News

One of the hottest works in progress at Ecam Forum’s second co-production market, unspooling June 10-13 in Madrid, the Romanian coming-of-age mystery/fantasy drama “Milk Teeth” reunites filmmaker Mihai Mincan with much the same team of his calling card debut “To the North” which bowed at Venice Orizzonti 2022: Oscar-winning sound designer Nicolas Becker (“Sound of Metal”), cinematographer George Chiper-Lillemark (“Immaculate”), and editor Dragos Apetri (“Animal”).

Also on board are four of “To the North” production partners: Romania’s deFilm, France’s Remora Films, Greece’s StudioBauhaus, Bulgaria Screening Emotions, joined by Denmark’s Oscar-nominated producer Monica Hellström (“Flee”) of Ström Films.

The story, penned by Mincan, is again inspired by true events that serve as starting point for the helmer to grapple with painful memories of Romania’s post-communist era, when dreams of a better life after the Romanian Revolution of December 1989 turned into disillusion. Here, the events...

Three years after taking top honors in Berlin with her elegiac tribute to the generations of peach farmers in her family, Alcarràs, Carla Simón returns to territory more directly connected to her own past, a companion piece to her debut, Summer 1993. That 2018 film explored a transitional period in the life of a six-year-old girl — a fictionalized version of the director — sent to live with an uncle’s family in the Catalonia countryside after losing both her parents to AIDS. Simón’s third feature, Romería, centers on another semi-autobiographical stand-in, this time a budding filmmaker fresh out of high school, who travels to meet the family of her late father.

Her journey, while essentially planned to complete bureaucratic requirements on a film school scholarship, becomes an exhumation of the parents she was too young to know, their histories veiled in secrecy, shame and the blurry lens of time. That lens...

For the first time since 1988, Spain has two movies in Cannes main competition, neither of whose directors are Pedro Almodóvar: Carla Simón’s “Romería” and Oliver Laxe’s “Sirat.”

That says much about this year’s Cannes Official Selection, packed with emerging talent. The double also marks, however, what might prove a turning point for Spanish film. From 1988, the feeding frenzy died for films by Carlos Saura in particular and at large titles picturing Spain’s dark past from which it had happily just emerged with democracy. Outside Almodóvar, this century, in 15 editions, only one Spanish director had scored a Cannes Competition place since Isabel Coixet in 2009: Albert Serra with “Pacification” in 2022.

Now, however, France – its big festivals, networks, distributors, sale agents, critics and audiences – are embracing Spain with energy, both Spanish film and indeed TV. When it comes to Spain, the change has been long in the making.

Atom Egoyan, director of the Seven Veils, surrounded by his admirers at the Quad Cinema Photo: Ed Bahlman

On Saturday, March 8, an audience member in the packed theater U of the Quad Cinema after my conversation with Atom Egoyan on Seven Veils asked him: “Which film should I put on when I get home?” Atom responded: “I would play [Michael Powell’s] Peeping Tom backwards maybe. Maybe [Alfred Hitchcock’s] Rebecca, actually some Hitchcock. Carmen is pretty interesting, the Carlos Saura film. Does anyone else have a double bill idea?” Suggestions rang out from Paul Verhoeven’s Showgirls and Brian de Palma’s Passion, to Todd Field’s Tár, and of course, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s The Red Shoes and The Tales of Hoffmann.

Atom Egoyan on Jeanine (Amanda Seyfried) at the Salome tech rehearsal: “There’s no one she can communicate with, she is really on her own.

Atom Egoyan, director of the Seven Veils, surrounded by his admirers at the Quad Cinema Photo: Ed Bahlman

On Saturday, March 8, an audience member in the packed theater U of the Quad Cinema after my conversation with Atom Egoyan on Seven Veils asked him: “Which film should I put on when I get home?” Atom responded: “I would play [Michael Powell’s] Peeping Tom backwards maybe. Maybe [Alfred Hitchcock’s] Rebecca, actually some Hitchcock. Carmen is pretty interesting, the Carlos Saura film. Does anyone else have a double bill idea?” Suggestions rang out from Paul Verhoeven’s Showgirls and Brian de Palma’s Passion, to Todd Field’s Tár, and of course, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s The Red Shoes and The Tales of Hoffmann.

Atom Egoyan on Jeanine (Amanda Seyfried) at the Salome tech rehearsal: “There’s no one she can communicate with, she is really on her own.

Silver Bear Award Winners (Photo Credit – Koimoi)

Berlin International Film Festival is one of the biggest award shows in the world and is known for recognizing cinema as an art. The show has many prestigious awards, including the Golden Bear for the Best Film and the Silver Bear for the Best Director. The Silver Bear, introduced in 1956, has since been one of the most coveted awards for a director. That honor has been bestowed upon filmmakers whose vision and storytelling push the boundaries of creative expression.

Remarkably, only four directors have been awarded this award on multiple occasions. Among this prestigious quartet stands a figure whose legacy transcends national borders: Satyajit Ray. His work not only elevated Indian cinema to a global platform but also set a high benchmark for artistic excellence. Ray is the only director to win the award in two consecutive years.

