Rotterdam Film Festival Reveals Full Program Including Tiger Competition

Nick Vivarelli International CorrespondentNaples-set young adult series “The Sea Beyond,” which depicts the world of a juvenile jail in the crime-ridden Italian city, is scoring a slew of international sales prompted by its phenomenal ratings on pubcaster RAI.Germany’s Beta Film, which is selling the show about kids behind bars produced by Rome-based Picomedia and RAI Fiction, has inked deals with WarnerMedia Latin America for HBO Max, Sweden’s free-to-air channel TV4, cabler HOT for Israel, and streamer Blu TV in Turkey.The deals mark a rare case of an Italian young adult series traveling abroad.Set in a youth detention center overlooking the bay of Naples, “The Sea Beyond” depicts a world populated by kids apparently without hope, “given that they mostly belong to [the Camorra] organized crime syndicate that Naples is known for,” said Picomedia chief Roberto Sessa, who added that the show also has “all the color and vitality of that city.” Instead, “It’s like the flip side of ‘Gomorrah’ in that it gives a sense of hope,” Sessa noted, because “there is light at the end of the tunnel for these kids.”Sessa also pointed out that they took some poetic license by making the youth penitentiary a place for both men and women who get to interact “with all the relationships and passions that stem from this.”The jail warden is a woman named Paola Vinci, played by Carolina Crescentini (“Bastards of Pizzofalcone”).Directed by Carmine Elia, Milena Cocozza, and Ivan Silvestrini, “The Sea Beyond” is now at its second season which debuted on RAI in mid-November 2021 both on the pubcaster’s linear RAI 2 channel and on its RAI Play streaming platform.It has become a minor phenomenon in Italy because it’s the first show that proved a

The 72nd Berlin International Film Festival has confirmed its various juries, including who will be joining M. Night Shyamalan to award the International Competition prizes.

Refresh for latest…: Xavier Giannoli’s Illusions Perdues (Lost Illusions) leads nominations for the 2022 César Awards, France’s equivalent to the Oscar. The Venice premiere scored 15 mentions, followed by Leos Carax’s Annette, which opened the Cannes Film Festival last year and has 11 nominations. They are followed by Valérie Lemercier’s Aline, the musical dramedy inspired by the life of Céline Dion which also debuted in Cannes and has 10 nods. (Scroll down for the full list of nominations which is being updated.)

EXCLUSIVE: Apax Capital Group, a film and TV funded backed in part by the Italian government, has struck a ten-year deal with Mike Amoia to provide music for its European projects.

Sasha Urban editorThe Alliance of Women Film Journalists has announced the 2021 AWFJ EDA winners for its 15th season. This year’s most-nominated film, “The Power of the Dog,” swept the awards with wins in 11 out of 25 categories including best film, best director for Jane Campion, supporting actress for Kirsten Dunst and adapted screenplay.“Although our beloved film industry was plagued by the pandemic, 2021 turned out to be a rather magnificent year for movies — especially for films made by and about women,” said AWFJ president Jennifer Merin.

Clayton Davis The horror genre is often overlooked and underappreciated in awards spaces. That’s what makes “You’re Dead Hélène” from Michiel Blanchart, which is one of the shortlisted contenders for live action short, an exciting addition to the Oscar conversation.After dreaming of working in the movies and making shorts with his friends while growing up in France’s countryside, Blanchart decided to go back to his native country to study in one of the best-known cinema schools in Belgium: the Institute of Media Arts.

Christopher Vourlias New feature films from Japanese auteur Koji Fukada, Spanish-Chilean filmmaker Théo Court, and rising Georgian director Elene Naveriani are among the 28 projects selected for this year’s CineMart co-production market, which takes place online Jan. 30-Feb.

Naman Ramachandran The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is informing film and television works around the world and Malayalam-language film “Hawk’s Muffin” (“Prappeda”) – selected in this week’s International Film Festival Rotterdam – uses it as a starting point, and adds elements of war to tell a surreal tale set in a dystopian future.After his plane drops an atomic bomb, a pilot is ordered into hiding by his commanders. The location is an isolated estate where his life intertwines with his daughter, granddaughter, a bodyguard, a priest and a policeman.

