Hot Docs, North America’s largest documentary festival, has unveiled the projects it has selected for the 24th edition of the Hot Docs Forum, the financing event aimed at securing co-productions and funds for feature length documentaries. The Forum returns in-person to Toronto’s Hart House on May 2 and 3 as…
Happiness
SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from the Season 1 finale of “The Last of Us,” now streaming on HBO Max. The world of “The Last of Us” just got its first major clue as to how Ellie, played by Bella Ramsey in HBO’s hit adaptation, became immune to the deadly…
Siva Ananth, one of the producers of Mani Ratnam’s magnum opus “Ponniyin Selvan: 1,” is ecstatic about the film’s rich haul of nominations at the Asian Film Awards. The film has received a total of six nominations, including for best picture. It is an adaptation of Kalki Krishnamurthy’s classic Tamil-language…
When he began working on his latest documentary, “The Last Seagull,” acclaimed Bulgarian filmmaker Tonislav Hristov (“The Good Postman”) set himself a seemingly simple task: to follow the last of the dying breed of male escorts who, since the communist era, have spent their summers seducing foreign women in resort…
There are no props in director Jamie Lloyd’s version of Henrik Ibsen’s drama “A Doll’s House” — no sets, no costumes (just plain contemporary clothing in dark blue), not even a curtain. There’s no dress to be mended, no mailbox, no letter to be read, no cigar to be lit,…
What the world needs now is Burt, sweet Burt, and there’s a bereft feeling to be had in knowing we won’t be getting any more of the haunting, mind-twisting melodies that characterized the composer’s work over a period of more than six decades of sumptuous pop. But Burt Bacharach left…
U.K. network Channel 4 has commissioned a new documentary from Curious Films about TV host and author Paula Yates, who died following a heroin overdose at the age of 41 in 2000. The two-part doc, titled simply “Paula,” will explore the “life and legacy” of the wildchild presenter, whose relationships…
Are the SAG Awards Michelle Yeoh’s last stand in the battle for best actress Oscar? SAG-AFTRA is the final industry group to bestow awards before final Oscar voting begins. With Academy members’ eyes on that Feb. 26 event, all hopes for Yeoh — after losing Critics Choice and BAFTA —…
Always a frontrunner at Co-Pro Series, the Berlinale Series Market’s annual project pitching event, “Tipping Point” walked off Tuesday morning with the Series Mania Award. The prize is an invitation to the production’s team to present again at the industry centrepiece at next month’s Lille-based get-together, the Series Mania Forum’s…
Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s modern-day feminist Western, “The Beasts,” already a box office breakout in France and Spain, swept nine prizes including film, director, and original screenplay on Saturday at a celebratory 37th Goya Awards, given Spain’s big fest prizes and rally at its home box office. The upbeat mood was tempered…
It’s safe to say Steven Spielberg is an “RRR” fan. In a conversation with director S.S. Rajamouli, the “Fabelmans” helmer praised the Indian blockbuster as “eye candy” and promised to return to India — where he last filmed in 1976 — for one of his next projects. After a brief…
Hollywood publicity giant ID PR has lost three of its top executives. Variety has learned that senior vice president Jillian Roscoe and vice presidents Lindsay Krug and Rachel Karten have left the company. Roscoe, who started her career two decades ago at ID in New York City, is launching a…