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News stories from Jan 2006 to 2012..

  • 17 July 2006
    Screen Agency

Glasgow Film Office's Crooks to head New Cinema Fund

Lenny Crooks, currently head of the Glasgow Film Office is set to take over from Paul Trijbits when his tenure as head of the UK Film Council's New Cinema Fund comes to an end on September 18. Crooks founded the Glagow Film Fund and  has backed a number of successful Scottish films, including Shallow Grave, Solid Air (pictured), The Magdalene Sisters, My Name is Joe and On A Clear Day. As director of the Glasgow Film Office, Crooks has supported the c...
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09 July 2006

EXCLUSIVE: HD Camera Wars - Prices Could Rocket With New Duty Rises

  Thomson GV Says Japanese HDV Cameras Are Far Too Cheap in Europe £4,000 HDV Cameras Could Soon Cost £12,000 With New Import Duty HDV Importers Alarmed at TGV Price-Dumping Complaint to EU EXCLUSIVE to Netribution The cost of a new HDV camera from Son...
09 March 2006

Five TV Newsbites Offered to New Filmmakers

Channel 5 and DFG are challenging emerging filmmakers to look for strong, contemporary and domestic story-lines, from both London and the regions, with emphasis on the cultural richness and diversity of Britain, for network broadcast as part of Channel 5 news. They offer support and facilities ...
14 April 2009

New government anti-piracy campaign finally takes the post-Cluetrain carrot

Communicating the message that films are generally very expensive to make, and that widespread piracy will directly affect the number and quality of films produced and released, should have been a straight forward pitch. However after years of, literally, demonising piracy as the sponsor of terro...
  • 18 July 2006
    Internet

Yahoo Enlists Film Students to Announce Redesign

  Yahoo's new home page has gone live in the U.S., and the company has enlisted several film school students to spread the word. The new, dynamic site has been in a preview phase since May. It is more customizable and interactive than the previous version, utilizing technologies like AJAX to refresh content on the fly, which Yahoo hopes will keep users on the page longer.   To spread the word about the site's redesign, Yahoo and its agency, S...
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29 July 2010

Garrick Hamm's New Short Enters Two Prestigious US Film Festivals

from publicist Marek Steven British director Garrick Hamm’s new short film The Man Who Married Himself has been selected for two prestigious US film festivals this summer. The first of these is the LA Shorts Fest which has just started this July. This particular Festival has an uncanny knack of...
11 November 2008

Short Film Completion Fund (2009/I) Call for Entries Extended!

From Tamsin @ MayaVision: Individual producers or production companies are invited to send a rough cut of their unfinished short film (up to 15 minutes in length) to Maya Vision International, along with a completed application form. The closing date for applications has been extended...
20 May 2006

Rickshaw Driver Rises To Movie Director

  It's a real rags-to-riches story of the Hollywood variety, but this is a tale of a poor but talented auto-rickshaw driver who has now become a Bollywood film producer, director and actor. 39-year-old Waqqr Khan, from Uttar Pradesh, is apparently semi-literate, but has produced...
  • 09 October 2007
    Festivals

Learning disabilities festival Brigtens up Hove

A record 113 entries have been whittled down to 38 for the Oska Bright film festival - the only festival in Europe that showcases films made by and for people with learning disabilities - which opens in Hove, East Sussex, on Monday. From the Guardian: The films, the longest of which runs for seven minutes, include Celebrity Shotgun, an EastEnders-style soap about infidelity, and In Our Shoes, a documentary about the emotional impact on a woman with lear...
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21 November 2006

Low-Budget Low-Down in Brighton’s CineCity

  Miranda Robinson, Head of Development at Screen South will host a panel event to discuss why low budget filmmaking is essential to British film-makers at Bighton's CineCity on 25th November. The panel will look at the restrictions of micro and low budgets, marketing a low budget fi...
27 June 2008

Bolzano ShortFilmFestival NEW DEADLINE - 15th July 2008

From Bolazno HQ:  We are pleased to inform you that new deadline for the festival subscriptions is 15th July 2008!: - 5th NO WORDS - International no-dialogue short film competition. In this competition, the film/video must be understood through the strength of the images on...
22 June 2006

'Music Piracy Reaching Epidemic Proportions'

  Counterfeiting and piracy is reaching epidemic proportions because of the internet and auction sites such as eBay, it has been revealed. The internet is now at the heart of piracy involving illegally copied software, music and films and for disposing of fake goods through eBay and othe...
  • 18 February 2006
    Community projects

Bad Movie Night Rocks

 A couple in Wales, fed up with seeing bad films they want to shout out loud at, are giving other filmgoers a chance to do just that, at the Bad Film Club night outSwansea comedians Nicola Vaughan, 31, and Joe Timmins, 33, formed the Bad Films Club which meets every month at Swansea's Dylan Thomas Theatre and at the Chapter Arts Centre in Cardiff.Nicola Vaughan, who styles herself on-stage as Nicko, used to be in the movie business as an insider, working as a scr...
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10 May 2007

UK’s smallest film studio – in a transit van!

