Ann Marie Corvin Latest Celebrity News & Gossip

Ann-Marie Corvin While the pandemic has had a minimal impact on animation compared with other genres, with studios devising global, virtual pipelines long before the COVID-19 crisis, the European toon landscape has faced many changes over the last couple of years.Animation production companies and distributors have had to deal with consolidation, the proliferation of subscription VOD and AVOD platforms and legislation that has affected their YouTube businesses.The irony, for Lionel Marty,

Ann-Marie Corvin With the majority of big global TV distributors opting out of a physical presence at Mipcom, the flashy stands have been replaced by snazzy digital platforms showcasing content rolling out starting this fall.Among them are a series of virtual festivals by Banijay, which acquired Endemol Shine in summer 2020 and boasts a catalog of more than 88,000 hours of programming.

Ann-Marie Corvin Variety has been granted exclusive access to a trailer of Bolivian director Kiro Russo’s second feature, “El Gran Movimiento,” which is premiering at the Zabatelgi Tabakalera section at San Sebastián, after winning the Venice Horizons Special Jury Prize earlier this month.Sold by Brussels-based Best Friend Forever, it has been acquired for the U.K. and Ireland by Sovereign Film Distribution.

Ann-Marie Corvin As it forges ahead with expansion into Europe, Starzplay is on the hunt for “edgy” returning scripted series of between six and ten episodes and promises all its partners a decent cut of the IP, according to the platform’s strategy head Peter Tortorici.In his on-demand keynote at Conecta Fiction Friday, the former head of CBS and Telemundo laid out Starzplay’s content requirements as it makes its migration from cable channel to international streaming platform.The niche player,

Ann-Marie Corvin Speaking at the 5th Conecta Fiction, Ana Bond, Sony Pictures VP and executive director for Latin American and Hispanic markets confirmed that Sony’s Entertainment division had no plans to launch its own streamer.During her online keynote on the first day of this year’s hybrid event, Bond added that the focus remained on partnerships and creating “the best possible content.”“It was a strategic decision that the company made some years ago – Sony wanted to focus more on content

Ann-Marie Corvin A perfect storm of titles previously delayed by the pandemic combined with features set to launch on the back of the Netherlands Film Festival later this month means that a bumper harvest of home-grown films is set for release in Dutch theaters this autumn.Anticipated titles include Alex van Warmerdam’s latest feature “No.

Ann-Marie Corvin As a cross-section of documentary sales exes winged their way towards the Palais for their first physical Cannes in two years, it wasn’t just the COVID-19 spit tests that marked out the experience as different – the marketplace has also changed, the pandemic exacerbating several trends.For starters, in terms of investment in new feature-length documentary titles, most sales agents are arriving with co-pro and financing deals in mind, rather than the acquisition of completed

Ann-Marie Corvin Off the Fence (OTF), the co-producer of Oscar-winning documentary “My Octopus Teacher,” has revealed a strategy overhaul and expansion of its senior management team.The move sees the U.K.

Ann-Marie Corvin Water pollution, organ harvesting and the complex relationships between mothers and daughters were among the subjects to emerge from the Dominican Republic pitching sessions that took place live on Wednesday afternoon during the second day of Cannes’ Film Market.Nine feature projects were presented at the session, which was organized by the DR’s film commission, in a bid to attract sales agents, investors and co-producers.Among them was environmental thriller “Candy Town,”

Ann-Marie Corvin A trailer for Romanian director Radu Muntean’s eighth film and the fourth to be selected for Cannes has dropped ahead of its screening at this year’s Directors’ Fortnight.“Întregalde,” the first acquisition of Romanian distribution company Voodoo Films’ sales arm, is a tense and mud-splattered affair that explores the true nature of altruism.The film follows a trio of Millennials on their end-of-year mission to deliver parcels to a series of remote villages in rural

Ann-Marie Corvin Filmax has acquired the Spanish and international rights to a psychological thriller about a woman in the middle of a marital crises who is stalked by an unknown entity on return to her hometown.Called “Visitor,” the film is the directorial debut of Alberto Evangelio, a producer and director of shorts and branded content, as well as the 13-part Catalan TV series “Sunday Paella.”Currently in post production, the producer-distributor’s latest pick up will be among the thrillers

Ann-Marie Corvin Barcelona-based producer distributor Filmax has snagged the Spanish and international rights to Carlota González-Adrio’s debut thriller “The House Among the Cactuses.”Currently in post-production, the film is based on Paul Pen’s U.S.

