Locarno Bound ‘Nightsiren’ Swooped on by Intramovies (EXCLUSIVE)

Daniel Craig stepped down from playing James Bond after No Time To Die, the race to replace him has been on. While the official announcement will likely come within the next year, a number of massive British stars are in the running in the Bond odds.

Brazilian filmmaker Julia Murat clinched the Golden Leopard prize in the main international competition of the 75th Locarno Film Festival with her latest feature Rule 34.

Lady Gaga attempted to go incognito in a black trench coat, matching baseball cap and a pair of oversized shades while visiting her pal Tony Bennett in New York City. As she prepared to catch up with her frequent collaborator, who recently turned 96, the 36-year-old pop star kept a low profile as she kept her head down while strolling down the sidewalk in a pair of sky-high black leather booties and light-wash jeans. For the occasion, she also sported a hot pink lipstick and kept her platinum blonde pulled back in a sleek ponytail.

Leo Barraclough International Features EditorSales agency Taskovski Films has acquired Susanna della Sala’s “Last Stop Before Chocolate Mountain,” produced by Marco Visalberghi, who won Venice’s Golden Lion for “Sacro Gra.” The film will have its world premiere Tuesday at the Locarno Film Festival as part of the Critics’ Week section.The feature documentary is set in a small Californian town called Bombay Beach, in the midst of a desert and next to a toxic lake. The town had become rundown and almost a ghost town until an influx of artists led to its rejuvenation.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentAmazon Prime Video’s Italian original series “Prisma,” which launches on Aug. 10 from the Locarno Film Festival, sees the streamer revisit the theme of gender identity fluidity after “Transparent” while catering to a young adult audience and also connecting with Italy’s neorealist roots.The eight-episode show (watch exclusive clip) – which marks the first TV series to premiere at the prominent Swiss fest dedicated to indie cinema – is centered around identical adolescent twins Marco and Andrea, who challenge gender norms in different ways, along with their group of friends who are also going through a similar journey.“Prisma” is set in the city of Latina, just south of Rome, and its surrounding area, which used to be a swamp until the land was drained under Fascist rule.

Emiliano De Pablos Chinese sales agent Parallax Films has acquired international sales rights to Malaysian director Ming Jing Woo’s feature “Stone Turtle,” which world premieres in the Locarno Film Festival’s international competition.A time-traveling movie, “Stone Turtle” is produced by Edmund Yeo and Ming Jin Woo at Malaysia’s Greenlight Pictures and co-produced by Cheng Thim Kian and Yulia Evina Bhara at KawanKawan Media in Indonesia.The story follows Zahara, a stateless refugee who lives on a small remote island in Malaysia, where she makes a living selling turtle eggs.One day, Samad, claiming to be a university researcher, visits the island, wanting to employ Zahara to show him around. As the day goes on, Zahara and Samad become entangled in a dangerous dance of duplicity and deception.

cancelation of “First Kill” on Netflix after just one season, series showrunner Felicia D. Henderson is speaking out.

On Tuesday, Netflix put a stake in First Kill after just one season. Today, showrunner Felicia D. Henderson went public with her thoughts about why the show was not given a new cycle.

Rome’s historic Cinecittà Studios on Monday afternoon (Aug. 1) and was extinguished by three teams of firefighters. The fire broke out in the area where a set depicting renaissance Florence was housed and which was being decommissioned, destroying parts of it.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentGiuseppe Tornatore’s Oscar-winning film “Cinema Paradiso,” about a marvellous Sicilian cinema where a boy nicknamed Toto embarks on a lifelong love affair with the movies, is being spun off into a high-profile TV series that Tornatore will write and direct.The six-episode “Paradiso” show is being developed by prominent Rome-based producer Marco Belardi (“Perfect Strangers”) through his new shingle Bamboo Production, which he launched in February. Belardi said he’s in advanced talks with an unspecified U.S. streamer to come on board.