 CANNES DEBUT FOR ROGUE RUNNER MOBILE STUDIO RogueRunner are excited to announce the formation of the UK's smallest film studio. So small in fact that it fits inside a Ford transit van. The creation of Director Dan Hartley who began his film career driving around Ewan, Jude and...
14 June 2006

Del Toro, Grisoni, Roeg & Fellowes in Cheltenham Screenwriting Festival

Masterclasses from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas adaptor Tony Grisoni, writer/director Guillermo del Toro, Don't Look Now's Nicholas Roeg, Gosford Park's Oscar winner Julian Fellowes and Hilsborough's Jimmy McGovern top a packed programme at the Screenwriter's Festival 2006...
07 July 2006

Emmy Nominees Show UK TV Talent is Tipped For Success

  British TV talent is on course for success at the Emmy awards after two dramas  between them earned a total of 23 nominations. Elizabeth I, the Channel 4 period drama starring Helen Mirren, scooped 13 nominations, including best actress in a mini-series for its leading lady. The B...
  • 18 March 2006
    Community projects

Island Publicans Barred in Cinema Battle

Film fans in Shetland islands, 200 miles north of Aberdeen, were dismayed when pub licensees there tried to stop the building of a new state-of-the-art cinema and music venue - Shetland's last commercial cinema went dark over 25 years ago. Shetlanders have a strong musical tradition and as well as a cinema, the project envisages a performance area, workshop and rehearsal rooms and a second screen, digital production studio and a common reception and services ...
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28 August 2006

The Yes Men Strike Back at New Orleans event

The Yes Men, a group of legendary corporate spoof artists who were the centre of 2005's feature documentary The Yes Men have struck again. On Monday Andy Bichlbaum, a 42-year-old former college teacher of video and media arts who lives in New York and Paris appeared at a conference in New O...
17 September 2006

New $5m fund for experiments in community journalism

The Knight Foundation have launched the 'Knight Brothers 21st Century News Challenge', investing up to $5 million in its first year in web 2.0-style community news projects that best use the digital world to connect people to the real world. The News Challenge is looking to fund...
08 June 2006

Armando Iannucci Takes On Hollywood For Laughs

  Comedy producer Armando Iannucci plans to take on Hollywood in the comedy film business and has joined forces with BBC Films to do it. Iannucci, tha man behind TV projects like The Thick Of It and Alan Partridge, will head a special comedy lab to develop low-budget comedy ideas for fea...
  • 06 September 2011
    Festivals

CALL FOR ENTRIES - Lancaster Children's Film Festival 2012

Lancaster Children's Film Festival (LancsCFF) is issuing a call for entries for the upcoming 2012 festival, to take place from February 15th – 18th 2012. Screenings will take place at the Dukes Cinema and various other venues around Lancaster. For entry form and requirements go to: http://www.lancasterchildrensfilmfestival.co.uk/?page_id=34 Categories include: · Live Action Feature: Any live action children’s or family feature (40mins+) · Animation: Animated films w...
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17 May 2006

If You Can't Beat Them - Samsung Threatens To Join Them

  The next generation of DVD, with greater capacity and higher definition, has been delayed by the bickering of the two camps: Blu-ray and HD DVD. Samsung, on the Blu-ray team, has announced that it will release a machine next year that will play both formats if the two rivals cannot fig...
21 November 2006

5th Discovering Latin America Film Festival Kicks off

Meet Film Directors and lead actors at the 5th DLA Film Festival  - Film Directors: Arturo Ripstein (pictured), Claudia Llosa, Emilio Maillé and Jorge Durán 5th DISCOVERING LATIN AMERICA FILM FESTIVAL 23 November- 3 December, 2006 Whether you are an enthusiast...
07 September 2011

55th BFI London Film Festival programme revealed

From the British Film Institute: We're excited to announce the line-up for this year's BFI London Film Festival, which will showcase 204 feature films and 110 shorts over 16 days. In addition to our previously announced opening and closing night films, Fernando Meirelles' 360 and Terence Davies...
  • 06 January 2008
    Festivals

London Short Film Festival into final week

The projector with teeth continues at the ICA in London through to the weekend. What's more, tomorrow night's panel debate with Asif Kapadia, features free (as in free software) beer.. 6pm – Curzon Soho C’mon, it’s the VX Auteur Theory 3A showcase of the next generation of D.I.Y auteurs for whom filmmaking is a more rounded, personal process as apposed to clear-cut, traditional film making roles, for those who produce, write, direct, shoo...
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23 July 2006

Cinema Extreme Open for Submissions

Cinema Extreme, the UK Film Council New Cinema Fund / Film Four backed high budget short film award  is open for entries. Managed by the Bureau and Lifesize pictures, a number of awards of up to £50,000 will be made. Past awardees include Andrea Arnold's Wasp, which went on t...
07 June 2006