Ann-Marie Corvin Premiere Entertainment has acquired the international rights to family faith-based film “The Girl Who Believes in Miracles” after the film’s solid performance at the U.S.

Ann-Marie Corvin Netflix has revealed more artwork and clips from four of its kids and family animation titles, which are set drop this summer and fall.During the streamer’s online Annecy session, introduced by Netflix director of character animation James Baxter, it was revealed that three of the titles – “Karma’s World”, “Vivo” and “Centaurworld” – are animated musicals, while all of them – including the Australian feature “Back to the Outback” – address themes of diversity, inclusion and

Ann-Marie Corvin A key creative from the team advising Warner Bros. Television on how it can bolster diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in its content creation has reached out to urge animators to “draw a better universe into existence”.Kicking off the keynote speech at Women in Animation’s (WIA) World Summit, which takes place annually at the Annecy Animation Festival, Dr.

Ann-Marie Corvin In Marvel’s character universe, what if British secret agent Peggy Carter was injected with super soldier serum, rather than her boyfriend, Steve Rogers?During Women in Animation’s virtual fireside chat on Monday at Annecy, with Marvel Studios’ EVP Victoria Alonso, the exec explained how the firm’s new ten part series “What If” – Marvel’s first foray into animation since becoming its own production company – is enabling creatives to explore a more inclusive universe.Dropping on

Ann-Marie Corvin Producer Suzanne Desrocher-Romero is in the process of completing her late husband George A.

Ann-Marie Corvin Making its European debut at International Film Festival Rotterdam in the Bright Lights section this week is “The Day Is Over,” the directorial debut of cinematographer Qi Rui (“The Sunflowers”), a graduate of the Beijing Film Academy.The feature charts the futile attempts of a 12 year-old girl and her friends to escape from their beautiful but impoverished village and reunite with migrant-worker parents in the city.Left in the care of inappropriate adults and bullied and

Ann-Marie Corvin This year’s International Film Festival Rotterdam Freedom Talk speaker Pallavi Paul claims that her mid-length film “The Blind Rabbit,” which examines police violence and systemic abuse of power, is unlikely to be seen by an Indian audience because the level of censorship applied by the government is “so intense.”The New Delhi-based filmmaker’s 43-minute essay, running in the festival’s short and mid-length section, moves across moments like India’s national emergency of

Ann-Marie Corvin Making its European debut in International Film Festival Rotterdam’s new talent category Bright Future is “OK Computer,” a six-part Hindi sci-fi comedy set 10 years in the future.Featuring an AI-driven “New India” of towering smart holograms and drone superhighways, the Disney Plus Hotstar series stars Vijay Varma (“A Suitable Boy”), Radhika Apte (“Sacred Games”) and Jackie Shroff (“Criminal Justice”), and follows the capers of a hard-boiled detective (Varma) who is called out

Ann-Marie Corvin Romantic frontier drama “The World to Come” opens the June instalment of International Film Festival Rotterdam 2021 and its director, New York and Oslo based writer-director Mona Fastvold is also set to give one of three Big Talks at the festival this week.Since the director’s second feature made its debut last September at the Venice International Film Festival, the mid-19th century-set tale of two isolated farmers’ wives in rural upstate New York who fall in love, with the

Ann-Marie Corvin Among the 16 projects pitched at this year’s Visions du Réel is “Science Fiction” – a genre-busting documentary about Argentine filmmaker Ezequiel Yanco’s flight of imagination during the confines of quarantine.Yanco and producer Ana Godoy first visited the Swiss festival three years ago when “La Vida en Común,” their hybrid documentary about a group of indigenous adolescents from a San Luis settlement, received its world premiere in the International Competition category.Now

Ann-Marie Corvin A Latina Millennial obsessed with racking up as many ‘likes’ as she can on social media is the focus of the latest collaboration between music superstar Marc Anthony’s production shingle Magnus Studios and ViacomCBS International Studios (VIS).Explaining the concept for the comedy “Liked” during a pre-recorded MIP TV keynote on Wednesday evening with VIS president J.C.

