Cannes Declares Virtual Market a (Qualified) Success

Public media station WETA Washington, D.C. and the National Alliance on Mental Illness are teaming to host a one-hour virtual town hall to launch Well Beings, a public media campaign to address the health needs of Americans with a focus on the Youth Mental Health Project.

Marc Malkin Senior Film Awards, Events & Lifestyle EditorWalter Mercado knew how to make an entrance.Just ask the filmmakers behind the new Netflix documentary “Mucho Mucho Amor: The Legend of Walter Mercado” about meeting the iconic television astrologer for the first time at his home just outside of San Juan, Puerto Rico.“We go into his office and meet his secretary and his nieces and they take us upstairs to one of his sitting rooms,” co-director Kareem Tabsch tells Variety.

iconic television astrologer Walter Mercado are hoping to adapt the film into a scripted biopic.Cristina Costantini, who directed “Mucho Mucho Amor: The Legend of Walter Mercado” with Kareem Tabsch, tells Variety that they asked Mercado who he wanted to play him. “I suggested Gael García Bernal and he said, ‘Too old,’” Costantini said.

Andreas Wiseman International EditorEXCLUSIVE: Pablo Larrain’s Princess Diana movie Spencer, which is set to star Kristen Stewart as the former royal, was a hot seller for FilmNation out of the Cannes virtual market.The New York-based firm all but sold out on the project, closing deals for the UK, France, Italy and Benelux (STX Entertainment), Germany and Switzerland (DCM), Australia/NZ (Roadshow), Latin America, Spain and Portugal (Sun), South Korea (Green Narae) and Japan (Tohokushina).Buyers

Matt Donnelly Senior Film WriterThe latest project from acclaimed independent filmmaker Justin Chon, “Blue Bayou,” has been acquired by Focus Features, Variety can report exclusively.The studio brokered a worldwide deal for the film’s distribution rights out of the Cannes 2020 virtual market, which was financed by MARCO and Entertainment One.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentCannes’s virtual Marché du Film, which wrapped on June 26, attracted more than 10,002 participants over the course of five days. The U.S.

Australian actor Margot Robbie, over the years, has steadily grown from strength to strength with each film. The actress, who began her career in 2007, was widely noticed for her role in The Wolf Of Wall Street as Naomi Belfort, opposite Leonardo DiCaprio.

The global film industry is betting that eventually there'll be a box office rebound. Studios and streamers, international distributors and global sales agents were doing business at the Virtual Cannes Market, the two parallel online film markets held June 22 to 28 in lieu of the canceled physical festival, as if the future were bright.

Anthony D'Alessandro Editorial Director/Box Office EditorEXCLUSIVE: Enlightened Kingdom is producing the John Stephenson Obe-directed feature Lady of Heaven about Lady Fatima, the daughter of the prophet Muhammad.Separated by 1400 years, an Iraqi child, in the midst of a war-torn country, learns the importance and power of patience.

Television trade group NATPE on Monday unveiled a new online marketplace, NAPTE Virtual, that will launch alongside its industry events this year. The virtual market is pitched as a one-stop shop for television producers, sellers and platforms, online and off.

It appears that actor-producer Margot Robbie and writer Christina Hodson enjoyed their time together on “Birds of Prey” so much that they’re willing to take their talents to the high seas, as the duo are said to be working on a new film in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise. According to THR, Margot Robbie has signed on to star in a new female-fronted ‘Pirates’ adventure over at Disney, and she’s bringing along her “Birds of Prey” writer Christina Hodson to pen the script.

Jake Kanter International TV EditorHello, and welcome to International Insider, Jake Kanter here. Well done on making it to Friday, here are the six things we want you to know about the global film and TV business this week.

As the Virtual Cannes Market heads into its final days, the majors have begun to flex their monetary muscle, with MGM closing a deal for remaining international territories on Endeavor Content's hotly-anticipated Bill & Ted sequel and several studios vying for the Will Smith/Antoine Fuqua escaped slave actioner Emancipation, which is expected to close a high eight-figure worldwide deal before Virtual Cannes wraps up.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentGreek directors are contending with the coronavirus crisis, on top of their country’s pre-existing economic struggles, by weaving the pandemic into their narratives and project presentations.That’s one trend that surfaced when five work-in-progress feature films, three docs, were digitally showcased to sales agents, distributors and programmers on Tuesday during Thessaloniki Goes to Cannes, the Cannes Virtual Film Market’s annual pics-in-post industry

Leo Barraclough Senior International CorrespondentBeta Cinema has closed numerous deals on its Cannes virtual market slate, spearheaded by all-rights deals on Berlin competition entries “Berlin Alexanderplatz” to Le Pacte for France and “My Little Sister” to Weltkino for Germany, as well as “The Auschwitz Report” to Signature Entertainment in the U.K./Ireland.As well as the French deal, Burhan Qurbani’s new adaptation of Alfred Döblin’s “Berlin Alexanderplatz” was picked up by distributors in

Pink as a pop of bubblegum and only a little more substantial, Magnus von Horn’s “Sweat,” one of the Cannes 2020 Official Selections that plays during this week’s Cannes Virtual Market is, despite all the cardio, a curiously low-blood-pressure affair.

Martin Dale ContributorOne of Latin America’s biggest genre propositions, the Latido Films-sold “Virus 32,” from Uruguayan director Gustavo Hernandez (“You Shall Not Sleep”), was unveiled Tuesday on the A Demain Cannes market platform.The $1 million pic is a 50-50 Argentina-Uruguay co-production between Aeroplano, run by Sebastian Aloi, and Mother Superior Films, run by Hernandez and Ignacio García Cucucovich.In addition to subsidy support from Argentina and Uruguay, the horror-thriller has

Carole Horst The Cannes Marché du Film, along with a sales initiative led by Hollywood agencies, is hosting the first major virtual market since the start of pandemic, starting on June 23. Distributors and sales agents are looking forward to it: the turn-up for the online Cannes Marché du Film is significant with more than 7,000 accredited participants as of mid-June.“As nobody can leave their house, a virtual market is the next best thing.

Chris Pine is set to star in a brand new thriller movie, called Violence Of Action.

Tom Grater International Film ReporterFull credit to organizers of the Cannes virtual Marche (June 22-26), who by and large pulled off with relative smoothness day one of what will be a technically challenging and largely unprecedented event.There were a few hitches here and there, however, which caused scattered moments of frustration and, in one particularly bizarre incident, some hilarity among delegates.Earlier today, Neon aces Tom Quinn and Elissa Federoff logged on for an insightful