Satyajit Ray won the Silver...

Hong Kong filmmaker Ann Hui will be honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 29th International Film Festival of Kerala (Iffk), adding to her impressive collection of career recognitions that includes the Venice Film Festival’s career Golden Lion.

The award, which comes with a cash prize of INR1 million, a sculpture, and a citation, will be presented by Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan at the festival’s opening ceremony on Dec. 13 at state capital Thiruvananthapuram’s Nishagandhi Auditorium.

Hui, 77, stands as a pivotal figure in Asian cinema, particularly known for her contributions to the Hong Kong New Wave movement. Her five-decade career has consistently focused on social issues, with particular attention to women’s experiences in Hong Kong society. Her work examines themes ranging from gender discrimination to the cultural shifts surrounding Hong Kong’s transition from British colonial rule to Chinese sovereignty.

Born in Anshan, China in...

Spain has been named the Country in Focus for the upcoming European Film Market at the 75th Berlinale. The EFM will run Feb. 13-19.

According to market organizers, Spain’s “many filmmakers make Spain a dynamic and strong European film location with international appeal, as well as a long-standing and successful tradition of numerous films in the festival program as well as at the EFM and in the Berlinale’s industry initiatives.”

EFM’s choice to shine a light on Spain is the latest in a string of recognitions for the Southern European country, which featured as the Country of Honor at the 2023 Marche du Film, Locarno’s Open Doors focus territory this past summer and will be the Country of Honor at Mipcom 2024 later this month.

“Spanish filmmaking has enriched the Berlinale program for decades,” Festival Director Tricia Tuttle said in a release. “Many hundreds of Spanish productions, created by outstanding and acclaimed talents,...

San Sebastian — With its awards ceremony Saturday night, the San Sebastian Festival’s 72nd edition is heading into its final straits. Following, 10 takeaways from what looks like its biggest edition ever in star wattage, the caliber of Spanish filmmaking and the number of deals reported by Variety, set in the context of vertiginous change in international independent film and TV landscape.

San Sebastian 2024: The Stars Align

Johnny Depp visited kids in a San Sebastian hospital dressed as Jack Sparrow; Javier Bardem teared up remembering his mother, the exemplary Pilar Bardem; Pedro Almodóvar remembered back 44 years to his first San Sebastian, performing at disco Ku and ending up on the beach at 8 in the morning. Cate Blanchett, accepting her Donostia Award, praised the “uncertainty which drives me.”

Never before have so many stars descended on San Sebastian. Why? “I think two factors are at play,” San Sebastian Film Festival director José Luis Rebordinos told Variety.

The Latin American premiere of Christopher Andrews’ TIFF selection Bring Them Down starring Barry Keoghan and a screening of Mathieu Kassovitz’s 1995 modern classic La Haine feature in the 20th Monterrey International Film Festival line-up.

Running September 25-October 2, the festival in northern Mexico led by general manager Diana Cobos brings Cannes, Sundance and Berlin selections in its World Highlights strand, including the Latin American premieres of Piero Messina’s Another End starring Gael Garcia Bernal, and Sugercane by Emily Kassie and Julian Brave NoiseCat.

The festival includes the Monterrey Classics section with screenings of Wim Wenders’ Paris, Texas, Carlos Saura’s Cría Cuervos,...

Seasoned international sales agent Oscar Alonso, one of Spain’s best-known – and well-regarded – executives in overseas markets, has joined Madrid-based Lazona as head of distribution at its domestic distribution arm Lazona Pictures.

A prominent player on Spain’s film scene, as a producer Lazona was behind “Spanish Affair,” the highest-grossing national movie in Spanish history grossing €55.2 million ($59.7 million) at cinema theaters in 2014.

Lazona also produced Enrique Urbizu’s “No Rest for the Wicked,” which swept six Spanish Academy awards in 2012, including best picture, as well as auteurist hits such as Manuel Martin Cuenca’s 2017 Toronto winner “El autor” and banner Spanish TV series, led by Movistar Plus+ “Gigantes” (2017-18), also from Urbizu.

A former senior executive at Madrid-based Latido Films, one of the Spanish-speaking world’s top film sales agents, Alonso joined Latido in 2005, serving as its festivals manager – and a sales executive during colleagues’ during colleagues’ absences – before being...

Un reencuentro que revive viejas heridas. © Vanity Fair

Comienza en Cáceres, Extremadura, el rodaje de “Día de Caza”, la nueva película de Pedro Aguilera, que adapta libremente el clásico del cine español “La Caza”, de Carlos Saura.

“Día de Caza” sigue a Blanca, Rosa y Carmen, tres amigas de mediana edad que tras mucho tiempo sin coincidir todas juntas, quedan junto con Diana, la joven y taciturna sobrina de Rosa, para ir a cazar conejos a un coto de caza que Blanca heredó de su tío José. Entre risas comparten los complicados momentos por los que están pasando en sus vidas. El calor, insoportable, asfixiante, y las conversaciones sobre temas del pasado van subiendo de tono hasta acabar enfrentando a las mujeres. Imposible no recordar que casi 60 años atrás, otro día de caza, en aquella misma finca, acabó en tragedia.