Naman Ramachandran The weird, wonderful and sometimes sad world of actors who make a living as lookalikes of Bollywood superstars is the subject of Geetika Narang Abbasi’s documentary “Urf,” world premiering in the Cinema Regained strand of the International Film Festival Rotterdam.The actors are known by the names of the stars they portray, with the prefix Jr. – short for Junior. “Urf,” which translates as also known as or alias, follows several lookalikes, but mainly focuses on Kishore Bhanushali a.k.a.

Nathalie Álvarez Mesén’s Clara Sola was the big winner at the 2022 Swedish Film Awards, known as the Guldbagges, scooping Best Film and Best Director. Scroll down for the full list of winners.

Bruno Dumont is one of the most exciting filmmakers working today. Sure, not everything he releases is perfect, but he’s a risk-taker, and his films, such as “Jeanette,” “Joan of Arc,” and “France,” all take big swings and are worth watching just to see how far he’s willing to go.

PENTAGON have made their much-anticipated comeback with ‘Feelin’ Like’.The members of PENTAGON look suave in the cinematic new visual, which is set in a lavish art gallery filled with curious ornaments and sculptures. “You got me feelin’ like,” they sing, before launching into a series of intricate dance moves as the track shifts into its funky chorus.‘Feelin’ Like’ is the title track of their 12th mini-album ‘IN:VITE U’, which was released at the same time.

Newen Studios is moving into feature film after financier Anton increased its investment in the French production giant by 40% to €50M ($56.6M).

Vine decides to mount a comeback, it should quickly and immediately license “After Yang.” Without exactly trying, South Korean–born American filmmaker Kogonada’s second feature offers a powerful, almost undeniable showcase for the narrative and emotional merits of extreme short-form video content. The delicately futuristic story of a family sent into a tailspin by the malfunction of its robotic servant and caretaker, “After Yang” examines the way that memory conveys meaning, very often when people absorb or revisit it from a perspective different from the way they originally experienced it.

“On a vacation in Tuscany, two families – one Danish, one Dutch – meet and become fast friends. Months later, the free-spirited Dutch family extends an invitation to the more conservative Danish one for a holiday weekend getaway at their countryside home.

Oscar international film shortlist right now, it would be the Cannes Film Festival. Nine of the 15 titles that made the cut came from the fest, even though the Palme d’Or winner, France’s submission “Titane,” did not.

Dennis Harvey Film CriticThe fear of seemingly harmless strangers that’s heightened during our era of online “relationships” (not to mention COVID) is cannily exploited in actor-turned-writer-director Christian Tafdrup’s “Speak No Evil.” Building on the thorny couple dynamics of his prior features “Parents” and “A Horrible Woman,” this excruciatingly slow-burn thriller has a young Danish family befriended on holiday by a Dutch clan, only to belatedly realize these new BFFs might be hazardous to their health.Tafdrup’s squirm-inducing tale is premiering in Sundance’s Midnight section, and should find ready berth among genre fans, with strong potential for remake bids. (Distribution rights have already been secured by horror streaming service Shudder.) At the same time, its all-too-palpable cruelty will repel some viewers, in the same way such prior atypical horrors as the original “Wolf Creek” and both editions of “Funny Games” did.

Mexico’s Oscar-shortlisted Prayers For the Stolen directed by Tatiana Huezo won the FIPRESCI Prize for Best International Feature Film at the Palm Springs Film Festival, which revealed its juried winners Wednesday despite being forced to cancel its 2022 edition.

Anna Marie de la Fuente Amanda Kramer’s ‘Give Me Pity!’ starring Sophie von Haselberg, is bowing a teaser trailer ahead of its Rotterdam world premiere where the pic closes the event’s Filmmakers in Focus section on Jan. 29.Variety nabbed an exclusive first look at the teaser, courtesy of Alief, which snapped up the global sales rights to the pic in early January.Following its world premiere, the U.K.-French sales agent, distribution and production company will present the film at the Berlinale’s online European Film Market for its market debut in February.“Give Me Pity!” pivots on Variety TV show host Sissy St.

Leo Barraclough International Features EditorInternational sales company The Match Factory has revealed its Berlin Film Festival lineup, including two titles in Competition: “A E I O U – A Quick Alphabet of Love” by Nicolette Krebitz and “Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush” by Andreas Dresen.