Cineflix Rights Presells ‘Last King of The Cross’ to Sky – Mipcom Global Bulletin

UPDATED with latest: A Los Angeles Superior Court judge on Tuesday ruled that Rust script supervisor Mamie Mitchell can pursue her negligence and other claims against Alec Baldwin, who fired a loaded gun on the New Mexico set of the indie Western last year that killed cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and wounded director Joel Souza.

Paul Mescal‘s breakout role may have been in 2020’s “Normal People,” but 2022 is the year the actor showcases his talents on the big screen. With starring roles in “God’s Creatures,” “Aftersun,” and “Carmen” this year, Mescal’s star is no longer just a rising talent but a bonafide star.

Naman Ramachandran The U.K.’s BFI has revealed details of the National Lottery Audience Projects Fund, with £15 million ($16.9 million) available over three years to support the U.K. exhibition and distribution sector to grow audiences for U.K. independent film and XR/broader screen work. Applications, which open Nov. 4, are invited from organizations that are focused on increasing access and growing the engagement of audiences that are representative of the U.K. population. The fund will make awards of between £20,000 and £200,000 depending on the scope and reach of the project, with an upper limit of £500,000 for projects of “exceptional scale and ambition,” the BFI said in a statement. Eligible applicants will need experience of film distribution, film exhibition or audience development activities in the U.K. For research and development projects, applicants can apply for between £10,000 and £20,000.

Liza Foreman Set to run April  14-19, Canneseries has introduced a new competition documentary section, the International Documentary Series Competition, to be included in its next go-round in Cannes. The idea is to keep storytelling at the heart of the event. “Whether the main character is sport, history, a crime, a celebrity, the environment or a changing society, it is always about telling stories. And Canneseries, which promotes serial writing in all its forms, had to highlight this narration of reality,”, said Albin Lewi, artistic director of Canneseries. Bavaria Media International has sealed a distribution agreement with major Portuguese production house SPi  to handle worldwide distribution of “Codex 632.” The six-part series is based on the bestseller of the same name by José Rodrigues dos Santos. “Codex 632” is a co-production between SPi, Portuguese TV station RTP, and Brazilian streaming provider Globoplay, and is scheduled to premiere in 2023.

“I’m used to being a chameleon but this was absurd,” Cara Delevingne told a Mipcom Cannes panel this afternoon as she discussed the many experiments she embarked on while making upcoming Hulu and BBC Three doc Planet Sex with Cara Delevingne, which has sold to 90 territories.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Singapore has banned the release of “#LookAtMe,” a feature film by local director Ken Kwek. The InfoComm Media Development Authority said that the film exceeds film classification guidelines because it denigrates a religious community. Supposedly based in true events, the film depicts a man who is offended by a pastor who preaches against homosexuality, but whose behavior contradicts his teachings. The protagonist’s viral video about the aberrant priest lands him in jail, causing the man’s gay identical twin to fight for justice. “#LookAtMe,” premiered at the New York Asian Film Festival and local media report that the film has been selected for next month’s Singapore International Film Festival. But the IMDA ruling means that it cannot now be shown in any form in Singapore unless Kwek is successful with an appeal.

Liza Foreman Fremantle is partnering with electronics giant Samsung to bring a dedicated FAST channel, “The Jamie Oliver Channel” to audiences in the U.K. Available from 12th October, the channel is dedicated to the most well-known titles from the British chef, catering to Samsung TV Plus watchers with cooking content for all occasions. Samsung TV Plus delivers over 1,600 channels across 24 countries, spanning news, sports, and entertainment. London-based Future Studios has launched factual series “Unbelievable Me” (10 x 45’) at Mipcom.

ITVX and Viaplay four-partner Litvinenko, which will see David Tennant playing the doomed Russian dissident, has sold into 80 territories ahead of its launch. AMC+ and Sundance Now have taken rights in the U.S., while Prime Video bagged Canada from distributor ITV Studios. 

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Australia’s SLR Productions has announced production on season two of the award-winning original CGI animated series, “Space Nova” for ABC ME. The 15 x 22-minute season has received significant production funding from both Screen Australia and the Australian Children’s Television Foundation as well as development funding from ABC ME and Create NSW. “Space Nova” will be co-produced with Giggle Garage in Malaysia and distributed internationally by ZDF Studios, with ACTF representing the series across Australia and New Zealand. Targeting a six- to ten-year-old global audience, the first season sold to broadcasters or streamers in Germany, the U.K., Norway, Finland, Sweden, Poland, the U.S, Singapore, East Asia, Indonesia, and Brazil.