La película está protagonizada por Carmen Machi (“Aída”), Rossy de Palma...

“La Mesías” star Carmen Machi, Almodóvar muse Rossy de Palma and Blanca Portillo, a Cannes best actress co-winner for Almodóvar’s “Volver,” are set to star in “The Prey” (“Dia de Caza”), billed as a contemporary revision of Carlos Saura’s 1965 pic “The Hunt,” quite possibly his crowing achievement.

The film is set to shoot in July in Spain’s Extremadura, with theatrical release scheduled for autumn 2025.

Brutal, kinetic at times and taking no prisoners, Saura’s original won a Berlin Silver Bear. The film follows three once-close friends reuinting for a rabbit hunt; the final bloody outcome was read as a broad metaphor of the social elite in dictator Francisco Franco’s Spain.

Directed by Pedro Aguilera “The Prey,” set in the summer of 2024, has three women reuniting for a rabbit hunt in the very same stark valley where Saura shot “The Hunt” almost 60 years before. Under a remorseless sun,...

Med Hondo’s 1979 musical extravaganza West Indies: The Fugitive Slaves of Liberty is a satirical skewering of the legacy of French imperialism in the West Indies and beyond. From the outset, it defies categorization through its distinct sense of free association as it leaps from one colorful image to the next, often shunning context along the way. Throughout Hondo’s film, the xenophobic and racist rhetoric of haughty, predominately white French aristocrats, bureaucrats, and citizens is combatted, challenged, or lampooned by various African figures. Some are slaves, some are revolutionaries, while some are simply power hungry. The result is a deliriously iconoclastic anti-colonialist work that’s worthy of the finest films from roughly the same period by Ousmane Sembene and Dijbril Diop Mambéty.

Adapted by Hondo and Daniel Boukman from the latter’s novel Les Negriers, West Indies traces an epic history of colonial oppression and enslavement in the West Indies,...

Forastera. the first feature by Spanish director Lucía Aleñar Iglesias, whose short film of the same name premiered at Cannes Critics’ Week in 2020, will start shooting in April in Mallorca.

Lastor Media, Vilaüt Films, La Perifèrica are producing with Sweden’s Fox in the Snow Films.

Lluís Omar and Zoe Stein will star with Swedish actor Nonni Ardal in the film about a woman whose vacation is dramatically disrupted by the violent death of her grandmother, an act to which she is the only witness.

Filming will take place entirely on location in Mallorca.

Producers Tono Folguera of Lastor Media and Dot of Vilaüt Films,...

It may not match last year’s sheer quantity in competition strands, but Spain still boasts a high quality presence at the Berlinale. Following, highlights the festival and EFM:

“Every You Every Me,” (Michael Fetter Nathansky)

A factory worker strives to reconnect with her distant husband, exploring the rediscovery of love within the complexities of relationships. From Contando Films, Studio Zentral, Network Movie and Nephilim, a German-Spanish production.

“Cura Sana,” (Lucía G. Romero)

Produced by Escac Films, this Generation 14plus premiere delves into sisters’ lives shaped by ancestral violence, exploring deep familial bonds and lasting impact of abuse.

“Deprisa, Deprisa,” (Carlos Saura)

A classic: Set to a memorable flamenco-pop score, four young Madrid delinquents pull robberies, snort heroin, steal cars the film capturing the raw energy youth and their vague, but visceral sense of ‘liberty.’ A restoration of a seminal work.

“The Human Hibernation,” (Anna Cornudella)

A sci-fi exploration of siblings undergoing hibernation,...

The Berlin Film Festival today unveiled further titles for the 2024 edition of its Berlinale Special Presentations sidebar section alongside its classics program. Scroll down for the full list of titles announced today.

Highlights from the latest drop of Specials titles include Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger, a feature documentary about influential British filmmakers Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger narrated by Killers of the Flower Moon filmmaker Martin Scorsese. The feature is directed by David Hinton and features rare archival material from the personal collections of Powell, Pressburger, and Scorsese.

Love Lies Bleeding, the latest feature from British filmmaker Rose Glass will debut in the Specials program. The feature stars Kristen Stewart alongside Katy O’Brian. A short synopsis describes the pic as “a romance fueled by ego, desire, and the American Dream.” The film will arrive at Berlin following it’s debut at Sundance.

Abel Ferrara is...

The 54th edition of India’s Goa Film Festival concluded Tuesday evening with a tribute to Michael Douglas, who picked up the fest’s Satyajit Ray Lifetime Achievement Award for Excellence in Cinema.

Previous winners of the award — which organizers say celebrates individuals whose unparalleled contributions have enriched the cinematic landscape — include Martin Scorsese, Bernardo Bertolucci, Dilip Kumar, Carlos Saura, Krzysztof Zanussi, and Wong Kar-wai.

“It’s a tremendous honor to receive this award. It’s a career life achievement. When I heard about the award, my family and I were elated,” Douglas said. The veteran Basic Instinct actor was joined by his wife, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and son Dylan Douglas.

