Despite blue skies over Greece’s second city ahead of the opening ceremony, the 65th Thessaloniki Film Festival kicks off Oct. 31 under clouds of uncertainty, with the war in Ukraine raging toward its three-year anniversary and the year-old Israel-Hamas conflict spilling into neighboring countries and threatening to engulf the entire Middle East. The U.S., meanwhile, […]

As the Thessaloniki Film Festival’s industry arm, Agora, celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, organizers are looking to maintain the right balance for an event that continues to grow in stature while retaining its carefully curated, almost intimate feel. To that end, industry head Angeliki Vergou — an Agora veteran who assumed her current post […]

Two-time Academy Award nominee Alexander Rodnyansky (“Leviathan,” “Loveless”) was sentenced in absentia to 8.5 years in prison by a Moscow court on Monday, with the producer accusing Russian authorities of attempting to “instill more fear” among critics of Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine. “Dozens of Russia’s best writers and musicians have been sentenced for that […]

“The Last Kingdom” and “My Policeman” star David Dawson leads an international cast in the dystopian thriller “The Flaw,” the feature directorial debut of Theophilos Papastylianos, which is currently filming in Athens. Dawson is joined by U.K. actors Arthur McBain (“Napoleon”, “Interview with the Vampire”), Ralf Little (“The Royle Family,” “Death in Paradise”) and Danny John-Jules […]

South Africa’s Both Worlds is leaning into IP and genre as it brings a packed slate of ambitious scripted projects to Mipcom this week, including an adaptation of the bestseller “The Cape Raider” and partnerships with Federation Studios and actor Djimon Hounsou’s Fanaticus production banner. The International Emmy-nominated production outfit, which recently released the Cape […]

The 10th edition of Rome’s MIA Market wrapped on Friday with organizers recording a 10% bump in attendance over the 2023 edition, welcoming more than 2,800 participants from 60 countries to the Eternal City for five days of pitching sessions, panel discussions and heated debates over the current state of and future prospects for the […]

Dutch drama series “The Night Watch” was among the big winners at Rome’s MIA Market on Friday, taking home the MIA Development Award for Outstanding Drama Project as the growing industry event wrapped its 10th edition in the Eternal City. The show was among a quartet of projects taking part in MIA’s Co-Production Market and […]

Universal Studio Group is all-in on the European market for unscripted content, with two of the company’s top TV executives telling industry professionals in Rome that there’s never been a better time for the continent’s producers to forge partnerships with the global powerhouse — or other U.S. studios looking to snatch up Europe’s top talent […]

Sony Pictures Television president Katherine Pope is still bullish on the future of TV, saying that some of the recent disruptions rattling the global business will be good for the industry in the long haul and insisting that this sink-or-swim moment is the time for visionary creatives to shine. “I think some of this constriction […]

Beta Film has released a swashbuckling, pulse-pounding trailer for “Rise of the Raven,” its epic 10-part drama series based on the bloody 15th-century battle that changed the course of Europe. The show will world premiere at Mipcom in the Grand Auditorium of Cannes’ Palais des Festivals on Oct. 22. Adapted from author Bán Mór’s bestselling […]

A riveting murder-mystery based on a prize-winning Japanese crime novel is at the heart of the upcoming six-part series “The Aosawa Murders,” a buzzy U.S.-Japan co-production that’s being pitched this week at Rome’s MIA Market. Adapted from the novel of the same name by Japanese writer Riku Onda, the show is produced by Jonathan Kier […]

Serge Gainsbourg, the French pop poet and provocateur who courted controversy while scaling the heights of stardom over the course of his decades-spanning career, is the subject of an upcoming animated documentary from Logical Pictures and the company’s The Jokers Lab documentary label. The film will be featured in the co-production forum this week at […]

“Frozen” head animator and longtime Disney veteran Lino DiSalvo is developing an animated feature that tells the coming-of-age story of an Italian teenager who teams up with a mythical beast to save her hometown from an evil curse. Written by Kissy Dugan and produced by Emmanuel Jacomet for Mediawan Kids & Family with Italy’s Palomar […]

Oscar-nominated screenwriter Jeff Pope (“Philomena”) and Xavier Marchand of “Nautilus” producer Moonriver TV are teaming up on “Castle of the Eagles,” a six-episode limited series based on the true story of Allied POWs who staged a daring prison break from a fortified Italian castle during World War II. The duo will be presenting the project […]