must have seen him about five times happy to see a film. Meaning, he doesn’t like anything.’ He said to me,...

Project is set to film in Germany in autumn 2023.

The Teachers’ Lounge director Ilker Çatak is reteaming with producer Ingo Fliess of if…Productions and cinematographer Judith Kaufman for his next feature, Yellow Letters.

Paris-based Haut et Court is on board as a co-producer and distributor in France and Alamode as distributor in Germany.

Set to shoot in Hamburg and Berlin from autumn 2023, Yellow Letters tells the story of an artist couple in Turkey who lose their jobs overnight due to arbitrary state action and start to live in exile. Together with their growing daughter, they fight for a life...

Channel 4’s ‘The Windsors’ To Return With King Charles Coronation Parody

Channel 4 Harry Enfield comedy The Windsors is to return after three years to parody King Charles’ Coronation later this year. Enfield’s King Charles character will take center stage as the UK’s first coronation in 70 years approaches. Meanwhile, Harry and Meghan are concentrating on life in California but pondering whether to fly over for the big day, while Prince William is focusing on the UK’s cost-of-living crisis. Produced by Noho Film & TV, The Windsors aired for three seasons on Channel 4 from 2016 to 2020. “Any channel worth its salt has a landmark show with the word coronation in the title,” said Joe Hullait, Channel 4 Comedy Commissioning Executive. “For the BBC it was the world’s first televised Coronation in 1953. For ITV it’s the world’s longest running soap Coronation Street. We at Channel 4 are delighted to announce...

by Arnaud Trouve

Brad Pitt and Virginie Efira present the Honorary César to David Fincher

The 48th French César Awards were just held and, as expected, The Night of the 12th was the big winner. It won Best Film, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor and Best Male Newcomer, just like last year's champion Lost Illusions. Its two additional prizes were for Best Sound and Best Director. Dominik Moll almost broke the record at the Césars for the longest time between two directing wins (he previously won 22 years ago for the thriller With A Friend Like Harry)...

Dominik Moll’s investigative drama earns awards in Paris for best film, director, adapted screenplay and more.

Dominik Moll’s investigative drama The Night Of The 12th enjoyed a big night at France’s 48th annual César Awards, picking up six awards including best film of the year at a starry ceremony at Paris concert hall l’Olympia on Friday night.

The film, which started the night on 10 nominations, prevailed in a competitive category alongside Louis Garrel’s crime-infused romantic comedy The Innocent, Cédric Klapisch’s dance drama Rise, Albert Serra’s political thriller Pacifiction, and Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi’s coming-of-age tale Forever Young.

Hollywood star power enlivens the Césars in Paris last night Photo: Academie des Césars

Director Dominik Moll had to wait 22 years to bag his second César, as Best Director for The Night Of The 12th, a thriller which delves into issues of gender and violence. It was a major winner in last night’s César awards, France’s answer to the Oscars, also winning the award for Best Film. Bouli Lanners and Bastien Bouillon, as two cops trying to solve a gruesome murder, received actor nods as Best Supporting Actor and Best Male Newcomer respectively.

Written in tandem with his frequent collaborator Gilles Marchand the pair were also rewarded with best adapted screenplay from the novel by Pauline Guéna. The last time Moll received the Best Director César was in 2001 for another thriller, Harry, He's Here To Help.

Happy nights: Virginie Emir named Best Actress in the Césars Photo: Academie...

Update, writethru: Dominik Moll’s The Night Of The 12th swept the board at the 48th edition of France’s César awards in Paris on Friday evening.

The film, which was nominated in 10 categories, also won best male newcomer for its star Bastien Bouillon, best-supporting actor for Belgian actor Bouli Lanners as well as best sound and adapted screenplay.

The investigative drama world premiered in Cannes’ non-competitive Cannes Première section last May.

Bouillon plays a police detective who becomes obsessed with a case involving a complex female murder victim in a small town close to the city of Grenoble in the foothills of the French Alps.

Louis Garrel’s comedy The Innocent, which led the nominations making it into 11 categories, won best original screenplay for the director and co-writers Tanguy Viel and Naïla Guiguet as well as best supporting actress for Tár star Noemie Merlant.

Brad Pitt & Virginie Efira presented...

Dominik Moll’s brooding procedural thriller “The Night of the 12th” won big at the 48th Cesar Awards Friday night in Paris.

Out of 10 nominations, “The Night of the 12th” picked up best film, director, male newcomer for Bastien Bouillon, supporting actor for Bouli Lanners, adapted screenplay and sound. Bouillon and Lanners star as two cops trying to solve the gruesome murder of a young woman. The film opened at Cannes in the Premieres section.

Caroline Benjo, who produced “The Night of the 12th” with Carole Scotta and Simon Arnal at Haut et Court, made a searing speech denouncing the violence against women. “When Dominic and Gilles came to us to make this film it was obvious that we (needed to address this issue) and that the perspective of men on this matter was crucial, and that filmmakers had to tell this story,” said Benjo. “A few days ago, Dominic...

The 46th César Awards, France’s top film honors, have been handed out in Paris, with Dominik Moll’s crime thriller The Night of the 12th winning the best picture trophy.

Moll’s The Night of the 12th, which premiered in Cannes last year, scored 10 César noms coming into the awards show, just behind Louis Garrel’s The Innocent, which picked up 11 nominations. Moll also won for best director, and Bouli Lanners earned the best supporting actor trophy for his performance in The Night of the 12th.