Later, during his acceptance speech, Douglas touched on world affairs, highlighting the role he believes cinema can play in bringing people together. Douglas also gave a shoutout to what he described as some of his favorite Indian films, including Rrr,...

The 54th International Film Festival of India (Iffi), Goa, concluded on Tuesday with Hollywood veteran Michael Douglas accepting the Satyajit Ray lifetime achievement award for excellence in cinema.

Previous winners of the award include Martin Scorsese, Bernardo Bertolucci, Dilip Kumar, Carlos Saura, Krzysztof Zanussi and Wong Kar-wai.

“It’s a tremendous honor to receive this award, a career life achievement. When I heard about the award, my family and I were elated,” said Douglas, who was accompanied by wife Catherine Zeta Jones and their son Dylan Douglas. The two-time Oscar winning actor said that his favorite Indian films are “Rrr,” “Om Shanti Om” and “The Lunchbox.” The award was conferred during the festival’s closing ceremony by Bollywood actor Ayushmann Khurrana and Pramod Sawant, chief minister of Goa.

At the festival’s international competition, the jury, presided over by veteran filmmaker Shekhar Kapur, awarded best film to Abbas Amini’s Rotterdam-winning Iranian film “Endless Borders.

Hollywood actor Michael Douglas, who is known for films like ‘The Sentinel’, ‘The American President’, ‘Disclosure’ and others, will be honoured with the prestigious Satyajit Ray Excellence in Film Lifetime Award at the 54th edition of the International Film Festival of India (Iffi) in Goa, this year.

Earlier, Spanish filmmaker-writer Carlos Saura was feted with the Satyajit Ray Excellence in Film Lifetime Award during the 53rd edition of Iffi.

Sharing the news of Michael Douglas being honoured at the upcoming edition of the festival, Minister of Information and Broadcasting, Anurag Thakur took to his X, formerly Twitter on Friday, and wrote: “I’m delighted to announce that Michael Douglas, the distinguished Hollywood actor and producer, will be honoured with theprestigious Satyajit Ray Excellence in Film Lifetime Award at the 54th International Film Festival Goa.”

He further mentioned: “His deep love for our country is well known, and we look forward to welcome him,...

Hollywood actor Michael Douglas, who is known for films like ‘The Sentinel’, ‘The American President’, ‘Disclosure’ and others, will be honoured with the prestigious Satyajit Ray Excellence in Film Lifetime Award at the 54th edition of the International Film Festival of India (Iffi) in Goa, this year.

Earlier, Spanish filmmaker-writer Carlos Saura was feted with the Satyajit Ray Excellence in Film Lifetime Award during the 53rd edition of Iffi.

Sharing the news of Michael Douglas being honoured at the upcoming edition of the festival, Minister of Information and Broadcasting, Anurag Thakur took to his X, formerly Twitter on Friday, and wrote: “I’m delighted to announce that Michael Douglas, the distinguished Hollywood actor and producer, will be honoured with theprestigious Satyajit Ray Excellence in Film Lifetime Award at the 54th International Film Festival Goa.”

He further mentioned: “His deep love for our country is well known, and we look forward to welcome him,...

Broadcast Rights

U.K. broadcaster ITV has signed a deal with UEFA to become the new home of England men’s soccer qualifying games. All European qualifiers, UEFA Nations League ties and friendlies between major tournaments will be shown on ITV from September 2024 through to June 2028.

The first set of games will be England’s bid to reach the 2026 FIFA World Cup finals in North America, followed by the European qualifiers to UEFA Euro 2028. In total at least 40 games, approximately 10 each season, will be shown by ITV over the period this new rights deal covers.

ITV had previously held the rights for England European qualifiers from 2018 until 2022 and were succeeded by Channel 4. ITV currently holds the rights to show the UEFA Euro 2024 and 2028 tournaments, sharing coverage with the BBC.

ITV also holds broadcast rights for England women’s soccer team games until 2025 and shared rights for the FIFA Women...

The ambassador of the Film Heritage Foundation (Fhf), and megastar Amitabh Bachchan, who unveiled the poster of ‘Olympics in Reel Life – A Festival of Films and Photographs’, said it will remind us of the achievements of the Indian Olympians. As India gears up to host the International Olympic Committee (Ioc) session after 40 years, and amid talk of Indian interest in hosting a future edition of the Olympic Games, the Mumbai-based Film Heritage Foundation, and Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland have joined hands to present ‘Olympics in Reel Life – A Festival of Films and Photographs.’ The festival is in collaboration with The National Centre for Performing Arts (Ncpa), and India International Centre (Iic).

During the release of the poster, Big B was joined by Film Heritage Foundation Director, Shivendra Singh Dungarpur; Olympic Gold Medalist Abhinav Bindra; hockey legend M.M. Somaya; and the renowned Badminton player Aparna Popat.

Talking about the same,...

