Italy’s ‘A Conspiracy Man’ Wins Cannes’ La Cinef Film School Shorts Competition

Dakota Johnson is officially a wedding crasher.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at LargeThe Banff World Media Festival revealed the winners of the 2022 Rockie Awards International Program Competition on Monday, with big winners including the “Friends” Reunion, “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” “We Are Lady Parts” and more.The event, held in Banff and hosted by comedian Rakhee Morzaria (“Run the Burbs”) featured winners chosen by a panel of 150 international industry professionals. The Rockie Awards International Program Competition presented awards in 28 categories spanning Documentary & Factual, Arts & Entertainment, Children & Youth, Scripted, and Podcast.The competition featured 148 nominations from 45 countries including the UK, United, Canada, Australia, France, China, Germany, Italy and Norway.

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentParis-based sales company Charades has closed a raft of deals on “Forever Young,” Valeria Bruni Tedeschi’s film which competed at Cannes and earned a warm critical welcome. “Forever Young” opens at the end of the 1980s in Paris and follows a young troupe of comedians who have just have been admitted to Les Amandiers, the prestigious theater school headed by Patrice Chéreau. Bruni Tedeschi wrote the script alongside Agnès De Sacy and regular collaborator Noémie Lvovsky.

Cineflix Rights Goes On Scripted Sales Spree

Elsa Keslassy International CorrespondentMK2 Films has locked major territory deals on Leonor Serraille’s drama “Mother and Son” which world premiered in competition at the Cannes Film Festival and garnered strong reviews. “Mother and Son” charts the lives of a young African woman, Rose, and two of her four children, Jean and Ernest, who come to France from the Ivory Coast in the 1980s with high ideals.

Unlike most films and series set in Naples, “Nostalgia” really does show us the city like we’ve never seen it before: from the melancholy perspective of someone who left forty years ago. Italian director Mario Martone makes the astute and powerful decision not to make this immediately obvious, opening the film with a stunning sequence showing a man (Pierfrancesco Favino) silently arrive in and explore the city at night.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentVeteran Hollywood multi-hyphenate George Gallo (“Bad Boys,” “The Comeback Trail”) is attached to direct “Gambino,” a high-end biopic about organized crime boss Carlo Gambino that Gallo is co-writing with two-time Oscar winner Nick Vallelonga (“Green Book”).The ambitious project, announced in Cannes, is being lead produced by Julius R. Nasso, also a Hollywood veteran, best known for his production partnership with Steven Seagal that went sour.

Leo Barraclough International Features EditorBerlin-based sales outfit M-Appeal has closed further deals for Jan Gassmann’s “99 Moons” in Italy (Teodora Film), France (La Vingt-Cinquième Heure) and Japan (AT Entertainment), following the film’s world premiere in the Cannes’ ACID sidebar.“99 Moons” follows the passionate and turbulent relationship of Bigna and Frank, two people from different worlds who become entwined in an erotic love story. With raw and intimate cinematography (Yunus Roy Imer, “Systemcrasher”), the film takes an unflinching look at the magnetism and power games of sexual attraction.

For decades, Italian filmmakers dominated Cannes.If the 1960s saw Federico Fellini, Michelangelo Antonioni and Luchino Visconti reign supreme, somehow the 1970s were even richer. Elio Petri and Francesco Rosi won shared top prizes in 1972, while for two consecutive years later that decade the Taviani brothers and then Ermanno Olmi hoisted Palmes across a border that sits just 40 miles away.This year’s lone competition title from an Italian director (the only other Italian language film, “The Eight Mountains,” comes courtesy of two Belgians), Mario Martone’s “Nostalgia” will probably not break that particular drought, but the Neapolitan director can take solace in another modest honor: Telling a story about mothers and sons, about gangsters and priests, and about a peculiar kind of longing for the past in a place where little has changed for hundreds of years, “Nostalgia” is a nigh perfect candidate to wave il Tricolore.Taking a thin amount of plot and stretching it as far and wide as it can go, the film itself is far from perfect, but it does benefit from “The Traitor” star Pierfrancesco Favino’s terrific lead performance as a man who learns the hard way that there’s no going home again.After forty years abroad, Felice (Favino, of course) returns to his native Naples a stranger in a familiar land.

