Beta Backs ‘Living’ Producer Number 9 Films’ New TV Division; Kate Laffey To Lead Small Screen Subsidiary

EXCLUSIVE: As it preps for the release of notable titles like Nickel Boys, production company Louverture Films has added a handful of key execs and collaborators, including two principal partners and a chief financial officer.

John Bleasdale Guest Contributor Veteran festival director Marco Mueller was only hired to take over as the artistic director of the Taormina Film Festival in April this year. “I’m stressed out,” he told Variety, two weeks ahead of the festival opening, but he is philosophical.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor “Baby,” which premiered in Cannes Critics’ Week where it won the Louis Roederer Foundation Rising Star Award for joint acting lead Ricardo Teodoro, has closed further sales. Berlin-based sales agency M-Appeal have sold the distribution rights to Ama Films for Greece, Mezipatra z.s for Czech Republic and Slovakia, and Falcon for Indonesia.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent France’s Les Films du Losange is taking international sales outside Italy on “Sicilian Letters” (“Iddu”), the hotly anticipated drama about Cosa Nostra boss Matteo Messina Denaro – who was dubbed “the last godfather” – directed by Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza (“Sicilian Ghost Story”). “Sicilian Letters” pairs two top Italian actors — Elio Germano, who plays Messina (see first-look image above) and Toni Servillo (first-look image below) as his antagonist Catello, a shady secret services operative — working in tandem for the first time.

EXCLUSIVE: Synchronicity Films is adapting Hanif Kureishi’s The Body as a series with the novelist and screenwriter on board as an exec producer and Emmy-nominated director Paul McGuigan attached. There are scripts from crime writer Robert Murphy and the producers will relocate the action from the UK to the U.S. for the series.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief A jury headed by French Vietnamese director Tranh Anh Hung awarded its Golden Goblet (Jin Jue) prizes for the Shanghai International Film Festival’s main competition. The top prize for best feature went to “The Divorce,” directed by Kazakhstan’s Daniyar Salamat. The jury praised the film for its sophisticated story-telling which mixes comedy, farce and tragedy, and “which moves fluidly from public sphere to the intimate relationship of a couple in crisis” and its feeling of innocence.

Peaky Blinders star Sam Claflin has been spotted filming scenes in the city centre for an upcoming drama for Amazon Prime.

Masterpiece on PBS has ordered a 10th season of the mystery series, Grantchester. Stars Robson Green and Rishi Nair are set to return as DI Geordie Keating and Reverend Alphy Kottaram, respectively.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent U.S.-based Italian director Mitzi Peirone’s comic horror thriller “Saint Clare” has been set as the opening night film of Italy’s upcoming Taormina Film Festival with protagonist Bella Thorne in attendance. “Saint Clare” follows Peirone’s debut, the horror film “Braid,” which launched from Tribeca in 2018. Based on U.S.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent Martin Scorsese is set to shoot a documentary in Sicily about ancient shipwrecks in the Mediterranean Sea that will bring the Oscar-winning director back to Polizzi Generosa, the small town where his paternal grandparents were born. The untitled project is based on research by U.S.

International documentary filmmakers and industry reps are gathering at Sheffield DocFest in the U.K. at a moment of political tumult in Europe. British voters head to the polls for a general election on July 4; in France, President Macron dissolved the National Assembly and called snap legislative elections after a French ultranationalist party surged in voting for the European Parliament. Germany’s far-right AfD party also scored substantial gains in that European Parliament vote. Overall, the center held — more or less.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Along with a red-carpet opening ceremony, a press conference with the members of the main competition jury is a staple event of major film festivals and the 26th edition of the Shanghai International Film Festival kicked off in traditional form on Friday. Along with Vietnam-French director Tran Anh Hung, previously revealed as jury president, the other members of the decisive committee this year are: Australian director and screenwriter Rolf de Heer; German director Matthias Glasner; Hong Kong actor Tony Leung Ka Fai; Argentinian director Santiago Mitre; Chinese director Sonthar Gyal; and, the jury’s only woman, star actor Zhou Xun. A packed audience lobbed familiar questions about the criteria they jurors would employ to decide the Golden Goblet prize winners, and what informs those views.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Berlin-based sales agency Films Boutique has closed further deals for Ray Yeung’s “All Shall Be Well,”following the North American deal with Strand Releasing and the first international sales previously announced by Variety.The film has been acquired by Nour Films in France, One From the Heart in Greece, Mezipatra in Czech Republic and Slovakia, HBO Europe in Eastern Europe, Beta Film in Bulgaria and Falcon in Indonesia, in addition to the already announced deals with Vedette in the Benelux, Karma in Spain, Trigon in Switzerland and Lev in Israel.Films Boutique is in negotiations with potential buyers in the U.K., Latin America, Germany and Japan.Additionally, New Voice Film Productions Ltd. secured distribution deals with Golden Scene for Hong Kong and Macau and Flash Forward Entertainment in Taiwan.“All Shall Be Well” is written and directed by Yeung and was produced by Yeung’s frequent collaborator Michael J.

Cadbury is set to delight chocolate lovers by bringing back the beloved Cadbury Top Deck for a limited time.

The Conservative Party manifesto confirms that a General Election win on July 4 will see the introduction of the ‘Triple Lock Plus’, a new measure that will ensure the Personal Allowance - which has been frozen at £12,570 since April 2021 - rise in-line each year with the Triple Lock. This guarantee would mean that the Personal Allowance is always higher than the maximum rate of the New State Pension, which is now worth £11,502 annually.

Nick Vivarelli International Correspondent Iginio Straffi, creator of the six teenage fairies in the hit “Winx Club” TV franchise, is launching a new animated series titled “Mermaid Magic” that will drop globally on Netflix on Aug. 22.

The waiting is almost over. Hundreds of thousands of Tartan Army have descended on Germany and millions more will watch around the globe as Scotland kick off Euro 2024 against the hosts in Munich's Allianz Arena.

Inside every fridge is a dial with a series of numbers, but many people are clueless about the vital role it plays in keeping your food as fresh as possible.

Ed Meza @edmezavar Madrid-based Begin Again Films has nabbed Santiago Maza’s Mexican documentary “State of Silence,” produced by Diego Luna and La Corriente del Golfo, the shingle he runs with Gael García Bernal. The sales agency and distributor, which acquired international rights with the exception of North America and Latin America, has also unveiled the film’s first trailer.

EXCLUSIVE: Bryan Brown and Greta Scacchi are back for more adventures in the Australian outback after Darby and Joan was renewed for a second season by Acorn TV.