The ambassador of the Film Heritage Foundation (Fhf), and megastar Amitabh Bachchan, who unveiled the poster of ‘Olympics in Reel Life – A Festival of Films and Photographs’, said it will remind us of the achievements of the Indian Olympians. As India gears up to host the International Olympic Committee (Ioc) session after 40 years, and amid talk of Indian interest in hosting a future edition of the Olympic Games, the Mumbai-based Film Heritage Foundation, and Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland have joined hands to present ‘Olympics in Reel Life – A Festival of Films and Photographs.’ The festival is in collaboration with The National Centre for Performing Arts (Ncpa), and India International Centre (Iic).

During the release of the poster, Big B was joined by Film Heritage Foundation Director, Shivendra Singh Dungarpur; Olympic Gold Medalist Abhinav Bindra; hockey legend M.M. Somaya; and the renowned Badminton player Aparna Popat.

Talking about the same,...

La BêteCOMPETITIONComandante (Edoardo De Angelis)The Promised Land (Nikolaj Arcel)Dogman (Luc Besson) La Bête (Bertrand Bonello) Hors-Saison (Stéphane Brizé) Enea (Pietro Castellitto) Maestro (Bradley Cooper)Priscilla (Sofia Coppola)Finalmente L’Alba (Saverio Costanzo)Lubo (Giorgio Diritti) Origin (Ava DuVernay) The Killer (David Fincher)Memory (Michel Franco)Io capitano (Matteo Garrone)Evil Does Not Exist (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi)The Green Border (Agnieszka Holland)The Theory of Everything (Timm Kröger)Poor Things (Yorgos Lanthimos)El conde (Pablo Larrain)Ferrari (Michael Mann)Adagio (Stefano Sollima)Woman OfHolly (Fien Troch)Out Of COMPETITIONFictionSociety of the Snow (J.A. Bayona)Coup de Chance (Woody Allen)The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar (Wes Anderson)The Penitent (Luca Barbareschi)L’Ordine Del Tempo (Liliana Cavani)Vivants (Alix Delaporte)Welcome to Paradise (Leonardo di Constanzo)Daaaaaali! (Quentin Dupieux)The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial (William Friedkin)Making of (Cedric Kahn)Aggro Dr1ft (Harmony Korine)Hitman (Richard Linklater)The Palace (Roman Polanski...

At a certain point you care less about world premieres and fixate mostly on a festival’s repertory slate. And even by the high standards set with Cannes Classics or NYFF Revivals is this year’s Venice Classics in a class of its own. We could start at the new cuts for three of the greatest directors ever: One from the Heart is the latest film to be given a revision by Francis Ford Coppola, following recuts of Apocalypse Now, Twixt, and Dementia 13––to say nothing of restorations like The Rain People, of which we’re hosting the New York premiere next weekend––while Andrei Tarkovsky’s Andrei Rublev will debut in “the reconstruction of the complete original version, which was censored before its release and has never been seen until now.” Meanwhile one of Yasujiro Ozu’s greatest films, There Was a Father, has been amended by “recent rediscovery...

The first screening of the uncensored version of ’Andrei Rublev’ by Andrei Tarkovsky has also been programmed.

Venice Classics will include a screening of ‘The Exorcist’ and tributes to late filmmakers Ruggero Deodato and Carlos Saura as part of its line-up of restored features for the 2023 edition.

The Exorcist, by William Friedkin, returns in a restored version, to mark the 100th anniversary of its distributor, Warner Bros.

Italian genre master Deodato passed away last year. One of his most extreme films, Ultimo Mondo Cannibale, has been programmed in tribute. This edition also pays homage to Italian actor Gina Lollobrigida, who died in January,...

Recently restored versions of William Friedkin’s “The Exorcist,” Terrence Malick’s “Days of Heaven” and Francis Ford Coppola’s “One From the Heart” feature in the Venice Classics section of the 80th Venice Film Festival.

The lineup of recently restored films in Venice Classics, which is curated by the festival’s artistic director Alberto Barbera in collaboration with Federico Gironi, was unveiled on Friday.

“The Exorcist” is screened, 50 years after it was produced by Warner Bros., alongside Disney’s “Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm,” starring Shirley Temple and directed by “the prolific and sometimes brilliant” Allan Dwan, to mark the Hollywood studios’ 100th anniversaries.

“One From the Heart” and Arturo Ripstein’s “Deep Crimson” are “not just restored, but also revised by the filmmakers themselves in what are genuine Director’s Cuts,” Barbera and Gironi said, while Andrei Tarkovsky’s masterpiece “Andrei Rublev” will be presented in the reconstruction of the original version,...

It will be the second travelling edition of the showcase of Spanish film projects following theh edition at Ventana Sur in late 2022.

Rome’s Audiovisual International Market (Mia) will host the second editon of Spanish Screenings on Tour, the international showcase of Spain’s audiovisual industry, from October 9-13.

The initiative, backed by the European Funds of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan. travels to strategic territories to promote Spanish films and the Spanish industry. It is part of Spanish Screenings Xxl, which also includes the year-long Spanish Screenings 360, film market Spanish Screenings Content which takes place at the Málaga Film Festival,...

Anonymous Content has partnered with Spain’s Morena Films, one of the country’s top production companies, to launch a joint venture aimed at developing and producing Spanish-language content for the global market.

The alliance marks the fifth international joint venture for Anonymous Content as they continue to build partnerships with local producers and companies in key territories around the world.

