‘Olympic Halftime’ Explores the Ruins of Vast Olympic Treasure Chests at Ji.hlava Doc Fest

Strictly Come Dancing viewers were left doing a double take after spotting an Olympic athlete in the audience at this weekend's live show.

Coldplay recently performed a cover of ‘The Astronaut’ by Jin of K-pop boyband BTS during their Tokyo concert on November 6.The new acoustic cover is the first time Coldplay have performed the song without Jin on their ongoing ‘Music of the Spheres’ world tour, which kicked off in March 2022.“We’re going to play a song that we gave to Jin. We’ve never played this before on our own, maybe we’ll never play this again,” teased Coldplay frontman Chris Martin.“This is Jin’s song.

Christopher Vourlias A middle-aged man grappling with his thwarted ambitions grows obsessed with a beautiful young woman. The fallout threatens to unravel the fraying seams of his precarious, frustrated life in Stergios Paschos’ “The Last Taxi Driver,” which world premieres in the main competition this week at the Thessaloniki International Film Festival.

Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea International Film Festival has unveiled it 2023 line-up and theme as it maintains its third edition against the backdrop of the escalating Israel-Gaza Conflict. (scroll down for full list)

EXCLUSIVE: Two-time Tony and Emmy Award-nominated actor Arian Moayed (Succession) and Oscar-winning filmmaker Rayka Zehtabchi (Period. End of Sentence.) have boarded Liam LoPinto‘s Oscar-qualifying live-action short The Old Young Crow as executive producers.

This year’s Tokyo Film Festival closes this evening with the world premiere of Godzilla Minus One, the latest edition in Toho’s monster franchise, directed by filmmaker Takashi Yamazaki. 

Davide Abbatescianni After two pandemic years and a successful 2022 edition back in full swing, Lucca Comics & Games — Europe’s biggest geek meet, second in size globally only to Tokyo’s Comiket — is set to unspool again in the picturesque Tuscan town from Nov. 1-5.

Very little has been heard from Indonesian filmmaker Mouly Surya since her buzzy 2017 Cannes title Marlina the Murderer in Four Acts. 

This year’s Tokyo Film Festival (TIFF) has three Japanese filmmakers playing in competition — a haul that TIFF programming director Ichiyama Shozo told Deadline is a welcome high for the fest. 

“Ticket sales have gone up 27%, and we’re only at the midway point, so I’m quite happy,” Ando Hiroyasu, Tokyo Film Festival (TIFF) Chairman, told Deadline as he shuttled between engagements at this year’s busy and buzzy comeback edition. 

Veteran Hong Kong actor Tony Leung passed through the Tokyo Film Festival this afternoon, where he led a masterclass session following a screening of 2046, his sixth collaboration with filmmaker Wong Kar-Wai. 

As the Tokyo Film Festival returns with a focus on international expansion, this year’s MPA seminar hosted as part of the festival industry program was centered around how to make the country a more attractive production environment for international producers.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Leading Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou has a tough guy exterior – leather jackets, black shirts and a square jaw that has earned him acting awards alongside his top-level credentials as cinematographer and director of “Hero,” “The Road Home” – but on a visit to the Tokyo International Film Festival this week he was all smiles and frank talk. Zhang received a lifetime achievement award on Monday. On Tuesday the festival gave a gala screening to his historical blockbuster “Full River Red.” And at a Wednesday masterclass, Zhang was more gushed usable details about his process and frank advice for newcomers. “To be a film director you need to be physically in good shape. No smoking and no drinking,” he advised. “I generally adopt a two-stage process,” he explained.

Naman Ramachandran Abramorama has acquired North American theatrical rights for Leslie Shampaine and Pip Gilmour‘s feature documentary “Call Me Dancer.” The deal was revealed on the sidelines of TIFFCOM, the film market attached to the Tokyo International Film Festival. The film follows Manish Chauhan, a young and talented street dancer from Mumbai who struggles against his parents’ insistence that he follow a traditional path.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Ichiyama Shozo assumed control of the program of the Tokyo International Film Festival after a long programming career that included Tokyo and the slightly more indie Tokyo Filmex events. He is also a regular producing partner of Chinese art-house darling Jai Zhangke. These influences have shaped his approach to this year’s Tokyo IFF lineup, he told Variety.

“The pandemic has finally passed, and cinema has returned to normal, but the way people think has changed dramatically,” Chinese filmmaker Zhang Yimou concluded when quizzed by Deadline about cinema post-Covid 19 during a brief chat at the Tokyo Film Festival (TIFF). 

Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer For three decades, Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios has been offering live terror experiences in Southern California and Florida — primarily via a series of mazes where the undead chase crowds with chain saws and scary movies come to life. Over decades, licensed characters like Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees have haunted the studio backlot. But on a recent Wednesday in October, the annual attraction was hosed down not with fake blood but a slew of corporate owner NBCUniversal’s intellectual property.

Wim Wenders introduced the cast and crew of “Perfect Days” at an outdoor stage, giving the opening ceremony of the 36th Tokyo International Film Festival a moment of European cool. Inside the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater, Wenders was brought on stage twice more. “I had a dream that with ‘Perfect Days,’ I’d make a film that would play at the Cannes Film Festival. I dreamed that it would win the best acting prize.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Chinese film sales company Parallax Films is poised to make a splash this week in Tokyo. The outfit has two titles in the Tokyo International Film Festival official selection and a host of festival-travelled Chinese films in the TIFFCOM market. Appearing in main competition is “A Long Shot,” a crime drama by first time feature director Gao Peng.

NBCUniversal still considers the Olympic Games to be “the great aggregator of viewership,” in the words of top exec Dan Lovinger, and sees 2024 revenue for Paris on pace to exceed the tally of the 2020 Tokyo Games.