The weekend was one full of fancy for Kourtney Kardashian and new husband Travis Barker . And while the entire Kardashian clan were out to celebrate the couple’s love, fans were quick to point out that her eldest son Mason didn’t appear in any pictures.

Newlywed official! Kourtney Kardashian has taken Travis Barker’s last name on Instagram.

Måneskin stopped by the The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon yesterday (May 20) to deliver a performance of their new single ‘Supermodel’ – watch it below.The Italian Eurovision winners were without their usual bassist, Victoria De Angelis, due to illness, but instead of recruiting another musician to fill in, the band asked the show’s host Jimmy Fallon to strap up.Rocking a blonde wig, colourful eyeliner, and a red and black jacket, Fallon addressed the audience before the performance. “This is a true story,” he explained.

Whoa. Talk about a change in public perception!

Lise Pedersen Paris-based international sales company The Party Film Sales has nabbed the rights for Antongiulio Panizzi’s hybrid documentary “The Girl in the Fountain,” a double portrait of icons Anita Ekberg and Monica Bellucci, which opened at the Torino Film Festival last November.The story of an actress devoured by her own icon, the film alternates between archive footage of Ekberg and reenacted scenes by Bellucci, who retraces Ekberg’s weaknesses and choices, inviting the viewer to reflect on what it is like to be an icon, providing a fresh look at femininity, fame and media exposure.The famous scene in Federico Fellini’s “La Dolce Vita,” in which Marcello Mastroianni and Anita Ekberg take a midnight dip in the Trevi Fountain, hides a much more chaotic life – that of an actress consumed by her own iconic image, says Panizzi. Speaking to Variety ahead of the Torino premiere, Panizzi said that the iconic scene turned out to be a burden for the actress, who got to experience what Rita Hayworth meant when she said that “they go to bed with Gilda; they wake up with me.”It was the director’s wish to have Bellucci tell the Swedish icon’s story, as he believed she would be the perfect match.

For his most subdued film yet, Belgian director Felix van Groeningen, along with co-directing partner Charlotte Vandermeersch take to the Italian Alps for a decades-spanning story of friendship. Following Groeningen’s solo effort, 2018’s “Beautiful Boy,” “The Eight Mountains” is a quiet return to form with its stunning mountain scenery and strong performances from Luca Marinelli and Alessandro Borghi, but this elegiac personal epic is far too languid for its length.

Coleen Rooney was able to celebrate her mother Colette McLoughlin's birthday on Wednesday. Although the Wagatha Christie trial between Coleen and Rebekah Vardy was expected to end, the judge put the case on hold for one day.MORE: Peter Andre and wife Emily put on defiant display after Rebekah Vardy's claimsTaking to her Instagram page, Coleen - who is married to football star Wayne Rooney - shared a lovely black and white snap with her lookalike mum to mark her birthday.WATCH: Rebekah Vardy cries in witness box during Wagatha Christie trial"Happy Birthday to an extremely special person, My Mum," she remarked.

Two years in France inspired Italian director Pietro Marcello to create “Scarlet,” his French-language feature debut and the opening film of this year’s Directors’ Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival. Freely inspired by Aleksandr Grin’s tale “The Scarlet Sails,” the film examines the quiet tenderness that permeates the relationship between a father comfortable in skepticism and a daughter driven by unshakeable belief.

TURIN, Italy -- Ukrainian band Kalush Orchestra won the Eurovision Song Contest, a clear show of popular support for the group's war-ravaged nation that went beyond music.The band and its song “Stefania” beat 24 other performers early Sunday in the grand final of the competition. The public vote from home, via text message or the Eurovision app, proved decisive, lifting them above British TikTok star Sam Ryder, who led after the national juries in 40 countries cast their votes.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy welcomed the victory, Ukraine's third since its 2003 Eurovision debut.

Following a rollercoaster voting section this year, Ukraine’s Kalush Orchestra won the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday with their song ‘Stefania’. The UK’s Sam Ryder followed in second place with ‘Space Man’, in a dramatic turnaround from last year’s nul points disaster.Already one of the favourites to win the competition, it became widely expected that Ukraine would be Eurovision champions this year following the Russian invasion of the country in February.Of course, following those events, it had not been a given that Ukraine would be able perform at this year’s contest at all.