Cédric Klapisch’s Rise, about a ballet dancer (Marion Barbeau) who, after an injury, seeks a new future in contemporary dance, was up for 9 Césars, as was Albert Serra’s Pacifiction, a thriller featuring Benoît Magimel as a morally-challenged Haut-Commissaire on an island in French Polynesia.

Valeria Bruni Tedeschi’s dramedy Forever Young, Cedric Jimenez’s terrorism drama November, Eric Gravel’s family...

Paris-based Haut et Court has closed French distribution rights with sales agent Film Factory Entertainment on Victor Erice’s ”Close Your Eyes” (“Cerrar los ojos”), the legendary Spanish director’s return to feature film direction 30 years after Cannes Jury Prize winner “Dream of Light” and a half century on from his milestone debut, “The Spirit of the Beehive.”

“Beehive” is regarded by many critics as one of the greatest Spanish films ever made. “Light” was chosen by the world’s cinematheques as the best film of the 1990s. “Close Your Eyes” reunites Erice with Ana Torrent, a wide-eyed mite in “Beehive.”

One of the most awaited Spanish films of 2023, it will be released in Spain by Avalon Films, the producer-distributor of “Alcarràs.”

“Close Your Eyes” turns on a famed actor who disappears while making a film. Many years later, a TV program airs the final scenes he shot, the beginning...

French pay-tv giant Canal+ went on the offensive at a special event in Paris on Wednesday, promoting its historic role as the biggest supporter of local and international cinema in France and laying out its past track record and future plans.

The roadshow-style conference was part of an operation laying the ground for the launch of a new high-end, cinema-focused channel Canal+ Box Office which was teased at the end of the event.

“2023 will be the most beautiful year for cinema in the history of Canal+. We’ve never held an event like this before devoted only to cinema, but we felt the need to talk about this,” declared Canal+ Group Chairman and CEO Maxime Saada.

The exec said the banner year was due to three factors, topped by the agreement it signed with the French cinema guilds in early 2022, pledging to invest at least €200M (213M) annually in cinema over five years.

Duo are behind Dominik Moll’s ’The Night of the 12th’

Haut et Court’s Carole Scotta and Barbara Letellier were named best producers of the year at the 16th annual edition of France’s Academy of Film Arts & Sciences’ Daniel Toscan du Plantier Prize held on Monday night (February 14) in Paris.

The duo are notably behind Dominik Moll’s investigative drama The Night Of The 12th, which has been sweeping awards season in France, winning the Best Film Lumiere Award and nominated for 10 César awards.

A swanky gala dinner celebrated the winning pair along with the finalists for the prize,...

Carole Scotta and Barbara Letellier, the French producers of Dominik Moll’s thriller “The Night of the 12th,” won the Toscan du Plantier Award at a Paris ceremony hosted by the Cesar Academie.

The pair, who produced the movie at Haut et Court (“The Class”), were voted on by 1,641 people, including artists and crew members who were previously nominated at the Cesar Awards, along with the governing body members of the Cesar Academie.

On stage with Letellier, Scotta praised Moll’s vision for the “The Night of the 12th” and said the film was “driven by the power of the collective effort. “That’s what we see with this group of cops working tirelessly to solve a case,” she continued.

“The Night of the 12th” is vying for 10 Cesar awards. The brooding topical procedural, which also opened as part of Cannes’ Premiere section, stars Bastien Bouillon and Bouli Lanners as...

Paris-based sales company beefs up slate ahead of Berlinale market.

Paris-based sales company Pyramide International has boarded Anna Novion’s Le Théorème de Marguerite and Marie Garel-Weiss’s Sur La Branche and will kick off pre-sales for the French dramas at the upcoming EFM.

Novion’s Le Théorème de Marguerite stars Ella Rumpf as the titular character, a brilliant mathematics student at France’s top university the Ecole Normale Supérieure. On the day of her thesis presentation, a mistake shakes up all the certainty in her planned-out life and she decides to quit everything and start afresh.

Rumpf notably starred...

Good cop, bad cop: Bastien Bouillon, left, and Bouli Lanners in Dominik Moll’s The Night Of The 12th Photo: Picturehouse Entertainment As a man of two countries - Germany and France - you could be forgiven for thinking that director Dominik Moll who shot to prominence 22 years ago with the psychological shocker Harry He’s Here to Help, might harbour a split personality.

Not a bit of it - he seems remarkably grounded and feels much more French than German. At this precise moment he’s feeling rather pleased with himself that his most recent brooding investigative thriller The Night Of The 12th has been a runaway success in France and also has been selling well around the globe, and will feature as part of Glasgow Film Festival next month.

Written in tandem with his frequent collaborator Gilles Marchand whom he met decades ago at film school in Paris,...

Marks the third feature animation from award-winning Chinese filmmaker Liu Jian.

Paris-based Memento International has secured global sales rights to Chinese filmmaker Liu Jian’s animated feature Art College 1994, which has made a late entry to the Competition line-up at the upcoming Berlinale.

The feature will receive its world premiere at the 73rd edition of the festival, which runs February 16-26.

It marks Liu’s third feature after 2010’s Piercing I and Have A Nice Day, which also premiered in Competition at the Berlinale in 2017 and went on to win best animated feature at the prestigious Golden Horse Awards in Taiwan.