Anonymous Content’s president of international, David Davoli, and Morena Films CEO Pilar Benito will oversee the joint venture, whose managing director will be named in the coming weeks, the companies announced Friday in a statement.

The partnership aims “to leverage Morena’s long-standing reputation” as one of the key production companies in Spain “to continue developing and producing premium film and TV projects,” the statement added.

Launched in 1999 to produce innovative, high-quality content for the international market, Morena is behind more than 100 titles, taking in feature films, TV series and documentaries,...

Veteran Spanish actor Ana Torrent was around five-years-old when she was cast in her first movie, the landmark drama The Spirit of the Beehive, by maverick filmmaker Víctor Erice.

Fifty years later, the pair have reunited on a new pic, Close Your Eyes (Cerrar los ojos), Erice’s first feature-length film in over a decade. The film debuts Out-of-Competition in the Cannes Premiere section on Monday.

The film follows a famous Spanish actor, Julio Arenas, who disappears while shooting a film. Although his body is never found, the police conclude that he’s been the victim of an accident by the sea. Many years later, the mystery surrounding his disappearance is brought back into the spotlight by a TV show outlining his life and death, showing exclusive images of the last scenes he filmed, shot by his dear friend, the director Miguel Garay.

Few European arthouse-crossover film sales agents have better weathered the ebb and flow of international market dynamics than Madrid’s Latido Films, which turns 20 in 2023.

Proof of that came at April’s Platino Awards, where Latido scored six statuettes, split between an acting double for Alauda Ruiz de Azúa’s “Lullaby” and four for Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “The Beasts,” which has already swept Spain’s Goya Awards and scored a French Cesar for foreign film.

Scoring €6.8 million ($7.5 million) in Spain, and 327,000 admissions in France, “The Beasts” also rates as one of the top-performing recent Spanish-language movies.

If Latido has survived for so long, insists director general Antonio Saura, it’s because of a core strategy of “working with talent, our search for talent.” Beyond that, other keys have been “collaboration with production companies that understand long-term relationships, and well-established relationships with clients.”

Companies with which Latido has held or holds...

In keeping with tradition, the 2023 edition of Cannes Classics promises to be a feast for cineastes with tributes to global masters and restored versions of all-time classics.

Cannes Classics’ Memories of Jean-Luc Godard strand pays homage to the master who died in 2022 by screening a restored version of “Contempt” (1963); “Godard by Godard,” a self-portrait of the auteur; and the world premiere of “Phony Wars,” a trailer for a film that will never get made, described by the festival as a venture where the filmmaker “transformed his synopses into aesthetic programs.”

Liv Ullman will be present at the strand with “Liv Ullmann – A Road Less Travelled,” a documentary directed by Dheeraj Akolkar.

Japanese master Ozu Yasujiro will be paid tribute to with screenings of “Record of a Tenement Gentleman” (1947) and “The Munekata Sisters” (1950) off restored prints. “Return to Reason” – where four films of painter, photographer and director Man Ray have been...

Above: Spanish poster by José María Cruz Novillo for The Garden of Delights.When the great Spanish filmmaker Carlos Saura died in February at the age of 90, I searched through his posters to find a suitable piece to post as a tribute and came across several very stylized, diagrammatic designs for his early ’70s films. They turned out to be the work of José María Cruz Novillo, an artist I surprisingly hadn't been aware of previously, but who, I have since found out, is a titan of Spanish graphic design.Above: José María Cruz Novillo (right) with his son Pepe in front of a wall of his film posters. Photo: Fernando Sánchez.Cruz Novillo, who is still working at the age of 86 (in partnership with his architect son Pepe), could rightfully be called the Saul Bass of Spain. Like Bass, he excels in both film marketing and logo design. Since...

“Carmen” didn’t begin life as an opera: French Romantic writer Prosper Mérimée conceived this tale of Spanish passion and tragic jealousy in 1845, thirty years before his compatriot Georges Bizet brought it into its best-known, aria-rich form. But it’s a story that thrives on operatic delivery, hinging on emotions so large and loud they beg to be sung at the top of one’s lungs. That makes it the opera that filmmakers can’t leave alone, even as they tend to switch out the music: Its screen interpretations range from Otto Preminger’s Broadway-rooted “Carmen Jones” to Jean-Luc Godard’s daring, Beethoven-infused “First Name: Carmen” to Robert Townsend’s Beyoncé-starring “Carmen: A Hip-Hopera.” With the plainly titled “Carmen,” ballet star and first-time feature director Benjamin Millepied joins that club, mostly eschewing song in an attempt to conjure the material’s intensity through dance. He is only intermittently successful.

Opera lovers flock to performances in order to be thrilled, aroused, overjoyed, moved to tears. Ditto disciples of dance, musical-theater fanatics, and — the worst, most masochistic, and unrepentant art-rush addicts of them all — moviegoers. Georges Bizet’s Carmen shocked audiences when it premiered in 1875 in Paris; eventually, his story of a Spanish soldier and a Roma traveler would become a staple of repertory companies and one of the best-known operas of all time. (Hum the opening notes of this, and at least one person will break into their best Beverly Sills impression.