Tim Roth-starring Australian drama Last King of the Cross has been picked up by Sky in Europe, marking the first major sale of the Paramount+ series as it heads to Mipcom Cannes.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Blackstone Publishing, Aethon Books and Sterling and Stone are among the first publishing partners to join Yonder, a new serialized fiction app combining mobile reading, a serialized experience and thousands of curated stories. Then venture is being launched by South Korea’s Naver, the tech giant that owns Webtoon and Wattpad, the story app that has germinated scores of book-to-film adaptations. The platform offers an ad-free reading experience with several chapters of each story available for free before readers are offered the chance to unlock additional material using virtual coins. At launch, Yonder is the home of exclusive new titles including “Bound to the Shadow Prince,” from Ruby Dixon, the international best-selling fantasy author of the TikTok viral sensation series “Ice Planet Barbarians”; “Bitten by Desire,” the first paranormal romance from best-selling author Ivy Smoak, (“The Hunted” book series”; and “Gravesong,” a spinoff of the popular web serial “The Wandering Inn,” from pirateaba.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Chinese filmmaker, Bi Gan, best-known for his single-take feature “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” has seen his “A Short Story” picked up by Kino Lorber for distribution in North America. A fairy tale that follows the relationship between man and cat, the film had its world premiere in competition at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival and now has its North American premiere in the Currents section of the New York Film Festival. Kino Lorber plans to qualify “A Short Story” for the 96th Academy Awards, showing it theatrically nationwide in early 2023 in tandem with a theatrical re-release of “Long Day’s Journey Into Night.” “Kino Lorber rarely acquires short films, but Bi Gan has packed more cinematic delight into the fifteen minutes of ‘A Short Story’ than many feature length films deliver in two hours,” said Kino Lorber SVP Wendy Lidell. The deal was brokered by Les Films du Losange.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Japanese director Kawase Naomi will lead the international competition jury of the 44th Cairo International Film Festival (Nov. 13-22). Kawase won the Caméra d’Or for best debut feature film at Cannes for “Moe no Suzaku” (1997) and also won awards there for “Mogari no Mori” (2007) and “Hikari” (2017). In 2000, her film “Hotaru” won the FIPRESCI award at Locarno. Cairo festival president Hussein Fahmy said that Kawase has had a distinguished career and possesses great experience that qualified her to obtain prestigious awards from various international festivals.

After the death of Queen Elizabeth II, many Royal fans are wondering: when is King Charles III’s coronation? 

Naman Ramachandran Oscar and Venice-winning filmmaker Laura Poitras (“Citizenfour,” “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed”) and fellow filmmakers Georgia Oakley (“Blue Jean”), Roberto Minervini (“What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire?”) and Ondi Timoner (“Last Flight Home”) were among those who protested against the imprisonment of Iranian filmmakers and other incarcerated artists around the world, and to demonstrate support for the tenacious women of Iran who are challenging for their freedom at the BFI London Film Festival on Monday. They joined festival director Tricia Tuttle, producer Madeleine Molyneaux (“Gospel Hill”); actors Aurélia Petit (“Saint Omer”) and Taki Mumladze (“A Room of My Own”); actor and writer Mariam Khundadze (“To Batumi and every single memory”); writer Morgan M. Page (“Framing Agnes”); industry leaders Tabitha Jackson, Clare Binns and Jason Wood; and other festival delegates in a moment of solidarity and reflection.

Naman Ramachandran Maureen Duffy‘s 1966 book “The Microcosm” has been adapted as a film featuring two-time Oscar winner Glenda Jackson. In 1966 London, when homosexuality was still criminalized, The Gateways club in Chelsea offered a haven for women to dance, express themselves and love who they want. In the book, based on her own experience, Duffy examined if this gay bar, and those like it, really offered the freedom its patrons crave. In the film, Jackson, along with director Joe Ingham, draw parallels between the past and the present and explore the uncomfortable paradox that exists within queer spaces. The Cheerio production featuring an original score by Helen Noir and animation by Rebecca L. Weil, opens at museum of British LGBTQ history, Queer Britain, London, on Oct. 12.

A small plane crashed near Biddeford Municipal Airport, killing two construction company executives who were aboard, officials said. The Beechcraft Bonanza was owned by the company and the executives were the only ones aboard Wednesday afternoon when the plane went down in woods in Arundel, officials said.