Apple TV+ to Launch on Tata Play Binge in India – Global Bulletin

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Uday Shankar, the former head of Disney in India, says that “limitless” changes to the Indian media landscape may soon leave behind conventional ideas of television and video. The great disruptor is JioCinema, part of Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries conglomerate, and in which Shankar is a major investor. JioCinema, which operates streaming services, and is allied with Viacom18, sits alongside the cluster of Jio companies that have, in just a matter of years, exploded the cellular telephony business in India and are doing the same with broadband internet access and video.

Naman Ramachandran The proposed merger between Indian powerhouse Zee Entertainment Enterprises and Sony‘s Indian TV businesses, which has been nearly two years in the making, is likely to be delayed further, Sony said in a filing on Friday. The companies cleared a key regulatory hurdle in August, but there are other matters pending, especially that of leadership. The original plan had foreseen that Zee’s CEO Punit Goenka would be its captain, while Sony would own a 51% controlling stake.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief TIFFCOM, the rights market that sits alongside the Tokyo International Film Festival, is celebrating its return to an in-person format for the first time since 2019, with a move to another venue and the launch of the new Tokyo Story Market. The three-day market (Oct. 25-27) will relocate from Ikkebukuro to the Tokyo Metropolitan Industrial Trade Center (aka Hamamatsucho-Kan) in Hamamatsucho district.

Naman Ramachandran The BBC has commissioned “Doctor Who: Unleashed,” a 30-minute factual entertainment series that will accompany the upcoming new season of “Doctor Who.” The companion show, hosted by Steffan Powell, will kick off after every episode of “Doctor Who” and will provide insights into how it was made and feature interviews with cast and crew. “Doctor Who,” which is celebrating its 60th anniversary with David Tennant as the 14th Doctor, returns in November with three episodes. Jemma Redgrave reprises her role as Kate Lethbridge-Stewart and Neil Patrick Harris will play the Toymaker, an all-powerful enemy last seen in 1966.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Lightning International, a Hong Kong-based content and channels business, is unveiling Flash, a new turnkey channel management service, designed to help media companies streamline video distribution to their customers. The news was announced on the first day of the APOS conference in Indonesia.

Any time Martin Scorsese makes a film, it’s a big event, and his crime drama, “Killer Of The Flower Moon,” has been at the top of our Most Anticipated Films of The Year list two years in a row (there was hope that it might arrive in 2022). Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, and Lily Gladstone (“Certain Women”), it’s about a series of murders that took place in Omaha’s Osage Nation in the 1920s; essentially, the Osage Native Indians were getting rich off the oil they were legally entitled to, and this made a lot of racist white people incredibly unhappy, to say the least.

Big Brother,” which first launched 23 years ago, is set to return to ITV screens on Oct. 8.

K.J. Yossman To mark the 25th anniversary of the “Harry Potter” books being published in the U.S., the Empire State Building is set to be lit up in Hogwarts house colors at sunset on Wednesday, Sept. 27.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Director Clara Law (“The Goddess of 1967”) has been set as president of the jury which will discern this year’s Asia Pacific Screen Awards. She will be joined by Malaysia’s Yeo Yann Yann (“Ilo Ilo,” “Wet Season,” American Born Chinese”), German producer Anna Katchko (“Stepne,” “Happiness”), and Faisal Baltyuor, producer and CEO of Muvi Studios in Saudi Arabia. A separate jury for documentaries and animation will be headed by Taiwan-based Myanmar director Midi Z, India’s Rima Das and Japanese documentary maker Toda Hikaru. The APSAs will be presented at a ceremony in Gold Coast, Queensland on Nov.

Naman Ramachandran British actor Vanessa Redgrave will receive the European Lifetime Achievement award for her outstanding body of work at the European Film Awards. Hailing from an illustrious family of actors, Redgrave’s first lead in “Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment” (1966), by Karel Reisz, won her best actress at Cannes and scored BAFTA and Oscar nominations.

Leonardo DiCaprio has only words of praise for Killers of the Flower Moon breakout star Lily Gladstone.

Naman Ramachandran India’s Film Heritage Foundation (FHF), which enjoys the support of cinema greats Martin Scorsese and Amitabh Bachchan, is conducting the third edition of the Biennial Audio-Visual Archival Summer School in partnership with the International Federation of Film Archives. The global film preservation training workshop is coming to India for the first time and will be held at the India International Centre in Delhi Oct.