Ann-Marie Corvin Made by “Marcella” producerBuccaneer Media as an original for AMC’s BritBox rival Acorn TV, “Whitstable Pearl” has all the ingredients of a travel-friendly crime series with a female lead in a picturesque English town.And while the six part, 45-minute series slots in neatly with the streamer’s other small town crime canon, including Cotswold’s based “Agatha Raisin” and “Queens of Mystery,” Buccaneer execs Tony Wood and Anna Burns were keen to give the seaside town of Whitstable

Ann-Marie Corvin Roberto Olla, executive director of Eurimages, has revealed that the Strasbourg-based public funder has hired diversity consultants to help facilitate fairer funding for under-represented filmmakers.Speaking at the International Film Festival Rotterdam this week on a panel titled “Reality Check: Funding Our Inclusive Futures,” Olla said that the co-production funding body, which comprises 41 member states, has commissioned a report, which should lead to a new policy being

Ann-Marie Corvin Accepting the Robby Muller award online this week, ahead of a talk at the International Film Festival Rotterdam to celebrate her work, Kelly Reichardt appeared delighted with its form.In its second year, the award has taken the guise of an enlarged Polaroid print featuring a solitary tree, which was taken by Muller on a winter’s day in Munich during the eighties.Both Muller and the award’s recipient have a talent for capturing landscapes and Reichardt said that she studied the

Ann-Marie Corvin “Mayday,” which took its first European bow at the Rotterdam Film Festival this week after premiering at Sundance, is the debut feature of U.S.

Ann-Marie Corvin As The Netherlands, under lockdown, celebrated the first half of 50th International Film Festival Rotterdam’s online, the physical half – set to take place in June with real audiences, panels and talks without Zoom links attached – still feels like a long way off.Meanwhile, the industry is hopeful that the swift and pragmatic measures taken by its national funding agency, The Netherlands Film Fund, will be enough to see it through until the end of this year.In January, the

Ann-Marie Corvin Set in turn-of-the-century Dominican Republic, “Liborio” received its world premiere at International Film Festival Rotterdam this week in the Tiger Competition.The directorial feature debut of Madrid-based Dominican-born film editor Nino Martínez Sosa, the Spanish-language film tells the true story of Olivorio Mateo, a peasant who disappears into a hurricane and returns, it is claimed, with the power to cure the sick and take away evil.The film takes place as the Caribbean

Ann-Marie Corvin “Feast,” the directorial debut of visual artist, photographer and filmmaker Tim Leyendekker, centers on a case that rocked Holland in the mid 2000s, when three men were accused of drugging others and injecting them with HIV-infected blood.The film/documentary/essay hybrid unfolds over 84-minutes in seven vignettes, offering the audience different points of view from the victims, perpetrators, police and even, via a microbiologist, the virus itself.A national buzz about the

Ann-Marie Corvin When Anders Thomas Jensen hit 45 years of age the “Adam’s Apple” and “Men & Chicken” director said he had a “minor breakdown,” questioning the point of his life and desperately searching for meaning.Channeling these feelings into the character of a military man with PTSD whose wife has just died in a train explosion that may not have been an accident was the start point of Jensen’s fifth feature as a director: a mid-life noir that straddles action, comedy and existential

Ann-Marie Corvin Göteborg’s TV Drama Vision, the drama series and TV industry strand of Scandinavia’s biggest film-TV festival, has unveiled further details of its works-in-progress and project showcases, as well as keynote speakers from HBO Europe to Walter Presents.As HBO Max lands in Europe during the second half of 2021, Antony Root, executive VP original programming and production at HBO Europe and Christian Wikander, commissioning editor and VP of Programming, HBO Nordic, discuss the

Ann-Marie Corvin Understanding what audiences want at any given time, creating services that switch seamlessly between linear and VOD, and providing in-app interactivity for live programming are key to attracting audiences, according to a NATPE Miami panel on the subject.First up was Jessica Rodriguez, president of entertainment and chief marketing officer of Spanish-language network Univision, which became the fastest growing network in the U.S.

Ann-Marie Corvin Younger demographics are flocking to local U.S.

Ann-Marie Corvin PBS’ American Masters documentary “How It Feels to Be Free” – which counts Alicia Keys among its roster of exec producers – salutes the careers of six Black female entertainers who used their celebrity to promote civil rights and challenge racists stereotypes.The documentary – which premieres today on PBS and is set to become a market priority for its distributor Fremantle at NATPE this week – is directed by Yoruba Richen (“The Green Book: Guide to Freedom,” “The New Black”).A

Ann-Marie Corvin With the success of Netflix’s Egyptian horror series “Paranormal” and a slew of streamers such as Viu and OSN seeking locally produced originals, the TV market in Egypt is set to undergo rapid change.In response, Cairo International Film Festival’s TV Pitch Market, part of the festival’s Industry Days program and now in its second year, joined forces with Middle East Media Initiative (MEMI) to shape 11 TV projects into a “pitchable” form this week.MEMI, a University of Southern