Veteran French docmaker Nicolas Philibert was the surprise winner of the Golden Bear at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, taking the prize for his film “On the Adamant,” a poignant observational study of a Paris mental health care facility.

He received the award from jury president Kristen Stewart, after the star offered an extended and plainly heartfelt ode to the film’s humanity and simplicity: “People have gone in circles for thousands of years trying to pin down what can be deemed art, who’s allowed to do it and what determines its value,” she said, citing the boundary-pushing nature of the festival, and namechecking such opposing philosophers on the matter as Aristotle, Barthes, Sontag and Beavis & Butthead, before concluding, “For all of us, you just know it when you see it.”

It was an apt way to introduce a film that stood out in this year’s Competition...

Major deals close for Latin American and Spanish content at EFM.

In one of the largest deals done at the European Film Market (EFM) this year for Spanish and Latin American fare, Madrid-based Latido Films has closed a raft of deals on Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s rural thrillerThe Beasts, Rocío Mesa’s magical-realist tale Tobacco Barns and Gustavo Hernández’s zombie horror Virus 32.

A big winner at the Goyas earlier this month and a box-office hit in Spain and France, The Beasts has been licensed to Scandinavia (Edge Entertainment), while Hernán Jabes’ erotic crime thriller Jezabel has gone to Italy, and...

It is huge deal for Latin American and Spanish content at the EFM.

In one of the largest deals done at the European Film Market (EFM) this year for Spanish and Latin American fare, Madrid-based Latido Films has closed a raft of deals on Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s rural thrillerThe Beasts, Rocío Mesa’s magical-realist tale Tobacco Barns and Gustavo Hernández’s zombie horror Virus 32.

A big winner at the Goyas earlier this month and a box-office hit in Spain and France, The Beasts has been licensed to Scandinavia (Edge Entertainment), Hernández’s zombie horror Virus 32 has been sold...

At the festival to receive a lifetime achievement award, the director reflects on his career.

Steven Spielberg admitted at a Berlinale press conference today that he has yet to settle on his next movie project as a director.

Spielberg said that he had just emerged from a busy period making two films back-to-back, having started writing The Fabelmans with Tony Kushner while he was still in post for West Side Story. “Those two films overlapped. Because that was such a time drain, I never had a chance to think about what I am going to do when these two movies are over.

Attendees included Carlo Chatrian, Agnieszka Holland, Wim Wenders and Volker Schlöndorff.

The Berlin film festival honoured the legacy of legendary Spanish filmmaker Carlos Saura, who died aged 91 earlier this month, with a special screening of his last film, documentary Walls Can Talk yesterday (Feb 20).

The attendees included Berlinale’s director Carlo Chatrian, the president of the European Film Academy and Polish director Agnieszka Holland and German directors Wim Wenders and Volker Schlöndorff.

Chatrian said the festival wanted to honour his contribution to cinema and also the special link he had with the Berlinale where he premiered The Hunt (1966), winner of...

One of Spain’s most celebrated directors best known for his 1990 film ¡Ay Carmela!

When the Spanish film director Carlos Saura, who has died aged 91, completed his first feature, Los Golfos (The Delinquents), a ferocious story of six impoverished children from the Madrid slums, it was invited to the 1960 Cannes film festival.

However, its implicit critique of the dictatorship of General Francisco Franco meant that it was forbidden in Spain for another couple of years. Taking his films outside Spain to bypass censorship was a strategy Saura adopted several times, although – an awkward contradiction that he recognised – his films’ success abroad made the dictatorship seem more liberal.

Prolific Andalusian production company La Claqueta has tapped award-winning screenwriter-producer Alberto Marini to direct rural thriller “Últimos días de caza” (“Last Days of Hunting.”)

Penned by José Cabeza, co-scribe on 2016’s “7 Years,” Netflix first Spanish original movie, “Last Days of Hunting” has a completed screenplay and has initiated financing.

The aim is to close the financing phase during this year and begin shooting second quarter 2024, probably in northern Spain.

“Last Days of Hunting” leads a growth-period for Seville-based La Claqueta, which is raising the ante in terms of film production ambitions.

“This is a noir that revolves around torpid masculinity; it is the story of volcanoes that don’t know how to release lava when they should and that explode inwards,” said Marini, who debuted as a helmer with 2015 horror feature “Summer Camp.”

“The story takes place in a very localized universe and is grounded in the territory but...

He was working to the last. Five days before his latest work, “Lorca by Saura,” opened at Madrid’s Infanta Isabel Theater – in what he saw as a new phase of theatre-based creativity – Carlos Saura died on Feb. 10 at his Collado Mediano home in the lap of the Guadarrama mountains, north of Madrid. Agnieszka Holland and Volker Schlöndorff look set to attend a Carlos Saura Homage Screening which will be held at the Berlin Film Festival on Monday Feb. 20 at 17:30.

Further good and great are still to confirmed at an event backed by the Berlin Festival and the European Film Academy.

The tribute will be combined with the double bill of “Rosa, Rosae” and “Walls Can Talk” (“Las paredes hablan”), films which premiered at San Sebastian in 2021 and last year.