Naman Ramachandran 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 Toronto International Film Festival, CJ Cultural Foundation and the Korean Film Council (KOFIC), have unveiled the CJ & TIFF K-Story Fund. It is an initiative to foster, support and champion Korean Canadian and American filmmakers looking to develop their first or second feature film. It will have an annual budget of $30,000 for a three-year period and support three creative teams.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Tabu-starring spy thriller, “Khufiya” has been set as the opening title of the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles (Oct. 11-15).

Ellise Shafer MIA, the international market held annually in Rome, has announced the first confirmed speakers for its ninth edition. This year, speakers at the industry event — which focuses on co-production, financing strategies and sales and distribution — include Nicole Clemens, president of Paramount of Paramount Television Studios and Paramount+ original scripted series; Sara Bernstein, president of Brian Grazer and Ron Howard’s Imagine Documentaries; Marge Dean, head of Skybound Entertainment’s animation studio and president of Women in Animation; “Waltz With Bashir” director Ari Folman; Nicholas Weinstock, founder and president of Invention Studios and “Severance” producer; and James Townley, chief content officer of development at Banijay.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Entertainment, sports and brand licensing firms WildBrain CPLG and WildBrain Ltd. have brokered location-based entertainment (LBE) deals on behalf of Peanuts Worldwide for “Peanuts,” “Teletubbies” and “In the Night Garden” with China’s Max-Matching Entertainments. These are expected to lead to the opening of family entertainment centers and IP-themed hotel rooms for each brand in Beijing, in Zhongshan City, Guangdong and a third city yet to be announced.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Abacus Media Rights has pre-sold the feature documentary “The Life and Deaths of Christopher Lee,” to Sky Arts, SBS Television Australia; to NonStop Entertainment for Scandinavia, Iceland and the Baltics and to Movistar for Spain. Lee is known as the Dracula character and for transitioning from 1960s Hammer horror films to a distinguished acting career that encompassed James Bond films, the “Star Wars” and “Lord of the Rings” franchises. Less well-known are his aristocratic Italian roots, a close family connection to James Bond novelist Ian Fleming, Lee’s wartime experiences in the British and Finnish military, post-war Nazi-hunting adventures and a side career as a heavy metal rock singer. As an actor, Lee achieved a Guinness world record for the highest number of screen appearances. Produced in association with the British Film Institute and Trigger Films by Canal Cat Films, “Life and Deaths” is an innovative documentary which uses fresh interviews, archive material and multiple forms of traditional and cutting-edge animation, including marionation, to bring one of the world’s leading actors back to life on screen.

Naman Ramachandran Netflix has unveiled the first trailer for “Jaane Jaan,” “Kahaani” filmmaker Sujoy Ghosh‘s Indian adaptation of Japanese author Higashino Keigo’s bestselling 2005 novel “The Devotion of Suspect X.” The cast is led by Bollywood royalty Kareena Kapoor Khan and also includes Jaideep Ahlawat (“Paatal Lok”) and Vijay Varma (“Dahaad”). The film follows a single mother and her daughter who commit a crime and a neighbor who helps them cover it up amidst a police investigation. The novel has been adapted numerous times including in Japan as “Suspect X” (2008), in Korea as “Perfect Number” (2012) and in China as “The Devotion of Suspect X” (2017).

Killers Of The Flower Moon actor Lily Gladstone has described Yellowstone as a “delusional” portrayal of the American West.The American neo-Western drama created by Taylor Sheridan and starring Kevin Costner premiered in June 2018, with the second part of the fifth and final season due to air this November.The show follows the Dutton family who own the Yellowstone Dutton ranch, and the conflicts they face from groups along their shared borders – including an Indian reservation, a cattle ranch and land developers.Gladstone – who featured in Martin Scorsese‘s Killers of the Flower Moon – said that she found Yellowstone‘s depiction of the American West “delusional” and “deplorable” in an interview with Vulture.She added that she’d previously auditioned for the show, having worked on projects with both Native and non-Native creators, sharing: “No offence to the Native talent in that. I auditioned several times.