Leo Barraclough International Features EditorMichele Vannucci’s “Delta” has debuted its trailer ahead of its world premiere on the Piazza Grande at the Locarno Film Festival. True Colours is handling world sales.The Po Delta in Italy is the setting of the clash between fishermen and poachers. Osso wants to save the river from overfishing at the hands of the Florians, a family on the run from the Danube.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentItalian auteur Mario Martone, who was recently in Cannes with “Nostalgia,” is set to direct a high-profile doc about the late Massimo Troisi, one of Italy’s most beloved comic actors who starred in the Oscar-winning film “Il Postino.”Troisi, who played the simple postman who rides his bicycle on the sandy terrain of an Italian island to deliver mail to his sole client, the Nobel Prize-winning poet Pablo Neruda, died tragically of congenital heart failure at age 41 in June 1994, the day after “Il Postino” finished shooting at Rome’s Cinecittà studios.The film directed by Michael Radford, which also starred Maria Grazia Cucinotta and Philippe Noiret, became an arthouse sensation one year later when it opened in the U.S. distributed by Miramax.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentSony Pictures International Productions is venturing into local-language movies in Italy with the comedy “Un Natale in Famiglia” (“A Family Christmas”), which is currently shooting in Rome.Alessandro Usai and Iginio Straffi of Colorado Film, which is owned by Straffi’s Rainbow Group, serve as producers on the film, which is the first of a three-picture deal between SPIP and Colorado.Directed by Italian commercial comedies helmer Giovanni Bognetti (“When Mom is Away”), Sony’s first foray into Italian movies stars Christian De Sica and Angela Finocchiaro, who are both local box office draws.De Sica, who is the son of late great neorealist director Vittorio De Sica, is among Italy’s most popular stars. He’s had leading roles in some of the country’s highest grossing Christmas movies, such as “Vacanze di Natale” and “Christmas in Love,” both produced by Aurelio De Laurentiis.

Billy Eichner is moving on from “Billy on the Street” but it doesn’t mean they can’t be friends.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at LargeUsher has signed on to executive produce “Storyville,” a new series about the birth of the Jazz Age in development from Starlings Television. The multi-Grammy Award-winning performer will exec produce along with creators and showrunners Bill Macdonald (“Rome”) and Walt Becker (“Wild Hogs”).“Storyville” is set in New Orleans and follows the tale of five brothel madams as they fight to control the red light district.

No Time To Die star Ana De Armas has said “there’s no need” for a female actor to play James Bond.The actor – who starred alongside Daniel Craig in the most recent 007 film – explained she would like the female roles in Bond films to be “brought to life in a different way”.“There’s no need for a female Bond,” de Armas recently told The Sun. “There shouldn’t be any need to steal someone else’s character, you know, to take over.“This is a novel, and it leads into this James Bond world and this fantasy of that universe where he’s at.”She continued: “What I would like is that the female roles in the Bond films, even though Bond will continue to be a man, are brought to life in a different way.“That they’re given a more substantial part and recognition.

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentItaly’s True Colours has sold Mario Martone’s Naples-set Cannes competition drama “Nostalgia” to Curzon Film for the U.K. and Ireland, among other new territories.The deal, negotiated by True Colours sales manager Francesca Tiberi and Curzon acquisitions executive Eleonora Pesci, marks the first partnership between the companies.At the Italian Screenings market event recently held in Lecce, Southern Italy, the Rome-based sales company also sealed fresh deals on several other films, including pre-sales on upcoming Locarno title “Delta,” which is a revenge drama with a contemporary Western vibe.Martone’s “Nostalgia,” which has been praised by Variety critic Guy Lodge as the prolific Italian auteur’s “most rewarding film in years,” stars Pierfrancesco Favino as the middle-aged Felice Lasco, who returns to the bustling port city after having lived in Egypt for 40 years.

Daniel Craig stepped down from the role of James Bond last year - following the release of No Time To Die - talks of his replacements have been rife. Many actors have been suggested as good candidates to take over from the actor in the ever-changing Bond odds.