A tribute at Berlin, the presence of two great European auteurs, Holland and Schlöndorff, and the double bill all seem highly appropriate.

Raquel Welch, the electric, multi-talented superstar of culture-rocking films like "One Million Years B.C.," "Myra Breckinridge," and "The Three Musketeers" has died. We're only 46 days into 2023, and it seems like the death of a major star has rocked almost every one of them. Burt Bacharach, Carlos Saura, David Crosby, Lisa Marie Presley, Ruggero Deodato, Cindy Williams — the list, unfortunately, goes on and on.

There's something particularly painful about Welch's death. She was best known in her time as a sex symbol. Parts like the role in "One Million Years B.C." which gave her such cultural latitude also hemmed her into a kind of straitjacket, in terms of roles she'd later be asked to play. But Welch soldiered on, delivering dynamic yet precise performances in everything from whodunnits like "The Last of Sheila" and social thrillers like "Bluebeard."

Her brilliant sense of timing regarding line delivery — comic and otherwise — is still deeply,...

Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI, and sign up for our weekly email newsletter by clicking here.NEWSKristen Stewart in Olivier Assayas's Personal Shopper (2016).The next film directed by Kirsten Johnson (Cameraperson and Dick Johnson is Dead) will star Kristen Stewart as…Susan Sontag. Based on Ben Moser’s Pulitzer Prize-winning biography Sontag: Her Life, the project will have some hybrid-doc elements, as we might expect from Johnson: according to Screen Daily, Johnson will film an interview with the actress about her preparation for the role at the Berlinale, where Stewart is jury president.Richard Ayoade will direct and star in an adaptation of George Saunders’s The Semplica Girl Diaries, with casting currently underway.New Spanish Cinema luminary Carlos Saura died last week aged 91. His best-known films depicted and critiqued life under the Franco dictatorship, like La Caza...

The filmmaker passed away at the age of 86 following a short illness.

Chariots Of Fire actor Nigel Havers leads the tributes to UK film and commercials director Hugh Hudson who passed away at the age of 86 on Friday (February 10).

The actor called starring in Hudson’s 1981 classic ”one of the greatest experiences of my professional life” and said he was “beyond devastated” by the news. “Like so many others, I owe much of what followed to him. I shall miss him greatly.”

Antonio Banderas, who starred in Hudson’s 2016 Spanish-language film Altamira, said on Twitter: ”Good bye mister Hudson.

Scott Satin, veteran television producer who recently worked on the comedy game show “Funny You Should Ask,” died on Thursday after a long battle with the neurogenerative disorder Progressive Supranuclear Palsy, according to a statement from Allen Media Group. He was 64 years old.

Satin began his TV producing career in the late 1980s with the PBS children’s TV series “Square One Television” and “Mathnet,” the latter being an educational parody of the ’60s police procedural “Dragnet.”

In the ’90s, Satin expanded to daytime TV with the Tom Bergeron-hosted revival of “Hollywood Squares,” “The Byron Allen Show” and “The Keenan Wayans Show.”

Also Read:

Howard Bragman, Veteran Hollywood Publicist and LGBTQ Activist, Dies at 66

Satin then made another genre shift to reality TV in the 2000s, producing shows like “Who Wants to Marry My Dad” and “Meet My Folks” for NBC, along with the Stan Lee-hosted “Who Wants to Be a Superhero?...

(Updated with more information) Howard Bragman, one of Hollywood’s top crisis management experts whose clients included Sharon Osbourne, Monica Lewinsky, Stevie Wonder, Chaz Bono and many more, died peacefully in his sleep Saturday night after a private battle with acute monocytic leukemia. He was 66, just days shy of his 67th birthday.

Related Story Hollywood & Media Deaths In 2023: Photo Gallery & Obituaries Related Story Jeffrey Ballard Dies: Veteran Hollywood Publicist For Charlie Sheen, Paula Abdul & Many Others Was 64 Related Story Carlos Saura Dies: Iconic Spanish Director Was 91

The PR vet was surrounded by his husband Mike, his brother Alan, his niece Lizzy and friends when he passed, we are told.

According to a family representative, Bragman will be laid to rest in a private ceremony later this week in his hometown of Flint, Michigan. Arrangements are being made for a memorial service in Los Angeles at a date to be named.

The Beasts Photo: Courtesy of San Sebastian Film Festival Rodrigo Sorogoyen's The Beasts tore through the competition at the Goya awards - Spain's equivalent of the Oscars - last night.

The western-style tale about a middle-aged French couple who come into conflict with locals after moving to a Galician village, stars Denis Ménochet - who was named best actor - and Marina Foïs. It took home nine awards in total, including best film and best director.

The evening was overshadowed by the death of Cría Cuervos veteran writer/director Carlos Saura, who passed away on Friday before he could receive this year's Goya of Honour.

Actor Eulalia Ramón, Carlos Saura’s widow, read out a note dictated by Saura days before his death. It read: “I would be happy if I’ve served as some inspiration for the directors of today. I see myself as a shooting star in the immensity of the cosmos.