Dreadfully Good Scares From The Brits

  It's Hammer time as the American Cinematheque celebrates The Golden Age of British Horror, 1955-1975. For two decades, Hammer Film Productions, along with other British purveyors of terror, such as Anglo-Amalgamated, Amicus, Independent Artists and Tigon, unleashed a steady stri...
22 February 2006

New Oscar Set Revealed in All its Glory

The new set for the film world's greatest drama - the Academy Awards, has been unveiled in Hollywood. It was created by Roy Christopher who has designed for the show since 1979.  Pictured is Christopher with his design for the 2004 Oscar ceremony. His 2006 design is much miore glamourou...
  • 27 April 2006
    Screen Agency

Scottish Screen Signals New Directions

  Scottish Screen, the first "one door" screen agency in the UK, is signalling a change in direction, away from funding features for cinema and towards marketing and promotion of locations and skills and digital content.   The agency's budget from the Scottish Executive is over £3m a year and it invests a further £3m of lottery funds. In the past five years it has invested £11m of public money into more than 50 Scottish...
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19 March 2006

New Tax Regime - Help or Hinder UK Film?

The opening scenes could be straight from a trashy TV episode of Bad Girls rather than from a traditional Bollywood showpiece. In Provoked, Aishwarya Rai, a former Miss World, exacts gruesome revenge on her abusive husband and then languishes in a cold, grey English prison. Provoked is Boll...
25 June 2006

Meeting The Needs Of Scotland’s Film Industry

  The public row over the future direction of Scottish Screen rumbles on. The film agency is due to be merged with Scottish Arts into a new all-purpose agency, Creative Scotland. Leading Scottish filmmakers say the plan is flawed. The former Head of Locations at Scottish Screen has now p...
18 June 2009

Ed's Off to a flying start - the 63rd Edinburgh International Film Festival underway

Sam Mendes was in Edinburgh last night with Sean Connfery and Alan Cumming for the opening night gala of his film Away We Go - which has great buzz here in New York where it's already openend. Amidst news that Lars von Trier will now attend the festival next week for the just added UK premiere of...
  • 19 January 2006
    Community projects

Getting Plastered is Not All Right

A film  about a hedonistic teenage night out, highlighting alcohol-related problems,directed by Hollywood actor Ian Hart, premieres in Liverpool. Plastered is the work of LA Productions, a Liverpool company headed up by local film maker Colin McKeown, led by the Liverpool Culture Company.  Eight teenage boys, recommended by youth service and major funder Connexions, star in the work alongside young local extras.  The storyline looks at the choices that young...
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07 August 2006

Documentaries on Indian Independence Eligible For Award

  Winning Proposals Will Screen in India and UK In celebration of India's 60th anniversary of independence, a competition will honour the best three-minute documentaries on Indian independence. Broadcast journalists in India have until August 21 to submit their proposals. The aw...
15 August 2006

UK Networker Generation Deserting Traditional Media

  Change Accelerating in Communications Industry Now 11 Million UK Broadband Homes Ofcom's annual Communications Market Report shows significant changes are now happening in consumer behaviour, including today's generation of online consumers deserting traditional media...
02 July 2006

Northern Ireland is Tops For MEDIA New Talent Awards

  Northern Ireland has become one of the most successful nations in Europe in this scheme so far. The UK has regularly received the largest number of funding awards from the scheme and, within the UK, Northern Ireland has received the majority. 100% of all applications from Northern Irel...
  • 16 October 2006
    Festivals

The Times BFI 50th London Film Festival...

... is kicking off on 18th October with a screening of The Last King of Scotland, starring Forest Whitaker, James McAvoy and Gillian Anderson.   Apart from that, the Festival is 50 years old this year and so the 50 Screens event is going to take place in celebration on Sunday 29th October at 8:30pm. A surprise film will be showing in 50 venues across London, ranging from a closed showing at Holloway Prison (luckily it's free for inmates) to 'A Livi...
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28 October 2008

British Independent Film Award nominations announced

Steve McQueen's Bobby Sands biopic Hunger battles it out with Martin McDonagh's In Bruges, James Marsh's Man on A Wire, Danny Boyle's LFF closer Slumdog Millionaire and Shane Meadow's Somers Town in the nominations for the Best British Feature film at the 2008 BIFA Awards. The films receiv...
30 March 2006

Liverpool – Film's Star Turn

  Liverpool has secured its reputation as the Hollywood of the North West after new figures revealed filming in the city increased by 42% last year.Last year was a record-breaking period for the city's film and television industry with production levels the highest recorded. &nbs...
14 September 2006

Top 25 stories that the media missed

Project Censored - an organisation dedicated to tracking unreported news stories - has put together a startling list of 25 stories that the mainstream media has largely ignored in the last year. It makes depressing, but important reading. Especially to anyone working in news or documentary ...