Oscars: Israel To Submit ‘Cinema Sabaya’ For Best International Film Category Following Ophir Win

Kathie Lee Gifford would rather not hear Kelly Ripa’s thoughts on their late co-host, Regis Philbin. On Monday, the former host shared that she doesn’t have any plans to read Ripa’s book,.  “I was very sorry to see the headlines,” Gifford said during an interview with  on Monday.

Jem Aswad Senior Music Editor While there’s been no official word, Pink Floyd has been shopping its recorded-music catalog and other assets for several months, seeking as much as $500 million, according to the Financial Times, with both major music companies and investment firms as the top bidders. But sources say an explosive new interview with founding member, main songwriter and stakeholder Roger Waters — in which he makes extensive remarks about Israel, Ukraine, Russia, the U.S. and other political matters that one could politely characterize as controversial — is giving at least one potential buyer cold feet and seems likely to lead others to rethink their positions. For years Waters has sounded off about politics in the press and at his concerts, most controversially Israel’s policies. But the new interview in Rolling Stone raises (or lowers) the bar considerably. While interviewer James Ball does his best to challenge some of Waters’ more far-fetched statements, the former Pink Floyd singer argues emphatically that some Jewish people in the U.S. and U.K. bear responsibility for the actions of Israel “because they pay for everything”; that well-documented accounts of Russian war crimes in Ukraine are “lies, lies, lies”; that the United States is “the most evil [country in the world] of all by a factor of at least 10 times”; that Russia’s brutal military involvement in Syria is justified because “they were there at the invitation of the Syrian government” (which is led by one of the world’s most murderous dictators, Bashar Assad), and more. (See a 12,000-word transcript of the interview here).

EXCLUSIVE: Alon Schwarz’s hard-hitting documentary Tantura, revisiting the conflicting accounts around an alleged massacre of the residents of a Palestinian village by Israeli fighters in 1948, will open the 16th edition of New York’s Other Israel Film Festival.

Zac Efron is opening up about the rumors he’s joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

K.J. Yossman International streaming service Starzplay has been rebranded as Lionsgate+. Available in 35 countries including the U.K. and Canda, the re-brand will roll out tomorrow (Sept. 29) across all territories. The full list of territories where Starzplay will re-brand as Lionsgate+ is: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, U.K., Argentina, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Venezuela, Australia and Japan.

Travel is in full swing again and with summer beach season winding down it got me thinking about what’s next. So I put together a list of the best destinations  for LGBT travel and which places are perfect for LGBT holidays. There are a lot of countries where, sadly, it’s illegal to be LGBT and some places where it carries the death penalty, but that needn’t put you off LGBT holidays.

Malina Saval Associate Editor, Features The rooftop terrace of Hollywood’s Neuehouse was abuzz Thursday night at a fete celebrating Scripted Israel, a social summit promoting Israeli television on the global stage. The inaugural four-day event, which ran Sept. 19-21, paired 28 Israeli delegates – selected by partners at Jerusalem’s esteemed Sam Spiegal Series Lab and the Israeli Producers Association – with development and content executives in Hollywood, served as a de facto workshop experience for TV writers and producers angling to make their splash Stateside.  Tchelet Semel, Director of Cultural Affairs, Consulate General of Israel, Los Angeles, and Daniel Susz, Director of Film & TV in North America, Israel Office of Cultural Affairs, Consulate General of Israel, were chief on-the-ground organizers of the summit. 

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Les Films du Losange has closed a raft of major deals on Kasja Naess’s animated feature “Titina” which is produced by the teams behind the Oscar-nominated film “The Triplets of Belleville” and Oscar-winning short “The Danish Poet.” “Titina” will world premiere at Animation Is Film Festival, which takes place Oct. 21-23, and is produced by GKids, in collaboration with Annecy International Animation Film Festival and Variety. Budgeted at $8.5 million, the Norwegian animated movie was produced by Mikrofilm (“The Danish Poet”) and Vivi Film (“The Triplets of Belleville”). The film tells the real-life story of a fox terrier that accompanied her master on an expedition to the North Pole in an air balloon in the 1920’s. It will be released in Norway by Norsk Film Distribusjon, and in France by Les Films du Losange.

Disney yesterday began overseas rollout on the remastered rerelease of James Cameron’s Avatar in five early markets with the Na’vi seeing a collective $877K gross. The 4K high dynamic range version was No. 1 in France at $513K, coming in 8% ahead of the comparable 3D rerelease of Titanic in 2012.

period drama “Corsage,” starring Vicky Krieps as 19th-century Austrian Empress Elisabeth; Lukas Dhont’s tender coming-of-age film “Close,” the Belgian selection; Jerzy Skolimowski’s nearly wordless “EO,” a road movie from the point of view of a donkey that was submitted by Poland; and South Korean director Park Chan-wook’s stylish crime story/love story hybrid, “Decision to Leave.”Other films that could be positioned to do well include the German selection, Edward Berger’s harrowing new version of the classic antiwar novel “All Quiet on the Western Front,” a Netflix release; Spain’s “Alcarras,” a drama by Carla Simon that won the Golden Bear at this year’s Berlin Film Festival; and “Our Brothers” from director Rachid Boucharev, who has represented Algeria seven previous times in the Oscar race, landing three of the country’s five nominations.As usual, the rule that allows an Academy-approved body from each country to choose that country’s Oscar submission has led to some surprises.

star Yara is worried about her friends and family in her home country of Ukraine after Russia invaded Ukraine in this exclusive clip from Sunday's new episode of. Yara moved to the United States to be with her now-husband, Jovi, but all of her loved ones are still in Ukraine, including her mother.In the clip, Yara says she's «miserable all the time» since the invasion began and that she's terrified for her friends and family.

EXCLUSIVE: French director Alice Diop’s breakout feature Saint Omer has secured distribution in a raft of territories for Paris-based Wild Bunch International (WBI) following its Venice Silver Lion Grand Jury Prize win.

Maha Haj’s drama Mediterranean Fever, which world premiered in Cannes Un Certain Regard this year, has been selected as Palestine’s official entry in the best international film category.

Naman Ramachandran Joachim Back’s “Corner Office,” featuring “Mad Men” star John Hamm, will open the 30th edition of London’s Raindance Film Festival (Oct. 26-Nov. 5). Austin Bragg and Meredith Bragg’s “Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game” will close the festival. To mark its 30th anniversary, Raindance will screen iconic independent films that had their U.K. premieres at the festival, including “Pulp Fiction,” “Memento,” “The Blair Witch Project” and “Oldboy.” Special screenings of new films include the world premiere of Stephen Moyer’s “A Bit of Light” (U.K.), starring Anna Paquin and Ray Winstone; director Moshe Rosenthal will take part in a Raindance masterclass and present the U.K. premiere of “Karaoke” (Israel); and the world premiere of Dilshad Husain’s British Asian feature “Banglatown.”

grossed an impressive $11.3 million at the North American box office this year.Instead, the country’s selection committee went with “Last Film Show,” a coming-of-age drama that was compared to “Cinema Paradiso” after its premiere at this year’s Tribeca Film Festival. In the vein of Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans” and James Gray’s “Armageddon Time,” it is a semi-autobiographical work based on moments from its director’s childhood.The decision was reminiscent of the choice in 2013 to send “The Good Road” to the Oscars over “The Lunchbox,” which had been considered an all-but-certain nominee if it had been chosen.India has sent 54 films to the Oscars dating back to 1957, landing three nominations with no wins.

Naman Ramachandran AGC International, the international sales and distribution arm of Stuart Ford’s AGC Studios, has revealed a raft of pre-sales on Richard Linklater’s “Hitman” and Anna Kendrick’s “The Dating Game.” “Hitman” will begin production in New Orleans in early October and “The Dating Game” in Vancouver later the same month. “The Dating Game,” which marks Kendrick’s directorial debut, tells the chilling true story of serial killer Rodney Alcala, who appeared on popular U.S. dating program “The Dating Game” — and was selected to go on a date with contestant Cheryl Bradshaw (to be played by Kendrick) — before his grisly crimes were ultimately exposed.

AGC International, the international sales and distribution arm of Stuart Ford’s independent content studio AGC Studios, has secured a raft of pre-sales on Richard Linklater’s Hitman and Anna Kendrick’s directorial debut The Dating Game, both of which will enter production in October.

Anna Marie de la Fuente Buenos Aires-based FilmSharks subsidiary The Remake Company has closed a remake deal with Italy’s Marco Belardi and his new label Bamboo Prod. for Ariel Winograd’s latest film “Today We Fix the World” (“Hoy se Arregla el Mundo”).  Produced by powerhouse shingle Patagonik, the family dramedy was picked up by Netflix for several key territories after its theatrical release by Disney’s Star early this year.  Mexico’s BH5 has also acquired the remake rights and is about to produce its version while talks are underway with Korean and French companies, said FilmSharks founder and CEO, Guido Rud. Winograd is already a known quantity in Italy. His last film “Ten Days Without Mom” topped the box office in Italy when it was released.

K.J. Yossman Keshet International (KI) CEO Alon Shtruzman is stepping down from the company at the end of the year, he confirmed today. KI is the content production and distribution arm of Israel-based Keshet Media Group (KMG). The company first attracted international attention with its drama series “Prisoners of War,” which was adapted by Showtime to become the hit show “Homeland,” before cementing its presence in 2012 as KI. Shtruzman has been with the company since 2012 and it is under his watch that KI established a global distribution and production infrastructure that has seen its shows, including “Suspicion,” “A Small Light” and “LA Brea,” picked up by networks from HBO and BBC to Netflix and Disney+.

Macro, the Oscar-winning film studio founded by Charles D. King, is getting into business with Amazon. Under the new deal, Amazon Studios has first look on feature film projects from the Judas and the Black Messiah producer, which intends to develop, package and produce for Prime Video. The  OTT service has a footprint in 240 countries around the globe.